overnights

Mayfair Witches Recap: Well That Was Infuriating

Mayfair Witches

Second Line
Season 1 Episode 3
Editor’s Rating 1 stars

Mayfair Witches

Second Line
Season 1 Episode 3
Editor’s Rating 1 stars
Photo: Vulture; Photo: Alfonso Bresciani/AMC

Well, Mayfair Witches continues its semi-lucid plod along a storyline while I, your dogged tour guide, plod dutifully along with it. The third episode answered even fewer of my questions than the last, while the questions it raised have become just boringly vague. What’s up with this creepy family? can only sustain one’s interest for so long, especially after you’ve killed off the only character with any clear objective — or even, like, a shred of internality. Deirdre’s death (apparently she really is dead, unfortunately) sends Ciprien Grieve into whodunit territory, leaving Rowan — who does nothing that is not by accident — to meander around town until she is supernaturally drugged and seduced by Lasher.

“Second Line” does at least settle any lingering doubts about Aunt Carlotta’s moral compass, which is sincerely fucked. As for our Scottish ladies, I have to assume they are the Mayfair witch ancestors, because the show has given me literally no other explanation for why we are opening with these random women once again. Why should I care about this woman who was gored by a wild boar, show? You have to give me a reason.

But it wasn’t just the slow pacing, lack of agency from the protagonist, or losing the only interesting character that so deeply irked me about this episode. It was also the cheap screenwriting sleight of hand in the Grieve plot. After depositing Rowan in his magically fortified apartment, Grieve sets off to investigate Deirdre’s murder — who could have gotten on the elevator, slit her throat, and then gotten back off, all without her ever seeming to realize it? — except Grieve’s “gift” is that he can just lay his hand on a thing and get an instant replay of the whole event in his mind.

That makes sense, I think, when Grieve can’t get a read on the hotel elevator because someone has interfered with the magic signal. Because it obviously can’t be that easy. Actually, all Grieve has to do is touch Deirdre’s body directly (why wasn’t the morgue his first stop?), which he promptly does, and the mystery is solved. But the episode still needs some kind of tension, right? So the writing simply doesn’t tell us who Grieve saw getting on the elevator with Deirdre so as to keep the mystery running on fumes for as long as it can. It feels like narrative, but it’s actually nothing. It’s incredibly annoying.

We do know that the murderer is a “him” because Grieve says on the phone, “I saw it. He stopped the elevator and got in with her,” adding, “That’s all I saw.” Maybe that’s a tease that this is all a red herring, but then again maybe it’s not. Perhaps what Grieve saw has something to do with the ambiguously menacing interlude between Cortland and Lasher earlier in the episode. “You’re heartbroken, I know,” Cortland tells Lasher. “I loved her, too.” Lasher glowers evilly. It seems like Cortland may have killed Deirdre so that Lasher could do whatever he needs to do with “the 13th witch,” but we’ll have to wait until Grieve tells us, the viewers, to know anything at all. This is the opposite of dramatic irony, or what literary critics call Bad Writing.

The fatal flaw of Mayfair Witches may be its habit of setting up plot points that immediately become irrelevant. Why did Grieve’s boss recruit dozens of his co-workers to come apply protective charms to his apartment building out of their little magic aerosol cans if they didn’t actually protect against anything? Shouldn’t these supernatural defenses have been able to at least hide Rowan’s location? Are they not flame retardant? Because they didn’t stop Lasher from smoking Rowan out of her hiding spot with baffling ease by just … starting a fire.

In another, better show, Rowan could have left the apartment of her own accord because she wanted to do her own investigation into who (or what) killed Deirdre, given that unraveling her own origin story is the reason she flew all the way out here in the first place. But Rowan is either uninterested in Deirdre’s death or just sufficiently freaked by Grieve’s dire warnings that she’s happy to stay put — until her not-so-impenetrable fortress is breached about an hour later and she’s chased out of the apartment by the fire alarm. Now that she’s already outside Rowan decides it’s probably not that dangerous after all, shrugs, and starts wandering in the general direction of the Mayfair House. I would ask why, but the show would probably just set off the fog machine and make woo-woo noises in my ear until I forgot what I had been asking about.

I’m also not going to ask about Grieve’s sister Odette, who I assume is going to go the way of the hot bartender, the priest, Dr. Keck, and the woman who answered Ellie’s phone call in episode one, and disappear into the ether, never to be referenced again.

Anyway, Rowan is not exactly on high alert for the unknown entity she’s been told is hunting her as she comes upon a funeral parade. She pauses to contemplate life, death, motherhood, daughterhood, adoption, surrogacy, the life of the dead guy maybe, snacks, who knows. All of Rowan’s manic paranoia has been suddenly replaced by blissful guilelessness. Perhaps I’ve been hardened by the mean streets of New York City, but if a strange woman started pushing unidentified beverages on me in the middle of the road, I would simply keep moving. Rowan thinks it’s probably fine, though, downs whatever Jungle Juice is in the beaker she’s handed, and allows herself to be dragged into this stranger’s funeral to dance. A brief vision confirms that this lady is actually Lasher in disguise, but Rowan doesn’t see this.

Soon our brave heroine is dancing the dance of a woman who has just consumed a particularly potent dose of MDMA (not that I would know, of course), when who should she bump into but Lasher, who is wearing a Mardi Gras mask. Sure. “What’s your name,” she asks hazily. He tells her it’s Adonis. “That’s your real name?” Rowan skeptically replies, using her last remaining critical thinking skills. “It’s my name tonight,” Lasher says, which sounds like a line he picked up from The Game. Rowan swoons, they kiss, the undead are partying, and then Lasher peels off, luring Rowan’s shimmying, pajama-clad booty to the Mayfair House.

This time the bait is a vision of Rowan’s dead birthmother, as opposed to her dead adoptive mother. Ghost Deirdre clasps Rowan’s hands and passionately assures her, “You’re not dead,” a fact I did not realize was at issue. Suddenly, Ghost Deirdre’s face glitches and Rowan realizes she’s been had. Honestly, this all feels like a lot of wasted effort on Lasher’s part, because Rowan was already on her way to the Mayfair House, but whatever.

As long as we’re on the subject, let’s check in on the Mayfair House, shall we? Aunt Carlotta is grief-stricken over Deirdre’s death and sobbing on Aunt No. 2’s lap (she does exist!). They quickly determine they need to get their hands on Deirdre’s daughter, so Aunt No. 2 suggests they get Rowan to come to them by hosting a wake for Deirdre. Again, there’s no need, because Rowan is already trying to get there.

The second problem facing the aunts is what to do about Him — meaning Lasher — because he’s dangerous when he’s out and about. Lasher is tied to the skeleton key necklace somehow, so Carlotta’s solution is to force the necklace onto Delphine, the Black woman who has been working for the family for 42 years, then trap her in the basement. Under Lasher’s influence, Delphine is next seen bashing her own head repeatedly into the cement wall. The aunts decide this is “worth it” because they are affirmatively evil.

The episode wraps up with Rowan safely back at Grieve’s apartment, where they decide to hold hands. This is a dangerous proposition because it will allow Grieve to see everything that’s in Rowan’s brain and because Rowan may accidentally kill him. Here’s hoping.

Loose Ends, Predictions, and Concerns

• Of course Carlotta and what’s-her-face sleep in twin beds side by side.

• I’m still waiting for clarity on how Ellie was connected to the Mayfairs.

• I would guess that there’s supposed to be something romantic brewing between Grieve and Rowan if it weren’t for the utter absence of chemistry.

• Cortland snooping through Rowan’s bag can’t be a good sign.

• Do we think the medical examiner’s Anti-Witch Brotherhood is going to come up again? With this show, who knows.

Mayfair Witches Recap: Well That Was Infuriating