Season two. Episode 5
A close-up of Vanessa’s eye. The camera pans out to showcase the profile of the doll made in her image.
Surrounded by her lifelike puppets, their faces aglow from candlelight, Mrs. Poole nails something into the forehead of her latest (Malcolm’s wife) while chanting in the demonic tongue.
“Mother.” Hecate enters. “Her hair.”
Mrs. Poole reaches to take the strands which Hecate has snatched from Vanessa.
“May I?” Hecate raises her chin, and her mother nods in amused pride.
The younger witch saunters over to the doll of Vanessa, while Mrs. Poole returns to her own task. Together, they intone over their respective works.
The chanting rises.
Gladys Murray bolts awake, screaming.
Back at the manor, Ethan, Vanessa, Sir Malcolm, Ferdinand Lyle, and Sembene are gathered in the drawing room. Realizing they know what their enemy wants, but not why, they agree to work every weapon, every superstition, every ritual to ward off the nightwalkers.
To a melodic score, the group begins to prepare the house against attack.
A witch appears in the mirror before Lyle. He throws a black crepe over the glass.
Vanessa prays in her room, alone, until two other witches gather at her sides. Feeling their presence, she runs to Ethan but then confesses to not being sure if they’d been real or just in her head.
“I wish I were going mad. Then they could lock me away and cut out the madness. Do you know the true path to freedom? Open any vein.”
When Ethan insists she wouldn’t do that, she agrees bitterly that God has a plan. Perhaps even to why Ethan has killed in the past.
“Whatever you’ve done,” she takes his hand. “I accept you. We are together for a reason.”
Josh Hartnett as Ethan Chandler and Eva Green as Vanessa Ives in Penny Dreadful (season 2, episode 5). – Photo: Jonathan Hession/SHOWTIME – Photo ID: PennyDreadful_205_1753
Back at the loft, Frankenstein argues once again with his Monster.
“Enough.” John slams his hands down on the work table. “I have lived with your evasions too long. Don’t think I can’t look into your black heart and see the machinations laid bare!”
After the good ol’ Doctor tells him to get lost, Clare grabs him by the collar. “Then you had a power, Frankenstein. If you had only used it kindly, what a different story we would be telling…I will see her.”
Indeed, he goes upstairs to where Lily was busy reading. As Frankenstein sits on the stairs, listening, John Clare tries to woo the reluctant woman.
“Ours is an exceptional history,” he tries, and there is a pitiful sadness as he recounts a false history.
“Let us start by being friends,” Lily offers. “I can do no other.”
During this long night, Gladys Murray continues to struggle, foam now forming at the corners of her mouth, while servants pin down her arms. Elsewhere, Mrs Poole continues working upon her eerie doll, fresh blood running down its face.
Morning finally comes.
As Chandler makes his way down a busy London street, he is accosted by Inspector Rusk. “Scotland Yard. I’d like a few words if I may.”
Meanwhile, Frankenstein takes Lily out to dine where they come upon Vanessa. Unfortunately, there is not even a flicker of recognition as Miss Ives greets the transformed woman.
Back at his office, the Inspector zooms in on the fact that Ethan had lived at the Mariner’s Inn. “There were many murders. All guests have been accounted for. Except for one Brona Croft, and one…Ethan Chandler.” The troubles started when Ethan arrived with his show, the Inspector notes.
“You’re a mystery.” And he wants to know Ethan’s real name…
#
While volunteering once more in the village struck by cholera, Vanessa again runs into John Clare. “Do you know you share the name of a dead poet?”
“Yes.” He chuckles. “Do you like poetry?”
“All sad people like poetry. Happy people like songs,” Vanessa smiles ruefuly through one of the show’s most beautiful and elegiac lines.
“I’ve always been drawn to John Clare’s story,” he continues. “He was only five feet tall. Sort of freakish. Perhaps due to this, he felt a singular affinity with the outcasts and the unloved…the broken…” And the two continue to bond over the haunting lines of I Am.
“And how are we to navigate the waters when they are so alien?” He asks at one point.
“The sea is waiting for you.” She later offers her hand for a dance. “Set sail.”
Dorian Gray paints the town with Angelique until they run into someone she stole money from in the past, and Sir Malcolm enjoys more time with Mrs Poole.
“I can honestly say I’ve never met a woman like you.”
“You have no idea.”
“What’s damning you tonight?” Ethan teases Ferdinand back at the manor.
The older man sweeps his hand over the relics spread across the table. “Here it is in Greek. And in Latin.”
“Lapus Dei,” Ethan reads. “The Hound of God.”
“I can’t endure dangling repetitions. It’s like a poem waiting to be rhymed.”
#
Angelique comes to Gray in her masculine clothes, and recounts the years of pain she has suffered.
“Do you think I don’t understand what it is to feel different?”
“I think I’m tired, Dorian. I’ve been fighting so long.”
“But you’re not fighting alone.”
Soon they are in each other’s arms as are Sir Malcolm and Mrs. Poole, and Chandler and Vanessa.
Gladys Poole awakens, grasping. In her room are two headstones. Upon them, the names of her children.
Hands reach out from below the floor.
Her children rise from out of the dirt.
Come. They offer.
All goes silent in her room.
Thunder, however, pounds in Lily’s, and she runs to Victor for comfort…
#
An interesting contrast can be seen between John Clare and Angelique. Both have suffered immeasurable pains due to physical masks. But one wallows in that pain, while the other strives to enjoy life nonetheless.
During the first season, my only real complaint was the lack of emotion. Everything looked and sounded great, but there was a disconnect with the characters. All that has changed this season. The relationship between Gray and Angelique is the most touching in a long time. John Clare might annoy me, but he makes me care, and I’m rooting for him to grow as a person.
Also during season one, I felt averse against what I figured was the inevitable romantic pairing of Ethan and Vanessa. Not a fan of these two must be together for no other reason than because they are the leads- a weak plot device used on too many programs. However, as tonight Josh Harnett and Eva Green sizzled together, I am warming to the idea of them.
Ethan’s cowboyisms, Vanessa’s craftiness, Brona back from the dead, Frankenstein vs his creation, Gray and Angelique, Malcolm and Mrs Poole, the witches…am loving this season.
Til next time.
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