SurrealEstate 1×8 Review: “Baba O’Riley”

SurrealEstate season 1 episode 8, titled ‘Baba O’Riley’, had Luke make an important decision about the Roman Agency while also exploring how certain characters used to be as teens.

I wasn’t able to review episode 7 of SurrealEstate, titled ‘Quarantine’, because my scheduling was a bit off last week. Anyway, I would like to share some important highlights from that particular episode because a huge moment’s directly connected to what happened to Megan in ‘Baba O’Riley’. So, here we go!

• Phil and Anthony are in the process of adopting a kid. My heart!
• We got confirmation that Zooey is bisexual. Yay!
• The Roman Agency got hit with bad news coverage.
• Megan got possessed by a paranormal being called a Roadie.

I keep telling everyone, that if you are looking for a supernatural show that’s scary but not too scary, has humor and heart along with a queer and diverse ensemble cast, you need to start watching SurrealEstate.

Here’s a video I did recapping and reviewing some of the highlights from episode 7!

Coming to ‘Baba O’Riley’, due to the bad press making the Roman Agency lose clients, Luke found himself wondering about how to move forward. As someone who’s interested in helping others, Luke’s the type of character who tends to blame everything on himself. As of now, The Roman Agency’s been involved in two unfortunate situations, with one of them leading to the death of an entire family. And, of course, Luke’s all about taking the blame because he couldn’t handle the paranormal situation sooner. Not only that, wondering about why his mother left him decades ago continued to make him feel insecure.

I liked how the writers finally allowed Luke’s father to comfort his son. He assured Luke that his gift to communicate with the dead and sense the supernatural wasn’t a curse. Even if Luke had been born “normal”, his mother would have left him because she was dealing with her own issues.

While I appreciated Luke’s father response, I still think Luke needs to have an actual conversation with the ghost of his dead mother Victoria. Apparently, Victoria was never cruel to Luke when she was alive. However, she was all about tearing down Luke’s spirit when he met her in Megan’s house. He’s also been having nightmares of Victoria strangling him. So, either she embraced her cruel streak after she died or Megan’s house is making her lash out at Luke for some reason.

The haunted residence being dealt with in ‘Baba O’Riley’ shared history with Luke. Turns out, he used to mow that particular lawn when he was a kid. However, he never met the owner once. Sensing something was off, Luke walked into the house and found himself transformed into his 16-year-old self.

I enjoyed watching Zooey, Phil, and August walking into the haunted house to find Luke and turning into 16-year-olds too. It allowed the creative team to show us how these characters were as teens by making the house give them rooms they would love to stay in. We found out that August grew up at a farm and was always interested in technology. He also liked smoking weed. Phil’s room had a couple of crosses, candy, and a whole lot of books, including ones about homosexuality from a Christian perspective. Zooey’s room had a piercing gun (for ears) and activist posters. Luke was into playing video games and basically doing nothing all day long.

I think the haunted house issue was handled well. While Zooey, Phil, and August were chucked out of the house because they wanted too much, it’s teen Luke who’s left to fend for himself. The house making an adult Luke appear in front of teen Luke to persuade him to stay was a smart choice. Teen Luke was experiencing trouble embracing his natural abilities to connect with the undead and having adult Luke tell him about the hardships he was going to face over the years in the outside world made for an interesting interaction. Seeing Tim Rozon play an evil version of adult Luke was very enjoyable.

The haunted house not accounting for teen Luke’s helpful and curious nature is what ensured its defeat. As a teen, Luke wanted to talk to the dead. He wanted to listen to their stories so he could aid ghosts in finding some kind of peace. That’s why he decided to create the Roman Agency as an adult. Remembering his primary motivation allowed adult Luke (now out of the house’s ‘Glamor’ power) to decide he wasn’t going to stop handling supernatural cases even if the agency was facing bad PR problems. Seeing the entire team coming together at the end made for a nice moment.

With Luke, Zooey, Phil, and August busy with the haunted house, Susan’s left to deal with a possessed Megan on her own. I’m glad the writers didn’t drag out that particular creative decision from episode 7 and allowed Megan to become unpossessed in this episode. It’s revealed that the Roadie had three lives, with our team being able to get rid of two of them in the previous episode. The third one got hold of Megan and came to her house due to the abundance of supernatural energy from the trapped angry spirits on the property.

The little battle between Megan and Susan was fun to watch. While I was waiting for Susan to use her pyrokinesis, I got to see her do something else. Susan has telekinesis! I repeat, Susan has telekinesis!

I have had my suspicions from the very first episode, but I wasn’t sure if the writers were going to give her two different kinds of powers. Anyway, I’m not complaining. Telekinesis is useful when it comes to facing difficult situations where you don’t want to burn stuff or someone.

With only two more episodes left, I’m looking forward to seeing how the Roman Agency will deal with the powerful haunting at Megan’s house. It sure looks like the spirits in that house are up to something sinister. Here’s to hoping Megan was staying over at Luke’s place when a bunch of ghosts decided to walk around at night.

What did you think of ‘Baba O’Riley’? Did you enjoy watching Susan vs. possessed Megan?

Let us know.

Author: Farid-ul-Haq

Farid has a Double Masters in Psychology and Biotechnology as well as an M.Phil in Molecular Genetics. He is the author of numerous books including Missing in Somerville, and The Game Master of Somerville. He gives us insight into comics, books, TV shows, anime/manga, video games, and movies.

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