Charmed (TV Series) Used Karma (2004) User Reviews

Pardon my French

[owlaurence · 6/10 · 10 July 2008]

This episode is mostly about the sisters' boyfriends. Richard is using magic again, which on the whole is a very, very bad idea, and poor Jason takes the brunt of it -in the form of Phoebe, who is once again possessed by the phantom of a bad girl. Mata Hari to be exact. Here I really have to thank the scriptwriters for using correct French, and Alyssa Milano for pronouncing it correctly -which is not always the case when series try to speak French. I find it a bit sad to have Phoebe's relationship end so abruptly after more than a year, but you cannot blame Jason for freaking out. It's only unfortunate that he should be at the center of the episode when he's about to leave for good.

Past lives

[Realrockerhalloween · 3 October 2016]

Not the best charmed episode as Richard tries to change his family's karma by casting a spell and releasing a spirit of a French prostitute. Since it was to rid of bad karma, not a seance spell it's full of holes from the start and fills like filler as she possess Phoebe without feeling disorient or out of place in the 21st century. She even change objects into another without spells and using powers Phoebe doesn't even have. Its a cheap ploy to break up her relationship with Jason when he's already freaked out about magic without trying to hammer out Phoebe winning him back or prove she's a good witch and robs it of any emotional attachment. Sure Paige has problems with Richard's use of magic, but it's pushed to the back burner instead of her breaking up with him right then and saved to give more time to the uninteresting possession story.

The second story of Piper facing the swarm king is much better as they multiple rapidly and should've been the main focus. You know a story is terrible when the story's only aspect is cool demons instead of sisterly bonding and proves the writers are running out of ideas. The swarm king had so much potential starting off well with Piper hunting them until they come back in drives posing a big threat yet once the French prostitute uses them as a firing squad to take vengeance on Jason it becomes a mockery of who and what they are as demons don't work with witches possessed or not.