Triad (Charmed)

The Triad
Steven J. Oliver, Leland Crooke and Søren Oliver as The Triad
First appearance	Magic Hour
Last appearance	Forever Charmed
Created by	Brad Kern
Information
Purpose	Attaining ultimate power, attaining rulership of the Underworld, commanding upper level demons in The Source's stead
Powers	As demons of the highest level, comparable to The Source, they are highly resistant to most manners of attack, and all their abilities are extremely powerful. In addition to this, their power works as a collective, much like the Charmed Ones, stronger with all three alive. Fireballs Pyrokinesis Teleportation Telekinesis Summoning Conjuration Freezing time[episodes 1] Telepathy Banishing demons Manifestation The Triad can also be seen generating vast amounts of bright energy to hone their powers, are very resistant to freezes
Membership	Current Members none Deceased Members Asmodeus Baliel Candor Expelled Members Xar Allies The Source The Brotherhood of the Thorn Dumain Belthazor Christy Jenkins

The Triad is a fictional group of powerful demons on the television series Charmed. They ranked very high in the hierarchy of evil during the series. They exist in the spiritual realm as eternal evil spirits, and they are referred to by upper-level demons as evil incarnate whenever they can find a host of three demons.

First appearance

The Triad first appear in Season 3,^{[episodes 2]} and are played by Amir Aboulela, Rick Overton and Shaun Toub. At this time, they work for The Source. The Triad demon-hosts in Season 3 are males, and have black eyes. They wear long dark red-like robes, with an upside down pentagram behind it. Each of them possesses multiple powers (including fireballs, teleportation, summoning demons, manifesting objects, etc.). When they become aware of the existence of the Charmed Ones, they begin sending demons after them. They were the nemesis of the Charmed Ones for the first three years of the series, while they were still being commanded by the Source. When all of their previous demons fail, they order upper-level demon Belthazor, to go after the Charmed Ones, Belthazor comes very close, but falls in love with Phoebe, which leads to him killing the Triad by throwing an athame into one, snapping another's neck and using an energy ball on the third.^{[episodes 3]}

Second coming

The Triad reappear in Season 8, composed of three new upper-level demons as their new hosts: Asmodeus, Baliel and Candor. They have been rulers of the Underworld since the Charmed Ones vanquished Zankou. This time, they wear long black robes with an upside-down pentagram on the front. They are revealed to be the ones responsible for witch/firestarter Christy Jenkins's kidnapping fifteen years earlier. The kidnapping occurred even before their discovery of the Charmed Ones' existence at the start of the series.^{[episodes 4]} They hired demons to guard Christy and keep her hidden. They also turned her evil by severely warping her sense of good and evil. Those demons later get vanquished by Christy and by The Triad.^{[episodes 4]}

A demon named Xar, a former member of The Triad, orders a demon to tell the Charmed Ones that The Triad is back, thus exposing them. Xar tricks the Halliwell sisters into going after The Triad, because he doesn't want them to take over the Underworld. The Triad become aware of this, and kill Xar. The Charmed Ones go after them using an insidious plan because they alone don't have the power to vanquish them. Knowing that The Triad probably has the same weakness that they do, where their power is in the group and killing one weakens the other, they attack with the purpose of taking out one for sure. It works: Asmodeus is hit by a fireball from Baliel as a result of a move by Piper and Paige and Baliel is vanquished by Piper's molecular combustion power, although it takes three hits to do it. Afterward, there is only one member alive, Candor, who escaped without getting vanquished as he ran when he saw Piper and Paige vanquished the other two. Candor later appears, when he freezes the Charmed Ones and Billie, but not Christy, as he tells her that they taught her everything she knows, and now that The Triad is weakened, she must go forward alone, to reunite with the Ultimate Power, her sister Billie. Candor then leaves, and unfreezes the others.

Later on, Candor is killed by Christy, for being responsible for the death of Christy's parents ramming her arm through his chest.^{[episodes 5]}

It is later discovered that The Triad cannot be destroyed as easily as previously thought. Their physical bodies can be vanquished but they continue to exist in spirit form until they are strong enough to constitute new bodies for themselves. Therefore, The Triad still exist and continued to progress their plan to kill the Charmed Ones, with Dumain, an upper-level demon and childhood "imaginary friend" of Christy's who serves them. It is later revealed that letting Christy be rescued was Dumain's idea all along. He hoped that Christy would turn Billie against the Charmed Ones, resulting in a battle that would kill all five witches and allow the Triad to return. The Triad liked this idea so much that they promised to make Dumain one of them should the plan succeed. Christy does briefly turn Billie against the Charmed Ones by making her younger sister think the Halliwells are on the verge of being corrupted by their power.

To ensure that the Jenkinses have enough power to kill the Charmed Ones since it is only two against three, the Triad instructs Dumain to have the Jenkinses summon The Hollow. However, Nomed, a young demon who had once worked with the Triad, got wind of this and warned the Charmed Ones, who took in the Hollow at the same time as the Jenkinses. The Charmed Ones then used Hollow-enhanced electrokinesis to destroy the Triad. The battle Dumain hoped for then took place at the manor. As it turned out, the Halliwells and the Jenkinses were evenly matched. The power shoots out in all directions, killing Phoebe, Paige and Christy.^{[episodes 6]}

Billie went back to Magic School to warn Dumain, who told her she could use her projection power to change the past. However, when Dumain tried to get her to go to the Triad rather than her sister, Billie realized she'd been tricked; she'd been led to believe the Triad was already dead. She projected herself to the past to warn Christy that the Triad was manipulating them, but Christy wouldn't listen and went back to Magic School. She and Dumain then went back in the past to warn the Triad of their death, but as he was warning them, Billie projected herself and the Charmed Ones into the past as well. The Charmed Ones vanquished the Triad once and for all with potions, and Piper proceeded to vanquish future and past Dumain with her molecular combustion power. An enraged Christy then launched a giant fireball at Billie and the Charmed Ones, but Billie telekinetically deflected it back at Christy and vanquished her.^{[episodes 7]}

Episode footnotes

1. "The Last Temptation of Christy". Charmed. 2006-02-19. The WB.When time was "frozen", the Triad made no attempt to murder the Charmed Ones, implying their power may be a communication tool only.
2. "Magic Hour". Charmed. 2000-10-12. The WB.
3. "Power Outage (Charmed)". Charmed. 2000-11-16. The WB.
4. "Kill Billie Vol.1". Charmed. 2005-10-30. The WB.
5. "Generation Hex (Charmed)". Charmed. 2006-04-16. The WB.
6. "Kill Billie Vol. 2". Charmed. 2006-05-14. The WB.
7. "Forever Charmed". Charmed. 2006-05-21. The WB.

References