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Supernatural: Asylum

Dean: "You seen a lot of horror movies?"
Kat: "I guess so."
Dean: "Do me a favor. Next time you see one, pay attention."

This one didn't do a lot for me. There was a lot of walking around the seriously trashed Roosevelt Asylum with flashlights that kept not working, while spooks with messed up faces lurked about and whispered and possessed people. It got a little old.

But what I did like were the many clever lines of dialogue. And of course, the dramatic tension between Dean and Sam, which the ghosts managed to tap into and exploit. So Sam doesn't like taking orders from Dean. What a surprise, she said sarcastically. Maybe if Sam had been more upfront with Dean about his feelings, he wouldn't have left an opening for some nasty, possessing, faceless ghost. Or not.

And there was one other thing I liked: the role reversal with Gavin and Kat, the couple who got trapped in the asylum with the boys. It was Gavin's idea to explore the asylum in the first place, but he quickly turned into a cowardly sack of mush. It was tiny blonde Kat who was all brave and helpful, ready to shoot ghosts with rock salt to back up the boys. The sort of girlfriend a good ghostbuster needs, dare I say.

Bits and pieces:

— Dean likes Jack Nicholson movies. He mentioned more than one.

— Sam spent some time at the shrink's that we didn't see. Did he confide in the shrink? Unload a little about Jessica and his frustrations with Dad and Dean?

— I wasn't crazy about this one, but I must admit that the messy, ghoulish asylum set was pretty amazing. And it just went on and on.

— The last scene was Sam getting a cliffhanger call from John Winchester.

— Dean's latest alias was Nigel Tufnel, from the Chicago Tribune. Nigel Tufnel was the lead singer of the famous fictional rock group, Spinal Tap.

Quotes (and there were a lot of cool ones):

Sam: "What about the journal? Any leads in there?"
Dean: "Same as the last time I looked. Nothing I can make out. I love the guy, but I swear, he writes like freaking Yoda."

Dean: "He's given us coordinates before."
Sam: "The man can barely work a toaster, Dean."

Dean: "Let me know if you see any dead people, Haley Joel."


Dean: "Hey, Sam. Who do you think is a hotter psychic? Patricia Arquette, Jennifer Love Hewitt, or you?"
(Well, I'm going with Sam. But that's just me.)

Sam: "It doesn't matter what he wants."
Dean: "See? That attitude, right there? That's why I always get the extra cookie."

Kat: "So how do you guys know about all this ghost stuff?"
Sam: "It's kind of our job."
Kat: "Why would anyone want a job like that?"

Kat: "If we make it out of here alive, we are so breaking up."

Two out of four stars,

Billie
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Billie Doux loves good television and spends way too much time writing about it.

6 comments:

  1. I agree. Sam's the hottest! Now if only they could give him back his soul, and his bangs! I miss his bangs!

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  2. I really liked how the ghost tapped into Sam because clearly Sam has been having issues about whether or not follow orders from Dean and Dad.

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  3. Gavin the idiot boyfriend also played Claire's idiot boyfriend on Heroes.

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  4. I remember watching this episode and being reminded of Buffy, with a smile, because it was the girl in the relationship that was tougher, which is so rare. I was happy you mentioned it.

    Oh and, fun fact, to the quote about which psychic Sam prefers. Dean mentioned Jennifer Love Hewitt because Jensen knew that Jared had a crush on J.Love. No spoiler, but Dean mentions J.Love again in a later episode, which I find a hilarious show of the friendship between Jensen and Jared.

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  5. I liked the start of this episode, and the idea of the secret examination room and the tragic inmates was really cool, but I wasn't real big on the ending. Maybe it's because I started at season 4 and saw the rest before coming back to watch season 1, but I'm kind of over the "one brother tries to kill the other" already. Also, I thought they maybe could have cut ten minutes out of the middle and not lost much.

    I did like Kat though, maybe one of my favourite one offs. And to add to the interesting facts, according to the trivia page on Amazon Prime Tom Welling was hiding in the backseat of the Impala while they were filming.

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  6. Anonymous, thank you so much for that Tom Welling tidbit. You made me smile. :)

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