Revisiting Fiction

In season two, episode twelve of The Owl House “Elsewhere and Elsewhen”, Luz and Lilith go on a time travelling adventure to meet Phillip, the author of the journal, while Eda finally talks to her father after twenty long years.

The Owl House episode title "Elsewhere and Elsewhen"

Well, this episode answered nothing I expected it to and everything I didn’t. Lilith has been doing fairly well for herself since we last saw her, landing a new job that allows her to geek out over history like I wish I was able to do. The reason Eda has avoided her father for so long isn’t just because she accidentally blinded him but because she also accidentally destroyed his career as a Palisman maker. Let’s talk about that first.

Eda’s father, Dell is not in this episode for long. Most of Eda’s half of the episode is spent on Eda trying to sneak out of the house without running into her father while constantly lamenting how ashamed she is for what she did to him when she was younger and hulked out as the owl beast. And when the two finally do meet, it is with a delightfully heavy atmosphere.

Dell is tired of chasing after his daughter to try and mend their relationship. He’s done. But he isn’t angry about it, just resigned. Dell has long since forgiven Eda for the accident (and probably never blamed her to begin with) and has managed to find a way to still work with Palismans even if he can no longer carve them anymore. He’s moved on and suggests Eda does to in regard to the guilt she’s been carrying all these years. Dell and Eda’s reunion isn’t filled with “I’m sorry”s and doesn’t end with Eda’s guilt suddenly disappearing and the two’s relationship perfectly patched. The episode leaves their plot optimistically open-eneded. Eda and her father talked, and it’s a step. Hopefully, one day Eda can better reconcile with her guilt and take another one.

The Owl House handles parent-child relationships in a rare way. Everyone involved is an individual with their own wants, needs, insecurities, communication styles, and it all clashes up against one another. I love it.

Now, time to talk about the larger time-travelling half of this episode.

Luz has learned a rather harsh lesson this episode: Never meet your heroes. To be fair, Green Fang and Red Fang did tell her to ask Phillip about what he had done to Blue Fang and his Palisman, and Luz never did. The warning signs were right there.

I find it interesting how Phillip is his own worst enemy here. He seems to loathe witches yet obviously doesn’t understand how the way he ultimately treats people might have an effect on why he gets beat up so often. Because the kind of guy who sees zero problem in using unsuspecting strangers as sacrifices to further his own goals and brazenly disregards cultures and customs of the land he’s currently in (such as, treading upon sacred land) probably would see the rest of the world as the problem. I don’t know what I expected from Phillip — who is heavily implied to Belos in the future — but this fits way better. The more I learn about Belos(?), the more disturbed I am.

What are those glyphs written on his skin? Why did his flesh just bulge out like that? What the frick is he trying to do in the long run if he isn’t looking to build a portal back to the human realm? Who is The Collector and has Belos found him in the present day?

Of course, all of this gets overshadowed by Lilith being an adorable dork over ancient railings. All historians have their super niche loves and Lilith is no exception.

Episode 11 Episode 13