Monday, October 31, 2022

A Strange Halloween - Netflix Retrospective - Locke and Key Season 1 Episodes 9-10

Within the sea cave, behind the black door
Lays an evil one cannot simply ignore
A lady of the well, both Lucas and Dodge
Have plans laid that are hard to dislodge

The family killer, a tragic regret
And a night that Matheson will not forget
Dodge has more keys, to use in her game
Including the one that sets things aflame

Knowing the consequence, seeing the dread
He put the Omega key inside his head
But ashes to ashes his secret’s revealed
At least the Lockes know to keep it concealed

The keys have their keepers, until they drop dead
Descendants now follow, in footsteps they tread
But another secret is yet to be seen
It will all be revealed on A Strange Halloween.





It’s our final look at Locke and Key, as both sides converge on the Black Door, who will prevail? Let’s find out.

Echoes

6 months ago, Ellie, serving as a track teacher, brings back her students before receiving the news herself that Rendel Locke had been shot, she calls Mark saying what happened is all her fault, and the events lead to Mark killing himself and destroying his house with the matchstick key.

3 months ago, Ellie receives a knock at the door, from Lucas, saying he needs her help. We see her let herself into key house and begin searching, she finds something in the rafters, a crown of sorts. This is what she was really doing when Nina caught her that time. Unfortunately, without the key, the crown doesn’t serve much of a purpose. And now we find out why Ridgeway had to go, he managed to get a picture of Ellie and Lucas together.

Ellie had hoped to just talk the phone off him but Lucas decides to kill him, and leave Ellie there with the body, she manages to run back. She then unloads a full round of bullets into Lucas, but it does absolutely nothing. Lucas is now threatening Rufus if Ellie doesn’t do as he says.

Bode comes in, having found the matchstick key, yeah, he just found it outside, strange. They finally decide to let Bode in on the memory jars and he holds the final piece of making things make sense, he sees Lucas from the memory and recognises him as the guy at Rufus’ house. Lucas instructs Ellie to find the Omega key in the ashes.

Bode skips school to pay Rufus a visit and explains to him about Lucas. Rufus in turn shows him the crown, missing a key with an insignia Bode says he recognises. Eden gets a fright from Kinsey’s fear, and confronts Kinsey about it, but Kinsey is more concerned with getting answers out of Ellie, she doesn’t get much.

Nina takes what’s left of the alcohol and pours it down the sink. As Tyler and Kinsey discuss letting other people help against dodge, Eden comes back for another round, Kinsey has no idea what she’s talking about until her fear attacks again. She and Logan help fend it off.

Ellie arrives at Keyhouse, eyeing the urn but decides to turn around and head home. With Dodge away, they’re packing to leave but Rufus shows his worth by revealing he’s secretly gathered the keys, he’s the one who left the matchstick key for Bode to find.

Revealing the truth comes with consequences, Eden takes it in stride, somehow, but Jackie is less than enthused. Gabe and Scot arrive to check up and Kinsey decides to be honest with both of them. Basically, she wants to not have to choose between them, and I think Scot is somewhat offended. It’s interrupted by a call from Ellie, who asks to meet at Keyhouse. Nina stops by a church, intending to attend an AA-meeting, but decides she really isn’t in the right mindset.

Ellie explains the truth. After graduation, the gang had a sleepover where they went down to the caves, Rendel had become obsessed with opening the Black Door. When they did, blue bullets came out and Lucas was hit. He seemed fine at first, but she has opened her mind with the head key to show them the rest. Lucas starts threatening the others for the omega key, killing Jet and Kim before Rendel can kill him with a hammer like they saw in Duncan’s memory.

They use the head key to remove his memories of the incident and other memories. They throw the bodies into the sea to create the cover of them drowning in the sea cave, they split the keys with each of them holding one or two of the keys, whilst the rest were split up around the house. Ellie spent most of the following years grieving for her lost love, and a year ago finally hit her breaking point, using the echo key on the wellhouse door to try and bring Lucas back, but it wasn’t Lucas who came back, it the was the entity that possessed him, now free of the limitations of the human body.

Meanwhile, Body finally remembers where he saw the key to the Crown of Shadows, and Ellie rather stupidly decides to take that key with her to get the crown. Naturally Lucas is there, knocks out Rufus and gets the key, and uses it to activate the crown.

The pieces finally start to come together, but man allowing her to take the key with her to get the crown is the dumbest idea.

Rating 7.5/10

Crown of Shadows

Ellie and the detective have coffee together, so she can be out of the action for today’s episode. The Locke siblings are confronted by Dodge and her shadow army, shadows that easily make into the house in the dark. But they disappear the moment that the lights are on, so it becomes a quest to turn on all the lights in the house. Unfortunately, Dodge’s creatures also know that and the room soon turns dark. Kinsey goes to trip the breaker and has to fight off more shadows.

Bode uses the matchstick key against the shadow monsters and it seemingly knocks her out, though the crown of shadows is missing. They can’t put Dodge back in the wellhouse without the Echo Key, their next best bet is sending her back to the shadow dimension using the black door and the omega key. To help Jackie, Eden, Scot and Gabe have arrived, with Jackie apologising for her reaction to all this.

Lucky for them, it’s just past low tide, so it’s safe to bring her through. Bode goes to see Rufus, and finds him unconscious, Ellie nowhere to be seen. The cave is dry enough for them to just walk through. Kinsey is beginning to show worry uncharacteristic for someone without fear. Kinsey gives fair warning to everyone about what they’re about to do, she then opens the door with the key and the gang all open the door.

Dodge wakes up and grabs Tyler as they force her through, he manages to free himself just in time, more glowing bullets fire out as the close the door. They get back to the house and Scot rejects Kinsey’s double-date proposal. The police answer the call regarding Rufus, Rufus is taken to the hospital but gives Bode back the head key, still no sign on Ellie at this stage.

Bode asks the others but they’re certain it was Dodge they brought back. The next morning Ellie is still missing and Rufus is likely to be staying with his aunt and uncle in Nebraska. Nina gives a family meeting about how she’s realised that it was a mistake taking them here and offers them the chance to go home. The house has been done up enough to sell.

None of the others want to leave and Nina ultimately relents on the issue, group hug. Bode writes a postcard to Rufus as everyone’s trying to figure out what happened to her. Bode, Tyler and Kinsey are officially the keepers of the keys. The family say their final goodbye as they chuck Rendel’s ashes off the cliff into ocean, like his former friends, that’s sweet, I guess.

Kinsey has turned down art school to hang out with Gabe over the summer and suddenly our viewpoint switches to him. Lots of scenes of him subtly manipulating Kinsey and time for the first big bombshell, Gabe is another form of dodge. She also used the identity key to make Ellie into a copy of Dodge, that she can use as a decoy. It was actually Ellie they threw into the void. And just to make matters worse, we see one of the demon bullets hit Eden in the arm, something Gabe/Dodge took notice of and has taken of as a new partner.

The finale portion of this finale feels over with way too quickly, with the larger chunk of the episode dedicated to setting up the next season. This is happening way too often and is not a pattern I’ve come to appreciate.

Rating 7/10

With the trap they have sprung, they think they have won
But it’s clear the Locke’s fight has barely begun.
Turns out that Dodge was actually Gabe
And it’s Ellie they’ve trapped within the Sea Cave

Dodge scored a victory, opened the door
It seems as if she sought something more
Within the next season there’s more to be seen
But that is for another Strange Halloween

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