This week’s episode begins when a young girl runs away from home. As starting points go for a journey, it’s certainly a familiar setup, and a typically rewarding one. You’re immediately saddled with a number of questions: Who is she? Why is she running? What was in that letter she left to her parents?
Of course, this situation’s a bit different. Because she’s a werewolf… and a debate team champion.
(Obviously, there are spoilers.)
Hal is so excited to be organizing things that he’s actually in danger of making the crap cafe look marginally respectable. After finishing a number of the most tedious tasks you could set human hands to (he organizes the eggs by size and seals the frying pans with olive oil to name just two), he asks Tom to do something very special: to fill the role that Leo had in Hal’s life. Basically, Hal wants Tom to give him regular tasks to do, so the routine can keep him sane. Tom says he’d be honored. D’aww.
Hal’s vampy sense tingles and he goes to the window to find a werewolf girl staring in at them. Tom wants to talk to her, but she runs off. Tom and Hal give chase, she presses a rape alarm. Tom shouts that they’re both werewolves, she turns the rape alarm off. It turns out that the girl (named Allison) knew that Tom was a werwolf and was intending to speak with him on behalf of that YouTube video.
She is, of course, referring to the video of his transformation that Cutler put on the internet, but Tom has no idea what a YouTube is. Or Facebook. Or any other web space for that matter. This actually addresses one of the most amusing aspects of Being Human as a series; while most of the characters are relatively young and savvy, have you ever seen one person in the show on a laptop? Posting to Twitter? Updating their blog? Of course it makes more sense for the vampires to care less, being much older, but it’s still pretty amusing that none of the characters have even a passing fancy for the web. Allison is here to remedy that, as her grasp of social media eclipses Tom’s knowledge of whittling and Hal’s knowledge of harpsichord classics combined.
It turns out that some people are taking the werewolf video very seriously. Allison is concerned, so she wants to find out who is responsible to stop it—exposure would be a very bad idea after all. Tom assures her that it’s not him, but vampires. Allison is all too keen to find out how to get in touch with these problematic vampires and talk them down with her forensic prowess.
Cutler finds himself with a brand new problem; with Griffin dead, a new vampire has stepped into his shoes. Her name is Golda, and she comes with a cadre of boy playthings. One, her personal trainer by the name of Cane, is a melding of every hilarious film cliche you could think of. He speaks in bad action movie lines. More on that later. Cutler is pissed because yet again, the people in power are not listening to him. Golda says she wants Tom because of all the vampires he’s killed and Cutler is to deliver him.
Annie is taking care of Eve, who won’t stop crying. A man comes to the door to complain about noisy babies being noisy, but Annie thinks the man is secretly a vampire. She ghost-powers him off the doorstep and he brains himself on the sidewalk. So that makes two kills for Annie, even if this one is accidental. It leaves her stuck with a grouchy old man ghost named Emrys (Merlin fans everywhere are laughing hysterically right now).
Tom and Allison go to the docks to talk to the vampires at Allison’s insistence. It doesn’t go so well, and Tom is forced to kill one of Golda’s boys. Allison is very unhappy that Tom resorted to violence and is thinking of leaving. Tom brings her to Cutler instead. Cutler feigns ignorance on the whole werewolf video thing, telling them it’s probably all Golda’s doing and that she needs to be taken care of. Because Cutler is smart and knows how to get his problems handled. Allison is still not keen on the violence, but Cutler and Tom assure her that it’s a war and they all need to be prepared to do what’s necessary.
Hal is working in the cafe (this week’s Oldies R&B selection is the Isley Brothers’ “Work To Do,” and I think Hal is trying to kill me with this) when a very cute girl comes in to get tea. Alex—that’s her name—is on vacation, and she thinks Hal is totally cute too even if he is an awkward recluse. Hal panics when she ruins his condiment line up and can’t tell her he finds her attractive. She leaves and he is left to headdesk.
In the meantime, Tom and Allison are getting close. He’s teaching her how to kill vampires, and she’s teaching him how to debate. Romance of the nerdiest kind is a-brewing. You’ll have to trust me on this, as I speak from experience; high school Speech Team is a very special realm of geekdom. After a talk about how “brutish” courting is these days (Hal prefers the dowry system and writing girls poetry), Alex comes into the cafe to find out if Hal would still like to go out. He hides behind a counter and hits Tom every time he encourages the date. Alex is aware that Hal is hiding behind the counter, leaving him waving awkwardly as she leaves.
Annie is going to help solve Emrys’ unfinished business, since she sort of owes him, seeing as she killed him and all. She’s convinced that unfinished business must be righteous and good, but no one else is quite buying it. Emrys says he’s never been kissed and that might be it. Annie goes to kiss him when she notices his wedding ring (again with men foisting creepy, creepy stuff on Annie). So Emrys is just a jerk. Annie takes him to his ex-wife’s house; she ran off with the piano teacher years ago, and Annie figures that Emrys has to tell her that he’s still in love with her. It doesn’t work.
Tom, Allison, Hal and Alex are going on a double date. Well, sort of—Tom hasn’t told Allison he fancies her, and Hal really doesn’t want to be there. Tom gives Hal a box of matches to sort to keep him calm. D’aww.
The date is at a museum because everyone besides Alex thinks that’s a perfect date idea, and Allison has a special badge that gets her into every museum for free. Hal tries to stick to Tom and Allison to keep Alex safe, but Allison knows that Alex wants to be alone with Hal, so they jet off with a “focus on the matches” from Tom and a “no glove no love” from Allison. (Can we keep Allison?) Alex and Hal talk things out a bit by the wooly mammoth, but when Alex closes her eyes for a kiss, Hal can’t handle the temptation. He runs away, leaving Alex standing in the shadow of a giant ancient elephant by herself. Poor form, honey.
The reason why Tom and Allison left was due to a clever play by Cutler; playing both sides, he told Golda that he would help Cane take Tom and Allison in, in exchange for half credit when the Old Ones arrived. He counts on Golda’s ego, which she has plenty of—she insists that Cane do the job by himself, which Cane is only too happy to do… after giving a “Nnoooooooooooo!” worthy of Revenge of the Sith Vader to mourn the passing of the last boy toy. Uh-huh. It would almost take me out of the episode tonally, but it’s too damn funny. Cutler calls Tom and tells them that Cane is after them, and they decide to head him off.
So Cane meets the pups and gets a hold of Allison. Tom’s worried until he notices Allison’s bloody nose and tells her she can bleed on him. They finish Cane off before he can get in a good movie line, and run back to the house. Allison is pretty keen and getting into bed with Tom right then and there, but Tom’s not really okay with that; he thinks they should take things slow. They both admit to being virgins, and Tom tells Allison that she’s not a soldier in a war, despite what he said earlier. He doesn’t want things to be so frantic. He leaves her in his room, and our boys are two-for-two at the moment. Shame on you, boys.
Tom goes down to kvetch to Annie, but she can’t be bothered since she’s still trying to get Emrys to cross over. She tells him that killing changes people, so it’s no surprise that Allison is different. Emrys shows Tom an article; Allison’s parents are making a plea for her return. Tom goes to tell her, but she’s vanished. It turns out that she’s gone to find Cutler, who could use her help in dispatching Golda now that the nasty vamp is all alone. Allison’s not a soldier, but she makes a good show of it, pinning Golda to the ground and getting ready to stake her. Tom stops her, telling Allison that she shouldn’t kill, that her parents want her back, that she’s only a werewolf for one night a year and she’s perfect. Allison agrees to stop, and lets Golda up once she promises not to try anything. But once Golda shakes her hand, she gets all fanged up—
So Cutler stakes her. I’m guessing that’s a pretty big deal for the boy who seems firm on not getting his hands dirty. The vampires aren’t exactly fond of those who kill their own kind either. Cutler is left to come to terms with his crazy. Tom and Allison clear out.
Hal is freaked out about the new news on the Box Tunnel stuff, but Tom and Allison think they’ve taken care of it since Golda is dead. They ask Hal how his date went and he admits that he left. Tom calls him a chicken, which leads Hal to go on about the “thousands of women” that he has seduced in his time as a vampire, and how he’s a cold-blooded killer and totally not scared, blah, blah, blah…. Sure, Hal.
Tom calls Alex’s voicemail and makes Hal leave a message. Hal tells Alex he’s sorry, and that he’d love to have dinner with her. He uses French, mentions dancing and courtly rituals, and you have to figure Alex is going to say yes when the guy sounds so pathetic.
Upstairs, Tom tells Allison that even though she wants to make a go of the long-distance dating, he doesn’t want to see her anymore. She knows he’s trying to push her away, but he’s adamant enough that she goes, leaving him her museum badge. Tears all around. Cupid has been absolutely thwarted this round, and we’re seeing an emerging pattern; despite Allison and Alex insisting that they are level-headed and well capable of looking after themselves, the boys are taking it upon themselves to make the opposite decision for them. Pretty annoying, guys. Also pretty sexist, but let’s not go there right now.
Annie and Emrys go to his ex-wife’s house and they poltergeist the hell out of her and her husband the piano teacher. It turns out that’s all he needs to get his door. Emrys makes the point to Annie that we’ve been skirting around all episode; that sometimes your unfinished business isn’t nice, or even righteous. He goes, but someone else opens the door; it’s Eve, the blonde woman from the future. She tells Annie that she needs to come quickly. This can’t be good.
Questions:
- So it’s Eve, but can we trust her? Her delivery isn’t very convincing (but that just could be the actress).
- Can we keep Allison? Come on, I know they don’t want another werewolf couple so soon after George and Nina, but she’s just too precious to waste.
- Do you think Hal will be able to keep himself together for that date?
- After that preview for next week, are you just counting the hours ’til the upcoming episode?
Tune in next week for: “Making History”
Emmet Asher-Perrin is really disturbed by how much she likes Cutler as a character. He’s like the new Gauis Baltar. You can bug her on Twitter and read more of her work here and elsewhere.
