Watching and Dreaming

"Watching and Dreaming" is the series finale of The Owl House as well as the series' third and final episode of the third season, and 43rd overall. It premiered on April 8, 2023.

Synopsis
The fate of everything on the Boiling Isles now rests on the shoulders of a human, a cursed witch, and a determined but tiny little King.

Plot
Continuing after the end of the previous episode, the Collector snaps his fingers and summons light tethers to capture the group. As they try to escape, Luz loses consciousness and blacks out.

While unconscious, Luz gets a view of the In Between Realm, and as she reaches for it, a voice calls out to her, followed by a glimpse of an unknown being telling her to wake up. Luz finds herself sitting in Emperor Belos's throne, wearing his robes. Assuming this to be a dream, Stringbean appears perched on her shoulder to Luz's relief. The two begin to explore the castle to determine how they arrived, passing by murals depicting Luz in place of Belos. At the main entrance, Luz looks under the drawbridge, only to find a frightening sight: everyone she knows, including her friends at Hexside, are petrified statues. She hears Amity's voice asking her if she remembers what happened. Overhead at the drawbridge stands a grim Amity. She accuses Luz of being the real villain by helping Belos and letting everyone turn to stone. Luz begs Amity to understand, but she charges at her. Luz escapes her attacks and runs back inside, barricades the doors and flies ahead.

Elsewhere, Eda wakes up inside a cell of the Conformatorium. She quickly breaks out by turning into her harpy form and flies outside. Suddenly, a net drops on her. Eda remarks this will not stop her from saving her family, when at that moment, Lilith and Gwendolyn reveal themselves from the shadows. Relieved, Eda asks for their help to find King; but however, the two send Coven Scouts to surround Eda and tell her that she will be kept locked away for how dangerous she is. Horrified, Eda asks why they are doing this; then, Dell emerges from the balcony, his right eye bleeding and injured as he asks Eda why she hurt him after he forgave her, which terrifies Eda.

Meanwhile, King awakens in darkness. Two torches then light up, presenting him to the shrine room from Titan Trapper Island where he is among the remains of many deceased Titans. An apparition of Bill appears behind him, startling King, and he demands to know what Bill is doing. Bill states he brought him here to add to his collection. He shows King the Collector's shrine, then grabs King sacrifice him to it.

Luz flies through the castle until entering a forested area reminiscent of the mindscape, where she finds Willow. Luz asks Willow what is going on. Willow, holding a seedling and staring vacantly, turns to face Luz and admits that she used to think the day they met gave her hope for her future, but now with everything she loved gone, she has nothing but anger against Luz, the seedling in her hands then withering away as Willow then launches a wave of vines after her, and Luz runs off in panic. When Luz thinks she has gotten away, the area suddenly blackens, a spotlight shines upon Luz. She finds herself on the Hexside gymnasium stage, to an audience of the school's students and faculty. Gus appears as the host to introduce her. He then calls Luz a hypocrite for keeping him from seeing his dad, prompting boos from the audience. Luz swears she will help him find Perry, only for Gus to push her off the stage. This lands Luz back at the castle entrance, looking at a solemn Hunter who is facing a large statue of Flapjack. Hunter discusses what Flapjack meant to him, recounting how he lost him helping Luz, and voices jealousy that she has everything he doesn't, before breaking down in tears.

The others then join Hunter as they look coldly at Luz, distraught and heartbroken that her friends have turned against her and blame her for the situation. Before they engage, Amity declares a "witches' battle". Luz reacts in confusion—the line is from The Good Witch Azura and knowing the real Amity would never misquote a line from the series, Luz realizes the scenario is not real. She goads the group to attack her, and they proceed to; before they can strike Luz, the kids are suddenly suspended by string-like tethers, which causes the kids to regain their senses. Amity then warns Luz that the Collector has taken them and is playing games to keep her away from Eda and King. To save everyone, Luz has to wake up by "turning on the light." Amity hands her a light glyph before the kids are turned into puppets once more and pulled away.

Luz activates the glyph and wakes up inside of a galaxy-like pocket dimension filled with toys. She turns to see King and Eda are also there trapped in their own nightmares by puppet versions of Tarak, Bill, Lilith, Gwen, and Dell. Luz quickly uses the light glyphs again to wake Eda and King up too, upon which the trio embraced each other, tearfully reunited, while surprised to see how they've all changed. As they rejoice, the Collector watches from his bedroom, with Belos at his side, still posing as Raine. The Collector is upset that the game didn't show them the error of their ways as Belos suggested, and fears that King will hate him more. Belos is confused by why the Collector brought up King, so the Collector explains that King is a Titan and the powers they hold, even the Titan of the Boiling Isles is still active by his heart. Intrigued and formulating a new plan, Belos suggests playing with the trio in person. The Collector accepts this and goes off to see the trio. Once he is gone, Belos retrieves a blue star from the Collector's nightstand, remarking that it will be easier than he thought.

Back in the galaxy dimension, Luz is catching up with Eda and King, introducing Stringbean to the pair. At that moment, the Collector appears in a flash of light. While Luz and Eda quickly become defensive, the Collector innocently replies he is only having fun; King pleads the Collector to see his games are dangerous, but the Collector states "toys break all the time" and he can still fix them. It dawns to Luz that the Collector does not grasp the concept of death, but she has little time to process before the Collector whisks them all away to play his games.

Back at the Archive House, Belos slowly makes his way through the halls, at the same time struggling to control Raine's body. This causes the puppet spell to wear out on Raine, restoring them to normal. As Raines fights for their freedom. Belos takes control again. Realizing that he won’t be able to control Raine for much longer, he hurries outside. He activates the blue star to form a platform and rides it down to his castle. Meanwhile, in an area of the Archive House that stores the puppet victims of the Collector, the finger of puppet Amity starts to twitch.

Inside the pocket dimension where the trio are, Luz, Eda, and King are forced to play the Collector's games, first by running from an Pac-Man-like enlarged head of the Collector to avoid getting eaten; followed by a round of marbles, with the trio trapped inside the marbles; and the third traversing a tower of blocks as the Collector removes various blocks, similar to Jenga. The trio overcome each game and defeat the Collector, who gradually becomes frustrated. After several rounds of victory, Luz notices the Collector nearby, visibly upset. Although Eda is defensive about Luz going to talk to him, King assures her to trust Luz. Seeing the Collector upset, Luz tells the Collector he can't keep the games up forever, but the Collector confesses all he wanted was a friend who will never lie or betray him. But he believes that everyone who claims to be a friend inevitably lies, like King, Belos, or his own siblings, the Archivists. The Collector elaborates they sent him to the Demon Realm years ago to play “hide and seek” with the baby Titans; there, the Collector bonded with the infant Titans, but his siblings saw the race as a threat and decided to purge the Titan race. Meanwhile, the Collector was trapped by the Titan who mistook him for an enemy. Especially after dealing with Belos and the Titan Trappers, now that he finally has a Titan as his friend, he wants to keep King with him forever, even if he has to pretend they are friends. Taking sympathy on the child entity, Luz tells the Collector that she, Eda, and King know what it is like to be alone and misunderstood. Luz offers to show him how they became friends, starting with giving him pictures of the trio and telling him stories of their adventures.

Outside, Belos crashlands at the entrance to his castle, Raine continuing to struggle against him. Raine musters enough strength to whistle a wave of bard magic and ejects Belos entirely. In the time Raine takes to recover, Belos escapes into the castle. Knowing what Belos plans to do, Raine follows him in and reaches the throne room armed with a violin. Belos' voice then echoes in the room asking Raine what the heart really is; subsequently, Belos emerges from the cracks on the ground and envelops Raine in sludge as Belos' main body crawls to the heart. Right as Belos lunges at it, Raine breaks free from the slime and smashes their violin to cast a magic shield around the heart, but it is too late—a small fragment of Belos makes contact. Belos taunts Raine for their failure to stop him, then starts merging with the heart, spreading mold-like terrain across the Boiling Isles.

At the same time, the puppet Amity finishes etching a crude light glyph on the ground, with its activation breaking the puppet spell on Amity, Gus, Hunter, and Willow. The kids notice other puppet victims, among which include Lilith and Camila, whom Gus attempts to free. However, Amity pauses for a moment, as she realizes Luz is not there with them.

Outside the Archive House, Luz, Eda, and King bring the Collector to the Owl House, the place where their friendship began. Luz explains her struggles began in the Human Realm, but she found her way to the Demon Realm thanks to Owlbert and met Eda and King, where they bonded over not fitting in and recounts how they decided to not fit in together. The Collector scoffs at first about how easy they connected; in response, Luz shows the Collector memory photos of all the obstacles she faced and the people she met, who helped her grown and learn. Noticing one photo of Luz and her friends playing grudgy, the Collector asks to see the game for himself. They fly to Hexside's grudgby field, where Luz explains the game rules to the Collector. There, the Collector notices Mattholomule, Jerbo, and another student are hiding. The Collector flies down to them and offers to play grudgy together, but the students run away in terror. Disappointed, he asks the trio to take him somewhere different, and picks a photo of the Knee. They visit the Knee, which Luz states was where Eda helped Luz make a connection with the Isles. She draws an ice glyph, and creates a block of ice. Although he scoffs at a feat he perceives as simple, the Collector does acknowledge her utilizing it and that not everyone can recognize "Titan magic". The Collector ponders if the Titan liked Luz enough to show her how to use magic, and asks if Luz forced the Titan to be her friend, like how she befriended other witches. King clarifies Luz didn't force anything, and Luz explains people are complex, but sometimes it takes kindness and forgiveness. As the Collector is intrigued by this outlook, suddenly, they hear a rumbling sound that resembles breathing. The Titan's eye lights up blue, and they realize that it is Belos.

On the ground, an eldritch forest of mold and decay has spread across the isles. Luz, Eda, King, and the Collector fly above and see it's originating from Belos' castle, which has been consumed by the mold. The castle then reconstructs into a monstrous dragon-like avatar of Belos, who proclaims he will cleanse the Boiling Isles once and for all and unleashes blue fire across the land. While the trio are unsure of what to do to stop Belos, the Collector states there is a way. He flies up to Belos and states he understands he needs kindness and forgiveness recalling what Luz said, then hugs Belos' skull, much to the trio's dismay and Belos' confusion. Assuming they reconciled, the Collector calls out to Luz they are friends now, but Belos proceeds to breathe fire upon him.

Luz steps in to protect the Collector from the blast. Shocked that Belos still betrayed them, the Collector asks Luz if he did the right thing; Luz assures he did and tells him not to worry, but then looks down to find the moss stuck to her arms, spreading quickly. Luz says farewell to a horrified Eda and King, before succumbing to the mold and dies, leaving behind small particles of light. The Collector tries to reach for her hand, but catches only one of the light particles. The rest float across the Boiling Isles, including one that drifts by the students trapped at Hexside, and another to the Archive House where the kids are; sensing this, the puppet of Camila produces tears from its eyes. Without her wielder, Stringbean shifts into her staff form and falls to the ground.

Nervous, the Collector asks where Luz is. He assumes Luz is pretending and asks Luz to come back, then tries to restore things using his magic, but it has no effect. Belos then unleashes a breath of flame down on the Collector, but King leaps in the way and generates a shield to protect the Collector. King is consumed by wild fury, brimming with Titan magic. The Collector asks Eda where Luz went, only for Eda to ask the Collector to stand back as she transforms into an enhanced form of the Owl Beast. Together, the enraged duo launches a combined assault on Belos' avatar. Taken aback by the fight, the Collector loses grip of the light particle in his hand, and it floats away. It then occurs to him what Luz meant earlier about death and realizes she is gone.

As the battle rages on, the light particle settles down to the water of the In Between Realm. The particle forms into Luz's spirit, and she begins to sink into a dark void, thinking about how she should have thanked her friends instead of a short goodbye. Suddenly, a hand grabs her arm and pulls her out. What Luz sees in front of her is an old Titan resembling King with a small Hooty head sticking out of its eye. She mistakes the Titan for King at first before the Titan introduces himself as King's father and the Titan of the Boiling Isles, which leads Luz to believe that she is also dead. The Titan clarifies that Luz is only dead partially, but will die if she sinks below the waters of the realm. Although Luz is surprised to finally meet King's father, she ponders where they are and how it is possible. The Titan explains that the realm is the space in-between realms, and his spirit has been here for a long time, using the dimension's cubes to watch over his son. Luz tells him she had hoped the Collector would blast Belos away. The Titan relates about how he tried to keep his own son safe, and shows guilt for attacking the wrong person. Luz then asks if trying to save their families makes them as bad as Belos, who was trying to save humanity. However, the Titan states that their ambitions don't come from the same place as Belos', who doesn't care about anything but his deluded belief he is the hero and his fear of losing control.

Just then, the Titan reveals a mold-like infection on his chest growing, signifying that Belos has nearly finished assimilating all the Titan's body, to Luz's shock. The Titan senses he does not have much time left, so he has decided to give Luz the last amount of his power to Luz as thanks for taking care of King. Hesitant at first, Luz asks the Titan if he is sure about giving his remaining life. The Titan assures he is, since she is the only one here and seems to be a good witch, but she's the one who has to choose to accept it, reaching out his hand to her as he asks her if she will choose. After a moment, Luz accepts his hand. A glowing orb appears around Luz, and she is lifted into the air. Before she can depart from the realm, the Titan warns Luz that his power will not last long, and she will have to defeat Belos fast, however Luz asks him if there is anything she can say to King for him. The Titan whispers a message into her ear, to which Luz excitedly remarks he will love it. Looking back at the Titan, she sees the Titan has assumed his full skeletal form and slowly sinks into the void, saying goodbye to Luz before it fully disappears. Luz then levitates away from the void.

Back in the Archive House, Camila is freed from her puppet form by Amity and the kids. The group is interrupted by the shaking of the Isles. Amity tries to activate her magic but fails, Camila noting that the kids haven't gotten rest in days. Despite her grief over Luz, Camila assures the kids that Luz will never give up, and they can still help the citizens another way. Meanwhile, the fight between Eda, King, and Belos carries on, with neither side relenting. The Collector begs for them to stop and tries to undo everything, but his powers fail once more. The Collector sees that he was hit by Belos' mold blast from earlier, weakening his magic. Truly afraid, the Collector apologizes and shows empathy, causing him to cry for the first time over the chaos he has created and reacts in confusion to the tears he is producing. At that moment, the mold begins to cover Eda and King. The Collector tries in vain to brush it off before Belos then slams the three of them with his hand. However, a purple light blasts through it and the three find themselves unharmed. Stringbean awakens and flies to the figure standing in the dust, parting to reveal Luz, who is now imbued with Titan magic, taking on Titan-like features. Eda cries with tears of joy, before a rumble on the ground interrupts them. Luz conjures an orb to move them from the area to above the Titan's heart. They see the Archive House is collapsing with everyone inside. Inspired by Luz's determination, the Collector leaves to use his limited powers to help them while the trio to make their way to Belos.

Luz, Eda, and King encounter resistance within Belos' twisted forest, working and combining their powers to break through the waves of mold. They then see the Titan's left arm rising up, so Luz flies them up for a view of what's going on. Back at the Archive House, the kids help rescue the puppet citizens with glyphs made by Camila. However, the Archive House then descends, bringing everyone down with it. Suddenly, light-tethers wrap around the house, suspending them in mid-air. The kids look to see it is from the Collector holding the house steady, to their surprise.

From the atmosphere, Luz, Eda, and King view the Boiling Isles slowly rising up. When Eda ponders how they can stop Belos, Luz reminds Eda of the source of magic- the heart, to which Eda beams proudly. The trio dart back down to the castle. Inside the castle, Raine is stuck inside of the fungus, their glasses laying out of reach on the ground. They hear someone approach and panic, unable to see, until their glasses are returned, subsequently revealing Eda to them. She frees Raine, and the two embrace, with Luz and King waiting nearby. The group travels to the throne room, where Belos is fused with the heart. Luz flies up to him and begins pulling Belos out, but Belos summons moldy tendrils to defend himself. Eda, King, and Raine help keep the mold at bay, while Luz continues her effort. Summoning all her strength, an enraged Luz ultimately removes Belos from the Titan's heart, referencing the Good With Azura, terminating his control over the Boiling Isles. The Collector places the Archive House safely on the Titan's head before collapsing. Amity walks up to him, and the Collector flinches at first, scared of her reaction, but then sees Amity extending her hand to help him out. Running outside, the group sees Belos' corruption disintegrating to ash and blowing across the isles, with the Hexside students also witnessing this.

In the ruins of the castle, Raine, Eda, and King pop out from the ash unharmed. Nearby, Luz looks on as the remnants of Belos' sludge slowly reconstruct into the form of Philip Wittebane, as he was when he first met Luz. In a last-ditch attempt at deception, Philip expresses gratitude, claiming that he was afflicted by a horrible curse, attributing his actions to its influence and warping his sense of right and wrong. However, he notices that Luz is silently glaring at him and not buying it, and he claims that all he wants now is to make peace with her. Above them, rainclouds form and the boiling rain starts melting Belos' disguise while Luz is unharmed. With every drop of rain dissolving him, a desperate Belos begs Luz for forgiveness, but Luz is unmoved. Seeing his tactic isn't working, Belos drops the façade as his body begins to melt, telling Luz that if she lets him die, she'll be just as bad as the witches, which he states they are both better than. Luz remains silent and steps back, letting the trio of Raine, Eda, and King, protected underneath a leaf, approach Belos with menacing looks. The three then stomp Belos to death, ending the emperor for good.

As the sun comes out, the magic of the Titan leaves Luz and flies away to the stars, reverting her to regular form. Luz, Eda, and King embrace each other and lie down on the grass, relieved that it is finally over. Luz then remembers the message from the Titan and whispers it to King, "I loaf you", prompting King to laugh at the pun. The three then laugh together, and relax having managed to do alright through everything.

In a narration by Luz, following the battle, the Collector restores everyone to normal, the kids reuniting with their families and loved ones. From there, the citizens start to rebuild the isles anew. Some are hesitant to change, but many are ready to give it a shot. As for the Collector, he made a promise with Luz to each try their best, and decided to return to the stars to discover more about himself. King gifts him Francois before he leaves, whispering something into his ear that Luz suspects was "I hope I see you again". Everyone gets their happy endings, but at that moment, Luz discovers that with the Titan's death, there is no longer a magic source to power the glyphs. Although Luz is sad that she cannot use glyphs to cast magic, it will always hold a special place in her heart, and she welcomes the next chapter in her life.

Four years later, an eighteen-year-old Luz is finishing packing up all of her belongings and heading off to college. Camila asks Luz if she is almost ready and what major she picked. Luz remarks that she has picked all the majors at her new school—the "University of Wild Magic". Luz is excited to finally see her friends again, to which Camila remarks that she saw them last week. Vee is with Owlbert outside the room, where she tells Owlbert it is time to "go get the others". He flies to the old house, now renovated and under ownership of the Nocedas. The door is now a portal to the Boiling Isles created by the Collector, opening for Owlbert to fly through. He passes by Willow, who is practicing for professional flyer derby. The two fly into the woods to meet with Hunter, who is now a palisman carver working with Dell and the Bat Queen, and is now bonded to a blue jay palisman named Waffles. Willow and Hunter stop briefly to pay respects to a memorial of Flapjack, with Willow conjuring flowers for it.

Hunter and Willow fly into town, passing by the rebuilt Boiling Isles, and stop at the library where Lilith and Hooty work as architects with Mattholomule and Kikimora. Amity then arrives at an Abomination blimp, now proficient in Abomination engineering. She jumps into Lilith's open arms, happy to see her, and gives Lilith a book on the Titan-Collector war whom Lilith gives to Mattholomule. Assuming her own harpy form, Lilith flies with the kids' group and they pass by Hexside, waving to their Hexside classmates-turned-teachers and a retired Bump who has taken up gardening. Alador, Darius, Eberwolf, Viney, Jerbo, and Raine work at the old Emperor's Coven Latissa precinct, now a hospital, to remove all coven sigils, removing one right as Owlbert appears at their window to invite them on the way. The group arrives at the heart where the castle used to be. In its place is now is the University of Wild Magic, run by Eda as the headmaster with Gus overseeing a human exchange program.

The whole group arrives at the Owl House, the door to which is now the portal to the Human Realm, where King is organizing a celebration when he hears the door activate. Upon crossing through to the Boiling Isles, Luz, Camila, and Vee are greeted with a "King-ceañera" by the Boiling Isles citizens. Luz's friends explains that it is a belated quinceañera in the style of the Isles, inspired by Camila's stories from the human realm. This is due to Luz's three-year contribution to rebuilding the Isles, meant to cover her 15th, 16th, and 17th birthdays to make up for her hard work. While surprised by the macabre nature of the style, Camila compliments their hard work. King then thrills Luz by sketching a different version of the light glyph and summons light. He has acquired the ability to empower the glyphs again, creating a new language of glyph magic for Luz to master.

As one last surprise, King reveals the Collector was in the area and he wanted to give Luz a gift. King brings Luz to the edge of the cliff, where across the sky a light show of shooting stars appears, for Luz and her friends to watch. As they watch the spectacle, Luz expresses a heartfelt thanks to Eda and King for their support during these years. As the light show nears its end and the Collector is about to leave, Luz and the rest of the party all shout a final farewell towards the sky.