Supernatural S02 E08 – Here, doggy doggy

Previously: The boys got arrested and hung out with Regan from The Exorcist.
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Crossroad Blues

Kirsti: Greenwood, Mississippi, 1938. In a bar, Robert Johnson (well, an actor playing Robert Johnson, anyway) plays the blues and it’s kind of awesome.

Everyone in the room is listening intently. He stops when he hears a dog barking, but no one else moves. It happens again, and he looks terrified, then runs from the room. Everyone else looks hella confused. He barricades himself in a house, hearing a dog barking and scraping outside the door. His friends break in and find him convulsing on the floor, mumbling about black dogs.

FLAME ON!

After the Not!Credits, Sam’s checking Dean’s criminal record. Apparently he’s now on the federal radar. Sam, meanwhile, hasn’t even rated a mention and he’s all sad panda about it. Dean chuckles. Sam pulls out some research, and informs us that their case involves a super in-demand architect who jumped off a skyscraper he’d just built two days after ringing animal control to complain about dogs that weren’t there. Dean asks if they’re dealing with an actual Black Dog, and Sam infodumps at us about Black Dogs. It can be summed up as follows:

Cut to them pretending to be journalists from Architectural Digest and interviewing the dead guy’s business partner of ten years. Business Partner says that the dead guy was a total genius who led a charmed life. But ten years ago, he was a no hoper who couldn’t design shit and was working as a bartender at a dive called Lloyd’s. Then overnight, he suddenly became some kind of Frank Lloyd Wright. Later, Dean walks out of the Animal Protection Agency, where he’s been flirting his way to a list of all complaints about big, black, dog-like things from that week. He also scored the girl’s Myspace address and Sam laughs when Dean has no idea what it is. Dude, I’m pretty sure Dean doesn’t have a computer or an email address. Because he basically lives in his car. So STFU.

They start investigating the complaints. At a big white house, they ask to speak to Doctor Perlman, but her housekeeper tells them the doctor’s out of town, and she has no idea where to find her. Also, she never saw or heard the dog Doctor Perlman kept complaining about. We get an infodump about how the doctor is only 42 and is the youngest chief surgeon of EVER. The housekeeper says she was an overnight success. Dean finds a convenient photo of the doctor at a bar with friends ten years earlier with a note on the back that says “Lloyd’s Bar”.

Cut to a crummy motel. Doctor Perlman’s clearly freaked, flinching at every noise. There’s a knock on the door, and the motel manager calls out that she needs to GTFO or pay for another day. She opens the door to pay him, and his face goes all stretchy and demonic. She throws some money at him and slams the door, which is legit.

The boys pull up at Lloyd’s, which is suitably divey, and note that it’s at a crossroads. There are also yarrow flowers growing all over, which Sam says are used in summoning rituals. Dean heads to the middle of the conveniently-dirt crossroads and digs a hole. In it, he finds a rusted box containing various mystical bits and pieces, and a photo of the guy who used “Deep South Hoodoo stuff” to summon a demon and make a deal. They realise that these people aren’t seeing Black Dogs (Padfoot’s off the hook!), they’re seeing Hellhounds. And that basically means they’re fucked.

Crummy Motel. The door rattles again, and Doctor Perlman crouches by the bed, screaming in terror. Something invisible leaps through the window and shreds the shit out of her leg. It starts to drag her across the room as she screams and we fade to black.

After the Not Commercial Break, it’s 1930. Robert Johnson digs a hole at a crossroads and buries a little bag of stuff, then turns to find a girl in a pretty white virginal dress standing behind him. Her eyes flash red to let us know that she’s all demonic and shit. He asks the Crossroads Demon to make him the best blues man of ever. She agrees and kisses him to seal the deal.

Back in the present, Dean informs Sam that the Robert-Johnson-sold-his-soul-to-be-a-blues-man legend isn’t a legend. His music is full of occult references. He lists a bunch of song titles, and earns himself a gold star:

Sam says they need to work out if anyone else at Lloyd’s made a deal and save them. Dean scoffs because they knew what they were getting into, but reluctantly agrees. They set off to chase down the guy in the photo they found in the rusty box.

Cut to a dodgy looking apartment building. Apparently they’re looking for a guy named George Darrow. When they reach his apartment, they find black powder sprinkled across the doorway. They suspect it’s pepper, and inform George when he opens the door that he wants salt to keep a demon out. George is all “The fuck are you?” and they tell him they’re there to help. He reluctantly lets them in. Sam asks what the black powder is, and he says that it’s goofer dust, used by hoodoo practitioners to keep demons at bay. They say again that they’re there to help, but he’s basically resigned to his fate. He says he was weak and never thought about the price at the time. He just wanted to be successful. But he asked for talent rather than fame, so now has a million fabulous paintings that no one wants to buy. Womp womp.

He tells the boys that the demon didn’t leave after he summoned it. It just hung out at the bar for a week, making deals for shits and giggles. There were the two people the boys already know about, plus a nice normal guy named Evan Hudson, who hasn’t become super famous or anything. Sam says again that they can help him get out of his deal, but he says that all he wants is to finish his last painting and he has enough goofer dust to keep the hellhounds away until then. The boys leave, confused.

Cut to a scruffy looking blond guy working at his computer. He hears barking outside and crosses to the window. His wife comes in and asks if he’s spying on the neighbours. He laughs it off and asks if she’s ready for her trip to see her sister that he’s conveniently sending her on. She kisses him goodbye and goes to leave. She turns in the doorway and her face goes stretchy and demonic before returning to normal for her to say that she loves him. Fade to black.

After the Not Commercial Break, there’s a knock on scruffy looking blond guy’s door. It’s the Winchesters. The scruffy blond guy is obviously Evan Hudson. He assumes they’re demons and barricades himself in the house, so obviously they break down the door to prove that they’re not. Okay, show, whatever. Dean asks what Evan sold his soul for, and Evan reluctantly reveals that he asked the demon to save his wife, who was dying of cancer and only had days to live. Sam looks feelsy.

Dean, on the other hand, gets pissed. He says that Evan had no right to do that, because now his wife will have to live without him forever and how would she cope if she knew the truth? Sam steps in and tells Dean to calm the fuck down. In the hall, Dean tells Sam to use the goofer dust George gave them to keep the hellhounds away while he summons the Crossroads Demon and exorcises it. Sam thinks this is the worst fucking plan of all time, and he thinks Dean is all over the place emotionally because he’s worked out that Papa Winchester made a demon deal. Dean says quietly that it fits, that Papa Winchester traded his soul for Dean’s life.

Evan interrupts the feels by yelling that he can hear the hellhound barking. Dean tells Sam to keep Evan alive and heads out to the crossroads. He replaces George’s picture with his and reburies the box. He turns to find a girl in a black dress standing behind him. She’s all “OH HEY, DEAN WINCHESTER” because apparently there’s a demonic newsletter about how pretty the Winchester boys are.

Dean suggests they talk in his car, and the Crossroads Demon agrees. Back at Evan’s house, Sam sprinkles goofer dust along the doors and windows, then in a circle around Evan. He tells him to stay in the circle, no matter what.

Back at the Bromobile, Dean tells the Crossroads Demon that he’s offering a trade – Evan gets released from his contract, and the demon gets him instead. “Well, well, well. You’d sacrifice your life for someone else’s. Like father, like son,” the demon says. Dean grits his teeth and opens the passenger door of the Bromobile, all gentlemanly. The demon is not impressed when she spots the telltale white paint of a Devil’s Trap under the car. Evan’s house. He whirls around at an unheard noise, then Sam hears a growling too. The doors rattle and Sam steps inside the circle of goofer dust as we fade to black.

After the Not Commercial Break, the Crossroads Demon is pissed. Dean tells her to take her best shot, but there’s more pleading in it than anything. She scoffs at that, because him being in pain is far too much fun. She gets all up in his face and tells him that it’s his fault Papa Winchester is dead. I have a lot of feels.

  Then she turns to go and sasses that she could have brought Papa Winchester back. Dean asks her to wait. She smirks triumphantly.

Back at Evan’s, the doors rattle more violently, then suddenly stop. Evan heaves a sigh of relief, but just then a grate bursts out of the wall, and Evan yells that the hellhound is in the room. Bromobile. Dean is now standing under a wooden watertank-y thing, looking pathetic. The Crossroads Demon says that she loves a good puppy dog face. She’ll bring Papa Winchester back and give Dean ten years before she sends the hellhounds for him. Seeing as how he’s meant to be dead anyway, that’s basically an extra ten years of life.

Dean turns away and walks to the other side of the watertank. The Crossroads Demon follows him, and he asks sassily if she’ll throw in a set of steak knives. [L: WEIRD. Second set of free steak knives this week…] She looks up to see a Devil’s Trap painted on the underside of the tank. She glares at Dean and demands that he set her free. He says he’ll free her when Evan’s released from his contract. She’s all “LOL NOPE”, so he pulls out the Filofax of Shadows. Cut to Evan’s. He and Sam are surrounded by growling, invisible hellhounds. Deep claw marks appear on the floor just outside the circle of goofer dust.

Dean pulls out a rosary, and the Crossroads Demon’s all “The fuck are you doing???”. She tells him to think of Papa Winchester, but he starts reading an exorcism. She starts to shake. At Evan’s, wind starts to blow through the room, taking the goofer dust with it. Sam and Evan make a run for it as Dean continues to read the exorcism. Sam braces himself against a door as the hellhounds try to break in again. The demon yells at Dean to wait. He stops reading. At Evan’s, the hellhounds stop pounding on the door.

Cut back to Dean, and the Crossroads Demon has her tongue down his throat to seal the deal. Evan, she says, is free. She asks for the same. Dean looks shifty and fingers his rosary. The demon says that if he double-crosses her, she’ll murder Evan’s face off. He puts the rosary away, and scratches out part of the Devil’s Trap. The Crossroads Demon walks free, then tells him that he never would have made the deal if he’d known what hell was like, where Papa Winchester really was. She taunts him and he threatens to continue the exorcism. So the demon bails, and the girl it was possessing slumps to the ground. Fade to black.

After the Not Commercial Break, the boys drive broodily through the night. Sam suggests the demon was lying, but Dean’s sure it wasn’t. He has to deal with the knowledge that Papa Winchester is in Hell because of him. The Yellow-Eyed Demon should be dead, but instead they’re making deals. Sam says that Papa Winchester would have wanted them to save Evan, and that they have to keep going to keep Papa Winchester’s legacy alive. He asks nervously if Dean was actually going to make the deal to bring Papa Winchester back, but Dean doesn’t answer. Sam flinches as we fade to black.

This episode feels a lot like filler to me. I mean, I like that we finally get some non-western approaches to fending off evil. But when you can see the future, this mostly feels like an introduction to demon deals and the badness they lead to. So…meh. But a better quality of meh than the previous episode. Or something.

 

Next time on Supernatural: Things take a turn for the creepy and/or historic when the boys get trapped in a small town in Oregon in S02 E09 – Croatoan.