Chris and Gerard Argent bring the corpse of the werewolf
hunter who was slaughtered by the lizard creature last episode to Dr. Deaton,
seeking his advice as to what might have killed him. Deaton points out that the
creature first incapacitated the man with a paralytic toxin via a cut on the
back of his neck, then mauled him to death with its claws.
Stiles brings his jeep to a body shop for repairs. The
muscular young repairman, who turns out to be a recently-graduated former
Beacon Hills High lacrosse player, keeps bumping up the cost of his estimate as
Stiles grows increasingly apoplectic. Stiles flounces off to the office to
wait, muttering, “I’ll be back here, seething with impotent rage.”
There’s some kind of sticky goop on the doorknob. When
Stiles touches it, it paralyzes him. While he lies on the floor, helpless and
immobilized, the lizard creature approaches the repairman, paralyzes him by
flicking a claw over the back of his neck, and kills him by dropping the jeep on
him. The creature sees Stiles, appears to recognize him, and leaves him alone.
Lydia’s been behaving strangely (smashing mirrors with her
hands, hallucinating images of Peter Hale) since she was found naked in the
woods, so her mom forces her to talk to the school guidance counselor, Ms.
Morell, who is played by Bianca Lawson, best known as the doomed vampire slayer
Kendra on Buffy. (Might be worth noting here that Lydia’s mom is played
by former Young and the Restless star Susan Walters, who is married to
Linden Ashby—Sheriff Stilinski—in real life.) While waiting outside Ms.
Morell’s office, Lydia has a meet-cute with an attractive and mysterious loner.
Given Teen Wolf’s 1980s teen-movie roots, I’m going
to go ahead and assume this is a direct homage to the Jennifer Grey-Charlie
Sheen police station scene in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off.
Deaton tells Scott that Gerard Argent is in possession of an
encyclopedia of supernatural creatures. If Scott can steal the book, he might
be able to identify the mysterious lizard creature. Scott, Stiles and Allison
scheme to get their hands on Gerard’s book, which, Stiles points out, is also
known as a bestiary. In a well-timed and perfectly marvelous running gag, Scott
and Allison, the adorable nitwits, keep confusing “bestiary” with “bestiality.”
Now that’s the kind of self-aware, goofy Teen Wolf humor that was
missing from last episode. Thank you for raising your game this week, writing
staff.
Locker room: Jackson gives the video he took of himself to
Danny and asks him to examine it for possible irregularities. When Danny asks
what’s on it, Jackson shrugs and says, “It’s just me, in my room… in bed.”
Danny cautiously reminds his best friend that he’s told him many times before
that Jackson simply isn’t his type. In response, Jackson coldly hisses, “I’m everyone’s
type.”
Oh, Jackson. I could not love you more, you cold, vicious,
unhinged, soulless beauty.
Danny gives the tape to Matt, who notices that two hours of
footage are missing from the middle of it, which suggests: a) something
happened to Jackson on the night of the full moon, and b) someone’s taking
pains to prevent him from figuring out what that might be.
Allison brings Gerard to the lacrosse game under the guise
of having a little grandfather/granddaughter bonding time, then pickpockets his
keys and gives them to Stiles. While the game is underway, Stiles heads off to
ransack Gerard’s office in search of the bestiary. En route, he finds Lydia
sobbing brokenly in her car. She wants to discuss something that’s been
troubling her; torn, Stiles promises to return as soon as he can.
He doesn’t find the bestiary in Gerard’s office. He doesn’t
return to poor Lydia, either. Instead,
he runs into Erica, who drags him off to the swimming pool, where Derek
interrogates him about his encounter with the lizard creature. Just as Stiles
spills the beans, the creature attacks, knocking Erica out cold and paralyzing
Derek with its claws. Derek tumbles into the pool; Stiles jumps in after him in
to prevent him from drowning. This turns out to be fortunate, because the
lizard creature is terrified of the water. Stiles clutches onto a
still-incapacitated Derek and keeps him afloat for a couple of hours while the
creature prowls around the perimeter of the pool, hissing at them.
After the game—there was werewolf mayhem on the field,
multiple players were injured, Jackson was a dick, Scott scored the winning
goal, the usual—Gerard cheerfully invites Scott back to the Argent house for a
celebratory meal. Another entertainingly hostile and unpleasant Argent family
dinner scene ensues. Gerard is genial and chatty, Victoria is cold and prickly,
and Chris tries to strangle Scott right before the dessert course.
Allison and Scott slip away from the table and
unsuccessfully search Gerard’s room for the bestiary. Suspecting Gerard keeps
an electronic version on the flash drive on his keychain, Scott heads to the
school to get the keys from Stiles. He arrives in time to save Derek and Stiles
from the lizard creature. The creature attacks Scott and clearly has the upper
hand… until it catches a glimpse of its reflection in a broken mirror.
Confused, it leaps up to the ceiling and smashes its way out of the building
through the skylight.
Derek explains that there’s no need for the bestiary—he’s
figured out what the lizard creature is. It’s a shape-shifter called a kanima,
and it’s similar to a werewolf, only something about it is horribly… wrong.
Scott hurries to the hospital to pick his mom up from work.
Just outside the front door, Gerard Argent approaches him, places a friendly
hand on his shoulder, and slips a knife into his perfect abs. As Scott squirms
and hemorrhages, Gerard cheerfully explains that he knows exactly what Scott
is, and unless Scott promises to do him a favor at some point in the future,
he’ll kill Scott’s mom. He withdraws the knife and casually saunters away.
Much better episode. The memory of last episode’s
half-assed, slipshod plotting has been nearly wiped away.
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