The Others
"Theta"

Airdate: March 18, 2000

In "Theta", Marian is the featured Others member, once again trying to find new ways to fit in with her peers. You'd think that her experience at the frat party from the Pilot episode might deter her from these kind of extracurricular establishments, but she just keeps comin' back! This time Marian befriends Jenny (Jeanette Brox), a member of the Theta Beta Phi sorority that no one else likes. Jenny is plagued by chronic panic attacks and horrifyingly real nightmares from her abusive childhood.

When the young woman's visions become more physically forceful and violent towards her Theta sorority sisters, Marian reluctantly recruits the help of the Others -- minus the eccentric Warren, much to my disappointment. As much as I like Sympathetic Marian, I wanna see a big Warren episode! His presence usually makes up for every time the wooden Dr. Mark Gabriel opens his mouth. But thankfully, all Mark must do here is sit tight and look pretty for the sorority girls. And Jeanette Brox's episode-carrying guest performance is played with enough tragic verve (and very strong lungs) to bring this disturbing episode to a much needed catharsis.

Here, Jenny's freakouts are set up as a mystery, at first thought to be a haunted house, what with furniture moving, doors banging, bodies floating and bathtub drownings. These aren't really the most innovative of ghostly encounters. We've seen a lot of that before, even on this very series. The story only becomes truly interesting when the mystery is revealed -- Elmer deduces that it is Jenny's wife-beating father "stepping out" of his vegetable body in prison with harmful intent towards his daughter, whom she shot in the head as a child in self-defense. Who rated this show as PG?

Abuse isn't the most original, nor most uplifting subject to base a story around either. But what impresses me with "Theta" is how two very different moods can emerge, using the same visual style in camera movement and cinematography. The climactic moments take place in Jenny's old house, filmed in an eerie, unnatural green light. We are brought there twice. First, for an intense flashback of a murder. This is quite the heavy, painful scene to watch. Jenny's father emanates pure evil -- it's no wonder she is so screwed up, regardless of her body being possessed. We are brought to the same location and same atmosphere again, when Marian leads the way for Jenny to confront her personal demons on 'the other side'. I was expecting another dark confrontation, but instead, I found that the intensity and fear dissolves into something really quite beautiful. Jenny's 'healing process' (for lack of a better term) is the highlight point of "Theta".

You may recall that the Greek symbol 'theta' held a fair bit of significance in an early episode, "Unnamed". In it, a crazy man warned of a greater evil force that was "coming". And that was it. Now, we're six episodes into this new series. With an original thirteen episode commitment, that means that The Others has reached its halfway point. Apart from the ongoing flirtation between Mark and Satori (bleh), most episodes have been pretty self-contained. We still had no idea what's "coming". "Theta" manages to tell it's own story, while still providing certain hints of a bigger picture to come.

-- Julie Ng

The Others airs at 9pm EST/8pm MNT, Saturdays on NBC.

We welcome your comments on The 11th Hour and this review. Please send letters to: letters@the11thhour.com

< Previous Review | Next review >