Picking up right where last week left off, Aidan is surrounded by Henry and two other vampires. He’s not too surprised at Henry’s betrayal and takes the fight to the three vampires but is quickly overwhelmed. The two minions hold him down while Henry prepares to deliver the coup de grace, only to do a 180 and stake one of the vampires while Aidan takes the opportunity to dispose of the second one. A quick cut to Sally has her searching for Zoe while Josh, as his voice over talks about the darkness and things going bump in the night, walks through the bright daylight woods and comes across Ray, the werewolf who turned him. But it’s only a dream, one where Ray taunts Josh for not having the stones to kill him; he awakens from the nightmare, next to Julia, relegated to the fact that now, he’s one of those things that goes bump in the night…
For his part, Aidan is shocked with Henry’s actions and his childe explains Mother’s desire to see Aidan dead, or until Suren is back in her graces. Despite Henry’s desire to help, Aidan slams a stake into Henry’s gut, telling his childe to return to Boston. Reluctantly, Henry agrees, and they embrace in the hopes of seeing each other soon.
Clad in pajama pants and a t-shirt, Josh is a bit disappointed when Julia’s all dressed up though she has the day off. She warns him that her best friend, Chelsea’s coming to visit, a prospect Josh isn’t too thrilled about. From Julia’s description, Chelsea’s not Josh’s biggest fan but Julia wants to share their new relationship with everyone but only if Josh is ready. He wants it to work but isn’t quite ready for everyone (his family included) to know about them being together but Julia still invites him to have lunch with her and Chelsea.
Sally finds Zoe and the latter is still not in the forgiving mood for her killing Nick. She’s bitter, going so far as to no longer protect infants from the potential ghostly possession. Sally’s not the only one searching for absolution; Josh spies on Ray, wondering if he has it in him to kill the werewolf but when he sees the other man’s son and wife, Josh is floored. He turns away, ready to drive off when Ray comes to his window, a questioning look on his face. Josh lays down a smooth story on wanting to reconnect but is really thrown off when Ray admits that his wife knows all about the wolf side. He lives “the truth”. He accepts Josh’s new desire to connect with another of his kind and the advice he gives Josh is one the younger man must think over.
When Aidan goes to the hotel, he tries to calm an unstable Suren, who’s coming apart with the waiting and lack of blood. They argue and he pushes her to the bed when she tries to leave, promising her they will be safe, all she needs to do is give him a little more time to find their sanctuary. That sanctuary ends up being Amish country where he seeks temporary shelter from Hadley. He reminds Hadley, who’s the new leader of the Dutch, how Aidan helped him secure the power seat. In order to convince his brothers, Hadley requests Aidan to bring them food, a notion that while ghastly is something Aidan can do if it gets him what he wants, though we never know if he will do it or not.
All the while a contemplative Josh questions Sally on whether he should share the truth with Julia; hiding the truth was what kept them apart before, and could be the only thing that could come between them now. He decides to join Julia and Chelsea for lunch and the redhead immediately throws a few digs his way. When he offers her a heartfelt apology and promises not to abandon Julia again, a part of Chelsea visibly relaxes. But there’s a part of her still hesitant and when Julia goes to the restroom, she lays out the rest of her concerns; namely, that he’s still hiding something and needs to come clean, especially if that ‘something’ was the reason he left the first time, information we already know to be true.
As Sally tries to convince Zoe not to give up on her gift, a dark cloud passes over them, the first signs of the eclipse. Said eclipse has an interesting effect upon the supernatural. Walter, one of the ghosts Sally shredded reappears, completely terrified of her. Back at the restaurant, Josh takes Chelsea and Ray’s advice on being honest with Julia and offers to tell her the truth but before he can lay things out, the effects of the eclipse hit him as well and he feels the excruciating pains of the change as his fangs and claws emerge.
A shocked Sally tells Zoe what she did to Walter and the medium surmises the duality of sun and moon affects things in such a weird way. She remembers killing Walter in the park and tells Zoe that Nick will be back at the house. Sally appears there and sees both Nick and Danny. She talks to Nick who tells her where he’s been; he no longer has a body but can see though there is nothing to see…it’s a limbo full of pain, a place he begs Sally to help him not to go back to.
Unprepared for this transformation, Josh runs from Julia who, despite her own confusion, has the wherewithal to follow him. A panicked Josh runs himself into a dead end, and it allows Julia the chance to catch up. She demands him to look at her and when he does, she’s stunned by the half-wolf face staring back at her. As another bout of pain catches the half-transformed Josh, Julia backs away into the street and gets hammered by a car. Josh goes to her but when he sees people surround the two of them, phones in hand, he runs away, not catching Julia’s hand reaching for him.
Nick continues begging Sally for help as Zoe finally reaches him. Sally talks to a recalcitrant Danny who only corroborates Nick’s fright of limbo, though he accepts his fate. Unlike what he told Sally, Nick puts Zoe at ease and tells her that he’s in a better place. As the sun shines through the windows, Nick says his goodbyes before fading back into nothingness. The guilt Sally feels knowing the truth is overwhelming though she willfully accepts it.
Aidan finally returns to Suren but she’s already gone, deciding to return to Mother. Josh returns to the accident and Julia, who sits on the sidewalk, out of sorts. His actions of leaving was to protect her from the monster he’d become; he vows to protect her from it. She can only give him a bittersweet smile and tells him it’s too late. Josh follows her eyes and he sees Julia’s real body on a gurney, being rolled into the ambulance just before they pull the white sheet over it. A crushed Josh can only apologize but tries to hold it together when Julia’s door appears. She opens is and looks back; “I loved you enough Josh,” she tells him sadly, “you just didn’t believe it.”
Wow. An all around good episode with an ending that was nothing short of a crescent kick to the gut. A fan of Norah from the start, I was disappointed when she took tail and ran (pun intended) but it wasn’t long before Julia took her spot on my fav list. Faced with the truth of Josh’s condition, it would be tough but I had no doubt she’d accept. As it was, she found out at the wrong place and time but, unlike Norah, she’s permanently gone from the show. More than anything, “Partial Eclipse of the Heart” was about loss and how we deal with it. Josh, Aidan, Sally, and Zoe all experience the pain of losing some part of themselves. Like anything though, it’s more about how you deal with loss; do you allow it to crush you or do you bounce back and become better, stronger for it? Next week’s season finale will tell us just how much our characters handle their loss.
If you missed the previous episode be sure to read our ‘Being Human: Don’t Fear The Scott’ recap to catch up.
