"The Librarians" Recap: "And the Image of Image"

Written by John Edward Betancourt

THIS IS THE EMERGENCY SPOILER ALERT SYSTEM...YOU ARE ADVISED TO READ AT YOUR OWN RISK...

I always enjoy it when television shows tackle present day issues that permeate our lives because I'm always curious to see what a particular writer or show has to say about our society and the things we do. Yet while it's cool to see, most shows never go near modern day topics and up until last night that included The Librarians. 

That's right, our favorite television show about magic decided to tackle a little slice of real life in this week's episode and while it wasn't exactly an earth shattering societal issue, it was just neat to see them do it...with the Selfie. Especially since they managed to tie it into the dangers of magic at the same time and it was done in the sneakiest of fashion as well, since our intrepid heroes were introduced to tonight's mystery by bearing witness to a young girl flying through the air in London during a night out, looking as though she was just hit by a car.

It leads the group to discover that the girl had just left the nightclub, Effigy and she is not the only one to suffer an accident after spending time within its walls. At least seven other people suffered some kind of calamity after hanging out in the club, including a young man who looks like he suffered from a drug overdose...despite the fact that he was working all night at a nearby restaurant, never did drugs a day in his life and only visited the club for a whopping five minutes for a delivery before finding himself in the hospital as an OD victim.  

But since the external investigation has yet to turn anything up, there's only one way to discover what's really going on in the club...they have to get inside and that's when the episode gets really special. Not only do we get some quality laughs since Stone gets denied entry repeatedly and Cassandra finds herself drunk because of the magic within, but we get an unexpected villain this week...Dorian Gray. Yes, it turns out this fictional character was real all along and he is using the Selfies being taken in the club and pictures from his staff photographer to build a new portrait to keep him young forever. The only way to defeat him, is to rework the portrait to resemble someone else to rob him of his power...something Eve is willing to do to finally put an end to Dorian's wicked plan. 

So when all is said and done, I have to admit this actually turned out be a darker than expected episode. Sure there were some laughs, in fact there were plenty of those, sure the episode made Selfies interesting for the first time in the history of ever and it gave the show a neat little modern day tie in. But what made this episode so dark, was the last five minutes where we basically came to the sobering realization that the Librarians and their Guardian are quite expendable. In fact it was Ezekiel that pointed out just why they were chosen, they had no ties outside of here. Several episodes now have ended in this darker fashion and even Jenkins made mention of a big battle ahead so one has to wonder...will the showdown with Prospero be far more costly than we ever imagined? Are we going to lose a major character somewhere along the way? I certainly hope not...but this is the first episode in memory that showed us a much more dangerous side to magic. Time will tell I suppose, until next time. 

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