Previously: Papa Winchester made a demon deal to save Dean’s life and now he’s dead. He won’t be missed.
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Everybody Loves a Clown
Kirsti: First of all, NOBODY LOVES A CLOWN. NOBODY.
Right. Now that’s out of the way, let’s get to the episode. Medford, Wisconsin. A young girl looks excitedly around a carnival while her parents look bored. She gets excited about clowns, and her dad’s all “NOPE.” She waves at one particular clown, which waves back, but neither of her parents can see it. Cut to them driving home. She sees the same clown out the car window. Cut to her getting out of bed that night and seeing the clown standing on her back lawn. She goes downstairs and lets it in because SHE’S A FUCKING IDIOT.
FLAME ON!
After the Not Credits, the boys cry as they burn Papa Winchester’s body. Sam asks if Papa Winchester said anything before he died, and Dean’s all “NOPE NOTHING NOT A THING.” Cut to Bobby’s junkyard a week later. Dean’s working on the Bromobile. Sam asks if he needs help, and Dean’s all “Stop trying to make me talk about my inner pain.” They argue about what to do next because they have no leads, and Sam says he checked the voicemail on Papa Winchester’s phone and there’s a four month old message from a woman named Ellen. Sam’s tracked down her address. They ask Bobby if they can borrow a car.
Cut to an old-timey looking saloon in the middle of nowhere, Nebraska. The boys pull up in a crappy old minivan and Dean complains that he feels like a soccer mom. I can’t not:
Totally something Dean would say.
They head inside to find it empty except for a dude sleeping on the pool table. Suddenly, there’s a gun in the middle of Dean’s back. He turns to see a sassy blonde girl holding a rifle. A blonde girl that you may know better as Meg Manning from Veronica Mars! He grabs it from her, she punches him in the face and takes it back because she’s awesome. He yells for Sam’s help but Sam’s got an older woman holding a gun on him. But the guns disappear when she hears their names. She introduces herself as Ellen Harvelle. The blonde girl is her daughter, Jo. Her bar is popular with hunters, which is how she knew Papa Winchester.
She says that she can help with the demon, then realises that Papa Winchester’s dead. She offers her condolences and says that Ash – the guy sleeping on the pool table – can help them find the demon. Despite his mullet, he’s a genius. Also, I feel the need to point out that the last time we saw Ash, he was a computer geek in I Robot, You Jane. Crossover magic?
Anyway, Dean scoffs, calling Ash “a Lynyrd Skynyrd roadie,” which Ash takes as a compliment.
The boys hand over a year’s worth of Papa Winchester’s research. Ash looks it over and says he needs 51 hours to assess it.
Sam spots a folder behind the bar and asks Ellen about it. She hands it over and he flips through articles telling us that the husband and wife from the teaser were murdered and their kid was left alive. Meanwhile, Dean and Jo flirt a little. She tells him that her dad was a hunter and died when she was little. He half-heartedly puts the moves on her, then stops himself. Because she’s awesome, Jo says “You know, I thought you were gonna toss me some cheap pickup line. Most hunters come through that door think they can get in my pants with some… pizza, a six pack, and side one of Zeppelin IV.” Dean looks shifty because that’s totally what he was going to do. Sam comes up with the Clown File and says he’s got a case for them.
Alison Hendrix Minivan. Dean scoffs at the idea of killer clowns, and we learn that Sam has clown phobia. Legit, dude. He tells us that there’ve been a series of murders before, back in 1981. All tied to one particular circus, Bunker Brothers. They hypothesise that they’re dealing with a cursed object, seeing as the new murders are tied to Cooper Carnivals. Sam says that hunting is what Papa Winchester would have wanted, and Dean looks thoughtful.
Cut to a carnival. A bored looking kid and his father go through a funhouse. The kid sees the creepy clown from the teaser waving at him, but when he looks back it’s gone.
He’s a little freaked, but his dad tells him not to be afraid because clowns are his friend. DUDE, NO. That night, the kid wakes his father up and says that he was right: the clown IS his friend. The father looks up to see the clown standing behind his kid. Aaaaaand THAT’S WHAT HAPPENS. Fade to black.
After the Not Commercial Break, the boys pull up at the carnival. Dean goes to talk to the police, who thoughtfully inform him of the new murders. He says a cursed object will give off EMF and they’ll have to scan All The Things to find it. Conveniently, the carnival is hiring. Dean asks a nearby knife thrower if he’s seen Mr. Cooper, and the knife thrower reveals that he’s blind so hasn’t seen shit. Dean awkward turtles.
In Mr. Cooper’s office, the boys claim to have worked the carnival circuit before. Mr. Cooper calls bullshit and says that the carnival is a place for outcasts. Given their massively mainstream and pretty appearances, they should go to school, get married, have kids. Sam says they don’t want to be in school and Dean looks confused. Outside, he confronts Sam, saying that he thought he’d jump at the chance to go back to his old life. Sam replies that Papa Winchester would have wanted him to keep hunting. Dean’s all “Since when do you give a shit what Papa Winchester wants?” and Sam replies “Since he died, okay.”
Sometime later, Sam’s in uniform, collecting rubbish and scanning all the things for EMF. He checks inside a funhouse and finds a skeleton. Like, a real one. He calls Dean and hypothesises that a spirit is haunting its own bones, which sounds like the worst thing EVER to get stuck haunting. Dean says they should check it out and hangs up. But Blind Knife Thrower has overheard the conversation and is all “Who the fuck are you people?” Dean says that they’re writing a book about ghosts. Eventually, he escapes and heads over to Sam just in time to see a little girl be all “HEY, LOOK AT THE CLOWN THAT’S NOT THERE!!” They exchange a look and follow the family home.
That night, they’re on stakeout. Sam can’t believe Dean told Blind Knife Thrower about the ghost clown, but Dean says it came in handy – he found out that Mr. Cooper worked at Bunker Brothers in 1981. Sometime later, Dean’s dozing when Sam spots the little girl walking through the house. We cut to her point of view as she opens the front door and asks the creepy clown if it wants to come in. It nods and follows her into the house. Fade to black.
After the Not Commercial Break, the boys are somehow in the house already?! IDEK. Whatever, show. Sam grabs the girl, who screams, and Dean shoots at the clown with rock salt. It hits the clown, which turns invisible and jumps through a plate glass door before running away. The girl’s parents rush downstairs to their screaming child and the boys flee as the girl says sadly “Mommy, Daddy, they shot my clown!”
On a back road the next morning, the boys dump the Alison Hedrix Minivan because a) the parents might have seen the licence plate and b) Dean hates it. As they start walking, conversation turns from the case to their manpain about Papa Winchester. Sam’s worried about Dean’s lack of emotion over it, while Dean argues that Sam’s sudden interest in doing what Papa Winchester would want is crap: “Sam, you spent your entire life slugging it out with that man. I mean, hell, you, you picked a fight with him the last time you ever saw him. And now that he’s dead, now you want to make it right? Well, I’m sorry Sam, but you can’t, it’s too little, too late.”
Sam looks hurt and announces that he’s going to call Ellen for help.
Sometime later, Sam says that Ellen’s best guess is a Rakshasa, a Hindu monster that sleeps on a bed of insects, turns invisible, passes as human, has to be invited in, and feeds every 20-30 years. Mr. Cooper, having worked at both carnivals, is suddenly their prime suspect. Sam says they need a dagger made of pure brass to kill a Rakshasa. Dean thinks he knows where to find one, and tells Sam to go make sure it’s Mr. Cooper while he tracks down the dagger.
At the carnival that night, Sam breaks into Mr. Cooper’s trailer and slices open the mattress to check for insects. A shotgun toting Mr. Cooper busts him. Meanwhile, Dean asks Blind Knife Thrower for a brass dagger. He tells Dean to check a trunk, which turns out to contain a clown costume. Dean turns in surprise as Blind Knife Thrower gets all “IT WAS MEEEEEEEEEEE!!!” and grins creepily as he turns invisible. Fade to black.
After the Not Commercial Break, knives fly at Dean’s head. He dodges them and manages to escape from the trailer. He runs into Sam and gives him an update, saying that they still need a brass dagger. Sam gets an idea and ushers Dean towards the funhouse. Inside, he approaches a steam organ with brass pipes and grabs at one of them, burning his hands because he’s a fucking idiot. Knives fly at Dean and pin him to the wall by one sleeve. Sam wraps a cloth around his hand and manages to break off one of the pipes. They look around in a panic for Blind Knife Thrower, but INVISIBLE YO.
Dean pulls a lever and the room is flooded with steam, revealing an outline behind Sam. Dean yells out and Sam stabs backwards. A patch of blood appears in thin air, and Sam turns to see the pipe is buried in Invisible Blind Knife Thrower. IBKT collapses, leaving nothing but the pipe and a pile of clothes on the floor. “I hate funhouses…” Dean says.
Back at Harvelle’s, Ellen congratulates the boys on their successful hunt. Jo sits down next to Dean and gives Sam a meaningful look. He quickly finds an elsewhere to be. Jo asks if she’ll see Dean again, and he tells her that ordinarily he’d be putting the moves on her in a second, but it’s the wrong place, wrong time. She gets it. Ash walks in carrying a homemade laptop and says he’s worked out a way to track the Yellow Eyed Demon through signs and omens. If anything pops up, an alarm will go off on his laptop. The boys are hella impressed that a dude with a mullet could do all that, and Sam asks where he learnt it. “M.I.T. Before I got bounced for… fighting,” he replies because he’s awesome. Sam’s stunned but impressed. Ellen offers them a place to stay, but Dean says there’s something he has to do.
Cut to Bobby’s. Dean’s working on the Bromobile again. Sam comes up and says that Dean was right about him and Papa Winchester. He regrets always picking fights and says he knows that trying to make up for it now is too little too late. “I miss him, man. And I feel guilty as hell. And I’m not all right. Not at all. But neither are you. That much I know,” he says with tears in his eyes. He walks away and Dean stares after him. Then he picks up a crowbar and smashes the window of a nearby car before turning and slamming the crowbar into the boot of the Bromobile over and over.
Eventually, it falls to the ground and he stares into the distance, lip quivering. Fade to black.
I don’t know what to make of this episode. It’s largely about their manpain, so the monster of the week feels a little like an afterthought. Plus, clowns = NOPESVILLE. But then on the other hand, we meet Ellen and Jo and Ash, all of whom are awesome. So…yeah.
Next time on Supernatural: VAMPIRES. And I tell you about my ridiculous headcanon. Find out more in S02 E03 – Blood Lust.
I'm a 30-something librarian and I still live with my parents because I'm super broke. Leader of Team Heartless Cow. I have an inexplicable love for 90s television, eat too much chocolate, and read more than is good for me.
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