Airdate: 12/15/76
A rich, elderly woman named Grace Rodeheaver receives a
mysterious phone call, and blankly proceeds to open her own safe, remove her
own expensive-looking jewels and drop them off for easy retrieval by an equally
mysterious-looking van. Dumbfouded, she calls on the Angels to help find
whodunit; they’re pretty sure of an inside job, while Jill notices a person of
interest in the form of Madam Dorian, the spiritual advisor helping Miss
Rodeheaver contact her dead husband. Kelly goes undercover as an oil heiress
trying to contact her dearly departed father; she “interviews” with Dorian’s
assistant, Terence, who hypnotizes her so she’ll channel her inner little girl
at a séance (where Jill thinks she’s just acting).
But now Terence uses her
hypnosis to find out about the real Kelly Garrett, whose cover is now blown,
and whose memories of being traumatized by her orphanage matron, Beevish, are
just what Terence needs to coordinate an Angel-on-Angel murder. In Kelly’s
eyes, Beevish is now Jill, narrowly escaping a car crash death before she snaps
her driver out of her trance. Sabrina catches Rodeheaver in her hypnosis, and
before long the she-ro trio nabs Terence, who kept his nefarious dealings a
secret from the well-meaning (and now dead) Dorian, and his dastardly days of
dream-state devilry are all over.
A taut, engaging thriller that utilizes its topic – hypnosis
– with eerie efficacy. It follows the Angels formula admirably but also
transcends it – by having Kelly truly hypnotized we also learn more about her
dark backstory (I always applaud when series’ characters are explored beyond surface
level). Extra points for placing the Angels in actual peril, or at least what
seems like peril – normally the climactic action comes off as slightly more endangering
than a cocktail party conversation. And the villain, as played by one of my
favorite character actors, Rene Auberjonois, is credibly ruthless, and his
knowledge of hypnotherapy adds another layer of danger to his already lethal
arsenal. It all adds up to the best Angels
episode thus far. My only quibble: the standard opening prologue gives away
too much; it’d be far more intriguing to learn
later on that Rodenheaver had robbed herself under hypnosis.
Learning experiences: we now know the source of Kelly trauma at the of-mentioned orphanage where she was raised: a mean ol’ matron named Beevish, who apparently has a thing against Raggedy Ann dolls.
Jaclyn Smith’s best acting so far, and boy does she ever
know how to sport a lace nightie!
Client: Grace Rodenheaver (and, ironically, the culprit as
well)
Plot difficulty level: 3
Rating: ****
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