"Digging Your Grave with Your Teeth" is the second episode of the first season of Slasher. It aired on March 4, 2016 on Chiller after the first episode as a special two-hour premiere.
Synopsis[]
Sarah receives a disturbing package with a gory message; Sarah works to stop the Executioner's plans to wreak vengeance on the residents of Waterbury.
Plot[]
A man and a woman are making out in the woods, despite the fact there is possibly a serial killer on the loose and a teenage boy has gone missing. The woman expresses her concerns about this, but the man teases her before they start getting hot and heavy on the grass. And that's when the severely injured Malcom pops out from under the leaves, gasping for air.
At home, Dylan and Sarah are eating breakfast, and Dylan mentions that barely anyone attended Verna’s funeral. Half of the town wanted her dead. The doorbell rings. It’s Sarah’s grandmother, Brenda. She wants to stay with Sarah until the killer is found, and she doesn’t like the idea of her living in the house.
Robin meets with Verna’s nephew, Trent, who basically threatens to kill him if he doesn’t get a good deal on the house. Afterward, Robin runs into Sarah and invites her to a summer solstice charity party. Sarah sets up her art gallery. Heather Peterson shows up and accuses Sarah of stealing her mail. Heather used to have a drugstore in this location, and she’s mad that Robin leased the space to someone else. Sarah threatens to call the police, and Heather leaves, spitting the window on her way out. A bit shaken, Sarah opens up some of her mail and discovers a strange, cryptic biblical message as well as a bloody human finger.
The police arrive and Sarah asks Sheriff Vaughn why the Executioner would send her a bloody finger. Vaughn denies that there’s a serial killer on the loose, and says Verna had a lot of enemies, trying to downplay the situation. Sarah says the police need to be warning people, but Vaughn rebuffs her and says it’s under control. That evening, Sarah tries to decipher the meaning of a series of numbers on the bottom of the message. Frustrated, she paints an image of the Executioner.
Elsewhere, Robin is having a webcam session with someone who’s definitely not his husband when the power goes out. He discovers cut power lines, only to be confronted by the Executioner. Robin runs away and is cornered in an alley where the Executioner slashes his arms. A shop owner sees what’s happening and manages to pull Robin into his store, locking the Executioner out of the building.
Sarah arrives at the hospital to and meets with Justin (Robin's husband), as they wait for news on Robin’s condition. She tells him about her encounter with Heather, but Justin assures her that while Heather’s crazy, she’s totally harmless.
Sarah visits Tom Winston in prison and asks why the Executioner would murder some people while letting others go. She shows him the message she received, and he tells her the numbers aren’t Bible verses, but geographical coordinates. It’s a location just outside of town. Tom warns her against going there alone, but Sarah replies that he’s not the boss of her. Not taking Tom’s advice, Sarah goes to investigate the location alone. After traipsing through the woods, she discovers a cave. She trips inside and falls down, only to find a decaying skeleton.
Eventually she escapes and calls the police. Dylan arrives at the cave with Cam and Vaughn. Vaughn chastises Sarah for following the killer’s message, saying it could have been a trap. Cam reveals that the corpse is the body of Peter McBride, Verna’s husband. Sarah says Verna must have killed Peter, and the Executioner punished her for her anger. Vaughn is obstinate and says that Tom Winston’s theories are ridiculous.
At the Bulletin office, Alison tells Sarah and Dylan that they need to get a hold of Peter’s sex tape, now held by the police. She theorizes that Verna must have discovered Peter’s activities and snapped, killing him.
Meanwhile, Brenda runs into Sonya Edwards, an old friend of hers. Sonya’s husband is the mayor of the town. Sonya asks how long Brenda is staying with Rachel, committing the ultimate social faux pas of confusing a dead person with a living one. Brenda corrects her, but she is clearly upset by the conversation and leaves.
Sarah arrives home to discover Brenda lugging her suitcase down the stairs. She tells Sarah it’s too hard to be back in this town and that they should both leave it behind. Sarah confronts Brenda about her parents’ sex tapes, while Brenda is disturbed to learn that Sarah met with Tom Winston. Brenda goes into graphic detail about how Tom killed Rachel, cutting open her stomach and ripping Sarah out of it, then stabbing Sarah's mother in the neck. This is the man Sarah has been confiding in.
Alan Henry visits Tom at the prison for religious counsel. Tom asks if Alan’s scar still hurts. Alan says it’s a reminder of the sinner he once was. He breaks down, saying he’s not sure he can stay strong. Tom says that he must.
Justin calls Robin (still in the hospital) from the party to check on him and says not to give Cam, who is guarding him, a hard time. He then sniffs a line of coke before heading downstairs. Meanwhile, Robin indoctrinates Cam into the world of Housewives reality shows. They’re interrupted by a power outage. Cam goes to investigate, while Robin begs him to stay. Alone, Robin notices a shadow approaching behind a curtain but Cam tackles the guy, who turns out to be a flower delivery man. Robin takes the flowers but is puzzled by the note which reads, “My condolences for your loss.” Cam radios Vaughn, who’s at the party, and tells him Justin is a target.
Vaughn finds Justin, but suddenly Justin begins to convulse and foam at the mouth, spitting up blood. Sarah tries to help, but Justin gives one last scream before falling still.
Cam and Vaughn arrive at Heather’s home, as she had previously made threats against Justin and Robin. She’s manic and having a fit.
Sarah returns to Tom and expresses confusion as to the killer’s operation. None of the punishments for the seven deadly sins involve poison. Tom asks what sort of poison was used, and he reveals that the biblical punishment for gluttony is to be force-fed rats, toads and snakes. Sarah realizes Justin was killed with rat poison. Still, she wonders why Justin would have been punished for gluttony since he seemed like a pretty okay guy, and Tom says there must be a reason for his murder. Everyone has secrets, and some people are willing to kill to protect those secrets.
A woman stands on a bridge with a cement block. She pushes it over the edge and watches it fall.
Death(s)[]
Executed Sin | Victim | Background |
---|---|---|
Gluttony | Justin Faysal | Though it was shown that Justin used cocaine prior to his death, Sarah is initially confused as to why he would be punished for gluttony (his ingestion of rat poison is a twist on a glutton's punishment of being forced-fed rats). Widower, Robin, offers Sarah some insight in Episode 3: A friend of Justin's knew someone on Waterbury's city council, who rezoned a parcel of lakefront land where the Vicker family had been living. Unable to afford the taxes, the Vickers were forced to sell their land and squat in an abandoned house, where they suffocated in their sleep due to a malfunctioning propane heater.Justin would acquire the Vickers' land, on which he and Robin built their dream house. |
Cast[]
- Katie McGrath as Sarah Bennett
- Brandon Jay McLaren as Dylan Bennett
- Steve Byers as Sgt. Cam Henry
- Patrick Garrow as Tom Winston
- Dean McDermott as Chief Iain Vaughn
- Christopher Jacot as Robin Turner
- Erin Karpluk as Heather Peterson
- Mark Ghanimé as Justin Faysal
- Mayko Nguyen as Alison Sutherland
- Rob Stewart as Alan Henry
- Victoria Snow as Sonja Edwards
- Jessica Sipos as June Henry
- Wendy Crewson as Brenda Merritt
- Jefferson Brown as Trent McBride
- Dylan Taylor as Bryan Ingram
- Shamier Anderson as Caleb
- Asha Bromfield as Ashley
- Deven Stillar as Cute Young Thing
- Wayne St. George as Doug Franklin
- James Eddy as Flower Delivery Man
- Stephen Joffe as Malcolm Smith
- Sarah Jean Hodkinson as Young Verna McBride
- Vaugahn Blakley as Peter McBride
- Alysa King as Rachel Ingram
- David Patrick Flemming as Young Tom