A dramatic episode that features a character that becomes far more important after season 3. The show once again plays on the death of the girls’ mother, and allows the girls to finally figure what happened to her. With some clever mirroring stories, and a sprinkle of family drama this is a strong one.
Synopsis: When Prue sees a demon killing someone where her mother was killed, the sisters discover that is was the same demon that killed their mother 20 years ago. They also meet their mother's whitelighter Sam, who had a forbidden romance with Patty, their mother.
The way this episode mirrors Piper’s current relationship with Leo is one of the first times we see just how similar Piper and her mother were. Just like Piper, Patty fell in love with her whitelighter. Here it never seemed to be as big of a rule as it was to become in season 3. Still, it was a nice touch, and it was the first episode a while that Piper didn’t drive me crazy.
We also saw a somewhat temporary end to the Piper/Leo/Dan triangle when Leo leaves after learning what can happen when witches and whitelighters are together. It’s the first time in a long while that I actually felt sorry for Piper.
Prue really became the best sister here. She keeps so much of herself bottled up and the way she deals with her mother’s death is so heartbreaking, and her strength to go and walk down the same path her mother did just before she died, shows just how brave she really is. Each of them dealt with her death differently though, the other two sisters were a little more upfront about it.
I felt sorry for Phoebe too. She always gets the short end of the stick, with her power of premonition. It’s a hard burden to bear. Having to relive your mothers last moments would be hard for any child, let alone if they were murdered by a demon.
Sam’s heroic act here worked so well that it’s almost a shame he had to be brought back again. It gave this episode the bittersweet ending it deserved.
8.5/10
This is a fabulous episode and deals with their magical side as well as their human side. The scene at the end in the kitchen is fantastic and the look Piper gives at the end is heartbreaking and highlights what a classy actor Holly is. One slight bug bear is that all through the episode it is shown how similar Piper and Patty were yet it's Prue who says it's her that share the similarities and is worried by it. But nevertheless a fantastic episode on many different levels.
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