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5 Reasons You Should Watch Fox's Badass 'Sleepy Hollow!'

5 Reasons You Should Watch Fox's Badass 'Sleepy Hollow!'

Sleepy Hollow is the new show to watch this season!

Sleepy Hollow is Fox’s new hit series that debuted Sept. 16. If you haven’t been watching, you’re forgiven. This show looked like run-of-the-mill, unserious, cartoonish/Halloween-ish made-for-lonely-pubescent-boys drama with no sharp edges.

But like Fox’s fabulous creep-fest from last season, The Following, Sleepy Hollow is super edgy, truly scary and full of surprises–not the least of which is breathing new life into an old story: The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. The show is so good, in fact, that after only three episodes Fox renewed the drama for a second season.

Sleepy Hollow is one of only two shows on the entire TV landscape to star a female African-American protagonist (the other being ABC’s Scandal). Nicole Beharie plays Lt. Abby Mills, a police detective with a secret. Lyndie Greenwood plays her dangerous sexually ambiguous sister.

(Catch up with full episodes at Fox.com.)

Meanwhile, here are 5 Reasons You Should Watch Sleepy Hollow!

5. Everyone Loves to Be Terrified.

We can’t get enough of scary, whether in the movies or on TV. We like blood, we like gore, we like the things that crawl up and over and down and make us scream involuntarily. We like to test our own mettle. How much can we take? What would push us over the edge? One of the reasons we love to be scared by movies, TV and books is because we can control the fear and walk away. But what if you couldn’t? Abby and her sister Jenny were just kids when they were cutting through the woods on their way home from school. Suddenly they weren’t alone. A stand of white birches seemed to move, whisper and something–what was it?–came after them. That event led them in different directions. But scared–and scarred–them for life.

4. Abby Mills Is One Tough Cookie

How many girls can face down both the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse and the local sheriff and the specter of foster care? But that’s what Abby did, learning to be the good black girl in the mostly white town of Sleepy Hollow. As portrayed by Nicole Beharie, Abby is far from the straitened little girl who got along to get along. Abby is unlike her sister Jenny (Lindie Greenwood) from whom she is estranged. Jenny, who’s spent her life in and out of mental hospitals and in and out of jobs as a covert operative. Ready to head for Quantico when Ichabod Crane (Tom Milson) returns from the dead (he was killed in 1781) and drops into her life, Abby’s full of badass kickass, full of smarts and full of questions about what is–and has been–going on in her little hamlet for what appears to be centuries.

3. The History Is Enthralling

Sleepy Hollow revisits the past through the eyes and memory of Ichabod (Tom Milson) and his wife, Katrina (the gorgeous Katia Winter), who was a witch. In addition to the field of battle, there is also Ichabod’s experience as a former professor of history at Oxford prior to the American Revolution. He was brought to America by the British, but later became a spy for the Patriots. Ichabod also exchanges related to slavery, torture and murder. Fascinating.   

2. The Show Is Emo

There is a lot of heart in this show. Abby’s mentor, Sheriff August Corbin (Clancy Brown), has been taking care of her and her sister (without Abby’s knowledge) since that day in the woods while also investigating the strange goings on in the town. His love for both young girls protected them from the perils of the demon Moloch (DJ Mifflin) and the Four Horsemen.

1. This Show Rocks Equality

Sleepy Hollow could easily have put Ichabod in charge of Abby, but it’s reversed the roles. Abby is in charge! Ichabod–once he understands she’s not “emancipated,” but that slavery is long past as is suffrage–views her as the Lieutenant she is. He respects her. She protects him. They work together as a team, but sans the go-to romance. (The love of his life is Katrina; she’s left her stalkery ex.) The show hasn’t addressed LGBT issues yet, but it puts race and gender front and center in a way that is fresh, real and equality driven.  

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Victoria A. Brownworth