We discover why they call her “The Owl Lady”…

We begin with a rainstorm. A boiling rainstorm, to be precise.

Eda: We don’t have weather. We have plagues. Gornados. Shale hail. Painbows.

King: It’s like a rainbow, but looking at it turns you inside out!

Eda sets up a magical forcefield to protect the house from the rain, so the household is completely isolated for the duration of the storm.

Luz: Wow. Someday I’d like to be as cool as Eda the Owl Lady. Magical, sassy, surprisingly foxy for her age…hey, why do they call you the Owl Lady anyway?

Eda: Cause I’m so wise.

Hooty: Cause she coughs up rat bones.

King: I think it’s because she gets distracted by shiny objects.

Eda: No I don’t!

Eda: It sparkles and shimmers it shines and delights. I must have it for my nest!

Evidently, those were all true statements about Eda (although her “wisdom” is debatable), but those aren’t precisely the reason for her moniker…

Anyhow, Luz is intent on taking this opportunity with Eda stuck in the house to make her finally teach magic.

Eda: I’m not teaching you magic tonight. I’m sleeping. I’m a sleepy little owl.

But Luz isn’t giving up that easily.

Luz: Teach me one spell, and I’ll give you your sparkle thing.

Eda: I respect your cunning, but I also hate you for it.

Eda: Now, humans think magic is made out of thin air, but that’s stupid. Everything comes from something. Let me ask you, kid: Where do you think magic comes from?

Luz: From the heart?

Eda: Actually, you’re right! No, really! It comes from a sack of magic bile attached to a witch’s heart.

This is obviously what Eda was referring to when she said that humans couldn’t become witches: Eda can just draw a circle in the air to cast a spell, and Luz can’t. But Luz isn’t giving up just yet.

Luz: One more spell won’t kill you.

But the forcefield spell must have taken a lot out of her, so she conks out right after the simple light spell.

King: Well, looks like one more spell killed Eda.

She’s not really dead, of course, just out cold. King and Luz drag her up to her nest (yes, that’s real, too) for a good long rest.

Luz: Sorry for pushing you, Miss Eda. Please don’t hurt me when you wake up.

This whole episode, King’s been itching to teach Luz some demon lore, his area of expertise, but of course she’s far more interested in magic.

King: Why do you wanna learn magic so bad, anyway?

Luz: I was a nobody back home. But becoming a witch is my chance to be someone. Do you know what it’s like to have no one take you seriously?

Then, when they’re busy in the kitchen, the power goes out. But unlike in the human realm, the Owl House is powered by Hooty, so the reason for this disturbance is a monster crashing down Hooty’s door.

Luz: This is terrifying! So why do you look so happy?

King: Because this could be a lesson!

King’s convinced this is the work of a snaggleback, a ferocious wild demon. And the monster escapes into Eda’s room, so they go to check on Eda, who was out cold last we saw her…

And this thing is running loose in the house. And the lights are out.

This is a genuinely frightening sequence, helped a ton by the animation, which clearly took some cues from the Noh-face chase in Spirited Away.

Then we meet this guy.

King: Why did you break down our door and take Luz? That’s not cool, man! Bad snaggleback!

Snaggleback: I didn’t do any of that stuff! I snuck in through a window just now.

But even when the actual monster gets the snaggleback, King still doesn’t put the pieces together (Luz doesn’t have a clue, of course, as he’s the demon expert here).

These are the pieces he needs to put together to get the picture.

King: I was wrong the whole time! That’s no snaggleback. That creature is-

Luz: Eda?

King: Don’t you see? The elixir I gave you doesn’t give Eda powers, it prevents her from turning into that thing! She’s turned into a nightmare and it’s all my fault!

Well, Luz kind of had a hand in it too, but pointing fingers isn’t going to fix this mess.

He figures out that the monster is sensitive to light, but again, no power. So the only way to make light would be to get the light spell to work. But just as Luz has almost given up, she spots something at the very end of the recording…

Luz: There’s a pattern in the spell circle!

She’s finally able to do magic by drawing the “glyph”.

And with that, she concocts a plan.

That light’s big enough to knock the monster out, so they just need to drag her back to the nest, find some extra elixir, and wait for her to wake up.

Eda can’t get too mad at them, especially because she was keeping secrets from them.

Eda: I haven’t been completely honest with you guys. When I was younger…I was cursed. I don’t know exactly how it happened, all I know is that if I don’t take my elixir…well, that’s why people call me “the Owl Lady”. No one likes having a curse, but if you take the right steps it’s…manageable. […] There’s nothing for you to worry about. It’s all under control. And as long as no one steals my elixir – King – then I’m fine. But hey, look at this. A human doing magic. Good on you, kid.

So this is one of the things I really appreciate about this show: The mental illness/neurodivergence metaphor. As someone who’s medicated for anxiety, I feel like this is a great way to normalize the subject. It’s a way to make sure you stay you. The show won’t really delve into it until season 2, but this is a great start.

Eda: You! You’re the one who cursed me, aren’t you? Who are you?

Until next time…