Charmed — “That Old Black Magic”

“That Old Black Magic” is an episode from the second season of Charmed, featuring Brigid Brannagh as Tuatha, a centuries-old witch woken from her imprisonment by a pair of unlucky treasure-hunters.  In the teaser, Tuatha shrinks and disposes of her feckless liberators.

There isn’t any more size-changing in the rest of the episode, but Brannagh as Tuatha just owns every scene she’s in. Yes, it’s a tragedy that she feeds her tiny victims to her snake rather than using them to sate her other appetites (it’s been over two hundred years!), but evil witches gonna evil.

Originally posted:  30 Sep 2016

8 thoughts on “Charmed — “That Old Black Magic””

  1. That kind of stuff creates such tension in me. On the one hand, yeah, wasted opportunity. Body exploration could’ve been so amazing. Why doesn’t she have the instinct to use them for prurient application? Well, guess not all women are horny all the time or (amazingly) interested in tiny men.

    On the other, I want to behead her for her transgression. All the lust is gone, this evil being must be obliterated.

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      1. Shrinking them down is one thing, but plucking them up and feeding them to her snake is beyond the pale.

        Okay, she doesn’t want to rub them around on her cooch, fine. But she could have fried them with a lightning bolt, severed their heads with a magic blade, or simply shut their brains off. There were so many ways she could have eliminated the annoyance instantly.

        Instead, she savors their terror. She draws out their death solely to enjoy their panic and confusion. This isn’t a punishment, because they don’t exist long enough to learn something from the experience and mend their ways. They’re not given a chance to apologize: what was their crime? They freed her. She was imprisoned and they freed her, and she repays them with more of the same crime that got her locked up in the first place.

        Being eaten by a snake is a trigger for me, beyond all this. Reptiles and amphibians stupidly swallowing a helpless tiny person whole is more shocking and offensive than most cruel endings.

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        1. I’m not sure we’re exactly disagreeing here, in that I love her for all the things you highlight. Iguanas are even more atrocious in their tiny-disposal, as they will often leave half of their prey’s body outside of their jaws, dangling and flailing for an unbearably long time.

          But yes, I would much prefer Tuatha here to rape me until I was rescued by the kindly sisters Halliwell (who have no idea how to reverse the spell).

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  2. Is the snake her familiar? I’ve never watched a single episode of Charmed, but even without having done so, I can understand waking up and doing your chores first thing, including feeding your familiars.

    I understand feeding on fear, but I’m glad it doesn’t seem her performance included her “acting evil”. There’s very little I find more annoying in size media than bwahahah-I’m-evil displays.

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    1. The snake is indeed her familiar, entombed with her and therefore hasn’t eaten in centuries. More urgently, Tuatha is missing her wand, the MacGuffin of the episode that will make her unstoppable, yadda yadda. Her familiar’s first task is to locate the wand, so sustenance is in order.

      Tuatha doesn’t speak to the boys at all once she’s shrunken them; they’re just pet food. In the final GIF she’s telling her snake, “You’re welcome.”

      Of course, I see no reason why a tiny couldn’t be used as a familiar…

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      1. Well, that explains everything! The way I see it, she’s being an excellent witch. And I’m sure those two guys were terrible people. They probably didn’t recycle.

        The right tiny as a familiar would have only improved the episode, of course.

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