So here’s the other end of the Robert Johnson selling his soul to the devil legend… what does the devil get?
First, don’t bother John when he’s covered in blood and chanting… Zed finds Chas and John at Jasper Winters’ former home in Atlanta, the repository of all things weird. John’s investigating the death of Bernie, his former music producer, a man who worked with his punk band Mucous Membrane, which was, as he says, “just a band of wankers trying to get laid.” Still suspicious of Zed, he decides to keep her close, and brings her with him to Chicago to find out what happened. He uses one of those weird items, The Hand of Glory (“you take the left hand of a man that’s been hanged, pickle it in amniotic fluid for seven years, say the right incantations, and the dead will rise for as long as the candles burn”), which raises not only Bernie, but every other body in the morgue. Bernie mutters something about “the acetate,” and “the voice,” and “Moonrise.”
Zed finds that Moonrise was a record label in the 1930s, and the label’s owner is still alive, just barely. John uses psychic paper… er, a psychic playing card, to get in to see the old man. Marcus tells John and Zed the story of Willie Cole, who had sold his soul. He said that the recording he was working on carried something other than music – the “voice of the deceiver” at the moment of Willie’s very messy death (filmed in the same studio where O Brother Where Art Thou filmed the Soggy Bottom Boys recording “Man of Constant Sorrow”).
When Marcus picked up the acetate, he heard voices telling him to do terrible things. He attempted to destroy it, but couldn’t. A private investigator came to see him recently and Marcus gave him the information about the recording. he tells John that the acetate was being sought by one of Bernie’s biggest successes, Ian Fell. He dies at that point, with Manny the angel at his side. John explains to Zed that the Devil is called “the first of the Fallen,” and that every soul he takes is his revenge on God for expelling him from heaven.
John crashes through a glass door to get to Fell, angry about Bernie’s death. “We’re not here to hurt you,” Zed says. “Don’t be so sure,” John responds. “The night is young, and Bernie’s still dead.” Jasmine tells them that she sold her soul 20 years ago because Ian was dying of cancer. A man came to her in the hospital – a soul broker named Anton, John explains – and offers to make a deal with her. Anton contacted her recently and told her that he could break the deal in return for her finding “the acetate,” which she is supposed to give to him that night. John says he’ll take care of it for her – he’s her best bet at ending the nightmare they’re involved in.
But little in Constantine’s world goes as planned – John goes after Anton, and finds that he had made a deal with Papa Midnite, a “cheating, drug dealing voodoo priest.” Midnite is able to capture and restrain John, injects him with heparin, an anti-coagulant, and cuts John to make him bleed to death as insurance to get the acetate.
Manny appears to John, but reminds him he is unable to interfere – he tells John that he feels his moral compass wavering, and worries that John sees trade value for himself in the acetate.
Papa Midnite’s Winchester rifle
Two of Midnite’s henchmen take the acetate from Jasmine; one touches it, and they begin to hear the voices. They take it to a nightclub and play it for the crowd – which goes crazy and begins a killing frenzy. Zed has a vision of a white tiger in an ambulance; Chas then sees posters for a local college’s “Tiger Radio” station, and they head there. John puts headphones in, and listens to Johnny Rotten and the Sex Pistols to keep from hearing the recording play in the station. But the earbuds come out during the fight, and John is taken over by the voices – until Papa Midnite enters and shoots out the speakers.
Zed and Chas take out the station’s transmitter to keep the sounds from going out to the public, and John uses an incantation to send the recording back to hell, and explode the henchmen.
They grab Anton to make him take back the contract – literally eat it – and set Jasmine’s soul free.
We’re all negotiating with forces bigger than us. But who are we truly negotiating with? The Divine? Well, it’s only natural. Perhaps it’s all a big negotiation with a higher power. But in times of true crisis, we’ll make a pact with whatever forces it takes. And pay whatever price.
This was definitely a better episode than last week’s (although I did enjoy episode 2), but I’m still waiting to get to the growing darkness part of the story! The pilot episode told us that evil was getting a foothold in the world, but nothing in the subsequent 2 episodes has given us any more of a hint of that, focusing more on local problems rather than a growing global infiltration by the Devil! At this point, while it’s definitely entertaining, Constantine has the disturbing potential to become a “devil of the week” show rather than tying everything together. And that’s just fine, up to a point – the show is entertaining, Matt Ryan is terrific, and from what I’m seeing from the comic-book fans, it’s pretty faithful to the decades of Constantine backstory. But the premise of the show is that John is seeing, through the scry map created in the pilot, that there’s an increase in supernatural, demonic activity, and he’s one of the primary defenses against it. I’m hoping to see more of that storyline become incorporated into each episode.
From the NBC Constantine website, here’s some of the episode’s backstory:
Are you a Matt Ryan fan? Matt recently starred in an independent film called Heart of Lightness, which is making its way around the US. Reports from the premiere showing in Seattle are that the film is quite good, and well worth seeing! It is being shown only by groups contracting with Tugg, a company that sets up viewings. You can buy tickets to these one-night events in these cities for these specific dates. The showings will not happen if there aren’t enough tickets sold, and you will not be charged if the event doesn’t presell a specified number of tickets. Click the city name for the ticket link:
Huntington Beach, CA, Nov. 17
Chicago, IL, Nov. 20
Dublin, OH, Dec. 1
Brandon, FL, Dec. 4
New Brunswick, NJ, Dec. 11
Baltimore, MD, Dec. 12
This is the song Reaper Man from tonight’s episode. It was performed by Martin Yarbrough and written by Martin Yarbrough, Bear McCreary (Martin Yarbrough is Bear’s father in law), and show producers David Goyer and Mark Verheiden.
Matt Ryan’s Twitter Q&A, 11/7/14
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