Okay, I’m gonna try to type while I watch this time instead of forgetting this blog exists until the episode is almost over.
You can tell the footage for the previously on segment was saved on a VHS copy instead of the original film that the show was shot with because even in the HD iTunes version I have it looks low quality as fuck. And jumpy in the way that brings me back to my teens watching the WB all the damn time.
I love this song. WTF is this song. Shazam says “Good Deal” by Mommy and Daddy. I… have no comment, except that it sounds like everything I was listening to in college at the time this shit was airing.
Aaaaand not!Dean turns around to face the SWAT team after obviously torturing some woman. THAT is a cold open.
I wanna know what that car is in the background. It’s pretty. Maybe a convertible Impala? They have similar grills. This is not at all important.
Also, I love that with these higher definition versions of the episodes you can see that Sam’s email is lawboy and whatever dot com and that people in the fandom have started calling him Law Boy. It’s hilarious.
DEAN: Well, what exactly do you tell ‘em? You know, about where you’ve been, what you’ve been doin’?
SAM: I tell ‘em I’m on a road trip with my big brother. I tell ‘em I needed some time off after Jess.
DEAN: Oh, so you lie to ‘em.
SAM: No. I just don’t tell ‘em….everything.
DEAN: Yeah, that’s called lying. I mean, hey, man, I get it, tellin’ the truth is far worse.
SAM: So, what am I supposed to do, just cut everybody out of my life? (DEAN shrugs.) You’re serious?
DEAN: Look, it sucks, but in a job like this, you can’t get close to people, period.
Aaaaand now I have Dean and Cassie feelings again and we haven’t even gotten to her episode yet.
SAM: No, man, I know Zack. He’s no killer.
DEAN: Well, maybe you know Zack as well as he knows you.
Aaaaaand now I have Dean and Lee feelings and we’re nowhere near Lee’s episode in season 15.
YOU JUST BLEW THROUGH A STOP SIGN DEAN WTF.
Little Becky. Oi with the reusing of names.
Of course Sam made friends with a bunch of rich kids while he was at college in a desperate attempt to try to be normal.
SAM: You know, maybe we could see the crime scene. Zack’s house.
REBECCA: Why? I mean, what could you do?
SAM: Well, me, not much. But Dean’s a cop. (DEAN laughs.)
DEAN: Detective, actually.
I love that Dean was like “how dare you call me that.”
Okay, after a bit of research, I totally want to take a day trip to Bisbee, Arizona, but it’s already in the 90s here in the desert and it’s not even May so that trip is going to have to wait until… winter or something. There is no way in hell I’m going deeper into the desert when the weather gets hotter.
It’s a historic mining town tourist trap looking place now which is exactly the kind of shit I love.
SAM: Bec, look, I know Zack didn’t do this. Now, we have to find a way to prove that he’s innocent.
I mean, not technically, technically you would 1) NOT FUCK WITH A MURDER INVESTIGATION YOU’RE NOT LEGALLY INVOLVED IN BECAUSE ANYTHING YOU FIND WOULD BE INADMISSABLE IN COURT 2) find evidence to provide a reasonable doubt for the jury that he did commit the crime. You know, like a lawyer would need to do, Law Boy.
DEAN: I just don’t think this is our kind of problem.
When I made my husband watch this show with me (he’s seen it all at least once now over the years) this is the recurring thing that drove him crazy.
You guys can’t even go in through the back door? Or shut the front door behind you? Really?
REBECCA: (tearfully) Well, there’s no sign of a break-in. They say that Emily let her attacker in.
Yeah, that doesn’t even really mean that she knew her attacker. Just that it was someone she let her guard down around or got in some other way. See: The Son of Sam and Nightstalker, etc.
Love the pinup magnet on the fridge. I’d throw shade at that, but I have a pinup magnet on my fridge too so… pot kettle and all that.
Okay, both people in the next couple are gorgeous.
And oh wow those special effects changing eyes… wow.
This poor couple. I feel so bad for them in this episode.
How… how are the police gonna explain the way he was able to beat himself over the head with a bat??? I…
I love that 5:30 in the morning on TV is clearly like… 10 AM.
Okay, this is a really unrelated point, but the graffiti on the dumpster here reminds me of the Teen Wolf fandoms use of the name Void!Stiles when Stiles Stilinski was possessed by a Nogitsune… I just spent way too long digging through YouTube and my Tumblr tags from back when those episodes were airing looking for a few specific videos and couldn’t find them. The TL;DR reason I bring it up here is goofball, bi-coded main character guy getting possessed by an entity set on destroying the people he loves. SOUNDS LIKE THIS EPISODE AND A WHOLE LOT OF SPN RIGHT. I love that all these monster hunting shows call out to each other.
This scene haunts me years later and I don’t even WATCH Teen Wolf. I just watched the fandom on Tumblr collectively lose it’s shit then tripped down a Hale Pack fanfiction rabbit hole.
Back to Supernatural, a show that also treated its fan base, cast, and characters like garbage! Huzzah!
DEAN: Well, there’s another way to go—down. (They look down and notice a manhole.)
I’m gonna be mature and ignore the double entendre there…
But I love that Dean thinks of the world in 3D. Which sounds like a dumb statement to make, but this is honestly a good example of that in action.
SAM: I bet this runs right by Zack’s house, too.
Really Sam, sewers run by houses? SO WEIRD. I WOULD HAVE NEVER GUESSED.
DEAN: You know, I just had a sick thought. When the shapeshifter changes shape—maybe it sheds.
SAM: That is sick. (DEAN puts the bloody pile back on the ground.)
Guys, there is a WHOLE ASS EAR in that pile of yuck you’re looking at. I think it’s pretty safe to assume the shapeshifter indeed sheds its skin like a snake. A much… gooier snake.
Sam’s friend is rightfully pissed at him for fucking with the crime scene.
This is before the pearl gripped guns?! Wow. I never noticed that before.
Also, this whole episode gives me feelings.
Cool. Tumblr mobile ate a whole section of my notes on this when it crashed for NO APPARENT REASON. Love that.
It always boggles my mind that actors can trust the people they’re working with enough to let people “tie” ropes around their neck or put them in actually dangerous positions in a scene.
SHAPESHIFTER: He’s sure got issues with you. You got to go to college. He had to stay home. I mean, I had to stay home. With Dad. You don’t think I had dreams of my own? But Dad needed me. Where the hell were you?
SAM: Where is my brother? (The shapeshifter leans in close to SAM.)
SHAPESHIFTER: I am your brother. See, deep down, I’m just jealous. You got friends. You could have a life. Me? I know I’m a freak. And sooner or later, everybody’s gonna leave me. (He backs away.)
SAM: What are you talkin’ about?
SHAPESHIFTER: You left. Hell, I did everything Dad asked me to, and he ditched me, too. No explanation, nothin’, just poof. Left me with your sorry ass. But, still, this life? It’s not without its perks. (He laughs.) I meet the nicest people. Like little Becky. You know, Dean would bang her if he had the chance. Let’s see what happens. (He smiles and covers SAM with a sheet.)
This exchange is just… so much. So many feelings. And I will forever (unless we magically get a fix-it fic mini season someday…) be SO MAD that none of this got resolved in that pointless, trash heap of a finale.
REBECCA: Okay, so, this thing—it can make itself look like anybody?
SHAPESHIFTER: That’s right. (She chuckles.)
REBECCA: Well, what is it, like a genetic freak? (The shapeshifter laughs.)
SHAPESHIFTER: Maybe. Evolution is about mutation, right? So, maybe this thing was born human but was different. Hideous and hated. Until he learned to become someone else. (REBECCA looks around, uncomfortable. The shapeshifter’s eyes glint silver, and he smiles.)
It always amazes me how much of this show is a pile of accidental queer allegories parading around in an ill-fitting toxic masculinity suit.
Vulcan mind meld! I love nerd!Dean. Also, I’m rewatching Star Trek: TOS with my husband, because that is what my life amounts to these days, rewatching comfort TV and flailing over the bits I love.
This post does a better job than I can do of pairing up screen caps with the dialogue of this next scene. SIX EPISODES IN. They’re dumping all of this character depth SIX EPISODES IN. FUCK THIS SHOW FOR NOT EMBRACING ITSELF.
Okay, I love that he screams back in her face after he threw the phone. It’s not something to laugh at because the situation is horrifying, but I can’t help laughing at it every time.
AND THE WAY THEY CUT THESE SCENES. Going from him winding his hand back to backslap her directly to him dropping the chains on the table to show how hard he must have hit her without actually making the actors hit each other. Good job editing department!
I… don’t understand the shifter’s motivation for killing people. If he can take over people’s identities without killing them, why kill them? Is it just because he’s a homicidal, rapist piece of shit? Cause that’s all it seems like.
How did the SWAT team even know she was being attacked? Why can the snipers aim no better than Storm Troopers?
Ugh, these kind of transformation body horror scenes are exactly why werewolf stories have never really appealed to me much. Like, I could do without watching your ribs move and teeth fall out, dude.
I looked up the song that’s playing over shapeshifter!Dean being caught by the SWAT team and then going through the grotesque transformation. (And as far as I know, the iTunes version has the original music from the episodes.)
It’s a song called “Mary” by The Death Riders
Who's your mother, who's your mother here boy // Who's your mother, whos your mommy dear // Who's your father, who's your father here boy // Who's your father, who's your daddy dear
Silently screaming // Where everyone knows // Daddy's always watchin' // Where everywhere - everywhere I go
I don't wanna be a freak show pretty boy anymore // I don't wanna be a full time slave // I don't wanna be your midnight cowboy anymore // I just want to be Mary
This is… a fascinating choice. Here are the rest of the lyrics. The song as a whole has a weird incesty kinda vibe to it? Kinda like when SPN tries to straight-wash itself and misses the mark wildly. (Like Dean’s male siren episode.)
The midnight cowboy line reminded me of 12x11 and the bull riding scene with “Broomstick Cowboy” by Bobby Goldsboro playing over it
Dream on, little Broomstick Cowboy, // Dream while you can; // Of big green frogs, // And puppy dogs, // And castles in the sand.
For, all too soon you'll awaken; // Your toys will all be gone. // Your broomstick horse will ride away, // To find another home. // And you'll have grown into a man, // With cowboys of your own. // And then you'll have to go to war, // To try and save your home.
And then you'll have to learn to hate; // You'll have to learn to kill. // It's always been that way, my son; // I guess it always will.
Because, you know, why not add tons of feelings into the lyrics, right?
Props to the people who can embrace their rewatches and reclamations of the show with ease. Because every episode seems to remind me of how hollow and tragic Dean’s ending was and I just… struggle all over again.
Anyway, back to the episode so I can move on with my day.
REPORTER: An anonymous tip led police to a home in the Central West End, where a S.W.A.T team discovered a local woman bound and gagged. Her attacker, a white male, approximately twenty-four to thirty years of age, was discovered hiding in her home. (A sketch of DEAN appears on the screen.)
DEAN: Man! That’s not even a good picture. (SAM looks around cautiously.)
SAM: It’s good enough. (He walks away.)
DEAN: Man! (He follows SAM.)
(CUT TO: Alley. DEAN and SAM are walking. DEAN steps into a puddle.)
I love that we get two tiny little back-to-back vanity moments for Dean here. One commenting on the sketch artist rendition of him being broadcasted on the news and the other tripping in the puddle. There is literally someone running around the city trying to kill people while wearing Dean’s face, but Dean is still concerned with how he looks appears to others. He’s still concerned with keeping up his own performance. The shifter left him with just a t-shirt, so he doesn’t even have his usual comfort layers on and at any moment someone could spot him and call the police or try to kill him for assaulting Sam’s friend. His life is wildly out of control in that moment and the only thing he can try to focus on is his appearance (something semi-controllable) and finding the shifter before any of that other shit can happen.
One day I want to put together a like top 10 episodes focusing on / explaining each TFW character from the series. Like the kind of list you could show someone who’s never seen the show, but has OPINIONS about the characters (or who hasn’t seen the whole show and seen the growth they went through… you know, like the people responsible for the travesty of 15x20). This episode would be on that list. I’m not sure how I could manage to make a list of only 10 episodes to understand Dean Winchester by, but eh.
SAM: What are you gonna do to me?
SHAPESHIFTER: Oh, I’m not gonna do anything. Dean will, though.
SAM: They’ll never catch him.
SHAPESHIFTER: Oh, doesn’t matter. Murder in the first of his own brother? He’ll be hunted the rest of his life. (He picks up a sharp knife and examines it.)
Speaking of season 15 in general, this right here. This was Chuck’s villain story arc thesis statement. AND THEY DROPPED THE GODDAMN BALL WITH IT. I think that’s the thing that honestly pisses me off the most these days (about 5 1/2 months from when the finale aired) is that they tried making the whole thing a tragedy but did such an awful job with it that it just ended up like a deflating condom balloon at a dive bar concert. Disappointing and gross. The finale for season 14 set them up SO FUCKING WELL and it just… didn’t get there.
Becky’s parents are gonna be pissed at how torn up their house is after all this shit…
And you’re not shooting him when you first see him strangling Sam because…?????
I like that he took the necklace back. Also, is this kinda Dean death number .5 of the show? Like it wasn’t him but it was also kinda him. Eh.
At least they left the windshield on Baby this time. Reflections are better than tearing her apart.
