3 Surprising revelations from Tell Me a Story Season 1, Episode 7

Betrayal is the name of the game in the seventh episode of Tell Me a Story, as every main character is faced with a deception, some of far greater magnitude than others, but each one life-altering all the same.

Kayla is betrayed by Nick when she discovers he’s been lying this entire time about his real identity. Sam betrays Mitch by shooting both him and his wife dead in order to save himself. Gabe is betrayed by a woman who masquerades as a kindred older spirit before drugging him and throwing him in the back of her van.

Only three episodes remain of Tell Me a Story’s debut season and with the rate things are going, I’m wondering if anyone will be left standing by the time credits roll on the season finale. After last week’s shocking twists and turns I couldn’t believe this episode followed up with even more surprises.

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3. Nick Sullivan’s real name is Joshua Sullivan.

Something is very strange about Nick Sullivan. First of all, he’s a murderer. Second of all, he’s a teacher who was willing to pursue a relationship with a teenage girl (on top of the fact she was one of his own students). Third, he isn’t even named Nick Sullivan.

After Kayla’s shallow dive into Google fails offer her any answers, new pal Laney walks her through a much deeper submersion into the online abyss and what they discover is quite disturbing. Nick has (or had – we don’t know the full story yet) a brother in a wheelchair.

The girls find a photo of Nick and Josh attached to old article where it appears Nick is helping his brother Josh, race across the finish line in  his wheelchair. Except the man we’ve come to know as Nick is actually labeled Josh Sullivan in the photo caption.

Upon further sleuthing, Kayla is able to dig up an old yearbook photo of Josh Sullivan and sure enough, it is “Nick”, meaning, he’s taken his brother’s name for some reason.

As if things couldn’t get any creepier, when Kayla breaks into “Nick’s” apartment to find more intel on his real identity, she discovers a painting with a familiar artist signature, Abby Powell, as in her recently deceased mother. Good luck explaining that one Josh.

2. Sam might be the real big bad wolf.

Up until this episode, we’ve been lead to believe Jordan would become the big bad wolf to Eddie, Mitch, and Sam’s thee little pigs. After their bank robbery gone awry in which Jordan’s fiancé wound up the innocent victim of Sam’s gun, he’s been stalking and harassing Mitch and Eddie for weeks in a desperate attempt to discover the name of the third “little pig”.

After kidnapping Shelley, Mitch’s wife, and holding her hostage in exchange for the fated final name, Jordan finds himself at the center of yet another murder scene. In another shocking twist, Sam betrays Mitch by shooting him and his wife dead. This time, Jordan is the one on the run and no ghost or wolf mask can help him now.

He finally learned the identity of the man he’s been chasing all season long, but at what cost? There’s a pile of bodies piling up on his consciousness and I’m not sure there’s room for anymore ghosts in his apartment now that Eddie has joined the undead crew.

1. There is an evil witch in Gabe and Hannah’s story.

It’s pretty obvious Gabe and Hannah are meant to be the equivalent of Hansel and Gretel in the fairytale-inspired Tell Me a Story, but up until now there hasn’t been an “evil witch” in their story. Initially I thought that part might be played by their mother, Madeline. In a way, she still could fit the bill, but I think we met the real big bad of their story in this week’s episode.

After the siblings crawl from the wreckage of the accident they caused last week trying to get away from the two faux-detectives, they’re forced into a deadly game of cat-and-mouse as one of the detectives managed to survive and has no intention of letting them escape once again. He comes at them both guns a ‘blazing and they get separated in the skirmish.

Gabe is able to get out of the forest and it looks like he may be free when he finds a pleasant-looking older woman who offers him a bottle of water and a chance to catch his breath. I guess Gabe has never heard the saying, “you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar”, since this supposedly sweet elderly lady is actually a potential mobster and wastes no time in dosing him with roofies or something similar. He is the unconscious lamb falling straight into the lion’s lap as she loads him into the back of her van to use as bait to catch Hannah.

Meanwhile, Gabe’s sister is able to take care of herself pretty well as she gets the drop on the goon whose been chasing them through the woods. She kills him just in time to pick up the phone and realize her brother has been taken hostage. It looks like the Perez’s still have a long way to go before they get their happily ever after.

Odds & Ends

• I find it strange that the show has no problem being extremely heavy-handed with the fairy tale motifs in the “three little pigs” storyline but is playing coy in both Kayla’s red riding hood tale and the Perez’s Hansel & Gretel story.
• Dania Ramirez is doing incredible work as Hannah. I wasn’t always a fan of her acting in some of her prior projects but she’s really shown incredible growth and I’ve loved watching Hannah’s fight sequences which have featured excellent choreography while still being incredibly thrilling and tense. I loved this exchange between her and the older woman when she tries to contact one of her thugs: “Did you get her?” and Hannah replies, “He tried to.” It’s the second time she’s bested a man trying to harm her, and probably (hopefully) won’t be the last.
• Does anyone else get the feeling Katrina has an ulterior motive when it comes to Tim or is it just me? This episode is titled “Betrayal” for a reason after all.
• Kind of wondering if the Tell Me a Story writers just forgot about Colleen. It’s a shame since Kim Cattrall is a great actress but she’s being underutilized. I hope that changes in the final stretch of episodes.

Why does Josh have a painting by Kayla’s mother in his apartment? Will Laney ever figure out what really happened to Ethan? Who is the old woman who kidnapped Gabe? Is Sam going to kill Jordan the way he’s killed Shelley, Mitch, and Beth? What do you think the final episodes of Tell Me a Story’s first season will bring? Let me know in the comments!

New episodes of Tell Me a Story are available to stream every Thursday on the CBS All Access app.