Supernatural: In My Time of Dying

Stupid, Macho Showdown
by
Sylvia Bond
Supernatural Episode Review, Season Two – Episode One
“In My Time of Dying”

When this ep opens, Sam is the only one conscious on account of his body was shielded from The Impact by The Dad’s and, symbolically, by Dean’s. This should set you up to realize what a very, very good ep this is even though it never won an Emmy. (It should have, I tells ya!) It contains, to misquote the hooker from Risky Business, “What all the fans on the lakeshore want.” It’s got angst and darkness, sacrifice and love, brotherly conversations and fatherly silences. It rocks so hard that you only have to see it once a year to be completely undone, not only by the fabbo script, directing, camera work, and acting, but by the sheer adorability factor of Dean walking around for the entire episode in his jammies. Now that’s what I call good TV!

Awake, Sam is alone. The last time we saw Sam while Dean was incapacitated, Sam spent days in his motel room, crying his eyes out and chewing on his fingernails. I loved him like that because he was so vulnerable and perfect. But here, watch him as he pulls the gun on the demon to protect his family. We get the stirrings of Sam rising into the fray, ready to take everyone apart if they dare come near. This is a scarier Sam, one that makes me feel a little uneasy simply because the all out, ready-to-kill Sam is not what I’m used to seeing. Then, when the demon goes away, Sam is left with the ruins of his life around him and two unconscious bodies. He asks for The Dad. There is no answer. Then he asks for Dean, and when he does this he BELLOWS, deep from his chest. Why the difference? It’s not that he doesn’t love The Dad and wouldn’t be devastated if The Dad died. It’s because Dean has become the center of his world.

The scene shifts, and now it is Dean who wakes up and gets out of bed. Have you ever seen such a cute eyeful as the Deanster? He’s in his jammies! Barefoot, no less. Yes, it’s true. He pads around the cold floors of the hospital looking for someone to talk to, someone who will tell him about Sam and The Dad. The white t-shirt he is wearing is divinely inspired, showing curves of shoulder, the tender skin of his neck, and his juicy but seldom (read never) exposed upper arms. Then there are the baby blue p.j. bottoms that hang just so from his delightful backside. Am I dwelling too much? I don’t think so. I mean, I could go on and on about the symbolism of said jammies, about how the thin cloth and pale colors (Dean never wears either) reflect his at-risk state and the vulnerability of his comatose physical body. But never mind that, cause folks? I just don’t care. Neither will you when you get an eyeful of that pert bottom. I mean! The boy works out, he just does. (Ackles, that is. Dean does too much running and jumping to get any time in the gym.)

Plus you get a little comedy as he tries to talk to the medical receptionist. She’s totally unresponsive and busy, as they always seem to be. That or she’s really dead, because who could resist Dean asking in that sweet voice if she could tell him anything? When he snaps his fingers at her, I snap mine too. I try to duplicate the Deanish style of this, the sharpness of the snap, followed by the rough, almost rude jerk of his wrist as he waves his hand in her face. There’s no reaction. She’s dead for sure. Only it turns out that Dean is. Or close to it. Dean discovers that his body, also clad in jammies but covered up in tubes and wires and blankets, lies resting in a coma.

In enters Sam. Alone, and not only that, but battered and bruised. He is the walking wounded. Which is kind of funny because for all The Dad and Dean were messed up in The Impact, they are just as beautiful as ever. The Dad is hale and hearty, and Dean, in spite of the jagged owie on his forehead looks beautiful enough to kiss. But Sam? He’s a mess. His eye is all mushed up and puffy, his face is bruised, and for much of the ep there is blood still clotted in his hair making it stick straight out. (I love Padalecki’s hairdressers 100% of the time. They make it look like Sam is the least vain person of anyone you would ever meet and that his hair just…falls…beautifully…that…way. Naturally.) Plus there’s blood on his clothes; it looks like he’s just forgotten to change them. And where does he go at night, the poor wee thing? Some dive motel all by himself? Or does he man the couches in the waiting room downstairs? I feel for him, I do. He must be exhausted.

On top of which, he’s the one who’s got to deal with the doctors. Doctors, as you know, love to tell you the bad news. In fact, they save the best for last, after building up the drama. It’s their technique; it’s the way they’re trained. As in, “There’s no damage to his spine, but….” Yeah. Thanks a lot, doc. But here Sam does one of his transmogrifications. That’s the best word I know to describe what happens to Sam several times through this ep. Here he becomes the surviving family member, the one who has to listen to this kind of information, and keep it all in his head, because lord knows, hospital staff never give you anything to write with so you can take the information back to the people who want to know. And if you are sensible enough to bring something to write it all down with, they won’t let you!

Anyway, Sam moves between roles frequently during this ep. This is in keeping with Sam’s character because Sam is aware at all times which profile of himself he needs to reveal. He’s a sophisticated, self-aware soul who knows when to be meek and pleasing, or, in this case, attentive and thoughtful. Dean in this particular scenario (listening to a doctor) would just be Dean. He would just be whoever he was, and either unaware that he was talking to a person with more years of education than his entire family put together, or he wouldn’t care. It’d be like he was thinking in his mind, so what, just give me the dirt, doc. Whereas Sam is acutely aware that this particular individual expects to be listened to and responds accordingly.

The Dad wakes up, and Sam goes to his bedside. I am glad to see that The Dad made it through The Impact, and so is Sam. After all it’s The Dad. His Dad. (And will you just LOOK at The Dad? How on earth does he look so….well? So alive. For all of his scrapes and such, he’s bursting with vitality; his tawny skin contrasts so nicely with the hospital white. They’ll be releasing him quite, quite soon, I have a feeling. WOOF!) But it’s easy to see that these two have trouble communicating. Especially when Dean’s not there to translate between them. It starts off simply enough. The Dad hands Sam his medical insurance card, and says something about “two loving sons.” (Two, note, not just one.) Sam takes them, he’ll take care of everything. And then The Dad asks about the Colt. Naturally, it being the source of so much contention and goings on, he’d be concerned about it.

But Sam? Oh, that boy. He rises to THAT occasion, berating The Dad for being more concerned about the Colt when his own son is DYING. Both of them are right. The Dad’s right because the Colt is important in the fight against the Demon. Sam’s right because some things are more important than the damn Colt, such as Dean’s life. It’s easier for me to relate to Sam’s point of view, but then I’m an emotional female (and a Deangirl for life), and not a father trying to protect his sons. Sam, in spite of his anger at The Dad, slips easily into son mode and goes off to take care of the Impala and to get the list of the things The Dad wants. (I suspect that the list was written on the back of one of those menu cards you get in hospitals. You know the ones, where each food choice is worst than the last and you just pray that someone who loves you will bring you a cheeseburger and fries.)

We get a glimmer of ghost Dean standing watching The Dad. Of course he saw the whole exchange where The Dad denies knowing what the YED meant about his plans for Sammy and all the children like him. Dean knows The Dad well enough to suspect that The Dad knows more than what he is saying. I love Dean’s casual attitude during this scene, the way he has his arms folded across his chest. He’s figuring things out, but sadly, there’s no one he can talk to about it.

When Sam deals with Bobby and the Impala, we get another side of Sam. Naturally this being Bobby, someone he knows and cares for, Sam is more relaxed and at home. At least as much as he can be given his task which is to deal with the remains of Dean’s beloved Impala. Some have hypothesized that the Impala is a metaphor for Dean, battered and broken and beyond repair. Watch as Sam tosses his trusty laptop aside. Bingo. Gone. But the Impala – if there’s a working piece to be found, Sam is determined to save what he can so that Dean can make it better when he wakes up. Sam also acts As If Dean will wake up, as in, Dean’ll be pissed or Dean’ll be mad. That’s the power of positive thinking for you. Bobby is dubious (as so many are of Sam), but, like Dean, he relents. Besides, as Kripke and Ackles et al have said, the Impala is a character in its own right. We can’t hardly just throw it away. That’d be cruel! (Not to mention no fun because there’s nothing sexier than Dean driving around in the Impala. We have to bring them both back, we just do.)

Then we get a great conversation between Dean and The Dad in spite of the fact that Dean is comatose. The Dad is sitting in a wheelchair, dressed in a natty blue bathrobe. I like the blue bathrobe; it contrasts nicely with his skin, and is that a hairy chest I see? Oh my. Plus, the juxtaposition of The Dad in the wheelchair makes The Dad just that much more powerful. But Dean, he’s got things to say, mostly about what The Dad is not saying, and more, is not doing. Dean says to The Dad, “I have done everything you have ever asked me.” As if love can be earned or something, as if he feels he’s earned enough points for The Dad to be obligated to get up and do something. Dean frankly, expects The Dad to rescue him, or to call someone to rescue him. That The Dad is doing nothing, and appears not to care tears at Dean. It tears at me too, because this reveals vulnerability in Dean that is even more shocking than the image of The Dad in a wheelchair. I mean, did you ever expect Dean to ask, “What kind of father are you?” Nope, nope, nope.

Sam returns to the hospital. He’s got the ever-handy Army green duffle bag full of the things The Dad has asked for and his hair is sticking straight out. I love it. But guess what Sam learned from Bobby? That the herbs and stuff The Dad wanted are actually meant to summon a demon. Sam goes ballistic and The Dad is right back at him. The argument is of the spark and shout variety you have heard tell of. Sam says it is a stupid, macho showdown that The Dad wants, and I love it that he calls it like he sees it. The Dad shouts back, and if you watch him close, you can see how upset he is. I put this down to JDM’s great acting chops that he can reveal the sadness hidden between the anger in those marvelous brown eyes. The layers, oh, the layers! The argument reveals a lot, such as The Dad now thinks it was a mistake to have brought Sam along. This makes me wonder what else he would have done with him? Like, left him in a foundling home? And Sam, for his part, ends up telling The Dad to go to hell, and I’m like, oh, no, you didn’t just say that Sam, TELL me you didn’t.

When they start going at it, I’m like goodie, it’s canon! Which is really mean of me, considering how much the argument hurts them and Dean, who is listening in with a ghostly ear. You can see how this is an old scenario for him, this escalating argument between his two favorite people. Normally, he’d have to play Switzerland, but since he has no corporeal body, there’s nothing he can do. Show gives me a shot of humor when Dean full on Swayzes the glass to the floor, stopping the argument between Sam and The Dad. They share no words, but they stop shouting and look, really look at each other. There’s a fracas in the hallway and The Dad nods at Sam. Sam, who was just a second ago shouting at the top of his lungs some very mean things transmogrifies not only into obedient son, but into hunter-brother. He’ll take care of things. He’s the responsible one.

Now here’s a sad scene. Dean’s soul is being drawn out by the Reaper. Dean is fighting it, of course, being Dean. But Sam knows none of that; he’s true pathos, trying not to cry, blood still in his hair, and he’s changed his role to that of grieving brother. But when Dean shouts at the Reaper, Sam almost hears him. Then later, in the hallway, when Dean is trying to reassure Sam that he will fight the Reaper, Sam almost hears him again. It’s a wonderfully filmed scene done in one circling shot. Sam’s head is scraping the ceiling (cause he’s so tall) and he’s just standing there. I imagine that he’s collecting his thoughts, trying to figure out what he’s going to do. And then, you get this long pan, and he turns his head, and then his whole body. I get particular joy watching his thighs shift, but that’s beside the point. What this means, really, is that Dean and Sam are so joined, so psychically connected, that they can hear each other beyond death’s door. Now that’s CLOSE.

Dean meets up with a cute chick. She’s also in a coma, and the two of them talk in the hallway about what’s happening to them. But because there’s this close-up of Dean’s face, the conversation fades away and I don’t even know what they say to each other. Because here the makeup artists do what I’ve begun to call eyebrow magic. Ackles has got the most amazing, most communicative eyebrows of anyone ever. And the makeup people, they manipulate this to make the most of that. In this scene, Dean’s eyebrows are wide apart, making his eyes even larger and more shiny than they already are. He looks ten. Yet compare this with a later scene, the eyebrows are back to the way they were, and he looks his regular age. (Ha, Show, and I’ll bet you figured I wouldn’t notice!) Also as they talk, there’s a call for Dr. Kripke and a code blue over the intercom. Show thinks that it is sly, but me? I’ve got the slo-mo button on. Yeah, the ep is a serious one, with people dying or in comas, and all I want to do is watch Dean run down the hallway in his jammies. Slowly. Over and over. Oh, I’m a bad fan.

Sam tells The Dad about hearing Dean. The Dad is not condescending when he answers, not quite. Anything is possible, as he says, and he must know, having seen it all. Sam here is in obedient son mode. He’s looking to his dad for answers. But he already knows the answer, right? Yeah, it’s the magic talking board. This is one of my favorite scenes in this ep. The first thing out of Sam’s mouth when he brings the board out of the bag in Dean’s room is, “Don’t make fun of me for this, but….” Which as anyone can tell you gives your siblings free license to do JUST that. Dean is dubious, but he goes along with it as he tends to do with Sam. As he always tends to do with Sam.

Plus it takes Dean forever to sit down. I rather enjoy this though there seems to be no point to it other than eye-candy. I tend to obsessively think about those p.j’s of his, and how thin they are, how cold the hospital floor must be on Dean’s lovely, lovely backside. And those dirty feet! For all the hospital floors should be much cleaner, the soles of his feet are as black as tar. (Given Show’s track record I’m inclined to wonder if there’s any symbolism to this.) And I’m not going to ask boxers or briefs, no. Just no.

Anyway the scene is touching in so many ways. There’s Dean’s trust in Sam, and Sam’s faith in the magic talking board, even though any schoolgirl could tell you if you use one you can just as easily open the door to bad mojo as talk to your dearly departed Nana. Both Sam and Dean’s hands are scarred, which of course represents their scarred inner selves, but sight of them makes me want to run for the Neosporin! Plus there’s Dean’s look of love. It happens when Sam says, “It’s not been the same without you.” And Dean, says, in reply, “Damn straight.” Which means in Winchester-speak, I love you, little brother. Plus when he says this, you get the double whammy of this being said by Dean’s eyes. It wipes me out every time. But I get the feeling that Sam doesn’t need to see this or hear Dean to know that it’s true.

When Sam finds out a Reaper is after his beloved brother, he transmogrifies again. He goes from giggling to somber in seconds flat. What is most revealing is what he says as he leaves the room: “Dad’ll know what to do.” He goes from independent hunter to dependant son fast, in spite of all the fighting between him and The Dad, because really, The Dad is who he loves most in this old world. After Dean, of course. But when Sam gets to The Dad’s bedside? The Dad has gone missing. These Winchesters, I swear. They should have a rule like my family does when we are on a road trip together: Always tell someone where you are going. Another good rule would be: Always tell someone what you are up to, they might be able to help you. But Winchesters are not sensible like that.

And we quickly find out how this is so. The Dad goes off to the basement to cast a spell to yes, you guessed it, summon the Demon. Oh no! This just kills me. As for the ritual, there’s grunting and chanting and bloodletting. Of course The Dad would be brave enough to cut open his own palm, of course, he’d know exactly how to summon the Demon. Of course he would not hesitate, once he’s made his mind up, as to what he’s going to do once the Demon comes to him. Because the Demon will, it’s a foregone conclusion. Have you ever met anyone who didn’t obey The Dad’s orders? I haven’t.

The ep gets even sadder than it already was and fast, too. The Dad is in the basement, dealing with the Demon. His gaze is straight and determined, for all he’s got one arm in a sling and he’s still unsteady on his pins. He wants to make a deal. (I’d like to make a joke about Bob Barker here, but it just wouldn’t be fitting.) Dean, for his part, finds out that the cute girl is actually a Reaper, and she wants him to give in and let her take his soul. And Sam? He’s all alone at Dean’s bedside, calling for his brother, and fast out of ideas as to what do to. His plea to Dean is made up of what my sister likes to call the dichotomy of pathos: “Don’t leave me alone with Dad, we’ll kill each other, you know it.” It’s funny, right, but it’s sad at the same time. What’s even more sad is what Sam says after, that he doesn’t want this to be the end because he and Dean were just becoming brothers again. Which reflects an interesting tidbit about Sam, that it’s taken him this long to get into that double harness with Dean.

So all these characters are on their own. And while I won’t say that the ep was filled with secrets and lies, exactly, it has been full of subterfuges and prevarications. Which amounts to the same thing. What’s saddest of all is that each character can’t or won’t consult with the other one. The Dad, for example, lies about what he knows about what the Demon wants. Dean, listening in, knows The Dad is lying but can’t tell Sam. And on and on it goes. If they could only communicate like normal people. Oh wait, normal people don’t communicate either!

In the end, just as Dean is about to give into the Reaper, The Dad makes his deal. And it’s a horrible deal done for the most altruistic of reasons. The Dad, you see, trades the Colt AND his soul for Dean’s life. The Reaper lets Dean go, and Dean wakes up. Simple, right? Simple and sad. But since Show is cruel to us all, there is MORE because The Dad is given the opportunity to say goodbye. Which he does in the most quintessential The Dad way. He comes in to the hospital room where Dean is now awake and aware, and instantly, Sam is on his case, going where were you in his Sam-ish way. The Dad, though, I love what he says here, about not knowing why they fight, not wanting to fight anymore. In fact, he apologizes for his mistakes and says that he did the best he could. This makes Sam suspicious because The Dad just does not talk to him like this. In spite of his suspicions, though, when sent out for caffeine, he goes, instantly obedient son instead of belligerent son.

Now Dean and The Dad are alone together, and what a scene it is. I wouldn’t say it’s my favorite because it makes me uncomfortable, but sometimes that’s what great art does. The Dad has a lot to say, for example, how proud he is of Dean. How he shouldn’t have made Dean grow up so fast. He cries when he says this – and dad’s don’t cry. Mine doesn’t, yours might, but THIS Dad? No. No way. But he does, the tear streaking down his face like hot mercury. You just have to feel for someone so worked up like this. And then The Dad goes into the whole kiss/kick routine. He’s just gotten done praising Dean and apologizing to the point where Dean makes a joke that The Dad might be possessed. That he’s not makes it even weirder for Dean. But then, The Dad turns around and lays it on Dean. He leans over Dean’s body and whispers into Dean’s left ear. He was closer to Dean’s right ear, why didn’t he whisper into that one? Some will tell you it’s for the camera angle, but I think it’s for control. As he moves into Dean’s personal space, he controls what Dean can do.

And what does he say? Any fan can tell you that the context of this message does not come to light until the end of Croatoan, but I’m going to give it to you here for the purposes of discussion. He says, in effect: If you can’t save Sammy, you have to kill him. Say WHAT? The Dad has just apologized for making Dean take on too much too young and now he’s giving him THIS? Not only is Dean being enjoined to commit fratricide, he’s being asked to decide when that particular act would be appropriate! I can’t tell you how many times this message comes up in the make or break conversations about “bad dad.” This is it, this is the doosey. Proof is in the pudding, yes, The Dad gave praise, he apologized for his mistakes, that’s appropriate. But even me, a dyed in the wool John fan, a proponent of “good dad,” well, I think on this aspect of his character, the willingness to give his soldier son one final, IMPOSSIBLE task, and I go, why, why, WHY? Oh, John. Yours is a hard road.

Then Sam comes back with the coffee. I suspect he’s taken the time to make it just the way The Dad likes it, which from the color means a little cream and a lot of sugar. But The Dad is on the floor and Sam drops the coffee. This is done in slo-mo, which I always like, but it makes this scene that much more tragic. Sam races to his father’s side, and drops to all fours, sprawled over The Dad’s body, howling like a wolf over a fallen pack member. The youngest child should never have to discover their parent’s dead body, it’s one of the perks of being youngest. Alas, Show tends to take the road less traveled, and this lot falls to wee Sammy. But for all that Sam never got along with The Dad, he’s devastated. I’m devastated too, in fact I go numb every time I see this scene. I want to make fun of it, because I just can’t take it, but I can’t make fun of it either because it’s so sad. And I think Sam, in the back of his brain, realizes that now the horrible, awful task of telling Dean that The Dad is dead is now his. Yeah, sure, there’s the final bit where The Dad is pronounced DOA by someone else, but Sam is the one who had to go to Dean and bring him to the bedside where they are fruitlessly working on The Dad.

So what do we do now? The Dad is dead, the Colt is gone, and the only thing that mollifies me is that this is just the first ep of Season Two. There’s boatloads of angst and suffering ahead for the boys, who are a delight to my eyes and my own true loves. Yet still I grieve. It was Show’s big idea to get rid of The Dad, probably because it would throw the boys into confusion and create a whole lotta mess for them to deal with. I can appreciate that, I can. But. Boy, will I miss Jeffrey Dean Morgan (JDM). When his character came on screen, everything got suddenly darker and more messed up. He added to the heaping pile of angst that was already there, simply because you never knew what was going on in that sassy head of his. Plus he was so darn good looking, well, I can’t even tell you. Every fan I have EVER talked to, be she a Deangirl or a Samgirl or somewhere in between, when I mention The Dad? They moan, mumble something about smoking hot, and then go off to watch one of the eps that he is in. John Winchester is sorely missed to this day, not just by his sons and the people who knew him, but by fangirls everywhere. If Show were nice to us, if Show loved us, Show would bring JDM back to play John in a flashback. Show says that JDM is too busy, but I blame Show. Show is mean. Show hates us. We want John!! Would it help if we begged? Please???

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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