galathea | Review for 2x05 'Simon Said'

Geesh, I love my show! ♥ This week we dive straight back into the mytharc, the brothers are back on track, there’s the fun, there’s the creepy and the heart-warming. What more can a girl ask for?! *g*

This was the first episode of the season that I went into without prior knowledge about what was going to happen and I was mainly concerned beforehand about how they are going to handle the brothers after the big talk scene at the end of 2.04. Any more angsty!Dean and pushy!Sam would have been redundant at that stage and once again, the writers didn’t disappoint me!

Now that Dean’s feelings are out in the open and Sam realized that he can’t offer Dean any consolation he does the only thing he can do, namely let it be and give Dean the space he needs without constantly questioning his every move. Dean on the other hand is visibly more relaxed and nearly back to his old self, his issues receded to the back of his mind. Dean was always good at compartmentalising. With Sam being in vision distress this episode, the fragile balance act the brothers played over the last couple of episodes was replaced by the relative comfort of their big brother/little brother routine. Concentrating on Sam’s problems is the best way for Dean to be distracted from his own issues, it allows him to re-establish his prior caretaker role and give Sam a break from trying to be the glue that holds everything together, a role allocation both of them seem to be much more comfortable with.

After they were awfully distant from each other over the last few weeks, which clearly translated into physical distance, especially from Dean’s side, we saw them closer this episode. No restraint whatsoever from Dean to give constant support, physically as well as emotionally. Additionally there’s a new layer of equality in their relationship, with Dean allowing Sam to handle parts of the case without constant interference or arguing and Sam falling back on Dean’s expertise and creativity when needed. Dean willingly handing over the control of a critical situation like the hostage situation on the bridge to Sam wasn’t quite imaginable during S1, mind control problem or not. It seems that with Dean allowing his brother to see him at his utmost vulnerable, their power balance shifted to a more even division.

To see that development made me very happy and it was very much needed after all the angst this season so far. Don’t get me wrong, I love angst and I think that given the gravity that John’s loss holds for the boys, the grieving process was handled incredibly well, in character and with the necessary time they needed. But unlike other shows, Supernatural has no established side characters to fall back to for comic relief, which makes angst in Supernatural a lot more exhausting in comparison. It will still need a lot of time for Sam and Dean to heal completely, but after Dean’s emotional breakdown last week, they at least established a new base of understanding to operate from, and I like that and it was played well in this episode.

Dean: "You’re not a murderer, Sam. You don’t have it in your bones."

Although Dean just stated two episodes ago how much he hates all supernatural beings, perceiving them as inherently evil, and showed a grave self-loathing at the very thought of himself being remotely touched by the supernatural in CSPWDT, he quickly dismisses this feeling as soon as it is about his brother. Whatever disconcerting information John had for him about Sam and his worries about freaky premonitions aside, Dean is unable to see other than goodness in his little brother. It was typical for Sam to not realise why Dean was so determined to defend Andy, convinced about his innocence, when it was clearly about defending Sam with this stance as well.

Still, Dean subconsciously calling Sam a 'supernatural freak' and the confession that Dean is afraid of what’s happening to his brother, which Andy unintentionally forces out of him, was telling. They have no concrete idea about the YED's plans, no control over what’s happening to Sam and it figures that Dean feels lost because he has no course of action ready for this. He loves his brother and knows him better than anyone, he could never truly believe that his Sam could become a stone-cold murderer, but there’s a lot of variables which he has no control over and that creates fear; not fear of his brother, but fear for his brother.

Dean manages to keep his fears in check though, for his sake as well as to keep Sam calm. Sam’s inclination to instantly assume the worst, to fall into self-doubt and panic isn’t helpful and the need to be the steady pole to Sam’s freak-out allows Dean to push those fears back. He’s determined to no let the fear dictate their actions. His calling do-over may be childish and his reassurance routine ("We just keep doing, what we’re doing!") lame, but it works at least for the time being.

Sam: "So I’m a freak now?"
Dean: "You’ve always been a freak!"

For Sam the situation is just as frightening as it is for Dean, just from a different perspective of course. The fact that he waited so long to even tell Dean about his premonitions showed how scared he is, not only of how Dean might react to it, but also of what it means for him. His readiness to look for parallels between him and a clearly psychotic Max Miller or Anson Weems, questioning his own person and his autonomy is understandable, still it’s also counterproductive.

Sam is in no way a killer, just as Andy isn’t one either. Dean is right, there’s a difference between killing out of self-defence or for the protection of others and killing out of hate or for 'fun'. Everyone can be pushed into the first, but only few are inclined to do the latter and Sam needs to see that distinction for his own peace of mind.

As a sidenote: Sam’s visions obviously seem to become more painful lately. There’s no way he could have been walking around in this episode like he did in Salvation. The fact that Dean even needed to pull over the car and the way he completely crumbled when he has the vision about Andy’s birth mother shows that clearly. :( I wonder if there’s any significance to that increase in pain. It’s also interesting that Anson mentioned that he endured headaches as well when using his powers, while Andy on the other hand didn’t have any problems with that.

Anson: "They ruined our lives, Andy. We could have been together instead of alone."

I love how they pulled off the parallels between the two pairs of brothers here. I couldn’t help but wonder if things would have developed differently for Andy and Anson if they hadn’t been separated. If Andy would have had the same stabilising influence on Anson, that Dean has on Sam. Anson’s isolation clearly played a role in him becoming a sociopath; Max also was isolated from any positive influence, while Sam and Andy obviously found grounding roots in their families! Both, Max and Anson were all too ready to use their newly found powers for evil purposes, not even questioning them or their origin. If the YED’s plans really do entail turning the psychic kids into killers, he certainly has a walk-over with some of them, while others seem to be more resistant.

I found it interesting that the demon didn’t want Anson to contact Andy until the time is right, which makes me suspect he expected Andy to turn at some point as well, being more open to Anson’s approach then. Still, there doesn’t seem to be a consistent pattern with the psychic kids at the moment. While the YED directly contacted Anson via 'dreams', he did no such thing with Andy, Max or Sam; while with Sam & Dean only one of the brothers is psychic, with Andy & Anson it’s both of them; while some of the kids had house fires, others didn’t. Speculations are wide open on how to interpret the demons actions with evidence that’s so diverse. The cards are really bad for the good guys at the moment, with no clue on how to kill the demon, not much success in tracking him down and now they even lost the little patterns they thought they had figured out. Not good at all. :(

I liked Andy a lot by the way. He took advantage of his powers, but only to secure a decent living and without harming anybody. He shied away from using his powers on the woman he loved and was satisfied with the little enjoyments in life, reading, relaxing, having fun drives in classic automobiles, but only to return the car safe and sound after it fulfilled its purpose. His laid back and friendly personality made him a loveable side-character and I was happy that he did turn out to be the good guy. As a sidenote: As a former philosophy student, I am probably the only person who found the contents of Andy’s van highly amusing, with Wittgenstein, Kant and Hegel as night lectures! Believe me, 'Moby Dick’s bong' made perfect sense here, only a doped up mind can voluntarily deal with Hegel’s metaphysics. *g*

Anson on the other hand totally creeped me out. The mind rape scene in the car was one of the most disturbing scenes for me, by far more than the gory deaths we had to experience in this episode actually. Tracy was fully aware of what was about to happen, not only the rape, but also that she would kill herself afterwards and still was forced into complying, horrible. Anson’s possessiveness of Andy was just as unsettling as his superiority complex and the deadly combination of power and an unstable mind was terrifying.

Again, in the end Sam and Dean were spared to take the life of the human perpetrator themselves, but the fact that one brother was forced to kill the other in order to keep him from harming more people, made me think that this is the 2nd time within the short span of three episodes that we had an account of sibling murder. That doesn’t seem to bode well for Sam and Dean at all. :(

Jo: "You’re afraid of my mother?"
Dean: "I think so!"

Last but not least some words about the Roadhouse gang: Ash grows on me with every appearance. Still I would like to see the boys hit their usual research machine from time to time again. It somehow seems not very believable that their on-the-road lifestyle allows them to just drop by at the Roadhouse every time just for simple information, especially if they are on a time table like with this case. I get that they need to establish these characters, but I would like to see it develop more organically within the style of the show.

Also my first impression of Ellen was kind of confirmed here. I like her; she is firm, resolute, doesn’t take shit and speaks her mind openly. I do have to admit though that her insistence on Sam and Dean trusting her with sensitive and very private information made me wary, just like Dean. She does have a point with sticking together but at the moment they just don’t know each other well enough that she could demand such a display of openness. Dean is maybe a bit too careful to let someone in, but he has good reason for that. The readiness with which Sam opens up though, tells us all about how scared he is. I’d have preferred for them to more subtly avoid to lay open all facts about Sam and only relay some of the knowledge they have about the demon. I am curious and a tad anxious how this will play out.

I am still not sure what to make of Jo, the whole episode seemed to emphasise her immaturity and naivety even more. Being good at a shooting game doesn’t make her a hunter and her eagerness to help Sam and Dean is nice, but it’s also overly self-confident when she knows nothing about their situation really. At the moment I don’t see any sign of a romantic development between her and Dean at all, only a one sided crush from Jo’s side: Dean doesn’t react to her blatant flirting attempts, his friendly manners and teasing banter with her look more brotherly to me than anything else.

The way Ellen sends her out of the room when she has a 'grown-up' talk with Sam and Dean, also served to emphasize her obvious youth, which makes her an absolute mismatch for Dean at the moment. I don’t doubt that this could change, I am still open to her character developing into something more mature and interesting, but at the moment I just see a immature young twen, trying to get the attention of a hot guy, ignoring his obvious disinterest.

By the way I found the way Sam completely ignores her presence, not even acknowledging her with a greeting, completely hilarious! *g*

What else was noteworthy?

Dean singing along to REO Speedwagon of all bands was just adorable! ♥ Who doesn’t know the situation to be stuck with a cheesy tune in your head and can’t help to hum or sing it constantly? That happens to me all the time, heck, I even know this damn song by heart, because it was such a big hit in the 80s. I know an embarrassing lot of this cheesy songs just because I happen to grew up then, sometimes only the mention of a song title is enough to get me stuck with one of this song themes for days. *g*

Andy talking Dean into letting him drive the Impala and Dean’s flabbergasted expression after he realized what just a happened made me laugh so hard. Sam’s incredulous reaction to seeing Andy behind the wheel of their car was priceless as well. Dean’s reaction to getting 'his baby' back was hilarious. I loved that Andy just took the car for a fun ride, but then just left it after he got out of it what he wanted.

So all in all I adored this episode. We will see how long the balance between Sam and Dean will hold but at the moment I was just happy to have the Winchester team back. ♥