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Recap / Charmed S5E8 A Witch In Time

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A Witch in Time

Two of the Charmed Ones are killed when Phoebe accidentally opens a time tunnel, allowing a warlock to get into the present.

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Phoebe and her new boyfriend Miles go upstairs and are starting to get horizontal when Phoebe has a premonition of Miles being caught in a police shoot-out and shot dead. She and Piper barely reach the scene and Piper's car is blocked by a delivery truck. They run to the scene of the shoot-out and Piper freezes the scene. The suspect is caught and Miles is saved.

Paige has a new "couch buddy" (as Piper calls him) named Max.

On kissing Miles after saving his life, she has another premonition of Miles getting stabbed at the manor. Shortly afterwards, the warlock Bacarra tunnels in from the future. He blinks into Cole's apartment and presents him with Cole's wedding band. He tells Cole that Phoebe had saved a man who was destined to die, and that she would repeatedly save him and after six months she too would die. He claims to be Cole's future adviser as ruler of the underworld. Cole does not believe Bacarra, but fades to the manor and warns Piper.

Leo, Miles and the sisters are having dinner when Bacarra blinks in. He throws an athame at Miles, but Phoebe dives over the table and the athame misses. Phoebe has another premonition, this one of Miles falling off a balcony.

The present-day Bacarra is pursuing a witch. The Bacarra from the future cancels the witch's invisibility spell and renders her unconscious. The two Bacarras plot to steal the Book of Shadows by cloaking themselves in good.

Cole tells Piper and Paige what Bacarra told him, that Phoebe must let Miles die to save her own life. Leo says the Elders won't confirm or deny that it is Miles' time. Piper and Paige tell Phoebe but she doesn't believe them.

Future Bacarra blinks into the manor and throws an athame at Piper. She freezes it but Bacarra casts his cancelling spell. Piper is wounded. Present Bacarra blinks in, teleports the athame to him, and with Pipers blood is able to cloak himself and steal the Book of Shadows.

Meanwhile, Miles falls off the balcony and Phoebe saves him again. Miles tells Phoebe to stay away, that he seems to be jinxed. Phoebe hugs him again and has yet another premonition: this one of Cole entering Miles's bedroom as he and Phoebe are asleep. Phoebe confronts Cole in the living room while Miles is sleeping, and Cole assures her that he'll take care of Miles and that he's after Bacarra. Juste then, Paige calls Phoebe and tells her what happened. "If I kill him," says Cole, "you'll never trust me." Phoebe decides to trust Cole and go with her sisters.

The two Bacarras blink in while the sisters are preparing a potion and say a spell to remove the sisters' powers. They kill Phoebe and Paige. Leo orbs Piper away in time. Future Bacarra tells present Bacarra to demand his rightful place in the underworld.

Leo and Piper look for the time ripple that future Bacarra used. Piper finds it, but future Bacarra attacks. Leo tackles him and Piper goes back in time, to the time and place where Phoebe first saved Miles. Future Piper tells present Piper that Phoebe must let Miles die. Present Piper points Phoebe in the wrong direction so they will be too late to save Miles, who is consequently killed in the shootout.


Tropes

  • Achilles' Heel: While looking over the Book of Shadows, the present-day Bacarra is amazed over how it explains how to vanquish every notable demon still around. He looks forward to exploiting that.
  • Being Good Sucks: Piper's past-self over ensuring that Phoebe won't be able to save Miles.
  • Berserk Button: Cole immediately tries to blast Bacarra for saying he's the future of evil. Bacarra effortlessly dodges because the future Cole told him that exact reaction would occur.
  • Big Bad Wannabe: Faced the fabled Charmed Ones and doing quite well for himself, Bacarra starts thinking about securing a future where he's the top dog. Even with his current power, he could never hope to do so, which is why he seeks out his present-day self to claim the Book of Shadows and gain the decisive edge over all possible challengers.
  • Broken Tears: Piper, after Paige and Phoebe are killed by Bacarra.
  • Evil Cannot Comprehend Good: Averted. Bacarra is not done with the sisters, after claiming the Book of Shadows. He gets to work on a spell to disempower them so they can't cause further trouble or try to reclaim the book.
  • Foreshadowing: The future Bacarra says that Cole will become evil again.
  • Future Badass: Bacarra. Whereas his present-day self is just a minor warlock stalking a witch, the future version is Cole's prominent adviser and strong enough to survive a fight with the Charmed Ones.
  • Godzilla Threshold: After the two Bacarras steal the Book of Shadows and kill Phoebe and Paige, the only way to stop him is for Piper to go back in time herself and tell her past self to let Miles die.
  • Hero Killer: Bacarra in the timeline where Phoebe saves Miles. He and his past self manage to kill Paige and Phoebe before Piper resets the timeline.
  • Hoist by His Own Petard: During the first bout, Bacarra says an incantation that allows him to absorb Piper's blast and send it back at her.
  • Hope Springs Eternal: After Paige and Phoebe are killed, a devastated Piper loses all hope. Leo, however, searches for the time ripple, as he is certain they can set things right and prevent this from ever happening.
  • My Future Self and Me:
    • Piper shares a scene with her past-self.
    • Bacarra and his present self tag team Piper and Paige in the attic to claim the Book of Shadows.
  • My God, What Have I Done?: After finding her past self, Piper explains the situation and warns her to tell Phoebe to go right instead of left when looking for Miles. When the time comes, the past Piper begrudgingly does so and then quietly mutters to herself, "Oh, God forgive me."
  • Next Sunday A.D.: Bacarra is from six months in the future, where Cole rules over the Underworld again and Phoebe has died from another attempt to save Miles.
  • Nice Guy: Miles so much so that repeated near-death experiences make him urge Phoebe to stay away for her own safety.
  • Not What It Looks Like: Upon Phoebe catching him hiding in the apartment, Cole insists this isn't the awful thing she thinks it is.
  • Ominous Message from the Future: Bacarra comes back in time to tell Cole about Phoebe's future death from trying to save Miles, and later Piper uses the same temporal rift that Bacarra used to come back to go back to the day before and prevent her past self from saving Miles in the first place.
  • Other Me Annoys Me: Observing his younger self stalking a witch, Bacarra finds the display rather embarrassing. The present-day version in turn doesn't entirely trust him, expecting some kind of double cross at some point.
  • Point of Divergence: Piper telling Phoebe to go right instead of left slows them down enough to stop them from saving Miles.
  • Properly Paranoid: After all the near-death experiences, Miles is certain something is after him.
  • Reduced to Dust: Paige and Phoebe after being hit with fireballs.
  • Rousing Speech: Having lost the book, the sisters feel their situation is rather hopeless. Leo attempts one of these speeches to rally them, going in for a lot of platitudes. Piper tells him to shut up, but Phoebe takes it to heart.
  • Selective Obliviousness: Phoebe continually insists that Bacarra is the one targeting Miles rather than the Angel of Death, rejecting the idea that Miles' death is a 'natural' event she can't prevent.
  • Self-Mutilation Demonstration: An interesting variation. Piper goes a little back in time and is trying to recruit her past self to help her. To prove that she's who she's saying, and not some doppelganger demon, she pinches Past Piper really hard and then shows the bruise that appears on herself.
  • Set Right What Once Went Wrong: A rather tragic example. After her sisters' death, Piper returns to the past and convinces her past self to let Miles die.
  • Spanner in the Works: Phoebe wasn't supposed to get any premonitions about Miles.
  • 20 Minutes into the Future: Bacarra is from six months into the future.
  • Wrong Genre Savvy: Phoebe is convinced she has to save Miles because of her premonition, but it's the Angel of Death after him.
  • You Can't Fight Fate: Miles was destined to die the first time Phoebe saved him. His survival is what opens the time rift for Bacarra to use.
  • You Have GOT to Be Kidding Me!: Phoebe over Cole being the only one around to watch over Miles. Cole wins her over by pointing out it's in his interest to be protect the guy.

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