Unauthorized Magic

**Dean**: "*Snuck a box of Oreos.*"
**Quentin**: "*Magicians can't eat Oreos?*"
**Dean**: "*Diabetics can't eat Oreos.*"
— Dean Fogg and Quentin

**"Unauthorized Magic"**, also known as **"Pilot"**, is the first episode of Season 1 of SyFy's *The Magicians*. It was written by Sera Gamble & John McNamara and directed by Mike Cahill. It is the first episode of the series overall, and premiered on December 16, 2015.

## Synopsis

A smart, geeky and socially awkward young man is amazed to realize that Magic he's so passionate about is actually real, when he's unexpectedly invited to attend a college of magic in New York.

## Recap

*This section is a detailed recap of this episode. **There are major spoilers.** Click to expand.*

The Henry Fogg of Brakebills University stands in New York City, where he has a conversation with a mysterious woman, concerning a moth, a school, and a man named Quentin Coldwater.

Quentin is a brilliant young man, while also being horribly depressed. He's a sad bear. He begins by checking out of a mental hospital, while also showing an aptitude for magic tricks. Flash to a party; he's very clearly the unpopular kid.

Quentin is obsessed with a book series that takes place in a magical land called Fillory, and features some adventurous British siblings named the Chatwins: Rupert, who was wounded in the war; Jane, the family skeptic, and Martin; the adventurer. There are 5 of these books. Quentin has read them all. A lot.

Quentin's best friend is Julia, who is also going to grad school, and is worried about Quentin. Also, it's possible Quentin has a giant crush on her. When the two of them swing by a fancy house for a grad school interview, the place has a clock that looks just like the one from Fillory. No time to marvel at that, though, because the person they were going to meet is dead.

The paramedic who comes to take the body away is a gorgeous British lady who looks not unlike the woman from the bench who was talking to the dean. Before Quentin leaves, the paramedic hands him an envelope, addressed to him. And in it, is an unprinted 1952 Fillory book. The sixth in the series.

Quentin and Julia begin to argue about the book, Julia saying that the book is a fake and meant to encourage Quentin about his childish dreams. They begin to walk home separately. Quentin loses a page as he begins to read it, and while chasing the page down, stumbles through a large amount of shrubbery. Julia takes the elevator up to her apartment, but it descends. Odd.

Quentin and Julia find themselves ending up on the lawn of a gorgeous college campus. Quentin meets Eliot, who tells him he is at Brakebills University and that he's here to take a preliminary exam for entry into the graduate program. The test is about to begin and they have to hurry.

Julia fails the test, and is brought to a small room where the Specialist, a Magicians specializing in memory wiping, tells Julia of the unfortunate news. Julia begins to argue with the teacher, to no avail. Her memory is erased, but she refused to forget, cutting into her arm with her ring.

Quentin HAS passed the test and is brought before a board of teachers. The Dean argues with Quentin, telling him to "do some goddamn magic!" In a fit of anger, he throws a deck of card that floats around the room and forms into a castle. They let him into the school, and Dean Fogg tells him that the paramedic who gave him the novel is a "freelance scout" for the school. Magicians are real and this is just a place for them to learn. The Dean's last condition of entry is that Quentin stop taking his anti-depressants. Quentin makes the decision right then, he will leave his old life to join the school.

Quentin returns to his room to find his Fillory novel missing, and he also meets his roommate, a dude named Penny. Eliot introduces Quentin to Margo, and the three of them waltz off to tour the school. Apparently, the entire third year class mysteriously disappeared, a group of twenty, only four left behind. And then, Margo mentions that Quentin should "Stay on the garden path." Here's the thing about that…

Throughout all of this, Quentin has been having dreams about Fillory. Or possibly he's actually going TO Fillory; it's hard to tell. In one of them, Quentin is facing one of the clock-trees as Jane Chatwin tells him that time is difficult magic and that he'll die if he "stays on the garden path." Later, through a door in the library, Quentin finds himself back in Fillory, speaking with Jane Chatwin again, who definitely wants him to leave Brakebills. She wants him to start learning how to fight with magic. When the dream is over, he finds a mark burned into his hand. Gang, what's up with Fillory? And the garden path?

Meanwhile, you know who's not doing great? Julia. She's been searching for magic things on the Internet, and when James, Julia's boyfriend, tells Quentin to come to her birthday party, she tells him she remembers Brakebills and wants in. Quentin, however, refuses to help her because he doesn't want to get kicked out. Later, Julia has a tricky time in the bathroom when a magician turns up, sexually aggresses her and then says he was just trying to make sure she was really magic. Looks like she has found her way in to the world of mysticism... just not through the University.

After one of his trips to Fillory, Quentin's hand is burned with a symbol that he's previously seen in a book that belongs to Alice. Now, she's basically a Hitchcock blond. You know, a blond who wears glasses but is gorgeous. She has been researching how to contact the "other side." And it turns out; Quentin, Penny and his girlfriend Kady all end up in the same place, boiling together a potion – all trying to get to the bottom of something. Alice wants to see if she can contact her brother, who died at Brakebills several years earlier, Quentin wants to know what's going on with the "Garden Path" and Penny and Kady just seem like they're in it for kicks.

The spell doesn't seem to work. That is, until the next day, when during a boring class on metals: time stops, everyone is frozen, and a creepy shuffling man turns up, his face obscured by giant moths. When Dean Fogg tries to intervene, the man (called The Beast) plucks out Dean Fogg's eyes. Then, the beast leans down, looks at Quentin and says, "Quentin Coldwater."
## Cast

* Stella Maeve as Julia Wicker
* Olivia Taylor Dudley as Alice Quinn
* Hale Appleman as Eliot Waugh
* Arjun Gupta as William 'Penny' Adiyodi
* Summer Bishil as Margo Hanson

Guest Starring* Jade Tailor as Kady Orloff-Diaz
* Rick Worthy as Dean Henry Fogg
* David Call as Pete
* Michael Cassidy as James
* Wayne Pére as Professor Van Der Weghe
* Tembi Locke as Dr. Jennifer London
* Esmé Bianco as Eliza
* Rose Liston as Jane Chatwin
* Brian Beckman as Rupert Chatwin
* Anthony Marble as The Beast
* Krystal Tomlin as Physical Kid
* Kim Ormiston as Psychic Girl #1
* Misty Ormiston as Psychic Girl #2
* Alexandra Lucchesi as Rainbow Girl
* Charles Mesure as The Beast *(voice)*

## References

1. ↑ http://www.imdb.com/title/tt4917582/?ref\_=ttmi\_tt
2. ↑ http://www.syfy.com/themagicians/episodes/season/1/episode/1/unauthorized-magic