Are You Afraid of the Dark: The Tale of the Sorcerer's Apprentice

Okay, finally a serious criticism to be leveled at this show: they really should have used some clear rotation of story-tellers. Perhaps it’s intended to highlight the personalities of the different characters by depicting some as more eager than others. However, this is Betty Ann’s (Raine Pare-Coull) second in a row, and third overall, while troublemaker Eric (Jacob Tierney) has told one brief fragment, and gets his first actual episode next week. It seems a bit unbalanced.

That said, however, I think this is another episode that hits it out of the park, to the point of being a viable season finale. One again, this story that affects me more now, as an adult, looking at it as a commentary on our educational system. While I’m certainly not in the crowd that cheers on Charter Schools, I do find myself nervous about the idea of bad information being inserted into our school systems by ideologues. I also constantly find myself horrified at the realization that much of the information I was taught as a student was, at best, wildly oversimplified.

In this story, that’s exactly what we see. Dean (Matthew MacKay) is a low-performing student who finds himself fascinated by a brief lecture given to his class by an archaeologist named Dr. Oliver (Emma Stevens). I’d say it was absurdly simple, but...no, this is the kind of watered-down understanding I received. “Many ancient civilizations believed some variation of x.” Information without context, designed only to convince school boards that their kids have been given a smidgen of culture.

In the lecture, Dr. Oliver tells the story of the ancient sorcerer Goth. She fails to tell anything about his historical context or the significance of his life, except that his followers gain good fortune. Just enough to intrigue a student desperate to feel special. Dean quickly finds himself meeting with her, and Dr. Oliver tips her obvious hand by saying she hopes she’s won “another convert.”

We’re told that Dean has only a single friend, Alix (Staci Smith), and as Dean falls to the dark side she becomes our viewpoint character. Dean begins hanging around with a strange group of students, and acting as their leader. He also somehow mesmerizes a jerk teacher (Jane Gilchrist) into giving him an A on a blank test. Finally, Alix follows him down into the school’s basement, and sees him using a staff from Dr. Oliver’s lecture to speak to the ghostly head of the mysterious sorcerer (Stephen Hart).

I’d say this episode has a peculiar way of using it’s short running time to it’s advantage. Obviously, we don’t have the time to tell Goth’s full history, nor would most of the viewers particularly care about his fanciful past. However, in this episode that’s part of the point: Dean has no idea who Goth is, how he was apparently trapped in another dimension, or the history of how he became a powerful sorcerer. Dean has been given just enough information to bring Goth back into our world, Goth’s apparent goal. He has to combine two simple ingredients: Belladonna and Mercuric Acid (I suspect the writers wanted to use a fictional “don’t try this at home kids” chemical, but according to Google they may have accidentally used a valid name for mercury mixed with any acid) to create the “mystic vapors.”

Goth is actually a perfect cult leader. His promises to Dean are vague (“all you desire”), and he uses the word “apprentice” to give a sense of commonality with the child he clearly doesn’t feel. We’re watching an angry adolescent being used by the first adult to show interest in him. Sincerity is not required.

The Midnight Society interruption in this episode is especially annoying because there are no major mysteries for them to speculate about in the episode. Instead, Alix gets captured, and they suggest that she’ll be boiled in the mercuric acid. Not only do Dean and his followers never attempt this, Dean has already been clear that he wants to convert Alix, so the suggestion seems silly.

The ending is a bit too convenient. Goth crosses over, attacks Alix, and Dean shakes off his control to protect his friend. He warns Alix to use chlorine to kill the Nightshade, thus forcing Goth back into the other dimension...he apparently concluded that vapors produced from belladonna could be stopped by the chemical because it kills bacteria, and “the leaves were organic...well, to be fair, it seems like the contrived ending a Middle Schooler trying to wrap up a story might use. My own head canon: They stopped Goth because chlorine is a base, and counteracted the acid. It’s not hard to imagine that was the original intention, and the “killed the leaves” was a way to dumb the episode down for the kiddies.

The ending revealed the painfully obvious: Dr. Oliver was a servant of Goth who goes High School to High School trying to recruit kids because...she can’t summon Goth herself for some reason. Well, we don’t know the reason, but it’s beside the point. She’s an authority figure corrupting young minds.

So, yes, for the most part it’s a strong episode. As cheesy and over the top as we’ve come to expect, but still a good time. And, it has some nice themes behind it.