Episode 8 - The Innocents

Mayfair Witches S02 E08 AMC Networks

Again, get comfortable.  Bring a wedding feast, airline peanuts, whatever you've got.  This is another long one.

From IMDb: Rowan is determined to save Lasher; Cortland becomes an unlikely adversary. 

The Season Two finale of Mayfair Witches seemed to have been resolving some things, but not others.  In case there is a Season Three, which has not been announced.  If there is a Season Three, what would have to be resolved from Season Two?

First, let's recall that there are THREE novels in the Lives of the Mayfair Witches series.  Season One focused on the first novel, The Witching Hour.  So, it follows that Season Two focused on the second novel, Lasher.  But what about the third novel, Taltos?

This is the point where I give a disclaimer: when writing these, I assume those reading have read the Lives of the Mayfair Witches novels as well as watched the show.  This fall will mark 30(!!) years since I first read the books.  I launched my website in 2008, long before the Mayfair Witches finally made it to the screen, and at a time when social media was nothing like it is today.  In 1995, it didn't even exist!  In fact, in 1995, the web host of my site was itself still very new.  And so was the movie, Interview With the Vampire.

When I approach discussion about this series, I approach it from the perspective of someone whose focus has always been the novels.  Whether or not I am a "purist" is something I don't exactly debate in my head, but coming from this perspective, it's hard to not say, "Now, WAIT a minute.  WHO/WHAT is this?"  

While it's true that the Mayfair Witches did later appear in a few of the Vampire Chronicles novels, and at least one member of the Talamasca from the Vampire Chronicles also appeared in the Lives of the Mayfair Witches novels, the vampires and the witches themselves did not cross paths with one another in the Lives of the Mayfair Witches novels.  With that out of the way...

What would Season Three be expected to clear up from Season Two?

Seemingly little things like how is Lark supposed to know how he happened to have been in Scotland?  Would he know where home actually is?  What if he finds remnants of his work on Rowan's genetics?  How is he going to explain them to himself, let alone anyone else?

Rowan holds the chalice,
Mayfair Witches S02E08 AMC

Another detail that might seem small but is definitely not insignificant is what happens to Lasher and Emaleth's children?  What does the Talamasca do with them?  Do they give the children shelter to protect them, or was Albrecht Escher not the only rogue Talamasca agent with plans for them?  Plans similar to what Ian Mayfair was trying to carry out?

Or, since Ciprien Grieve is technically their grandfather as well, will he be able and willing to protect them from exploitation?

And where did Emaleth go, anyway?

When Rowan and Moira arrived home in New Orleans, the sight of the deteriorating house was quite a shock.  Rowan already stated she was returning to New Orleans and to Mayfair Medical.  Is this in keeping with the novels?  Well, basically, yes.  However, the series version changed when the character of Jojo was added and Mayfair Medical already existed before Rowan ever learned of her New Orleans family.  In the novels, it was Rowan who would go on to use the Mayfair fortune to build Mayfair Medical.  

Speaking of Jojo...

This lady will no doubt NOT be happy to learn that although Rowan and Moira were able to pull her and Daphne out of the thrall, another disaster is hanging out by a tree in front of the Mayfair house.  The now deteriorated, abandoned-looking Mayfair house.

Cortland.

Uh oh.

Well, there's a bigger problem there.

Obviously, between Scotland and the trip back to New Orleans, the hourglass long since ran out.  So, if Jojo looks outside and sees her father standing there, will she go to greet him?  If she does, will she sense that Cortland isn't...himself?

Remember that Ian and Julien tricked Cortland into going into the Victrola.  Also remember that Dolly Jean and Evelyn warned that the hourglass had to be monitored very closely.  If it runs out of time, so does whoever is in the Victrola with Julien.  So, is Cortland just gone, now?

Or is there a possible twist that would somehow allow Cortland to reclaim his living body from Julien?

Funny that the whole point of Lasher's union with the Mayfair Witches was to create one strong enough to birth him back into the living world.  In return, the Mayfair family would supposedly be upheld in some sacred way.  Instead, several Mayfairs are dead, Rowan's more recent forebears, like Deirdre and Antha Mayfair, were both murdered, multiple Talamasca agents are also dead, and so is Lasher himself.  The only one who seems to have been able to have "cheated" death is Julien Mayfair.

Speaking of which, what happens now that Julien Mayfair is "back"?  This was not a man to just sit and let the women of the family continue to be in charge.  Rowan will likely know it's Julien in there and not Cortland.  Moira will no doubt be aware of this as well.  But how about Jojo?  Will she be able to sense that this is not her father?

And how about Millie Dear?  Yes, Millie.  The ghost of Cortland's sister (in the AMC series).  One has to wonder if Millie, who was able to communicate with Jojo and Daphne while they were stuck in the thrall, will be able to sense that her father is the occupant of Cortland's body and not Cortland.  

Since Julien is actually long dead, the only way Julien could force his will upon others is through someone known to be living at the time.  He's done that already.  Before the trip to Scotland, Ryan Mayfair did say to Moira that there was talk of a legal way to replace Rowan with someone else as the new Designee of the Legacy.

In the novels, this was done only because Rowan Mayfair, due to her need for a life-saving hysterectomy, was unable to bear children before she had any.  Any that could inherit the legacy as the next in line, that is.  In the series, the suggestion is that the possibility is being explored due to Rowan's behavior regarding Lasher.

It is also not hard to imagine that if there is to be a Season Three, the question will be if, using Cortland's mortal body, Julien Mayfair himself will try to reclaim the Mayfair house and fortune himself.  Or somehow try to convince Rowan to allow him in or partner with him in some way.  Since the Legacy, according to the novels, is one set in motion generations before and not easy to circumvent, this will be a huge challenge for any Mayfair male.  Just appointing an interim Designee in the legal sense will be far more difficult than a ritual to pass a familiar spirit from one Mayfair Witch to another Mayfair woman.

Which means this is going to be a difficult plot twist to address in a number of ways.

Just for funsies, if there should be a Season Three, wouldn't it be fun if the Mayfair house undergoes a restoration not unlike the one in The Witching Hour?  When Rowan's hand went right through that wall in the dining room, I wondered, "What might be behind the walls?"  Not in a Winchester mansion/Rose Red sort of way, where the house appears to renovate and rebuild itself.  More like what people might conceal in spaces where they anticipate no one looking.

Welcome to Fontevrault by the Parlor
from Anne Rice's Taltos

I'm still trying to figure out exactly which house this is, but I did come across an account of a house in New Orleans that is not unlike the Brevard-Rice house and the Soria-Creel house.  That is, an "American Townhouse" with Italianate and Greek Revival architecture.  There are many of them, it turns out.  And this one that I am referring to was the subject of an episode on one of those "true hauntings" shows that I happened to catch on YouTube.  Long story short, this house also had an elevator in it.  And supposedly, hidden behind a wall of said elevator was, I think, a deck of Tarot cards and a few other items.  They seemed to have been hidden there for quite some time.

Indeed, in Lasher, a discovery made during the restoration of the Mayfair house was revealed to have been a hidden compartment.  In it were some photographs of Stella Mayfair, some pearls that had belonged to Stella Mayfair, and--wait for it--Julien's Victrola.  The recovery of these items and Gifford Mayfair's frantic return of them to the First Street house was one of the many things that triggered a loud argument between Gifford and her sister, Alicia.  Alicia was very angry that Gifford had done that after it had been made clear that Mona (no doubt the character that Moira ultimately replaced in the AMC series) was to have the items.  

That takes us back to Cortland having been tricked into going into the Victrola so his father, Julien, could take over his body.

Notice it wasn't the same Victrola that Dolly Jean and Rowan had both used?

Remember that Rowan was urged to take Julien's Victrola back to her own house, the Mayfair house, to enter it.  Which, she did.  It was directly following Rowan's rescue from the Victrola that she, Lark, Moira and Cortland traveled to Scotland in search of Lasher.

Which means Julien's Victrola, the one used in New Orleans, is still in Rowan's house.  Is Julien supposed to have also bound himself to the Victrola in Scotland as well as the one in New Orleans?  If there is a Season Three, this is a question that will no doubt have to be answered.  Because it's not hard to imagine that the Victrola in New Orleans would have to play a pivotal role of its own in whether or not Julien can remain in this "mortal coil".

That is, without vampiric assistance, if you get my meaning.

Could there be a Season Three?  Perhaps.  Should there be a Season Three?  Good question.  The third novel in the Lives of the Mayfair Witches series is called Taltos.  Obviously, for the series, a Season Three would have to focus on the Taltos.  The Mayfair Witches might have what we'd call supernatural or paranormal abilities and live in houses haunted by ghosts they can see and communicate with.  What they do not have any longer is Lasher.  Not as a spirit, not as a Taltos.

Episode 8 Recap amc+ on YouTube

If AMC decides to go ahead with Season Three, and I can be a "purist" for just a sec, here's what I really REALLY want to see.  If the producers would be so kind as to make the flooded Fontevrault plantation a setting, that would be great.