It’s hard to beat a fragile Johnny Depp tiptoeing through the dead leaves, peering daintily through steampunk spectacles at decapitated corpses with cauterized necks. His persnickety Ichabod Crane combined with Tim Burton’s lavish sets and vision of “Sleepy Hollow” have fueled my Octobers for a decade.
I wasn’t looking for a new “Sleepy Hollow” but come every October, I get the fidgets and long for something equally campy, fun, scary and new to appear on screen. This generally doesn’t happen. Combining humor with horror is a delicate job and like the will ‘o’ wisps that shine so brightly, leading people off the paths and to their deaths in swamps, I’ve learned to shun the shiny media campaigns despite their gleaming promises.
Fox pushed their new TV series, “Sleepy Hollow,” at every available opportunity. Standing in line at the grocery store, on a plane or in my own home, the commercials were inescapable. Nothing portents dismal mediocrity like a mass media campaign, so I wasn’t holding my breath. One night, however, with the leaves damply falling, a full moon in the sky and a mug of pumpkin spice tea steaming at my elbow, the stars aligned. The cat cozied into my lap and we began to watch “Sleepy Hollow.”
The show opens with Ichabod Crane, fighting and hacking his way through the Revolutionary War. If this new alarming, aggressive Crane isn’t enough, he proceeds to attack an opponent three times his size. He shoots the massive Hessian, a German mercenary hired by the British, point blank in the chest. When this has no effect, Crane decapitates him. Unfortunately, Crane receives a wound from the enemy’s ax during the duel and falls alongside his foe. He drifts into unconscious and when he awakes, he lurches out of a dirt bed in an underground cave. He crawls out of the cave and onto a road, nearly run over by a passing semi. Ichabod Crane’s new life in the 21st century has begun.
Fox’s Ichabod Crane is a far cry from Depp’s steampunk spectacles and haunted visage. He’s a history professor from Oxford College now, shipped over to America by the British to fight against the Revolution. Once he arrives, he’s won over by the colonists’ patriotic ideals, turns on the British, and fights for the Revolution. He’s sent on a special mission, assigned by George Washington himself, to bring down the great Hessian enemy. Crane succeeds but is injured and falls unconscious. Both men lay side-by-side, blood from their wounds oozing forth and mingling, creating a blood bond between them. Crane awakens in the 21st century, his wounds healed and his headless nemesis on the rampage. Police pick him up after he causes car accidents and question him about the headless murders while subjecting him to a lie detector test. It blows his mind, of course, that a machine can tell if he’s lying. And this is where the show’s great fun lies.
Tom Mison does a great job at playing a flummoxed yet witty Ichabod. It’s inconceivable to know just how jarring the 21st century would be to an 18th century citizen, but Mison does an excellent job looking thunderstruck and intelligent, a glint of humor always gleaming in his eye.
After police questioning, Crane is released to a mental institution, under the escort of Lieutenant Abby Mills. She’s the first to entertain the notion that Crane is actually telling the truth about the Horseman. Mills shuffles him into the car and Crane is mesmerized pressing the electric windows buttons, up and down, up and down. Mills locks the windows and Ichabod responds by unleashing a full commentary on Sleepy Hollow as they drive.
“That building used to be a livery stables,” he points out. Abbie warily responds that’s now a Starbucks, where they make coffee.
Ichabod: And that building is also a Starbucks?
Abbie: Yep.
Ichabod: Well, how many are there?
Abbie: Per block?
Ichabod: Is there a law?
When Mills hands him a bag of doughnuts, he fishes out the receipt and gawks, “What’s insane is a ten percent levy on baked goods! You do not realize that the Revolutionary War began on less than two percent? How is the public not flocking to the streets in outrage? We must do something.”
The Crane and Mills partnership bandies on, Nicole Behrier playing a great straight woman to Mison’s quirky professor-spy. The pair hunt the Headless Horseman, deal with a skeptical police force and eradicate each Monster of the Week. A vengeful Roma witch, precursor to the Horseman, kicks off the monster lineup and in each following adventure, a new creature wreaks havoc with campy ire.
The show’s willingness to laugh at itself combined with a powerful and resourceful female lead, helps me forgive some of its more regrettable tactics. One such is the inclusion of a Native American car salesman, randomly approached because of his ethical background. Under duress and threats, he admits to be the powerful shaman they need. Why “Sleepy Hollow” omitted depicting a respectful approach towards the Native American community for help instead of assuming that any native man can be picked up and scolded into admitting he is a shaman, is lazy, ignorant and regrettable.
Despite this hand-waving shaman tale, the show wheels along, dealing out laughs, fights and drama. Besides the overarching story of the Horseman, smaller and more personal stories arise. Ichabod must free his witch wife Katrina from a strange purgatory she’s trapped in and Abby needs to accept responsibility for hurtful past actions and reunite with her sister. In between these, of course, Hell must be fought and the Horseman finally demolished.
A new decade calls for a new “Sleepy Hollow.” This version rises to the occasion. Whiffs of Tim Burton’s wacky world abound (particularly during the opening credits) but Ichabod Crane has been replaced by a snappy British spy alongside a no-nonsense cop making sure they both survive. Not too bad on a full moon fall’s night. Not too bad at all.
Catherine Eaton contributed this article to The Stake. Catherine is a writer living in a western suburb of Chicago. She blogs over at sparrowpost.com and enjoys foraging around the neighborhood in her spare time.
