Ordination Day is nigh, friends! You knew shit would get wild ahead of the Big O, but I did not expect wild in this way. Sure, there are cannibals and stuff, but I’m talking about that last scene. Oh, buddy, I am here and always will be for that last scene. I mean … did you see it? Of course you did.
Before we get to that moment, David has quite a busy few days ahead of his ordination. First, he has a series of interviews testing his biblical knowledge, Latin, and thoughts on how the church handles racism. His final interview is a surprise: Renee pops up on the screen, and as the church’s lawyer, she has to ask him about financial and sexual indiscretions that could get litigious. She asks about his stint in sex-addiction rehab. She tells him to make sure he’s doing this for himself and not for her sister because life is just too hard any other way. What a welcome return! But that’s not all: David, Ben, and Kristen also have a case to work on this week. You’d think they’d give the guy time off for his ordination, but cannibalism waits for no priest!
That’s right, we’re talking cannibalism in the season-two finale. The team meets med student Mitch during hell week on campus, and this longtime vegetarian confesses to some bizarre urges as of late. First, it was simply sucking down raw meat at a family barbecue, but now all he wants to consume is human flesh — especially the flesh on one of the cadavers in his dissection lab. The urges are so bad that he’s zip-tying himself to his bed at night so he doesn’t snack on his roommate. Why his roommate hasn’t moved, I’ll never know. This friendship is not worth it, buddy.
Aside from Mitch, who is spinning out as he tries to avoid eating a person, the team doesn’t find anything too weird upon first glance — but they do happen upon a note about a “3 a.m. haunt” in the abandoned psych building. They’ll head back there that night, but first, they have something very important to do: party!
Kristen and Ben throw David an “ordination bachelor party” ahead of his big day, and they invite all their buds. It’s very sweet because these three are the best, and also, it’s a fun way to see some characters interact who wouldn’t usually get the chance. Kurt Boggs and Sister Andrea? Sheryl talking up Leland to the monsignor? And you know I’ll always take a scene of Ben the Magnificent hanging out with the Bouchard girls. The party also gives Kristen a chance to check in with David about his feelings ahead of taking the plunge. He might say that he’s fine and just running through the usual doubts, but we, the audience, know he’s been having lots and lots of sex fantasies as of late. He’s questioning a lot.
The assessors head back to the psych building at 3 a.m. to see what this haunt is all about. It turns out to be a hell-week dare situation and really gets them nowhere. Until, that is, David ends up wandering around the building himself and comes across a giant, horned, winged creature eating the cadaver. (The thing gives off some major Midnight Mass vibes. Have you, an Evil viewer, watched Midnight Mass? You should.) When it notices David’s there, it goes after him, chasing him down the hallways. It’s pretty terrifying. When David makes it back to Kristen and Ben, the creature disappears. Neither Ben nor Kristen asks any follow-up questions about why David’s running down empty hallways and freaking out, which seems ridiculous. And that’s saying something for this show!
David has to download to someone who will believe him, so naturally, he chats with Sister Andrea. She does not tell him what he wants to hear. When he asks about how this vision could feel so real, she tells him: because it’s very real. They have a gift and the closer they are to God, “the more good and evil have a corporeal presence.” She even shows him a scar she has from one of her recent visions. This is a bridge too far for David. Why would he put himself through this? He says he wanted things to be normal, not crazier. As he storms out, much-needed booze in hand, Sister Andrea yells at him that the way other people live their lives, in darkness of what is going on, is crazy; they see things as they really are. It’s a good thing Sister Andrea is so willing to let these terrifying, very real visions come to her because later, that winged creature attacks her while she sleeps — she has a night terror in which she can barely move — and after it licks her face and talks to her about cannibalism, she grabs a crucifix from her bedside table and stabs the hell out of it. “You will not hurt David,” she yells before she wakes up from her dream.
Things get weirder, if you can believe it! David and Ben end up back at the creepy psych building after learning Mitch has chewed his way out of his precautionary zip ties. They find him screaming over the cadaver that he doesn’t want to do this but that the dead body is making him. Ben comes across a tattoo on the cadaver’s head, and, surprise but not surprisingly, it’s one of the demon sigils. The demon sigils!
Sister Andrea finally gives us a little more explanation about these sigils. They are the “family crests,” so to speak, of 60 demon houses. Before the head of a house dies, they must guarantee a successor. (Edward used this terminology when gifting Sheryl the head in a jar, remember? Of course you do, it was a head in a jar!) But Andrea adds on a new little piece of info — to do that, the former successor “must be consumed.” “Eaten,” she clarifies, just in case no one got that.
Now that we know Mitch is wrapped up in this demon-sigil situation, it makes sense that Leland is interested in taking this moment to begin his job as a volunteer overseeing the assessors for the church (his entire exorcism play was to gain this kind of access by getting the church to trust him). Kristen’s trying to interview Mitch so that they can officially perform an exorcism and help him when Leland knocks on the door. Kristen is NOT having this. The monsignor demands it, but that doesn’t mean Kristen has to be okay with it. Kristen hitting Leland repeatedly in the face with her high heels and then screaming, “This is me with help, Leland!” is a moment that I will cherish always.
It’s not the last time she’ll have to see Leland. He’s at David’s ordination, of course. While David’s up on the altar becoming a priest while imagining a steamy three-way, Kristen watches as Leland smiles at Lexis while on his way out of the church and hands her a note that says “daffodil.” She forces Lexis to tell her what’s happening: Apparently, Leland has been visiting Lexis at school and told her not to tell her mother. She says she thought he was just lonely after breaking up with Sheryl, but if he’s using that code word (the one Edward used when he wanted Sheryl to do him a favor), who knows what they’re really up to.
At home, Kristen is shaking with anger. It’s yet another evil person threatening her kids. She stares at that ice axe, and you can see her trying to fight her own urge here. She wants to kill Leland once and for all. She grabs the axe and leaves the house.
Meanwhile, Leland’s hosting a little get-together. The non-human-body-part of the spread looks great, to be honest. It’s a birthday party for Mitch, whom Leland convinced that eating a dead body isn’t a sin because it’s basically what Holy Communion is. He’s surrounded by a bunch of smiling people, including Sheryl, who we can assume are all heads of other sigil houses. Here, Mitch will take his place as successor. Leland has brought the cadaver to his home, cuts the sigil from his head, holds it up like it’s the demented brother of the Eucharist, and Mitch goes to town. His transformation is complete. The demons are getting stronger, people!!
So where did Kristen end up with that ice axe, if not at Leland’s? She knocks on David’s door. She’s still shaking. And then she empties herself in front of David. Even with those cleansings, she’s been holding on to so much. If you aren’t convinced, in this episode, Lexis tells her she smells like a dead person, and Kurt thinks it could be a symptom of her not fully dealing with killing Orson. She tells David she was about to kill Leland. She shows him the axe as proof. She needs him to hear her confession. She’s sobbing as she tells him about Orson and how she got away with it all and that she never, ever wants to do it again. Well, at least we know that Kristen hasn’t gone to the dark side — she is actively fighting against it. Good for her! Good for us!
What I really can’t stop thinking about here is Mike Colter’s performance. The way he moves from shock and denial to feeling like he’s maybe infringing on his friend’s privacy to wanting to do anything he can to help Kristen is a thing to behold! He holds her as he tells her she’s forgiven and it’s all over. He finally frees her from this burden, and then everything changes. They look at each other and kiss, softly at first, and then they go at it, no longer able to resist the temptation they’ve been fighting since they met. And if David really believes what he said during his priest interview that “God will not allow us to be tempted beyond our strength,” well, then this new priest is going to have a lot of guilt to grapple with. Wow, wow, that is one way to do Ordination Day, huh?
Church Bulletin
• Kurt Boggs is certainly unraveling a bit. At David’s party, he saddles up to Sister Andrea to first please all of us by interacting with these two characters and, more importantly, telling her about getting demon-booped. He probably wasn’t expecting her to tell him to get baptized because otherwise, “that demon that you saw will drag you into hell when you die.” Kurt, at the urging of his wife, decides to take two months off to decompress. That should be fun for Kristen!
• When Lexis needs to unwind, her book of choice is The Pop-Up Book of Terrifying Things. That feels right.
• So wait, not even a mention of Ben’s girlfriend(s) or Lexis’s tail? Also, I could really use more clarification on what Sheryl is up to. She remains a mystery. Did she “consume” Edward? Do I want to know the answer to that question?
• “If you ever hurt one of my granddaughters, I’ll cut off your dick.” Grandma of the year, over here!
