This week’s Evil is a literal jaw-dropper.
About halfway through the episode, which is titled “The Demon of Sex,” the titular figure loses the lower part of his face when Sister Andrea strikes a stunning spiritual blow. It’s gross — but nowhere near as disgusting as the backhanded move Leland pulls against the small-but-mighty nun near the end of the hour.
Elsewhere, Sheryl has two big wins at work, one of them assisted by everyone’s favorite fictional influencer. And Karima has a super-secret solution to Ben’s existential crisis. Read on for an episode rundown.
MR. & MRS. & HELL FIEND | David presides over the wedding of Leo and Amalia, two young parishioners who waited until they were married to have sex and who wind up needing a consult barely a week after their “I do”s. While they’re talking with Father Acosta, Sister Andrea follows a trail of otherworldly slime (that only she can see) into the conference room and winds up interrupting the newlyweds’ meeting… where there’s also a giant demon (again, whom only she can see) lurking in the corner.
“I didn’t see anything,” David tells her when she requests a moment’s chat in the hallway. “Because you’re not as good!” the frustrated nun bluntly responds. (Ha!) Theorizing that something about the marriage is possessed, she joins David’s consultation — angering the demon. And soon the truth comes out: When Amalia and Leo try to have sex, “we have a physical reaction,” he explains. Leo gets nauseous. And Amalia has “hives” that suspiciously look like claw marks on her back and rib cage. (“Food allergy. I didn’t do that,” the cheeky demon, who also moons Sister Andrea during this scene, quips.)
Kristen chats with the couple, and at first, she’s making headway — we can tell because the demon starts deteriorating right before Sister Andrea’s eyes. And though Dr. Bouchard doesn’t love that the nun is sitting in on her session, the women come to an agreement… which is good, because when Leo and Amalia return, the demon is larger and it mocks Sister Andrea, saying she’s losing.
Kristen counsels the pair to “do what your body wants you to do” and encourages them to engage in whatever urges come to mind. That manifests as Amalia slapping Leo in the bedroom one night. Then he bites her lip while kissing her, drawing blood. Then she grabs a butcher knife from the kitchen and orders him to “F—k me now, or I’ll kill you.” Leo is into it! They go at it, all nausea and skin irritation forgotten, and the demon happily climbs right under the covers with them as they consummate their (unholy?) marriage.
SINGLE MOTHERHOOD’S GOING GREAT, THANKS | While the contractor is being a big jerk to Kristen, pressuring her to sign up for his services while Andy is away in Nepal, Ben is upstairs snaking the toilet while Lynn, Lila and Laura watch/provide color commentary. Something starts pulling on the snake like a tuna on a fishing line; the device eventually snaps, cutting up Ben’s hand and adding to his pile of woes. When the sisters Bouchard note that Ben isn’t very magnificent lately, Lynn diagnoses him with “cultural derealization,” or depression brought on by the extreme bizarreness of the world. “I think that’s why you’re sad,” she says. “You can’t figure it out anymore. Things have gotten all weird, and you don’t like it.”
Where’s Lexis, you wonder? Oh she’s just chanting “I’m bad” over and over in her room, solo, while wearing her mom’s sex wolf mask — totally normal teen stuff. When Kristen discerns that Lexis’ actions are Lynn’s punishment for Lexis’ telling Kristen about Lynn’s boyfriend in the previous episode, Kristen Has. Had. E. Nough. She calls an impromptu family meeting and drafts a list of 10 commandments for their family that must be followed, “no matter what.” The first entry: “Thou shalt not lie to Mom.” There are some about telling Kristen if Leland approaches, and not going into Kristen’s closet, that kind of thing.
Upstairs, the toilet coughs up an eyeball attached to an optic nerve. Ben looks at it, flushes it, then slowly walks out.
KARIMA FTW! | Ben holes up in his apartment, which eventually leads his sister, Karima, to hunt him down and demand to know what’s the matter. “I try to figure out these cases that don’t make any sense, and then we just move on to the next thing,” he says listlessly. So she demands that he come with her to the “Super Secret Science League,” a gathering of nerds that Ben finds massively unimpressive… until they announce that he’s got to see whether he can blow something up in three minutes, using only materials that can be found in a kitchen. He and Karima nail the task, and aw, Ben looks so happy!
Later, as a guest speaker is talking about a meteor that’s spewing rocks and stumping scientists, Karima points out that it’s possible to believe in science and have faith in Allah. Then she volunteers to help him figure out his unanswered cases, and anything they can’t piece together, they’ll bring to the League. After all, “Anything that God has given is solvable,” she says, smiling. (P.S. I LOVE HER. MORE KARIMA/SOHINA SIDHU, PLEASE.)
Ben’s newfound joie de vivre is noticeable when he next meets up with David and Kristen. Oh, and he’s solved one of their old mysteries, that of the girl in Season 1, Episode 2. Remember, she died for a little while but came back to life, and it looked like an angel was in the footage of her room? Ben now thinks the image was created with an app. I’m glad he’s feeling better, but… an app? We’re good with that, Ben?
KRISTEN TO THE RESCUE | When Leland gets wind of Sister Andrea messing with the demon, he sees an opportunity. So he scurries to the monsignor and announces that the nun is in ill health and has been hallucinating. “The worry is liability,” the monsignor later tells David and Kristen, then he defers to Kristen’s professional assessment of the aging sister. Kristen sees the situation for the potential railroading that it is, and blithely assures the head priest that there’s no evidence Sister Andrea is talking to anyone imaginary. In the hallway afterward, the two women seem to come to an understanding based on mutual respect.
RAD G TAKES CHARGE |You know who’s got no respect, though? The millennials who work at Sheryl’s troll farm/crypto currency company, who regularly say “OK, Boomer” to her face and who refuse to help her brainstorm a way to get Makob (the currency’s name) to trade at $135/coin instead of the $11 it’s at.
But then she gets a very helpful idea from an unexpected source. When Sheryl visits her granddaughters to announce that she’s moving to a house just a few minutes away, she sees the commandments list… as well as the ones the girls came up with to help them survive school. An entry on the latter list — “influence the influencers” — was inspired by Melindaz, aka the YouTube-esque personality we’ve met a few times before, and Sheryl gets an idea.
When Melindaz is sitting in Sheryl’s office, she’s initially not down with the idea of promoting Makob on her feed. But when Sheryl offers $10K up front and another $10K when the price rises, the extremely online blonde is all in. And the plan works! Later, as Sheryl rejoices over Makob’s new value, she calls her uncooperative assistant, Taylor, and the equally surly office manager, Bobby, into her office.
Without losing her very pleasant tone, Sheryl demands that Taylor resign. And when Taylor balks, Sheryl announces that the chocolates she sent the woman earlier that day contained Brazil nuts — a substance to which Taylor is deathly allergic. Sheryl also has stolen Taylor’s epipen, and as the assistant starts to cough and rub at her throat, Sheryl makes her sign a resignation letter. Eventually, Taylor is gasping as she enters the elevator; Sheryl tosses the much-needed medicine into the car just as the doors close. “Everyone has their weaknesses, Bobby,” she says to the gaping office manager. “Don’t make me find yours.” Damn, Rad G!
Now it’s your turn. What did you think of the episode? Sound off in the comments!