‘Sleepy Hollow’ Episode 8 Necromancer Recap: The Horseman’s Identity is Revealed!

The identity of the Headless Horseman is finally revealed while we learn what his long standing grudge against Ichabod is really all about…

By Damon Martin — Editor/Lead Writer

Sleepy Hollow has become one of the best action/adventure/fantasy romps on television and consistently week over week the show finds new ways to get even better. The latest episode titled ‘Necromancer’ is no different and we find out some pretty big reveals this week in regards to the history between Ichabod and the Horseman and how Katrina fits into this entire wicked story.

Let’s start at the beginning.

How Do You Interrogate a Headless Man?

That was an inquiry I asked in last week’s recap of Sleepy Hollow, but sure enough the producers behind the show had a perfect way to interrogate the headless man — find a necromancer! A necromancer is an already dead being who has the ability to connect with the supernatural, and that’s where everyone’s favorite risen from the dead cop Brooks comes back into play. He’s been traipsing around the tunnels for the past couple of weeks offering help to Abbie and Ichabod while also still being a hapless servant of Moloch.

Abbie and Ichabod are able to convince him to play translator for the Horseman after they trapped him under an ocean of UV lights last week and chained him up for safe keeping. They want answers and the best way to get them is to have Brooks connect with the Horseman telepathically and speak for a man who has no head (thus no mouth of course).

The first big reveal courtesy of the Horseman is a necklace he tosses down that Ichabod immediately recognizes as belonging to his wife, Katrina, as given to her by his best friend and her former finance Abraham Van Brunt. Fans of the original ‘Legend of Sleepy Hollow’ story by Washington Irving should of course recognize all of the players in this little story and at least in some way see where it’s going.

Abraham and Katrina were betrothed to each other in a promised marriage, but Abraham actually falls in love and seeks help from his friend Ichabod to ensure he wins over the hand of his lady. Unfortunately, Abraham later finds out that Katrina isn’t in love with him and instead her heart belongs to his best friend Ichabod.

Enraged to find this out, Abraham challenges Ichabod to a duel while the pair are on a secret mission for the new government of the United States to deliver the precursor to the Declaration of Independence. In the battle, Abraham bests Ichabod but only for a moment before British soldiers hot in pursuit shoot him down. Ichabod watches his friend die, and he’s to blame for putting him in harms way in the first place by stealing his woman.

New Super Friends Team Up

So we learned last week that Abbie’s sister Jenny is coming home from the nut house and under her watchful eye. Well she’s out and now being asked to team up with Captain Irving to help investigate any strange occurrences around town that could be related to the whole end of the world happenings going down lately. First up, they have to look into an antiquities shop that was robbed and an artifact stolen. Turns out the piece that was taken was an old Druid weapon that could break a hex placed on a person or a location cast by a coven of witches. The people responsible for the theft just so happen to be the modern day Hessians hell bent on freeing their trapped brother, and this weapon will allow them to break the spell currently keeping the Horseman under lock and key.

It’s also revealed that the Hessians will look to take down the power grid currently supplying the endless sunshine that’s taking the Horseman’s strength away. Now it’s up to Irvin and Abbie to find the Hessians, get back the artifact and stop them from messing up the plan to keep the Horseman under lock and key.

Brooks the Backstabber

Brooks may be sweet on Abbie but he’s still a soulless dead guy being controlled by a demon. As we soon find out, he’s got the ancient artifact hidden inside his rotting body and he uses it to summon an army of demons to help battle the good guys while the Hessians free the Horseman.

The demons attack but luckily they are thwarted by Irving and Jenny, who have made their way to the tunnels to stop the Hessians. Seconds later, however, the lights are shut down and the Horseman rises from his slumber and breaks free of the chains. Just then he grabs a sword, and immediately puts it to Ichabod to stand and fight — just like the situation he faced more than 200 years ago when Abraham confronted him when finding out that Katrina loved Ichabod and not him.

Yep — Abraham Van Brunt is the Headless Horseman.

Back all those years ago when Van Brunt was shot, he was dying but not dead and Ichabod had to leave him there to escape with the secret papers he was charged with protecting. In his absence, the Red Coats led by the Hessians took Van Brunt back to their camp where he came face to face with Moloch. He makes a deal with the devil to become his eternal soldier in exchange for only one thing — he wants Katrina back when this is all over.

Van Brunt has his head shaved, he’s marked with the brand of the Hessians and a mask placed over his face and the Horseman is born. It explains why the Horseman has had an eternal hatred for Ichabod, and why he was gunning for him during the Revolution. It also explains why Katrina was kept alive and put into a purgatory world where she will stay until the Horseman brings about the end of times and then she will be his forever.

Ichabod is stunned by this revelation and despite his best efforts to battle back against his old friend, he’s no match for the powerful Horseman. Luckily, Brooks is still there and he summons the demons to drag the Horseman off of Ichabod but not to save him for a good reason — it’s because Ichabod can’t die. Obviously despite the blood bond being broken between the Horseman and Ichabod, he has some deeper connection to this entire story than we’ve been led to believe.

Ichabod notes once the Horseman and his henchmen leave that they now know the key to how to stop him — it all comes down to his wife Katrina and her eternal connection to the man once known as Abraham Van Brunt.

Next week when Sleepy Hollow returns for a new episode titled ‘Sanctuary’, Abbie and Ichabod are called to investigate a missing person while discovering that the abduction ties back to Katrina in some way…

Check out the promo for the episode below: