Warning: Spoiler Alert
A woman walks down a dark alley. A cop, too drunk to contain himself, relieves himself on a building as she passes. A strange woman with surgical mask invades the first woman’s personal space. She looks upon the innocent strangely. Like a stray dog that smells food. Then stabs and slashes the victim’s neck with scissors. The drunk cop fires many shots at the assailant, none of which are able to even slow her down.
John, Zed and Chas this time venture out to New Orleans to investigate this incident. At the scene Constantine pulls out a wristband of sorts. Looks like a thick banded watch. But the face of said watch tells no time. It indicates the type of entity nearby. Blue means there was a spirit nearby recently. Green means it’s in the vicinity. And red is bad news. They are met by the drunk cop who failed to slow down the non-human. Before they left, Zed had one of her visions. Now presented before the cop, she is able to put together the vision to the cop. The cop is skeptical, but accepts John’s card. Even if it still reads, “master of the dark arts”.
An older man picks up a young hitch hiker (late teens early twenties) who sounds like he isn’t comfortable with words. The kid is cold. The old man driving makes a reference to warming him up as he puts his hand on the young boy’s leg. As Zed and John approach the elevator in the hotel, Zed sees the inside of the elevator as her next vision. Outdoors in the woods. A tree is ‘scarred’. Then she turns to see a car speeding right for her. John pulls her out of the elevator to interrupt the vision.
In the car, the old man asks intentional questions as to whether or not anyone is expecting this kid in the city. Gauging how safe this bet of his is. He turns to look at the road then back to the passenger seat where the kid is supposed to be sitting. Only he is not. The man looks forward again and standing in the middle of the street is that kid, only now there is blood coming out of his eye sockets and mouth. The man swerves to avoid hitting the kid and instead fuses his car with the tree from Zed’s vision.
When the team arrives on scene, Zed decides to assert herself with the local authorities. Her efforts crash and burn quickly. Just in time for the drunk cop from earlier to show up and arrest John. Typical of cops in this type of story. Only considering what they can rationalize as long as it’s 6 inches in front of their face.
Chas takes to retracing the first crime scene. The little illuminating wristband shows blue, which means a spirit is nearby. He sees a man in the alley and quickly gets between him and the spirit. The same spirit from before. She asks Chas if he thinks she’s pretty. He says yes. She removes the mask to show her mouth savagely slashed. She then proceeds to stab and slash Chas many times. It looks like Chas is going to die in that alley, but by now we all know better. At least maybe, we will get some insight into what Chas is.
At the precinct, the cop drops a file in front of John who is handcuffed to a desk. Kind of cute really. With all that we’ve seen of John to this point, handcuffs should be child’s play to him. By the end of the scene, John takes the work the cop’s already done and looked ahead to what the next move is. The cop, still skeptical, asks how do you live with it? Knowing what he knows. So at least the cop is starting to accept that maybe there is something to what John is saying.
EMT’s find Chas in the alley. They rip his shirt open to administer CPR. At this point Chas is not breathing with a bleeding gash that stretches the width of his torso. Just then, Chas wakes up and gasps for air. He then looks at the EMT and asks if they have a clean shirt in the ambulance as the huge gash heals itself in a few seconds.
John and Zed split up the leg work. John with the paroled model, Zed with the Grandmother of the hitch hiker. They have one thing in common. They were both approached by a man who could help them gain closure by addressing the entity directly. Speak to the dead model and the dead hitch hiker. Can you sense it? The hairs on the back of your neck stand up. I sense Papa Midnite.
It appears that Papa Midnite is moonlighting as a seance for money racket. Which seems to be actually effective. While he channels a certain woman’s dead husband, he is interrupted by John. Papa Midnite is visibly angry. Not just for the intrusion but still a little residual anger over the acetate. John explains that he is not speaking to the dead, he is raising them. Papa Midnite blows some sort of powder at John and John slowly passes out.
The cop (Jim) finds Zed at the scene of the accident. She’s trying to keep people away from the spot, just in case Phillip (hitch hiker) returns. Jim has a better idea. They’re going to try to pick up Phillip. Meanwhile, Papa Midnite alone in a dark lair of some sort speaks to a skull. As he is a Voodoo priest, this doesn’t seem that far out of sorts. During this, he grabs the skull which is hanging as if he would a living person in order get close and ask an important question. Is Constantine telling the truth? His expression says all you need to know. Side note. Papa’s tone and eye contact with the skull tell me there is more to it than just an ordinary skull. Maybe even a portal to a loved one.
In the home of the woman trying to reach her dead husband, Papa Midnite discovers that he did indeed raise Clark (the husband). Consequently, despite her joy, the wife looks terrible. Her appearance compared to that of Clark’s seems to suggest that Clark is killing her the way he died. With cancer. Papa makes his way back to the car. John has escaped the trunk and taken the driver’s place. Constantine was right, to Papa Midnite’s chagrin. And now, there is a lot of ‘we’ being thrown around. The debt over the acetate has been erased. However, John needs something else. He has a question for Midnite’s sister. Along the natural progression one has to assume the skull from previous, must belong to Midnite’s sister. Which will only be granted if they are successful. And thus, the ‘unholy partnership’ begins.
Zed and Jim attempt to pick up Phillip’s ghost. While they drive, Jim discovers that he recognizes Zed. Only her name has not always been Zed. Then they find Phillip’s ghost and he gets in the SUV. Zed engages in small talk. Motivated small talk as she already has the answers to the questions she’s asking. The second she says his name, Phillip vanishes. Like an idiot she turns to the back to look for him. Then as expected, when they turn around Phillip is standing in the middle of the road. Instead of swerving to miss him, she guns it right for him. His spirit disappears again.
John and Midnite travel out to Clark’s resting place. The idea being, if they can rob the corpse, they can perform a spell that will remove the spirit from this plane. An idea that Midnite is not comfortable with. From his perspective it is disrespectful and sloppy. Sloppy as it may be, they go ahead with it. Meanwhile Zed and Jim try picking up the hitch hiker again. Same dialogue except this time Zed leads with calling him Phillip.
Constantine and Midnite are essentially singing the same song in different languages. Three corpses bundled on a large fire. As they burn, both men recite incantations of two completely different origins. The spell does not work. Then the two men begin accusing the other of being the weak link. Words are exchanged. Midnite throws a low blow by insinuating that Constantine’s methods don’t work so well. Especially when it came to that little girl (Astra). Then Constantine retorts with, “at least it wasn’t my own bloody sister”. Midnite responds with a right hook. Constantine jumps back up and begins to claim that it wasn’t Midnite’s power that raised the dead, it was the women bring their pain into his house. Then he stops short and knows what went wrong.
In a very compelling scene, but visually and substantive, the women are escorted to Midnite’s location for the spell. John explains that their guilty combined with their constant observance allowed them to raise the spirits of their deceased. Then when Madeline (Clark’s wife) says she can’t lose Clark again, Midnite steps forward and gives a very nice short speech about a person’s time to go. Then they attempt the ritual again.
In the middle of the incantation, Midnite almost seems possessed. He falls to his knees and the fire around the bodies gets larger. Then the various spirits in their various locations, one at a time vaporize. Then the same thing happens to the corpses. Jim leaves the scene as soon as the ritual appears to be working.
Jim drives to Zed’s location. She thanks him for helping. Then he starts to tell a story about working missing persons. He recognizes Zed’s face. She doesn’t attempt to avoid it. She’s honest about the shoplifting that was caught on camera years ago. She asks if the file still exists. He says no. Then leans down to kiss her hand. When he does, everything goes green. Then just like with Phillip, the image of Jim is blood coming out of his mouth and chest. Clothes tattered. But he speaks to Zed like there is nothing wrong. Remember, green means ‘its in the vicinity’.
Papa Midnite (hands Constantine a drink): Our truce is over at the bottom of that glass. So sip cautiously.
Midnite makes reference to John’s lack of faith. That being the reason that his magic failed. This is the beauty of two men at the apex of their respective crafts. We see it from two completely different vantage points. As a Voodoo priest, Midnite believes deeply in what he knows to be true. Constantine, being (as Midnite put it) a Jack of all trades and master of none, knows the facts but doesn’t operate within faith. It’s the whole knowing and believing aren’t the same thing bit. Then Midnite offers to let John speak to his mother. But that wasn’t the deal. John wants to contact Midnite’s sister. With her in hell, she could potentially shed light on the uprising of darkness John believes is taking place.
Midnite walks over to the skull and whispers something to it. The response he gets back, though not audible, freezes him where he stands.
John: Well…?
Midnite: All of your efforts are in vain. A darkness is coming. Heralded by someone close to you. Someone who will betray you.
Just conjecture on my part, but that has to be in reference to Zed. Mysterious history. Tight lipped about her past. Has a powerful psychic ability. Just happened to present herself at an ideal time. And even at the close of episode 2, Constantine himself acknowledged not knowing her true motivation. It cannot be Chas. And that pretty much sums up the people who are “close to him”. Once again, the show that stumbled out of the gate continues to improve at an incredible rate since the stumble.
