Teen Wolf – Superposition

By: Kim Olson

Previously on “Teen Wolf,” Stiles (Dylan O’Brien) was “erased” by the Ghost Riders, meaning no one remembers he ever existed – ever. Even though Stiles isn’t there in flesh and blood, his presence lives on in the memory of the characters that remain. They are still thinking about him and hearing his voice, even if they don’t know it’s him. Stiles isn’t gone, for good. He’s just invisible, for now. (For those wanting to see Dylan O’Brien’s face every week, he’s still in the opening credits.)

Before Stiles was erased, he begged Lydia (Holland Roden) to do whatever it took to remember him and she’s keeping her promise, even if she doesn’t realize it. Her last moments with him, before the Ghost Riders took him, keep playing in her head like a broken record. She hears his last words on loop. His voice wakes her up, screaming (She hasn’t woken up screaming in years.). She visualizes being back outside the school with him. She gets so lost in her hallucinations, her memory of him; she almost walks into oncoming traffic! (Lydia would die for Stiles, pass it on.) The audio is there, the visuals too, but no other person remembers him. She remembers him though and she doesn’t even know it. She spends all day looking for him, trying to find him at school, but she can’t. She doesn’t even know who she’s looking for. All she knows is someone is missing. She tells Scott (Tyler Posey), “I came to school this morning and I was sure I was supposed to meet someone, but I couldn’t remember who it was supposed to be. I have been looking for them all day. Whoever it is, I think I loved him.” So close to figuring out who is gone, she follows that feeling of love to Deaton (Seth Gilliam), who has her use her Banshee powers to write down the name of the person who’s missing. In an amazing performance by Holland Roden, Lydia who is in a possessed/animalistic state, writes the letters S-T-I-L-E-S out of the word “mischief.” She reads what she wrote and in a call back to Season One she asks, “What the hell is a Stiles?”

Stiles is Scott McCall’s best friend from before anyone can remember. He’s his brother. Without Stiles, it’s as if Scott is missing a limb. Trying to remember Stiles is like an itch he can’t scratch. To alleviate his mind, Deaton suggests Scott’s subconscious is trying to tell him something and to figure out what it is Scott should sleep and dream. So, Scott does this. When Scott wakes up, he’s back in the woods where he and Stiles were in the pilot episode when Scott got bitten and turned into a werewolf. Scott remembers everything that happened that night, except Stiles being there. Without the memory of Stiles, Scott can’t remember why he was there or how he got there. “What was I doing out in the woods looking for a dead body alone? …How did I know about the body? …How did I get five miles from my house? …I didn’t have a car.… How did the sheriff know I was out here? …I wasn’t supernatural,” he asks Lydia. Lydia wishes she could help him remember, but she didn’t know him sophomore year of high school. (She was too busy being the queen of the school and ignoring the likes of Scott and Stiles.) Scott realizes there had to be someone else with him back then, someone he can’t remember. How else could he do these things he couldn’t and wouldn’t do alone?

Meanwhile, the Ghost Riders that took Stiles are still in Beacon Hills collecting souls. Corey (Michael Johnston), thanks to his chameleon-like superpowers, is the only one that can see them without them seeing him back. It’s as if he can pass between worlds undetected. After he and Mason (Khylin Rhambo) see the Ghost Riders take a classmate of theirs, they research the Ghost Riders together something that pisses off Liam (Dylan Sprayberry). Liam becomes an angry, jealous prick toward Corey because he doesn’t like his relationship with Mason as he thinks Corey is putting Mason in danger and he doesn’t trust Corey. It doesn’t help that Corey uses his powers of invisibility to spy on Liam’s private conversations. Seeing how he and Corey not having a friendship upsets Mason though, Liam and Corey bury the hatchet and further investigate the Ghost Riders together. As soon as they find the library card of the Ghost Riders’ latest victim and put it through the system, they remember who the student was, which they had previously forgotten as the Ghost Riders had erased him from their memories. The big question is: How does this apply to Stiles? What of Stiles can they find to jump start their memories of him? Perhaps it is his lacrosse jersey, tucked away in his locker, that Lydia and Scott keep circling back to?

That’s just a few of the questions Superposition raised and left unanswered. Others include: How are Stiles’ parents still married?! More importantly, how is Claudia Stilinski (Joey Honsa) alive again?! Does Papa Stilinski (Linden Ashby) being married mean he can never be with Mama McCall (Melissa Ponzio) so their chance to be a couple is over and ruined?! Is Coach Finstock (Orny Adams) gay or is he just a super champion for equality, telling students it’s “even better” to be gay and he “totally gets” realizing things after holding a guy’s hand? How is Liam going to be the new Alpha, once Scott is gone, if he can’t even be captain of the lacrosse team?! Why is Lydia hearing trains? Did the Ghost Riders take everyone, including Stiles, to a train station? Why did Lydia write “mischief” and what does it mean? Lastly, is Corey going to be the one to bring Stiles home?

Stiles will be back, count on that. It’s just a matter of when and how. Give the show time. It’s only episode two. It’s not like he’s dead. He’s just somewhere else, in another world. He’s not gone for good. He will be back. He’s a main character, still in the opening credits, so therefore he has to return. When he is back, hopefully, he and Lydia will tell each other they love each other in a sweet, normal moment without some impending doom or dark music and the series finale, 18 episodes from now, will see them married and with children.

Best Lines:

• Mason: 4.9 (GPA). Corey: I didn’t even know it goes that high.
• Coach: Your teenage years are not the time for academic achievement. Mason: Yes they are. Coach: That’s a lie sold to you by the government.
• Coach: I don’t get paid to lock up after you losers! Mason: Yes, you do.
• Lydia’s Mom: I had to convince 23 students that what they saw in the library last semester was a large bear and the fangs on Scott McCall were the result of acute teenage hallucination syndrome. Corey: What is teenage hallucination syndrome? Lydia’s Mom: I have no idea.
• Parrish: I’m a harbinger of death. Not a harbinger of kidnapping. I’m also a sheriff’s deputy working on an unsolved murder that for once doesn’t involve shape shifters, resurrected 18th century serial killers, or me. It’s just a straightforward robbery-homicide. Mason: Straightforward? He was bludgeoned to death and stuffed in a high school air duct.
• Lydia (to chained up Malia): If this is an after school club, count me out.