Category Archives: Channel Zero

Channel Zero – Season 2, Episode 5: “The Damage”

Syfy’s Channel Zero
Season 2, Episode 5: “The Damage”
Directed by Steven Piet
Written by Harley Peyton & Lisa Long

* For a recap & review of the previous episode, “The Exit” – click here
* For a recap & review of the next episode, “The Hollow Girl” – click here
Screen Shot 2017-10-19 at 11.23.14 AMMargot (Amy Forsyth) and Jules (Aisha Dee) drive away from the No-End House, seemingly free from its haunting horrors. They’re out again. However, they’ve got no idea that John (John Carroll Lynch) escaped with them. On top of it all, the house was feeding on their memories, they barely have any left.
Speaking of John, he’s out lurking around someone’s backyard, waving to the little girls. A concerned dad comes out to confront him, so John goes on his way. A cannibal, feeding off the memories of others, out in the real world.
When they head back to Margot’s place, the girls are both freaked out. Their memories all slipping away. Margot calls her mom (Corrine), they get to talking: mom reveals dad’s death by allergy, his actual suicide, helped them in a dire financial team, allowing them to keep the house. A terrifying sacrifice to save his family.
“I‘m sure he did it for us”
Screen Shot 2017-10-19 at 11.28.04 AMKnowing the truth doesn’t set Margot free, she’s weighed down by it. She doesn’t want to keep carrying the burden of knowing. Jules talks about the previous summer, after John’s death. She hated seeing Margot “getting attacked by a beast” mentally, in brutal pain; she admits to running away from it, her friend. Meanwhile, just outside, dad is lurking, and he’s very, very hungry. Ravenous, in fact.
Out of nowhere, Seth (Jeff Ward) arrives, warning Jules: “He‘s in the house.” Dear ole dad slips in while Margot sleeps. He’s feeding again, draining those memories while she rests. Memories of her old dog. And soon enough, a black puddle on the floor opens up, birthing an eerie looking thing. One which John starts tearing apart to eat. Seth cracks him over the head. They’re all worried about him being out in the real world.
Dad wants a family again. Margot doesn’t want to be fed upon anymore. They’re not sure what to do with this… creation. They’re not free from the No-End House if it follows them out into the world. She asks him to go into the basement until they can figure it all out.
But papa ain’t happy. And he’ll just get hungrier.
Screen Shot 2017-10-19 at 11.36.37 AMSeth tells Margot the only sure way to get John back into the No-End House is if she leads him. Fuck that. Neither she or Jules is willing to go back there. It could mean getting trapped inside, all over again. If the house disappears for another year, dad is left in the real world, and who knows what’ll happen then. So, they might have to “kill him.” A cruel twist of fate: losing your dad to suicide, then having to kill him, too. We also hear more of Seth, discussing his life back at the house; those people caged in the suburb were his family, he couldn’t hurt them and he locked them away for protection.
Poor Jules isn’t well, either. That fleshy orb knows where she’s gone, she made a connection with it. She’s starting to slip between reality and the world of No-End House. Can she actually ever escape? Or is the house a part of her, and the rest of them, now?
Upstairs, Seth and Margot allow John to eat more of the memory dog. He digs in, feeding. A disgusting scene. They sit and wait to see how it goes. She wants to see what her memories “feel like,” so dad lets her hold the dog’s head. He talks about their past, camping, happier memories. This is when John begins succumbing to the medication Seth put in his food. He must die again, as his daughter watches the death. In a way, it’s like a grim healing process. Because she only saw the aftermath before his suicide, now she sees the other side. They’ve got to get John back to the house before it’s gone, as well. Doesn’t help things when mom gets home in the middle of it all, and John is still alive. He gets up and starts throwing everyone around, chasing after his daughter.
Screen Shot 2017-10-19 at 11.48.56 AMJohn starts feeding off Margot’s memories again, as Seth grabs him off her. But this only leads dad to nearly jamming his finger through the guy’s head. Finally, Margot pleads with him, agreeing to go back to No-End House with him. And poor ole mom, she has no idea what’s been going on, waking up from being knocked out by her formerly living husband.
Now, Margot, Seth, and John head back to No-End House.
Across town, Jules is still trying to figure out her own life, the memories all faded and the real world blending with that of the house. She’s nearly driven mad, and she starts running down the street. But when she gets to where No-End House recently appeared to the others, it isn’t there anymore.
Screen Shot 2017-10-19 at 12.04.59 PMScreen Shot 2017-10-19 at 12.07.06 PMA favourite of mine, this episode really digs into all the disturbing memory stuff. Can’t wait for the finale. Not sure how it’ll end. But that’s what makes Channel Zero so damn good! “The Hollow Girl” is next.

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Channel Zero – No End House, Episode 4: “The Exit”

Syfy’s Channel Zero
Season 2, Episode 4: “The Exit”
Directed by Steven Piet
Written by Nick Antosca & Katie Gruel

* For a recap & review of the previous episode, “Beware the Cannibals” – click here
* For a recap & review of the next episode, “The Damage” – click here
IMG_0316Margot (Amy Forsyth) and Seth (Jeff Ward) wake the next day, after becoming intimate. Dylan (Sebastian Pigott) is still trying to show Lacey (Jess Salgueiro) the truth about what’s happening, that they’re actually married; however, that’s just us going on what he’s said, it isn’t necessarily true. Although currently his word, the strangeness of the No-End House, these are all we have to go on.
Of course it gets a bit nasty because she’s “not remembering anything” and she’s attacked him with his own knife. And out in the middle of the nearby neighbourhood is still that cul-de-sac, a group of people stuck inside. Everybody else is strange, like they’re all lost. Of course, they are, in various ways. “They‘re part of the house,” Dylan tells them, and they’re not keen on the group’s trying to leave. A parade of people follow behind them as they go.
Naturally, one of them is John (John Carroll Lynch), who’s looking paler, more awful than ever. He heads further after them while the rest of the neighbourhood stays behind.
IMG_0317On their way, in a field, the group finds a decimated man lying on the ground. He’s one of the cannibals, unable to feed and wasting away. JD (Seamus Patterson) questions Seth, as to why he hasn’t said anything about his peeling skin; the former threatens to expose the latter if he does say a word. Because something fishy’s going on, either way. Regardless if Seth is one of the doubles.
Soon they come across a corn maze. Within are people calling out, all kinds of them. They stop outside for the night and light a fire. Seth tells Margot he’s not who she believes him to be; “someone who doesn‘t belong.” He claims he lives in this place, or that he came there before and that living there can “be beautiful.” Meanwhile, Dylan ties JD to Lacey as he goes to check out noises in the dark. Then a woman comes from out of the darkness, digging her fingers into Lacey’s eye sockets before walking back into nowhere. This is when an angry, grief-stricken Dylan sees the withering skin on JD’s arm.
Dylan stabs him, telling the others to keep away. “He‘s not real,” Seth says. So Dylan lights the cannibal JD on fire while they all run into the maze. Yet Margot tells them all that Seth lives there, that he can’t come. But now they’re all divided, so many eerie things culminating at once. Not to mention surrounding them in the corn maze is a sea of lost voices, calling out to their loved ones.
IMG_0319IMG_0320Soon they’re all lost themselves. Margot can’t find Jules (Aisha Dee) anymore. Then she comes across one of those black pools, a person materialising out of it. She stumbles onto her friend touching another big, fleshy orb. She takes Jules away from it; simultaneously, we see the person sinking back into that black pool of blood-like substance.
Just as they get away, dad shows up to plead with Margot. He needs a taste. To tide him over, y’know. He needs something on which to subsist, a cannibal, a junkie. He tells his daughter to flee before anything bad happens, so she does, with Jules in tow.
John: “I‘m only a reflection that lived in you”
The remaining trio come to the No-End House. Where Dylan says they have to go on alone. He wants to burn the place to the ground. Inside they find more of the masks, only this time a bit different; each of their faces is a mask with a cracked open head, one hand hauling a dark face out from within, a visual metaphor of what we’ve been seeing already. They go further, into Room 2. The place goes dark, when the light returns a black pool expands across the floor almost like it’s alive, chasing them both, spreading in arm-like streams. Jules attempts jumping across to Margot. They manage to get out as the pool takes over the whole room.
Outside, Dylan’s not so lucky. John finds him, sinking a knife in his guts and ripping his throat open. Leaving him to die in the grass, as dad heads on towards his daughter.


Margot and Jules hear more of the Russian, an old teacher of theirs; the old woman writes DON’T GO over and over across a chalkboard. Except it isn’t an old woman, it’s the creepy man from the hallway, from Margot’s earlier visit. He tries hauling her away, but Jules pulls her back to the next room with her.
This takes them into the gruesome sounds of John’s death by allergy, a mask of his swollen face in front of the girls. He chokes and coughs and sucks for air. A nasty experience. Finally, they make it to Room 5. “We got this,” Jules assures her friend. In there is a bloated, ghostly version of John, in a living room but with a bathtub. He runs his hands through the water, silent. Afterwards he lurches for a hug.
But the girls escape, out into the open air. They don’t see the white flowers anymore, instead a normal dandelion. Dudes are out front trying to get in, so Margot and Jules tell them the house is “finished eating.” They head back to normal life, in a normal neighbourhood. As if none of it ever happened.
Problem is, John’s escaped, as well. He has come back to the world. That can’t be good.
IMG_0326Oh, this is probably my favourite episode now! Wow. Just incredible how Channel Zero consistently ups its game. And here I was concerned there was no way they’d be able to do better than Season 1. Pfft. Amazing.
“The Damage” is up to bat next week.

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Channel Zero – No-End House, Episode 3: “Beware the Cannibals”

Syfy’s Channel Zero
Season 2, Episode 3: “Beware the Cannibals”
Directed by Steven Piet
Written by Don Mancini & Erica Saleh

* For a recap & review of the previous episode, “Nice Neighborhood” – click here
* For a recap & review of the next episode, “The Exit” – click here
Pic 1Jules (Aisha Dee) keeps seeing the room with huge, white, semi-translucent orb. She touches it and something all but reaches out. She flashes back to her childhood briefly. Then, nearby, her sister grows out of the memories in one of those black pools we saw last episode. Last thing he sees is the thing in the orb, reaching out.
Jules and Seth (Jeff Ward) are both awake now, as the former wants to make sure Margot (Amy Forsyth) is safe. Speaking of Margot, she’s waking to another day at home with her father John (John Carroll Lynch), as well as a strange house. Her closet’s become like a hallway to… nowhere, or who knows. She closes it and heads out into the hallway, hearing her father talking to himself, practising his “Morning, Margo!” He has to seem like a real person, her real dad. Spooky.
Meanwhile, J.D. (Seamus Patterson) is burning in a fire, after his double killed him. All the eerie nastiness is lurking just beneath the surface. Like dad, and his cannibalism.
Screen Shot 2017-10-05 at 11.18.55 AMOur mysterious drifter is Dylan (Sebastian Pigott), husband to Lacey (Jess Salguerio). He has her strapped into a chair, trying to get her to remember her life. But in this house, there’s pictures of her and another man, married. Troubling. Is that part of the illusion of No-End House? Or, is Dylan the one feeling its illusory pull?
In the meantime, J.D’s double arrives to see Jules and Seth. Uh oh. I wonder if he’s a cannibal, too. I’m sure he is. That leads me to also wonder if he’ll try and kill/eat his original self’s friends.
The hardest part for Margot now is dealing with her father being back, how he left them, killing himself via allergy. She talks about how death feels distant until it’s there, before your eyes. She wonders how it felt, what he was thinking, everything. Then she finds mom’s face in the garbage. Suddenly, her memories of her mother have no face. Margot wants to go for a walk, but dad won’t let her. Instead she goes to her room, terrified. She can’t get out of there, either. The windows are sealed, they won’t even break. She’s trapped in that house. Afterwards he admits that what he eats is in the trash, he thinks it’ll make him “lose control.” And this means he must be fed, some other way.
At the empty home, J.D. version 2 is talking with Seth and Jules, trying to figure out where the No-End House has gone. But Jules needs to make sure Margot is okay first.
Screen Shot 2017-10-05 at 11.26.23 AMWhen John goes nuts, it prompts Margot to go into her closet. When she pushes through the clothing she’s underwater, swimming up to the surface. And after a moment, she emerges from the pool in the yard, as dad watches from the window. Margot runs down the street, only finding odd people. Then J.D. the 2nd, Jules, and Seth watch John chase his daughter, fighting violently with a neighbour before jamming the hose into the guy’s face, blood spurting everywhere.
Margot runs into a nearby school, looking for refuge in its dark halls. She only finds a woman shushing her endlessly who falls to the floor, repeating something similar to Russian. In fact, there seems to be Russia everywhere. She runs deeper into the building, where she meets Jules. They hide from John in a classroom. Soon, Seth and J.D. start making noise, which sends the father to investigate. For now, Margot’s safe.
“You know when you loose a tooth, and you, like, push your tongue in the spot where it used to be? There‘s this mother-shaped hole in my brain. I mean, I know I have a mother, but I can‘t remember anything about her. It‘s like he took the memory and ate it.”
Lacey’s husband (Sean Skene) arrives at home to find his wife tied to a chair, Dylan pointing a gun. But this husband is tough. Until he has a knife planted in his neck. A gruesome scene, as she watches him die. Her supposedly real husband tells her not to worry, it’s not real. Down the road, Seth and Margot see what they believe is “the edge of the world” – on the horizon is an inky, cloud-like formation, dark and shadowy. This is the border of the No-End House’s dreamworld, whatever that means. In a clearing at the middle of the border, it looks like the No-End House standing in the distance.
Screen Shot 2017-10-05 at 11.45.58 AMOn the streets, Jules is searching for Margot. So is the father; and he’s hungry. When Margot and Seth go to her, John’s coming, too. They have to flee. They go into a house’s garage, discovering a hole in the floor where they might drop dad inside unknowingly, like a pitfall for a bear in the woods. While he tries apologising to Margot, she understands he’s essentially feeding off her memories, even just as he talks, let alone his dietary habits. For now, they manage to let dear ole dad slip away into the hole under the garage.
When the friends get back to their hideaway, they find Dylan. He explains a bit more about the No-End House, what’s happening, the hungry memories. People in the neighbourhood rambling, they’ve been inside too long. The message from the wall in No-End House “Beware the Cannibals” becomes very clear to them all. He says some people aren’t “ready to leave.” Such as his wife Lacey. He wants to get her back to the real world, hoping it’ll fix her. The No-End House moves, to stay out of sight long enough people become “so hollow” they forget to even look anymore.
How will they escape?
During the night, Jules has more visions of the orb, of whatever’s inside. She dreams of her family, her sister. Suddenly there are several black pools around her, growing. Holy shit.
That’s not all. The second J.D. is picking his skin off, he’s falling to pieces. This also makes me wonder, is Seth also a double, a cannibal? The way he asks J.D. if he’s “falling apart already” and how he looks next to Margot in bed certainly makes it seem that way.
Screen Shot 2017-10-05 at 1.08.41 PMAnother fantastic episode, this season is exceeding expectations. Just can’t wait for more macabre, unsettling plot. “The Exit” comes next week.

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Channel Zero – No-End House, Episode 2: “Nice Neighborhood”

Syfy’s Channel Zero
Season 2, Episode 2: “Nice Neighborhood”
Directed by Steven Piet
Written by Harley Peyton & Mallory Westfall

* For a recap & review of the Season 2 premiere, “This Isn’t Real” – click here
* For a recap & review of the next episode, “Beware the Cannibals” – click here
Pic 1We open on Jules (Aisha Dee) having a weird dream, underwater in a bathtub. She seems scared. But she wakes up on the couch to a normal day, though she’s visibly unsettled, at least a little. She and her family talk about Margot (Amy Forsyth). She’s acting strange. Cut to her crying in her car, trying to compose herself. Then she’s at Margot’s house that morning.
Flash forward further to when they came out of the No-End House. They discuss what happened in the rooms after they separated. Jules went into Room 5 where there sat a large orb on the floor. She touched it, the thing lit up, sounding like voices were coming from inside.
When she goes to Margot’s place later in the morning, she finds her friend and her previously dead father John (John Carroll Lynch) making breakfast. Like he’d never ever died. So, where do the girls go from here? That’d be one hell of a head trip.
Pic 1ASeth (Jeff Ward) and J.D. (Seamus Patterson) meet up outside, in the daytime, talking about their experiences inside. They don’t see the girls there, obviously. Poor J.D. is tripped out bad, having seen the masked man in a second room, where he removed it to reveal another mask underneath, worried about seeing his own face in one of the masks. He’s headed home while Seth wants to make sure the girls are fine.
“I‘m not waiting around, that‘s what they‘ve got Uber for.”
“What, to get away from haunted houses?”
John doesn’t remember dying, even if Margot’s been without her dad for a year. There’s also a sense of everything having been affected, from Margot’s perspective. Right down to too many eggs in the fridge. She and Jules try not to let their heads explode. Whereas John can’t taste anything. Ah, things are already getting dicey.
Then there’s our Mysterious Drifter (Sebastian Pigott), trying to find a way out. His story’s an enigma, as is the place where this town exists; or is he existing in some other timeline, in another place? He meets a woman, one he knows. Afterwards, he blows her brains out, and a guy bringing his garbage to the curb doesn’t even notice.
Meanwhile, Seth is in a strange place, too. He comes to a cul-de-sac, where an island at the middle is blocked off with an iron fence all the way around. Within it are people who know him. Seems like coming out of the No-End House was, for everyone, entering another parallel universe. Is it ONE universe? Or various universes, for each of them? J.D. sees himself through a window, a girl with him as they close the curtains, then the other him opens the door to let him in.
At the Sleator home, Margt heads upstairs. When she looks outside, she sees the same two cyclists riding by twice. Like a loop. Downstairs, John tells Jules: “I‘m not supposed to be here.” He does have a gap in his memory. He also has doubts about Jules’ love for her close friend, an upsetting conversation for her.
Pic 2Jules shows Margot that instead of marigolds in her backyard, there are white orchids. No-End House somehow alters space and time. “What if this is Room 6?” Jules wonders. Couldn’t be, right? “This is not your home, and that is not your dad,” she tells her friend, echoing the Talking Heads in a much creepier sense. After that Margot reveals she knows her father committed suicide, after he had an allergic reaction previously then took more of the same stuff again before he died. However, none of it matters now. She believes he’s alive. He’s there, physically. She can’t seem to deny it. And the whole thing’s tearing the two best friends apart, bringing up the recent past with a lot of angry sadness.
The drifter is on the intersection of Ash and Oakley, the brief glimpses we saw in the first episode. He’s looking for the girl, Lacey (Jess Salgueiro), whom we witnessed running from another man. We also know the drifter’s in that same place, with the white orchids. He finds Lacey in one of the houses, but she says she’s home, that she doesn’t know him. He tells her this house, the neighbourhood is “not in our reality, we don‘t belong here.” That they went into No-End House together, she didn’t get out. He’s her husband.
Jules finds Seth again. The No-End House is gone, not where it was when they went inside. At home, J.D. sits with himself, the girl, they have a drink. The other him explains a few things, or at least discusses them. Says he’s made of J.D’s own memories, what him HIM. The subconscious cobbled together from bits and pieces. At the same time Margot’s hanging with dad, going from present to past as her own memories shape what she sees, too.
In another part of town, Jules and Seth hole up in a house for sale. When she wanders upstairs, she comes across the orb again. Like her dream. She touches it, the light appears, the voice-like sounds. Something inside moves to her hand, like there’s a person trapped.
Screen Shot 2017-09-28 at 2.02.30 PMJ.D. ponders whether his double is there to help. But things get nasty, real quick. The other him cracks his head with a bottle. Continually whacking until there’s nothing left, just blood flicking everywhere. Yikes. What happens when a real person dies in the No-End House universe? Does it mean real death?
While Margot sleeps, dad seems to be sucking the memories out of her brain. Thoughts of her mom Corrine (Kim Huffman), specifically. They fill his mind. Simultaneously, a black, blood-like pool seeps from a crack in the floor of the basement. John is growing another version of Corrine out of his daughter’s memory. She’s birthed from the bloody pool out of the concrete. John goes down and tears off one of her arms. Before eating some of the meat. Abstract life becomes real, only to be consumed by an unreal man. Hideous, haunting.
Screen Shot 2017-09-28 at 2.16.18 PMNow give us “Beware the Cannibals” before I scream!

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Channel Zero – No-End House, Episode 1: “This Isn’t Real”

Syfy’s Channel Zero
Season 2, Episode 1: “This Isn’t Real”
Directed by Steven Piet
Written by Nick Antosca (based on the story by Brian Alan Russell)

* For recaps & reviews of Candle Cove episodes, click here.
* For a recap & review of the next episode, “Nice Neighborhood” – click here
COVER1We open on a neighbourhood, like any other. At the side of one house is a girl named Lacey (Jess Salgueiro), crying, looking petrified. Soon she walks out to the street, looking all around her, paranoid. And then we see the end of the street, where there stands an eerie, dark house. The girl walks quickly towards the place. Suddenly, a man is behind her. She runs, so does he. When he catches her, he tosses her hard into the ground, knocking her out. “Why‘d you do this to yourself?” he asks. We see what looks like deep cuts in her arm reading: THIS ISN’T REAL.
Cut to an ordinary house, a family. John Sleator (John Carroll Lynch) and his daughter Margot (Amy Forsyth) when she wasa little girl, growing up with dad at her side. Although a darkness looms over them clear from just about the minute we’re introduced. Now Margot’s older. She and her friend Jules (Aisha Dee) are the average American teens, trying to figure themselves and their lives out. Mom Corrine (Kim Huffman) is the typical mom, looking out for her daughter, taking care of business at work.
Out of nowhere, both the girls get a video on their phone: images of the dark house’s door, a blooming flower, morphing into other sinister shapes. They pass it off, just some stupid viral shit. They go to the bar, meet a couple guys for drinks, pool. One of them brings up the No-End House. “It just shows up,” he tells them. Now it’s in their town. Jules figures it’s a “super bougie haunted house” but he insists terrifying things happen inside, even disappearances. Although they all laugh.
Pic 1Later we discover more about Margot. Her father died, complications from medication and allergies. She found him, too. All puffed up, sitting there dead. Worse, she blames herself for not being home on time that night, worrying that she might’ve been able to save him.
That night Margot sees the weird video on her TV. The No-End House appears, numbers, images, street names. Just as quick as it came, it’s gone. Cryptic messages calling her to the place. So, of course, they all hop in the car. Off they go to find the place together, the girls, Seth (Jeff Ward) and J.D (Seamus Patterson). When they arrive there are people everywhere, like a true carnival ride. Someone stumbles out and vomits, one guy heads in with a backpack on as if he’s heading on a journey. All kinds of people, lining up to go inside.
Screen Shot 2017-09-21 at 1.28.35 AMFaster than expected, they’re in. They come into a room with some 1920s-style music playing through crackling speakers, as well as containing a bunch of moulds that look like they’re fashioned as their faces. Everybody has one corresponding to them. Guy with backpack seems to know more about this place than anyone, having told J.D. he’s been “looking for” the house. Hmm. And naturally, the lights go out.
When they come back on the music’s distorted. The moulds of their faces are now cracked in half, moulds of hands breaking them open; all except for J.D’s face. Behind them a wall opens up revealing a passageway. They stumble into a new room, almost like an empty pool but still a room, a couple doors.
Except they’re locked inside. In the corner is someone wearing a black mask, he circles the group. Until finally coming around to Margot, leaning in and whispering to her. And it visibly affects her. When the lights flicker, there’s a smear of blood running along the floor, into the wall. This sends one girl from their group running back out.
“Welcome back, Martian.”

 


But Margot must go on, compelled by the words of the masked man. She heads in further, through a revolving door and into a hallway. A creepy man lurks partway through, half-laughing, half-screaming. She makes it past, though finds herself in a room like in an attic. She sees the morphing visions, her father. Then she goes into the next room, which leads her back to where she found her father on the couch. His corpse is there, puffy, grotesque. While Margot watches home movies playing on the TV, the sounds repeat, her father’s voice loud, calling to her. His corpse comes alive, trying to grab her, standing and reaching out for her, as if wanting a hug. And he does grip her in his arms, holding her against his bloated body while she struggles, repeating: “I want to go home.” But she’s reminded: “You have to go through to go home.”
She makes it through to find Jules outside. They can’t find the guys, assuming they went on home without them. After a long night comes morning, following a walk home when the car won’t start. It’s almost as if Margot’s been cleansed, having confronted part of her darkest fears. However, at home, life isn’t exactly the same as before. From the kitchen she hears the happy whistling of her father, cooking away. Like he never ever left.
Screen Shot 2017-09-21 at 1.45.19 AMMan, I loved Channel Zero‘s first season. This is already shaping up to be just as interesting. Love these stories, and love how the directors bring out the visuals so well. Some of this episode was downright creepy as fuck.
“Nice Neighborhood” is next week. I’m already dying.

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Channel Zero – Candle Cove, Episode 6: “Welcome Home”

SyFy’s Channel Zero
Season 1, Episode 6: “Welcome Home”
Directed by Craig William Macneill
Written by Nick Antosca, Don Mancini & Harley Peyton

* For a review of the penultimate episode, “Guest of Honor” – click here
screen-shot-2016-11-16-at-2-53-53-am
Here we are at the end of the road to Candle Cove.
Mike Painter (Paul Schneider) sees himself laying in bed with his brother Eddie (Luca Villacis). They read about Long John Silver, as Eddie talks about understanding “why he does what he does.”  Then Mike is in a field with Eddie. He talks about how the other kids, the bullies, let out the bad spirit in him. All the still living brother wants is his daughter Lily back. Eddie becomes the Tooth Child, stuffing a hand down Mike’s throat.


Still through the television, Lily speaks to Mike in his hazy state underneath the static. At the same time, Amy Welch (Luisa D’Oliveira) and Gary Yolen (Shaun Benson) search for Francis Booth (Marina Stephenson Kerr). They head into the woods to find her from where last she was seen. They hear someone walking in the trees nearby, Alex Fry (Keenan Lehmann). Seconds later they see Mrs. Booth, as well as her band of creepy kids, which include Gary’s own children Dane and Katie. He tries talking to them and tells the kids about their mother’s death. Yet the other children approach with knives in hand. Eventually he convinces the two to walk away with him.
Mike and his mother Marla (Fiona Shaw) argue about what’s happening next. He tells her that it involves giving himself over to Eddie a bit in order to get his daughter back. When Mike’s estranged wife Erica (Kristen Harris) shows up things get worrisome. She wants to know where Lily is, right now. It all sounds insane to Erica when Mike says she’s in a place “where only I can go.”
Further into the forest Amy discovers a small trailer. Inside is Alex, hiding in a corner. Silent and eerie. So she heads out to try tracking Francis down once more, that tricky old broad.
In the meantime, Mike heads out to the Crow’s Nest with Erica. They see Lily lying in a clearing, as the Tooth Child – Eddie – appears from the bushes. It reaches a hand out towards Mike, who goes to it. He kneels in front of the thing, as it puts a hand inside his mouth to take the toll which needs paying.


After Mike passes out, he wakes… somewhere else. A television set plays static. Outside, a storm crashes with thunder and lightning. Mike goes out into a hallway, a familiar one we saw in a flash during the first episode, and he tries the various doors until one opens. There he sees students sitting in their desks, bloody little faces and hands. They hiss at him. So back out he goes, as one would. Then at the end of the hallway something appears. It wears a wide brimmed hat, making growling, animalistic noises in the dark. It shakes free the hat and whatever else is has on. It slams against the walls, violently. When the thing runs at Mike, it disappears into thin air.
But something else is still at the end of the hall, made of straw or wicker, and it burns, walking towards Mike with a head full of fire, beating hands against its face. That creature too retreats into darkness leaving Mike by himself. He goes on down the hallway to another room. This one is covered in skin, hung and dried from the ceiling. Some fresher, some much older. Further in he sees Eddie lying in bed. Not only that, the Skin Taker is there, the other creature from the hall. A vile creature. “He‘s part of me,” Eddie explains. The Skin Taker (Olivier de Sagazan) rips its face open to take Mike “inside.”
He finds his daughter in that dark hallway, pleading with his brother to let them go. Eddie says he made that place “for both of us.” And he’s pretty pissed that Mike killed him. He wants to trade places and go back to the real world. So Lily crawls through the television into reality, free from the clutches of Eddie and Candle Cove‘s influence.
What of Mike? Eddie prepares to go back home, and Mike tries to keep him there. He wants to finish their never ending card game. Can he manage to get himself out of that terrifying place? Can he thwart Eddie’s plan of becoming him, to be the one that “everyone trusts” with their kids? Yikes.

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Marla ends up confronting Francis, who taunts her over Eddie. The two women trade jabs. A really great scene for Marla, the way she describes Francis and her ugly side. Things don’t play well for Marla, once Mrs. Booth starts hacking into her. Lucky, though: Amy comes out of the forest and shoots the crazy old bitch, calling an ambulance for Marla. What a wild little moment there!
The card game is finished. All those cards laid out. “You can do good in the world,” Mike tells his brother. But Eddie’s been lost so long in the world of Candle Cove, there’s no changing his mind.
A few months later, life moves on. Amy has stepped up as Sheriff, she gives a press conference concerning Francis Booth and her vicious crimes, cluing up the Iron Hill Murders of 1988 after nearly three decades. Gary and his children try to pick up and begin again fresh somewhere new. Marla is alive and well, Erica and Lily set to head back home.
On the television at grandma’s house Lily sees Candle Cove playing suddenly, and dear ole dad comes in to shut it off. Only he isn’t dad anymore, is he? Or is he even alive?


Now we switch back to those few months prior. Marla stumbles onto her son lying in that field. We go back to see that Lily whispered something to her grandmother after getting home safe. And when she rushed out, heading for the field, it was to hold Mike’s airways shut, to suffocate his body in an effort to keep Eddie from returning.
Stuck together, the boys are left in that dreaded place with the Skin Taker, forever to live out their days with only themselves as company. In the real world, Marla goes on knowing that Mike was a good man, and now his daughter has a chance to live a normal life free from the reach of Candle Cove.

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What a fucking fantastic finale! It truly clued the season up nicely, the storyline and its plot weaved nicely together right to the finish. Very happy. Also, super excited to see the next season that’s already done filming, I believe. Looks intense, and judging by this season and its quality we have much to enjoy.

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Channel Zero – Candle Cove, Episode 5: “Guest of Honor”

SyFy’s Channel Zero
Season 1, Episode 5: “Guest of Honor”
Directed by Craig William Macneill
Written by Katie Gruel & Mallory Westfall

* For a review of the previous episode, “A Strange Vessel” – click here
* For a review of the finale, “Welcome Home” – click here
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With Jessica (Natalie Brown) face down in a kiddie pool, stabbed to death… by kids… Amy Welch (Luisa D’Oliveira) must deal with the fallout. The scene is gruesome, even for someone in law enforcement to see. What I dig about this scenario is that the writers aren’t afraid to make characters expendable. And certainly with only this and another episode left there’s a sense of urgency, in all manners of speaking.
Mike Painter (Paul Schneider) is back at his mother Marla’s (Fiona Shaw) with his daughter Lily (Abigail Pniowsky). He’s having a little tooth problem, too. But the news about Jessica comes and devastates him. Amy lets him know about Mrs. Francis Booth (Marina Stephenson Kerr), the kids. They found props from Candle Cove in her basement. This is nearly too much for Mike to handle hearing. That tooth pain again makes him cringe. Due to the fact there’s a new tooth seemingly pushing down from out of the top of his gums. Like a fang. He doesn’t bother with a dentist. No, Mike tries pulling it out instead. Just as his wife Erica (Kristen Harris) arrives. Naturally she’s weirded out about how Lily got there. Maybe it’s best if she just gets the hell out of and away from Iron Hill.
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At the station nobody’s buying the Mrs. Booth story. They don’t get it yet. Children murdered under her command, and so much more. Mike tries to say his piece, but ultimately it’s Amy who professionally has had to step up. She makes the call to start searching for these kids. They’ve got to find them. Meanwhile, Mike feels a bit thirsty to get over and see the Candle Cove artefacts. He suggests getting Gary Yolen (Shaun Benson) back on things, to escort him to the crime scene. Not sure if that’s smart. Yet there they go, Gary and Mike; the two unsuspecting partners. Poor fucking Gary. He’s lost his wife, lost everything. Poor Jessica, dying so young, so brutal. Outside Gary finds teeth left on a garden post. Downstairs the remnants of Candle Cove awaited Mike. This is a sort of watershed moment in his life because he’s finally figuring out that the television show was real, that he wasn’t crazy, after all these years. Then there’s Francis. She calls her house where Mike answers, saying: “I have so much to tell you”
We flash back to a younger Mrs. Booth. Her son Jacob and Eddie Painter witness one of her seizures. We see something spooky in Eddie, as he stops the woman’s epileptic fit, commanding her to get up. What sort of power did he have? Where did it come from? In the present, Mike makes a deal to go talk with Francis alone. At the very same time more children are being called by that creepy television show, summoned to do its bidding. To prepare the plank for others to head for the supposed real cove. Even little Katie Yolen is gone from the hospital, she and her brother Dane.
The sudden missing kids start a panic at the station, and Amy does the only thing she can, getting Deputy Simon Grove (Bruce Novakowski) to “find Mike Painter.” The man himself, he’s busy trying to meet with Francis. Once Simon gets there the terrifying little kids are scuttling around in the nearby field, and Mike goes inside to find the old woman. Simon ends up meeting the person in the skeleton costume, as the kids hold him to be murdered. Before passing out Mike sees Francis take off the skull mask in the distance.
And on the way out of town Erica, with Lily in tow, nearly fly off the road due to the pack of kids in front of them.

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Amy comes across Candle Cove screensavers all over the station. Another creepy image to add to the pile. Another one? When Mike wakes to Simon’s cut throat, Francis in her costume again; with Lily in her grasp. Not to mention the only remaining Painter twin is hooked to wires, strung up overhead, as if a living marionette doll. But then he wakes, in the grass again. Erica and Lily are in a motel room, safe. For now.
Out of nowhere Marla sees that Francis Booth is now in her kitchen. She wants to talk to Mike. The three of them sit around and chat. They have things to catch up on. “Tell me about Candle Cove,” Mike asks of Francis. She talks of life changing moments, life altering people, purpose. That sorta thing. When Eddie showed her the power in him, her life changed drastically. Furthermore, she claims he’s the one that created the show. “You thought Candle Cove found him. What he had was always there. He was born with it. He‘s the light; the beacon. He always was,” Mrs. Booth rambles. Supposedly, she says the dead twin is coming back. Uhh… what now? Either way, just as I suspected Eddie required sacrifices. For the cove. Little Jacob was fed to those otherworldly powers. Francis claims Mike was also born with something special, just like Eddie. One thing’s for sure, he has horrifyingly real nightmares.
At this point his daughter’s seeing scary visions of Candle Cove. Even the Tooth-Child is hanging around her room at night, lurking at the edge of the bed. It lures Lily, closer, closer. Simultaneously, out in a trailer amongst the woods Francis tells her children of the night: “He‘ll be here soon.” And is it Eddie she speaks of?

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When Mike finally pulls that extra tooth out of his head, everything gets a bit strange; I mean, stranger. On the television Lily shows up. In Candle Cove. Standing terrified in the mouth of the cove’s yawning cave.

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This set the stage for a great, scary finale! Can’t wait to see “Welcome Home” and find out the last remaining secrets of Candle Cove. Loved this series, from the start. Anticipating an exciting and disturbing finale. Also have a hard time containing my excitement, and need, for the second season. Should be a trip.

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Channel Zero – Candle Cove, Episode 4: “A Strange Vessel”

SyFy’s Channel Zero
Season 1, Episode 4: “A Strange Vessel”
Directed by Craig William Macneill
Written by Erica Saleh

* For a review of the previous episode, “Want to See Something Cool?” – click here
* For a review of the next episode, “Guest of Honor” – click here
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With Mike Painter’s (Paul Schneider) daughter Lily (Abigail Pniowsky) at his mother’s step in Iron Hill, will we discover more secrets behind his childhood? In 1988, Mike and Jessica talking about Eddie, the kids starting to go missing. Then Mike shows her a Pirate Percy doll his brother made recently. No sooner does Candle Cove come on, the skull-headed figure announcing: “Do you sense it? Something is coming. A strange vessel is headed for the cove!”
In the present day Mike tries to figure out how his daughter got all the way back to his hometown, at grandma Marla’s (Fiona Shaw). Lily’s spaced out, no answers for her father. But you know that deep down Mike understands this connects with Eddie, the other missing and dead children. And maybe Marla understands that, too.
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Standing in the hallway of the hospital Jessica (Natalie Brown) can clearly see there are multiple children all witnessing strange things. Candle Cove characters appear all over the wall in kids’ drawings. At least Jessica’s kids are making up. Uh oh – she also notices her boy Dane is missing a tooth. That’s because Katie has it, and the grin across her face as she looks at it is disturbing.
While Mike tries to explain to his wife their daughter showed up in Iron Hill, Jessica goes to see her husband, Sheriff Gary (Shaun Benson), as he sits behind bars. I mean, he fucked up. He’s still convinced Mike is dangerous, advising his wife to go home and get his gun, to keep it close. Just in case. However, husband Gary isn’t aware that his wife’s reconnected online with Mike as of late, before his breakdown and his trip home.
Amy Welch (Luisa D’Oliveira) is busy running things at the station, between actual work and turning down a fellow officer’s sort of sweet advances. I hope to see more of her. It’ll be nice to have her take on a bigger role at work because of Gary’s situation.
Switch back to ’88. Jessica doesn’t particularly like Eddie much, preferring Mike’s company. Especially seeing as how Eddie went pretty weird after watching too much Candle Cove. In the present Jessica meets Lily, who’s still pretty spacey. When she asks the little girl what she likes, Lily replies: “I like pirates.” Oh, for fuck sakes! Then, in the wall of the living room, she pulls out the Pirate Percy doll. She also says she isn’t Lily. Her doctor dad tries to do his thing, analysing; is Lily channelling the spirit of her dead uncle Eddie? Speaking of, we go back to ’88 again when he tells Mike about how every time they send somebody off to Candle Cove, “it gets stronger” – the Tooth Child? Regardless, there was a division between the brothers, and clearly Eddie felt that slipping, worried his brother would love a girl more than him. Tragic, really, as well as part of growing up, figuring life out.

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We get a strange reenactment in the shadows, what looks like kids wearing papier-mâché replicas of the Candle Cove characters. Then there’s an amazing matching shot of young Mike and Eddie playing cards, which then cuts to Mike playing cards with his daughter; more evidence of the fact she’s channelling uncle Ed. Also, a terrifying figure lurks in the shadows as father and daughter/brother play. What is it? A pirate?
Only problem with the whole channelling dead Eddie thing is that it really gets to Marla. She’s a good woman, whose family was just torn right open. Mike has been immersed in this weirdness his entire life, or most of it; she’s only been experiencing the truth behind everything recently. And she doesn’t know exactly how to handle all those emotions. Hopefully she’ll be able to keep it together. At the same time, Mike talks to his brother through Lily; about his murder. Basically Eddie’s soul needs to get put to rest. Until then Lily ain’t Lily.
Those creepy mask wearing kids are no doubt those crazies Mrs. Booth has been training. Deputy Welch winds up talking to the old teacher, worried about what she saw them doing recently by the roadside – stabbing the shit out of a mannequin. They speak a bit of ’88, Jacob… then we’re back to that time once more, as Eddie goes to see Jacob Booth. Oh, my. I can see it coming now. Candle Cove comes on. Mother hugs her son Jacob tight, kissing him with tears in her eyes. Is she doing what I think she’s doing?
Eddie once tricked Jessica and tried sending her to Candle Cove. So brother confronts brother. Eventually, Mike gets the upper hand by pulling back those injured fingers on Eddie’s hand and running off. Present day once more, there are other nasty children skulking about. Amy tries to track down those kids at the school only to stumble into a darkened room where computer screens with Candle Cove screensavers pop up. On she goes to the gym where the mask wearers shout “Protect the ship” before Amy interrupts. Jesus, these kids are creepy.

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Mike and Jessica go the morgue where Eddie’s body lies shelved. They’re taking the next necessary step to try returning Lily to normal. They burn his remains out in the woods. Simultaneously, grandma can’t seem to keep her eyes off her granddaughter, the spirit of her dead son looking back. If all this works, that spirit will be gone soon enough. Good, and sad in a way for Marla.
In other parts of Iron Hill bad things are on their way. Deputy Welch is at home with her Chinese food, the friendly law enforcement suitor from earlier in bed next to her. Little does she know there are awful kids coming for her. In a last minute move she heads over to see Mrs. Booth. No answer. So Amy finds the spare key and lets herself in. Noises lead her down to the basement. There she finds unpleasant jars, a Candle Cove doll, a dead Daphne being feasted on by a cat. GET OUT, AMY!
It seems the masked kids didn’t go to see the deputy after all. Jessica discovers them in her home, wielding knives. They start stabbing her, so she pulls the gun. But who could kill a kid, right? This sends her outside, as the kids crowd her in the little pool and stab her repeatedly under the watchful eye of Mrs. Booth.
Later in the night Lily wakes. She’s herself again, finally. Although she doesn’t remember a single thing. It was all a “nightmare” her father says. But the nightmare’s just beginning.

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What a savage episode. This one frayed my nerves, genuine fright a couple times. There’s just this true sense of dread and suspense. I never expected Jessica to come across those kids. That really threw me for a complete loop.
Next episode is titled “Guest of Honor” and I’m in awe trying to think of what they’ll do next on this series. Love this show. Give me another 5 seasons, right now. So many great, classic Creepypastas they could use.

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Channel Zero – Candle Cove, Episode 3: “Want to See Something Cool?”

SyFy’s Channel Zero
Season 1, Episode 3: “Want to See Something Cool?”
Directed by Craig William Macneill
Written by Harley Peyton

* For a review of the previous episode, “I’ll Hold Your Hand” – click here
* For a review of the next episode, “A Strange Vessel” – click here
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We start in 1988. The Painter Twins sit at the table with their parents, making a wish for their birthday; they decide to make a wish for one another. It was a happier time. Nowadays, Marla Painter (Fiona Shaw) tries to get rid of all the memories of her son, since finding out the truth.
In other parts of Iron Hill, new generations of kids are seeing Candle Cove and all its strangeness. Are there about to be more dead children turning up?
Marla goes to talk with her son Mike (Paul Schneider) at the police station. Only he’s not there, of course. Sheriff Gary Yolen (Shaun Benson) is taking him somewhere else.
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Headed elsewhere, Gary shuttles Mike along while he rattles on about broken dreams. Fiona clues Amy Welch (Luisa D’Oliveira) in on what’s happening, as well as Jessica (Natalie Brown); all three are fairly stunned by whatever Gary is up to, and what IS he up to? They’re up at an unfinished home, where the lawman wants to sit Mike down. Y’know, for a chat.
We get a flash back to ’88 and watch Mrs. Booth with her son Jacob (Connor Peterson), the one that tragically turned up in the hills without teeth. We see his mother hit the floor suddenly, having what looks like an epileptic fit. In the present day, Mrs. Booth tries to carry on, although in her classroom one of the kids on their device gets a sudden transmission of Candle Cove that sends him into a near trance.
Tim Hazel (David Brown) shows up at the house where Gary’s keeping Mike. Looks like there may be something nasty brewing, even if Tim says they’re only there to “talk.” Naturally, Mike starts talking about Candle Cove, but nobody’s willing to listen to him. Daphne Bell (Gwendolyn Collins) is also present and she shows Mike pictures of all the kids that went missing back then, including Tim’s brother Gene and her own cousin. Ah, an even more personal connection for them both. Everybody believes that Mike had more to do with the murders than just his own brother.
Another flashback: “Wanna see something cool?” a young Mike asks Gene. He says he’s headed up to the crow’s nest. Oh, my. What else don’t we know about Dr. Painter? The former friends start interrogating him, trying to get what they want; what they need.
When young Mike led Gene up to the nest, Eddie starts showing the kid “stuff in his head.” What? All of a sudden Gene is a mindless drone working off the beck and call of Eddie. To the point he must “pay the toll” by ripping out a couple teeth. OH, FUCK ME. Afterwards he can walk the plank into Candle Cove, which actually means Gene walked over the cliff to his death. So Mike’s story is that, all those years ago he had to stop his brother from doing worse at the hands of that horrific television series.

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Amy is out looking for Gary and Mike. She only finds a group of kids stabbing a mannequin with knives. When she tries to talk to them they scatter like animals. Things in Iron Hill are getting awfully gruesome. Up at the makeshift interrogation Mike is trying to convince them all about what Candle Cove does to people, and that it’s still working its dark magic on them all. Daphne agrees, partly. She’s had dreams about the show, remembering specific images. Even Gary starts to lean a bit towards it, although Tim doesn’t have much time for any of these theories. He’d prefer to break the gun out and get rough. And in a brief second Mike is shot in the shoulder, right before Marla and Jessica show up. They stop Tim from doing something crazy. I’m more concerned about Gary. He’s way too easily influenced and as a sheriff he should lose his fucking job. Certainly doesn’t help his case when Amy arrives, either. She pulls her gun on him to get the one in his hand neutralised. A serious breach of ethics there, Sheriff Yolen.
Out in a field Mike parks his car for a nap. Then up creeps the Tooth Child to suck on his fingers. A grotesquely wonderful image I won’t soon forget!
Psyche – just a dream. In the hospital, Marla sits with her son and he rests up after his gunshot. Like any good cop Amy wants to find out what was going on up at that house. Mike tries laying out his story about Eddie falling under the influence of Candle Cove, et cetera, and you know how that sounds to anybody normal listening: like batshit nonsense. Yet something needs to explain all the mysterious events surrounding Iron Hill, people are looking for answers. One big surprise is that Marla’s now telling Amy that her son didn’t confess to murdering his brother. And why? Maybe mom is starting to clue in on something having gone wrong with her other boy way back in the day.
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Mrs. Booth gets a visit from Daphne, shocked and sickened by the way Tim reacted to everything earlier. The old woman is concerned about Mike, hoping he’s all right, and advises Daphne to turn herself in. That won’t be necessary. Because the older of the two has devious plans. She sinks a meathook into Daphne at the neck. “You shouldn‘t fuck with Mike Painter.” Seems that Candle Cove and the powers behind it have other things in mind for their old buddy Mike.
The children of Iron Hill are over at Mrs. Booth’s place, watching the creepy show. She has cocoa for them. They’ve been good boys and girls. “Where did you leave the body?” she asks them all before they crowd around for a warm, chocolatey treat. Good lord, this is delicious good horror. Is this lady grooming these kids, so they can make sacrifices to the Tooth Child?
Meanwhile, up in Westchester, the rest of the Painter family sleeps. Little Lily Painter is in for a bad night, though. On the television we can hear the faint music of an eerie show, and then Lily is gone in the darkness. At the very same time something creeps in the shadows around Mike as he sleeps in Iron Hill.
Nobody’s getting any rest tonight. During the night Marla hears strange noises. When she investigates – there is the Tooth Child in the living room. But wait! Only a dream again. Looks like the dreams are infecting her, as well. Nobody is safe from the reach of Candle Cove. Out in the street, Lily stands by herself. Mike rushes to her side and she appears in a trance, as the Tooth Child watches from upstairs in the window – watching, waiting, hungry as ever.

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Jesus christ on a fucking slice of Melba! This was an incredible episode with lots of things happening. Plus, more Tooth Child than ever. Great, great stuff. Excited for the next episode titled “A Strange Vessel” and I’m eager to see how each little plot plays out from one chapter to the next. Solid, terrifying writing with plenty mystery to chew on.

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Channel Zero – Candle Cove, Episode 2: “I’ll Hold Your Hand”

SyFy’s Channel Zero
Season 1, Episode 2: “I’ll Hold Your Hand”
Directed by Craig William Macneill
Written by Nick Antosca & Don Mancini

* For a review of the premiere, “You Have to Go Inside” – click here
* For a review of the next episode, “Want to See Something Cool?” – click here
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Where is the search for his brother Eddie going to take Mike Painter (Paul Schneider)? Last episode, we discovered – through his mother Marla (Fiona Shaw) – that the TV show Candle Cove didn’t actually exist. It was a figment of the twin brothers’ imaginations. So where does it all go from here?
We see images of the discovery of bodies in Iron Hill. Bits of news coverage on the murders. Snippets of the eerie Candle Cove. Katie Yolen, daughter of Gary and Jessica (Shaun Benson & Natalie Brown), hears the show talking to her.
Then we cut to a terrifying scene at the Yolen residence, as screams in the night wake Gary and Jessica. Their boy Dane is screaming, on the floor a bloody hook. Katie stabbed him with it. And haven’t we seen such an image before? Oh yes. It all comes full circle: “This show, it can make people do things,” admits Jessica to Mike over the phone, begging him to come back and help. Things are getting murky.
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Now Mike has more belief on his side, including his mother. Too many coincidences. With Katie seeing the show, is it real? Doesn’t matter. Because the mind of children is making it real, and that’s the only thing that does matter. The Yolens are left reeling, naturally. Sheriff Gary’s not exactly thrilled about Mike coming to talk with Katie. I can see why he’d be sceptical. Yet Jessica knows Mike, and knew Eddie, more than anybody else. She knows there’s a soft, human side to him, as well as the fact creepy evidence is starting to mount in Mike’s favour.
So he gets back into the mix of things in Iron Hill, despite any objections or weird looks from those who know him. It’s like everywhere he turns, no matter if it’s a kid’s drawing in a hospital, there is something from the past staring out at him. At the same time, his mother Marla is trying to track down information on Candle Cove, which proves pretty much impossible. A weird guy at the public access station has tapes of some episodes. He is absolutely fucking terrifying to me, good god. And he doesn’t actually have any of the show – he made a bit of “fan fic.” Although he did see the real show as a child, and strangely lingers on its memory all these years later. But the real television series was unrecordable, off a pirate signal.
In the hospital Mike finally gets talking to Katie. He shows her the drawing he found from the wall outside. It has a pirate ship in it, and a train track leading into a dark cave. “What happened when you saw Candle Cove?” he asks Katie. A trippy moment ensues, as Mike sees himself talking to his lost brother Eddie. Katie talks about the cave. To anyone else, it sounds loony. To Mike, it’s awfully real. When Gary hauls Mike out to talk Katie’s visited by a strange-looking creature – the Tooth-Child from up in the hills.


Speaking of teeth, Amy Welch (Luisa D’Oliveira) goes to see Beth Fry (Rachelle Casseus). She’s had a break-in at the house. A keepsake box, that has her boy Alex’s baby teeth in there. God damn! You know what’s going on there. Oooh, love the creepy creeps.
Also, Mike has a life back in his new home. He’s got a wife, a daughter. He checks in with them while on the morbid adventure home. While talking to his daughter Lily (Abigail Pniowsky), she pauses strangely, peering into the darkness, telling him: “You have to go inside.” Spooky, and definitely spooks poor Mike. A little later his mother sees the picture Katie drew and tells him that the tracks, the cave, is a real place.
Marla and Mike head out together. “I look around and I see him everywhere,” Mike says about Eddie, as we literally see the young twin run on ahead in a memory. This prompts a nasty little bit of family history to regurgitate between mother and son. Tough lot of history, really. Particularly considering Marla’s had no closure on the loss of her son. When they get up to an industrial area, Mike heads inside, seeing a vision of Eddie. Or is it someone real? Chasing the figure onward Mike heads through familiar territory, where he and Eddie would play around as boys. He sees a boy off in the distance, in the dark, through a concrete opening. He follows until the light all but disappears completely. Further in he discovers lit candles and what looks like the mummified corpse of a child.
The police are called in, and what’s the consensus? All of a sudden Dr. Painter comes home, things start turning up, kids stab each other, and Candle Cove suddenly reappears on everybody’s minds. And who is the child? Is it Eddie? So many anxieties resurfacing.
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We flash back to Eddie being questioned about his busted hand, from last episode. Marla tells the boys to “watch out for each other.” She tries to instil a sense of toughness in them because of how cruel the world is, and this is ultimately what eats her up inside in the present day. The fact she couldn’t protect them from everything. Amazing acting from Fiona Shaw, a fantastic actress, giving it her all in the role’s brutish grief. And Mike, he flashes back, too. To holding a hook, exactly like Katie.
Then we see Mike in flash backs, dragging something into a grave he’s dug out. He cries. From out of a dream Mike is ripped, and the horrific monocled character from Candle Cove is sitting life-sized next to his bed: “All your secrets will be safe in Candle Cove,” he speaks from the shadows.
Could Mike have murdered Eddie under the spell of that mysterious show?
Awhile after, Mike tells his mother that he indeed killed Eddie. Buried him a grave out in the forest. He believes someone took the body away since nothing’s been found. His mother cuts him with a knife when he tries to tell her “more” about the story. But what more is there? Holy shit.
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Mike goes out into the woods. He remembers the good times, before all the bad. He can’t forget the bad ones though, no matter how hard he tries. And he can’t fight the dreams, the nightmares. Sheriff Gary ends up tracking Mike down to answer a few questions about his confession to mom. Yeah, knew that would happen eventually.
In all of this, I can’t help wondering: does Mike remember what happened, for real? Could his memory of supposedly killing his brother be false? We’ll have to wait on that one. For the present moment he’s a suspect. A viable one, too.
But Gary has other plans than going to the police station. He and Mike are going for a drive. Where?
We also see more of Mrs. Booth, Mike’s old teacher, mother to Jacob who turned up dead in the murders during ’88. She’s the one stealing teeth from Beth Fry. She’s summoning the Tooth-Child out with them. What a wild image! The monster eats the teeth right from her palm, like an animal. So stunning and creepy. Love that more than I can say.

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What a nice follow-up to the first episode. Very pleased with the series so far. Can’t wait to see “Want to See Something Cool?” next, and remember that’s a quote from the public access dude. I hope we see more of his weirdness because he looked positively obsessed. Just like I am already with Channel Zero.

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