The Dawning
What happened to Mae? Where is she?
Episode 8 of Devil in Ohio marks this finale with us over at the Dodd household. Malachi speaks to his crow, believing it’s time to enact his plan. Now, it turns out Mae is actually over at the Dodd residence, back in Amon Town after being snatched up by Sherriff Wilkins. He’s also behind the orchestrated hit on Suzanne’s car too but when he finds out she was let go, he contemplates his next move. Those inside the compound are happy to see Mae, believing that her death will be their salvation. With a veil over her face, Mae is reminded that there’s no greater sacrifice to one’s family that what she’s about to do. However, she’s unaware that Suzanne is on the way to try and save her. With the wet mud outside though, Suzanne isn’t exactly subtle with her footprints. And of course, Wilkins finds it immediately. Suzanne does leave a message for Lopez before she enters, letting him know what she’s doing. Lopez however, has been told to drop the case due to limited budget and not enough to get a conviction. Still, Lopez decides to head over and track her down upon receiving the voicemail and, hopefully, save Mae too from her fate.
What distracts the cultists?
Mae shows up in the church, with some beautiful cinematography and costuming to boot. Say what you will about the ritual and its grotesque implications, these guys know how to dress in style! The purple robed women sing chorally before the Book of Covenants is brought out. Passages are read by Malachi while Mae is brought in to listen. They sign off by reminding her that the chain must not be broken. However, Suzanne is here to stop that. She wrestles with Wilkins outside, spraying peppers spray in his face when he attempts to fight her. He reaches for his handcuffs but the jingling triggers Suzanne and she pushes him into a torch, which ends up tipping and setting light to a stack of logs. Uh oh! Suzanne presses on, pretending to be one of the cultists as the makeshift platform, complete with the wish sigil carved in the wood and oil slathered across the wood. However, just before Mae’s ritual is completed, church bells in the distance sound, which signifies the town on fire.
Why does Abigail sacrifice herself?
Malachi leaves Mae’s burning and ritual to Abigail. And just her too, everyone else hightails it back to town to try and salvage what remains. That’s great news for Suzanne though, who appears and tries to climb the platform, fighting against the triggering effects those heights are giving her. Anyway, Mae sees this as a sign and believes Lucifer wants her to go. She also doesn’t want to die, and urges Abigail to go with her. Abigail refuses whilst Mae and Suzanne both jump off the platform where Noah is there waiting. It turns out he’s the one who rammed into Suzanne’s car on the road. Mae smacks him upside the head with a shovel and knocks him out, while Abigail stays atop the platform and decides to sacrifice herself to make sure the chain isn’t broken. Meanwhile, Peter drives with the kids away from their house, noticing the red A marked on the front door and realizing they’re not safe. Instead, he takes them to his apartment complex he’s in charge of. Lopez drives into the complex where he ends up face to face with Wilkins. The latter looks close to shooting him but as he’s praying, Lopez draws his gun first and shoots. With Wilkins gone and dead, we cut back to the platform where Malachi takes control of the situation and claims they’re saved thanks to Abigail’s sacrifice.
How do the family move on from this?
It seems to do the trick and her self-sacrifice serves as a way of freeing Mae. But then how does the pentagram sigil play into all this? Either way, that doesn’t matter right now as Mae is seemingly free from the horrors of Amon Town and allowed to go. The chain is no longer broken and it appears she’s free to leave the community, especially with the single sheriff in town now dead. With all of this behind them, Suanne heads back to therapy and embraces her painful past, venting to Dr Daniels. She believes there was a part of her child-self that still wanted to be saved and she’s convinced that if she’s been able to overcome her fears, so too will Mae. Lopez has been promoted to Lieutenant after shooting that sheriff and solving the Amon Town case. Peter drops by and thanks him for his help. The insurance cheque has come through and things are looking up. When Peter leaves to grab some groceries, Lopez has a warrant to go search through Malachi’s compound. When he shows up, the place is completely abandoned. It appears the cult has moved on to greener pastures – quite literally. Lopez rings Suzanne to let her know, who’s having Thanksgiving alone with Mae given she and Peter have separated. Suzanne is still hopeful they’ll get back together but Peter doesn’t look too enthused by that idea.
How does Devil In Ohio season 1 end?
Anyway, Lopez rings and quizzes her about Theodore Harrington the Third, or Teddy as we’ve come to know him by. Teddy’s car had been reported stolen 2 weeks back, the same night as the dance. Not only that but it turns out Mae has been lying. She replaced the red roses with white ones, which she hid behind the dumpster. She actually ordered them that day and she brought them to the school. Not only that, but she also took Teddy’s keys and drove herself out to Amon Town. It wasn’t the Sherriff’s doing after all! Mae set the whole thing up. Suzanne is rattled after this call, realizing she’s completely destroyed her family for this girl. As she sits down to eat, the camera zooms out, away from the house to the shrine Mae has been setting up outside. It’s much bigger now and at its centerpiece is a picture of Mae and Suzanne together, which was her wish all along.
The Episode Review
Devil in Ohio has been a decent enough watch but it’s also one of those shows that’s also caught in two minds about what sort of series it wants to be. On the one hand we get the teen drama angle and all that stuff with the high school. Unfortunately, Helen, Dani, Isaac and Sebastian are woefully underdeveloped and don’t have very much of an arc at all. Jules does have a bit of an arc – but barely – while Mae is still technically the same person at the end as she was at the start. In fact, the only movement character-wise comes from Peter and Suzanne who are in very different places now compared to where they were at the start of the series. In terms of the plot though, the ending actually wraps things up pretty well. There will be some asking for a second season I’m sure but personally I think the ending is pretty conclusive and does a good job giving a payoff to Mae’s wish, which was to stay with Suzanne all this time. She’s certainly managed that but also done so at the expense of Suzanne’s entire family life crumbling apart. Beyond that, Devil In Ohio almost dabbles in trauma and trying to move past that, with some delightful juxtaposed scenes showing the correlation between Suzanne and Mae’s past trauma. All of that has been great but unfortunately it’s overshadowed by a lack of character growth that ultimately fails to stand out. It’s not a bad show but this undoubtedly could have been so much more.
