Demons From The Past
Picking up after the cliffhanger ending last time out, Castle Rock returns with its third episode, rounding out this trio of early episodes in Hulu’s horror series. With some nice nods to Stephen King novels of old and a great blend of horror and drama, Castle Rock continues to deliver with another tense episode. We begins with Abdi managing to break free from his restraints and heading to the hospital with Pop, begging the doctors for help. Meanwhile a spooked Annie heads out to Jerusalem’s Lot and finds the concrete dry and covering the spot she fell. Desperate for answers, she heads up to Marsten’s where she finds a man mumbling to himself and eating a raw egg. He looks like the man killed by the scythe too but before we get any answers, Annie hurries out. Chance tells Joy about the murder and suggests heading out to find the body. After some deliberation, Joy agrees to go along with the others and they head down to the lake together. They have a good time too and after getting high, Joy appears normal when she heads back. Her and Chance have a tender moment together but despite her happiness, she comes crashing down to reality when she heads home and finds the place trashed and her mother staring in the mirror, convinced she’s been poisoned. It’s here she tells Joy the truth about the murder and how Ace is stalking her from beyond the grave. As she looks out the window and stares at the road, Joy slowly reaches for her phone. At the hospital, Ace arrives and speaks to Pop while he’s in bed. Lamenting him for still being alive, Ace walks off, unblinking, and drives home. The police stop him but he nonchalantly curses them and remains sitting in his car. Ace’s arrival sees Chance message Joy and tell her he’s still alive. It also re-confirms Joy’s suspicions that Annie has slipped further into her psychosis. Tied to the bed, Annie pleads with her daughter but Joy takes control and refuses to release her. While she looks up visual hallucinations on her phone outside, Annie takes desperate measures and smashes a glass under her pillow, intent on trying to break out. However, she holds off when Joy enters the room again, asking about the truth. After a speech about the monsters, a knock at the door startles Annie and she begs her daughter not to answer it. However, as she heads out she notices the pills on the floor and ignores her mother in disgust, approaching the rapping at the door instead. It turns out it’s Nadia and she asks about Annie’s condition. After deflecting her questions, Joy heads back into the bedroom where she finds Annie breaking her binds with a shard of glass. Desperate to stop her, Joy jumps on the bed but her mother lashes out, slashing her arm. Running out the house, Annie tries in vain to follow until she spies a shadowy man approaching the house. Heading back inside, she slams the door shut and squeezes her eyes tight. However, the figure approaches and tells her she’s going to kill her. With another cliffhanger ending and plenty of Easter Eggs sprinkled throughout the episode, Castle Rock does a great job conjuring up nods to old Stephen King novels here. The most notable, of course, being Gerald’s Game and The Green Mile. This continues Castle Rock’s trend of tying everything together in King’s universe and so far, there’s been enough intrigue with the storyline to keep things interesting too. Quite where this one is likely to go next remains to be seen but for now, Castle Rock is shaping up to be a very good series indeed.
