Supernatural: Ghostfacers
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by Sylvia Bond
Supernatural Episode Review - Season Three, Episode 13
“Ghostfacers”
The opening of this episode was cute. I appreciated the way it poked fun at the recent writer’s strike, and enjoyed the whole “fat cat” style with which Ed and Harry, our intrepid ghost hunters from Season Two, present their unsolicited pilot episode for their new show idea. In spite of being hindered by Sam and Dean last season, the geeky Ed and Harry managed to finagle it somehow. They’ve done what so many have talked of, but never acted on. They’ve created their pilot and are well on their way to that RPG as well as fame and fortune. And sex. With girls. Way to go Ed and Harry! (They are also leaving Kinko’s further behind them with every step they take. And was it just me or did the ghostfacer’s theme song sound vaguely like the song “We Are the Pirates,” from The Pirate Movie starring Christopher Atkins?)
After the fat cat scene, the faux credits for Ed and Harry’s show “Ghostfacers” play. It was funny for about a minute and a half. I’ll be honest, I didn’t laugh all that hard, although I usually love parodies, and that was because for what felt like an eternity, Sam and Dean are conspicuously absent. Then, finally, Sam comes on during the credits in a little freeze frame, and this made me smile, on account of he looked so serious and his hair was long and lovely. (I’m shallow that way.) And then, when Dean appears and looks right into the camera and flips it the bird and the camera freezes? Yeah, then I laughed out loud.
After the credits, there is more ghostfacer stuff while Show establishes the story. Ed and Harry, and their ghostfacer pals Maggie, Spruce, and the intern Corbett, set themselves up to spend the night in the Morton Mansion. Apparently this place is the most haunted place in the US on the night of February 29th. The ghostfacers are amusing and absolutely earnest, which is the way I like them. Every one of them has got a herky-jerky digital camera with which they film everything. Their skills are such that they have bad timing and no idea how to focus or light a scene, which gives the visuals a gritty realism.
After ten minutes, though, the whole crazy cam thing became too much. I also got confused as to who was filming what. Anyway, I gave up trying to keep track; the clever camera trick became overly clever. Yes, the intro brought to my mind the popular show Ghost Hunters. I’m wondering if Show means for this to be a respectful parody, or if they’re just making outright fun. It makes no never mind to me. I watched Ghost Hunters a time or two, but the self-aggrandizing and over dramatization left me cold. (For something much scarier, watch A Haunting on the Discovery Channel.) I guess that reality TV is an acquired taste, much like cage wrestling is.
After an eternity of the ghostfacers dancing around the “eagle’s nest,” I actually checked the clock. I wanted to know how much longer I would have to exist in the Sam and Dean-less desert. There was simply too much information about characters that I considered to be merely secondary. Spoiler free me, I had no idea that these secondary characters would be what the plot centered around, and that my beloved boys would only be a dash of flair. Sure it’s is silly and fun, but if I wanted silly and fun I would watch Blinky’s Fun Club. However, I’m willing to give Show the benefit of the doubt because I could see that they were trying something new, and I can appreciate that they were pushing the envelope, thinking outside the box, yadda, yadda. Plus I am mollified because what Show has done in the past is to produce one or two silly eps and then follow this up by several heartbreakers. For example, in Season Two there was Hollywood Babylon and Folsom Prison Blues, which were followed up by What Is and All Hell Breaks Loose, Parts I and II, which were absolute tear jerkers. So I fully anticipate that this will happen again.
Back to the ep. The ratio of Ed and Harry to Winchester boys was already OFF at this point, and to such a grand degree that I barely heard the familiar rumble of a certain car’s engine. At 6 minutes and 49 seconds (Yes, I was watching the clock. I was desperate!), I hear the sounds of the Impala, and my heart begins to speed up. (Oh, that rumble always stirs me.) At 7 minutes, I hear the sounds of heavy metal rock music, and lo appears Sam and Dean driving up in that sizzling black car of theirs, with the windows rolled down and the boys shining their flashlights into the darkness.
Sam and Dean come inside (at 11 minutes and 48 seconds), pretend to be police, and attempt to take control of the situation. Ed, however, spots them straight off, and is not impressed. Harry comes down and recognizes them even faster, and refers to them as the a$$holes from Texas. The swearword is again bleeped out and the shape of Harry’s mouth is covered over by a little skull. (Everybody got the joke, right? Dean and Sam met up with Ed and Harry in Texas, but both Ackles and Padalecki were born in Texas. I think this is an example of a double entendre, by golly!)
Anyway, there’s tons of “ain’t-ing” from Sam, and “f—ing” from Dean (the expletive deleteds NEVER failed to make me laugh, but I have an awful feeling that that’s all the pleasure this ep will afford me), but Ed and Harry refuse to stand down. I think it’s Ed who says that never mind Dean’s chiseled chest, they were there first. I have to give Ed points for noticing this in spite of Dean being covered from neck to toe. Then Dean gets aggressive. He swears at the camera (which is bleeped out) and then he comes at it and knocks it around. You know, it was kind of cool to see Dean in attack mode from that angle. Yeah, you just wouldn’t want to mess with this guy.
It’s at this point that I realize what might be the saving grace of this ep for me, personally. I am so spoiled by Show; Show has raised my level of expectation so high that when an ep doesn’t appear to meet those expectation, I continue to look for what it is trying to do. So here I think what I’m going to get is the outsider perspective of Sam and Dean from that of a ghostfacer. Frankly, to a ghostfacer, Sam and Dean are scary and intimidating. Firstly, they’re tall. Secondly, they’re VERY tall. And thirdly, they’re entirely serious and don’t need any help from you or me. Plus, Dean he’s got that aggression thing going on right about now; when he comes at you, your first impulse is (and should be) to just back the hell away. As for Sam? He knows too much for you to be messing with him so just try and stay out of his line of sight. Me, I’m hiding behind Spruce.
With flashlights a flashing, and guns loaded with rock salt, Sam and Dean are less than pleased to find a bunch of wannabes horning in on their gig. Of course they will be much better at this than the ghostfacers, that’s a given. They try and get everyone out of the house, but no one is paying attention to them. Then the gang discovers the death echo, which revealed something about ghosts I didn’t know. Not that I know a whole lot, but isn’t being stuck in a moment something that already defines a ghost? It’s like that inexplicable difference between a “kiss” and a “kiss kiss.” There’s a “ghost” and then there’s a “ghost ghost.” I guess the first kind has only one action, which is directly related to their death throes. The second kind can march around the house handing out party favors and lopping off people’s heads.
One good bit happens where Sam and Dean go off for a private conversation between them. Problem is, whoever is filming them (I think it was Spruce) has a mike to beat the band and can pick up every word they say. The transcription of their words is another nod to Ghost Hunters. Plus we get the outsider perspective again, with Sam and Dean acting as if they are alone. I wish, though, we’d gotten more of this. I wish Show’d taken the opportunity of the outsider perspective and RAN with it instead of just walked. Because for all the episodes we’ve seen, we seldom get to know what any civilian thinks of the boys. For example, the woman in Salvation, who had the baby that Sam and Dean saved. Did she think the boys were scary? Did she wonder whatever became of them afterward? It’s a missed opportunity here.
It’s at this point that Corbett disappears, and Show takes a dark turn. This is so like Show that I feel I’m in more familiar territory, though it upsets everyone else. Enough so that Sam says “shit,” which is bleeped out and makes me laugh because Sam doesn’t seem the swearing type. As for Corbett, he’s upstairs trying to communicate with ghosts. Yeah, he gets grabbed by something or someone and is dragged off screaming. Poor, foolish Corbett. I could see right away that he had a bit of a mancrush on Ed. Ed who is oblivious to Corbett’s attentiveness as to his choice in coffees. But I feel for Corbett, silly as he seems, for who among us hasn’t experienced unrequited love? Nobody, that’s who.
At any rate, Sam and Dean want them and everyone out of the house, but they are trapped inside by the ghost. Sam’s trying to be calm but he is now quite PISSED. He’s so fun to watch when he’s worked up like this because he lets it all hang out and he calls it like he sees it. Exactly like he sees it. He says to Dean, “Happy now?” Dean says sarcastically, “Yes, I’m happy.” Then Sam says, “Let’s go hunt the Morton House, you said. This was supposed to be our Grand Canyon, you said. You’ve got two months left, but no, instead we’re going to die tonight.” This to me seemed a very quintessential Winchester brothers’ moment, them communicating a great deal through one or two terse and snotty comments, but what does it mean?
At one point during Season Two, Dean said he wanted to go to the Grand Canyon because they’ve crossed the country a hundred times or more and he’s never been. It’s one of his last dying wishes. This statement of Sam’s implies to me that off screen there was this rather heavy discussion wherein Sam suggested that they finally go to the Grand Canyon. (For Dean, you know, there’s nothing he’s not willing to do.) But Dean managed to convince him that taking care of the Morton House would be as fun as visiting the Grand Canyon. With two months on Dean’s contract, I’m thinking they could have done both. But what Sam says implies that there isn’t going to be enough time, and he allows Dean to make the choice, because, after all, Dean is going to be “goin’ away soon,” and all that. But I love the way Sam says “our” Grand Canyon. As if that destination had more symbolism and meaning than a mere vacation spot. To me, it echoes the line at the end of Casa Blanca, making me feel that the Grand Canyon holds the same significance to Sam and Dean as Paris does to Rick and Ilsa, but without the sex.
A death echo appears, and naturally Dean is the one who strides forward to deal with it while everyone else watches in open-mouthed awe. Then the boys lead the ghostfacers on a research expedition where they learn about Mr. Daggett, who once owned the house At one point, Dean turns to Maggie and asks her if it makes her feel better to view this particular nightmare through the camera. Maggie, after a pause, says yes. Dean rolls his eyes and turns away, accepting this. I thought it was interesting that he asked the question because it tells me he recognizes what she’s doing, that is, removing herself from direct contact with a scary situation. I got to hand it to Dean here. He might not be emo boy, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t understand. He also uses the word “mook,” when telling her that the people in the death echoes didn’t live or die in that house. I had to look this one up; there’s so many definitions to it that it’s not funny. He’s using it in the sense that the death echoes are stand-ins for their real selves. (Sorry, but my linguistics gene will not shut up!)
Anyway, they find out that Daggett collected dead bodies to “play” with. Everyone is grossed out. (Plus Ed and Harry are completely beguiled by Sam and Dean researching. For Sam and Dean, this is what you do on a gig. You talk your ideas out loud, and poke through people’s private papers to find the information that you need.) At this point, while everyone else is doing something constructive, Maggie goes looking for Corbett. I think this is to provide Dean the opportunity to rescue her and to tell her, “Closer to the herd, okay?” So, naturally, it occurs to me that he equates the ghostfacers with a herd of sheep. Which makes Sam and Dean…sheepdogs? Hell, wolves is more like. So now we’ve got wolves guarding the sheep. Nice!
And then, a second later, Sam vanishes. Well, this, at last, piques my interest. Dean’s too. Suddenly, what’s going on in that house has become a WHOLE lot more important to him. He’s sold his soul for Sammy’s life; with only two months to go, he can’t loose him now, he just can’t! Dean goes looking for Sam. At one point during this fracas, Maggie and Harry get together to share a kiss. Naturally, being healthy humans, the threat of death makes them want to procreate. However, Ed discovers them and is pissed off enough to fight with his best friend. This gives Show the opportunity to have Dean in rescue mode again, where he pounces on everyone and, teeth bared, tells them to knock it off. (He’s rather like a fierce part-wolf sheep dog, bringing his charges to heel.) Seconds later, Dean manages to get trapped in the basement with Spruce, who comments, while filming, “You’re strong.” To which Dean responds by giving him the finger. Which is digitized out, naturally, this being a family channel. He also comments to Spruce’s camera exactly what he thinks about telling his bull$hit problems to a bull$hit reality show. (The naughty parts of this were bleeped out.)
What I love about this, though is what it shows us about Dean. I’ve always thought Dean, while having a somewhat low opinion of himself, does not, at the same time, actively seek approval from anyone, especially strangers. He’s got Sam’s approval (and Bobby’s and some others) and that’s enough for him. That he shuts Spruce up by giving him the finger shows the street side of him, the I-just-don’t-care and take-a-flying-leap-hosebag side. There’s something that comes up from the gut at a time like that, and Dean, he’s like, jeeze, WHO CARES how strong I am? Sam is missing, you idiot!
And maybe it’s just me, but I thought it would have been cool for Dean to go on and on in response to Spruce’s question about the fact that Dean only has two months. There’s another missed opportunity here. I mean, it’s dark in that basement, there’s only Dean and Spruce, and Dean can easily discount Spruce on account of he’s not going to be much help finding Sam. And he does, after all, start talking when Spruce asks him the question. I’ve seen him do it before, this talking thing. He opens his mouth and out the words come. Why not let him continue and give us some insight as to what’s going on in that beautiful head of his? Oh Show. You continue to deny me.
Sam and Corbett have been taken by ghost of Daggett, who places them at his birthday party table and ties them up. The ghost stabs Corbett through the neck with something long and pokey. Sam gets to watch. You just KNOW what this does to Sam. He’s going to blame himself for not being able to save Corbett till the Rapture comes. Plus, then the ghost goes over to Sam and says the same things to him that he said to Corbett. Like, don’t be afraid, this won’t hurt. For the first time, I’m worried. Not Sammy! He’s not allowed to hurt Sammy!!!
Corbett’s camera is still going, you see, clutched in his now-dead hand, so we get this slightly green, slightly out of focus, whacked picture of Sam, now in the pointed party hat that the ghost has just put on him. Sam with a pointy paper party hat on his head is beyond bizarre. It’s creepy and it’s kooky. The fact that it’s tilted to one side does NOT help, and I’m sniggering even though I know he’s in grave danger. Don’t get me wrong. My snigger is the kind that is appropriately nervous, given that the bad guy is about to gouge out some delicate part of Sam’s throat. Shades of Psycho! Shades of House of Wax! (And any other classic horror flick you’d care to name where the deranged soul props up dead bodies as though they were still alive to have company while he or she participates in happy celebrations now become macabre travesties.)
Upstairs, the ghostfacers are now scared out of their minds. I can relate better to Ed and Harry when they’re scared enough to pee themselves, because that’s how I’d feel were I trapped in a haunted house with no way out and one of my friends had just died a horrible death. Yeah, being rescued by Dean and Sam would be WAY cool, but if I didn’t know it was Dean and Sam? What if I thought they were just two hosebags trying to keep me from my dream and I didn’t have the hots for either of them? If one of them was tall and gorgeous and pissed off about everything and the other one (with his chiseled chest) was as beautiful as an angel and not too happy to see me there? Yeah, I’d be inclined to do exactly as I was told and sit inside that circle of salt. (And here I’ll check to see if anyone else made the connection between the name of the mansion and a particular brand of salt. Morton. Salt. When it rains, she gets wet. What? Too shallow? Okay, let’s move on.)
Anyway, that brings us back to Corbett, who, with his mancrush on Ed, is much pitied by all now that he’s dead and shows up in a gory death echo. In fact it’s Ed who figures out that the human and humane thing to do would be to step outside the circle of salt and stop Corbett from repeating his death throes so that he can move to the Great Beyond. Ed’s scared all right; I appreciate his fear along with his bravery, which reminds me, at that moment, of Don Knotts in The Ghost and Mr. Chicken. He almost can’t do it, till Harry reminds him that Corbett “wanted” Ed. I love the little push Harry gives to Ed’s chest, as if that will clear up the kind of “wanted” Harry means. So Ed goes over and starts talking. He says nice stuff, some he means, some he’s making up. He’s trying to do the right thing here, I can’t hardly say liar liar pants on fire about him saying he loves Corbett if it’s going to help Corbett. Because Corbett, as the audience knows by this time, doesn’t deserve any of this, but for some reason it’s TV’s self proclaimed job to kill off all the gay characters.
Corbett reminded me partly of Max from the ep Nightmare, but mostly of that guy on the free credit report commercial. You know, the one who’s always singing about having such bad credit that he ends up wearing a pirate shirt in some dive restaurant. (Either that or his posse’s getting laughed at.) I wonder if Corbett might also stand for everyman, and what will happen to you if you dabble in things beyond your ken. Show has been known a time or three (or gazillion) to be just about that deep when you least expect it. That Show focused on such a minor character like this and then made much of him, makes me wonder. If you don’t know what you’re doing, you die. If you join a club because you’re in love with one of the members (and he’s got a cool, golden beard), you die. If you are a gay character on a TV show, you die. Is that how it goes? Are we being warned away from following our hearts, is that it? Because as you know, Corbett wanted to find out where ghosts come from. Now he knows.
But what gets me is this. You know, I like Ed and Harry. I do. They’re sweet and earnest and when they’re not pretending to be other than what they are (slightly geeky smart but not too bright fans), then I like them very much. But not enough for this, not enough to care that there are tears (and nice ones too) streaming down Ed’s face. The scene looses its meaning because I don’t have anything invested in the characters participating in it because they will soon never be seen again. Now, get, say, Dean in the scene, and it would have gone a lot farther with me. It wouldn’t have mattered if the person who needed to move into the Great Beyond was Corbett, or Maggie, or Ed. The fact that Dean would have needed to expose a little of his inner soul to set that person free (with those beautiful tears streaming down his face) AND maybe in order to save Sammy, now that would have been worth waiting for. In its effort to be cute and clever, Show missed the boat. Again. (I fully recognize, however, that I am a spoiled fan and that I should just accept with gratitude whatever Show gives me.)
Dean rescues Sam from the birthday party from hell. This is a given; this is the way it should be. As the boys and Spruce are trying to escape from the basement, Sam finally says something about the camera to the camera. He says, “You’re still shooting?” But it’s Dean who says, as he bashes on the door leading out from the basement, “Don’t ask.” This is a nice little flip here. Normally it’s Sam who connects with the civilian of the week, so we get to see Dean actually relating to someone outside his normal circle. Naturally, Daggett shows up to ruin their escape and gives the boys a hearty toss against the wall. Corbett shows up and, apparently at Ed’s behest, battles Daggett until instead of two ghosts there weren’t any. After which follows another quintessential Winchester moment. Sam staggers to his feet, Dean staggers to his feet. They walk towards each other, asking how the other one is, assessing each other’s damage with careful eyes. It’s nice and intimate, I’m thinking, very Winchestery, at which point Dean notices the camera and blocks it off with his hand. He’s had enough intrusion into his private life. I like to think that even though I couldn’t see it, Dean wiped some of the blood from Sam’s face with his thumb.
It is dawn over the Impala. This is a beautiful shot, I don’t mind telling you, because the orange glow against the black paint gives the whole image a Halloween feel. Which, given the nature of Show, is only right. The ep ends with Ed and Harry back in fat cat mode, saying grand things about their exploits. When the dedication to Corbett showed up, it was done in such a way that for a moment I thought that Show had really dedicated this ep to a fallen friend. Well, er, okay, if that’s what Show wants to do. But then the ep kept going, right over the credits, which also surprised me. Usually the ep ends at the credits, and while I’m not one to bitch about a few or three minutes more of my favorite entertainment, it felt rather strange. But enough about that. Good laughs were to be had when Sam and Dean destroyed all the ghostfacers’ hard work. Ha. Ha. I can imagine that they would want to destroy evidence of themselves in nefarious activities, but to destroy everything? I guess their motto is salt and burn and move on. (Dean uses a HUGE electromagnet. I made one of these in the sixth grade, they’re not hard. But you can make them a lot smaller than that, just so’s you know, Dean.)
After that, the boys, as Huck would say, light out, headed for parts and gigs unknown. The tires spin, gravel spits, and the paint job gleams. And in the end, I found myself having enjoyed the ep more than I thought I would. Naturally, I loved every scene with Sam and Dean in it, and laughed out loud at every bleeped over swear word and digitized rude hand gesture. I adored that Show let us know that Dean only had two months left. In addition, given that this ep was about Ed and Harry and co, I didn’t expect to learn much about Sam and Dean. But I did, so I’m happy.
Sam was not his usual self in that he barely spoke a word that didn’t relate directly to the job at hand. (Except for the one conversation he had with Corbett. I think this is because he’s really worried about Dean’s deal.) If he wasn’t talking to a ghostfacer about the job, he was talking to Dean and Dean alone. Sam is terse. He watches Dean, his eyes big and serious, as handsome as ever, though I would have liked more hair in his eyes, but that’s just me. I get to see Sam as a relative stranger would see him. If he doesn’t want anything from you, and if he doesn’t know you, well, Sam just isn’t going to feel the need to talk to you. Bobby? Sure, Sam’ll chat the afternoon away, with a beer or two in his hands. Dean? You bet. Sam’ll be on him like a duck on a junebug, talking his fool head off if it’ll get Dean to see reason. (This never works, though Sam will insist on trying. Dean’ll see reason when Dean’s ready to see reason.)
Mostly he stalks around with a flashlight in his hands. Sam’s goal seems to stay out of everyone’s way while simultaneously keeping his eagle eyes on Dean. Or, at one opportune moment, display his fistful of factoids about who died and when. I loved the moment when he pulls out all this paper, and Ed goes, you did research? Like it’s never occurred to him that that’s what you do ahead of time. I’m not surprised that he’s surprised, however, at the amount of research that Sam has done. There’s an entire research facility right there inside of Sam’s brain. They make reports and charts up there, that’s all they do. Those who encountered him at the Morton House would consider him a serious young man, with no joy to express, and certainly no Sammy smiles to share.
Dean? He’s stalking around that place barking out orders that no one is paying any attention to. Perhaps he’s surprised by the number of people willing to give in to their own personal stupid gene and spend the night in a house that’s known to make people disappear. He’s completely beguiled by the fact that a bunch of idiots could be so stupid as to want to diiiiiiiiiiiiiie. And he hesitates not in letting his feelings on the matter be known. Eye rolls are normally Sam’s area of expertise, but since Sam is being a bit standoffish on account of all the strangers (and BOY are they strange!), Dean’s taken over that task for him.
Of particular and hysterical note are the swear words, bleeped out and helpfully marked for your attention by a little comical skull. That the skulls and the bleeps appear at pretty much regular intervals tell you how much Dean (and Sam) swear when they’re not out to impress or cajole anyone. Dean flipping the bird is, frankly, classic – check out his expression as he stares right into the camera. (It’s very disconcerting to have him stare directly like that.) But it’s like Dean to confront things head on and he does this a lot during this ep. If there’s a camera in his face, he’s going to stare it right in the eye, swear at it, knock it about, put his hand in front of it or whatever. He interacts with it like it’s human. Sam, on the other hand, barely spares the camera a glance for most of the ep. Instead you can see him interacting with the human being who’s behind the camera. (Except for one bit at the end.) This seemed very true to character to me; Dean doesn’t like people all that much and Sam is human-contact-emo-boy. So it fits.
Dean’s face is constantly chiseled by the hard light, his hair is short and bristling (like his temper), and he is not willing to suffer fools gladly. I’m assuming that Ed must be right in that Dean’s chest is chiseled too, but I’m going to have to take his word on that. (Thanks for the visual, though, Ed!) I guess it shouldn’t be so amazing to me that even with the blurry focus and bad lighting, Dean (and Sam) still look HOT.
So the episode was nice. But it would have been nicer, and it would have gone a lot further with me if Show, to paraphrase the YED, had somehow managed to sweeten the pot. Remember the first time Ed and Harry showed up? Yeah, that ep. Then, we got Sam in a towel. The Towel. He’s mostly nekked. It’s a GREAT scene. To be fair, I think Dean should have worn a towel in this ep. He’s got a great body and a nice gleam in his eyes. I think he could have pulled it off VERY well. And it would have given these two companion eps a nice bookend feeling. Plus, to be honest, I just want to see Dean not so covered. That’s a nice, Victorian way of putting it. Not so covered. In the altogether. El buffo. I’m just saying.
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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