![]() ![]() The time jump is there to put them in the same boat as those watching them, and viewers end up disoriented and discombobulated before heading into the rest of the premiere. In that sense, then, the characters are the viewers, superficially caught up in the thrill of passing over so much time, before realizing how much of it was ultimately hollow. Ichabod and Abbie only recognize they're trapped inside of a dream - designed by the villain to trick them into revealing the location of Franklin's key - once they realize that they can't remember the year that transpired. It knows you've watched enough Sleepy Hollow to believe it would do this, but it also knows you've watched enough television to understand the conventions it's playing around with. And it also knows that it can play these cards as a way to suggest that, say, Ichabod and Abbie are going to have to travel back in time to the end of the season one finale (when the former was buried alive and the latter stranded in Purgatory) to avert the terrible year to come, because it knows you'll buy the show doing something this whacked out. The episode is even playing off of those who watch it solely for the sexy subtext.) They plunge forward with their plan, as if it's the only way to stave off disaster.Īnd what's key here is that Sleepy Hollow knows you've seen enough TV to recognize both a dream sequence and a time jump when you see one. (Buried in all of this is the hidden hope that Ichabod's wife - the chief obstacle to any eventual coupling between Ichabod and Abbie - being dead could unite the two heroes romantically. They mention that Ichabod's wife and Abbie's sister are both dead. Ichabod and Abbie keep talking about an awful year that's just transpired. So Sleepy Hollow leans into its dream sequence - because it is a dream sequence, something we learn, but only after lots and lots of time spent inside of it - by making you think, for all the world, that you've just gone through a time jump. ![]() ![]() I couldn't work John Noble's excellent work into this piece, but aren't you glad you got to see him anyway? (Fox) But most of the time, it's just a superficial way to shift deck chairs around on the Titanic, a way for an aging show to stave off disaster a little while longer. Things that could have been stale if they played out in real time can become cool and mysterious if the time jump is executed well. In the space the show leaps over, characters can get married or have children. There are times when this has been done very well - in fact, FX's Fargo accomplished just such a feat earlier this year - but most of the time, it's just a way to change the status quo without really doing so. TV is going through a spate of time jumps recently, where a show leaps over a few months or even a few years, in order to get to another point when the story will be exciting again. And then it starts to make it seem like something else entirely. let's just not get into it, okay?) At first, it seems like this is a dream sequence, the sort of thing that will prompt groans and eye rolls, but Sleepy Hollow just keeps going with it. (The key is a loophole to get people in and out of Purgatory and. When "This Is War" begins, Ichabod and Abbie are working feverishly to find the key tied to the end of the kite with which Benjamin Franklin discovered electricity. "This Is War" uses a storytelling device that's currently very trendy on TV to get away with one that could seem much hackier. No, the best thing about "This Means War" is the way it used all of the rules of modern serialized television against you.Įverybody wants to see Ichabod (Tom Mison) and Abbie (Nicole Beharie) working together again. And it has complicated back-story delivered in a pitched murmur.īut none of these are the best thing about the premiere. Its network, Fox, is hoping absence really does make the heart grow fonder.) The episode has plenty of Ichabod (Tom Mison) and Abbie (Nicole Beharie) interplay. (Thanks to its shortened seasons, the show last aired in January. "This Is War," the second season premiere of Sleepy Hollow, is an energetic gallop through everything the weirdo horror show does well.
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