Magic – The Magicians S5 E7 Acting Dean

Jason and Cristina give you a in-depth review and discussion of The Magicians Season 5 episode 7, Acting Dean! Emergency Protocols, Psycho Fogg, Windward Woods.

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Podcast Notes –

EPISODE 5.7:  ACTING DEAN

OVERALL THOUGHTS

DEN OF GEEK:     Penny brings up a good point in this week’s episode. He and his friends just saved our world; are they really on the hook for saving Fillory as well?  As the problems on Earth continue, the Magicians struggles to pivot to the conflict in Fillory – the idea that the Dark King, a woefully underdeveloped character, is responsible for creating the very enemy he is lauded for vanquishing, was seen weeks ago by everyone except Eliot.”

NEW FACES/ PLACES/ MAGIC:

FACES:

• Hamish Bax          applicant for Botany position at Brakebills  
• Psycho Fogg          a troubled version of Fogg from Timeline 17
• High Lepus Gertrude new Advisor of Talking Animals in Fillory

MAGIC:

• Cinnabar the bright scarlet to brick-red form of mercury sulfide. It is the most common source ore for refining elemental mercury.

SYNOPSIS:

BLAH BLAH FILLORY

Blah blah blah blah Fillory, a most amazing land but fucked by catastrophe and way before we planned.  La la la la Fillory, a land without a god, needs a brand new hero, a strapping man named Todd. 

Todd relates the rhyme given by Sir Effingham that Fillory is in trouble.  He asks for Julia’s help and she says she’s taking over the quest.  But upon telling Margo and Eliot, they argue that’s what they were trying to do before she pulled them into this Moon mission and leave for Fillory. 

BRAKEBILLS – ACTING DEAN

After missing the Faculty Meeting, Penny finds out that Circumstances are still messed up because of the Moon being moved.  Lipson was trying to reset the campus wards when Fogg’s security system turned on her and left her in a coma. Plus, since nobody wants the horrible job, they elected Penny as Acting Dean (where he deals with all sorts of magic mishaps from the students).

Alice thinks that because of the Circumstance changes, they’ll need to learn to cast all over again.  Plus, there are still surges.   Penny finds a box in Fogg’s desk marked, “For Emergencies Only” and Julia presses the button.  At first it seems nothing happens, but then Fogg shows up, saying he had no choice but to leave to prevent more students being hurt by his system.  Alice tells him about the temporary solution she found – to cast as though you’re 1,000 feet lower – and he goes off with Todd to shut down the security system. 

BRAKEBILLS – EMERGENCY PROTOCOLS

With things seemingly under control, Julia is planning to leave for Fillory.  Penny wants her to stay and help at Brakebills – he wants them to be together and also, not every apocalypse is their problem.  She disagrees but before she can leave, the school’s Emergency Protocols are activated. Todd arrives with the news that when Fogg tried to shut down the security system, it set off all the defenses at once. Julia thinks something is up with both of them. 

Meanwhile, Alice meets Hamish Bax, who was there to interview for the Botany job.  She realizes the magic is no longer working because the Circumstances keep changing; they need to warn Fogg.  Hamish thinks he can take down the wards, but gets injured in the process.  Since they can’t trust magic to fix it, they go to the greenhouse for healing herbs.  There, Alice starts to make a poultice when Hamish sees a flower inside a magic container.  It’s from a different planet and shouldn’t even be able to grow here, but the machine allows the container to adjust to the specific Circumstances needed.  This gives Alice an idea and she is now able to use the calculations to adjust her magic. 

BRAKEBILLS – PSYCHO FOGG

As Todd is trying to leave with the Cinnabar for Fogg, Penny and Julia confront him and realize (when he’s blown up by a land mine) that was an imposter Todd from another timeline.  They think Fogg must be too.  The real Todd says he knows all the versions of Fogg better than anyone from helping with his memoir.  He realizes this is “Psycho Fogg” from Timeline 17 – where he was responsible for Brakebills blowing up and almost killing everyone (burns on his hands). 

Alice has adjusted the Circumstances within the whole greenhouse so they can test the magic, and it’s working.  Julia and Penny arrive in time to expose Fogg – he admits he wants the Cinnabar to fix Stoppard’s time traveling machine.  He made modifications so he can take all of Brakebills back home to his Timeline. 

In Timeline 17, he took measures to try to contain the damage the Beast could do.  Jane Chatwin left and reset things, but his timeline continued (multiverse hypothesis) and he was left to deal with a post-apocalyptic world with hardly any living magicians and no resources.  He wanted to fix things for his daughter there, so he needs Brakebills.  However, when he tries to activate the machine, it fails and Penny reveals they swapped the Cinnabar for Cinnamon. 

Not sure what else to do, they put Fogg in a Clean Room where he can’t cast.  Thanks to the readouts on the greenhouse tank, Alice has a theory on the magic problem – the Lunatics were right; the Moon has feelings and she’s mad at them. Penny tries to talk to Julia, saying he doesn’t want to lose her to a quest again but she says she needs to do this. 

FILLORY – WINDWARDS WOODS

Back in Whitespire, Eliot and Margo are looking for Fen.  They consult Rafe, who has a new kangaroo boss – High Lepus Gertrude – who is apparently a nightmare and traitor to her own kind, nothing but a puppet of Bick Pickwick.  She was offered a deal to relocate all Talking Animals to beyond the walls.  Bick has a deep hatred for anything non-human (including fairies).  Rafe says Fen was venturing into the Windward Woods.  

Charlton joins Eliot again, as he goes to a meeting with Bick and the King. The Takers are gathering in force and they need their army for protection, but their gold reserves are depleted and the men haven’t been paid in weeks. They need 5 lbs. of gold by tomorrow and another 15 by the end of the week. Bick says the Fairies have been stealing and hoarding their gold and argues for storming the forest to take it back.  But Eliot says he knows the Fairies and they aren’t thieves.  He requests a chance at diplomacy and is given 24 hours to try.

It turns out, Fen found the fairies and gained their trust.  But when they fill Margo in on how her story has shifted over generations (from the King who made peace with the Fairies to the one who stole their Realm) – she abandons the attempt to make them see reason.  They are interrupted by a bunny with a warning that Bick is coming.  Margo is able to help the fairies escape before their arrival and slip in with the Centurion guard.  Bick then ‘finds’ the gold (that he planted), but relents to returning it and coming back for the Fairies. 

FILLORY – THE PICKWICKS

Bringing the 6 lbs. of gold back to Whitespire, Margo and Eliot spy on Bick and see him slip into a back room where he’s been secretly keeping Gold-Shitting Beetles.  Everyone thought they’d been extinct for hundreds of years thanks to a rumor, started by the Pickwicks.  Eliot brings news of the beetles and Bick’s treachery to the Dark King and he is taken away. 

Privately, Eliot tells Charlton he likes the King and hopes he’s not bad; or maybe he is and that’s all that Eliot deserves.  Back in the forest, the Fairies thank Margo and Eliot for helping them and in repayment, show them the truth.  They watch as the Dark King dumps a back of gold on the ground, melts it into the soil, and casts a spell that creates new Takers. 

QUESTIONS

• Is this the end of the Penny & Julia relationship?
• Why keep this version of Fogg – will he tie back into the story later?
• Where is Kady and Zelda?
• Where’s Plum and what is she up to?

If the gold creates Takers, why do they need to go after the Fairies?