Series 1, Episode 10: Asylum

Just for fun I decided to look online to see when these episodes that I'm now watching were first broadcast and I was shocked to find it was 2005. How have I never been aware of this series until now?? 2005 was also the year that Doctor Who came back so I guess my attention must have been elsewhere. How different my life could have been if I'd followed this show instead....Probably not that much different really. Maybe I wouldn't have learned to knit..

Anyway, this episode is called "Asylum" so I like it already because anything to do with asylums has to be proper creepy. It's a shame I've chosen to watch this episode in the middle of a beautifully sunny Sunday but I was in the mood for another episode right now and experience has told me not to delay such things.

In a brief chat about Sam's developing psychic skills, Dean utters the line "oh whatever. Don't ask, don't tell". The "Don't ask, Don't tell" attitude was used until very recently in the American armed forces to deal with homosexuals joining up. Basically they weren't banned from joining the army but they had to keep their sexuality a secret from the other soldiers. Dean's use of this phrase is a further hint that he is "a gay". 

Sam notices that there are lots of "orbs" within the asylum. I know what orbs are from my many viewings of Most Haunted. Basically they are specks of dust caught in the light...well that's what they ACTUALLY are anyway, but the Most Haunted explanation was that they were the first signs of a ghost's manifestation, despite the fact that no ghost ever actually manifested in the show. I remember one episode where they got ridiculously excited because they saw an orb through the camera which was like a long string I.e it was a piece of someone's hair caught in the light. In fact I'd love it if there was a Supernatural episode where they stumbled upon one of these rubbish reality TV show productions and showed them what real spirits are. A cameo from Derek Acorah would be nice.

Dean and Sam find a young scared girl called Kat in the asylum who has lost her boyfriend. Dean suggests they split up to look for her boyfriend and then has the nerve to have a go at Kat for not paying attention to horror movies! "If someone says somewhere is haunted then you don't go in!" Well I'm sorry Dean but I've seen my fair share of horror movies and while I completely agree with your statement I would also point out that splitting up is also a dumb idea! Especially as he's teamed up with this young girl who will presumably turn out to be already possessed by the evil spirits of the asylum and try to kill him! 

I think I might have misjudged Kat and the spirits. They don't seem to be evil at all. They just want to talk. Aww that's nice. The spirits are directing them to room 137. Maybe that's where all the other spirits are hiding, ready to surprise Dean and Sam with a party and a lovely buffet for all their hard work in defeating evil demons.

Unfortunately it's actually the room of the evil doctor who performed vicious experimental procedures on his patients....not a sausage roll in sight!

That was another really good episode. And another exciting development at the end where it appears that Sam receives a call from his father. He picks up the phone, listens and says "Dad??" I'll be annoyed if the next episode starts with him saying "oh I'm sorry you sounded just like my dad..." 

Series 1, Episode 9: Home

So I've just done some maths and I've worked out that at this pace it will take me about 5 and a half years to get up to date with this series. That's terrible! I really need to start doing at least a couple of episodes a week. That's my new resolution! 

As the name of the episode suggests, Dean and Sam travel back home to help out the family who now live in their old house, the house where their mother was killed. Sam tells Dean that he knows that is where they need to go next as he has been having nightmares about the place and he reveals that quite often his dreams come true. Dean seems pretty sceptical about this which is surprising considering all the weird stuff they deal with on a daily basis. Is that really where Dean's credulity stops?? I'm not sure if these nightmares of Sam's are going to be a running theme throughout the series but it would at least explain how they keep finding these strange cases to investigate. 

Dean and Sam arrive at the old house and Sam tells the lady that lives there that this used to be their house and as they were driving past they decided they'd call in and have a look around the old place. I can't imagine that going down too well in real life. I used to live in my Nan's old house for a couple of years before it was sold and strangely I quite often dream about that place. I'm in the house but I know I'm not supposed to be there and the new owner could come back any minute and catch me. Sometimes I'm in there and discover I've left loads of my stuff scattered around and I'm desperately trying to gather it all up before I'm caught. I would really like to go and have a look round there sometime to see how it may have changed. But I would never think of just knocking on the door and asking to have a look round. I mean that's just weird! I'd hate it if someone did that to me! Anyway I've gone off on a right tangent here. Back to the episode....

This episode is really really good! Sam and Dean have teamed up with a psychic lady called Missouri (I may have spelt that completely wrong!). She's brilliant and funny so I hope she comes back as a recurring character. They take her back to their old house and she's tells them there is an evil poltergeist inhabiting the property. That would explain the poor plumber getting his hand ripped to shreds in the waste disposal in the sink, a scene which was pretty difficult to watch! She also says that there is another spirit present in the house but she can't work out what it is. Given that the little girl saw a burning ghost at the start of the episode then I'm willing to bet that it might be the ghost of their mother who is maybe trying to protect the family from the poltergeist. 

Yep! Totally got it right, I'm awesome! Dean and Sam's mum sacrifices herself to thwart the poltergeist and the house returns to normal. Well...it's pretty trashed to be honest but the owner seems happy enough. Personally I would be thinking of moving.

I really enjoyed this episode, especially after the slight disappointment of the previous one. Things seem to be developing nicely. Sam clearly has powers that he is only just finding out about which is going to be an interesting side plot and there was a fairly big twist at the end when it is revealed that  Missouri knows the whereabouts of their father despite telling them she didn't. She goes to visit him at the end of the episode and he says he can't meet up with Dean and Sam again until he discovers the truth..whatever that means. I think he is starting to suspect that Dean may be a homosexual and he needs to know for sure so that he can take time in coming to terms with it...Stranger things have happened! Especially in this show!

Series 1, Episode 8: Bugs

...Bunny?....Is this one going to be about Bugs Bunny? I hope so. Bugs Bunny becomes real, escapes from a child's television and goes on a muderous rampage. Dean and Sam have to team up with the scary eye-d guy from Who Framed Roger Rabbit in order to destroy this psychotic toon....Or it could be about insects.

I'm very tired this weekend. I don't know what's the matter with me. I planned on doing another double session of Supernatural but I'm afraid it'll just be the one episode tonight, but then hopefully more in the week. It's tricky though with Big Brother being back on at the moment!

Anyway let's get this episode started...

Oh good lord it is about creepy crawlies and I feel itchy already! Some poor guy has just fallen down a hole and been set upon by millions of them. They didn't look too vicious so I'm not sure how they killed him but they did. I haven't been this freaked out since Fatima Whitbread got that cockroach stuck up her nose on I'm A Celebity! 

One thing I am finding unusual about this series is how Dean and Sam just keep stumbling upon these strange cases. These events must be very rare. If they weren't then more people would know about them and such supernatural happenings would be common knowledge. They clearly aren't common knowledge so therefore they must be rare. So how is it that, without really looking that hard for them, that Dean and Sam keep discovering them? It's almost like I think there needs to be some guiding force sending them to these cases...but I don't think I like that idea so it's a no win situation. For now, I'm fine with them just going on as they are. I just thought it was worth commenting on.

I do have an answer to anther question that was "bugging" me though (see what I did there?). I remembering wondering a few blog entries back how Dean and Sam got any money. In this episode we see Dean hustling people at pool while Sam is as pragmatic as ever and suggests they just get day jobs. That would be quite funny. The rest of the series is just about Dean and Sam working in grocery store with nothing unusual happening at all, aside from the odd sinister looking pineapple.

Dean and Sam attend a house viewing in order to try to get some more information about the guy who fell down the hole and apparently had his brain eaten by beetles. Nice! Whilst there they are mistaken for a gay couple...That's pretty hot actually..

A lady just had massive spider crawl out from her hair. She jumped a little bit and casualy brushed it off. If that had been me I would have run out of the bedroom screaming! Boarded up the door and set fire to the house, but not before finding my passport so that I could flee the country! 

Sam alerts Dean to the news of another death whilst Dean is in the shower. Dean pokes his head around the bathroom door for a brief chat before the action moves on to another scene. I'm not happy with the director of this episode. They missed a perfectly good opportunity to have a topless Dean scene! I just wanted a brief glimpse, I don't think that's to much to ask! 

The death they go to investigate is the one shown in the picture above. I was a little disappointed at how fake the spiders looked. They were obviously CGI but not done very well. What has impressed me so far about this series are some of the practical effects used and I think it would have been much better here if they had just used real spiders. I wonder why they didn't. It wouldn't surprise me if the actress involved had point blank refused to have real spiders in the scene, which I could understand completely!

Well I've just finished the episode and I'm not really sure what I make of it. The insect problem was being caused by a Native American curse put on the land 170 years ago after an entire village of people were massacred there by white men. The story of the massacre was so appalling that I didn't really want Dean and Sam to reverse the curse as it would seem disrepectful. And it turns out that they don't reverse the curse. They just let it run its course. Which puts me in a weird situation because it seems that nothing in the episode would be different had Sam and Dean not been there. Aside from being there to explain to the audience what was going on, they actually had minimal impact on the plot. Which seems strange..We do however learn some more interesting things about their dad, specifically his troubled relationship with Sam so that seems to be driving the main story arc of the series along nicely.

Series 1, Episode 7: Hook Man

Well it seems that hundreds of my friends have jetted off to Cyprus this week and left me all alone..I am of course exaggerating, I don't have anywhere near a hundred friends! And besides, when I weigh up whether I'd rather be relaxing in sunny Cyprus or sitting in rainy Nantwich watching an episode of Supernatural then I know where I'd rather be. Cyprus would be far to warm for me. 

So this episode is called "Hook Man". Two things spring to mind. Either we are going to have a killer with a hook for a hand or Robin Williams and Dustin Hoffman are going to be battling it out again as Peter Pan and Captain Hook. I think the latter is very unlikely so I'm banking on it being the former.

I'm guessing this guy isn't Dustin Hoffman! Captain Hook is seriously pissed off!

I think the vicar did it! Sorry for that sudden inexplicable exclamation but I just wanted to get my prediction in. This is one of the best bits about doing a blog about a series I know nothing about as opposed to one that I know back to front! To explain my earlier statement I need to briefly mention the plot thus far.

A young girl (Laurie) is on a date with a lad and they drive to a secluded spot. Her dad (the vicar) tries to call her and she refuses to answer. The couple start "getting close" when the guy decides to go and investigate a strange noise coming from outside the car. I wonder if the sound he could hear was me thumping my head against the wall in frustration at how much this idiot was fulfilling the horror movie cliche! Anyway, he soon ends up dead after an attack from a semi invicible man with a hook. When you do see the hook man it's actually pretty terrifying. Men in hats with weapons attached to their hands still set off that underlying Freddy Krueger fear that still resides inside me. Laurie escapes and it seems to be that her father is being overly protective of her so I think he did it. I think he's a religious nut who does not want his daughter to be despoiled. 

The vicar and Laurie have an argument and shortly after her room mate has met the same fate as her boyfriend. I'm starting to think that it's to obvious that it's the vicar as everything seems to be pointing that way so I have reassessed the situation and I think it will be Laurie herself committing the murders somehow and the reason the vicar is trying to keep her to himself is because he knows she is dangerous. That's my prediction and I'm sticking to it! At least until my next brainwave hits. So far Dean and Sam haven't done much except get arrested. Disappointing. Come on guys! Get in the Mystery Machine and solve this puzzle! 

On a side note, I'm having chicken nuggets and chips for my tea so life's not all bad after all. I bet the food in Cyprus is awful! 

Well it turns out I got this episode pretty much dead right. In fact I was constantly ahead of Dean and Sam every step of the way so either I'm on good form today or they are having a bad day. Maybe I should take up this demon hunting! I'll finish my chicken nuggets first though! Annoyingly I found I had hardly any chips in but then got excited as I found some onion rings so when you think about it, my life is just as exciting and has the same ups and downs as Dean and Sam. We're not so different when it comes down to it. I'm looking forward to them starting a blog about my life.

Just a quick note to end on. I'm not really upset about not being invited to Cyprus. I just thought it would be funny to pretend to be. I understand that pointing this out kind of ruins the joke but I didn't want people thinking I was genuinely feeling sorry for myself. I'm not. Well no more than usual anyway.