Alright my sweet Fillorian babies, The Magicians is giving our rag tag magical group a little break from the main story this week with some character building side adventures!
“Marry, F…, Kill” starts off with Josh baking condolence muffins for Quentin because the call he received while holding the bad luck bear was about his dad’s passing. Josh and Penny observe the Eliot Monster from the kitchen, who is examining the now black and hardened organ that he ripped from Bacchus last episode. It seems that taking the organ hasn’t returned his memories like he hoped. Margo later approaches the Eliot Monster and suggests that perhaps the memories haven’t returned because he’s in a limited human body and transferring to a different one might help. Unfortunately, the Eliot Monster sees through her ploy to get Eliot back and declines her offer, because even though Bacchus is “donesies” the rest of the gods, and Margo’s friends, still need to be punished and murdered. Josh offers Margo a condolence muffin, which she eagerly accepts. However, for Josh, the room begins to spin and he starts fixating on Margo’s….parts. Later he wakes up from a nightmare in which he murders Margo to find a dead animal in his bed. Turns out the sexually transmitted Lycanthropy he picked up a while ago is kicking in with “the Quickening.”
Meanwhile, Quentin and Julia have a quick conversation in which he tells her about his impending trip back home to sort through his father’s belongings (after missing the funeral because of Fogg’s identity spell and the Eliot Monster). Julia is headed to Fillory to track down Bacchus’ maenads to try and get some answers about her lack of magic and invulnerability.
Josh goes to Brakebills to confront the Crypto-Zoology professor that infected him. She gives him some advice about how to handle “the Quickening” – namely, don’t fight it. Because of the strength of the curse, he must either have sex or murder someone – otherwise he will “rip his own innards out.” Lucky for Josh, “the Quickening” only happens once every thirty years, so he just has to make it through this one for the time being.
Back in the Library, the stranger that snatched Alice at the end of the last episode turns out to be the pedophilic author of the Fillory books – Christopher Plover. Apparently he managed to eventually escape the Beast and has been hiding in the Library ever since. He offers to help Alice recover her and her friends books from the Revisions Room in exchange for her helping him with a tricky spell. He has a “World Book” (a book that lists every possible world and universe) and he’s looking for a place to go where he can be himself but not harm anyone else. Alice is angry and disgusted with him, but without any other options, agrees to his terms.
Quentin reunites with his mother (with the Eliot Monster in tow) and it is, predictably, extremely awkward. She has a lot of tough to answer questions. Where was Quentin? Why didn’t he attend the funeral? Why did NOBODY attend the funeral? He gives her some very unsatisfactory answers, and she acquiesces and tells him that he has twenty four hours to sort through his father’s belongings (particularly his large collection of model airplanes) so that they can be sold. She bitterly reminds him “not to break anything.”
Meanwhile, Josh is torn about what to do. He doesn’t want to have sex with someone and pass along the curse, but the other options of murder or suicide are worse. Margo vows to help him and discovers an old Indonesian spell that requires the heart of a komodo dragon. Apparently Kanye West owns a komodo dragon and keeps it in his NYC apartment, so they head out to steal and gut Kanye’s dragon. Josh also remembers that while under Fogg’s identity spell he had a one night stand. He runs out to find her and figure out whether or not she was infected.
Josh finds Enid, the woman he slept with while Isaac, and after a very uncomfortable conversation in which he compares lycanthropy to “being Herpes-like” they run down the symptoms list. She tearfully admits that she has all of them and then leads him to the bedroom where he finds a bloody and dismembered dead body. Josh is horrified and upset at turning her into a werewolf.
In Fillory, Julia and Penny find Bacchus’ last remaining maenad, Shoshana, about to hang herself. Without her god to worship, her life has no meaning. Plus, all the other maenads already offed themselves with poison wine. They convince her not to commit suicide and ask for her help in determining what exactly Julia is. She attempts to read Julia’s aura but the results are inconclusive. She tells them that there is another “ more intimate” spell she can try, but it requires someone who worships Julia completely. Good thing this is alternate universe Penny and he happens to be in love with Julia!
Back in the Library, Alice uses her light bending power to render herself invisible and sneaks into the Revisions Room and grabs their books. Plover casts a spell that will keep the books writing the stories even when they are outside of the room. Unfortunately, as Alice flips through Quentin’s book she makes a horrifying discovery. According to the book, Quentin is going to die next week.
Quentin and the Eliot Monster are sorting through his father’s possessions and having a conversation about grief. The Eliot Monster is curious about why Quentin isn’t going on a murder spree, after all that’s what he would do. Quentin explains that humans usually grieve on a smaller scale and for once the Eliot Monster agrees to sit quietly and observe.
Josh and Margo have acquired the heart of Yeezy’s dragon. (“That’s not how I thought I would meet Kanye. That was actually less fucked up than how I thought I would meet Kanye.” – Margo) Margo shouts in Indonesian and Josh eats the heart. They hop back in the car, hoping that the spell worked, but unfortunately, Josh feels the symptoms of “the Quickening” take hold again. He bolts out of the car to take his “urges” out on a tree. They then head back to Brakebills for a final attempt to help him survive the curse.
Quentin is still hard at work, and the Eliot Monster is questioning why he is putting so much effort in to this. Quentin explains that ever since he accidentally broke an ashtray as a child, his mother can only see him as someone that carelessly breaks things and so he has spent his life trying to not be that person and failing. The Eliot Monster argues that in order for Quentin to break free of this cycle he should lean in and break all the things. They then spend a very cathartic few minutes smashing every model airplane and all of his father’s belongings.
In Fillory, Julia and Penny perform the ritual. Which involves Julia stripping naked and Penny “worshipping” her before washing her feet. They both admit to feeling awkward but manage to complete the very sexy task. Later, they give the foot water to Shoshana. She studies it and a bright flame bursts from the water. Apparently even though Julia can not cast spells, she still holds and immense amount of power and is still a goddess. Shoshana decides that she has a new god to serve and pledges her service to Julia.
At Brakebills, Josh has locked himself in a cage. He hopes that the cage will hold him until “the Quickening passes” even if it results in his death. Margo is unwilling to lose another friend and so she locks herself inside the cage with him and offers to sleep with him to pass on the curse. Being “L positive” is worth saving her friend, and besides, the curse won’t affect her for another thirty years and she doubts she’ll even be alive then. Josh consents and they have sex. In the post-coital cuddle, Josh asks if they are an item now or just casual and Margo responds “I just saved your life, bitch. How’s that casual?” She then tears up as they admit to fearing that Eliot might really be gone.
Post-cathartic plane smashing, Quentin and the Eliot Monster are both feeling better. The Eliot Monster decides that since this grieving process was so successful he would impart some other news to Quentin for him to grieve over: Eliot is dead. The Eliot Monster claims that he felt Eliot’s soul die a while ago. He wanted to impart this information so that Quentin can move on and help him with his plan to murder all the gods.
However, it’s revealed that the Eliot Monster lied and Eliot is in fact still there, but trapped inside his own consciousness (in the form of an empty Brakebills.)
Are Margo and Josh now officially a couple? Will Alice help Plover find a new world to escape to? Will Eliot find a way to regain control of his body? Will Julia learn how to access her trapped power? This episode might have been about side adventures, but they served to lay down some important building blocks for the main story going forward.
The Magicians airs Wednesdays at 9pm on the SyFy Channel.
