Teen Wolf - Recap: Eternal Sunshine of the Stiles Mind
Teen Wolf continued tonight with an episode that sent Scott and Lydia into the spiraling mind of Stiles Stilinski. Derek smiled so much this week!
MTV "Teen Wolf"
Episode 22 opened exactly where last week left off. Sheriff Stilinski (Linden Ashby) arrived at Derek’s big empty house to confront his son/ the nogitsune possessing his son. Luckily, he brought along the Argents and Derek as backup. Unluckily, Stiles seems to now have super strength and everything from tasers to Derek’s paws ended up getting swatted away like mere nuisances. In the end, it was Chris’ gun pointed squarely at Stiles’ forehead that ended the fight, though I, for one, thought this crew was supposed to be playing some sort of reverse joke on the nogitsune. Nah, it kind of seemed like Chris was simply ready to blow Stiles’ brains out, though Allison and Stiles’ dad stepping in to diffuse the situation. This is, of course, what the nogitsune loves... strife. As it turned out, the fox actually lured them there to protect his body from the incoming Oni, who arrived to crash the party, only to subsequently vanish along with Stiles.
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In the basement of Eichen House, Mrs. Yukimura (Tamlyn Tomita) visited the open tomb of Reese, only to then come face to face with her worst nightmare. Stiles revealed his presence. Apparently, Kira’s mom was ready to get down to business, as she clutched her final fox tail sword in her hand. Sadly, Stiles snatched it away quite quickly before opening up his own gut (Yikes!) with the blade. From the open wound flew hundreds of little bits of chaos aka a whole swarm of yucky flies that seemed to taunt Mrs. Yukimura before spreading out into the Beacon Hills air. We watched as one by one, Scott’s pack succumbed to the power of the nogitsune. We watched a fly dig its way into Derek’s open wound left from an Oni blade. Another was splashed into Aiden’s face along with some water in the locker room, while his brother, Ethan, took a bug to the ear. Lastly, a fly managed to weasel its way into Isaac’s IV at the hospital. Before we knew it, all hell broke loose. More on that soon enough!
I liked that Episode 22 introduced us to more mediums in which Lydia’s powers can manifest. For example, her car’s magical GPS system now knows to lead her straight to supernatural hotspots. In this case, Lydia and Ethan discovered Stiles’ unconscious body in an empty parking lot. I’m sure soon enough there will be a banshee smartphone app. After promptly taking Stiles over to Scott’s home, the group stood puzzled with absolutely no clue where to go or what to do. Clearly, the nogitsune was entirely behind the wheel of Stiles’ mind at that point. Luckily, Deaton (Seth Gilliam) still had some leftover kanima venom to paralyze the monster for most of the episode.
MTV "Teen Wolf"
In the end, numerous failed phone calls were made to Derek’s cell, leaving Lydia and Scott no choice but to call in the big guns, Peter Hale. The thing about Peter, aside from the fact that he’s clearly the best, is that he has some wisdom to him. For example, it was Peter who pointed out that Stiles Stilinski plays chess. This nogitsune plays a game with no rules. See, we’ve been led to believe that a werewolf bite could cure Stiles by “changing his body,” but at this point the kid was looking significantly deranged and sickly. Way too ill to take a bite. Peter, of course, it the expert on mind tricks, though, and he made the suggestion to, instead, tap into Stiles mind for a change. If they could make their way to their actual friend somewhere deep in his subconscious, they could essentially yank him back to reality. Peter doesn’t give handouts, guys. In exchange for his tutorial, Lydia promised to offer him the name of his daughter upon her mind’s safe return to the real world. Ugh. I certainly hate when I’m forced to dive into the unraveling subconscious of my friends like I’m willingly participating in some sort of Nightmare on Elm Street sequel, but sometimes you have to do things you don’t really want to do.
As all of this was transpiring, we followed three side-plots over the course of Episode 22. First, Sheriff Stilinski got a surprising helping hand from Agent McCall (Matthew Del Negro), who actually hasn’t been in Beacon Hills to get him fired at all. In fact, an apology of sorts was owed, as he used Stilinski as an excuse to stay in town to grow closer to Scott. McCall stepped up during Silinski’s job review, clearly recognizing that Beacon Hills is the “Bermuda Triangle” of homicides, disappearances, and other freakish stuff. There’s more to this story that had yet to be revealed until this episode. The nogitsune, and apparently Stiles, know some secret about Melissa McCall (Melissa Ponzio), something that allegedly drove her husband away and led her to Stiles’ father for help. Could she have really done something so horrible that Scott would never forgive her? Nah, probably not, but Sheriff Stilinski advised Agent McCall to simply tell the whole story to his son.
MTV "Teen Wolf"
Next, the bugs inside their brains finally brought the chaos to Scott’s pack. First, Derek ventured over to the Argent residence to harass Chris about the fact that the horrible Kate Argent burned his family alive years prior. Obviously, the insane smiles, complete with full teeth, and unhinged out-loud thinking certainly tipped Argent off to the craziness at hand, though he seemed sort of helpless tied to a chair and doused with lighter fluid. Basically, the nogitsune drove Derek temporarily insane, and Argent was eventually forced to use his hunter skills to get the upper hand, driving a gun under Hale’s chin.
At Beacon Hills High, Allison and Kira teamed up to deal with Aiden, Ethan, and Isaac, all of whom were sipping the same Void Kool Aid as Derek and at each others’ throats. Allison had previously thought that Isaac had simply healed and decided to immediately join her for a late-night cuddling session. Waking up the next morning to find her legs handcuffed to the bed sort of sent up a red flag that Isaac’s obsession with her weapons and killing the twins probably wasn’t just unfunny banter. Oh, I nearly forgot. While Isaac’s craziness stewed throughout the night prior to his locker room battle with the twins, Scott and Kira spent the night together smooching up a storm and, well, having a great time in bed! Poor Allison. When you get handcuffed to a bed you should be enjoying yourself. In any case, Kira and Allison were an awesome display of girl power tonight, kicking werewolf ass and taking werewolf names, though I don’t really think anyone knows which twin is which at this point, save for maybe Lydia and Danny (Keahu Kahuanui). Maybe just Danny.
The trip into Stiles crumbing mind was no vacation, but it was entertaining for us! Scott and Lydia actually made quite the team while they were together. Apart, however, Lydia struggled with the gruesome bandaged nogitsune. Scott, on the other hand, hooked up with the illusion of Allison in a drummed up version of her bedroom closet. I loved that Teen Wolf took us back to the night of Lydia’s bite. We re-watched her searching for Jackson (Colton, not even a little cameo?!) in the high school hallways, only to nearly fall victim to the looming nogitsune. It was Peter who ironically ended up saving Lydia from the outside world, calling to her to find the strength to overcome the mind games. I love watching these two together.
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Oh, so he's busy. ( I know, I know… Arrow. There's always one of you.)
MTV "Teen Wolf"
Scott and Lydia eventually met up in the infamous white room, the big open warehouse that houses the mental version of the druid tree. There, the nogitsune and Stiles silently played a game of Go. Lydia, who always seems to come up with clever solutions to any and all dilemmas, reminded Scott that Stiles doesn’t have to be a werewolf to be in his pack. True Alpha Scott “howled,” though to me it sounded more like a teen wolf roar than any howl I've ever heard. Stiles snapped out of it, and the trio was brought back to the reality of Melissa McCall’s tidy living room. All across Beacon Hills, the wolves affected by the demon flies dropped to the ground, unconscious. There was this great moment here where Stiles vomited up every last inch of nogitsune bandage, only to then witness the monster clawing his way out of the garbage spat up on the ground. Peter was ready to snap the creature’s neck, until Scott thought to first reveal its face. Under the bandages was the actual Stiles. The nogitsune, who apparently still looks like Stiles, snatched Lydia and ran for the hills. So now Teen Wolf has two sets of twins?
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What did you think of Teen Wolf Season 3 Episode 22, “De-Void”? Do you want to see more Peter Hale? What is Melissa’s secret? What does this mean for Stiles? Why did the nogitsune react with a spasm when he overheard Lydia whisper "Malia" to Peter upon her return?
Thanks for reading my Recap and Review of Teen Wolf Season 3 Episode 22, “De-Void”!