While Lydia, Scott, and Malia head to the town teased in episode five, Liam and Hayden take measures to defeat the Ghost Riders into their own hands, which involves a few surprising familiar faces.
Lydia’s opening vision
The audience is treated to quite the throwback as Lydia experiences a vision through her own mirror. She finds herself transported to Canaan, but back in the late 80s. Canaan has 80s rock, big hair, jean jackets, and huge cell phones. It would be fun, if it wasn’t so creepy. While we don’t see any Ghost Riders, it’s pretty obvious that they’re in Canaan during Lydia’s vision, as people suddenly begin to vanish in puffs of smoke.
The entire sequence is so well done and so fascinating to watch.
The pacing in this episode is top-notch
“Teen Wolf” can be hit or miss when it comes to pacing out episodes, but “Ghosted” does a fantastic job of moving through scenes and story points quickly without giving the audience whiplash, which is a pleasant surprise. Often, when the show moves at a break-neck speed, it skips over plot points or breaks the already established rules of its universe.
The trip to Canaan does, however, require quite the suspension of disbelief, even for a supernatural show. Lydia, Malia, and Scott not only find the banner from her opening vision, but they also find newspapers and ticket stubs to show them the date - completely intact on a picnic table outside, exposed to the elements for nearly 30 years.
Apparently there’s never any sort of weather in Canaan in addition to it being a ghost town.
Mr. Douglas is creepy
After he overhears Hayden and Liam coming up with a plan to catch the Ghost Riders, he decides to play along as a naive witness to the activities we’ve seen so far. He’s clearly got his own plan in mind. Hayden and Liam immediately buy into his concerned act, telling him what they know.
You’d think they’d use a little more caution after everything they’ve seen.
We get a few familiar ‘Teen Wolf’ faces
Not only do we see Theo when Malia hallucinates in Canaan, but he’s also an integral part of Liam and Hayden’s plan to catch the Ghost Riders. They need his ability to absorb electricity that he “inherited” from a member of his pack.
But he’s not the only familiar face.
Who do Liam and Hayden get help from to get Theo back to the land of the living (remember, his dead sister crawled out of the ground to take him)? None other than Kira’s mother. I guess that since Arden Cho didn’t return for another season, this decision makes sense, though you do have to wonder why she helps the teenagers, since she seems so against cracking the earth open with Kira’s sword.
I do wish she was sticking around, though.
Melissa McCall feverishly attempts to save Chris Argent
I know that he’s basically on his deathbed in this episode, but who knew these two had so much chemistry? Maybe it’s because I’m used to Melissa having more of her screen time with the sheriff, but I didn’t expect that.
Despite him barely breathing, their scenes are so fun!
Something is fishy with Claudia Stilinski
I was always suspicious of her returning from the dead, but after this episode? Even more so. “Ghosted” shows us that the banshee left behind in Canaan also received a loved one back from the dead - her drowned son.
Does this mean Claudia is somehow the trade-off for the Ghost Riders taking over Beacon Hills? Or is there something even more sinister going on? Lydia does speculate that those left behind become Ghost Riders themselves. Could Claudia become a Ghost Rider? Or is that fate reserved for Scott and his friends if they don’t figure out a way to stop this?
The verdict
Such a well constructed episode in a usually uneven show, this really gave us some forward momentum on the Ghost Rider storyline and kept me on my toes.
4 out of 5 stars
