Recap/Review: Penny Dreadful's 2x07: Little Scorpion

This week was a little return to the Moors, the absence of the witches and a moment that might have soured any future relationship with Ethan and Vanessa to boot.

Written by John Logan
Directed by Brian Kirk

Monsters & Demons: This episode was mainly set in the moors where both Ethan and Vanessa decided to regroup at the Cut Wife's house, following the attack the latter suffered during Dorian's ball in the previous episode. During this episode, both Ethan and Vanessa learned more about each other, came close to getting physical with each other but at the end, were seperated when Vanessa resorted to dark magic to get back at the landowner responsible for her former mentor's death. While Ethan certainly had good reason to lay out the consequence of Vanessa's actions, he wasn't exactly that honest about the true extent of his own demons either. Speaking of ...

Revelations: While Ethan and Vanessa may have indulged in dancing and gunplay before things went south for them, I did like that not only was Ethan honest to Sembene about his true identity but the latter seemed genuinely sympathetic towards Ethan's plight and wanted to help him. Aside from Sembene now knowing about Ethan's true identity, no other progress was made with the guy that Ethan nearly killed or Detective Rusk in this episode.

Awakening The Monster: Keeping with the revelations of this episode, Victor's attempts of sheltering Lily are thankfully beginning to wane. In this episode alone, Lily/Brona enjoyed a night out on the town with Dorian (who may or may not soon remember who she really is) and then the episode ended with Lily picking up an older gentlemen, having sex with him and then murdering him in the bed. I guess it was inevitable that we saw some killer tendencies with Lily. I don't envy Victor or Caliban when her memories inevitably resurface in the next three episodes.

Ticking Things Over: This episode didn't really make any progress at all with the main plots whatsoever. While Ethan and Vanessa's stay in the moors was good for character stuff, unlike The Nightcomers, there was no appearances from Evelyn, Hecate or any of the witches and aside from Lyle subtle way of trying to protect Vanessa from an enchanted Malcolm and a nice little scene with him and Victor working on a puzzle together, nothing else really happened away from the Moors and Lily scenes this week.

A Man Possessed: He might have had little to do in this episode but even without Evelyn around, her influence was certainly felt on Malcolm. Malcolm was pretty enraged with the idea of Vanessa and Ethan going somewhere without him knowing where and it did seem like other people outside of Vanessa were picking up on his strange behaviour too. Hopefully someone is able to break Evelyn's hold on him within the next three episodes.

Next week, Malcolm and Sembene clash, Dorian's secret is revealed to Angelique and Lily goes on the rampage.