Thinking about Father David Acosta sitting there and picking out the perfect GIF to send to his friends and colleagues to inform them that they will be assessing possessed pigs tickles me to no end. Was he giggling when he texted the new case assignment to Ben and Kristen? I bet he was giggling.
Yes, it’s true: This week, our assessors have been called in by the American Pork Lobby to investigate whether the pigs at Belmonte Farms are possessed. There’s a VidTap challenge going around in which people eat pork products from the farm and display signs of possession. Pork sales are plummeting. Our team has to get through some pretty weird shit to get to the bottom of things, including pigs going, well, hog wild — you’re welcome — when Kristen accidentally cuts her leg and bleeds on the floor: night-vision drone footage from a Belmonte Farm neighbor of Farmer Chet’s son Anthony running through their land like some kind of animal on all fours; a giant, sniveling, cannibal pig. What a job, honestly. I have no concept of how much these people are getting paid for their services, but it is not enough.
In true Evil fashion, the answers here could be attributed to religious and demonic sources, or there could be a very practical, science-based answer. I won’t go as far as to say “depending on which truth you believe†because David might rip my head off for implying there can be two different truths to what’s happening here, but us Evil fans know — there could be two different truths to what’s happening here!
When Ben discovers Anthony’s drone footage, they press Chet and learn that when his son came home from school, he started having these episodes. At first, he thought they might be night terrors, but then he thought, but what if possession? It turns out he enlisted the help of the Trio of God, a group of women who fancy themselves amateur exorcists — think of them as influencer exorcists — a group David knows about and completely loathes. When David, Ben, and Kristen pay them a visit, they learn that the ladies followed protocol from a story in the Gospel of Mark, about Jesus saving a possessed man by driving the demons out of him and into a nearby herd of pigs. Now possessed, the pigs drown themselves in a river. David could not be more annoyed to learn the Trio of God “expelled†the “demon†from Anthony and into pigs without any body of water to let them drown themselves in. He pretty much wants to punch a wall in when they tell him that that did instruct Chet to kill those pigs and went on their way. I know what’s going on with David here is layered, and we will get into the details later, but this level of bitchiness Father Acosta is bringing in this moment is thrilling for me, and I hope for him. There’s no way the Trio of God don’t pop up elsewhere this season and I hope the same David Acosta pops up, too.
Ben decides to grab a sample of the soil at the farm. Years of pesticide could have infected it, and working with the soil and eating food from that soil could have, in turn, infected Anthony (and the pigs). Of course, Ben decides to go collect this soil sample in the dead of night, completely alone. I’m not saying Ben asked to almost be mauled to death by a disgusting cannibal pig because I’m not a victim blamer, but also, my man, come on! Bring a friend or go collect your sample at the break of dawn. It’s poor decision-making skills like this that left Ben covered in goat’s blood at that cult.
The excursion, though reckless and definitely the reason for me staying off pork for at least a month, does yield some answers. So, Chet did kill those pigs like the Trio of God told him to, but he then turned around and used them to feed his other pigs. It’s apparently a common and legal practice called “feedback.†However, as Ben and David point out, pigs raised on feedback tend to develop “aggressive and cannibalistic behavior.†One in Oregon even ate his farmer whole! Let that cute little story lull you to sleep tonight. When asked to sign NDAs for their findings, the boys refuse. So were the pigs possessed or was it the feedback? Whatever your truth, I doubt any of us will be looking at bacon the same way for some time. But I refuse to give it up entirely because bacon is delicious and that is my truth.
Aside from the pigs, there are a few other major developments here. David has another meeting with his new Entity handler, Father Dominic Kabiru. This time, Father Kabiru gives David coordinates, and he wants David to use his remote viewing to tell him what he sees there — and apparently, it is a life or death matter for eight Christian missionaries. It’s not until later, while praying that David has a vision related to the coordinates. Suddenly, there are corpses, obviously violently killed, strewn about his room. He sees the Ethiopian flag and a strange scar on his hand. He reports this to Father Kabiru, who is floored. The coordinates were to the quarters of the head of the military, a dictator, in Ethiopia who had taken the eight missionaries; he has a strange scar like the one David saw. David didn’t just view the location; he became the man they were looking for in this vision. It’s why David is suddenly full of anger and hate, why he is so easily annoyed. Father Kabiru can’t believe it and what David’s “Perfect Sight Immersion†abilities might mean for the future. David refuses to believe it. These are just visions, he says, visions that don’t tell the future, but simply offer possibilities of it. Our guy has had a lot of visions of the end of the world, so let’s hope he’s right.
Thankfully, David doesn’t let his rekindled relationship with the Entity stay a secret from Kristen and Ben for too long. In the car following their meeting with the Trio of God, Kristen starts talking about how much happier she is now that she’s decided not to give any credence to demons or God. As Kristen and David debate whether or not there can be more than one “truth,†Ben finally comes clean about his jinn and that he’s testing out medication to see if it helps. Seeing Ben be so honest about what’s going on pushes David to do the same. He tells them about the remote viewing and his latest vision. Ben’s response sums it up best: “We are three fucked up people.†Kristen decides all of this truth-telling and realizing what each of them are carrying calls for another perfect response: a roadside hug. They have to hug! So David pulls over and that’s exactly what they do. I could not love them more. Of course, we live in a hellscape and before long a dude in a pickup truck with a Confederate flag beeps at them and Ben decides that “a Black man, a Muslim, and a woman hugging on the side of the road†is asking for trouble.
Kristen’s going to need more hugs in the future, by the way, because guess what? The antichrist has been born! Something fishy is going on leading up to the birth, which isn’t all that surprising since we’re dealing with Team Demon. Sheryl gets her assistant Leslie to the DF private hospital once her water breaks. Now who should show up as Leslie’s nurse but none other than squeaky shoes herself, Nurse Bloch. I can’t believe you’d forget her, but just in case: She was the racist nurse holding David hostage in the hospital in season one’s stand out episode, “Room 320.†She is pure evil, and she’s back, baby. At one point, Leslie believes she overhears Bloch and Leland talking about how they need to kill Leslie and feed her body to the baby once he is born. Later, Leland explains he wasn’t talking about her but the baby’s biological mother — Kristen. The problem, of course, is that Kristen wants nothing to do with the baby; Leland thinks Leslie can help with that. Still, Leslie doesn’t look exactly convinced — in fact, she still looks terrified.
The next thing we know, Kristen is getting a call from a petrified Leslie, who is begging her for help. She is terrified Leland is going to kill her, she is having this baby, and she needs help. Before long, Kristen is swept up into the birth of this child she swore she’d have nothing to do with. She learns Leslie has named him Timothy, Kristen’s father’s name. She even gets roped into feeding the baby while Leslie sleeps. So who is scamming whom here? Is all of this Leslie helping Leland get Kristen invested in the baby? Is Leslie being honest and genuinely seeking out Kristen for help? Is Leland playing them both? Ah, the beauty of childbirth!
Church Bulletin
• I know she’s got some demon in her, but I think in season four, in Sheryl we trust. She gathers some of the other women at DF and gathers them under the glass ceiling in her office. She’s trying to get them to work together to dominate the men. When Leland refers to them as a “cute†“sewing circle,†Sheryl reveals to them that she wants to take Leland down from the inside, and she’s doing it to protect her family. I still think she’s got some demonic motives going, but if anyone can take down Leland, I think it’s Sheryl.
• The only therapist Kristen knows in all of New York City is Kurt Boggs, so as her worry for her husband’s health — he is still sleeping under the bed — grows, she pays her old shrink a visit to see if he’s still into all those demon writing shenanigans. He seems to sincerely be over it, but the moment his receptionist catches him throwing out his little “Alouette, Gentille Alouette†paraphernalia, she calls Leland. Kurt’s not getting out of his deal with the devil so easily.
• Something wicked this way comes: Our assessors realize that all of their cases thus far have been within a few miles from one another. Are strange things happening around the spot where the particle accelerator maybe opened up the gates of hell, or is it just a coincidence? (It’s never a coincidence on this show.)