"There is no fate but what we make for ourselves."
-- Nick Stahl as John Conner, Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines
"To each generation," Samson tells us, "was born a creature of light and a creature of darkness." "In every generation," Giles said, "there is a Chosen One." "And unto all the generations," sayeth Our Lord Tubey, "Aaron shall be called forth to recap a show about religious freaks in the desert."
So it is written, and so it shall be done.
We all have our roles to play here at Television Without Pity, I suppose. Miss Alli does reality TV, Stee sticks to crappy MTV, and Alex Richmond is known far and wide as our show killer extraordinaire. (Interesting side note: Alex Richmond has killed a total of nine shows. Kim has actually k i l l e d ten ). My own career, however, is proving somewhat harder to categorize. The simplistic answer is to merely call me "HBO's Bitch," but a deeper analysis would seem to indicate The Lord working in some very mysterious ways. "The Lord," of course, being Sars in this case. After all, I've been made to recap spoons and goons and giant buffoons, not to mention Boon, still more Dune, and Claire de Lune (UK readers should feel free to insert their own "sexed-up" Geoff Hoon joke here). And now at long last the two great threads of my recapping history have merged here with Carnivàle, as HBO gives us a show about -- you guessed it -- religious freaks in the desert. It can only be fate, right? Right?
"And The Lord said…'I have made thee a God unto Pharaoh, and thy brother Aaron shall be thy prophet."
-- Numbers 8:9
["Oy."
-- Sars 3:15]
After some particularly snazzy opening credits (featuring tarot cards, Babe Ruth, Mussolini, Jesse Owens, and the Hindenburg), we begin with Michael J. Anderson addressing us directly in front of a plain black background. "Before the beginning," he solemnly intones as a faint halo of light expands behind him, "after the great war between heaven and hell, God created the Earth and gave dominion over it to the crafty ape he called Man." Hmm. "Crafty ape"? Is that like an orangutan who does macramé? And I'm also pretty sure God created the Earth IN the beginning, not before it. I don't think it bodes well for this show's constant religious allusions that they can't even get the first three words of The Bible right. Michael cocks a quick eyebrow before continuing with Carnivàle's signature line: "And to each generation was born a creature of light and a creature of darkness, and great armies clashed by night in the ancient war between good and evil." "There was magic then," he adds, "and nobility, and unimaginable cruelty. And so it was, until the day a false sun exploded over Trinity, and man forever traded away wonder for reason." Oy. Thanks for the nuclear-powered anvil, boys. While we're at it, it should also be noted that said false sun didn't explode until eleven years after the show takes place, so I hope no one minds being spoiled on Mikey's ultimate fate while we're still less than two minutes into the pilot.
We then smash cut directly into a truly bizarre dream sequence, with any number of disturbing and presumably plot-related images flashing by almost too fast to register. A thorough Zaprudering with my TiVo's pause button, however, yields the following shot list:
1. A guy (played by John Savage) in white tuxedo is being chased through a cornfield by a gentleman I'll just call Creepy Ugly Naked Tattooed Guy.
2. The Chasee again, only this time he's hiding in a trench, and wearing an American World War I uniform.
3. A Masonic ring bearing the legend "In Hoc Signo Vinces," which they were probably hoping no one would notice, because it's a bit of a spoiler if you know your ancient history.
4. The Chasee, and now he's wearing a black tuxedo and sitting in a restaurant.
5. The Chasee again, facing the other way in the same restaurant and wearing what I think is either a German or Russian WW I uniform.
6. More cornfield, only this time we get a better look at Creepy Ugly Naked Tattooed Guy. He's got a tree printed on his chest.
7. The same "magician reversed" tarot card that Ben draws later in the episode.
8. A fly-by shot of mourners surrounding a casket on a wagon. It's very sort of "Bring Out Your Dead," only very fast and significantly less funny.
9. Adrienne Barbeau kissing a snake.
10. A top hat being popped out to its full height, as if by a magician.
11. The cornfield again. More chasing.
12. A dead sheep. Or possibly a dead horse. Or maybe a dead mountain lion. You know what? It's a dead furry mammal, and it probably isn't kosher. Enough said.
13. A photo of a group of coal miners hanging on an unidentified wall.
14. A close-up of a hand grasping Creepy Ugly Naked Tattooed Guy's creepy, ugly, naked, tattooed butt.
15. The owner of said hand is shown to be a woman getting raped. I'm about 80 percent sure the woman is Sofie's mother.
16. The dead furry mammal again.
17. A close-up of those coal miners, this time revealing that The Chasee is among them.
18. Still more of the cornfield chase.
19. A gun on a pillow, with four bullets lying beside it.
20. An incredibly disturbing close-up of an arm with a claw-like, two-fingered hand at the end. If that's real, it's really, really freaky. If it's fake, the prop department on this show rocks.
21. A shot of Nick Stahl, waking up and pulling away the blankets to reveal that his both of his legs have been severed above the knee. It's only a flesh wound!
22. A clock pendulum swinging back and forth at high speed.
23. The Chasee in his WW I uniform, cowering in a trench.
24. Same guy, and now he's aiming his rifle at someone off-camera.
25. A wide shot of a funeral under what looks suspiciously like the Six Feet Under tree.
26. A close-up of that same tree, tattooed onto Creepy Ugly Naked Tattooed Guy's chest.
27. Fade to white.
Incidentally, can someone please hit the nickname thread and come up with something better for Creepy Ugly Naked Tattooed Guy? He shows up a lot, and that's not really something I can abbreviate.
The dream ends when Nick Stahl wakes up in a tiny little two-room shack. He raises his head to see a woman lying in bed in the other room, hacking and coughing as a dust storm rages outside. And speaking of outside, that's exactly where we cut to , as a legend reveals that we're in Oklahoma in 1934. The remnants of Hurricane Isabel are swirling around my high-rise office as I type this illicitly on company time, but they're absolutely nothing compared to the flying dust that's pelting Nick's home. Back inside, Nick watches the woman cough, and then slowly (verrrrrrrry, verrrrrrry slooooooooooooowly) creeps up beside her and reaches out to touch her hand. Before he can make contact, however, she wakes up and fearfully jerks away. "Momma, please!" he begs, but whatever he's offering she stubbornly refuses. He slowly (slooooooooooooowly) collapses to the floor and starts to cry. And with one final gurgling cough, Momma wheezes off this mortal coil. Farewell, Mommie Dustiest. And there's really only one thing I can say after watching someone die of a lung disease: Flick, ahh…
After the mildly discomfiting failure to appear of an Ironically White Title Card of Death, we fade to a shot of Nick digging his mother's grave just outside the shack. He's got her body lying out there beside him, covered with a sheet that billows in the furious wind. Out on the horizon, we see a bulldozer emerging from the haze, and it's quickly established that the shack has been repossessed by the First Merchant's Trust Bank and therefore scheduled for destruction. Nick, however, stubbornly refuses to move out of the way, and Dozer Guy (played by HITG! Jack McGee) threatens to run him down, which the law apparently allows. So, what? He's Arthur Dent now? Will there be Vogons? Did Nick remember to pack his towel? Does anyone want to hear my crappy poetry?
This pastoral little encounter is interrupted by the sudden arrival of a convoy of carnies. Michael J. Anderson, hereafter known as Samson, and Tim DeKay, hereafter known as Jonesy, are seated in the cab of the lead truck. "They're set to squash him," mutters Samson. "Nah, they won't squash him," replies his colleague. "They're gonna pork him." "They're not going to pork him, Jonesy," insists Samson. "This ain't Deliverance. At least not yet." Okay, just kidding. They do, however, decide to wager "two bits" on whether or not said squashing will occur. Sadly, there's no mention at all of the shave and a haircut Nick Stahl so desperately needs at this point. He certainly hasn't reached Krause-ian proportions or anything, but this whole "possessed by the Devil's Flow-Bee" look he's working here really isn't doing the boy any favors.
Spotting an opportunity to influence events in his favor, Jonesy hops out of the truck and heads over to speak with Dozer Guy. He soon manages to convince him to hold off on the squashing for a few seconds through the cunning combination of logical reasoning ("It'll gum up your works") and pelting the guy with rocks. Wow. I wish I knew about that tactic when I was hitting the college debate circuit. We'd have cleaned up. Of course, what's funny about this shot is that the only two pebble-sized rocks in this entire dust-bowl wasteland just happen to be lying right at his feet. Mighty convenient, don't you think?
A short reprieve secured, Jonesy sidles over to chat up Nick. Despite the large, highly obvious, blanket-covered corpse lying a mere three feet away, Jonesy seems to think that Nick is just out there planting crops. He also asks if Nick's mother is anywhere to be found, presumably so that Nick can point out the body just as Dozer Guy comes over to try and hurry things up a bit. They both realize what's going on at the same moment, and Dozer Guy reluctantly agrees to fetch some shovels from his 'dozer.
Remember when I said Nick moves really slooooooooooowly? Well, he's not the only one. Those last four paragraphs cover almost seven minutes, and no more than a hundred words of dialogue. Six Feet Under would have more than a hundred "fucks" alone in that amount of time.
The funeral. Assorted as-yet-unidentified carnies have gathered around to sing "Nearer My God to Thee," accompanied on a tiny little hand-accordion by a freakishly skeletal Adrienne Barbeau. Also in attendance are Samson, Jonesy, a pair of Siamese twins, various roadies, and a tastefully-veiled Bearded Lady. Others, including Clea DuVall and Sydney from The Pretender, hang back by the trucks. Sydney even sings along a bit, in French, no less. Ooh la la! This goes on and on, through at least three verses of a hymn I don't know the words to, with Nick Stahl looking all the while as if he's about to faint.
See the B-movie queen, performing hymns on her machine. She's desperate for some cuisine, what a scene, what a scene
The instant the song ends, however, chaos breaks out. Dozer Guy fires up his dozer and promptly flattens the shack, and Samson orders everyone immediately back onto the trucks so they can get going. Adrienne Barbeau, however, insists that they just can't leave Nick alone. Aww. I guess after Ernest Borgnine and the Swamp Thing, she's got something of a soft spot for stray weirdos. Or maybe she's just hoping to reprise her role in Cannibal Women in the Avocado Jungle of Death and finally get a decent meal for a change. Samson, however, doesn't like the idea. "We got nothing open," he protests, before adding that they're down to "tater shucks" for food. Actually, tater shucks sound pretty good right about now. Where's that bag of chips I had stashed around here somewhere?
While the carnies bicker, the chaos continues. After being on the verge of fainting for several minutes, Nick finally does keel over (see? Slooooooooooooooow), and we also begin to hear sirens approaching in the distance. Having noticed that Nick appears to be sporting some sawed-off leg irons that would indicate he's escaped from a chain gang, Samson finally caves in and decides to bring him along rather than leave him for the cops. I guess it wouldn't be much of a show if he didn't. Fade to…black? Okay.
Interlude: I haven't really had an occasion to mention this yet, but seeing as how it's needed to set up a joke in the paragraph, I'd like to take this moment to point out that in addition to being the episode's title and an actual town in Oklahoma, "Milfay" is also an anagram for "family." Special bonus thanks go out to Suzanna for emailing with that tidbit, which I totally missed. In my defense, I wasn't really paying attention so much, because I was already planning to make a MILF joke about Adrienne Barbeau. This way is better, though, don't you think?
Fade up on a billboard announcing that we're in a quaint little town called "Mintern." In addition to being an actual town in California, Mintern is almost, but not quite, and anagram for "Terminator." CA residents should feel free to insert their own "sexed-up" Arnold Schwarzenegger gang-bang joke here. We cut to a very nice-looking Methodist church, where yet another dreary hymn I don't know the words to is being sung by the congregation. Wow. Christians have really depressing music. I mean, just look at Stryper, for God's sake. This particular congregation is being led by a bespectacled Clancy Brown, who sits quietly on the dais as his parishioners drone their way through the last few words of the song. Ahh, Clancy. We've all got love for you man, but your résumé is seriously all over the place. This guy has been in some great movies (The Shawshank Redemption, Highlander), some decent movies (Buckaroo Bonzai, Starship Troopers, TV's Earth 2), and even some truly naughty movies (Female Perversions, Annabelle's Wish, Big Guy and Rusty the Boy Robot). ["He also turned up on ER for a while." -- Sars] And before all you fanboy nerds out there start composing virus-laden e-mails to chastise me for putting Highlander ahead of Buckaroo Bonzai, let me just validate my own nerd credentials by adding that whatever you may think of the man's film choices, his video game selections have been damn near iconic (including "Fallout," "Mortal Kombat," and "Crash Bandicoot").
Anyway, Clancy finally stands up to deliver his sermon, which is all about plagues and sandstorms and other things he describes as "being harbingers of the apocalypse." Incidentally, other notable harbingers include Madonna's children's book, the Cincinnati Bengals, and Miss Match. He then segues into a bit about being kind to the less fortunate, and this is accompanied by a shot of an elderly woman in the back row palming a silver coin out of the collection plate. All the other churchgoers are scrubbed clean and Mintern-fresh, whereas this woman is covered in dirt and grime, so you just know she has to be evil. The only person who seems to notice this transgression, however, is Amy Madigan, who has been seated off to the side up on the dais the entire time. Her eyes narrow a bit as she stares the dirty lady down, and she actually starts to look even creepier than she did before, assuming such a thing is even possible. Although I suppose Clancy must have noticed it as well, because even he seems a little frosty as he closes his sermon with "The Lord giveth, and The Lord taketh away." The service ends with an slightly more jaunty rendition of "He's Got The Whole World In His Hands." Heh. Is "It's A Small World After All" considered a hymn as well?
An audio fade takes us back to Clancy's chambers, or whatever a priest's office is supposed to be called. A vestibule? A rectory? Our rabbi just calls it his office. He greets The Dirty Lady, whom our eagle-eyed forum readers have already identified as a former Ma Kent. No, not that one. After offering her some tea, which she declines, he correctly deduces that she's come up from Oklahoma to seek work in California. Unfortunately, she wasn't able to find any, so she's been living out in a squatter's camp near the highway. "We ain't got no preacher," she explains, "so I been coming up here the last three Sundays. A lady's got a right to worship." Clancy couldn't agree more, and he even takes her hands in his as a show of solidarity. Or maybe not, because he quickly reaches up her sleeve to find the coin she stole from the collection plate. "I see you in my sermons," he sighs, "and you pray so hard it breaks my heart. But my words, they wash over you like water over a stone." Dirty Lady starts to cry, but Clancy presses the coin back into her hand, and delivers his own take on the show's theme: "We all, each of us, carry within us the seeds of our own salvation, and our own damnation. You do believe that, don't you?" Dirty Lady, however, is unable to answer, mostly because she suddenly starts puking up coins. Whoa. Cool effect. She's obviously a bit freaked out by this, but Clancy has the look of a man who's seen stranger things, even if he's not real happy about it. "Kneel and pray," he instructs her, but she's too petrified to move. "KNEEL!" he shout. Oh, yeah. This one's definitely a priest. Still crying, the Dirty Lady drops to her knees, and tries to follow along as Clancy prays for salvation. Unfortunately, she's still spewing coins like a Reno slot machine, so all Clancy can do is gather her in his arms and Heston, "Enough!" a few times to the heavens until she finally stops. He cradles her there on the floor, trying to comfort her, but the sobbing continues as creepy Amy Madigan watches from the other room. Personally, if I suddenly discovered that I had the ability to puke up Susan B. Anthonys, I'd probably respond with a hearty "Hallelujah" and a raging case of bulimia. But that's just me. ["I'd wonder who plunked me down in the cherry-pit scene from The Witches of Eastwick, myself." -- Sars] And in any case, when Clancy looks over to check out the coins, they've mysteriously vanished. I suppose that means the whole thing was only a shared vision, but it's also possible the coins were just made of leprechaun gold. Speaking of which, "Accio nicotine!" Flick, ahh…
And now back to the carnies. It's well after dark as the convoy of trucks cruises down a dirt highway. An announcer on the radio extols the virtues of the banking industry, which I'm totally taking as a shout-out. At least up to the point where Samson shuts off the radio in disgust, that is. Jonesy wants to know if Samson has discussed Nick's situation with "management." Samson confirms that he has, but also whines that only have $34.87 in the kitty, and they just can't afford to be taking in strays. Only he does it by using phrases like "choking on the nut" and "another belly to wash." Those of you desperate for HoYay can make of that what you will. Management's reply to all this? "He was expected." "Expected?" asks Jonesy. "What the hell does that mean?" "I stopped asking that question a long time ago," answers Samson. I suspect we may all have to stop asking that question before this season is over.
As the convoy pulls into Mintern at last, we see a young girl awakened from her bed by the passing headlights, she tumbles out of bed, and drags herself across the floor to the window, with her obviously paralyzed legs trailing behind her, to join her brother looking out. That will be important later.
In another trailer in the convoy, Sydney is playing cards with The Bearded Lady. It's a good thing he's blind, by the way, because otherwise the pink and orange feather boas she's wearing could do some serious retinal damage. He also seems to be winning quite handily, although whether that's due to his ability to read minds or the fact that she's been hitting a nearby bong pretty hard is yet to be determined. She casts a quick glance over at Nick, who's sleeping in the corner. "Fine-looking boy," she rather lewdly observes. Sydney chides her for being so unrepentantly horny, and also suggests that she discard the jack of clubs because "it will only come back to haunt [her]." Surprisingly, she accepts his advice, and he promptly snatches it up and calls gin. Heh. But what kind of person is stupid enough to not only play cards with a mind reader, but also to take his suggestions? Probably someone stupid enough to wear that outfit, I suppose. In any case, she begs Sydney (whom she calls "Lodz") to read Nick's dreams, and he reluctantly agrees. He steps over to Nick's bed, and performs the time-honored Mr. Miyagi hand-warming motion before clasping Nick's forehead in an almost Vulcan fashion.
We flash immediately into the same dream images we saw before, but with some minor expansions. The corn field chase continues as expected, but we see quite a bit more of the World War I scenario, with John Savage wandering through a corpse-strewn battlefield holding his weapon at the ready. He also comes to the same trench we saw before, only now the mangled bodies within are much more visible. There are additional quick flashes of him in the black tuxedo and what looks like one of the miners from the photo, impaled on some sort of a hook. Creepy Ugly Naked Tattooed Guy, of course, remains creepy, ugly, naked, and tattooed. Sydney, however, has an almost epileptic seizure as he views the dreams, and Lila the Bearded Lady is forced to yank him away as if he were being electrocuted. Young Nick, meanwhile, sleeps soundly through it all.
The morning we see that the "Carnivàle" sign has already been erected at the perimeter of the, er, carnival. The bright sunlight streaming through a window finally manages to awaken Nick, and he sits up in bed looking more than a little confused. He's also shocked to see that his leg irons are gone. Viewers at home, however, are shocked to see him wrap a sheet around his waist, rather than opting for the de rigueur "It's not TV, it's HBO" butt-shot. Sorry, kids. You'll just have to stick with those Oz DVDs for now.
Elsewhere, Clea DuVall is brushing a dead woman's hair. And also talking to her. Except it turns out that the woman isn't dead, but merely in some bizarre form of an open-eyed coma. She's also doing what all mothers everywhere do, regardless of whether they're dead, alive, comatose, or telekinetic. That is, she's hounding Clea to find a nice boy and settle down. Specifically Nick, in this case, although Clea doesn't seem to think that's a very good idea. Or perhaps more accurately, Clea just doesn't want her not-dead, telekinetic mother to know that she actually does think it's a pretty good idea. Methinks Clea would have wanted to see the butt-shot, too. And she almost gets her chance, because after Ma causes some tarot cards on the other side of the room to flip up into the air, Clea peeks out a window just in time to Nick emerging from his own trailer, wearing nothing more than a tasteful flowered kimono. She glances down at the card she's picked up off the floor, and notices with a bit of trepidation that it's the magician reversed. We'll be seeing a lot of that card this week.
All Nick wants to see, however, is some pants. He finds a pair on a clothesline, but ends up seeing a lot more than he bargained for, because there's a guy with a tail standing right on the other side. "What are you, some kind of freak?" asks the guy as he turns around and reveals himself to be rather surly-looking, dreadlocked Lizard Man. Nick recoils a bit, and ends up bumping into an extremely tall guy who appears to suffer from sort of an unexplained physical or mental defect. That impact spins him right around into the passing Siamese twins, who push him away and send him sprawling into a puddle of mud. Everyone gathers around to laugh, including Jonesy, who does a little nipple-tweaking dance and sings a vaguely bawdy sounding song about kimonos. Hee! Nick, however, is not amused.
In yet another trailer, Sydney (heretofore known as Professor Lodz) is enjoying a nice refreshing glass of absinthe. I'm not normally a fan of the idea of putting something neon green into my body, but in this particular case I might be willing to make an exception. And Lodz certainly looks as though he could use a good stiff drink. Samson enters, and Lodz immediately asks if "the stranger" is still with them. "He was," answers Samson, "but then he muttered something about 'movin' out' and 'only the weird dying young' and he took off." Or maybe he just said yes. I'm not really sure. "He's dangerous," warns Lodz. "Aw, hell," replies Samson, looking pointedly at the absinthe. "He's a rube." Lodz relates the story about trying to read Nick's dreams, and adds that the experience almost killed him. Samson doesn't believe him at first, and further points out that Management wants him to take the kid on full-time. "If he really were a threat," Samson adds, "Management would know about it." "Would he?" wonders Lodz. Dun-dun-DUH!
Cut to a dirt road, with Nick wandering along the edge. Clea pulls up beside him in a pickup truck and offers him a ride, which Nick refuses, mainly because he doesn't appreciate "getting shanghaied by a pack of freaks who steal [his] duds." Predictably, Clea is a bit insulted by this, and she accelerates away from him and continues down the road. Smooth, Nicky. Very smooth.
Sometime later, Nick has moved from a dirt road to a set of railroad tracks, where he comes across a small squatter's camp alongside an engine watering tower. Apropos of nothing, a nearby Okie who looks exactly like the Steinbeck version of Larry's other brother Darryl pipes up to say that his wife won't let him bury their dead son. Because that's exactly the sort of thing you'd want to discuss with random strangers who still have bruises on their legs from the chains they were wearing. Despite the fact that everything we've seen of Nick so far indicates that he's the least sociable person on the entire planet, our hero still decides to head over to the guy's wife for a nice little chat. "Ain't that a pretty baby you got," he observes to the woman, who looks exactly like the Steinbeck version of a poor man's Allison Janney. Now I could have sworn I'd seen her somewhere before, but according to the IMDb, her only notable role was as Niles's wife on Frasier, which is a show I tend to avoid like the plague. Steinbeck Janney reveals that the kid's name is Michael, and Nick immediately notes that it's just like "the archangel." This prompts her to be silent for a few beats, and then she looks sadly up at Nick to mutter, "He's dead…wrapped in sackcloth." Nick confirms this fact as compassionately as possible, and then reaches out to take the child's body from her arms. Spoiler whores are obviously supposed to think he's planning to heal the child at this point, but instead he just hands it over to Steinbeck Darryl, and continues on his merry way without a single word. Hmm. That scene was just…weird, and not in a good way, either.
Over in downtown Milfay, which appears to consist of a single gas station, Clea has pulled in to pick up a couple gallons of unleaded. The station attendant and his Ron Howard look-alike buddy pretend to work on the truck, but really just take a few minutes to ogle her as slooooooooooowly as they can. Eventually, the attendant interrupts the ogling to confirm that she's "with them carnies." Opie, however, just keeps staring at her tits.
A bit later, Nick finds his way to the same station, and he's miraculously just in time to hear Clea shouting from inside. Of course he is. He dashes to her rescue, stopping briefly to pick up a two-by-four before finding Opie and the attendant trying to rape poor Clea on the hood of a Model T. Despite Samson's earlier Deliverance-related prophecy, there doesn't seem to be any pig-like squealing going on. In fact, Clea actually seems to be putting up a pretty good fight, which is all the more impressive considering her torn shirt and highly flimsy-looking period costume bra. Nick, however, jumps right into the fray and quickly decks the attendant. Opie tries to put up a fight with his screwdriver, but while he's occupied with Nick, Clea bashes him over the head with an oil can. Wow. She's still no Lauren Ambrose, but I dig chicks with a mean right hook.
Cut to Nick, driving them back to the carnival as Clea sits silently beside him. Apparently over the "shanghaiing" of his "duds," Nick suddenly gets all gentlemanly and offers up his coat for her to wear over the torn shirt. And thus, my friends, a future romantic subplot is born. Aww. Sniff.
Back at the carnival, we're treated to a quick bit of tool-related humor, and then Jonesy spies Clea pulling up with a torn shirt and the new guy in tow. He follows her into her trailer, and immediately blames Nick for whatever might have happened. Clea explains that Nick was the one who saved her, and Jonesy weirdly decides to go all Cro-Magnon on her ass. "How many times you been told?" he asks. "The one thing you cannot do is prance into these towns without asking for trouble." After confirming that he's actually blaming her for "asking for it," Clea responds with a slap across the face that serves notice that her left is just as mean as her right. "The only thing I asked for was a tank of gas and a Nehi soda and maybe ten minutes to myself," she shouts. "The rest of it was them!" There's a Rape-ar O'Reilly joke hanging somewhere around that Nehi line, but I just can't seem to find it. Which is probably for the best. She shoves Jonesy out of the trailer, and sits back down in a huff. After a completely silent beat, she suddenly turns to shout, "Would you please shut up!" at her not-dead mother. Heh.
On the other side of the camp, Samson is desperately trying to convince Nick to stay. He doesn't seem to be having much success, though, because Nick just keeps right on walking. "The point is, kid," Samson pleads, "I'm about to make you the offer of a lifetime." "Stop calling me 'kid,'" replies Nick. "My name is Ben Hawkins." Well it's about fucking time. There ought to be a law that all characters must be named within the first five minutes of a pilot. "Well, Ben Hawkins," Samson says in a perfectly framed shot, "how would you like a career in show business?" Heh. That's exactly what Sars said to me. Ben asks about wages, and Samson is forced to admit that there won't be any. That's also exactly what Sars said to me. Ben laughs in his face and walks away, causing Samson to yell out that he should ask what the wages will be for breaking rocks once the cops find him and throw his ass in jail. Ben must not be the spooning type, because this is finally enough to change his mind.
Interlude: Just for the record, and for the benefit of people who are reading this without actually having seen the show, I'll point out here for the first and only time that Samson is a midget. Or a dwarf. Or a little person, or whatever the currently preferred PC term might be. And before I get thousands of angry letters accusing me of being size-ist for not discussing the height of everyone else in the cast, I'll also point out that everyone else in the cast appears to be of roughly normal height for their age. Except for the really tall retarded guy, that is. I'd also like to take a moment here to praise Michael J. Anderson for appearing in the second-best episode of The X-Files of all time. In the immortal words of David Duchovny, "You'd be surprised how many men [find his size to be intriguingly alluring]."
Cut to Samson and Ben, eating lunch at a picnic table. "You know, I remember when I was a whelp," Samson pontificates. "My daddy worked in the stockyards. Big hands. Spoke German at home." Wait a second. "Big hands"? Was than an Austin Powers joke? Hee! You know, if there's one thing I like about this show, it's the fact that Daniel Knauf clearly has a highly anachronistic sense of humor. Well, that and the strippers. But we'll get to that later. Despite repeated questioning, Nick remains stingy with the details of his own backstory. He basically claims to have never left the farm, causing Samson to ask if Nick thinks he looks stupid. "I been to New York City," brags Samson. "I been to Chi-town and The Big Easy. I met Caruso and Dempsey. I made eyes at Theda Bara. On a bad day, I cracked tougher nuts than you." I suppose all that's a pretty big deal for 1934, but I've been to all three of those cities, and I once made eyes at Linda Fiorentino (although it's possible she was just looking at the waiter standing behind me), so I'm not really all that impressed. Neither is Nick, who pushes his lunch away and gets up from the table. "You don't like steak?" asks Samson. "Oh, the meat's fine," replies Ben. "It don't ask questions."
Later that night, the carnival is in full swing. Various barkers shout the praises of their acts, including Lila the Bearded Lady and Adrienne Barbeau shilling for Gabriel the strong-man. Ben wanders from tent to tent, soaking in the sights right along with those of us viewing at home. There are sword-swallowers, fire-breathers, and even the Siamese twins singing in French. We also spy Jonesy showing some sympathy for the little paralyzed girl we saw earlier, as he hoists her onto the Ferris wheel and refuses to take her money. Ben watches this scene approvingly, and then moves over to the strippers' tent, where the barker is describing their act as "an informative, educational display of European muscle dancing." Ben heads inside, where we soon learn that European muscle dancing seems to focus primarily on whatever muscles are used to jiggle the breasts. It's probably not much of a workout, but the one girl does look as though she'd be right at home in the Bada Bing. Our hero is apparently not much of a fan of the breast-jiggling, because he quickly gets a disgusted look on his face and storms out of the tent.
Performing on a stool, we've a sight to make you drool. Meatloaf's daughter shows her jewels, keep your cool, keep your cool.
And then that look only gets worse when he sneaks behind the tent to smoke a cigarette, and ends up overhearing the barker pimping out one of the strippers for twenty-five dollars. "Hey, she's a whore!" he exclaims to a passing Samson. "Rita Sue didn't do nothing to that chump that the First Merchant's Trust didn't do to you," comes the reply, and I'm afraid the insanely bad dubbing on that line is about as close as you Twin Peaks fans are going to get to seeing Michael J. Anderson talking backwards.
Ben adjourns to the parking lot to finish his cigarette in peace, and this time it's a passing Clea DuVall who catches his attention. He's certainly a lot happier to see her than he was to see Samson. She haltingly thanks him for saving her earlier, and points out that she must be "some fortune teller" if she couldn't have seen the attack coming. She also asks if he'll be joining them permanently, but Ben insists that he's "no carnie." Ah. No wonder she likes him. He's got big hands. "The people in these towns are asleep," she explains, for no other apparent purpose than to provide a good line for the promos. "We wake them up." This doesn't impress Ben much, but then again, he's the guy who can sleep through dreams that would send most men straight to the loony bin. Clea offers to read his cards, but Ben declines, mostly because he's broke. He does, however, ask her name. "Sofie," she replies. "Hawkins," he starts, making for an almost clever "Sadie Hawkins" joke about her suspiciously modern feminist attitudes. "Ben Hawkins," she finishes. "I know." Okay, so I guess she is a good fortune teller. Fade to black.
And now we return once again to the dream sequences. We still get the cornfield chase and the World War I stuff, but there are a number of new shots here, including a fetus in a jar of formaldehyde, Amy Madigan looking scared, two little kids holding hands, a burnt skull, and a neon sign reading "Mr. Chin's" that explodes in a shower of sparks. The kicker here is that it's Clancy having the dream, and he jerks awake in his living room to find Amy knitting in the corner and "The Shadow" playing on the radio. It's neat to hear the distinctive voice of Orson Welles playing Lamont Cranston, but unfortunately Orson didn't start that role until three years after this scene takes place. Was that an intentional mistake, or not? You be the judge.
Without so much as a single word to his sister, Clancy heads out for a quick walk around town. Mintern is obviously quite prosperous, especially compared to Milfay. It's also a lot creepier than Milfay, which is really saying something when you consider just how creepy a town full of Ron Howard look-alike rapists must be. After an interminably long stroll, Clancy suddenly finds himself in front of a house of ill repute, and he looks upward to see the same Mr. Chin's sign that appeared in his dream. He's solicited by an Asian prostitute as he stares at the sign, but when he grabs her arm to push her away she snarls at him in Chinese ("Can you believe they're actually making a Firefly movie?") and runs off. And then as Clancy stands there, bathed in the red neon light, it suddenly begins to snow. Within seconds, the street is covered (if by "covered" you mean "rendered in CGI"), and he finds himself standing alone in the center of the storm. The snow is then replaced by a rain of blood, and Clancy raises his arms and does a passable imitation of Tim Robbins at the end of Shawshank Redemption. With his face coated in blood, he looks up to see the "Mr. Chin's" sign explode just like it did in the dream, only this time the only two tubes of neon left intact form a glowing sign of the cross. Hmm. In hoc signo vinces, anyone? Clancy clasps his hands in prayer, and falls to his knees. And just like that, the vision ends, and we see that he's kneeling in the middle of a busy and completely snow- and blood-free street, and the neon sign remains intact. Fade to black. Hmm. Freaky. And am I the only one who ever wonders where the writers come up with this stuff?
There behind the glass lies an eighth of Alan Ball's grass. The bong, it has been passed. Bring it on, bring it on.
It should probably be noted that, unlike Ben, Clancy has yet to demonstrate that his powers are anything more than the ability to create a shared hallucination. And some of them, in fact, don't even seem to be shared. That could mean something, or it could just be the way things worked out this week. I guess we'll have to stay tuned to find out.
Back in Milfay, Ben is helping the carnies strike the tents. Oddly enough, I happened to visit the Ringling Brothers museum in Tampa, Florida a few months ago, where I learned that a team of sixty-five workers can erect the circus's entire big tent in less than one hour. That's pretty impressive. What's really weird about the Ringling Museum, and also tangentially related to this show, is that it's also the home of the world's largest collection of Christian-themed artwork. That place has enough Madonnas to give Britney a sprained tongue.
Eventually Ben takes a break to sip some water from a bucket, and Clea emerges from her trailer and actually asks if he's now "one of us?" Oy. I guess you had to know it was coming, but even so, that's a little much. She then adds that it's his last chance for a tarot reading, and this time he accepts. I guess he was impressed by her ability to quote movies from forty years in the future.
Inside Clea's trailer she asks if he's interested in his past, present, or future. Ben doesn't have an opinion either way, so she selects "past" for him. He then cuts the cards, and she deals three of them facedown. She turns over the first to reveal The Moon, which she explains signifies "confusion and exposure." We get a quick flashback to Ben's childhood, where Mommie Dustiest is berating him for digging up a kitten that's been dead for three days. Okay, that's just disgusting. And it's even worse if we're supposed to believe that he didn't know about his powers at this point. She angrily rips the kitten corpse away from him, and it suddenly comes to life in her hands. It's really nothing more than a well-timed edit, but the effect is impressive nonetheless. Ma jumps back in horror, and young Ben immediately scoops up his kitty Lazarus and starts petting it.
Present-day Ben is lost in the haze of memory, and Clea asks if he's all right before continuing on to the second card. This one is Death, which is "not a harbinger of bad fortune, but of transformation." The flashback continues, with Ma insisting that "The Lord takes what's His, and man don't take it back." She stuffs the kitten in a sack, and as young Ben struggles to stop her, she submerges it in a tub of water. Oy. There's a happy childhood memory for you. "You're marked by the beast, boy," she snarls, as she holds the bag beneath the waves. Yeah. I got no jokes for that.
Sofie's Mom has a few choice but silent words for her daughter before we continue, and even though we don't hear what's said, it obviously gives Sofie some reason for concern. She slowly flips the third card, which is the same "magician reversed" that's come up so many times before. "You have a great talent or ability," she explains, before adding that the "reversed" part means that the gift has been wasted. This time the flashback is of Ma on her deathbed, refusing to allow Ben to heal her. She feebly holds up a wooden cross at him, as if he were a vampire, and calls him "filth" and any number of other nasty names. "What are you hiding?" asks Sofie. Ben doesn't answer, so she reaches out to take his hand. "Tell me," she says, only Ben gets a flash of a black-eyed Clancy angrily demanding the same thing. He jumps out of his chair and bolts from the trailer, leaving Sofie alone to ponder the fact that between the attempted rape and this little scene, the two of them have now been on the two worst dates in history.
Ben runs and runs and runs until he finally finds himself amongst the rows of plants at a nearby farm. He sits down beside a tractor that's been overgrown with weeds, and starts sobbing to himself. Suddenly, however, he hears a voice, and looks over to see the little paralyzed girl, sitting in a red wagon and asking why he's crying. He clambers to his feet, and steps over to stand beside her. "Gremmie says y'all are marked," she says. "They ain't marked," replies Ben. "They're just people, that's all." He asks about her legs, and she reveals that she's been that way "forever." He thinks for a minute, and then kneels down beside her. Before he can do anything, however, Samson calls out from across the field to ask if he'll be staying or leaving with the carnies. Ben doesn't answer, causing Samson to give up and order everyone to move out. Gee, I wonder if they'll leave without him? That should make the eleven episodes pretty interesting.
Back in the field, Ben reaches out to grab the little girl's shins. She looks worried by this. He looks constipated. A wide shot suddenly reveals that the crops immediately around them are beginning to shrivel and die, and the wilting even expands to the weeds that have covered the tractor. The CGI is actually not very good up close, but the overall effect definitely works. We cut to Ben, running through the field, and he manages to catch up with the convoy of trucks just in time to swing himself onto the cargo bed of the very last one. He climbs in amongst the sacks of whatever, and almost instantly falls asleep as they drive off into the sunset.
But before we fade to black and end the show, we see that same little girl running for the very first time on her newly healed legs. And as she passes each row of the crops, they die and turn a nasty shade of brown across the whole length of the farm. Heh. Let's see how much she enjoys walking when the entire family is starving to death.
And that's it, folks. But before we go, I just want to add that Rodrigo Garcia is one hell of a director. He's done the last two Six Feet Under season premieres, both of which rocked, and now he's hit a home run with this installment of Carnivàle. It's almost enough to make me forgive him for having Body Shots on his résumé. Almost.
Daniel Knauf: So you're saying this guy is just going to make up conversations, and, like, totally put words in my mouth?
David Chase: Yep.
Daniel Knauf: Well, can't we, like, sue him or something?
Tom Fontana: Relax, Danny Boy. It's all part of the job.
Alan Ball: Yeah. You're one of us now.
All: One of us…one of us…one of us…