Charmed Rewatch: Dream Sorcerer
Nov. 7th, 2018 11:04 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
impyDream Sorcerer is episode #5 and it's one of those episodes that I'm not sure is worth the trouble of me starting and then abandoning a normal recap. Which sounds like I dislike the episode and I don't. It's that it's a really simple set up for both the A and B plot, so let's get started.
First up, I'm not sure it's really fair to call the B plot a B plot considering it's given almost as much air time as the A plot, but since the episode isn't called Queen Bee or The Trouble With Lust Spells, we'll go with Prue's story as the A plot.
Subtle, Pheebs. Subtle.
We open with Phoebe making her way through Quake and she's hit on by no less than two guys (with more than a couple more eying her) and still has the audacity to later act like she needs a lust spell to get a man. Admittedly none of them really give off "give me a shot!" vibes and the second is clearly only there so that Phoebe can say she's no angel, she's a witch but still. She gets to Piper and Prue, who are seated at a table and watching a couple who have apparently been sucking face for the better part of an hour. A cute blonde waitress shows up with drinks and Prue does the whole "there must be some mistake; I didn't order this" and cue the cute but definitely creepy guy who sent it over. Prue sends her regrets with Skye, along with the drink, and not!Stephen Dorff takes the opportunity to hit on Skye who also shoots him down. Gee, this couldn't possibly end badly, could it?
Next we've followed Skye home and she's getting in bed and an hour and a half later the lighting has turned red and creepy dude is magically out of his wheelchair and dancing with a very confused dream!Skye. Just as your brain says hey, this is a Garbage song, not!Dorff assures us that if we die in our dreams, we die in reality and flings her off the building where she falls to her death. It's not safe for blondes on Charmed, truly.
Andy and Darryl show up in her apartment where Skye's death is most perplexing. Her bones have all been broken even though you'd think bruising and bleeding would be a thing but other than that whole being dead thing, she looks fine. Anyway, point is, her death is puzzling to Andy and Darryl is not thrilled because obviously this is murder and it's a weird one and you know how he feels about them by now. (He's not a fan of the weird cases, k?) Also? How in the hell did they know about Skye's death? It's not like work called them as Piper's ticked that Skye didn't show, not sad because she's dead. Did DS call them?
And now we should hop on over to the B plot, huh? Phoebe gets the brilliant idea to look in the BoS to see if there's a spell to help out her inability to get a guy. Which, again, we just proved was not really a thing. Piper, maybe, but not Phoebe. Still, she finds one and convinces Piper to cast it with her. Piper's intrigued but initially begs off because of personal gain and also because Phoebe comes up with this idea while Piper is at work but eventually she comes around. Either because she'd kinda desperate for a date with a non-warlock or ghost, or because she really does think it's a good idea to use her powers for something that gives a spell reversal. This all comes up when Prue comes home early (wearing the prettiest blue shirt and I'm in love) and overhears Phoebe mention the spell.
Busted.
Piper and Phoebe invite Prue to join them but she's got enough with Andy and the witch thing, not to mention working herself to death at Buckland's, so she passes. The other two, and Kit the cat, head up to the attic and we're given a list of what Piper wants in a man and what Phoebe does. Unsurprisingly, Piper wants someone romantic and kind and Phoebe wants someone sexy and a little bit dangerous (but who also recycles!). Piper essentially describes Leo and Phoebe hits pretty close to Cole, actually, but it's obviously not foreshadowing since Leo was not meant to last and Cole isn't a glimmer in anyone's eye yet. I do wonder if they looked back to this ep for Leo, though.
They cast the spell and when its done, the phone rings. They both run downstairs in hopes that it's for them, but it's for Prue and it's creepy bar dude who's somehow gotten her name and phone number. Again she shoots him down, but we don't dwell on this for long because Phoebe heads out to Quake to see if the spell worked, while Piper and Prue stay home. Prue head's up to take a long, leisurely bath that she falls asleep in... and yes, our Dream Sorcerer shows up and attempts to kill her. He plays with her a bit and it's really creepy the way he paralyses her and obviously enjoys making her powerless and no, there's nothing subtle about this at all. But it still works. He scratches her back and then goes to drown her but Piper wakes Prue up by knocking loudly on the door. For reasons that we can only assume are "to pad the run time", Prue doesn't tell Piper what happened even after she sees the scratches on her back.
Dreams shouldn't scratch or drown you, Prue.
Well. She does tell her. In the morning when the scratches are gone and the best she can come up with is "he knew what Mom told us to do in bad dreams!" Piper gently points out that Prue's worked more than 60/70 hours already this week and she's had three cups of coffee before even heading to work... on a Saturday. She does not point out that of course someone in your dream would know things you know, but maybe she figured it went without saying. Prue's not thrilled that Piper doesn't believe her but these are the risks you take when you don't run after your sister to show off the mystery cuts as soon as you notice them.
Before we get to Prue falling asleep at work, we have Andy dragging Darryl to Whitaker Berman's lab as he was dating the first victim. Oh, yeah, turns out that Skye is at least the fourth woman to die in her sleep but have injuries more in line with a jumper. Anyway, Whitaker's girlfriend was the first victim and Andy smells something fishy. Darryl is on board until he seems that a) Whitaker is in a wheelchair and b) he's got a fairly ironclad alibi. Andy, however, is more suspicious than ever because HOLYFRICK does WB act super creepy. It's interesting to compare the actor's performance as WB and the DS because as WB he's very monotone and as DS he's pretty much chewing the goddamn scenery. Anyway, Andy's pretty sure Whitaker did it because what's his research? Dream Leaping. Darryl takes a moment to wonder what the hell he did to deserve getting the weird cases (not said aloud, simply the look) and oh, honey, you have no idea what's coming.
Let's check on Phoebe and Piper, shall we? Phoebe finds and hooks up with Hans, a cute guy she runs into at Quake and then subsequently brings home for a night of safe sex. He runs into Piper and Prue the following morning as he walks into the kitchen, shirtless, and downs the milk (and spills it down his abs) before Phoebe turns up with his shirt. Ever thoughtful, he cheerfully tosses the glass milk bottle in the recycling bin but he didn't fucking rinse it. Also, glass milk bottles? Really?
Piper's dude of interest is Jack, a guy who seems to be a regular who orders the most persnickety and bland food known to man, but he shows interest and then turns out to have a sense of humor, so after Piper tries talking to Prue on the phone (and gets hit on more than a couple of times in the process), she agrees to go out with him. Phoebe has picked Hans up at Quake again and she's shown to actually kind of trying to talk herself, and Piper, into believing that Hans is anything more than a fun way to spend the night. It's one of the first big clues that Phoebe's not just looking for a good time but does want someone at least semi-serious, even if she's not quite ready for that yet.
On Piper's date she realizes that nothing she says or does will turn Jack off and she's not comfortable with that or the other guys hitting on her at every turn. So she goes home and gathers up the zillions of flowers she and Phoebe have been sent and waits for Phoebe to get home? Or Prue? I'm not sure which, honestly, as she's surprised when Phoebe gets home early. Turns out that Hans got handsy and Phoebe's ready to reverse the spell, particularly since poor Kit seems to have attracted all the attention of every tom cat in the area, too.
Even creepier with the later reveal that Kit isn't just a cat...
Back to Buckland's, where Prue has fallen asleep at her desk and the DS appears to try and kill her. Prue's eventually manages to snap out of it enough to stab him with the letter opener she's holding after kicking him in the balls. Ha! The phone rings and Prue wakes up. Turns out Andy just called to say hey and Prue is beyond thrilled to hear from him, though perhaps not for the reasons Andy thinks. They hang up and then someone grabs Prue's shoulder and she whirls around, letter opener in hand, but it's only Rex. When Prue looks at her hand, she notices there's blood. Dun dun DUN.
She calls Piper and Phoebe and begs them to look in the book because the DS is real and she's scared. They do, after initially trying to get her to not drive but failing because panicked Prue just wants to get home... even though he clearly knows where she lives.
Which is one of my problems with this. I'll allow the dream leaping thing because y'know, this is a show about witches and powers and why not let science make a leap that defies logic. But how does he find his victims? And what if he targeted someone who sleeps during the day? I mean, technically it's entirely possible that Skye wouldn't have fallen asleep til much later in the night/earlier in the morning and he can only hunt his victims while he's at the lab, drugged up and asleep, too. Which means you sleep during the day and you're fine. But I digress.
Anyway, the book is no help for once and then the phone rings, so Piper and Phoebe run downstairs after dithering about what the hell they're supposed to tell Prue: sorry, you can't sleep ever now? They finally answer and Prue's fading fast and Phoebe takes over to wake her up. Just as she declares a singalong is the answer, there's a crazy guy at the door. Now, Phoebe and Hans make a fair amount of noise and there's no fucking way that mama bear Prue wouldn't hear Phoebe's in trouble and not WAKE THE FUCK UP. But no, we're led to believe she'd just fall asleep while driving. DS appears and cheerfully does nothing as Prue crashes into a light pole. We leave her, mumbling about not falling asleep.
Commercial break!
We return as Prue is wheeled into the hospital and other than a bump on the head and muttering about not falling asleep, she seems okay. Until she falls asleep as soon as they get her into Trauma 1... and the DS appears again. He dresses her in a sparkly black gown and Prue tells him she's worn better because she's not going down easy.
Andy and Darryl rush the lab because Andy's sure that, even though it sounds crazy and he'll never be able to prove this, Whitaker is killing women in their sleep. So when they find Whitaker is out like a light, he demands the lab rats wake Whitaker up. Which gives Piper and Phoebe time to head to the hospital and then duck into Prue's restricted area room (and they're never disturbed, btw) and talk to her. Prue can hear them and Piper implores Prue to use her powers against this asshole. Eventually this registers enough for Prue to wait until the last possible second and then she sends him flying off the building. Where he falls to his death, causing Andy and Darryl to both wonder what the hell they did to deserve this.
Seriously, what did we deserve to have our cases end like this all the friggin' time?
We end the episode with Piper and Phoebe wheeling in a gazillion flowers for Prue (the ones their besotted dudes sent them) and promising to tell Prue all about it later... but it's okay because they reversed the spell and it's fine. Andy shows up and brings Prue her favorite: a cheeseburger and fries. Aww. True love.
So when the spell is reversed, Piper calls Jack who has no memory of her and Phoebe reports the same of Hans. While I'll fully believe Piper didn't do anything more than probably kiss Jack, Phoebe cheerfully tells her sisters that she and Hans had safe sex- a lot of safe sex. But she basically magically roofied him and he forgot all about her. This... is something that I'm not sure I really caught the first time, but definitely did on rewatches and I think they could have gotten away with it had Hans not had his freakout center on the fact that he could literally do nothing else but think about Phoebe. Which makes their initial encounter and his later inability to remember it really kinda gross. Considering Piper doesn't really even make it to her first date before realizing this isn't the best idea she's ever agreed to, it's not the best subplot ever.
This marks the first time magic has nothing, at all, to do with the threat in the A plot, and only a little in the B plot because Phoebe and Piper cast a spell they shouldn't have. Not the first non-magical antagonist as Tony in the last episode gets that honor.
Prue's age is said to be 27, but this episode was filmed/written/meant to come before the previous ep but that's not how they were aired. This I only mention because we'll later find out that Prue was born in 1970 and you'll do the math and think, "huh, she should be 28."
There's a really cute exercise scene at the start of the episode where Piper is trying to work out at home and it's not going well.
Piper : Uh, I give up. Two weeks and nothing strengthened but my temper.
Prue : Piper, here's the problem. You didn't read the fine print. See, it says right here. $19.95 for the video and twenty grand for the plastic surgeon.
This entire scene, including Phoebe appearing, is adorable and no, I will never get tired of pointing out the really cute/funny/whateverly awesome sisterly scenes. Never!
Prue for president.
When the new!Charmed acts like they're breaking new ground in regards to, y'know, the current climate, feel free to point out this gem:
"You rejected me and now you have to pay!" - our villain right before he murders a woman for simply not wanting to go out with him.
And Prue telling the DS to suffer was just fabulous.
More trivia, but while I kept referring to the actor as not!Dorff, he was also in Blade and I laughed absurdly loudly at that. It might also explain why he looked so familiar since I did, in fact, watch Blade in theaters way back when.
Even more trivia because I'm pretty sure I warned you, I'm a Charmed nerd. The dress Prue is wearing in the teaser and the dresses Piper and Phoebe are wearing for their disaster dates are from this promo shoot:
So 90's.
And if you've read any of these Charmed posts, thank you.
You're awesome.
First up, I'm not sure it's really fair to call the B plot a B plot considering it's given almost as much air time as the A plot, but since the episode isn't called Queen Bee or The Trouble With Lust Spells, we'll go with Prue's story as the A plot.
Subtle, Pheebs. Subtle.
We open with Phoebe making her way through Quake and she's hit on by no less than two guys (with more than a couple more eying her) and still has the audacity to later act like she needs a lust spell to get a man. Admittedly none of them really give off "give me a shot!" vibes and the second is clearly only there so that Phoebe can say she's no angel, she's a witch but still. She gets to Piper and Prue, who are seated at a table and watching a couple who have apparently been sucking face for the better part of an hour. A cute blonde waitress shows up with drinks and Prue does the whole "there must be some mistake; I didn't order this" and cue the cute but definitely creepy guy who sent it over. Prue sends her regrets with Skye, along with the drink, and not!Stephen Dorff takes the opportunity to hit on Skye who also shoots him down. Gee, this couldn't possibly end badly, could it?
Next we've followed Skye home and she's getting in bed and an hour and a half later the lighting has turned red and creepy dude is magically out of his wheelchair and dancing with a very confused dream!Skye. Just as your brain says hey, this is a Garbage song, not!Dorff assures us that if we die in our dreams, we die in reality and flings her off the building where she falls to her death. It's not safe for blondes on Charmed, truly.
Andy and Darryl show up in her apartment where Skye's death is most perplexing. Her bones have all been broken even though you'd think bruising and bleeding would be a thing but other than that whole being dead thing, she looks fine. Anyway, point is, her death is puzzling to Andy and Darryl is not thrilled because obviously this is murder and it's a weird one and you know how he feels about them by now. (He's not a fan of the weird cases, k?) Also? How in the hell did they know about Skye's death? It's not like work called them as Piper's ticked that Skye didn't show, not sad because she's dead. Did DS call them?
And now we should hop on over to the B plot, huh? Phoebe gets the brilliant idea to look in the BoS to see if there's a spell to help out her inability to get a guy. Which, again, we just proved was not really a thing. Piper, maybe, but not Phoebe. Still, she finds one and convinces Piper to cast it with her. Piper's intrigued but initially begs off because of personal gain and also because Phoebe comes up with this idea while Piper is at work but eventually she comes around. Either because she'd kinda desperate for a date with a non-warlock or ghost, or because she really does think it's a good idea to use her powers for something that gives a spell reversal. This all comes up when Prue comes home early (wearing the prettiest blue shirt and I'm in love) and overhears Phoebe mention the spell.
Busted.
Piper and Phoebe invite Prue to join them but she's got enough with Andy and the witch thing, not to mention working herself to death at Buckland's, so she passes. The other two, and Kit the cat, head up to the attic and we're given a list of what Piper wants in a man and what Phoebe does. Unsurprisingly, Piper wants someone romantic and kind and Phoebe wants someone sexy and a little bit dangerous (but who also recycles!). Piper essentially describes Leo and Phoebe hits pretty close to Cole, actually, but it's obviously not foreshadowing since Leo was not meant to last and Cole isn't a glimmer in anyone's eye yet. I do wonder if they looked back to this ep for Leo, though.
They cast the spell and when its done, the phone rings. They both run downstairs in hopes that it's for them, but it's for Prue and it's creepy bar dude who's somehow gotten her name and phone number. Again she shoots him down, but we don't dwell on this for long because Phoebe heads out to Quake to see if the spell worked, while Piper and Prue stay home. Prue head's up to take a long, leisurely bath that she falls asleep in... and yes, our Dream Sorcerer shows up and attempts to kill her. He plays with her a bit and it's really creepy the way he paralyses her and obviously enjoys making her powerless and no, there's nothing subtle about this at all. But it still works. He scratches her back and then goes to drown her but Piper wakes Prue up by knocking loudly on the door. For reasons that we can only assume are "to pad the run time", Prue doesn't tell Piper what happened even after she sees the scratches on her back.
Dreams shouldn't scratch or drown you, Prue.
Well. She does tell her. In the morning when the scratches are gone and the best she can come up with is "he knew what Mom told us to do in bad dreams!" Piper gently points out that Prue's worked more than 60/70 hours already this week and she's had three cups of coffee before even heading to work... on a Saturday. She does not point out that of course someone in your dream would know things you know, but maybe she figured it went without saying. Prue's not thrilled that Piper doesn't believe her but these are the risks you take when you don't run after your sister to show off the mystery cuts as soon as you notice them.
Before we get to Prue falling asleep at work, we have Andy dragging Darryl to Whitaker Berman's lab as he was dating the first victim. Oh, yeah, turns out that Skye is at least the fourth woman to die in her sleep but have injuries more in line with a jumper. Anyway, Whitaker's girlfriend was the first victim and Andy smells something fishy. Darryl is on board until he seems that a) Whitaker is in a wheelchair and b) he's got a fairly ironclad alibi. Andy, however, is more suspicious than ever because HOLYFRICK does WB act super creepy. It's interesting to compare the actor's performance as WB and the DS because as WB he's very monotone and as DS he's pretty much chewing the goddamn scenery. Anyway, Andy's pretty sure Whitaker did it because what's his research? Dream Leaping. Darryl takes a moment to wonder what the hell he did to deserve getting the weird cases (not said aloud, simply the look) and oh, honey, you have no idea what's coming.
Let's check on Phoebe and Piper, shall we? Phoebe finds and hooks up with Hans, a cute guy she runs into at Quake and then subsequently brings home for a night of safe sex. He runs into Piper and Prue the following morning as he walks into the kitchen, shirtless, and downs the milk (and spills it down his abs) before Phoebe turns up with his shirt. Ever thoughtful, he cheerfully tosses the glass milk bottle in the recycling bin but he didn't fucking rinse it. Also, glass milk bottles? Really?
Piper's dude of interest is Jack, a guy who seems to be a regular who orders the most persnickety and bland food known to man, but he shows interest and then turns out to have a sense of humor, so after Piper tries talking to Prue on the phone (and gets hit on more than a couple of times in the process), she agrees to go out with him. Phoebe has picked Hans up at Quake again and she's shown to actually kind of trying to talk herself, and Piper, into believing that Hans is anything more than a fun way to spend the night. It's one of the first big clues that Phoebe's not just looking for a good time but does want someone at least semi-serious, even if she's not quite ready for that yet.
On Piper's date she realizes that nothing she says or does will turn Jack off and she's not comfortable with that or the other guys hitting on her at every turn. So she goes home and gathers up the zillions of flowers she and Phoebe have been sent and waits for Phoebe to get home? Or Prue? I'm not sure which, honestly, as she's surprised when Phoebe gets home early. Turns out that Hans got handsy and Phoebe's ready to reverse the spell, particularly since poor Kit seems to have attracted all the attention of every tom cat in the area, too.
Even creepier with the later reveal that Kit isn't just a cat...
Back to Buckland's, where Prue has fallen asleep at her desk and the DS appears to try and kill her. Prue's eventually manages to snap out of it enough to stab him with the letter opener she's holding after kicking him in the balls. Ha! The phone rings and Prue wakes up. Turns out Andy just called to say hey and Prue is beyond thrilled to hear from him, though perhaps not for the reasons Andy thinks. They hang up and then someone grabs Prue's shoulder and she whirls around, letter opener in hand, but it's only Rex. When Prue looks at her hand, she notices there's blood. Dun dun DUN.
She calls Piper and Phoebe and begs them to look in the book because the DS is real and she's scared. They do, after initially trying to get her to not drive but failing because panicked Prue just wants to get home... even though he clearly knows where she lives.
Which is one of my problems with this. I'll allow the dream leaping thing because y'know, this is a show about witches and powers and why not let science make a leap that defies logic. But how does he find his victims? And what if he targeted someone who sleeps during the day? I mean, technically it's entirely possible that Skye wouldn't have fallen asleep til much later in the night/earlier in the morning and he can only hunt his victims while he's at the lab, drugged up and asleep, too. Which means you sleep during the day and you're fine. But I digress.
Anyway, the book is no help for once and then the phone rings, so Piper and Phoebe run downstairs after dithering about what the hell they're supposed to tell Prue: sorry, you can't sleep ever now? They finally answer and Prue's fading fast and Phoebe takes over to wake her up. Just as she declares a singalong is the answer, there's a crazy guy at the door. Now, Phoebe and Hans make a fair amount of noise and there's no fucking way that mama bear Prue wouldn't hear Phoebe's in trouble and not WAKE THE FUCK UP. But no, we're led to believe she'd just fall asleep while driving. DS appears and cheerfully does nothing as Prue crashes into a light pole. We leave her, mumbling about not falling asleep.
Commercial break!
We return as Prue is wheeled into the hospital and other than a bump on the head and muttering about not falling asleep, she seems okay. Until she falls asleep as soon as they get her into Trauma 1... and the DS appears again. He dresses her in a sparkly black gown and Prue tells him she's worn better because she's not going down easy.
Andy and Darryl rush the lab because Andy's sure that, even though it sounds crazy and he'll never be able to prove this, Whitaker is killing women in their sleep. So when they find Whitaker is out like a light, he demands the lab rats wake Whitaker up. Which gives Piper and Phoebe time to head to the hospital and then duck into Prue's restricted area room (and they're never disturbed, btw) and talk to her. Prue can hear them and Piper implores Prue to use her powers against this asshole. Eventually this registers enough for Prue to wait until the last possible second and then she sends him flying off the building. Where he falls to his death, causing Andy and Darryl to both wonder what the hell they did to deserve this.
Seriously, what did we deserve to have our cases end like this all the friggin' time?
We end the episode with Piper and Phoebe wheeling in a gazillion flowers for Prue (the ones their besotted dudes sent them) and promising to tell Prue all about it later... but it's okay because they reversed the spell and it's fine. Andy shows up and brings Prue her favorite: a cheeseburger and fries. Aww. True love.
So when the spell is reversed, Piper calls Jack who has no memory of her and Phoebe reports the same of Hans. While I'll fully believe Piper didn't do anything more than probably kiss Jack, Phoebe cheerfully tells her sisters that she and Hans had safe sex- a lot of safe sex. But she basically magically roofied him and he forgot all about her. This... is something that I'm not sure I really caught the first time, but definitely did on rewatches and I think they could have gotten away with it had Hans not had his freakout center on the fact that he could literally do nothing else but think about Phoebe. Which makes their initial encounter and his later inability to remember it really kinda gross. Considering Piper doesn't really even make it to her first date before realizing this isn't the best idea she's ever agreed to, it's not the best subplot ever.
This marks the first time magic has nothing, at all, to do with the threat in the A plot, and only a little in the B plot because Phoebe and Piper cast a spell they shouldn't have. Not the first non-magical antagonist as Tony in the last episode gets that honor.
Prue's age is said to be 27, but this episode was filmed/written/meant to come before the previous ep but that's not how they were aired. This I only mention because we'll later find out that Prue was born in 1970 and you'll do the math and think, "huh, she should be 28."
There's a really cute exercise scene at the start of the episode where Piper is trying to work out at home and it's not going well.
Piper : Uh, I give up. Two weeks and nothing strengthened but my temper.
Prue : Piper, here's the problem. You didn't read the fine print. See, it says right here. $19.95 for the video and twenty grand for the plastic surgeon.
This entire scene, including Phoebe appearing, is adorable and no, I will never get tired of pointing out the really cute/funny/whateverly awesome sisterly scenes. Never!
Prue for president.
When the new!Charmed acts like they're breaking new ground in regards to, y'know, the current climate, feel free to point out this gem:
"You rejected me and now you have to pay!" - our villain right before he murders a woman for simply not wanting to go out with him.
And Prue telling the DS to suffer was just fabulous.
More trivia, but while I kept referring to the actor as not!Dorff, he was also in Blade and I laughed absurdly loudly at that. It might also explain why he looked so familiar since I did, in fact, watch Blade in theaters way back when.
Even more trivia because I'm pretty sure I warned you, I'm a Charmed nerd. The dress Prue is wearing in the teaser and the dresses Piper and Phoebe are wearing for their disaster dates are from this promo shoot:
So 90's.
And if you've read any of these Charmed posts, thank you.
You're awesome.