Dead Boy Detectives – Episode 7 Recap & Review

The Case of the Very Long Stairway

In episode 7 of the Dead Boy Detectives, Esther finally arrives from underground dimension, and visits the cat king since he blew Monty’s cover, who has also gotten his bracelet back since Edwin has been taken to Hell. He tells her to stay away from the boys since Edwin has gone through more pain than anybody else by surviving Hell. Esther kills the cat king in anger, leading to him to crawl out of his corpse into his fourth life, complaining that he only has nine. Based on the information from the cat king, Esther devises a plan to use Edwin’s pain as a way to give her power.

Meanwhile, Charles persuades the Night Nurse to open the gate to Hell so he can rescue Edwin. He shows them a map that Edwin had drawn of hell and Charles is confident that he can bring him back. When Crystal wants to come, Charles refuses to bring her along so she goes to find her own way to Hell by asking David the demon. Jenny follows Crystal because she thinks Crystal is on her way to meet her abusive ex-boyfriend.

Night Nurse, finally, agrees and opens a way for Charles to go through on the condition that they will be coming to Afterlife with her. She looks into Charles’ memories to make sure he is not lying. We witness how Charles and Edwin first met. While escaping from his bullies, Charles ends up in Edwin’s old school and dies from hypothermia. Edwin arrives, chats with Charles and keeps him company since he did not want to scare Charles. After a while though, Charles realises he’s dead and decides to ditch death to stay with Edwin. This memory tugs at the heartstrings of the Night Nurse who lets Charles through to Hell.

Charles descends from a long stairway and finds Maxine sitting on the staircase, not knowing why she’s there. Charles follows Edwin’s map to navigate through ‘The Doll House’.  Meanwhile, Edwin is busy fleeing from the giant spider made up of dead baby skull’s when he meets his bully, Simon, who’s punished to tear off pages for infinity. Edwin is transported to a face-to-face meeting with Despair, and realises that Simon’s in the realm of despair. He later realises that Simon actually liked Edwin but thought that Edwin did not.

Edwin forgives Simon and apologises to him, letting Simon free from his punishment, where he is finally able to meet Death to go to a better place. Meanwhile, Crystal finds David and asks him to transport her to Hell, but he refuses and ends up possessing Jenny. Crystal, with her newfound collective power, retrieves her memories from David and buries him deep within her spiritual power source. Elsewhere, Esther is making a device to extract power by torturing ghosts.

Meanwhile, Charles finds Edwin and throws a bunch of bombs at the creepy doll-head spider demon. The two then flee and encounter rooms of gluttony, lust and limbo. When they reach the staircase, Edwin tells Charles that he loves him more than as a friend. Charles replies that while he cannot reciprocate in the same way as Edwin but Edwin’s still the most important person to him. They finally come out of Hell successfully.

However, now they need to leave with the Night Nurse because of Charles’s promise but Niko is able to exploit a loophole in the deal as according to the rules of the Afterlife, the Night Nurse needs to file more paperwork to retrieve souls who have returned from a different plane (outside Earth).  Thus, the group get some more time together before Night Nurse comes back.

The Episode Review

In this episode, we come across an explanation of how Charles and Edwin met and dialogues between the two are clever and hilarious. Take for instance, the joke about India and Pakistan being the same country in Edwin’s time as Charles is unaware that Edwin’s a ghost who died in 1916.

Moreover, there are references to 9 Circles of Hell in Dante’s Inferno and The Map of Hell by Botticelli! It was such spectacularly portrayed despite being brief. We also see a cameo from Donna Preston, reprising her role as Despair from Gaiman’s ‘The Sandman’.

Earlier we’d met Kirby Howell-Baptiste as Death, her character in ‘The Sandman’ as well. For the fans of the series, these cameos are a welcome addition till we wait for season 2 of the show!