Today it’s time once again for Leah’s recap of the latest episode of Teen Wolf! 

Title The Overlooked

What Happened? Scott, Stiles, Derek, and Peter are trapped with Jennifer Blake in the evacuated hospital during a bad storm, and they have to deal with trying to save Cora while navigating the struggle between Jennifer and the Alpha Pack, who each have their own agendas. While trapped in an elevator, Jennifer Blake reveals to Derek how she turned into this dark druid. When she escapes the elevator, knocking Derek out before she leaves, she kidnaps Melissa McCall as one of her next sacrifices (guardians). Scott cannot get to his mom in time to save her from Jennifer, and he sees no other option than to join Deucalion in order to get his help in bringing his mother and the sheriff back safely.

Favorite Quotes
“We’ve got a problem. A big problem.” (Peter)

“You know, next time I put my lips to your mouth you better be awake.” (Stiles)

“You know, I actually used to be the one with the plan. Or at least a Plan B. Now, I don’t know; I’m thinking maybe you were right. I mean, we are pretty much useless. Maybe all we really do is find the bodies…I don’t want to find my father’s body.” (Stiles)

“Well if that means I should continue to be profoundly terrified, then don’t worry, I’ve got it covered.” (Melissa McCall)

“We were the overlooked. The emissaries. It was a mistake Deucalion and the Alphas should never have made, because I made an oath of my own. From virgins and warriors, from healers, philosophers, and guardians, to loan me their power so that I could teach these monsters that their monstrous actions would never be overlooked.” (Jennifer Blake, aka Julia Baccari)

My Thoughts I’m going to start off with the bad because I like to keep things positive, but I need to say something about this season of Teen Wolf. While I am enjoying the show, I feel like it has gone a little off the path in a way that has made it less impactful. We are almost all of the way through these first 12 episodes, and yet we have barely had any onscreen development with our main characters or the relationships between them. Most of the development we’ve seen has seemed to happen over the summer—the four months that passed between Season Two and this season.

We’ve had a bit of development for Allison, which has been done well in my opinion, but, other than that, we’ve only had bits and pieces. “Motel California” was possibly the best at showing us character moments, because it gave us time with many of the characters and showed their inner conflicts, while also showing us their relationships with each other. Sure, we’ve seen hints this season that Stiles is cracking under the strain of the events of the past year. We’ve seen Scott wrestling with fears of becoming an Alpha and the responsibilities that could entail, as well as how to deal with fighting the Alphas without doing something he’d regret.

The writers have also added on to the mountain that is Derek Hale’s angst and guilt, multiplying it even further with not only the backstory involving Paige but Derek’s storyline with Jennifer as well—all compounding into one big pile of emotion I like call “Derek’s life is the worst ever; I don’t know how he decides not to just spend all day in bed.” It’s too much; it’s growing to a point where it’s ridiculous rather than horrifying and impactful.

There have been so many missing character moments so far this season. Scott and Allison still haven’t had the relationship talk they meant to have in Episode One. We’ve barely seen how Lydia’s dealing with Jackson being gone other than her getting it on with a few other guys. Derek and Cora haven’t had a proper conversation about the past or about where each of them were during the six years they’ve been apart. We haven’t seen Scott talk to Stiles (or Isaac, potentially his new BFF) about his anxiety over his new Alpha status or how to deal with Deucalion. Most of the episodes and the plot this season are being driven by new characters, and we’re missing out on having moments with our core characters. To me, that is what the crucial missing element has been this season and why, while I am still enjoying this season, I am also disappointed with it.

Now, on to my thoughts for this week!

This episode seemed to mostly serve as a way to give the audience and the characters that were in the dark some information we need to know about the two main villains of this season. We learned that Jennifer Blake’s real name is Julia Baccari, and that she used to be Kali’s emissary. Kali attacked her but left her to die “a peaceful death” of bleeding out instead of striking the killing blow, which proved to be a mistake as Julia crawled her way to the nemeton tree, where she gained enough power from it to hold on to life until she was found by the sheriff.

When Jennifer explained all of this, I found it very interesting but also horrible, because it seems that the entirety of whatever piece of Jennifer that may have had genuine feelings for Derek is based upon how he enabled her to live by performing a mercy killing on top of that tree a decade ago. I also find it strange that apparently it has taken Jennifer this long to get to a point where she can get her revenge on the Alpha Pack; what has she been doing for 10 years? Also, I really, really dislike how she continually tried to manipulate everyone around her, even after they knew the truth and didn’t trust her. Her manipulation of Derek was particularly distasteful to me, because she seemed to knowingly add on to the pile of guilt he already carries on his shoulders—not to mention it repeated Derek’s past of being used and betrayed by a woman he was in a relationship with (i.e., Kate).

There were also a lot of things that I was wondering how Jennifer knew, which made me ask: Is she in league with Peter? Jennifer knows that Scott is a true Alpha, and I have no idea how she would know that when not even Stiles or Derek knew that, seeing as Jennifer has spent very little time with Scott. Peter has definitely been up to something this season, as he’s been so often off-screen, and he could have had the experience necessary to recognize what Scott was going through. Peter also knows the other piece of information that Jennifer revealed she knew: the previous color of Derek’s eyes due to his killing of Paige. The only other way Jennifer would know that was if she had been around during Season One to see them in person, or if she somehow had access to Derek’s memories or those of someone who was around before Derek became an Alpha. Unless, of course, somehow her magic has ways of telling her these things. It’s very unclear what exactly is the extent of Jennifer’s powers, and there are a lot of questions still unanswered.

The rest of this episode was mostly made up of little moments with the characters—Peter and Scott’s hilarious interaction; Mama McCall’s awesomeness with the paddles, shocking Ethan and Aiden with the electricity; Stiles’s mini-breakdown while in the ambulance with Cora; and Isaac, Allison, and Chris all working together as a team. We also saw that apparently Scott and Stiles haven’t been talking much, since Stiles clearly didn’t know what a true Alpha even was, let alone that Scott was one. This lack of communication between these two seems unusual and possibly dangerous, as I think we’ll need all of our characters to communicate well with each other in order to be able to defeat both the Alpha Pack and Jennifer Blake.

Other Notable Things
• Lunar Eclipse: We learned in this episode that on the lunar eclipse the werewolves lose all of their powers. Considering that this event is coming up soon, it’s sure to be a chaotic last few episodes where all of the werewolves are left somewhat defenseless. Perhaps they’ll have to take some lessons from the awesome humans in order to defend themselves?

Episode Title Speculation: 3.11 “Alpha Pact”
I’m guessing this episode’s title will relate to Scott’s deal with Deucalion and possibly involving Stiles and Allison in the deal as well, since it appears from the promo that not only does Jennifer take Melissa and the sheriff as her guardian sacrifices; she also takes Chris Argent. I wouldn’t be surprised, however, if there was another pact that someone had made with the Alphas that we have been unaware of thus far—Peter, perhaps? He’s been suspiciously missing for a lot of the action this season, only really appearing in a fight against the Alphas in this week’s episode.

As this Season 3a winds down into our last few action-packed episodes, we’ve got a lot to think about! What are your opinions on the season so far? Did you enjoy this week’s episode? And what do you think is in store for our heroes in these last two episodes? Tell me your opinions in the comments below!