The Magicians 308 – Six Short Stories About Magic

Here’s the thing. The Magicians has A LOT of story lines going on right now. The writing team tried to make it easy on us this week by breaking them up into six short stories, each focusing on a particular character. Did it work? Kinda. Did we get some answers to our burning questions? Yep! Here’s the rundown.

Major Spoilers Ahead

Eliot

Yes, I know Eliot’s story wasn’t the first, but it was the shortest. If you’ve been hanging on the edge of your seat all week to see how things pan out for Margo and Eliot with the angry mob, strap in for another wait. We get a glimpse of the pair on trial, looking less than amused with their circumstances. Eliot is pleading their case with “a marsupial,” suggesting the talking animals of Fillory are sick of the humans mucking about and have gotten involved. That’s it! That’s all we get with the biggest story line of the season! Moving on…

Penny

Penny makes it to the underworld to find what looks like something from an X-Files, UFO crash-site scene. How will he find Benedict now the sprawling tent city? The dead aren’t really interested in money, but how the hell does Game of Thrones end?! He tracks down Benedict, who doesn’t even have the key. It’s back at the library where Penny runs into his old friend Sylvia, who takes him to meet Cassandra. Cassandra is the writer of ALL the books, who happens to look a lot like Alice for reasons that remain unclear (Not enough budget to pay another actress?).  Penny reads along as non-Alice scribbles away her stories about his friends, hoping she will reveal the location of the next key before Quentin and Poppy give up trying to retrieve it.

Poppy

Whatever Poppy’s true agenda, for now she is content to get close to Quentin while toying with Alice in that age-old game, book nerd versus cool chick. Her “be you and accept the consequences” attitude could be just the influence Quentin needs to be less annoying, but I won’t count on it. She shows genuine concern for Victoria’s well being, throwing a wrench in my theory that she is pure evil. They have to use Victoria’s traveler blood to keep the mirror bridge open between Earth and The Library. She is a little too willing to ditch Quentin in The Library when he stops to talk to Alice, but again presumably out of concern for Victoria. Why should Victoria sacrifice her life because Quentin is a lovesick puppy? Poppy’s story does give us some insight into what The Library is up to. They have been hiding a magical source of their own in something called the Alexandria Cell, a Mc-Monster magic battery.

Alice

Alice is feeling conflicted about magical power and if anyone has a right to it. After refusing to help Quentin and Poppy bleed out Victoria to power the mirror bridge, Harriet and Kady take a turn trying to enlist her help. The library’s purpose is to collect magical knowledge and keep it safe, but from whom? Who gave them the authority to control all of this knowledge and only grant access to those they choose?

Alice remains unmoved until Fen tumbles through the Fillory clock. I have to give a nod to actress Brittany Curran who plays Fen. She doesn’t get much screen time, but when she does she makes it count! Still coming to terms with the loss of her daughter, Fen points out to Alice that the knowledge and power she has lost is still out there. She only has to get off her ass and go get it. Alice is willing to trade what she can remember from her time as a niffin with the library if they will share their knowledge to help her fill in the gaps. The trouble is, they already documented her story and don’t care. They are, however, interested in the seven keys quest.

Fen

As Fen takes a siesta from drinking away her pain, Julia gets a visit from Irene MacAllister. In the last episode, Irene gave Julia a special powder that gave her a temporary dose of magic. Whatever this cocaine magic is made from, Irene has developed a nasty skin condition as a result. Now that Julia has her power back, she can help Irene with a cure. Fen witnesses this exchange, and notices Irene’s unseen companion.

Fen is able to see fairies since Margo made the deal on her behalf that got her daughter taken from her. This fairy seems different from the ones Fen is used to in Fillory who invisibly pull the puppet strings of powerful people. Irene’s fairy is a slave, and “no one is better off with slavery.” Julia has noticed her power source is connected to acts of kindness. Helping the slave fairies could help grow her power. Fen and Julia discover that Irene’s pale-faced servants believe they are being protected from bad magicians, when Irene is actually grinding them up into fairy dust and using them for a magic source.

Harriet

The episode takes a few moments of silence as we see the world from Harriet’s (Marlee Matlin) perspective. As her backstory unfolds we get a BIG reveal. The head of the librarians is Harriet’s mother! It is clear that her mother locked the two of them in the library following some sort of accident that drove her and her daughter into hiding. Locking them up in the library was the only was to keep them safe. Harriet may be deaf, be she will not be silenced. She believes the magical knowledge the library hoards belongs to everyone, along with the Alexandrian Cell the library has been using since magic died to power their spells. Instead of a giant magical battery, Harriet and Kady find more dead fairy dust. Too bad the mirror bridge breaks as Harriet tries to escape with the evidence. Is she lost forever or are her and Victoria just trapped in between? Those glass shards flying about didn’t look like they would feel too good.

Back to Penny

Surprise! Penny has a lightening bulb moment reading Q and Poppy’s sex scene again. Benedict had the key the whole time! Poor Benedict is the only one who mustered up tears when Penny died, and they keep leaving him hanging, so he buried it. Penny manages to get the key through the bookwyrm right before being taken away by the librarians.

Thus concludes how to make six short stories long! What did you all think of the silent scene?

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