The second episode of Glen Mazzara’s Damien premiered this past Monday and it showed that this series is just getting started with the drama, the murder and the impending sense of doom that follows Damien Thorn wherever he goes. Where last episode had a more passive Damien, this time he is thrown into the thick of things and has to react to everything going on around him.

The episode starts out surprisingly or maybe unsurprisingly with an exorcism. We don’t know any of the characters and I was even more surprised it went well. I thought for sure Damien was going to have a new minion/friend on the way. Instead it seems the opposite as the nun was able to cast out the demon and is even confronted by one of the hellhounds but it doesn’t harm her. She is then ordered to go to New York to help with an ‘emergency,’ I can only imagine what that may be.

We also see a young man speaking with a priest during confession. Instead of talking about sins they speak of murder. Damien’s to be precise. The priest hands over the dagger to him, telling him the others have been lost and to pierce the Beast in the heart with it. The young man is unsure of this. He wants to help any way he can, but murder? The priest insists it must be done, that the Antichrist is no man, harkening back to what was told to Damien’s father before. The man still wants to talk about this, but the priest suddenly has heart failure and dies. The shocked man takes the dagger and runs off.

Damien suddenly has many enemies.

We start with Damien at his apartment and his best friend Amani demanding he go to Kelly’s funeral. He is very unwilling, but after first shaming and then threatening Damien with taking a shower with him Damien decides to go. Everyone live tweeting on twitter was disappointed we didn’t get that shower scene. Hint, hint Mr. Mazzara.

I was overjoyed to see that Bradley James looked gorgeous in a suit and tie and not the drab clothing I complained about last time. Indeed the rest of the episode he looked much better than the entire first episode. The church scene was really intense. We get flashbacks of the Omen movie where Damien as a child flips out to not have to go into a church.

This time we see him pressured into it and its ill effects on him. It starts with fidgeting and goes to sweating. Then Damien starts to physically feel ill and even Simone’s voice starts to sound far away to him as she talks about how Kelly is with the Lord now. Another interesting note is that we and Damien see that Ann Rutledge is also attending the funeral. That woman is the best stalker I’ve ever seen.

It looks as if Damien is about to either freak out again, or pass out when the tension is suddenly broken by a bird smashing through one of the stained glass windows (right through you know whose head) and scaring everyone inside. Damien bolts out of the church and is immediately sick all over the church lawn.

That Antichrist y’all, not calling girls back and puking on lawns. The horror.

I actually really enjoyed that entire scene. I had wondered what would become of Damien entering churches for prolonged periods of time and from a previous #DamienChat with Glen Mazzara he had answered my question that it does physically hurt him. Still I wondered the extent of that pain and how long it would take. It was played out really well and I hope we see some more of that.

Ann, like the stalker she is, finds Damien first and he is still disconcerted from being inside, her being there and that strange man that is obviously tailing him. The man sees he’s been spotted and flees and when Amani and the others come out soon after, Ann also disappears.

The group goes to the wake afterwards and Damien is thrown into the spotlight twice. Once when they’re talking about all their injuries (and the injustice that Kelly was killed by a sinkhole in NYC) and how Damien has somehow never been touched. He touches his head, right where the 666 mark is and quickly leaves the conversation. We find out that someone bought all of Damien’s photos and his boss gives him a check for 55 grand. Damien is confused when he sees it’s a personal check from none other than Ann Rutledge. He goes to call her and we see Amani talk to their boss and it’s found out that he and Damien have been let go. I think their now ex-boss might be a devil too.

Damien makes the call where the woman answering insists she doesn’t know an Ann Rutledge until Damien mentions his name. Then she apologizes and promises Miss Rutledge will get right back with him. Creepy.

Damien makes one more show of himself at the wake when he and a priest get into a heated debate. Damien being an atheist doesn’t like to hear that this was God’s plan and all that. Many emotions went into it that I found riveting. His grief and anger over losing Kelly, his disenchantment with religion, his stress with finding out maybe he’s the Antichrist and maybe some of that dark power all spilling out when he mentions that God has a sick sense of humor doing that to Kelly and that he is a, ‘sadistic prick.’ The passionate side of Damien got to him and this last part is yelled and has all eyes on him. He quickly leaves.

The show also introduces a new plot line that I didn’t think would happen. I assumed Damien and Simone would get together this episode to continue figuring out what Kelly was looking into for Damien before her death. Instead they barely speak and it is Simone and Amani that are going through Kelly’s last notes and trying to figure out what she was doing. Are they going to retrace her steps and realize what Damien is? Will they believe it? Confront him? Comfort him? I don’t know, but I find this one of the most interesting new plot lines and can’t wait to see how it all plays out.

Somehow the episode is almost over; seriously this show goes by so quickly, the pacing is so on point. I love it. Damien is out trying to clear his head by taking random pictures of buildings, homeless people and a scary girl in the window that writes 666 at him. So you know, normal NYC. We see Damien’s would be assassin stalking after him and jump him. They fight, but the assassin is unable to stab Damien.

A force intervenes then, aka evil, and a hellhound suddenly makes an appearance in the middle of the street. It makes an oncoming cab swerve and it’s at the perfect time that Damien and the man spill out onto the street. Damien narrowly misses being hit, but the man isn’t so lucky. His death is prolonged and impaled. Still he tries to choke Damien out one last time when Damien offers assistance. The dagger is lost down a storm drain.

Later as the police were called, we finally meet Detective James Shay. He is interviewing Damien and finds it very interesting how close to death he has been lately, yet always comes out unscathed. Damien is angry. Some justifiably so at being questioned for Kelly’s death and some I think because of fear of what may be true; that they are his fault in a way.

Ann makes another sudden appearance claiming to be his lawyer which raises Shay’s suspicions more, but he lets Damien go. Ann then takes Damien to her home which looks totally normal except the photography on the wall depicting human suffering and misery. Some of which is Damien’s own. I liked her description of it as being, “images that make other people uncomfortable.”

She also tells Damien he’s adopted. He doesn’t like her saying so, but he accepts it. Personally I don’t think I would have taken her word, but maybe he will check out his birth more now.

The episode ends with Ann taking Damien down to her special room that has even more memorabilia dedicated to him. His old tricycle on display and she even hands him one of the lost daggers. Seeing it brings back the last of the memories from the Omen for Damien. He sees his father posed to stab him and being shot. He then sees Mrs. Baylock, his creepy nanny as he looks at Ann Rutledge.

I’m thinking this means that Ann is either related to his old nanny or they are from the same cult that worships him. Will Damien accept her help from now on? Should he or should he be more wary of her intentions? That stalker room would have freaked me out a lot more, but we’ll see soon what Damien thinks of it all.

The next episode airs on Monday at 10:00PM/ET on A&E. I hope everyone watches as this series is really starting to take off and the ratings haven’t been the best. A .31 last time and this second episode had a .21. Let’s make sure this great horror show lasts by watching!

I will be live tweeting it on Monday (@quietlikeastorm) as part of the Nerdy Girl Express ‘Devils Night’ that includes Lucifer at 9:00 on FOX. Make sure to join us and help keep these great shows going.

Here is a preview of next week’s episode: