Damien, Season 1, Episode 10: Ave Satani

Well… that certainly ended dramatically. With actual action rather than foreshadow as well!

Damien and Simone escape – mainly because Damien’s got his full demon powers going now. This means John’s army of minions (who would have been really helpful last episode) are happy to shoot themselves if they try to stop Damien. Random nice ladies cry “Damien I love you” and try to throw themselves off dams. He even accidentally makes Simone spit insects.

Despite my flippant tone, it’s so very very very spooky and terrifying. Damien has a whole lot of power and doesn’t quite know what he is doing beyond wanting all of this to end, unleashing poorly understood demonic power in terrifying waves.

Simone, however, is firm. She is staying with him. She managed to save a life, she has a front row seat to the apocalypse and she isn’t going to go home and pretend it isn’t happening. Certainly not when she can make a difference, even if minor.

I like this – I like why Simone is here effectively as Damien’s second. Because it’s not about him, not as a love interest – she is there for everyone around Damien. She is there, yes, to try and keep Damien back from the edge but it’s clearly for the world, for others, for the innocents in his wake.

Ann and the Nun who killed her daughter have a few theological debates. Well, it’s more “god god god” “satan satan satan” “GOD!” “SATAN!” “GOD!” “Satan! And poking your stab wound! Ha!” Wounded nun ends up being dropped in the grave – with wounded Amani (John has him shot for… reasons. I don’t even know). They’re then both buried alive

But as they leave, a hand thrusts out of the dirt. I hope it’s Amani… maybe. I mean it’d be nice if he didn’t die, but his depiction this season has been entirely as Damien’s servant which… no. He had no real character there, no real presence beyond as an extension of Amani. It’s a broken depiction and a non-person portrayal which is so common for POC and other marginalised characters

With much running in the dark and spookiness, John, Ann and their army catch Damien – and we see a difference between Ann and John. Ann worships Damien in all his satanic glory. John worships Damien for the power it will grant him – and John gets eaten by demon dogs. That’ll learn him! No fake devotion here! You’re in or you’re dog food.

Damien, Season 1, Episode 9: The Devil You Know

So last episode Veronica got shot and Sister Assassin Nun decides the best thing to do is not take her to a hospital and instead to pray for her soul while she slowly bleeds to death. Yeah the nun has gone off the deep end. She also interspaces prayer with questions about Damien and Ann, her mother (poking more of Veronica’s mother issues since Ann was so obsessed with Damien not her).

Simone is not a big fan of this solution but spends a lot of time passively condoning it but it seems more shock as she tries to grasp just what is going on and the general sinister nun and gun shot wounds et al.

Damien and Amani are sorting out their differences which involves more of Amani returning to Damien’s service: firstly by putting him in touch with Simone’s Assassin nun (who poor Damien even thinks may help him. Hah, no) and by agreeing to try and get close to Veronica again to spy on Ann. This gets Amani kidnapped because Ann really wants her daughter back.

With Damien arriving on the Assassin Nun’s doorstep, he happily locks Simone and Veronica up to focus on “helping” Damien. He tells her all his visions and she’s very comforting about it all. Which includes lots of nice things about he’s god’s chosen and he doesn’t have to be evil and he can be good. Which is nice except for the whole “you’ve been chosen to be the antichrist – god’s will!” which Damien takes issue with. He’s not here to praise any god that decides invading the world and unleashing torment and horror is a good idea.

Hah-ha he’s using logic to try and convince the Assassin Nun. That doesn’t work. Nor does the head injury that Simone inflicts on her finally trying to escape with Veronica and get her to a hospital. Assassin Nun decides the best way to help Damian is to stab him, wrap him in thorns, carve up his head and bury him alive.

This is not helping. She even finds minions (from… somewhere? I mean where did these come from? She was alone and new to the country and kind of acting outside of Vatican sanction… so where did these minions come from? Extras?) to help her. Which helps her because Simone, after abandoning poor Veronica in the middle of the forest (we moved to a forest at some point) because she heard Damien screaming, needs restraining. As does Amani and Ann Rutlidge who have also tracked them down

Damien, Season 1, Episode 8: Here is Wisdom

Can I say again how slow this series is? I mean we’re on episode 8 now and I was actually stunned to realise how far into the season we are and I really can’t see how we’ve managed 8 episodes of content out of this… I mean looking back, was there really enough?

Damien’s therapy isn’t going really well, he continues to be super conflicted and tortured and lost. Hi therapist pokes him with some very interesting comments about choice and predestination and basically how Damien is almost accepting the inevitability of him being evil without actually seeing he has a choice. And more, with that lack of understanding he has a choice, he’s denying his own responsibility for whatever happens.

Damien himself also raises some interesting elements on his potential PTSD which would be really fascinating if he actually had PTSD and wasn’t actually the antichrist. Damien feels silly about having PTSD, he has seen so many people who have suffered incredibly that he feels selfish, shallow to actually have PTSD when he’s considers the terrible horrors he has seen people endure. This is a wonderful examination of both survivor’s guilt and how many people with PTSD are shamed because X person has it worse – like their pain is somehow less important because they are not the most suffering person in the entire world

This would be excellent, in fact all of these sessions with the doctor would be pretty good if it weren’t not just for him actually being demonic – but also because she is also on team cultist.

Damien is posted the severed tongue from his murderous friend Charles and after a brief meeting in which Charles declares his eternal devotion and also rambles terrifyingly about the apparently many people he’s killed for Damien (Damien seems to think this includes Kelly but, given the supernatural way she died I don’t think so). Damien absolutely loses it and beats Charles half to death.

But only half. He choses not to give into his desires to murder him. But, as he then asks the doctor – is that his good instincts telling him not to murder or his evil instincts making him preserve a serial killer? This conflict is also excellent –hey all the Damien psychological torture hasn’t been especially great until this episode but now it’s really fascinating to watch as the conflict builds and is legitimately difficult to unpick

Damien, Season 1, Episode 7: Abattoir

My recaps of Damien tend to be very short. Part of this is because I am rapidly running out of fucks to give about this show (and, to be fair, I didn’t exactly have a huge number to begin with) – but it’s mainly because very little happens. As I’ve said time and again it’s all about the ominousness and the theme and the darkness which is all well and good – but it’s kind of already known. No-one going into this show is not aware what’s going on and just how much ominous foreshadowing do we need?

On top of this it has a whole lot of problems with the ableism of it. This ominousness is constantly depicted by having numerous mentallyill people babble ominous inanities. Doubled up on this episode with Damien being in the secure psychiatric wing which means we get the classic horrendous depiction of mentally ill people ranting and screaming and being tied up and bashing their heads against various walls and generally utterly failing to be people and instead being dramatic set dressing. This depiction is old, it’s vile and it’s utterly dehumanising. Mentally ill people are not props to trot out every time you need something to be suitably creepy or some nonsense to babble.

Even Damien’s own brushes with mental illness are more about exposition and ominousness than an actual depiction of mental illness. Which is annoying because they’re right he has been through some horrendous things, he has suffered, he could very well have PTSD – but it’s all about the ominousness. It’s another tool. Another prop.

We also have the introduction of Margot, someone precious to John, possibly wife. She’s disabled, in a wheelchair and mentally ill – which means she babbles more ominous semi-prophecy to Damien, of course she does. In case you had trouble interpreting prop-babble, John’s after power and to become one of Damien’s powerful lieutenants/generals/head honchos. Though, really, did we need ominous prophetic babble to establish it.

While visiting, Damien also finds John’s murder temple where he kills goats in the name of the antichrist. Why he wants a goat isn’t quite explained but killing goats seems to be the done thing. I wonder where the get these goats anyway, I mean chickens – yes, we’ve got loads of chickens, but goats? I’d definitely be hard pressed to find a goat.

Damien, Season 1, Episode 6: Temptress

And here is the episode where all the pressure on Damien is ratcheted up and no-one knows what’s real or not – certainly not Damien

After his suicide attempt he wakes up in hospital with a concerned Simone and a suspicious Ann. But Amani offers him a lifeline – he finds a guy who says he was forced to tattoo the 666 on Damien’s head while he was unconscious! Yes it could all be fake!

He rushes to super influential father figure John to ask him about it and he reveals that Ann is a religious fanatic with lots of money and power and shadowy influence and he totally didn’t mention it earlier because reasons – he also has Damien’s doctor show him that someone has been poisoning him with hallucinogens. Yes, a reason for all those visions and weirdness!

Damien is high and happy, he knows what’s happening – ok , what’s happening is that a powerful rich lady with shady connections is poisoning him until he thinks he’s the antichrist… but at least he isn’t the antichrist… right? He’s so happy about this that he even, very unwisely, kisses Simone

(Simone back away, he is not the best choice at the moment).

But we have some more paranoia - because Amani follows John and finds he meets with Ann! They’re in cohoots!

He breaks into John’s office to get more information (from a very ineffective PA who didn’t think for a second to watch him while he “looks for his phone”) and finds out his mother is still alive! (or he’s being played AGAIN – because that’s the whole essence of this episode – who knows what is real or who to trust?)

He rushes to see his mother and they have a touching, loving reunion as she describes all the terrible lies and manipulations that convinced her that he was a) evil and b) dead. Everything is wonderful… until Ann shows up and after many demands to be listened to, she goes for mother. Damien steps in and in the struggle, mother falls down the stairs and dies. Which is when Ann says “I won’t tell anyone what you did.”

Damien, Season 1, Episode 5: Seven Curses

So, this episode does something meaningful and very powerful about a very important issue and then kind of throws that all out and promptly shifts the focus in a really crinegworthy way.

While looking for a doctor to try and get some help for his PTSD which involves lots of waiting at an underfunded VA hospital---

----actually, an aside. Like last week I have to call shenanigans and bullshit here. Damien is a very wealthy, immensely connected man. He has so much wealth, influence and power, not only does he not have to wait in an underfunded hospital to get help, but he SHOULDN’T be putting further pressure on an already under-supported system.

So, while in this hospital and pretending, yet again, that he’s desperate and poor when he realluy really really isn’t, Damien happens to run into Claudia, the woman whose child (Tiago) he saved last week from the train tracks. She’s here visiting her veteran husband who is going through a painful and difficult rehabilitation

Damien is introduced and decides to document Alex’s time and struggles in the hospital – as a war photographer he considers this part of his remit and it’s an excellent point. With other great points about how utterly financially unsupported they are, how much pain Alex is in, how much he is struggling and the massive stress his family is under.

It’s an excellent depiction of Alex’s struggle, his attempt to put a strong face on things and his painful realisation that, due to lack of support, his family may have a better life if he died. It’s powerful and a very real experience for a lot of completely neglected veterans, including mentioning their high suicide rate. But it’s also overwhelmingly negative which can be a toxic trope of disabled people as people who suffer, have to rise above and/or are a burden on others. I’m not saying it should be bright and happy, but more scenes of, say, Alex and Claudia and/or Tiago would have presented that there’s more to Alex than endless suffering and despair.

Damien, Season 1, Episode 4: The Number of the Man

Time for more ominousness! Including weird stuff in demonic bathtubs and Damian contemplating suicide with his ominous razor.

John hasn’t completely given up his battle against Ann for control over Damien – playing the happy, kind paternal father figure to Damien, reassuring him that all this antichrist nonsense is totally silly and Ann is a scary weird lady he should stay well away from. At the same time he tries to aim for a truce with Ann with them both playing nice and united in front of their fellow corporate types/possible devil worshippers, saying nice things about unity and working together while clearly sharpening those knives for when the backs are turned.

Suspicious Detective Shay continues to be suspicious – really he would be completely bored and move on if the supernatural didn’t keep flashing up around him. Honestly it’s like the various infernal forces are taunting the man and encouraging to persecute Damien

Which he tries to do, it’s almost laughable. I mean there’s a whole scene where Shay says how suspicious it is that a man died in a freak accident while Damien was busy saving a child’s life – he’s literally just described Damien’s perfect alibi! Far less funny is his rather ridiculous threat to persecute Damien, stalk him and even outright murder him

No. Bullshit. Ok, yes this kind of police abuse bullshit happens. It does NOT happen to extremely wealthy well connected White guys who spent part of their childhood in the White House. John Lyons, his father figure, is a former White House chief of staff for crying out loud! Ye gods, with Damien’s connections he could have been found with blood up to the elbows cackling confessions in 8 languages and he could still walk!

Damien instead tries to cast suspicion on Ann which really doesn’t work because Ann is Ann and is good at this game, happily casting suspicion back at Damien along with aspersions regarding his mental illness.

Proving my point, Shay’s boss also tells him to back off, accusing him of being obsessed and making a homophobic crack about Damien being Shay’s type

Damien, Season 1, Episode 3: The Deliverer

This episode tones down some of the endless ominousness of the series so far. Oh, don’t get me wrong, there’s plenty of ominous music and ominous scenes – like a long painful recitation of atrocities that Damien has witnessed with Ann deciding it’s all because of Damien and his dark evilness. This is also sprinkled with lots of reminders of Damien’s ominous past and evil childhood.

Still while there is the ominousness, we also get some actual advancement of the plot: Damien turns to one of his high powered contacts: a former secretary of state called Jack who does his very best to warn him off Ann, the ominous ominous Ann. He even implies she *gasps* murders people who get in her way

But, surprise, he and Ann are part of the same organisation (and she’s made the point that there are several ominous organisations all interested in Damien, anarchists, Satanists, people who want to bring about the second coming, people who want to keep the world the way it is…. All the while carefully not telling Damien which organisation she is from). Only he’s decided Ann is being too softly-softly for his taste.

Jack wants to force the issue – he wants to “bring Damien in” and he wants to force the plan forwards. Ann doesn’t agree with this, but Jack assumes she’s gone soft and decides his lackey Troy will take over

Ann’s not having that. Taking advantage of Damien watching her (because he’s not entirely a fool to completely trust his stalker) she manages to set up a nice scenario, pushing Troy’s buttons, faking and attack and setting Troy running with Damien chasing after him. The chase leads to a subway and poor Troy having a nasty accident with an escalator. There’s certainly something worse than Ann watching him

And Jack has been taught a nice lesson there as well. Do Not Mess With Ann.

While on the Subway Damien gives up the chase to save the life of a boy that fell on the tracks – yes, an unsubtle message that Damien may be the son of satan but there’s still good in him.

Damien, Season 1, Episode 2: Second Death

Damien is all sad and tortured doing lots of research and freaking about Revelations because of his 666 tattoo on his scalp, his dead friend Kelly and lots of memory flashbacks. I think they need to lean on the flashbacks to the film to convince us why Damien has so rapidly gone back into the deep end.

Amani is there to help drag him out of his pit and to Kelly’s funeral (this is actually lampooned with Simone, Kelly’s sister, commenting about Amani is there to clear up Damien’s mess. Does the show get points for realising what it’s doing to its POC? Nope nope it does not) which he was going to skip because Manpain. Amani points out that would be epic arseholery so it’s off to the church with lots of ominous music, flashbacks, Damien struggling and in pain and windows breaking before he’s driven out – because churches and the antichrist don’t mix

He is dragged to the wake where all the reporters talk about their various war wounds and we find Damien got through all the terrible things he’s seen (despite always being in the middle of the worst situations) completely unscathed because OBVIOUS REASON CAN WE NOT WITH THE FORESHADOWING ALREADY?!

Anne Rutlidge is also at the church and, well, everywhere. She just follows him around and says vaguely cryptic ominous things. Over and over and over. OMINOUS GUYS! Listen to the music! Ominous

He also has a loud, tasteless argument with a priest at the wake that has him run into the night because yelling about there being no god while everyone’s grieving is kind of tacky. Though, to be fair, the priest approached him and continues talking god talk to him when it was clear Damien wasn’t buying his bullshit. Take a hint padre and back off.

Instead Damien goes into the night-time streets, finds some poor areas and homeless people to take photos of without their consent because treating people like zoo animals is totally ok, right? Yeah, I know he’s a journalist, but he’s not writing a story here and it’s equally clear part of his career is taking photos of Big Dramatic Tragic Moments and selling them without commentary like some kind of vulture feeding off people’s pain. Rich people then buy his art and comment on the Big Special Feelings that poor-people pain makes them feel probably saying how powerful or moving it is without actually adding any kind of commentary, awareness or productive help being given to the actual victims depicted.

Sorry, side rant.

Damien, Season 1, Episode 1: The Beast Rises

This… is not selling it to me. And that takes some effort, because Bradley James can read Dickens to me (Dickens! Who nearly killed my love of literature) and I’d back it.

Not that that’s a criticism of his performance – he’s pretty epicly bringing the acting, the pain, the angst and the drama… but the show really isn’t supporting it and has a lot of problems besides.

So this picks up after the Omen films, kind of, with the evil devil child Damian now all grown up to the age of 30 with no real memory of his childhood, his parents or all the dark evilness. He’s now a photojournalist going to warzones and reporting on atrocities (supported by considerable wealth and connections) – like Damascus in Syria. He has a friend, Omani, and a not-quite-ex-love-interest-with-whom-he-has-issues Kelly. While taking photos he runs into an old woman who magically restores some of his memory of the BAD THINGS.

He quickly becomes obsessed with finding this woman. Which brings me to my first issue with this episode: what is happening in Syria is horrendous, brutal and deeply tragic… not only does this show use the atrocities happening in Syria as a backdrop, but they’re barely worth any attention at all. It could have been a natural disaster zone in China for all the actual Syrian conflict was relevant. It was just dropped in as background imagery and then absolutely none of the characters cared. Damian’s attempt to get back into Syria, Kelly tracking down where refugees were being forcibly removed? All of it was about Damian finding this old woman – the actual conflict didn’t even register with them.

They don’t find her, but Kelly is quick to help Damian track down more clues to his past because that woman said something ominous and Biblical in Latin. She starts making some hug comparisons between Damian and Jesus and generally pushes the whole ominous devil-child theme with little foundation. Which is my second – and third – issue. Firstly Kelly and Damian apparently have History yet one quick “I have ominous dark feelings so push you away” and ta-da dealt with! She’s on board again. I also don’t remotely buy how quickly she was to buy the whole devil-child idea with comparisons with Christ and deciding to visit an expert on revelations – because his mentor once knew Damian’s now dead dad. I mean, why would she run with this? Damian describes his nanny’s tragic suicide when he was a child which would point to deep seated mental trauma to address (especially as he’s just remembered it) not “oooh time to check the Book of Revelations!”