[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v9E1FCNKQbQ]

Teen Wolf: Weaponized (4×07)

by Elise Kulik

Synopsis: Scott and the gang survive another assassination attempt- this time a weaponized virus set loose by a creepy schoolteacher. Derek and Braeden make eyes at each other across a hospital bed, and Malia finds out she’s a Hale.

Rating: ★★★★★ 

Now that’s what I’m talking about, Teen Wolf writers! I got everything I never knew I needed: standardized tests, infectious disease, and mystical tea, oh my!

This episode was a wild ride from start to finish. The gang (sans Lydia) is taking the PSAT at school this week, and in addition to the usual test-induced anxiety, they have to deal with a weaponized virus infecting the class.

It all starts with the test proctor, a creepy middle-aged ginger man who sounds like he has a comb-over and a collection of human organs in jars alphabetized in his basement. Gingercreep fingerprints all the students before their test, infecting the students.

Lydia’s mom helps proctor the test, but Coach doesn’t show up- he’s found passed out on the desk in his office, presumably drunk. The test proceeds normally, until a girl falls out of her seat and hits the floor. Her name is Sydney, she’s super-stressed because this test determines whether or not she qualifies for the National Merit Scholarship, and thus whether or not she can afford college- she’s patient 0 and I love her because she’s little me in high school.

Me too, Sydney.
Me too, Sydney.

Lydia’s mom runs over to fainted Sydney and helps her up, noticing a spidery red rash on her wrists. Quickly excusing herself, Mrs. Martin runs over to Coach and lifts his shirt to expose raw, blistered pox on Coach’s back. Cue the CDC. Good on you, Mrs. Martin. You would probably survive a horror film; quit touching rashes, though.

CDC comes in with yellow suits blazing, setting up quarantine tents exuberantly until the high school looks like it’s wrapped in one giant, E.T.-playhouse latex bubble. Mrs. Martin thinks it’s smallpox, but Creepyginger disagrees; smallpox has been eradicated.*

Woooo, CDC!
Woooo, CDC!

*Fun fact: recently the CDC got in a metric tonne of trouble because one of their fridges in a storage facility contained vials of smallpox which were believed to have been eradicated in their last freezer spring cleaning. Because who stores smallpox in the fridge and not the freezer, right? Wrong.

Meanwhile, back outside the school, the Vet has just been attacked by Sitomi, the leader of the slaughtered Buddhist werewolves from last week. Though this isn’t probably the best way to get someone’s help, it is the method she chose and it does represent a kind of random hostility I can get behind as an audience member this season.

The Vet looks at Sitomi’s infected Beta before he dies. The virus eradicated the entire Buddhist werewolf pack, and it causes its victims to shift uncontrollably and go blind before they die. It’s the same virus loose at the school.

Realizing that the virus causes the werewolves to change, Scott and the gang hide themselves in the Hale’s vault underneath the school. How do they get in, you ask? Malia lets them in with her Hale bloodline claws, of course.

After a good amount of heroic suffering, bleeding out from underneath fingernails, blindness, etc. the gang finds the cure to the virus. It’s magic tea, and it’s conveniently located in the Hale vault. Scott shatters the tea leaf jar and the contents aerosolize, curing everyone.

Creepyginger is shot by Scott’s dad (yay) and all’s well that ends well. Except Malia finds the rest of the deadpool and sees her last name is ‘Hale’ before she angrily storms off screen. Whoops.

 I found myself whispering,  “Oh, Haaaale no.”
I found myself whispering,  “Oh, Haaaale no.”

In other news, Lydia had a poignant moment apologizing to dead Meredith in the Soundproof Room, and Derek and Braeden made googly eyes at each other after Derek saved her from the Buddhist werewolf wreckage of last week. Eh. I ship it.

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4vdIQCfKHw]

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