Stream of Consciousness, Recap/Review, Episode 7.14
What were you afraid of when you were a kid? What are you afraid of now?
And how many of you (like I do) miss believing that covers were both bullet- and monster-proof?
But first - thanks to those who came by, read, and commented on the late posting of the last Ramble for 7.13. I really appreciate your time and thoughts. When I’m tired and worn a bit thin, part of me wonders if I should keep this up - but then I realize how much I miss reading your comments when I’m late, so there you have it. Plus, I know you have plenty of places to go read about the show and that there are recaps/reviews galore, so I appreciate you making this one of your stops along the way.
And second - traveling there and back again inside six days did a number on me, so I’m once more writing this with a tired mind. I promise to do my best, but look to all ya’ll to help me fill in the gaps my brain just can’t grasp right now.
Thank goodness for our boys. And their unique brand of entertainment. I love our Show.
So…clowns.
Fear of them is the one thing Sam and I have in common. I’ve never really liked them - never found them funny. I saw Poltergeist when I was much too young and that scene where the freaky-assed clown jumps the little boy did me in. Fast forward about ten years and I’m reading and watching Stephen King’s It and Pennywise has me stepping over and around the grates in the sidewalk for the rest of my life.
This episode made me think about what I fear - much like Yellow Fever did - and how that has changed over the years. Now, I can say I have a fear of heights and water and the dark, but only truly when Mo Chuisle is around. It’s more the thought of something happening to her in any of those situations than those situations themselves. Since I became a mother, my worst fear is of losing her (to any degree you define that…for five minutes in a mall, or forever). So the things that used to just make me sweat now turn me inside out when she’s added to the equation.
Now, Mo Chuisle…that’s a different story. At five, she’d fit right in to the theme of these “draw your worst fears” place mats. She has recurrent nightmares about a “fisherman statue” as she calls it. She describes him a little like the Gordman’s Fisherman - yellow slicker, big hat, gray beard, all wet. He’s standing in her room, staring at her, and his sleeve is ripped. Always his left sleeve. She’s dreamed about him so often and jerked me from sleep with a scared cry so many nights I actually get a little afraid sometimes when I open the door of her bedroom that I’m going to see him.
It’s almost enough to make me want to do some research into our house location. I might worry a bit more if we weren’t in landlocked Lawrence, KS. Then again…it is Lawrence, KS…. *gulp*
One last bit of randomness - this afternoon the hubs took Mo Chuisle to a place called PowerPlay - which is pretty much exactly like Plucky Pennywhistle’s Magical Menagerie…without the clowns. Weird, yeah? I thought so, too.
Okay, so the THEN was basically for all of those who haven’t watched every single episode ever and revealed that Sam was afraid of clowns. Duh.
Then they did that inside-out storytelling thing I like, only this time, it’s with a twist because we go a little back-and-forth. Now I realize that this one was supposed to be a ‘funny’ episode because it’s funny that Sam’s scared of clowns, right? And yes, I will concede that the tired I’ve got hanging over me made me less prone to finding the funny they were throwing at us…but I didn’t really laugh throughout this one. I did chuckle several times, and one time had an all-out happy grin (tell me Dean’s genuine laugh doesn’t make you smile), but mostly I just felt bad for Sam. *laughs at self* What? I did!
It’s no fun being forced to confront your fear. And we all know he’s just this side of hanging in there…. I was kinda worried about the guy. And I also think that he’s maybe played the “I’m in control” façade a bit too well lately. Because even his brother seems to take it for granted that Hallucifer is a constant companion that Sam has to remind himself (with some serious scar rubbing) is not real. I don’t blame Dean for that - it’s kinda Sam’s own fault…and it’s what Sam wanted, right? Who wants to be reminded every day, all the time that he’s not “normal?”
Still, though, I couldn’t help but feel a bit bad for the guy.
We start with a NOW that has Sam running with a semi-terrified look on his face, skidding behind a car and hiding while whispering to himself, “They can’t hurt you. If it bleeds you can kill it.” Again, put me in the mind of Yellow Fever and Dean’s terrified flight from the tiny pooch.
Sam peers over the edge of the car and suddenly a freaky-assed clown is there. And it’s not just a clown that looks freaky ‘cause it’s a clown. It looks…demonic. Even if you don’t have a thing about clowns you have to admit that one was scary. So, Sam high-tails it across an empty lot and barricades himself into a darkened garage - like a workshop garage, not one attached to a house.
Suddenly, the clown chasing him uses it’s incredible clown strength and moves the barricade away, entering the garage and behind Sam another even freakier clown (this one with red eyes…yeah…I told you) shows up. *gulp*
The splash card is an array of clown-like colors mixed into the ooze with the letters of Supernatural reflecting those colors. They were going to have fun with Sam’s phobia, I could tell. Poor Sam. *laughs helplessly*
So, then we get this interesting time ticker that says 60:00:00 earlier. That was too much math for me, but I am thinking it was basically a little over two days prior based on all that we see transpired. Hey, I became a writer so I wouldn’t have to do math. Sue me.
A payphone rings. Sam’s leaning against a late ’80’s model Jeep Cherokee and there’s a mustard yellow ‘70’s muscle car-looking thing nearby. I didn’t get a good look at it. Dean goes to answer the phone and is visibly skeeved out by having to touch it. I have to say, it’s been awhile since I’ve actually seen a payphone. They don’t have any around here - maybe in Kansas City, but I can’t say that I’ve actually looked.
It’s obviously cold - Dean’s fingers are red. He's talking to Frank and rolls his eyes, muttering, “I am the eggman,” into the phone, causing Sam to grin adorably. Ah, so Frank is a Beatle’s fan, eh? Nice. Dean complains that he’s getting the clap off of the phone just by touching it and asks for some intel on Dick Roman. All he finds out, apparently, is that Fred Savage has joined the ranks of the Big Mouths. Aww. I always liked Fred Savage. Especially as the sick grandson in The Princess Bride.
Dean hangs up and makes his way out of the phone booth, wiping his hand on his jacket (‘cause that’s a sure-fire way to get rid of germs). It’s funny to me that Dean’s such a germ phobe about the phone booth. I don’t know why…just seems like an interesting quirk to his bad-ass personality.
He goes up to Sam and says that the protocol du jour is “creeping his cheese” (*laugh* what?).
Sam: So we’ve got dick on Dick?
Dean (a beat): That’s a vivid way of putting it.
The Amazons are gone, and with nothing on Dick Roman, Sam tells him he found something in Wichita, KS. Dean lays down ground rules: no babies, no booze, no bars, no hot chicks of any kind. Sam’s like, did you just say…?
Dean: You spawn a monster baby and see how quickly you want to dive back into the pool.
Love it. Love that they bridged the end of the last one into this one by addressing the fact that the "wonder women" were truly in the wind and having Dean address his 'monster baby' without blame placed on Sam. Sam's grin at his brother in the phone booth showed that he wasn't worried about it, either, so that meant (for me) that Dean never blamed Sam and Sam had found somewhere to put his frustration of how Dean was (or was not) handling his grief -- for the moment, anyway. I like the way that was handled.
And! I don't think I saw Dean take one drink the entire episode. So he definitely took a break from drinking (not that I think that ends anything, just that I think he took a break). All good things in my book. However, Kansas? Really not a great place for them. Every time they come back this way things go very, very bad.
Suited up at the Wichita morgue, they are inspecting the body of a guy who looks like he got hit by the worst case of hickies in the history of ever. Turns out, the hickies are actually sucker marks from an octopus. A Giant Pacific Octopus, to be exact. Which, as you might guess, are rare in Kansas. And yet, here they are.
The M.E. says that it’s obviously the result of a freak fetish and that someone created the hickie marks and then bled they guy out by a hole on his neck. As they leave, Dean asks Sam if the bite mark looked a little vampy to him.
Sam: No question.
Dean: Octovamp? Vamptopus?
Sam: That’s crazy even for us, right?
With the Leviathans out there oozing all over the place and making those who misbehave bib themselves, I don’t know if they can really rule anything out these days. Still, they’re used to the “normal” crazies - and this is definitely to the left of normal. They decide to go talk to the dead guy’s widow.
They go with routine questions. For them. Did the house feel different? Any cold spots? Smell anything weird? Sulfury? Nope, none of that. When they ask about skeletons in the closet, though, the wife’s eyes go hard and she tells them to talk to Stacy if they want to know what her husband has been up to lately. Turns out Stacy is the nanny. As they leave, we see a little girl watching them with creepy eyes from the top of the stairs - making me immediately suspect the girl. I was all about jumping to conclusions with this one, folks.
Dean comments on how a mom/dad/nanny situation was a love triangle right out of Casa Erotica (which made Sam smile a bit, hee!) but that the jealous wife has to channel her feelings more productively. Sam can’t wrap his mind around why an octovamp, though. Seems a bit…extreme and unnecessary. Dean says one of them needs to talk to the naughty nanny while the other stakes out the house.
Sam: I’m on the nanny.
Dean: No, I’m on the nanny.
Sam: Thought you said no hot chicks.
Dean: We don’t know that she’s hot.
He’s got a point. Still, it was funny that he had to go with the nanny. Just…’cause. *grins* I thought the nanny looked a little like a young Cassie. Dean refrained from looking lecherously interested, though, his eyes just watching her for clues rather than appraising her finer attributes.
She tells him that she had more interaction with the mom and that there was nothing going on with the dad, but that yesterday was Kelly’s (the daughter) birthday, the mom was out of town, and they had a birthday party for Kelly that the dad only showed up for five minutes of. The party was at Plucky Pennywhistles - a name Dean finds vaguely familiar.
Stacy tells him it’s a place for kids - then comments that it’s more for lazy parents. I’ve never been to a birthday party at one of those places, but I can tell you that just going to them for “fun” with your kiddo is not for the lazy. We keep Mo Chuisle in our sight at all times and with all the noise and the kids and the random adults…sheesh. It’s exhausting.
As they’re talking, Dean tries to find out if anything weird happened lately and Stacy tells him that Kelly’s afraid of a monster in her closet. Dean’s jaw clenches and he swallows. He leaves, calling Sam, and tells his brother not to watch the mom, watch the kid. Sam says he can see her right now. Dean asks if he can get to her without tripping the Amber alert. Good point.
It just occurred to me in this moment that they were driving separate cars - Sam in the Jeep, Dean in the mustard yellow car. I thought that was interesting. I wonder when/where they picked up the other one. And why. Other than convenience.
Anyway, Sam comes up to Kelly who is drawing on the sidewalk with chalk. He tries to talk to her, but she says her mom won’t like it because of what she told the police men. Sam asks what she told them and Kelly says that she tried to warn her dad that the monster was going to get him. The mom comes out and calls Kelly inside away from Sam (which I would have done, too) and Sam looks down to see that the picture Kelly had been drawing was of a giant monster octopus with shark jaggedy teeth. Yipe.
Next thing we know, it’s night and some guy is in his jammies and a robe hauling ass across some open field, running from what looks like a white horse. He manages to get over the wall for the Wichita state champs, leaning against it, thinking he’s safe when suddenly he’s stabbed through the chest by a horn. Yes, a horn. He falls to the ground, dead, and we look back through the hole to see a unicorn standing there with a blood-covered horn. The unicorn rears up, then turns and runs off, rainbows coming out of its butt. No, I’m not kidding. I guess once we've had faeries, unicorns are the next logical step. *wink*
Plus, the rainbows was an awesome touch, I have to say. When was it that Dean commented about rainbows and unicorns? Sometime in Season 2, I think.
Then it’s NOW again and Sam is fighting the clowns. He’s whispering to himself, “If it bleeds, you can kill it,” and then he shoots one of the clowns…only glittery confetti poofs out of the clown’s body and all that evil-looking thing does is laugh. The clown’s laugh can only be described as maniacal at this point and Sam looks full-on freaked out as the clowns proceed to beat the hell out of him.
Poor Sam.
36:36:06 earlier and Dean’s at the site where the dude got impaled by the unicorn trying to figure out what the hell happened. He’s talking to a cop about the evidence in front of them and all they can come up with is “something big” stabbed through the guy. Dean’s guessing a lance. He goes over to where the wife is waiting by the ambulance and finds out that the man took his 8 year old son, Billy, to Plucky’s the day before for a birthday party.
Oh, by the way, Dean is apparently Agent Jones, FBI, and Sam is still Agent Johnson. Or did I hear Dean wrong?
Dean calls Sam back at the hotel and asks him if he remembers Plucky Pennywhistles and Sam totally freezes up. In fact, I think he goes a little pale. His answer is too rushed as he says that no, no he doesn’t. Dean’s like, “Really? I swore you loved those places.”
Sam: No. I hated them. You would dump me and go trolling for chicks.
He says they were lame, smelled like puke, and the ice cream was grainy.
Dean: Don’t have one of your episodes. I got a dead end with the witch’s gone wild theory.
The ‘episodes’ comment was what had me thinking that Dean’s taking for granted that Sam’s got his hallucinations under control. Of course, it could just be a brother comment - take a pill, don’t get your panties in a bunch, that sort of thing. But 'having an episode' is also kinda true with Sam. I’m not all omg he can’t say that or anything…just makes me worried about when things do go south - ‘cause they will - how Dean will beat himself up for not seeing it sooner.
Dean says Sam should check out Plucky’s and Sam has a minor freak out (alone in the hotel room - Dean only hears his voice get a little shaky) and says he could just wait for Dean to get back. Dean says he’s on his way to talk to Billy. Sam offers to talk to Billy instead, his voice totally giving away his complete and utter reluctance to go to that place alone.
Dean: This isn’t about your clown thing, is it?
Sam (too adamant): What? No!
Dean: Sammy….
Sam: No.
Dean: What in the world did they do to you?
Sam is blinking and trying to steady his breath and looks about five years old. Poor guy! Also, total aside, what the heck was up with that hotel room? Any of you think it looked like the basement of a retired strip club owner? Weirdest décor yet.
Dean: Sam. 99.9% of all clowns can’t hurt you. And, if it bleeds, you can kill it.
*rubs heart* So, we know where Sam’s mantra from the “NOW” moments comes from. His brother.
I liked this because Dean wasn’t coddling him and swooping in for the rescue, he wasn’t teasing him and telling him that his fears were unfounded, he was giving him tools and grounding to work through it. Maybe because he’s his big brother, maybe because Dean’s been there with the fears that are paralyzing to him and seem irrational to others. Who knows, but Dean does what he can from afar and trusts Sam - as Sam as insisted he do - to handle himself.
Sam repeats Dean’s words to himself as he hangs up, looking like he's near tears. Later, outside of Plucky’s, Sam is in the car, staring at himself in the rear-view mirror, saying he’s too old for this. As he enters, an uber-cheery man greets him with, “Welcome to Plucky’s, where all your dreams are good.”
Um, already creeped out.
Sam asks for the manager, trying to not look directly at any one of the 100 clowns all over the place. He heads inside and sees an employee named Libby trying to get her son to “stay sane for 3 more hours” and puts his homework in front of him. The kid complains that he can’t concentrate there, but Libby just breathes through the knee-jerk frustrated response and walks away. Sam watches the kid and his face softens a bit.
Then he turns to a wall where kid’s art is hanging and sees that it’s all “draw your worst fear and Plucky will make it disappear.” Okay, creeped out more. The manager - a young girl with long, dark hair - comes up and says that it’s the owner’s idea. He wanted a “safe” way to help kids with their fears because a “pop psychologist” said that if the fears are allowed to run wild they will affect the kids well into adulthood.
A clown skitters by and Sam pulls in on himself to avoid any accidental contact, saying he’s heard that. Hee.
So, the manager says she does remember Billy - the kid wanted to stay at a birthday party, but the Dad made him leave before cake and ice cream, pulling a “full-frontal douche bag” and starts screaming, really embarrassing the kid. Sam calls Dean, but before he can connect, the janitor psssts him and says he wants to tell him something but to come back after hours.
Sam heads back to the randomly decorated hotel room where Dean is setting out Chinese food for them.
Dean: What’s the low down in trauma town?
Sam gives him a very funny look which Dean answers with a it was a little funny look of his own. Sam says that the dead guys won’t win parent of the year and tells him about Kelly and Billy and the art on the wall, showing him some of the kid’s pics, but saying Kelly and Billy’s were missing - just the names were there. Dean shows Sam the drawing Billy made for him when he went to talk to him - it’s of a unicorn with rainbows coming out of its butt stabbing a man with its horn.
Sam: So, now unicorns are evil?
Dean: Yeah. Obviously.
Hee.
They are at a loss as to how any of this is happening, though, so they head back to Plucky’s after hours. Before they get there, though, the manager tells Saul the janitor that some kid puked in the ball pit and before he leaves, he has to give it a full sanitation. I hate those ball pits for that reason. You can’t see what’s in there and even thought they claim “sanitation”…how can you be sure, right? I always lie to Mo Chuisle and say that it’s broken or something. She’s only been in one one time…and I don’t think she liked it very much. Thank goodness. I know, I know. My friends call me a helicopter mom. I can’t help it!
Moving on.
Saul’s in the pit using the big sweeper thing when we see some balls moving around behind him. Suddenly he’s bit on the leg and he reaches down and sees blood. After that, it’s a total Jaws reenactment with motion in the balls and him being pulled down, clawing his way up, then pulled down once more before splat - blood everywhere. Gack.
Boys show up to see the EMTs and cops around. Sam goes to talk to the manager and Dean peeks under the bloody sheet of the body, wincing and pulling back, dropping the sheet before Sam gets there. Sam tells him the manager found his body in the ball pit and there was blood everywhere.
Dean: Cops have a theory?
Sam: Yeah, they think the ball washer did it.
Dean: The what?
Sam: Ball washer.
Dean (barely suppressing a grin): The what?
Sam: Ball wa-
He stops and tosses his hands up in an I give up motion while Dean lets his grin spread across his face. Okay, that made me laugh a bit. I swear the guy is like a 14 year old kid sometimes. I love it. *grins*
Dean shows Sam the body and Sam’s all, “That’s a shark bite.”
Dean: Judging from the radius, I’d say it was a 20 footer.
Sam = blank stare
*laugh!*
Dean: Shark week, man! How do you not watch that?!
I have a friend who is terrified of sharks and she watches shark week every time. It’s crazy.
They go inside and find another missing picture - but this kid wasn’t connected to Saul…so the theory of it going after ‘bad parents’ is shot. Dean’s like, “We’re looking for something that can literally fire off childhood fears at will.”
Sam gets out his EMF and says to look around. Dean gets out his EMF and starts grumbling, “Seriously. Dractopus. Seabiscuit the Impaler. What’s next?”
Libby shows up with her kid the next morning and is apologizing to him that he has to be there, but needs him to please behave himself. It’s obvious she’s a single parent doing the best she can with little money - else why would she be working there. But the kid is young and disgruntled, so I immediately thought - it’s him!
/conclusion jumping.
As he gets out of the car he leaves behind a picture in a notebook of a giant robot with laser beams for eyes destroying a city. Whoops.
In another NOW moment, Sam is still getting his ass handed to him by the two freaky clowns.
At 04:34:08 early, the boys are in the motel researching, fruitlessly.
Sam: Tulpa?
Dean: The killings are too spread out.
Sam: Angels?
Dean: Too imaginative for the God squad.
Aside - isn’t this the first time they’ve actually mentioned angels since Cas died? I mean, aside from Sam mentioning Cas’ death to Dean…they haven’t actually talked about angels, have they? I found that interesting.
Dean is tapped out, but they realize that while they don’t know what it is, they know where it is. So, Sam comes up with the idea to go back in and play bad cop (since the employees already know he’s a Fed {sorta}) and lean on them a bit, then Dean can follow and see what the fall-out is.
I saw a bunch of potential red flags on this - splitting up, facing down things by themselves…especially with Sam’s fear painted out for us. But I think that was because we saw him getting beat up by clowns in the NOW moments, and not because there was really any other direction they could go while trying to plan their approach. So, Sam goes in all Dirty Harry while Dean hangs out in Plucky’s, acting normal.
Dean: Yeah. Guy in his 30’s hanging out at Plucky’s alone. That’s normal.
Hee. He’s got a point. Poor guy.
So, Sam suits up and shows up to Plucky’s acting all big and bad and growly. He interviews the manager first while Dean hangs out looking a bit mopey, until some kid walks by with a giant slinky and he lights up like it’s Christmas morning. He goes over to the Ticket Guy and wants to buy a slinky, but the Ticket Guy says that it’s 1000 tickets - and they only take tickets, not money. Which, I tell you what, that’s the BIGGEST scam in the history of ever. Do you know how much money you spend on those blasted games just to get enough tickets to get the ‘thing’ your kiddo wants because the ‘thing’ is an insane number of tickets?
Mo Chuisle has left sans ‘thing’ more than once. Hmmm…maybe I ought to start watching out for that fisherman statue to come after me…. At least she always gets a balloon. Balloons make everything better.
The Ticket Guy tells Dean that it’s double ticket Tuesday if he plays skeeball. So, Sam ‘bad cops’ the manager (and basically the only thing we find out is that Sam was a lot scarier when he was soulless…and the manager had to write an essay to get the position and she was picked out of a handful of others who competed for the job) and Dean plays skeeball until the manager comes out for a smoke. He tells Sam she’s not their baddie.
Sam starts to question Ticket Guy who is so cheery and enthusiastic about helping he made my teeth hurt. Meanwhile, Libby’s kid - Tyler - catches another kid cheating at skeeball and tells him to stop. The other kid just looks at him (Tyler’s kinda scrawny and little…looks about 5 or 6) and keeps doing his thing until Dean shows up and using a Big Voice says, “You heard him! Knock it off!”
The other kid scrambles away (and Dean might want to make sure his picture doesn’t end up on the wall) and Dean and Tyler mutter at the same time, “Jackass.” Cute. *grins*
Libby calls Tyler for his lunch and while Tyler goes to sit down, Dean nabs the cheater’s tickets. HA! He hears Tyler complaining to his mom and when Libby walks away, Dean goes over to talk to him.
Dean (kinda soft): Why don’t you cut her some slack?
Tyler: What do you care?
Dean: I’ve been where you are.
Tyler: Your mom made you come to Plucky’s after school?
Dean: No…but my Dad hauled me places. ‘Sides, she’s working a tough gig. You should take pity on the old. (*laughs*) And hey, free grub!
Tyler: That pizza tastes like butt.
Dean: It can’t be that bad….
He picks up the slice and takes a bite. It’s that bad. He spits it back out on the plate, much to Tyler’s delight. Then Dean sees what Tyler is drawing on the placemat (the one that will go up on the wall).
Dean: Scared of robots?
Tyler (in a duh tone of voice): They have laser eyes.
The Ticket Guy comes out of the interview and is all cheery to a kiddo, so Dean texts Sam a ‘no’ on him. The guy dressed up as a Lion is next. Sam tries the “why’d you do it” approach and the Lion flips out, clumsily opening the back door and high-tailing it out of there. Sam yells for Dean had gives chase. Dean runs after him, but Sam is held up by a clown innocently stepping into his path. They chase the Lion outside and Dean pulls off his costume's tail (hee!) before tackling him into a bunch of tires in a stunt dive that looked like it had to have hurt somebody.
The Lion starts rattling off that the meth lab wasn’t him, it was his brother, but they have the same fingerprints…Dean asks him if he’s making kids nightmares come true and killing people and the Lion is all, um, no, I don’t think so.
Dean: We don’t care that you broke bad or whatever, but there’s something seriously weird going on here.
The Lion guesses he means down in the subbasement and tells him that he and Saul heard some weird stuff coming from there.
Lion: You ever ‘shroom in a ball pit? (Laughing…slowly sobering as the boys are Not Amused) Not that I would. It was Saul. Just Saul.
But they heard some spooky stuff through the vents coming up from the boiler room. As the boys bring the Lion guy back inside, they see Libby and Tyler leaving and Tyler’s complaining that his placemat is gone. Libby is tired and at the end of her rope and snaps that he can draw another one. Tyler and Dean meet eyes and Tyler relents, telling his mom he’s sorry. She melts a bit, cupping his face and saying thank you before they leave.
Dean starts adding things up and tells Sam that Libby was being snappish to Tyler earlier when Sam was playing bad cop. He thinks bitchy mom + sad kid + placemat with something nuts on it = whacky corpse. Sam says he’ll go tell Libby just in case - telling Dean to check out the boiler room. He pauses and asks Dean what was on Tyler’s placemat and Dean tells him about the giant robot with laser eyes.
Sam: At least I’ll see it coming.
Down in the boiler room, Dean pulls his gun and starts poking around. It doesn’t take him long to find the sigil painted in the middle of the floor with what looks like a trashcan in the middle of it, a fire burning brightly inside.
Dean: Well. That’s perfectly normal.
He sees drawings on the wall - not placemat drawings, just little kid drawings. It’s of water and stick figures and what looks like someone drowning. He sees a book of rites and sigils sitting on top of Tyler’s drawing and next to it some clown statues. Suddenly, on the other side of the burning barrel, Ticket Guy shows up. I knew he was too friendly to be normal.
Dean is pretty calm as he walks through what the Ticket Guy is doing - though he says that the sigils and stuff in the book aren’t powerful enough to kill these people. Ticket Guy says that he has to have something of the person he’s going after and that there’s power in fear - some of that power goes into the paper when the kid draws what they’re afraid of. Dean throws the book at Ticket Guy, distracting him for a moment and then tears up Tyler’s picture saying, “No picture, no Iron Giant.”
But then Ticket Guy says he has a plan ‘B’ and someone else to go after - like Dean’s FBI friend. He had Sam's business card and there’s something he noticed about Sam’s fear of clowns, so he picked something form his own personal collection.
Dean looks a bit panicked and his eyes do that darting thing where he’s weighing all the angles and trying to figure out the best one - Run after Sam and help him fight the clowns? Stop this guy and possibly stop the clowns in the process? Which one is faster? Which one will work? Which one will save Sam?
Sam is outside of Libby’s house, watching them go inside. He gets out of the car, starts to head in, and that’s when Freaky Clown #1 shows up.
And then it literally says: RIGHT FRIGGIN’ NOW at the bottom of the screen, as time and events have caught up. I laughed at that. Might just be the best time-stamp thingy ever. *grins*
Sam is fighting the clowns and they are still beating the hell out of him. It’s not going any better, really.
Dean finds a Plucky doll on the table behind him and sizes up the drawings, figuring out a bit about Ticket Guy in a few second’s time. Ticket Guy is yammering on about how the people he killed were bad parents and he was thinking of the kids and Dean is firing back with incredulity about how making a little girl see her father get killed by the monster in her closet is so far from thinking of the kids it’s not funny.
Ticket Guy says all he wanted was to take care of the kids, but was passed over as manager (shocker) and figures out from what he’s saying and from the pictures that Ticket Guy’s brother drowned and Ticket Guy yells that he tried to tell his parents and his parents wouldn’t listen and it’s his parents fault…. It was actually a bit sad and a tad confusing - because it wasn’t clear if Ticket Guy killed his parents, too, or if he was just so traumatized by his brother’s death that being passed over as a manager made him snap and the reason it was falling in our boys’ lap instead of the local police is because the guy somehow found some book with sigils and spells and such and decided to do his serial killing in a bit of an imaginative way.
Dean throws one of Ticket Guy’s pictures and the Plucky statue (something of Ticket Guy’s) into the fire and Ticket Guy shoots at Dean, causing Dean to duck and cover, diving for his own gun. But he doesn’t have to shoot the guy because the dead brother shows up and touches Ticket Guy (who’s pleading that his death wasn’t his fault) and makes Ticket Guy drown.
The way the bad guy was taken out made me sad, to be honest. He actually had a tragic story, even though he was a killer. And I didn’t like that it was his dead brother who ended up killing him…though, I suppose that angle makes sense since it was what the kids feared that came out to kill. And he was obviously afraid of his brother after having watched him drown. So I accept it, but it still made me feel bad. *shivers*
But none of that mattered because back in the garage where Sam is fighting the clowns, the two clowns are charging at him from either side and the minute Ticket Guy dies, they clash into him and shatter into a spray of glitter confetti - some of which Sam has to spit out. *chuckles*
Later, after presumably cleaning up the sigils, etc., down in the boiler room, Dean is leaning against the car waiting. Sam drives up in the Jeep and climbs out - mouth bloody, covered in glitter - and is all, “Let’s roll!”
Dean can barely suppress a grin.
Sam thrusts his hands into the air and says, “Go ahead. Say it.”
Dean starts laughing - a genuine, real, made me smile just to hear it laugh - and says, “You look like you got attacked by some PCP crazed strippers.” He’s laughing around the words and I had to wonder how many takes they had to do for him to get the words out coherently. I'm grinning now just think about it. Love hearing him laugh.
Sam chuckles and tells him that one of the clowns actually sprayed him with seltzer water from his flower. Dean laughs harder. He has to grab his side, then takes a breath saying he’s sorry.
Dean (sobering up): I’m sorry for psychologically scaring you.
Sam: Which time?
Dean: Shut up. Seriously. Me ditching you when we were kids…that was a dick move. The whole clown thing….
I’m glad he got a chance to say he was sorry about doing something he did as a kid that he regrets now as an adult. Not all of us get or take that opportunity. It’s rare and I’m glad he got it - and took it. *smiles*
Sam: Honestly, getting my ass kicked by clowns was therapeutic.
Dean: You faced your fears.
Sam: Right. And now, what could a clown possibly ever do to me? I feel good!
Dean: Congrats.
Sam: By the way, to celebrate….
He goes back to the Jeep and grabs a giant slinky out of the back. HA!
Dean: No! Did you win this!
His eyes sparkle like a 5 year old. Love it when he looks happy like that.
Sam: We earned that.
Dean: HA! I got you a little something, too.
He tosses him a Plucky doll. Sam catches it, gasps, turns it away from him, holding it by the neck.
Dean: What? You said you were over it. You can think of it as a clown phobia sobriety chip.
*laughs* Big brothers…they’re incorrigible. Sam pouts, and they get in the mustard yellow car, leaving the Jeep behind. As they drive away, the camera pans down to see the Plucky doll lying in the street, a maniacal clown laugh echoing as the screen goes dark.
The previews look awesome and back to being seriously about…stuff. That’s all I’ll say. Which I’m looking forward to because the last two - even with the sex scene and the brotherly moments - have felt like stepping stones as we move more toward a serious outcome. We have ten episodes left (since we get an extra one this season) and I’m so looking forward to how all of this plays out.
Especially now that we really have our brothers together. They may be broken and more often than not, barely breathing, but they are together. The main thing I worry about right now is…how do you hold your brother up if you barely have the strength to stand on your own? It goes for both of them.
Thanks again for reading and I look forward to your thoughts. See you next time.
Slainte!