Okay, I admit I am writing this before The Way Home airs, because I have had the screener all week. Having it all week has enabled me to watch it quite a few times and well, I am still in a state of shock.
A state of shock for so many things.
Secrets have a way a way of rising to the top and in The Way Home, there is nothing but secrets. I think that part of the excitement of watching this show is that we’re figuring out the secrets as the characters do. We’re piecing together the pieces of the puzzle and there are so many pieces to piece.
You could say that this could all be solved by communication, but even then, communication wouldn’t even solve all of this. Everything seems like it’s something you couldn’t believe. You wouldn’t believe it.
I think that when it comes down to it, there is so much that we need to examine and so much that needs to be said. But when the truth comes to light, is it going to be something that everyone can deal with?
JACOB
We start in the past. Back in 1814 and well, I think that was the best place to start. However, I do think that we don’t get enough of Jacob in the episode. We don’t get enough of him and Kat.
Jacob explains to her what he remembers, but you can tell he feels a distance from her. He feels a sense of comfort with what he’s known, and all he’s known is the 1800s. He doesn’t know Kat. He barely remembered her. But he does remember going into the pond.
When Thomas and Susanna arrive, Jacob’s guard is down. He suddenly feels a sense of relief and comfort – you can see it in his eyes. I actually feel for Jacob. There has to be a sense of confusion and of abandonment. He doesn’t understand what has been happening and why Kat is just there now.
He even asks her why she didn’t come for him sooner.
And seeing that, you can’t help but wonder, will he ever understand? Kat didn’t know about the pond and all she’d ever done was want her brother back. But her seeing the way he doesn’t seem to want to ever forgive? Well, that feels like a lot. It feels like too much for anyone to ever really deal with.
Kat does what she needs to do. She runs. She runs back to the present because she needs to. She needs to be there for Alice. She needs to face her Mom.
And none of that is ever going to be easy.
THE CORE FOUR
Elliot is the man who seems to always have something to hide, and he doesn’t seem to know how to be honest. Now there is a part of me that thinks that Elliot has just gone through a lot and doesn’t know how to be vocal about anything or let his guard down. I know that Alice’s time travel and all of the things that he knows now are coming are messing with him.
I know that there are pacts made.
But the thing that stands in Elliott’s way is his lack of honesty. He doesn’t know when to be honest, because that’s truly the one thing he’s never been. Elliot’s kept track of everything that has happened and kept it in his head, versus really talking it all out.
I want to love Elliot the way that I did the first season. I want to feel as though he can be redeemed because it’s not necessarily that I think that he is a bad guy. I just think that he is misguided. I think that he is just trying too hard to please everyone that somewhere along the way he’s lost who he was and who he’s meant to be.
I feel like Elliot’s lack of self-confidence keeps getting him into trouble.
After going on the ghost tour, the group ends back at Elliot’s. It’s there that we find out that Kat wasn’t the one who shared the Facebook message announcing that party all of those years ago.
But it’s also there where Kat finds out that Elliot came back from his summer away to try and win Kat back. Only like most things, Elliot doesn’t come clean with Kat. Instead, Elliot is always hiding something and keeping his guard up. He just always tells the wrong people what he’s up to.
I think that Elliot is just terrified that he’s always going to end up hurt, but he’s always hurt because he refused to open up.
The dance party was definitely fun to watch though.
ALICE & THE PARTY
I’ve started to understand that the reason that we’re not back in 1814 in a lot of these episodes is that we needed to set up for the ending. And what better way to set up for any ending than reviewing what got you there? Well, that and creating two separate timelines of drama.
Alice is tired of waiting for answers and so she decides to go back – with the pond taking her to 2007.
When she makes her way back, Elliot tells her that she’s been gone for five years. Kat is in Port Haven at the farm, fighting with Del over the fact that she wants to sell part of the farm. Kat can’t understand what she’s doing and if we’re being honest, I am not too sure that I understand Del at this point.
One thing that I have noticed is that time seems to keep repeating itself in some way. But it doesn’t matter what period we are in, Kat seems to continuously take people for granted. She takes Elliot for granted, but Elliot is continuously letting her. He’s not stopping her, because he wants to please her.
So when she draws him in, he says yes. He will throw a party. Alice says she will attend and she says no. But that’s how it all starts, because he never knows how to say the right things to her and she never knows how to not ask. What ends up being a masquerade party will be something that changes everything.
Kat left Brady and in talking to Elliot at the party she tells him the reasons why. Her life was planned out for her, by Brady’s five-year plans. She wanted more and had applied for a graduate program in England. She was accepted. She hadn’t told anyone. The first person that she’s told is Elliot.
Alice, overhearing it all, I can’t blame her for being hurt and angry. When Elliot and Kat make plans to run away together, she realizes that everything is changing and it’s not supposed to change. Elliot doesn’t care what the implications are, he just knows that he’s not going to miss his chance with Kat again.
Only his not missing his chance with Kat and running away with her to London leaves us wondering what would happen to Alice. Luckily Brady shows up and he wants to talk to Kat. He wants to understand why she’s running away.
It’s when Alice goes to talk to Elliot and say that Brady is there, that we learn why Elliot wanted to make sure that Alice could forgive him. He didn’t care about the implications of London and how it would make Alice not exist. All he cared about was making sure that he got the girl.
You can’t watch this show and not think about how badly this would hurt Alice. Elliot was a young man, sure. But what he did and what he said, was a lot. He was more worried about what it would take to get Kat.
When this resulted in Kat getting hurt and us starting to see what happening on that day that the town wanted to forget.
THE ALICE & NICK OF IT ALL
Alice and Nick have always been this weird point of the show. It’s like how does this work? I shipped them so hard – when they were younger, but it’s never truly been young at the same time. Nick’s never fallen out of love with Alice but has never understood the Alice that comes and goes out of his life.
The one that he can’t forget.
Alice has never fallen out of love with Nick but knows that they can never be together. So what does one do when you love someone who feels like a ghost because they’ve never been this part of life that has been constant?
They’ve just been a part of life that neither one will ever let go of. Love is strange that way.
As we all know, Elliot has kept a notebook that is filled with notes about Alice and her time travels. It’s all of the things that Alice has done. All of the times that she’s shown up.
Nick finds that notebook and all of the notes on who Alice is. When he reads it, he storms outside, interrupting Kat and Elliot finding their way back to each other. Not even gonna lie, I stood up and applauded him. How could he find the truth out and not feel betrayed? He deserves so many answers, but in the same breath, I am not sure what answers he gets will be enough.
OTHER THOUGHTS
- The Gibsons wanted to build a vinery and buy part of the Landry land. Well, let’s be honest here, we hate the Gibsons after what Cyrus did to Kat. BUT we need to know why it is that Kat’s painting was in their home.
- Kat in the pool, I gasped.
- Del and Sam – why does Del get in her own way?
- Sam wants to help Del with her dream and her pride getting in the way… again! When is she going to stop with this sh**?
The Way Home airs on Sundays on The Hallmark Channel.