After the revelation of Audrey in the rotting barn, it’s
time for us to concentrate on that storyline!
Hah, no, have another Trouble of the Week! This time a
little girl called Harper who has imaginary friends; including one she blames
for a damn creepy laugh. The next morning her mother finds the girl is gone;
apparently through a grate in the ceiling after piling up all her toys into an
impressive ladder. As her mother points out to Dwight and Nathan, no normal 4
year old girl could do that. A Troubled
4 year old!
Audrey/Lexie is in her nearly empty bar trying to
assimilate everything, including the Barn about to disappear and take her with
it. It doesn’t help that William can’t show her the way out because the Barn,
built for Audrey, only shows her the real exit. He also can’t tell her much of
anything else, including who/what he is. He’s a helpful fellow, isn’t he? He guides
her through a mental exercise until she can see the parts of the barn that are
dying, rotting away into glowing holes. And if she can’t find the exit, she
will cease to exist.
Which is heard by Jennifer who has the awesome Trouble of
hearing stuff in the barn. After a brief visit to the site of the Barn with
Duke and Nathan, Nathan’s stressiness is consider less-than-helpful for helping
Jennifer connect so she is left in Duke’s capable hands to help relax her into
becoming a better receiver.
She meditates and drops a bowl – which is heard in the
barn by Audrey; William calls that a good sign that people are looking for her.
As another 4 year old disappears, Nathan is back on the
Trouble hunt. This boy, Kent, also managing to escape the scene with reasoning
and skills a 4 year old shouldn’t have. They check the CCTV and hear the creepy
laugh and see the face (and awful dentistry) of the person they believe behind
it.
They arrange a search team (while Jordan drops in to hit
Nathan with more guilt – which Nathan has in spades since he’s keeping count of
the people who have died to the Troubles since he broke the barn – 17) through
the woods and find footprints. The shoed footprints o Harper and Kent – and the
footprints of 4 older kidnappers, barefoot with claws.
The Teagues have done some research (as well as bickering
about something involving Audrey and hiding a secret book of secretness) to
pass on to Nathan – Troubles are sometimes explained through myths and legends.
In this case they’re dealing with a Douen, an Afro-Caribbean legend of a clawed
creature that steals children with its enchanting laugh. And very good at
deception – including misleading search parties. As they talk, another child is
taken despite his mother’s precautions. When talking to her, they find her
sister, the missing boy’s aunt, is the headteacher of the school. The dramatic
music tells us we should be suspicious of this. I smell another Haven leap of
logic!
They break into Carmen’s house (she has a connection to
all the victims – apparently, but then she is a TEACHER) and find that she has
been trying IVF for a baby for a long long time. They also find her husband who
tells them that recently Carmen’s sister got pregnant, accidentally; while
Cartman struggles and fails to have a child, likely triggering her Trouble. The
kids that have been taken are her favourite kids and, after many protests that
she’d never hurt kids, he agrees to lead them to the clearing in the woods
where he proposed to Carmen, her favourite spot.
In the woods, Carmen is playing with the children and the
three Douen, but she seems to be under their spell as much as the children are,
being drawn back in even when Harper collapses from the cold.
Nathan and Dwight arrive with Bret and get clawed by the
Douen to keep them away from the children. But they don’t attack Bret – it’s
not Carmen’s Trouble, she’s bespelled, it’s Bret’s. It’s Brett who can’t have
children, it’s Brett who thinks Carmen is a natural mother and promised her a
family. Nathan draws another comparison to his experiences and, lo, we have
breakthrough and the Douen disappear.
Audrey break, Jennifer manages to hear again just as
William drops another bombshell – Jennifer and Duke can’t help Audrey find the
door out, because they need to find another door. There are 2 doors to freeing
Audrey. Jennifer also hears a foghorn which Duke can’t hear – so it must be
coming from close to where the barn is. Time to track down the foghorn
Audrey also hears the foghorn inside the Barn – and tracks
down the real door. She opens it – but they appear to be high the sky –just clouds
and wind. She isn’t thrilled to be crossing that- though William assures her she can cross it
with a “leap of faith.” Even more leapy since Audrey doesn’t even know if her
friends have opened their door.
Jennifer and Duke find the door and Duke calls Nathan (and Jordan follows him). Only Jennifer can see the door. While Jennifer is struggling with the door, Jordan leads a squad of heavily armed Red Guard to them. Duke tries to stop Nathan disarming himself and one of the Guard try to stop him – and nearly gets throttled by Duke for it.
Audrey opens her door – and the door in Haven becomes visible to everyone. Nathan tries to open the door that can’t – Jessica steps forward only to be stopped by Dave Teague with a gun. From reading the archive, Dave has concluded that opening the door could unleash all kinds of bad powers. Jordan disables him with her agonising touch (awww, I wanted Jordan to be destroyed by super-powerful Teague wrath)
Jennifer opens the door. Audrey makes the leap - and
there’s an explosion of energy that knocks everyone down.
Everyone staggers to their feet and Nathan goes to Audrey.
Nathan gives Audrey a gun and points it at him and tells her the Troubles haven’t
ended. He kisses her then tells her to kill him – to which she responds (while
everyone looks on all tragic) “I’m not killing anyone, certainly not someone I
never met before”. And who’s Audrey? Her
name is Lexie.
Yes, her memories are still gone.
Ok, shenanigans – as if the Wendigo weren’t bad enough.
The Troubles, from what we’ve seen of them, do not support widespread myths and
legends across cultures. Why would special, intermittent abilities in one small
town in Maine really lead to Afro-Caribbean legends? Really? It doesn’t fit the
canon they’ve established unless it is dramatically expanded. It’s also another
example of annoying appropriation we see a lot in Urban Fantasy. Haven has had
next to no POC characters – and none this season so far – yet the show’s going
to raid Afro-Caribbean culture for spare monsters? It’s deeply appropriative
and disrespectful to not make the slightest attempt to include people from a
culture, yet still feel free to make off with any woo-woo you can glean.
Especially if you’re just going to take the name and then
only pay the slightest attention to the actual legend.
Ok, Audrey is back – the season can properly start now.
But I’m leery as to whether it’s going to go anywhere fast with Audrey missing
her memories.
