In advance of the season four premiere of MGM+s FROM this Sunday, April 19 at 9pm ET/PT, here’s a refresher of where we left off with this series’ puzzle box of horrors.
From hails from creator John Griffin, who writes the teleplay for most episodes, alongside regular co-writer Jeff Pinkner and LOST‘s Jack Bender, who usually directs.
The series is set in a mysterious town that residents can’t escape. They usually find themselves stuck after a detour on the highway thanks to a fallen tree. Once inside the town, which has a diner, a bar, a police station, and lodging in the form of Colony House, residents must stay inside after dark or risk being horribly killed by smiling Creatures who look human.
Buildings are protected by a limited supply of talismans that series protagonist Sheriff Boyd Stevens (Harold Perrineau) discovered before the start of the series, but these only prevent the Creatures from entering and multiple residents have been lured outside to their deaths.
The series was recently renewed for a fifth and final season.
The Main Characters Trapped in From
- Boyd is the emotional core of the ensemble. Each season, he is put through a series of gruelling physical and mental obstacles, often to the point that he debates giving up. Boyd is also contending with the unresolved guilt of murdering his wife, Abby (Lisa Ryder), and has an adult son, Ellis (Corteon Moore), and a daughter-in-law, Fatima (Pegah Ghafoori).
- Colony house is run by Donna Raines (Elizabeth Saunders), a gruff, no-nonsense woman who secretly has a heart of gold. She’s the other de facto leader of the town alongside Boyd.
- The Matthews family’s arrival in town kicked off the series back in the pilot. Patriarch Jim (Eion Bailey) and wife Tabitha (Catalina Sandino Moreno) were working through a separation that neither of their two children, teenage daughter Julie (Hannah Cheramy) and pre-teen son Ethan (Simon Webster), knew about. Jim spends most of his time with narcissistic software developer Jade (David Alpay) because they are convinced they can find a way to uncover the town’s secrets and get everyone out.
- Ethan develops a friendship with Victor Kavannaugh (Scott McCord), the man who has survived in town the longest. He witnessed a town massacre as a boy that claimed the lives of both his mother and sister; as a result of his trauma, Victor is emotionally stunted as an adult.
- Kenny Liu (Ricky He) is Boyd’s deputy. Over the seasons, Kenny has lost both his parents to the town. His father was murdered by Sara Myers (Avery Konrad) after she was manipulated by voices, and his mother Tian-Chen was tortured to death by the Creatures near the beginning of season three. Kenny is also getting over a crush on the town’s young doctor Kristi (Chloe Van Landscoot) following the arrival of her nurse girlfriend, Marielle (Kaelen Ohm), in season two.
- Other notable characters include folks who arrived on a bus in the season two finale, including Elgin (Nathan D. Simmons), a quiet Black man who experiences visions and déjà vu; Randall (AJ Simmons), a belligerant disbeliever who routinely butts heads with Boyd; and bus driver Bakta (Angela Moore), who took over responsibilities at the diner after Tian-Chen’s death.
- Finally, there’s Acosta (Samantha Brown), a hot-headed police officer who showed up mid-season three.
So where did we leave off with the major storylines?
Fatima, Elgin, and the “Hysterical” Pregnancy
Fatima’s long-gestating arc began in season two and then escalated in season three as she contended with an impossible pregnancy. Early in the series, it was established that she couldn’t have children, but in season three, she began experiencing pregnancy symptoms that included the need to eat blood and rotting food. Kristi and Marielle believed she was having a hysterical pregnancy (ie, she was imagining it), but in the two-part season three finale, “Revelations: Chapter One & Two,” Fatima was abducted by Elgin and locked in a cellar before going into labor.
The normally reserved man did this at the urging of ‘Kimono Woman‘ (Shoxin Fu), an apparition that only he and Fatima could see (in his defense, Kimono Woman spent the season getting into his head). First Boyd, then Sara tortured Elgin for information, which led to Fatima’s rescue, but not before Boyd saw her newborn baby grow into Smiley Creature (Jamie McGuire) – the only Creature that Boyd has managed to kill.
Tabitha, Jade and Repressed Memories
To date, Tabitha remains the only character to have escaped from town. After being pushed out of a lighthouse in the season two finale, Tabitha spent part of season three trying to find her way back and rescue the family she left behind. Her search led her to Henry (Robert Joy), Victor’s father, but they soon wound up back in town, along with Officer Acosta.
Tabitha spent the rest of season three investigating her ties to Henry’s wife, Miranda. She and Jade were eventually lured out to the bottle tree by the good-intentioned-but-freaky looking ghost children who dress in white. The pair discovered hidden musical notes in bottles that, when played, activated their repressed memories of previous lives.
As a result, Tabitha now knows that not only is she Victor’s mother, Miranda, but that she and Jade, who has the memories of Victor’s childhood friend, Christopher, also have a romantic history. They were in town at the beginning, had a child together, and have been trying (and failing) to save the children ever since.
For those keeping track, that also means Tabitha has now been married to Jim, Jade, and Henry.
Time Moves Differently for Julie the Storywalker
Give Griffin credit for not his absolute cruelty because From is shockingly unafraid of whittling down its cast by at least one or two main characters every season.
Arguably, the biggest cliffhanger of season three found the Grim Reaper coming for Jim in the form of The Man in the Yellow Suit (Douglas E. Hughes). This character, who has verbally antagonized Boyd, Jim, and Jade via the phone and the radio, finally appeared in the flesh in the daytime to rip out Jim’s neck.
Admittedly Jim’s death wasn’t entirely shocking: it was telegraphed in the last few episodes of season three as the shitty father began taking tentative steps towards a reconciliation with Tabitha. Regardless of whether audiences anticipated Jim’s death, however, it’s what The Man in the Yellow Suit says and who else appears at the crime scene that sent shockwaves through the Fromily community.
Just before killing Jim, The Man in the Yellow Suit explains, “Knowledge comes at a cost,” and that the murder is in retaliation for Tabitha digging a hole in their basement back in season one (that event led to a cascade of discoveries about how the town functions).
Additionally, moments before The Man in the Yellow Suit appears, Jim is confronted by his desperate/screaming daughter. She is NOT, however, the Julie that we know. This iteration has shoulder-length hair and seemingly knows that her father is about to die because she desperately warns him that “it’s not safe” and “you need to get back to town now.”
At this point, we should concede that this is not the first time that characters have magically appeared out of the blue. Typically, though, characters on the show move through space, not time (the Farway Trees have famously dropped Boyd into a well in the season 1 finale, and poor Dale wound up half-stuck in a swimming pool wall and died. See also: Tabitha and the lighthouse).
So this isn’t exactly new territory, but no one has come from the future before. So why Julie? How far into the future does she hail from? And why is she wearing a terrible wig? Considering how adept the series is at balancing out mysteries and answers, these are extremely tantalizing questions that will undoubtedly drive the narrative as we head into season four.
What are your outstanding questions as From enters its penultimate season? Who is your favorite (or least favorite) character? What do you hope to see in this new batch of episodes?
From season four debuts Sunday, April 19, on MGM+.
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