‘Look who’s Barking’ turns two different sisters into two very different creatures. With a great mid episode twist, this is actually quite a fantastic penultimate episode.
Synopsis: In order to track an evil creature known as a banshee that kills those in pain, Prue is turned into a dog. But when Phoebe ends up being transformed into a banshee herself, it’s up to Piper to save both her sisters by turning to Cole.
Since Shannen obviously directs the season finale, she is (like in Apocalypse Not) missing for quite a large chunk of this episode. Even if it was to get rid of Prue, I always thought it was a hilarious twist. In fact, I actually liked the idea a lot more than her becoming a man for almost the same thing in ‘She’s A Man, Baby, A Man!’ back in the second season, it worked far better in this instance and the cute dog is a big bonus.
They had a lot of fun with the whole dog thing too, Prue chasing Kit (the last time she appears until ‘Cat House’ if I’m right?) and one stroke of genius is the whole being run over by a cute guy thing; Very cute.
Phoebe’s heartbreak makes this episode so amazing. The idea of bringing in something like a banshee just so we can see how broken up she is was such a great move. The Banshee itself was actually quite creepy (If I recall correctly when this was being aired first over here, there was a warning before they broadcast it). Luckily, Banshees are something that haven’t been done to death on other TV series before this and the way Charmed went about it was brilliant.
They really changed up the usual chronology of events by having the demon itself vanquished quite early on in the episode, which usually happens towards the very end. Obviously this was to allow time for Phoebe’s transformation but I just felt that it was a nice change of pace.
Again, there’s lots of fun with Piper learning how to control her new power. This episode is the first time we really saw just how much Piper can grow as a character without her other sisters around. One line that always makes me laugh is Holly’s “Phoebe’s home. Her delivery is spot on!
As the penultimate episode of such a fantastic season, this episode worked brilliantly.
9/10
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