SupernaturalAfter School Special
Original Air Date: Jan 29, 2009
Kara – TwoCents Senior Staff Writer
kara@thetwocentscorp.com
Hello, Kara here! The wonderful Jenny D is taking a break for a few weeks so I’ll be stepping in to keep you updated on the Winchesters. This week, we get to see what kind of a time Sam and Dean had in high school. We start out with a girl who beats up a fellow student and claims she was possessed. Cue Sam and Dean who believe her and go to her school to investigate.
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Hello, Kara here! The wonderful Jenny D is taking a break for a few weeks so I’ll be stepping in to keep you updated on the Winchesters. This week, we get to see what kind of a time Sam and Dean had in high school. We start out with a girl who beats up a fellow student and claims she was possessed. Cue Sam and Dean who believe her and go to her school to investigate.
ReplyDeleteThe Impala pulls up in front of Truman High School to Foreigner’s “Long, Long Way From Home.” Can I get a big hell yeah for Supernatural getting music back? Sure, it was only for about thirty seconds but I’ll take what we can get. We also get to see an older license plate for the Impala and in case you wanted to know for trivia purposes, it was BQN 9R3. Teen Dean and Little Sam go into the school, expecting to only be there for about two weeks, tops. Dean’s jaded by the whole process and doesn’t even try to pay attention to class.
Sam’s teacher gives the class an assignment to write an essay on their most memorable family experience, which is a great assignment for a Winchester, especially one that doesn’t think he’ll still be there when the teacher reads the assignment. Sam makes a new friend, the nerdy Barry, who is getting picked on by a bully. Sam stands up for Barry and when the bully, Dirk, asks if Sam wants to take Barry’s place, Sam says yes. Aw, Sam.
Meanwhile, in present day, Sam and Dean pose as a janitor and substitute coach Roth, respectively. Dean, who said he doesn’t do shorts in season one, is all decked out in red shorts, knee length socks and has a whistle. He introduces the kids to dodgeball and proudly explains to Sam, “The whistle makes me their god.”
The school’s science class takes a bad turn when a bully’s hand gets shoved in some sort of awful chopper/blender/hand-dicer. The boy who did the shoving oozes black liquid from his ears, same as the girl in the first five minutes of the episode. It’s ectoplasm, like in the season two episode, No Exit. Translation: ew and uh, oh. What it means is that they’ve got one super pissed off spirit running around the school.
Sam finds out Barry killed himself in 1998 and he and Dean salt and burn Barry’s bones. They think they’ve handled the ghost situation but a girl asks Sam for directions, then stabs him. He pours salt in her mouth to get the spirit out of her and it whooshes off down the halls.
Back in the Teen Dean days, Dean spends his days messing around with a girl, Amanda, in the janitor’s closet. Barry sees Dean and says to Sam, “He’s cool,” to which Sam replies, “Yeah, he thinks so.” In the courtyard, Dirk punches Sam and Dean goes ballistic when he finds out about it. He asks Sam why he didn’t fight back and Sam says he just wants to be normal. Later, Sam gets called into meet with his teacher about the essay he wrote. The teacher makes sure Sam knows it was supposed to be non-fiction and then explains that it’s well written. Yes, Sam gets an A for his essay on his family tracking a killing a werewolf the previous summer. The teacher asks Sam if he’s thought about being a writer and Sam says he’s got to stick with the family business. In the biggest statement of foreshadowing I’ve ever heard on Supernatural, his teacher says that there’s, “three to four big choices in everyone’s life and you need to be the one that makes them.” Oh, dear. That would be when I slapped my hand to my head and stressed out even more about where this season was going to take us.
Dirk confronts Sam again and Sam fights back this time. He wins and Dirk earns the permanent nickname of Dirk the Jerk. Back in present day, Sam and Dean figure out that Dirk is the seriously angry spirit and visit his father. Apparently, Dirk took care of his mother, who died very slowly and the experience messed him up, as you would expect. Being called Dirk the Jerk didn’t help him any and Sam feels massively guilty, as Sam usually does. Dean asks Dirk’s father if he had Dirk cremated and Dirk’s father says yes. After a pause, Dean continues, “All of him?” Sam gives him this amazing, “What?” face. Dirk’s father says he kept a lock of hair, prompting Dean to say another fantastic line, “Oh, that’s nice. Where do you keep that?”
Cut to the school bus where Sam and Dean corner the spirit in Eddie, the bus driver. The spirit jumps to the coach and attacks Sam. Dean finds the lock of hair, burns it and the coach collapses on Sam. The spirit is released and the day is saved.
Back in Teen Dean land, Amanda catches Dean in the closet with another girl. She calls Dean a “sad, lonely, little kid” and says, “I feel sorry for you, Dean.” Dean says he saves lives and calls out that he’s a hero, which is true but a bit tacky. Sorry, Dean. John phones Dean and picks them up. Unfortunately, it’s not Jeffrey Dean Morgan but I’ll just pretend he was in the episode. Hey, a girl can dream. Sam waves goodbye to Barry in the window and we jump back to present day, where Sam has decided to visit his teacher. The teacher asks him, “Are you happy, Sam?” It’s the last line and the camera holds on Sam’s hesitant face. Ah, crap.
So, what did you think? I liked the casting on this young Sam Winchester a lot and while Teen Dean had the outfit, voice and swagger right, there’s this nagging, “Yeah, he’s just not Dean” aspect to him. It’s hard to try to step in Jensen’s shoes. Everyone I watched the episode with agreed that while he was not Dean, he was as close as we could possibly get. Did you like the younger Winchesters? And what did you think about all the foreshadowing? Tell me your TwoCents in the comments!