Below Episode 2 recap: “Crown and Anchor” brings the Old Hag to Snooks Arm
As the search for Jerry Biles continues, Wade's recovery raises new questions, Fonda investigates disappearing marine life, and the Penney family tries to keep Come Home Year on track.
Charlie Heaton plays Wade Penney in Below, Netflix's Newfoundland-set thriller. In Episode 2, Wade struggles with disturbing dreams and unexplained symptoms after surviving an accident at sea.
Photo credit: Jan Thijs/Netflix
Spoiler warning: This recap contains spoilers for Episode 2 of Below, “Crown and Anchor.”
Read the episode one recap here
Episode 2 of Below picks up in the harbour at Snooks Arm, where a diver is searching the water around the wreck of Jerry Biles' boat. Visibility is almost nonexistent, and the search crews have been told to bring recovered wreckage directly to shore for inspection. Jerry's death has left the community shaken, although there's already a disagreement about what should happen to the remaining Come Home Year celebrations.
Ruth Penney is prepared to postpone the dory race. It would be difficult to hold a rowing competition while the authorities are still looking for the rest of Jerry's body, but other residents object to cancelling the festivities when people have travelled from away to attend. The Garden Party, at least, is going ahead. Ruth has been coordinating the search in her role as harbourmaster, but someone suggests she step aside because her nephew Wade was involved in the accident and an investigation is coming. She doesn't take that particularly well, especially when there is still work to be done in the harbour.
Calvin is having trouble accepting the official explanation, too. According to the account circulating around town, Jerry got tangled in a cable while trying to haul aboard a piece of iceberg ice. Calvin knows how the equipment works, but he also saw the wreckage, and he's doubtful that an accident involving a single chunk of ice could have destroyed so much of the boat.
Then the searchers pull something else out of the water: part of a moose that appears to have been partly digested. One of the men says he's gutted enough fish to recognize when one animal has been inside another's stomach. Someone speculates about an enormous creature, but nobody has an explanation for what could have eaten a moose. With Jerry's widow standing nearby, the mood changes. Calvin promises her they'll find out what happened, but Mrs. Biles has a more pointed question: “What did this?”
Wade, meanwhile, has been taken home to recover. He's drawing the enormous eye, or circular opening, he saw in the water during the accident, although his family has no idea what to make of it. Mary and Jay are in the kitchen trying to find something to drink, and Mary is increasingly irritated by the absence of tea. She's sure there used to be a large tin of Tetley in the house, but Noah offers coffee instead, having brought his own beans and hand grinder from Montreal. The contrast between Mary's expectations of home and Noah's carefully prepared coffee is rather funny, particularly when somebody suggests the fairies may have taken the tea.
Mary is worried about Calvin and Wade being alone together in Snooks Arm after she and Jay return to their lives elsewhere. She also thinks their father is going to be even harder to live with now that his proposal for a family ice-harvesting business has been turned down. Jay is less convinced the business was such a bad idea, although Mary points to what just happened to Wade as a fairly compelling reason to reconsider.
At the Ocean Science Centre, Fonda Howander receives another troubling update. Her colleague Anik reports fish stocks and entire runs disappearing along the Labrador coast, raising concerns about what changing ocean conditions could mean. Within the series, Fonda fears a catastrophic change to the Atlantic circulation system; that is her interpretation of events in this fictional investigation, rather than an established explanation for what has happened around Snooks Arm.
One of Fonda's colleagues arrives late at the laboratory, explaining that his wife made him sleep on the Chesterfield because she could still smell ammonia on him. I haven't heard anyone call a couch a Chesterfield in years, and it took me straight back to childhood. He's also looking distinctly unwell, which is more concerning after the strange symptoms we saw when he was handling Calvin's ice sample. Fonda asks him to examine material collected from the iceberg in the harbour but tells him not to log the new samples in the usual way. He questions that departure from procedure before doing as she asks.
Elsewhere, someone working with fishing gear near a wharf has a frightening encounter of his own. Movement approaches beneath the surface, followed by long, tentacle-like appendages. He falls into the water, where visibility is poor and fish are darting around him. The scene cuts away without showing what becomes of him.
Wade wakes up changed
Calvin returns to find a large YES painted on his property, another sign of how divided Snooks Arm has become over resettlement. Mary and Jay have been arguing about what will happen if their father refuses to leave after the community votes in favour. Mary imagines the other residents departing, the ferry service ending and the electricity being shut off, leaving Calvin on his own in an increasingly isolated settlement. Jay thinks their father is stubborn enough to survive, but Mary is less confident.
When the conversation turns to money, Jay asks how much each resident could receive. The figures are $140,000 per household and another $60,000 per resident, and his interest in that additional payment is immediate. Mary notices and warns him against whatever he's thinking. Considering the threatening messages he received in Episode 1, I didn't take his sudden enthusiasm for relocation as a sign that he'd become convinced by the policy arguments.
Calvin's greater concern is Wade. His son has apparently emerged from his room long enough to drink an enormous amount of water before going back to bed, and when Calvin finally talks to him, Wade is asking for another drink. It's an alarming change, particularly given the amount he's already consumed. Wade also appears confused about Jerry, briefly asking how he is before remembering that his friend died.
He can recall shooting at the iceberg and watching it turn, but what happened afterward is largely missing from his memory. Calvin is trying to prepare him for the investigation, and his first questions concern how many mushrooms and beers Wade consumed. Wade insists he took hardly any psilocybin and drank five or six Blue Star beers, an answer Calvin doesn't find reassuring. He instructs Wade to make absolutely certain investigators understand that he wasn't driving the boat.
Wade, though, seems far more interested in what he believes has changed inside him. He talks about finally seeing the bigger picture and promises that he won't be a burden to his father any longer. Considering how desperate Wade was to work alongside Calvin in Episode 1, that sudden certainty is unsettling. Calvin seems puzzled by it too, and when he notices marks across Wade's back, he becomes genuinely alarmed. The marks resemble impressions left by suckers or something with a similar circular pattern. Wade can't explain where they came from, and he's still asking for water while his father examines them.
At home, there are still practical problems to sort out before the Garden Party. Noah is hoping to spend time with Calvin and Mary, offering another elaborate coffee and saying how much he's looking forward to the celebrations. Calvin is distracted, particularly when he learns that Keith and Candice-Marie, the Airbnb guests who were supposed to check out, never returned from their hike. Their bags are still at the house, and everyone is growing tired of the improvised sleeping arrangements, whether on the couch or in Wade's room.
Mary also reminds Calvin that she and Noah are running the Crown and Anchor booth at the party and expects him to join them. She remembers operating it with her mother when she was little, taking turns spinning the wheel, and the tradition matters to her. Calvin promises he'll be there, although he wants to visit Fonda first. He instructs Jay not to let Wade leave the house or talk to anybody else while the investigation is underway. Noah has to ask what BUI means, and learns that it's boating under the influence.
Crown and Anchor is a traditional betting game associated with fairs and community gatherings, using symbols on a wheel or dice and wagers placed on the corresponding images. Its presence at the Snooks Arm Garden Party fits the wider Newfoundland tradition of community celebrations combining games, food and rowing events. The Royal St. John's Regatta, for example, has long included games and concessions alongside the rowing. For the Penneys, however, the Crown and Anchor booth has a more personal meaning because of Mary's memories of her mother.
Fonda looks for answers
Calvin brings Wade's mysterious back markings to Fonda, who admits that she's seen comparable patterns before, although not on a human being. She shows him material about Architeuthis dux, the giant squid. Calvin has worked on the water all his life and knows squid as creatures that generally avoid people and boats, so he's skeptical when Fonda begins asking how large one might become.
The giant squid is a real species, and Newfoundland has a particularly interesting place in its scientific history. In 1873, the naturalist and writer Moses Harvey acquired a giant squid that had been caught by a Newfoundland fisherman and displayed it at his home. The specimen helped researchers document an animal that had long featured in sailors' accounts but was still poorly understood by scientists. According to the Smithsonian Institution, the largest reliably documented giant squid measured nearly 13 metres in total length, including its tentacles. They're formidable animals, although the behaviour suggested by Below is considerably beyond what is known about them.
Fonda wants Calvin to consider something large enough to damage a 40-foot long-liner, and then asks whether it might also have been capable of bringing down his family's house decades earlier. That gets his attention. Calvin explains that the authorities blamed his father for rigging the barge incorrectly when their home sank during resettlement. Fonda asks whether he actually believes that explanation, knowing he reported seeing something unusual beneath the house.
Her research is also beginning to suggest a geographical pattern. Two major ecological reserves in the North Atlantic are reportedly empty, and six fish farms have suffered heavy losses, amounting to $1.3 million worth of fish in the past week. The incidents have been reported as poaching, but Fonda isn't convinced. They appear to trace a route from Greenland toward Newfoundland, broadly following the iceberg corridor along the Labrador coast.
Calvin points out that a local operation known as Pittman's should be added to her map. It may not be a formally licensed fish farm, but its location fits the pattern, and he thinks the owner might have noticed something. Fonda agrees that they should find him. She's drawing together the contaminated ice, Wade's injuries and the unexplained disappearances, while Calvin has begun reconsidering the official story of his father's death.
The search for Jerry is still continuing, but Ruth has been on duty for almost 20 hours, and a fisheries official orders her to go home and rest. She resists because the rest of Jerry's body hasn't been recovered. When she finally gets home, she's too exhausted to eat. Someone asks whether she's spoken to Calvin about the relocation vote, but she hasn't managed it yet. She promises to do it tomorrow.
News coverage of the missing Portuguese fishing vessel, the Santa Christina, also continues. Authorities release the boat's final distress call, which offers a frightening reminder that Jerry's death may be part of something happening well beyond the harbour. Meanwhile, when Calvin and Fonda investigate Pittman's operation, they discover that the fish pens have vanished. The place appears abandoned, and they're left looking for some sign of what happened to the fish and the man who was supposed to be tending them.
Wade and the Old Hag
Wade's problems take a stranger turn when he goes back to sleep. The markings across his back have become more pronounced, and he experiences a vivid, frightening encounter involving a woman associated with the sea. At one point she's on top of him and he cannot move. When he wakes, the figure seems to have followed him into the room, appearing wet and muddy near the bed.
Jay hears Wade struggling and wakes him, insisting that he's been dreaming. Wade is terrified and tries to explain that a woman was standing over him, looking as if she'd come straight out of the water. He couldn't move while she was there. Jay immediately recognizes the description as the Old Hag, a familiar Newfoundland explanation for frightening experiences that occur around sleep. He says he had the same thing happen while living in Fort McMurray and offers advice about sleeping on one's side, along with a folk remedy involving vinegar and a pebble under the tongue.
The Old Hag has a substantial history in Newfoundland folklore. Memorial University's Dictionary of Newfoundland English records the expression for nightmares and experiences in which a person feels pinned to the bed by an unseen presence, sometimes described as someone sitting on the chest. Memorial University's Folklore and Language Archive also preserves first-person accounts and research gathered from Newfoundland communities, including descriptions of waking unable to move while sensing another presence in the room. The experience has been studied in connection with sleep paralysis, although the cultural explanations and methods of protection vary between families and communities.
Wade knows the tradition well enough to recognize what Jay is talking about, but he insists that this experience was different. I can understand his concern. We've already seen the strange marks on his back and his extraordinary thirst, and the woman in his nightmare seems connected visually to the water. There are also wet footprints in the room, which makes it harder to dismiss everything as a bad dream, at least within the rules of this particular horror story.
Jay suggests that Wade might benefit from leaving Snooks Arm for a while and reminds him that there's always a place for him out west. He doesn't think Wade and Calvin are doing one another much good at the moment, but Wade refuses to abandon his father. The two look after each other, he says, and that's how their lives work. After the way Calvin has treated him, Wade's determination to stay says a great deal about how he sees his responsibilities to the family.
Trouble at the Garden Party
While Wade is trying to recover, Calvin and Fonda's investigation leads them toward the coastal trail where the missing Airbnb guests had gone hiking. A sign warns that wildlife cameras are operating in the area, which offers a possible way of finding out what happened. They discover a campsite with belongings scattered and torn apart. Calvin recognizes items belonging to Keith and Candice-Marie, who apparently decided to camp during their excursion rather than return to the bed-and-breakfast.
They have no way of knowing yet whether Keith and Candice-Marie are alive. The cameras may have recorded what happened, so Calvin and Fonda set about examining the footage while the Garden Party continues back in Snooks Arm.
The Garden Party is still underway, with residents and visitors gathering at booths along the waterfront. Mary and Noah are helping with Crown and Anchor, and Mary encounters people who remember her mother.
Jay has much less pleasant business to deal with. The threatening messages from Episode 1 lead to a confrontation with Connor and another man, who have travelled a considerable distance to find him. They want money, and when Jay cannot produce it, they beat him. He tries to buy time by explaining that the government is offering relocation payments and that he expects to receive $60,000 if the community leaves. The men aren't impressed by a promise that depends on an unsettled vote, and they give him 24 hours to come up with what he owes.
This explains his earlier interest in the relocation payment, although it also leaves him in a difficult position. His family is divided over whether to leave Snooks Arm, and Jay has begun counting on money that nobody is guaranteed to receive, certainly not within a day. His confident talk about earning a fortune on the Alberta rigs now looks rather less convincing.
The wildlife-camera recording gives Calvin and Fonda their first look at what happened near the campsite. A moose wanders into view, and Keith tries to frighten it away while Candice-Marie remains in the tent. The scene is ordinary enough at first, but the badly damaged campsite has already suggested that something went wrong.
At the Garden Party, Mary discovers they're out of ice for the Crown and Anchor booth and sends Noah down toward the beach to get more. Back at the recording, long appendages surge out of the water and seize the moose before attacking the campers. I wasn't expecting the moose to be involved, although it helps explain the partly digested remains recovered from the harbour earlier in the episode.
Later, Noah is nervous around Mary. He asks whether Calvin is still coming and seems unable to explain what's bothering him. Then he notices that something may be missing from his bag and asks whether Mary has looked through it. I wondered whether he might be planning to propose, although that's only a suspicion at this point, and the episode leaves his intentions unresolved.
Calvin, meanwhile, has realized that the Garden Party is taking place right beside the water. He rushes back and orders everyone away from the shore, shouting that there's something in the water. The celebration dissolves into confusion as he tries to get people to safety.
The Coast Guard then announces that the search for the Santa Christina has been called off. All five missing Portuguese nationals are presumed dead. The episode has one final, particularly unpleasant image to leave us with, however: a man who appears connected to the missing vessel is shown restrained in a chair with a leg missing, while another figure with wet, dirty feet stands nearby. The scene doesn't establish precisely who is holding him or what has happened to the others.
Wade's extraordinary thirst, the marks across his back and the woman he saw in his bedroom remain unexplained, while Calvin and Fonda now have evidence of something attacking people and animals along the coast. I was particularly worried about Wade by the end. He survived the iceberg, but whatever happened out there appears to have followed him home.
