Previously: Phoebe’s ex-boyfriend was a thief but he would never hurt her, so that made her happy.
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The Wendigo
Lorraine: I love when we unintentionally develop crossover magic here in Traumaland. Here, we have another wendigo episode! If we really want to this a thing, Wikipedia tells these shows have wendigo appearances: X-Files, Blood Ties, Fear Itself, Haven, Grimm, Hannibal, Teen Wolf or My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. You never know.
Piper got a flat tire on the way to meet Prue and Phoebe for dinner. Phoebs is trying to talk her through changing a tire via phone call, but things go south quickly when Piper tries to use a wooden spoon to jack up the car. Phoebe offers to go and get her, seeing as how she’s stranded and only has a broken wooden spoon to protect herself. Somewhere, Buffy is all, “girl, that’s enough!” Especially in the later seasons when minimal effort was required to pierce through the chest. Piper reminds her sister that she also has that whole freezing time power, which she calls better than mace and hangs up.
Phoebe is trying to convince Prue to hire her at Buckland’s. Prue mildly protests but agrees after Phoebe says she’s definitely up for the job and definitely nothing will go wrong.
Piper’s phone dies before she can call the auto-club. She spots a payphone nearby and psyches herself up to cross the bit of park that separate her and the phone booth. It’s not a long walk, but if you’ll recall, Piper seems to be the only sister who’s seen TV before and knows how these things go. Sure enough, she starts walking and from the trees comes nefarious twig snapping. WENDIGO. Piper runs to the booth and closes herself inside. The Wendigo attacks. It looks super related to Oz’s werewolf. Wendigo knocks the entire booth over and Piper screams as it tries to get at her. It scratches her forearm, but a man comes running from the trees and scares it off with a flare gun. He tells Piper that everything is going to be alright. Piper’s face says, “BUT I’M BLEEDING.”
I AM THE SAHN.
Our establishing shots over moody music is all set at NIGHT TIME this time. I mean, you can still have your guaranteed shot, but maybe switch up the kind of alcohol or something. Get crazy. Prue and Phoebe rush into the hospital and find Andy is there too. They are directed to her room and poor Piper looks worse for the wear. Her cuts aren’t deep enough for stitches, but there’s some blood and she’s worried about passing out. The nurse is all, “you’ll be fine,” and sends her on her way.
Outside of the room, Phoebe asks why Piper didn’t just freeze the thing. She explains that she was trapped in a phone booth and her power doesn’t work outside the room she’s in. SAY WHAT? THAT COUNTS FOR A PHONE BOOTH? That’s really weird.
Piper introduces everyone to Billy who saved her life. Andy’s all, “mmmhmmm,” and wants to talk to Billy about just happening to show up with a flare gun. Billy starts to light a cigarette and Prue blows out his lighter before he can, because you know, hospital. Billy says it wasn’t a coincidence that he was there. He heard about a murder by some creature the night before. Piper confirms it was definitely a creature. A woman who reminds me of Emmanuelle Vaugier comes from behind them and asks Piper to describe the creature. Andy introduces her as Special Agent Fallon, FBI. Piper describes it as kind of like a cross between a werewolf and Charles Manson. “Yellow eyes?” Fauxgier asks. “Talon-like hands?” Yes on both counts. Fauxgier asks to speak to Andy.
In hushed tones, Fauxgier says that Piper is the only one to survive this kind of attack. It’s happened before in other cities, meaning the case is out of Andy’s jurisdiction and we’re stuck with Fauxgier for an episode which doesn’t make me suspicious of her at all.
Billy tells the 3Ps that he discovered the creature is afraid of fire after it attacked him and his fiance. The creature still managed to kill his fiance, so safe to assume he didn’t discover that little tip soon enough. He’s here in San Fran to kill the creature.
Daytime. Halliwell Manor. Piper is looking through the Book of Shadows. She doesn’t think coming across the creature was an accident. Prue and Phoebe are getting ready for work and make Piper promise not to go after the creature alone. Prue doesn’t think she should go after it at all, but Piper wants to help Billy out. After her sisters leave, Piper finds a picture of the thing that attacked her: the wendigo.
Prue and Phoebe are going through some items slated for auction. Things seem to be going well until Phoebe picks up a bracelet and has a vision of the past (flashback?): a car going off a cliff, the bracelet being neatly thrown from it as it crashes. Phoebe tells Prue about it, thinking this means she’s meant to find the owner of the bracelet. Prue thinks not.
At Qua ke, Piper is info-dumping for Billy about the wendigo. It can pass for human and survives on human hearts. The first one was a spurned lover who cut out the heart of his ex. Billy asks if that means the wendigo is seeking out love to destroy or if it must be attracted to… eyebrow waggle… beauty. Piper chokes out a HA! and Billy apologizes. It’s just that Piper reminds him of his fiance. You know, the one that was wendigo-mauled.
Piper’s is all, “anyway,” and says that the wendigo attacks during the full moon, so it’ll be out again that night. Billy praises her Wikipedia knowledge of a wendigo (calling it PhD level) and Piper suggests calling Andy to fill him in. Billy quickly suggests calling Fauxgier instead. She’s already a believer and very helpful (suspect). Piper stands and gets a little dizzy. After she’s steady she makes Billy promise to call once he’s talked to Fauxgier.
Andy calls Piper at the restaurant to check in on her. She tells him she’s fine, but tired, and that Billy is on his way to the federal building to talk to Fauxgier. Andy passes the message as soon as he hangs up with Piper. Fauxgier points out that Andy is pretty friendly with the witness and he explains that he dated her sister. Fauxgier probes a bit, saying she wants to make sure he isn’t lovesick, since she thinks that’s who the wendigo is going after. Andy offers his explanation: all of the victims had AB negative blood (Piper does too. She told us so in a bit of clunky dialogue I didn’t recap earlier) and the thing attacks during the full night. Fauxgier takes this opportunity to suggest a stakeout with even more eyebrow waggling. Andy says he’ll bring his “flare gun.” Uh-huh. Sure you will, Andy.
Billy finds Fauxgier and he tries to tell her about the wendigo, and she’s all, “how about you tell me about it in dark and scary corners? For privacy, you know?” Billy follows her to a parking garage. As he’s talking, he takes out his lighter and Fauxgier flinches. NO ONE IS SURPRISED BY THIS REVELATION. Fauxgier snaps Billy’s neck.
Buckland. Phoebe pede-exposits (for exposition on the go!) that she found out who the car in her vision-back belonged to: a PI named Franklin Bates. The bracelet belonged to Teri Lane, a five year old girl kidnapped by her father. It was the case Franklin was working on when he died. Phoebe figures the bracelet means Franklin found the girl, but never got to tell the mother because he died. Phoebe wants Prue not to sell the bracelet until they can investigate more. Claire enters just at that moment and sees the bracelet. She grabs it back, saying she already has two interested buyers, and leaves. Phoebe insists they can’t let Claire sell that bracelet.
Qua ke. A code inspector visits and Piper is all sweaty and gross while speaking to him. She directs him into the kitchen and promptly sticks her fevered head into a giant freezer.
The inspector tells her to go the hell home.
Andy arrives at the scene of Billy’s death and Fauxgier is already there. They talk about the circumstances surrounding Billy’s murder and Fauxgier says some pointed things like, “MAYBE THE CREATURE WANTED TO KILL HIS FACE OFF FOR ALMOST DISCOVERING IT.” Andy wants to go see Piper, in case Billy told her any useful information.
Buckland. Phoebe finds Prue and, right in the middle of an auction, tells her that she found Teri Lane. As it happens, the bracelet is next up to be sold. Prue asks what the heck she’s supposed to do and Phoebe squints at her. Prue’s all, “oh alright. I’ll squint.” And she squints at anyone who tries to bid on the bracelet, telekinesising their bidder paddles out of their hands. The bid caller assumes no one is interested and moves on.
Manor. Andy visits Piper to see how she’s feeling and notices that her arm is all healed. He asks how that happened and Piper turns into a wendigo and growls at him. But! It was a dream. Piper wakes up to find her arm is still wendigo-mauled. The doorbell does ring and it is Andy. He breaks the news that Billy is dead. Piper wonders WHO COULD’VE DONE IT and Fauxgier comes from around the corner, doing everything except saying, “ME ME ME.”
After the officers are gone, Piper takes off her bandage and discovers a very hairy arm. This reminds me of that CLASSIC Goosebumps book, My Hairiest Adventure. The main character there knows all about becoming suddenly hairy. He dealt with it by shaving his hands.
Phoebe finds Mama Lane and asks if she recognizes the bracelet. It’s clear that she does, even though she tries to close the door in Phoebe’s face. Phoebe insists, saying she knows Mama recognizes it, though it must be difficult for her to admit. Prue leads Teri in and mother and daughter have an emotional reunion. Phoebe and Prue watch this private moment and congratulate each other on a B-plot well done. The A-plot calls, though, all, “I’m unresolved with 14 minutes of episode left.”
Fauxgier and Andy check out the spot where Piper was attacked. She keeps doing really suspicious things Andy doesn’t pick up on, like tell him to turn off his cell phone and give a Classic Spurned Woman Speech. Instead of being all, “hey girl. Why are you breathing so heavily and flaring your nostrils while talking about never letting anyone hurt you again?” Andy’s all, “I feel you.” Don’t die, Andy.
Manor. Prue and Phoebe find Piper in bad shape, with one hairy arm and being really mean to them.
In the attic, it’s actually Prue (after failing to reach Andy) who finds the reference they need. To stop the sudden-onsent-wendigo, they have to “melt the heart of ice” of the current wendigo. So, basically, get her from the Heartless Cow Ottoman over to the Feels Couch.
The try to assure Piper that all will be fine, but they are going to have to tie her down while they go deal with Fauxgier. Phoebe has something they can use.
Alyssa Milano’s face acting is cute there. They handcuff Piper to some pipes, without even a cushion for her to kneel on.
In the park, Andy muses about how he’s probably the worst cop to be on a stakeout with, since he’s AB Negative. Fauxgier flirtatiously says that she’ll protect him.
Manor. Piper gives a scream before she changes into a full blown wendigo. Not even some hand shaving can save her now.
In the park, Fauxgier gets flirty some more and Andy asks her if they can just keep it professional. Fauxgier is all, “NO,” but communicates that more by turning into her wendigo self. Andy shoots at her, but gets slapped for his trouble.
Wendigo!Fauxgier starts cutting Andy’s chest but gets spooked when she hears one of the Ps call out to Andy. Prue and Phoebe are walking along, arm in arm, looking way too calm for what the situation calls for. Wendigo!Fauxgier comes for them and Prue shoots a flare gun at a nearby tree. It catches fire and Wendigo!Fauxgier runs from it. She keeps circling around the sisters who quickly spot Andy’s body. They have one flare left and Phoebe says she’s going to take the last shot. Except two wendigos come running at them. They deduce that one of them is Piper but they don’t know which one. Prue gives the hilarious advice that Phoebe should just shoot one and pray she’s right! 50/50 chance! Phoebe shoots and right before the flare reaches the wendigo, it throws up its hands and freezes it. Everyone just kind of stares at each other for a bit before Prue telekinesises the fire over to Wendigo!Fauxgier. She burns and disappears in a cloud of dust.
I seriously thought the Book of Shadows meant a figurative melting of the heart, not like, actually setting that bitch on fire. Which makes me wonder why Prue kept lighting all those trees on fire instead of aiming at the wendigo in the first place. Smokey the Bear does not approve.
Piper turns back to her normal self and Andy’s wounds disappear. When Andy wakes up, he’s super confused but Prue tells him to take it easy. She’ll explain everything later. She’ll probably lie.
Episode wrap-up at Qua ke: The girls are happy things worked out relatively well, except Piper points out that whole Billy-is-dead-thing. That’s a bummer. They ask Prue what she told Andy and she says she told him the truth. WHAT? I’M ALL WRONG THIS EPISODE. He seemed to believe her. Prue says it’s time to get to work, but Phoebe quits on her because she doesn’t want to keep touching old stuff and having premonitions. Besides, “that” (I guess the museum, but possibly just being employed) is Prue’s world and Phoebe needs to find one of her own.
I don’t know what those hand gestures mean at the end. Maybe, “WE WERE SO CLOSE TO KILLING HER!” You were, girls. You were.
Next time on Charmed: It’s Friday the 13th and the Ps are after a demon who deals with deepest fears in S01 E13 – From Fear to Eternity.
I'm a 30-something south Floridan who loves the beach but cannot swim. Such is my life, full of small contradictions and little trivialities. My main life goals are never to take life too seriously, but to do everything I attempt seriously well. After that, my life goals devolve into things like not wearing pants and eating all of the Zebra Cakes in the world. THE WORLD.
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