Episode Report Card Demian: B- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT The Contrived, The Unrealistic, And The Overlong
By Demian | Season 3 | Episode 14 | Aired on 02.14.2001
Commercial. Fah-nuh-leeee.
Miss Indian Territory 1869 backstories as she leaves the saloon with Prue and Cole. Sutter has ties to the railroad industry, and initially arrived in town promising to "bring the tracks through." In return, he wanted a cut of the profits of every business in Frontierland. The yokels at first resisted, then caved when Sutter murdered the sheriff. Just wait: pretty soon we're going to find out everyone's last name is "Johnson," and Mongo will come to realize he is "only pawn in game of life." If they start punching the horses in the head, I'm out of here. Same if Cookie serves them all beans around the campfire. Anyway, Bo is the only person who has consistently resisted Sutter's efforts to take over the town, and is therefore perceived as a threat who must be destroyed. Miss Indian Territory 1869 finally gets a name as Prue reassures "Isabel" that she and Cole can help Bo if Isabel will only trust them. Isabel offhandedly notes that she does trust them. Bo, it appears, received a vision of the arrival of "two strangers" in one of his dreams. Isabel pointedly eyes Prue's get-up on the word "strangers," which immediately makes her my new TV girlfriend. Isabel tells them Bo inherited "The Gift" from their father, a medicine man of some renown who died when they were children. Their mother forbade Bo from ever discussing The Gift with strangers, as she understood the fear of magic that is endemic "in the white man's world." Prue and Cole both get in lines about knowing what it's like to be on the outside looking in, and the world's smallest guitar strums sadly for them in the background. Isabel smiles in acknowledgement of this, and leads the two to horses she's had ready for their visit. Cole proposes they "eliminate the threat first" by offing Sutter, thereby canceling the curse by default. Prue responds they can't be certain that will solve things, and adds that if Cole truly wants to join the forces of good, he needs to check his impulse to vanquish first and ask questions later. Makes ya think, don't it, Cole? Have I mentioned yet that Cole is wearing the white hat and Prue is wearing the black one? See what they're doing there? Huh? Whatever. Isabel, Prue, and Cole ride off down the main street as Cal scuttles over to his horse behind them.
Chuckles appears, languidly flapping and cawing his way back into the current dimension. Or "plane of existence." Your choice, people. Chuckles perches on the roof of the abandoned sheriff's office, where he lights a cigarette to while away the hours until his presence is again requested on-set. Piper and the Dolt emerge, with Piper bitching (natch) about the utter lack of clues to be found in town. "There's nothing here," she moans, "but spiders and lizards and a stupid old crow." Chuckles mutters a "dammit" to himself under his breath, flips his lit cigarette into his mouth with his tongue, and flaps over the street. I've never been able to do that trick. I hope he doesn't burn the inside of his beak. Piper and the Dolt blather needlessly about the wedding as Chuckles lands on the roof of the saloon. Piper makes the connection between saloons and smackdowns in the traditional (clichéd) Western, and heads into the bar with the Dolt. Chuckles puffs away contentedly while balancing his checkbook. Once in the bar, the Dolt makes unfunny with a remark about "Hankin's Nerve Tonic" helping Victor accept his soon-to-be son-in-law while Piper shuffles through some trash on the bartop. The Dolt espies a discarded newspaper with Sutter's "Half-Breed" headline. Piper reads the headline, and we discover apropos of nothing that Bo and Isabel's last name is "Lightfeather." The Dolt warns Piper that they must find a way to warn Prue and Cole that they have until sundown, and not midnight, to fix things in the parallel dimension. Since Prue and Cole saw the damn paper themselves, I don't understand what this particular "plot twist" has to do with anything. Piper underscores the fact that Phoebe could die at sundown, and we cut over to the manor.