Visionary

Visionary is episode eight of MTV's Teen Wolf Season 3.

Synopsis
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Full Recap

 * Editors Note: Portions of this episode happen in the past. We know it is sometime prior to the Hale House Fire, more than six years ago, but that is the only indication of just when these events took place. We are told some of the character's ages at the time but the issue is confused by a lack of information about their current ages. The production seems to have left the standing sets unaltered for this episode so computer monitors, signage and other visual cues give no indication of the time period.

In the past, Derek Hale (age 15) runs through a foggy wood. He trips and falls in front of one of the hunters’ ultrasonic emitters, a device which broadcasts a high pitch designed to herd werewolves in a certain direction. More than a dozen hunters are in the woods with flashlights, guns and crossbows.

Young Derek runs into another young man who recognizes him as “a Hale” just before an arrow pierces through the back of the young man’s neck and lodges in his throat. Stunned, Derek just stands there as a hunter takes aim at him with a crossbow. As the shaft flies toward him, his Uncle Peter steps up and grabs it out of the air. Both boys run.

Gerard and Chris Argent, flanked by several other hunters, approach the young man’s dead body. Chris says the dead man “killed two of ours” and orders the hunters to find Peter and Derek but to bring them in alive according to the Hunter’s Code.

Derek and Peter take refuge in the basement of an abandoned house. There is a large tree growing up through the foundation.

In the present at Derek’s Loft, Cora explains to Stiles that her uncle and brother were in the basement hiding for two days. She says “hide and heal” is what werewolves are taught to do when the hunters find them.

Stiles is impatient with Cora’s story. He doesn’t understand how it will help him find Derek in the here and now. He indicates that Derek has not been seen since Boyd’s death. Stiles thinks, since everyone seems to be after Derek, that he should be around to deal with the crisis.

Cora says Derek has changed since she knew him. Peter elaborates saying Derek was once like Scott. Derek was apparently once “unbearably romantic” and “profoundly narcissistic”. Peter says Derek’s experience with a girl changed his personality and the color of his eyes from yellow to blue.

Scott and Allison visits Gerard to find out what he knows about the Alpha Pack. The old man forces Scott to take away some of his pain before he will talk to them.

In the past, a girl named Paige (Madison Blaine McLaughlin) is practicing the cello in the Beacon Hills High School Music Classroom. The noise from a bouncing basketball in the hallway is competing with her metronome and screwing up the steady rhythm.

She steps into the hall where a group of teenage boys and Young Derek Hale are bouncing the ball. She asks them to stop. Derek cockily tells her he will stop if she can take the ball. She makes a few half-hearted attempts at a steal as Derek shows off with trick dribbling. She then just turns around and returns to the Music Room.

Derek follows and apologizes. He asks her name but she refuses to tell him unless he “can play one instrument in this room”. He spends a short amount of time scanning shelves stacked with musical instruments before returning to her with something behind his back.

He produces a triangle and strikes it gently with the metal beater producing a single clear note. She acquiesces and says her name is “Paige”. He offers his name but she says “I know who you are”.

Because a third healer was found dead right after Dr. Deaton was rescued, Gerard hints that Deaton is behind the Darach’s killing spree. He suggests that Deaton staged his kidnapping and, knowing he would survive, had the third victim strung up already. Scott protests saying Deaton would never let anyone innocent die. Gerard says Scott would be surprised how far someone would go to get rid of someone like Deucalion. “Or someone like you?” Allison quips.

Gerard laughs and says the events of Season 2 (See Master Plan) have turned him into a celebrity with his doctors. He is now almost cancer free but no one can figure out why he continues to produce and expel the viscous black fluid from his nose and mouth.

Scott becomes impatient and demands that Gerard tell them how to beat Deucalion. Gerard says “you can’t. I’ve tried.” Allison stands up and heads toward the door saying Gerard has wasted their time. The old man calls for her to wait. Then Gerard offers up the cryptic advice that Deucalion has lost his eyes but that he’s not always blind.

Stiles is confused. According to Peter’s story, Derek was a sophomore when he fell for Paige. Stiles wants to know his age at the time, he also questions Peter’s age back then and now. He gets the cryptic response “not as young as we could have been but not as old as you might think” as Peter avoids the question. He then asks Cora her age. She responds that he is 17 which Stiles finds a satisfyingly direct answer. Then she further confuses and frustrates the topic by saying “17 how you would measure in years”. Stiles drops the question of werewolf ages.

Peter continues his tale of Derek’s whirlwind teenage romance with Paige. Derek had a favorite getaway, an abandoned distillery outside Beacon Hills. While Peter claims Derek told him all this because Peter was his nephew’s closest friend and confidant, we see that he is lying to Stiles. Peter was actually spying on Derek and Paige as they made-out in the distillery. The couple’s encounter is cut short when Derek smells blood and hears people approaching. They leave the distillery but Peter remains behind and watches as Ennis, Kali and Deucalion arrive with their packs in full.

Ennis is angry. He points to a frayed rope hanging from the ceiling and indicates that it was in that spot that the Argents killed one of his Betas. Kali wants to know why she should care about another’s pack. One of her Betas speaks up and says the Argents don’t discern between packs when they come after a werewolf.

Deucalion points out that the hunters do discern motive. One of Deucalion’s Betas, Marco (Delon de Metz) says that Ennis’ dead Beta had been young and naive and had killed a hunter. Ennis says it was an accident.

Gerard picks up the tale from that point. He explains to Scott and Allison that each member of the current Alpha Pack had once gathered in Beacon Hills with their own packs to seek guidance and advice from Alpha Talia Hale. Derek’s mother was well known and widely respected in the werewolf community partly because she had the rare ability to fully shape-shift into a full wolf.

Talia explains to Deucalion that vendetta is Ennis’ right and that they are not the only people to adhere to rituals “thousands of years old”. Deucalion says that’s no excuse for not evolving. Ennis has grown tired of the “useless debate”. He yells that the hunters ripped out his Beta’s claws one by one when they tortured him. Deucalion begs him not to become an “historical cliché”. He cautions that a battle between two such powers will never end at “an eye for an eye”. Deucalion believes it will escalate to all-out war if Ennis pursues vendetta against the Argents.

Ennis doesn’t care. He uses his claws to make an enormous spiral, slicing it into a wall of corrugated metal so fast that the metal sparks and heats up to the point that it is glowing.

Peter draws a similar spiral with his finger on the condensation collecting on the window in Derek’s Loft and explains to Stiles that it is their symbol for vendetta. Stiles, referencing Peter’s own revenge fueled killing spree in Season 1, says werewolves take the revenge thing to a whole new level. Cora says it’s not just about revenge. She says losing a member of the pack is more painful than losing a member of your family she says “it’s like you lose a limb”.

Peter then relates how Beacon Hills’ authorities wouldn't let Ennis see the body of his dead Beta. We see a distraught Ennis menacing an orderly at Beacon Hills Hospital. Deputy Stilinski arrives and tries to calm Ennis explaining that they are investigating the death as a homicide. He further explains that no matter how close Ennis was to the deceased, they were not family. Ennis, still angry but also heartbroken, says “he was family to me”.

Peter says he looked at Ennis’ situation and saw profound loss but that Derek saw opportunity to always be with Paige. This is a lie. The truth was the opposite.

In the past, Young Derek sits in class using his heightened senses to listen to Paige play Franz Schubert’s Ave Maria. He makes his way to the Music Classroom and tries to distract her from her “laser-like focus” on playing by gently brushing his lips along the outside of her ear. It works and she stops playing. They declare their love for one another and kiss.

Peter then claims that Derek lived in constant fear that Paige would find out he was a werewolf but we see, in the past, that this is another lie. It was Peter who went to great links to convince Derek that if Paige found out it would end their relationship.

Young Peter wants to know why Paige eats alone. Young Derek threatens to have him banned from campus but Peter says no one would ban him because he’s too good looking. He questions if Paige has any friends. Derek says she does but that she likes to study during lunch and he thinks she doesn't like his friends. Peter says no one should like Derek’s friends calling them “hormonal half-wits”. He then opines that Derek and Paige are perfect for each other. He says “perfect combinations are rare” while opening and eating a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup (a bit of product placement and a visual pun since the company often touts their “perfect combination” of peanut butter and chocolate as a selling point.)

Peter then goes on to plant the seed that Derek should turn Paige into a werewolf so she won’t leave him.

Derek continues to lie to Stiles and Cora claiming that he tried to talk Derek out of turning Paige even though we see, in the past, Peter telling Derek to have one of the Alphas who have come to town to bite and turn Paige.

Gerard and Chris Argent are examining the basement where Peter and Derek hid from the hunters. They notice the large tree growing out of the foundation and a symbol painted on its trunk.

Chris explains that it is a five-fold knot a druid symbol and that the blood on the trunk of the tree indicates some sort of sacrifice took place there. He says the basement is a “Nemeton”, a sacred space for ancient druids. According to Chris, druids picked a large, older tree in a grove to represent the center of the world. Many believed that cutting or harming the tree would bring severe problems like fires, plagues, strife, “death and destruction of all kinds” to surrounding villages.

Allison questions Gerard about why her father would know so much about druids. Gerard says “know thy enemy” and goes on to describe the relationship ancient werewolves had with the druids which the wolves called “emissaries”.

He then recounts to the tale of Lycaon, an ancient Greek:


 * According to myth, some Greek citizens believed they owed their lives to Prometheus than to the gods of Olympus. Some followers even took names to honor the titans instead of the gods like Deucalion who is named after the son of Prometheus.


 * Lycaon didn’t just refuse to honor the gods, he challenged them. He invited Zeus to a banquet where he tried to serve him the flesh of a human being. Angered, Zeus blew the place apart with his lightning bolts and then punished Lycaon and his sons by turning them into wolves.

Editor’s Note: The story up until this point segues pretty well with the actual real world myth, the next portion seems to be made up specifically as a part of Teen Wolf Mythology


 * Lycaon sought out the druids to help turn him back to human. The belief was that the ancient druids knew how to shape shift. They couldn’t make Lycaon and his sons human again but they did teach him how to shift back and forth. And so the druids became important advisors to the packs.

Cora picks up the story explaining that the druid emissaries keep the werewolves connected to humanity but are kept a secret even within the pack. Sometimes only the Alpha knows their identity.

More to come...

Video
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