‘A Discovery of Witches’ Recap: ‘Season 3, Episode 2’

Written by John Edward Betancourt

Caution: This article contains spoilers for Episode 302 of ‘A Discovery of Witches’. To revisit the season three premiere, click here.
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There are a great many trials and tribulations that families will endure throughout the years. Such as financial strife, martial problems, and growing pains with the children. Since kids do dumb things sometimes and that learning experience is never easy. But of the many troubles a family can face, there is one that parents hope will never come to fruition. Specifically, coming to learn that one of their children, has gone astray and committed awful and evil acts. For to cross that bridge, not only makes a parent question if by chance, they are utter failures at their one job, but it also leaves them holding the bag as to what comes next. For now, they must decide to stand by their child or turn their backs upon them, and this conundrum is top of mind today, because it served as the focal theme of the next episode of A Discovery of Witches.

But it sure didn’t seem as though that kind of tough notion was going to be present here. After all, this is a story that saw Peter Knox once again in duress, since his desperate attempts to have Satu help him regain power in the witch world, ended with him getting his pompous butt kicked… and that’s always satisfying. Plus, Matthew was willing to open up to the world about his affliction and his identity to others in order to help cure the blood rage. Since Diana’s pal put together a research team to figure out this mess and well, it’s a good thing that more resources and honesty were poured into this. Because a surprise reunion with Father Hubbard brought about joy and the conundrum in question. For Hubbard reunited Matthew and Diana, with young Jack. Whom as it turns out, was turned to vampirism, and has spent the decades waiting for his surrogate parents to return.

But while it was wonderful to see this family be reunited at last… it didn’t take long for the issue at hand to come to fruition. For we also came to learn that poor Jack… so missed his ‘mother’ and ‘father’, that he found himself motivated to do questionable acts to obtain memories of them. Such as stealing the pendant that was so sought-after last season. Which also meant though… that Jack was the very vampire that was suffering from blood rage and indulged in it, more often than he should. And to make matters worse, Benjamin was eager to help him enjoy that rage and taught him how to embrace it and how to hunt in the decades in between the return of Matthew and Diana and well, that revelation put Matthew and Diana in quite the difficult place. For their child was in fact, a monster through and through and had done horrible things in this world and now decisions had to be made.

After all, the family edict was to kill blood rage infected family members on sight and knowing full well that was the case, motivated Jack to run off into the night and put his father on the hunt and this was a harrowing sequence to watch play out. Because we never expected Jack to be the monster, nor did we ever expect Matthew to have to hunt his surrogate son and decide his fate and well, when he caught up with Jack… he made his call and a breath of relief washed over all of us. For Matthew realized that Jack was a mere victim of a condition that no one understood, and that science could potentially save lives by curing this mess and he decided it was best… that Jack live. A decision that Matthew might come to regret since his brother won’t like it in the slightest, but even that may not be a problem after all. Since Matthew is ready to split the family to take it in a new direction.

One that embraces the future and rightfully so. Since the world is changing around Matthew and he’s taking part in that change and a new path might bring new opportunities for monster kind and a chance for penance for the ones that suffer from old lines of thinking. But before we enjoy the benefits of these bold decisions, we can revel in the wonder of another brilliant tale. One that really did make it clear how difficult it is to turn our backs on family and how we will indeed go the extra mile for them, regardless of their acts, when we know that salvation is in the cards and well… you cannot go wrong with tender moments in that manner, nor can you go wrong with character growth. Which is what we saw in spades here and in the end, all this episode does is leave us hungry for more, since we are all now dying to know how Matthew’s powerful change of heart is going to impact the monster world in a positive manner. Until next time.

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