Teen Wolf delivered the seventh episode of its last half-season, “The Werewolves of London.” We’re steadily approaching the end, and so we are getting some answers—unfortunately, at the cost of the last shreds of realism.
Recap
We see Ethan in London, upset because it seems his boyfriend forgot about their anniversary. Then some Hunters break into his flat. They tie Jackson up with purple wolfsbane and shoot Ethan with a wolfsbane dart. However, he warns them that Jackson is part kanima, so purple wolfsbane doesn‘t work on him. Just then, Jackson breaks through his bonds and beats the two hunters up. He tells Ethan he would never forget about their anniversary.
After the opening credits, we find out that there wasn‘t just one person shot at the end of the previous episode, but several. Melissa—she was in most danger—Agent McCall, Lydia, and Mason. Everyone is going to be all right, though. Melissa tells Scott not to run, and that he should fight. The Sheriff assures him there will be deputies posted around the rooms, because that is clearly going to help against a group of people who successfully held up the entire Sheriff station. Scott realizes this perfectly well, too, and declares to Malia that they will need to build an army.
Scott and Malia meet up with Deucalion, who tells them he is done fighting. He does, however, offer them “guidance”, and advises them to lower their standards for allies. Jackson and Ethan are interrogating the Hunters they captured and find out they were sent by Gerard. They have also been killing werewolves on a large scale. Liam beats up one of Nolan’s friends in school because that’s the wisest course of action at this point. Theo stops Liam from killing him, and the boy tells them that there are “other bodies.”
The Sheriff demands that Tamora gives him the names of the people who shot up Scott’s house, airing all of Gerard’s dirtiest laundry in front of her in an attempt to get her to betray Gerard. She turns the conversation on him by saying he failed as a Sheriff when he didn’t manage to protect people from the supernatural.
Lydia has a vision of a frozen hospital with just one slot in the morgue red hot.
Scott and Malia follow Deucalion’s advice and meet with Peter. He has imprisoned a hunter and gives him a rifle in an attempt to provoke Scott into killing him. It fails, and Scott and Malia leave again, as Peter points out that this war can’t be won without killing and that if Scott won’t do it, he needs to find a Left Hand.
Tamora then takes control of the Sheriff station. I just…is this the Wild West now? Did we suddenly do a time skip?
Malia goes to speak to Peter alone, and lets him see her memories of the Anuk-ite. Peter freaks out. He realizes Malia’s plan is to put enough killers around Scott that they would do what he is too squeamish to. However, he declares a thing like that cannot be fought. He leaves after telling Malia he brought a luxury car for her. She throws the keys back at him. Malia then suggests to Scott they make use of an uncivilized pack called The Primals. Scott says he won’t work with them if they are murderers, which, again, Deucalion? Peter? Rings a bell?
Liam and Theo find the bodies that were eaten by ants and figure out this is the way the Anuk-ite looks for its other half. They also figure out Aaron is one part of the Fear demon.
Scott and Malia find the Primal pack dead—by Anuk-ite, though they don’t know that yet—and Lydia nearby. She was led there by the dead Hellhound, and now she is is looking for another body in the woods. They find two, skinned, and one of them belongs to the Primal pack. It seems they are the ones that Anuk-ite possessed.
Liam and Theo show them the bodies they found, and as they are trying to figure out what to do next, Peter shows up again. He claims he is now willing to fight because Gerard blew up his lovely car. Later when they are alone, Malia points out that he’s lying. We see that what actually convinced him was that Malia was in love with Scott. He warns her away from falling in love with Scott because he will likely die, but Malia says it’s “too late.”
The boy Liam has been interrogating speaks to Nolan and admits he shot up Scott’s house. He also admits to telling Tamora that Nolan did it to save his life. Apparently, Tamora was under the impression Nolan was about to chicken out and wanted to kill him.
Jackson and Ethan walk into Beacon Hills High like they own it, and the first person they speak to is Tamora. She prompty captures them—offscreen, somehow, in the middle of a school hallway—and then tortures them for information on the same rack we saw Theo tortured before.
Review
Of course everyone is going to be okay after being present in a house that got shot up. Naturally. Was anyone expecting anything else? Don’t get me wrong. Like I’ve said before, I don’t actually want the characters to die. But the story requires it, and has required it for quite some time now.
It is true that when it is revealed that the shoot-up was organised by a random high school kid, it’s a little less unbelievable that everyone would survive. But it only begs more questions. Like how they managed to get close enough in the first place? Does Scott have no security measures at all? When he is in the middle of a war? And what exactly happened after the shooting ended? Did the attackers just drive away without making sure their victims were dead? Did the police stop them? If so, how come they don’t know who did it? Or was it simply that the kid was trying to save Nolan’s skin, rather than actually kill anyone? Yet it was a bit too lethal of an attack for that.
Speaking of the police, Scott was entirely right for once. The Sheriff’s declaration that he would find out who was behind the shooting was rather absurd, and so was the promise of protection. They all knew who did it. Not individually, but they knew which group was responsible. And we have known for several episodes now that the local police don’t have the power to stop the genocidal hunters. So the Sheriff’s declaration rang empty. Tamora had a point, too, when she told the Sheriff he’d failed. When you find out that you live in a supernatural hub, the answer is not “run your police force as if everything was normal.”
On the other hand, Tamora’s takeover of the police station was beyond absurd. It came entirely out of the blue, like Beacon Hills suddenly being empty of people last half-season. It seems that in a very Game of Thrones-like manner, the writers decided that the best way to deliver a shock was to let it be without any foreshadowing. But much like in GoT, it just makes for a a bad story.
Mere episodes ago, these people were willing to risk their lives on their Sheriff’s say-so, expecting to be shot by armed militia. No one even tried to clandestinely kill the two werewolves to save their lives. I read that as a proof of their loyalty to the Sheriff. Now, they are apparently listening to the woman who threatened to shoot them all very recently. How exactly are we meant to find this even remotely believable?
On the other side of the army camp, Scott is not doing much better. For one, he apparently already forgot that he himself tried to guide Deucalion into redemption. He is now very surprised that Deucalion doesn’t jump at the idea of killing Gerard. They even quote one of his sadistic killer lines at him and expect it to resonate. If that was your belief, why the hell did you let him go, Scott?
The show, on the other hand, tries to build him up as some sort of wise guide. Given his past, that is deeply upsetting. I want to believe in redemption, but it would take much longer than two years or so to take advice from a mass murderer who swears he is reformed.
I am also pissed that it is implied that Peter is worse than Deucalion. The things Deucalion did were much worse than anything Peter ever got up to. So is the difference now Deucalion’s redemption? As far as we know, Peter doesn’t go around just killing people anymore either. His storyline last half-season was supposed to be about him learning to sacrifice himself. Is it less worthy because he doesn’t spout vaguely Eastern sounding wisdom? Moreover, Peter already risked more than we ever saw Deucalion risk, so what makes him worse than Deucalion again?
Speaking of. Why are we forced to watch Peter’s will-he-or-won’t-he (join the righteous cause) again? We already did that last half-season. Even that wasn’t particularly well executed, but it doesn’t mean they should try the very same thing again. Especially when they do it equally bad, or, as the case may be, even worse. Peter was influenced by Malia being in love with Scott? Really? Why was he not influenced by her being in danger, something we already know he would risk his life for? There should not have even been any discussion. They should have called and he should have come, just with a little bit of sass thrown in. There are plenty of other areas of conflict they could have concentrated on instead.
Like the conflict about Scott’s insistence on keeping his hands clean. Yes, that could have been something more than it was. Especially if we were actually shown the price of this. If people on his side died because Scott had a chance to kill Gerard or Tamora and didn’t take it, it would finally show the complicated moral issue for what it is. Instead, we get a rehash of the same old thing as Scott is held up as some pinnacle of morality rather than a complicated human being.
And why did we have the scene with Scott saying “no more half-measures”? It sounded like he was finally driven to extremes, but then he did…nothing. All right then.
The one good thing about Peter’s storyline, I suppose, was that they did not go the “overprotective father” route. Maybe Peter feels that given he had already tried to kill Scott once, so he did his part?
But to end on a positive note, Jackson and Ethan are the best couple. I miss Danny, I do, but their combination is priceless. I was very happy to see them back on the screen.
