Home Featured TV Shows All TV Shows Movie Reviews Book Reviews Articles Frequently Asked Questions About Us

Supernatural: Two and a Half Men

Samuel: "Congratulations, it's a boy. Sometimes."

The opener completely creeped me out. Maybe because of the unspoken horror movie rule that babies are noncombatants. But the baby exploding and turning into the picture on the diaper box was hilarious. Monster babies. Very Supernatural.

Why the subterfuge? Why don't male shifters just knock up female shifters? No muss, no fuss, no murder, but no, that would be too easy. Maybe there aren't any female shifters. Although we know they can turn into females. See? Why can't they do it that way? One shifter becomes male, the other becomes female, and I'm spending way too much time thinking about this. For that matter, how does a shifter baby know to look like a baby?

Anyway, the alpha shifter was a truly cool monster, and points for being a lot less messy than his kids. I bet we'll see him again.

I thought the baby was symbolic of the unnatural family life that Dean kept clinging to even when he was more than ready to let it go. (Seeing Dean Winchester hold a baby was like a weird alternate universe, wasn't it?) Yes, it's sad that Dean can't have a normal life, but we already knew that. At least he realized that he was turning into John and making Lisa and Ben crazy. It's like the knowledge that monsters exist is enough to poison a normal life, like something is eventually going to come after Lisa and Ben, anyway.

Lisa letting Dean go so easily was almost too good to be true. I guess any woman with any chance of holding on to Dean would realize that she had to let him go if she ever wanted to see him again, though.

So Sam has managed to pull Dean back into the hunter life already, and it's only episode two. Sam did feel more like Sam this time, although the old Sam would never have used a baby as bait. I thought it was interesting that the alpha shifter walked in as Samuel, switched to Sam, and then became Dean, like a confirmation that things just aren't right with them. Those Campbells are just too creepy. Did cousin Mark just die? No one seemed to acknowledge it. And who was Samuel talking to on the phone? It sounded like he got orders to capture the alpha shifter. Who would be giving Samuel orders?

I liked this one more than the premiere, but that doesn't necessarily mean it was a better episode. Maybe I'm adjusting to the new "feel". At least Dean is still my Dean.

And hey. Baby shifters. Awesome.

Bits and pieces:

— Sam drove his own black Knight Rider car, with Dean in the passenger seat. That was just wrong.

— Sam's car had Illinois plates.

— Cousin Christian has a wife named Arlene. Maybe she's at home waiting for him to show up now and then, like Lisa will be waiting for Dean.

— The butt paste that the boys picked up in the store was actually labeled "butt paste."

— Lansing, Michigan. And wherever it was that Dean, Lisa and Ben moved. How did Sam know where they were living, by the way?

— The motel room wasn't one of the crazy ones, but it had Magic Fingers. They didn't seem to hold their old appeal for Dean, though.

Quotes:

Samuel: "Either we got monsters grabbing babies to make baby stew, or we got a bunch of psychotic yokels grabbing babies to make baby stew. Either way, it's baby stew. Which is bad." I don't know why this struck me so funny, but it did.

Sam: "Welcome to the party, Guttenberg."

Dean: "Bet you're missing your ex right now. The boring one?"

Dean: "This is like defusing an IED with poop."

Sam: "Not every hunter is a head case. I mean, Samuel is actually a lot like you."
Dean: "*I'm* a freaking head case."

Dean: "Come on. You can't Angelina Jolie a shapeshifter."

Samuel: "I'm pretty sure it's not a myth now."

Three out of four packages of baby butt paste,

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

10 comments:

  1. I'm willing to believe Sam when he said he wasn't using the baby for bait. Yes, he suggested Samuel once they realized what the baby was, but he straight out asked Dean for a better suggestion of what to do with the baby and Dean came up with nothing.

    Sam knows that there are Alpha's out there, but that doesn't mean he was trying to use the baby for bait. I honestly can't think of any place else to take the baby, unless Dean wanted to adopt it. There really was nowhere else to go.

    We know Samuel has orders to capture the Alpha, but we don't know who else in the family knows about these orders and we certainly don't know what Sam knows.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I like the new shapeshifter lore, it's an interesting direction to go in. I wasn't in love with this episode, but I did get a huge kick out of the baby shifting. Too funny. I think I know what is missing, the impala (on the road, not in the garage) and Cas.

    I think that either the shapeshifters (except the Alpha) may have to be half-human and that the only way a shapeshifter can be born is to have a human mother or that a shapeshifter's body may be unable to carry a baby to term. It seems doubtful that a pregnant shapeshifter would be able to shift if they were pregnant. I'd think it could hurt the baby.

    Oh, and am I the only one who thinks the guy on the right in the screencap really doesn't look like Dean? Maybe it is the angle.

    ReplyDelete
  3. "How did Sam know where they were living, by the way?"

    I'm not sure he does. Dean met Sam away from his new house, twice, and might (even subconsciously) be moving to avoid Sam and the Campbells.

    Some sort of punch is still lacking. Even the score is subtly different.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Heather,

    The guy in the top picture isn't Dean. I was saying the same thing when I first say it. That is not Dean. But then it came to me. If you notice in the picture, ShifterDean is not wearing a coat either which he was in the show. I assume this picture was taken when they were probably rehearsing. Jensen being ShifterDean and probably a stunt double as RealDean.

    ReplyDelete
  5. I wasn't overly keen on this one, but it had its moments. I kind of liked that Lisa volunteered to be Dean's home base. I'm still not sold on their "great love" or anything, but I like that Dean may not have to give up his little slice of happiness (such as it is) but still gets to follow his true calling.

    I found the opening extremely upsetting, but the baby shifter changing to match the diaper box was pretty hilarious.

    Billie, I believe that cousin Mark did just die. Gwen was grief stricken in the moment, at least. I heard her yell, "Mark! No!" or something like that.

    I'm wondering if Samuel was maybe talking to Castiel on the phone. They are making us think the Campbells are creepy and that Samuel is sinister and collecting demons and whatnot for nefarious purposes. But what if Castiel is behind Sam and Samuel's return and they aren't forces of evil? He's supposed to be setting heaven to rights, yes? And Samuel claims to have been in heaven. So maybe Cas has a planetside crew working on his behalf.

    Also, that diaper cream the boys bought is a real brand. It is actually called "Butt Paste." Supposedly it works pretty well, too. Crazy, huh? It totally sounds like some prop they would mock up for the show, but it's not.

    ReplyDelete
  6. This episode felt very Supernatural-ish and I liked it a lot more than last week’s season premier. Here’s a wild theory I’ve been pondering, what if it was Death himself who is responsible for Sam and Samuel’s spontaneous resurrections. And suppose that they weren’t the only ones who were brought back. Perhaps the one Samuel was talking to on the phone was none other than John Winchester.

    Too unlikely?

    Oh, and can I just say that I really hate it when they give away the plots twists in the recaps. I know that a show with as dense a mythology as this one you’ll need to keep viewers up to speed every week on what’s going on but that’s no excuse to just give away the monster of the week before the episode has even started. It’s annoying and kinda patronizing. Right, mini-rant over.

    ReplyDelete
  7. A few things about this episode I liked:

    - the well executed scene with the handsome shifter cop, the dead cop, and the goop dripping out of the car

    - the concept of an alpha shifter

    - new married family member (forgot his name) calling Dean out on being a dickhead about the shifter baby

    And many things I didn't like:

    - still no big fall out from Sam doing a "The Gift" to save the world

    - why are shifters doing a cuckoo instead of banging one another to make kids?

    - Dean is determined to stay out of hunting but agrees to make one exception just because there's a baby involved?! Surely Sam's had bigger trials that he and granpappy have dealt with themselves over the past year.

    - family member is added then gets almost no lines so he can be killed off during a fight scene

    - family member appears to die and no one even mentions it?!

    - Alpha shifter kills one family member with ease, but everyone else survives... how? And why wouldn't it kill Dean when it so easily could have and nearly did?

    - That disgustingly cheesy and over indulgent douchey Impala scene at the end!

    - no Bobby in this ep.

    - STILL NO CASTIEL!!!


    This just isn't the Supernatural I've come to know and love. We had Angels and Demons, and brother fighting brother then overcoming all odds to be brave and heroic and saving the world and averting the apocalypse. And now we have babies and relatively uninteresting new cast members and bs mystery about why Sam is back.... is it because Supernatural good renewed? Why yes of course, but surely they could at least have given a pretty damn good justification for it.

    ReplyDelete
  8. The scene ín the supermarket was funny, and the name Bobby John is too funny also.
    I gotta say that I love how Lisa is supportive of Dean and that Dean admitted that he was on his way to becoming John.

    ReplyDelete
  9. On the right track, let's hope episode 3 will be just like Kripke's Supernatural.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Something major has changed with Sam. Even his dynamic with Dean seemed different. He was the one driving the car; he was the one making decisions; he was the one telling Dean the truth about his life. It's obvious that Dean doesn't trust him either.

    Grandpa is doing something very, very bad. I have no idea yet what it is, but it's going to bite our team in a very big way. My guess is that it has something to do with Alphas -- this season's Big Bad? I kind of like the idea of Alphas; after all, the boys have fought Lucifer so it's going to be tough to ramp up the tension this season.

    I'm interested to see how they are going to play the Lisa/Ben storyline. Eric Kripke said in an interview that the reason they burned down the Roadhouse was because he did not want the boys to have a home base. Also, won't having this base divide our boys even more?

    Unlike Harry, I loved the scene with Dean and the Impala. Felt like we finally had the old Dean back.

    ReplyDelete

We love comments! We moderate because of spam and trolls, but don't let that stop you! It’s never too late to comment on an old show, but please don’t spoil future episodes for newbies.