In the wake of an epic, mythology-heavy, cliffhanger-y premiere, we slow things down a bit to explore the aftermath and the characters’ reactions. Also, there’s a kid named Boner. But the real question of the hour is: “Why are there ghosts in there punching each other in the balls?”
Recap:
Nora fully wolfs out and kills Heggeman, saving Josh. As expected, she has trouble coping with the fact that there’s nothing she can do to remain human, culminating in getting drunk and spilling her guts at a first-year Med student mixer. Realizing the pain she’s in from both her lycanthropy and the recent miscarriage, Josh decides to drop out of med school and work on a cure for both of them, though Nora tries to convince him to stay. Moreover, Nora remembers killing Heggeman, but no one knows she does. Meanwhile, Aiden has to deal with Mother’s daughter, the newly rejuvenated Suren, as she readjusts to the world. Her way of readjusting, however, involves taunting Aiden, rejecting his ideas, and turning a cop into a vampire. Aiden reveals that he initially “went vegetarian” after seeing what he did when he turned Suren—making her into a psychotic monster (though luckily she’s toned down since then.) However, Aiden makes it blatantly clear that he’s only assisting her with becoming head vampire so he can finally be out of Mother’s grasp. Still freaked from her nightmare, Sally invites Stevie and two new teenage ghosts, Dylan and “Boner” (not related to Growing Pains) over. They go to a party to “rage,” and Sally learns a new trick from her friends: willingly jumping into people’s bodies. At first a joyous experience being able to taste soda, Dylan, possessing a man, attempts to make moves on Sally against her will. This prompts Stevie to pull him out of the body and, after a little ghost fight, Stevie rips him apart completely. Sally realizes how weak ghosts become when they possess people, and worse, they can be destroyed by other ghosts in this weakened state.
Review:
“Do You Really Want to Hurt Me?” is exactly the kind of episode of Being Human I enjoy. No vampire fights, no werewolf transformations, no shocking cliffhangers. Not that I don’t like all of those things, but this particular show is at its best when it’s simply exploring these characters’ lives.
This is, essentially, the second half of a two-hour premiere, developing the same issues and exploring the aftermath, just without any epic climax. It’s an episode about the core of the show: three very unnormal people trying to live impossibly normal lives. The concept had been put on the backburner since the mythology was amped up at the end of last season, but this week we were brought down a little more.
The biggest indications of this were the short scenes with our three core roommates at the beginning. The heart of the show is these guys growing as a family and learning to live together, despite their “ailments.” Aiden is stressed about the vampire developments, Josh is stressed out about Nora, and Sally is stressed out about that shadowy guy. So they vent to each other, stress each other out, but as they blow off steam we get little dashes of fun and comedy as they play off of each other. They annoy the heck out of each other sometimes, but it’s just like families do, and in the end they still love each other. The best parts of this show are the camaraderie between our leads, and while there wasn’t a ton of it this week, the little we saw was perfect.
Sally got the opening monologue, and it was a breath of fresh air. Short and sweet, without any of Aiden’s metaphor-heavy, trying-too-hard-to-be-insightful speeches. I guess the poetry-like speech of last week fits Aiden’s character, but a down-to-Earth opening like Sally’s grounds the show a little better because it’s, well, more down-to-Earth.
The aftermath of Nora’s werewolf transformation was the biggest part of the episode, and it was well-handled. Post-monster reactions are nothing new in any horror-esque media, and Nora certainly falls into the tried-and-true “my life is over” category. And while there isn’t much new presented, there are things that make it work well. First off, she already passed the denial phase in the last episode, so she’s facing her situation head on here. Second, she’s not angry at Josh, but at the situation, an important indication of how much they do love each other even when they don’t particularly show it. There’s also the fact that, as a nurse, she does see illnesses that simply won’t go away. Her line about the futility of telling family members of terminal patients to “just be there” was very insightful. But the best part is bringing up the miscarriage. Nora’s certainly faced her share of tragedy, but it’s something we’d almost forgotten about. She certainly hasn’t, though, despite not mentioning it until she gets drunk. Coupling this with remembering she killed Heggeman, it seems apparent that her flaw is keeping things in. Also, as a quick aside, Nora’s reaction to seeing Sally was sweet, as was the last scene of the episode. I’m really looking forward to seeing the two women interact more (especially considering Kristen Hager is now listed in the main credits.)
Josh didn’t have much to do this week besides react to Nora, but I’m glad his whininess was significantly toned down from last week. Sam Huntington played his scene at the Med student mixer very nicely. Those natural puppy dog eyes can make grown men cry.
I was pleasantly surprised by Dichen Lachman as Suren. It’s hard to nail that “sexy yet exotic and mysterious” feel that so many horror-inspired movies and TV shows go for. While we still need to see more, at this point Lachman did a nice job keeping Suren fairly subdued, but still intriguing, with a dash of crazy. She already seems like the wild card this season, since she doesn’t have clear allegiances with Aiden or vampires in general. Aiden has been very upfront with her, while she seems to be attracted to him, so we’ll just have to see where this story goes. Tying their pasts together was a nice touch, considering how little we’ve gotten of Aiden’s past. Suren’s a personification of his guilt, it seems—much like Rebecca last season, but tied to a much deeper part of his history. I was a little so-so about Aiden’s story arc last season, but his relationship with Suren shows promise, despite its similarities to Rebecca’s story.
However, Sam Witwer with that mustache in the flashback? No. Just no. And this is coming from someone who normally admires mustaches, but that just didn’t work. Thankfully that shot was brief. Let’s not ever flash back to it again.
Sally continues to have the most interesting plotlines. The abstractness of ghost mythology means no matter how much is explored, there’s always something more to explore. Even something as mundane as possessing people is taken to the next level when we learn that even as a ghost, you can be weakened and “killed.” The best assumption is that your soul ceases to exist, which I guess is worse than at least existing, even if you never find your door. I also wonder if, perhaps, the shadowy creature Sally is afraid of could be what happens when you’re ripped apart? Sort of the “shadow” of your soul? It would be an interesting way to tie those two plot points together. Regardless, injecting a little more danger in Sally’s afterlife is smart.
While there wasn’t much substance in the ghosts’ “raging,” it was still fun to see Meaghan Rath portraying being able to feel again. It’s probably similar to someone who loses their hearing, but then gets technology to get it back for them (or at least, that’s how I imagine Rath interpreted it for her performance.) In any case, Rath was phenomenal with her exuberance. I was a little annoyed that we quickly jumped into attempted rape territory, but it makes sense. Sexual pleasure would be among the things you’d want to experience again, right? Besides, we got a very cool revelation out of it.
There really isn’t too much to write about beyond that. If the premiere was a shiny sports car, “Do You Really Want to Hurt Me?” is your mom’s old minivan—way slower and much less flashy, but it still gets you where you want to go with much more room to spread your legs out. There are small steps towards whatever comes next, with plenty of character moments and insights. But those little things we saw tonight were a nice reminder for why this series is great.
