Episode Report Card Demian: F | 3 USERS: B YOU GRADE IT Hippie Bitches
By Demian | Season 6 | Episode 11 | Aired on 01.10.2004
Raige materializes in what we soon learn is The Prue Halliwell Memorial Bimbo Boudoir Of Paisley Tit Slings And Other Fashion Atrocities, currently occupied by a ludicrously young Grams. A nearby calendar tells us it's January 1967, the strains of a faux-Hendrix guitar riff assault the soundtrack, there are posters of peace signs and rainbows and shit all over the walls, and various gaudy fabrics litter the furniture and floors. You just know the place reeks of patchouli and incense. Hippies suck. The ludicrously young Grams glows in front of a full-length mirror, "adjusting [her] aura." I instantly hate her. While these two exchange introductions and pleasantries, I'll note that Ludicrously Young Grams is played by Kara Zediker of Rock Star and a few episodes of 24. While the Internet Movie Database has no date of birth for the woman, she looks to be roughly thirty years old, which leads us to our third major continuity error of the evening: If Grams were thirty in 1967, that means she was barely thirteen years old when she gave birth to Teeth! in 1950 -- not to mention the fact that she'd have been about nine years old when she was getting it on with Susan Sarandon's ex-husband back in the day. This stupid fucking show sucks. Speaking of stupid fucking things that suck, a scrawny blonde woman darts into the Boudoir and blurts, "The Whitelighters are putting on a light show!" Ack. LYGrams grabs Raige's hand and drags her into the hall, insisting that a stupid fucking light show coordinated by a bunch of stupid fucking Whitelighters for the benefit of a pack of stupid fucking hippies is something not to be missed. Raige wrinkles her face in disdain. I am so with you on that one, doll.
Back in the present-day attic, Piper and Phoebe explain to the best of their respective abilities -- snerk -- what happened to Raige. The Dolt immediately reveals that Grams used to cast spells on her clothing when she was younger, and I'm sorry, but how fucking stupid is that? I'll tell you how fucking stupid that is: It's really, hideously, mind-bendingly stupid. Which brings me to something that's not so much a continuity error as it is a slap in the face to anyone who's watched this show from the beginning -- Grams, as the character has been constructed over the course of several seasons, is too damn wise to cast heedless and ridiculous "Return to Owner" spells on her belongings, and she's too damn WASPy to have been a goddamned hippie. EVER. Now, granted, several people in the forums mentioned this episode was originally intended for Finola Hughes as Patty, as an opportunity for Raige to get to know her mother a little better, which sounds like a nice idea. For whatever reason, though, Finola dropped out. Okay, fine. These things happen. But. The idiots responsible for this mess had more than enough time to do one of the following: Push the time-traveling bits back into the '50s so those scenes would make sense given the established timeline and character of Grams, or scrap the idea for this episode entirely and come up with something different in its place. They chose to do neither of these things, and so the long-suffering Charmed audience is once again tossed into a shitty, shitty, shitty episode for reasons known only to Brad Kern and the dark Satanic majesty he serves.