Quentin gets patched up by some centaur doctors but this
is going to take a while to put him together after the beast gave him a
mauling.
That means Elliot and Margot can’t really hang around since
they’re the last monarchs standing. They head back to the capital only to be
reminded that Fillory is pretty much falling apart and being monarch is no fun
at all.
This involves Elliot falling apart into a mopey, useless mess,
as per usual. While Margot grows spikes and is vicious, ruthless leader and,
probably, actually quite effective in an iron-fisted despot kind of way. She
knows what needs to be done, is willing to get it done and isn’t going to be
distracted by sentimentality.
Including not being interested in building a monument to
Alice because she wasn’t actually their friend. She was a “package deal who
came with Qunetin” She’s brutal, but I almost have to respect her adherence to
a vicious honesty rather than claiming a relationship they didn’t actually
have.
The problem with Fillory is that, while the Beast isn’t
draining the wellspring any more, apparently gods taking a shit in it isn’t
great either
This is also a problem back in Brakebills where Henry and
his professor notice magic acting up.
Margot has little patience for Elliot’s moping, making the excellent point “my crown is as heavy as yours.” She’d be an evil ruler but damned if I’m not respecting her.
Elliot bemoans the awfulness of him having grown up and Margot
starts looking for a loop hole for him
She finds a way to create him a golem which he can move
his mind into so he can stay in Fillory while his brain is happily running
around in his body and partying in Brakebills, making drinks and finding a hot
guy to have sex with.
Except while having sex in golem body with his man, his “sexually
aggressive wife” (who has already made comments that makes it clear they’ve had
sex and while he didn’t enjoy it, she’s a definite fan) approaches his real
body in Fillory, pursuing sex. And Elliot says yes to her while saying yes to
the hot guy he just met
Have you noticed how every time Elliot, a gay man, has
sex, a woman is involved? Seriously, that’s an issue with this damn show.
Having partied, Elliot ends up being interviewed by Dean
Henry about how very very very over his head he is. Henry, rightly, points out
that Elliot has to choose between his two lives: Fillory or Brakebills which is
basically no choice because he can’t leave Fillory. So he has to step up and
accept he has actual responsibilities – at least Henry decides he’s going to
help because the whole idea of Earth students going to Fillory and sort of conquer
the place. (Sort of).
This feels like an attempt at a social justice message on
colonism but is so weird and clumsy and with such a kind of ludicrous context
that it’s all so very very bizarre.
We also really need to discuss the really horrendously
homophobic depiction of Elliot. Elliot is the flighty, emotional, impractical
one while Margot has it together. But more than that – he seeks an escape, but
there’s a clear dichotomy between the two lives: in one he is responsible, has
duties, an adult (he even talks about is as growing up) and is married (without
the choice of anything but monogamy) to a woman. In the other life he’s free,
partying, irresponsible, sex and alcohol driven and free to be the gay man he
actually is
Elliot, the gay man is childlike, immature, debauched,
hedonistic, irresponsible and emotionally weak. Elliot putting on the mantle of
straightness is an adult, he has responsibilities. Gay is childish. Straight is
mature. This
is an ongoing problem with the utter hot mess of Elliot’s portrayal. I’d
honestly prefer no representation to this.
Also, can we not treat his “sexually aggressive” queen as
a joke, damn it – this is vile.
Over to Julia – she manages to find Kady and together
they work on their own plan to bring down Reynard. Together they rebuild their
friendship – well acquaintance – and work some tricks with Marina’s body to get
her to come back briefly to tell them a) the afterlife sucks and b) a woman
banished Reynard in the past. Of course Julia can do this again because Julia
is determined and dangerous and this show should certainly be about her.
Along the way Julia meets Margot and both of them unleash
their most vicious insults which makes me cringe. I think Margot probably had
the harsher insults – but it’s Margot who is clearly more injured. She
recognises the lack of complete connections she has, how a lot of her “friends”
are just afraid of her and want to be on her side
This prompts Margot to back Elliot’s expensive Alice
statue – because they weren’t Alice’s friends so they owe her this much
On to Quentin and Penny. Quentin wakes up in a Centaur
hospital which involves disturbing shitting (and a nurse who scoops it up and
is more than a little disturbingly subservient) and wooden prosthetics. Penny
also shows up because he wants some treatment for his cursed hands. Also he and
Quentin continue to snarl at each other a lot (with Quentin being terrible).
Penny doesn’t get much help on account that the River
Watcher is a very scary man and the Centaurs are duly terrified of his curses.
That leaves Penny with one choice when his hands try to kill him: a lot of
booze and Quentin with an axe
He now has no hands and there was a whole lot of
screaming.
In the aftermath of that horribleness Quentin has spotted
the White Beast which is one of Fillory’s questy creatures. Basically you hunt
it down, shoot it and lo you get wishes. With the help of Penny’s magical coaching
and a quick trip through the flying forest (Quenting thought this was a forest
where the trees actually flied – but it’s really a forest that makes everyone
completely stoned and is absolutely hilarious).
This is also something a bonding experience between the
two and eventually, maybe, they won’t hate each other. There also follows a lot
of comments from Penny about how “hunting a white woman” has terrible
connotations for a man of colour like himself which…. Yes is on point but this
throw away joke is hardly commentary or noteworthy
Surprisingly they do actually find and shoot the White
Beast and get 2 wishes and a whole lot of snark (turns out wishing creatures
don’t like being shot). Penny gets his hands back. And Quentin… doesn’t get
Alice back. Because magic can’t raise the dead. (The genie on Aladdin told us
so).
So the beast asks what Quentin wants. And Magicians hits that darkness it actually
does occasionally well when it’s not trying for scatological humour and rape:
the bleakness of magic not being that wonderful
Because Quentin has everything he ever wished for. Magic
is real. He met an amazing woman who loved him. He went to Fillory as he always
dreamed ad now lives there
And it’s all terrible. Everything is awful. So he makes a
wish –to go home. Back to the real world; no magic, just safe mundanity. At
least he was wise enough not to wish to be happy by having his memories of
Alice taken: because, as the White Beast tells him, eventually he would return
to sadness. Because BLEAK.
