The eighth and ninth episodes of Castle Rock’s second season (“Dirty” and “Caveat Emptor,” respectively) deftly negotiate immersing viewers within labyrinthine spaces while revealing the core truths of some of the series’ most complex characters, a combination that simultaneously seems to steer us closer to and further away from resolution. 

“Dirty” finds Annie (Lizzy Caplan) and Joy (Elsie Fisher) in the Marsten House, which seems like both a sanctuary following Annie’s questioning about Rita’s (Sarah Gadon) death and a prison. Annie’s movements through the Marsten House are characterized by disorientation and uncertainty: the past and the present blur together as she sees the now-restored interior, so different from her first experience of the house after disposing of Ace’s (Paul Sparks) body, while the images on the walls draw the present inexorably farther back into the past. When Annie makes her way through the house to find Joy, the labyrinthine nature of the house is even further emphasized, as she navigates through rooms, doors, and stairways to reclaim her daughter (including using one of those blind turnings as an opportunity to brutally and fatally wield a sledgehammer, in an unsettling echo of future Annie). In “Caveat Emptor,” the Emporium Galorium takes center stage, with the overwhelming clutter of its shelves and basement serving as a testament to Pop’s (Tim Robbins) life and work, while also providing lots of shadows, nooks, and crannies where both friends and foes may hide. 

While the places through which characters move are complicated and difficult to see fully, these episodes provide unfiltered insights to Annie and Pop. When Amity’s (Mathilde Dehaye) followers initially think that Annie will be the ideal vessel for their returned leader, they replace Annie’s antipsychotic medication with placebos in order to cleanse her body for Amity’s arrival. This manipulation makes Annie vulnerable, even as she tries her best to take care of herself to be the best protector she can for Joy, and without the medications, viewers get to see some of Annie’s unfiltered perceptions, including her mother (Robin Weigert) appearing in monstrous form in Annie’s thoughts, goading her to kill Joy. This unfiltered, unmedicated version of Annie draws viewers closer to the Annie she will become in King’s Misery (1987) and the 1990 film adaptation, as she acts with unrestrained and unrepentant violence, willing to do whatever it takes and kill whoever stands in her way as she tries to get to Joy. 

“Caveat Emptor” gives viewers a glimpse of the real Pop Merrill, including his pain, his sorrow, and his regrets. As he nears the end of his life—first through his cancer and in this episode, in his decision to sacrifice himself to protect those he loves and to atone in some way from the wrongs he has committed against them—there is no reason for him to put on a public face or pretend to be someone he isn’t. In this episode, we see Pop as he really is, with the good, the bad, and the ugly, in one of Robbins’ best performances over a long and impressive career. Pop’s weariness, his heartbreak, his refusal to break: all of these complex emotions are written clearly on his face and in his body language, as he gives everything he has to try to save Nadia (Yusra Warsama) and the others. 

What we still don’t know the truth of, despite the new piece added by Dale Lacy’s (Terry O’Quinn) letters to Alan Pangborn (Scott Glenn), is the true nature of the Kid (Bill Skarsgård). Lacy and Pangborn believe the Kid was the devil, while Amity and her followers believe him to be an angel. Either way, he has undeniable through mysterious powers, which seem to be further displayed in the statue that serves as a proxy for his presence, literally drawing the people of Castle Rock and Jerusalem’s Lot under its spell as they catatonically follow where it leads them, a parade that Joy joins. So who is he? Is he a devil that masqueraded as an angel to get Amity to do his bidding, and if so, to what purpose? A potentially terrifying but misunderstood angel that Lacy locked in a cage? Some other supernatural being who either endures or reappears through the years and is ultimately a cipher, open to interpretation and the attribution of meaning by those who see and use him? 

(In a non-narrative aside, one notable feature of streaming series that is particularly pronounced in taking these two episodes together is their very different run times: “Dirty” is a thirty-six minute episode, while “Caveat Emptor” runs fifty-three minutes. This is a range that would be difficult, if not impossible, to accommodate in traditional television programming blocks, with their firmly established run-times and ad breaks. But as a Hulu streaming original series, those restrictions don’t apply, which is a blessing. I’m sure “Dirty” could have been longer, with scenes added to stretch the run-time, and “Caveat Emptor” could have been condensed, but I would hate to think what depth and complexity would have been lost by doing so. In the streaming format, with this flexibility, Castle Rock is able to use these individual episodes to tell the stories it wants to tell in the way that best suits those stories and the larger series. The original streaming format absolutely, unquestionably empowered Castle Rock to tell these stories in the most impactful way possible, and I’m grateful for that). 

The desolate and post-apocalyptic seeming Castle Rock that the statue leaves in its wake is unnerving, with deserted cars, empty streets, and resounding silence further emphasizing the isolation of the towns and more specifically, the handful of characters who are still resisting and struggling to survive or escape. 

At the end of “Dirty” and “Caveat Emptor,” many of the characters know one another more authentically than they ever have before, with particularly significant shifts in the relationships between Annie and Joy, and Nadia and Pop. But in the episodes’ final moments, those labyrinthine spaces reassert themselves, separating the characters from one another, leaving them uncertain of how to survive, who their loved ones may become, and what comes next.