Supernatural: Malleus Maleficarum

What Hell Must Be Like
by
Sylvia Bond
Supernatural Episode Review, Season 3 – Episode 9
“Malleus Maleficarum”

This episode was dark. I’m not saying locked-in-a-vault dark, but it’s the kind of dark you need a flashlight for, when if you don’t have one, you are screwed. The Winchester boys have flashlights, you know. However, they probably don’t have extras to lend, so you are still screwed. Get used to the dark.

Here’s how the ep opens: A rich couple comes home from a party. Here’s the rule about that: If a rich couple comes home from a party, especially one they didn’t enjoy, then either or both of them is going to die. And that just facts. In this case it’s death by tooth loss for the wifey, so don’t forget to floss, kids. And, just to warn you up front, there’s a lot of death by mouth and suffeing by mouth this ep, some oral fixation that the script had running through it. Not to mention the fixation of women dying while wearing black lingerie slips. In a puddle of very red blood. I think it’s a guy thing.

The boys investigate the bloody death wearing suits. They look adorable, right? But I’m over that, because, like, dude, where’s the iron and the ironing board? But since no one is listening let alone answering, this question must go in the box with all the other mysteries. Like, where do hangers go? And, do keys have legs? Luckily, however, when Sam and Dean are done pretending to be FBI agents (Bachman and Turner, ha ah), they change back into their normal gear. Watching them walk around in comfortable, old jeans, is like pulling on a pair of…comfortable old jeans. I’m sorry, but there’s no better simile to describe how this feels. The boys belong in jeans, just like a fireman belongs naked in front of a fireplace. (Strategically placed Dalmatian dog optional.)

During the investigation, Sam is in the bathroom of the dead woman, poking around. Dean, on the other hand, is talking to the grieving husband, Paul, who is totally sure (as they always are) that his now deceased wife had no enemies. None whatsoever. But really, the change, with Dean and Sam exchanging tasks and viewpoints, has been coming on a while. Though maybe if the surviving spouse had been female, it would have been Sam talking to her in that gentle way he has. And did you see the little head tip that Sam gave Dean? The little wordless code that said, “I’ve got what we came for, so let’s go.” Better than semaphore!

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One really fun bit here. When the boys finish talking to Paul, they walk out in the pouring rain, and get into their car. Nothing new, right? Well, as they get in, the cameraman takes the camera into the back seat, which means that I’m in the back seat, too! Looking over Dean’s shoulder, as Dean slings his arm over the back seat, I can see the dashboard. I can see over Sam (barely) to see what he sees day in and day out, mile after mile. (The glove compartment, whoo hoo!) But I guess I thought that since the car is black, and the steering wheel is black, that the whole of the interior would be black. The instrument panel is black, with silver fittings, but the rest of the interior is cream colored, with a little faux wood trim on Sammy’s side. But, you know, shouldn’t the Impala be black inside and out? A dark car for dark deeds? Cream is a color that seems so, well, suburban. I’ll get over it though, because I’m enjoying the idea of being in the back seat on one of Sam and Dean’s road trips. Because it’s raining, Dean’s got the heater on. Since it’s an older heater, the air gets dry fast. Maybe there’s stuff behind the driver’s seat on the floor that I’m kicking with my feet. Maybe I accidentally am sitting on The Dad’s Journal. Maybe Sam will let me have a look at the map while we take a spin. I always did want to go along for the ride. To their next gig. To some dive motel. To anywhere. Hoboken, even.

Back to the plot. This woman, Amanda, casts a witchy spell that makes Paul eat a maggoty burger and then choke on it. The lesson here: You order fast food and eat it glumly in your car, you’re liable to end up with a mouthful of maggots, cause when you go through the drive through, well, you know what happens in the drive through.

Sam and Dean arrive to save Paul, who, it turns out, is a adulterer, and why didn’t he mention that before? The boys save the guy who cheated, but couldn’t save the wife who was innocent. Is there something we’re meant to learn here, such as good people die and sometimes evil gets away with it? And, here again, there’s a switch. It’s Sam searching the bad guy’s car for the hex bag and Dean who helps Paul throw up. But why does Sam get to set the hex bag on fire? Dean’s my pyro guy, right? And, what’s up with the little blow torch? It looks like one of those little kitchen blow torches you use to carmelize the top of a crème brule, but I could be wrong. Why can’t Sam just use a match?

The boys go to Amanda’s house. But Amanda is in her black lingerie lying in a pool of her own blood, and here’s another lesson: You cast black magic spells and you die. There’s some cool camera work, as we get to look UP at this delightful scene through the glass coffee table. Then Dean calls the dead body in on his cell phone. He gives the address as 309 Mayfair Place. I practically saw the Anne Rice reference as it marched determinedly past me, Mayfair being the name of the family of witches in her series of books about the same, but I was more interested in the fact that Dean was actually calling a dead body in. Usually the boys just leave the scene of the crime behind, or maybe there’s some behind the scenes burning that I’m unaware of, but I don’t believe they’ve ever called it in before. Anyway, I love it when he hangs up, not giving his name. True to Dean, authority figures be damned. Plus, I love the fact that he seems more concerned about the poor bunny (who was sacrificed for Amanda’s ceremony) than he is about the woman bleeding on a glass table. Well, I guess when you’ve seen one dead body, you’ve seen a dead body. And Sam, he thinks Dean is being cute, and maybe he is, to entertain Sam. They’re like that, you see. They are each other’s favorite and best audience.

The boys figure out that there’s a coven of witches behind this death. Four women who want to succeed the easy way. And what’s their plan? To win more garden shows, to get raises for their husbands, and, most importantly, to get lower mortgage rates. (They’re casting spells for this? Jeeze, just call a bank, they’re good at that sort of thing.). The women are shallow, and I don’t like them. But I’m not meant to.

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Okay, back in suits, Dean and Sam talk to Elizabeth, and you can tell she’s the innocent one of the bunch because a) she has no cleavage, and b) her hair is country messy. This is in contrast to her two pals, who show up with cleavage, hundred dollar haircuts, and French manicures. (That’s Tammy and Mrs. Van Allan, the latter of whom tries to pull the snooty on the boys, but they’re not buying it. Later, in a severely cute throwaway line, Sam mocks her by imitating her.)

The episode picks up steam when the boys dither in the Impala. In the rain. Sam is all for getting rid of the coven. Sam, in Dean’s mind, should be less eager to put them all out of their misery, since they are human. But Sammy reminds Dean that they are murderers, and so Dean capitulates with a wiry, “Burn, witch, burn.” At which point, the Impala begins to sputter and stalls out on a lonely back road. This surprises Dean because he keeps that car running like a top. I’m thinking another hex bag, but, oh, no! It’s Ruby. She’s a roadblock. The boys get out. Ruby wants them to leave town. They protest. A fight ensues. Hard words are exchanged. I think this is one of my favorite scenes, watching Sam’s whole body react with fear when Dean finds out it’s Ruby. Watching Dean pull the Colt on Ruby, as he starts waving the gun around, wanting to know why they’re listening to this skank.

I don’t even know how to discuss this next part. Ruby snaps, “Put a leash on your brother, Sam, if you want to keep him.” This forces all sorts of weird thoughts into my head, unbidden, even for me. What she means, of course, is that she wants Sam to exert his influence over his brother so that Dean doesn’t kill her. What it also brings to mind is the idea that if Sam is going to be the boy king in hell, then Dean will surely be his main minion. Nobody’s ever asked Dean if he wants to be a minion, Sam’s or otherwise, but, I somehow doubt it. He’s a free spirit and a Winchester and they don’t make very good minions. Or lackeys. Or leashed boys.

I actually put my hands over my ears, like that’s going to stop the vivid images from entering my fangirl brain. I’m really, really, really sorry, but I couldn’t stop it. Because I’m a prudish sort, I’ve got Dean in clothes, but there was this leash image that bounced into being. And because there was a leash, there’s also, you know, a collar. I think I was shocked at how quickly everything went darkish like this, with Sam holding the leash diffidently in one of those large, manly hands of his. And Dean, at the other end, leash attached, wearing the collar. He doesn’t look happy and I’m thinking it won’t be long before both the collar and the leash are history. Leather can snap you know, if you put enough strain on it. I’m sure, really, really, really sure that what Show meant by this was a metaphorical leash, in that Sam should be able to control his brother. Which also suggests that Dean is out of control, or soon to be so. There’s something evocative about the idea of power contained, and to think that Ruby thinks that Dean needs this, or would even submit to it, takes my mind down very dark paths indeed.

Luckily, I’m distracted because the argument escalates and Dean actually tries to shoot Ruby, which I think he should have done the second he laid eyes on her. But at the last minute, Sam pushes Dean’s arms up and the shot goes wild. There is brotherly clutching, and Ruby disappears, leaving the issue unresolved and me wishing I hadn’t been thinking so hard about leashes and collars so I could figure out how the brothers are going to resolve the impasse they’ve reached about Ruby.

The boys go back to the motel to dither, which helps, because now I’m in more comfortable territory. But check out Sam. I do believe, and please correct me if I’m wrong, but Padalecki is wearing an old jacket and shirt from last season. And either the jacket and shirt have shrunk in the wash, or Padalecki has been working out. I vote for the latter, because the jacket is pulling at the shoulder seams like there’s not enough cloth to cover those deltoids, even though there’s enough length to cover his fingers. And the buttons in his shirt across are straining across his pecs. His jeans are hanging off him in the way conventional off-the-rack jeans do when you put them on a man whose thighs cut away from his groin muscle with a lovely dent, and there’s nothing the jeans can do but fall straight from his hips. Jeezus, Padalecki.

Oh, and the motel room? It’s like a big danger sign, painted in as many shades of orange as there are shades. Orange, as you know, is used to make you wary, even afraid. Traffic cones are orange. Busses are orange. Signs warning for crossing pedestrians are orange. Orange says “beware” and “Danger, danger, Will Robinson.” But there’s more to this than just an ugly room. The different shades of orange brought to my mind the different shades of flames, more to the point, the different shades of hellfire. Sam and Dean discussing Dean’s upcoming demise in such a room is rather like a preview of bad things to come, which is not just Dean burning forever in the pit, but also the pain of their separation. Which I think, for them, is the worst of all possible things. I mean, anticipatory grief, right? It’s those weeks, days, moments, seconds, even, leading up to the last point you will ever see someone again. Ever. So this for them, is hell.

The dither they have is dark, so bring your flashlights. The boys argue about whether or not they should consort with demons. Sam also expresses some very brotherly jealousy at the thought of Casey. “Oh, that´s funny! I remember that demon chick in Ohio. Casey? You didn´t want her dead!” Dean says that at least Casey wasn’t stringing him along. And then Sam says, “No one is stringing me along.” Check out Dean’s expression as he looks at his little brother. You can see that he thinks Sam is full of it, but he’s not going to say anything because he doesn’t want to take away Sam’s last hope. The problem with Ruby, then, is that Dean thinks she’s jerking Sam around. Then Dean wants to know why Sam isn’t acting like himself. I love the way Dean puts it here: “We’re supposed to drive around and you’re supposed to be worried about the santicty of life.”

Sam explains that he’s merely trying to prepare to continue the war after Dean is gone. The saddest line in the whole ep is when Sam says, “You’re leaving, and I got to stay in this craphole of world. Alone.” This coming from Sam, who, you know, loves and emotes and worries about, well, pretty much everything, considers that a world without Dean is a craphole. That just breaks my heart. And they’re back to using euphemisms for the Big Day when the hell hounds come to take Dean away. No one protests because Dean’s going to hell has become inevitable. They’ve both passed the point where they can deny it, and according to Show’s timeline, Dean has only a few months. So Sam, who is rather more practical than his emo boy reputation gives him credit for, is gearing up. Sam retorts that he’s just finally doing what he’s supposed to be doing, and his tone is exasperated as he explains he’s finally becoming 100% pure Winchester, and why does Dean have a problem with this. I think this is what kills Dean most of all. Not going to hell, but what his Sammy is going to have to become to deal with it.

And it gets worse. Someone puts the whammy on Dean. Mid-conversation, he starts coughing up blood and it goes way beyond whumpage and limpage. It’s not even remotely fun. It’s more like watching someone you love die right in front of your eyes. There’s blood and lots of it, pouring out of Dean like it’s a waterfall. His earlier comment about how unsanitary witches are because they spew bodily fluids now becomes rather ironically echoed here. Plus, the orange colors in the room become intensified, as if someone has just turned up the fires of hell. Dean falls to the floor, and there is more brotherly clutching than you can imagine. Dean is not used to being incapacitated, so I notice that once he grabs on to Sam, he does not let go.

Sam is beside himself. I’m not saying he’s not good in an emergency, but you know, really, he’s not. At least not when it comes to Dean. Put him in a room with a vampire-hating vampire like Gordon, in the dark, with a machete, and sure, he’s fine. He can loose the machete and behead the madman with a piece of wire and his bare hands. But have Dean coughing up blood and collapsing at Sam’s feet? Sam’s all elbows and thumbs, because he can’t think of what he should do first. He can’t think, of course, because it’s Dean, and there’s a lot of love and emotion in the way of being calm and collected, and so what does Sam do?

First he tears up the room, to no end. Then he grabs the Colt and races off to the coven to stop them. This is odd, because he’s leaving Dean to cough up more blood, because who knows how quickly Dean might die. If the positions had been reversed, I think that Dean would have taken Sam with him, regardless of how much blood would have ended up on the upholstery of the Impala. But yeah, when Sam gets to the coven, he scares them. He scares me, a little too, but it makes me glad because I know, now that Dean’s not in the room, he’s not afraid. He’s going to do what he has to do. They’ve hurt his Dean, see, and that’s not just naughty, it’s wrong.

But stop a minute. Yeah, Sam crashing through the door is way cool and very sexy. Him pointing a gun at the three women he believes are responsible for his brother coughing up blood is hot. But Sam, at this point, is prepared to kill them in cold blood, and that’s where it gets freaky. He’s just going to shoot them, one after another. Slowly and with consideration, and with no compunction whatsoever. You first, then you, and then you. That’s it, end of story. Sam has left behind normal a long, long time ago, behind the wheels of the Impala. I’m not even sure if he watched to see it go, looking in the rear view mirror to see if it was closer than it appeared. It’s gone. But is Sam’s humanity gone with it? I don’t think so, because at this point, his Dean is dying. He doesn’t care about the demon war or saving the world or any of it. The only thing that matters is saving Dean. Dean is his humanity.

So, like I’m waiting for him to gun them all down, using three precious demon-killing bullets in the process, when, oh crap. Tammy, the one with the not-quite-so-suburban hair, turns out to be a demon using the coven for her own demented plans. Yeah. She kind of stops the bullet from penetrating her and believe me, I never saw that coming. (Spoiler free since 1993.) This means, of course, lots of things, but the most obvious of which is that the Colt can’t kill everything. On top of which, this means The Dad was wrong, or at the very least, that he doesn’t know everything, and oh, how hard a pill that’s going to be for the boys, especially Dean, to swallow. Finding out that your Dad doesn’t know everything? That’s it’s own kind of hell, right? Sam doesn’t have time to think about this overly much, because Tammy pins him to the wall like a bug.

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Meanwhile, Dean is on all fours in the motel room, coughing up his lungs into a nasty red puddle on the floor, and in marches Ruby. Dean is not the least bit worried because if she wants to kill him, she’s going to have to get in line. Instead, she throws him on the bed and pours something nasty in his mouth. (See? More mouth stuff.) This saves him. He is grateful, but can’t really express it. However, this leaves him alive to race over to the coven (did he steal a car? Did take a cab?) to help Sam. Only he’s not much help because he too gets pinned to the wall like a bug.

Ruby shows up and then there’s a chick fight between her and Tammy. The fight shows us several things, beyond the fact that the screenwriter likes a little chick on chick action. (As does Dean, you can tell by his expression.) First, Tammy and Ruby knew each other before this. That Ruby once served Tammy, and that now she’s gone her own way. She’s a rogue demon, see, just like Sam and Dean are rogue hunters, so they’ve got lots in common. We also find out that Ruby was once human, which comes as a shock to the boys. And then Tammy says something interesting as she threatens to send Ruby back to hell. She says, “There’s no secrets where you’re heading.” Which is an interesting idea if you think about it, because what is hell, after all? Other people, like Sartre said? Or is it, as the joke goes, having to wander through eternity handcuffed to David Hasslehoff?

Then Tammy has that victory speech so many bad guys do when they are on the verge of winning. I find these speeches boring, especially when camera time on her means less camera time on the boys. However, the last member of the coven, Elizabeth, casts one last spell, which makes Tammy spit up pins. Blood oozes from her mouth as she kills Elizabeth, and this gives Dean enough time to jump up, grab Ruby’s magical knife, and stick her, like, eight or a gazillion times. He’s out of control, you bet. Tammy falls dead. Elizabeth is dead. Dean helps Sam up from the floor. There’s yet more brotherly clutching. Ruby says she’ll clean up the mess, because I guess that’s what demon chicks do.

So, back at the hellfire motel, Dean trots out to get him and his brother some soda. Ruby shows up, and she and Dean have a conversation. And guess what? She can’t save Dean from going to hell. I suppose I shouldn’t be as shocked as I am about this, but then I’m a trusting soul, and Dean is not. He almost already knew this, see, but to hear it from her must have been killer hard. What pisses him off more, I think, is the fact that she’s been lying to Sam, because it’s going to kill Sam when he finds out.

Dean’s more worried about Sam because Dean’s ready to go to hell. He’s not afraid, or at least that’s what he’s been saying. But every now and then, he gets this small spark of hope in his eyes, only to have it dashed because Ruby isn’t going to be able to help. Why has she been telling Sam that she can? To get him to talk to her, to get him to trust her so that she can train him to be more like Dean. She doesn’t care about any of that human emotion stuff, even though she used to be human. Back when the Black Death was popular, according to her, but she messed around with black magic and through the ages has lost her humanity. As demons will. Except for this demon, because according to what we see, she’s hanging on by her thumbnails to her memory of what it was like to be she. Back in the day.

Because, as she explains, hell is not simply fire and brimstone and damnation. Hell is not merely bones and pain and blood, and more fire. Hell is not misery beyond imagining. No, hell is where you have every last bit of you that you know is you burned away in the flames until there is nothing left of who you are. Kind of like a demonic case of Alzheimer’s, only without the aluminum pans.

But for Dean, maybe being burned in the fire until he forgets who he was isn’t as bad as that fact that it means being alone without Sam. It’s not bad enough that for him there will be no beer, no cheese fries, no open road, no Impala. No, it’s worse than that. No Sam. None. Not even a little bit. Dean’ll go crazy inside of one minute, staring at that long eternity without his brother beside him. And thinking of his brother doing the same.

That’s bad enough, but watching Ruby display her humanity is like watching Dracula get defanged. What good is the threat of a demon if you find out they don’t know why everything hurts so much? I preferred it when she was less of a known entity, when she stood in the grey areas. I don’t want to pity her, it’s like pitying a spider I’m about to squash. I want to be made anxious by her presence, I want to be worried when she shows up. So now, not only am I not going to be worried, I’m pretty sure she’s not going to save Sam. So her usefulness is pretty much over with and she can go now.

The only thing that saves this end scene is Dean. Good Lord. While he’s listening to this dribble from Ruby, I don’t for one minute think that he’s consorting with demons. Rather, I think he’s playing her, trying to find out what he can. And the lighting guy, he’s about to propose to me, because would you look at the way the light hits Dean’s face. It’s a hard and unerring light that shows me Dean, spare, rather like all the lushness has been burned off of him. I put this marvelous image down to Ackles himself. Who has, throughout this episode, refined Dean to only those things he needs for the hunt. No wasted movements, no wild gestures, well, except for the time he tried to shoot Ruby, and massive amounts of focus. The last expression of Dean’s that Ackles gives us is like something out of the Manual for Brave Men: This is the expression you wear when you face death. The hair on the back of my neck stood straight up when I saw it.

On the whole, this episode left me feeling a little lost and empty. Rather like Kripke had been at my bedside, telling me a rather dark and depressing bedtime story. Then, halfway through, he shuts the book and tells me it’s time for lights out. And that’s it. No protestations of mine about needing a glass of water or more story will sway him. He stands up, snaps the light off, and then he leaves. I’m in the dark now, and I’ve got a long stretch till morning with no flashlight. Well, okay, I only have to wait a week at this point, but you see what I’m saying here. Kripke has the whole story in his head, and he’s handing out what happens as he sees fit. I’m still Kripke’s bitch, okay, but I think that being so faithful gives me the right to complain a little. I’m just saying, cause I don’t know if I can make it to the next installment.

Sylvia Bond is a ten-year technical writing veteran with too many degrees under her belt to count. She lives in Colorado, but does not ski, preferring instead to spend her money and time at the annual Great American Beer Festival, taking road trips across the United States, and reading historical fiction from the comfort of her fluffy green arm chair. She has been involved in fandom since 1993 and been writing fanfic since approximately 1993. What she finds most amazing about fandom (besides the open heartedness of fans and the sheer amount of creativity) is how visible fandom has become. “In my day,” she says, “we had to hide behind P.O. boxes to get fanfic. But nowadays, people wear t-shirts that shout their affiliation and share their shiny toys on the internet.” It’s a wonderful world.

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