SLEEPY HOLLOW Recap: ‘The Weeping Lady’

Every week is Halloween on SLEEPY HOLLOW, but this episode feels especially suited to the season, doesn’t it? The Weeping Lady is classically spooky. She’s a local legend made real, and she has a connection to Crane. Moloch could probably play Six Degrees of Ichabod Crane with his whole army at this point.

The War

Caroline, the Revolutionary War reenactor who stocks Ichabod’s closet, stops by his place with new clothes and some freshly churned butter. She makes a pass at him, but she leaves in a hurry after he tells her that he’s married. Unwilling to lose one of the few friends he has in Sleepy Hollow, Crane shows up at Caroline’s door to apologize in person. He even bows to her, because Ichabod Crane does not take gallantry lightly.

Caroline tells Ichabod that all is well, and she’ll see him next week. A figure upstairs has other plans. The woman’s eyes are green, she weeps into her flowing black veil, and she seems to be surrounded by a haze of water. She lunges at Caroline, whose body is recovered from the river the next morning. Crane, visibly upset, vows to find his friend’s killer.

Abbie finds tire tracks further upstream and assumes that they’ve stumbled upon a lovers’ lane. All lovers’ lanes lead to high school spirit squads. Cutting to the heart of the students’ gossip network, Crane and Abbie manage to track down two kids who were out beneath the bridge on the night of Caroline’s murder. Crazy as it sounds, the kids insist that they heard the Weeping Lady.

Crane and Abbie head to the library to learn more about the local legend, but Crane’s research is interrupted by a crow at the window. Thanks to Henry’s enchantment, Katrina can’t use magic within Abraham’s estate, but she does manage to summon a crow as her carrier pigeon. I’m not entirely sure why she wastes that much energy on a letter that contains absolutely no inside secrets, but she probably has a lot of time to kill, and sending a love note to Ichabod is never a bad way to pass the hour. She tells him that she’s well and that she misses him. He tucks the letter into his pocket.

On the other side of the library, Abbie runs into Hawley, who’s reading up on the monsters of Sleepy Hollow. To apologize for his flakiness, he promises to help the next time they meet a mysterious creature. That time comes sooner than either of them expect; the Weeping Lady is wailing in the corner of the library. She drags Abbie through some kind of portal into the river.

Ichabod manages to reach through the portal and pull Abbie back to him, but she isn’t breathing. He panics, assuming that he’s lost her. (Add “mouth to mouth resuscitation” to the list of modern skills that Ichabod will have to learn immediately.) Hawley runs over and administers CPR. After a quick visit from the “mobile doctors,” Abbie is back in business, and she brought a piece of the Weeping Lady’s veil with her. Crane recognizes the pattern.

The veil is made of a specific lace that once belonged to Mary Wells, the woman to whom Ichabod was promised at a young age. When he left for the colonies, they agreed to break off their betrothal, but Mary assumed that Ichabod was only breaking up with her because he expected to die in battle. She went to America to retrieve him, only to find that he still had no interest in marrying her. Mary blamed Katrina, who was engaged to Abraham at the time, and left in a huff.

The next day, Ichabod received a note from Mary, apologizing for her behavior and officially releasing him. She said that she was going back to England, but Abbie and Ichabod consider the possibility that she never left. If the Weeping Lady is Mary, that explains why she’s targeting women close to Ichabod. Katrina may be next, especially since her note to Ichabod is no longer in his pocket. It must have fallen into the water through the portal in the library.

Crane and Abbie borrow a crossbow from Hawley and head to Abraham’s estate, but they’re too late. The Weeping Lady has already pulled Katrina into the water. Katrina uses magic to escape; Abbie and Crane find her in the woods and bring her up to speed on Mary. Given the black magic it would take to bring Mary back, Katrina suspects that Henry is responsible. She can undo the spell and give Mary’s soul some peace, but only by using black magic herself. Since Sleepy Hollow is “all out of witches,” Abbie volunteers to be her anchor.

Abbie and Katrina restore Mary’s soul just in time, but when Ichabod asks why she never went back to England, Mary points at Katrina. As it turns out, she asked to meet Katrina by the water on her first night in Sleepy Hollow. When Mary confronted Katrina, she fell to her death. To keep Ichabod from returning to England with the body of his betrothed, Katrina used an enchantment spell to forge a letter in Mary’s handwriting. Ichabod barely has time to process this betrayal before the Horseman of Death rides up with revenge in mind.

Katrina uses magic and persuasion to keep Abraham from killing Ichabod. She returns to her captivity, but she remains convinced that Henry brought Mary back in order to make Ichabod doubt her. Moloch scolds Henry for going rogue; he wants Katrina turned, not dead. He calls Katrina a Hellfire Shard and says that she’s an important vessel in his mission.

The Key Players

This episode settles a few big questions about Katrina, particularly where her magic is concerned. She can’t use it because Henry enchanted Abraham’s estate. Here’s hoping she escapes that estate permanently as soon as possible, because she’s much more interesting with her powers than she is as a helpless observer — although even in full witch mode, she’s still just a pawn in Moloch’s plan. What is a Hellfire Shard? Does it have anything to do with Abraham’s desire to bind Katrina to him?

In other news, Hawley seems to be acquainting himself to the mysteries of Sleepy Hollow. He isn’t ready to dive in quite yet, but he’s getting there. When Jenny returns his crossbow, she kisses him and leaves him wanting more. This isn’t the first time they’ve done that, either. Stringing men along looks good on Jenny.

The Witnesses

It’s official: Abbie and Ichabod have been mistaken for husband and wife. And while it’s unfortunate that mouth to mouth resuscitation wasn’t a common thing in Ichabod’s time, the way he frantically says her name — her first name, not “Leftenant” or “Miss Mills” — is proof enough of the care he has for his partner. Katrina’s betrayal only pushes Ichabod closer to Abbie, reminding him that their duty is to each other before all else. Their relationship is the heart of the show, and it looks like Katrina is being moved out of the way, not just by Moloch, but by her own actions. I’m guessing that she’ll find a way to redeem herself in her husband’s eyes, but I’m not sure how long it will last.

What did you think of the episode?

Follow @GiveMeMyRemote and @_kellyQ on Twitter for the latest TV news. Connect with other TV fans on GIVE ME MY REMOTE’s official Facebook page.

And be the first to see our exclusive videos by subscribing to our YouTube channel at youtube.com/givememyremotetv