(Warning: Spoilers from this week’s Lovecraft Country will be found below.)
This week’s Lovecraft Country showed off striking sights of this world (Jurnee Smollett tearing down the street with a baseball bat) and of another realm inside her home. That’s where those racist Chicago North Side neighbors had stirred up dormant spirits, and we saw one heck of an exorcism scene that was attended by a baby-headed ghost. That ghost, which was really something, also managed to scare the bejesus out of some white home invaders. The sight of a giant man with a tiny baby head may very well have scared them to death. What a terrible (and fitting) fate for them, but seriously, imagine that ^^^ being the last thing that you see.
From what we learned later in the episode, it was clear that this poor soul had been experimented upon by Hirem Epstein. Presumably, the guy was insane and sociopathic and so on, but is there a reason that a baby head sat atop this ghost? Yes, and the explanation might be even more disturbing than the sight itself. Creator Misha Green revealed to CinemaBlend that Epstein’s acts were based upon the Tuskegee experiments “and the kind of medical things that have been done to people of color on American soil.” That fits right in with the show’s contextual tapestry thus far, but then Misha revealed exactly how they wove this idea into the mythology of the show:
“Okay, well, what is then the mythology? What is Hiram the ghost testing?’ He’s testing a time machine. So if he sent people through this time machine, what would happen to them? Like, would part of their body change in time? So then, their head is their baby self, but their body is their adult self. And so, it’s like you go down those things and then you get to ‘baby-headed ghost.’”
Soooo, time travel is now a part of this show. Not only that, but Hirem’s apparently got some sort of contraption upstairs that might be a part of that process. Perhaps we’ll find out more next week about that device, but we also know that Christina is very interested in the Winthrop House, though I still cannot figure out where she sits on the good-evil spectrum. I can’t even process thought right now, though, because… Baby. Headed. Ghost. Ahhhhhhhhhhhh.
(Via CinemaBlend)