Episode Report Card Demian: B+ | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Black as the Bitter, Bitter Heart Of Brad Kern
By Demian | Season 4 | Episode 8 | Aired on 11.14.2001
The cordless rings. Phoebe and Cole have reached "Battery and Clay," but they don't sense a demonic presence. Make sure you're sitting down: Battery and Clay really exists. It's about four blocks from the Embarcadero. Whether or not the actual intersection features a dank, forbidding alleyway filled with Convenient Shipping Pallets Of Grave Bodily Injury is for someone else to discover. Piper passes the phone to Raige and turns to scry once more for tonight's demon. Raige snides something to Phoebe about Cole morphing into his demonic form as the scrying crystal slams down onto the map at Battery and Clay again. Raige tells Phoebe that the demon is still at the intersection just as the demon himself drops down from the sky behind Phoebe and Cole. If I knew more about comic books, I'd be able to tell you which one the costume and makeup crew raped to create this guy. He's wearing some sort of black PVC diaper with leggings, and his bald head and torso are slathered with oily black body makeup. A painted green hourglass begins high up on Diaper Boy's forehead, slides into a point at the bridge of his nose, and flares back out to end at his upper lip. The green tape he shoots out of the palm of his right hand wraps around Phoebe's ankle to drag her up into the air. Cole grips both of her wrists as the two struggle against the demon's pull for a moment. Finally, Cole releases one of Phoebe's hands long enough to hurl an FBOD at Diaper Boy. Diaper Boy immediately explodes into a cloud of green and black goo. The force of the explosion tosses Phoebe and Cole down the alley onto a pile of discarded rags, Phoebe hooting all the way. Cole lands on his back with Phoebe smack on top of him. Green slime has spattered them both, but they giggle and snicker doofily as Phoebe snorts, "We have to stop meeting like this." "Marry me!" Cole pants joyously. Phoebe's snickers halt at once. "What?" she bites. Cole's giddy grin melts a bit as he realizes what he just said. Phoebe's glossy lips gape as we slide into the credits.
"I can hear you thinking what I feel. I know that what we've got is real." Where do the producers find the crappy alterna-ovary folk shit they use under the opening travelogues, anyway? "And all we need to get us through is to live like lovers do." This is atrocious, even for Charmed. The alterna-ovary wails and wails until at last we land in the Manor hall as Phoebe and Cole enter through the front door. "Don't you think we should talk about this?" Cole asks. Phoebe dissembles, "Talk about what?" The two remain spattered with the goo, but Phoebe has pulled her slimy hair back into a low bun. Piper descends the stairs to greet them: "Wow. Looks like you got a juicy one." Ew. Also, snerk. Cole smirks happily as Phoebe tells Piper the "juicy one" isn't the demon responsible for the two witchy murders. "Upper-level demons have a human form," Cole explains. "And they bleed red, not green." Phoebe bolts for the stairs, intending to take a shower and scrub the goo from her hair. She also wants to check the BoS "for the demon [she's] wearing." Cole believes they need to chat. Phoebe believes that denying she heard his proposal will mean he never made it. Piper believes that she has no idea what the other two are talking about, but a tinkly little chime hits the soundtrack as it dawns on her that romantic foolery is afoot in Halliwell Manor. Phoebe curtly instructs Cole to focus on vanquishing that witch-slaughtering demon. Piper pulls an hysterical pop-eyed-while-sucking-on-alum face as she whips her ponytail back and forth between the two. Cole is adorably tousled and bright-eyed as he masks his disappointment with an affable offer to search the underworld for further information. Seriously, the guy is all blue-eyed, rosy-lipped, green-smudged, clean-shaven gorgeous here. Were Phoebe not such a neurotic intimacy-issues freak at the moment, I'm certain she'd be inviting him to join her in the shower. Cole's smile fades just a bit as he turns and squiggles out. Phoebe growls in frustration. Piper asks in a sugary-sweet tone of faux concern that clearly indicates she's up for some gossip, "Honey? Did you two just have a fight?" Phoebe doesn't want to talk about it and scampers up the stairs. Piper fixes her face with a determined look, and follows Phoebe to the second floor.