Nancy Drew season 1, episode 8, “The Path of Shadows,” returns after a week hiatus. Check out our review for everything that went down in this episode.

It was difficult waiting an extra week until we got to see “The Path of Shadows,” considering episode 7 left off on two pretty big cliffhangers.

The world of Nancy Drew is starting to open up more, and I’m happy that the supernatural is still a significant part of the storyline without taking over the very real and grounded plot points, like the two murders and everyone’s interpersonal relationships.

I was also glad to see both George and Sheriff McGinnis play significant parts in this episode. The sheriff has been a bit of a mystery to me thus far, but I have high hopes that he’s one of the good guys. Plus, the revelation that he also believes in spirits adds a new dimension to both the character and the show.

Shall we get into what exactly happened on Nancy Drew season 1, episode 8, “The Path of Shadows”?

‘Nancy Drew’ season 1, episode 8 review

Ace is in mortal (and spiritual) peril

I had a feeling Ace would pull through in the end, but with a show as new as this, there’s always that lingering suspicion that they may try to do something drastic to keep the audience on their toes. I’m glad that wasn’t the case here. We need Ace alive!

With everyone gathered at the hospital, we find out that Ace’s father was a bit of a legend on the force and that the sheriff and Ace are much closer than everyone thought. McGinnis really does care about him.

Nancy goes through Ace’s belongings and finds the recording of his conversation with Laura, including the moment when she lost control of the car. It sounds like the vehicle was tampered with.

Worse yet? Ace is in a coma and no one can figure out why. Nancy sees McGinnis notice a figure wandering the halls. He brushes it off, but Nancy suspects what’s really going on: “That’s a look I’m starting to recognize around here.”

Sheriff McGinnis knows more than he lets on

Like I said above, I really wasn’t sure what to make of Sheriff McGinnis when we first met him. I couldn’t tell if he was a bad cop or just a terrible one. Turns out, he’s probably neither. In fact, he might just be exactly what Nancy & Co. need.

McGinnis finds out that someone has been tampering with the spirit world and he goes straight to Nancy. Honestly, the summary of everything they’ve been up to in the last seven episodes was hilarious, and you can see how incredulous McGinnis gets after each revelation. They’ve done a lot of damage, and at some point, they’ll have to clean it all up.

For now, however, they need to focus on Ace. His spirit is lost and scared. They need to find him in order to place his spirit back in his body.

“Every culture has its own onramp to the spirit world,” Nancy explains to her father. The outer layer of the spirit world is usually quiet, but they’ve been clogging it with ghosts because they’ve been reckless.

“There are many things you and I need to discuss,” Mr. Drew says — and he’s not wrong.

The fight for Ace’s life

When they perform the ritual, George is taken into the spirit realm, where she sees the ghosts that came through the coins. It mostly looks like our world, but with a lot more stairs, the color blue, and smoke on the ground.

Inside the Drew house, Nancy and Carson’s tension is literally clogging the air, not to mention the spirits are starting to come alive. Time is running out. What’s more, George also sees Lucy Sable’s dress burning and the writing on the walls. Why is the Drew house so important to Lucy? We don’t get the answer to this question in this week’s episode, but I’m going to guess it’s pretty imminent.

They believe Ace is reliving the moment of his greatest fear. As it turns out, that was the moment of his father’s car crash 15 years ago, when he nearly died.

Luckily, George finds little Ace and is able to carry his spirit inside her until they return to Ace’s body and replace it. After that, it’s only a matter of him healing physically, which I hope he’ll do sooner rather than later.

The case of the mysterious girlfriend

When the crew is looking for suspects as to who could have tampered with Laura’s car, their focus almost immediately shifts to Lisbeth. She’s on the Hudson payroll, and she certainly knows cars, so it makes sense that she’d be the one to wipe the car’s diagnostics to cover up the fact that it had been tampered with.

“You know what you need to do?” Nick asks Bess.
“Put on my mission pants,” she says.

Lisbeth had no reason to be in town on the day of the car accident. Her online identity is also a complete fabrication (Bess was channeling her best Elle Woods here). But it turns out she’s got a pretty good excuse.

Lisbeth is an undercover state police officer. This just makes her even more amazing in my eyes, and I’m so glad she didn’t turn out to be a bad guy. In fact, she’s investigating the Hudsons because it seems they may have the local police on their payroll.

Lisbeth thinks that now her cover is blown, she may need to skip town. But the Drew Crew make a deal with her — if she stays undercover, they’ll give her access to the information on the hard drive to cross-reference the numbers. Nancy will present their case to the sheriff, so Lisbeth can continue to fly under the radar.

It was Officer Rawley, at the scene of the crime, with the boots

Okay, that’s not really how it goes in Clue, but you get the idea.

When George finds little Ace, he tells her not to forget the boots, which were leather with brass eyelets. The Crew suspects a cop could’ve cleaned up the car tampering at the scene and no one would be the wiser. This would also mean the Hudsons were definitely trying to kill Laura, but which one is actually behind it?

Regardless, Nancy and Sheriff McGinnis corner Officer Rawley and give him no room to wiggle his way out of the situation. The Hudsons aren’t coming to his rescue either. That means he’s going to jail and they’ve no longer got an inside man.

The Sheriff and Nancy make a pretty good team, and even though I think they’ll always be a little hesitant around each other, I hope they continue to work together. They’re both smart, capable individuals who have different techniques and resources they can rely on to solve a case. Two heads are better than one, right?

Clearing the air (finally)

One of the other cliffhangers from last episode was when Nancy asked her father if he killed Lucy Sable. Carson is obviously hurt and taken aback by this, and though Nancy’s suspicions are logical, it’s also her dad.

“You suspect everyone of everything. You always have, ever since you were a kid. But if you keep suspecting the people closest to you of horrific crimes, you’re gonna end up alone,” Carson tells her.

This tension is what nearly lost them both George and Ace, so in the middle of the ritual, the two of them head outside to talk. We don’t get any answers in this scene, but we do learn that the Hudsons sent Carson to look for Lucy on the night of her death, but when he arrived, she was already dead.

Later, Carson admits he saw tire tracks in the dirt, a piece of broken crown on the rocks, and Lucy’s dress dangling off the cliff face. He took the dress because he was afraid that if it was a Hudson, they might try to do something to his family. That $50,000 was from a previous job, and it allowed the Drews to stay safe in Europe for the first year of Nancy’s life.

For the first time this season, I really feel like Nancy and Carson have seen eye to eye here. The air is still clogged with tension, but both of them are making an effort to move forward and trust each other a little more.

As it is, they do have one thing in common — the driving need to do what they believe is right, even if they have to break a few laws along the way.

Final moments of ‘Nancy Drew’ season 1, episode 8

Nancy confronts Lisbeth for breaking up with Bess, but Lisbeth punches her in the face and basically tells her to get lost. It’s all an act of course, to keep Lisbeth’s cover and make the Hudsons believe she and Bess broke up. But that punch was very, very real.

Meanwhile, McGinnis sits in his office, looking at a suspect form with Carson Drew’s information filled out. I didn’t catch what the picture was of or what crime Carson is suspected of committing, but this will certainly have future ramifications.

Finally, we see little Ted sitting in the back room at The Claw. The door opens and we see a shadow fall across her. She seems to be surprised by who it is, but we never see their face. The lit-up dragon makes me believe it could be the spirit that has been communicating with her. By the end of the episode, she’s missing.

Next week on ‘Nancy Drew’

The Nancy Drew season 1 winter finale airs next week. It’s titled “The Hidden Staircase,” which is the name of the second Nancy Drew book and a reference to a case Nancy solved when she was a kid, as we saw in the pilot episode. Remember the name Rose Turnbull, as it may pop up next week!

Nancy Drew season 1, episode 9, “The Hidden Staircase,” airs Wednesday, December 11 at 9:00 p.m. ET on The CW.