The Magicians Season 4 Episode 9 Review: The Serpent

| March 21, 2019 |

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This The Magicians review contains spoilers.

The Magicians Season 4 Episode 9

The lack of unified quests that nosotros worried about in final calendar week'southward episode of The Magicians takes a stride in the right direction in "The Snake." In addition to an intriguing twist in the hedge witch storyline, the rescue of Harriet gave us some wonderful insights into Alice's character, and there were moments in Fillory that likely left few dry eyes in the audience. And of course, the mission to recover the Monster'southward missing parts took a surprising turn and upped the dues in ways that we have still to fully comprehend. Fortunately, the fog seems to be immigration up around the disparate conflicts, and although the way forrad is fraught with difficulties for Julia, Margo, Eliot, and others, the journey is 1 we truly care near.

Nosotros even so take to recollect, though, that the stories of the Library's control of magic, Margo'due south birthright, and the Monster's possession of Eliot are nevertheless fairly separate, but what this episode does is bring in elements that cross between the threads, although not always smoothly. On the one manus, the introduction of "The Foremost," a leader of the southern nomads in Fillory who can expel demons with special weapons, creates a compelling reason for Margo to motility from curing talking lizards to trying to help Eliot. On the other hand, the mysterious advent of a book called "Binder" in the middle of Alice'due south mirror mission was a bit more than jarring in its try to span the Library's arc with that of Julia.

The fact that Julia'south divine self-discovery keeps getting interrupted by the need to assist the Monster in his own godly research indicates that her inevitable awakening volition nearly likely exist tied to the Monster'south defeat — or perhaps the defeat of those who wronged him. The latter possibility springs from Penny's discovery while exploring the Monster'south memory that Bacchus, Iris, Heka, and about importantly the missing Enyalius may not have had the about altruistic motives for luring the Monster to their chantry. When Penny tells the others that the stones are non well-nigh making a trunk simply something much worse, who's to say the Monster'due south evil doesn't leap from what was left behind rather than what was taken?

Perhaps the expectation of a twist of that sort comes from the surprise knowledge that Zelda'south mentor, Everett, wonderfully played by Brian Markinson, is the one backside the frightening attacks on hedge witches. Although the being of blood worms feels a fleck contrived this late in the game, the plan is brilliant: either stop the hedges from using magic forcefully or use fear to take them submit to a voluntary Reed's Marker tattoo to remove their powers, supposedly temporarily. Zelda may have initially agreed to aid Kady map the junction boxes to become Harriet back, but at present that Harriet has revealed the truth nearly Everett, all bets are off. Plus, yous know, poor Pete.

As for the mirror realm rescue, the phosphoromancy spell was conspicuously more about Alice's fragmentation than Harriet's, narratively speaking. Sure, Harriet was able to spy through the mirrors, merely the splitting of Alice into her mousy and arrogant halves gave us quite a bit of insight into what makes her tick. Not only are we reminded that it was Alice'southward fear not her arrogance that destroyed the keys in the flavour 3 finale; we too get the enticing cess from Alice's more than brazen (and frankly more appealing) version, who says, "We still have no idea what were actually capable of." An ex-niffin with renewed conviction in her ain abilities might be just what The Magicians needs heading into its season iv climax.

And truth exist told, it doesn't even really thing if Margo ends up finding a way to exorcise Eliot's demons. The fact that she'southward now aware of her best friend's continued existence was a huge relief and gave her new purpose. Coming on the heels of Fen'due south prophecy, Margo's realization that Eliot was nevertheless live could easily have gotten tangled up in a disharmonism of opposing conflicts, but when Josh tells Margo about the impending expose, her sudden need to be free of imperial encumbrances in society to visit i of Fillory's sworn enemies made the dethroning more palatable by far and made the states hopeful for a compelling journey alee for the former Loftier Male monarch.

Plus, once again, Summer Bishil nailed a heartfelt functioning cheers to some undeniable chemistry with Brittany Curran's Fen every bit Margo tearfully begs to be overthrown. Anyone who wasn't moved by Margo's banishment or Josh's goodbye has a heart of stone, and no affair who you are, there's no avoiding the stirring of emotion that comes from listening to Pat Benatar's "Nosotros Vest" as Margo heads off into exile in slow motion. And viewers could be forgiven for being equally excited to see what Fen does with her newfound power — not every bit acting High Rex, but as Fillory's start native ruler.

This review didn't even become a run a risk to touch moments like Alice glancing longingly through the bookshelves at Julia and Penny so at Quentin or Zelda acknowledging Kady's capacity to sit with the woman who acquired the death of the man she loved, only there were many instances of strong motivation and character insight in this episode of The Magicians . This, along with an encouraging pivot towards more cohesion between the story arcs with conflicts that we truly intendance about, makes "The Serpent" a wonderful build-upward to what will surely be an explosive finale.

Keep up with all of the news and reviews for The Magicians season 4 here!

Michael Ahr is a author, reviewer, and podcaster here at Den of Geek; yous can check out his work here or follow him on Twitter (@mikescifi). He co-hosts our Sci Fi Fidelity podcast and voices much of our video content.