Episode Report Card Demian: A | 1 USERS: A+ YOU GRADE IT All Hell Breaks Loose
By Demian | Season 3 | Episode 22 | Aired on 05.16.2001
Oh, and: Whatever. Morons.
Back in the manor, Prue and Piper form a sort of Halliwell Pieta on the floor. Prue dissolves into tears of horror, frustration, and anguish as she cradles Piper’s shuddering body in her arms. Piper looks like she’s quickly sliding into shock. Damn. Holly Marie Combs even pulls off dying better than anyone else on this show. Prue’s repeated, frantic cries of “Leo!” go unanswered. She whispers through her sobs, “Piper, it’s going to be okay. We’ll get you to the hospital.”
Good luck. The mob outside has pretty much blocked the driveway. Prue struggles to haul Piper down to her car, calling out for Leo the entire time. The mob, meanwhile, responds to their appearance with a heightened frenzy. Piranha Dominguez finds this an excellent time to shout a couple of questions at Prue. Prue eases Piper into the back seat of the car as gently as possible, given the circumstances. She leaps behind the wheel and heads down the drive, but her path is blocked by protesters and reporters and police. Prue bangs repeatedly on the horn, screaming, “Move!” They don’t listen to her, probably because with all of the damn noise, they can’t hear her in the first place. The next sequence is really well done. Congratulations to Ms. Doherty on the direction. And I mean that. Prue gets out of the car, baying for the assistance she so badly needs. It doesn’t come. There is a series of jump cuts of the crowd, presumably from Prue’s point of view, and it looks like Hell on Earth. Dominguez continues to shout, “Miss Halliwell, can you tell us what’s going on?” as we get a shot of Piper’s lifeless form slumped face down in the back seat. The camera cuts abruptly to an angle from the far side of the manor, sweeping into Prue as she screams, “What’s wrong with you people?” As the shot pulls in closer to her at a slightly skewed angle, it slows down while the cacophony on the street melts together into a single, low-pitched roar under Prue’s screams. The roar of the mob fades away as the beat of the rotors of the news choppers overhead slows to fade into the beating of Prue’s heart as Prue’s entire world collapses in on her. Two more brief slow-motion Prue POVs of the crowd and the reporters. Prue snaps. She flings her left arm out, and the shot goes back to real time as the TK hits Piranha and Jimmy. They fly backwards onto the lawn. The effect on the crowd is immediate. Various extras hit the deck while others attempt to scamper away. The ones who run are not moving fast enough for Prue. She sends about a half dozen of them through the air, with one landing so hard on a nearby car he shatters the windshield. Once she’s cleared a path, she gets back into the car and tears off down the street. You could argue this entire sequence represents a meta-statement on Shannen Doherty’s part regarding her real-life relationship with the tabloid press and what she’d really like to do to them, and you very well may be right about that. I don’t care. It worked. Brava.
San Francisco Memorial. A gurney carrying the grievously injured Piper slams through a set of swinging doors. Prue asks one of the nurses for the whereabouts of Doctor Griffiths. At that moment, he hustles to one side of the gurney. He starts barking out orders for Piper’s vital statistics, and all of the sudden I’m recapping ER. Actually, I wouldn’t be surprised if Luka popped in right about now with his scythe. Piper’s pulse is “seventy and weak.” They lift her from the gurney onto an operating table. She’s hyperventilating, her face has a greyish cast to it, and her lips are turning blue. Doctor Griffiths, by the way, justifies my earlier rant about Piper’s injuries when he confirms, “Small entry wound upper back, large exit wound lower abdomen.” Smelly Alice would have to have been hovering in mid-air above the first floor of the damn manor to pull that off. As Griffiths determines that Piper’s “lungs are failing” and calls out for a couple of units of blood, Prue again calls for Leo. Piper still has the presence of mind to pant out, “He can’t hear you. Something must have gone wrong.” Prue takes Piper’s bloodied hand in hers and leans in to whisper, “Don’t die on me.” Oh, man. This is rough. I mean it. Piper, struggling to breathe, softly whimpers, “Prue? I’m cold.” That sent chills up and down my spine as the hairs on the back of my neck stood on end. I felt like I’d been slapped in the face when she delivered that line. Damn, she’s good. Prue’s composure -- fragile to begin with -- shatters. She wordlessly pleads with Griffiths to save her sister as sobs wrack her body. Piper, weakly gripping Prue’s hand, continues, “I can’t feel my legs.” She turns her head to beg of Prue, “Don’t go. I love you.” Piper slides down into cardiac arrest. The nurses wheel in a defibrillator as Prue backs away from the table in terror. She raises her hands -- stained with her sister’s blood -- to her face as Griffiths charges the paddles and shouts, “Clear!” Piper’s body jerks violently at the shock. They recharge the paddles for another try. Another violent jerk. Nothing. She’s gone. Griffiths mutters, “I’m sorry,” as Prue wails. Her face is now streaked with Piper’s blood as well. She moves to Piper’s side, keening, and gently draws her hand over Piper’s face to close her eyes. Prue’s sorrow turns briefly into rage. “Get out of here,” she snarls at the various medical personnel. “Go!” Griffiths is the last to leave the room, and he looks guilty as hell. Prue dissolves into strangled sobs. As the medical personnel shut the doors behind them, soldiers in full body armor moves in to block access to the room.