‘Being Human’ 4.03 Episode Recap and Review: Lil’ Smokie

Sally’s really getting into her reading and Aidan’s in tight with the new King of Boston on this week’s Being Human!

Sally has been making an effort to learn all of the spells in Donna’s book, but it’s a bit more trouble than she expected. The pages keep rewriting themselves, erasing some spells and adding new ones. Aidan is definitely not a fan of the whole project Josh and Nora are frankly ambivalent.

Aidan heads to the hospital with Josh, but gets “detained” (read: kidnapped) by a couple of vamps in the funeral home van. They take him to Kenny, who reveals that he’s the new head honcho in Boston. Kenny shows his vamp dad around the new place, a schmancy live feeding club. He explains that his mutations were the vampy version of chicken pox; they went away with a little time. He wants Aidan to join back up and help him run the city as a father-son duo. Aidan refuses, saying that he’s done the whole leadership thing and it’s not his bag. Kenny looks pretty hurt and drowns his sorrows in a blonde fang-banger after Aidan leaves. Oddly enough, his mutations seem to come back when he’s feeding, but he’s able to compel the girl to forget.

Back at the hospital, Josh is having a little trouble getting back into the swing of things. His senses are going haywire and he first impresses, then subsequently freaks out on a new doctor. Josh goes on a run to clear his head, but he almost wolfs out on a fellow jogger. He ends up flipping out at the hospital again and knocking over the new doc he’d been talking to. Josh goes home to change for yet another run, but this one seems to be less of a good idea. He gets cornered by a couple of vamps out to take him down. He overpowers them by undergoing half a transformation mid-fight. Josh calls Aidan to come get him and tells him all about what just went down.

Aidan goes back to Kenny, who admits that he sent the vamps after Josh. He was jealous and had hoped that taking out Josh would bring Aidan back. The kid promises to stay away from Aidan’s friends and family from now on, then reveals his little mutation secret. The mutations never actually went away. Kenny’s able to compel even vampires to see what he wants them to see. It looks like they’re headed towards a touching reconciliation when Kenny gets a call. Someone has taken out all of the vamps in his club. A review of the security cam footage (‘cause Kenny is a modern vamp) reveals that the Slayer is none other than Susanna.

The girls seem to be in their own episode, for the most part. Sally finds a spell that supposedly summons her door, but when she tries it, all it summons is Donna. They have it out and Sally ends up burning the book in order to get rid of Donna. When she does, all of the spells from the book end up in Sally’s head, even the ones that had been disappearing. Later, Sally and Nora have a girl-bonding moment over getting out of abusive relationships, and Sally offers to use a spell from the book to get rid of Nora’s scarring. They go through with the non-blood-magicky spell, the effects of which pull Sally back to the house in the 1970s. She sees the same little girl who was getting sacrificed during Sally’s last time trip, but isn’t able to do anything about it. When she gets back, Nora’s scars are gone, but something else has changed, too. The new wallpaper in Josh and Nora’s room falls to reveal the words “Don’t leave me!” written in blood. Nora can’t see them, but Sally thinks they’re a cry for help from the little girl.

Alright, we’ve all been watching the same show. Can one of my fantastic readers explain to me why Aidan wasn’t all Team Kenny when the kid came back with all the appearance of having his act together? Later in the episode, after the attack on Josh and the crazy “I can compel vampires” thing (start hitting the vervain now, Aidan), I understand the reluctance. But isn’t that initial rejection what set off the attack in the first place? So much for that much-vaunted sire bond. Not cool, Aidan.

I’m really liking Josh’s part-wolf twist. I’ve love to see this become something he learns to control, rather than something they end up magicking away by the end of the season. I admit, in my head I’m seeing Josh become a more suburban version of Lost Girl’s Dyson. I grant that the whole idea is a bit too neat and happy for the kind of show that we know Being Human loves to be, but a girl can dream, right? Just as long as we never see Josh dancing shirtless to “Hungry Like the Wolf”.

Best Quote:
Josh: “Seriously, when is the administration going to catch on that you, me, and Nora are like the worst nurses ever?”

Things to Ponder:

• Well, obviously the book burning into Sally is going to cause issues, but what?
• There’s probably a different explanation, but for now I’m going to go with Susanna being a vampire vampire-hunter. Like Blade (kinda) or Mikael from TVD.
• Why in God’s name would you make a small-ish bedroom look even smaller by putting dark brown wallpaper on every wall? (Yes, this went through my mind during the show. No, I’m not sorry.)