“Let me tell you a story about starting over”
There’s a rare thrill these days in a real cliffhanger, and “The Word” has got that. For the first time all season, I cannot wait to get back to Castle Rock, and to Castle Rock.
Annie Wilkes’ story nearly ended sixteen years ago on a bluff somewhere outside of Bakersfield, California, and Amity’s on a bluff off the cruel shore of Maine. But instead, both stories turned tide there, on the strength of a smile. “You saved me,” Annie tells Joy (Evangeline, my conscience chides me, a kidnapper doesn’t get to rename a child, but still I think of her as Joy) with wonder, remembering how her daughter (sister) saved her life then, and again just last night.
Like teenage Annie, Amity Lambert (Mathilde Dehaye) is saved by a smile, and damned by one. Cast out from their starving village by her father, Amity and her lover, the disgraced priest, are doomed to exile. But soon Amity returns with baskets and bags of food, showing her former fellows the newly fertile earth and promising much more, all this abundance brought “an angel” who smiled gently upon her and delivered a bounty, enough to save everyone.
Everyone who submits.
A good story ends where it begins, Ace Merrill—really Pere Augustin in Ace’s flesh—tells the crowd at Castle Rock’s 400th anniversary celebration, and it’s exciting to see the intersections of these stories as the seasons, seemingly discrete stories unwinding over the same landscape, stop glancing at each other and instead collide at full speed. I just wish that the show’s “full speed” moved faster than a cheerful parade meandering through town.
A good story keeps its focus, and “The Word” sticks tight to the settlers, the Satanists, who took over New Jerusalem, sacrificing or driving out all others. Only occasionally does the episode glance at Annie Wilkes and her daughter (sister), at the quiet, quick-eyed officer (Chris Mulkey, his thoughtful but quick-eyed face so different from Hank Jennings’ sharp, scheming eyes) questioning her, at the events playing out around town separate from the founders’ resurrection plans. Mulkey’s cop isn’t buying Annie’s story, by the way, no matter how flatly she tries to sell: “I did it, the end,” she tells him, and “That’s the story, soup to nuts.”
Instead of aiming for superficial similarities to tie together Annie and Amity with some portrait-of-Dracula’s-bride resemblance, the casting relies upon each actor’s performance, and upon a remarkably similar vocabulary of expressions that suggest each could be, could be, the other’s mirror. Like Lizzy Caplan, Mathilde Dehaye can beam with just her eyes, or cut with them. Like Caplan, Dehaye can tilt her chin with winning challenge, set it in chilling wrath, or soften it in resignation. It sounds superficial, but in a story switching abruptly to subtitled French, an actor who can strongly signal every shift in tone with a glance is valuable. One who can also craft a few stolen slivers of resemblance—in feature, in expression, in temperament—to Annie Wilkes is invaluable.
Not since the ice cream scoop has Castle Rock boasted a split second as charged, as startling-but-inevitable, as that first look at the face under that deep hood. The “angel” Amity encounters, the entity for whom she killed her father, then her god, is him. The Kid (ol’ Smilin’ Bill Skarsgård).
As present-day characters in “The Word” mention, The Kid was discovered (in Castle Rock’s series premiere) in Block F, a forgotten chamber under Shawshank prison, where he’d been held captive by then-warden Dale Lacy. The same Daly Lacy whose old letters are bundled together in Pop Merrill’s desk drawer. The same Block F Ace Merrill visited just two days ago.
This week, I can promise not to spoil anything else from Castle Rock’s first season; I make no promises for next week. Like the vault of graves under the new mall’s construction site, Block F runs deep under Castle Rock, deep into its ground and its history. Now those stories are intersecting underground, destabilizing the terrain, threatening (promising) to collapse both stories into one dreadful tangle.
As the end draws near, Castle Rock’s writers are being more careful to track the passage of time. The town’s 400th anniversary is four days away, Ace is sure to mention, and then again when it’s three days off. Three days until the settlers’ resurrection, because that’s what Castle Rock is dishing out here: not just Satanists, not just Satanist bodysnatchers, not even your classic revenant Satanist bodysnatching scenario, but a woman-led colonialist Satanist death cult revenant-and-resurrection bodysnatching scenario.
Castle Rock’s second season doesn’t have the meditative mourning quality of its first, and it doesn’t need to. The fast-paced potboiler action of the premiere has its own appeal, and the mystical (and occasionally mystifying) scenes of the past have a stillness that contrasts cleverly, if not always effectively, with that grim humor. The fun that the first few episodes chased is almost entirely absent in “The Word,” but it’s traded for building horror and an immersion into a new character almost as successfully drawn as Annie’s mother. And I suspect that if I had seen this episode in swift succession between other episodes—if I had watched in the newly traditional, reputedly least affecting way—the flaws would be glossed over and the strengths amplified.
At a time when streaming sites have changed the nature of watching television, Hulu unwittingly presents an argument for the approach of their most powerful competitors. Instead of releasing Castle Rock in one big swallow, ready for audiences to swig back at will, each episode is doled out like Annie’s medication, to be taken at its time.
For the first time this season, Castle Rock has me fully in its grip, and for the first time, I’d rather keep watching than stop to write about it, or than almost anything. But we can’t.
Stray observations
- Twenty-five years later, Tim Robbins is back at Shawshank… but just for a visit. This week.
- John Henry Diehl (or, as genre viewers might know him better, John Diehl) has played a previous King-universe character, appearing in a 1997 The Outer Limits episode adapted from The Revelations Of ’Becka Paulson, a name you might recognize from The Tommyknockers. Even I have to admit, this feels less like a deep-cut Easter egg and more like pure coincidence, given the sheer volume of King’s adapted work and the range of Diehl’s roles over the decades.
- Viewers of Slings & Arrows might recognize in Pere Augustin the reluctant Romeo from season two, who sheds his diffidence and learns to let his broad face glow, looking like a Renaissance prince ready for his portrait. As the pastor of New Jerusalem, David Alpay is more restrained, but just as passionate, and just as duty-bound. Both character and actor know how to stand back and let Amity lead.
- Burning crosses are not great in a community struggling with overt racism, and I don’t think inverting them makes it better. Fun fact: Inverting a victim of bloodletting is intended to let their blood charge to their heads so they stay conscious longer into the process! I wonder if that works at all, and specifically if it works for burning, and additionally if I’ll get a polite note from our outstanding editors on the correct usage of fun fact.
- See you, as I may have mentioned, next week!
47 Comments
It seems like Emily liked this episode much better than most of the season, but gave it a grade on par with the rest of it just the same.What happened to Henry Deaver? How did the kid get out of his cage? It’s still locked and his clothes are seemingly there, so it appears he apparated out of there? Still, his plot here seems a bit at odds with his plans from last season, especially if you accept the conceit that he could see 400 years into the future (so, presumably 398-399 years as well).
As we’re dealing with multiverse fuckery, who knows. I think the assumption is that The Kid used his satan powers and Henry is dead.
I mean how could Lawyer Henry have even kept up the visits with Shawshank open?
Stretching (because we have to, with this show) but he clearly becomes a local fixture after S1, he could easily visit under the auspices of a volunteer law clinic for inmates, or whatever. In any case, I doubt we’ll be seeing Andre Holland again
Well, yes. He could easily get access to Shawshank, but the tank? Unlikely.
I’m still not sure there is a multiverse here. I know that has the story the Kid told, but the world he described was everyone in Castle Rock’s idealized version of it… seemed like lies from the Devil, y’know? I believe that was left intentionally ambiguous, but if it were true, the Kid couldn’t be here now as he’d promised Amity if he’d actually gotten to go “home” last season as he claims he wanted. I think his plans for the schizma we more ominous than that, and Henry stopped him.
Possible. That we got an episode from The Kid’s perspective leads me to trust the first season’s version of events at face value. I know some big King heads and they all seem convinced that the first season was pretty steeped in unstated King cosmology. I’ve never read the Dark Tower books but alternate realities and The Man In Black feature heavily and (apparently) link most if not all King settings together.
Beyond that, Amity hears the dimensional screeching and then The Kid appears, indicating that he’s arriving from another reality, so it’s worth asking where The Kid is coming from – if this Kid is the S1 Kid, then it stands to reason that S2 Castle Rock is not S1 Castle Rock.
Interesting theory.I still like thinking it’s all one Castle Rock, but I am wondering if the Kid Amity met in 1619 was a post-2018 the Kid from S1, which is an interesting thought in-and-of itself. More Timey-Wimey, but I really never bought his story from last season. The Other Castle Rock was too perfect in ways that were too tailored to the specific characters (but Allison Tolman comes to mind the most).
Well, I think last season the thought was that Henry was in the cage so long he forgot who he was. And was starting to remember when he was re caged. But there’s also the fact that that sound and those lights allowed both Henry’s to skip around time, space and location. For example Bad Henry did see Amity with that dagger.
I was talking about our Henry. What happened to him? I don’t call the Kid that because I think he was lying about being from another dimension, as wasn’t ever a Henry Deaver.
I’m not sure he was lying in so much as I don’t think he’s another world’s Henry *anymore*. I mean, Lawyer Henry certainly seemed to remember parts of the story he told him. We don’t know yet what happened to Lawyer Henry, but I don’t expect that means we’ll NEVER know.
I thought all Lawyer Henry ever truly remembered was what he forgot in the snow–he tricked his dad into falling to his death while the Kid was present. The Kid seems a legit stand-in for Evil (capital E) at this point, thought I’ll admit I’m gonna be real sad if he’s Randall Flagg. Too easy, and also I’ve never thought Flagg was that interesting as a villain (though never the Dark Tower series; I know him from the Stand).
Alexander Skarsgard was just cast as Randall Flagg in the series adaptation of the Last Stand … holy shit, do you think there’s a chance they will cross over at some point?
(I hate how excited I just got at this thought. What if Alex was purposely cast so the long game was to have the two appear together at some points as architects of all of this?!!)
I doubt it, but I agree that it would be very cool.
The first season of this show had some low lows but it was generally inoffensive and the highs were good enough to make your time feel not wasted. Won’t be surprised if this season is the same. I’m waiting until the season is over, though. The main problem with Season 1 was that, apart from that one Sissy Spacek episode that was clearly why she signed on, there was really no B story. It was like a cop show in the 80s where the entire episode is one thing that doesn’t take long so there are lots of stakeouts.
This episode makes a good case for plot – it’s hard to meander when you give yourself a timer, as they do here – but I wouldn’t say it makes a case for binge watching. I was only distracted from the waste of Evangeline/Joy’s mother by the feint toward this propulsive second rail of story, and in a binge scenario I can’t imagine it would really patch over the bad taste left by last episode.As has been the case with this season, what makes the show move is the bodysnatching satanist cult, but the show clearly wants Annie / Joy to be the heart of it all. It doesn’t work. Not for nothing that the best episode of the season fully sidesteps their part of it – the satanist angle is pulpy and gruesome fun, but the Wilkes angle is turgid and exploitative rather than pulpy. I fully expect that the show will hit its patchy rut once again as we get back to Annie.Anyway, I’m all for openly bringing The Man In Black into this show but it further confuses the first season, which just looks more scattered in terms of what it was trying to do with The Kid. Why wait off on the big King Lore question until now? What was all that ambiguity for, now that we know he was Randall Flagg the whole time?Also, I don’t agree that a good story ends where it begins, because S1 did so, and it was not a good story. And I’m not really looking forward to “Annie and Joy escape as a happy family”, if that’s the ending to this season the show is implicitly promising.
I don’t think there has been ANY confirmation he’s Randall Flagg.
I mean, who else would he be? He’s clearly some sort of magician or plane-hopping sorcerer with a plan. I wouldn’t put it past these showrunners to create a secondary, Snoke-esque Big Bad just for TV, but… why would you, when Flagg is already there?
Because there are plenty of characters in Kingverse he could be without being Flagg, and the Kid’s abilities aren’t the same as Flagg’s. They are, however, pretty similar to Andre Linoge AND Lelaund Gaunt’s.
I mean, Flagg shows up with different names at different times with different faces, but this is pretty classic Flagg – genuinely hard to come to any other conclusion based on how Flagg is presented throughout the King universe. I don’t really agree with anything else Swinton said here, but the assessment that the Kid is supposed to be Flagg, or this “level of the Tower’s” version of flag seems pretty obvious/spot-on – much like this is a different version of Annie Wilkes than the one in Misery.
We know he’s Flagg?
We don’t.
He’s not Flagg. They’re adapting the Last Stand separately – but another Skarsgard brother has been cast as Flagg. My fan theory is that they’re eventually going to overlap at some point between shows. (I’m secretly hoping that the Stephen King renaissance is the focus of the next decade, replacing superhero movies, and they eventually cast Gustaf Skarsgard as some god like figure, or the actual Devil)
I would love to know how this twist didn’t leak at all. My assumption is that the Henry scenes were filmed with the Amity scenes that aired last season, but the promo next week does show Henry with the main populous…
I assume it would have leaked, were this show not lost in the rapidly swelling crowd of streaming television.
Not sure I agree. Plenty about this season leaked, if you visit the right sites. (YVR for example, had plenty of BTS info)
Dustin Thomason did an AMA earlier and he said that he has a bunch of green screen footage of Bill Skarsgard that he keeps on his phone and used that. I’d assume that if it wasn’t really him we won’t be getting anymore white Henry Deaver this season.
Interesting! Where was this AMA?
Considering Bill Skarsgard has been super adamant for the last year he wouldn’t appear in season 2, I’m guessing the fangirls of tumblr are distraught right now. I’m glad there’s still some surprises in tv to be honest!
Either that’s the correct usage of “fun fact” or I’ve been using that one wrong for years
Abdi, in his search for Hassan, saw the 3 people burned alive on inverted crosses on the Marsten House property. One was Patrice (Officer Buschor was the vessel). Who were the other 2?
I kind of wish they had not blatantly shown the Kid in the flashback (at least not yet). As soon as I saw the statue of their ‘Angel’ I could tell it was supposed to be him and I honestly think it would have worked better if they had just trusted in the audience for an episode or two instead of being blunt with it.But, yes, definitely one of the better episodes of the season.
Completely agree! They should have either let us appreciate that the statue bore an uncanny resemblance to The Kid or hold off showing the statue’s face right until the end, so then we’re thinking “Wait a minute, that looks like OOHHH SHIT!”
I didn’t make the connection.
Really? About tige burning crosses? Ever heard of context?
So, some thoughts after a while. We’re assuming, apparently, that the kid has been around for hundreds of years, but we know that the Schisma if you can hear it and see it can send you anywhere in time and space and multiverse. We know that the schisma is back, and that Amity saw it and heard it 400 years ago. We know that Henry The Kid vanished from his cage, apparently naked and is nowhere to be found at the moment. We know that Amity met him 400 years ago, wrapped in robes or possibly some sort of blanket but likely naked under those. Is it…not possible that the Henry she met is a Henry who’s just vanished from the Cage?
Is it…not possible that the Henry she met is a Henry who’s just vanished from the Cage? Entirely possible.
Anything is possible as far as the Kid is concerned. I guess I’m more confused as to a) did he choose to go there on his own, or was he summoned somehow? and b) why was he stuck for so long only to get out at this point?
The director/writers have stated this: Who says he was stuck?
Great point – I just can’t fathom what he was waiting for, or why he chose to stay where he was for so long.
My guess is, he was waiting for his followers.
During scene with the header image at the top of the review, I was waiting for her to hand him his long-lost lightsaber.
Has there been any confirmation about the length of the season? Is it going to be 10 episodes like Season 1? I was hoping for a shorter bow this time around (it doesn’t really look like they had enough plot for 10 episodes either).
I really, really liked how Pop got a lot of focus this episode, and actually realised “something bad is coming”. I especially liked his comment to his Somali son (forgot his name!) about “I’m old enough to remember things you can’t even fuckin’ imagine”. AND, reference: CHRISTINE!!!
Back in S1E9, The Kid has a vision of a woman in old-timey clothes holding a blood covered knife. This is definitely Amity (probably not same actor tho) and the same knife she used. I was wondering if this scene had any meaning when I originally watched it last season, now we know! Cool, cool, cool.
Damn, nice callback. I was so lost in S1 that I still don’t know what happened, but I do now remember that scene.
Under the rating, it says this is episode 1 — if anyone is checking on this to correct it, should be episode 7 (was really annoying thinking I kept going from episode 6 to 1).