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By Demian

, you mincing stereotype at the end of that list) as Raige stresses in the background and we cut over to...

...the nonexistent attic, where the Dolt and the Psycho play with the dollhouse while poor, abused, and woefully neglected -- but not, apparently, deceased -- Tiny Gay Chris finds himself unceremoniously imprisoned in his hand-me-down product-placed playpen. Tiny Gay Chris's monster noggin is swaddled in a thick blue knit cap, no doubt to hide the scars and bruising from his insane brother's last horrific attempt on his life. The Psycho, typically enough, remains dead-eyed and silent throughout, but Tiny Gay Chris amusingly lets out a giggly, enthusiastic, pre-verbal squeal of delight for some reason or another. Cute! But still: Poor Chris. He has no idea how wretched and futile his life ultimately becomes. Sigh. Piper enters, and there is rampant bitchery when she discovers that the Dolt's deactivated the Crystical circle, so Piper and the Dolt head down the stairs to have, as the Dolt puts it, "an adult conversation." The doomed Tiny Gay Chris lets out another giddy squawk at this news, but the murderous Psycho simply pivots to train his vacant, cold stare on his parents' retreating forms. DUN! Eventually.

Lair Of The Zankou. Raige orbs in with the Feebs, who's mid-rant about Elise dumping responsibility for the evening edition onto her inexperienced lap. Raige cares as little about this plot development as I do, apparently, for she silences her yappy half-sister by hissing, "Focus!" The two pick their way across the cracked dirt floor until Zankou flames in before them with a merry, "Greetings!" Heh. He's mildly annoyed, however, to realize that Piper hasn't joined Phoebe and Raige on their little demon-sporking jaunt. Phoebe, not getting it, impatiently blares, "We'd love to stay and chat, but we have business to attend to." "I know," Zankou twinkles, snapping his fingers to conjure a trio of Craven's underlings. "Gonna take longer than ten minutes," Raige grunts as she and Phoebe hurl a few vanquishing vials at the new arrivals. Zankou darts out of the frame to avoid the resulting explosion, which floods the screen to whisk us back to...

...the Manor, where the Dolt's just arrived on the main floor from above for another round of bickering with the wife. It's endless, and it's nothing we haven't heard before, but they do manage to arrive at an affable enough truce just as Craven flares onto the sun porch with a pair of his underlings. "What are you doing here?" Craven screams as Piper demolishes the underlings with a flick of her wrists. Craven darts into the dining room, and there follows a little game of cat-and-mouse as Piper, Craven, and the Dolt warily edge around the main floors' many, many corners, accompanied by a series of bizarre, blurry, swooshing camera transitions. The Dolt's suddenly alarmed, however, when he realizes that the Psycho's silently appeared on the stairwell, and he heedlessly rushes into the foyer to order the bemulleted sociopath back upstairs. Craven spots the Dolt's wide-bodied shadow on the foyer floorboards and unleashes another deadly demonic boomerang, which slowly whickers through the center parlor before whipping around the corner and driving itself into the back of the Dolt's left shoulder. "[Dolt]!" Piper shrieks as she scampers from the dining room onto the sun porch to hurl some explosive mojo at Craven, but her warning arrives a little too late. What's more, her Hands, while knocking Craven to the floor, do nothing more than spark against the demon's upper arm. Craven flares out as the Dolt drops to his knees in agony. The dead-eyed Psycho, meanwhile, watches all of this from above with -- at best -- a mildly annoyed look on his face. At least he's finally displaying some sort of emotion, I suppose. The Dolt, grimacing in pain, extracts the boomerang from his back and struggles to his feet as Piper races to his side. Then, for the Psycho's supposed benefit, the pitiful Dolt assumes as brave a face as he can muster given the circumstances, as both he and Piper urge the brat to head back upstairs. The Psycho just stares at them. Piper, unnerved, sotto-voce sing-songs to the Dolt, "What is he do-ing?" Heh. The Psycho blinks, and his parents immediately vanish from the main floor in a burst of bright, raying, golden light. The Psycho, tugging at his mouth for some strange and no doubt sinister reason, orbs up through the ceiling to..