Charmed season 2 episode 8 review: A bloody good wedding
In the midseason finale of Charmed, Maggie and Parker prepare to tie the knot when things quickly go south as everyone else works to stop them.
Last week’s episode of Charmed saw Maggie’s long-awaited reunion with Parker, now the demon overlord, culminating in his surprising marriage proposal. This week, we pick up immediately after the proposal with a slightly horrified Maggie recoiling from the proposal. As much as she may love Parker, marriage is too much, too soon.
She ports back home to her sisters at Elder HQ to discover there’s been another demon attack. When Harry, Macy, and Mel begin to accuse Parker, Maggie gets frustrated that they won’t believe her, telling them she can solve it all with a “wave of her hand.”
Not wanting to be treated like a kid, Maggie very childishly decides to marry Parker out of spite and defiance toward her sisters and Harry. Macy and Mel insist that this is too big of a sacrifice, something Maggie can’t take back. But Maggie decides that it’s time to do something different and take stronger action.
So Maggie goes to Parker and tells him to release the latest witch hostages, and Parker does, despite judgment from the demons. Parker explains how their marriage would work: The demon world runs like the mafia. Maggie represents all of the witches, so an attack on any witch would be an attack on her, and an attack on her, would be an attack on him, which is forbidden.
Just as they become hopeful that they can strike a peace between the demons and witches, Abigael and Godric cement their plan to take him out, using Maggie to do it. Godric tells Parker and Maggie that they must perform a blood ritual in order to cement their engagement for the demons. But Parker says they’ll move forward without it and earn the demons’ trust without it.
Back at Elder HQ, Harry, Macy, and Mel are suspicious at Abigael’s sudden confession to killing the magical tree after maintaining her innocence (though they forgot the truth serum component?).
Wishing she could be a fly on the wall, Mel embarks on a dangerous, shapeshifting curse with Mel and Harry. As Mel and Macy are collecting flies for the spell, Macy vents her frustration about Harry’s trust in Abigael. Mel points out that her feelings may be coming from a place of jealousy due to her feelings for him.
Mel tells Macy they found the drawing of Harry. While at first Macy is defensive, she finally tells Mel that it wasn’t Harry in the drawing, but instead the darklighter — Sexy Harry. “I was disgusted by him, but intrigued by him.”
Mel then tells Macy that Harry actually does have feelings for her, and Macy is clearly shocked. Mel gently tells her that she and Harry could try it out, take it one step at a time. But Macy tries to tamp it down and say that it would be weird.
They take their collected flies back to Harry, who tells them that Maggie and Parker are getting married tonight. Mel insists they brew fast, even though they don’t yet know how to break the curse. With curse in two (and a very vague way to break it from the Book of Elders), Macy, Mel, and Harry go to the wedding looking spiffy as ever.
Harry decides to break out Abigael, much to Macy’s dismay, thinking they may have a shared goal of disrupting the wedding while Mel takes the potion. Mel watches as Godric brings Parker one of the enchanted apples, telling him he needs to be impervious to magic if he is truly to bring peace. It’s what Maggie would want.
A frustrated and powerless Mel lands on Godric’s shoulder only to be swatted away, and it nearly ends her. It’s enough for Mel to take action to end the curse. She flies in front of the mirror and reflects on the fact that, even if she doesn’t have her magical powers, she still has power in other ways.
In moments, she’s transformed back into Mel and away from the dangers of the short fly lifespan. Mel finds Maggie who is all dressed up for the wedding in a beautiful blood-red dress to tell her what she learned.
But Maggie doesn’t want to hear it. Rather than taking Mel’s spying as a sign of caution, she instead sees it as more evidence that Mel treats her as a child — and asks her to leave. Mel does, but she asks her to check Parker’s office for the fruit so Maggie knows she wasn’t lying.
Meanwhile, Macy and Harry continue their search for Abigael. As Macy receives an update text from Mel, a freed Abigael (wearing a Dracula cape?) comes around the corner and hugs Harry, telling him that Maggie and Parker are in danger. Macy does not seem impressed.
Abigael presses on, telling them she’s their only hope of saving Maggie, who has taken Mel at her word and found the magic apples in Parker’s office. Unfortunately, Parker’s demonic side begins to take hold when he discovers Maggie there without his permission. While he claims to have not been a part of the plan to kill the tree and steal the fruit, he gladly took Godric’s help to become immune to magic with an apple.
Maggie is caught red handed in her attempt to steal back the apples as Parker accuses her of being the untrustworthy one. This takes her aback, of course, and Parker seizes on the moment of weakness to grab her head and read her mind, picking up on her relationship with Jordan.
She tells him Jordan is just a friend, but it’s clear that Parker isn’t as reformed as she once thought. Maggie tries to call off the wedding and leave, but Parker won’t let her and tells Godric to prepare the blood ritual.
Over at the demon compound, the wedding/blood ritual is nigh, and just as Godric is about to slice into Maggie, Abigael (threatened by Harry to do the right thing or be exposed) blasts the gun with fire. It sets Godric back and allows enough chaos for Macy and Harry to get Maggie away.
Back at Elder HQ, Mel shows the rest the tree branch she found growing through the floor, and realizes it’s the tree depicted in the Book of Elders — the source of the Charmed Ones’ powers. Maggie touches the sap and gets a vision of Jordan dying again, but this time sees Parker as the killer. They run upstairs into SafeSpace to find that Parker is in Jordan’s gym.
Macy lights her finger flame under the fire alarm to evacuate the building as Maggie runs into the studio, pleading with Parker to go and leave Jordan alone. Jordan puts two and two together — he knows Maggie and her sisters are running from a bad man. He takes a step to stand between Maggie and Parker to try to protect her and ends up hitting Parker, but Parker immediately chokes him and overpowers him.
Maggie pleads with Parker to let Jordan go, so he throws him across the room and tells Maggie it’s time to go home. Mel tells him he’s not taking Maggie anywhere and instinctively puts her hand up to stop him. Shockingly, he turns to ice. The magic sap has restored Mel’s powers and then some — molecular manipulation!
But Parker has eaten the apple and is thus impervious to magic. Within moments, he turns to smoke and breaks out of it. Maggie pleads with him, tells him this isn’t who he is, but Parker insists he’ll always be a demon. Just as he gets ready to kill Jordan, another body of black smoke appears behind him and stabs him — Abigael.
Parker falls to the ground and Maggie begs Harry to heal him, but Harry stalls, whether because he doesn’t believe he should be healed or because he knows it won’t work. Eventually, Harry tries, but nothing works due to the magical apple. Within moments, Parker turns into the black smoke and disappears for the last time.
As the episode ends, Macy and Mel comfort a grieving Maggie, upset not only over Parker, but over the loss of their partnership and attempts to bring peace. But nothing of the whole episode is as exciting or more upsetting even than when Harry thanks Abigael for killing Parker, and gets a passionate make out in return, only to be seen by Macy.
Of course, Parker isn’t actually dead. (It can’t be that easy, right?) Abigael has captured him and put him in jail, taking her rightful place on the demonic throne.
Next. Charmed season 2 episode 7 review: Ghosts of Parker past. dark