It is time for a homecoming game in Purgatory, apparently in celebration of the only hockey game the high school has ever won. 10 years ago and they’re still celebrating it. That’s kind of faintly tragic.
More tragic is that those old hockey players are dying - starting with one man ripping out his own liver while a creepy guy in burlap sack looks on and apparent compels him into it. I’ll take Demonic Pact for a 100, Bob
Nedly goes into full on cover-up mode because he doesn’t need the drama around the big game. Much to Nicole’s frustration and attempted shaming. Nedly has no shame at all
Wynonna herself isn’t that focused on this monster either - because she’s obsessing over the ritual she saw last week in the old school. She doesn’t want to focus on little demons and revenants so Black Badge can hit their quota. There’s something big and bad out there she needs to focus on - her ongoing insecurity about Dolls not being there adds to this. There’s something big out there and she doesn’t know what to do about it - again harking back to the fact she’s not a leader or doesn’t know how to be.
Mercedes is still around though being immensely fun, encouraging the drinking of tequila and lamenting how her parents left os much of their money to the town. She’s also not thrilled with trying to sort out the lives of her younger siblings. She’s still fun and trying to set Wynonna up with Perry, another member of the ill fated hockey team. She agrees to do this mainly so she can try and find out more information about the hockey team
He’s also very very easy on the eyes which helps.
Thought that information on the team thing? Is kind of shoddy writing - Wynonna kind of lasers in on the team, the hockey trophy, ripping our own organs et al right away without any real evidence trail leading her there.
Though she seems to be right to be suspicious of Perry since he skins a rabbit (Hey, they’re in the boonies. Maybe this is lunch. But since he’s in a hotel room I’m sure there’s rules about that. No smoking or vaping and no skinning small game). And at the big, more than a little pathetic meeting to kick off the celebrations of the match he ends up dumping Wynonna, his date, to help another panicking Hockey player who is drunkenly rambling on. Perry definitely seems more interested in silencing the man before she says something he shouldn’t
Wynonna is definitely suspicious and manages to follow Skip - now sporting a bloody rune on his forehead - being hunted by burlap demon. Wynonna waving around the Peacemaker is enough to make him back off.
She has a meeting with Doc and Waverley to guess next step and basically accuse Perry - but he just happens to be passing and overhears them. After Doc knocks him out and they rouse him, he claims to actually be trying to protect the team (Waverley confirms that the rune he has been drawing on his fellows and himself is actually a norse protection rune). He also confirms that, yes, 10 years ago they had a sort of demonic pact because the coach was totally sick of losing. It also meant they all had super great lives for the last 10 years
Except for how it’s all going to end with tearing out body parts.
The easiest way to deal with this peskiness would be to shoot the demon with the peacemaker - but Doc intervenes
All those secrets that he’s been keeping with Rosita? He’s making Doll’s medicine. And Rosita isn’t just an awesome mixologist she has a master’s degree in Chemistry (Wynonna is duly chastised for making assumptions based on her appearance). But they’re hit an impasse: they need demon blood
And Wynonna just has a demon, if she can only take it alive. Of course Dolls told Doc not to tell them because of Lacona found out - with her hatred of Dolls - Wynonna’s head would be on the line.
To get the demon they need the trophy which is now all demon prisony for REASON. Which involves Wynonna beating up the current hockey team (not the old one) and heading to save Skip in the police station - since other than Perry he’s not the only one left
Perry has his obligatory trying to be a hero moment, largely because he’s hanging around and likely to become Wynonna’s new love interest so he needs to get proactive.
That fails so they report to what works - a peacemarker to the head. The Demon begs for mercy and is duly imprisoned even though he offered Wynonna a wish - and a chance to avoid the Earp curse. We knew that wasn’t going to happen
It’s actually something of an anticlimax.
But aside from the action and demon, I think this episode is Nicole’s episode - still dealing with the frustration of being a small town cop in the face of Waverley becoming Black Badge and feeling faintly irrelevant.
Though she has the consolation of Waverley’s cheerleader dance, she spends a lot of this episode at a loss. Waverley, being all dark eyed, does random stuff like trying to make out in public when she’s working. She’s generally confused by Waverley’s bizarre behaviour and asking Wynonna is difficult because Wynonna is playing full big sister protective nd not hearing anything that could be even slightly critical of her sister
(I also like a moment where wynonna is concerned about Waverley focusing too much on Nicole - as she remembers Waverley doing the same thing with past partners, focusing so much on them that she lost her own life and goals to it).
There’s also Tucker Gardener, creepy pervert taking photos up women’s skirts and generally being vile - he’s Mercedes’s brother and used to using his wealth and name to protect himself from consequences. And it happens again as Sheriff Nedly lets him go, dismissing his crime as “boys will be boys” and openly making it clear that he is dropping it entirely because of his name - more than a little frustrating to Nicole. Equally frustrating is Waverley trying to make her back off in public - which Nicole sees as Waverley telling her how to do her job.
It’s not Nicole’s best day
But in the end Nedly has a heart to heart and it’s kind of awesome. Firstly he tells her how Purgatory works - how basically everyone just denies their town is full of demons et al. But he also emphasises how important their job is. People need normal police for all the mundane crimes as much as they need Wynonna and Black Badge - and the whole reason he recruited Nicole was to replace him (something which shocks her) when he retires.
Oh he also advises her that sometimes it’s necessary to play a long game - and he has a whole file on Tucker Gardener.
Nedly is a man with hidden depths.
And to Waverly - her black-eyedness continues, eating lipstick, obsessing over the trophy, throwing Tucker around because she can wit super human strength and taking Doll’s medicine to him…. And then taunting him with it? I’m not sure what she’s doing here but she’s definitely possessed and evil.
Tucker is also evil, but Mercedes is officially done with him and her little sister and lays down the law. She then seems to be killed by the black smoky ghosty things (related to Waverley’s ghostly black eyes? Or the ghosts of her dead parents?)
I hope she isn’t dead… I kind of like Mercedes. I have a soft spot for awful people who revel in it gloriously. I might name a trope on it
