I am sorry to say that I have to discontinue this blog. I loved looking at Supernatural the way I did and learning about its multi-faceted approach to story-telling. For now, however, I will have to put my time and energy into other projects. Until we meet again.
S02E20 What is and What Should Never be
Episode Summary
Dean and Sam hunt a jinn in Illinois. When Dean investigates an abandoned building the jinn captures him and puts him in a kind of dream state where his mum didn’t die in a fire. In this alternative world Dean and Sam don’t get along and all the people they’ve saved in the real world are dead. Thus the perfect fantasy soon turns sour and ends up with Dean and alternate-Sam driving to Illinois (again) to hunt the jinn. In his lair, alternate-Sam and his companions (Jessica, their mum and Dean’s dream girlfriend) try to persuade Dean to stay in the alternative world but he refuses and kills himself to wake up. When he does, he and Sam manage to save a girl who had been captured by the jinn as well.
Commentary
“What is and What Should Never be” is closely connected to the issue already raised in the previous episode: Sam and Dean’s motivation for doing “the family business”. While “Folsom Prison Blues” focused more on the lengths to which Sam and Dean are willing to go (to honour the family (business)), this episode explores what keeps them going in general.
The focus clearly lies on Dean which, I think, has two reasons: First of all, he has been in the business for longer. Sam at least has had the chance to live a normal life, he “had Jess” as Dean puts it. Thus it is implied that his sacrifices were maybe not as big as or certainly not as numerous as Dean’s. And secondly, Dean is, and has to be, the strong one – for the business, for all the people they save but especially for Sammy. After all the pain and the sacrifices and after Sam asking for reasons to justify them going as far as prison to hunt in the previous episode, it is Dean’s turn to question their activities – and find strength in a creepy girl in a white dress.
Before going into this journey of heart and its different stages, here’s an interesting fact: More than 30 minutes of the roughly 40 minutes of the episode are shot in Dean’s dream world and we learn extremely little about the place he and Sam investigate. We only know it’s Illinois because Dean tells alternate-Sam they drove there while he slept. I think this emphasises the focus of this episode on Dean and his emotions and motivations rather than the “monster of the week”, that is, the jinn.
When Dean first wakes up in his dream world he lies, not exactly surprisingly, “next to some hot chick”, as he explains to alternate-Sam over the phone. As far as dreams are concerned, Dean is very predictable up to this point. Almost immediately afterwards, however, the letters Dean picks up show that “hot chick”, aka Carmen, isn’t just a fling but actually lives with him. I can’t say that would’ve been my first thought when asked to guess what Dean might wish for. The initial superficiality of Dean’s dream world crumbles further when the audience first finds out what this fictional world is built upon:
Dean [to his alternate-mum]: “What did you say when you put me into bed?”
[After she answers correctly:] “I don’t believe it. […] You don’t think wishes can get really…”
Alternate-Mum: “What?”
Dean: “Forget it.” *hugs her*
This is not only the moment when we find out what the whole “hot chick”-story is about, that is, a dream that came true, but also where Dean’s initial doubt starts to waver. The slow waning of doubt is also very nicely illustrated by a short question-answer dialogue between Dean and his mum which first takes place when she opens the door and is later paralleled when Dean makes himself comfortable on the couch:
At the door: “Are you alright?” – “I don’t know.”
vs.
On the couch: “Are you sure you’re alright?” – “I think so.”
Shortly after begins the stage of content suburban Dean where he eats the “best sandwich ever” and realises he now has an utterly normal job (at a garage). And for some precious hours, Dean is a perfectly happy suburban citizen that likes to mow the lawn, look at garden gnomes and scare his neighbours by waving at them – all to the sound of “What a Wonderful World” in a rock version. Seeing Dean smiling that widely, don’t tell me you wouldn’t watch a series where Dean does nothing but mow the lawn with awesome rock music playing in the background! Not only does he have the body to rock any suburban dream but even after only two seasons you really think he deserves a break, or at least I did.
Only a little while later, however, Dean realises that in this perfect world he and Sam don’t get along. Without hunting, the just-engaged law student and always-drunk car guy simply don’t have anything in common. After this rather simple realisation begins the next stage where Dean starts to cling onto hope despite of himself. He is convinced that he “can fix things with Sammy” and sees the alternate reality he stumbled into as a second chance he doesn’t want to waste. Dean throws all his experience as a hunter out the window, ignores the jinn and embraces this freak world just so he can hug his mum again – or some mental image of her.
Of course, this stage doesn’t last too long either and is followed by one that highlights the problems of Dean’s fantasy. The almost extinguished hunter fire in his heart is rekindled when he realises that the anniversary of a plane crash, where all the passengers died, he hears about on TV is the one he and Sam prevented from happening (S01E04). Dean does a quick search and finds out that the plane passengers weren’t the only people that didn’t make it in his dream world. Struggling with the sheer number of victims Dean is drawn to his alternate-Dad’s grave:
“All of them. Everyone you saved, everyone Sammy and I saved, they’re all dead. […] My old life […] doesn’t want me to be happy. […] You’d say: ‚Go hunt the jinn. […] Your happiness or all those people’s lives – no contest.‘ But why? Why is it my job to save these people? […] Why do we have to sacrifice everything, dad?”
After this powerful monologue Dean leaves the graveyard and one senses that the stage of solutions has begun. Considering the dilemma and the pain that comes with it, the solution in this case is almost absurdly simple: “Go hunt the jinn.” And so Dean sets out to do what he always does. Except this time everything is a bit different and Dean as well as we, the audience, can’t help but notice all the little things that are off. There is, for example, the already well-established bitch/jerk exchange that doesn’t work with alternate-Sam, who accompanies Dean to the lair of the jinn after catching him steal part of their mother’s silverware. From a more cinematic perspective, there is also the repetition of a scene from the very beginning of the episode: Dean is introduced with a frontal shot of the Impala where the camera starts just above the ground, passes the licence plate and finally shows the driver of the car. The slightly off version in this part of the episode contains the same camera movements but the licence plate is “wrong” and next to Dean sits a version of Sam that is out-grossed by lamb’s blood. Once they arrive at the jinn’s hiding place, this alternate-Sam tries to convince Dean to go back and while a part of him wants to listen (and parts of us wouldn’t judge him if he did), Dean continues. When he finally finds the creepy girl that kept appearing in his perfect fantasy world, he knows he is doing the right thing.
In the end, Dean is able to make sense of what has happened to him. He now has an answer to the half-formulated question addressed to his mum at the beginning of the episode:
“Is that what the jinn does? I doesn’t grant you a wish. It just makes you think it has.”
It doesn’t take long, then, that the jinn, or the part of Dean’s brain under his control, realises that he has to stop Dean from escaping his dream world. Thus, Jessica, Dean’s mother and Carmen appear to help alternate-Sam convince Dean to give in and live this alternate life:
“Why do you have to keep digging? […] You were happy.”
“No more pain, no more fear. Just love and comfort and safety. […] Get some rest.”
“Why is it our job to save everyone? Haven’t we done enough?”
They pick up a lot of points Dean has questioned himself. Some of this parallels his monologue on the graveyard where he turned to his dad to find the strength to hunt the jinn. This time he finds a reason to stay strong within and by himself: “You’re not real, none of it is.” At this point, Dean realises that real pain is better than false peace – quite a conclusion for a mainstream TV series, if I may say so. Later on, when the real Sam congratulates Dean on his strength, we also learn that it was not an easy decision for him:
“I wanted to stay so bad. […] All I can think about is how much this job’s cost us. We’ve lost so much. We’ve sacrificed so much.”
In contrast to other more superficial and black-and-white storytelling, the questions of sacrifice and pain aren’t suddenly gone. I am certain this won’t be the last time Sam and/or Dean wonder whether what they’re doing is the right thing. Thus Supernatural shows us that our heroes are only human (mostly). They, too, are weak and desperate, even. But Sam reassures us as well as Dean:
“But people are alive because of you. It’s worth it Dean. It’s worth it. It’s not fair and, you know, it hurts like hell, but it’s worth it.”
And so the last stage of the episode doesn’t exactly stick to what it promises. Even though Dean tries to make sense of it all (the jinn, the family business, life) in the end, all he and we can do is to trust Sam and hope that they will be able to “get some rest” eventually. The fact that Dean hears this phrase three times during this episode seems to imply that the desire for a break will keep them company for a while and, sooner or later, come up again. Until then, however, there is nothing to do but to carry on wayward son.
S02E19 Folsom Prison Blues
Episode Summary
Sam and Dean are arrested for breaking and entering in Arkansas. Once they’re in the county jail, it is revealed that Dean planned being caught because their dad’s former army colleague Deacon asked them for help. Deacon suspects that a ghost from an old cell block kills people in the prison. Because Deacon saved their father’s life, Sam and Dean start to investigate as inmates – even though FBI agent Henriksen is keen on trying them for, among other things, murders and the desecration of numerous graves. A psychopathic killer from the old cell block that died from a heart attack, as all the victims do, turns out to be a false lead. After Dean is attacked by a ghost that looked like a nurse, the Winchesters start to look for other explanations. Through the help of a „regular“ at the prison they find out about a nurse called Glockner who was said to kill some of the prisoners she was supposed to treat. With the help of Deacon and their public defender Sam and Dean escape prison and salt and burn the bones of Glockner. The FBI, meanwhile, was sent to the wrong graveyard by Sam and Dean’s lawyer.
Commentary
I spent a lot of time thinking about this episode because I felt there was so much content between the lines and so many hints and hunches to follow. In the end, there were so many thoughts in my head that I couldn’t make sense of them anymore. I had to take a step back and look at the episode less closely and ended up repeating in my head what most episodes repeat at the beginning: the Winchester motto.
Saving lives, hunting things, the family business.
„Folsom Prison Blues“, more than any other episode so far, deals with the motivation behind Sam and Dean’s demon hunting activities. At the beginning of the series we learn about the deaths of their mother and Sam’s girlfriend but it is clear that there is more to it than revenge or even closure. It’s about saving lives, hunting things, the family business and, most importantly, what lies beyond.
First of all, the lives that are to be saved are often specified to be the lives of innocents. In „Folsom Prison Blues“, however, the innocence of certain victims is more than questionable. In fact, the ghost of nurse Glockner specifically targets people who broke the law, inmates as well as corrupted guards, thus guilty rather than innocent people. Her judgement, however, is doubted even before we learn about her, or before Dean becomes a target. While Sam calls Dean out on calling the victims in the prison innocents whose life they’re supposed to save – according to the family motto – Dean reaffirms that the victims of a vengeful spirit are (always) innocent. The family motto, then, is less easy or superficial than it sounds. Innocence is not as clear-cut as the law might make it seem sometimes and every life is worth saving (to a certain degree). Thus, the implied heroism in the first part of the motto loses some of its convincing motivational force which is to say, the Winchesters aren’t hunting things for purely heroic reasons and the rewards that might go with it.
A similarly loose rather than strict interpretation also applies to the second part of the Winchester motto that explicitly refers to the hunt, specifically the hunting of things. Sometimes, these „things“ they hunt aren’t things but real people, such as in S02E17 „Heart“, who cannot be saved and sometimes hunting spirits means freeing them, c.f., S02E16 „Roadkill“. And then there are the times where the „things“ become allies or business partners (S02E08 „Crossroad Blues“) or turn out to be your brother. Thus it becomes clear that the classic thrill of the hunt (that a lot of wealthy men and women seem to experience when shooting rare, captivated animals on the African continent) and the dichotomy of the hunter and the hunted is lacking from Dean’s and Sam’s adventures thus making it an unlikely motivator.
So far, neither the „public reward“ (often said to be the defining characteristic as well as driving force of heroism) of saving innocents and experiencing their gratitude nor the hunting-related adrenaline rush can fully explain why Sam and Dean do what they do. And so we continute to the last part of the motto, the family business, and its particular relevance for „Folsom Prison Blues“. This episode sheds light on what else drives Sam and Dean by highlighting what „the family business“ means – and especially what it means to Sam and Dean. Sam is clearly more sceptical of doing the family business according to Dean’s plan and has a hard time understanding why they should risk their lives (the FBI is following them closely after all) for an old and seemingly distant friend of their late father. Dean, on the other hand, stresses the debt they owe to Deacon because he saved their father’s life. One might argue here that John Winchester’s military education affected his sons, particularly Dean, on more than just a physical level. Semper fidelis, „always faithful“, the motto of the United States Marine Corps, the military unit John and Deacon served in, seems to shape Sam’s and Dean’s actions significantly albeit differently. While Sam displays a strong sense of family and responsibility for his relatives, Dean goes one step further by acknowledging his responsibility not only for his family but also for their debts, even beyond death – always, as in semper fidelis. The family, then, is what matters most and what drives them. Thus the family business is not just a kind of traditional profession but more of a set of ideals the Winchesters live by and some of those say they should hunt down those who hurt other people, that is, their extended, almost global, family.
Summing up the arguments above, „Folsom Prison Blues“ particularly highlights the last part of the Winchester motto, that is, the importance of family and friendship for the business. After all, they only succeed in this episode through the help of, more or less close, friends, namely Deacon and Mara Daniels, the defense lawyer. Thus it becomes clear that as solitary as hunters and their lives might seem, what drives them and what helps them fight the dark forces are their families – however those might be defined.
S02E18 Hollywood Babylon
Episode Summary
Dean and Sam go to Los Angeles to investigate a horror film set in a Hollywood studio. After they find out that the first death had been staged as a publicity stunt the producer of the film dies. What looks like a suicide turns out to be an exact copy of the death of a black-and-white film starlet. While the Winchesters salt and burn her bones another person dies on the set. It is only when Sam recognises the incantations in the film that he and Dean see the realism in the script. It turns out that the original script writer Walter turned what he learned about black magic into a film script and went on to punish the people who tampered with it and turned it into a horror flick. In the end, the ghosts he summoned and forced to kill take gruesome revenge on Walter.
Commentary
Imagine a cabin in the woods. The light from the full moon is dim and the swing on the front porch screeches in an unnatural breeze. When a sudden light beam disturbs the dark scenery, we see a young and attractive woman who is looking for her friends, unaware of the horror that lies in front of her. When her torch light finally finds a, literal, part of her friends a scream p- Cut! What the hell was that?! Thus, or similar, begins the Supernatural version of meta.
Put simply, the term “meta” refers to something that goes above or beyond a particular thing. The term metalanguage, for example, is used to describe the words used to describe a language, i.e., its grammar. To create a meta-level in their works writers, for instance, may use self-reference. Sometimes such a technique “breaks the fourth wall”, see also No Fourth Wall at TV Tropes. The French theorist Jean-François Lyotard popularised the term meta-narratives (also grand narratives) which, in a nutshell, describe our theories about the world, that is, theories that go „above and beyond“ the tangible reality. I don’t want to go too much into his theory, Wikipedia has a quite adequate summary if anyone’s interested, so it is enough if we think of meta-narratives as unfinished, ever changing blueprints of ideas, such as the “idea” of the horror genre, as will be discussed here. Lyotard goes on to define postmodernism, his actual topic, as being incredulous towards such meta-narratives. There are many different ways of questioning a meta-narrative or an idea. In the Fantastic genre, Terry Pratchett created, among many other postmodern characters, Cohen the Barbarian, based on Conan the Barbarian, that questions and undermines the stereotypical burly action hero. The Scary Movie series, too, creates a kind of parody, mostly by means of references to well-known horror films. Supernatural’s approach to the meta-narrative of the horror genre lies somewhere between those two. It is neither as elaborate and witty as Pratchett’s Discworld series (it is mostly this one particular episode, anyway), nor quite as silly a spoof as the Scary Movies. Supernatural creates a dense network of overlapping levels of references, meta-levels, that places the series among its precursors in the horror genre in a casual, pragmatic way, a style that seems to shape the series so far, that involves a lot of, metaphorical, winking. Rather than trying to write down a list of references here, which would not be exhaustive – or that interesting, really, I will look at the many different meta-levels presented in this episode, how they interact and what they tell us about Supernatural.
First of all, there are several instances where “real” events or things are mentioned during the episode, such as the 1987 film Three Men and a Baby Dean mentions but also Metalstorm or Boogeyman. Some of these are linked to the Supernatural universe. Boogeyman, for example, was written by Eric Kripke, creator of Supernatural, and McG is both a fictional director in Hollywood Babylon and one of the real producers of the Supernatural series. He is also the director of the film Charlie’s Angels – in the series and in real life. Even further go the references within the series to the series itself. They are clearly self-referential and thus create a Supernatural meta-level. My favourite example are the posters on the wall of the writer’s office where, for example, the truck from Route 666 (S01E13) advertises the film Monster Truck.
The most significant reference, however, can be found in the title of the episode. Hollywood and Babylon both refer to important cultural sites during their respective era. Thus, unsurprisingly, they both also attracted businessmen and women, some of which were more shady than others. It is not until almost the very end, however, that some light is shed on the relevance of the title for the episode. Before Walter, the original script writer, summons the spirits to finish off the studio writer who tore up his text, the following dialogue (excerpt) takes place:
Walter: “Hell, we could have gotten it right for the first time ever in this whorehouse of a town!”
Martin: “Who gives a rat’s ass about real?”
Walter’s statement likens LA, or, rather, Hollywood, to the Whore(house) of Babylon and Martin not only does not deny that but in his stereotypical Hollywood snobbery reinforces that point of view. The effect of this parallel is twofold. First of all, it further confirms Supernatural’s place in the history of the horror genre that was established through various references and tropes throughout the episode (some of which were mentioned above). It does so by, on the one hand, actually referring to antique history and, on the other hand, through the allusion to sexuality, for instance, that is a recurring trope of horror classics, such as the often discussed vampires.
Secondly, it places the universe of Supernatural in the same dark cesspit as the biblical Babylon, that is, in a Hollywood studio. It is interesting to see how well the Winchester brothers fit into such a place. Once they are off the tourist train, nobody questions their presence. What is more, their enquiries and, more generally, the way they interact with the crew doesn’t raise any eyebrows – at least not until they start walking around with shotguns. While Sam just doesn’t stand out, Dean seems to feel right at home. It stands to reason that their different adaptive capacities reflect their respective attitude to demon hunting. Sam, on the one hand, has a clear goal he wants to achieve. For Dean, on the other hand, demons are his job, the hunters, if not his family, at least his kind of people. He is “one hell of a PA”, as Tara puts it, as well as one hell of a demon hunter.
This conclusion is underlined by the shot of Sam and Dean walking towards the sunset, a trope TV Tropes introduces as follows:
“It’s the end of the movie and The Drifter has to be moving on. There are other people in trouble, other wrongs to right, other paths to follow. He saddles up his horse and rides west into the setting sun. The townspeople look on as his figure, silhouetted against the orange disk, disappears into the horizon. The music swells and ‚The End‘ appears.“
The Winchesters, however, aren’t your typical heroes. Their postmodern stories have more in common with the labyrinthine layouts of many a crooked Gothic castle than the open prairie of the West with the clearly defined good, bad and ugly. Thus the fake sunset is revealed to be a prop and rolled away, opening up the path for more Supernatural chaos.
S02E17 Heart
Episode Summary
Sam and Dean investigate a series of murders in San Francisco. There they meet Madison, her neighbour and her ex-boyfriend. The latter, the prime suspect, is killed by a werewolf that turns out to be Madison. Sam, who feels attracted to Madison, tries to save her by killing the werewolf who bit her which is revealed to be her neighbour. After this attempt fails, Madison convinces Sam to save her by shooting her.
Commentary
I have recently followed an interesting discussion on why people start watching a series, and, even more interestingly, why they keep doing it. My feelings for Supernatural are quite clear in this respect: I came for the plot, I stay(ed) for the plot! (Despite the huge gap between posts.) Episode 17 of Season two is a great example for a seemingly straightforward plot with a great twist, great potential and great heart. Before, when thinking about the metaphorical heart in Supernatural, I used to locate Dean’s either on his tongue or way south and Sam’s in tiny little pieces locked up away from harm after his girlfriend’s recent and brutal death. The episode „Heart“ shows I could not have been more wrong – or more right.
While the very first shots of the episode made me think of a vampire-y encounter, scratch marks and some interesting dog-perspective camera shots make it clear from the beginning, that the Winchesters have to deal with a werewolf. That, however, is about the only thing clear and obvious in this episode. Take the „damsel in distress“, for example. She is pretty, says her creepy, overprotective, religious neighbour is „sweet“ and gets it on with one of the Winchester brothers. She seems like the typical bad stereotype of the „sexy dumb blonde“. Except she’s not blonde. Or always pretty. Or responding to Dean’s charm. Her distress isn’t the result of some powerful external figure’s plot but lies almost wholly in an as yet undiscovered part of her inner self.
As the episode progresses it becomes clear that she isn’t threatened by a werewolf, she is one herself. Unsurprisingly, Sam wants to save her. That this is no easy task is already partly shown by the more than ten remaining minutes of the episode. Things get complicated further by Sam’s feelings. The inner monster he knows and fears himself not only makes him relate to Madison’s situation but to Madison herself. This attraction leads to an eventful night were clothes, tears and blood are shed.
My conclusions of that night can be summarised as follows: Some things are as they seem, others are more complicated. On the one hand, the creepy neighbour is a perpetrator. Dean likes strippers and bawdy jokes. And supernatural beings are dangerous. On the other hand, the most likely suspect, the violent ex-boyfriend, is not the killer but killed. Sam isn’t abstinent either. And supernatural beings face problems some of us are just too familiar with. All of Supernatural is full of life lessons but the last example also ties in with what I said at the beginning of this text. The series isn’t about undermining stereotypes but it breaks with them ever so often. The „damsel in distress“ really isn’t a lonely, helpless girl in a tower waiting for a knight to save her. Madison is a self-determined woman who decides that she can’t live with her werewolf-side. Eventually she asks Sam to help her – under her conditions: „This is the way you can save me. I’m asking you to save me.“ That is, to shoot her. And Sam does. Because his heart may be shredded and buried but it is still beating. And even Dean flinches at the sound of the shot. Thus far, the Winchester brothers turned out to be ambivalent figures with hearts in all the right places.
I’m back!
It’s been a while, I know. After the first couple of drafts and posts I realised I had pages of notes but no clue what to do with them. Not really anway. I needed a new, better plan. And notes that would help me get there. But that meant a lot of work… and then life happened. Weeks passed, more important things had to be organised and I never really found the time to revise my newest project. In the new year, when I finally had some time to kill, I decided not to make a resolution about working on Watching Supernatural; it wasn’t supposed to be something I had to do, a duty. Instead, I put it in a nice, sunny place at the back of my head, watered it regularly and watched it grow. And here we are. With more ideas, plans and time and better notes. I’m looking forward to putting some of these into posts. Stay put if you wanna hear more about them!
S02E16 Roadkill
Episode Summary
“As Molly McNamara and her husband drive along a highway, a man suddenly appears in the road. They crash in an attempt to avoid him, and Molly later wakes up alone in the car. The man reappears and chases after her, but Molly flags down a car driven by the Winchesters. She tries to show them the wreck, but the car has disappeared. While later driving to the police, they are confronted again by the man, but Dean drives through him, causing the ghost to dissipate. The brothers reveal that what has been chasing her is the vengeful spirit of Jonah Greeley, who died on that roadway years earlier and now kills drivers on the anniversary of his death. The trio locates Greeley’s home nearby, and, after digging up his corpse, salt and burn the body. With the ghost of Greeley gone, the Winchesters explain to Molly that her husband is still alive, but is now married to someone else. Molly—having died in the same car accident that killed Greeley—is a spirit that has been reliving the same night since her death. Accepting the truth, she finally moves on.” Source: Wikipedia Supernatural Season 2
Commentary
Much like the previous episode, “Roadkill” is a brilliant example for good scriptwriting or, more generally, a well-produced series/episode. At the beginning of “Roadkill” I was almost convinced that, finally, I had found something I did not like about Supernatural just to realise later on that whenever I think they’re doing something wrong, they’re actually doing something very right (so far anyway…)!
It all starts with, what I thought to be, a rather archaic argument including gender stereotypes and car driving topped off with a little “This is just a short cut!”-tropeism. Already while arguing, however, the two characters involved point out the stereotypes underlying their discussion (e.g., “Isn’t this argument a little archaic?”, “No, we can’t ask for directions, it’s against our genetic code!”). Not only does this show the awareness of the scriptwriters (the term TV Tropes would use the term lampshade hanging here, if I’m not mistaken) but it also demonstrates how happy this playfighting couple is. The latter is especially relevant for the plot of the episode which is mostly about a ghost not willing to let go of something worth holding on to.
I find this particularly interesting because it shows two things: First of all, the series/writers doesn’t/don’t rely on it’s/their main characters exclusively, i.e., they don’t need Sam and Dean to write a good story. That is, “Roadkill” is not about character-building or their dad/the Big Bad etc., i.e., the main plot; instead they invest time into world-building, for example by explaining the rules that govern the world of ghosts and demons. The most important of which seems to be “Salt and Burn the Bones” – a catch phrase I really start to like. While I, personally, am not a huge fan of world-building when it comes to series I’m binge watching – I really just wanna know where it all leads to – I really appreciate that the creators of Supernatural took the time to craft what can be called an iconic series. And I start to think that it really deserves such a title.
By taking their time, the producers turned “Roadkill”, and this is the second interesting point, into an episode that is also about showing the other side, about the humans behind the monsters. On the one hand we have the classic, creepy Redneck torture guy [to those of you who haven’t seen Joss Whedon’s and Drew Goddard’s The Cabin in the Woods yet: it’s worth watching!] and on the other a young woman running for her life the same day every year. This goes to show that not every ghost is evil and that there is a certain grey zone. Which, of course, in a rather subtle way, also reflects Sam’s situation since he’s worried that the demon who killed his mother will eventually make him join the Dark Side. So, in a way, “Roadkill” actually still propels the main plot forward. Because it is so well done, however, the constructedness of the episode goes almost completely unnoticed. Thus “Roadkill” has something of a Renaissance painting where it takes more than a casual glance to uncover the effort that was put into form, concept and proportions.
As, however, neither “Roadkill” in particular nor Supernatural in general is aimed only at those who enjoy subtle ethics, philosophy and the fine arts there’s still Dean. And in this episode, he seems to have a particularly good day! Instead of using my own words to describe just how much I laughed at certain of his jokes, I’ll finish today’s post by letting Dean speak and quoting some of my favourite lines:
“Follow the creepy brick road!”
“It smells like old lady in here.” Aaand they find dead Mrs. Greeley…
“You’re like a walking encyclopedia of weirdness!”
“Thank God!” – “Call me Dean.”
A post, finally!
It took quite a bit longer than expected until I could turn my notes into a coherent text. I hope you enjoy it!
Considering my current work load and the time it took to write my first post, I will probably publish more commentaries every fortnight. The ones to follow might be a bit shorter though… We’ll see 🙂
Have a good weekend and looking forward to hearing from you!
S02E15 Tall Tales
Episode Summary
Sam and Dean investigate several unusual occurrences on a college campus in Springfield, Ohio. These not only include freak deaths but also an alien abduction. What they all have in common is the exaggerated absurdity of the stories: they are all based on urban legends. Because Dean and Sam are caught in a brotherly feud, they call Bobby for help. He tells them that they are dealing with a trickster, a demigod (“like Loki”). Sam and Dean then identify the janitor as the source of all (deadly) pranks and go on to stake him. The trickster, however, manages to fake his own death.
Commentary
The fact that this particular episode was the first one I looked at in detail and took notes to share my experiences turned out to be a lucky coincidence as “Tall Tales” is my favourite episode so far. It contains all the things I love about Supernatural (so far), including the things I actually hate – but you know how it is with love, it’s complicated.
The episode itself is not very complicated, though. So far, most episodes have telling names and for this one it’s not different. A tall tale (or tall story) is, according to the OALD, “a story that is difficult to believe because what it describes seems exaggerated and not likely to be true”. And that pretty much defines the outline of the episode. My love for well-chosen titles (and alliterations) here clearly overrules my usual contempt regarding too transparent plot lines.
The intro of the episode summarises the pranks the Sam and Dean played on each other in earlier episodes. I’m expecting funny games! [Funny Games, by the way, is a pretty intense horror film. As far as I know, the German, or rather, Austrian version is better than the American one, in case you’re interested.] “Tall Tales”, however, is neither very scary nor excessively funny. Not for the first time, nor the last, I can tell you so much, the writers of Supernatural successfully scripted a somewhat light-hearted story about tricks and pranks that, when looked at more closely, turns out to be quite a bit deeper.
Besides being funny and entertaining, “Tall Tales” is, in my opinion, also an ironic study of human nature and pop culture starring a charismatic cast. My favourite ironic moment almost went unnoticed. It occurs when Sam and Dean investigate the death of a professor and talk to some students in a bar. It is, rather casually, mentioned that the professor taught ethics and morality. The audience, however, at this point already knows he died shortly before abusing his power as a professor and giving in to temptation. So this part of the episode is not only about abuse but also about hypocrisy.
The story then goes on to depict how quickly a social outsider is born. All it takes is an alien abduction. Well, I guess “quickly” is a relative term… What I love about this part of the episode is the contrast between the completely broken student, the familiar yet crazy (contrast #2!) story he has to tell and the way he tells the story. This, among other things, made me actually look up whether “Tall Tales” was broadcast on April 1 – it wasn’t.
Finally, “Tall Tales” explores how far people are willing to go to get what they want which is, more often than not, something shiny. We see a well-dressed man lie on his stomach and grope for one of these shiny things, a watch, while also going through quite a bit of sewer related filth. When he gets bitten or almost eaten up, really, the penny finally drops for me. It’s the well-known story of the alligator in the sewers (of New York, usually). [At this point I can heartily recommend Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere, where Gaiman deals with the monster(s) in the sewers in quite a remarkable way.] To be more precise, it’s not just a story but an urban legend. A(n often tall) tale that becomes immortal through various retellings and because it can almost always be tracked back to a “source”, i.e., someone like your neighbour’s cousins baby-sitter.
This is where the episode makes the full circle in a way – yet another thing I appreciate. The title is not only an appropriate one but it sets the tone for the whole episode. The trickster, the urban legends and the fact that the trickster poses as a janitor, it all connects, it all makes sense somehow. And once I find out (or am told) I can really enjoy the feeling of revelation. It’s like a good crime novel where you only find out who the murderer is at the end and not because of some deus ex machina solution. (Although the fact that the janitor wasn’t some random old man with a broom but an actually quite handsome guy was kind of a big hint…)
Fun, irony, depth, a well-thought-out concept, a riddle and the Winchester brothers from their best side – this episode has it all! It even opens up the possibility for a return of the janitor. I’m looking forward to the episodes to follow! Stay tuned for more and let me know what you think.
Welcome!
Welcome to my Supernatural experience!
Thanks for stopping by! Here’s some info before you go on:
The idea to start a blog didn’t come up until somewhen at the beginning of season 2. I am now somewhere in the middle of season 2 and will start posting from that point onwards. The first season and the first half of season 2 will be summarised separately but not per episode.
I will soon start posting my thoughts on Supernatural episodes. I’d love to hear from you!
Watching Supernatural for the First Time 