1.16 "Shadow"
Thankfully, after the crapfest that is "The Benders", we can sit back and enjoy the sort of quality story we're coming to expect from this show. Dean and Sam check out an apartment where a woman has been apparently killed --- in fact, torn to pieces --- without the alarm being tripped and with no sign of visible entry or exit. Considering the damage done, Dean thinks werewolf but Sam disagrees: the cycle isn't correct for lycanthropic behaviour, and besides, a werewolf would have demolished the place both getting in and out. Dean has an idea and uses masking tape to join up the pools of blood that are on the ground, and they look at the symbol thus formed, but neither recognise it.
Checking through their father's journals they have no further luck, then while at the bar where the girl who was killed worked, Sam runs into Meg again (see "Scarecrow") and though he acts glad to see her, he's suspicious. He hardly knows her, he met her while at his lowest ebb, leaving Dean to sort out the mystery of the killings in Burkitsville, and now, when she's supposed to be in California, here she is, "accidentally" bumping into him again at the very site of another possibly supernatural killing. He doesn't like it, but Dean tells him he's making something out of nothing. His older brother is probably biased by the fact that Meg is hot, too.
While Sam stakes out Meg's apartment Dean checks on her (at Sam's request; he doesn't think there's anything in it) and also the symbol they found. Meg seems to check out, but the symbol proves to be an ancient sigil for a dark demon from the Zoroastrian belief, something called a Daeva. Dean says they're powerful, nasty: he calls them "demonic pit bulls". He tells Sam they have to be summoned, conjured. They're ancient and savage, and very hard to control: they tend to turn upon the one who brings them forth. Dean whistles that it would appear there is some very dark magic at work, and a major force is in town. Sam watches Meg dress and leave her room, and follows her.
She enters what appears to be a camouflaged door which leads to an abandoned warehouse in which there is a black altar. She picks up a silver bowl filled with blood and again does her communication trick, as she did when hitch-hiking at the end of "Scarecrow". Again, only her side of the conversation can be made out, but she seems to warn whoever is on the other end of the line, so to speak, not to come yet as Dean and Sam are in town. She nods, and promises to be ready, then leaves. When she has gone Sam checks out the altar and sees several human hearts on it, along with some magical and ancient artifacts and drawn on the wall in blood the symbol they saw in the room where the girl was murdered.
When Sam gets back to the hotel and talks to Dean, his brother advises him that he has been checking into the other murder that happened prior to the one they are investigating --- or were; things seem to be about to take a much more important turn now --- and is dismayed to find that the victim was born in ... Lawrence, Kansas. Turns out the other victim also comes from there originally, so surely that can't be a coincidence? The place they lived as children, where their mother was killed by a demon, and now two other people from there are linked into this murder? Dean is all for capturing Meg and interrogating her, but Sam says they should stake out the black altar and see what turns up, see who or what she was talking to.
Considering how big this is, and how it's just possible that they're near the end of their quest, Dean calls their father and leaves a voicemail, hoping he will be able to come and help them. Meanwhile they assemble every weapon they can and head to the warehouse. Meg however seems to know they're there, hiding in the shadows as she carries out her ritual, and suddenly the Daeva --- assuming that's what it is --- forms as a shadow on the wall and knocks Sam to the ground while throwing Dean across the room.
When they come to they are tied to separate posts. Meg tells them there is no link between the two people; the fact that they were both from Lawrence was just a ruse, used to lure the two brothers to her. Those two people died for nothing, but Meg seems the type who's happy to kill for no reason. Then the real reason for trapping (and not killing) the two boys becomes apparent: this is not a trap for them, but for their father. Sam breaks free and nuts Meg, she goes down. He runs to the altar and overturns it, at which point the demons turn on Meg and drag her out the window to her death.
When the boys get back to their hotel they are overjoyed to see their father standing there. An emotional reunion ensues, but is broken when a Daeva attacks John, and we see Meg is not dead after all; she is standing in the street clutching a pendant with the Zoroastrian symbol and directing the attack. Sam throws a flare which destroys the shadows and thereby robs the demons of their power, as they can only exist in this world as shadows. Under the cover of the exploding flash of light they get out of the hotel, and though Sam wants their father to come with them, Dean reasons that it will be too dangerous: the demon used the brothers to get to their father already, knowing he's more vulnerable when he has to protect and worry about them. They can't let that happen again. Tearfully they part, their father telling them they will meet up again soon.
MUSIC
Little Charlie and the Nightcats: "You got your hooks into me"
Vue: "Pictures of me"
QUESTIONS?
Who is Meg, and who is she working for or with? Who is this "father" she speaks of? Can she really be the daughter of a demon?
The "WTF??!" moment
Has to be when the boys come back to their hotel and see the figure of their father standing there to greet them.
PCRs
Dean quips: "It’s Miller time!"
Slogan of the Miller Beer company, as if you didn't know.
BROTHERS
We learn a lot more about what the quest means, separately, for each of the boys here. Sam just wants to find the demon that killed his mother, destroy it and go back to having a normal life. He's prepared to stick it out to the bitter end, but once they've achieved their goal he wants to draw a line under it, forget it and move on. Dean, on the other hand, has seen too many weird and evil things to be able to go back to any sort of a normal life, and anyway he's been hunting longer than Sam has, and has become used to it.
More than that: he's beginning to enjoy it. It's like an addiction, something he really can't live without now. When Sam says he can't wait till it's over, Dean says "It'll never be over", and there's a note of gratitude in his voice that says he doesn't
want it to be over. "There's always gonna be something to hunt", he tells Sam, with more relief in his voice than horror. Dean has settled into the role of professional demon hunter over the last few years, and now it's a way of life for him. He can't imagine doing anything else. Even if they get the demon that killed their mother, he's prepared to keep hunting down evil things, whether they're connected to that demon or not. And he knows there is no shortage of evil supernatural beings in the world.
He honestly can't understand Sam's wish to leave it all behind; to him, there's nothing he wants more than to continue the life they're leading, with the exception of having their father join them and being then a trio of demon hunters. The elaborate facade Dean has constructed around his feelings begins to chip and break as we see a vulnerability in him here that we have slowly begun to notice creep in since his heart attack. He is upset that Sam would leave him, go back to his life. He's like a small child; he wants everything to stay as it is. In that respect, he is far the younger brother.
And yet, he's again taking charge and doing the adult thing by the end of the episode, when he realises that it's far too dangerous for their father to remain with them, and they must split up again. Sam wants their dad to stay with them, having not seen him for years, but that's understandable. Dean, of course, closer to his father but ready to shoulder the burden, takes up the cloak of adulthood and the mantle of the bigger brother and tells Sam this is the only way they can ensure their father's safety. No doubt John Winchester is proud of both his boys, but doubly proud of Dean for his pragmatic approach to the situation.
Sam is no doubt worried that he brought Meg down upon them by splitting with Dean back during "Scarecrow", but logic would suggest that if she wanted to find the brothers she would have found a way. Logic would also suggest that, not having died as we thought in the fall from the hotel window (the possible daughter of a demon killed by a simple fall? The very idea!) we should expect to see this hellion again, and the paths of the brothers will surely cross with hers in the future.
The ARC of the matter
This is a particularly arc-centric episode. We meet Meg again, the strange girl we first encountered in "Scarecrow", who turned out to be a lot more than she at first appeared. Here we see her setting a trap for the boys, or actually their father, and it seems obvious that her master/father --- whether the demon they are pursuing or another entity --- knows of John Winchester and his boys and is moving to try to stop them. We're thrown a curveball in the shape of the murder victims both being from the boys' hometown, but it turns out that's just a ruse to draw them in.
We also see, for the first time since the end of "Home", John Winchester on screen, and we see him briefly reunited with his boys. The reunion does not last long, however, and they must part ways again, but the boys' father warns them of dark days coming, and says he will be in touch.
1.17 "Hell House"
Sam and Dean come to Richardson, Texas, to investigate the tale of a supposedly haunted house in the woods where the very real police report says three girls saw another one hanged, and when the brothers talk to the girls they keep coming up with the one name, a guy called Craig. Questioning him, they are told about the legend of Mordechai Murdoch, who was a man who killed his daughters during the Great Depression, rather than let them starve to death. He then hung himself. Sam and Dean take readings from the location where the old house used to stand, and they do seem to get some activity. They go inside, and find that there are freshly-painted symbols on the walls, one of which seems familiar to Dean but he can't quite place it.
Then they hear voices, and ready for anything, run into two "ghost hunters", Ed and Harry. They are clearly fakes and Sam and Dean leave them to it, but Dean wonders why that symbol seems so recognisable? Researching the legend of Mordechai Murdoch they hit a blank wall, although they do come across a report on a Martin Murdoch who lived there in the thirties, but nothing untoward seems to have happened to or about him: he had no daughters, just two sons and neither died. The boys are beginning to wonder if they've come here on a wild goose chase?
However that night another girl dies, supposedly committing suicide by hanging herself, though it has been shown that she was dared to go into the "Hell house" by her friends and then a phantom appeared behind her and strangled her with the rope. When the brothers hear the news they realise that something is up: this girl was a good student with a great future ahead of her, hardly a suicide prospect. They gain access to the house that night by blowing the cover of Ed and Harry, who are skulking in the bushes and who the cops then chase, leaving the way clear for the boys. Inside they encounter the ghost and shoot at him, but to no avail and they have to run.
Sam points out that the ghost was carrying an axe and had slashed wrists, which does not fit in with the legend about him. He is beginning to form a theory, and the next day they head back to Craig's record store, where browsing through albums they come across one by Blue Oyster Cult, and Dean realises that the symbol that was fresh drawn on the wall of the Hell House is the logo for the band. He forces Craig to confess, and he admits it was all a hoax, set up by him and his cousin as a joke, but that now it appears to have taken on a life of its own, and called forth an angry spirit.
Up to now the brothers have been checking one of the websites Sam frequents, hellhoundslair.com, which has confirmed the Mordechai Murdoch story, but now when they check the story has been changed to reflect the fact that the ghost is now said to have slashed his wrists with an axe. Sam thinks the ghost may be a Tulpa, a Tibetan thought spirit. There is a story about monks envisioning a golem and it appearing, so perhaps if enough people believe strongly enough, on the web, the same thing could happen here.
They go to the trailer where Harry and Ed are running the website and they agree to shut it down, so that Dean and Sam can try to figure out how to kill the spirit. When it reappears again the best they can think of is to burn the house down: if Mordechai, or the Tulpa, is bound to haunt the house and they burn it to the ground there will be nothing left for him to haunt, and he should vanish. He does, and they hope he stays gone, unless someone else writes a new legend. But Ed and Harry now understand the danger of posting such information on their website, and will be much more careful. In fact, they've received a call from a movie producer to make a film about the spirit, and will in all likelihood forget about the site. Sam doesn't tell them that it was only him, pretending to be a movie mogul, who made the call.
MUSIC
Blue Oyster Cult: "Fire of unknown origin"
Blue Oyster Cult: "Burnin' for you"
The "WTF??!" moment
Meh, not really one. Maybe when it's revealed that the symbol on the wall is the BOC logo, but sure, any rocker worth their salt would have known that!
PCRs
Announcing the recommencement of the practical jokes, Dean grins "What's the matter Sammy, scared you're going to get a little Nair in your shampoo again huh?"
This would appear to refer to the female hair removal cream "Nair", and one can only assume that at some point Dean mixed some in Sam's shampoo, though where girly leg hair cream came from among two guys is anyone's guess!
When they meet Craig and introduce themselves as journalists, he says he writes for his school magazine, to which Dean sneers "Well, good for you Morrisey."
I can't be sure, but I think this may refer to the lead singer with the Smiths, Morrissey. Though the Smiths would not have been that big in the USA, so it could refer to something else? Also, I don't get the writer link, but that's all I got...
Ed, one of the self-proclaimed "ghost hunters", to his partner: " Be brave. WWBD. What. Would. Buffy. Do. huh?"
You don't need me to tell you who Buffy is, do you? 
)
BROTHERS
When they were younger Sam and Dean were always playing practical jokes on one another. Here, their relationship has mellowed, from the point where they split in anger during "Scarecrow" to the coming back together and standing with their father of the previous episode, and it's almost like they're kids again. Sam changes Dean's radio station to a, well,
not rock station, while Dean puts itching powder in Sam's shorts. Sam superglues Dean's drinking bottle so that it sticks to his lips and Dean ... and so it goes. I must say, to be perfectly honest it's all very immature and silly, and I guess it's meant to show that even in the depths of darkness and despair the boys can find something to laugh about, and it probably also holds back the fear and terror that must be reaching for them every night since their encounter with Meg. Still, I could have done without it. Never really saw the value of practical jokes myself.
Since they parted company with their dad the brothers have been using the website hellhoundslair.com for information and for leads on what to tackle next, which is how they end up in Texas looking for the missing girl (who is never found).
Notes: It seems that after "Shadow" the whole quality of the writing has slid, not as abysmally as on "The Benders", but this is sloppy. It's sort of back to monster-of-the-week and though the idea of propogating a legend and summoning a demon, almost, through the power of the internet is an interesting and sobering one, the resolution of the story smacks of boredom. They burn down the house. How original. I get very little from this episode and can only hope (can't really remember that far back now) that the next one gets much better, because, despite the chilling title which promises much and delivers little really, this is a serious slide in quality.