Monsters all, are we not?
Vanessa Ives sheds light from her past.
Here is our review of Penny Dreadful season 2 episode 3.
The journey from Daywalker to Nightcomer is not an easy one.
It is the story of a powerful witch.
A witch so strong she stopped Vanessa in her tracks.
The Nightcomers is almost thePenny Dreadfulversion ofWaiting for Godot.
Patti Lupone plays the role of the Cut-Wife with equal parts menace and regret.
Her eyes may blaze, but there is a history of pain behind them.
It is obvious, but in check.
At their first encounter, the Cut-Wife considers Vanessa with an aggression born of fear.
Lupone is a master.
Watching her intone the words of the old language, the audience feels the blood in their brows.
Vanessa has to have a thick skull to take lessons from the crone.
With every clipped answer she gets a crack on her forehead.
When shes asked a question, the Cut-Wife stabs a finger into her forehead.
Essay questions would probably cause a cerebral hemorrhage.
I have to say, Lupone brings a touch of running gag to this invaluable teachers aid.
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Leave everything you were outside this door.
Everything you are, bring with you, the Cut-Wife tells the exchange student at admissions.
Vanessa uses her mental scorpion claw to pick at the Cut-Wifes branding iron scar, in lieu of SATs.
Vanessa comes on screen in full grief and pain.
Shes suffered the tortures of the damned and it shows.
She makes the kid in The Sixth Sense seem like a cruise director.
Vanessa certainly is earnest, something Dorian Gray (Reeve Carney) knows the importance of.
She softens as grows harder under the older witchs tutelage.
There is little underplaying in this episode until Evelyn Poole shows up.
She betrays with a kiss and she makes the kisses look sweet.
She rewards loyalty and ambition with a whack on the ass.
Satanism and S&M have been connected as far back as the original Gardnerians.
One of the first things you have do with a demon after you conjure it is kiss its ass.
The sophisticated Evelyn Poole didnt strike me as a cow-tipper.
The special effects were effective and subtle.
They opened the season with a sequence showing Ethan (Josh Hartnett) come into bleary consciousness.
This serves to make it more claustrophobic when the two witches are surrounded.
It is also a comforting image where witches can be safe.
It becomes as liberating as it is sad.
We finally see where the Cut-Wife gets her name.
The Cut-Wife sees Vanessa as her successor and the student is willing and surprisingly able.
The abortion scene was brutal without being graphic.
Seeing that very woman later betray the Cut-Wife laid bare the hypocrisy the witch bemoaned earlier.
Pagans were early feminists.
The Cut-Wife points out that amenities such as medical care werent freely given to the women-folk.
Im not sure why the star that The Cut-Wife was branded with depicted female magic.
If the Cut-Wife were branded by her Satanist sister, shouldnt the point be facing down?
Vanessa and Evelyn encounter each other at the stand-off at the Cut-Wifes gate.
At the very least she should have recognized her energy.
After all, she did give her a matching psychic wound in the form of the branding.
Lupone is intensely focused on everything going on inside and out.
She is wary and aggressive at all times.
She has no patience and yet, she warms to her cursed visitor pretty fast.
The pair grow familiar, and not in the way of a black cat or spotted toad.
They are an ad hoc family.
Neither character has any family to speak of and neither wants to talk about it.
The closest thing the Cut-Wife has had to family since maybe 1644?
Vanessa learns all the basics of witchery: herbal teas, flower remedies and intuition.
But Vanessa takes a special shine to the Tarot, which is more an art than a science.
It is only a matter of time before Vanessa will have gone away from god forever by opening it.
The Nightcomers was written by John Logan and directed by Brian Kirk.
Rating:
5 out of 5
