For her Halloween episode, Amber Ruffin dares to summon The White Lady

You can’t accuse Amber Ruffin of not getting into the spirit of her two-days-until-Halloween episode. For one thing, she underwent what looks like some intricately painful weave-work to have that spider carved into her ’do. (It’s got little red eyes and everything.) For another, Ruffin’s Friday show was packed with terrifying bits drawing power from everything from the personification of Facebook itself (unsurprisingly, a machete-wielding, Jason-esque hockey mask killer, demanding Ruffin do her monologue Facebook Meta-joke), and another visit from bat-crap insane right-wing psycho (and sitting Republican congresswoman), Marjorie Taylor Greene. (As is her creepy habit, the show’s Greene spouted her seditious, racist nonsense through a woman of color’s mail slot.)

But nothing could prepare Ruffin, her audience, or even stalwart sidekick Tarik Davis for the true terror to come, even if Amber and Davis did bring on the unholy abomination that is The White Lady down upon themselves. Apparently a distant cousin to Candyman, said apparition was summoned by the skeptical duo repeating her name three times, which, again, is just some rookie-level Halloween season behavior on Amber and Tarik’s part. Sure enough, upon the third unwise repetition of her dread name, and accompanied by a peal of thunder and some in-studio lightning, The White Lady did appear, with her tattered wedding gown, her long, concealing locks of Ringu-style hair, and blood seeping like demonic tears from her eyes. Her cackling maledictions to her summoners even rhymed and everything.

Sadly for The White Lady, Ruffin and Davis just weren’t feeling her whole vibe. “Wait,” asked a thoroughly unimpressed Ruffin, “Who are you?” The White Lady attempted to weave her tale of bloody woe (murdered by a fiancé, mission of vengeance, etc), only for Ruffin and Davis to giggle with relief that they hadn’t actually summoned a white lady, and not this not-white White Lady. (Played by Amber Ruffin Show writer Corin Wells, not to spoil the illusion.) The White Lady tried her wicked damnedest to win back the room, but even telekinetically snapping Tarik’s neck (he got better) couldn’t cut through everybody’s palpable relief that she wasn’t the sort of white lady Ruffin showed in clips throwing racist hissy fits while demanding to speak to the manager of seemingly every business unwilling to bend to their increasingly caught-on-camera white-privileged demands. There’s bleeding out your eyes scary, sure, but that’s nothing compared to everyday reality scary, especially if you’re working a service job.