'Sleepy Hollow' Saved: 5 Fixes for Season 3
Despite declining ratings and a pronounced rise in fan dissatisfaction, the time-traveling demon hunters of Sleepy Hollow, Ichabod Crane (Tom Mison) and Abbie Mills (Nicole Beharie), will live to fight another season. Fox recently announced that the series would be getting a third year, under the guidance of a new showrunner: Clifton Campbell, who previously oversaw the cult A&E series The Glades. That’s a well-deserved win for “Sleepyheads,” but now the hard work begins: recapturing the magic that made the show’s first season such a delight. Here are five suggestions for how to make Sleepy Hollow a must-visit destination again.
Related: Fox Renews Sleepy Hollow for Season 3, Names the Series’ New Showrunner
1. Keep the Focus on the Core Four
Season 2 took a gamble by making Ichabod’s witchy wife, Katrina (Katia Winter), a permanent partner in the Ichabod/Abbie alliance, pushing Abbie’s sister, Jenny (Lyndie Greenwood), to the background and dispatching Captain Irving (Orlando Jones) to a (temporary) death. But fans — and Winter herself — generally agreed that Katrina was the season’s weak link, only getting interesting towards the end when grief compelled her to go all Dark Willow and become the enemy. In the meantime, Jenny helped a resurrected Irving recover his humanity (and a wicked sword), and take their places alongside the dynamic duo of Crane & Mills. The last scene of the finale finds Abbie addressing the whole group — “Whatever’s next, we’re there for each other” — before they stroll out of the room Scooby Gang style. That suggests that the writers finally figured out what the rest of us already knew: these characters play better together than apart.
2. That Said, Take Romance Off the Table
The one noble purpose that Katrina did serve was eliminating any chance of a hook-up between Ichabod and Abbie. Yes, it’s true that Mison and Beharie have terrific chemistry, but too much “Will they or won’t they” teasing will just upset their enjoyable “Ichabbie” interplay. Right now, these two are our platonic ideal of a modern-day Mulder and Scully, which means that if they do get together, it should occur off-screen or in a little-seen movie sequel so we can all pretend it never happened.
Related: 'Sleepy Hollow' Star Lyndie Greenwood's Instagram Takeover
3. Cut the Episode Order
On the strength of the first season’s ratings, Fox upped Season 2’s episode count from 13 to 18, which, at the time, seemed like a big vote of confidence. Based on the way the year unfolded though, the writers didn’t have enough material to fill those extra five hours. So dropping back down to a more manageable, tightly-constructed 13 hours shouldn’t be seen as a demotion (heck, look what Empire was able to accomplish in a mere 12 episodes!) — but rather a recognition that brevity is best for certain shows.
4. Bring Back the Funny
Like a four-day-old sturgeon, “fish out of water” jokes can grow stale very quickly. But Ichabod’s befuddlement at 21th century America remains an endless source of amusement — thanks to Mison’s expert comic timing — and was much-missed as Season 2 took a pronounced turn for the dark and dour. Obviously, the longer Ichabod spends in the modern world, the less weird it will seem. But there’s still lots about the future that can and should befuddle him. Like Tinder… amirite?
Related: 'Sleepy Hollow' Star Tom Mison Takes Over Yahoo TV's Instagram
5. A Better Big Bad
The loss of Moloch midway through Season 2 may have been a smart move from a storytelling perspective — we wouldn’t want him turning into Red John, after all — but it left the heroes desperately in need of a villain with whom to match wit and might. (Love John Noble, but Henry wasn’t quite up to the task.) A new year wipes the slate clean for new nemeses, at least one of whom will hopefully be compelling enough to stick around throughout the season.
