News The Terror: Devil in Silver The Terror: Devil In Silver Trailer Almost Gives Us Enough Dan Stevens The Terror: Devil in Silver will adapt the Victor LaValle novel of the same name By Matthew Byrd | Published on April 15, 2026 Image: AMC Comment 0 Share New Share Image: AMC The first trailer for AMC’s The Terror: Devil in Silver emphasizes the two best things the series has going for it at the outset: an incredibly frightening premise based on the novel of the same name by Victor LaValle and an ample amount of lead actor Dan Stevens. The Devil in Silver trailer follows a man named Pepper who finds himself in one of the ultimate nightmare scenarios after he is wrongfully committed to a less-than-reputable psychiatric hospital. And while works like One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest taught us all about the many horrors that can occur to such an individual in such a place, this particular hospital seems to be the home of a monstrous demon who lives alongside the ghosts of its patients’ and doctors’ pasts. Without going too far into the plot of the book, it’s safe to say that Pepper soon finds himself regretting being admitted into the one hospital in the United States that an insurance company seemingly isn’t in a hurry to get you out of. While the criminally underutilized Stevens (where is our sequel to The Guest?) steals much of the trailer’s runtime, Devil in Silver benefits from an incredible cast of character actors and generally underrated players. Joining Stevens on his journey into hell are Stephen Root, Michael Aronov, Marin Ireland, CCH Pounder, Judith Light, and more in currently unconfirmed roles. Behind the scenes, Karyn Kusama (The Invitation, Jennifer’s Body) will direct the season’s first two episodes and serve as executive producer alongside Stevens, Ridley Scott, Chris Cantwell (Halt and Catch Fire), and Victor LaValle. LaValle and Cantwell are also credited as the show’s writers, with LaValle also handling showrunning duties. The Terror has proven to be one of AMC’s most fascinating experiments. The anthology series’ acclaimed first season (based on the novel of the same name) followed a group of Arctic explorers whose ship crashes forcing them to survive in one of the most hellish environments you could ever hope to find at the end of the world. The second season (The Terror: Infamy) told an original story about a family that was imprisoned in an internment camp during World War II. While praised for its premise and the ways it addressed one of the most under-discussed atrocities in U.S. history, the season ultimately received mixed reviews. Still, this series has quickly established itself as one of the most reliable sources for fascinating horror stories that take some pretty big swings. The Terror: Devil in Silver will premiere on May 7 on AMC+ and Shudder.[end-mark] The post <i>The Terror: Devil In Silver</i> Trailer Almost Gives Us Enough Dan Stevens appeared first on Reactor.

Excerpts Young Adult Read an Excerpt From Senescence by Shelby Nicole Time and fate are at a tipping point. Can true love rewrite history, or will Jade’s second chance at love slip through her fingers forever? By Shelby Nicole | Published on April 15, 2026 Comment 0 Share New Share We’re thrilled to share an excerpt from Senescence, the second installment in Shelby Nicole’s YA paranormal romance Grove Hollow—out from Delacorte Press on December 1st. Jade thought she had lost Will forever… so his return to her through a magical mirror is shocking. Even more shocking: He’s no longer a ghost. To blend in, he enrolls at Grove Hollow Academy with Jade and the Misfits. But as the couple will soon learn, destiny has plans for Jade and Will. With Will’s return come his secrets—and his past loves. And when Jade and Will are approached by ancient gods with a life-changing message, Jade will have to decide where her heart lies.Time and fate are at a tipping point. Can true love rewrite history, or will Jade’s second chance at love slip through her fingers forever? Blackhill Cemetery Wes nods, picking up the thread. “So, what you’re saying is, if there’s no grave, it means Will is really here to stay?” The hope on Will’s face fades, replaced by a frown on his lips. His eyes drift to the cemetery, where the gray, foggy horizon stretches endlessly, marked by scattered rows of weathered headstones. “As if I was never murdered?” he asks himself. “That I maybe never existed at all before now. My identity… erased completely…” His words falter, leaving a void that none of us dares to fill. The group instinctively closes in, our footsteps leaving trails in the frosted ground as we gather around him. I tug at his coat sleeve. “You’re still you, Will,” I say firmly. “Whatever the locket did or didn’t do, it doesn’t change who you are.” Will’s voice trembles, his eyes glistening. “That’s not what I’m concerned about. It’s that if I never existed… then who am I?” The tip of my nose stings. I think, again, of my grandfather’s sea shack. That place is a part of who I am. It’s where I sat in front of the fire, reading my books and watching television with my grandfather. What would it feel like if someone told me these memories, these pieces of myself, never happened? That they never existed? Even with the unsettling truths now altering my perception of my grandfather, it doesn’t change the fact that he was my family. He was a giant part of my childhood. He’s still a part of me. But if Will never existed, and without his memories, he had no past to hold on to. His parents never knew him. He never knew them. My heart sinks. Why did I think this was a good idea? I didn’t fully realize the consequence of this question, of how much it could hurt Will, and how much his struggle to understand his past life might tear him apart. Now I’m not sure I want to know if we’ll find his grave. What if it’s gone? What if nothing remains of him to prove he ever existed at all? While a part of me selfishly hopes it’s not there, hoping my dream was just a dream and not some form of premonition, I can’t ignore what that would mean for Will. The lump in my throat grows at the severity of that realization. The world is frozen quiet. Just the six of us, standing on the border of a reality we can’t fully grasp, daring to hope that this fragile second chance might mean something more. “I guess there’s only one way to find out,” Davy says, pointing toward the graveyard’s tall, iron gate. Each step into the graveyard is a descent into death, now surrounded by the muted presence of countless buried souls. The tombstones stretch out in every direction. Hundreds, maybe thousands, of grave markers rise from the earth. Their edges are worn and weathered by time, covered in snow, dirt, and dead moss that dulls the words engraved on them. Occasionally, an angelic headstone rises above the others. Her mournful eyes follow us as we tiptoe. Amid the lonely, bleak horizon, a solitary red cardinal perches on the twisted branch of an ancient elm. It reminds me of the one I saw at Montgomery Manor. It doesn’t move as it watches us. Will guides us along the stone path, his steps sure, as if he’s memorized the way. We tread behind him with careful footfall, too afraid that even the smallest sound might disturb the dead. “This place is freezing. I don’t think I’ll ever feel warm again,” Julian mutters, zipping up his leather jacket. “The chill seeps into my bones.” Davy quivers. The whites of Aubrey’s eyes shine in the half light. “It’s always colder and darker here, even on the hottest summer day when the trees are full of leaves.” “How many times have you been here, Will?” Wes voices the question I’ve been hesitant to ask, unsure if it’s too delicate to bring up. “I’m not sure. I never kept count. Perhaps a couple hundred?” There’s a raw sadness in his reply that slips through. “There was a time I came almost every day just to talk to my mother,” he adds. The crack in his voice catches in his throat, and his reflective words and longing for his mother pull at my heart. “Sometimes, I would hope… hope that maybe a spirit like mine, another lost soul, might be wandering these grounds. A ghost, I guess. Just so I wouldn’t be alone. But it’s been… since the sixties since I’ve returned.” “Why’s that?” Aubrey’s words are faint. “The funerals,” he murmurs. “So many young men… so many sons, all of them too close to my age, dying fighting in Vietnam. Every time I came here, there was another grieving family. Another boy buried too young. I couldn’t bear it. The sight of them broke me. All of their lives and dreams were taken before they even had a chance to begin. Like me.” “That must have been really tough for you,” Julian says, his hand resting on Will’s back. Will nods with mournful eyes lost somewhere in the past. There’s nothing more to say. We all understand. He continues guiding us down the hill to a grander section of the cemetery, where the gravestones rise higher and grow more elaborate. Here, tombs with wrought-iron gates stand in rows, and intricate statues of elegant obelisks, pedestal tombs, and broken pillars mark the resting places of the departed. Frozen shrubs and frostbitten flowers, once meant to add life and color, exist in an elegant attempt to elevate this area. It seems the souls here hold greater importance than those buried in the humbler grounds beyond. Buy the Book Senescence Shelby Nicole Buy Book Senescence Shelby Nicole Buy this book from: AmazonBarnes and NobleiBooksIndieBoundTarget “Hey, Will, here are some Ashmore tombs,” Wes says, gesturing toward a short row of tombs that look more like miniature townhomes than burial sites. A few marble obelisks and gravestones stand among them, all remarkably well-kept. No dead branches or overgrown brush in sight. I wouldn’t be surprised if Allison’s family hired someone to maintain them. “Maybe there’s a Victoria somewhere,” Will says. We split up, scanning the tombstones for any sign of the name, but we come up empty-handed. “Jade, look,” Aubrey says, pointing to a stunning stone statue of a weeping female angel. She stands naked, her hand reaching upward to the sky as if pleading for redemption and grace. Below her rests a rectangular tomb with the name WHITNEY etched into the stone. I stop and stare at my last name in disbelief. “I bet it’s one of your ancestors.” I consider the tomb of someone I’ve never known. Someone linked to me by blood, blood that now mingles with the earth beneath my feet. A chill shudders through me. I find myself beside the marble tomb, tracing the letters etched on the gravestone with my finger. “Bruce Whitney, born eighteen sixty-two to Octavius Whitney and Tabatha Whitney.” I pause, recalling Aunt Ruth’s words from the first night I arrived at Blythe House. Octavius Whitney was my great-great-great-grandfather, twin to Augustus Whitney, who founded Whitney & Whitney Oil Company with his brother. “Died nineteen thirty-one. Loving, devoted husband to Emily Whitney, and father to Bruce Whitney Jr.” Wes gestures toward a tall marble tomb on a slight rise in the cemetery, commanding attention. It dwarfs the other graves, intended as a deliberate display of power and wealth. The tomb’s foundation is massive, complete with a pedestal where people can sit and admire the intricate details carved into its surface of roses and vines. Every curve and edge is perfectly executed. The grandeur of it all makes the surrounding graves seem insignificant, as if this tomb was built to remind everyone of the influence and legacy of its occupant. The name Octavius Whitney is impeccably etched into the eternally sealed door. A tribute to the man who helped build the foundation of the Whitney family’s legacy and fortune. “It feels odd, standing here next to the tombs of people connected to me, yet I know nothing about who they were,” I mutter. Aubrey drapes her arm around me. “Does it make you feel sad, not knowing them?” I pause in front of the opulent tomb. Mr. O’Connor hinted more than once at my family’s shady business history, and now, standing here, it feels almost ironic—this grand monument trying to dress up a life built on greed and deceit. As if marble and gold could rewrite who Octavius really was or somehow justify his legacy. If the Egyptian goddess Ma’at were to weigh his heart against her feather, I’m certain it would sink like a boulder from all the corruption. Wherever he is now, I can only hope he’s being held accountable. “No. It’s oddly comforting. Their secrets, whatever dark bargains they struck, are buried with them. They’ll face their judgment in the afterlife. I’d rather not know what they did to bring our family to a point where my grandfather was taking lives at such a young age.” “Let’s hope you never have to,” Aubrey says. “Jade!” Will calls. The hair on the back of my neck stands up. I turn to find him standing over a nearby grave, pointing to a marble headstone decorated with two cherubs. One cherub’s arm is missing as if it broke off long ago, and their heads are dusted with snow. I brush aside the brittle, lifeless branch that covers the headstone. The words carved root my feet to the ground: Here lies Maura Whitney, the beloved wife of Augustus Whitney and mother of Poppet Whitney. My breath stops. My hands cover my mouth as I read the name again. I glance around, eyes scanning the tombstones nearby. “I checked. There are no headstones near her mother’s grave with her name on it,” Will says. “Whose?” Wes asks as the others draw near. “Poppet. The ancestor of Jade’s who murdered me and my family. It appears she has no gravestone here.” I roll the green beetle between my thumbs. “No. There would be no grave. Maybe a memorial, but there wouldn’t be a body to bury,” I whisper. The cold breeze blows and prickles skin. “Poppet went missing after she killed Will. The Whitney family covered it up after she ran away.” “Assuming Will was even murdered. Assuming he has a past,” Julian says. “Let’s keep moving.” I walk beside Aubrey and Julian, trailing behind Wes and Davy, with Will once again taking the lead. His hands fidget in his coat pockets while his legs move in lengthy, brisk strides. Our breaths come quickly, with each exhale a cloud escaping our mouths into the cold air. The space between us is shrinking, as the unknown creeps closer. I think I’m not alone in sensing we’ll be arriving at Will’s grave soon. My fingers twist the locket. The scarab clinks against my collar buttons, and my nails dig into the gold metal and green stone. Will’s footsteps slow, then stop entirely under the stone archway of a family plot. Like a ripple, we all follow suit. I slip through the group and squeeze to his side. My heart feels like lead as I glance up at him. His face is pale and drained of color. His expression is so ghostly that I momentarily forget he’s alive. His eyes hold a distant haze. It tells me his mind is no longer here but lost down a rabbit hole of thoughts he can’t seem to climb out of. I can feel in my bones how much the unknown before him is tearing him apart. Whatever lies ahead, it’s no longer his burden alone to carry. It’s all of ours now. I take his hand, and together, the six of us move forward, stepping into the Montgomery family plot. The fading light of the setting sun, dimmed by heavy snow clouds, casts a mournful glow over each grave we pass. The headstones stand close together. Proof of the unbroken bond of the Montgomery bloodline. Stone upon stone, as if even in death, they refused to be separated. Beside me, Will’s pace slows. His breath comes in shallow, uneven clouds of steam against the cold air. Next to me is his mother’s grave. Its century of age never hindered its elegance. The limestone headstone, rounded and weathered, is surrounded by an old iron enclosure. The fence is no longer upright but leaning sideways as if it might collapse at any moment. The ornamental stone vases, once home to beautiful flowers, now stand empty. Will doesn’t acknowledge her burial site. His eyes are fixed straight ahead as if refusing to look could somehow ease the pain. I know him. I know it’s his way of coping. Avoiding the places that hold her absence, whether in her bedroom or at her grave. If time really does heal all wounds, then I suspect the years spent avoiding her resting place only worsened his. My heart aches, knowing he’s waging an internal war to hold himself together while her loss, still fresh even after all these years, threatens to shatter him. I hold his hand firmly, offering what little comfort I can. He squeezes back. We move on, passing his father’s grave, the largest in the family plot. Its tall marble obelisk rises with a mournful, commanding presence; though not as grand or ostentatious as my great-great-great-grandfather’s monument, that feels fitting. It speaks to who Will’s father was and what was important to him, I think. A humbling humility that sets him apart from the greed and vanity embedded into my own family’s legacy. And then we come to a halt. I hadn’t anticipated how much this view would hit me. The dread in my chest pushes the air from my lungs and makes it nearly impossible to breathe. I steady myself by planting my feet hard into the ground, resisting the wave of lightheadedness. Standing before us is a monument to grief. A tombstone carved with an hourglass and wings. The stone wall enclosure stretches the length of Will’s six-foot body before it. This is the final marker in the line. No one says a word, as if time itself has halted. “William Montgomery. Loved deeply by father Albert Montgomery and mother Cornelia Montgomery. Born July 13, 1864. Died December 23, 1885,” Aubrey reads. I let out a staggered sigh. My brain gradually absorbs the meaning of the engraved writing. Will’s arm slips around my body. I hold him, unwilling to believe what I’m seeing. How am I in love with a man, his arms wrapped around me yet buried just beneath the earth we stand on? “May I?” Wes is the first to speak as he seeks Will’s permission to enter the grave’s shadowed boundary. Will’s nod brushes the top of my head, even as I stay pressed against his chest. Wes and Davy lead the way, crossing the stone enclosure’s threshold first, followed by Aubrey, then Julian. Will takes my hand and I follow his lead. We stand above where his century-old body rests six feet below us. All of us sit on the edge of the stone fence, huddled together, with eyes tracing the old-fashioned letters carved into Will’s gravestone. “I don’t get it,” Julian mutters, his fingers running over the back of his neck. “How are you here… if you’re down there?” It’s the question that’s probing at us all. Excerpted from Senescence, copyright © 2026 by Shelby Nicole. The post Read an Excerpt From <i>Senescence</i> by Shelby Nicole appeared first on Reactor.

News From The Mysteries of From Will Be Solved in a Fifth and Final Season Dig up that MGM+ password for one last ride By Molly Templeton | Published on April 15, 2026 Photo: MGM+ Comment 0 Share New Share Photo: MGM+ MGM+’s most-watched show is coming to an end. The Hollywood Reporter says From has been renewed for its fifth and final season—though it almost went longer. Creator John Griffin told THR, “There was a fair amount of soul-searching. … But we all came to the realization that if we made that sixth season, it would be for us, because it’s just too hard to say goodbye.” From stars Harold Perrineau as the self-appointed sheriff of a very peculiar town. As MGM+ puts it, “From unravels the mystery of a nightmarish town that traps all those who enter. As the unwilling residents search for a way out, they must also survive the threats of the forest including the terrifying creatures that come out at night.” The show’s fourth season premieres this coming weekend, meaning fans can go into new episodes knowing it’s not the end just yet. And after the revelations of season three, there’s probably a lot to worry and wonder about. Griffin said, “This season brings our characters closer to the truth than they ever have been before. In fact, it doesn’t bring them closer. It brings them the truth. We see this place push back than it ever has before to direct them down the wrong path.” Executive producer Jeff Pinkner concurred: “I feel very confident the audience will feel honored and respected by the way these stories end. It’s feeling both surprising and inevitable, and we’re being very mindful about the things the audience is curious about, and all the questions that need to be answered.” From’s fourth season premieres April 19th on MGM+.[end-mark] The post The Mysteries of <i>From</i> Will Be Solved in a Fifth and Final Season appeared first on Reactor.

Books Reading the Weird What Skins Are For: Stephen Graham Jones’ The Buffalo Hunter Hunter (Part 5) Good Stab enacts revenge on the buffalo hunters, and Arthur proves to be a terrible liar… By Ruthanna Emrys, Anne M. Pillsworth | Published on April 15, 2026 Comment 0 Share New Share Welcome back to Reading the Weird, in which we get girl cooties all over weird fiction, cosmic horror, and Lovecraftiana—from its historical roots through its most recent branches. This week, we cover Chapters 9-10 of Stephen Graham Jones’ The Buffalo Hunter Hunter. The book was first published in 2025. Spoilers ahead! The Absolution of Three-Persons, April 14, 1912. Arthur Beaucarne wants to record his encounter with the Pinkerton man, hoping the act will keep it from festering in his memory like a tendrilled mushroom. On the fourth try, he manages to stop pacing and settle down to write. He knows that under the pretense of casual conversation, Dove was interrogating him. They strolled around Miles City, Arthur still carrying the cathouse cat. Eventually, in “strictest confidence,” Dove shared some information about his case. A man of “middling high society,” and substantial expectations from his family’s newspaper wealth, disappeared after being seen with a black-robed man. Never fear, the black-robe was younger than Arthur, and darker skinned, and wore sunglasses. Arthur asks if the missing heir was the first flayed man they buried. Dove nods. He will have the corpse exhumed for return to San Francisco. Dove is briefly distracted by the ladies on the cathouse porch, to whom Arthur doesn’t yet return their surprisingly-complacent mouser. Recalled to business, Dove adds that the heir’s three sons went missing right after their father did. He shows Arthur a photograph of the youngest son, whom Arthur recognizes as the second flayed man. No need for Arthur to bury him; a San Francisco grave awaits him as well. Arthur asks how he can assist in Dove’s investigation. Arthur’s “position in the community” could help, Dove says, then asks if Arthur’s sect practices confession. It does, but the Lutheran Seal of the Confessional forbids disclosing anything confided to him. However, he will relay to Dove any permissible information. Perhaps “too eagerly,” he suggests that the murderer may be an Indian. Dove neither rejects nor pursues the possibility. He asks the distance to Fort Benton. He’s obliged to telegraph from there any information he might uncover about a long-missing transport. Six Pinkertons and the “large package” they were conveying west went missing in Montana in 1870. Inadvertently, Arthur drops some hints that he knows about Cat Man. For a third Sunday, Good Stab attends church services and stays behind to continue his “confession.” He notices the cat that Arthur still hasn’t returned to the town brothel, and which he’s named Cordelia. Good Stab approves of the animal as an adept hunter, like himself. Arthur prompts him to pick up his tale. The Nachzehrer’s Dark Gospel, April 14, 1912. Shot through the shoulder, bleeding out the sustenance he’s just taken from his fellow Pikuni, White Teeth, Good Stab falls against a bull that’s skinned but not quite dead. He digresses from his tale to tell an old Pikuni legend about Kills-for-Nothing, whose face was torn away by a similarly not-quite-dead bull. She ran to the Backbone and leapt in a lake there, where she still lives with the underwater people. The skin she lost was placed in a powerful medicine bundle whose keepers all died of smallpox. If ever that skin reaches Kills-For-Nothing’s lake, she can reclaim it and walk again on land. But no one tells such stories anymore, so Good Stab returns to his own. He clawed his way into the bull’s body to hide and drink its still-living blood. He fell into his post-feeding sleep and woke up the next day. The napikwans had overlooked him and gone away. Naked, caked with his savior’s gore, he wandered among the buffalo corpses. Calves, left alive as too worthless to spend bullets on, followed him, crying for food and comfort. Their plight is what drove Good Stab to declare personal war against the napikwans. He raised a fist and, for the first time, he hissed like the Cat Man. The stink of the napikwan hunters led him, and the calves, to their camp. They carried a new kind of rifles he named “long-shooters”; this explained how they could have hit him from far off. They feasted noisily on buffalo tongues until they noticed the calves and began luring them with cow butter and cutting their throats. The soldiers who attacked Heavy Runner’s camp during the Marias River Massacre had similarly killed the Pikuni with knives and axes and rifle butts to spare their bullets. Enraged by the memory, Good Stab first terrorized the camp with his supernatural stealth and speed, then returned to choke two to death with the slaughtered calves’ blood. A tomahawk to the back left his legs useless, and he prepared to die yet again. But a last unslaughtered calf found him and licked his face, asking for protection. Knowing the pursuing napikwans would kill it along with him, he rallied and with great effort wrenched the tomahawk from his back. He used it to fell the first napikwan, then drained his blood to the last living drop. It was deep irony that the next napikwan’s shot saved him from the post-feeding sleep that would have left him helpless, draining the excess blood. He managed to get to his feet within a circle of would-be captors. They screamed, not knowing what he was. What he was was “the Indian who can’t die,” the “worst dream America ever had.” Before the napikwans could react, Good Stab dodged away and ran for the Backbone. Bullets hailed, but he paused to scoop up the last buffalo calf, the one who had licked his face. When morning came, he would see it was a white one. And now, he tells Arthur, his heart is empty, and so is his pipe. What’s Cyclopean: Arthur gets more vocabulistic as he gets more stressed. “Maychance I bring my own perturbations into this fraught interrogation.” Big mood, Pastor. Big mood. The Degenerate Dutch: Native Americans have “an inbuilt sense to avoid anyone in uniform, or with credentials granting them authority.” Gee, I wonder why they might develop such a tendency. Hmmm. It is a mystery. Libronomicon: Arthur compares the Pinkerton’s interrogation style to “the stinging couplet at the end of a sonnet, which is where the fatal turn resides.” There’s tragedy happening here, he suspects, or at least awful, flaw-driven inevitability. All the world is “if not a stage then at least a farce,” and so he plays his part. Anne’s Commentary Agent Dove is a sharp customer. As his conversation with Arthur Beaucarne progresses, it “smells” more and more like an informal interrogation. More unnervingly, Dove doesn’t seem to be on a random clue-fishing trip, with the town preacher just one more Miles City resident to cross off his list before he can move on to those more interesting ladies on the brothel porch. No, Dove has already gleaned enough info-grains to make Arthur a subject of special interest. He draws Arthur in by disclosing select particulars of his case, in “strictest confidence.” This is flattering—he must view Arthur as trustworthy. Missing newspaper heir from San Francisco, what could he have to do with our pastor? Then Dove dangles a bit of bait: The suspected abductor is a “man in black robes.” Arthur swallows the bait. Surely Dove doesn’t think that he—? Dove grins as if “proceedings are proceeding his way.” Why would Arthur react anxiously to so broad a description as a “man in black robes” unless he feels guilty about something? In fact, the San Francisco black-robe was too young and dark to be our pastor. Before Arthur can relax, Dove drops a second bait: Arthur doesn’t “have any of those sunglasses either now, does [he]?” Arthur blinks and swallows, then confusedly nods yes before self-correcting with a too emphatic headshake. Dove has now described Good Stab, and Arthur has reacted as if he has indeed seen a younger, darker, black-robed and sunglasses-wearing man, right here in Miles City. After viewing a photo (taken in better times) of the second victim, son of the first, Arthur nerves himself to ask outright how he can help Dove’s investigation. Dove’s next hook is double-baited. Arthur might help because he’s the town minister, yes? Arthur nods, after too lengthy a pause. And what might one of his duties be but to hear confessions? Arthur must “regretfully inform” Dove that he’s “bound by Luther’s Small Catechism” concerning confession. He apparently assumes that Dove knows a Lutheran confessor is bound never to reveal what a penitent tells him. So, regretfully, with regards to any confession, he can’t help Dove. Also, regretfully, he’s doubtless wondering whether Dove has learned that a man fitting the black-robe’s description has lingered in the church with Arthur two Sundays running. It doesn’t help that Arthur “too eagerly” hints that Indians might be involved in the murders. You know, Mr. Agent, because of how violent the killings were. Because, you know, Indians “place a low value on human life.” Dove shrugs. He chuckles that the “woolier days” of yore, which Arthur mentions, bring to mind “a buffalo hide, yes?” Then he seems to drop back into casual conversation by inquiring about Fort Benton. Arthur asks about his business there, giving Dove the opportunity to mention the disappearance of a Pinkerton transport, oh, back in 1870, two wagons, six agents. It’s standing orders for any agent to telegraph headquarters if he chances on information about the cold case. He offers no more details, leaving Arthur to bumble once more by implying he knows the transport was carrying something other than the usual money, and that it disappeared in winter. The coup de grace comes with Dove’s parting non sequitur: “There was no horse.” No horse where? Why, where the two San Francisco men were found. No hoofprints. No footprints, either. So Arthur should ask parishioners if they know anything about a killer who could carry and dump grown men without leaving any mark of his passage. Arthur’s left to fret on whether Dove knows about Good Stab, by his weird nature if not by name, and how much he could know about Arthur’s dealings with the Nachzehrer. Good Stab’s third confession delivers the first big climax of his villain/hero’s origin story. He’s been despairing about his utter disconnection from his people and from any Pikuni-worthy purpose. The wanton waste of a buffalo herd is horrific enough. What damns the napikwans even deeper is how they class the calves unworthy of the expenditure of bullets, like soldiers did the Pikuni in Heavy Runner’s camp, whom they massacred with economically reusable weapons. The hunters in Chapter Ten only deign to kill calves when they can do so for cheap fun, luring them to the knife with white-horn butter, the same napikwan nourishment that made young Good Stab so sick. From the transgressor who killed the beaver-chief, from the undead leech on his own people, Good Stab becomes the undying Indian, America’s worst dream. Running for refuge, he takes the last living calf with him, and in the morning sunlight, he sees it is a white buffalo, a rare birth of deep spiritual significance to Native American tribes of the Plains, including the Blackfeet. Its appearance heralds hope, renewal, the promise of better times to come. It’s hard to imagine a more propitious omen for Good Stab to bear away from the carnage of Chapter Ten. Ruthanna’s Commentary Adding to my initial impression of What Kind of Vampire Is This, poor Good Stab is definitely The Gross Kind of Vampire. This is not someone who can have sexy fun at nightclubs. This is hunger that can’t be controlled, even when you really, really want to control it. Bit one of your own people? Too late. Interrupted by guys with guns? You’re gonna get shot. Literally full to bursting? Grossness abounds. Arthur’s gluttony for cake is only a pale reflection. Unfortunately for Arthur, said gluttony is also the least of his problems. The Pinkerton detective clearly doesn’t believe that A’s guilty conscience is solely due to his religion. And it isn’t—A either knows who the missing heir is or has a strong suspicion. (He’s also a terrible liar.) My own strong suspicion is that said heir shares A’s own dark, secret past. He certainly shares A’s long meetings with a man in black robes. So will he also share A’s fate? It doesn’t stop Arthur from continuing the meetings. The privilege of the confessional doesn’t (I think) require taking confession from someone you suspect will murder you, so… again, guilty conscience. Arthur’s not convinced that his looming fate isn’t just. Good Stab’s confession, this week, gets to the point of explaining the book title. He’s failed his people multiple times—by killing the beaver, by killing White Teeth, by losing his ability to live safely in community. He’s neither human nor animal, and the worst of both. But now he claims a purpose that, if not fully Pikuni, is at least connects with their values: to take revenge for disrespectful Napikwan slaughter of the buffalo, and of the buffalos’ people. “Blackhorns are always there for the Pikuni,” and even if he can only protect orphaned calves for a few hours, Good Stab finds a way to be there for the blackhorns. Flaying and skins are an ongoing image through all this. (Gah. Almost as bad as eye horror.) The buffalo are skinned; so are the bodies found outside of town. Good Stab hides inside buffalo skins; his own fails as a vessel for their blood. Legendary hunters sleep inside such skins. Old campfire stories tell of Kills-for-Nothing, who lost her face on a blackhorn horn, and lives underwater to avoid the sun burning her skinless face. (Ewwww. Also a familiar problem for Good stab.) Skin is protection and point of failure, and the thing off of which you can’t scrub guilty blood. The thing without which your guilt is made plain. Meanwhile, Arthur reports, Chance Aubrey remains tremblingly enthused about the “titanic hull” wending toward America. He’s “gambled all he has, including his happiness, on this crossing.” The readers know, of course, that this will turn out to be a bad gamble, and somehow symbolic other “infectious” obsessions. I’m put in mind of Ragtime—I haven’t actually read E.L. Doctorow’s book, but have enjoyed the musical. One central thread is the parasocial relationships that ordinary people have with the celebrities who, to them, represent the relationships they want to have with the modern world: Emma Goldman’s radical inspiration, Harry Houdini’s ability to escape from anything, Evelyn Nesbit’s glamour. Chance’s obsession seems of a piece: you can care deeply about Progress, but Progress will never care about you and has no obligation to follow your scripts. People (and ships), however famous, will always be people (or ships) first and symbols second. You can’t control them. The same holds for Arthur’s trembling relationship with Good Stab, and I think with the Pinkerton detective. To him, they are heralds, perhaps sent by G-d (or some other power) to hound him as he knows he secretly deserves. To him, American Indians are likewise symbolic—sharing instincts and characteristics that serve as instruction or mystery for White Men. To themselves, these people are people. Or, in Good Stab’s case, perhaps something else. Next week, we wrap up National Poetry Month with Linda D. Addison and Jamal Hodge’s Stoker-nominated chapbook, Everything Endless.[end-mark] The post What Skins Are For: Stephen Graham Jones’ <i>The Buffalo Hunter Hunter</i> (Part 5) appeared first on Reactor.

Movies & TV Daredevil: Born Again Daredevil: Born Again Forces Flashbacks On Us in “The Grand Design” Everyone is smoooothed and Matty is wearing a deeply offensive wig. By Emmet Asher-Perrin | Published on April 15, 2026 Comment 0 Share New Share One more week on the Daredevil desk! This time, our episode is “The Grand Design,” and it contains mostly flashbacks. It’s written by Jesse Wigutow and directed by Angela Barnes. A Spoilery Recap No preamble this week: We start with the credits sequence and move on to a beach. You know, one of those sequences that is always half-memory, but also a metaphor for death? So that’s not a great sign. Then we flash to the present and Vanessa is being taken care of in a hospital while Wilson Fisk rages, and has to be forcibly restrained so doctors and nurses can do their jobs. Later, while she is resting following her first surgery, Wilson tells Officer Powell that when they catch Bullseye and Daredevil, he wants them alive. Daredevil shoves Bullseye into a restaurant kitchen and asks the staff for prep towels (awfully specific for a guy who I’m pretty dang sure has never worked in a restaurant) to help staunch his bleeding. Dex doesn’t care much what happens from this point, but Matt is going to keep him alive, dammit. As you can see, there’s something of a theme popping up around who is going to stay alive this episode, with Fisk and Daredevil both determined to keep that special someone around. Image: Marvel Studios At the hospital, Daniel is currently on the phone with the press, snapping at them for asking if the Mayor’s wife is alive. BB texts him to meet her by the vending machines and asks the same question, which hurts Daniels’ feelings a lot. BB realizes she’s misstepped and gives him a real hug, which allows them both to be normal people for a moment. Daniel tells BB that Vanessa is in critical condition; BB tells Daniel that they’re lucky to have him. Wilson meets with Vanessa’s brain surgeon, who tells him that the situation is precarious, but he’ll do everything he can. Flashback! You can tell because the screen ratio has changed! Vanessa (who is visibly smoothed and shaved down via de-aging tech) is in the gallery where she worked when she met Wilson, taking over for the current proprietor while she’s away. She sees “Rabbit in a Snowstorm” in a basement and wonders why it’s not on display, believing that a man who saw his own emptiness reflected back at him would happily buy the piece for much more than it’s worth. The proprietor is intrigued but unmoved, and refuses to push the piece upstairs. Dex and Matty are arguing about whether it was okay for him to try and kill Vanessa. Dex believes that he’s balancing the scales because he was supposed to die when Matt threw him off the roof after Foggy’s death. Matt says that’s not the Grand Design. Dex makes the mistake of saying Foggy’s name, so Matt chokes him a little to make sure he knows that’s not okay (and to give fuel to ship wars for another few years). Image: Marvel Studios Flashback! Ratio change! It’s Nelson and Murdock (who are less smoothed and shaved via CGI—which feels like some weird sexism, honestly—but Matt’s wig is horrifying) in their early years, taking on an avocado-at-law case for Landman and Zack. The guy is supposed to plea out and not go to trial; said guy is Lionel McCoy (Ray, to his home buddies), who grew up in Foggy’s building. (Ray calls him “Foggy the Fembot,” a choice that we get no further information on.) His little brother Connor was one of Foggy’s friends in childhood. Ray promptly informs the duo that if he goes to prison he’ll be killed, and that they don’t realize who they really work for… Wesley picks up the phone. (What did I say last week? Feeling extremely vindicated right now.) He tells Wilson that they have a problem with “the Lion.” Wilson, however, is caught up in asking about Bitcoin—he wants to diversify their funds after the problems they’ve been having with the Russians. Wesley knows someone, of course. They own an art gallery. He’ll make all the necessary calls. We’re back in the present and Dex and Matt and still fighting and making their way through a random city tunnel (where are these tunnels? I’m sure most of us New Yorkers would love a different commute option) for all the same reasons, but this time the script is really worried that you’re not getting it: When Dex gives Matt a hard time for helping him after trying to murder him, Matt just point blank tells him, “I’m trying to save you because I tried to kill you.” Yeah no, we got that! It’s very clear, what with the whole Catholic-hero-who-never-kills deal. They continue on their way to mutual penance. Flashback! Nelson and Murdock are getting ready for the weekend, and adding to their allowance box where they stash funds for their future firm. They’re stopped from clocking out by Jeff Levine, who gives them hell for not getting Lionel “Ray” McCoy to plead out. The result is that he’s a public defender’s problem… but also that all the firm’s paperwork on the guy needs to be collated and delivered to the PD by Monday, which is their problem for screwing up the assignment. Now Matt and Foggy are hanging out in the office after hours with beers, going through all the case files, and we get the best exchange of the episode, one where they gripe about Jeff, and Foggy insists that he’s probably into weird stuff, like feet, prompting Matt to ask, “What’s wrong with feet?” This exchange continues. Matt Murdock needs his dear buddy, Foggy Nelson, to know that he is maybe a-okay with feet. Of all the things that I expected this flashback-laden episode to reveal, Daredevil’s foot fetish was not on the bingo card. So thank you for that. Immediately following, Foggy finds a smoking gun: The warrant that got Ray arrested has the wrong address on it, making everything that was found with it inadmissible. They’ve got him off the hook, but they’ve got to argue about it. Matt doesn’t think that Ray deserves release, but Foggy knows what kind of life he had and doesn’t think it’s fair—not to mention the fact that they’re his lawyers and it’s their job to do everything they can to help him legally. When Matt insists that consequences are needed in this instance because the guy was in with the mob, selling drugs and poisoning the neighborhood, Foggy points out that Matt is Catholic and should care about mercy. That, predictably, works a treat. Meanwhile, Wesley has a solution for “the Lion,” and tells Wilson that the man who can fix their problem is very good. Wilson tells Wesley to use the man more often, if that’s the case. In the present, Vanessa’s condition is leaked to the press and Daniel is horrified. A reporter approaches immediately, but Buck is there to stop him. Wilson is told that Vanessa’s procedure went well, and that the surgeon is hopeful, but Wilson doesn’t need hope—he knows she’ll be fine. Flashback! Vanessa is going against her boss’s wishes and hanging “Rabbit in a Snowstorm” up front in the gallery. More flashes to Wilson and Vanessa, married, on a beach. Then we’re back in present and Buck is having Daniel drive them to Albany—he assures Daniel that Wilson knows what they’re up to. He tells Daniel about his background doing night raids in Afghanistan. He tells Daniel that there are moments that define a man’s life, blah blah, etc. Daniel clearly thinks Buck is going to kill him for the leak; Buck goes and buys a shovel and a buzzsaw on their way. Image: Marvel Studios Flashback! Wesley meets a younger Buck (also wearing a heinous wig), and gives him the assignment to kill Ray. Foggy gets Ray out of prison and asks him what he’s going to do. Ray leaves without giving him much comfort about how good his prospects are for staying alive. Later on, Foggy comes to Ray’s apartment and gives him all their saved allowance money to help him escape the city and start over. This is intercut with a conversation between Matt and Dex, now back at Matt’s church to hide. Dex doesn’t get the whole vigilante thing; he thinks they’re all just people trying to beat their personal demons and doing a terrible job of it. Ray tells Foggy that he never had a friend like him, the way his brother did. Foggy knows and tells him to go find his brother upstate. The AVTF arrives at the church door, and the priest in training tells them to hide. Dex tells Matt to leave him and let him die—after all, he killed Foggy and didn’t think twice about it. Matt apologizes that he can’t save them both and leaves Dex to bleed out in the church. In the flashback, Matt is waiting at the bottom of Ray’s apartment building stairs because he noticed the money was missing and knew what Foggy had done. He says that he thought the fund was about the future, and Foggy agrees—it’s just not only about their future. (Cue dramatic cut to Bullseye dying on the church floor and Daredevil’s torn expression outside.) Nelson and Murdock head to Josie’s for drinks, arm in arm, ready to toast mercy. That’s when Matt suggests that they swap the firm names. Matt is back in the church, offering Dex a hand and leading him out. The taskforce only finds a streak of blood on the floor. Up in Albany, Buck and Daniel pull the car into the woods. Daniel is begging for his life, assuring Buck that he can disappear. Interspersed with this is a flashback sequence of Buck arriving at Ray’s door to kill him for Fisk… but the man has fled and there’s no one for him to kill. Buck tells Daniel that he needs to show unwavering loyalty. Buck tells him to make a choice: saw or shovel. They’re in the trunk with Savva’s body, which they’re about to bury. Matt brings Dex to Punisher’s sadness basement, where Karen is practicing her punches. She is… shall we say, displeased, that Foggy’s murderer is getting sanctuary in her dang house. Image: Marvel Studios Vanessa wakes after surgery and Wilson is an absolute wreck, as he thought he might never see her again. She wants pineapple juice, which is odd because she normally gets the itchy mouth reaction to it and never drinks the stuff. There are clues all over the following sequence that something is wrong, even without the juice. She seems surprised by Wilson’s behavior, and a little confused in general. (More on that, um, below.) She asks Wilson to tell her the story of how they met and they laugh about how they overpaid for the painting. He says it was a very lucky day, but she insists it was the Grand Design—just like Matt said about Dex earlier. But then Vanessa asks for the story again, as though she’s forgotten their discussion. And the she begins to seize. Wilson screams for help as they both remember their first meeting. We end on the abject grief in Wilson Fisk’s face as Vanessa dies. Grace Image: Marvel Studios Myriad issues aside… Vincent D’Onofrio. Argh. The man is just flawless. The craft is flawless. Every choice he makes, flawless. It drives me bananas how little I care about the character of Wilson Fisk within the comics and how much I care in these shows because Vincent D’Onofrio is playing him. The way his voice shifts on Vanessa’s waking—how he loses his deep baritone entirely and at once sounds like a terrified child—how are we supposed to deal with that? How are we supposed to watch him break in realtime and walk it off afterward? He’s the primary reason this corner of Marvel storytelling works at all. No matter how heinous the Kingpin’s deeds, we get to watch Vincent D’Onofrio dig in, every episode. The very obvious ploy between Buck and Daniel, where you knew he wasn’t about to kill the kid, but clearly wanted to rattle him, was pretty great. On the other hand, after making the point that Buck is no Wesley last week, it’s incredibly silly that this script is clearly trying to baptize the guy more clearly by showing us that he was hand-selected by Wesley. And not even in an interesting way! He’s just a murder thug who can do a job (and then doesn’t do said job). If they were trying to create resonance, there needed to be a stronger and more interesting connection there, and instead it was just… bleh. It was nice to see Nelson and Murdock again, back before they even had their firm, just paling around and being ridiculous. The foot convo was exactly what I want in the middle of serious conversations about mercy and justice, and you can only get them when Foggy’s around, sadly. But I was a little dismayed at the fact that we were getting a very common argument between Matt and Foggy that usually ran in the other direction in the previous series—those moments where Foggy was constantly trying to get Matt to make them a little money. We know that the point is meant to be that they hold each other accountable, a common mark of the most meaningful relationships in a person’s life. But this argument skewed so close to what we’ve already seen half a dozen times over, mostly because the criminal they were defending was tied up with Fisk (again), before they ever knew the guy’s name. It’s that need to connect the dots that prevents fresher vantage points. You can always reiterate a dynamic—it still has to feel new. Image: Marvel Studios That said, I always love watching Elden Henson bring Foggy’s awkwardness and compassion to life. The scene with Ray was actually the best piece of the flashback because we don’t need Matt around to be reminded of what made his best friend special—he does that better on his own. The tears in his eyes when Ray acknowledges that he never had someone like Foggy in his life is this wonderful balancing act where Foggy knows the importance of what he provides, in a manner that exists without ego: he understands that all people need care and competence and support, and so he’s here. Showing up is always what he did best. Karen’s face on seeing Matt and Dex should be framed and put in Vanessa’s gallery. All her faces, really, she went through the full spectrum of human emotion in the space of three seconds. Retribution Image: Marvel Studios They had a shot to cleverly redo one of the previous show’s best episodes, and they blew it. Once Matt had Dex in those tunnels and the taskforce was after them, I assumed we were getting a new version of Matt’s night trying to keep Vladimir alive after the bombs went off across the city in “Condemned.” It could have been so good. But the dialogue between the two of them was subpar, with a lot of repeated grievances, and Matt simply dragging Bullseye across town. Dex’s wounds were also baffling? Is he bleeding out and about to die, or not? You’ve got to pick a lane here, how bad are we talking. The ending makes it far worse, landing on a stumble when they could have stuck the whole thing. It’s easy to see what they were going for, intercutting with flashbacks where Foggy is telling Matt that what they do isn’t only about them. But Matt suddenly decides that he can’t help Dex anymore, rushes away, changes his mind and rushes back, and we get no indication of why he really gave up in the first place. You’d assume it’s because it was too difficult to get them both out of the building undetected, but clearly it wasn’t because we don’t even get to see them make their escape. So he just abandoned Dex the first time… because he felt like it? He got too grumpy before he remembered his best friend? There’s a lot of over-explaining in this episode, which is becoming a hallmark of the current era of television. This entire script reads like a reminder for everything we’ve already watched, which makes all the flashbacks feel grotesque and cheap—and that’s without getting into the weird de-aging scrub they did on the actors. Which they did far more pronouncedly on Ayelet Zurer, and boy did that piss me off. The woman is gorgeous and all bodies change over time—why are the men getting less smoothed out here? We already know the answer, but I want Marvel to own up to what they did. The biggest mistake is in making the entire flashback segment interconnected—we could have avoided a lot of sloppiness by allowing it to take place in roughly the same period, but without bringing these things together. Having Buck be the guy who was assigned to kill Ray is silly, and suggesting that this is how Buck was brought into Fisk’s orbit is even goofier because it does nothing for the narrative; it’s only connected for the sake of connecting. And getting the background behind Vanessa’s choice to hang “Rabbit in a Snowstorm” in the gallery for sale ultimately kills so much of the magic in her meetcute with Wilson, as does the acknowledgment that Wilson getting involved with art was all part of a thought toward diversifying funds. I don’t need or want to know any of this! It was better without the extra knowledge. And that’s without getting into the fact that this whole setup seems wrong timing-wise? Unless there’s a significant jump between Ray’s case and Wilson pulling up to the gallery. Fiorello’s Desk Image: Marvel Studios So it looks like they did actually kill Vanessa, but did an entire episode of fake-out to get there, and I’m livid over it. This wasn’t well-conceived in any direction. The whole plot is cheap emotional manipulation to get Fisk to do what the narrative needs (which is to become entirely unstable so he can be more easily toppled). But, moreover, if you’re going to kill off a (fantastic) character and you don’t spend your entire flashback giving us more information about that character—particularly when the character has been positioned as a love interest and that results in very little background given—you’ve missed a step. I didn’t need this episode to flashback to When Vanessa Met Wilson, I wanted to know more about her childhood, or even her affair when Wilson was away, or why she started working in art galleries. Anything! More of her. Also, the beach metaphor? Really? There’s a slightly more personal peeve here for me in how brain surgery is depicted, where cinema likes to do its cinema thing and suggest that stuff is wrong because a character seems slightly off or confused following their procedure, but that’s… not necessarily a red flag in all this. Because, you know, she had brain surgery. (Weird note: The reason I know this is due to experience with the procedure myself. If we’re getting into accuracy, nothing about this scenario fits—you definitely cannot just wake up and demand juice.) It’s all bad dramatization all the way down. And now this is going to result in a wider manhunt for Dex and Matt because… you know, they couldn’t think of any other reasons for Wilson Fisk to come down hard on the city in a way that would make enough people angry, even though it’s already under martial law. There’s an extra problem in here, where New York City is being used as a stand-in for the entire country to critique what’s going on in the world right now. But this premise is stretching credulity for anyone who lives here right now, I’ll tell you that. Quotes “I think it’s pretty obvious why I chose not to include it, but if you feel differently, by all means, why should I put it up?” —The gallery proprietor pretending to hear Vanessa out on “Rabbit in a Snowstorm” while having no intention of listening to her because she’s clearly a great boss “And I’m ready for judgement.” “Oh, good for you!” —Dex, who is excited for death, and Matt, who needs him to shut up “Just, uh, for the record? I don’t have a problem with feet.” “You’re also not not weird, so…” —Classic Matty and Foggy Closing Arguments Image: Marvel Studios The thing is, I was worried when I heard this season was going for flashbacks, and it turns out that I was right to be worried, but for none of the reasons I expected. The industry needs to have some conversations about how they use weird de-aging CGI in the future. But moreover, flashbacks don’t have to be puzzle pieces that snap together—it’s cool when you can achieve that, yes, but not everyone has the skill to make it work, which is part of why this episode is a mess. We better get to see Karen chew Matt out for bringing Bullseye home with him. We also better get Vanessa resurrected, stat. All that work to bring her into this series, just to waste it—they’ve got a lot to fix for that, and I’m a little worried that it’s all downhill from here. The characters I’m most curious about at present are BB and Daniel, because that’s clearly a hinge for this season: Whether Daniel doubles down into Fisk’s cadre, or if BB is capable of deradicalizing the guy. I’m interested in either possibility, but I’m not sure it’s going to work in any direction given how many characters we’ve got on the board with only four episodes left. Image: Marvel Studios Also, I’m not sure what the point was in rescuing Dex when he seems this keen to die? His whole speech about how they’re all just people trying to resist their natures and failing feels like dialogue that works better for the Punisher. It’s hard to understand what makes Ben Poindexter interesting in this mix when you remove his killing of Foggy from the equation; without that key action, his whole character arc isn’t doing much of anything. Next week, Leah is back! Hopefully, they’ll get an upswing, episode-wise.[end-mark] The post <i>Daredevil: Born Again</i> Forces Flashbacks On Us in “The Grand Design” appeared first on Reactor.