The formulation of this post started at some point between this tweet:
Me an hour and a half after #SleepyHollow #SleepyHolla pic.twitter.com/mVkwy7TAXw
— Monique Jones (@moniqueblognet) April 9, 2016
And this tweet:
What’s amazing is that everyone, fans and critics, feel disappointed & angered beyond belief. We’re all grieving. #SleepyHollow #SleepyHolla
— Monique Jones (@moniqueblognet) April 9, 2016
with some final conclusions coming in at around these tweets:
@BlackGirlNerds I know one thing—I’M about to write for us! I’m getting on my script before the night is out!
— Monique Jones (@moniqueblognet) April 9, 2016
Congrats on a job well done, @NikkiBeharie I’ve been a fan since “42” and I’m looking forward to your next project.
— Monique Jones (@moniqueblognet) April 9, 2016
Indeed, several TV critics on Twitter were aghast at what happened:
I haven’t watched #SleepyHollow since early S2 and tonight’s news still makes me sad. What a waste of a show on all levels. Crikey.
— Ryan McGee (@TVMcGee) April 9, 2016
Been a long time since I watched Sleepy Hollow, but when I liked it, it was for the interplay of the leads. Sounds like a big mess now.
— Alan Sepinwall (@sepinwall) April 9, 2016
Way behind on #SleepyHollow but this (spoilery) news is so sad. Few shows had more potential at one time but now… https://t.co/kj8h7ORX7C
— Mo Ryan (@moryan) April 9, 2016
And several online recaps had the same theme throughout the post: If Abbie and Nicole Beharie are gone, then what’s the point of even watching the show? Just as important: Why on God’s green earth would the writing team as a whole (including the showrunner) go out of their way to lead the fanbase on and act like they were going to give the fanbase what they wanted (which is a final say-so on #Ichabbie) just to turn around and destroy the only thing that made the show worth watching? To quote Vulture’s Rose Maura Lorre, “The latter statements [of Pandora stating in her dying breaths that Ichabod loves Abbie] lead me to believe that, intentional or not, this show’s careless disregaard of its Ichabbie ‘shippers has been fucked up. Make them just-friends or make them more-than-friends, but have a conversation about it and stick to your decision. Don’t keep stringing the ‘shippers along with your hand-kissing and your ‘be still my beating heart’ (which no person has ever said platonically) while you know Abbie’s imminent fate full well.” And as The A.V. Club’s Zack Handlen wrote, “I’m not sure if there were behind-the-scenes issues we are privy to, but Beharie’s a crucial element of the series. Tom Mison is a fine actor, but without the two of them together, what’s the damn point?”
The chemistry between the two leads, Tom Mison and Beharie, was the only thing that kept mostly everyone tuned in. (I say most, because somehow, there are folks out there who think Sleepy Hollow is just Ichabod’s story of time travel. When was he the only lead on this show? I have a lot more to say about this later on in this post.) Sure, the creative elements that made up the show, like the lighting, the set design, the creature makeup and stuntwork, and the time travel/Christian apocalypse madness were amazing and really gave the show its creepy edge. But the glue that stuck all of those disparate parts together were the grounding forces provided by Ichabod and Abbie. Without one or both of them, the show’s just a bunch of junk, to be quite honest about it. So I ask again: Without Abbie, what the f*ck is the point of watching a fourth season?!
I don’t even like using coarse language, but how else am I supposed to get this point across? How much more plainly can I say it? Abbie was the show. Even Mison would agree to that, I’m sure, since he was never without a kind word to say about working with Beharie and being able to share the same breathing air as her. Mison has always stuck up for Beharie and looking back on it, it makes a lot of sense as to why neither Mison nor Beharie have done a lot of press for this season. It’s slowly come out that Beharie was deeply unhappy during S2 and wanted out of her contract, and I don’t blame her for wanting to leave, because as I’ve written before, Abbie was made to be a house slave for Witchy White Feminist Katrina. As far as Mison is concerned, I honestly wouldn’t be surprised if Mison eventually leaves as well. If someone decides to interview Mison about his thoughts on everything, I betcha he’ll reveal his true emotions over this, just like how he did with Ichabod fawning over Katrina in S2. (To paraphrase him from an earlier interview, he had a serious disagreement with the writers about how Ichabod was acting out of character. We already know how he felt about Katrina from some of his DVD commentary, in which he shades Katrina for only being able to lift a stick even though she was supposed to be a powerful witch.)
I could just go on rambling, but I’m going to use my favorite writing tools—bullets—to boil down my points into easy-to-follow chunks.
If you remember a few months ago, I talked about some remodeling I was doing to the site. You can read about it at length here, but one of the changes was no more focus on recaps. The only recap I wrote I’d continue was Sleepy Hollow, and that those recaps would be exclusively for the Black Girl Nerds community. In case you are new to the site and heard about me and my recaps and are surprised not to see any new recaps here, just head over to Black Girl Nerds to read what I’ve got to say!
The latest recap is of the midseason premiere, and I have a lot to say about everything that went down, including Ichabod basically proposing to Abbie without Abbie even being in most of the episode. Here’s a snippet:
I had been waiting to see Ichabod finally be beside himself with grief, and I got what I was looking for. Ichabod has finally let go of some of his decorum and is now outwardly showing his feelings for Abbie. Well, by “outward,” I mean telling wedding vows he usually reserves only for talks with Abbie to someone else. It’s probably because Foster indirectly reminds Ichabod of Abbie that he was able to say how he actually feels about Abbie, and it could also be because Foster’s a stranger; I still think he’d have enough decorum to not blurt this private talk to Jenny. But the fact that he’s willing to confess to someone else that he truly believes Abbie is his better half, the person that makes him better just by being in his life, means he’s got a more complete handle on what his feelings for her are. Sometimes the person you love has to go away in order for you to realize what they mean to you, and even though Ichabod has generally shown how much he appreciates Abbie, this seems like the first time he’s realized exactly how important she is to him. It’ll be highly interesting to see how he acts when they finally get back together[.]
…Their relationship down the road will get really, really fascinating, seeing how he still hasn’t broken up with Zoe. We completely forgot about Zoe in this episode. That says a lot about her character. (Full admission: I had to go back and edit this article to write “Zoe” instead of “Caroline.” That shows just how much I forgot about Zoe and how much of an impact Caroline made. She’s still effective, and she’s been dead since Season 2. We still miss you, Caroline! Zoe’s an evil replacement!)
Read the rest at Black Girl Nerds, and make sure to catch me and Black Girl Nerds’ Jamie Broadnax on the Sleepy Addicts’ Hollow Hangout event this Friday, Feb. 9, at 9 p.m. ET, right after the airing of the latest Sleepy Hollow episode!
Don’t miss #HollowHangout 9pET following #SleepyHollow w/special. guests @JamieBroadnax @moniqueblognet @BGNPodcast pic.twitter.com/3XTXlJIsk6
— Sleepy Hollow Addict (@SleepyAddicts) February 10, 2016
Sleepy Hollow‘s midseason finale, “Novus Ordo Seclorum,” has left many people in shambles. To be frank, the double billing of Sleepy Hollow and How to Get Away with Murder‘s mideseason finales have left many people in shambles twice over. But let’s talk about what sent people over the edge during “Novus Ordo Seclorum”—Abbie’s sacrifice.
What a fascinating episode of Sleepy Hollow, right? The episode, “The Art of War,” could have also been called, “Talk to Her,” since that was the subtext of the night.
Sleepy Hollow gave me tons of good vibes with the latest episode, “This Red Lady of Caribee.” It was a black woman extravaganza—Abbie kicking butt, Jenny tag-teaming with Joe, and a powerful black villain who was part fashionista woman, part bug. This episode was also written by a black woman, Shernold Edwards (kudos to her). I also received my fair share of bad or annoying vibes, but we’ll get to that when we get to it. Let’s get to the recap, and then some bullet points.
This Sleepy Hollow episode, “Dead Men Tell No Tales,” was Part 2 of a Bones-Sleepy Hollow crossover, and frankly, the second half of the crossover, the actually Sleepy Hollow episode, was better to me than the Bones portion. First of all, I’ve never been a fan of Bones, and after watching this crossover, my feelings on the show have been hardened. Temperance is a pill. As my sister said, she was that kid in class that would always correct the teacher (or anyone), saying, “Well, actually…”. That “dis bi***” face that Ichabod made after he tried to explain the emotional side to love and life was exactly how I felt. Moving on.
In my last Sleepy Hollow recap, I wrote this small passage:
[W]hat I do know is that the whole situation and my look at the Twitterings online about Betsy Ross (whom I’m getting to) made me think about why we want Abbie to get with Ichabod in the first place. I mean, I get the argument that black women need to be at the center of main-tier relationships in TV shows. That’s a completely valid thing and I get behind that so don’t misunderstand me. BUT, is there a dangerous element of wanting a black woman to be “validated” as it were, by the white male gaze, after centuries of being denied and/or wrongfully exoticized by it? I’ll write more on this in the coming days, but I just want to throw that out there, because sometimes, certain discussions about Ichabbie makes me slightly uncomfortable, to be frank, and because Danabbie is still a very real possibility as well. If Ichabod can have his woman for the moment, then Abbie can certainly have Danny for a moment as well.
I wrote I’d have an article about it, and here it is.
Edited to properly reflect Joe Corbin’s career
Sleepy Hollow’s latest episode, “The Sisters Mills,” was the best one of the season so far. It really captured the Season One feel of drama, action, and genuine horror that has eluded the show in recent times. But, at least for this episode, the horror was back! Whoever wrote this episode, let me commend you and hope that you and/or others will continue to keep the horror quotient up, because that’s been sorely missed.
Edited to reflect more accuracy with ratings numbers
I’ve been keeping tabs on Sleepy Hollow‘s ratings this season, and even though we’re only three episodes into the season, I think it’s time to start looking at things objectively instead of subjectively. Sleepy Hollow is facing some tough times when it comes to ratings, and if support doesn’t come soon from viewership, the tough times are going to get even worse.
