'Van Helsing' Episode 13 review: 'The Beholder' feels more like a filler than a season finale
Spoiler alert for the season finale of ‘Van Helsing’
Thank the Dark One that ‘Van Helsing’ has been renewed for another season, because it’s hard to imagine how the finale could have been any more unsatisfying. In fact, the entire episode feels more like a promo for Season 5 than it does a finale for Season 4 - which may have had its ups and downs, but honestly deserves much better.
It’s made it all the more disappointing for how well tension was set up in last week’s episode - the quiet moment before what turns out not to have been a storm, but a whirlwind of events quickly rushing us on to the next season before we have a chance to really appreciate everything that’s happened in Season 4.
The question of what happened with Jack (Nicole Munoz) and Violet (Keeya King) in the Dark Realm is unraveled slowly, flashback scenes interspersed with the present. It turns out that Jack and Violet never really stood a chance, as Dracula (Tricia Helfer) appears to be nigh omnipotent in her own realm. Dracula finally gets the spotlight she deserves, and it’s a joy to watch. Dracula takes it to a new level this episode, as she explains to Jack and Violet that their arrival was part of her plan from the beginning.
While Tricia Helfer’s performance was well worth waiting for, the things she says don’t quite sit comfortably. The revelation that Wilhelm (Dakota Daulby) is their biological father directly contradicts not just what Wilhelm has said, but what the show itself has shown us in flashbacks - meaning that either the show has lied to its audience, or Dracula is. Lying would be very much in character for the embodiment of evil, but the show doesn’t present enough room for reasonable doubt to be able to tell if that’s the case, or if the season finale is just retconning its own season.
Either way, the focus on Jack and Violet’s destiny is a plot point that has may need retiring at this point - too much time has been spent on determining what the girls’ destiny is, and not enough time on either of them being able to forge their own. With Jack now trapped in the Dark Realm while Dracula roams free in the world under the guise of President Archer (Jill Teed, who plays a wonderful shapeshifted Dracula), and Violet sedated for most of the episode, the only Van Helsings left on ‘Van Helsing’ have never had less agency - although Violet, inspiringly, never once stops fighting.
In the meanwhile, Axel (Jonathan Scarfe), Julius (Aleks Paunovic) and Colonel Nicholson (Aaron Douglas) go to visit the Sunshine Unit, where Doc (Rukiya Bernard) is supposed to be. They find a strange orange powder whose rules are vague and arbitrary enough to likely be a huge narrative convenience in Season 5, as it kills some vampires, supercharges others, and take away Julius and Axel’s healing abilities. The scuffle with the supercharged vamp may have lead to the deaths of the Colonel and Julius, but it’s getting increasingly difficult to tell what, if anything, makes death stick on ‘Van Helsing.’
By the end of the episode, the Dark One and Bathory (Jesse Stanley) are free, and already in a major position of power, Jack is trapped in the Dark Realm with the voice of Vanessa (Kelly Overton) for company, Axel and Julius are dying on the steps of a facility that may bring us more Doc in Season 5, and overall, the season finale presents a lot to look forward to, and little to enjoy.
It wasn’t that it was a bad episode, on its own. If there were another two or three episodes after this one, this would have been a perfectly acceptable filler episode, with some compelling performances from the three Draculas (her original form, as well as shapeshifting Jack and President Archer) and the mystery of the orange powder. As a finale, however, it’s lacking in resolution. There are ways to do an episode that ends with more questions than it answers, and ultimately, this wasn’t it.
'Van Helsing' is slated to return for Season 5 in 2020