Sabrina finds a way to fight fate, but faces a new threat as she unravels some dark truths, and Blackwood takes the church in a new direction.
Harvey draws what he remembers from Sabrina's possession, and though Sabrina bemaons that she is truly evil, Roz says they might not know the truth.
They remind her the picture is pretty clear, and Nick it's definitely apocalyptic. Harvey leaves to board up mine 13, while Nick and Sabrina go to look for answers. While leaving, Roz asks Harvey why his way of getting Sabrina off the roof was bringing up their love. He says it was the one thing he knew would work, and while he used to love Sabrina, he now loves her. Nick wants to visit Cassius at the Academy, but Sabrina decides they'll first visit Wardwell, who is currently teaching Adam he's more than just straw. He doesn't want to get closer to fire, but she commands him, and says soon enough he'll fulfill his purpose: to kill Sabrina, leaving the Dark Lord without protection. Sabrina arrives just then, but her hopes to kill the girl are dashed when Sabrina says Nick is there as well, so she takes a look at the drawing. She says declares Sabrina the herald of Hell, who will usher in the apocalypse with the Dark Lord ruling all after the gates of Hell open. The unmasked and shriveled Adam sits in a hall as Nick questions her knowledge, but she says it's obvious by the drawing and she studied with Nostradamus. She is surprised to learn about Sabrina's new powers, but the girl says she won't do it, and Wardwell says the only way would be to get rid of these abilities. Sabrina wonders if this is possible, and Wardwell's suggestion of the "Mandrake Spell," which would take away all her powers, upsets Nick. Nick leaves, adamant he'll find another way, and as Sabrina follows, Wardwell asks her to keep in touch and look into the spell. She also orders Adam to tail and kill Sabrina. At home, Sabrina admits she worries her dad knew her destiny, so Nick agrees to search the Sanctum. She promise to not do anything rash until he reports back.
Of course, she immediately takes what she's learned to Ambrose with the spell, which will turn a Mandrake into a copy of herself, siphoning her energy, and she'll kill it.
He knows the spell and chides her for trying to stop a prophecy she doesn't understand or know to be real, but she's sure it is. Reminding her she'd be powerless and age like a mortal, he urges her to think of her loved ones, but she counters that that's the issue: she again has no control of her life. Though aware she'll lose them one day, she doesn't want to end the world, so he agrees, saying they'll need a mandrake root from Hilda's garden and 13 hours. He has Sabrina lie down in the morgue and attaches the Mandrake to her, then performs a spell and says he now simply guards her as she sleeps. Hours later, Sabrina wakes to discover Ambrose is asleep and the spell didn't work, so he suggests another method: creating and drowning a river mud golem. As they leave, Blackwood is at the Academy detailing recent events, ending with the council has abandoning them. However, he says one person can help whom they've turned their backs on, and unveils a new centerpiece: a statue of Judas He declares they're now the Church of Judas, declaring they'll know Satanic greatness if everyone learns and follows their new laws. Back at the house, Hilda is surprised to see a strange Sabrina, dressed oddly and excitedly declaring her joy at just being alive. She requests blueberry pancakes, and gives Hilda a hug before she leaves to see her friends. Prudence pays Blackwood a visit, surprised at strict rules for witches only, including no darker magics, and he shrugs that witches need to focus on feminine magic. She asks if the Dark Lord showed him these rules, and he admits they're his own making. She wonders if she'll have to follow them as well, but he says that, if she serves as his hand and convinces the other girls, she'll be exempt. Zelda makes quick mirror portal to Hilda and tells her about Blackwood's plans to splinter off his own church. She urges her sister to go to Methuselah, but has to return to her wifely persona when Blackwood enters. Hilda does so at the unholy church, but to her surprise, the council says Blackwood can govern the church how he wants, and warn to not waste their time again. At first leaving without a word, she says she and the Dark Lord see through them, knowing Blackwood's a killer and they're protecting him because they'll fall if he does.
The Sabrina copy goes to Harvey, confusing him with a love declaration. When he rebuffs her, she coldly says she knows how to make him love her, and uses her powers.
At the Academy, boys enter Blackwood's office with Elspeth, who tried to defect for Sabrina. Blackwood gives a death sentence, so Zelda steps in that he'd be martyring her, and when he turns to reply, Prudence adds that other girls might follow suit. He agrees and has the girl tossed in the witch's cell to starve. After sending Zelda and Prudence away, he tells the boys to kill Sabrina and bring him her head. Roz gets a visit from Fake Sabrina, who says that while Harvey will always love her more than Roz, they're still BFFs. Confused, Roz grabs her, and the Cunning reveals that after the Mandrake spell worked, the copy put another mandrake down and escaped. Roz realizes this isn't Sabrina, but the copy calls this an awful thing to say, and uses her powers. Back at the Academy, Zelda brings Elspeth food, promising to help her escape, but Prudence enters and says she's going to report Zelda to Blackwood. Zelda warns that every witch will end up subjugated in a cell, but Prudence believes having Blackwood's name, especially by blood, makes her immune. Reminding her she also has his name, albeit not by blood, Zelda brings up how Prudence helped hide Leticia, doing so because she knows Blackwood's character. Next up on Mandrake Sabrina's list is Theo, whom she offers to magically transform physically into a boy. Theo turns this down, comfortable feeling like a boy as he is. The Mandrake says he confuses people, like how he's on the boy's basketball team, causing Theo to get angry and shove her. She calls this mean and uses her powers. The real Sabrina arrives home when Nick shows up with important info, but goes upstairs to wash up as Wardwell's Adam enters the house. Adam pulls a Michael Myers and approaches in a bed sheet. Unable to use her powers, Sabrina cries out, and Nick storms in, wrestling the monster and ripping out his rib. She realizes the Mandrake Spell worked, and though he is upset that she performed it against his wishes, he agrees to be strong. He reveals he found a prophecy in the "Tome of Tomes" that tells of a half-shadow girl who will bring about the apocalypse by performing blasphemous miracles. He lists numerous, making Sabrina realize Wardwell constantly led her to perform them, and she believes the woman had her perform this spell to create a Sabrina who would fulfill the prophecy since she won't.
The pair busts into Wardwell's and demand she drop the act, saying how she pushed Sabrina down the path of darkness. She tries to play dumb, but Nick ties a string around her rib to painfully bind her in place.
Sabrina demands to know where her double is, but Wardwell claims she doesn't know, so the girl has Nick keep her bound and leaves to kill the Mandrake, then Wardwell. Blackwood's boys find the fake skipping through the woods, and after insulting her, move in for the kill. Upset by their rudeness, she snaps all their necks. Dorothea wakes Theo, urging him to "kill them." He looks up to find himself, Roz, and Harvey in the woods with Mandrakes set to become their clones. The Harvey clone is already rising, so he grabs some rocks and crushes his head, then gives the others the same treatment before waking his friends. He hurriedly explains, with Roz correcting the Sabrina was a fake, just as the fake arrives, screeching they murdered her friends. They run as she collapses and wails. At the house, Hilda greets Methuselah, who claims his stern attitude before was an act for the council. He agrees to help with Blackwood, but wants her to "show how passionately she wants his demise." Zelda enters Blackwood's office, only to find Prudence has returned Leticia to him. He calsl Zelda a traitor, so she pulls a knife on Prudence and demands Leticia. Blackwood says she can do it, as he has another daughter, but Zelda won't be leaving with anyone. She sticks the knife in his desk and lets the boys take her away. Ambrose finds the fake Sabrina at home, but as she describes her friends' deaths, he realizes something's wrong and suggests she lie down. The real Sabrina enters as the fake demands comforting, so the fake, disgusted at the original and pitying her too much to kill her, orders Ambrose to do it. Ambrose makes up an old witch law to suggest that, since the copy is more powerful than the original Sabrina, they should settle this with a pistol duel. The two agree, and the fake decides they'll meet at midnight "at the place where they were born." With Zelda rebelling, Hilda dealing with Methuselah, and now Sabrina facing her mandrake, the Spellmans are in a tight spot that's about to get worse.
I have to wonder is Sabrina is ever going to stop making hasty decisions while letting only one person in on her plan.
Obviously she did it because she doesn't want to cause the apocalypse, and I definitely understand her desire to have control of her own life. In the end, losing or keeping her powers is Sabrina's choice, but she really isn't taking the time to give it enough rational thought. Going against the grain has allowed her to fix issues while others stood by before, but it's also a thing that has caused problems, as it does this time around. It's also pretty sucky of her to promise Nick she'll give him a bit of time to go looking for another fix for their problem, then minutes later performs the Mandrake Spell. Later on, she throws in that she just needs him to be strong for her, and come on Sabrina, that's what he constantly is, always willing to do whatever she needs. Ambrose was really right in his warning to Sabrina, with how she doesn't know the full details of this prophecy or even if it's true. It's sort of like how premonition powers can be used in shows, like when Dragon Ball Z's original version of Bardock was granted the power: in trying to stop a devastating future from happening, the character causes it to happen. In Bardock: Father of Goku, the Saiyan warrior conquers a planet, only for a dying inhabitant to give him premonition powers, warning they saw this coming. Likewise, Bardock has visions of the tyrant Frieza, who rules the Saiyans, destroying their planet, with Bardock dying fighting alone. Horrified, he tries to tell others about it, but having been injured by Frieza's men, the other Saiyans think he hit his head or something and is going crazy. Because they don't believe him, Bardock decides he'll stop Frieza himself and flies into space. He hurls a ball of energy at the dictator, only for Frieza to create a massive blast himself that hits Bardock directly, before impacting the planet like a meteor. That's what has been happening to Sabrina thus far, as although Wardwell has been helping things go, it was Sabrina discovering over time she had a dark destiny that pushed her to Wardwell, who in turn led her to her dark destiny. The thing she wanted most at the start of the series was to live both her lives and have her friends accept her, and her efforts to help them with magic caused problems. What's sort of funny about her attempt with the Mandrake Spell is that neither she nor Ambrose bother to check in they're wrong about it not working. All they would've had to do is have Sabrina try to perform a spell, but they see the mandrake still on the table and decide it obviously didn't work. Though Sabrina frustrates me in these ways, I liked Zelda in this episode more than I used to, as she's finally realizing how scummy Blackwood is. Her spying unfortunately falls through, because she fails something I've heard before: To pull off a ruse, you need to keep it up even when you think no one is watching. The first moment for Blackwood to begin suspecting her comes when he finds her at her mirror, both because she's talking to someone and likely from her smoking. Whenever she was under his spell, we never saw her smoking like she used to, yet he walks in to find her casually holding a cigarette. Later on, there's the moment she argues for Elspeth, which the enthralled Zelda wouldn't have done, and of course Prudence discovers her helping the girl. Prudence has, for now, taken Zelda's place in admiring everything about Blackwood, so desperate to please him that she ignores how he's subjugating witches. There's no way this can last, however, especially after Zelda pulled a Catelyn Stark by threatening to cut his daughter's throat, and he shrugs that he has another. In this moment, Prudence sees that he really doesn't care about her, especially since he has his legitimate daughter back. It was also disheartening to see Leticia's situation come to a close, as I feel like Zelda was right that being with Blackwood won't be great for her. I was surprised for most of the episode at how bold Blackwood is now being with his mission for the church, especially since the council allowed it. The last time we saw them, they were outraged at anything he tried to do, yet now they're in a situation where his downfall could apparently ruin them. Of course, they're definitely not all that great as we see this episode, with Methuselah demanding sexual favors from Hilda if she wants help with Blackwood. This has been one of my favorite examples in the show of more hidden misogyny within the Church of Night, with Methuselah keeping it behind closed doors. The Mandrake Sabrina was entertaining throughout the episode, with some obviously overdamatic acting from Kiernan Shipka for the naive character. I was glad with her that everyone quickly saw through what she was doing, as although Theo still thought it was Sabrina, I'm sure he knew something was off. It was especially helpful that Roz touched her and got a vision, which also made me happy since she still has the Cunning despite having her vision back. I'm hopeful that, despite finding themselves in the Mandrake's trap, they don't come to fear Sabrina once again, since it's just another bad experience with magic. Sabrina and Ambrose might've outsmarted the mandrake, but they're about to learn they should've taken a different course of action.
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