Apologies. Either the WB decided to crank up this episode at 6:58 PM Central, or my VCR exercised a little of its heretofore unknown supernatural protection mojo and lopped off the opening seconds of tonight's episode, vanquishing in the process something called The Flaming Lips as it performed at P3. Not that I'm complaining. However, in its zeal to shield me from on-the-skids alt-rock bands, my VCR also vanquished most of the short scene between Raige and her latest slampiece as well. Not that I'm complaining about this development, either. Slampiece "Trevor" looks like an O-Town reject and never appears after this short bit in the teaser, so if my VCR in its infinite wisdom decided he wasn't worthy of recapping, that's perfectly all right with me.
In any event, my tape kicks in just as Raige says, "I'm really sorry," and the spurned slampiece stalks off. Across the bar, Phoebe and Piper play armchair relationship quarterbacks, all, "Oh! Oh! Ooooooo! A strong offensive drive from Slampiece O-Town, but Raige's superior intimacy issues absolutely demolished that play well before it reached her end zone. Oh, the humanity!" Phoebe, incidentally, has slicked back the offense to God and nature she's been calling bangs, and has added to her topknot a lengthy wig piece that trails down from the crown of her head towards the Fun Bags. Despite the fact this makes her look like the lead chorine in Sweet Charity's nightclub dance number, it's the best her coif's been in a year. Though I do keep expecting her to whip her head around and lash Piper in the face with that tail of hair. The ladies return to their cocktails and thrash the half-sister's recent track record with her gentleman callers for a bit before Piper rises to leave. She and the Dolt are interviewing "magical nannies" in the morning, and Piper, ever anal, wants to give the Manor a final once-over before they begin to arrive. Phoebe protests that it's far too early to be hiring supernatural child care providers, as Piper's not even showing yet. "Except for your boobies," Phoebe amends gracelessly, dropping her gaze to her sister's supposedly inflated chest. Piper fans a demure hand over her cleavage and snorts, "They're large, and they're definitely in charge, but at least something's normal about this pregnancy." Piper collects her handbag from the bar and sails off just as Raige dejectedly slumps over to assume control of Piper's abandoned barstool. With a touch of self-deprecation, Raige jokes about boy-band rejects loved and lost before Phoebe, irritated that the topic of conversation has strayed so far from herself and her problems, leads, "At least you don't have to worry if [Slampiece O-Town's] going to attack again." Raige cocks a brow, represses the urge to twist that tail of hair around her sister's neck and yank on it until The Feeble One drops from her stool unconscious, and asks, "Is that some sort of Cole segue?" "Well, now that you mention him," Phoebe begins. Just slap her, Raige. Slap her hard. Raige ignores me, allowing Phoebe to blither endlessly about her latest set of problems with the ex-husband. Specifically, Cole hasn't contacted Phoebe in days. As idleness and Cole never made even a passing acquaintance with each other, Phoebe interprets the deafening silence emanating from the Casa as an indication that Cole's up to something evil.
The Ironic Segue Fairy pirouettes through the frame to escort us all to a biker bar, where Cole's busy placing a mighty dent in a bottle of Jack Daniel's. Atta boy. The Ironic Segue Fairy, meanwhile, glances at the other patrons of this particular establishment, quickly realizes they're not his kind of people, and jetes away before one of the spiky gents by the pool table cracks his skull open with a cue. As the Ironic Segue Fairy leaps off, two loathsome, murderous, and tubby thugs barge through the front door with prominent shotguns and absolutely nothing masking their identities. Cole's about as enthralled with this sudden development as I am, and casually refills his shot glass while the tubby thugs order the patrons to hand over their valuables. I'm not going to bother wondering who would be stupid enough to knock over a biker bar, so I'll turn my attention to the nifty six-shooter the bartender surreptitiously draws from beneath the till. The bartender points the revolver at the lead loathsome, murderous, tubby thug, and receives a bellyful of buckshot for his effort. Cole, still not caring, pours out a few more fingers of Jack. A somewhat attractive biker standing near the rapidly-cooling corpse of the bartender panics and bolts towards Cole's end of the bar. The thug underling raises his shotgun -- scratch that -- his fully automatic pistol, and blasts away at the fleeing biker boy. The thug underling misses the somewhat attractive gent completely. However, in a strangely satisfying bit of effects, the underling shatters the shot glass in Cole's hand by sending a round through Cole's chest. As the hole in Cole's grey tee magically knits itself up and the pesky bloodstain left by the bullet's passing vanishes of its own accord, Cole just stares glumly at the remains of his cocktail all, "Even my shot glass hates me." Poor guy. He rises to his feet, turns, and, channeling The Late Lamented, flings his arms around, violently TKing the tubby thugs into opposite walls. I want Cole's fleece-lined bomber jacket, and I want it now. I'd look like a monumental ass in it, of course, but that's not the point. Anyway, various biker types scramble to their feet and scurry out the door as the dazed and murderous tubbies paw for their weapons on the ground. Cole smacks the lead thug in the head with a Flaming Ball Of Death, and the felon erupts instantly in a gout of fire. The thug underling darts for the door, but Cole slams another FBOD into the underling's back. Tubby scum thus eliminated, Cole screams, all manly and tortured.
A massive black blot smears down from the ceiling to morph into two black-clad gentlemen. One is a scrawny little middle-aged white guy with a ponytail and a goatee. The other is the master of menace himself, Mr. Tony Todd. That's just sad, guys. Tony Todd's gone from Candyman -- which was, hands down, the most frightening horror movie of the 1990s -- to Candyman's two awful sequels to Final Destination to Smallville to Charmed. I weep for you, Tony Todd. Tony Todd and his scrawny accomplice advance upon Cole, crooning, "We've been waiting for this moment." A lingering glamour shot of Julian McMahon's pretty, scruffy, pouty-lipped face takes us into the opening credits.
The opening travelogue has been abandoned this evening in favor of a sharp fade up on Raige shoving a blueberry muffin into her mouth as she and Piper discuss supernatural nannies in the Manor kitchen. Raige's black bra strap, meanwhile, mesmerizes me by playing peek-a-boo with the camera, popping in and out of her blouse as the scene repeatedly shifts points of view between the sisters. Was no one on the set that day able to convince Rose McGowan to choose a strap strategy and stick with it for two lousy minutes of dialogue? The Dolt finally orbs in to further tonight's plot with a piece of news from The Ever-Useless Elders. Raige is to assume responsibility of her first charge as a Whitelighter. "His name is Samuel," the Dolt explains. "A good man who's lost his way." "Samuel?" Raige replies. "You mean like my long-dead, home-wrecking father Samuel?" Oh, fine. Raige says no such thing, choosing instead to babble enthusiastically about Sam's "good, strong, Biblical name." Piper attempts to dampen the general enthusiasm a bit by making note of Raige's lack of experience, but Raige is not having it. "I don't want anyone to rain on my Whitelighter parade," she coos, tracing invisible patterns of joy in the air with some subdued spirit fingers.
Cue the bellowing of the Feebs. Phoebe races downstairs into the main hallway and oh, Lord. She's working the ever-so-flattering Angela-Lansbury-as-Mrs.-Lovett double bun look again, and she's accented the simple, restrained combination of jeans and a white jersey shirt with a length of pale pink netting she's wound around her neck as a scarf. Piper, Raige, and the Dolt scamper in from the kitchen to find Phoebe shrieking demands for the Cole vanquish Raige concocted using the bloody letter opener from the season premiere. Raige confesses that she destroyed it, as she discovered that it wasn't strong enough to do any good. She tested the potion on the letter opener itself, you see, and nothing happened. Piper steps into the conversation to wonder why Phoebe needs a Cole vanquish in the first place. Phoebe relates the sordid tale of last night's attempted biker bar robbery, taking care to emphasize the incident's supernatural details, particularly the part involving the thugs' unfortunate encounter with a couple of Flaming Balls Of Death. And Phoebe knows about this...how, exactly? She had a premonition? She heard it on the radio? Dionne Warwick sent her an email? Darryl called from the set of The Other Half with the skinny? What? Whatever. The writing staff obviously doesn't care, so neither should I. Raige, bursting with pride over her purported promotion, adopts a serene countenance to caution Phoebe against jumping to conclusions while prudently suggesting that she confirm her suspicions before attempting to destroy her ex-husband. Phoebe, surprisingly, agrees with Raige, and exits the Manor for a private chat with Cole. She does, however, instruct Raige to whip up a stronger version of the vanquish while she's gone. "If I'm right about Cole," she calls over her shoulder, "our truce with him is over."
Casa Del Binge Drinker. Cole flings open the French doors, no doubt to rid the condo of the wretched stench rising from the pool of Jack-induced sick staining the carpet behind him. Though Cole's probably the type to pass out without vomiting, right? In any event, The Master Of Menace smears in with his scrawny lackey and announces his presence with a velvety-voiced murmured greeting. Cole wearily turns towards the intruders and orders them to leave. Sorry, Cole. Tony Todd and the middle-aged scrawn are contractually obliged to remain in your apartment until they describe the latest jerry-built addition to the general Charmed mythology, and nothing you say or do will prevent them from fulfilling their appointed duties. Tony Todd and the middle-aged scrawn are "The Avatars Of Force And Power," you see, and because Cole "crossed a line" the evening with his murder of the tubby thugs, they decided to drop by with an invitation to join them. Okay, here's where my head explodes. Where did Cole cross a line? When he offed two scumbags who displayed no concern for human life? The thugs had already killed the bartender, and had Cole himself been human, he'd have ended up sprawled across a puddle of Jack Daniel's, bleeding to death. The way things were going, the robbery would have ended in a massacre -- probably in the walk-in refrigeration unit out back. Tubby thugs with fully-automatic pistols just love shoving unsuspecting bar patrons into walk-in refrigeration units out back and plugging their unsuspecting heads full of lead. When, you know, the tubby thugs aren't just wandering into fast food restaurants and mowing down random customers. I know. I read about it in the paper. Several times in the last twenty years. Cole's actions were entirely justified, if you ask me. Sure, he could have kept TKing the thugs into heavy objects until their brains leaked out of their ears, but why waste all that energy on a couple of guys who were going to end up on the business end of a policeman's service revolver anyway? Or, more likely, strapped to gurneys with needles in their arms. Cole not only saved the life of every single biker in that bar, he also spared the taxpayers of California the expense of trials, lengthy appeals, and the executions themselves. Pin a medal on the guy already and be done with it.
Okay, fine. So the current system of capital punishment in the United States pretty much sucks, and I shouldn't be so cavalier about it in my sidebar rantings. Terrific. No argument there from me, though I wasn't exactly crying when a fellow inmate bludgeoned Jeffrey Dahmer after he fortuitously escaped lethal injection by choosing to munch on his one-night stands in a state that had no provisions in its legal code for the death penalty. However. Would it have placed too great a burden upon the writing staff to have Cole lose control of himself in a situation where right and wrong and good and bad weren't so starkly delineated? Whatever. In tonight's episode, Cole's actions in the biker bar constitute a hideous and unforgivable offense against the order of things, and he must be punished for them. That's what they're trying to sell me, and I'm not buying it. At all. If Cole wants to target the scum of the earth, and if his idea of earth scum is what we saw in the pre-credits sequence, let him have at it.
ANY-way. Cole without hesitation vows that he'll never turn evil again. The scrawny lackey scoffs at such restrictive labels as "good" and "evil." Oh, ew. He sounds like that twit of a Brit editor Out magazine snared a few years back who tried to bring his "post-gay" crap to America. Either that or a bisexual uncomfortable with his orientation who insists that labels are unnecessary. Tools. In any event, The Avatars "don't have to choose between good and evil -- [they] can drive them both." No, it makes no sense, and I doubt it ever will, but The Avatars are this season's Source, apparently, so I suppose we'll have to learn to live with them until Piper's uber-infant dusts their collective ass. That's not a spoiler, by the way. That's a certainty. So, The Avatars are "preparing to wield a power the likes of which this world has never seen." Does Cole wish to join them? Cole responds by hurling a couple of FBODs into their chests. The FBODs sputter and vanish, leaving nary a smudge on The Avatar's clothing. "You can't fight us, Cole," claims the scrawn. "Sooner or later, you will join us. It is [beat] inevitable." The Avatars smear out as Phoebe emerges from the elevator. She immediately confronts Cole about the two dead thugs. Cole heaves an irritated sigh and confirms he did indeed kill "those two criminals." Phoebe pinches her nose in pain. "They weren't only two criminals, Cole," she asserts ungrammatically. "They were two human beings." "Spare me the judgmental crap," he snaps. Yes! Thank you! Cole is my hero. And I'll give you a bit of additional ammunition, buddy: Phoebe had no problems whatsoever when The Late Lamented offed a very human serial killer, so where the hell is this shit coming from? Christ on a stick. I've spent far too much time screaming about this already, so I'll cut to the end. Phoebe vows that should Cole kill anyone else, she'll vanquish him. "You really think you have the power to vanquish me?" Cole asks. "Try me," Phoebe snots, reentering the elevator. The camera zooms in on Cole's face as he breathes, "I might just do that."
Alleyway Of The A-Plot. The Dolt glances through piles of refuse for Raige's new charge while Raige bitches about the damage being done to her Jimmy Choos. Raige has decided to use her former job at THE BLACK HOLE as a cover story, and intends to introduce herself to Sam as his social worker. A social worker who can afford Jimmy Choos. That'll fly. Not. The Dolt blurts that Raige needn't have bothered hammering together a cover, then stammers something about each charge being different and blah blah gah he's hiding something from her. We all saw the promos, kids, so could you move it along, please? Just then, a bouncer tosses a drunk out of the local watering hole. The drunk lands hard on the asphalt at Raige's feet. "Good luck!" perks the Dolt before hastily orbing away, for the drunk is indeed Raige's father. Ooops! I mean, "charge." Sam barfs on Raige's shoes, promo-style. Raige rages. Scene.
Flophouse Of The A-Plot. Raige lugs Sam into his room and tosses him onto his bed. Unlike another Halliwell father I could mention, Sam Sam The Whitelighting Man is being played by the same actor who appeared the first time around. For those of you who missed that particular episode and expect a fuller description of the guy, all I can tell you is that he's in his late forties and looks generally Scandinavian. And drunk. Raige makes with the perky chatter, insisting that his current accommodations have a certain "shabby chic" to them, but Sam's not having it and tells her to get lost. Raige's face falls a bit in frustration and disappointment. She nervously scribbles her phone number onto a sheet of paper and hands it to him, urging him to call at any time for any reason. She wants him to understand that she's there to help him. I want to understand how a fallen Whitelighting wino like Sam here can afford those bottles of Johnnie Walker and Bombay Sapphire I spy on the kitchenette counter. Sam snatches the slip of paper from her hand and sneers, "I can't believe The Elders finally tracked me down with a novice." Raige gapes. "You know?" she gasps. Sam rather unkindly suggests that Raige reread the Whitelighter's handbook for cloaking tips before she accepts another assignment, then snarls at her to leave. Raige flatly refuses to go, vowing to remain in the flophouse and protect her charge if she has to break every damn bone in Sam's body to do so. Just as I lapse into my regularly scheduled Sunday night coma, a Latino Darklighter with Samoan tattoos on his face materializes with a crossbow and takes aim at Sam. In honor of Robert Beltran, I'll be calling the Latino Darklighter "Raoul." Raige tackles Raoul to the floor while screaming, "Duck!"
Smash-cut to a vertically-challenged actress intoning, "Sorry. I don't cook." Huh? Was that supposed to be a joke? "Duck!" "I don't cook." The hell? Jesus. Anyway, the vertically-challenged actress is, of course, portraying one of Piper's supernatural nannies. She's identified in the closing credits as an elf, but those freakish lime-green contacts in her eyes make her look like an iguana. So, Piper and the Dolt lounge in the wicker loveseat on the sun porch, giving the iguana woman the third degree. Iguana Woman rather snippily asks if she's "expected to protect the baby from the incessant demon attacks." Just as Piper claims that demons rarely attack in the Manor, Raige orbs into the parlor with Sam as Raoul materializes over by the dining room. Iguana Woman glares. Oh, Iguana Woman, please don't glare. Your freakish green eyes frighten me so. Raoul lets fly with a poisoned arrow that digs deep into Sam's shoulder. Piper leaps to her feet and flings out her Hands Of Discontent. Raoul's left arm explodes into a cloud of black goo. The bloody stump drips gore and smokes as Raoul howls and wails and shimmies on out of there. Meanwhile, Phoebe has jiggled into the dining room from the kitchen to yodel. Freaky Tiny Iguana Woman spins on her heel and snits, "Consider my application withdrawn." She hoists her enormous purse onto her shoulder and flares out in a huffy haze of green. Piper cries, "Dammit!" and crosses to Phoebe as the Dolt warns Raige not to touch the arrow. Why Raige was reaching for it in the first place is beyond me. She's only known about the damn things for the last nine months. Piper and Phoebe get a good look at Sam's face and realize who he is. They do not, however, blurt, "I thought he was dead!" The Sam-kebab grimaces and wheezes and hacks part of his lung into the commercial break.
Back on the sun porch, Phoebe delicately snaps the feathered end off the Sam-kebab skewer and yanks the rest of it out of his back. Piper, Raige, and the Dolt, all with "Whitelighter blood" coursing through their veins, cower in the distance, sniping at each other. Raige can't believe The Ever-Useless Elders would assign her a fallen Whitelighter without first giving her the relevant facts. Piper snides that The Elders left out other pertinent information as well. Phoebe interrupts the argument so that the Dolt can apply the tingly touch to Sam's gaping wound. Once he's done so, Piper sends Raige to the attic on some hastily-manufactured Book of Shadows mission so that she and Phoebe can rip Sam and the Dolt a couple of new ones in private. Sam glances guiltily at Piper and Phoebe and greets them by name. Phoebe wonders what he's doing back on earth. Sam whines that after he hooked up with Teeth! in the afterlife, The Elders stepped in and made him a Whitelighter again. Bullshit! The Elders offered you the position again, and you accepted it, right? Right. Needless to say, Sam screwed up once more, and although details of his latest failure are thin on the ground, he blames it on having to surrender his daughter to a nun the day she was born. I hate when that happens. Piper and Phoebe clue him in on Raige's identity as Cole silently smears into the parlor to eavesdrop. Sam gets mouthy as Piper snarks at the Dolt, "You knew about this supernatural Jenny Jones reunion, didn't you?" The Dolt dorks that he was sworn to secrecy. Sam sneers that none of it matters because he's leaving and everyone should just leave him the hell alone and why did The Elders get Raige involved in the first place? Cole listens intently. The Dolt exclaims that Sam left the idiots in charge with no choice -- once he stopped using his powers, he "dropped off the radar" and could only be found again by a blood relative. My, but that's contrived. Good thing Raige has complementary abandonment issues to resolve by the end of the hour; otherwise I'd be wondering why The Elders didn't just send one of Sam's New York relatives after him. Phoebe insists that Sam remain in the Manor for Raige's sake. Sam looms over her and mopes something about having his daughter find out her father's "a two-time loser and a drunk." Cole, having heard enough, quietly smears away. Sam apologizes, but repeats his desire to be left alone. He orbs out just as Raige hits the stairwell landing with the Book of Shadows. Piper and the Dolt awkwardly babble something about Sam's disappearance and how Raoul is actually one of the higher-level Darklighters known as Trackers before suggesting that Phoebe and Raige work on a Tracker vanquish while they look for Sam. Phoebe nods vigorously. Raige wonders who made her birth family smoke crack.
Elsewhere, Raoul howls in agony as Cole smears into the background. Cole has no sympathy for the grievously injured Raoul, and taunts him for being such a sissy pantywaist pussy-boy. Heh. Cole has a proposal he'd like Raoul to consider. If Raoul returns to the Manor to help Cole off the Charmed Ones, Cole will ensure that Raoul kills Sam. To prove he's a demon of some ability, Cole passes a hand over Raoul's stump, and a replacement arm immediately sprouts forth from the gory wound. It should interest regular viewers to note that Darklighters apparently have Terminator-like titanium skeletons. Casual viewers couldn't care less, I'm sure. Raoul, impressed, agrees to join forces with Cole. Cole Vannas a hand over Raoul's body to amp up his existing powers. Raoul wonders what's in it for Cole. "Let's just say," Cole replies mildly, "I'm looking for a showdown."
Flophouse Of The A-Plot. Sam orbs into his room to find Piper and the Dolt waiting for him. Snarling. Wailing. Threats. Piper and the Dolt attempt to convince Sam to reconnect with his long-lost daughter. Sam resists, still hung up on that whole "passing the kid to a nun" thing. We also get a bit of revisionist history. According to Patty in the fourth season premiere, she and Sam gave Raige up for adoption because they were worried The Elders would deny the Famous Original Glamorous Ladies their birthright, should They learn of Patty's liaison with her Whitelighter. According to Sam now, he and Patty gave Raige up because he didn't want her to become a magical entity and get killed by some random demon. Whatever. The scene ends with Sam agonizing over his decision.
Manor kitchen. Phoebe and Raige stand at the center island, mixing potion ingredients while Phoebe dodges Raige's questions regarding Sam's provenance. Raige persists. Phoebe folds. Raige takes the news rather well, as one would expect had they been watching the show for more than a week. God knows why her sisters thought it necessary to remain silent on the whole drunk dad issue. Raige pretty much berates Phoebe along these lines as Sam slinks sheepishly into the kitchen behind her. He asks if he can speak with her alone. Phoebe urges them to take as much time as they need -- she can handle the potion on her own. Raige quietly sidles past her home-wrecking drunk of a dad into the dining room. Sam silently eyes Phoebe for a moment, then turns to follow Raige.
Sun porch. Sam pulls some "I'm a loser and I screwed up your life! Pity me!" crap that Raige isn't having. She had a father, you see, one who made her proud to be his daughter, and no offense, Sammy Boy, but Raige doesn't know you, didn't waste too much time thinking about you when she was growing up, and quite frankly couldn't give a rat's ass one way or the other about your supposed failings in life. Sam argues that Raige should hate him. "After all, I'm the one who gave you up at birth," he notes. "That has to have caused you some pain." Raige wrinkles her nose and squints like Sam's suddenly pulled a Mel Gibson and started speaking Aramaic. Oooh. Raige is getting sassy.
Over in the kitchen, the Dolt orbs in with Piper. Phoebe congratulates them on convincing Sam to return to the Manor. Piper and the Dolt haven't the slightest clue what she's talking about, for their visit to The Flophouse Of The A-Plot was an abject failure. Uh oh!
Sun porch. Sam babbles some more bullshit about how screwed up Raige must be because he left her with a nun the day she was born. Raige tells him to blow it out his ass just as Piper, Phoebe, and the Dolt race in from the kitchen with the news that this Sam is an impostor. "What are you talking about?" Raige snips. "[They're] talking about this," Sam says as he morphs into Cole. Cole is so much more attractive than Sam, anyway. Plus, he's got that bomber jacket. "You son of a bitch!" Raige seethes. Cole just giggles and snorts, "Wait, wait. It gets better!" He calls for Raoul -- whose actual name seems to be Ronan, by the way. Piper immediately tosses her Hands Of Discontent in the Darklighter's direction, but Raoul simply absorbs the blast with barely a twitch. "He's immune!" Cole giddily perks. I do so love it when Cole enjoys his job. Phoebe sneers that Raoul's not immune to her mad potion skills, and hurls a vanquishing vial at his chest. It explodes harmlessly against his jacket. Raoul takes aim with his crossbow, and the arrowhead glimmers with a light from within. When Raoul pulls the trigger, the arrow flies across the sun porch, splitting into three separate missiles as it goes. One hits Raige in the stomach, the second wings the Dolt's arm, and the third plunges into Piper's belly, where the percolating infant chews it up and spits out toothpicks and penny nails. Either that, or the percolating infant hastily erected a protective shield and the arrow bounced off. Things were moving pretty quickly there. Raige drops, wincing slightly in pain. The Dolt drops, making with the constipated chimpanzee faces. Cole and Raoul smear and shimmy themselves into the commercial break.
Sun porch. Aftermath. The Dolt is blissfully unconscious. Blissfully for the audience's sake, I mean. Phoebe's convinced that Cole's lost his mind. Piper doesn't think it's that simple. The most recent attack was just stupid, and after two and a half years worth of dealings with the demon, the one thing they know he's not is dumb. Raige, meanwhile, is stretched out on a sofa, weakly insisting that she convey a few more details about the Cole vanquish before she, too, passes out. She declines towards death rather well, you know? All glowing, like she's Camille or Mimi from La Boheme with the consumption and such. Hey, anything's better than Krause with the overblown wheezing and the whining and the sweaty gargoyle faces. Phoebe gently urges Raige to remain quiet and conserve her strength until she and Piper can figure out a way to heal her. Piper announces that Sam's their only hope. Yeah. Sam, or any of the other hundred thousand goddamned Whitelighters floating around. You'd think The Elders would have assigned a back-up Dolt to entities as vital as the Charmed Ones. That is, if The Elders shared a whole brain between themselves. Raige doubts that Sam will be able to rise to the occasion. Piper assures her that now that his daughter's in danger, Sam will do whatever it takes. Raige simply has to sense Sam's presence. Piper will then drag him back to the Manor while Phoebe finishes her vanquishing potions. Phoebe frets that Piper shouldn't risk leaving the Manor on her own. Piper assures her she'll have plenty of assistance. "Apparently," she notes, patting her stomach, "the baby here prefers Mommy to be indestructible." Raige closes her eyes to scan for Sam.
Alleyway Of The A-Plot. Sam sprawls upon some convenient shipping pallets, a bottle of Smirnoff vodka clutched in his hand. Mmmm. Generic vodka. Oh, what am I saying? I drank so much of that crap mixed into college-sized screwdrivers back in the day that it put me off vodka for life. Feh. Raoul shimmies into the alleyway and stalks over to the sleeping dipso. Just as he raises his crossbow to aim, Cole interrupts the proceedings with, "I wouldn't do that if I were you." Raoul gets shirty, demanding that Cole keep his part of the deal they'd brokered and allow Raoul to kill Sam. Cole's all, "Shyeah. You know what? This isn't about you. It's all about me." Are you familiar with the term "suicide by cop"? Good. Cole, you see, set up the whole Manor invasion so he could perform suicide by Glamorous Ladies. He needs Sam alive so that Sam can heal Raige and the Dolt, so that the Glamorous Ladies can draw upon the Power of Three to vanquish him. Raoul makes confused whimpering noises. Or nasty threatening ones. Your choice. Cole dusts him with a Flaming Ball Of Death. Ah. An Evil And Loving It Cole is the best Cole there is.
Cole hears Piper galumphing through the alleyway and ducks behind a convenient stack of crates. Piper barrels over to Drunk Daddy and orders him back to the Manor. Drunk Daddy whines. Shut up, Drunk Daddy.
Manor. Sam and Piper orb onto the sun porch just as Raige is about to slip into convulsions. Sam kneels at her side and tries to apply the tingly touch. It's not working. Drunk Daddy whines some more. Piper's not having it, and gets off several good lines, including, "You will not sit there and drown in self-pity while [Raige] and my husband die!" and "[Raige] saved us. She is the reason I'm still standing here. She brought this family back together!" Unfortunately, Raige seems to have slipped into a coma, and so cannot hear these long overdue words of praise. Phoebe contributes some psychobabble about letting go of pain. Shut up, Phoebe. Raige wakes up long enough to trail a hand along Drunk Daddy's coat. A glowy cloud of orbs rises from her body to swarm around his head. This, apparently, "heals" him. I'd vomit, but I'm too bored by this plotline to make the necessary effort. Sam reapplies the tingly touch, and this time it takes. My, but that Sam's got a lovely manicure for a drunken bum living in a flophouse when he's not sleeping in the gutter. By the way, that cloud of orbs that emerged from Raige's chest is better than a series of Botox treatments. Sam looks ten years younger. Once Raige is healed, Sam applies the tingly touch to the Dolt. "I'm gonna get started on those potions," announces the Feebs. "We have a Cole to vanquish." Piper checks her watch to see how much longer she has to put up with this tedious episode as the onrushing commercials overwhelm her.
Attic. The three gals gather around a table as Raige explains her three vanquishing potions. Each is at least as strong as the one they used on The Source, she claims, and if applied in tandem, they should be enough to vanquish Cole. Nice. Except for the fact that you didn't use any vanquishing potions on The Source, you boneheads. Raige decides they should test her theory by applying a small amount of each liquid to the bloody letter opener. She places it on a tray on the floor in the center of the room, and the three stand over it with tiny vials. Raige flings her vial to the floor first. The blood still staining the metal begins to bubble and foam. Piper's , and her vial creates a small explosion and a cloud of smoke. Phoebe's final vial bursts into flame on contact, sending a small ripple of concussive air through the room. It also manages to vanquish the opener, the tray, and a large square of fabric from the large circular rug. Somewhere, Grams grinds her teeth. The ladies strengthen their resolve and prepare to confront Cole.
Casa Del Suicidal Binge Drinker. Cole scribbles out a note at his desk, in front of that cheesy photo of Phoebe staring up at him from beneath her just-got-a-tumor-removed knit cloche. We get glimpses of the text, but all that's legible are the phrases "life without you," "my choice," "my heart," and "love always." The note's illegibility might be blamed on Cole's shitty handwriting. He was born in 1885, right? That means he grew up with the damn Palmer Method and the MacGuffy's Readers and whatnot. He shouldn't have this cramped, crabbed style of writing. Whatever. All the ludicrous developments to bitch about in this episode, and I pick on the man's handwriting. And speaking of ludicrous developments, here come The Avatars! They smear in to offer Cole one more chance to join them. He wearily waves them off. They leave just as Raige orbs in with Phoebe and Piper. Cole calmly props his note against that cheesy picture, deliberately slips his wedding ring from his finger and places it to the frame, and then stands as Piper has ordered him to and turns to face them. Cole rather half-heartedly sneers at them. Raige hurls her potion between his feet, where it shatters on the terrazzo. Piper's , and a small cloud of smoke erupts. Hey. Cole's got some damn fine shoes, too. What? I might as well covet the shoes for a while, because Phoebe puts a halt to the proceedings to psychoanalyze her ex. She's realized what he intended to do all along, you see, and she's none too pleased to have been so masterfully manipulated by him once again. Phoebe wants to kill him, sure, "but on [her] terms, not [his]." "You already have," he smirks, and makes a grasping motion in the air. The final vial of vanquish flies telekinetically from Phoebe's hand to shatter amid the others at his feet. A massive fireball erupts, shooting outwards across the floor and upwards to devour Cole's body, as Cole lets loose with a mighty wail. Phoebe, Piper, and Raige shield their faces with their hands as they drop to flatten themselves against the floor. The French windows explode outwards. Jets of flame shoot towards the walls just above the ladies' heads. Phoebe slowly rises to her feet as the air clears and mutters, "Oh, my God." From the depths of the dissipating smoke, Cole grunts and gasps, completely intact and looking none the worse for wear. Even his clothes remain unsinged, which is a good thing, because if anything happened to that bomber jacket, I'd have had to kick some Charmed ass. "They knew it wouldn't work!" Cole wails. "You can't vanquish me. Nobody can." Cole staggers towards the balcony as the Glamorous Ladies exchange Looks Of Concern.
Cut to a lovely new shot of the sun blazing a path into an orange sky behind the Golden Gate Bridge. Over on Prescott Street, Raige and Sam process through the episode's events. Sam's shaved, and he appears to have darkened his eyebrows. Sam apologizes once more for "abandoning" Raige. Raige gently assures him that he has no reason to apologize, nor should he regret his decision to hand her over to the nuns twenty-five years ago. "I used to think that you did not matter to me at all," she explains. "That if I never met you, my life would be perfectly fine." Raige smiles wistfully. "I guess The Elders knew better after all. When you gave me up, you made a choice that gave me the most amazing gift -- see, I got to have these tremendous parents, and we loved each other --" She pauses, searching for the right word. "Fiercely. And now I have this new life with my sisters. I choose to be a witch." She checks to make sure Sam understands this. "I could have walked away," she emphasizes. "I didn't." She grins. "And now I'm a Whitelighter to boot!" Now that's how you resolve an Issue Of The Week, people. Nice scene.
We wander over to the kitchen and more pedestrian resolutions. The Dolt orbs in to inform Piper that the freaky little iguana woman warned everyone in her midget union about the Manor. They've all canceled their interviews. Piper gnashes her teeth in despair, but the Dolt assures her that they'll find someone before Piper drops the brat. Raige enters and announces that she's inviting Slampiece O-Town on a trip down the coast to relax after all the emotional upheaval that's been smacking her in the teeth over the last couple of days. She and Piper chat about hanging on to slampieces for more than one week for a bit before Phoebe The Drama Queen melodramatically raises her arms above her head at the table and collapses face-first into the Book of Shadows. Cram it, bitch. Raige politely inquires as to the nature of Phoebe's dilemma. "Having an invincible ex-husband is really making me nervous," Phoebe complains. Why? He's on your side, you moron. It's just like the coup scored by the United States when Superman's teeny little spaceship landed in Kansas instead of upon the foul Communistic plains of the Soviet Union. Nurture a friendship with the invincible ex-husband and get him to do your dirty work. How is this a problem? Compromise is not a four-letter word. Oh, Christ. Did I just type that? I sound like Bo Duke. Anyway, Raige kindly notes, "Good thing we have someone invincible of our own," as she rubs Piper's belly. Piper agrees, and promises to protect Phoebe for as long as she can.
Over at the Casa, Cole cracks open a couple of Rolling Rocks and picks his way through the wreckage on the balcony. He passes one of the bottles to Foreshadowing, and the boys gaze out at the skyline as we fade to black. You'd think Raige could have rattled off that annoying "Object Of Objection" spell to fix his apartment before she left. And here I thought she was so considerate.
week, Judy Garland pops so many amphetamines that she hallucinates a Technicolor kingdom teeming with frumpy midgets, belligerent apple trees, and all the opium you can eat. Happy Thanksgiving.