Teen Wolf Season 5, Episode 3: "Dreamcatchers" Recap/Review
Mis amigos, I'm going to be honest with you-- I literally have no idea what the hell is going on this season. I know that sounds like a complaint, but it's really not! As I mentioned at the end of the previous recap, I have watched a lot of TV in my life, to the point where it's really hard for me to be surprised or confused as to what is going on, because it doesn't take long for me to find the pattern and figure out what is going to happen. In the case of this season of Teen Wolf though, the storyline has been woven in such a complicated way that it's been difficult to pinpoint the motivations of the possibly-bad-guys, which of course makes it equally difficult to figure out what they're going to do next.
The main confusion I'm having about this show is specifically regarding the Dread Doctors and what their aims are, because let's be real here, their actions have been a little nuts. Giving a werewolf glowing talons and enhanced strength and sending him after anyone who could know where Scott McCall is? Taking advantage of a teenage girl's night terrors by luring her into your lab and injecting her with a substance that looks like mercury and turns her into some kind of werewolf-kanima hybrid? Catching a runaway felon and drilling into his ears and filling it with some other unknown substance? Burying them in the woods and having them dig themselves out? Their behavior has been a little weird, is what I'm trying to say.
Speaking of weird, I still don't understand what's up with Theo, either, but since we see so little of him in the episode (most of the mentions of him involve Stiles desperately wanting him to have been behind all the maulings/killings so that his suspicions could be vindicated) what he's really up to is still very much a mystery. But, to get back to the recap in general, "Dreamcatchers" was a seriously scary and worrisome episode in the best way possible, and I am so eager for next Moonday to come quickly so we can figure out what's happening. Most importantly, it was a girl power episode, which is my favorite kind, because it's the girls of the McCall Pack who are getting shit done: Lydia and Kira work to figure out Tracy's state of mind and why she's behaving the way she's behaving, and Kira and Malia both work to protect everyone else from her-- and, in Malia's case, try to protect her from herself and snap her out of her night terror. Granted, it was all for naught, but it was a shitload of growth on everyone's part, and I adored it so much, you guys. So, let's talk teenage werewolves and mutant man-made supernaturals, yeah? Settle in, babies, because this is gonna be a long one.
Previously, on Teen Wolf: A kid that Scott, Stiles, and Lydia went to school with as children, Theo Raeken, has come back to Beacon Hills after a lengthy absence. He claimed he was bitten against his will, like Scott, and has returned specifically to join our favorite True Alpha's pack. Of course, Stiles is sure that he's shady, and has been doing tons of research to figure out what his motives are, with little success. When Scott confronted him about never trusting people, Stiles told him he has to be distrustful, because Scott trusts everyone, although we all know that's a bald-faced lie. Fellow high school senior Tracy Stewart ended up in the guidance office because of her night terrors, but hers haven't been the usual kind-- she threw up black werewolf ink and feathers all over Natalie Martin's desk, and has had waking nightmares that the Dread Doctors have been following her around, leading Lydia, her mother, and Jordan to try to help her out with whatever she's dealing with. Scott got attacked by a sludgey wolf with harpy eagle talons that glowed blue, who stupidly tried to steal Scott's powers and got himself a badly broken arm for his troubles. Upon examining the talons Scott broke off, Deaton suggested that perhaps the rules of their supernatural world are changing. Tracy ended up sleepwalking to the Dread Doctors' creepy secret lab, where they injected her in the neck with some substance that looked like mercury, and it seemed as though she had been turned into a werewolf, with glowing gold eyes, claws, and fangs of a beta. Which is kind of where we pick up today!
This episode's extra-long opening scene cuts back and forth between Deputy Clarke Romero (Liam's little nemesis/future love interest Hayden Romero's older sister!) as she handcuffs young robber Donovan's wrists in preparation for him to be transported to prison, and Sheriff Stilinski, who is preparing for a date (!!! No wonder he took off his wedding ring!!!) in his office, complete with a very handsome green, blue, tan, and brown plaid button-up with a navy blue tie and a light brown suit jacket. Lookin' good, Sheriff! I see you're taking clothing cues from your son, which is not a bad idea, since Stiles' sense of style is pretty good for a boy who doesn't care much for fashion. Once Donovan is sufficiently shackled up, Clarke and Jordan escort him into the bullpen, where his lawyer is waiting for him. Guess who his lawyer is? PAPA STEWART, TRACY'S DAD. He's in the middle of reading Donovan's file, and when he sees him come in, he gives him a grim look as he slaps the file closed.
In his office, Sheriff is fussing over his appearance in a hand mirror and is lamenting the fact that he didn't think to get a haircut, but Stiles tries and fails to cheer him up by reminding him that at his age, he should be thrilled that he has hair to cut in the first place. Oh, Stiles. Scott, naturally, tells Sheriff that he looks great, and Sheriff remarks that Scott is the son he deserves, which is kind of harsh, but I'm sure he's just joking, and Stiles doesn't seem too offended, so whatever. After a moment, Sheriff considers what he's actually doing and starts to panic, loosening his tie and insisting that this date plan is a terrible idea, but Stiles immediately stops him and straightens up his tie before giving him a pep talk. "Dad! Dad, it is one date," Stiles argues. "Okay? The town of Beacon Hills won't implode while you're out with one woman. Or man," Stiles continues with a knowing look. LOL, OH STILES. Also, every time someone says "Nothing bad will happen during the few hours I will be spending doing actual fun things," it's like the universe says, "LOL CHALLENGE ACCEPTED." Anyway, Sheriff does confess that his date tonight is a beautiful woman, but when the boys ask who she is, he stays mum, despite Stiles protests to the contrary.
Donovan is being led out to the prison transport van by Jordan and Clarke while Papa Stewart explains the plea deal he's managed to work out. "I'll admit, it isn't what I was hoping for," Mr. Stewart begins as they walk through the station. "But the DA's offer is still pretty reasonable." Donovan wastes no time asking what "reasonable" means in this case, but Clarke impatiently tells them to talk it out in the transport van on the way. Of course, Donovan has an even worse temper than Liam did pre-bite, so he just petulantly stops walking and demands that Mr. Stewart tell him what the deal is. Jordan immediately gets in his face and asks Mr. Stewart if they're going to have difficulty with his client, but he just shoots Donovan dagger-eyes and assures him that they won't before admitting that the DA is offering him three to five years in prison, which means Donovan should let him do his job so he can get out in two.
If you're not American and don't really know much about how the law works here, let me tell you a bit about California's justice system, just for the sake of clarity-- California has so many inmates in their prison system that there is literally not enough space for all of them, so most of the prisoners who are in there for non-violent crimes (drug possession, drug dealing, driving under the influence in cases where no one is actually hurt by it) are usually released in at least half the time just to make sure there are enough cells for the really violent criminals (murderers, rapists, kidnappers, people in human trafficking, drunk driving that results in someone's death or severe injury, etc). That's part of the reason why you see celebrities like Lindsey Lohan getting arrested constantly for stuff like drug possession and driving under the influence and barely getting any jail time for it. (The other part is the fact that they're rich and can afford good attorneys, but that's a whole different story). However, I'm not sure if Donovan being caught breaking and entering with a gun (if you recall, he was caught with a loaded .38) counts as a violent crime if no one got hurt in the process. So, yeah, so that's likely what the lawyer means by getting him out in two years.
Still, despite the fact that Donovan knowingly committed a pretty serious crime even after being told by a judge at least once that he'd be going to prison if he continued breaking into places, he's very, very surprised and angry when he hears that he's actually going to have to serve jail time. He starts yelling for Sheriff Stilinski, who eventually comes out to see what all the commotion is about. "I'm going to kill you!" Donovan yells at him, but Sheriff isn't super bothered by it. "Donovan, if you think that shocks me, remember it was well-documented in your Anger Expression inventory," he replies with a sigh before instructing Jordan and Clarke to escort him out to the transport van. Of course, Donovan isn't done being super creepy yet, so he stops before calmly retorting, "I'm not angry like I'm gonna throw a brick through your window. I'm angry like I'm going to find you, I'm going to get a knife and I'm going to stab you with it until you're dead. And when you look at me and you ask me why, remember right now. Because this is why." YIKES! Smart move, bozo, threatening the Sheriff of the entire county in which you live with an audience full of people as witnesses. That's totally going to help your case.
There's a really awkward silence as everyone just stares at each other in stunned confusion, except for Papa Stewart, who has pulled out Scott McCall's perfected "close-eyes-and-sigh-deeply" move while he curses his decision to become a public defender. Finally, after a moment, Stiles pipes up, "Wow, that was awesome." Everyone turns to look at Stiles like, "What the fuck are you doing?" but we all know that he's a little shit who can't keep quiet at times like this, so he keeps talking. "That was awesome. That was great. Can we do one more? Give us another one. Maybe like Christopher Walken this time, you know?" Donovan doesn't say anything, he just looks at him blankly while everyone else in the room is desperately trying to telepathically communicate "SHUT THE FUCK UP" to Stiles, but he totally ignores their glares. "Okay, you know what? It's fine. You'll have plenty of time to work on it when you're in your tiny little cell. You know, just stuck there. Forever." Donovan lunges for him, but the two deputies tighten their grip on him and pull him back as Scott leaps in front of Stiles to protect him, only to be pushed back as well by Sheriff.
As Donovan is dragged out by Jordan and Clarke (who fortunately aren't the ones accompanying him to the prison), Scott asks Stiles what an Anger Expression Inventory is, so Stiles briefly explains that it's a test you have to take in order to become a law enforcement officer. Methinks that maybe LEOs should have to take a few more personality assessment tests before they can start officially working, considering how many unwarranted officer-involved shootings have been happening in the last few years. Anyway, Scott is stunned that this guy actually tried to be a cop, but Stiles just quips that at least his time in jail will give him the full law-enforcement experience. Ha!
Our favorite rageaholic criminal is sitting in the back of the prison transport van next to a heavily armed deputy while they head to their destination, and Papa Stewart is sitting in the passenger seat while another deputy drives. "Well done," Papa Stewart snaps at Donovan in frustration. "Threatening the Sheriff in front of his entire department and his son? I'll be lucky to get you three to five decades. You realize that?" Damn, dude! Tell him what's up! Because seriously, that was supremely stupid. No wonder he's always caught when he breaks the law-- dude literally has no chill whatsoever. Suddenly, he realizes that the driver is speeding and suggests that he slow down, since Donovan is hardly in a rush to get to prison.
However, something seems to be going on with the deputy who is driving, because he starts groaning in pain as he removes his right hand from the wheel. It starts to lock up, and when Papa Stewart asks him if he's okay, the driver starts to panic and replies, "No. My hand, I... Uh, I think I'm having a..." The man trails off as the tires start to screech, and the van continues to accelerate faster and faster even despite Papa Stewart's pleas for him to slow down. Donovan starts to panic and demands to know what's happening, but the deputy in the back assumes that the driver is having a heart attack. Papa Stewart frantically asks the driver if he can at least hit the breaks, but when he shouts that he can't move his legs, the lawyer tries to take control of the wheel from him and slides his leg over to try to hit the pedals to at least get them to stop moving.
After much swerving, grinding the van against the stone walls of the tunnel through which they're driving, and generally putting everyone in serious danger, Papa Stewart manages to control the steering wheel well enough to stop and park. While this was going on, the camera panned up toward the ceiling of the van, where four punctured holes are leaking a very familiar-looking clear gel that is curiously present while someone is exclaiming that their limbs are paralyzed. Ruh-roh. Once they're stopped, Papa Stewart, Donovan, and the deputy in the back with him all pant and try to catch their breath before noticing that the driver is sitting motionlessly as his body is pressed to the back of the seat. Before they can even start to process what is wrong with him, they hear a loud thump, followed by some very alarming creaking noises from above them, indicating that something is on the roof. When that "something" jumps down on the driver's side of the van, we see that it is actually Tracy, whose claws and fangs are still out. HOLY SHIT! So the Dread Doctors just took advantage of her night terrors to lure her sleepwalking self to their secret lab, where they injected her with some weird mercury-looking substance, turned her into some weird man-made supernatural, and then just let her loose on the whole town? What the hell?
Papa Stewart looks at his daughter in confusion and surprise and calls out, "Tracy?", right before she growls at them menacingly, rears her right arm back, and punches right through the driver's side window. Both the windshield and her father's face are splattered with blood as Tracy starts straight-up mauling the driver, which freaks out the deputy in the back with Donovan so freaked out that he loads his shotgun and starts shooting buckshot after buckshot at her despite Papa Stewart's terrified pleas. YIKES! Those buckshots don't seem to be doing much, though, because she's still able to claw the shit out of the driver before moving onto the second deputy in the back. In the scuffle, the back doors of the van burst open, and Donovan manages to throw himself out of it, though he lands face-first on his chest thanks to the fact that his hands are still shackled and connected to a chain around his waist. The deputy tries to catch him, but Tracy grabs him by the back of his jacket and starts attacking him, enabling Donovan to run the fuck away.
Once the deputy has been sufficiently maimed, Tracy circles around to the front of the van again to see Papa Stewart, who is covered in blood and has just managed to get out of the passenger seat. "Tracy?" he asks in fear, not understanding anything about what has just happened, but Tracy just replies in a girlish, creepily-calm voice, "Don't worry, Daddy. I won't let anything happen to you... ever again." YIKES YIKES YIKES! Between the very little-girl timbre of her voice, the fact that she was echoing what he told her in "Parasomnia," and the fact that her eyes shifted from brown to gold as she finished her statement was just so, so chilling. She then starts to growl yet again and starts clawing the hell out of her father as he screams in pain and horror. THIS IS SO HORRIBLE, OMG. It also vaguely reminded me of Season 2's "Shape Shifted," when the kanima attacked Isaac's dad, which is kind of interesting, considering what we learn about Tracy at the end.
Meanwhile, Donovan, who either hit his head in the wreck or is covered in the driver's blood, is running through a dark, wet alley, and turns his head back as he rushes away when he hears the sounds of his defense attorney being mauled to death. Unfortunately, he isn't paying attention to where he's going, so he ends up tripping and falling to the ground, quickly rolling onto his side to cushion the blow, since his shackled wrists prevent him from properly using his hands to break his fall. He hears a weird clicking noise nearby, and when he looks over at a nearby rain puddle, he sees the one of the Dread Doctors reflected in it.
Wait a second-- did the Dread Doctors send Tracy help them nab Donovan? Were they specifically seeking him out, or are they just taking advantage of the fact that they ran into him? I'm so confused, but since next week is the fourth episode of the season, I think that's when we'll start getting some answers-- if you recall, it was in S02E04 "Abomination" that we learned the weird lizardy creature running around was called a kanima, and that it was a mutated version of a werewolf, and in Season 3A's "Unleashed," we learned about Deucalion's plan to have Derek join the Alpha Pack by having him kill his own, along with the fact that the human sacrifices that were occurring in threes had specific themes, like healers, warriors, virgins, etc. In 3B's "Illuminated," we finally met the oni up-close and got an idea of who it was targeting and got confirmation that something bad was going on with Stiles, and in Season 4's "The Benefactor," Lydia found the first deadpool list and determined that they were all in danger. It works this way because in the twelve-episode format, the first arc wraps itself up within episodes 1-4, with the last episode setting the stage for the second arc that takes place in episodes 5-8. Of course, this season, we're getting twenty episodes separated into two ten-episode halves, and unlike in Season 3, where the two halves were totally different with separate villains, the Dread Doctors are going to be our main villains for both parts of Season 5, so this format may be slightly altered because of the change-up.
But, I digress, and not for the first or last time. Anyway, so the Dread Doctor in front of him is holding a medical tool similar to the one used to inject Tracy in the neck with that mercury-ish substance, but instead of having a syringe on the end of what looks like a large gun, this instrument has a cone made of metal wires with a hole in the middle. When Donovan gapes in fear and turns to run away, he ends up rushing straight into another Doctor who has appeared behind him in that weird jerky/glitchy way that they have. These guys are seriously so creepy, because they don't look corporeal-- in fact, they look kind of similar to the ghosts on Supernatural, in how they flicker in and out. However, they must be at least have a semi-physical form, because they're able to restrain Donovan while the doctor with the medical gun sticks the end against Donovan's head, so that the wire cone part is around his ear, stabilizing the gun so that a SUPER FUCKING LONG DRILL BIT can be extended through the middle of the cone and through his external auditory canal so that it can DRILL INTO HIS EAR. EEEEEK! Donovan shrieks in fear and pain as the Doctors drill into his ear/head. We then get a close up of his eye so we can watch as his brown iris is shot through with silvery veins until his entire eye-- iris, pupil, sclera and all-- appears to have the same opaque softness of the mercury substance with which they injected Tracy last week. WHAT THE HELL? What did they do to him? Is he a new beastie all together now? I mean, that's certainly not a human characteristic. TITLE CARD!
After the break, we return to just outside the Sheriff's station, where Stiles and Scott are inside the Jeep. Stiles turns the ignition, only for his engine to predictably sputter before going out completely, causing him to curse his shitty car under his breath. Scott looks concerned as he stares at Stiles, and after a moment, Stiles snaps, "It's anxiety." Scott doesn't understand what that has to do with anything, so he clarifies, "The chemosignals? Oh, I'm well aware of how you all monitor my emotional state." Aw, Stiles, that only means they care! Don't be mean! I'm wondering how long they've been doing this, though. Since the nogitsune? Since he almost got shot by the Chemist? Since the huge showdown at La Iglesia? Anyway, Stiles anxiously and frustratedly slams his fist against his steering wheel in yet another uncharacteristic spell of violence, so Scott, who is looking at him with even more worry than before, asks him if he's sure he's okay.
After a moment, Stiles decides he can't not spill his guts about what is bothering him, and pulls his phone out of his pocket to show him what he's just learned. Apparently, he's still in touch with Braeden, and she's sent them a message about her newest lead on Malia's elusive mother. "That's the first real bit of information we've gotten on the Desert Wolf in months," Stiles explains as he shows a photo on his phone to Scott, though we don't actually get to see it for ourselves. Whatever it is, it shocks Scott enough that he can hardly believe TDW did this, but Stiles confirms that she did before admitting that he was the one who started pulling on this thread in the first place. Scott looks horrified and tells Stiles that he should probably stop pulling it, then, but Stiles insists that it's not up to him before sighing and turning the key in the ignition again. Surprisingly enough, the Jeep starts up normally, which makes me extremely concerned about the Jeep and Stiles and the instances that it has been breaking down lately. That's something I'll get into in detail in the meta write-up, so stay tuned!
Elsewhere in town, Malia, Lydia, and Kira are all their own car together so that the latter two girls can give Malia some more driving lessons while they listen to In Film's "Set It Off." I was about to question the legality of this, but then I remembered that in a lot of places, people with their temporary license can do their driving hours with drivers over age eighteen who have been driving for a certain length of time, and since Lydia is like, 18.5 by now and has been driving since Season 1, I'd say she probably qualifies. This scene is actually kind of painfully awkward for me, and I don't know why, so I'm just going to make it brief. What we learn from the girls' conversation prior to starting is 1) Papa Tate bought Malia a brand-new Toyota product placement, which is both awesome and hilarious (Lydia, Kira/the Yukimuras, and Derek also all drive Toyotas, so we all know who's paying for a ton of the Teen Wolf special effects budget these days), and 2) the newest recommended position for hands on a steering wheel is now at 9:00 and 3:00 instead of 10:00 and 2:00, since apparently driving with the latter position could cause you to break your thumbs if the airbag were to deploy. Good to know! I like my thumbs and I would rather not break them.
Once Malia is getting ready to drive to the school, Malia once again starts to get flashbacks to when she was eight and accidentally caused the car accident that killed her adoptive mother and sister when she inadvertently shifted for the first time, but she manages to shake them off so they can go. Despite Kira's chirpy and cute encouragement from the backseat, Malia has a bit of trouble getting the hang of driving on the road, first weaving between the two lanes on the road, then driving off the road, then doing carefully controlled donuts in the middle of the road when she's trying to make a U-turn. It is so bad, and I'm thinking that all of the flashes to causing the car wreck in her youth is still having a huge affect on her, and I totally get it. People who haven't been in serious wrecks can have a hard time imagining just how terrifying it can be.
I've been in a handful of car accidents in my life (two when I was driving, and three when I was a passenger), and the worst one happened while I was sick with the flu and laying down in the backseat during a spring break cross-country roadtrip with my former roommate and good friend Jane. Even though it was mid-March, it was still snowing a ton in the midwest, and by the time we got to Montana, the roads were slick with black ice, so when we turned around a bend that didn't have a guardrail, the car ran off the road and down a steep hill into a ravine, during which time the car flipped 2.5 times and landed upside down. It was terrifying, and I wasn't wearing a seatbelt because I was sleeping and laying down, and I got thrown around like a load of laundry in a washing machine. To this day, I still have major car-ride anxiety, typically when I'm a passenger and not in control of the car that I'm in, so I can sympathize with Malia's situation a lot. There are a ton of people I've seen on Tumblr saying that Malia has no reason to be freaking out since she wasn't the one driving, and it makes absolutely no sense to me-- it's actually worse being a passenger in a car wreck, because like I said, you have no control over the situation whatsoever, and instead are just a slave to whatever fate is thrown at you. Considering the fact that it was Malia's first transformation into a werecoyote that triggered the car accident that killed her family, I'd say Malia has plenty of reason to be freaked out about driving.
ANYWAY, back to the story at hand-- Lydia finally gets Malia back on the road and points her in what she initially believed to be the direction of the school so that way they can practice Malia's parking skills in the parking lot. However, once the road they're on merges onto a main road heading toward a streetlight-illuminated street, Kira realizes that they're not actually heading toward the school-- in fact, they're heading downtown. OH SHIT, BANSHEE FUGUE STATE ALERT. Kira asks if they should be turning around, but Lydia gets this exhausted look on her face and instructs Malia to keep going, because they're almost there. After a few more moments of driving, they end up at the tunnel where Tracy attacked her father, the deputies, and Donovan, and the girls quickly get out of the car to find that a man with a bloodied hand is shakily reaching out to them, causing them to gape at him in horror. "Call 911," Lydia murmurs urgently. DUN DUN DUN.
When we return after the break, Scott and Stiles have just showed up to the crime scene, where they immediately meet up with Sheriff Stilinski, who apparently either missed his date completely or had to duck out early and raincheck it for another time. Sheriff addresses Scott first and points out that he saw Donovan earlier at the station before asking him if he was supernatural, but Scott believes that unless he's a werewolf or other supernatural who can inhibit his scent, he's likely human. "Well, human or otherwise, this kid might have just murdered his lawyer and mortally wounded two officers," Sheriff explains exhaustedly. "We've got an APB out on him, but you think you can find him faster?" LOL, I love how Sheriff is totally cool with the McCall Pack essentially doing the Sheriff's Department's job for them. I just wonder how everyone aside from Sheriff and Jordan are so unquestioningly cool with it. When Scott tells him that he can definitely try, he hands Scott a walkie-talkie and tells him to keep it on channel two before Scott rushes away to try to track him.
We then catch back up with Scott, who has just hopped over a fence and flipped off of the dumpster he landed on to soften his landing while he takes a deep breath and finds Donovan's scent. Man, I know everyone hates on the unnecessary gymnastics thing, but I totally love it. If I had superpowers, you can bet I would be parkouring off of every surface just for funsies like our long-lost Derek Hale. When he lands on the ground, his red Alpha eyes flare as he figures out where Donovan was headed.
Once Scott has left, Stiles turns to his father and quietly brings up the possibility that someone other than Donovan did this. When Sheriff instantly assumes that Stiles already has a theory, Stiles confirms his suspicion, though he doesn't name names. We don't really need him to, though, because he's obviously still obsessed with Theo being a bad guy and has already pinned the blame on him. I know I have more information than Stiles does, since only the audience is aware of what happened with Theo and his "parents," but I'm guessing that a guy who would go through all that trouble to ensure that his maybe-fake-dad's signature is identical to his maybe-real-dad's isn't going to just outright maul a bunch of people in public, you know? COME ON, STILES. You're a smart kid! Use your damn brain. Then, just so we're totally sure Stiles is blaming Theo for this murder-spree, we see Theo hiding behind the nearby corner of the tunnel, where he's eavesdropping on everyone in the area. WHAT ARE YOU UP TO, THEO?
We cut back to Scott, who is on Donovan's trail throughout the weird network of tunnels in this part of town. When he stops for a moment to regroup, he hears the sounds of clinking chains and turns just in time to see Donovan yelling at the top of his lungs as he lunges for him. Of course, Scott's the damn Alpha, so he just dodges him, spins, and throws him down onto the ground. Donovan shifts so he once again lands on his side instead of his face and looks up at Scott with pretty much unbridled fear. I may not like the kid, but I don't blame him a bit for being freaked out, because YIKES. Just then, back at the crime scene, Jordan gets word back from Scott over the radio that he found Donovan, who is understandably panicking. When Scott adds that he keeps saying some name, Stiles is hilariously like, "Theo!", even though I'm pretty sure if it had been Theo's name, Scott would have just said that off the bat. Instead, Scott informs them that Donovan has been saying the name "Tracy," which makes both Lydia and Jordan sigh, like, "Gods damnit, here we go," because Tracy is the girl they were trying to help just the other day. WONDERFUL.
In what is probably the best scene of the episode, we cut to the next day, where the entire high-school contingent of the McCall Pack, plus Mason, are all gathered around in the bus bay for a meeting to discuss their current situation regarding Tracy. "Tracy wasn't just having trouble sleeping," Lydia begins. "It was a real disorder-- it was night terrors." Stiles points out that now she's the night terror, especially considering they've had no luck with regards to catching her, so what now? "Okay, I know we're all tired and miserable..." Scott pipes up, before he looks over at Mason, who has this amazed, awestruck and almost gleeful look on his face, before sighing, "Except for you." HAHAHAHA. And in that moment (and pretty much all moments in this episode), Mason speaks for all of us, because seriously, would we not be acting the exact same way if we just found out our best friend is a werewolf who is a member of a large and unconventional pack filled with various different supernatural creatures? If I had firsthand proof that TV-level magic was real, it would literally be like the best day of my life.
Anyway, Mason immediately apologizes and insists that everything he's just learned is just too mind-blowing for words, which causes Liam to make this hilarious face, as though he's super embarrassed by his best friend's fanboy behavior. "You're a kitsune," Mason adds breathlessly as he turns his focus to Kira. "I don't even know what that is!" Kira awkwardly replies that she's still learning herself, and an exasperated Stiles glances over at Liam and admonishes him for bringing his tagalong friend. "Liam, we said you could tell him, not invite him to the inner circle!" Stiles snits, and when Mason is like, "HOLY SHIT, AM I IN THE INNER CIRCLE," both Stiles and Liam simultaneously insist that he isn't. Oh, don't be cliquey, you guys! Mason's already saved your asses once without even knowing he was doing it, so cut the kid a little slack! An impatient Scott turns the topic of conversation back to Tracy and reminds his packmates that she's just one lone wolf against a pack, which means she shouldn't be that hard to track down, but Malia reminds him that she's a serial-killing wolf, so that kind of complicates things. "Uh, she only killed one person, you know," Stiles cuts in, playing devil's advocate as usual. "The other two were mauled."
Stiles goes on to ask what they should do when they catch her, and as usual, Malia's like, "Uh, put her down, obviously?" Then this really great moment happens where Stiles, Lydia, Kira, and Liam each make a different face in reaction to this suggestion-- Stiles looks embarrassed at first, but both he and Lydia seem to be considering it, Kira just looks alarmed, and Liam seems very worried in general-- before turning to Scott to see what he thinks about it. And, when everyone's focus turns back to Scott, Mason gets this look on his face as though he's just realized that Scott is totally the leader to whom they all defer when it gets to be time for a mission. Then, realizing the gravity of the situation, Mason just nods in understanding and chirps, "Intense." BAHAHAHA. That is so classic. Anyway, as you can guess, Scott isn't willing to just kill Tracy off the bat, and instead says that they need to just focus on catching her first, and then they can get into the particulars afterward-- their priority right now is making sure they get to her before anyone else gets hurt or killed. Aw, that's my boy, Scottie! You keep being your pro-rehabilitation self.
Back at the Sheriff's station, Donovan, who seems to have a headache that is causing him to wince in pain and generally be even more aggressive than usual, is back in a holding cell in the jail while they figure out what to do with him. I guess the headache makes sense, since-- if my understanding of anatomy and physiology is correct-- the Dread Doctors literally drilled into his brain with a drill that is covered in gods know what. Sheriff is sitting on the bench across from him to try to see if he can't get any details about what happened from him, but, of course, Donovan isn't feeling in much of a helping mood, plus his cop-ambitions gave him a great working knowledge of the law, so instead of speaking, he just snaps, "I want my lawyer." Sheriff sighs and reminds him that he's lawyer is dead, so Donovan asks for a different public defender, as per his Constitutional rights.
"I know you know something," Sheriff replies somewhat impatiently. "One girl against three grown men? No matter how unbelievable you think it's going to sound, I promise you can tell me." It almost looks like Donovan might relent and tell him what he saw, but nope-- he's still feeling spiteful thanks to the fact that Sheriff insisted upon his arrest for a felony he was actually caught committing, so he just sarcastically remarks on how his nice-guy tone of voice makes Sheriff sound like a guy who is actually interested in helping. Just then, he hears this collection of weird noises-- including the rattling that the Dread Doctors make, a strange hissing sound like the one a kanima makes, and a high-pitched whine-- which hurts his head so much that he groans and grabs his temples in pain as he squeezes his eyes shut. It's kind of like how Liam reacted to his wolf hearing at Lydia's lake house in "The Benefactor," which is interesting-- do you think whatever the Doctors did to him has given him enhanced hearing? I don't think he's a werewolf/kanima like Tracy, but I do think he's some kind of other modified supernatural creature, or perhaps a hybrid of sorts. Anyway, Sheriff seems a little bit concerned about this random migraine Donovan seems to be experiencing, but Donovan just shakes it off and once again insists that he's not talking without a lawyer.
Realizing that he's not going to get anything useful from Donovan, at least not now, Sheriff reluctantly leaves the cell and runs into Jordan on his way into the bullpen. "I've got an answer to why we couldn't find Tracy last night," he explains upon seeing his boss. "She was in the hospital." And by in the hospital, he means at the hospital, specifically killing her psychiatrist who worked there. We cut over to the psychiatrist's office to see that everything from the papers on top of his desk to the wallpaper to the man himself is covered in blood splatters, and his body is slumped backwards in his desk chair, all of it riddled with slashes and soaked in more blood. WHOA. This is bananas! At first, I thought that maybe the night terrors themselves were a side-effect of the experiments the Dread Doctors were performing on her, but now it seems as though Tracy has had night terrors for a while and was seeing a psychiatrist for help dealing with them. So, if that's the case, then maybe the Dread Doctors targeted her because of her history of sleep disorders? I imagine it's a lot easier to manipulate someone who is sleep deprived and who has a hard time distinguishing dreams from reality, especially now that these night terrors are happening in the day time, too.
SO, after this revelation, Sheriff instructs Jordan to let Scott know what he just learned, but to make sure he knows that he doesn't want them involved in this just yet. "Shouldn't we be putting him on the payroll?" Jordan asks, which is a totally legit question, and one to which Sheriff admits he's considering it. I seriously want to know how they've been able to get away with the pack solving all of their crimes for the last two years now, because you'd think there'd be at least one deputy or even a higher-up who thinks it's weird that Lydia (and her friends) are always finding dead/dying bodies, or that Scott is always on the search parties for the lost or missing in supernatural-related cases.
Meanwhile, at the school, Stiles and Malia are in the stairwell off of the main hallway, where Stiles has just finally showed her the photo he got from Braeden about the Desert Wolf on his phone. We also finally get to see the photo for ourselves-- there are about five or so men in it, all of whom are sprawled dead on the floor and covered in/surrounded by blood as though they had been attacked viciously.
Anyway, over in the biology lab, Mrs. Finch is passing out the pre-class test to see where everyone was in terms of the material, and she seemed very impressed by the fact that Scott got an 86%. Yeah, Scott! Some of you might think that the American equivalent to a B+ might not be that impressive, but let me remind you that this is Scott's first time taking an AP science class, from the sounds of it, and again, it was meant to be a test to see what level of understanding of the subject the students had coming into the classroom so she could tailor her curriculum accordingly-- this wasn't supposed to be some test that everyone aced right off the bat. So, yeah, Scott's a smartie-pants! The teacher congratulates him on his priorities and instructs him to lead the class in a review over last night's reading, which I'm going to go on ahead and guess he didn't get a chance to do since he spent the entire night chasing Donovan and Tracy around town. In all fairness, he does have the important bits highlighted, so maybe he did do a read-through earlier.
Right as he's flipping through the pages to find the chapter so he can begin the review, he's suddenly distracted by the adorable appearance of his werecub son Liam, who is standing in the doorway and waving at him to get his attention. Scott assumes he's just trying to say hello, and Mrs. Finch assumes that Scott is just easily distracted, so she calls him out to focus, making Scott feel guilty enough to apologize while he continues to anxiously flip through the pages of his textbook. Of course, Liam actually has something important to say, so he keeps waving and making faces to get his attention, which once again distracts Scott from what he's doing. When Mrs. Finch impatiently tells him to get back to the task at hand, Scott sighs and gives Liam a quick look, just long enough to tap his ear to indicate that Liam should just whisper what he wants to say so Scott can pretend like he's actually doing school stuff. Unfortunately for Scott, it's kind of an emergency. "She's here," Liam mutters urgently. "She's in history class right now. Tracy. She's here." And, of course, Theo, who is still sitting in the back of the class, hears this announcement as well. YIKES YIKES YIKES. What the hell is Theo's deal? Trying to figure out his agenda is giving me the worst headache.
We cut over to Papa Yukimura's classroom, where Tracy is in the middle of the back row and is anxiously gripping onto the ends of her desk as she desperately tries to get herself in control, though since her eyes start to glow gold, I'm going to go out on a limb and say it's not working so well. She also has no books or notes out, nor a bookbag, and she literally looks like she spent the night running through the woods, so how nobody notices this sooner is beyond me. For a town that has a ton of weirdo supernatural shit happening 24/7, its townsfolk are almost willfully unobservant. As Tracy sits at her desk, she starts to get night terrors/hallucinations again that the overhead lights are going out, and the thought of the Dread Doctors returning scares her so much that she continues to hyperventilate and grip her desktop so hard she cracks it right down the middle. Sitting next to Tracy is Liam's frenemy love-interest Hayden, who sees she is in distress and kindly leans over to whisper, "Hey, are you alright?"
For a moment, I was like, "Uh, didn't they just say Tracy was a senior in the last episode? Why is she in history class with a person we know for a fact is a sophomore?", but Hayden quickly clears that up for all of us when she then adds, "Are you even supposed to be in this class?" Her eyes look Tracy over, and she becomes even more alarmed when she sees the girl isn't even wearing shoes, and her bare feet are scratched up and dirty. I feel compelled to point out that she's wearing skinny jeans and a cowl-neck gray sweater that is cut up the back and has no shirt or bra under it, and considering she was wearing pajamas when she got injected with all of that stuff in the last episode and then went straight for Donovan and her father, I'm not sure when she got the chance to change her clothes. Whatever. Doesn't matter. Just then, the fire alarm goes off, and Liam, who was the one who pulled it, naturally, hides in the corner as the students in every classroom start to file out into the hallway. In the history class, Ken instructs his students not to rush and assures them that it's likely just a drill, but though most of the class starts to leave, Tracy stays seated, and has gripped the desk so hard that a deep crack has formed down the center of the desktop. "Hey, we need to go," Hayden whispers impatiently, before narrowing her eyes to examine the girl more closely and asking her if she's okay.
Fortunately for her, Scott and Liam have just showed up to try to help her, much to a very concerned Ken's relief. Scott slowly walks toward Tracy and calls out her name with his hands up in a non-threatening manner, like he's trying not to scare a skittish animal. Which, I guess is kind of true, given her new animal-esque abilities, and considering she's totally hallucinating that Scott, Liam and Ken are the Dread Doctors, it's probably best not to make any sudden moves. Just then, Tracy throws her arm forward and clutches Hayden's wrist tightly with a clawed hand with a blank look on her face as she stares at the approaching "Doctors." Damn, what did those guys do to her to make her night terrors into pretty much full-blown hallucinations during the day Do you guys think it's a side-effect from the stuff she was injected with? I am going to go on a limb and assume that it is, but I'll be talking about this more in the speculation write-up that will follow this recap!
Tracy stands up, looking woozy and swaying a little on her feet, but she continues to grip Hayden's wrist so hard that a thick stream of blood starts to drip onto the floor, and by her whimpers of pain, it sounds like she's close to breaking it all together. Scott, who has a little experience with feeling out of control, patiently instructs Tracy to let her go, and Hayden fearfully cries that Tracy is hurting her, which makes the situation all the more urgent. Finally, Tracy lets go, and Hayden immediately yanks her arm away and starts to cradle it as she watches her in horror. "They're coming," Tracy whispers quietly as she continues to sway, as though she's close to passing out. "They're coming for all of us." Suddenly, Tracy's eyes roll into the back of her head, and she crumples to the floor before that same mercury-esque substance starts pouring out of her mouth into a huuuuuge puddle. HOLY SHIT. Also, Kelsey Chow is a champ, because she's pretty much been throwing up weird colored fluids since she first debuted, and it does not look like it tastes good. I think in an interview, Charlie and Max Carver (who played Ethan and Aiden) said that the substance they use for the black "werewolf ink" tastes like licorice, which makes me want to throw up just thinking about it, but that silver stuff looks like it tastes like paint. Gross!
We meet back up in the hallway, where Ken is escorting Scott, who has Tracy in his arms, out of the school, with Liam and Hayden following close behind them. When Scott makes it to the front doors, he's joined by Stiles and Malia, who have come to see what they can do to help and who follow him out. "She wasn't even supposed to be in our class," Hayden murmurs in confusion to Liam, who is watching his pack leave with an anxious expression on his face, probably because he's not thrilled to be left behind. When she asks Liam where they're taking her, Liam suddenly realizes that she was totally just exposed to the supernatural, too, and now he has to come up with an excuse, so he's just like, "Uh, the hospital, I guess?" Smooth, kiddo. Very subtle. He notices the fact that her wrist and forearm are still all bloody and kindly asks her if she needs help getting to the nurse, but Hayden remembers that they're totally enemies and just snaps, "I think I'll make it."
However, instead of the nurse, she just goes into the bathroom, where she rushes to the sink so she can clean up her wounds. However, once she washes the blood away, she gapes in horror when she sees that THERE ARE NO WOUNDS ON HER ARM. What the fuck? She looks surprised, so I'm going to guess she doesn't know about the supernatural, but what does it mean? Is she a born wolf or some other creature who just has no idea what she is and is just starting to activate her abilities? Or did Tracy's claws have some kind of weird substance that healed it? WHAT IF TRACY ACCIDENTALLY TURNED HER? She's not an Alpha, obviously, but the fact that she's a man-made monster means that the usual rules don't apply, right?
Back in the hall, Liam has met up with Lydia and Kira, who stayed behind, probably to cover for Scott in Bio, so they can talk about what's going on. Liam confirms that Scott, Stiles and Malia took Tracy to the animal clinic to see if Deaton may have any ideas as to what is happening to her. I keep forgetting that they don't actually have any clue about the Dread Doctors at all-- all they know is that there was a weirdo werewolf/harpy hybrid who tried to suck out Scott and Jordan's powers and/or maybe their life force, and now they have what they believe is a regular-old werewolf who has no idea what is happening to her and is stuck in a night terror. Honestly, we should all be soaking up this relatively normal stuff while we still can, because I guarantee that by the end of next week's "Condition Terminal" that it's going to be nothing but awful shit for the next six episodes.
Anyway, Lydia reminds them all that they do have an idea of what's wrong with her-- she literally just killed two people, both her father and her psychiatrist. Kira asks if there's anyone else they can talk to, like her mother or family, but as far as they know, she doesn't have any. After thinking for a moment, Lydia brings up the fact that if she is indeed a werewolf, then she must have an Alpha, right? She looks to Liam for confirmation, as he's the only werewolf among them, but he's still a newbie and just shrugs. She then brings up whether or not they know of any new Alphas swinging into Beacon Hills recently, but Kira is thinking that there might be an old one-- the oldest one, in fact, who they actually know personally. Liam, realizing that going to Satomi means dealing with his other nemesis Brett, starts to scowl in anticipation.
And cut to the BHHS lacrosse field, where Liam and Mason have just found Brett is practicing with some friends while "Ilium" by Alex Metric & Mark Yardley plays in the background. And, naturally, Brett's playing in a pair of sweatpants and running shoes with no shirt, because this is Teen Wolf, and Jeff Davis knows his type and knows his audience. Wait a second--doesn't Brett go to Devenford Prep? Why is he practicing at BHHS? It's not even lacrosse season! Did he transfer or something? Inquiring minds want to know. Mason once again starts leering at the sight of him, just like when he first saw Brett shirtless in "IED," and he excitedly exclaims, "So, he's a werewolf too?" Liam, who is still scowling as he watches his former schoolmates play, confirms that he is, and Mason just shakes his head in disbelief and murmurs, "This just gets better and better." Mason's enthusiasm about all of this is seriously great, you guys. He is the McCall Pack groupie we deserve, and could probably give Stiles some pointers on how to not be a dick to people.
Over at the animal clinic, Tracy is unconscious and laying on the exam table in the back room while Deaton does a physical assessment on her, informing Scott, Stiles and Malia of every exam he does. Her pupils are apparently reacting to light, which is good from a neurological standpoint, but her heart rate is at 250 (a typical resting heart rate is between 60-80 beats per minute, just for the record), and he found an allogeneic skin graft on her right shoulder. That last part is really weird-- skin grafts are usually used to replace skin lost due to a serious injury, amputation, or, most commonly, with burns. The allogeneic part means that the graft came from another person, which isn't strange in general, but in this specific instance, it totally is.
What I'm wondering is why should would have one in the first place? She was injected with that silver stuff in the left side of her neck, so it doesn't have anything to do with that. Is it possible that this is part of how Tracy was turned into a werewolf/kanima? I mean, I'm not a dermatologist or a geneticist, I'm just a regular-old nurse with a special interest in women's health, and the very brief amount of research I've done on the subject says that in the majority of cases, these skin grafts have to be between members of the same species, but considering this is a show about teenage werewolves, werecoyotes, werejaguars, banshees, kitsunes, kanimas, wendigos, druids and darachs, I'm going to go ahead and assume that the usual rules of science don't apply, much like how the Dread Doctors have thrown the supernatural rule book into the trash can.
Anyway, Deaton has never seen the silvery stuff that Tracy threw up before, though he also points out its similarities to mercury, both observations of which are worrisome for sure. Malia is worried just looking at the girl, and asks Deaton if they can't just give her a shot of something. Deaton assumes she means pain relief and points out that she doesn't seem to be in pain at all (which is also strange), but of course Malia is actually suggesting they just put her down, like she suggested earlier. "I generally prescribe to a code of ethics that frowns on such measures," Deaton explains patiently, since he knows Malia is still learning, and Scott reminds her that killing is kind of against the McCall Pack's code as well. Malia asks how they both know Tracy won't try to kill them, and Stiles pipes up that she makes a decent point, since Stiles' first instinct is to always kill the problem.
While I don't necessarily blame them for considering it as an option, I wish that they'd remember that had Scott actually done what they said and killed the supernatural that was causing problems, Derek, Cora, Malia, Stiles, and Liam would all be dead, so they should maybe keep in mind that there are other factors in play that are affecting what Tracy is doing and try a little harder to help her before resorting to murder? Anyway, Stiles brings up the fact that he's eventually going to have to let his dad know they found her, since she did kind of murder two people and seriously injure two more, so Deaton concedes that while he's not in favor of euthanasia, he's also not against extra security measures to protect the town, so he grabs a jar of mountain ash from the side table and tosses it toward the door. BADASS. I want more Druid!Deaton stuff already! Enough of this, "Oh, but I'm just an ordinary veterinarian!" shit, Supervet! Get to the good stuff!
Across town, Lydia and Kira have just showed up to the Stewart house, where they're standing outside of Tracy's bedroom to try to look around for clues and see if Lydia can't get any banshee hints on what they're dealing with, here. Before they walk through the door to the bedroom, Kira stops Lydia and is like, "Hold on, isn't this a crime scene or something?" Lydia just rolls her eyes and says no, since it's not like she murdered anyone there, but once they open the door and go inside, they see that crime scene tape has been wrapped around the bedposts to indicate that it shouldn't be touched. "...Maybe," Lydia adds, before shrugging and telling her not to worry about it. HAHAHAHA. I love how Lydia and Kira's friendship has boiled down to Kira worrying that the things are illegal, as though half the supernatural battles they've had were legal, and Lydia just telling her to do it anyway. It's a very Scott and Stiles dynamic, and I'm digging it.
Also, is Lydia actually wearing pants in this episode? Has that ever actually happened before? I can't remember the last time we wasn't wearing a skirt or dress, or on rare occasions, a pair of shorts. Way to be functional and fashionable, girlfriend! Kira turns the topic of conversation to their mission and asks her what they're looking for, but Lydia, as usual, isn't sure. "I'm mostly just following a feeling," Lydia admits, to which Kira reminds her that her feelings usually lead them to the bodies of people who have been viciously murdered. Remember that time in "117" when Lydia led Kira to that body Kate ripped to shreds? That was so gross. I think Kira agrees, because she totally blanches when Lydia quips, "Well, let me know if you find one!" Rulebreaker-Lydia is so great, I love it so much!
Back at the animal clinic, Stiles is anxiously looking at the thin line of mountain ash that has formed on the threshold of the door to the exam room, and does not at all look reassured when Deaton promises that Tracy won't be able to cross it. I think I've been reading way too much "Stiles is something!" meta on Tumblr, because now even I'm starting to notice these weird little hints, and I was initially a huge skeptic-- people are interpreting this reaction on Stiles' part as Stiles becoming aware that he might be something more than human (especially since there have been moments that indicate he has superhuman abilities, like being stronger than usual, and the fact that thinks tend to break down when he's emotionally stressed or upset and then fix themselves once he's talked about it with someone, etc) and is worried that he won't be able to cross the mountain ash if it's necessary. I'm still not sure I buy it, but I would be remiss if I didn't at least mention it. I'll be talking about it more in the early-Season-5-discussion post that will be posted shortly.
Anyway, when Stiles gulps nervously and replies that Tracy being unable to leave is kind of what he's afraid of, Deaton just smiles and says, "Well, you and I will be able to get out of here, no problem." He then looks at Scott and Malia and says that the two of them will pretty much be stuck, though. Malia, who apparently hasn't been around much mountain ash, lifts up her hand and reaches toward the boundary, and when her hand rebounds backward, she yelps, "Weird!" Yes it is, girl. Yes it is. Much like with Bb!Derek in "117," Deaton has some more invasive tests to run on Tracy, the first of which naturally involves Scott and Stiles holding her down while he takes a scalpel and slices her forearm open to see what her healing factor is like. Okay, but what if she doesn't heal? Maybe he should try a less vein-y area just in case? Of course, he doesn't listen to me, but fortunately for Tracy, her skin is literally rock-hard, and the scalpel doesn't even leave a red, irritated mark behind. In fact, once Deaton has drawn it down the entire length of her forearm, a piece of the surgical-steel blade actually snaps off from the sheer strength of her skin! DAMN! I mean, I wouldn't want to be a weird man-made werewolf/kanima hybrid, but that kind of invulernability would be pretty badass. Stiles jokes that he's going to need a bigger blade if he's going to want to actually wound her, but Deaton is not at all amused by his attempts at humor and just side-eyes him so hard.
Over at the lacrosse field, Liam has pulled up a photo of Tracy on his phone to show to Brett, but he just smirks and remarks that she's cute before informing him that he's never seen her before. When Liam asks him if it's possible that Satomi turned her without him knowing, Brett just rolls his eyes and points out that ever since the deadpool, Satomi and the pack have been trying to keep a low profile, so she's hardly going around looking for new recruits. "That's how it works?" Mason asks in amazement. "Alpha werewolves just go around biting people?" Well, sometimes! If they're like Peter Hale, or some other werewolves who don't believe in consent, anyway. Or if it's an emergency situation like with Scott and Liam. Otherwise, I think people like Satomi and Talia, back in the day, probably only bit certain people who wanted it and who they knew would make good werewolves, since we've seen first-hand that lycanthropy isn't for everyone, especially if there are anger/impulse issues in play. But Mason didn't actually ask me-- I'm just answering since Brett's response is kind of vague and I'm a bit of an insufferable know-it all, if you haven't noticed.
This gets me thinking about something else, though-- how likely is it that Mason is going to want the bite? Do you think Scott would go there? On the one hand, I doubt he wants to have any more unruly teen wolves to take care of, but on the other, a werewolf pack needs at least three Betas to be stable, according to Peter in Season 1, and since Scott technically only has one Beta (probably two, if Malia counts, and I'd think she would, since the bestiary that came with the Teen Wolf Season 4 DVDs says that werecoyotes are cousins of werewolves), he could use a third to round it out. Just a thought! SO, Brett is surprisingly patient with newbie-supernatural-groupie Mason and explains that there are also born wolves whose parents were werewolves, like himself and his sister. And get this-- Brett's family was killed in a fire, which is why Satomi took him and Lorilee in. That's kind of awesome, at least the Satomi part, but the fire mention already has people comparing Brett to Derek, which I expected, since we all miss Derek a ton. Liam, who has been looking at the photo of Tracy on his phone to avoid having to talk to Brett, notices that the necklace Tracy is wearing in the photo is exactly like the one he saw in the hole he fell into in "Parasomnia," which gives him an idea. Yeah, Liam! Look at you being a detective like a pro!
Meanwhile, Lydia and Kira are still brainstorming in Tracy's bedroom while they go through her stuff, and the camera pans over to that same empty jewelry stand on her bedside table just to drive home the fact that Liam, Brett, and Mason are going to go looking for the necklace in the woods. Kira calls Lydia over when she finds a small box with a dreamcatcher in it and a note from Tracy's dad, and immediately gets a case of the sads as she reads it aloud to her. "Remember Tracy-Bear, it only works if you believe it. Hope this helps. Love, Dad." Ouch, my heart! Kira, too, points out how brutally depressing this is, and Lydia totally agrees, since it's clear he was only trying to help his daughter.
At the animal clinic, Deaton is still examining poor unconscious Tracy, but when he sees something move under the skin of her neck, like there's some kind of snake insider her, which is not only disgusting but also very telling to what we're dealing with her. Deaton's lip curls in a very grossed-out expression as he informs the kids that he's just found something interesting. Just as Deaton calls Malia over to help him turn Tracy over so she's laying on her stomach, Scott gets a series of text messages from his mother to let him know that not only is the driver of the prison transport van awake and talking, but they also just found out that he didn't have a stroke or a heart attack while he was driving like they initially believed-- when they asked him about it, he told them that he felt like all of his muscles were locking up, one after the other. Which would explain why it was his hand that went out first, and then the rest of the body, because from what we've seen in the past, it starts where the person makes contact with the paralytic venom, and then spreads from there.
Stiles immediately realizes what they're dealing with, having felt the exact same sensation on more than one occasion, but when he tells the gang that thinks he knows what's wrong with her, a very alarmed Deaton asks him to enlighten them all, because what he's found does not look good. The kids all gather around the table, where Deaton has taken advantage of the fact that Tracy's sweater has a slit that goes right between the shoulders so he can expose her back to them and show them what he's found. Sure enough, much like he saw in her neck a few minutes ago, there is also something moving around under the skin around her spine.
So, naturally, Deaton starts prodding at it, and it immediately moves away from the places he pokes. Just as they're all thinking they can't be more grossed out by this Alien-style situation, Tracy's skin splits right in the middle of her back, exposing her spinal cord and spraying Deaton, Scott and Stiles with black goo. Before any of them can process this, a long, scaly tail bursts out of her back and whips itself at Stiles, slicing open a shallow-ish cut across his chest from collarbone to collarbone and knocking him face-first onto the floor. Yikes! I always wince when Stiles, Mason, and Lydia get hurt, because injuries suck when you have regular-human healing abilities. That scratch ain't healing anytime soon, unless the nogitsune gave him kitsune-level healing as a parting gift. (Which could have happened, who really knows with this show).
Anyway, the wound on Tracy's back instantly heals itself as she hops into a squatting position on the tail so she can easily nick Deaton in the arm with her tail, Malia across the wrist, and swipe at Scott down his neck with her claws as well, infecting all four of them with her KANIMA VENOM because TRACY IS A KANIMA. They all fall to the floor within seconds of each other as the paralytic toxin takes hold, allowing Tracy to run toward the door without interference. In an even more incredible move, Tracy steps over the mountain ash barrier and breaks the line as she flees from the animal clinic. Stiles, whose face is smooshed against the floor and now cannot move out of that position, mutters "It wasn't a werewolf," and Scott, who is flat on his back on the floor and still covered in that shit that actually looks like, well... shit, turns his head the best that he can toward Stiles and gasps, "Kanima." THIS IS TOO MUCH TO HANDLE.
First of all, I STILL CAN'T BELIEVE THIS-- everyone always brings up the kanima thing when the pack has brought someone new in (see: Sheriff Stilinski and Jordan Parrish), but I wasn't really expecting to see one, at least not like this! I could have sworn I caught a quick glimpse at a kanima in one of the cells at Eichen House when Deaton went through it in "A Promise To The Dead," but I didn't think Tracy would turn into one! Secondly, I still think that she's either some kind of a hybrid, because, as I'll discuss later, her features do not resemble Jackson's at all. It's possible this is because she was man-made and not a truly supernatural kanima, or maybe it's because of both that and that the Doctors were trying to make her a werewolf, and she unintentionally began the transition into a kanima due to the trauma/night terrors, but the transition wasn't complete? That would also totally explain why the Doctors act the way they do at the end, because her becoming a kanima wasn't intentional on their part and so she was useless to them? We already know they're not really fussy when it comes to cutting out their failures.
When we return from the break, Stiles asks Deaton how the hell Tracy managed to make it over the mountain ash, but as usual, Deaton has no idea, though he maintains that no supernatural creature should have been able to cross it. Stiles reminds him that Scott did it, all the way back in "Lunar Ellipse" when Scott was fighting against Jennifer Blake, but Scott points out that he only managed to successfully do it once, and doing so nearly killed him to the point that he pretty much had to activate his True Alpha-ness in order to survive it. Wait, so does that mean he doesn't think he could do it again? Boo! I thought that was actually one of his True Alpha powers, since it took a lot of willpower to break through. Bah! Anyway, Malia, who managed to fall to the ground in a seated position while leaning against the back wall, groans, "We should've killed her!" Stiles doesn't really think it matters at this point, since they're all paralyzed and now Tracy's off to probably kill someone else.
"Listen, everyone," Deaton begins calmly, despite the fact that he's also laying face-first on the floor right behind Stiles' feet. "We need to concentrate. Scott and Malia, you two will probably be able to move long before Stiles and I can. But, you need to focus." When Malia, who has never been paralyzed by a kanima before, asks what they need to focus on, Scott informs her that they need to trigger their healing. Deaton confirms that this is correct, but Malia is seriously panicking and yelps that she doesn't know how to tell her body to heal when it's not already doing it. Stiles hears the anxiety in her voice and immediately shifts into his helpful mode and gently encourages her to calm down. "I can't calm down!" Malia yells as she starts to hyperventilate. "I can't move!" Man, this must be going against all of her animal instincts right now. No wonder she's scared! I would be too. Scott assures her that it's not a permanent condition before asking Deaton what they need to do, so Deaton brings out the power of positive thinking yet again. "Think of a body part," he explains, still calm as ever. "Your hands, your feet, even just the tips of your fingers. Imagine them moving. See it in your mind, and your body will follow." The four of them then get to concentrating on their limbs, though Malia especially does not seem to feel confident about it.
Meanwhile, night has fallen out in the nature preserve, where Liam, Mason, and an unimpressed-looking Brett are wandering around looking for the hole that Liam fell into in "Parasomnia." Brett asks our favorite wolf cub if he's sure he knows where the fuck he's going, but Liam assures him that he knows exactly where they are. "So do I," Brett retorts. "The middle of nowhere." Suddenly, they both hear a thud as poor Mason pulls a Liam and falls right into a hole. "Guys?" he asks nervously. "I think I found it." Liam and Brett rush over to see what's up, and when Liam asks him if he sees the necklace down there, Mason pulls out his phone and uses the flashlight to search around. Fortunately for him, it's not muddy like it was when Liam was in it, so he just has to search around a bunch of dried up leaves. Still, it doesn't seem to be anywhere in there, so Brett reaches down and easily yanks him out so he can join them.
Mason frowns when he takes a closer look at the hole itself and its location, and eventually pipes up, "Liam? I thought you said this was a sinkhole?" Liam just shrugs and is like, "Uh, it's a hole, so what's the difference?" Mason kneels down and looks at the ground around the hole, which is covered in loose dirt with hand prints in it. After a moment of considering this, the boys become horrified when they realize that Tracy didn't fall in the hole and lose her necklace-- she was buried and dug herself out. Mason's reaction? "Intense." BAHAHAHA. I love him so much. But, back to this revelation-- HOLY SHIT. Okay, I'm a little confused about the timeline, here, from where Tracy was first treated by the Dread Doctors to when she was buried to when she went on her murder spree, but I'm going to try to map it out in the discussion post. Regardless, how weird is it that the Doctors seem to be burying these people in the woods? Does this mean that the treatment kills them and then resurrects them, like a vampire or something? Or is the ability to dig themselves out of the ground some kind of test regarding their abilities? OH WAIT, does it have something to do with the Nemeton? That would be amazing, but I don't know. I'm seriously curious, whatever it is.
Back at the animal clinic, the gang is still focused on trying to get their limbs to move, and after a moment, Stiles exclaims that he pretty sure he felt his right leg move. He tries it again and adds, "Uh, yup. Definitely felt it. Like a twinge, spasm, something." Of course, Deaton's face is literally like three inches from Stiles feet, and he just groans before replying, "I'm going to have to disagree, and I think I hold an informed opinion." LOL. I saw on Tumblr that someone speculated that Stiles actually farted instead of moving his leg, which is why Deaton looked so grossed out, so I'm totally accepting that as my headcanon because that is fucking hysterical. Anyway, Scott's still working on healing as well, and his head is stuck facing Malia, whose middle and ring fingers suddenly twitch. Scott excitedly informs Malia that she totally just moved, and she seems relieved as hell. A lot of people were like, "How did Malia heal from the venom before Scott the True Alpha?", because the fandom lives to trash Scott, but Malia explains it herself-- Tracy just barely nicked her on the wrist, so while she was paralyzed due to the venom's effects, the fact that she was exposed to a lot less than Scott and the others means that it made its way through her system much faster and allowed her healing factor to overcome it more rapidly. SCIENCE!
Deaton encourages her to keep moving, and she does-- first, she's able to move her hand, then her arm, until she manages to slowly pull herself up off the floor as Ruelle's "Take It All," an amazing song that is perfect for this scene, starts to play. Stiles starts freaking out, since his face is turned toward the door, and he can't see what's happening, but once Malia manages to get onto her feet, he begs her to wait for them to come with her. "There's no time!" Malia replies urgently as she tries to gather her strength. Stiles is clearly worried about her girlfriend is running off after a night-terror-y kanima and reminds her that Tracy isn't actually a werewolf like they thought, but Malia responds that Tracy does have a scent, which means she can track her. I love how great she's gotten at controlling her powers since last season! It is so, so, so great. Malia gets ready to leave, but before she does, Scott calls out to her one last time-- "Malia? Save her." Malia groans in frustration, but you know that in the end, she's going to do it, because despite the concerns she voiced to Stiles in "Time of Death" about how she's afraid that killing runs in her family, she's not like Peter or her mother-- she's her own person who controls her own fate.
At the Stewart house, Lydia and Kira are still pacing around Tracy's bedroom while they try to figure out what exactly Tracy's motivations are. Kira points out that they know her dad was just trying to help her, and Lydia confirms it before adding that her psychiatrist seemed to be doing the same. Lydia realizes that she probably ended up at the school because she was looking for someone else who was just trying to help, and Kira, using that theory, suggests that maybe she was after Lydia. Lydia frowns at this, so Kira quickly adds, "...Or not, since that would mean she wants to kill you." Apparently, Lydia was just brainstorming though, because she actually agrees with Kira's line of thinking-- Lydia was trying to help, but she wasn't the only one, since we know Mama Martin was also trying to help her in the guidance office when she admitted she was having night terrors. Kira immediately begins to worry, and wonders aloud if Tracy went to the high school to look for Natalie and asks where she is at the moment, which makes Lydia sigh unhappily. "On a date..." Lydia replies grimly, just before we cut to...
...The Sheriff's station, where Sheriff Stilinski, back in his fancy civvies, comes out of his office and into the bullpen in order to meet with his yet-unknown date. "Thanks for meeting me here," Sheriff begins, as the entire Teen Wolf fandom holds their breath in hopes that the camera will pan over to reveal Melissa standing there. Sheriff starts to say that he probably shouldn't even be doing this until he turns to look at his date and is awestruck by the beauty that is Natalie Martin, who smiles and replies that she's just glad he didn't have to cancel again. Sheriff just smiles bashfully and admits that he's glad, too, and they're both just so charming. HOLY SHIT. I have to say, I was not expecting this revelation, but awww, that is actually really cute! Despite the surprise, I can definitely get onboard though, especially since Linden Ashby and Susan Walters are actually married in real life! I mean, the Sheriff/Melissa shipper in me is a little bummed, but whatever-- Sheriff is just getting back into the dating game, so maybe something not-so-serious is a good thing for him. Also, the cast talked about how nervous Linden and Susan were when they filmed these scenes during one of their interviews at San Diego Comic-Con, and that is just seriously precious, if you ask me.
Anyway, while the two are getting ready to leave, Sheriff notices Clarke is slumped over on her desk and walks over to her, thinking that she's sleeping. However, when he asks her what the hell she's doing, he circles around her desk to find that she's wide awake and laying cheek-down with a horrified expression. "I can't move," Clarke gasps in fear, just as Natalie notices that the deputy working the front desk is also similarly slumped over as well. Lydia and Kira come running into the bullpen to play rescuers, and Lydia immediately informs her mother that Tracy is coming for her, but since Natalie has no idea about this supernatural stuff (and never seems to question whenever she actually witnesses weird supernatural stuff), she's just like, "Uh, what the fuck are you on about?"
Of course, the girls are too late, which they figure it out quickly when they look up and see Tracy crawling on all fours across the ceiling above them. She hisses at them menacingly as bluish-green scales start to develop on half of her face and her eyes flash a completely golden-orange with slit pupils like a snake, rather than the simple gold irises of a beta werewolf. Ummm, what? Again, those eyes are not like how Jackson's eyes used to look back in the day-- they were like white and pink instead of gold, and Jackson's fangs were double-rowed skinny fangs like a wendigo, kind of. So I'm still very confused about this part. And, of course, neither Sheriff nor Natalie nor Kira have ever actually seen a kanima before, and Lydia probably wished she'd never see one again, because YIKES!
Back in the woods, Liam has just jumped down into the hole where Mason fell to search for the necklace himself, and is both disappointed and confused when he can't find it either. When he asks aloud why it would be gone, Brett impatiently retorts that she probably came back for it, clearly over this little mission of theirs. Liam jumps out of the hole to continue brainstorming, and after examining the area, he sighs and informs them that he doesn't think this was the hole into which he fell while out here with Stiles. Mason is like, "Um, qué?" but Liam insists that the hole he fell into was much closer to the bridge than this one is, which makes sense, since they were following Theo to the bridge when he fell. Of course, that means that there is more than one beastie that is being buried to force them to dig themselves out, which is not at all comforting in any way. WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE? UGH.
And, because everything isn't confusing enough, we cut over to Donovan, who is still in his cell in the jail part of the Sheriff's Department and has just opened his eyes. They're his usual brown shade at first, but then when he blinks, his entire eye area is covered by what looks like a silver skin, just like earlier when the Dread Doctors were drilling into his skull, before returning back to the way they were. WHAT THE FUCK? Is that some sort of reaction to Tracy's presence? Is it a reaction to the Dread Doctors' presence? I don't understand anything. Donovan starts breathing heavily as he rubs his face with his hand, and he seems to be really out of it. He also seems to be hearing that weird rattly-clicking noise that the Doctors make whenever they're around. It's kind of oni-ish. All of a sudden, he starts hearing gunshots and immediately rushes to the barred door to his cell to try to see what's going on.
As it turns out, Sheriff was shooting at Tracy, but since her skin is like cement, the shots do nothing, and she takes him out by nicking him in the wrist with her tail before jumping onto a desk to better fight the girls. Natalie is hiding around the corner, looking understandably terrified, and Lydia, too, has backed as far away from Tracy as she can get. Kira whips out her katana-belt and flips her sword around in anticipation for Tracy's attacks when Sheriff yells at her to look out from the floor, where he's slowly being paralyzed by her venom. As it turns out, Tracy is a good fighter for not having been supernatural for long, but Kira is good, too, thanks to her kitsune reflexes. She easily dodges Tracy's claws and tail as she whips her sword around while she spins and twirls like a pro. I'm actually wondering what Natalie's thoughts are right now, since she's seeing this weird lizard creature with superhuman abilities who could overpower the Sheriff of the county before engaging with her daughter's good friend who is a master katana-wielder. It's gotta be a shock to the system for sure.
Lydia is still trying to stay out of the heat of the battle, but yells at her mom to run, which she wisely does. However, before she can get away, Tracy purposely spins in the air and slashes Lydia in the side with her tail, causing her to fall to the floor in pain and pretty much ensuring that Natalie would come running back to make sure she's okay. Natalie sees her daughter go down and screams "LYDIAAAA," which immediately made everyone think she might be a banshee, but I'm doubtful-- Lorraine was Lydia's father's mother, and it's from her that she got her banshee nature, so unless Natalie also just happened to be a banshee from a different line, it seems pretty unlikely. Anyway, back to Lydia-- if you're like me, you're thinking, "Whew, at least Lydia is immune to kanima venom, right?", because Lydia only has regular human healing so it'd be better if she wasn't paralyzed on top of it. Unfortunately, it's not that simple, though we don't have time to talk about it now.
At the sight of her best girlfriend getting hurt, Kira angrily lunges for Tracy and continues fighting even more fiercely this time. Kira manages to body-check her so she's thrown onto the ground, giving her enough time to hop on the nearby desk and do some complicated swordplay that causes her eyes to glow orange and her entire body to burst into what looks like flames. YESSSSS FINALLY KITSUNE!KIRA HAS COME OUT TO PLAY! Her trickster-spirit aura is so strong that even Lydia can see it with her naked eyes, and she gapes in both mental and physical shock as she bleeds out on the ground. Tracy doesn't stand a chance against a foxfire-enhanced Kira, but it doesn't stop her from trying; unfortunately for her, it takes only moments for Kira to lunge for the kanima and CUT OFF HER FUCKING TAIL. Tracy yelps in pain and runs away while Kira momentarily gets overwhelmed by her aura, until she finally manages to get a hold on herself and conceal it. HELL YES KIRA! I have waited so long for her to win a fight, and I'm so glad we finally get to see her in her element, so to speak, but I'm also super-worried, especially given how awestruck Lydia seemed to be-- I can't tell if releasing that aura was Kira's intention, but it did seem to take control of her for a moment, and it seems like it's just the beginning of a long struggle over the kitsune spirit within her for this season.
We then return to the animal clinic, where Scott has managed to regain enough of his motor abilities to get on his knees, and he's just about to attempt to pull himself up by leaning on the exam table when a scruffy-looking Theo shows up and helps him stand to his feet. Confused and the tiniest bit suspicious, Scott asks him how he even found them, but Theo just replies, "'Cause you work here" before admitting that he heard about Tracy and that he's been looking all over for him. Yeah, you heard about Tracy from Liam, just like Scott did, ya shady jerk! Theo then bends down to pick up Stiles, who, in a hilariously petty move, groans "NO!" even as Theo helps him regain his footing. HAHAHA, SO MATURE, STILES, BUT I APPROVE.
Scott reluctantly confesses that they lost Tracy and Malia, but Theo assures them that he can help as he leans over one last time and lifts Deaton to his feet. Deaton seems surprised, because he looks at Scott and remarks, "This is Theo?" but Theo just ignores that statement and insists that he can help them. When he sees Stiles' skeptical expression, he adds, "It doesn't have to mean I'm part of the pack, or like you've accepted me, or anything like that. It just means I can help you catch this girl." Stiles gives Scott a wary look, but when Theo once again repeats that he can help, Scott just shrugs, like, "Whatever, we need help." It reminds me a lot of the Ethan and Aiden situation, actually. Scott more than anyone knows that sometimes you can't turn down free assistance, but he'd be smart to at least question Theo's motives once this is all said and done.
Back at the station, Malia has just arrived, and she follows a large smear of blood from the lobby into the bullpen, where she finds Sheriff laying paralyzed on the floor. "Careful..." he whispers, before Lydia's voice weakly calls out to her. Malia follows the sound to Sheriff's office, where another large smear of blood leads her to Lydia, who is laying paralyzed across Kira's lap while Kira presses her hands against Lydia's wounds. I was confused at first why Lydia would be paralyzed when she's supposed to be immune to most supernatural stuff, but I'm guessing the fact that Tracy was a man-made supernatural had something to do with it? Unless Jeff just forgot about continuity again, which isn't out of the realm of possibility. Anyway, Malia is immediately worried about Lydia when she sees her, but Lydia assures her that it looks worse than it is before getting to the point-- Tracy is asleep and thinks she's dreaming/in a night terror, but she isn't, so Malia needs to make Tracy understand that everything is real. When Malia instantly turns to find her, Sheriff calls out, "Malia! Basement. They're in the basement." Malia is even more concerned by the use of the word "they," but when Lydia informs her that she's down there with her mother, Malia wastes no time going down there to save them.
Down in the basement, Malia follows a trail of black ooze mixed with that silver vomit of Tracy's to a hallway that looks suspiciously like the basement of the high school. Her claws are already out, and she takes slow, purposeful steps until she finds Tracy dragging Natalie's paralyzed and unconscious body down the hall. When Tracy sees her, she shoves Natalie's body aside and growls as Malia's lip twitches in anticipation for a fight. She rolls her neck, Derek Hale-style, and lets her full coyote face out as she roars and races toward Tracy, whose stump of a tail merges back into her body while the two girls start swiping at each other. Malia is a really great fighter, actually-- she is best at kicking, punching, and clawing at vulnerable areas like sides, elbows, and knees, which allows her to easy slow down whomever she's fighting. She manages to pin Tracy against the wall for a brief moment before Tracy spins out of it, running across the wall while Malia clutches her arms and gaining enough momentum to throw Malia into a nearby bookshelf.
Malia shakes it off and side-kicks Tracy in the chest before doing this great move where she grabs Tracy by the arm, swings it backward while also kicking her leg forward and sweeping her calf so it hooks behind Tracy's knees and knocks her over as Malia does a somersault away from them. SO PERFECT. I saw someone (I think it was pocketlass on Tumblr) refer to it as a modern contemporary pas de deux and I wholeheartedly agree. Teach me to fight, Malia! She's then able to get to her feet quickly enough to take advantage of Tracy still laying flat on her back on the floor by grabbing her by the arms to restrain her while she straddles her and puts her knee against Tracy's throat. She then roars aggressively in Tracy's face, which seems to do the trick-- after a moment, the kanima in her fades away just as Malia returns to her human form, and though it takes a few short moments for Malia to remind herself that she was told to help Tracy, she sees that the girl has shifted back and quickly stands to her feet before she chokes her to death. Tracy coughs intensely for a bit until she finally is able to stand up, and when she starts looking around in confusion, Malia uses all of her experience in being talked out of her times of panic by Stiles and the fact that she and Tracy actually have quite a bit in common to try to anchor Tracy in reality a bit.
"Tracy? Tracy?" Malia begins, as the girl tries to get her bearings. "No, no, no. Look at me. You're not dreaming. This is real! All-all of this is real." Tears start to fill her eyes when she realizes just how scared and confused she must be after everything she did while she thought she was asleep, and Tracy has the look of a person who has literally just had the worst day or so of their lives, because she pretty much did. "Do you get it?" Malia asks worriedly, but not unkindly. "Do you get that?" Tracy looks at Malia in horror, and Malia reminds her once again that she's not dreaming. "What...?What's happening to me?" Tracy asks in a quiet, scared voice, but before Malia can answer, the real Dread Doctors appear out of nowhere, and the one who usually has the syringe quickly injects Tracy in the neck with an overdose of that silver stuff. NOOOO! When Malia rushes toward Tracy to help protect her, another doctor, this one with blue light-thingies at the fingertips of the weird metal gloves he wears grabs Malia and shoves her against the wall, holding her head still so Malia can do nothing but watch as they kill the girl she thought she just saved as she starts to spit up copious amounts of that silver liquid.
No matter how hard Malia fights against the Doctor, they are too strong for her, and the lead doctor says, "Her condition is terminal," in a robotic voice. They remove the needle from Tracy's neck, and the girl falls to the floor as the three Doctors walk away from them and down the hallway until they disappear. Malia, realizing that Tracy is dead, bites back a sob as she falls against the wall and slides down until she's seated on the ground. NOOOO, TRACY! NOOOO, MALIA. NOOOOOOOO.
This is so heartbreaking for so many reasons! Like, on the one hand, the fact that she died might not be a 100% terrible outcome, considering she seems to have killed the only family that she had and hurt several more people and likely would have spent the rest of her life feeling massively guilty, but still, she didn't deserve to die by any means, no more than Stiles would have deserved it while he was possessed by the nogitsune, or Scott when he stabbed Kira after Kate turned him into a mindless berserker, or Malia after she shifted uncontrollably and caused the wreck that killed her mother and sister when she was only a child. I just imagined Malia and Tracy bonding over their shared experiences, and the pack helping her transform back into a werewolf-- in fact, I assumed that the search for the necklace was so they could use it like the key that helped Lydia turn Jackson back-- and just generally giving her a support system, so this is just absolutely devastating on so many levels. Poor Malia! If anyone gives her a hard time for what happened, I am going to go off.
Next week: Malia informs the pack about what she saw of the Doctors, the Doctors go after Donovan in his jail cell, Liam goes to Jungle with Mason to be his BFF's wingman, Lydia presumably is hospitalized for her injuries, and the Nemeton comes back into play.
NOTES/SPECULATION/QUESTIONS:
-Fashion time! There were a two reworn pieces in this episode, from what I can tell. At the beginning, Malia is wearing the same tan/orange/pink floral blouse that she wore in "The Benefactor," and the purple zip-up hoodie Stiles is wearing was previously worn by him in "117."
-I'm going to get into this more in the write-up to follow, but does anyone else get the feeling that the Doctors can make themselves intangible? They often look like a glitchy ghost from Supernatural, but they can obviously be corporeal sometimes, because otherwise they wouldn't be able to touch any of their test subjects. It looked like they almost passed through the walls, though, which would be convenient for them, because then no one could ever hide from them. I don't know, they seriously give me the wiggins and I still have no idea what their goals are.
The main confusion I'm having about this show is specifically regarding the Dread Doctors and what their aims are, because let's be real here, their actions have been a little nuts. Giving a werewolf glowing talons and enhanced strength and sending him after anyone who could know where Scott McCall is? Taking advantage of a teenage girl's night terrors by luring her into your lab and injecting her with a substance that looks like mercury and turns her into some kind of werewolf-kanima hybrid? Catching a runaway felon and drilling into his ears and filling it with some other unknown substance? Burying them in the woods and having them dig themselves out? Their behavior has been a little weird, is what I'm trying to say.
Speaking of weird, I still don't understand what's up with Theo, either, but since we see so little of him in the episode (most of the mentions of him involve Stiles desperately wanting him to have been behind all the maulings/killings so that his suspicions could be vindicated) what he's really up to is still very much a mystery. But, to get back to the recap in general, "Dreamcatchers" was a seriously scary and worrisome episode in the best way possible, and I am so eager for next Moonday to come quickly so we can figure out what's happening. Most importantly, it was a girl power episode, which is my favorite kind, because it's the girls of the McCall Pack who are getting shit done: Lydia and Kira work to figure out Tracy's state of mind and why she's behaving the way she's behaving, and Kira and Malia both work to protect everyone else from her-- and, in Malia's case, try to protect her from herself and snap her out of her night terror. Granted, it was all for naught, but it was a shitload of growth on everyone's part, and I adored it so much, you guys. So, let's talk teenage werewolves and mutant man-made supernaturals, yeah? Settle in, babies, because this is gonna be a long one.
Previously, on Teen Wolf: A kid that Scott, Stiles, and Lydia went to school with as children, Theo Raeken, has come back to Beacon Hills after a lengthy absence. He claimed he was bitten against his will, like Scott, and has returned specifically to join our favorite True Alpha's pack. Of course, Stiles is sure that he's shady, and has been doing tons of research to figure out what his motives are, with little success. When Scott confronted him about never trusting people, Stiles told him he has to be distrustful, because Scott trusts everyone, although we all know that's a bald-faced lie. Fellow high school senior Tracy Stewart ended up in the guidance office because of her night terrors, but hers haven't been the usual kind-- she threw up black werewolf ink and feathers all over Natalie Martin's desk, and has had waking nightmares that the Dread Doctors have been following her around, leading Lydia, her mother, and Jordan to try to help her out with whatever she's dealing with. Scott got attacked by a sludgey wolf with harpy eagle talons that glowed blue, who stupidly tried to steal Scott's powers and got himself a badly broken arm for his troubles. Upon examining the talons Scott broke off, Deaton suggested that perhaps the rules of their supernatural world are changing. Tracy ended up sleepwalking to the Dread Doctors' creepy secret lab, where they injected her in the neck with some substance that looked like mercury, and it seemed as though she had been turned into a werewolf, with glowing gold eyes, claws, and fangs of a beta. Which is kind of where we pick up today!
This episode's extra-long opening scene cuts back and forth between Deputy Clarke Romero (Liam's little nemesis/future love interest Hayden Romero's older sister!) as she handcuffs young robber Donovan's wrists in preparation for him to be transported to prison, and Sheriff Stilinski, who is preparing for a date (!!! No wonder he took off his wedding ring!!!) in his office, complete with a very handsome green, blue, tan, and brown plaid button-up with a navy blue tie and a light brown suit jacket. Lookin' good, Sheriff! I see you're taking clothing cues from your son, which is not a bad idea, since Stiles' sense of style is pretty good for a boy who doesn't care much for fashion. Once Donovan is sufficiently shackled up, Clarke and Jordan escort him into the bullpen, where his lawyer is waiting for him. Guess who his lawyer is? PAPA STEWART, TRACY'S DAD. He's in the middle of reading Donovan's file, and when he sees him come in, he gives him a grim look as he slaps the file closed.
In his office, Sheriff is fussing over his appearance in a hand mirror and is lamenting the fact that he didn't think to get a haircut, but Stiles tries and fails to cheer him up by reminding him that at his age, he should be thrilled that he has hair to cut in the first place. Oh, Stiles. Scott, naturally, tells Sheriff that he looks great, and Sheriff remarks that Scott is the son he deserves, which is kind of harsh, but I'm sure he's just joking, and Stiles doesn't seem too offended, so whatever. After a moment, Sheriff considers what he's actually doing and starts to panic, loosening his tie and insisting that this date plan is a terrible idea, but Stiles immediately stops him and straightens up his tie before giving him a pep talk. "Dad! Dad, it is one date," Stiles argues. "Okay? The town of Beacon Hills won't implode while you're out with one woman. Or man," Stiles continues with a knowing look. LOL, OH STILES. Also, every time someone says "Nothing bad will happen during the few hours I will be spending doing actual fun things," it's like the universe says, "LOL CHALLENGE ACCEPTED." Anyway, Sheriff does confess that his date tonight is a beautiful woman, but when the boys ask who she is, he stays mum, despite Stiles protests to the contrary.
Donovan is being led out to the prison transport van by Jordan and Clarke while Papa Stewart explains the plea deal he's managed to work out. "I'll admit, it isn't what I was hoping for," Mr. Stewart begins as they walk through the station. "But the DA's offer is still pretty reasonable." Donovan wastes no time asking what "reasonable" means in this case, but Clarke impatiently tells them to talk it out in the transport van on the way. Of course, Donovan has an even worse temper than Liam did pre-bite, so he just petulantly stops walking and demands that Mr. Stewart tell him what the deal is. Jordan immediately gets in his face and asks Mr. Stewart if they're going to have difficulty with his client, but he just shoots Donovan dagger-eyes and assures him that they won't before admitting that the DA is offering him three to five years in prison, which means Donovan should let him do his job so he can get out in two.
If you're not American and don't really know much about how the law works here, let me tell you a bit about California's justice system, just for the sake of clarity-- California has so many inmates in their prison system that there is literally not enough space for all of them, so most of the prisoners who are in there for non-violent crimes (drug possession, drug dealing, driving under the influence in cases where no one is actually hurt by it) are usually released in at least half the time just to make sure there are enough cells for the really violent criminals (murderers, rapists, kidnappers, people in human trafficking, drunk driving that results in someone's death or severe injury, etc). That's part of the reason why you see celebrities like Lindsey Lohan getting arrested constantly for stuff like drug possession and driving under the influence and barely getting any jail time for it. (The other part is the fact that they're rich and can afford good attorneys, but that's a whole different story). However, I'm not sure if Donovan being caught breaking and entering with a gun (if you recall, he was caught with a loaded .38) counts as a violent crime if no one got hurt in the process. So, yeah, so that's likely what the lawyer means by getting him out in two years.
Still, despite the fact that Donovan knowingly committed a pretty serious crime even after being told by a judge at least once that he'd be going to prison if he continued breaking into places, he's very, very surprised and angry when he hears that he's actually going to have to serve jail time. He starts yelling for Sheriff Stilinski, who eventually comes out to see what all the commotion is about. "I'm going to kill you!" Donovan yells at him, but Sheriff isn't super bothered by it. "Donovan, if you think that shocks me, remember it was well-documented in your Anger Expression inventory," he replies with a sigh before instructing Jordan and Clarke to escort him out to the transport van. Of course, Donovan isn't done being super creepy yet, so he stops before calmly retorting, "I'm not angry like I'm gonna throw a brick through your window. I'm angry like I'm going to find you, I'm going to get a knife and I'm going to stab you with it until you're dead. And when you look at me and you ask me why, remember right now. Because this is why." YIKES! Smart move, bozo, threatening the Sheriff of the entire county in which you live with an audience full of people as witnesses. That's totally going to help your case.
There's a really awkward silence as everyone just stares at each other in stunned confusion, except for Papa Stewart, who has pulled out Scott McCall's perfected "close-eyes-and-sigh-deeply" move while he curses his decision to become a public defender. Finally, after a moment, Stiles pipes up, "Wow, that was awesome." Everyone turns to look at Stiles like, "What the fuck are you doing?" but we all know that he's a little shit who can't keep quiet at times like this, so he keeps talking. "That was awesome. That was great. Can we do one more? Give us another one. Maybe like Christopher Walken this time, you know?" Donovan doesn't say anything, he just looks at him blankly while everyone else in the room is desperately trying to telepathically communicate "SHUT THE FUCK UP" to Stiles, but he totally ignores their glares. "Okay, you know what? It's fine. You'll have plenty of time to work on it when you're in your tiny little cell. You know, just stuck there. Forever." Donovan lunges for him, but the two deputies tighten their grip on him and pull him back as Scott leaps in front of Stiles to protect him, only to be pushed back as well by Sheriff.
As Donovan is dragged out by Jordan and Clarke (who fortunately aren't the ones accompanying him to the prison), Scott asks Stiles what an Anger Expression Inventory is, so Stiles briefly explains that it's a test you have to take in order to become a law enforcement officer. Methinks that maybe LEOs should have to take a few more personality assessment tests before they can start officially working, considering how many unwarranted officer-involved shootings have been happening in the last few years. Anyway, Scott is stunned that this guy actually tried to be a cop, but Stiles just quips that at least his time in jail will give him the full law-enforcement experience. Ha!
Our favorite rageaholic criminal is sitting in the back of the prison transport van next to a heavily armed deputy while they head to their destination, and Papa Stewart is sitting in the passenger seat while another deputy drives. "Well done," Papa Stewart snaps at Donovan in frustration. "Threatening the Sheriff in front of his entire department and his son? I'll be lucky to get you three to five decades. You realize that?" Damn, dude! Tell him what's up! Because seriously, that was supremely stupid. No wonder he's always caught when he breaks the law-- dude literally has no chill whatsoever. Suddenly, he realizes that the driver is speeding and suggests that he slow down, since Donovan is hardly in a rush to get to prison.
However, something seems to be going on with the deputy who is driving, because he starts groaning in pain as he removes his right hand from the wheel. It starts to lock up, and when Papa Stewart asks him if he's okay, the driver starts to panic and replies, "No. My hand, I... Uh, I think I'm having a..." The man trails off as the tires start to screech, and the van continues to accelerate faster and faster even despite Papa Stewart's pleas for him to slow down. Donovan starts to panic and demands to know what's happening, but the deputy in the back assumes that the driver is having a heart attack. Papa Stewart frantically asks the driver if he can at least hit the breaks, but when he shouts that he can't move his legs, the lawyer tries to take control of the wheel from him and slides his leg over to try to hit the pedals to at least get them to stop moving.
After much swerving, grinding the van against the stone walls of the tunnel through which they're driving, and generally putting everyone in serious danger, Papa Stewart manages to control the steering wheel well enough to stop and park. While this was going on, the camera panned up toward the ceiling of the van, where four punctured holes are leaking a very familiar-looking clear gel that is curiously present while someone is exclaiming that their limbs are paralyzed. Ruh-roh. Once they're stopped, Papa Stewart, Donovan, and the deputy in the back with him all pant and try to catch their breath before noticing that the driver is sitting motionlessly as his body is pressed to the back of the seat. Before they can even start to process what is wrong with him, they hear a loud thump, followed by some very alarming creaking noises from above them, indicating that something is on the roof. When that "something" jumps down on the driver's side of the van, we see that it is actually Tracy, whose claws and fangs are still out. HOLY SHIT! So the Dread Doctors just took advantage of her night terrors to lure her sleepwalking self to their secret lab, where they injected her with some weird mercury-looking substance, turned her into some weird man-made supernatural, and then just let her loose on the whole town? What the hell?
Papa Stewart looks at his daughter in confusion and surprise and calls out, "Tracy?", right before she growls at them menacingly, rears her right arm back, and punches right through the driver's side window. Both the windshield and her father's face are splattered with blood as Tracy starts straight-up mauling the driver, which freaks out the deputy in the back with Donovan so freaked out that he loads his shotgun and starts shooting buckshot after buckshot at her despite Papa Stewart's terrified pleas. YIKES! Those buckshots don't seem to be doing much, though, because she's still able to claw the shit out of the driver before moving onto the second deputy in the back. In the scuffle, the back doors of the van burst open, and Donovan manages to throw himself out of it, though he lands face-first on his chest thanks to the fact that his hands are still shackled and connected to a chain around his waist. The deputy tries to catch him, but Tracy grabs him by the back of his jacket and starts attacking him, enabling Donovan to run the fuck away.
Once the deputy has been sufficiently maimed, Tracy circles around to the front of the van again to see Papa Stewart, who is covered in blood and has just managed to get out of the passenger seat. "Tracy?" he asks in fear, not understanding anything about what has just happened, but Tracy just replies in a girlish, creepily-calm voice, "Don't worry, Daddy. I won't let anything happen to you... ever again." YIKES YIKES YIKES! Between the very little-girl timbre of her voice, the fact that she was echoing what he told her in "Parasomnia," and the fact that her eyes shifted from brown to gold as she finished her statement was just so, so chilling. She then starts to growl yet again and starts clawing the hell out of her father as he screams in pain and horror. THIS IS SO HORRIBLE, OMG. It also vaguely reminded me of Season 2's "Shape Shifted," when the kanima attacked Isaac's dad, which is kind of interesting, considering what we learn about Tracy at the end.
Meanwhile, Donovan, who either hit his head in the wreck or is covered in the driver's blood, is running through a dark, wet alley, and turns his head back as he rushes away when he hears the sounds of his defense attorney being mauled to death. Unfortunately, he isn't paying attention to where he's going, so he ends up tripping and falling to the ground, quickly rolling onto his side to cushion the blow, since his shackled wrists prevent him from properly using his hands to break his fall. He hears a weird clicking noise nearby, and when he looks over at a nearby rain puddle, he sees the one of the Dread Doctors reflected in it.
Wait a second-- did the Dread Doctors send Tracy help them nab Donovan? Were they specifically seeking him out, or are they just taking advantage of the fact that they ran into him? I'm so confused, but since next week is the fourth episode of the season, I think that's when we'll start getting some answers-- if you recall, it was in S02E04 "Abomination" that we learned the weird lizardy creature running around was called a kanima, and that it was a mutated version of a werewolf, and in Season 3A's "Unleashed," we learned about Deucalion's plan to have Derek join the Alpha Pack by having him kill his own, along with the fact that the human sacrifices that were occurring in threes had specific themes, like healers, warriors, virgins, etc. In 3B's "Illuminated," we finally met the oni up-close and got an idea of who it was targeting and got confirmation that something bad was going on with Stiles, and in Season 4's "The Benefactor," Lydia found the first deadpool list and determined that they were all in danger. It works this way because in the twelve-episode format, the first arc wraps itself up within episodes 1-4, with the last episode setting the stage for the second arc that takes place in episodes 5-8. Of course, this season, we're getting twenty episodes separated into two ten-episode halves, and unlike in Season 3, where the two halves were totally different with separate villains, the Dread Doctors are going to be our main villains for both parts of Season 5, so this format may be slightly altered because of the change-up.
But, I digress, and not for the first or last time. Anyway, so the Dread Doctor in front of him is holding a medical tool similar to the one used to inject Tracy in the neck with that mercury-ish substance, but instead of having a syringe on the end of what looks like a large gun, this instrument has a cone made of metal wires with a hole in the middle. When Donovan gapes in fear and turns to run away, he ends up rushing straight into another Doctor who has appeared behind him in that weird jerky/glitchy way that they have. These guys are seriously so creepy, because they don't look corporeal-- in fact, they look kind of similar to the ghosts on Supernatural, in how they flicker in and out. However, they must be at least have a semi-physical form, because they're able to restrain Donovan while the doctor with the medical gun sticks the end against Donovan's head, so that the wire cone part is around his ear, stabilizing the gun so that a SUPER FUCKING LONG DRILL BIT can be extended through the middle of the cone and through his external auditory canal so that it can DRILL INTO HIS EAR. EEEEEK! Donovan shrieks in fear and pain as the Doctors drill into his ear/head. We then get a close up of his eye so we can watch as his brown iris is shot through with silvery veins until his entire eye-- iris, pupil, sclera and all-- appears to have the same opaque softness of the mercury substance with which they injected Tracy last week. WHAT THE HELL? What did they do to him? Is he a new beastie all together now? I mean, that's certainly not a human characteristic. TITLE CARD!
After the break, we return to just outside the Sheriff's station, where Stiles and Scott are inside the Jeep. Stiles turns the ignition, only for his engine to predictably sputter before going out completely, causing him to curse his shitty car under his breath. Scott looks concerned as he stares at Stiles, and after a moment, Stiles snaps, "It's anxiety." Scott doesn't understand what that has to do with anything, so he clarifies, "The chemosignals? Oh, I'm well aware of how you all monitor my emotional state." Aw, Stiles, that only means they care! Don't be mean! I'm wondering how long they've been doing this, though. Since the nogitsune? Since he almost got shot by the Chemist? Since the huge showdown at La Iglesia? Anyway, Stiles anxiously and frustratedly slams his fist against his steering wheel in yet another uncharacteristic spell of violence, so Scott, who is looking at him with even more worry than before, asks him if he's sure he's okay.
After a moment, Stiles decides he can't not spill his guts about what is bothering him, and pulls his phone out of his pocket to show him what he's just learned. Apparently, he's still in touch with Braeden, and she's sent them a message about her newest lead on Malia's elusive mother. "That's the first real bit of information we've gotten on the Desert Wolf in months," Stiles explains as he shows a photo on his phone to Scott, though we don't actually get to see it for ourselves. Whatever it is, it shocks Scott enough that he can hardly believe TDW did this, but Stiles confirms that she did before admitting that he was the one who started pulling on this thread in the first place. Scott looks horrified and tells Stiles that he should probably stop pulling it, then, but Stiles insists that it's not up to him before sighing and turning the key in the ignition again. Surprisingly enough, the Jeep starts up normally, which makes me extremely concerned about the Jeep and Stiles and the instances that it has been breaking down lately. That's something I'll get into in detail in the meta write-up, so stay tuned!
Elsewhere in town, Malia, Lydia, and Kira are all their own car together so that the latter two girls can give Malia some more driving lessons while they listen to In Film's "Set It Off." I was about to question the legality of this, but then I remembered that in a lot of places, people with their temporary license can do their driving hours with drivers over age eighteen who have been driving for a certain length of time, and since Lydia is like, 18.5 by now and has been driving since Season 1, I'd say she probably qualifies. This scene is actually kind of painfully awkward for me, and I don't know why, so I'm just going to make it brief. What we learn from the girls' conversation prior to starting is 1) Papa Tate bought Malia a brand-new Toyota product placement, which is both awesome and hilarious (Lydia, Kira/the Yukimuras, and Derek also all drive Toyotas, so we all know who's paying for a ton of the Teen Wolf special effects budget these days), and 2) the newest recommended position for hands on a steering wheel is now at 9:00 and 3:00 instead of 10:00 and 2:00, since apparently driving with the latter position could cause you to break your thumbs if the airbag were to deploy. Good to know! I like my thumbs and I would rather not break them.
Once Malia is getting ready to drive to the school, Malia once again starts to get flashbacks to when she was eight and accidentally caused the car accident that killed her adoptive mother and sister when she inadvertently shifted for the first time, but she manages to shake them off so they can go. Despite Kira's chirpy and cute encouragement from the backseat, Malia has a bit of trouble getting the hang of driving on the road, first weaving between the two lanes on the road, then driving off the road, then doing carefully controlled donuts in the middle of the road when she's trying to make a U-turn. It is so bad, and I'm thinking that all of the flashes to causing the car wreck in her youth is still having a huge affect on her, and I totally get it. People who haven't been in serious wrecks can have a hard time imagining just how terrifying it can be.
I've been in a handful of car accidents in my life (two when I was driving, and three when I was a passenger), and the worst one happened while I was sick with the flu and laying down in the backseat during a spring break cross-country roadtrip with my former roommate and good friend Jane. Even though it was mid-March, it was still snowing a ton in the midwest, and by the time we got to Montana, the roads were slick with black ice, so when we turned around a bend that didn't have a guardrail, the car ran off the road and down a steep hill into a ravine, during which time the car flipped 2.5 times and landed upside down. It was terrifying, and I wasn't wearing a seatbelt because I was sleeping and laying down, and I got thrown around like a load of laundry in a washing machine. To this day, I still have major car-ride anxiety, typically when I'm a passenger and not in control of the car that I'm in, so I can sympathize with Malia's situation a lot. There are a ton of people I've seen on Tumblr saying that Malia has no reason to be freaking out since she wasn't the one driving, and it makes absolutely no sense to me-- it's actually worse being a passenger in a car wreck, because like I said, you have no control over the situation whatsoever, and instead are just a slave to whatever fate is thrown at you. Considering the fact that it was Malia's first transformation into a werecoyote that triggered the car accident that killed her family, I'd say Malia has plenty of reason to be freaked out about driving.
ANYWAY, back to the story at hand-- Lydia finally gets Malia back on the road and points her in what she initially believed to be the direction of the school so that way they can practice Malia's parking skills in the parking lot. However, once the road they're on merges onto a main road heading toward a streetlight-illuminated street, Kira realizes that they're not actually heading toward the school-- in fact, they're heading downtown. OH SHIT, BANSHEE FUGUE STATE ALERT. Kira asks if they should be turning around, but Lydia gets this exhausted look on her face and instructs Malia to keep going, because they're almost there. After a few more moments of driving, they end up at the tunnel where Tracy attacked her father, the deputies, and Donovan, and the girls quickly get out of the car to find that a man with a bloodied hand is shakily reaching out to them, causing them to gape at him in horror. "Call 911," Lydia murmurs urgently. DUN DUN DUN.
When we return after the break, Scott and Stiles have just showed up to the crime scene, where they immediately meet up with Sheriff Stilinski, who apparently either missed his date completely or had to duck out early and raincheck it for another time. Sheriff addresses Scott first and points out that he saw Donovan earlier at the station before asking him if he was supernatural, but Scott believes that unless he's a werewolf or other supernatural who can inhibit his scent, he's likely human. "Well, human or otherwise, this kid might have just murdered his lawyer and mortally wounded two officers," Sheriff explains exhaustedly. "We've got an APB out on him, but you think you can find him faster?" LOL, I love how Sheriff is totally cool with the McCall Pack essentially doing the Sheriff's Department's job for them. I just wonder how everyone aside from Sheriff and Jordan are so unquestioningly cool with it. When Scott tells him that he can definitely try, he hands Scott a walkie-talkie and tells him to keep it on channel two before Scott rushes away to try to track him.
We then catch back up with Scott, who has just hopped over a fence and flipped off of the dumpster he landed on to soften his landing while he takes a deep breath and finds Donovan's scent. Man, I know everyone hates on the unnecessary gymnastics thing, but I totally love it. If I had superpowers, you can bet I would be parkouring off of every surface just for funsies like our long-lost Derek Hale. When he lands on the ground, his red Alpha eyes flare as he figures out where Donovan was headed.
Once Scott has left, Stiles turns to his father and quietly brings up the possibility that someone other than Donovan did this. When Sheriff instantly assumes that Stiles already has a theory, Stiles confirms his suspicion, though he doesn't name names. We don't really need him to, though, because he's obviously still obsessed with Theo being a bad guy and has already pinned the blame on him. I know I have more information than Stiles does, since only the audience is aware of what happened with Theo and his "parents," but I'm guessing that a guy who would go through all that trouble to ensure that his maybe-fake-dad's signature is identical to his maybe-real-dad's isn't going to just outright maul a bunch of people in public, you know? COME ON, STILES. You're a smart kid! Use your damn brain. Then, just so we're totally sure Stiles is blaming Theo for this murder-spree, we see Theo hiding behind the nearby corner of the tunnel, where he's eavesdropping on everyone in the area. WHAT ARE YOU UP TO, THEO?
We cut back to Scott, who is on Donovan's trail throughout the weird network of tunnels in this part of town. When he stops for a moment to regroup, he hears the sounds of clinking chains and turns just in time to see Donovan yelling at the top of his lungs as he lunges for him. Of course, Scott's the damn Alpha, so he just dodges him, spins, and throws him down onto the ground. Donovan shifts so he once again lands on his side instead of his face and looks up at Scott with pretty much unbridled fear. I may not like the kid, but I don't blame him a bit for being freaked out, because YIKES. Just then, back at the crime scene, Jordan gets word back from Scott over the radio that he found Donovan, who is understandably panicking. When Scott adds that he keeps saying some name, Stiles is hilariously like, "Theo!", even though I'm pretty sure if it had been Theo's name, Scott would have just said that off the bat. Instead, Scott informs them that Donovan has been saying the name "Tracy," which makes both Lydia and Jordan sigh, like, "Gods damnit, here we go," because Tracy is the girl they were trying to help just the other day. WONDERFUL.
In what is probably the best scene of the episode, we cut to the next day, where the entire high-school contingent of the McCall Pack, plus Mason, are all gathered around in the bus bay for a meeting to discuss their current situation regarding Tracy. "Tracy wasn't just having trouble sleeping," Lydia begins. "It was a real disorder-- it was night terrors." Stiles points out that now she's the night terror, especially considering they've had no luck with regards to catching her, so what now? "Okay, I know we're all tired and miserable..." Scott pipes up, before he looks over at Mason, who has this amazed, awestruck and almost gleeful look on his face, before sighing, "Except for you." HAHAHAHA. And in that moment (and pretty much all moments in this episode), Mason speaks for all of us, because seriously, would we not be acting the exact same way if we just found out our best friend is a werewolf who is a member of a large and unconventional pack filled with various different supernatural creatures? If I had firsthand proof that TV-level magic was real, it would literally be like the best day of my life.
Anyway, Mason immediately apologizes and insists that everything he's just learned is just too mind-blowing for words, which causes Liam to make this hilarious face, as though he's super embarrassed by his best friend's fanboy behavior. "You're a kitsune," Mason adds breathlessly as he turns his focus to Kira. "I don't even know what that is!" Kira awkwardly replies that she's still learning herself, and an exasperated Stiles glances over at Liam and admonishes him for bringing his tagalong friend. "Liam, we said you could tell him, not invite him to the inner circle!" Stiles snits, and when Mason is like, "HOLY SHIT, AM I IN THE INNER CIRCLE," both Stiles and Liam simultaneously insist that he isn't. Oh, don't be cliquey, you guys! Mason's already saved your asses once without even knowing he was doing it, so cut the kid a little slack! An impatient Scott turns the topic of conversation back to Tracy and reminds his packmates that she's just one lone wolf against a pack, which means she shouldn't be that hard to track down, but Malia reminds him that she's a serial-killing wolf, so that kind of complicates things. "Uh, she only killed one person, you know," Stiles cuts in, playing devil's advocate as usual. "The other two were mauled."
Stiles goes on to ask what they should do when they catch her, and as usual, Malia's like, "Uh, put her down, obviously?" Then this really great moment happens where Stiles, Lydia, Kira, and Liam each make a different face in reaction to this suggestion-- Stiles looks embarrassed at first, but both he and Lydia seem to be considering it, Kira just looks alarmed, and Liam seems very worried in general-- before turning to Scott to see what he thinks about it. And, when everyone's focus turns back to Scott, Mason gets this look on his face as though he's just realized that Scott is totally the leader to whom they all defer when it gets to be time for a mission. Then, realizing the gravity of the situation, Mason just nods in understanding and chirps, "Intense." BAHAHAHA. That is so classic. Anyway, as you can guess, Scott isn't willing to just kill Tracy off the bat, and instead says that they need to just focus on catching her first, and then they can get into the particulars afterward-- their priority right now is making sure they get to her before anyone else gets hurt or killed. Aw, that's my boy, Scottie! You keep being your pro-rehabilitation self.
Back at the Sheriff's station, Donovan, who seems to have a headache that is causing him to wince in pain and generally be even more aggressive than usual, is back in a holding cell in the jail while they figure out what to do with him. I guess the headache makes sense, since-- if my understanding of anatomy and physiology is correct-- the Dread Doctors literally drilled into his brain with a drill that is covered in gods know what. Sheriff is sitting on the bench across from him to try to see if he can't get any details about what happened from him, but, of course, Donovan isn't feeling in much of a helping mood, plus his cop-ambitions gave him a great working knowledge of the law, so instead of speaking, he just snaps, "I want my lawyer." Sheriff sighs and reminds him that he's lawyer is dead, so Donovan asks for a different public defender, as per his Constitutional rights.
"I know you know something," Sheriff replies somewhat impatiently. "One girl against three grown men? No matter how unbelievable you think it's going to sound, I promise you can tell me." It almost looks like Donovan might relent and tell him what he saw, but nope-- he's still feeling spiteful thanks to the fact that Sheriff insisted upon his arrest for a felony he was actually caught committing, so he just sarcastically remarks on how his nice-guy tone of voice makes Sheriff sound like a guy who is actually interested in helping. Just then, he hears this collection of weird noises-- including the rattling that the Dread Doctors make, a strange hissing sound like the one a kanima makes, and a high-pitched whine-- which hurts his head so much that he groans and grabs his temples in pain as he squeezes his eyes shut. It's kind of like how Liam reacted to his wolf hearing at Lydia's lake house in "The Benefactor," which is interesting-- do you think whatever the Doctors did to him has given him enhanced hearing? I don't think he's a werewolf/kanima like Tracy, but I do think he's some kind of other modified supernatural creature, or perhaps a hybrid of sorts. Anyway, Sheriff seems a little bit concerned about this random migraine Donovan seems to be experiencing, but Donovan just shakes it off and once again insists that he's not talking without a lawyer.
Realizing that he's not going to get anything useful from Donovan, at least not now, Sheriff reluctantly leaves the cell and runs into Jordan on his way into the bullpen. "I've got an answer to why we couldn't find Tracy last night," he explains upon seeing his boss. "She was in the hospital." And by in the hospital, he means at the hospital, specifically killing her psychiatrist who worked there. We cut over to the psychiatrist's office to see that everything from the papers on top of his desk to the wallpaper to the man himself is covered in blood splatters, and his body is slumped backwards in his desk chair, all of it riddled with slashes and soaked in more blood. WHOA. This is bananas! At first, I thought that maybe the night terrors themselves were a side-effect of the experiments the Dread Doctors were performing on her, but now it seems as though Tracy has had night terrors for a while and was seeing a psychiatrist for help dealing with them. So, if that's the case, then maybe the Dread Doctors targeted her because of her history of sleep disorders? I imagine it's a lot easier to manipulate someone who is sleep deprived and who has a hard time distinguishing dreams from reality, especially now that these night terrors are happening in the day time, too.
SO, after this revelation, Sheriff instructs Jordan to let Scott know what he just learned, but to make sure he knows that he doesn't want them involved in this just yet. "Shouldn't we be putting him on the payroll?" Jordan asks, which is a totally legit question, and one to which Sheriff admits he's considering it. I seriously want to know how they've been able to get away with the pack solving all of their crimes for the last two years now, because you'd think there'd be at least one deputy or even a higher-up who thinks it's weird that Lydia (and her friends) are always finding dead/dying bodies, or that Scott is always on the search parties for the lost or missing in supernatural-related cases.
Meanwhile, at the school, Stiles and Malia are in the stairwell off of the main hallway, where Stiles has just finally showed her the photo he got from Braeden about the Desert Wolf on his phone. We also finally get to see the photo for ourselves-- there are about five or so men in it, all of whom are sprawled dead on the floor and covered in/surrounded by blood as though they had been attacked viciously.
STILES: [guiltily] "Now, I wanted to show you first, but, considering my lack of self-control..."
MALIA: [stunned] "My mother did this?"
STILES: "...Yeah. Yeah, Braeden said these guys were bad. You know, really bad."
MALIA: [looks at him hopefully] "So, they deserved it?"
STILES: [winces] "...Yeah, I'm not sure anyone deserves that, per se."
MALIA: [sighs] "I guess we know one thing now-- she's good at her job."Yeah, I'd say so! I'm also really glad that the Desert Wolf is still an ongoing storyline in this season, because since the pre-Season 5 trailers only really showed the Doctors, I was concerned that maybe it'd be pushed off until 5B at least, so the fact that we're still getting hints and clues that it's coming up is very reassuring. On the other hand, it's just making me even more curious! Just looking at the photo, you can tell that the men were killed by being viciously clawed to death, so I think it's pretty safe to say that she's a werecreature herself-- most likely a werecoyote, as has already been assumed by most. What I'm most curious about is whether or not she has any maternal feelings for Malia-- the fact that she never showed up during the deadpool seemed significant, since Peter specifically mentioned the Desert Wolf to Meredith, and since she followed his instructions to the letter, it seems unlikely that she wasn't informed of its existence. And, if she was, why wouldn't she come to town when she saw that her own daughter was on the list? Unless she was, and she just stayed out of sight-- I have this nagging feeling that maybe the fact that Malia was only targeted twice by assassins (and even then, it was mostly due to her association with Scott, since she had the lowest bounty of any of the pack members) was because TDW took them out before they could get to her? Probably just a crack!theory, but still!
Anyway, over in the biology lab, Mrs. Finch is passing out the pre-class test to see where everyone was in terms of the material, and she seemed very impressed by the fact that Scott got an 86%. Yeah, Scott! Some of you might think that the American equivalent to a B+ might not be that impressive, but let me remind you that this is Scott's first time taking an AP science class, from the sounds of it, and again, it was meant to be a test to see what level of understanding of the subject the students had coming into the classroom so she could tailor her curriculum accordingly-- this wasn't supposed to be some test that everyone aced right off the bat. So, yeah, Scott's a smartie-pants! The teacher congratulates him on his priorities and instructs him to lead the class in a review over last night's reading, which I'm going to go on ahead and guess he didn't get a chance to do since he spent the entire night chasing Donovan and Tracy around town. In all fairness, he does have the important bits highlighted, so maybe he did do a read-through earlier.
Right as he's flipping through the pages to find the chapter so he can begin the review, he's suddenly distracted by the adorable appearance of his werecub son Liam, who is standing in the doorway and waving at him to get his attention. Scott assumes he's just trying to say hello, and Mrs. Finch assumes that Scott is just easily distracted, so she calls him out to focus, making Scott feel guilty enough to apologize while he continues to anxiously flip through the pages of his textbook. Of course, Liam actually has something important to say, so he keeps waving and making faces to get his attention, which once again distracts Scott from what he's doing. When Mrs. Finch impatiently tells him to get back to the task at hand, Scott sighs and gives Liam a quick look, just long enough to tap his ear to indicate that Liam should just whisper what he wants to say so Scott can pretend like he's actually doing school stuff. Unfortunately for Scott, it's kind of an emergency. "She's here," Liam mutters urgently. "She's in history class right now. Tracy. She's here." And, of course, Theo, who is still sitting in the back of the class, hears this announcement as well. YIKES YIKES YIKES. What the hell is Theo's deal? Trying to figure out his agenda is giving me the worst headache.
We cut over to Papa Yukimura's classroom, where Tracy is in the middle of the back row and is anxiously gripping onto the ends of her desk as she desperately tries to get herself in control, though since her eyes start to glow gold, I'm going to go out on a limb and say it's not working so well. She also has no books or notes out, nor a bookbag, and she literally looks like she spent the night running through the woods, so how nobody notices this sooner is beyond me. For a town that has a ton of weirdo supernatural shit happening 24/7, its townsfolk are almost willfully unobservant. As Tracy sits at her desk, she starts to get night terrors/hallucinations again that the overhead lights are going out, and the thought of the Dread Doctors returning scares her so much that she continues to hyperventilate and grip her desktop so hard she cracks it right down the middle. Sitting next to Tracy is Liam's frenemy love-interest Hayden, who sees she is in distress and kindly leans over to whisper, "Hey, are you alright?"
For a moment, I was like, "Uh, didn't they just say Tracy was a senior in the last episode? Why is she in history class with a person we know for a fact is a sophomore?", but Hayden quickly clears that up for all of us when she then adds, "Are you even supposed to be in this class?" Her eyes look Tracy over, and she becomes even more alarmed when she sees the girl isn't even wearing shoes, and her bare feet are scratched up and dirty. I feel compelled to point out that she's wearing skinny jeans and a cowl-neck gray sweater that is cut up the back and has no shirt or bra under it, and considering she was wearing pajamas when she got injected with all of that stuff in the last episode and then went straight for Donovan and her father, I'm not sure when she got the chance to change her clothes. Whatever. Doesn't matter. Just then, the fire alarm goes off, and Liam, who was the one who pulled it, naturally, hides in the corner as the students in every classroom start to file out into the hallway. In the history class, Ken instructs his students not to rush and assures them that it's likely just a drill, but though most of the class starts to leave, Tracy stays seated, and has gripped the desk so hard that a deep crack has formed down the center of the desktop. "Hey, we need to go," Hayden whispers impatiently, before narrowing her eyes to examine the girl more closely and asking her if she's okay.
Fortunately for her, Scott and Liam have just showed up to try to help her, much to a very concerned Ken's relief. Scott slowly walks toward Tracy and calls out her name with his hands up in a non-threatening manner, like he's trying not to scare a skittish animal. Which, I guess is kind of true, given her new animal-esque abilities, and considering she's totally hallucinating that Scott, Liam and Ken are the Dread Doctors, it's probably best not to make any sudden moves. Just then, Tracy throws her arm forward and clutches Hayden's wrist tightly with a clawed hand with a blank look on her face as she stares at the approaching "Doctors." Damn, what did those guys do to her to make her night terrors into pretty much full-blown hallucinations during the day Do you guys think it's a side-effect from the stuff she was injected with? I am going to go on a limb and assume that it is, but I'll be talking about this more in the speculation write-up that will follow this recap!
Tracy stands up, looking woozy and swaying a little on her feet, but she continues to grip Hayden's wrist so hard that a thick stream of blood starts to drip onto the floor, and by her whimpers of pain, it sounds like she's close to breaking it all together. Scott, who has a little experience with feeling out of control, patiently instructs Tracy to let her go, and Hayden fearfully cries that Tracy is hurting her, which makes the situation all the more urgent. Finally, Tracy lets go, and Hayden immediately yanks her arm away and starts to cradle it as she watches her in horror. "They're coming," Tracy whispers quietly as she continues to sway, as though she's close to passing out. "They're coming for all of us." Suddenly, Tracy's eyes roll into the back of her head, and she crumples to the floor before that same mercury-esque substance starts pouring out of her mouth into a huuuuuge puddle. HOLY SHIT. Also, Kelsey Chow is a champ, because she's pretty much been throwing up weird colored fluids since she first debuted, and it does not look like it tastes good. I think in an interview, Charlie and Max Carver (who played Ethan and Aiden) said that the substance they use for the black "werewolf ink" tastes like licorice, which makes me want to throw up just thinking about it, but that silver stuff looks like it tastes like paint. Gross!
We meet back up in the hallway, where Ken is escorting Scott, who has Tracy in his arms, out of the school, with Liam and Hayden following close behind them. When Scott makes it to the front doors, he's joined by Stiles and Malia, who have come to see what they can do to help and who follow him out. "She wasn't even supposed to be in our class," Hayden murmurs in confusion to Liam, who is watching his pack leave with an anxious expression on his face, probably because he's not thrilled to be left behind. When she asks Liam where they're taking her, Liam suddenly realizes that she was totally just exposed to the supernatural, too, and now he has to come up with an excuse, so he's just like, "Uh, the hospital, I guess?" Smooth, kiddo. Very subtle. He notices the fact that her wrist and forearm are still all bloody and kindly asks her if she needs help getting to the nurse, but Hayden remembers that they're totally enemies and just snaps, "I think I'll make it."
However, instead of the nurse, she just goes into the bathroom, where she rushes to the sink so she can clean up her wounds. However, once she washes the blood away, she gapes in horror when she sees that THERE ARE NO WOUNDS ON HER ARM. What the fuck? She looks surprised, so I'm going to guess she doesn't know about the supernatural, but what does it mean? Is she a born wolf or some other creature who just has no idea what she is and is just starting to activate her abilities? Or did Tracy's claws have some kind of weird substance that healed it? WHAT IF TRACY ACCIDENTALLY TURNED HER? She's not an Alpha, obviously, but the fact that she's a man-made monster means that the usual rules don't apply, right?
Back in the hall, Liam has met up with Lydia and Kira, who stayed behind, probably to cover for Scott in Bio, so they can talk about what's going on. Liam confirms that Scott, Stiles and Malia took Tracy to the animal clinic to see if Deaton may have any ideas as to what is happening to her. I keep forgetting that they don't actually have any clue about the Dread Doctors at all-- all they know is that there was a weirdo werewolf/harpy hybrid who tried to suck out Scott and Jordan's powers and/or maybe their life force, and now they have what they believe is a regular-old werewolf who has no idea what is happening to her and is stuck in a night terror. Honestly, we should all be soaking up this relatively normal stuff while we still can, because I guarantee that by the end of next week's "Condition Terminal" that it's going to be nothing but awful shit for the next six episodes.
Anyway, Lydia reminds them all that they do have an idea of what's wrong with her-- she literally just killed two people, both her father and her psychiatrist. Kira asks if there's anyone else they can talk to, like her mother or family, but as far as they know, she doesn't have any. After thinking for a moment, Lydia brings up the fact that if she is indeed a werewolf, then she must have an Alpha, right? She looks to Liam for confirmation, as he's the only werewolf among them, but he's still a newbie and just shrugs. She then brings up whether or not they know of any new Alphas swinging into Beacon Hills recently, but Kira is thinking that there might be an old one-- the oldest one, in fact, who they actually know personally. Liam, realizing that going to Satomi means dealing with his other nemesis Brett, starts to scowl in anticipation.
And cut to the BHHS lacrosse field, where Liam and Mason have just found Brett is practicing with some friends while "Ilium" by Alex Metric & Mark Yardley plays in the background. And, naturally, Brett's playing in a pair of sweatpants and running shoes with no shirt, because this is Teen Wolf, and Jeff Davis knows his type and knows his audience. Wait a second--doesn't Brett go to Devenford Prep? Why is he practicing at BHHS? It's not even lacrosse season! Did he transfer or something? Inquiring minds want to know. Mason once again starts leering at the sight of him, just like when he first saw Brett shirtless in "IED," and he excitedly exclaims, "So, he's a werewolf too?" Liam, who is still scowling as he watches his former schoolmates play, confirms that he is, and Mason just shakes his head in disbelief and murmurs, "This just gets better and better." Mason's enthusiasm about all of this is seriously great, you guys. He is the McCall Pack groupie we deserve, and could probably give Stiles some pointers on how to not be a dick to people.
Over at the animal clinic, Tracy is unconscious and laying on the exam table in the back room while Deaton does a physical assessment on her, informing Scott, Stiles and Malia of every exam he does. Her pupils are apparently reacting to light, which is good from a neurological standpoint, but her heart rate is at 250 (a typical resting heart rate is between 60-80 beats per minute, just for the record), and he found an allogeneic skin graft on her right shoulder. That last part is really weird-- skin grafts are usually used to replace skin lost due to a serious injury, amputation, or, most commonly, with burns. The allogeneic part means that the graft came from another person, which isn't strange in general, but in this specific instance, it totally is.
What I'm wondering is why should would have one in the first place? She was injected with that silver stuff in the left side of her neck, so it doesn't have anything to do with that. Is it possible that this is part of how Tracy was turned into a werewolf/kanima? I mean, I'm not a dermatologist or a geneticist, I'm just a regular-old nurse with a special interest in women's health, and the very brief amount of research I've done on the subject says that in the majority of cases, these skin grafts have to be between members of the same species, but considering this is a show about teenage werewolves, werecoyotes, werejaguars, banshees, kitsunes, kanimas, wendigos, druids and darachs, I'm going to go ahead and assume that the usual rules of science don't apply, much like how the Dread Doctors have thrown the supernatural rule book into the trash can.
Anyway, Deaton has never seen the silvery stuff that Tracy threw up before, though he also points out its similarities to mercury, both observations of which are worrisome for sure. Malia is worried just looking at the girl, and asks Deaton if they can't just give her a shot of something. Deaton assumes she means pain relief and points out that she doesn't seem to be in pain at all (which is also strange), but of course Malia is actually suggesting they just put her down, like she suggested earlier. "I generally prescribe to a code of ethics that frowns on such measures," Deaton explains patiently, since he knows Malia is still learning, and Scott reminds her that killing is kind of against the McCall Pack's code as well. Malia asks how they both know Tracy won't try to kill them, and Stiles pipes up that she makes a decent point, since Stiles' first instinct is to always kill the problem.
While I don't necessarily blame them for considering it as an option, I wish that they'd remember that had Scott actually done what they said and killed the supernatural that was causing problems, Derek, Cora, Malia, Stiles, and Liam would all be dead, so they should maybe keep in mind that there are other factors in play that are affecting what Tracy is doing and try a little harder to help her before resorting to murder? Anyway, Stiles brings up the fact that he's eventually going to have to let his dad know they found her, since she did kind of murder two people and seriously injure two more, so Deaton concedes that while he's not in favor of euthanasia, he's also not against extra security measures to protect the town, so he grabs a jar of mountain ash from the side table and tosses it toward the door. BADASS. I want more Druid!Deaton stuff already! Enough of this, "Oh, but I'm just an ordinary veterinarian!" shit, Supervet! Get to the good stuff!
Across town, Lydia and Kira have just showed up to the Stewart house, where they're standing outside of Tracy's bedroom to try to look around for clues and see if Lydia can't get any banshee hints on what they're dealing with, here. Before they walk through the door to the bedroom, Kira stops Lydia and is like, "Hold on, isn't this a crime scene or something?" Lydia just rolls her eyes and says no, since it's not like she murdered anyone there, but once they open the door and go inside, they see that crime scene tape has been wrapped around the bedposts to indicate that it shouldn't be touched. "...Maybe," Lydia adds, before shrugging and telling her not to worry about it. HAHAHAHA. I love how Lydia and Kira's friendship has boiled down to Kira worrying that the things are illegal, as though half the supernatural battles they've had were legal, and Lydia just telling her to do it anyway. It's a very Scott and Stiles dynamic, and I'm digging it.
Also, is Lydia actually wearing pants in this episode? Has that ever actually happened before? I can't remember the last time we wasn't wearing a skirt or dress, or on rare occasions, a pair of shorts. Way to be functional and fashionable, girlfriend! Kira turns the topic of conversation to their mission and asks her what they're looking for, but Lydia, as usual, isn't sure. "I'm mostly just following a feeling," Lydia admits, to which Kira reminds her that her feelings usually lead them to the bodies of people who have been viciously murdered. Remember that time in "117" when Lydia led Kira to that body Kate ripped to shreds? That was so gross. I think Kira agrees, because she totally blanches when Lydia quips, "Well, let me know if you find one!" Rulebreaker-Lydia is so great, I love it so much!
Back at the animal clinic, Stiles is anxiously looking at the thin line of mountain ash that has formed on the threshold of the door to the exam room, and does not at all look reassured when Deaton promises that Tracy won't be able to cross it. I think I've been reading way too much "Stiles is something!" meta on Tumblr, because now even I'm starting to notice these weird little hints, and I was initially a huge skeptic-- people are interpreting this reaction on Stiles' part as Stiles becoming aware that he might be something more than human (especially since there have been moments that indicate he has superhuman abilities, like being stronger than usual, and the fact that thinks tend to break down when he's emotionally stressed or upset and then fix themselves once he's talked about it with someone, etc) and is worried that he won't be able to cross the mountain ash if it's necessary. I'm still not sure I buy it, but I would be remiss if I didn't at least mention it. I'll be talking about it more in the early-Season-5-discussion post that will be posted shortly.
Anyway, when Stiles gulps nervously and replies that Tracy being unable to leave is kind of what he's afraid of, Deaton just smiles and says, "Well, you and I will be able to get out of here, no problem." He then looks at Scott and Malia and says that the two of them will pretty much be stuck, though. Malia, who apparently hasn't been around much mountain ash, lifts up her hand and reaches toward the boundary, and when her hand rebounds backward, she yelps, "Weird!" Yes it is, girl. Yes it is. Much like with Bb!Derek in "117," Deaton has some more invasive tests to run on Tracy, the first of which naturally involves Scott and Stiles holding her down while he takes a scalpel and slices her forearm open to see what her healing factor is like. Okay, but what if she doesn't heal? Maybe he should try a less vein-y area just in case? Of course, he doesn't listen to me, but fortunately for Tracy, her skin is literally rock-hard, and the scalpel doesn't even leave a red, irritated mark behind. In fact, once Deaton has drawn it down the entire length of her forearm, a piece of the surgical-steel blade actually snaps off from the sheer strength of her skin! DAMN! I mean, I wouldn't want to be a weird man-made werewolf/kanima hybrid, but that kind of invulernability would be pretty badass. Stiles jokes that he's going to need a bigger blade if he's going to want to actually wound her, but Deaton is not at all amused by his attempts at humor and just side-eyes him so hard.
Over at the lacrosse field, Liam has pulled up a photo of Tracy on his phone to show to Brett, but he just smirks and remarks that she's cute before informing him that he's never seen her before. When Liam asks him if it's possible that Satomi turned her without him knowing, Brett just rolls his eyes and points out that ever since the deadpool, Satomi and the pack have been trying to keep a low profile, so she's hardly going around looking for new recruits. "That's how it works?" Mason asks in amazement. "Alpha werewolves just go around biting people?" Well, sometimes! If they're like Peter Hale, or some other werewolves who don't believe in consent, anyway. Or if it's an emergency situation like with Scott and Liam. Otherwise, I think people like Satomi and Talia, back in the day, probably only bit certain people who wanted it and who they knew would make good werewolves, since we've seen first-hand that lycanthropy isn't for everyone, especially if there are anger/impulse issues in play. But Mason didn't actually ask me-- I'm just answering since Brett's response is kind of vague and I'm a bit of an insufferable know-it all, if you haven't noticed.
This gets me thinking about something else, though-- how likely is it that Mason is going to want the bite? Do you think Scott would go there? On the one hand, I doubt he wants to have any more unruly teen wolves to take care of, but on the other, a werewolf pack needs at least three Betas to be stable, according to Peter in Season 1, and since Scott technically only has one Beta (probably two, if Malia counts, and I'd think she would, since the bestiary that came with the Teen Wolf Season 4 DVDs says that werecoyotes are cousins of werewolves), he could use a third to round it out. Just a thought! SO, Brett is surprisingly patient with newbie-supernatural-groupie Mason and explains that there are also born wolves whose parents were werewolves, like himself and his sister. And get this-- Brett's family was killed in a fire, which is why Satomi took him and Lorilee in. That's kind of awesome, at least the Satomi part, but the fire mention already has people comparing Brett to Derek, which I expected, since we all miss Derek a ton. Liam, who has been looking at the photo of Tracy on his phone to avoid having to talk to Brett, notices that the necklace Tracy is wearing in the photo is exactly like the one he saw in the hole he fell into in "Parasomnia," which gives him an idea. Yeah, Liam! Look at you being a detective like a pro!
Meanwhile, Lydia and Kira are still brainstorming in Tracy's bedroom while they go through her stuff, and the camera pans over to that same empty jewelry stand on her bedside table just to drive home the fact that Liam, Brett, and Mason are going to go looking for the necklace in the woods. Kira calls Lydia over when she finds a small box with a dreamcatcher in it and a note from Tracy's dad, and immediately gets a case of the sads as she reads it aloud to her. "Remember Tracy-Bear, it only works if you believe it. Hope this helps. Love, Dad." Ouch, my heart! Kira, too, points out how brutally depressing this is, and Lydia totally agrees, since it's clear he was only trying to help his daughter.
KIRA: "Why would she go after him like that?"
LYDIA: [shrugs] "I guess she wasn't in control of herself."
KIRA: [confused] "But it wasn't even a full moon."
LYDIA: "Maybe a werewolf with night terrors is worse than a..." [She suddenly gets an idea] "You know, there are cases of people who accidentally murdered their entire family while in a night terror. They had no idea what they were doing. It's called homicidal somnambulism."YIKES! That is seriously intense. Can you imagine doing that? Having to live with the fact that you accidentally killed your family while you were dreaming? That is so, so, so brutal. Also, it probably would have been helpful if Lydia would have had that dawning revelation like, twelve hours ago, but whatever. Kira points out that if Tracy is killing people she actually has no true intention to kill, then she might be just like Stiles was in the early stages of his nogitsune possession, where she thinks that she's awake but she's actually still dreaming. Lydia points out that in this case, she's still in the middle of a night terror, which is no bueno, since being afraid AND asleep isn't exactly conducive to making rational decisions, you know? THIS IS SO BAD.
At the animal clinic, Deaton is still examining poor unconscious Tracy, but when he sees something move under the skin of her neck, like there's some kind of snake insider her, which is not only disgusting but also very telling to what we're dealing with her. Deaton's lip curls in a very grossed-out expression as he informs the kids that he's just found something interesting. Just as Deaton calls Malia over to help him turn Tracy over so she's laying on her stomach, Scott gets a series of text messages from his mother to let him know that not only is the driver of the prison transport van awake and talking, but they also just found out that he didn't have a stroke or a heart attack while he was driving like they initially believed-- when they asked him about it, he told them that he felt like all of his muscles were locking up, one after the other. Which would explain why it was his hand that went out first, and then the rest of the body, because from what we've seen in the past, it starts where the person makes contact with the paralytic venom, and then spreads from there.
Stiles immediately realizes what they're dealing with, having felt the exact same sensation on more than one occasion, but when he tells the gang that thinks he knows what's wrong with her, a very alarmed Deaton asks him to enlighten them all, because what he's found does not look good. The kids all gather around the table, where Deaton has taken advantage of the fact that Tracy's sweater has a slit that goes right between the shoulders so he can expose her back to them and show them what he's found. Sure enough, much like he saw in her neck a few minutes ago, there is also something moving around under the skin around her spine.
So, naturally, Deaton starts prodding at it, and it immediately moves away from the places he pokes. Just as they're all thinking they can't be more grossed out by this Alien-style situation, Tracy's skin splits right in the middle of her back, exposing her spinal cord and spraying Deaton, Scott and Stiles with black goo. Before any of them can process this, a long, scaly tail bursts out of her back and whips itself at Stiles, slicing open a shallow-ish cut across his chest from collarbone to collarbone and knocking him face-first onto the floor. Yikes! I always wince when Stiles, Mason, and Lydia get hurt, because injuries suck when you have regular-human healing abilities. That scratch ain't healing anytime soon, unless the nogitsune gave him kitsune-level healing as a parting gift. (Which could have happened, who really knows with this show).
Anyway, the wound on Tracy's back instantly heals itself as she hops into a squatting position on the tail so she can easily nick Deaton in the arm with her tail, Malia across the wrist, and swipe at Scott down his neck with her claws as well, infecting all four of them with her KANIMA VENOM because TRACY IS A KANIMA. They all fall to the floor within seconds of each other as the paralytic toxin takes hold, allowing Tracy to run toward the door without interference. In an even more incredible move, Tracy steps over the mountain ash barrier and breaks the line as she flees from the animal clinic. Stiles, whose face is smooshed against the floor and now cannot move out of that position, mutters "It wasn't a werewolf," and Scott, who is flat on his back on the floor and still covered in that shit that actually looks like, well... shit, turns his head the best that he can toward Stiles and gasps, "Kanima." THIS IS TOO MUCH TO HANDLE.
First of all, I STILL CAN'T BELIEVE THIS-- everyone always brings up the kanima thing when the pack has brought someone new in (see: Sheriff Stilinski and Jordan Parrish), but I wasn't really expecting to see one, at least not like this! I could have sworn I caught a quick glimpse at a kanima in one of the cells at Eichen House when Deaton went through it in "A Promise To The Dead," but I didn't think Tracy would turn into one! Secondly, I still think that she's either some kind of a hybrid, because, as I'll discuss later, her features do not resemble Jackson's at all. It's possible this is because she was man-made and not a truly supernatural kanima, or maybe it's because of both that and that the Doctors were trying to make her a werewolf, and she unintentionally began the transition into a kanima due to the trauma/night terrors, but the transition wasn't complete? That would also totally explain why the Doctors act the way they do at the end, because her becoming a kanima wasn't intentional on their part and so she was useless to them? We already know they're not really fussy when it comes to cutting out their failures.
When we return from the break, Stiles asks Deaton how the hell Tracy managed to make it over the mountain ash, but as usual, Deaton has no idea, though he maintains that no supernatural creature should have been able to cross it. Stiles reminds him that Scott did it, all the way back in "Lunar Ellipse" when Scott was fighting against Jennifer Blake, but Scott points out that he only managed to successfully do it once, and doing so nearly killed him to the point that he pretty much had to activate his True Alpha-ness in order to survive it. Wait, so does that mean he doesn't think he could do it again? Boo! I thought that was actually one of his True Alpha powers, since it took a lot of willpower to break through. Bah! Anyway, Malia, who managed to fall to the ground in a seated position while leaning against the back wall, groans, "We should've killed her!" Stiles doesn't really think it matters at this point, since they're all paralyzed and now Tracy's off to probably kill someone else.
"Listen, everyone," Deaton begins calmly, despite the fact that he's also laying face-first on the floor right behind Stiles' feet. "We need to concentrate. Scott and Malia, you two will probably be able to move long before Stiles and I can. But, you need to focus." When Malia, who has never been paralyzed by a kanima before, asks what they need to focus on, Scott informs her that they need to trigger their healing. Deaton confirms that this is correct, but Malia is seriously panicking and yelps that she doesn't know how to tell her body to heal when it's not already doing it. Stiles hears the anxiety in her voice and immediately shifts into his helpful mode and gently encourages her to calm down. "I can't calm down!" Malia yells as she starts to hyperventilate. "I can't move!" Man, this must be going against all of her animal instincts right now. No wonder she's scared! I would be too. Scott assures her that it's not a permanent condition before asking Deaton what they need to do, so Deaton brings out the power of positive thinking yet again. "Think of a body part," he explains, still calm as ever. "Your hands, your feet, even just the tips of your fingers. Imagine them moving. See it in your mind, and your body will follow." The four of them then get to concentrating on their limbs, though Malia especially does not seem to feel confident about it.
Meanwhile, night has fallen out in the nature preserve, where Liam, Mason, and an unimpressed-looking Brett are wandering around looking for the hole that Liam fell into in "Parasomnia." Brett asks our favorite wolf cub if he's sure he knows where the fuck he's going, but Liam assures him that he knows exactly where they are. "So do I," Brett retorts. "The middle of nowhere." Suddenly, they both hear a thud as poor Mason pulls a Liam and falls right into a hole. "Guys?" he asks nervously. "I think I found it." Liam and Brett rush over to see what's up, and when Liam asks him if he sees the necklace down there, Mason pulls out his phone and uses the flashlight to search around. Fortunately for him, it's not muddy like it was when Liam was in it, so he just has to search around a bunch of dried up leaves. Still, it doesn't seem to be anywhere in there, so Brett reaches down and easily yanks him out so he can join them.
Mason frowns when he takes a closer look at the hole itself and its location, and eventually pipes up, "Liam? I thought you said this was a sinkhole?" Liam just shrugs and is like, "Uh, it's a hole, so what's the difference?" Mason kneels down and looks at the ground around the hole, which is covered in loose dirt with hand prints in it. After a moment of considering this, the boys become horrified when they realize that Tracy didn't fall in the hole and lose her necklace-- she was buried and dug herself out. Mason's reaction? "Intense." BAHAHAHA. I love him so much. But, back to this revelation-- HOLY SHIT. Okay, I'm a little confused about the timeline, here, from where Tracy was first treated by the Dread Doctors to when she was buried to when she went on her murder spree, but I'm going to try to map it out in the discussion post. Regardless, how weird is it that the Doctors seem to be burying these people in the woods? Does this mean that the treatment kills them and then resurrects them, like a vampire or something? Or is the ability to dig themselves out of the ground some kind of test regarding their abilities? OH WAIT, does it have something to do with the Nemeton? That would be amazing, but I don't know. I'm seriously curious, whatever it is.
Back at the animal clinic, the gang is still focused on trying to get their limbs to move, and after a moment, Stiles exclaims that he pretty sure he felt his right leg move. He tries it again and adds, "Uh, yup. Definitely felt it. Like a twinge, spasm, something." Of course, Deaton's face is literally like three inches from Stiles feet, and he just groans before replying, "I'm going to have to disagree, and I think I hold an informed opinion." LOL. I saw on Tumblr that someone speculated that Stiles actually farted instead of moving his leg, which is why Deaton looked so grossed out, so I'm totally accepting that as my headcanon because that is fucking hysterical. Anyway, Scott's still working on healing as well, and his head is stuck facing Malia, whose middle and ring fingers suddenly twitch. Scott excitedly informs Malia that she totally just moved, and she seems relieved as hell. A lot of people were like, "How did Malia heal from the venom before Scott the True Alpha?", because the fandom lives to trash Scott, but Malia explains it herself-- Tracy just barely nicked her on the wrist, so while she was paralyzed due to the venom's effects, the fact that she was exposed to a lot less than Scott and the others means that it made its way through her system much faster and allowed her healing factor to overcome it more rapidly. SCIENCE!
Deaton encourages her to keep moving, and she does-- first, she's able to move her hand, then her arm, until she manages to slowly pull herself up off the floor as Ruelle's "Take It All," an amazing song that is perfect for this scene, starts to play. Stiles starts freaking out, since his face is turned toward the door, and he can't see what's happening, but once Malia manages to get onto her feet, he begs her to wait for them to come with her. "There's no time!" Malia replies urgently as she tries to gather her strength. Stiles is clearly worried about her girlfriend is running off after a night-terror-y kanima and reminds her that Tracy isn't actually a werewolf like they thought, but Malia responds that Tracy does have a scent, which means she can track her. I love how great she's gotten at controlling her powers since last season! It is so, so, so great. Malia gets ready to leave, but before she does, Scott calls out to her one last time-- "Malia? Save her." Malia groans in frustration, but you know that in the end, she's going to do it, because despite the concerns she voiced to Stiles in "Time of Death" about how she's afraid that killing runs in her family, she's not like Peter or her mother-- she's her own person who controls her own fate.
At the Stewart house, Lydia and Kira are still pacing around Tracy's bedroom while they try to figure out what exactly Tracy's motivations are. Kira points out that they know her dad was just trying to help her, and Lydia confirms it before adding that her psychiatrist seemed to be doing the same. Lydia realizes that she probably ended up at the school because she was looking for someone else who was just trying to help, and Kira, using that theory, suggests that maybe she was after Lydia. Lydia frowns at this, so Kira quickly adds, "...Or not, since that would mean she wants to kill you." Apparently, Lydia was just brainstorming though, because she actually agrees with Kira's line of thinking-- Lydia was trying to help, but she wasn't the only one, since we know Mama Martin was also trying to help her in the guidance office when she admitted she was having night terrors. Kira immediately begins to worry, and wonders aloud if Tracy went to the high school to look for Natalie and asks where she is at the moment, which makes Lydia sigh unhappily. "On a date..." Lydia replies grimly, just before we cut to...
...The Sheriff's station, where Sheriff Stilinski, back in his fancy civvies, comes out of his office and into the bullpen in order to meet with his yet-unknown date. "Thanks for meeting me here," Sheriff begins, as the entire Teen Wolf fandom holds their breath in hopes that the camera will pan over to reveal Melissa standing there. Sheriff starts to say that he probably shouldn't even be doing this until he turns to look at his date and is awestruck by the beauty that is Natalie Martin, who smiles and replies that she's just glad he didn't have to cancel again. Sheriff just smiles bashfully and admits that he's glad, too, and they're both just so charming. HOLY SHIT. I have to say, I was not expecting this revelation, but awww, that is actually really cute! Despite the surprise, I can definitely get onboard though, especially since Linden Ashby and Susan Walters are actually married in real life! I mean, the Sheriff/Melissa shipper in me is a little bummed, but whatever-- Sheriff is just getting back into the dating game, so maybe something not-so-serious is a good thing for him. Also, the cast talked about how nervous Linden and Susan were when they filmed these scenes during one of their interviews at San Diego Comic-Con, and that is just seriously precious, if you ask me.
Anyway, while the two are getting ready to leave, Sheriff notices Clarke is slumped over on her desk and walks over to her, thinking that she's sleeping. However, when he asks her what the hell she's doing, he circles around her desk to find that she's wide awake and laying cheek-down with a horrified expression. "I can't move," Clarke gasps in fear, just as Natalie notices that the deputy working the front desk is also similarly slumped over as well. Lydia and Kira come running into the bullpen to play rescuers, and Lydia immediately informs her mother that Tracy is coming for her, but since Natalie has no idea about this supernatural stuff (and never seems to question whenever she actually witnesses weird supernatural stuff), she's just like, "Uh, what the fuck are you on about?"
Of course, the girls are too late, which they figure it out quickly when they look up and see Tracy crawling on all fours across the ceiling above them. She hisses at them menacingly as bluish-green scales start to develop on half of her face and her eyes flash a completely golden-orange with slit pupils like a snake, rather than the simple gold irises of a beta werewolf. Ummm, what? Again, those eyes are not like how Jackson's eyes used to look back in the day-- they were like white and pink instead of gold, and Jackson's fangs were double-rowed skinny fangs like a wendigo, kind of. So I'm still very confused about this part. And, of course, neither Sheriff nor Natalie nor Kira have ever actually seen a kanima before, and Lydia probably wished she'd never see one again, because YIKES!
Back in the woods, Liam has just jumped down into the hole where Mason fell to search for the necklace himself, and is both disappointed and confused when he can't find it either. When he asks aloud why it would be gone, Brett impatiently retorts that she probably came back for it, clearly over this little mission of theirs. Liam jumps out of the hole to continue brainstorming, and after examining the area, he sighs and informs them that he doesn't think this was the hole into which he fell while out here with Stiles. Mason is like, "Um, qué?" but Liam insists that the hole he fell into was much closer to the bridge than this one is, which makes sense, since they were following Theo to the bridge when he fell. Of course, that means that there is more than one beastie that is being buried to force them to dig themselves out, which is not at all comforting in any way. WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON HERE? UGH.
And, because everything isn't confusing enough, we cut over to Donovan, who is still in his cell in the jail part of the Sheriff's Department and has just opened his eyes. They're his usual brown shade at first, but then when he blinks, his entire eye area is covered by what looks like a silver skin, just like earlier when the Dread Doctors were drilling into his skull, before returning back to the way they were. WHAT THE FUCK? Is that some sort of reaction to Tracy's presence? Is it a reaction to the Dread Doctors' presence? I don't understand anything. Donovan starts breathing heavily as he rubs his face with his hand, and he seems to be really out of it. He also seems to be hearing that weird rattly-clicking noise that the Doctors make whenever they're around. It's kind of oni-ish. All of a sudden, he starts hearing gunshots and immediately rushes to the barred door to his cell to try to see what's going on.
As it turns out, Sheriff was shooting at Tracy, but since her skin is like cement, the shots do nothing, and she takes him out by nicking him in the wrist with her tail before jumping onto a desk to better fight the girls. Natalie is hiding around the corner, looking understandably terrified, and Lydia, too, has backed as far away from Tracy as she can get. Kira whips out her katana-belt and flips her sword around in anticipation for Tracy's attacks when Sheriff yells at her to look out from the floor, where he's slowly being paralyzed by her venom. As it turns out, Tracy is a good fighter for not having been supernatural for long, but Kira is good, too, thanks to her kitsune reflexes. She easily dodges Tracy's claws and tail as she whips her sword around while she spins and twirls like a pro. I'm actually wondering what Natalie's thoughts are right now, since she's seeing this weird lizard creature with superhuman abilities who could overpower the Sheriff of the county before engaging with her daughter's good friend who is a master katana-wielder. It's gotta be a shock to the system for sure.
Lydia is still trying to stay out of the heat of the battle, but yells at her mom to run, which she wisely does. However, before she can get away, Tracy purposely spins in the air and slashes Lydia in the side with her tail, causing her to fall to the floor in pain and pretty much ensuring that Natalie would come running back to make sure she's okay. Natalie sees her daughter go down and screams "LYDIAAAA," which immediately made everyone think she might be a banshee, but I'm doubtful-- Lorraine was Lydia's father's mother, and it's from her that she got her banshee nature, so unless Natalie also just happened to be a banshee from a different line, it seems pretty unlikely. Anyway, back to Lydia-- if you're like me, you're thinking, "Whew, at least Lydia is immune to kanima venom, right?", because Lydia only has regular human healing so it'd be better if she wasn't paralyzed on top of it. Unfortunately, it's not that simple, though we don't have time to talk about it now.
At the sight of her best girlfriend getting hurt, Kira angrily lunges for Tracy and continues fighting even more fiercely this time. Kira manages to body-check her so she's thrown onto the ground, giving her enough time to hop on the nearby desk and do some complicated swordplay that causes her eyes to glow orange and her entire body to burst into what looks like flames. YESSSSS FINALLY KITSUNE!KIRA HAS COME OUT TO PLAY! Her trickster-spirit aura is so strong that even Lydia can see it with her naked eyes, and she gapes in both mental and physical shock as she bleeds out on the ground. Tracy doesn't stand a chance against a foxfire-enhanced Kira, but it doesn't stop her from trying; unfortunately for her, it takes only moments for Kira to lunge for the kanima and CUT OFF HER FUCKING TAIL. Tracy yelps in pain and runs away while Kira momentarily gets overwhelmed by her aura, until she finally manages to get a hold on herself and conceal it. HELL YES KIRA! I have waited so long for her to win a fight, and I'm so glad we finally get to see her in her element, so to speak, but I'm also super-worried, especially given how awestruck Lydia seemed to be-- I can't tell if releasing that aura was Kira's intention, but it did seem to take control of her for a moment, and it seems like it's just the beginning of a long struggle over the kitsune spirit within her for this season.
We then return to the animal clinic, where Scott has managed to regain enough of his motor abilities to get on his knees, and he's just about to attempt to pull himself up by leaning on the exam table when a scruffy-looking Theo shows up and helps him stand to his feet. Confused and the tiniest bit suspicious, Scott asks him how he even found them, but Theo just replies, "'Cause you work here" before admitting that he heard about Tracy and that he's been looking all over for him. Yeah, you heard about Tracy from Liam, just like Scott did, ya shady jerk! Theo then bends down to pick up Stiles, who, in a hilariously petty move, groans "NO!" even as Theo helps him regain his footing. HAHAHA, SO MATURE, STILES, BUT I APPROVE.
Scott reluctantly confesses that they lost Tracy and Malia, but Theo assures them that he can help as he leans over one last time and lifts Deaton to his feet. Deaton seems surprised, because he looks at Scott and remarks, "This is Theo?" but Theo just ignores that statement and insists that he can help them. When he sees Stiles' skeptical expression, he adds, "It doesn't have to mean I'm part of the pack, or like you've accepted me, or anything like that. It just means I can help you catch this girl." Stiles gives Scott a wary look, but when Theo once again repeats that he can help, Scott just shrugs, like, "Whatever, we need help." It reminds me a lot of the Ethan and Aiden situation, actually. Scott more than anyone knows that sometimes you can't turn down free assistance, but he'd be smart to at least question Theo's motives once this is all said and done.
Back at the station, Malia has just arrived, and she follows a large smear of blood from the lobby into the bullpen, where she finds Sheriff laying paralyzed on the floor. "Careful..." he whispers, before Lydia's voice weakly calls out to her. Malia follows the sound to Sheriff's office, where another large smear of blood leads her to Lydia, who is laying paralyzed across Kira's lap while Kira presses her hands against Lydia's wounds. I was confused at first why Lydia would be paralyzed when she's supposed to be immune to most supernatural stuff, but I'm guessing the fact that Tracy was a man-made supernatural had something to do with it? Unless Jeff just forgot about continuity again, which isn't out of the realm of possibility. Anyway, Malia is immediately worried about Lydia when she sees her, but Lydia assures her that it looks worse than it is before getting to the point-- Tracy is asleep and thinks she's dreaming/in a night terror, but she isn't, so Malia needs to make Tracy understand that everything is real. When Malia instantly turns to find her, Sheriff calls out, "Malia! Basement. They're in the basement." Malia is even more concerned by the use of the word "they," but when Lydia informs her that she's down there with her mother, Malia wastes no time going down there to save them.
Down in the basement, Malia follows a trail of black ooze mixed with that silver vomit of Tracy's to a hallway that looks suspiciously like the basement of the high school. Her claws are already out, and she takes slow, purposeful steps until she finds Tracy dragging Natalie's paralyzed and unconscious body down the hall. When Tracy sees her, she shoves Natalie's body aside and growls as Malia's lip twitches in anticipation for a fight. She rolls her neck, Derek Hale-style, and lets her full coyote face out as she roars and races toward Tracy, whose stump of a tail merges back into her body while the two girls start swiping at each other. Malia is a really great fighter, actually-- she is best at kicking, punching, and clawing at vulnerable areas like sides, elbows, and knees, which allows her to easy slow down whomever she's fighting. She manages to pin Tracy against the wall for a brief moment before Tracy spins out of it, running across the wall while Malia clutches her arms and gaining enough momentum to throw Malia into a nearby bookshelf.
Malia shakes it off and side-kicks Tracy in the chest before doing this great move where she grabs Tracy by the arm, swings it backward while also kicking her leg forward and sweeping her calf so it hooks behind Tracy's knees and knocks her over as Malia does a somersault away from them. SO PERFECT. I saw someone (I think it was pocketlass on Tumblr) refer to it as a modern contemporary pas de deux and I wholeheartedly agree. Teach me to fight, Malia! She's then able to get to her feet quickly enough to take advantage of Tracy still laying flat on her back on the floor by grabbing her by the arms to restrain her while she straddles her and puts her knee against Tracy's throat. She then roars aggressively in Tracy's face, which seems to do the trick-- after a moment, the kanima in her fades away just as Malia returns to her human form, and though it takes a few short moments for Malia to remind herself that she was told to help Tracy, she sees that the girl has shifted back and quickly stands to her feet before she chokes her to death. Tracy coughs intensely for a bit until she finally is able to stand up, and when she starts looking around in confusion, Malia uses all of her experience in being talked out of her times of panic by Stiles and the fact that she and Tracy actually have quite a bit in common to try to anchor Tracy in reality a bit.
"Tracy? Tracy?" Malia begins, as the girl tries to get her bearings. "No, no, no. Look at me. You're not dreaming. This is real! All-all of this is real." Tears start to fill her eyes when she realizes just how scared and confused she must be after everything she did while she thought she was asleep, and Tracy has the look of a person who has literally just had the worst day or so of their lives, because she pretty much did. "Do you get it?" Malia asks worriedly, but not unkindly. "Do you get that?" Tracy looks at Malia in horror, and Malia reminds her once again that she's not dreaming. "What...?What's happening to me?" Tracy asks in a quiet, scared voice, but before Malia can answer, the real Dread Doctors appear out of nowhere, and the one who usually has the syringe quickly injects Tracy in the neck with an overdose of that silver stuff. NOOOO! When Malia rushes toward Tracy to help protect her, another doctor, this one with blue light-thingies at the fingertips of the weird metal gloves he wears grabs Malia and shoves her against the wall, holding her head still so Malia can do nothing but watch as they kill the girl she thought she just saved as she starts to spit up copious amounts of that silver liquid.
No matter how hard Malia fights against the Doctor, they are too strong for her, and the lead doctor says, "Her condition is terminal," in a robotic voice. They remove the needle from Tracy's neck, and the girl falls to the floor as the three Doctors walk away from them and down the hallway until they disappear. Malia, realizing that Tracy is dead, bites back a sob as she falls against the wall and slides down until she's seated on the ground. NOOOO, TRACY! NOOOO, MALIA. NOOOOOOOO.
This is so heartbreaking for so many reasons! Like, on the one hand, the fact that she died might not be a 100% terrible outcome, considering she seems to have killed the only family that she had and hurt several more people and likely would have spent the rest of her life feeling massively guilty, but still, she didn't deserve to die by any means, no more than Stiles would have deserved it while he was possessed by the nogitsune, or Scott when he stabbed Kira after Kate turned him into a mindless berserker, or Malia after she shifted uncontrollably and caused the wreck that killed her mother and sister when she was only a child. I just imagined Malia and Tracy bonding over their shared experiences, and the pack helping her transform back into a werewolf-- in fact, I assumed that the search for the necklace was so they could use it like the key that helped Lydia turn Jackson back-- and just generally giving her a support system, so this is just absolutely devastating on so many levels. Poor Malia! If anyone gives her a hard time for what happened, I am going to go off.
Next week: Malia informs the pack about what she saw of the Doctors, the Doctors go after Donovan in his jail cell, Liam goes to Jungle with Mason to be his BFF's wingman, Lydia presumably is hospitalized for her injuries, and the Nemeton comes back into play.
NOTES/SPECULATION/QUESTIONS:
-Fashion time! There were a two reworn pieces in this episode, from what I can tell. At the beginning, Malia is wearing the same tan/orange/pink floral blouse that she wore in "The Benefactor," and the purple zip-up hoodie Stiles is wearing was previously worn by him in "117."
-I'm going to get into this more in the write-up to follow, but does anyone else get the feeling that the Doctors can make themselves intangible? They often look like a glitchy ghost from Supernatural, but they can obviously be corporeal sometimes, because otherwise they wouldn't be able to touch any of their test subjects. It looked like they almost passed through the walls, though, which would be convenient for them, because then no one could ever hide from them. I don't know, they seriously give me the wiggins and I still have no idea what their goals are.
Am i the only one upset that Stiles wasn't the one to talk Tracy out of her night terror? i mean, think about how much experience he has in trying to tell dreams from reality from season 3b, so wouldn't he be the best to help Tracy? i dunno i just feel like that such a great opportunity that they missed
ReplyDeleteI'm actually glad they took the opportunity to shine the light on the girls, as Emily said... it was important for Malia to try and save Tracy instead of killing her, especially since we know that this was her first instinct. Besides, this really wasn't Stiles' storyline, it centred around Lydia, Kira, Malia, and Tracy. Giving the solution not only to a character who wasn't involved but especially a boy would have been a cop-out.
DeleteI don't really see how this was Malia's storyline? I mean, I'm not positive, but I'm pretty sure Malia never interacted with Tracy before that last fight scene. Besides, Malia & Stiles could've done it? I was just watching and Tracy's whole problem just reminded me so much of Stiles' in 3b that I couldn't NOT relate the two.
DeleteOn the surface, this is Tracy's storyline, dealing with her noticing strange events, starting to worry, trying to get help; then becoming somewhat aware that something is indeed wrong, that someone is doing something to her, changing her; then we have Tracy lashing out, seemingly still in her dream state; then we have Tracy wake up with Malia's help and getting killed. That storyline - or story arc - lasts two episodes.
DeleteIt is also Lydia's storyline, specifically in the first episode, where she meets Tracy, who is distressed, and tries to help her by getting Parrish to investigate Tracy's room and observe the house. This shows Lydia's character development - this is a new, mature Lydia, who uses her contacts and abilities to help out strangers in distress. Lydia's part of the storyline continues into the second episode, but becomes connected to Kira, who is sort of her sidekick, and later, protector. Here we also get development for Kira, who is shown as less willing to bend rules than Lydia (who just waltzes onto a crime scene), but finally finds the means to step up as a fighter by embracing her fox spirit - because she wanted to protect Lydia from Tracy.
Malia, meanwhile, gets involved in Tracy's arc in the second episode - she sees first hand the carnage Tracy causes (which is later paralleled with the killings of her mother) and draws the conclusion that Tracy needs to be put down. She wrestles with this idea as the episode continues, with Scott and Deaton offering her differing advice, and Tracy being quite explicitly paralleled to herself - a girl who accidentally kills her parent when she's not in control of herself.
So this whole plot basically becomes about Malia, too - can she control herself? If she can't control herself, is she still worth helping? Can she even use her own experience of being out of control, of wanting to kill, to reach out to Tracy and save her? That's why it has to be Malia, who is the first to throw off the paralysis and go after Tracy, why she has to see that her friend Lydia has been badly hurt by Tracy, and that Tracy is still dangerous, *without* knowing Tracy as a person. She doesn't have an emotional connection to Tracy, and she doesn't have emotional support to go through with not killing Tracy, but she manages it, anyway. Neither Stiles, nor Scott, nor even Lydia or Kira or a conscious Natalie can be there, because it is a decision Malia has to make on her own.
It's completely alright if you associate Tracy with Stiles, it's just that the show didn't - they associated her with Malia, and the whole narrative of this story arc is build around that. If you don't like that narrative - that's your decision. But it doesn't make the narrative bad.
I understand why you'd think that Stiles should have been the one to help Tracy, and you're right that her night terrors are very similar to what he went through with the nogitsune. In terms of the plot of the episode, I just don't think it would make much sense-- like Wendy discussed upthread, the focus of the episode was on the girls, as it was Lydia and Kira who figured out what was going on with Tracy, it was Malia who broke through the kanima venom quickly enough to go and track her down. In order to have made Stiles the person to find her, he would have had to break through the kanima venom before anyone else did, and he likely would have had to fight Tracy to get her to calm down like Malia did, which just isn't really that realistic, considering Stiles' physical abilities are much less than the others.
DeleteBut really, all of the girls had associations with Tracy-- Lydia, Kira, and Malia all know what it's like to be thrown into the supernatural world with no warning or explanation and to be extremely frightened because of it. Lydia and Malia both know what it's like to do bad things to the people they care about because they weren't in control (Lydia when she was mind-controlled by Peter, Malia when she shifted for the first time and accidentally killed her mother and sister), and Kira, it seems, will soon know that feeling as well, if the midseason trailer is any indication.
Otherwise, Wendy explained it much better than I ever could. I'm sorry that you didn't like that Stiles didn't have a more prominent role in helping Tracy, but I just can't honestly say that I minded. It seems as though Stiles still has a very big part to play in the ongoing story though, so if it's Stiles' story you enjoy, I don't think you'll be disappointed in the future. :)
I must confess, I hadn't thought about it as much as you two have. What you're saying makes perfect sense. I never thought the narrative was bad, just that there was an opportunity missed. And yeah, I agree, with the way they wrote the first three episodes, having Stiles be the one who 'rescues' Tracy would make no sense. I just think that it was an opportunity that the writers could've used, and they didn't, they made their own instead, that is probably just as good/better.
DeleteAnd I don't think you have to worry about Stiles, at least in the sense of him getting nothing to do: I'm sure the whole plot about Donovan will develop into his direction, and there's of course still Theo, who'll likely either try to win his trust or to separate him from Scott. The San Diego Comic Con was just now, and there was an interview with Jeff Davis, where he said the next episode especially has a lot of Stiles! So you can definitely look forward to that.
DeleteI'll probably have more thoughts later on, so just three quick things:
ReplyDelete- What happened with Donovan's eyes is called a nictitating membrane, or third eyelid. Birds, Reptiles, Amphibians, and some mammals have it; it usually protects from things like getting debris in the animal's eyes when in flight, under water, etc. So Donovan probably got some bird or reptile abilities, and since the Doctors just drilled into his brain (yuck) instead of injecting him with anything, I'm assuming they've experimented on him for some time, which might explain why he is so incredibly ragey (on top of probably already suffering from IED or something like that).
- I don't think Lydia was paralyzed, but simply lost a lot of blood in a short time, that's why she was so out of it (I kept wondering why people talked about her being paralyzed, lol. Thanks for explaining).
- I tend to think the Doctors don't phase in and out of reality, just that we see them mostly from the POV of their victims. If they use hallucinogens in additions to their drills and syringes and whatever they are injecting people, it would explain why the Doctors seem so freaky, and why the environment of the experiments always seem so distorted.
- That is seriously an excellent theory about Donovan! I didn't even consider that this could have been happening for a while, but that would make a lot of sense, actually, since they seem to have some reasoning for going after the people they go after. Eeeee!
ReplyDelete-I was leaning toward that as well, because it just seems silly to drive home that whole "Lydia's immune!" story line for an entire season, only to have her paralyzed by a kanima three seasons later. Lydia being in shock from the injury seems a lot more likely.
- Oooh, the Doctors using hallucinogens is an excellent theory, since that is actually how it looks, now that I think about it! (Not that I have a whole lot of experience doing hallucinogens, of course... ;)) Again, I didn't even think to consider that we were seeing it from the perspective of their victims, but that fits perfectly! And that's why I adore you, because you have such great ideas. :) Thank you for the comments!
Donovan: If this is really the case, his behaviour might even mirror Tracy's in a sense. From the first episode, I had the feeling that Sheriff had actually tried to help Donovan before, and that he was disappointed that Donovan had screwed up again. So Donovan, like Tracy, lashes out against someone who wanted to help but failed, only because he goes about it aggressively, it looks like he's just being a jerkass who wants to blame others for his own faults. (And tbh, I'm wondering if that is also true of Theo in some way, but for that we'd have to know more about Theo.)
Delete- Lydia: exactly!
- lol, me neither, though my meds sometimes have interesting side effects. Never seen anyone as a Steampunk villain, though. I honestly don't know if it will be the case, it just seemed such a simple explanation for how all of this is going down - I mean, think of Glow Wolf, why would he be so subservient to these guys? Even hurt, he could probably rip them apart. It seems logical that he's probably scared to death of them.
*blushes* Thanks, I wouldn't know where to put all those ideas if it weren't for reviews like yours adding some structure to them. XP
DeleteI read a meta that said that perhaps if they do end up revealing that Lydia was paralyzed by the venom that it could be because the Dread Doctors are again breaking the rules of the Supernatural and so she wasn't paralyzed last time because Jackson was a 'natural' kanima but she is this time because Tracy was an 'unnatural' kanima? Or it could've just been a plot hole... who knows.
DeleteYou guys have great ideas, so what do you think about this one: Donovan was made into something by the Dread Doctors, yeah? So once he presumably escapes from jail, he's planning on getting revenge and killing the Sheriff, right? But we know he somehow ends up in the Dread Doctor's 'lair' again with Theo (because that clip was in a trailer). And Theo's voice over in the trailer is saying "If you really want to hurt him, go after someone he loves." The trailer shows Theo with Kira and Malia, but I think he was talking to Donovan and telling him to go after Stiles, because Stiles distrusts him and then if Donovan just takes out Stiles for him, Theo won't have to worry about Stiles' sleuthing. So Theo is actually the one who influences Donovan to go after Stiles, and it wasn't just Donovan reacting to Stiles' sarcastic quip in the police department.
Maybe that was obvious and I just picked it up real late, but I have no idea. What do you guys think?
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Delete(Reposted to clear up some things)
DeleteThat's possible, too. Maybe it wasn't "supernatural" venom in a way, I mean - she was able to cross the mountain ash, which shouldn't be possible for most creatures. In addition, Glow Wolf had talons of a perfectly normal bird, so the docs seem to use non-supernatural animal DNA in their experiments.
Theo and Donovan: I definitely think you're onto something here. I'm not sure Donovan really escapes from prison, he might get kidnapped by the Doctors - they're around anyway, and from the trailers we know he sees them - and then Theo could free him and convince him to go after Stiles. Donovan probably is so screwed up by that point, he doesn't think rationally at all, and convincing him that this is somehow all the Sheriff's fault should be very easy. And for Theo, this is a great way to get rid of Stiles, without being suspicious, since everyone will think Donovan went after Stiles on his own account because he was mocked by him. Good point!
I'm with both of you ladies re: Donovan! I was actually thinking about this today when I was driving to my doctor's appointment, and I'm guessing that Donovan gets broken out of jail by the Doctors, which is why the synopsis discusses Stiles going after a fugitive. I'm predicting that the Doctors and/or Theo may do some more experiments on him before Theo breaks Donovan out and sends him after Stiles. Like Wendy says, between Donovan's pre-existing rage issues, his fury towards Sheriff Stilinski, and the trauma the experimentation has put him through, it wouldn't be hard to convince him to go after Stiles. For Theo, it helps him for the same reason Claire brought up, which is that he stops digging into Theo's (likely fake) history, PLUS it puts a rift between Stiles and Scott so he can wedge himself right in and better manipulate Scott. And for Donovan, he could easily see it as a "two birds, one stone" situation where he can simultaneously get back at Stiles for mocking him at the station and also get revenge on Sheriff himself by harming/killing the person he cares about most.
DeleteClaire-- re: Lydia and the kanima venom, I actually thought the same thing as you, which is that Lydia was paralyzed because Tracy wasn't a natural kanima, because she was man-made and/or some sort of werewolf/kanima hybrid. Then when Wendy brought up that she could have just been in shock from the injury, I started wondering if maybe THAT wasn't it, but I'm thinking either way is pretty likely! Or it could just even be poor acting choices on Holland's part. The "Is this a clue or is this a glitch/continuity error" game is one I'm constantly playing with this show, hahaha. :)
Seriously though, thank you both so much for the comments and the discussion! I seriously love it, and seeing that I had so many comments on these recaps has seriously made my day. You are both amazing!
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DeleteNo problem for the comments! I love your recaps, they're so entertaining to read and they always help refresh my memory so I can watch the next episode/make predictions/find clues.
DeleteOn an unrelated note, Teen wolf airs in 30 minutes but I can't watch it because I'm at work (I'm in China and it's 9:30am here) and I'm dying to watch it. Maybe I could sneak my laptop into the bathroom for 45 minutes?
Oh no, missing Teen Wolf is a fate worse than death, I'm sorry! (Okay, that's a little dramatic, but still!) I hope you get to watch it sooner rather than later, since I'm sure there are streams/downloads all over the internet if you need them!
DeleteAnd thank you for the compliments, that makes me happy! I often worry that they're wayyyyy too long and that no one wants to read anything that detailed, but since I have a hard time discerning what is important and what isn't, and you never know when Teen Wolf is going to make a callback to some detail later, I figure it's better safe than sorry! Glad to know that people are still interested. :) Plus, I figure it's easy to understand for people who can't watch, for whatever reason.
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