A Discovery of Witches: Season 1, Episode 8

The final episode of A Discovery of Witches and I am immensely frustrated. Oh, British TV shows, every part of my soul wants to say how inherently superior you are to American shows - but no we have to have these teeny tiny seasons where absolutely nothing gets space or time to be developed!

It’s something American shows TEND to do better (I say “tend” because they also tend to have marathon seasons of So. Much. Filler).

So we reach this last episode with Juliette the disposable and pointless threatening Diana and dramatically declaring she was created by Gerbert expressly to seduce Matthew and Matthew just rejected her and so she’s just been his whipping girl and servant and now is totally jealous of Diana.

And oh dear gods this character. We will revisit this in the conclusion when I have had a drink and can handle the level of cringe here. The cringe is high

Juliette decides to stab Matthew after making him kiss Diana because, well, she’s not a character, she’s a caricature of woman scorned. Matthew ends up bleeding and dying and Diana pulls another magical power out of her back of Deus Ex tricks and shoots Juliette with a bow made of fire. Bye Juliette.

Oh and that “fire was the only element she doesn’t have” of course she has it?

She worries about poor Matthew who is now dying and she prays and begs saying she’ll do anything to get him back. Thankfully the goddess is all into that, warns her there’ll be a price but Diana’s all ANYTHING FOR HIM and feeds him her blood and lets him bite her.

Y’know if blood was what he needed they had 2 other witches, 2 vampires and I’m sure a passing bunny or something to help spread the load. Someone could even sponge up Juliette.

She also throws up a magic circle to stop anyone else interfering so he can drain her to death

Which of course he doesn't do because that whole “craving” thing just means nothing and was kind of thrown in the first couple of episodes for some Twilight-esque shout outs but then never actually went anywhere. Diana does realise he does crave her and has been resisting tearing out her spleen and sucking on it every minute they’re together

She thinks this is sweet and romantic

There’s something badly wrong with this woman. She needs help. She needs an intervention.

A Discovery of Witches: Season 1, Episode 7

Diana and Matthew make their goodbyes to Ysabeau and Marthe (who are now totally on side with Diana now) and get in a helicopter to go to Diana’s aunts in America

Can a helicopter cross the Atlantic? I assume it’s just taking them to the airport.

Anyway they arrive in Madison and their aunts house - which is haunted - or magical; either way it’s extremely nifty, fun, a little creepy and an extremely convenient source of Deus Ex Machinae since it can do a whole lot of stuff. The house likes Matthew (of course) and if your magical house doesn’t even keep undead blood drinking monsters from your door, what’s the point.

They meet Emily and Sarah - Emily is super welcoming, Sarah would rather have a squad of MAGA hatted zombies vomiting on her porch. But Diana’s main concern is to confront them in a rage demanding to know if they knew she was spellbound. Sarah is horrified at the idea that she had been spellbound… but Emily suspected that Diana’s parents were involved

Sarah is horrified - her emotions run from high to outerspace - and Diana is devastated at the idea that her parents thought she was such a terribad awful monster that she needed to have her magic bound (remembering that this is generally only done to evil witches who are terribad awful). The house steps in to give us a useful flashback

Her parents magically bound Diana when she was a small child to try and protect her from Knoxx who is terribad awful and was heading over to examine her magic and discover her specialness. Because they bind her they stop her being revealed to Knoxx.

With Diana safe, her parents then leave because they know Knoxx will hunt them now and they leave Diana with Emily and Sarah… Emily suspected something was going on

Diana mopes a little but it quickly turns into this romance of awfulness because her mother talked all about her Shadow Prince. And that’s probably why her spell binding broke. Because they were meant to be

Hey, remember when he craved her blood and he had to flee to Scotland in order not to murder her? Anyone remember that? No?

Emily and Sarah have their own angst - because Sarah is deeply upset that they didn’t tell her about all this. She’s hurt but also somewhat guilty - thinking Rebecca (Diana’s mother) couldn’t trust her because she’d fly off the handle and go into a rage while Emily would be careful. I mean, we’ve barely seen these characters but… yes? Emily’s even sensible enough not to challenge this pretty accurate assessment of her character - but pulls out the plus of this. Rebecca trusted her to look after her daughter - knowing she would be a passionate warrior and carer for Diana.

This little snippet of their beautiful relationship really makes me wish they’d appear more often

A Discovery of Witches: Season 1, Episode 6

Diana has been captured by Satu. Who can fly - this is apparently a witch thing. And she has been delivered to Gerbert the evil vampire

Honestly, Satu, you’ve got Gerbert the evil vampire and Knoxx the evil witch - you need better friends.

When she arrives Gerbert starts getting all gropy but Satu steps in - she’s her’s first before Gerbert

She then tries to convince Diana she’s a friendly kidnapper, appeal to her witch solidarity (though she seems shaken when Diana reveals her parents were killed by witches before falling back on the witches must have had a good reason) before getting to the core - she wants to see Diana’s power.

And Diana throws some witchwind about but it’s not all that impressive and Satu isn’t going to be moved by it. She tries to frame it as a chance to help - if she teaches Diana magic she can then protect herself from Gerbert and Matthew. Of course Diana objects to the idea she needs protecting from Matthew and Satu’s attempts to convince her that a) Matthew is using her for the book and b) that Matthew killed Gillian are also not exactly convincing

It’s not like Diana even likes Gillian and disparages her as just another puppet of Knoxx’s - just like Satu. Well… she’s not wrong Satu.

Satu keeps magicing at Diana which involves some fire effects, lots of throwing her around and some glowing lines on Diana’s back while she screams and Satu demands to know her secrets. She also has an ominous box

Gerbert is interviewing his headless witch: beware the witch with the blood of the lion and the wolf which will destroy the children of the night. Can someone write this down so she can stop repeating. It. Gerbert would quite like to know whether Diana or Satu is the witch of prophecy (probably Diana I think)

More screaming and woo-woo and Satu collapses, apparently not getting what she wants, so she drags Diana to an oubliette and drops her in (they’re in Gerbert’s ruined castle). Gerbert arrives to demand he be tagged in and Satu needs to get Diana out  - but she can’t. Using woo-woo on Diana has cost her her powers.

Welp, Knox did warn you Satu.

Knox locks her up in a room with the severed witch head which duly freaks Satu out that an ancient powerful witch has been kept in such an appalling condition for so long. The witch is apparently Meridana (THE Meridana - so clearly important) - and Satu borrows some of her magic so she can escape - with the head.

While Diana dreams about her parents who take a long time to explain that to get out of a room with a hole in the ceiling one has to fly

I would say it shouldn’t take this long to explain things to her but given her decision making to date… maybe.

Of course the rest of Team Good Guy aren’t standing around. While Matthew snarls and manhandles his brother Baldwin and even bites him for the actions of the Council, Marthe investigates and discovers a flying witch must be behind the abduction (something Knoxx cannot do). They call Knoxx anyway and he lies and claims Satu is with him - it’s not a convincing lie. But a witch invading vampire lands is justification for a war...

A Discovery of Witches: Season 1, Episode 5

I am never going to get used to this title card.

Diana is still in France with Ysabeau and she HASN’T had a tragic accident falling down all those stairs yet. I know I was surprised too. Ysabeau, you are not creative.

Instead she decides to try and scare Diana off by taking her hunting and have Diana watch her kill a fox for blood. For she is a vampire RAWR. Honestly it’s… not horrifying? I mean she could have killed say, a deer and wrapped the entrails round her neck like a stole and covered her face in blood. This was… really clean and quite neat? “THIS IS THE REALITY YOU WILL LIVE WITH IF YOU’RE WITH MY VAMPIRE SON!” uh-huh, I know rich people in silly clothes here in England who are waaaaay more evil when hunting foxes than Ysabeau.

Unshockingly, lack of vegetarianism does not send Diana running for the hills. So Ysabeau decides to tell her of Matthew’s human life 1500 years ago when he had a wife and child who died of fever and he may have actually committed suicide in response. She sired him when she found him dying and he was all ragy and savage. She is convinced that Matthew has not mated since then because he’s not over this human who died in medieval times. Look, not to  destroy a good true love narrative, but someone who is grieving for fifteen centuries needs therapy. That’s not healthy. Oh Ysabeau doubles down -  Diana is also mortal and will die and leave him all sad and tragic.

Ysabeau is pulling zero punches here. No it doesn’t work… can we remember that this epic love is based on about 2 weeks acquaintence?

Marthe also tells Diana how awesomely powerful she is but, in a moment of almost insightful thinking, Diana isn’t excited about this because it’s basically even more power she can’t control. This is a good insight. Now she needs to actually do something about it

Also she needs to tell these vampires to get the hell out of her bathroom while she’s bathing.

Diana calls her aunts to catch up and ask why she wasn’t told about the Congregation and the Covenant to have the excellent response that how could they when she resists all mention of magic. Fair point. She also tells her aunts she loves the vampire she hasn’t known for a month yet, which her aunts thinks this is a very very bad idea. Diana insists that they must surely understand

To which her lesbian aunts should get on a plane to France right then so they can personally slap her upside the head for that completely uncalled for dig at their relationship and comparing marrying a vampire to marrying another woman. Discovery of Witches, you’ve put your lesbians safely on a different continent, don’t make it even worse.

In Oxford Matthew checks his lab and finds nothing stolen - but does smell out the witch who broke in. It’s Gillian - and he hunts her down. She doesn’t really explain herself beyond “vampires are awful, RAWR!” so he bites her and drains her blood (which also gets her memories of what she saw) and steals her phone which had photographs of his lab. Gillian staggers with extreme severe blood loss to Sylvia’s house

Miriam is not happy with Matthew for drawing all this attention to him with his witch mating - because everyone knows this is happening. Yes he’s not been subtle. But Matthew is sure that it wasn’t about his lab - but about Diana’s samples. Because it has to about Diana it seems. Personally I think the witches may be more interested in the fact he’s illicitly examining their DNA after digging up their ancestor’s bodies. I mean they might have issues with this… which isn’t exactly… out there?

Marcus is equally concerned about this witch love and calls Baldwin, head of their family and Congregation to explain what’s happening but how he’s totally sure Matthew has it together. Baldwin not so much and is pretty sure that Matthew will drag them all down and he absolutely cannot help him. He’s not making politics easy and there’s not a lot of good will on the Congregation

At the Congregation, Knoxx is freaked out about Matthew experimenting on witch DNA - but is pretty blase about him attacking Gillian because a) he doesn’t want his fellow Congregation witches to learn that he put her up to breaking into his lab and b) while having sex with a witch is super bad, nearly killing her is totally ok so long as she broke into your home first

A Discovery of Witches, Season 1, Episode 4

Matthew and Diana have gone on holiday to France to the ancestral castle where everyone knows them. Matthew assures him that his mother is totally looking forward to meet her

Unshockingly she really isn’t

In addition to find warm bloods poorly educted mongrels who can’t speak classic French, she’s also super super not into witches. And she hates change as well. Diana is as welcome as that bloke who knocks on your door at 8:00am on a Sunday morning to tell you all about Jesus.

We also have Marthe who seems to be the family servant and/or exposition aide.

Back in Oxford Juliette shows up looking for Matthew and after slapping Marcus around and then getting set down hard by Miriam she asks after him. Miriam snarks about Juliette chasing a man who doesn’t want her for all eternity and it’s a definite good hit. Go Miriam.

So why does Ysabeau hate witches? Well Matthew’s step dad died in world war 2 - by “her kind”. Matthew insists that she can’t blame Diana for what other witches did and both angrily and sadly laments that once she used to love all people for how they were

Aunt Sarah and Ann hear that Diana is in France and insist she leave because Ysabeau is a renowned witch killer who slaughtered entire covens in South America. Of course Diana stays and isn’t even overly freaked out by this news. She does ask about Phillipe’s death and does put 2 and 2 together about some witches working with the Nazis (this may also make Ysabeau’s little rampage more… targetted since historically fleeing Nazis did run to South America such as Mengele and Eichman. So maybe Ysabeau slaughtered those covens with good reason)

What she is freaked out about is the revelation that her parents were murdered by other witches - Matthew found evidence of a magic circle on the photographs.

Since Diana has a death wish and kissing the vampire who craves her just isn’t getting the job done she tries plan b: asking Ysabeau about how those witches murdered her beloved

This woman wants to die. There is no other explanation.

But her appeal that she’s a good person, that her dead parents are good people and the existence of some evil Nazi witches does not, in turn, make witches evil - and adds that she’s doing her utmost to not judge Ysabeau despite the things she’s heard about her. Point to Deathwish Diana.

Ysabeau has some advice for Diana - get revenge. Sure it doesn’t make pain go away, but it helps. And points to this show for breaking the trope where eveyrone who has killed in vengeance is supposed to tell us all how it’s totally a bad idea. Nah, Isabeau has Zero Regrets.

Discovery of Witches, Season 1, Episode 3

This voiceover is happening every episode. Really, this is happening? These are the credits?

So I’m going to mix the order up a little more this episode so it flows better for a recap just because I’m lazy and I really hate view switching storylines almost as much as I hate stories not in chronological orders.

So in, I’m going to assume Venice because it’s wet, we have the Congregation which seems to be an all powerful ruling body for the three supernatural races (or, I guess, more than three since there could be more) It’s run by a human in a male inherited role which a visiting Satu is snarking about.

She is there to research Diana (and gets a file including pictures of her dead parents( but the witch archive is invaded by the Venetian investigator Dominico and there’s some magic and lots of strangling. We’ve seen Satu open a pit into the floor - I think Dominico is very very casual about strangling her one handed. He may be asking for some severe combustion

Anyway he learns about Diana and rushes to boss man Gerbert (and I still can’t get over Trevor Eve in this role) to tattle that Matthew is totally messing with witches and if they can prove it they can get him in trouble. Apparently this is is something they want

Gerbert doesn’t think that Matthew is going to be that daft as to play into their evil hands. But he consults a mummified head in a box which mumbles something about a witch with the blood of a wolf and a lion (I think. I am so against cryptic nonsense prophecy I refuse to rewind to find out). So he sends his daughter. Who he bathes and kisses extremely inappropriately before sending her off. Uckies do not want

Right now we can head back to Oxford to where Matthew reports to Diana that the Bodleian is now utterly full of Creatures all looking for Diana to get the book so instead invites her to his country house. But first she runs into Gillian to tell her she’s the worst betraying supposed friend ever. While Gillian admits she’s not nice but that knoxx is awesome becaus he’s *gasp* CONGREGATION. And she needn’t spend time with “that.”

“That” being Matthew. Again, everyone on this show is so utterly incapable of being endearing even slightly. Like everyone in this book needs to charm Diana onside and they’re all really really bad at it. I mean, super bad. Like everyone can tell Diana is really put off by this anti-vampire rhetoric so consider toning it down? Maybe?

So to Matthew’s house because his whole Craving her blood thing means it’s an excellent idea for him to take her out to some isolated house in the country where they can be alone together. Yes. It does give them chance to explore Matthew’s past, hid Frenchness (all vampires are French. It’s a rule. Damn you Anne Rice. And all werewolves are Scottish - no-one to blame for this. It’s something about the hairiness. It’s a rule) his age (he was born in the 6th century), his family and his brother’s alchemy books. It actually manages to be a full conversation with minimum creepiness

They also establish that Diana’s magic is instinctive - basically she just wants something and it happens, sort of. Personally I’m not a lover because it makes magic a bit too effortless and too much of a deux ex. But he points out since she’s using magical all the time without knowing she should really get behind her super powers already

And I still don’t buy the idea that someone can have magic and decide not to use it. Nope nope nope. I don’t care if their parents were eaten alive by rabbits pulled out of hats, there’s no reason.

A Discovery of Witches, Season 1, Episode 1

This show is set in Oxford. Since Oxford, the city of dreaming spires, one of the most beautiful cities in England it’s kind of required to have lots and lots of aerial shots and showing off all the pretty university buildings. Only this is accompanied by overly ominous music and melodramatic voice overs

The first few minutes of the show and already the urge to snark is rising… It just feels like it’s going to… take itself overly seriously

Our main character is Professor Diana Bishop, she’s an American researcher who has a position at Yale who is back in Oxford in the hope she will be offered a professorship. By the way everyone gushes, she is very very very good at her job as a historian.

She is also a witch -but never uses her magic because her parents were killed by witch hunters in the Ukraine (as she explains on an almost date with a guy who is also a librarian and she kinda needs to work on her flirty banter) so she’s decided it’s far better to never practice magic and have it leak out accidentally ruffling papers and throwing priceless ancient books around. She also wants nothing to do with the local witches despite being friends with Gillian, local witch, and the local coven leader offering her a place

She is, perhaps, not the best at making decisions.

She has to do some research on Alchemy to get her paper done by October  so she can get this much coveted role so she goes researching in the Bodleian where she requests a book. This book is a Special Book and it only appears when she asks for it. When she touches it we get a full on poltergeist experience with flickering lights and writing moving and running down her hands and it even burning her. Duly freaked out she sends the book back - and it vanishes.

She calls her aunt, who raised her, for advice but then hangs up all sulky because her aunt suggested maybe she use magic. Diana is outraged - how could she suggest a magical witch use magic to deal with the magic weirdness caused by the magic book?! The very idea!!!!

The magical weirdness is also felt by all the vampires in Oxford, especially Matthew (a professor of biochemistry) who sidelines in ominous voice overs. He think she has found The Magical Special Book which contains secrets about “creatures” (supernatural beings), especially vampires. And he’d really really like to find that so that a) the witches don’t find it and use it to squish vampires (since vampires and witches are not best buds at all) but mainly b) so he can fix vampires. It seems recent attempts to create new vampires have been failing -as we see with young vampire Marcus trying to raise his friend who gets in a terrible car accident. This doesn’t work and the man dies.

Also Marcus’s non-consensual public attempt to turn someone is totally not allowed as well. Matthew and his assistant Miriam are testing blood and trying to find a cure. He thinks the book will help so approaches Diana and honestly explains his worries and predicament.

Hah, no. He starts following her around being all spooky and vampiric and creepy making not-quite threatening statements and warning her that other supernaturals will have felt the woo-woo and be looking for her. He’s also trying to grasp that despite being rather powerful, she’s also utterly ignorant of her power

Sinbad: Season 1, Episode 11

 We begin with an old man running along a night shrouded path trying to carry an armload of documents until a wolfy-type thingy leaps on him. I’m assuming that’s not a good thing. We also have a woman, Lara, and her son being helped considerably by an Priest and she seems more than a little perturbed by his solicitous charity.

And Sinbad and co have arrived in Malta, looking for a map to the Land of the Dead - someone please at least question this dangerous quest. Aha, Gunnar is questioning whether any such map exists – something Tiger objects to (she apparently knows the map maker, Brother Angelico… presumably some details have been retconned – I mean, added, since last week). Even if it exists, Gunnar think it’s a bad idea to go since the living probably shouldn’t wander around the Land of the Dead. Also, Gunnar, as a Viking who has killed a great many people doesn’t especially want to go visit either. He also has trading to do – actual trade, for money, at least someone is watching the purse strings.

Sinbad, Tiger, Rina and Anwar enquire after Brother Angelico in a tavern – except the tavern is for islanders only (good business practice there) and he tells them that brother Angelico is old, infirm and doesn’t leave the monastery. He’s dying.

Sinbad, being a gentle and kind soul, understands that Tiger must be sad about her friend’s death and, after 2 seconds of respect for that, focuses again on his map. They’re interrupted by everyone suddenly locking up their houses – and monks running around painting red lines on the doors. Hey, can I get some monks in to do the redecorating?

Gunnar goes to deliver the silk to Lara; her husband, the tailor has died recently leaving her unable to pay – he gives the silks as a gift. She invites him to dinner and he is all adorable with her son – but also sees giant scratches on the wall of her house, like claws. He fixes a window, sets the fire and engages in some gentle flirting. When it’s time to leave, an odd wind starts up and she begs him to stay. She fears a Fiend that apparently travels on the wind

The priest is being strangely creepy – for a start a mysterious woman who I shall pretend, for 5 seconds, isn’t Taryn since I think the show’s trying to save that as a surprise, has been called in to help Brother Angelico. He finds papers on the path dropped by the old man who was running at the beginning of the episode – he seems to find them annoying and screws them up and throws them away, looking more angry and menacing. He goes to see Lara and seems less than pleased to see Gunnar through the window being all cutesy with Lara. The priest and his men burst into the room and one of them bashes Gunnar over the head.

Sinbad, Season 1, Episode 5

With Team Evil, Lord Akbari and Taryn are still using their wiles to try and find Sinbad. And, between her sight and his throwing people off rooftops, they may have found him.

Sinbad and co are sat in a nice little place, drinking bad booze, sharing stories and laughing other Anwar’s terrified attempt to get a tattoo from Rina, when Anwar see’s Basran guards moving through the town showing pictures of Sinbad to people. Sinbad loses his temper and wants to fight them but Gunnar brings the common sense to the discussion and points out they’ll all be killed – even if they want Sinbad alive, his companions are fair game.

Time for a cunning plan. A distraction as both Rina and Nala pretend to fight over Anwar, allowing Sinbad to sneak away. Anwar, Nala and Rina are to sneak on the ship and sail it round the cape where they can pick up Sinbad and Gunnar. That’s the plan but it doesn’t go well, with Basran guards and Taryn on the Providence, capturing Anwar, Rina, Nala and Cook. Taryn threatens to kill his friends right there unless Anwar tells them everything – and he does, spilling about Sinbad and Gunnar going to the Cape and that Sinbad is cursed.

Taryn uses Sinbad’s hair, herself and some salt to create a salt monster, a hunter that Cook identifies as old, dark magic, and sends it out hunting Sinbad.

It doesn’t go simply for Gunnar and Sinbad either, with Sinbad refusing to run and leading them to a patrol. Gunnar knocks him down easily but is furious with Sinbad for seeking a fight they could have avoided. This isn’t the first time Gunnar has shown himself averse to violence – and to have a powerful rage when pushed.

As they move through the city they’re followed by masked figures in red who, when they’re alone, leap on them and attack. After a nifty battle, they manage to knock out Sinbad and, finally, subdue Gunnar (who refuses to draw his sword).

Sinbad wakes with Gunnar missing and follows his trail (I assume. Or psychically knows where he is) to a castle on a hill, inside which lots of the red clad masked people are practicing martial arts and one of them, a guy without a mask, reveals they’ve been hunting Gunnar for a while. The man is called Obsidian (shouldn’t he wear black?) and the men are the Kaimar and their job is to be world police, protect the innocent, punish the lawless (hey, Akbari’s over there guys).

Sinbad Season 1, Episode 4: Old Man of the Sea

 Guess what? They’ve run out of supplies AGAIN. Someone needs to look at packing a bit more supplies since they do seem to stop to load up every other day. How far away is Barooq anyway? I’m Because the length of time they’re sailing and the number of times they have to stop for supplies makes me think they’ve sailed out of Basra and are heading for Australia.

They’re dehydrated, so much so that Cook is actually hallucinating. So, thirsty, hungry and hallucinating, Sinbad and Rina decide to row out to investigate a neighbouring ship because it has a spooky light. After all, it’s not like they’ve run into lots of mystical crap that might make you just a little leery of that and, maybe, want to wait until daylight.

They row through the dark and eerie sea, full of dead fish (and probably big neon signs screaming “you don’t want to go there!”) to the ship. The ship is silent, the sails are ragged and the planks rotten – even the neon signs yelling “go back you fools! Go back!” are flickering. Inside there’s a dinner table set for a wedding feast, covered in dust, spider webs and maggots. Faced with this, Sinbad and Rina agree to leave (yay sense!) the room and go check the hold for supplies (because the dust, spider webs and rot are so encouraging). And in the hold they find an unconscious man. Ah well , no supplies, guess it’s time to return to the Providence empty handed.

Hah, no, of course they bring the man back with them. Cook promptly, and sensibly, loses his shit over them bringing the only survivor of a deserted ship that may have been wiped out by plague onto the Providence. Cook also has a hallucination of the man with plague markings all over him.

Next day dawns and the ship is missing – though Anwar assures Sinbad it’s just a mirage and it’s still there. Gunnar checks on the unconscious man and he speaks “I see the blood on your soul” before falling unconscious again – which causes Gunnar to leave all freaked. He wakes to talk to Sinbad and Anwar, revealing his name is Anicetus, that he’s seen Sinbad before and avoiding all of their questions.

Sinbad, Season 1, Episode 2: Queen of the Water-Thieves

Cook is giving the inexperienced sailors a crash course in how to actually sail a boat – including the importance of being able to tie good knots if you don’t want your head crushed by a boom.

After the crash course and over lunch they discuss exactly what they want to do. Anwar, the doctor, and Sinbad are all for adventure – they have their own ship, time to see things. Nala wants to go her own way and return to her own life and Rina and Gunnar point out they have nothing in common and have their own things to do. Cook, who seems to be the practical one of the whole group, says they go to shore because they need food and water – and the charts point to the nearby island of Sind, abandoned of people with only wolves inhabiting it.

That night on the boat, a child sneaks aboard to eat. Nala catches him in her cabin, but is tricked into lowering her knife by the child’s fear, seeking to reassure him instead. At which point the kid pulls a knife on her. On deck, Sinbad is ambushed by another who knocks him out

The next day, they wake and the whole crew has been captured (except Cook) and held at knife point by children, though they are joined by a few adults who row them, and the ship’s supplies, to the island. There is an ancient, partially ruined city of step-pyramids – and Sinbad worries about his grandmother’s curse. He cannot set foot on land for more than 1 day.

The Cook is still on board, with 2 guards and his emergency supplies – and he is cooking for them. I think Cook may actually be awesome, he’s rapidly becoming the most amusing character.

They are taken before the Razia, Queen of the Water Thieves, who singles out Gunnar and orders the rest caged – before Sinbad, of course, speaks up and convinces her to take him instead (by amusing her with his bravado). She rewards her people by feeding them bread (which they scramble over wildly from a trough) and promising them meat (yes, not ominous at all).

Sinbad is delivered to her chambers where he meets her pet (a massive bird of prey), learns that overpowering her would be… difficult to say the least and gets a lecture on leadership. He claims he’s the leader of the crew but misfortune brought them together – she says misfortune binds people together and a real leader sacrifices and risks for their people. She has a lot to say about the costs and burdens of leadership before bringing Sinbad to her bed.

After a visit from Razia’s son he’s given an extreme lesson on how ruthless Razia is and how impossible it is to earn her favour – she shows no favour to her son and killed both his father and her other lovers.

The rest of the crew are in cages and discussing Sinbad. Nala is disgusted and thinks he’s going to save his own neck, though Rina says she’d do the same in his situation. Anwar is convinced Sinbad has a plan for their rescue and Gunnar doesn’t understand why Anwar –or Nala for that matter – thinks Sinbad owes them any kind of loyalty or consideration.

Sinbad, Season 1, Episode 1: Pilot

 

Sinbad and his brother, Jamil are in Basra and making a living while up to no good. Sinbad pretends to lose in a fist fight, so his brother can get excellent odds , then suddenly turn the fight around to fleece a bookie. A simple con – but it doesn’t end simply as his opponent bangs his head at the end of the fight. He seems to recover, Sinbad and Jamil leave, but then (under the menacing gaze of the sorceress Taryn) he slumps and died.

In the market, they indulge in some pickpocketing with the help of a friendly corrupt guard, stealing a case from Nala and her father (wealthy visitors to the city) – though inside the case there is only an odd, hairy totem.

Of course, since Sinbad is a hero, he has been indulging his crooked ways for good purpose – to support his elderly grandmother and his catatonic mother –because you can’t have a hero who is a thief through greed or even to save himself – he has to be stealing for other people to make him a redeemable character. Bonus points if the people he’s stealing for are elderly, children or helpless.

But it catches up with him – first with his grandmother having a vision from the coins that the money is blood money – money earned through killing (which is a surprise to Sinbad who didn’t know he’d killed his opponent). And then by the guards battering down their door, chasing them across the city and eventually capturing them.

Lord Akbari, the father of Sinbad’s dead opponent, is grieving for his son, being supported and comforted by his brother, the Emir, making a him powerful man one does not want to annoy. Lurking around is also the Sorceress Taryn (she who cast her magic eyes on the fight) who laments that they don’t have the magic to bring the dead back any more, since the Emir is encouraging science instead of magic.

He wanders down to the cells to tell Sinbad that his opponent in the fist fight is dead, and surprise, he was Lord Akbari’s son! And the Emir has very kindly let Lord Akbari decide how justice will be done in this case, how very nice.  Realising how well and truly screwed he is, Sinbad begs for his brother’s life – accepting his fate. So Lord Akabari… has Jamil killed and makes Sinbad watch; killing Sinbad’s loved one to make up for Sinbad killing his.

Sinbad isn’t without his tricks and, during the night, he manages to overcome one of the guards and escape home – where his grandmother watches over his brother’s dead body. His grandmother is grieving – and blames Sinbad for his brother’s death. Through tears she curses Sinbad to drift so he cannot spend more than a day on land – so he can learn and find atonement. She binds the curse in a locket around his neck, just as his friend the guard shows up to help him leave the city.