Haven: Much Ado About Mara

“Much Ado About Mara” was, as the title suggests, another Mara-centric episode of Haven in which . . . surprisingly little happened, now that I think about it. Mara’s still there and threatening general destruction. Everyone’s still trying to get Audrey back. No one really knows what to do.

So. Everyone’s in a standoff because Dwight wants to arrest Mara but first she has to give Duke a Trouble to save him. She gives him one that makes him speak nonsense, and supposedly this is good because it doesn’t actually hurt anyone, but it’s so annoying to watch. It turns out that this is a guilt-linked Trouble, so once he accepts that he’s feeling guilty about Jennifer’s death, it goes away. Mara calls Dwight’s bluff: As long as she’s the only one who supposedly can cure the Troubles, he won’t actually kill her. She offers to cure one Trouble to show that she’s for real, and allegedly cures Jodi, but she actually just changes the Trouble so Jodi emits invisible but very destructive microwaves instead of lasers.

Meanwhile, Audrey is still coming out occasionally, when certain people talk to Mara as though she’s Audrey. She shows herself to Duke and gives him a hint about his nonsense Trouble, which makes the boys think that she might now have all of Mara’s knowledge and memories just as Mara has Audrey’s, and that she could therefore cure the Troubles. Nathan insists that this isn’t about him: if they bring Audrey back, Mara won’t be able to destroy Haven and Audrey could possibly save it. “You care about Audrey and you care about Haven, so help me.” And Duke does, of course.

They go to try to rescue Mara, and predictably enough, she uses Duke not being able to talk to drop hints about Colorado. Before this can really be addressed, Dwight catches them and handcuffs them together by the woodpile, which gives them plenty of time to talk. I love how Nathan phrases this: “I don’t know if I even care, but did you sleep with Audrey?” But a) even though Duke can’t talk, why didn’t he shake his head no? And b) Nathan, you were with Jordan at the time, I think, and also slept with Sarah. Once Duke can talk again, he tells Nathan that “nothing happened” in Colorado, and while it’s true that he didn’t sleep with Audrey, which is what Nathan asked, they did kiss, so I wonder if that half-truth will become an issue at some point.

Duke and Nathan escape the cuffs, because of course Duke knows how to do that, and Dwight pretty much realizes he’s got bigger problems and just makes them agree not to try to steal Mara again. And when Audrey shows herself to Dwight for a moment, he’s all in. Nathan is confused because he thought Audrey was appearing to him, and then Duke, because she loves them: “I thought she just came out because she loved me, and then she came out for [Duke] and I was fine with that.” Awww. Dwight hilariously assures them that no, he’s not in love with Audrey too, and Nathan realizes that Dwight was talking to Audrey about something she loved: “Three things Audrey loves: Me. You. And helping people with Troubles.” The three of them team up to call Audrey back, talking to her about their memories of her and saying “we need you” and, in Nathan’s case, “I love you,” and it works for a while: She appears long enough to tell them that she can only tell what Mara’s currently thinking, so she doesn’t have Mara’s memories and can’t cure the Troubles. But she can tell them that Mara is lying about being about to cure the Troubles in the first place. And then Mara realizes that Audrey is there, comes back, and swears to kill her once and for all.

Elsewhere, Vince and Dave are seeing a counselor to try to do some sort of hypnosis to make them remember what happened in the cave. This results in Dave and the counselor losing time – as Dave has been doing – but in the time they can’t remember, the counselor writes the word CROATOAN in her notes. This reference to the lost colony of Roanoke is perhaps the most interesting thing in the episode, and I’m curious to see where it goes.

Other favorite lines and points of interest:

• “Setting fires, torturing animals. You wet the bed, too?”
• “Delicious taco.”
• “Dammit Nathan.” Thanks, Dwight. This is basically my refrain so far this season.
• “I cuffed you in front as a favor.” “And we appreciate that.”
• “Well, at least I know there’s no E in grammar.”
• “No one’s going to think a telephone pole was running down the road.” “Well, in Haven they might.”
• Did that young (now dead) guy really join the Guard to get laid? That’s amazing.
• “I don’t know why I waited so long.” Aww. Neither do we, Nathan.
• “She loved to sing. Songs about cats.” Cats? How many songs are there about cats? Or was she making them up?

Next week: We start a two-parter, with body swapping: “The Old Switcheroo.”

(Image courtesy of Syfy.)