Recap / Film Reroll: Practical Magic

Resurrection of Jimmy fan-art by fishfingersandscarves on tumblr

We play through Practical Magic! Carolyn writes a letter! Lisa chooses teas! Paulo plays piano!

Episodes 71-72 of Film Reroll. Based on the 1998 comedy movie.

Sisters Sally and Gillian Owens come from a long line of witches living under The Masquerade. However, their family suffers from a curse where any man who marries into it will die under strange circumstances. Struggling to break the curse, things take a turn for the worse when Gillian’s abusive husband not only dies but comes back wrong and attacks the sisters. With police officer Gary Hallet also investigating the sisters on suspicion of murder, Sally and Gillian have to push their magical abilities to the limit if they want any chance of getting out of this mess.

Starring Lisa Kopitsky as Sally Owens, Carolyn Faye Kramer as Gillian Owens, Paulo Quiros as Gary Hallet, and Jocelyn "Joz" Vammer as the Dungeon Master.

Followed by Adventure Time.

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Tropes:

• Achievements in Ignorance: During the ten-month Time Skip following Michael’s death, Gary (having stayed in town to try and solve his murder) managed to accidentally blow the lid off of a legitimate crime ring.
• Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!: Sally, who decides to munch on some brownies in the middle of a resurrection ritual.
• Bittersweet Ending: Jimmy's spirit is exorcised out of Gillian and banished, and Sally has a new boyfriend, but Michael is still dead and the entire Owens family is shaken by the events of the film.
• Bizarre Taste in Food: The ice cream place Gillian takes Antonia and Kylie to in order to help calm them down after Michael dies turns out to sell basil ice cream.
• Blood Magic: The sisters decide steal a pig from their neighbors^note in reality, one winds up chasing Gillian after she fails to properly grab it, kill it and drain its blood to make their paralyzation potion.
• Broken Masquerade: To the extent that at the end of the campaign, Sally has assembled a whole coven made up mostly of Muggles, with even resident Agent Scully Gary Hallet becoming their token guy.
• Brother–Sister Incest: It's heavily implied that Jimmy was planning to sexually assault Sally through her sister's possessed body.
• Call-Back:
  • The Rerollers make it clear that Margaret's last name is not Thatcher.
  • When Gary goes to investigate the pool, Lisa asks if Brad Pitt is in this movie, too.
• Cannot Talk to Women: Michael when trying to flirt with Sally, who is only slightly better at talking to guys. They still end up together eventually.
• Canon Foreigner: Michael's family, which he invites Sally and Gillian over to meet. It consists of his father, his mother, his brother, and his baby sister (who was probably an accident.)
• Chekhov's Gun: The Blood Oath between Sally and Gillian back in the first episode returns in the finale as the sisters defeat Jimmy with The Power of Love.
• Come Back Wrong: The sisters decide to resurrect Jimmy to cover up his death, even though their aunts had warned them that the spell could cause this to happen. Sure enough, he starts choking Gillian immediately upon waking up, forcing Sally to kill him again by dropping a typewriter on his head. Later, he comes back again as something even less human.
• Demonic Possession: Jimmy's spirit ends up taking over Gillian's body, leading to her Fighting from the Inside.
• Disposing of a Body: The first episode ends with Sally and Gillian burying Jimmy's body in their backyard, having prepared it with a substance which will eventually make it dissolve.
• Domestic Abuser: Jimmy, who has threatened to beat Gillian up multiple times before actually doing so, and that's before he Came Back Wrong as a feral zombie.
• Dramatic Irony: Michael tries to tell Sally that, despite being run over, everything will be fine... only to die mid-sentence.
• Dream Spying: Sally learns that her sister is in danger after receiving a telepathic message from her in a dream.
• Explain, Explain... Oh, Crap!:
  • When Garry shows up at Sally's house, he mentions he's investigating a serial killer and that Jimmy's a suspect in the case. Paulo then breaks character and explains to the audience that he's lying, even though in the movie there are actually implications that Jimmy is the serial killer... but when Lisa explains that Gary had merely brought Jimmy in as a suspect and that he had no actual evidence, Paulo realizes that this was probably also a lie in the movie.
  • After Sally accidentally botches her cover story to Gary^note she explains she went to St. Louis to pick up Gillian at "her address", and never encountered Jimmy... except that means she went to the hotel they were staying at, meaning she would have, she manages to backtrack and "explain" she was covering for Gillian stealing Jimmy's car. After Lisa manages to do that, attention is called to the fact that Sally has "honesty" and "truthfulness" on her character sheet... because Sally was 100% unable to lie to Gary in the film, and that she needs to backtrack even more.
• Eye Scream: The resurrection spell involves jabbing needles into Jimmy's eyes. Sally and Gillian are both disgusted by it.
• Foreshadowing: invoked At one point, Paulo brings up kicking someone in the boner, only for everyone to mildly freak out, as that campaign hadn't come out yet.
  Paulo: Hey, listeners? Look forward to someone getting kicked in a boner.
• Gayngst: Heavily implied with Margaret Preston, who makes an off-hand remark about how her family judges her. She easily falls for Gillian's advances, and later fawns over her beauty, including — as much as she tries to deny it — her cleavage.
• Glad-to-Be-Alive Sex: Sally has glad-you-are-alive sex with Michael after killing the murderous beetle. Michael has no idea what's going on, but isn't complaining.
• Hereditary Curse: The Owens family are cursed to only give birth to daughters and have any men who marry into it die an unfortunate death. Sally spends a fair amount of the first episode trying to break the latter part of the curse.
• Is This Thing Still On?: When Gary calls the Morningside police department in order to have some of their officers check in on the Owens sisters, he is left on the line as the officers at the department proceed to ignore him and talk amongst themselves. It takes several minutes for them to remember to end the call, even as Gary repeatedly tells them he's still on the line, and it even drifts into I'm Standing Right Here when they start insulting him.
  Gary: I-I'm still on the line, I think you- you guys didn't... You gotta hit "9" on those old phones... Okay...
• Just Friends: Paulo points out that giving Sally a friendship bracelet is not a smart way for Michael to woo her.
• Magic Music: This is the first Film Reroll campaign to incorporate background music^note specifically, Paulo playing the guitar and piano, and it usually plays during spellcasting scenes.
• Maybe Ever After: The campaign ends with a Time Skip to ten months after Michael's death and Jimmy's exorcism, where Sally (with help from Gillian) has managed to move on from the pain of losing her husband and decides to start again with Gary, with the two of them kissing.
• Mean Character, Nice Actor: Paulo Quiros was very uncomfortable playing Gillian's abusive boyfriend, leading to the character becoming an enemy NPC during the actual abuse scene. (He felt similarly about portraying Harlam in Thelma and Louise.)
• Mistaken for Cheating: Jimmy accuses Gillian of cheating on him when she writes a letter, (which was actually addressed to her sister.) In fairness, it probably doesn't help that she seduces the receptionist immediately afterwards in order to find a hiding spot...
• Mood Whiplash: Towards the end of Part 2, Lisa openly declares that their take on the movie is severely mood whiplashy. And it's hard to argue against that:
  • As Gillian speeds off to the airport after drugging Jimmy with a lethal amount of belladonna, we cut to Gary jamming out to “I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles)”, unknowingly passing by Gillian as he drives.
  • During Jimmy's resurrection, Gillian gets too distracted by a tray of brownies, and winds up force-feeding Sally one against her will; in response, she throws said brownie onto Gillian.
  • When Sally sends Gillian off to steal a sow in order for them to use its blood for a spell, she winds up being chased by it instead back to the house, all the while Joz is making pig noises during the scene. So naturally, once Sally slits the pig's throat and Joz goes silent, everyone in the room becomes unhappy.
  • In the middle of the dramatic scene of Michael's death, Gary locates the truck driver and decides to interrogate him... but because Paulo's roll was a Crit Fail, it instead becomes Gary accusing the driver of deliberately murdering him and arrests him on the spot due to being part of some nefarious organization.
  • After everything is starting to settle down following the climax, Carolyn decides to roll in order to have Gillian do something to comfort Sally over Michael's death. Because it was a Crit Fail, it is decided that she "comforts" her sister by being extremely insensitive:
    Gillian: You know, I'm single too!
• My God, What Have I Done?:
  • After Sally slits the throat of a baby pig, everyone at the table becomes severely uncomfortable. Not helping matters is that Joz, who was "voicing" the pig by making squealing noises throughout the scene, abruptly stops talking and does a death pantomime once the pig dies.
  • While the driver that accidentally ran over Michael was already upset with what he had done, Gary accusing him of having done so due to nefarious reasons is when he starts freaking out.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero / Not Helping Your Case:
  • If Gillian wanted it to be clear that her letter was meant for her sister, the fact that it started with "Hey, bitch." and had a kiss at the bottom didn't help exonerate her.
  • When explaining to Gary how she left St. Louis with Gillian, Sally accidentally botches their cover story; instead of saying Gillian had picked her up from the airport, she said she took a taxi to where Gillian was staying^note meaning the hotel she and Jimmy were at, even though she said she never saw Jimmy.
• Nightmare Fetishist: Gary Hallet shows traits of this, with him saying he always wanted to catch a Serial Killer and all...
• Not so Dire: When the spell for keeping Jimmy's spirit at bay requires a lock of a child's hair, Gillian starts freaking out, trying to find some other alternative other than using one of Sally's children... even though literally, all she needs to do is cut part of their hair with some scissors.
• "Not Making This Up" Disclaimer:
  • When Joz!Jimmy asks Gillian if they can pee together in the bathroom, Joz is quick to point out that was a direct quote from the movie.
  • Paulo becomes considerably uncomfortable with Gillian and Sally deciding to bring Jimmy back to life via dark magic... only to be informed this was lifted straight from the movie.
• Not What It Looks Like: As Sally and Gillian get ready to return to the aunts’ house in Part 2, Joz makes an independent roll and is annoyed by it, causing Paulo and Lisa to call her out on her seeming determination to kill off Michael. When the sisters arrive, Joz points out that a rose bush had grown since they left earlier. "It wasn't Michael I was rolling for."
• Oh, Crap!:
  • Both sisters have this reaction once they realizes Gary had died on the ride back to Massachusetts, but especially Sally once she realizes she moved a corpse across state lines.
  • Our protagonists have this reaction once they see that a rosebush has grown on Jimmy's grave overnight, and even more so when it quickly starts coming up again after they burned it down. Somehow, the fact that it otherwise appears to be a completely normal bush only makes it worse.
    • This also happens later when both the Aunts and Sally's daughters independently start singing "You're Always on My Mind" without knowing why. Both seem to be signs of Jimmy's impending resurrection.
  • When Gillian decides to try and perform a banishment spell to get Gary to leave, she asks Antonia and Kylie for help, in particular acquiring a bottle of syrup. And after making it clear how they shouldn't consume it, Paulo and Joz announce that Kylie is fed the entire bottle.^note Luckily, the spell didn't work because of a wrong ingredient; all that happens is that Kylie has a sugar rush.
  • In the middle of the girls having breakfast with Gary, Joz does an independent roll and goes silent, which winds up disturbing the other players, especially given how she starts making direct eye contact with Paulo. As it happens, Michael finally failed to beat the dice.
• Ooh, Me Accent's Slipping:
  • As a slight Take That! to Nicole Kidman, it's mentioned that Gillian has undergone speech therapy in an attempt at getting rid of her Australian accent.
  • Inverted: For some reason, when playing Kylie, Paulo's voice for her drifts into Southern.
• The Paralyzer: The sisters try to keep Jimmy at bay by casting a petrifying enchantment on his grave. It only works for a while.
• Parting-Words Regret: Subverted: Upon arriving at the scene of the accident, Sally tries to cast some healing magic on Michael, but because he was dead, all it does it bring him back for just long enough to say goodbye.
• Rearrange the Song: The second episode opens with a new cover of the Film Reroll theme, made by a fan of the show.
• Repetitive Name: Michael's full name is apparently "Michael Michaels."
• Rooting for the Empire: invoked Inverted: When Carolyn is about to roll the first time Gillian spikes Jimmy's drink with belladonna, Paulo openly hopes for a Crit Fail^note meaning Gillian pours a lethal dose, as it would mean a shorter movie. She instead succeeds on the roll.
• Second Love: Sally gets together with Gary after the death of Michael, though it takes ten months for this to actually happen.
• Shout-Out:
  • While going to rescue her sister, Sally decides to pack a copy of Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets.
  • The evil beetle sounds suspiciously like Ringo Starr.
  • Officer Malboro actually manages to defy this trope. He says that there's a "disturbance in the force", before clarifying that he's talking about the Police Force and isn't a big fan of Star Wars.
• Shout-Out to Shakespeare: Sally decides to press the flower Michael gave her in a book of sonnets.
• Slipping a Mickey: Gillian has a habit of doing this to her boyfriend Jimmy, who has seemingly started to build up an immunity against the sedative. The first time she tries it in the campaign, it barely has any effect on him. The second time she gives him a far too strong dose, which eventually ends up killing him.
• Spared by the Adaptation: Invoked by Paulo Quiros, who makes it his mission to keep Michael alive all the way through the campaign. However, while he survives his original death scene, he still dies a few days later after being hit by a truck.
• Spider-Sense: Sally has an inkling sensation that something is wrong right as Michael is hit by a car, and immediately runs to the scene, which Gary initially mistakes for an admission of guilt.
• Stalker with a Crush: Gary Hallet starts heading in this direction after a while, becoming obsessed with Sally after reading a letter she sent to her sister, and taking a personal interest in her case far beyond that of a regular officer. Though she still ends up falling for him in the end.
• Stepford Smiler: At first glance, Gillian's life is seemingly perfect. Then we learn about the abuse she's had to endure from her boyfriend...
• String Theory: In the epilogue, Gary has made one of these, trying to connect Michael's death to various local crime gangs. (He has, understandably, made very little actual progress.) Sally is urging him to just move on, and by the very end of the story, it seems like he might actually listen to her.
• Take This Job and Shove It: It's implied, given how he had taken up residence in a nearby hotel for 10 months, that Gary wound up quitting his job in Tuscon in order to solve Michael's "murder" for Sally.
• Time Skip: Happens twice, first from when the Owens sisters are children to when they are teenagers, and then to when they are grown women.
• Tuckerization: The Rerollers decide to name the cashier at the tea place where Sally and Michael have their date "Paulo", because of the surprising amount of tea-related opinions he expresses in that scene.
• Unusual Euphemism: Joz referring to Michael's youngest sister as "an oops" winds up doing more harm than good as the players get too hung up on the fact she casually admitted said character was a mistake.
• We Have Ways of Making You Talk: Paulo says this verbatim when he has Gary arrests the driver who ran Michael over.
• Whatever Happened to the Mouse?:
  • In Part 2, when Gary contacts the Morningside police department about the Owens sisters, it's decided to send over Officers Sully and Bobby. But when the cops show up, it's instead Officers Malboro and Zampbaner.^note But since Bobby and Sully decide to stop by Dunkin Donuts first, it's implied they never left there.
  • Early in the campaign, after Sally has sex with Michael after killing the beatle, Joz rolls, and concludes Sally's pregnant with a third kid. Towards the end of the campaign, following a ten-month Time Skip, nothing is brought up about it again, rather concerningly.
• Wrong Genre Savvy:
  • When the sisters first start to plan out bringing Jimmy back, Paulo asks if they’re pulling a fast one on him and the campaign is actually Pet Sematary.
    • Likewise, when Sally and Gillian decide to bring Jimmy back from the dead (with a spell that is stated to not be perfect), Paulo immediately voices his unease with the shift in tone the campaign has taken... only to be shocked when everyone else at the table points out this is legitimately what happens in the movie.^note To Paulo’s credit, he does admit he didn’t remember this part.
  • Thanks to a Crit Fail on an interrogation roll, Gary is convinced^note even after learning about the existence of magic that Michael's death, seemingly a normal traffic accident, was the result of some nefarious criminal conspiracy.

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