Thursday, October 11, 2018

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.


They have dinner and while it starts awkwardly, eventually everyone thaws and and there’s happiness and dancing which leads to Diana glowing in happiness. Literally. They got for a midnight walk and there is kissing

From this happy scene we have everyone gathering at the Congregation (with Agatha, a Black woman, happy to see a new female witch delegate since the vampires are all about the old white men) and Knox goes for his witchly ploy and accuses Matthew of kidnapping Diana which is a naughty naughty crime. Gerbert and Dominico, two of the vampire representatives, don’t like witches much but are happy to leap on a chance to pile on Matthew. The third representative, Bernard, is Matthew’s brother and part of his vampire family and decides to do some research.

Discovering that she went of her own choice and, oh yeah, she can find the book of life which the witches totally didn’t mention. The demons note this and Agatha is quick to seize on this and point out the book matters to all the races not just witches.

Further upsetting Knox’s plans is that Satu challenges him on how he tested Diana as a child and decided she was like totally weak when clearly this isn’t the case. Instead of answering her, Knox magically seizes torments and threatens her. He expected a loyal sycophant, not a member in her own right.

Agatha meanwhile calls her daughter in law about that weird vision she had about a giving a statue to someone - putting together her visions Agatha realises she’s speaking about Diana. And I guess that concludes Demons do have visions and she isn’t delusional. Agatha wants to stay well away from Diana because she’s in bad trouble

While, in Oxford, Gillian and Silvia have received orders to find out what Matthew is up to, what he wants. Gillian is sympathetic about Diana who maybe just doesn’t know how important the Congregation is - while Sylvia cares less since the whole reason Diana is ignorant is because she has actively chosen to isolate herself from her people

At the congregation Gerbert and Baldwin spar but it is decided to send someone to investigate Matthew. And it will be a vampire. Knoxx is probably not thrilled

So they send Dominico who catches up with Diana to ask her to attend the Congregation. She tells him to go away and how she doesn’t have the book. Matthew and co arrive to be very menacing and a united front (and Diana definitely isn’t following anyone’s instructions to go away). And while they deny that she has the book or has anything to answer for. Except she and Matthew are clearly A Thing

And one of the many rules of the Covenant is no interspecies nookie.

Matthew unleashes some violence against Dominico and they get rid of him to talk. Ysabeau puts a spanner in the works by pointing out that they should do what the Congregation says or they will come back and it will be bad, Very bad

So Matthew decides to call off their whole relationship. More he’s going to Oxford to check what the witches are doing to his lab and leaving Diana in the care of his mother. Diana is outraged and refuses to let it go and certainly doesn’t appreciate being ignored. She declares she loves him

DIana…. You’ve known him for like… a week. You wonder why he’s running to a different country? You don’t drop the L word that soon

She is duly ignored anyway despite declaring they have a bond and that she’s not going to be bound by centuries old out of date laws - and off Matthew goes, leaving his beloved to be eaten by his mother. She also cries very sadly about this. Which causes a rain storm which everyone is very very impressed by. I think it’s a balance between her very powerful magic and her doing it accidentally

On that note can I say again how the idea of her not using her power because she feared her parents were killed by witch hunters falls apart epically when you have so little control and leek random weather effects. Also, again, 2, maybe 3 weeks they’ve known each other. Having piteous tears that cause the skies themselves to weep over that seems… excessive. And Matthew saying she doesn’t know him may be an attempt to do the “I’m going to be mean to you to drive you off for your own good” thing - but it’s not wrong. Or him saying that he doesn’t want to cause a multi-side civil war between the Creatures because of a 3 week old relationship… this is too rushed to have the emotional impact it deserves