This episode contained a whole lot of fighting (which From Dusk Till Dawn has previously used
as filler because they’re not even super fight scenes) with one important
incident – and by important I mean enraging.
Last episode Richie was kidnapped by Amaru and taken to
the mental hospital where she was locked up, the bloody words still on the wall.
With a flashback we’re shown a new power of Amaru’s – the ability to turn
people to their dark side and make them evil and violent: marking them with
blood red eyes.
She then uses this power on Richie – turning all three of
his eyes (including the eye on his palm) red, raising his shadow self and
convincing him to serve her sending all of his fellows to a “better place”
Which basically means killing them and sending them to
Xilbalba
So when the gang arrives to save him he starts picking
them off one by one and imprisoning them. Yes he’s not killing them because he
has a plan which defies even Amaru – he needs to capture them so Seth can join
them in Xilbalba (apparently he can only get there by killing the others? I don’t
know, Richie logic)
Most of the episode is spent on these battles and cat and
mouse games
Look, I like action, I do. And a well choreographed fight
scene is a joy to behold (just look at any episode of Into the Badlands, that is awesome and beautiful). But From Dusk Till Dawn has many of the same
terrible problems that we’ve seen with Vampire
Diaries and Originals when it
comes to supernatural power –it varies. A couple of episodes ago Burt took down
Richie and Seth like they were small children because he was the eternal hunter
and Just That Awesome. This episode Richie takes him down with minimal effort.
Seth is human yet seems to manage better against Richie than Burt does. Scott
has these amazing sword skills from nowhere. We see this a lot with From Dusk till Dawn, a character’s
skill, power etc will change episode to episode at the convenience of the plot.
One element that is powerful to see is Richie’s terror
for his brother – both in the beginning afraid he wouldn’t find Richie and then
when he sees Richie possessed. You can almost feel the flashback to the first
season when Seth was so afraid that Richie was delusional and dangerous – that he
was worried he was losing his brother to insanity, even as it turned out to be
possession or something similar.
After much fighting they eventually, with Burt’s insight,
figure out how to free Richie and cleanse him with fire.
But not before he manages to use his eye possession power
to make Freddie kill Ximona
Yes she’s dead.
After several moments this episode establishing their
relationship and what they mean to each other, she is killed
Last episode I said that this show lacked meaningful
female characters and Ximona was badly used and deserved to be far more than a
love interest. The solution to this wasn’t to fridge her, damn it! This problem
is now just so much worse because with Santanico gone there are no female
characters who are likely to realistically step up on par with Ximona’s
potential.
