There was something worrisome that popped up immediately in this episode. Crane comes down with the common cold all of a sudden and that means that he will be sidelined for much, if not all, of the episode. Yes, this development would mean that the focus shifts solely to Abbie to carry the episode, but this put me on alert. As I've written numerous times in reviewing this show, it is the Abbie-Crane relationship and interplay that serve as the anchor by which everything is based. The show has rarely deviated from this path, trying various other combinations that don't have the similar feel of that core relationship.




With Crane temporarily out of the picture, the focus shifts to a story that addresses the Mills women. This is a haunting, spooky, tragic sort of history. It is one that has been only hinted at through the run of the series. I'd argue that it isn't crucial to see this history play out, but it forms the procedural aspect of the episode. So here it is: Tarrytown Psychiatric Hospital has encountered a rash of patient suicides. Abbie is sent to investigate and has Jenny for a partner not only because Crane has taken ill, but because Jenny has first-hand experience with Tarrytown Psychiatric as a former patient. What they find in the course of the investigation is quite revealing of their family history.


It's been long known that Lori Crane abandoned both of her daughters. This was eventually connected Lori's insistence that she did so to protect her daughters from supernatural forces. Here, Lori furthers the sacrifice she made for her daughters, opting to take on the demons haunting her by her lonesome. The brutal result of which leads to her suicide in the hospital and the complete destruction of any loving relationship between the sisters, as well as between mother and daughters.




It's an elegant plot to base an episode around. There were some very creepy and frightening visuals. Also, the actresses playing Abbie and Jenny were asked to bring forth the full emotional weight of what was happening to their characters. The yearning for Lori plays out differently for both Abbie and Jenny. For Jenny, having to confront the ghost of her dead mother is an intensely personal journey into some of the darker secrets of her own past.


Lori isn't the best mother that she could have been, but she left Jenny a complete psychological wreck. The most egregious act, to me at least, was the moment when Lori uses the family car to suffocate both herself and Jenny via carbon monoxide poisoning. For Abbie, she gets the better fate of the two sisters in avoiding any hospitalization, but she still understandably would miss her mother.



The issue with her (and really, Jenny as well) is that the connection between mother and daughters isn't fully realized. The major reason for that is because Lori is a ghost who floats in and out of certain scenes instead of being a firm presence that the characters can work with. The actual villain of the piece turns out to be Nurse Lambert, who isn't much of a presence either because she's just as non-corporeal as Lori is.






There is no overriding reason for what Nurse Lambert is doing. She might have initially been an instrument of Moloch to use against the Witness and her family members, but the story largely depends on what looks like an independent agenda. She only wants particular people to commit suicide, and well, she was successful on that point for the most part.



The unsubstantial feeling of the main plot also applies to the subplot with Katrina and Henry. Henry is losing some of his menace. The longer he sets plans in motion and sets up pieces that should pay off in the future, the harder it will be to take him as a serious threat. Katrina and her short relationship with Baby Moloch keeps with the episode's maternal themes, but there is no sense of payoff to it. The baby isn't much of a threat beyond spreading some black substance onto Katrina's skin.


This freaks her out so much that it looked for a moment like she would go through with the murder of a baby, albeit a demonic baby. The stinger is that the baby rapidly transforms into a young boy and the show avoids what would be a controversial move. I don't have too much hope that this subplot will resolve itself in a logical manner. It would be better just to move on to other things.