The Shannara Chronicles - 'Dweller', 'Paranor', 'Crimson', 'Warlock', 'Amberle', 'Wilderun' and 'Blood'

"I am a sexy, shirtless god of war."

Hey! Remember The Shannara Chronicles? I stopped reviewing them because my Sky box done fucked up and missed a bunch of episodes, but now season 2 is on Netflix, so I can catch up ready for oh, it's been cancelled(1).

In 'Dweller', Bandon pops into Leah - where we will see over and over that the security situation is at least as bad as that in Arborlon, which you will remember allowed a random human to come within shivving distance of its princess and last surviving Chosen while on serial killer alert. He reminds Queen Tamlin that she made a deal back in the War of the Races, when the city was surrounded by the Warlock Lord's forces and she offered him access to the kingdom's magical source in exchange for shanking her husband, the King, and leaving the rest of the city unmolested, because apparently the nigh-forgotten War of the Races, the events of which were regarded with some scepticism by the sons of the elf king last season, happened within the adult lifetime of a human in her forties. Not only is the four lands very small, its history is apparently similarly compressed.

Mareth has a strained reunion with his Allanon, not least because he tells her that she isn't his daughter, because the Druid Sleep messes with your junk. So he's all 'nuh-uh, magic radiation!' and she's all 'uh-huh, 'cause magic, yo!' And the whole thing gets very tense and snippy as he starts to suspect shenanigans of a warlock nature. Nonetheless, they and Wil go to some mountainy place that we've never heard of before now to retrieve the Sword of Shannara, which supposedly makes the Elfstones look a bit shit and will let them confront Bandon.

Nope! Nopenopenope!

Bandon tries to convince Flick that people are all shit, and to prove it he takes the human to visit his former home, the farm where his parents locked him in the basement for being a seer. He asks about the previous owners, and when the new owners start talking about how the son of the family was a magic-using abomination who had to be locked in the cellar after telling his parents that they would be murdered by demons, brutally murders their own son, just in case he was starting to feel sympathetic again(2).

Eretria returns to Leah, reconciles with Lyria and gives her blessing to the political marriage. Since she is able to tell Ander that Catania was coming to look for him, they realise that this whole 'she ran away in a jealous strop' thing was bullshit. Thus tipped off, they catch Ander's guard captain Edain smuggling weapons from Leah to the Crimson. Edain fesses up and Ander executes him, Ned Stark style.

Wil, Mareth and Allanon fight a giant spider-thing called a Dweller - so there's your title - in order to get the Sword. It's shiny AF.

"Allanon! I choose you!"

In 'Paranor', Allanon takes Wil and Mareth to the druid fortress of the episode title, where Mareth and Allanon use a dummy skull to trap Bandon in a magical cage (without telling Wil, because he's too easy to mind read, even though I'm pretty sure all you'd get is 'bloobloobloo Amberlebloo.') To sell the trap, Allanon is trapped with him, but Mareth can selectively release people, only wouldn't you know it, Bandon has poisoned Flick with his sword and in a dolorous blow kind fo deal, only the Warlock Blade can remove that poison. He demands the skull in exchange for Flick's life, and despite Allanon and Flick telling Wil that Bandon can fuck right off, Wil agrees and Mareth goes along with it, because being a strong independent woman, of course Mareth has a case of the Blandy-cravings which seem to afflict all sassy brunettes in the Four Lands.

"Check out my post-apocalypse specs!"

Speaking of sassy brunettes, Eretria falls back in with mentor/protector/weird pseudo-kidnapper and not-really-okay visit screener Cogline, who turns out to be a good guy after all; an ex-druid and a past adviser to Queen Tamlin, who is pretty shaken by the idea of the Warlock Lord getting to Heaven's Well, the big magical source place. He tells Eretria that her magic tattoos mark her as a descendant of Armageddon's Children, a group of humans susceptible to demonic corruption, but in theory also of wielding great power over the darkness. Alternatively, I guess, a black metal band misunderstood by history. He takes her to a faraday cage where he has imprisoned a Mord Wraith, to start her training to resist the call of darkness which has always been inside her, but never mentioned nor had any notable effect until now. She does this by commanding the wraith to kneel before her, because that isn't going to lead anywhere bad.

Garet Jax captures Valcaa, a Crimson officer who tries to capture him, and takes him to Ander and Lyria for some extreme questioning, which provides enough information for Lyria to turn the tables on her mother and insist that the political marriage will be on her terms.

Shea Ohmsford really only has intensity going for him, but it's one more
character trait than Wil.

Against all good advice, Wil and Mareth use a magical portal to find the hiding place of the Warlock Lord's skull, which turns out to be somewhere in Shady Vale... In the past! As we move into 'Crimson', they search for the skull in the past, and naturally run into Wil's father, currently a troubled boy and not a mean drunk. As a demon attacks, they have to protect him, and also ensure that he doesn't give up his relationship with Wil's mother to save her the problems of marriage to a half-elf. They find the skull hidden in the Ohmsford scarecrow and take it back, where Flick runs himself through on the Warlock Blade, but Bandon still gets away with the skull after the oh-so-shiny Sword of Shannara shatters against the Warlock Blade and Allanon gets cut with the Blade's poison.

Once more, go Wil!

I've been scathing about Lyria before, but props to her, because she's about to
sword fight in that dress.

Our other heroes set about cracking the Crimson's influence, and Jax kills Valcaa after he escapes. Riga is pissed. Ander and Lyria prepare to wed and the priest approaches, all hooded and WHAT UP? RIGA! Who could have seen this coming, besides anyone who watched the priest pace up all sinister, and anyone who had ever surveyed Leah's security arrangements, because honestly it has more holes in its defences than Star Labs. Witness here, where not only is Riga able to just pace the fuck up to the royal wedding with a broadsword up his cassock, but the palace is suddenly heaving with Crimson, who set about the guards and guests. The heroes seem to be doing okay, but then Riga kills Ander while the rest of the group apparently stand around like pills thanks to either a) pure apathy and long-hidden loathing for Ander, or b) shonky editing.

"What's my motivation?"
"Leave no scenery unchewed, Manu."

This brings us to 'Warlock', and Eretria and Lyria flee to Cogline's Wraith lab, while everyone else is captured. Eretria receives a vision from Amberle/the Ellcrys, warning that some shit is about to go down and that Wil needs to reach the Ellcrys, because he is their last hope. Mareth and Wil bring Allanon to the healer-commune of Storlock, where Mareth uses a ritual to project herself into her father's mind to heal him, after having a bit of awkward and unconvincing tension with Wil. Within the dream, the two meet Allanon's mentor, Bremen, who confirms that she is his daughter, and the next druid. Allanon wakes and agrees to teach Mareth to be his successor.

Leaving Allanon and Mareth at Storlock to bond, Eretria and Wil travel to Arborlon. Meanwhile, Bandon arrives at Graymark and slaughters the Crimson garrison there with magic. Then, he uses an eclipse-related ritual(3) to resurrect the Warlock Lord, who for no adequately explored reason looks a lot like Allanon(4), around his blade, skull and... whatever the third thing was. His heart? His elfstones? I forget, but I'm sure they did say.

When a Warhammer 40K aquila and Wonder Woman's logo love each other very much...

Back in Leah, not knowing what has happened to his garrison, Riga is in hog heaven, and like all successful extremists decides to celebrate what turns out to have been a completely successful coup with a little summary justice. He accuses Tamlin of treason for sheltering magic users, but as a final fuck you, she reclaims some dignity and a measure of redemption, and steps off the execution waterfall just as the smug douchebag is building up a head of steam.

"So, until I'm over my girlfriend becoming a tree, my sword will be forever
short and useless. Well, sure glad it isn't anything symbolic."

In 'Amberle', Wil and Eretria reach Arbolon, only to find that it has been sacked by the Crimson, thus saving the show the cost of more than a handful of extras and proving that Leah still has competition in the woeful domestic security stakes. Eretria rescues the surviving Chosen from the Crimson and leads them back to the hidden catacombs below the Ellcrys, but then she gets possessed by a Mord-Wraith and horribly murders at least one of them. While this is happening, Wil goes into the tree, where the Ellcrys advises him to get the fuck over himself and stop moping over Amberle, like he was doing for all of one episode that one time. When he accepts that there is no bringing her back and that she is in his past, the sword regrows, because... I have no real idea. Because his body and mind were going north and south before? Because the sword of Shannara is as much of a euphemism as the elfstones? Anyway, it's a good thing, because the spirit of Shea Ohmsford tells his son that only the Sword can kill the Warlock Lord.

Well, this is gratuitous.

Bandon asks his master to resurrect Catania, whose corpse he stole from Leah after she was murdered. He does, and she is immediately creeped out by him, on account of having seen him do a murder on a guard, or just because he's looking all grunge and coming on like a freight train when she's just woken up in what could charitably described as 'a crypt' with a clear memory of being stabbed in the gut by a trusted ally. Because he's apparently bored easily, the Warlock Lord puts the 'fluence on her to turn her into a trashy goth with low morals, then macks on her in front of Bandon - again, because apparently the bad teeth, jet black eyes and homicidal tendencies aren't quite enough to be really sure that he's the bad guy - and then forces Bandon to kill her. Amazingly, given these top notch people skills, Bandon is starting to have doubts about his life choices.

"Magic is evil. It makes people do bad things. Now let's burn down this
hospital and get back to doing good!"

Allanon and Mareth are sold out by one of the other patients at Storlock, and captured by Riga and the Crimson. They threaten Mareth to force Allanon to give up the Druid Codex, then sentence them both to burn at the stake, while being all sanctimonious at them. Riga then returns to Graymark, where the Warlock Lord dispatches his guards with contemptuous ease. Riga boasts about his magical immunity, but unlike Allanon, the Warlock Lord doesn't forget that his magic is at least 50% telekinesis, and kills a rather surprised looking Riga with barbed wire and rebar, neither of which he is remotely immune to. He takes the Codex and monologues about independence and seizing power until Bandon tries to magic-kill him, only to turn around and run Bandon through with his Blade.

Alas, poor Bandon; you barely had a consistent characterisation. And alas, poor Sassy Elf. You deserved so much better than reduction to girlfriend, murder and resurrection as a bad-taste sex-toy, as indeed does basically everyone.

Oo. That's not a good sign.

Moving on to 'Wilderun', and Loyalists within Leah spring Jax and the gnomes, who jack the Crimson at Storlock and head to Greymark with Allanon and Mareth. They find the aftermath of the Warlock Lord's rise, including Riga's head, but no the Warlock Lord himself. Using the head, they persuade the Crimson to join forces with the loyalists against the Warlock Lord, for all the good that might do. Eretria admits to Wil that she is a Child of Armageddon - largely I suspect to try to fake out the audience that maybe she'll resist the influence of the Warlock Lord - and they join Allanon, Mareth, Lyria and Cogline at the latter's enclave. Cogline explains that they must guard Lyria and her golden elfstone necklace, which together form the key to Heaven's Well and which they naturally opt to keep together for maximum ease of theft.

"That could have gone better."

The Mord-Wraith possessing Eretria betrays them, drawing in the enemy and overpowering Lyria. Meanwhile, the Warlock Lord whoops Allanon, Cogline and Mareth in a fight, killing Allanon at the start of 'Blood', totally for reals this time.

Jax leads the defence of Leah against the Warlock Lord's armies of... I'm not sure. They seem to have too much truck with walls to all be Mord Wraiths. Eretria is sent to disable the dam on which Leah is built, allowing the Warlock Lord to take Lyria up to a shrine behind the reservoir. He pollutes Heaven's Well with his blood, and with the floodgates open, this will spread his power and influence throughout the Four Lands. Cogline and Jax retake the control room and exorcise the Mord-Wraith from Eretria, while Wil and Mareth defeat the Warlock Lord, and Wil sacrifices himself to cleanse Heaven's Well.

Lyria becomes Queen, and Eretria, Cogline and Mareth go to Paranor. There, Mareth suddenly feels that Wil is still alive, and we cut to Wil waking on a battlefield (in the Forbidding?) surrounded by Furies. 'To be continued,' the screen caption lies.

This is the end...
No, actually, this is the end.

So, there we go. Two seasons of sub-Game of Thrones fantasy heroics, in all its compressed scale, minimalist timelined glory, and now we will never know if Wil gets eaten by demons on the wrong side of the tree. I like to think that he does, because he has been been the consistent weak link in the series. It's not even that he's less talented or pretty than anyone else, but that he's got so little substance. I can't blame the actor, given how little he has to work with. The ladies in the piece aren't much better, but at least they get to be a bit sassy (apart from poor sassy elf Catania, who was done wrong in this season.) The best you can say about Wil is that he's... present, and in retrospect I tend to blank out even that. The standouts tend to be the bit parts, which tend to be filled by solid thesps, and the production design is impeccable, even if the budget sometimes impairs the execution.

I will miss The Shannara Chronicles. If it's never been classic TV, it's been good fun to watch, and absolute classic snarking material.

(1) I can't claim to be surprised. I'm more astonished that it made it to season 2.

(2) Partly because he genuinely has had a shit time of it, and partly because of his big-eyed woobie face, it's easy to forget that he's a world-ending zealot.

(3) Which shows excellent timing on his plan.

(4) He is also played by Manu Bennett.