The Originals: Keepers of the House Recap and Review – The Hollow

KEEPERS OF THE HOUSE RECAP AND REVIEW

Joseph Morgan directed this week’s episode of The Originals in “Keepers of the House” as Hope’s life remains in the balance. Meanwhile, we learn more about the season’s Big Bad. Overall, it was a strong episode (with some wonderful directing from Morgan) though it also had some underwhelming character reveals.

RELATED The Originals: Haunter of Ruins Recap and Review – Father and Daughter (Plus More Impossible ‘Moonlight’ Theories)

KLAUS AND HOPE

Vincent uses magic to heal Hope. She wakes up. The little girl’s seemingly purified. However, just then, a bunch of dead crows falls to the ground.

“Can you hear that?” Hope asks. Whispers speaking Ancient Creole reveal “The Hollow is coming.”

With Hope now getting worse, Hayley opts to work with Marcel to find the culprits while leaving Klaus behind with Hope.

The two share a few sweet father and daughter moments. He promises to keep her safe always and forever and also tells her she has the warrior heart of a Mikaelson. While Hope tells Klaus she saw the other kids and makes him promise to not look at the blue lights.

ELIJAH AND VINCENT – THE NEW THREAT

Meanwhile, Vincent and Elijah form an unlikely (and very temporary) alliance to track down the new threat – which we learn is called The Hollow. Using Vincent’s magic, they discover Kinney’s part in the whole scenario; leaving Vincent destroyed that this “evil” not only took over his wife but has now taken control of his best friend.

Unfortunately, their hunt leads to the death of Detective Kinney, who could not resist the promise of The Hollow. That if you give it your loyalty it will save New Orleans from the evil that destroyed it. He also reminds Vincent that he’s in the middle of all of this, which worries Vincent to no end.

HAYLEY AND MARCEL

With the kids from the ambulance missing, Marcel turns to the witches to look for answers. But they don’t trust him. Hayley appears, pleading to the witches for help since her daughter is missing. And it seems to work, as one of the witches gives Hayley and Marcel a decent lead. The lead brings them to the Bayou to a werewolf girl named Laura who the witch saw drawing the ouroboros symbol in blood.

A penitent Laura reveals to Hayley and Marcel more about the Hollow. She says that the followers of the blue light are a group trying to take back the city from Marcel and the vampires. And that the Hollow wants power. The kind of power that only comes from sacrifice. Laura tells them it will feed and it will rise. “The Great Beast.”

Laura then kills herself believing that it is her only mercy to not be there to see it.

FREYA AND KEELIN

As everyone hunts The Hollow, Freya and Keelin work more toward the mixture that will destroy Marcel. They break into Marcel’s loft and take some of his stockpiled venoms. Keelin only agrees to help because Freya gives her a magical ring that keeps her from turning into a wolf; with a catch that is. If she tries to run away, Freya will turn her into a wolf. However, by the end, Freya has a change of heart. Because Keelin helps her, she alters the magical ring to “keep the benefits minus the leash.”

WORKING TOGETHER

Klaus, Hayley, Elijah, Marcel, and Vincent all come together to save the kids and defeat The Hollow, temporarily putting aside their differences. They find the followers of the blue light performing a ritual to sacrifice the children. While Hayley and Marcel save the kids, the rest of them fight. Klaus especially eager to end this “circus of sadists.”

They kill the followers and Klaus kills Will (somewhere Cami’s unhappy in the universe) hoping to end the ritual. But not before Will tells him that he can’t stop what’s coming.

And then Klaus and Marcel are taken into a vision inside a circle, the Hollow channeling their power and anchoring it to the living world. Vincent works to break the spell by linking the kids to Elijah and then staking him, leaving him temporarily dead.

Inside the circle, Klaus remembers Hope’s warning and tries to tell Marcel not to look at the blue lights.

Thankfully, Vincent’s plan works and the spell breaks. Hope wakes up, seemingly much better. And all of the children are returned to their parents. And once again, the Mikaelsons plan to leave the city once Hope’s better. In a nice exchange, Marcel tells Hayley to tell her daughter that she doesn’t need to fear him. “She never did.”

THE GOTHIC ENDING

The questions on everyone’s mind: Did they end it? Or is it just getting started?

As young Hope wanders the gothic compound with shots looking eerily similar to Cocteau’s La Belle et La Bete (a nice homage), Vincent questions Marcel about what he saw in the Circle during the spell. Marcel says, “nothing.”

Hope continues to go up the staircase with the flickering lights, all of which lead her to Klaus.

Lights begin to flicker for Marcel as well once Vincent leaves him behind in the bar. Flickers of blue light appear in his drink. Marcel turns to see a shattered mirror behind him. The gothic beauty and the beast imagery intrigues. Marcel looks into the blue lights and into the mirror which hints toward the beast within.

As Hope finds Klaus, he turns around only to reveal the blue lights in his eyes. He too is a monster. Hope screams and wakes up from her nightmare/vision.

“The Hollow is here.” Uh-oh.

THEORIES, THOUGHTS, AND QUESTIONS

The Will Reveal

I find myself rather disappointed (even frustrated) with the writers’ lack of originality in relation to Detective Kinney. What was the point of using Will as a reveal if not to answer some of the previous season’s unanswered questions? Or even to finally flesh out his character. YOU HAVE LOGAN ECHOLLS AND JOSEF KOSTAN FOR GOODNESS SAKE, SO USE HIM! Instead, he just gave into the Hollow in the same way Vincent’s wife did. So nothing about why he was interested in Cami and her family. Nothing about some of his strange behavior last season. Nothing about his odd timing and connection to Vincent. And nothing about last season’s prophecy (they never did reveal its origin by the way).

Kinney entered Vincent’s past at the same time the Hollow first appeared. And yet, the writers chose not to connect that. Why? It literally is just about showing how the Hollow can corrupt almost anyone. So Kinney aka Dohring has been used as nothing more than a plot device with a reveal that could have been given to any living, breathing character. That I find underwhelming and a real disappointment. There was so much story potential with Dohring that they simply wasted right up to the end.

The Hollow

As for the Hollow, it’s not an uninteresting villain. Not as entertaining as Lucien, Aurora, Tristan, and the Strix in the first half of season 3 but promising nonetheless. At this point, they’ve revealed quite a bit about The Hollow. What remains to be seen, however, is who this Great Beast will be. Will Marcel become a beast possessed by the Hollow? Another character we know? Or will some great ancient being appear in the form of a new character/actor we’ve yet to see? We’ll have to wait and see as the season plays out.

That all said, it’s become clear to me that The Hollow is about the monster within in a very Bronte-esque kind of way. The Hollow only has power if you let it have power. If you choose not to give into your darkness, it can’t consume you. That is why Vincent was able to fight its power. He chose light over dark. Will and Eva chose the dark. So, how then do you defeat “the devil?”

The Angel/White Wizard Theory

If the power of the Hollow has the ability to corrupt in a very “ring of power” sort of way, then shouldn’t there also be characters of light there to help destroy it?

The obvious answer to this is Hope. Using Hope in a similar way that Cami was used previously, she represents the “Beauty” archetype in this Beauty and all the Beasts story. While she has power, we haven’t seen anything to hint that she’s anything but good. Even at the end of the episode, the imagery quite clearly presented Hope as “Beauty,” while Klaus and Marcel were presented as the beasts. Yes, there is no romance here. But it’s a different kind of beauty and the beast tale now without Cami and Davina around.

Still, it’s an odd choice to go so atmospherically gothic without connecting the story to romance but perhaps the writers couldn’t figure out how to use both Hope and Cami in the story simultaneously. Only one could be the “beauty” character. Heaven forbid two female characters be the light (though they have begun to transform Hayley’s previously dark female character into a lighter one) when they have so many male characters representing the dark.

Still, right now, it seems the best way to defeat the Hollow is to 1) not give into its temptations and the beast within AND 2) Hope. A name that continues to represent its meaning.

However, that’s not the only possibility. Like Grimm and The Vampire Diaries, past characters who have died could also appear to help defeat the big bad. The power of the good ancestors, the power of the ghosts of New Orleans, etc…

In that way, I could see characters like Sophie, Cami, Davina, etc. reappear as “angels” to help them defeat the Hollow. We’ve already seen Cami this season as the symbolic angel on Klaus’s shoulder reminding him to be good.

But what if one of them were to resurrect or be reborn in a Gandalf/white wizard type of way to help defeat The Hollow? It would be clever to see the writers of The Originals use Tolkien’s storytelling technique, eucatastrophe. Meaning when all seems lost and all hope is gone, at the very last minute, something appears to change the tide from bad to good. So, it’s similar to deus ex machina – but not. Eucatastrophe is typically foreshadowed and works well in fantasy settings.

Hayley and Elijah

Trouble seems to be growing between the relationship between Hayley and Elijah. As a single mother, Hayley’s perspective has changed quite a bit about morality. While Elijah would have killed one of the kids to save Hope, Hayley reminds him that they have to stop making a habit out of putting their family’s lives ahead of others.

“We have to do better,” she tells him.

With Hayley’s shift in personality, their differing views could ultimately tear them apart. However, I hope at least one of the core romances on The Originals (Klaus and Cami, Hayley and Elijah, Marcel and Rebekah, Kol and Davina) get to have a happy ending of sorts.

The Freya and Keelin Relationship

As far as Keelin and Freya goes, it seems likely a romantic relationship will form between the two. Perhaps it’s the thing to do on popular vampire shows in season 4. AKA reveal the supporting female character is bisexual or lesbian. The Originals and Buffy the Vampire Slayer being particularly similar as Willow and Freya are also both powerful witches. Not sure of the reason for the repetition (True Blood did something similar with Tara in season 4 – though she wasn’t a witch and instead became a vampire) as the obvious comparisons are bound to happen. True Blood at the time was accused of copying Buffy.

So for such a similar character arc to happen on three different vampire shows now is sure to raise a few eyebrows. But maybe enough time has passed for people not to care or even notice. Though if this story is simply meant to lead to Keelin’s death, well we know how well that went for the writers of The 100. That said, The Originals does have an overwhelming need to kill female characters in order to propel the stories of male characters.

The past season and a half especially have been overwhelmingly about the women supporting the men. Or the death of female characters causing the men pain and propelling them to be the heroes or villains they’re meant to be. Even Hayley now (not a female character previously known for being the conscience of the show) has changed personalities as a mother to be more supportive of the men. “Do better!”

The only adult female character with an actual story right now is Freya – sort of – because it’s still about finding a cure for her brothers. Hayley’s only role is to be the mother with no story of her own outside of that. Whereas Klaus, Marcel, Vincent, and Elijah all get to struggle with the monsters within. So Klaus can be both “Father” and “beast.” Hayley can only be “Mother.” I hope that changes as the season continues. But ever since the second half of season 3, there has been a real female problem on the show. I’m not sure why.

Personally, as of now, I’m mostly neutral to the Keelin/Freya relationship. And I don’t think it’s an antidote to the female problem. That said, I’m much more interested in the idea of finding a cure to suppress vampirism and to cure Marcel’s venom through science. I’m hoping they don’t drop this science plot as it has a lot of story potential.

Well, what did you think of “Keepers of the House?” Let me know in the comments!

Till next week…

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