Episode Report Card Demian: C+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Schlong Day's Journey Into Raige
By Demian | Season 6 | Episode 20 | Aired on 05.01.2004
Raige crosses to help Phoebe to her feet and, once that's done, yanks one of the errant throwing stars out of the wall to acknowledge its value as scrying fodder. Phoebe thinks real hard for a bit and supposes the Flearing Floozies are in the employ of a darker demonic force. Her reasoning? "What powerful demons do you know that would dress that tacky?" You, for one. Tramp. Raige volunteers to head back to the Manor for immediate Book of Shadows abuse, but Phoebe snatches the star from her sister's hand with a promise to abuse the Book herself while Raige gets some rest. Grateful, Raige replies, "I think I will."
Manor. Up in the Prue Halliwell Memorial Bimbo Boudoir Of Paisley Tits Slings And Other Fashion Atrocities, currently occupied by Raige, the lady of the boudoir slips in from the hall, shuts the door tightly behind her, flicks on the lights, smiles in anticipation of what's to come, and summons a set of candles into position on the floor with her orbing TK. As she lights the candles, she recites the following vaguely familiar spell:
A perfect man I summon now --
Another way I don't know how --
Bring him now into the light:
Come back to me, Mister Right.
The candle flames instantly shoot about a foot into the air to emit glittery streams of twinkly golden lights that collide in mid-air above the carpet. The streams presently coagulate and glow, morphing into a fully clothed gentleman who is not, alas, Eduardo Verástegui. In fact, this guy's so egregiously white it almost pains me to look at him. Not Eduardo greets Raige with a silent smile and a somewhat shy glance through his tousled mop of hair. "Welcome back," Raige purrs before horning her way into the opening credits.
Tonight's opening travelogue features some new, oddly warped footage of the corner at Haight and Ashbury; some fresh, oddly animated footage of pigeons flapping past the Palace of Fine Arts in slow motion; and some novel, even more oddly warped footage of Postcard Row. It also includes the techno caterwauling of the one-time Ovary-In-Law of a certain Australian actor whose presence is still missed, even though we're all very glad indeed that his character is long gone. And if I've lavished that much attention on the stupid opening travelogue, you should be able to guess how much I dread recapping the chatty snoozefest that makes up most of this episode. Over at the Manor, Phoebe slouches across the table in the nonexistent attic, clad in last night's clothes and pounding her head in frustration over a pile of letters from her advice column. "Dear Sad In San Jose," she sighs, reading from her scrawled notes on a legal pad. "Try Viagra." Okay, where's the laptop, hon? Unless, of course, your Power of Typing was also revoked during last week's assfest, in which case scribbling out your column in longhand makes all the sense in the world. And while I'm at it, what's with the mad product placement tonight? There's yet another can of Red Bull at Phoebe's side, and now the dimwit's shilling for Pfizer? Whatever. I hate this show. Phoebe rips the topmost sheet from the pad, wads it into a ball, and tosses it to the floor as the Dolt ambles in from the stairwell to open with, "Long night?" Phoebe, surprised, quickly lies that she's been "trying to come up with some summoning spells" "for that mystery demon." She glumly admits she's had no luck as far as that's concerned, but she did pass the Flearing Floozy's throwing star to Big Gay Chris in the hopes that he could work his Underworld connections for a few clues. The Dolt stoops to retrieve the last crumpled sheet of paper from the floor, reads what's written there aloud, and snorts, genially enough, "Nice spell." "Don't ask," Phoebe groans, snatching the thing from his hands before dropping to the carpet to gather the pile of discarded advice littering the carpet. The Dolt, in that helpful mode of his we all love so much, wonders what gives. Long, boring story short, Phoebe's afraid that without her powers, she's back to being the hopeless fuck-up we first met in the series premiere. Not a chance, doll. That hopeless fuck-up was endearing. You're a bitch. The Dolt gives her a little pep talk, reassuring her that she can still "kick ass" as a witch, and snore! The Dolt then urges her to rely on Raige for a little while, much as Raige initially relied upon Phoebe herself back in the day. Raige relied upon Phoebe back in the day? That's news. Though now that I think about it, if she did, it's no wonder she's become so damned annoying over the past couple of seasons. "Where is [Raige], by the way?" the Dolt adds, getting nosy as is his wont. "Sleeping, and don't wake her," Phoebe replies. "She's exhausted. She was tossing and turning all night!"
Smash-cut to Raige and Slampiece Wonder Bread poking their heads out from beneath her duvet to make with the wacky pillow talk before disappearing again to engage in ungodly acts of fornication. Wah. Wah. Waaaaaaah!