Teen Wolf Episode 3.06 "Motel California"

Last week, Derek Hale supposedly died, Deucalion gets a lot more suspicious and Scott McCall was an Alpha for approximately 2.45 seconds. This week, I get extremely emotional and attempt to reign in my feelings to create something vaguely comprehensible and legible for you to write while maintaining my usual levels of sass.

The episode begins with a man driving into the parking lot of the Motel Glen Capri, set on March 5, 1966. He exits the truck with a huge wound on his leg, and he limps into one of the rooms. He pulls his shirt up to reveal what is presumably an Alpha bite on his torso, and he sees the full moon out of his window. He pulls out a shotgun, his license and his other items, places the gun under his chin as his eyes turn yellow, and pulls back the trigger. This all seems very dramatic until the camera zooms in on his drivers’ license – his name is Alexander Argent. That explains a lot. Cutting to the present day, the Beacon Hills bus pulls into the same parking lot and our protagonists exit the parking lot, still on the way to their mysterious track meet of some kind. Coach explains that the meet has been postponed and that this is where they’re staying for the night, and warns them that there will be no sexual perversions just because they need to share some of the rooms. As everyone heads to a room, Lydia freakily stares at the motel in a manner we’re rather familiar with, and mentions that she doesn’t like the motel. I don’t blame her, we just saw a dude kill himself there, that can’t be a good omen. Allison calms her down, saying that they’re only staying one night, and Lydia responds that “a lot can happen in one night” – more foreshadowing of the most blatant kind.

In their room, Stiles and Scott go through their top suspects in the recent sacrificial murders. Stiles’ list includes Mr Harris, Cora Hale, Dr Deaton… and Lydia. Keeping in mind that she was in fact brainwashed by Peter the previous season, she is remarkably prone to a whole bunch of creepy stuff. Scott says that it might be someone else at their school that they don’t suspect, bringing up Matt from last season. Stiles scoffs and mentions that he had suspected Matt from day one, which was true. Back in Beacon Hills, Jennifer Blake helps Derek into his loft while Chris Argent is exploring the abandoned mall where the battle took place, piecing together what happened with his badass hunter skills. When it starts to get dark out, Stiles heads to the vending machine for a snack when he sees that Boyd is already there, strangely nonresponsive. The vending machine stalls and instead of letting Stiles jimmy it (as he did marvelously last season), Boyd just punches through the glass to get what he wants. Stiles is shocked but also steals some snacks when nobody is looking. Allison is showering and asks if Lydia has new towels, and finds Scott standing in the bathroom being creepy like he’d been taking lessons from Peter. He partially snaps out of his weirdo daze and heads out of the room, leaving Allison pretty freaked out. Lydia goes to ask for new towels and notices some numbers on the wall and asks what they are. The clerk mentions that it’s the number of suicides the motel has had – 198 in the 40 years they’ve been open, the highest number in California.

Chris Argent calls Allison from the mall and offers to come and get her, she mentions the motel to him and says that they’re fine. After they hang up he sees the marks on the walls where Allison fired her arrows during the battle. At the loft, Jennifer removes Derek’s shirt to reveal his injuries, and he passes out as she begs him not to die. She presses an ear to his chest and is relieved that he’s still alive. Lydia freaks out over the suicides to Allison, and finds it weird that the motel likes to post the number of them in their office. She suddenly hears a voice of a couple through the air vent even though Allison seemingly doesn’t, and listens as they decide to commit suicide together. She screams and heads next door to investigate, but finds only construction equipment and no dead couple. Outside, Boyd is getting ice from the ice machine when he hears voices calling his name, and he mutters out the name Alicia. He digs through the ice and uncovers a girl buried in it, who opens her eyes. Boyd freaks out and runs away. Lydia wants to leave but can’t convince Allison, who really should know better considering the freaky supernatural stuff that’s been happening to them. Isaac is lying on his bed when he starts to hear noises, including the voice of his abusive dead father. Isaac can hear his father talking about the freezer and ducks under the covers of the bed, and then finds himself chained inside a freezer; he screams as it shuts on him.

At the motel office, the numbers have changed from 198 to 201, and Lydia and Allison wonder why the numbers have changed, and that it might be because some deaths are about to happen. Scott’s phone rings and hears his mother’s shaking voice, he looks outside to see Deucalion with his claws in his mother’s throat. He threatens Scott and then slices Melissa’s throat, and she falls to the ground. Stiles snaps Scott out of it and we find that it’s just a hallucination, and this is starting to feel like the wolfsbane party from season 2. In another room, Danny and Ethan are kissing and giggling adorably, and Danny shows Ethan his scars. Ethan stares at them and asks Danny what he’d do if there was a way to make them disappear – insinuating that he’s willing to give Danny the bite. Danny says he likes them and they make him feel like a survivor, and begins to kiss Ethan again. Ethan freaks out when he feels his spine move and launches himself into the bathroom and sees a hand and face coming out of his stomach, and he gaps it out of the room, leaving a confused Danny behind. Stiles meets up with Allison and Lydia to talk about the behavior of the werewolves, and Lydia grabs a bible to find newspaper clippings off all the suicides that happened in that motel room and decides to investigate the under construction room. They enter to find Ethan trying to cut himself with a saw, and Stiles immediately tries to grab it from him and Lydia pulls out the power cable, then Ethan tries to slice himself with his claws. They push him into a space heater and the heat snaps him out of it although he has no memory of what happened. At Derek’s loft, his injuries are still severe and she mentions to Jennifer that he needs to let everyone know that he’s alive, and she mentions that many characters in literature have used a fake death to their advantage.

Allison goes off to find Scott while Stiles brings up his theory to Lydia that she might be connected with the murders going on, bringing up the wolfsbane party from last season. Boyd is sitting on his bed when the radio turns on and begins replaying an incident from his childhood – apparently he was meant to be watching his sister on the ice skating rink when he lost sight of her and she died. He crushes the radio and storms out. Derek at the loft is feeling better and gives a beautiful Edward-esque speech about how Jennifer really should stay away from him because he hurts everyone. She ignores him and they end up having sex; because he’s hot and vulnerable and she can. Lydia is distracted when she tells Stiles that she can hear more voices and water running, like someone is drowning. They run into Boyd’s room so see that he’s drowned himself in the bathtub, a heavy safe from the office on his chest. They try to lift it but it doesn’t work, and Stiles remembers the heater from the construction room, so he runs to the bus to get the safety flares. While he’s gone, Lydia hears something under the bed and sees Isaac shaking underneath it. Stiles returns with the flare and they light it, saving Boyd, and then turn to Isaac to save him. Lydia and Stiles find Allison and they find Scott in the parking lot holding a flare; it’s good that he’s got the last one- oh. He’s completely soaked in gasoline. That might be a bit too much heat. Scott mentions that there’s no hope for him or for Derek (who consequently is having sex with Jennifer while his Betas and Scott have been trying to kill himself, great Alpha skills). Allison says that Derek isn’t Scott’s fault, but he says that it doesn’t matter what he does, people always get hurt and die around him and that killing himself might be the best thing for everyone. Scott says that everything was so much better when they weren’t popular, weren’t good at lacrosse, when they weren’t special, they were just nothing. That it would better to be no one at all. Stiles steps forward shakily with tears steaming down his face, and explains to him that Scott is someone, he’s his best friend and his brother. He steps into the pool of gasoline and grabs Scott’s hand with the flare, and says that if Scott his going to kill himself then he might as well take him down with him (excuse me while I sob my heart out my words are not doing this scene justice). Stiles grabs the flare and hauls it away, but a force shoves the flare back into the gasoline. Allison and Lydia tackle the boys out of the explosion, and when Lydia looks back, she can see the deformed face of the Darach in the flames.

The next morning Coach Finstock finds Stiles, Scott, Allison, Lydia, Boyd and Isaac all sleeping on the bus and announces that the meet has been canceled. Ethan thanks Scott for saving his life and tells him that Derek is alive, however Ennis is dead and that’s (supposedly) Derek’s fault (spoilers: it’s not), and that Derek will either be forced to join the Alpha pack, or Kali will kill him. Lydia notices a stain on Coach’s shirt and pulls off his whistle, blowing it into her hand to reveal wolfsbane – every time he blew the whistle on the bus, the werewolves were all poisoned. Stiles throws it out the window as the bus drives away. Chris Argent visits a hospital and finds Gerard Argent alive and wheelchair-bound, black goo still dripping from his face. Chris asks about Alexander Argent and the Glen Capri Motel, and wants to know the Alpha who bit him. Gerard says with a smug smile, “Deucalion”.

This episode has been the best out of all three seasons for me, this show just keeps getting better, and I will shamelessly admit that I sobbed like a baby. I give this all the stars out of five, the highest rating possible and I’m amazingly excited for the rest of the season and where this is going. Plus I’m like 90% sure that Jennifer Blake is the Darach.