Starring Tom Mison as Ichabod Crane and Nicle Beharie as Abbie Mills.
Hudson Valley, New York - 1781
Ichabod Crane (who's a lot more manly here than he was in the original story) and his fellow patriots are in the woods fighting a skirmish with the red-coated British. Suddenly Revolutionary Era Jason Voorhees rides up on a pale horse. He's wearing a red coat (so the Brits are to blame!), a full facial black mask, a strange mark on the back of his right hand, and is wielding a battle axe. He's intent on riding Crane down when Ichabod fires his flintlock pistol first, knocking the horseman to the ground.
Spotted Horse cannot be killed by a bullet, though, and the Horseman quickly regains his feet. He swings his battle axe, giving Crane a serious wound to his chest. Just as the Horseman raises the axe for the killing blow, Crane swings his own sword first and neatly decapitates his foe. But remember, Crane has already been grievously wounded. As he starts to fade away the last voices he hears are of a woman begging him to stay with her and a man warning, "We don't have much time."
Cut to an underground cave. Jars of questionable contents and talismans are situated around a plot of ground. A human being bursts out of the grave (for lack of a better word). It's Ichabod Crane. He stumbles out of the cave and through the woods until he comes across an asphalt road, something he's not familiar with, and is nearly run over by several vehicles. (In his defense the weather was foggy and these people shouldn't have been driving that fast in those conditions.)
Now it's night. Lt. Abbie Mills is at a diner having a bite to eat with Sheriff August Corbin. He can't make himself be happy that Abbie will be leaving soon to join the FBI. They receive a call that a local stable has reported something is going on there and is spooking the horses so the pair go to check it out.
They immediately split up. (Not only is this improper police procedure, this is always the wrong thing to do in a horror situation. Strength in numbers, people.) Sheriff Corbin goes into the stable while Abbie looks for the owner of the horse farm. She finds him - well, part of him. He's missing his head. Meanwhile in the barn, Corbin pulls his gun and orders someone to come out of the horse stall. It's our old friend, the Headless Horseman.
As Abbie races towards the barn, the Headless Horseman (on a new pale horse) bursts out of the building. She has time to note the strange marking on the back of the Horseman's hand before he rides off. Inside the barn Abbie finds Corbin has also been decapitated.
(There's a bit of a joke here. Sheriff Corbin is played by Clancy Brown. Brown was in the original Highlander movie as the villain who went around cutting off everyone else's head. Now he be the one who be beheaded. Karma's a bitch, y'all.)
Abbie immediately radios in that an officer is down. Back in the town of Sleepy Hollow, another cop in his car starts to race off in response when he has to come to a screeching halt before running over Crane. The cop jumps out with his gun drawn and arrests Crane. (I don't understand why he's stopping to bother with a jaywalker when there's an officer down elsewhere. Priorities!)
Crane is handcuffed, sitting in a cell when Abbie is brought in to identify him. She immediately discounts him as the murder suspect. (Again, why did they bother to arrest him? He was nowhere near the scene of the crime!) As Abbie starts to describe what the killer did look like, Ichabod recognizes this is the Headless Horseman he thought he had killed.
They hook Crane up to a lie detector. He passes with flying colors as he tells the truth about being a British soldier who changed sides (so he's a turncoat!) and fought for the Colonies. He served under THE George Washington. After the battle, Ichabod's last memories are of being in triage, his wife Katrina by his side begging him to stay with her. The next thing he knew he was crawling out of the ground in a cave.
The cops want to send Crane to a mental hospital. Abbie asks to be the one to transport him. She trusts Ichabod enough to allow him to ride up front with her. Abbie wants to ask more about the headless man with the brand of a bow on the back of his hand. Lame jokes about Starbucks fall flat. As they drive past a church, Ichabod makes eye contact with a priest standing outside. Interestingly, the two men both seem to recognize each other although 250 years should have separated them. Is the priest the man who said "We don't have much time" in Crane's hazy memories?
Anyway, Abbie takes off Ichabod's handcuffs (she must really, really trust him) as he leads her to the cave where he was resurrected. Ichabod finds an old Bible that hasn't been damaged by 250 years of exposure to the elements. Revelations is bookmarked. Ichabod tells Abbie how THE George Washington had personally given him a mission to kill an unknown mercenary with the mark of a bow on the back of his hand. The fate of mankind rested on Ichabod defeating the Horseman, who turns out to be one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.
Meanwhile back at the church, the mysterious priest is bearing a spade and heading for the old graveyard when he hears the approach of a horse. Instead of going back inside the church, the priest chooses instead to run around the graveyard as the Headless Horseman slowly stalks his prey.
But wait: the priest has some kind of strange powers. He shouts out foreign words that don't sound like Latin. Nearby chains whip out in an attempt to imprison the Horseman. It doesn't work. The priest's last words are defiant as he swears he'll never tell the Horseman where "it" is. I'm betting it's the Horseman's head.
Mills returns to Sleepy Hollow with Crane to check up on the death of the priest. As Ichabod sits in the police car a hawk lands on the hood of the vehicle. He feels the need to follow the bird. The police captain (Captain Irving, to continue the in-jokes.) rightfully jumps on Abbie's case for not taking Crane to the mental hospital as she was ordered. Abbie points out the death of the priest is the same M.O. as the other deaths and since Crane was with her at the time he can't be the murderer they're looking for.
The hawk leads Crane to the old graveyard and to a particular headstone. Crane pulls aside the vines to read the very legible 250 year-old tombstone of his wife, Katrina. The rock notes she was burnt as a witch. I would like to note that America didn't burn its witches. We had other, non-flammable ways to dispense with them.
Pressured by her captain, Abbie has no choice but to take Ichabod on to the mental hospital. Abbie confides in Crane about something that happened to her back in her youth. She and her sister were walking through the woods. They happened upon four white trees that Abbie found rather odd. There was a mysterious voice and something started to rise up out of the ground. Abbie and her sister blacked out and were found somewhere else later. Ever since, Abbie's sister has been in and out of mental hospitals herself, which is why Abbie is so willing to listen to Ichabod's strange story.
Abbie returns to the late Sheriff Corbin's office and discovers a key. She searches to see what this key unlocks. It goes to a fortified file cabinet where Corbin kept his own records of the occult history of Sleepy Hollow, including reports on witches, covens, and unsolved murders. Abbie also finds a file concerning her own case.
She's caught by Captain Irving who demands to know what she's doing in here. Abbie covers herself claiming she was looking through Corbin's old files in hopes of finding something that would help with the current mystery but she found nothing helpful. The captain orders her out, not noticing the paper she had hidden in her clothing. Irving seems to have a suspicious look on his face which may be indicate he's not to be trusted.
Back at the mental hospital Ichabod is having a vision of his dead wife Katrina. She confesses that she really was a witch but her coven was the good coven that was fighting the evil in Sleepy Hollow. Her grave doesn't contain her body but the missing head of the Horseman. After the wounded Ichabod beheaded the horseman, they both fell to the ground next to each other. Their blood mingled on the ground, thus connecting them through space and time. Katrina's coven buried the Horseman's body in the river while they hid Crane's body in the cave in an effort to protect him.
Katrina didn't revive Crane. Someone else brought the Horseman back and inadvertently brought Ichabod back as well. This same unknown villain has trapped Katrina's spirit in the woods. She pleads with her husband to find and protect the skull so the Horseman can't be made whole, otherwise the other three Horsemen will appear and it will be The End.
Abbie breaks Ichabod out of the mental hospital. She tells him about all the case files she found in Corbin's office and shows the paper she smuggled out. It is an old map of the Hudson Valley made by THE George Washington. Corbin had marked parts of the map that he thought were important to solving the age-old mystery.
Abbie calls her friend Andy, the cop who arrested Crane for jaywalking and murder, to ask for help at the church. Oh, but turns out Andy is working for the Headless Horseman, who has now acquired all sorts of guns and ammo in addition to his battle axe. So Andy must be part of the Evil Coven.
Abbie and Ichabod have just dug up the head from the grave when the Headless Horseman rides up with his pump shotgun. Ichabod hides in the grave while Abbie runs for her life. Now it's time to put away the shotgun and take out the AK 47. Just as the Horseman is about to shoot Crane, Abbie remembers she has a gun and starts firing back. Andy arrives and Abbie thinks she has backup. That is until he knocks her out cold.
Ichabod is fighting the Horseman with a shovel. It's not going well. Abbie comes to and disarms Andy. Ichabod grabs the head in a jar and starts running. The Headless Horseman slowly stalks his prey. (Why do these serial killers always walk slowly?) Just then another cop car arrives on the scene and pull their guns on the Horseman. Ah, but the sun is starting to come up. Sunlight is the Horseman's weakness. With a final gun volley at the other cops, the Horseman mounts up and rides away.
Abbie decides to put off going to the FBI and stay in Sleepy Hollow. Ichabod shows her more of Revelations in the Bible indicating that they are fated to work together to combat the forces of Hell. Andy is in a jail cell when a blurry figure speaking an unknown language appears. Andy begs for another chance. It doesn't go well.
