Meta on SPN 3.05
My first reaction to this episode was that it was a clever story, executed in an entertaining fashion for the audience to follow along with. However, I had some problems with the overall tone of the show. It seemed for each thing I liked there was also something that disturbed me. And considering this episode was written by a woman, it was mostly a misogynistic air that lingered.
In the clever department, the start with the three pigs was a good beginning. I noticed the first brother disappeared clinging to what appears to be PVC pipe. Granted, straw would be a bit of an odd thing to find at most construction sites but if you ask me, particle board would have made more sense. PVC is durable and strong whereas particle board is today's overused, disposable material. The cinderblocks were also a nice touch.
I'm going to assume that the reason the "wolf" broke off the attack is because the brick pig survives the tale, so maybe Callie called him off. Or perhaps he just came to and ran off. Which brings up the disturbing question of what's going to happen to this guy now that he's not being controlled anymore. He did commit 3 murders which he may or may not have any memory of. What is he supposed to do now and how did he get off scot-free? Won't that little girl who just lost her grandmother and was traumatized by this stranger talk? That's a pretty large loose end to me.
One of the pluses? I really enjoyed the various shots of the Impala in this episode. That road shot with the frog was a good one (and also defied my expectation that Dean would mow it right down).
So we have exposition in the car again, but once again it works. It's an all-out fight this time and may be the first time I've heard Dean pull the "because I'm older and I said so" card. Sam pulls what I suspect was his frequent response, that Dean wasn't John. Of course, that statement holds an entirely different implication these days than the days where Sam felt Dean was overstepping himself. Dean has a point, of course, which is that Sam is being rash and reckless. Problem is, he's got nothing to offer Sam in exchange. The distraction of the case must not seem like much of one to Sam given the last time they ran into a werewolf. I would think it would just remind him that much more how he can't stand by and do nothing.
(I also couldn't help but think that the argument about who was going to die first was soon going to be academic if Dean kept driving at that speed without looking at the road).
Loved the little look Dean gives Sam after glancing at the sketch in progress, not to mention the whole sketch artist bit. Ok, we now know something Sam sure can't do. I thought the "How would you feel?" a little heavy handed in that scene but at the same time, Sam's reply and Dean's reaction made it worthwhile.
The next scene was the first that made me wonder - did JP hurt his right leg? Or maybe his lower back? Because he seems to be trying hard not to limp in this and the next hospital scene. I also never get tired of seeing them in suits.
Hansel & Gretel bit, liked the power bars touch, the fact that we see smoke from the stove in the shots of the house, and Gretel's suspiciousness. Good thing Dean wasn't there, he'd have been on the floor with that pie in no time. I'm going to assume this attack occurred the same day Sam & Dean arrived since it's apparently the next day when they've already heard about the new attack and return to the hospital.
This hospital, by the way, has to be brighter and sunnier than any I've ever seen. It just highlighted for me how much sunnier and brighter this season definitely is. I can't say I miss the grey cast everything had last season. I liked the small nod to the pair's legal problems in their avoidance of the cops (doubly so, since they're still masquerading as detectives).
Sam makes the connection pretty quickly I thought, and also the one about the trances and control of the actors in the crimes. I did kind of wonder where he'd been researching since he appeared to be waiting for Dean to emerge from the library. It always makes my eyes roll to see these research jags go so quickly and smoothly - apparently decades of crime records are mysteriously at the local library and Dean goes through them in a single afternoon.
I had to wonder if the toad was supposed to be a coincidence and red herring or if that was supposed to be an actual person turned into a frog. I'm going to assume the former since I can't see at all how the trance and hypnosis explanation could explain transmutation. Also, I can't imagine how Sam made the leap from seeing a pumpkin to breaking into a house on the off-chance there was child abuse going on within. As Dean sensibly points out, it's not an unlikely house decoration in the fall. Wouldn't it have made more sense if it was in the middle of the driveway instead of a porch? And boy has he got amazing eyesight to see a mouse running about from that distance.
Instead of hanging a lantern on these huge leaps, Dean says one of the most baffling things I've heard come out of his mouth. What is so gay about knowing the story of Cinderella? I mean who HASN'T heard of it in most western countries? And Dean hasn't heard the story of Snow White either (except of course for the porn version because the only woman worth watching is a naked one), but he immediately grasped the 3 little pigs and Wile E. Coyote (a WB plug)? They better not be saying that boys would never pay attention to a story with a female lead unless they were gay because I am going to be really unhappy with them (though speaking of the WB, they are after all the studio that decided this). Is the show simply trying to assuage the concerns of any watching males that they're not being girlish by watching an episode about fairy tales? Either way, people see me after class.
By the way, is it just a coincidence that this episode had several commercials playing on fairy tales? The toothpaste commercial about Prince Charming, the gum commercial with a princess kissing a frog? If so, it worked in getting my attention.
The discussions about misogyny in SPN are not new. Certainly it's something I think can be applied more widely to the horror genre. On the whole the violence against women hasn't bothered me. Overall, as in this episode, there's a mix of villains and victims. For example the first set of victims are males, as is the perpetrator. In the second case the perpetrator is a woman, the victim a male and the survivor a woman. It is this third case that bothered me enough to cause a physical reaction. We have the brutal attack of a man on an old woman. Like the other attacks the violence is largely implied. We never see the resulting effect of the stabs, bites or punches. However I have to say this is the first episode where I really felt that there was something deeply wrong about what I was watching. On review I think it had to do with the anger and relish of the attacker upon the (unseen) old woman, and the sound of the blows and her reaction. Even though it didn't actually go on that long, it seemed like it to me. In the first crime we never see the attacker. In the second we do see the killer's actions but she seems cheerful and vaguely disconnected from what is happening. It's creepy alright but it is mostly Gretel's screams that provide the horror. In the third case though there's a relish in the violence that's disturbing, and the helplessness of the victim (however unseen) is awful. The makeup on her is remarkably light when the body appears at the hospital, given the blows she sustained.
Another thing I found offputting was the overall message of the episode. The main killer is a girl, however she herself is a wronged victim. I found her situation analogous to the dilemma in child molestation cases where children either can't trust any adults or aren’t believed when they do, making them victims twice over. The original perpetrator however was a woman, with the blind complicity of Callie's father. It is only his recognition of her pain that legitimizes what has occurred with her and allows her to move on. She not only is victimized by her stepmother but again by her father who is responsible for her lingering in her suspended state for years. I have a problem with a story that basically says that it is only male attention to a problem that can solve things. I also find it deeply ironic that we end the episode with the tale of Red Riding Hood, a story which itself was tampered with over time to insert a male hero, the woodsman, whereas in its original incarnation, the girl saves herself. It seems no coincidence that the Grimm tales are the basis of this episode, themselves "sanitized" for their society's biases.
That the stepmother is at the root of everything is nodded to when Sam and Dean discuss the fact that the first victims had their liver and intestines eaten rather than their hearts. Not only was this indicative of something other than a werewolf, as they had surmised, but the stepmother in Snow White attempts to eat her lungs and liver, not her heart. I also think it interesting that the original interpretation in Snow White, where the stepmother suffered jealousy of the daughter's primacy in her husband's attention due to her growing age and the daughter's youth is not used. The motivation would imply that there was something perverse about the father's interest in Callie who, as in the origin story in the 1600s, is 7 years old at the time of her coma. Instead, Dean suggests a modern (and medical) example that places the blame squarely on the stepmother and removes the father from any involvement in the family dynamics by removing the sexual aspects of the story. Rather ironic given this was supposed to be a return to the "original" form of these stories. As with many other stepmother stories, "these heartless creatures stand in sharp contrast to their relatively artless spouses, whose only serious defect appears to be a lack of discrimination in choosing a marriage partner." The only nod we get to the fundamental issue of sexuality is that the father's kiss delivers Callie to death rather than a prince's kiss bringing her to life. Lends special meaning to the lines "So it's over" "Yes, all thanks to you."
Of course, since the show's heroes are both men there's little choice but to have Dean engage in heroics to save one girl, while another man's word makes Callie's father finally acknowledge what was done to her. Nevertheless the end of the episode brings us to one last blow against women.
I found it interesting to contrast Dean's reaction to the "wolf" coming to himself after he's released from Callie's control to Sam's reaction last week with Casey. There Dean is, in the middle of a violent fight, and one sudden appeal from the guy he's fighting and he freezes. Granted he had some idea of what was happening and was no doubt hoping Sam would succeed, but Dean's hesitation is improbably sudden to me. By contrast, last week gave the first inkling that Sam and Dean have switched places in remembering the victims.
I always thought that Jake's death, while unnecessarily vicious with the multiple shots, was nonetheless justified. Jake had proven himself to be a killer, to be untrustworthy, and to have developed powers they didn't know the extent of. In the midst of a battle, I actually think they hesitated too long to stop him.
Similarly Sam's shooting of the priest seemed fair enough. The man had just attacked both him and Bobby, and Sam catches him attacking Dean. If the gun doesn't work, they're in trouble. Luckily it does.
However there's no conclusive evidence from Sam's view that Casey is a demon. Yes, he found sulfur in her apartment but that doesn't mean it came from her. She and Dean were both trapped below and Dean is still alive when he finds them. He doesn't know for sure she's possessed. But he reacts quickly enough that Dean is unable to stop him.
At the end of this episode there's no question at all that Sam murders a woman for his own purposes. He can have had 4 possible motivations that I can see. (1) He shoots her out of sheer revenge for having given Dean the deal, (2) He shoots her in case she's lying and her death will undo the deal, (3) He shoots her in hopes that his attempt to tamper with the deal will reverse it, resulting in his death (and Dean's freedom), or (4) He shoots her to get the attention of her mysterious boss, with whom he hopes he can deal. While options 2-4 are rational enough, they all result in an innocent person who's dead for no other reason but that it might benefit Sam in some way. I'd been feeling all along that the dubbing of Sam's actions as "cold" were an exaggeration. Not anymore. Wonder how long it will be until Dean discovers what Sam did.
Minor note: they seem to be staying in nicer motels than usual this season.
The crossroads scene didn't come off quite right to me. It seemed rather devoid of tension and I think part of this is the fact that we rarely see the two actors facing off in the same frame. I wonder if part of this was to obscure their large disparity in height - something so obvious that the normal "over the shoulder" shots involved seeing Sam's sleeve in frame and only part of the demon's torso.
She recognized the Colt with just one look? A bit odd that Meg and her brother were potentially fooled by John's substitute in S1 if it's so well known. As apparently Ruby is. Rather odd too that she's known as Ruby - I'd have to assume that's the demon's name rather than that of her inhabited body. And apparently Ruby is a personal antagonist of the Crossroads demon. Is that, perhaps, why she's goaded Sam into this action?
Speaking of goading, I'm going to assume that what the demon says to Sam about Dean are true. Lies would be less effective than the truth, and there seems little reason to pointlessly taunt him when he's threatening her. It also seems no coincidence that she refers to Dean being bossy after their first scene together had him being exactly that. If so, it's interesting to know that Sam thinks of Dean as broken, creating problems he has to resolve, and who's "desperate, sloppy, needy." A part of Sam always has thought he's better than Dean in a variety of ways. That she mentions his secret relief at being free however is pretty intriguing in what it may say about the reasons Sam left for Stanford in the first place.
It's not like Sam didn't have motivation enough. Aside from being bright and wanting an education, Sam clearly wanted to get away from both his family's lifestyle and John's erratic parenting. Canon has indicated up to now that he left after a blowout with John, and there was no shortage of issues Sam had left with him. What it's been rather silent about is whether or not Sam was also leaving Dean, or leaving in spite of Dean. We've just been given the first indication that Sam's silence with Dean may not just have been about anger and betrayal. It may have been Sam feeling unable or unwilling to deal with what Dean wanted from him. Sam wasn't just leaving the life, he really was leaving his family. Little wonder then that Dean felt personally betrayed by Sam's actions rather than on behalf of John and family pride.
Also interesting is the information that rather than being some poorly considered decision, Dean's deal was actively wanted by some party. He likely could have gotten a much better deal but for his own desperation. Little wonder the Crossroads demon grasped his desperate, sloppy neediness.
In some production asides, I feel sorry for Sandy McCoy if, as it seems, this scene was shot out in the cold at night and she was in that dress. Also, someone should really have a word with the makeup people about stopping at the neck. I've noticed this once or twice with JA as well, and while one could say leaving her with a yellowy-green face and pink neck and shoulders makes her seem creepier I'd like to know what the excuse is with him.
Also, I would think RPSers are going to have a field day with the implications of having these two actors specifically facing off in a scene where she belittles the brothers' relationship and he shoots her at the end. Of all the parts she could have gotten over the past two years (or the rest of this season) and it's this one? Hmm.
In the clever department, the start with the three pigs was a good beginning. I noticed the first brother disappeared clinging to what appears to be PVC pipe. Granted, straw would be a bit of an odd thing to find at most construction sites but if you ask me, particle board would have made more sense. PVC is durable and strong whereas particle board is today's overused, disposable material. The cinderblocks were also a nice touch.
I'm going to assume that the reason the "wolf" broke off the attack is because the brick pig survives the tale, so maybe Callie called him off. Or perhaps he just came to and ran off. Which brings up the disturbing question of what's going to happen to this guy now that he's not being controlled anymore. He did commit 3 murders which he may or may not have any memory of. What is he supposed to do now and how did he get off scot-free? Won't that little girl who just lost her grandmother and was traumatized by this stranger talk? That's a pretty large loose end to me.
One of the pluses? I really enjoyed the various shots of the Impala in this episode. That road shot with the frog was a good one (and also defied my expectation that Dean would mow it right down).
So we have exposition in the car again, but once again it works. It's an all-out fight this time and may be the first time I've heard Dean pull the "because I'm older and I said so" card. Sam pulls what I suspect was his frequent response, that Dean wasn't John. Of course, that statement holds an entirely different implication these days than the days where Sam felt Dean was overstepping himself. Dean has a point, of course, which is that Sam is being rash and reckless. Problem is, he's got nothing to offer Sam in exchange. The distraction of the case must not seem like much of one to Sam given the last time they ran into a werewolf. I would think it would just remind him that much more how he can't stand by and do nothing.
(I also couldn't help but think that the argument about who was going to die first was soon going to be academic if Dean kept driving at that speed without looking at the road).
Loved the little look Dean gives Sam after glancing at the sketch in progress, not to mention the whole sketch artist bit. Ok, we now know something Sam sure can't do. I thought the "How would you feel?" a little heavy handed in that scene but at the same time, Sam's reply and Dean's reaction made it worthwhile.
The next scene was the first that made me wonder - did JP hurt his right leg? Or maybe his lower back? Because he seems to be trying hard not to limp in this and the next hospital scene. I also never get tired of seeing them in suits.
Hansel & Gretel bit, liked the power bars touch, the fact that we see smoke from the stove in the shots of the house, and Gretel's suspiciousness. Good thing Dean wasn't there, he'd have been on the floor with that pie in no time. I'm going to assume this attack occurred the same day Sam & Dean arrived since it's apparently the next day when they've already heard about the new attack and return to the hospital.
This hospital, by the way, has to be brighter and sunnier than any I've ever seen. It just highlighted for me how much sunnier and brighter this season definitely is. I can't say I miss the grey cast everything had last season. I liked the small nod to the pair's legal problems in their avoidance of the cops (doubly so, since they're still masquerading as detectives).
Sam makes the connection pretty quickly I thought, and also the one about the trances and control of the actors in the crimes. I did kind of wonder where he'd been researching since he appeared to be waiting for Dean to emerge from the library. It always makes my eyes roll to see these research jags go so quickly and smoothly - apparently decades of crime records are mysteriously at the local library and Dean goes through them in a single afternoon.
I had to wonder if the toad was supposed to be a coincidence and red herring or if that was supposed to be an actual person turned into a frog. I'm going to assume the former since I can't see at all how the trance and hypnosis explanation could explain transmutation. Also, I can't imagine how Sam made the leap from seeing a pumpkin to breaking into a house on the off-chance there was child abuse going on within. As Dean sensibly points out, it's not an unlikely house decoration in the fall. Wouldn't it have made more sense if it was in the middle of the driveway instead of a porch? And boy has he got amazing eyesight to see a mouse running about from that distance.
Instead of hanging a lantern on these huge leaps, Dean says one of the most baffling things I've heard come out of his mouth. What is so gay about knowing the story of Cinderella? I mean who HASN'T heard of it in most western countries? And Dean hasn't heard the story of Snow White either (except of course for the porn version because the only woman worth watching is a naked one), but he immediately grasped the 3 little pigs and Wile E. Coyote (a WB plug)? They better not be saying that boys would never pay attention to a story with a female lead unless they were gay because I am going to be really unhappy with them (though speaking of the WB, they are after all the studio that decided this). Is the show simply trying to assuage the concerns of any watching males that they're not being girlish by watching an episode about fairy tales? Either way, people see me after class.
By the way, is it just a coincidence that this episode had several commercials playing on fairy tales? The toothpaste commercial about Prince Charming, the gum commercial with a princess kissing a frog? If so, it worked in getting my attention.
The discussions about misogyny in SPN are not new. Certainly it's something I think can be applied more widely to the horror genre. On the whole the violence against women hasn't bothered me. Overall, as in this episode, there's a mix of villains and victims. For example the first set of victims are males, as is the perpetrator. In the second case the perpetrator is a woman, the victim a male and the survivor a woman. It is this third case that bothered me enough to cause a physical reaction. We have the brutal attack of a man on an old woman. Like the other attacks the violence is largely implied. We never see the resulting effect of the stabs, bites or punches. However I have to say this is the first episode where I really felt that there was something deeply wrong about what I was watching. On review I think it had to do with the anger and relish of the attacker upon the (unseen) old woman, and the sound of the blows and her reaction. Even though it didn't actually go on that long, it seemed like it to me. In the first crime we never see the attacker. In the second we do see the killer's actions but she seems cheerful and vaguely disconnected from what is happening. It's creepy alright but it is mostly Gretel's screams that provide the horror. In the third case though there's a relish in the violence that's disturbing, and the helplessness of the victim (however unseen) is awful. The makeup on her is remarkably light when the body appears at the hospital, given the blows she sustained.
Another thing I found offputting was the overall message of the episode. The main killer is a girl, however she herself is a wronged victim. I found her situation analogous to the dilemma in child molestation cases where children either can't trust any adults or aren’t believed when they do, making them victims twice over. The original perpetrator however was a woman, with the blind complicity of Callie's father. It is only his recognition of her pain that legitimizes what has occurred with her and allows her to move on. She not only is victimized by her stepmother but again by her father who is responsible for her lingering in her suspended state for years. I have a problem with a story that basically says that it is only male attention to a problem that can solve things. I also find it deeply ironic that we end the episode with the tale of Red Riding Hood, a story which itself was tampered with over time to insert a male hero, the woodsman, whereas in its original incarnation, the girl saves herself. It seems no coincidence that the Grimm tales are the basis of this episode, themselves "sanitized" for their society's biases.
That the stepmother is at the root of everything is nodded to when Sam and Dean discuss the fact that the first victims had their liver and intestines eaten rather than their hearts. Not only was this indicative of something other than a werewolf, as they had surmised, but the stepmother in Snow White attempts to eat her lungs and liver, not her heart. I also think it interesting that the original interpretation in Snow White, where the stepmother suffered jealousy of the daughter's primacy in her husband's attention due to her growing age and the daughter's youth is not used. The motivation would imply that there was something perverse about the father's interest in Callie who, as in the origin story in the 1600s, is 7 years old at the time of her coma. Instead, Dean suggests a modern (and medical) example that places the blame squarely on the stepmother and removes the father from any involvement in the family dynamics by removing the sexual aspects of the story. Rather ironic given this was supposed to be a return to the "original" form of these stories. As with many other stepmother stories, "these heartless creatures stand in sharp contrast to their relatively artless spouses, whose only serious defect appears to be a lack of discrimination in choosing a marriage partner." The only nod we get to the fundamental issue of sexuality is that the father's kiss delivers Callie to death rather than a prince's kiss bringing her to life. Lends special meaning to the lines "So it's over" "Yes, all thanks to you."
Of course, since the show's heroes are both men there's little choice but to have Dean engage in heroics to save one girl, while another man's word makes Callie's father finally acknowledge what was done to her. Nevertheless the end of the episode brings us to one last blow against women.
I found it interesting to contrast Dean's reaction to the "wolf" coming to himself after he's released from Callie's control to Sam's reaction last week with Casey. There Dean is, in the middle of a violent fight, and one sudden appeal from the guy he's fighting and he freezes. Granted he had some idea of what was happening and was no doubt hoping Sam would succeed, but Dean's hesitation is improbably sudden to me. By contrast, last week gave the first inkling that Sam and Dean have switched places in remembering the victims.
I always thought that Jake's death, while unnecessarily vicious with the multiple shots, was nonetheless justified. Jake had proven himself to be a killer, to be untrustworthy, and to have developed powers they didn't know the extent of. In the midst of a battle, I actually think they hesitated too long to stop him.
Similarly Sam's shooting of the priest seemed fair enough. The man had just attacked both him and Bobby, and Sam catches him attacking Dean. If the gun doesn't work, they're in trouble. Luckily it does.
However there's no conclusive evidence from Sam's view that Casey is a demon. Yes, he found sulfur in her apartment but that doesn't mean it came from her. She and Dean were both trapped below and Dean is still alive when he finds them. He doesn't know for sure she's possessed. But he reacts quickly enough that Dean is unable to stop him.
At the end of this episode there's no question at all that Sam murders a woman for his own purposes. He can have had 4 possible motivations that I can see. (1) He shoots her out of sheer revenge for having given Dean the deal, (2) He shoots her in case she's lying and her death will undo the deal, (3) He shoots her in hopes that his attempt to tamper with the deal will reverse it, resulting in his death (and Dean's freedom), or (4) He shoots her to get the attention of her mysterious boss, with whom he hopes he can deal. While options 2-4 are rational enough, they all result in an innocent person who's dead for no other reason but that it might benefit Sam in some way. I'd been feeling all along that the dubbing of Sam's actions as "cold" were an exaggeration. Not anymore. Wonder how long it will be until Dean discovers what Sam did.
Minor note: they seem to be staying in nicer motels than usual this season.
The crossroads scene didn't come off quite right to me. It seemed rather devoid of tension and I think part of this is the fact that we rarely see the two actors facing off in the same frame. I wonder if part of this was to obscure their large disparity in height - something so obvious that the normal "over the shoulder" shots involved seeing Sam's sleeve in frame and only part of the demon's torso.
She recognized the Colt with just one look? A bit odd that Meg and her brother were potentially fooled by John's substitute in S1 if it's so well known. As apparently Ruby is. Rather odd too that she's known as Ruby - I'd have to assume that's the demon's name rather than that of her inhabited body. And apparently Ruby is a personal antagonist of the Crossroads demon. Is that, perhaps, why she's goaded Sam into this action?
Speaking of goading, I'm going to assume that what the demon says to Sam about Dean are true. Lies would be less effective than the truth, and there seems little reason to pointlessly taunt him when he's threatening her. It also seems no coincidence that she refers to Dean being bossy after their first scene together had him being exactly that. If so, it's interesting to know that Sam thinks of Dean as broken, creating problems he has to resolve, and who's "desperate, sloppy, needy." A part of Sam always has thought he's better than Dean in a variety of ways. That she mentions his secret relief at being free however is pretty intriguing in what it may say about the reasons Sam left for Stanford in the first place.
It's not like Sam didn't have motivation enough. Aside from being bright and wanting an education, Sam clearly wanted to get away from both his family's lifestyle and John's erratic parenting. Canon has indicated up to now that he left after a blowout with John, and there was no shortage of issues Sam had left with him. What it's been rather silent about is whether or not Sam was also leaving Dean, or leaving in spite of Dean. We've just been given the first indication that Sam's silence with Dean may not just have been about anger and betrayal. It may have been Sam feeling unable or unwilling to deal with what Dean wanted from him. Sam wasn't just leaving the life, he really was leaving his family. Little wonder then that Dean felt personally betrayed by Sam's actions rather than on behalf of John and family pride.
Also interesting is the information that rather than being some poorly considered decision, Dean's deal was actively wanted by some party. He likely could have gotten a much better deal but for his own desperation. Little wonder the Crossroads demon grasped his desperate, sloppy neediness.
In some production asides, I feel sorry for Sandy McCoy if, as it seems, this scene was shot out in the cold at night and she was in that dress. Also, someone should really have a word with the makeup people about stopping at the neck. I've noticed this once or twice with JA as well, and while one could say leaving her with a yellowy-green face and pink neck and shoulders makes her seem creepier I'd like to know what the excuse is with him.
Also, I would think RPSers are going to have a field day with the implications of having these two actors specifically facing off in a scene where she belittles the brothers' relationship and he shoots her at the end. Of all the parts she could have gotten over the past two years (or the rest of this season) and it's this one? Hmm.