Lie detecting witches have been let loose in Washington D.C., the hot-bed of betrayal and deception, in this week’s episode of Sleepy Hollow “In Plain Sight,” which set the series on more serious tone with little room for our weekly “craneisms” and lighthearted moments.
We start with Crane having a vision in Jenny’s new Washington D.C. trailer through the use of a a mystical Tibetan singing bowl she found during her travels. He’s looking for Abbie, but unable to find her until he comes across a little girl. Crane doesn’t recognize Diana’s daughter, Molly, in the vision since he has never met her before, but he feels a sense of familiarity about the little girl that he just can’t put his hands on.
Meanwhile, our villain Dreyfuss is destroying the wilderness by digging up the ground in his search for magical objects. He meets with a coven of witches and offers them a blade called The Dagger of Z’urn D’oragh, which kills whoever it cuts, if they hand over the witch’s stone, an artifact they have been protecting for centuries because it is there sacred duty.
They find out the truth rather quickly after meeting Dreyfuss though: that their coven leader Mole Dire was lying to them about the importance of the witch’s stone so they kill her by replacing her “lying tongue” with a serpent.
Back with our heroes, Diana leaves Molly to Nanny Claire after unsuccessfully attempting breakfast and burning the pancakes. I feel like I know just the type of character the writers are trying to turn Diana into, and I’m not resonating with her. While I think it’s great to portray that not all women have to be amazing home cooks, the awkward interactions between Diana and Molly are painful to watch. The two actresses just don’t have chemistry, and I don’t blame Molly for not wanting to talk to her mother, if I were in her position, I don’t think I would want to have a conversation with Diana either.
On a lighter note, we also catch up with Joe who was up all night mapping the passageways in the vault. Crane hilariously sneaks in and scares the daylights out of Joe and Alex because he doesn’t have a clearance band to get into the vault. It turns out that that the embassy doesn’t get many visitors, so Alex has been using the bands to balance a wobbly table.
Speaking of Alex, her character has become more insufferable, rushing off to check her Tinder mid-conversation. While I understand that it’s good to have a character with healthy skepticism, it doesn’t make sense for Alex to still be so defensive about the supernatural world. She was thrown across the room by a demonic Booth last episode, if that didn’t make her a true believer in Crane’s cause, I’m not sure what will.
Later on in the episode, she does have a moment with Joe when they realize that the name Ichabod Crane only shows up once in all of human history during the 1700’s. Joe immediately jumps to Crane being a time traveler. Alex, of course, is skeptical but still thinks something is fishy about Crane.
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Meanwhile Diana has a stab victim in the middle of the woods. The victim appears to be a young woman, but through Diana’s cell phone, it’s revealed that she is actually an old woman, hiding her age through glamour. Crane knows this woman because she visited Sleepy Hollow centuries ago. When Benedict Arnold deceived Washington’s army, a trio of witches known as the Dire Sisters, who could use magic to detect lies, took credit for finding out the truth. The dead women is their leader, Mole Dire, who was killed in the beginning of the episode. Crane figures out that she was murdered by the other two sisters and that witchcraft is alive and thriving in our nation’s capital.
Speaking of witches, Crane reveals to Diana that he was married to a witch in the car ride to pick up Molly. Crane asks about Molly’s sudden silence, and when he see’s a photo of Molly on Diana’s phone, he quickly realizes that it is the same girl from his vision earlier on in the episode.
When they get to the school to pick up Molly, Diana is less than thrilled to see Jenny with her daughter. Two older girls were bullying poor Molly, and Jenny, who was scoping out the area, stood up for her. Diana dislikes the idea of her daughter being brought into the world of Crane and his supernatural dangers, but everything changes when Molly looks up at Crane and says ‘hello,” breaking her silence.
They don’t have time for celebration though because they still have the witches to deal with. It turns out that the Dire sister’s home is also glamoured, once they find the location they head into the run-down home in search of the magical object that is keeping the sister’s young looking. They quickly realize that it is the golden grandfather clock, and Diana, stupidly, touches it and sets off a supernatural alarm.
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It’s not long before the witches arrive and have our heroes pinned to the walls. Things aren’t looking good, but it turns out that Diana’s stupid decision to touch the clock wasn’t so stupid after all. The clock shuts down causes the two sisters to become old and frail, easy for our heroes to quickly take down and save the day.
The episode ends with Crane figuring out, after they are unable to locate the witch’s stone, that someone is creating havoc in D.C. by trying to procure mystical objects. Crane also has to deal with Molly because it is confirmed by the end of the episode that she is, in fact, the next witness even though she is only a child.
On top of that: the headless horseman is back and making his way into Washington D.C.
Sleepy Head Highlight: Molly’s insightful dialogue during the end of the episode regarding her becoming the next witness, “It felt like a shadow walked over my shadow, like a friend was gone.” Some deep stuff for kid in elementary school.
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Episode Rating: 6.5/10
Sleepy Hollow airs Fridays at 9/8c on FOX.
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