MENDINGS, MAJOR AND MINOR (THE MAGICIANS SEASON 1, EPISODE #05): RECAP & REVIEW

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The Magicians

Season 1, Episode 04

Episode Title: Mendings, Major and Minor

Brought to you by OBS reviewer Omar

The fifth episode starts with Quentin asking Dean Fogg about what they are going to do about Julia remembering about Brakebills, and Dean Fogg tells him that they won’t interfere with the Hedge Witches as they are not to be worried about them. Julia tries to get into the Hedge Witches warehouse only to be stopped and sent away by Pete with a warning that Marina can be dangerous.

Dean Fogg goes to ask Alice to go back to the Brakebills, as she is staying in a magic farm, and she accepts to go back for a week. Back in Brakebills, the students are having a picnic party where they can find or be chosen by mentor of different kinds of disciplines. Quentin and Alice meet again, and Alice tells Quentin that she is not mad at him and now knows that Charlie had been dead since the beginning. It’s revealed that the magic farm where Alice was staying belongs to Gengi, the mentor that Eliot and Margo want to have, only that she is picky regarding who she chooses.

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Penny doesn’t attend the picnic, but Stanly, a mentor, still goes to find him as he is also a traveler. Penny doesn’t want to learn who to use his power, but instead how to stop it. Stanly tells him to learn Astral projection as is safer and to get a tattoo that with anchor him and not traveler psychically.

To show off the student’s skills, the university is having a tournament of Welters, a game similar to chess only where the goal is to use magic to win the squares with specific circumstances. Margo sings up the physical kids to the game and expects them to win, as she wants to get Gengi attention and likes Welters.

Quentin receives a message from his dad where he tells him that he is sick. He goes to his dad’s house and learned that he has cancer and a tumor, but he has decided not to get any medical procedures. Instead, he wants Quentin to be happy and doesn’t think he should be in his economics career as that is what he believes.

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Trying to save his dad, Quentin asks one of the mentors that specializes in healing about using magic to cure cancer only to be told that it’s something that it hasn’t been able to do, but still points him into researches that have been done on the subject.

In the tournament, the psychical kids go against a group of naturalist. The team consist of Margo the captain, Eliot, Alice, Kady, and Quentin. The problem is that Quentin is thinking only of his father’s cancer and the conversation he had with him. He’s the last of his team to play and when he rolls, it lands in the only black square that has complicated circumstances. The spell that he chooses is the one that he was practicing when he learned about his dad sickness, a black hole. The spell works creating a black hole in the ceiling, and with the help of Alice that closes it they win the game.

Back in the Psychical Cottage, the residents are celebrating their win, but Quentin is still depressed about his dad. Margo tells him that magic doesn’t come from happiness and sunshine, but instead of powerful feeling like what he is feeling and that’s the reason he was able to create a black hole.

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Penny decides to practice astral projection and ends up in a dungeon where a girl, with the tattoo to anchor travelers, is chained up to a wall. He tries to talk to help, but notices that she can’t hear him. The door opens and the Beast walks in, and the girl screams. It appears that the Beast can see Penny, as he turns to look at him and says his name, scaring Penny and making him go back to his body.

After having sex with Pete, Julia is able to get the address of another Hedge witches safe house near her. When she gets there, she learns that all the magic that they know she has already learned it. She asks Pete why he sent her there, and he replies that it’s the second best place in the city. He mentions a place in the Mongolian desert where there is better magic, and he tells her that they can go together, but she tells him that she loves James and declines the offer.

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With the idea of feeling powerful because of what he is feelings at the moment, Quentin asks Eliot for cancer puppy, a dog that has cancer, but with magic is being kept the stage of a puppy. He casts a spell that he thinks it will help and later use it with his dad, but instead of working, he ends up killing cancer puppy.

Dean Fogg tells Quentin that magic can’t cure everything, and that magic can help to only some extend. Quentin goes to see his dad, and tells him about not studying economics, but instead being in Brakebills and doing magic. He uses his magic to repair a miniature plane that he accidentally destroyed when he was little, and was his dad favorite model.

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Julia meets James in a coffee shop, but he doesn’t know her. Knowing that its magic, she goes to the warehouse and confronts Pete about asking Marina to erase James memories of her. Pete tells her that it was for James safety as she is out of control, and thinks that she will harm James.

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The episode ends with Penny showing a drawing of the crest that he saw in the dungeon to Quentin and Alice, after Kady remind him about Quentin being targeted by the Beast the first time. Quentin recognizes the crest and tells Penny that he might have traveled to Filory.

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We are in the middle of the season and we finally see the game of Welters. At the beginning of February, it was announced that the Magicians was given the green light for a second season of 13 episodes for next year. The series has captured the attention of not only the fans of the book series, but also of many more. In this episode we see Quentin struggling with his father having cancer and not wanting treatment. Like in other episodes, the series has changed to have Quentin’s parents separate instead of being a happy couple like in the books. It was good to see Alice going back to the school, but also to see other places outside the Brakebills. Welters, is something that I have been looking forward since I recently read the Magicians. It’s interesting how the writers have blended some characters of the book into Kady, as in the books Josh was the fifth member of the physical kids, but so far I like Kady’s character. I loved the scene of the black hole, I really like the special effects that they use in the show. Julia, it seems that she is spiraling out of control just like in the books, only with the help of the hedge witches. I have the theory that these hedge witches are not the ones that she will befriend and teacher her more about magic, such it was in the books. We officially half way the first season of the Magicians and it seems to get better and better. What do you want to see before the first season ends? Tells us in the comments.