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Supernatural: Mannequin 3, The Reckoning

Dean: "I don't like the way Kim Cattrall is looking at me."

Mildly creepy. Somewhat funny. And unfortunately, sort of sad.

I liked that they addressed one of those obsessive fan questions, i.e., what if the marauding ghost donated a kidney and the recipient was still alive? Although the fact that poor Isabel died five minutes later sort of negated the coolness. What would they have done if Isabel hadn't died? It would have been interesting to find out. Come to think of it, didn't they encounter a similar situation with remains in "Yellow Fever"?

The anatomy dummy was particularly creepy, but the creep factor was somewhat reduced by Dean's glee as he was playing with it. The thing made me think of Warren in the Buffy season eight comics. (For that matter, the forehead line was very Sylar from Heroes, and the white mannequins reminded me of Doctor Who.) And then we got to Johnny the third victim talking to his at-home sex doll, and I got confused. After I thought about it, I concluded that Rose must have chosen the mannequins to channel her ghostly killer self because of Johnny's sex doll, and because the pranksters had set up a male mannequin at the dinner table to be her faux secret admirer. (I bet that was Johnny's idea.) Rose may have been boring and shy in life, but she was certainly a creative ghost.

The writers have always been consistent with stories that have a symbolic connection to what's going on with the Winchesters. I was thinking that the mannequin murders were a call-back to soulless Sam. But it was also about Dean hurting his "family," like Rose, who ended up killing the sister she loved. Love hurts. Dean stayed away from Lisa and Ben and that hurt them. But Dean staying with them might kill them. Dean was right that if he stayed, Ben might end up a hunter. Although I think he probably will, anyway.

We did get a "farewell to Lisa and Ben" montage. It's time for Dean to leave them behind. Even though I liked the maturity Dean showed during those scenes. He was acting very like a real husband and father, like it came naturally to him.

The time discrepancy for Sam's "fat faceful of Hell" was disconcerting. He was out two or three minutes, and mentally back in the Cage for a week? It sounded a lot like the actual time slip situation. If this keeps happening, it's not going to be fun for Sam. In fact, I kept expecting him to pass out again during the episode.

No happy ending. Dean and Sam didn't save the day and in fact, they made the situation worse. Like last week. It's a season six theme, isn't it?

Bits and pieces:

— Big points for "Mannequin 3: The Reckoning." You gotta love it when just the episode title makes you laugh out loud. I liked the music "Love Hurts" at an appropriate moment, too.

— Dean running from the carjacked Impala was really funny. Jensen Ackles has a gift for physical comedy. I also liked how Dean said, "I'm so sorry, baby" as he outwitted the Impala into a brick wall.

— What a totally nasty practical joke. It seems unrealistic that a couple of reportedly very nice guys would participate in something so cruel, especially when the victim was such a quiet nonentity.

— They addressed the body part situation with the kidney, but technically, the kidney was still there after Isobel died; it wasn't destroyed. Was Rose just so devastated that her need for revenge was over? Why am I coming up with an answer the writers should have supplied?

— Was Jared having a bad hair week? He usually looks so good.

— This week: Paterson, New Jersey and whatever was three towns over. No motel rooms, but we did get the shabby factory/warehouse/whatever that we've seen a few times before.


Quotes:

Dean: "Maybe we'll have a Snooki sighting."
Sam: "What's a Snooki?"
Dean: "That's a good question."
It is. I have no idea what a Snooki is. Could someone enlighten me?

Sam: "Went to church. Donated to charity. Rubbed her feet during Glee."
Dean: "I just threw up in my mouth."

Sam: "That anatomy dummy you were molesting in the lab... what if that's what this is about?"
Dean: "What exactly are you accusing me of?"

Dean: "We've got a bunch of killer dolls, like... Chuckie? I mean, come on. That's just... just... freaky creepy."

Lisa: "What's going on?"
Dean: "We've been Parent Trapped."

Dean: "This is Dean's other, other cell, so you must know what to do."

Dean: "So what are you suggesting? That we cut it out of her?"
Sam: "And then what? Leave her in a tub of ice with a phone taped to her hand?"
I thought this was hilarious in a totally sick way.

Sam: "At least Satan's left the building."
Dean: "Yeah. It's the little things."

Maybe the dynamic of the episode felt off because the boys were separated for most of it. It always feels off when they're separated. And a possessed mannequin episode could have been better. So I sort of liked it, and I sort of didn't. What did you guys think? Please post a rating,

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

21 comments:

  1. I was pretty disappointed in the plot-of-the-week, especially the resolution--the whole thing with the kidney is an interesting dilemma, so the fact that it was like 'oh whoops, she's dead, that solves that problem' seemed lazy, like they couldn't come up with a better solution.

    I thought the Dean and Lisa and Ben stuff was good though.

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  2. This one just wasn't for me.

    The montage, the weirdly 1980s score, the pacing, the dead joke of the sex mannequin, the sister explaining exactly how she felt every step of the way, the boys explaining how they felt at the end, instead of just bonding over a beer...Nothing felt right. I might even go so far as to say this is my least favorite SPN ever, although I could be forgetting something from Season One.

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  3. I'm pretty sure I'm in the minority, but I really liked this episode. I loved the Dean/Ben/Lisa scenes and I really hope to see them back at some point.
    The boy who plays Ben (Nicholas Elias?) is starting to look even more like Jensen as he gets older.

    I think it'd be interesting to see if Jensen's wife, Danneel Harris, make an appearance at some point in the series. But I don't think my heart could take it.

    I think this episode helped re-new my love for the series.

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  4. I enjoyed the mannequin plot, it was creepy. I also really enjoyed the whole kidney twist till they f'ed it up in the end. Completely agree with Ben, lazy writers, this is becoming a trend for season 6.

    Lisa and Ben have never felt like part of Dean's life, that whole subplot always felt tacked on to me. What exactly was the point of having them in this episode, aside from a very un-Supernatural montage, it didn't feel like there was any resolution.

    There were some good elements, but they were just badly pieced together. I gave it a 2, only because Dean made me laugh quite a bit.

    Billie take it as a blessing that you don't know what a "Snooki" is.

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  5. I acturally loved the episode. The whole ghost story was a throw back to Seasons 1 & 2. You win some you lose some. Your points are valid. Regarding the kidney...I assumed that when the sister died and Rose went up in flames (because Sam burned the bones) that the kidney burned up too, since it was Rose's in the first place. Loved all of the Dean/Ben/Lisa story, but I'm not ready to leave them behind. I WANT MORE LISA.
    Snooki reference is to an idjit from the reality show "Jersey Shores". She's a real person on the show.
    Like you I found a lot of this episode very sad. Dean and Sam not saving an innocent, and Dean again having no faith in himself and believing he is or will be something evil and not human.

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  6. I... tolerated this episode. The dummy thing had a creepy factor that was underused, specially the sex doll thing. How creepy is that per se? But when the episode really lost me was the montage. That was horrible!

    As somebody who's been bullied, I don't know if I'd pursue issies as much as they did. Oh, the ghost wants revenge on some jerks, and to stop that we have to make a sweet innocent girl go through at least an unpleasant situation? I say let it kill the jerks and have peace! Maybe I'm not cut out to be a hunter.

    I think it's curious you don't know who Snooki is.

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  7. I think I liked almost every piece of this episode, but found the whole thing together uneven. I do agree the sudden death of the sister was a weak way to solve their dilemma. I'm neutral on Lisa, but I absolutely love Dean with Ben. I don't want them to go all sitcomy and add a kid character to the main cast or anything, but I really hope we get to see him again, I feel like Dean is a really natural father.

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  8. I don't think you need to rewatch it, Josie. I had pretty much the same reaction you did. Especially to the horribly cheesy '80s music in various places. That Lisa and Ben montage was beyond horrible. It felt completely unnecessary, too. I think Jensen is strong enough to show us what's going through Dean's mind with just an extended shot of his face as he drives.

    I was pretty creeped out by the anatomy dummy, but the rest of the episode didn't work for me. I didn't actively HATE it, and wouldn't say it was the worst SPN ever, but I really didn't like a lot of it. Please, creative team, I don't want to hear the bad '80s background music again, unless you're making some kind of joke.

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  9. Did anybody see the previews for next week? Talk about piercing the fourth wall...

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  10. Seriously guys, the music was part of the joke. Or do y'all not know what Mannequin was / what the title refers to? -Jen

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  11. Jen again. Look up Mannequin in Wikipedia. Kim Cattrall, the creepy sex doll he treated as if real, the 80s music...it's all a homage to Mannequin...especially considering the title. I am just saying,

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  12. "What a totally nasty practical joke. It seems unrealistic that a couple of reportedly very nice guys would participate in something so cruel..."

    I got the idea that they only became nice and fluffy after the murder to make amends.

    I didn't mind the 80's music so much, but I do agree that I did not like the Lisa/Ben montage. I thought it felt forced and sappily out of place for the show.

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  13. Billie I think that Jared was supposed to look kind of bad.

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  14. Enjoyed it! Only thing that bothered me - I'm guessing Sam not knowing who Snooki is was a callback to his memory-wipe, so how did he know about Glee?
    :D

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  15. Henrik, Sam was only recounting what the girlfriend told him about her dead boyfriend, but I'd rather think it's because he has some taste.

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  16. Jeeze you guys are harsh! Dean so wants a normal life where he can be loving and nurturing ... and this is a problem because he is a Hunter born and bred. The montage showed what he is giving up. Bonding with a son (real son, not a brother), picnics in the backyard ... this is pathos guys! (Cheesy music cue up.)

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  17. I liked this episode a lot! I thought the plot of the week was creepy and then sad with Isabella dying. And the whole Ben/Lisa situation was nicely handled and I´m torn with it: I want Dean to be a hunter but also to have a life with them.

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  18. The ending was weirdly convenient. The ghost just destroyed itself by accident. Or maybe it was deliberate on her part? Dunno.

    So the wall is not broken. Nice True Blood-style cliffhanger resolution. After one minute it was like, what cliffhanger? I came to expect better from Supernatural.

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  19. This is probably the worst episode of the show to be honest. And that's saying a lot when episodes like Bugs, Bedtime Stories, Family Remains, Swap Meat, Season 7, It's Time for a Wedding, and Bloodlines exist. On top of that the episode as a whole is completely useless. It does nothing to progress the story of season 6 along. The cheap look of the episode doesn't help either. The scenes involving Dean and Lisa or Dean and Ben are useless because everything they say never comes back into play. It's bad for many reasons but the worst of all of them is how useless it is. Skip this episode and go watch the French Mistake which is actually a great episode.

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  20. While I do hate it when a show brings up an interesting dilemma with a convenient resolution (the girl with the kidney seeming to accept her death on top of it was the worst part), I for one loved the last surviving guy turning out to have a cherished doll... partner. It's bad but it caught me off-guard and tickled me. It also meant he didn't get away with it after all. What a sick prank

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