Directed by Mike Rohl
Written by Cathryn Humphris

One of the most extraordinary things about the truncated Season 3 is that there isn’t a hurry-up-we’re-running-out-of-time vibe. In many ways, the shorter length intensifies the conflict so much it’s a nearly unbearable presence in every episode. The resistance on Dean’s part to invest even just a little bit in his own future – in his own life – is the REAL conflict of the season. The PLOT may be “let’s get Dean out of the deal” but that’s not the conflict.

In the triptych of episodes “Bedtime Stories,” “Red Sky at Morning” and “Fresh Blood” (leading up to the catharsis that is “A Very Supernatural Christmas,”) the show hammers away at this conflict, coming at it from different angles, highlighting Sam’s isolation, Dean’s self-destructive Burlesque (no other word for it: he rubs Sam’s nose in it), and Sam’s desperation to get Dean to at LEAST admit he’s scared.

“A Very Supernatural Christmas” wouldn’t be the catharsis it is without all of the episodes leading up to it, where Dean sashays around courting death and Sam loses his patience. It’s perfectly constructed.

Arc-Building, The Importance of the Entelechy

There is enormous patience on display on the part of showrunner/writers/everyone in exploring this arc. This was what was so devastating about the lack of ANY exploration of Mary returning – because when you draw it out, like they do here, like they did with Soulless Sam, etc. – you get so many opportunities to explore all the underlying relationship issues in the show. The writing team acts as if they have all the time in the world in Season 3. They make us WAIT for the moment when Dean finally admits he doesn’t want to die. We’ve known it from episode 1, when he was busy having a threesome and pretending everything was okay. We knew it the second he got a glimpse of Ben exclaiming “AC/DC rules”! First two episodes of the season and it’s obvious. But Dean is so slow to acknowledge it, so slow to share with Sam, that the show becomes a Sibling Relationship Melodrama, and that’s really the heart of the show anyway. Monsters are okay but if we’re not exploring THAT then what the hell are we all doing here?

The entelechy is present from the start. (This is one of my issues with the recent seasons. There is no entelechy at all. And this, my friends, is the showrunner’s job. Establishing an Entelechy is in the Job Description.)

I did a quick search to see if I had discussed the concept of the entelechy in my Supernatural writings and found a couple of references, mostly early on, in an opening salvo called Thoughts on TV Pilots, including the Supernatural Pilot: What Works, Story Arcs, Starting Out Confidently, Working Blind. TV pilots are all about establishing an entelechy. The really great ones move forward – episode by episode – fulfilling the promise. (If you watch The Sopranos pilot and the final episode, back to back, it’s the clearest example I can think of.) Ellen Burstyn used the concept of entelechy in the acting workshop I took with her – it was my introduction to the concept, which she laid out very simply: “The entelechy of an acorn is a giant oak.”

The entelechy of Dean in the pilot is Dean strapped over Hell’s abyss. Or Dean staring at Castiel striding towards him in that crazy barn. The entelechy of Sam in the pilot is him falling backwards into the Pit. Or him sucking blood out of Ruby’s arm. These are rich rich characters, and Kripke established them with potential to grow and develop, acorns with the space to become oaks.

Most of Dean’s “revelations” in Season 3 are private; he doggedly hides them from Sam and – in some cases – from us. He feels he’s got to be strong for Sam, but its manifestation in Season 3 is fascinating and infuriating. Instead of reassuring Sam “You’ll be okay” or “Let’s do what we have to do to make this right, okay, Sammy?” he shuts Sam out. It is anathema to Dean to prioritize himself, and when Sam expresses worry, Dean puts up a fortress of unconcern – and this is done AT Sam. It’s aggressive. He gets a look on his face I call “Dean’s Season 3 Look.” I’ll get into that. It’s a look designed to not only shut Sam out but to call into question Sam’s version of reality. It’s gaslighting. Sam is grieving about Dean’s impending death, and Dean looks at him with the “Season 3 Look”, and there is literally no way INto Dean with that look – and this is startling, this is different, considering Dean’s penetrability. In shutting Sam out, Dean shuts out everything. (Loving is easy. Dean does it naturally. It often happens instantly. But BEING loved is another matter altogether.)

Let’s break down the Trajectory of the Dean-Sam conflict:

First up, there’s The Magnificent Seven (recap here), starting with Dean’s sex romp and ending with what I called “the scene beneath the scene,” a confrontation between Sam and Dean. This is where “Dean’s Season 3 Look” shows up for the first time.

“The Kids Are All Right” (recap here) introduce Lisa and Ben into the mix, hinting at a possible alternate future and speculation that Dean has actually fathered a child. Through this, he confronts his lack of a “legacy”. It is really important that Dean’s softness and openness to Lisa and Ben takes place without Sam present. This will be a Season 3 theme.

“Bad Day at Black Rock” (recap here) starts mid-argument (just like “Bedtime Stories” does, just like “Red Sky at Morning” does – it’s been one long dreary argument.) Tangent: This is my main issue with the Bunker. They’re too comfortable there. Now episodes start with Dean and Sam having breakfast, while re-capping the plot for us: “Okay, so we’ve got Jack in the wind, we don’t know where Cas is, and Mom is gone …” All as they eat leftovers from the fridge. UGH. BURN THE BUNKER DOWN. The Impala – the privacy of the atmosphere but also the sense of speed, rootlessness – leads to an intensity of relationship I often miss now that the Bunker has become home base. In “Bad Day at Black Rock”, Sam’s bad-luck takes center stage, but still, we start OFF with the Demon-Deal arc: nobody in the audience is allowed to lose sight of the entelechy, you catch my drift?

The revelatory “Sin City” (recap here) is a nothing episode EXCEPT for the show-stopping scene between Dean and demon Casey, one of my favorites in the entire series. As with Dean’s conversation with Lisa at the end of “The Kids Are All Right,” Dean’s speaking-out of and vulnerability TO his situation only comes out when Sam is not there. This is strangely touching, the more I think about it.

“Bedtime Stories” features a big ol’ “Dean’s Season 3 Look” in the penultimate scene in the hospital followed by Dean’s The Searchers-esque solitary walk down the hallway, away from the grief-struck Sam. Whatever Dean shared with Lisa and Casey, he will NOT share with Sam. Sam then summons a crossroads demon, demands she let Dean out of his deal, and when she refuses, he kills her, using the newly-refurbished Colt. This is how desperate Sam has become.

“Red Sky at Morning” (which I am really looking forward to recapping – at the rate I’m going it’ll be in 2020) starts with a huge argument about the missing bullet in the Colt and Sam “disobeying” Dean’s orders to not go to a crossroads demon. Bela gloriously re-enters the story. Bela is very important. What is interesting about Bela is – without us knowing it yet – her quest over the season is exactly the same as Sam’s quest – and, implicitly, Dean’s too. She is trying to get out of a crossroads deal she made. So she’s Sam AND Dean. The sparks of hostility and lust between Dean and Bela come out of recognition – on both sides, although Dean doesn’t even KNOW he recognizes her – but he DOES. Dean continues to put on a happy-go-lucky face in “Red Sky”, suggesting a trip to Atlantic City. Sam has had it.

Please note how long Supernatural draws out the worry/anxiety about Dean. Please note how willing they are to let us get frustrated with him. It trips some fans’ motherly tendencies, they want to baby him, comfort him. That’s not my bag at all, BUT it’s a POWERFUL fan identification and investment for those who go that way. And for those who DON’T go that way, it’s a fascinating exploration of the tensions and contradictions fighting it out inside one human being.

“Fresh Blood” is a vampire episode, which – in Supernatural-ese – means sick, abusive and codependent families. In the opening scene, Dean offers himself as bait to a vampire, flaunting his recklessness for Sam. It’s all part of the “Dean Season 3 Look,” rubbing his brother’s nose in how much he DOESN’T care. (It’s awful. Talk about wanting to mother/baby/nurture. What about SAM in this scenario?) Gordon is the main player of the episode, but the conflict between Sam and Dean in the first scene continues through the whole episode, culminating with Sam killing Gordon in one of the grisliest murders in the series’ history. But it’s not over yet: “Fresh Blood” ends with a heart-breaker scene, showing the first crack in Dean’s armor (at least while Sam is in the room): he teaches Sam about the Impala. But it’s impossible to ignore that the moment is still once removed, because Dean is basically saying “I am going to die, nothing will stop it, and so you need to know how to fix the Impala.”

This scene pours into “A Very Supernatural Christmas”: we’ve been primed by the Impala scene. Dean’s nostalgia – for a Christmas they never had – takes over the episode, and Sam’s resistance to the whole thing is so fascinating (this will come into play again in “Dark Side of the Moon”). Now Dean wants to open up and bond. Sam’s not having it. Interspersed with flashbacks to a lonely Christmas the boys spent locked up in a motel room, the episode provides context to Dean’s protective worry over Sam, and also shows how tragic Dean’s nostalgia really is. He pretends it’s one thing (“remember the fun we had at Christmas?”) for almost the entire episode – and finally reveals it’s coming from somewhere deeper (“this is probably the last holiday we’ll be together”). This is the start of him mourning himself. FINALLY. But still. BUT STILL, PEOPLE: what Dean doesn’t say is, “Okay, Sammy, I want to live, let’s figure it out.”

“Malleus Maleficarum” represents a step backwards in the progress they’ve made. Sometimes vulnerability – like what emerged in “A Very Supernatural Christmas” – is followed by a retreat. The vulnerability of “Christmas” is certainly not sustainable, not for these tormented two (nor would it be dramatically interesting). “Malleus” feels a bit like “filler” but there’s an interesting aspect to it: Sam suggests they kill the witches and Dean is shocked. The witches are human. Sam’s heartlessness/coldness – the concern that he came back from death “different” – raises its pesky head. Sam is trying to prepare for the inevitable: he will be left alone, and he had better toughen up, be more like Dean. But Dean experiences this as a shocking betrayal. This is so realistic! So codependent!

Finally, FINALLY, we get to episode 10, in my Top 5 in the whole series, “Dream a Little Dream of Me”, where Dean finally opens up to Sam and tells him he’s scared and wants to live.

The conflict percolates, retreats, is pushed back for episodes upon episodes. We must sweat it out. They make us WAIT for Dean’s confession to Sam. When you’re forced to wait for something, the payoff is better.

Fairy Tales: Children In Peril

This is Mike Rohl’s third episode, and he directs with humor and aplomb. There are multiple settings, each of which require a non-generic environment (except for the hospital, and even there he puts a fairy-tale “spin” on it). “Bedtime Stories” has a lot of fun with its initial idea: Grimms Brothers fairy tales come to life. Casting this must have been so much fun!

The metaphor itself is a really strong one, especially since it’s not really underlined, except for one moment with the “Little Pig” in the hospital. Sam and Dean do not make explicit verbal connections with the “metaphor” of the case, and it’s there for us to meditate upon. Fairy tales are often about children in peril. And more than that, they’re about SIBLINGS in peril. Children against monsters. Children threatened with death, separation from parents, from safety, or – even scarier – children being done wrong by their parents (or stepparents). We see all this play out in the episode – poor Cinderella chained up in the kitchen, poor Snow White dropping the apple at Dean’s feet, Hansel and Gretel (siblings in the original – now a couple – which is more interesting the more you think about it), Little Red Riding Hood realizing her beloved grandmother is a … huge scary man who abducts her and has clawed her face by the time Dean shows up (we don’t see that violence, but it happened). Sam and Dean are the saviors of children, but on a subtextual level, THEY are those children in peril, THEY are those siblings lost in the woods, threatened on every side, betrayed by the adults who were supposed to care for them. The mood of the episode is light, airy, fun, even with its horror. But underneath, you can’t get away from the fact that Sam and Dean WERE children in a fairy tale growing up, and as men they are doing the best they can but they are DEEPLY marked by that trauma.

Teaser

The sign outside the construction site says ONCE UPON A TIME, and it’s like the first page flipping over in a book.

The “Three Little Pigs” are construction-worker brothers (so funny), and played by Chris Cochrane, Michael Coleman, and Malcolm Scott (who played The Cook in Sucker Punch – which I wrote about, indepth, for Oscilloscope. That piece was about 6 years in the making.) As the episode starts, they are in the thick of an argument you sense they’ve had a million times. Only siblings yell at each other about the same damn thing over and over again and still remain in each other’s lives. Which leads to …

1st scene

First, we see a huge green bullfrog, gleaming in the middle of the dark road.

And then the Impala roars by, splashing the frog with water. This is another “opening the fairy tale book” moment. A little “flourish,” a little “something extra,” which gives the episode its stylistic panache. These are directorial choices. Each episode has its own mood, its own vibe. What works for one wouldn’t work for another. The flattening out of all this is one of the catastrophes of the show in recent seasons. But this honking bullfrog having to leap out of the way of the Impala is a whimsical and thematically-consistent detail, putting us in the right mood.

Mirroring the Three Little Pigs, Dean and Sam are arguing when we join up with them. It’s a hell of an argument, and it’s so huge you know it’s been building for weeks. Dean is being more obnoxious than usual (I say with love), pulling out the “Because I said so” and “I’m older.” There’s so much that’s wrong with this, and so much in his treatment of Sam – for the entire season – has been so painful to watch. I can’t imagine one of my siblings literally shrugging in my face or getting pissed off if I showed concern that they were about to die. Not to mention trying to completely remove Sam’s sense of agency.

As always with these nighttime Impala scenes, there’s so much beauty, their gorgeous faces in the same frame, focus switches back and forth – fluid and easy, taking us through the conversation, with blurry lights zooming by … and the fact that the show doesn’t really feature these scenes anymore is a catastrophe. Of epic proportions.

There are some complexities at work here, stuff which will play out as we move forward.

1. Sam working with Ruby. This is a long LONG arc, and once we know what she’s really been up to all along, the effects are devastating. We’re still in the beginning stages, but you can’t help but think about it, and think how “helpful” she’s being and what that really means.

2. Dean’s long talk with Casey the demon about Hell, which, as far as we know, he hasn’t shared with Sam. She speaks of Lucifer. Lucifer wasn’t a concept that existed on the show until Casey said it. It’s all been about Yellow-Eyes. And Crowley will come up – unnamed – in the final scene with the crossroads demon. Someone is directing these crossroads demon, giving them orders. This is our first glimpse.

3. In connection with 2: the conversation Dean had with Casey freaked him out. Badly. But he can’t deal with his own fear, so he roars against it, or burlesques his way into bed with some tootsie. Sam will call him on this in the great scene in the motel in “Fresh Blood.” If you watch Ackles’ work in this scene, he’s being so loud, so … John Winchester-y … it took me some time to dig in and look at what Ackles is really playing. And he’s not playing anger. Not really. Dean’s anger doesn’t usually look like this. Ackles is playing fear. He’s such a smart actor.

Great choice from Rohl and Serge Ladouceur: Right after Sam yells the ultimate insult, “You’re not Dad!” we get a huge side closeup of Dean, looking over at Sam, and at the same moment the screen floods to red. (Not sure what angle another car’s taillights would have to be at to get this effect – zooming right towards the Impala? In reverse? – but never mind.)

This is a perfect example of what the show did so well at its best. Its visuals were connected to emotions/themes/moods. They were not afraid to be dramatic. This is cinematic filmmaking – or, if you like, “prestige TV” filmmaking. Supernatural was never perceived as a “prestige” show but that’s just because it didn’t get the press or the audience that it would have if it had been on HBO or whatever.

The flood of red works on multiple levels. I know I’m all about “multiple levels.” Sometimes I do a “find and replace” on those two words to try to cut some of them out. But it’s part of the appeal of the show for me!

One level is the red is reflective of the flush of anger and hurt that comes at being compared to John. But the next level is deeper, less conscious. The flames of Hell. They’re already there, they’re IN the scene already, flickering in his mind’s eye. Sam sees it. Dean refuses to acknowledge it. But there it is. Visualized in that flood of red light. Gorgeous.

When Dean forcibly changes the subject, he’s not angry. What’s in his energy is panic, upset, the freakout inside bubbling up to the surface. When he asks Sam to tell him about their next case, he’s not just ordering Sam to keep focused on the job. That’s not the tone I hear. The tone I hear is … begging. Please change the subject. I’m so freaked out. Come on. Please. I need to work. All the things he can’t say.

This is the subtle nuances he always finds in almost every moment.

One word on Sam. Well, more than one word.

I love him always but there’s something about him in “Bedtime Stories” that gets my motor running and I’ll try to explain what it is. In the opening scene, he’s had it up to HERE with Dean. Once they start working the case, that dissipates and he loses himself in his work. When he says to Dean in the old lady’s cottage, “Actually … I have a theory” … and it turns out he basically has a Ph.D in fairy tale lore … It’s so attractive! He has a head full of knowledge, much of which he will never use. He probably studies lore in his spare time, just in case it will come in handy some day. Also, he is a literate and curious man. He has looked around the landscape of horrors, and has thought, “Huh … these stories all have a familiar ring …” He withstands Dean’s teasing (the “Could you BE more gay” comment is clearly from the Mesozoic era – they’d never throw a line like that in now, and it’s a good thing – although Jensen’s line reading is very funny). And as the episode goes on, he gets stronger and stronger. Dean is more all over the place, and looking to Sam for his larger base of knowledge. Sam is not charge-ahead-active here. He is deeply thoughtful. You can SEE his brain working.

“Bedtime Stories” plays around with Dean = Brawn and Sam = Brains, which of course isn’t totally true, but it’s enough true that they play out those roles, almost unconsciously: Dean gets the shit kicked out of him by the Big Bad Wolf, and Sam turns into Family Grief Therapist – and he does an incredible job. He is FIRM with the doctor, but never contemptuous. He is patient, and yet always firm:, he’s like a rock (with a sorrowful face): I’m sorry but it’s true. Here’s what you need to do. I know it’s hard. But you have to blah blah blah.”

Sam, who is so worried about Dean, so frustrated with Dean, ends up being so COMPLETE as a man in “Bedtime Stories.” Dean is the Bossypants but this is Sam’s episode, from the second he shares his theory. It’s subtle, but the point of view is always Sam’s here (except for the one scene where we see Dean getting beaten up, and even there, Sam’s side of the scene is prioritized). We aren’t “let in” to Dean’s experience the way we were in “Sin City” or “The Kids Are All Right.” I don’t think it’s a coincidence, then, that Sam is so beautifully confident here, following his instincts (and brain), owning his power, his larger knowledge-base, his lack of embarrassment at knowing about Cinderella … He’s sexy as hell.

2nd scene

Detectives Plant and Page. Subtle. I love when they move in unison. Also they’re both filmed like they’re 10 feet tall.

Mixing it up a bit, the “pig” doesn’t say “I already talked to the cops.” Instead he says, “I’ve been expecting you. You’re the sketch artist, right?” which allows for some nice schtick where Dean throws Sam under the bus. Because he’s older. And then he ruins it, as he so often does, by going too far and making a joke which sounds sexual about “the things he can do with a pen.” He’s so awkward! He brings sex into inappropriate contexts all the time and I never get sick of it. And everyone looks at him like, “Ew.”

The torment this guy feels – over losing his brothers – is highlighted, underlined by his line readings and the hint of music underneath. It may be a joke that he’s one of the Three Little Pigs, but his pain is real, and his slight frustration at these two boobs showing up – one who makes a sexual comment about the other’s drawing abilities, and the supposed artist drawing a wacky cartoon instead of a sketch – seems real.

They ask question after question about “animal eyes” and teeth and fingernails and it just seems to Pig that these guys aren’t really on top of their game, and this is a huge traumatic event in his life and would they please just shut it? It points up that this is a man who has two brothers, brothers who are now dead. The connections with Sam’s experience (and all those big closeups of his beautiful listening face) is quite clear.

The moment is intense. Sam is very upset. Dean, looking very short, is upset too, but it’s also almost like he’s embarrassed that he’s going to die, and that’s a big part of this. He’s the one who made the dumb deal. John Winchester taught them tough truths, you make a mistake you live with the consequences. You make a mistake you die. Dean’s not worth fighting for. And the idea that Sam will be sad, as sad as “Pig” is in the bed, is unbearable. He’s embarrassed. It’s a very intense moment, and in the closeup shot of Dean that follows, he looks … exhausted. And freckled. And shadows-under-eyes. And glamorous.

Dean bounces back though, excited to be able to provide “Wyle E. Coyote” in answer to one of the Pig’s questions, and again, Dean makes things so awkward, giving the Pig a little wink and thumbs up, proud of identifying the cartoon. Dean, his brothers were just killed! This isn’t Trivia Night!

We meet Dr. Garrison (Christopher Cousins), a nice metaphoric name there. Right out of a storybook where people are named for their qualities. Right out of Southpark too. Those multiple levels again.

Humorous button to the scene, which is all part of Sam’s devastating charm: the Little Pig asks to see the sketch, and Sam, who has drawn an Abominable Snowman with a tattoo, is busted, almost frightened, and says “Yeah” twice, the second one with a little eye-close (a “tell”) and shrug like, “Of course, why WOULDN’T I show you this cartoon, what a silly question” and it’s details like this that give me oxygen to make it through the day.

Talk about “sketch”. Sam and Dean both seem so sketchy!

3rd scene

Huge foreground shot of that honking bullfrog again, before the camera focuses in on Sam and Dean walking toward the camera. They’re seen from far away. I love it when they do this, because it makes them out in the world, they are walking around out in OUR world, with people walking by, things interfering our sight of them, we glimpse them from afar. I love it. They don’t choose to do this very often. Difficulties with location shoots? Closing down parks for half the day? Whatever the case, they look gorgeous in their suits strolling toward us. Being beckoned down a path by a bullfrog, although they don’t know it.

Even Sam admitting “I got nothin'” is sexy.

I would like my “Bedtime Story” to involve Sam.

Ackles and Padalecki carry these exposition information-dump scenes on their charisma and relationship. They get the job done, but they give it an improvisational behavioral spin that makes it extremely watchable. This happens time and time again – and even more than the big emotional scenes, it’s these small “filler” scenes – so essential to getting information out – that make up the texture of the show’s success. You do a show like this, you have to deal with constant information dumps. How to make it interesting? How to do it without losing momentum? (You want to see a real master class in this, watch The X-Files. Those two characters were much more verbose and articulate than Sam and Dean. They talked, in this daunting language, and because of how they were filmed – because of the pleasure of looking at them – because of the tension in their performances, you couldn’t look away, even if they were just re-capping what they just learned.)

4th scene

Speaking of location shoots: A+ on the locations in “Bedtime Stories”. I will go into excruciating detail about my love of Cinderella’s house – that is ONE. WEIRD. HOUSE – was that planned?? Or did they just FIND a house with all this crazy decor inside? Or … did Jerry Wanek say, “I have a warehouse of weird shit, let’s just use IT ALL in this house”? You only see it in passing. It’s not there to be looked at. It’s pure background.

But this location:

It’s perfect. Look at how they’ve tricked it out, down to smoke coming out of the chimney.

The setup here is slightly different from the actual Hansel and Gretel, a story which absolutely terrified me as a child. Look at some of the illustrations for this story over the 200 years or whatever of its existence. This is some psychotic shit.

Patrick Gilmore and Kimberley Warnat play “Ken” and “Julie”, the Hansel and Gretel roles, although now they are not brother and sister, but an exhausted bickering couple. They’re not dropped off into the woods by their parents, with a “Good luck out there, kids. Hope you make it.” They are on a hike and they are lost. He refuses to admit they are lost and she is exasperated. They both look the part: milk-fed healthy Americans. A perfect meal for the grisly little old lady who comes out of the cottage, complete with crooked walking stick.

There are some nice details, like the zoom-in to the pie on the windowsill, the small bickering moments between the couple, the way “Hansel” slowly realizes something is wrong with them. Also that “Gretel’s” alarm bells go off about going inside. Because she is a woman and she knows instinctively not to trust people. She is overridden by “Hansel,” who is a man, and therefore somewhat dumb about keeping himself safe. Women know threats are everywhere. They rearrange their whole lives on avoiding POTENTIAL threats. I always have my keys out and ready when I get to my front door or my car. I don’t even think about it.

And even though you don’t see the knife plunging into him over and over again, isn’t her stabbing of him just awful? It’s pretty out there. (One of the great things about Supernatural is that it gives actresses like Maxine Miller – whose first credit on IMDB is in 1954 – “The Howdy Doody Show” – who was a regular on Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood – Nurse Miller! – a chance to play a psycho killer. She has a lot of fun with it.

5th scene

I have one thing to say about the opening moments in the following scene at the hospital:

LEGS.

There’s a fluidity to the camera work here, and Rohl makes some bold choices where he breaks the 180-degree line, repeatedly, which you’re “not supposed to do”, although directors of course do it all the time and sometimes to great terrifying effect. The scene in the washroom in The Shining is probably the most famous example of breaking the 180-degree rule:

Stanley Kubrick is so brazen with it and the effect on an audience is: WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT! Mike Roh’ls is much subtler, but still, it’s a nice way to destabilize the mood in the scene. Sam and Dean walk in, two sheriffs walk in, Sam and Dean huddle together at the front desk, hiding themselves from The Law (this kind of subtle unspoken portrayal of the reality of their lives as hunters and outlaws, has also been lost in the intervening years) – and the camera keeps switching from one side of the room to the other – seeing Sam and Dean from one side, and then from the other side of the room. It triangulates them in the center. It’s quick and effective. No dialogue.

Dr. Garrison comforts Gretel, convincing her she needs to stay in the hospital for a little bit longer. His presence here is two-fold, one practical and one thematic. 1. He needs to be there so Sam and Dean can have an interaction with him. 2. It shows him being a good doctor and a kind man. This will be very important. Christopher Cousins does an excellent job with this guest-spot performance. His final scene is tremendous and I cry every time I watch it. This is an actor who knows the job, who has created a character, and sustains it throughout. He is always slightly suspicious of Sam and Dean, and it’s interesting, the more I watch it, the more I can see he is playing a man with a guilty conscience, he is playing a man who is literally being haunted – probably nightly – by the ghost of his dead daughter. He is not getting any sleep. He wonders if he is going mad. Somehow, these two giants in suits haunting his hospital disturb him, in ways he probably can’t describe. But it’s in Cousins’ performance.

Venetian-blinds shadows pepper so many of the scenes in Supernatural: it’s a good way to lower the lights and to give boring rooms (and potentially boring scenes) some visual texture.

Sam and Dean focus on her and yet their brains work a mile a minute. Dean is baffled. He keeps having reactions like “Wow … wait … what?” glancing at Sam. Sam, though … Sam is really really focused. The shots of them listening to her, all their eye contact with one another, their thinking and reacting …

Especially Sam.

He’s so … COMPLETED in the episode. I don’t know how else to say it. Even though he has so much going on, so many balls in the air, he’s REALLY good at what he does. With or without Dean. Dean is like, “Man, a little girl was at the cottage, what the hell, dude, right??” Sam’s boundaries are always more stable. He’s contained. He’s thinking something. He thinks he knows what might be going on.

6th scene

How on earth did the Impala make it up through that jungle?

Let’s take a minute to appreciate the perfect decor. Every jug carefully chosen. This is not generic set decoration.

Here is where Sam steps into his own, where Sam takes over the episode.

“I do have a theory. I’m thinkin’ about fairy tales.”

And I’m thinkin’ about riding you like a pony.

Sam continues to slay me by explaining the history of the Grimm Brothers franchise, how frightening those original stories were, how sanitized they became. He’s wearing a red checked shirt which looks soft and touchable. As he speaks, he shrugs on his Army-Navy jacket, and forget it, he is such a MAN. Dean, meanwhile, rolls his eyes like a teenager that he has to go to the library now.

I’ve often said Sam is the “Key” to the show. Dean is the scene-stealer and the emotional center. He creates conflict merely because of who he is in the world and his reactions to things (God love him). But when Sam changes … the whole show changes. He’s not just support staff to Dean. When Sam alters the dance step (see Season 9), the entire show tips off its axis. Dean can’t deal. The entire fabric of the series is threatened. This is why “why are planets round” is unforgivable. I can forgive a lot – and I have – but I cannot forgive THAT. Sam has been the biggest casualty in the New Order. Without Sam being the “Key”, its main instigator and agent-of-change – the whole show suffers.

7th scene

This is a superb walk-and-talk, done in one shot. There are three separate lighting schemes the guys have to walk through. Do you know how challenging this is to do in one? To get your light meters right, so the screen isn’t bleached out, or too dark to see? Dean emerges from the library, Sam waits (he’s been a busy boy himself), and as Dean gives him a re-cap, they walk across the street – out of the tree shadows – into a blinding sun making the road behind them a sea of light, haloing their hair – and then they walk into the park, where they disappear into the tree shadows again, misty shafts of light coming down through the branches. It’s magical!

The men walk through the park. (Legs.) The light looks mystical: they’re underneath the lush green canopy, but beyond, the sunlight is shining, creating a background of light. So it’s like they’re backlit, hidden in a secret grove. Light pours through the trees.

It’s hard to control what things look like in broad daylight.

Like this, with the slanted angle water foundtain in the foreground? And the two of them bathed in light with a dark leafy far background? It’s so beautiful.

Meanwhile, Sam regales Dean with the story of Lilian Bailey, a trance medium. I Googled her and came up with this crazy story in The Daily Mail (redundant?): The night a bogus medium conned the Queen into trying to contact her beloved father. This occurred in 1953. The Daily Mail paints her as a kind of Rasputin character, bamboozling her way into the Royal Family.

In his research, Sam tripped over Bailey, a medium controlled by spirits while in her trances. Because he’s sexy and smart and self-sufficient and on top of his “theory”, now he knows what he’s looking for.

Dean is skeptical until they come across a big gulping bullfrog at their feet, sitting in a pool of sunshine. The music-box theme starts up, as they stop dead in their tracks. Sam has a BLAZE of sunlit green behind his head, an incredible shot, as he comments, “Yeah. That’s totally normal.” I’ve fainted in a puddle on the floor.

Obviously, Dean is the comic relief in “Bedtime Stories”, used as a foil for Sam’s serious and scholarly competence. It’s Burlesque, but maybe some of it comes out of the residue of panic at how much little time he has left. But a lot of it is just Dean’s sensibility, his sense of humor, his awkwardness.

Take this moment:

He stares down at the frog for a while, a suspicious look on his face. He seems … personally affronted by the frog’s presence, as though the frog WANTS something from him. Personally. Just by sitting there at his feet. Dean says, emphatically, “I tell you one thing, there’s no way I’m kissing a damn frog.”

No one said you had to, Dean. No one said you were going to have to kiss the frog. It hasn’t even been implied. Don’t make this about YOU. (I am laughing as I type this.)

Besides, in “The Frog Prince” it’s a a spoiled bratty princess who “kisses the frog” (although in the original tale, she doesn’t kiss the frog at all. She throws him against the wall!! Good night, kiddos, sweet dreams!)

That’s Dean. That’s how Dean sees himself.

Dean’s lack of boundaries with the Frog (I can’t believe how much I’m talking about this) is really his identification with the Princess, i.e. the FEMME side of his personality, so much a part of him he’s not even aware of it, or aware that he puts that out into the world, it’s what EVERYONE gets from him, even 11-year-old clerks at a motel front desk. Even when his entire environment screams at him YOU’RE FEMME. YOU’RE ALSO BUTCH. he doesn’t quite get it.

Case in point.

Only Dean would look at a frog and feel sexually threatened. It’s a comedic moment, but it’s all about Dean’s dissolving boundaries: no matter how hard he tries he can’t keep his boundaries in place. Sam’s boundaries are secure (except for, oh yeah, demon blood and Ruby). Normally, he and Dean are codependent but in “Bedtime Stories” they’re not at all. Sam investigates the case and Dean gets lost in a vision of being sexually assaulted by a frog and I’m falling off my chair laughing.

Dean is both Hero and Damsel in Distress. I have talked about this constantly, from my very first essay about this show.

Sam, though, moves on, having seen the pumpkin across the park, with mice running around it. He’s not even paying attention to Dean, which adds to the humor of it. Sam is the Older Brother in “Bedtime Stories”, a nice conflict with their initial argument where Dean asserts his primacy merely because he’s the older brother.

Lastly: 80% of my friends are gay and none of them are experts on fairy tales. Being an expert on fairy tales is not what I would consider a stereotypically gay male thing. Being able to recreate Judy Garland’s every gesture in Meet Me in St. Louis, okay, I’ll give you that. My 4-year-old niece is an expert on fairy tales, so the “gay” insult is saying “You sound like a little girl” which – “gay” = “little girl” is bad no matter which way you slice it. I’d rather him just say “What are you, a 4 year old girl?” It’s funnier, first of all, especially since Sam is so huge.

8th scene

They follow the sign of the pumpkin and mice and break into the house. And WHAT a house.

I MUST discuss the decor of this insane house. They put so much crazy shit into this house. Every single corner of the frame is filled with something WACK.

First up: super creepy wreath. I’m pretty sure “meadow sweet” is involved.

Next up: old-timey telephone on the wall, with some indistinct and vaguely frightening photo on the wall above. Either these people are antique dealers, hoarders, or they are lost in a time warp.

Okay, this is one of my favorite rando background shots. The hats, first of all. AND the long red scarf, draping over the mirror. What does it mean? What is its function??

In a shot from another angle, you see a coat rack by the front door, weighted down by more hats.

A lace curtain seems to have been hung to separate two rooms or to drape over a glass cabinet but … look at it. What is going on.

For an angle we only see for 2 seconds, that’s a hell of a lot of detail. Books and papers shoved everywhere, tacked up on the wall too. Either that is a dead plant on the counter or it’s some kind of noodle dish gone horribly wrong. There are jars of things everywhere. Not in the “creepy things in jars” mode but in this house I wouldn’t be too sure. Above the lightswitch appears to be … an old-fashioned doorbell apparatus? I see multiple flashlights. Nothing looks right. This house is deeply wrong.

Oh my God, check out
1. that terrifying Urn, big enough to carry the ashes of an entire generation.
2. That horrifying photo on the wall that looks like one of the final photos of the Romanov family before they were gunned down in the basement in Yekaterinburg, with jewels sewn into their corsets. Or just your garden-variety tragic Victorian-era family. There’s another ghostly family photo on the other side of the door. WHAT is this HOUSE. and
3. the scary single rose in a tiny vase. Is it paper? Or is it real? Or was it picked in 1892 and stayed in full bloom all this time?

Wild guess, but that room behind Dean is probably Cinderella’s. Maid’s quarters with an iron bedstead. There are pictures on her walls too but – from what I can tell – they come from our modern world. It looks like she even has a poster up there, of a band or a movie. Good for you, girl.

Excuse me, but what the fuck is that statue behind Dean’s head?

Look at the doll on the stairs.

LOOK AT THE DOLL ON THE STAIRS.

Paired with the old-fashioned photos on the wall above, the lace fabric over the rail (leftover from that messy curtain-hanging in the other room?), that doll is some messed-up shit.

There’s more. There’s a glass cabinet filled with old books and strange little objects. There are plants everywhere. There are lamps with colored-glass shades. And you barely see any of it until you freeze-frame the moments and fall into the weirdness of it. Clearly I think it’s fantastic.

Is Victoria Duffield the most perfect modern-day Cinderella you’ve ever seen? My only wish is that she said something about “My prom is tonight …” Still. She’s perfect, a burnished-golden-beautiful young woman … chained to a stove.

Dean sees little Snow White (Ava Hughes) through the intervening space. Weird clutter in between us and her.

Dean’s “Who are you?” when he’s face to face with her has a great texture. He’s tentative because he doesn’t know what he’s dealing with (is she real?) but she’s a child, not a huge snarling beast … (or a harmless bullfrog), so he holds back. But also, he knows Sammy would probably instantly guess who this child was supposed to be in fairy tale land. And what the apple is all about.

9th scene

They got the perfect fairy-tale Vancouver weather for “Bedtime Stories.” Also: broody profile.

More Dean Burlesque, as he goes into a reverie about Snow White porn. Sam doesn’t even smile, or roll his eyes, or go “My God, Dean do you ever stop?” or any of the other normal sibling behavior he usually throws at Dean in these moments. His tolerance for Dean’s Burlesque (never very high) is at a low point. He’s also … strangely? maybe? … focused on the case. Sam is activated here in a way that feels unique. Maybe because Dean is flitting around making jokes, and it’s just more evidence of Dean’s lack of concern about his situation, but I think the case is touching on something very deep in Sam’s life, his psyche, his history. He’s not distract-able here. “Bedtime Stories” allows Sam to shine.

Snow White is one of the worst stories I’ve ever heard. It plays on every single fear a woman might have of helplessness, cruelty from other women, male objectification, of being DONE TO, of having zero agency. Of being asleep and having people look at you without your consent. Rapey as hell.

I will wake up screaming in the middle of the night just thinking about that.

10th scene

I love the casting of the nurse:

She could not be more appealing. And sympathetic and kind too. Her looks are soft and pretty. She is played by Tracy Spiridakos (this was her very first role and she has gone on to appear on many television series, often as a regular. It’s not hard to see why. She’s lovely.) Why I love this casting is it allows for a totally unspoken moment where Dean clearly has a moment of “Wow. Pretty pretty girl” but – for a change – doesn’t say anything.

Remember the scene with the nurse in “Salvation”? An equally pretty young woman, open to the aura of sexual possibility Dean carries, and Dean having to turn her down with great reluctance? There’s no potential on THIS nurse’s side of the fence, but I like Dean’s moment of appreciation. You don’t cast a woman who looks like this for no reason. It also adds texture because she looks like she’s from out of a picture book. Of course a nurse in Maple Springs would look like the Princess Bride.

11th scene

Nice cross-cutting: Dr. Garrison reads “Little Red Riding Hood” out loud, and then there’s a cut to Grandma (Mary Black) walking to a car with two paper bags full of groceries (ubiquitous and cliched roll of French bread peeking out of the top). Dr. Garrison continues reading the story in voiceover, describing the wolf eating the grandmother with great ferocity, all as a smiling Muscle Man (Aron Eastwood) swoops in to carry Grandma’s groceries. More perfect casting.

Closeup of Wyle E. Coyote tattoo as he punches her in the face over and over again. It’s horrible. You don’t see the blows landing and that makes it worse. Then they cut back to the hospital and you finally see Callie (Tracy Froese), Dr. Garrison’s comatose daughter, lying in bed, black hair spread out around her. She is a vision! And her peasant blouse! Such attention to detail.

Dr. Garrison whispers about “The Huntsman” taking a pair of scissors and cutting open the wolf’s belly. Which, of course, will come up later in Dean’s fight with the Wolf and it’s such a nice flip-flop – Dean goes from the Frog-Kissing Princess to the Hunstman in one episode. THAT’S Dean Winchester.

Dr. Garrison is less happy to see Sam and Dean with each encounter. Sam and Dean both heard the story he was reading to Callie, and they are putting together, silently, the image of the apple on the floor connected to Snow White connected to Coma Callie … and so there’s got to be an evil stepmother in the picture. Even Dean knows that, by now. It’s great that Mike Rohl/Cathryn Humphris didn’t include a scene where Sam and Dean discuss this: “Wait … Dr. Garrison has a daughter in a coma?” “Like Snow White, dude?” “And a poisoned apple? Did she have a stepmother?” “You don’t think the stepmother could have … do you?” We get to have the pleasure of watching the two of them thinking, communicating with one another without words. At one point, as they hear Dr. Garrison’s story, they think the same thing at the same time: Stepmother.

Another great detail is Sam thinking “Snow White poison apple” and Dean – although he’s been prepped by Sam to recognize the “bread crumbs through the forest” (BY THE WAY) – thinking “Sixth Sense Mischa Barton.” As always, Supernatural‘s scripts and direction leave time for pauses. Without those little pauses, you’d lose so much.

They walk, talking about Mischa Barton, Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy, and “deranged stories”, and they’ve put it together. Sam looks pleased, a proud light dawning on his face like “Yeah, yeah, we’re onto something now, I think we’ve figured it out” and with his red-checked shirt and peasoup-green jacket it is all too much!

When Bloody Grandma rollsin on a gurney …

… Sam and Dean’s spidey-sense go into overdrive. Sam maintains the status of expert, because Dean asks him, “What was the story he was just reading to her?”, and he knows Sam will be one step ahead of him. Sam is such such a LEADER, and – because this is Supernatural and it’s such a weird show – he’s a leader not because he’s big and strong, he’s a leader because he recognizes the details of “Little Red Riding Hood.” Dean Burlesques off to kill the Big Bad Wolf, and Sam is left standing in the hallway, watching Dean go, with a super intense and somewhat ambiguous look on his face.

His expression is kind of a show-stopper.

The show is great when it allows for ambiguity – mixed emotions – unclassifiable emotional experiences (like Dean getting drunk in the bunker kitchen looking at childhood photos while the real Mary is right upstairs.) Ambiguity brings with it power, impact, engagement, potential to disturb and delight and haunt.

Sam watching Dean walk away from him is echoed in the penultimate scene, when Dean strolls off with the “Season 3 Look” on his face, refusing further engagement, his back to Sam. Sam’s interior look of intensity and urgent thought here is unmistakable, and the urgency is not just about the case. No. It’s too big for that.

12th scene

Libby Osler is the perfect Little Red Riding Hood, making her way to the sidewalk with a huge smile on her face. She’s adorable! A happy innocent child. Mike Rohl did such a wonderful job with each of these little scenarios, finding actors and placing them in costumes/contexts where we immediately “get” who they are. He had fun with the concept.

Fairy tales are messed UP. But consider again: Sam and Dean as children, dealing with monsters every day, the possibility of abduction, being eaten, being clawed to death … it was the air they breathed. There’s some deep stuff going on in “Bedtime Stories”, deep unspoken stuff about terrifying stories told to children right before they go to bed, “deranged stories” as Dean calls them, stories which he and his brother have actually LIVED.

12th scene

As the finale unfolds, Dean gets the shit kicked out of him by the Big Bad Wolf (I always wonder: Where did Little Red Riding Hood go? Did she run out the door?), and Sam – with firmness and a beautiful undercurrent of gentleness – or maybe it’s the other way around – forces Dr. Garrison to “let go” of his daughter.

Understandably, Dr. Garrison reacts with rage at Sam’s suggestion that his daughter was poisoned by her stepmother, his wife. Cousins kills this scene. He’s legitimately upset, but (again with “multiple levels”) … on some level, he already knows. How could he not know? Something was wrong between his wife and his daughter. He probably tried to make the peace. He probably thought it would blow over. He made allowances, maybe he was so busy at his job he wasn’t fully aware of what was going on at home. But on some deep-down level: he KNOWS that what Sam says is true. This is why he fights back so hard: the truth is too terrible to contemplate.

Sam doesn’t have time to cushion it. He’s matter-of-fact, blurting it out. When the doctor slams the door in his face, Sam takes a moment. This is Sam at his best. When you can’t talk anymore, you’ve got to ACT. He’s a big man. He’s bigger than anyone else in any room. He knows what moving quickly and strongly means to other people, how scared they might be. He is aware of how he must come across, and so he does his best to project gentleness and concern (all of which is genuine). This is unlike Dean, who more often than not flails about, runs in swinging, loses his patience. Considering where we’re going in the Sam arc, and considering the final scene of the episode … Sam pausing before that closed door, taking a breath, gearing up for the confrontation to follow … is pretty striking. He is a force to be reckoned with.

The music swells up, connecting us to Dean’s side of the equation, breaking into Grandma’s house to fight the Big Bad Wolf. While the decor in this house is interesting (there’s a plate of cookies and two green apples on the coffee table), it can’t hold a candle to that Cinderella house. HOWEVER, I will point out that having interesting decor for different sets is part of what Supernatural does so well. (Or … did. I think the bunker, in general, has made them too complacent in terms of other sets.) You can tell a lot about people through their decor.

Grandma’s house looks like the set-up for the Campbell house, although this one is filled with dainty glass figurines, a pretty funny choice, considering the two GIGANTIC MEN who are going to be hurling themselves around in that room.

One of the things I really like – a detail meant to work on us subconsciously – is that outside Callie’s hotel room green leaves press up against the window, with sunlight pouring through.

It’s the same misty shafts of light in the park, a mystical magical look, the look of forests and glades, the landscape of fairy tales. It’s like Callie is in a forest glade, resting in her glass coffin.

Everything Padalecki does in this scene is right. Every line reading, every pause, every expression flitting across his face. He’s playing a lot, and he plays it all so simply it feels as natural as breathing. This is about owning your power, without having to throw your weight around. This is about being compassionate but firm. In this moment, Sam knows who he is. He is better at this part of it than Dean would be. Dean would make it through, of course, but this? What we see here in Sam is total freedom to be in the moment, to say the right thing, to be there for Dr. Garrison but to urge him to do the right thing. Sam’s not just “okay” without Dean beside him. He’s awesome. There’s a lot to unpack here, and it’s not all on the screen, or in the dialogue, this is just the accumulated context of the character. Sam has always been “competent.” It’s not a surprise he’ “rises to the occasion.” But somehow … because of where Sam is at in his Arc, and where he is at with Dean (the background-noise of their conflict and his anticipatory grief at being left alone), his strong firm confidence here, his certainty of knowing what to do and how to do it, is incredibly moving to me. “She’s angry. She’s desperate. Because no one will listen to her.” He’s her advocate. He’s her voice. He does it magnificently.

This is just great scene work in general. Padalecki is equally matched by Cousins.

After Callie passes, there’s a look on Sam’s face … he’s solemn, respectful, sorrowful. But … like I keep saying: there’s more going on here than the fairy-tale plot and Dr. Garrison’s grief. He’s so FULL. In every moment, he’s FULL. The entelechy of his Arc is IN HIM. It’s what gives him his intensity.

He just encouraged a father to let his daughter go, and he has very mixed feelings about “letting go.” He has experienced losing loved ones. But Mary’s death and Jess’ death were sudden, they were ripped from him. He has had almost a full year now getting ready to “let Dean go.” When is it time to say “Okay. I accept. I am letting you go”? Of course Dr. Garrison couldn’t have done it earlier. Callie is his DAUGHTER. She’s still alive, she still needs to be cared for. This connects to Sam’s experience. I could go on forever, and this is a testament to the richness of Padalecki’s performance.

13th scene

This may seem like a trifle, but everything means something (and even if there was no intent on the part of the creator, once it’s out there in the world, it’s OURS. To interpret how we wish. Of course, there are grey areas, like Manson deciding The Beatles’ white album was calling him to kill random people. But in general: when an artist goes out of his way to explain himself, I’m not into it, because it takes away MY experience, and I can’t help but be affected. I like to make up my own mind.) So here goes. The penultimate scene starts with a doozy of a camera move, swooping around from behind a corner, at ankle level, close to the floor, revealing Sam and Dean (Dean’s got some MAJOR Legs action going on) and Dr. Garrison. They’re conversing, it’s the denouement – but the camera is still in Horror-Mode. It’s as though it’s from the point of view of a stalking low-to-the-ground monster. Or, perhaps, a bullfrog??

This is almost the end of the episode. Sam and Dean saved the day. So the low-to-the-ground “GOTCHA” camera move seems … ominous. Emotional subtext. Maple Springs may be safe now, but Sam and Dean most definitely are not.

The next shot is a gigantic closeup of Dean. His expression is arrestingly open as he looks at Dr. Garrison. It’s not regular-Dean-listening. It’s ALERT Dean, taking in another human being. It’s, frankly, an amazing expression.

It’s blinding in its openness, something we have not seen from him in a long time.

Maybe it’s because Dr. Garrison asked if Little Red Riding Hood was okay. Maybe that strikes Dean, cracks through his (penetrable) shield. This man just lost his daughter and he still cares about the fate of other people. He hasn’t lost his humanity, even with his personal loss. Maybe. Or maybe it’s something else. I’ll say one thing: JENSEN knows what that moment is about. JENSEN knows what Dean is thinking that would bring about such an open expression.

Sam is not quite as open. Something is happening with Sam. Confronted by another’s loss. Dealing with his own. It took something out of him, that scene with Dr. Garrison and Callie. That scene COST Sam something and you can see it in his face. When Dr. Garrison says, “Callie was the most important thing to me,” again there’s a shot of Dean, with that same open, almost CURIOUS, expression on his face. That’s what I’m sensing, now that I write it out. It’s curiosity I see, and it’s such a fascinating choice. It’s not what you expect. Dean is hearing something else. He is looking at a man who has “let go.” He is seeing in Dr. Garrison a possibility for Sam. He wishes Sam would get to this point. There isn’t just one thing going on with Dean here. (Multiple levels. Sorry.) This expression on his face will be an enormous and painful contrast to the Season 3 Look coming up.

After Dr. Garrison leaves them, Dean turns to Sam and makes the connection FOR Sam, it is as though the entire episode hasn’t happened: he picks up where the argument left off in the first scene. Sam has been struggling ever since Callie died. Now the problem of Dean, their conflict, his helplessness, his sadness, reemerges. No more distractions. Dean’s comment makes things worse, and the look on Dean’s face when he says those terrible words …

That’s the Season 3 Look.

It is a closed door.

The anger is on a low boil, but it’s still there, mixed with Sam’s grief. He’s not just anticipating his brother’s death. It’s as though he’s already lost him.

Dean sees Sam’s emotions. His little brother’s sadness. His little brother’s anticipatory grief. And he holds firm with his Season 3 Look.

And turns and walks away. Away from his brother, away from possibility for himself, away from BEING loved. Dean can love, but he can’t BE loved, he just won’t have it.

I know I’m a broken record on this score but there’s an echo of this …

… in his walk down the hallway.

Sam is home, comfort, love. It’s not for Dean. Too much has happened. He is banished.

14th scene

The fairy tale is not over. Look at that moon.

In the dissolve that follows, to the fairy-tale-village mural on the motel room wall, the moon stays the same. Lovely effect. I don’t know if Rohl planned it, or if it was in collaboration with his team (“wouldn’t it be cool if …”) Either way – hats off.

Dean lies sleeping, a little restless, and the camera pans to the next bed, empty, with Sam picking up his camo backpack and starting for the door. Never a good sign in their double-helix relationship. Sam stops at the wall separator and looks back at Dean, who now lies peacefully on his back, bathed in moonlight on one side.

Dean is now Snow White. The shot is almost an exact replica of the shots of Callie lying peacefully and beautifully in her coma. Sam is now the Dr. Garrison character, looking at his sleeping … daughter? Wait, what? Or he’s one of the Dwarves looking at Snow White in her sleep. Or the Prince, staring at the vulnerable woman who – remember – is lying in a glass coffin. Death, Death already around Dean, it’s all Sam can see. Whichever way you want to take the image, it vibrates with weirdo possibilities. Sam’s shadow is thrown out onto the wall so far away from him it looks like a separate sentient being. Dark side, split off.

15th scene

I miss crossroads demons. Rowena has kind of ruined the show. She’s too powerful. She removes the possibility of Sam and Dean doing really sketchy things to get themselves out of scrapes. All they have to do now is call her up. Go away, Rowena. Go away, bunker.

The scene starts in black, then revealing Sam from inside the hole he’s dug in the gravel at the crossroads, to bury his box of creepy objects. There’s no music now. Just silence.

There’s a long slow crane shot, coming up the side of the windmill or water tower. It’s a perfect setting. Did they create this crossroads? There’s a great shot following where Sam looks around him, 360-degrees, and you can see those four roads stretching off into the misty night. It’s just stunning.

The crossroads demons have all been the same type: petite brunettes in black cocktail dresses. I love the concept. Each actress brings her own spin to it, and I love the consistency of it, but also the variations.

There was the first crossroads demon in “Crossroad Blues,” whom I described as: “ladylike in appearance, almost Southern in style (I detect the echo of a drawl), with a formality in her manner and speech. Even when she hits on him, she does so from an arch place of power and form..” There was the demon in “All Hell Breaks Loose, Part 2,” where Dean made his disastrous deal. I described her as: “a tough-chick who probably hangs out on St. Mark’s Avenue in the East Village. (St. Mark’s Avenue as it was in 1983, that is. Before gentrification.) A CBGB’s tough-chick. Who then marries really well and moves to Park Avenue, but still has the aura of subversive nightlife around her.” Because I’m insane.

Sandra McCoy is the new crossroads demon. She’s a petite powerhouse. She’s kind of a bitch: this is our first time seeing Sam interact with a crossroads demon. When Dean interacts with them, you feel like fucking is just around the corner. He’d hate himself after, but he’d do it. This is not what happens here. She is unmoved by Sam’s anger, his plea, his threat of violence. She teases him, even though it’s like poking a bear. She plays dirty. She goes for the jugular: Aren’t you a little bit relieved at the prospect of being freed from “sloppy needy Dean?” When Sam says “Watch your mouth” it’s so tough and so real you can see how tough SHE is that she doesn’t recoil, and keeps going. She has secrets, and at a couple of points she looks like she may be ready to spill them. But she refrains. She holds all the cards. When he shoots her in the forehead, she looks truly surprised. She underestimated him.

These scenes are always stunners. You can feel the cold night air, smell the cut grass, you are in the middle of nowhere. That’s what the crossroads are all about. A place where things happen, things you can’t take back.

There are moments when she’s thrown off (slightly). Especially in regards to the Colt. We didn’t see Ruby fix the Colt (although it was suggested) and we didn’t see her give it back to Sam. But here it is. The demon realizes it’s a new version. She is truly curious, and is the first time she betrays a little bit of fear: “Where did you get that?”

“She is such a pain in my ass.” This behind-the-scenes glimpse of the perception of Ruby gives a glimpse into something sinister, the double-cross (or is it triple-cross) that will be coming down the pike for Sam, via Ruby. He should take warning. He should not be so credulous.

When she goes for the jugular, the really ugly, crooning at Sam, smiling, that he’s going to be relieved when Dean is gone, he will be freed up, he’s “stronger than Dean” (and – ironically – in this episode he has been) … but it pours into Sam’s status, the interest Yellow-Eyes has had in him, the “mark” upon him, his demon blood. She’s speaking to that part of him. The betrayer part. And she’s gentle and suggestive as she’s doing it. It’s beautifully nasty.

When he kills her, suddenly, it’s a shock. I’m not sure it quite works as a moment showing Sam’s ruthless qualities, his cold-bloodedness, the “something is wrong with Sam” thing they’ve kept on a low boil during the season. But he killed Casey. He killed Jake. He can turn off his empathy. But why should he have empathy for this crossroads demon?

The thing about her that is so frightening is her logic. No matter what Sam does, there’s no way out of this deal. It’s airtight.

Dean’s going down.

Supernatural Re-Caps
Season 1
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