Teen Wolf Review: “A Promise To The Dead” (Season 4, Episode 11)

Teen Wolf managed to squeeze a first date into the penultimate episode between run-ins with the berserkers, which added a little teen normalcy to the pending doom, but they had a little trouble making it through the evening at that pace.

Although Scott (Tyler Posey) and Kira (Arden Cho) skipped right past dinner and a movie (Star Wars, selected personally by Stiles), and opted for a more risque activity, their intimate evening is cut short when Kate (Jill Wagner) and her supernatural bodyguard crash the party. It looks like these two aren’t cut out for a “normal” relationship after all, and somehow that shouldn’t come as any real surprise to regular viewers of the show.

Peter’s (Ian Bohen) plan to take Scott out of the equation is almost a success story, until Kate decides to insert her own agenda in the master plan. Instead of taking him out in the loft, she decided that the death of a True Alpha deserves a little more pomp and circumstance. Season four started out in Mexico, and it looks like that’s exactly where it’s going to end: “We’re going to church.”

In the season premiere, Scott and his cohorts ventured south of the border to rescue Derek (Tyler Hoechlin) who had mysteriously disappeared during the previous season finale. When they finally found him in the basement of an old Mexican church that somehow withstood a massive earthquake, he had been transformed into a younger version of himself. Although that transformation was only temporary, the side effects attached seem to be more lingering – and possibly deadly.

Returning the characters back to this previous setting brings the narrative full circle, but also wraps up the season four storyline in a convenient bow. Whether Derek is going to succumb to Kate’s voodoo or defeat it, it only makes sense for it to be at the scene of the crime. This is also the location where fans were introduced the deadly force of the berserkers, Kate’s still mostly unexplained partners-in-crime.

Along with the change in scenery, you have to love the innate supernatural ability to heal at an unprecedented speed. It keeps the plot moving without those pesky, long-winded scenes where all the characters are bed ridden following each physical conflict (for the most part), and it allows for epic fight scenes that flow into equally dramatic follow-ups to exist. It also creates this wonderful contrast between the supernatural characters and there human counterparts. Kira may have been able to stumble about the pit o’ bones, but Argent (JR Bourne) had to muster up the last ounces of adrenaline in his system to get himself out of his life or death predicament.

It looks like everyone is heading to Mexico for round two, and not just the underage supernatural types. With the help of Lydia (Holland Roden) and Dr. Deaton, there is at least a basis for understanding what’s ahead of them. Deaton played a more active role than normal on this episode of Teen Wolf when he physically exerted himself in order to uncover background into what’s motivating the current string of threats against Beacon Hill’s supernatural entities.

As if the dead pool wasn’t enough, the more overt threat of Peter and Kate still remains – and it’s about to get more complicated. Peter has never been a man of particular honor, but asking his own daughter to kill his enemy for him in exchange for the identity of her biological mother, that’s an impressive new low, even for him. Especially after Kate has went to such dramatic lengths to dress Scott up as a berserker with the intent of having his own friends take him out.

It’s a troubled web of betrayal that Peter has weaved on this season of Teen Wolf, and there’s only one episode left for our main characters to unravel it before it’s too late. Judging by the lead up, Derek’s chances of surviving his return trip to Mexico aren’t as high as fans might hope – and neither are Scott’s.

Let us know if you think Scott and Derek are going to walk away from the season four finale of Teen Wolf, along with all your other theories, in the comments section below!