Season 4, Episode 12
The Secret Sea
The Monster reunites with his sister, Kady and Zelda look for a way out of the Poison Room, and Quentin tries to break the curse on the reservoir of magic.Tropes That Appear In This Episode:
- Ambiguous Situation: Alice claims to have seen the Cozy Horse when she was a Niffin. Did she, or is it a Motivational Lie in order to encourage Quentin?
- Back for the Dead: Hi, Persephone! Bye, Persephone!
- Badass in a Nice Suit: Dean Fogg puts on a suit loaded with various enchantments when he's arrested by the Library, and puts them all to good use.
- Batman Gambit: Dean Fogg has Todd deliver a forbidden book to the Library while he is being arrested by them. After breaking out of custody, he waits for the book to arrive, betting the librarians will immediately take it to the Poison Room. When they do just that, he disables them and steals the keys so he can rescue Kady and Zelda.
- Bestiality Is Depraved: The hedge veterinarian discerns that fish Josh is a werewolf, sees that Margo is also one, then asks if she fucked the fish. She explains that the fish used to be human.
- Beat the Curse Out of Him: Kady breaks Zelda out of Everett's mystic trance by slapping her awake.
- Bizarre Alien Biology:
- Fillorian Dying Fish is goldfish that dies if it doesn't maintain constant eye contact with someone else.
- There is also Fillorian Fucking Fish, entirely different species, but we don't get any additional info on them.
- The Bus Came Back: Gordy the Magician veterinarian shows up again.
- Can't Kill You, Still Need You: Plover leverages his knowledge of Martin's curse on the reservoir so Dean Fogg, Kady, and Zelda will take him out of the Poison Room. They wouldn't honor his original deal of showing them a way to survive the poison, which turned out to be a dud.
- Catch and Return: Everett's assistant tries to use a spell on the Monster, but he freezes it in midair and his sister casually tosses it back, vaporizing the guy.
- Cliffhanger: The episode ends with Quentin and Alice, powered up by the reservoir, about to fight the Monster's sister.
- The Cobbler's Children Have No Shoes: Gordy the veterinarian hates animals.
- Crisis of Faith: Everett had one regarding the Library's quest for knowledge, which led him to make a play for godhood.
- Curb-Stomp Battle: The Monster and his sister tear through the Library staff with ease.
- Death Seeker: Penny 23 deduces that Kady doesn't want to be cured after being exposed to the Poison Room, because she knows Penny 40 is in the afterlife. He tries to argue that life shouldn't be wasted, but it falls on deaf ears.
- Demonic Possession: Julia is possessed by the Monster's sister.
- Don't Ask, Just Run: Persephone can only hold the Monster and his sister for a few moments, so she tells Julia to book it. Julia doesn't.
- Dope Slap: When Margo has some trouble removing her fairy eye, the vet does this to her to knock it loose. She threatens to pop out his balls if he touches her again.
- Enemy Mine: Plover knows where the reservoir is since Martin had no secrets from him, therefore Fogg, Kady and Zelda help him get out of the poison room.
- Entertainingly Wrong: Since he was eating the moss which grew in the Poison Room and not dying, Plover assumed that it was keeping him alive. It's not really clear how he forgot the age-suspension spells Martin put on him that let him be tortured for decades without dying. It seems like something you'd remember.
- Face Death with Dignity: About to be killed by the Monster's sister, Dean Fogg uses his last moments to apologize for all the trouble he's caused. Lucky for him, Alice and Quentin interrupt.
- Forced Transformation:
- Martin Chatwin cursed the reservoir so that anyone who attempts to use it without eating the antidote flower is turned into a Fillorian Dying Fish. This fate befalls Josh.
- Dean Fogg has a pair of cufflinks which turn two librarians into puppies.
- For Science!: Everett wants to become a god because he knows the Library will never have access to the knowledge of the gods otherwise.
- Going Native: The Monster is accused of this by his sister, though she doesn't hold it against him.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Dean Fogg stays to fight the Library staff so Kady, Zelda, and Plover can escape, eventually being overwhelmed and captured by them.
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Martin Chatwin enchanted the antidote flower so that it would only bloom in the presence of someone who truly loves Fillory. While this seemed like a good idea at the time, as he grew older and more jaded, the flower stopped blooming for him, locking him out of the reservoir.
- Hypocrite: Margo calls Penny out for how much more driven he is to save Julia from possession than he was Eliot.
- Internal Reveal: Alice and Quentin learn that Margo and Josh had sex, and by extension that she is now a werewolf as a result.
- It Is Beyond Saving: After learning that the Library let Penny die even though they could have cured him, Kady wants to burn the entire Order down in spite of Zelda insisting it could be reformed.
- Kill the God: The Monster's sister plans to one-up the regular deicide of the season and kill the old gods, which she believes is possible by going to their realm.
- Literal Metaphor: When he is confronted about wanting to become a god in spite of how the previous four turned out, Everett insists he won't become drunk on power, which he notes was quite literal in the case of Bacchus.
- Love Epiphany: When Margo tells Quentin and Alice about her relationship with Josh, Alice says that it sounds like she loves Josh. Margo bemoans that Alice is right, because she sees herself as a bitch who doesn't do feelings. Alice says she can love Josh and still be a bitch.
- Neck Snap: Our Lady Underground has her neck snapped by the Monster's sister.
- Not Quite Dead: Plover is still alive, protected from the poison by the anti-aging spell Martin cast on him.
- Once Done, Never Forgotten: Plover complains that no matter what you do, people will only remember you for the worst thing you've done and will treat you accordingly, as his experience with Alice shows. Kady is unsympathetic.
- Organ Autonomy: Margo's fairy eye can be removed and continues to work outside her body, which she uses to keep looking at Josh without having to drag his fishbowl everywhere.
- Person as Verb: Dean Fogg has Todd deliver a forbidden book to the Library, and instructs him not to "Todd it up".
- The Power of Love: The antidote flower only blooms in the presence of someone who loves Fillory. This is problematic, as the idealized Fillory in the books is nothing like the Crapsaccharine World it truly is. Quentin is only able to make it bloom after pouring his heart out about how the Fillory he dreamed of saved his life, even if the real one is disappointing.
- Psychic Strangle: Dean Fogg uses a spell that does this to a librarian.
- Retired Monster: After reuniting with his sister, The Monster doesn't have any plans beyond spending time with her for a while and in fact tries to dissuade her from taking on the old gods.
- Revenge: The Monster's sister wants to kill the old gods for creating and abandoning them. After retrieving the scroll that will allow access to their realm, she and the Monster decide to slaughter everyone in Library as revenge for using them in an experiment.
- Skewed Priorities: Dean Fogg's first reaction to being in a Library cell is that his prison clothes are terrible.
- Spanner in the Works: Everett's plan to become a god is hampered by the fact that all the magic he stored wound up in the reservoir, which he can't access. However, he knows Quentin will be able to get to it.
- Stating the Simple Solution: When Gordy notes that Margo's fairy eye isn't attached to her head, he suggests popping it out, which didn't occur to Margo.
- Throwing the Distraction: As he's sneaking around the Library, Dean Fogg uses magic to shove some books off a shelf, getting the attention of a librarian who was blocking his path.
- Twin Desynch: The Monster has undergone enough Character Development for his twin sister to notice how different he is. For one thing, he's started caring about humans.
- Very Loosely Based on a True Story: Plover admits he embellished or outright lied about a lot of the things in the Fillory books, as publishing the truth would hardly have made him a successful writer. For example, the Flying Forest being about the wonders of recreational drug use wouldn't have gone over well with parents.
- Vomit Indiscretion Shot: Kady vomits up the anti-poison bugs she ingested last episode.
- Weaponized Teleportation: Dean Fogg's tie clip, when attached to another person, teleports them somewhere else. We can assume it's a desert of some sort based on the poor schmuck he does it to.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: Everett wants the power of a god so he can obtain the knowledge of the gods and add it to the Library, as well as defend the Library from the likes of the Monster.
- What the Hell, Hero?: Kady is pissed when she learns there's a cure for the poison in the Poison Room, which the Library could have given Penny but chose not to. Zelda tries to pass it off as Just Following Orders, but Kady is having none of it.
- You Do Not Want To Know: The veterinarian would rather not discuss why he happens to be in possession of a pirate-themed eyepatch that fits a human.
- Your Approval Fills Me with Shame: Knowing what he knows now, Quentin is ambivalent about Plover being impressed with his first-edition Fillory book, as well as signing it.
- Your Days Are Numbered:
- Fillorian Dying Fish only live for about two days.
- Although the bugs slowed down the Poison Room's effects, Kady and Zelda still only have a few days before they die once they get out, unless they take the cure.
