Season 2, Episode 4: If these Woes Could Talk
Preface: This have been gnawing at me, the one-eyed crow is giving the one-eyed turkey from Bob’s Burger’s. Also Wednesday shall go down in history for the one who didn’t close a door, unlike Davinci who shall go down in history as the man who opened a door.
Episode four serve a large scale crescendo ending in cliffhanger to close out part one of season two. Love them or hate Netflix loves their two part season method. So a lot happens here.
First some good points…
Joanna Lumley is introduced as Wednesday’s Grandmama and as a fan of Ab Fab it’s great to see. She is a quite underused in the episode but given the gala sub-plot she’ll most likely be seen again. Though let’s circle back to her later.
While Jenna Ortega does excel at playing Wednesday, it’s Fester that has the more realized characterization that both honors and expands on the character. The show seems freer with Fester, less concern with how the character is portrayed. This actually makes him feel akin to other versions but wholly his own in this version. Also while the jokes may or not land they are at least feel like a black comedy, so Fester navigating around Willowhill on his assignment are enjoyable parts of the episode.
Also Fester’s fake name, Fester Dubois. Now to me, I understand that as A Streetcar named Desire reference which works because at the end the main chapter, Blanche DuBois, is taken to a mental institution.If this is the case it’s a clever reference but maybe they were not referencing Streetcar. Not mad if was a reference but this show reference a lot references. Fester Fiesta was cute… more of that and less zombie.
Again while Joanna Lumley is a great addition to the cast Wednesday and her generational issues with power dynamic feels so off in a Addams family version even that is just what Wednesday as a show does. Still in seeing Morticia’s relationship with her mother being fraught just bring it all back up again and brings up the question of Wednesday’s teenage rebellion, such as it is. Where does her push back against her mother come from? It seems like there something missing as Wednesday said she didn’t want to be a copy of Morticia. And yet she still maintains the family aesthetics and interests. The push back and teenager rebellion feels half-hearted and yet that is where some much of the drama lies. At least Morticia and her mother are at odds about Ophelia and parenting styles but is all feels wrong and hollow.
Also in the subject of interpersonal relations, Lo and Behold or maybe “Woe and Behold” season two does have a love triangle, of sorts. Enid is jealous that Wednesday is hanging out with Agnes more. It comes off as more immature and petty on Enid’s end as she wants Wednesday to hang with her on her terms and then insets herself into Wednesday late night shenanigans. Enid comes off as more entitled to Wednesday than anything else. But in a way it’s a triangle since it’s motivated for competing for Wednesday’s attention and friendship. Wheres season one Enid didn’t care that Wednesday was investigating with Eugene and rarely involved herself with Wednesday’s investigations, in fact when they invested the Gates mansion it was only because Wednesday tricked her.
So at last we can talk about the willow hill set piece. Because of Wednesday’s vision and the murders by murder of crows, Wednesday figures that an Avian is the reason for Enid’s demise. Wednesday investigation points her to a person called “LOIS” who is linked to outcasts who were at Willowhill which is where Tyler is being held as well as Laurel Gate and that damn zombie.
Most of this episode is a crescendo before the midseason break that serves mostly to get Tyler out of the hospital but to do that there needed the chaos of a Zombie rampage. The happenstance of it all is Wednesday not closing the damn door on the Zombie but the further happenstance is why is a Zombie in a hospital at all. If the normies of the world just didn’t know what a Zombie and if they had just thought he was just some weird guy with very poor hygiene that bits violently that would have been one thing but they use the word zombie outright. So they all know it’s a zombie so instead of putting the damn zombie in a cell with the security measures like Tyler’s, they just chain him to a wall and even give him a room mate, oh well, the plot necessitates the damn Zombie, so by cracky the damn zombie needs to break out.
Then there is the Avian who is Judi and LOIS is an acronym for an outcast experimentation with one of them being a mysterious woman, Wednesday’s aunt or Tyler’s mom are the leading theories on her identity. So the Avian is Judi, Dr.Fairburn’s assistance, and Fairburn actually works for her. Avian Judi was born a normie but through the magic of science she become an Avian and can controls birds, look out Tippi Hedren.
I suppose it’s a matter of escalation to see where this plot goes, because Judy got out but aside from revenge of Wednesday, the plot could build to be dropped or turn out to be just a revenge a thing since Wednesday ruined the experiments.
The episode ends with Hyde-boy knocking Wednesday out a window and if the show wasn’t called “Wednesday” one might be worried.
Even with all the plot elements and some stabs at Addams-esque comedy this episode tittering on being forgettable. Also the show wastes Thandiwe Newton and Christina Ricci.
And Tangent…
In an episode where seemingly there was no reason to include the concept of The Davinics, they bring up the Davinis. Apparently Judi’s mad scientist “normie” father wanted to be one but couldn’t handle the experiment. So he was able to take outcast traits from outcasts and transplant them into a “normie” but that begs the question what is the line of demarkation between a genius normie and regular Davinic or any type of outcast? Is it just telekinesis or are Davincis more like the materiakli of the Grishaverse or some kind of other matter manipulation. If they don’t say one lore base thing about this damn outcast type… I shall be very annoyed…
Also speaking of annoyance, the Quad/”The Link” of season two is not an improvement. It’s a weird cramped staircase opening still more wooden picnic tables with a food truck called “Tell Tale Cafe” So they replaced the Weathervane, which was a niche Charles Addams reference to yet another Poe reference.
