Thoughts on FROM at the Mid-point of Season Two
speculative recap – SPOILERS
Sarah Meyers (Avery Konrad) was brought back to town by the same Farway Tree that saved the life of Sheriff Boyd (Harold Perrineau). Nearly everyone but Boyd and the empathic new arrival Elgin (Nathan D Simmons), wants to feed her to the night beasts because she tried to kill Ethan (Simon Webster) and ended up killing her brother instead. (There’s something biblical about her attempt to kill the young Matthews boy, and it brings to mind the first verse of Dylan’s Highway 61 Revisited which begins with: “God said to Abraham ‘Kill me a son'”)
Ethan insists on confronting Sarah, and tells her: “Everyone thought you died, but you didn’t. You lived out in the woods. Only monsters live in the woods. You’re a monster, and I’m not afraid of you.” Questionable reasoning, since she is able to walk about in the daylight and the monsters cannot, but Ethan might be onto something.
Jim Matthews (Eion Bailey) tells Boyd about the radio message he received (in Episode 1.10), but the Sheriff declines to get involved even though Jim expresses sympathy for Sarah. Boyd has his own secrets. He hasn’t told anyone about the manacled ex-marine named Martin, who inexplicably knew the name of Boyd’s late wife, and infected the Sheriff with (possibly imaginary) subcutaneous parasites.
Boyd’s hallucinations are vivid, but, unlike Sarah’s, have not given him any specific instructions. The unfortunate Brian (Taras Lesiuk) and Kelly (Phoebe Rex) didn’t survive longer than twenty-four hours, and Boyd suspects that their purpose was to remind him of Brian Kelly, a soldier who died in his arms on a battlefield years ago. He tried to talk to Donna (Elizabeth Saunders) about that but she shut that conversation down quickly. Boyd also went to Donna looking for help protecting Sarah. She refused to support him, and called his motives into question. Donna seems to actively work to prevent the spread of useful information.
FROM’s best scene so far is the one with Kristi (Chloe Van Landschoot) and Marielle (Kaelen Ohm) waking up in the morning in “Lullaby” (episode 2.5). It is the only scene in the entire series containing two genuinely happy people. Kristi has made bread chips “like Tian Chen makes” and describes them as “a cross between a cracker and a chip”. Then Marielle produces a surprise. She has brought along Kristi’s favourite t-shirt (The shirt is from Gerhardt Trucking in Lunenberg, Nova Scotia.)
KRISTI: “How do you even have this?”
MARI: “Are you kidding? I haven’t gone anywhere without it since you… For a long time, it still smelled like you. Now it just smells. I still remember the last time I saw you wearing it. – Kristi, what’s wrong?”
KRISTI: “Nothing. It’s stupid.”
MARI: “Tell me anyway.”
KRISTI: “What if I’m not the same anymore? I’ve just seen things here. I’ve had to do things that…”
MARI: “Hey. You’re still you. I’m still me. The rest of it, we’ll figure it out together.”
Tillie (Deborah Grover) drops by. She calls Kristi the “resident Quincy”, and hands her a bottle of liquid morphine. Turns out, Tillie was diagnosed with a terminal illness a month ago, and worries she might be too far gone when the time comes to administer it herself.
Jade (David Alpay) asks Victor (Scott McCord) about the strange and unexplained symbol he keeps seeing, and Victor takes him to a graveyard for automobiles which somehow has gone entirely unnoticed. Victor explains that the guy in that Polaroid from the 1970s (Christopher, played by Thom Payne), started seeing that symbol, and soon after that, Victor’s mother told him to hide where Christopher could not find him. The next morning, everyone else, including his mother, was dead. (At Victor’s request, Jade plays “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star” on the violin. The tune is originally from the French nursery rhyme “Ah! vous dirai-je, maman”, which begins: “Oh mother, shall I tell you the cause of my torment?”)
Tabitha (Catalina Sandino Moreno) has visions of zombie kids from time to time, and they appear connected to a cairn-like structure she first saw in the tunnels beneath the town. She gets swarmed by several of these imaginary waifs, who chant the word “Anghkooey”. Tabitha takes a page from her son Ethan, and tells them: “I’m not afraid of you.” (For what it’s worth, Angh means “death” in Welsh, and Kooey is Cornish slang for “hello”.)
As to what might be behind the mysterious town and all its terrors, one is reminded of Fred Wilcox’ 1956 film FORBIDDEN PLANET, particularly the part where Warren Stevens tells Leslie Nielsen the cause of the mysterious nighttime attacks on his crew. “Monsters, Skipper,” he says. “Monsters from the id.”
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