The Collector

A young First Nations woman turns out to have sold her soul for a dreamcatcher that would stop the horrific nightmares that had driven to the brink of suicide, but they soon discover that the horror of her dreams seems to have spread to the Native community she left behind.

Morgan's client is a night shift pharmacist who sold her soul to be cured of the cancer that was about to kill her. But the Devil did something odd -- he gave her more of the cure than she needed for herself, facing her with a dilemma: should she try to cure others and risk exposure and an early trip to Hell?

Morgan's client is a tattoo artist who remembers making a deal 10 years earlier...but doesn't remember why. As they slowly uncover the secrets of his past, the client recovers his memories...and the pain that goes with them.

Morgan's client sold his soul to be the most successful standup comedian in the world, and is on the brink of beginning a series of live comedy specials when Morgan interrupts him at the end of one of his remarkable improvisational acts at a local club. This starts a series of dominoes falling that will expose the client's bitter secrets.

Morgan initially suspects his client of being a young, handsome, charming politician who seems to be on a straight course to the job of Prime Minister, but discovers that the deal was actually made by the power behind the throne: the candidate's campaign manager, a sharp, smart woman with a mysterious agenda. Morgan has to fight for the woman's attention as she struggles to win one last election.

Morgan is stumped when he researches his client's name and finds out that she died ten years earlier. That part of the mystery will be resolved when he meets another woman, a tour guide for a bus tour of Vancouver murder sites, but more secrets remain to be uncovered as he investigates his client's apparent death.

Morgan's client is a nobody, working in the bowels of the Vancouver Star as a copy editor, which leaves Morgan puzzled as to what he could possibly have bargained for. Turns out the client has a secret identity -- and secret tragedies to go with it.

This is the first episode that shows us Morgan during his centuries as a collector; we begin in London, September 1883, and Morgan is both unsurprised and eager to collect when the Devil tells him that his next client will be Jack the Ripper. What follows reveals a surprising truth behind the Ripper's legend.

Morgan tries contacting his client, a history professor, but finds she mysteriously disappeared that morning. Upon trying to contact her, Morgan finds himself in the Mauthausen concentration camp in 1945, where he discovers that his client is a prisoner. Can Morgan save his client and return her to the present?

"Beginnings" juxtaposes two stories: the Devil's initial training of Morgan as the first collector, and Morgan's memories of the beginning of his 10 years with Katrina. In the course of the episode we see the origin of the memories, both tender and troubling, that maintain Morgan's humanity even after Katrina's death, and also the Devil's nearly-successful first strike in snuffing out that humanity completely.