Orlando Jones leaves Sleepy Hollow

I’ve noticed an odd thing—fans of supernatural TV shows almost always hate change.  Maybe that’s why they like vampires so much; they never age, they never change their look, they are constant.  Given how shoddy the last two seasons of Buffy, the Vampire Slayer were, I have to admit part of me was relieved when Angel got to go out on its feet with some dignity after only five seasons.

Change is coming to another supernatural television show, but it isn’t much of a surprise: reports have confirmed that Orlando Jones will not be back for the third season of Sleepy Hollow.  I say this is not a surprise; yes, his character was killed off, but he was killed off once before and he somehow returned (that’s what I mean about supernatural shows not changing).  But given that they seemed to be cleaning house at the end of last season, it seemed clear that if Sleepy Hollow were to continue, it would have a smaller cast.

Note I said, “if.”  Given the low ratings and general discontent about the quality of season 2, season 3 was not a given.  While I loved season 1, I was one of those who felt that the quality dropped as the episode load increased from 13 to 18 and the cast expanded to include John Noble and Lyndie Greenwood.  But the Powers That Be at FOX decided to re-up for another season, albeit with a new showrunner.

The show never managed to integrate the character of Katrina, Ichabod Crane’s witchy-wife, who started off trapped in purgatory but still never fully interacted with the plots once she was released.  Katrina never found a situation she couldn’t make worse by trying to help, which made her character pathetic even though she was supposed to be strong and intelligent. 

And the show’s attempts to deal with new and different supernatural elements took them pretty far afield.  In one episode the protagonists sought a Biblical sword that was protected by a Gorgon.  In upstate New York.  And don’t even get me started on the absurdity of the interactive hologram of Thomas Jefferson.

Ichabod and his partner Abbie tried their best to defeat the Horsemen of the Apocalypse and prevent Armageddon, but Katrina kept having warm fuzzy feelings for her former fiancée (who was the Headless Horseman) and their son (who was the Horseman of War).  It is kind of hard to fight Evil when a member of your team wants to reform them and make them good again. 

To make another allusion to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, it reminded me of season seven when Buffy fought “The First Evil.”  One problem the show had was that it was never able to quite explain why The First Evil was taking a week off so the characters could do something else.  Constantly fighting The First Evil is monotonous, but having it take a week off in order to develop other plot lines isn’t plausible.  It was the same with Sleepy Hollow season 2; Evil seemed perfectly willing to rest for a while in its inexorable quest to destroy the world.

I am partly relieved that Orlando Jones will not be back next season.  Not that I didn’t think he did a good job; in the early episodes he provided a grounding that was needed when talking about the Apocalypse.  The thing is this; Jones’ strong suit is comedy.  He rose to fame as a pitchman for 7-Up where his comic timing was essential to selling the phrase, “Make Seven [pause] Up Yours!”  He did excellent work on MadTV, and had a great supporting role in the largely forgotten David Duchovney comedy Evolution (he had the memorable line, “There’s ALWAYS time for lubricant!”).

I guess it isn’t so much that I am happy to see Jones go, as I am that Captain Frank Irving will be gone.  His whole back story with the estranged spouse he still loved and the child in the wheelchair were just underdeveloped from the beginning, and integrating him into the Apocalypse fighting unit erased his status as the outsider who grounded to project in reality.  Not that I want him replaced by the ridiculous “Hawley.”  The one thing Sleepy Hollow does not need is a blonde surfer dude-love interest for Abbie’s sister Jenny.

The show still has the chemistry of Tom Mison and Nicole Beharie, which counts for a lot (they could do an entire episode of Ichabod and Abbie doing karaoke and it would be entertaining).  But it needs Evil to have a better game plan.  And it needs better supporting characters than Captain Frank Irving.