Episode Report Card Djb: C+ | 1 USERS: A YOU GRADE IT Something Borrowed, Something Prue
By Djb | Season 3 | Episode 13 | Aired on 02.07.2001
Back at the bar, Leo frets further about the wedding, conscious of the difficulty in trying to plan a "normal" wedding "when a ghost'll be presiding and the groom's dead." There's an Anna Nicole Smith joke in there somewhere, but I'm still figuring out names here, so let's keep to the basics, shall we? Prue labels the whole thing a "Cinderella" complex, claiming that, as the oldest, she's the one who's supposed to get married first. Gee, who poured Prue the tall, frothy mug full of Ale About Me? Because a second ago they were talking about Piper. And then not so much. Anyway, "Piper" makes her way back over to the bar and asks to borrow Prue's lipstick, grabs it and runs, then returns to the back room and re-morphs into Receding Hairline Baddy. Apparently there's something about this process of shapeshifting that requires the shifter smile in a very, very sinister manner. Receding Hairline looks around and disappears. That shade's gonna look awful on him. As it does, come to think of it, on anyone with the ability to perceive color.
And, back at the bar, Conveniently Appearing Backstory is strumming an acoustic guitar and singing the "second verse, same as the first" line of its favorite folk tune, "I'm Conveniently Appearing Backstory, I Am," when Leo ventures, "Speaking of Phoebe, don't you think it's time you let her off the hook a little? I mean, she came clean about Cole." Prue bitches that a person can't lie about vanquishing a demon and expect to get away with it without enduring the arduous "So You Say You Lied About Vanquishing A Demon" twelve-step program, but Leo defends her and claims that he's sure Phoebe doesn't want Cole around anymore. Prue says that won't stop him from trying to kill them again. Leo raises an eyebrow. Conveniently Appearing Backstory has not picked up so much as one damned can.
Cut to a dreary outdoor set with burning candles and wind chimes and general faux-underworldly spirituality. As Mark Burnett pulls out a tape measure and relabels the soundstage "Tribal Council, Survivor XXXVII: The Transylvanian Foothills, Receding Hairline Baddy kneels down at the altar and inhales deeply. From seeming nowhere appears an Asian woman who Receding Hairline Baddy (someone wanna throw this guy a name, please) refers to as "Dantalian. Princess Dantalian." He bows. She's important. He hands her the lipstick he poached from Prue, and Dantalian clarifies, "You're sure this has touched her lips?" Yes. Yes, it has. Receding Hairline Baddy asks what benefits Dantalian stands to reap "by making Prue Halliwell [his] wife?" She responds that, as "a humble servant of the Source, Zile," all she gets is the pleasure of a job well done in turning good into evil. Oh, and also the Book of Shadows. Dantalian prepares an immunity-challenge kind of stew with some chicken broth and a live scorpion and a dab of the gloss while continuing to blaze a trail of exposition about the BoS. Save it for the pilot episode, sister; even I know what that is. So her plan is to turn Prue evil, which will turn the sisters evil, which will turn the book evil, which will allow those with evil access to it. But Receding Hairline Baddy's first chore is to lure Prue to the tribal council site, and Dantalian rubs some potion on his lips with the explanation, "Getting the witch here so I can perform the ceremony. That's what this potion is for. Kiss her and it paralyzes her. After I bind you in marriage, she'll fall into a deep sleep, where the transformation to evil will occur." He kneels down before her. She puts the lotion on the lips. Zile? Is that his name? Sounds…receding. Of course.
Back at the Halliwell manor the following morning, two official-looking wedding planners we may never have seen before stand with clipboards and survey the place. Piper makes her way down the steps, noting, "The more traditional the better, as far as I'm concerned." That hardline traditional approach would probably preclude Prue from being allowed to continue wearing her awful pastel plaid patchwork of a button-down shirt in a "traditional" culture that prizes that which is "fashionable" over that which is "faint-inducingly fugly." No one's denying that the AIDS quilt is a very important, socially conscious tapestry; it just shouldn't be sported as knitwear. That's all I'm saying. Banter about trolls and other assorted invitees in the Halliwell's corral of freaks, until Wedding Planner John and Wedding Planner Jane move on to the business of how many guests they will be inviting. The wackiness continues when the witches and goblins keep trying to act like the Normal People in the room, and Piper mentions "mom" as a potential guest. Prue asserts, "I don't really think that you can count her." Wedding Planner John frets, "We have to! If she's going to eat!" Wedding Planner Jane for some reason knows that Mom has passed away, and Piper leaps in on damage control in assuring Wedding Planner Jane, "I just meant I hope she's there in spirit." Wedding Planner John agrees that "that doesn't count," and goes about callously crossing her name off his list. Oh, ha. All hail the well-heralded brusqueness of that oft-lampooned character known the world over as "the guy who plans weddings." The perfect wacky foil for comedic exploration. Martin Short's character from Father of the Bride scootches over ever so slightly to allow Wedding Planner John entrance into the canon. Anyway. Wedding Planners John and Jane move on to the topic of hors d'oeuvres, and the three pause for a moment until Leo calls out, "Pigs in a blanket!" The three crack up, while Wedding Planners John and Jane stand silent, thinking about how they drew the short straw down at Wedding Planner Inc., shifting uncomfortably in the face of this raging, cackling idiocy they cannot believe they've had the bad luck to encounter. John? Jane? I so feel you.