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Edvard's Supernatural Rewatch & Review: 1x17 Hell House

This episode is the closest series 1 gets to a comedic episode, but it stops way short of ones such as 4x04 Monster Movie or 5x08 Changing Channels. Far from being a bad episode, it is still long from being one of my favourites. Based on its score of 8.2/10 from 5,400 ratings on IMDb, it seems to be regarded as a good episode, but not brilliant. It raises some interesting questions about the nature of monsters and the supernatural in general in the show, but like 1x16 Shadow it does not quite grab my interest.

One of the problems with the traditional monster of the week (MOTW) format is the inconsistency in narrative flow and structure. In episode 1x16 Shadow, Dean and Sam finally had the long-awaited reunion with John, which almost ended in disaster for the boys (although I have little pity or sympathy for John). To keep John safe, Dean agreed they should remain separated to prevent demons exploiting the brothers to get to John.

This episode had no mention of Meg and only a passing mention of John, and so feels disconnected from the preceding and following episodes. For the most part, 1x17 Hell House could have happened almost anywhere in these first 22 episodes without changing the narrative. The result of this on my viewing experience is that none of the suspense or narrative momentum built up in 1x16 Shadow carries over to this episode, and is thereby lost. If something is to happen at the end of this narrative arc that builds on that momentum, it will fall flat unless something happens first to rebuild the suspense and drive.

Dean and Sam taking action to protect themselves against daevas (the shadow demons from 1x16 Shadow) would have helped prevent that problem because Sam cannot always make a Herculean leap of logic and deus ex them with a flare. Ed and Harry could have caught the brothers on camera and posted it onto the internet, causing the brothers to demand/themselves remove the footage to keep their location hidden (remember the Dean-is-wanted-by-the-police subplot? The Show clearly does not). They could have guessed Meg survived her re-enactment of the Defenestration of Prague based on the daevas still attacking John, and taken precautions to ward themselves. This could have all happened without taking any time away from the tulpa plot.

Having said that, the characters’ behaviour in this episode shows some development that could not have occurred before. Dean and Sam’s pranks on each other are puerile, and occasionally border on assault (super-gluing somebody’s hand to something means skin will have to be torn off) but show an easing of the tension building between them since the pilot. Sam did very little to irk me in this episode, and it made a change to see him not acting like Dean was an embarrassment and a burden.

That said, I did not care all that much about the pranks, but Sam’s anger at Dean was way over the top. It was not irritation, but suppressed rage at having a spoon in his mouth while he slept and then getting woken up by Blue Öyster Cult’s Fire of Unknown Origin (which Dean sang along to in-tune. Clearly he fakes his bad singing later in the series…)

Dean lets us know that he once put hair-removal cream in Sam’s shampoo which is indeed a douche move (What’s that, me criticising Dean? Yep, it happens on occasion, and it will happen again in this episode), but Dean’s pranks in this episode are tame. I have had the unpleasant experience of spending a whole school day with itching powder in my clothes. It felt like fibreglass and my neck and back were raw red afterwards, so I am not well disposed to itching powder, but a bullied child being bullied by bullies is not the same as a brother’s fiendish jape. Shop-bought itching powder is likely made from dried roses or similar harmless botanical matter: throwing your clothes into the wash and having a quick shower will solve that problem in a jiffy, annoying as it may be. Irritating yet harmless.

But do you remember the superglue I mentioned earlier? Itching powder was a douche move, but Sam getting Dean’s hand superglued to a bottle of beer is double-douche with a side of c*nt. Dean’s prank was highly unlikely to do any damage, but superglue is a whole different matter. That was unprovoked escalation. I am probably supposed to see this as humour, but whatever, Show. Get some better jokes.

It also left me wondering how and when? Did Sam do it when Dean went to the toilet? Was Dean in the toilets for an hour again?

What I did take away from it was that Dean was trying to have fun with Sam. He knew Sam would prank him back, and was likely inviting it. It was really quite sweet of him.

Onwards to the actual episode. The cold open is reminiscent of several others in the showas it involves stupid teenagers going into a place they should not be going into or doing something they should not be doing which involves ghosts or monsters. This is far from original or interesting, as teenagers being stupid is the basis of umpteen horror films, but what is interesting about it is the introduction of the unreliable and shifting nature of urban legends (and legends in general). ‘My cousin heard it from X’ is just vague enough that it could possibly be true and not completely made up, but at the same time it is difficult to believe. This way, the story teeters on the borders of being realistic, as the best tall tales do.

The mutable nature of such stories is also demonstrated soon after the title card as Dean and Sam canvas the youths to find out what happened. The details of what they saw in Mordechai’s basement are different, with descriptions of the hanged girl ranging from red-haired to brunette, to stone cold dead to still twitching etc. This is precisely how stories like this change with retelling: exact details vary, but general details remain largely the same, until eventually they too change.

An example which comes to mind is that of Ganymede from Greek mythology. The generalities remain the same: he was a beautiful (blond) Illian/Trojan youth in what is now western Turkey. Zeus saw him one day, and was so enamoured of his youthful beauty that he sent an eagle to sweep him up to Mount Olympus to become his immortal cupbearer and eventually his lover. At least, that is the version I prefer, for other versions exist where it is Zeus himself who transforms into an eagle, swoops down on Ganymede, then proceeds to rape him before kidnapping him to Mount Olympus to become the gods’ servant and Zeus’s catamite.

The general details there remain the same: the most beautiful of mortals captivates the Father of the Gods, and is taken to Mount Olympus to become cupbearer for Zeus. The details themselves change, but the general narrative remains the same. The version involving no rape and a loving relationship is my version of choice, and one detail which I find especially beautiful is that Hera could not stand her husband’s male lover being prettier than her and grew jealous and resentful. As a result, Zeus set Ganymede in the sky as the constellation of Aquarius, the Cupbearer, where his beauty would always be unmarred until the end of time.

‘Gay love pierces through the veil of death’ eat your heart out.

Speaking of beautiful mortals, Dean once again shows his scepticism by being dismissive of Sam’s ‘case’. The kids reported seeing a hanged body, but there were no traces of any body in the basement. Sam also found the case on a website of dubious repute. Dean might believe a lot of things, but he is not gullible.

He agrees to check the case out, however, after Sam’s strange bit of whining about needing a case after they ‘let dad take off’. Sam, my buddy, my man, my guy: I was there last episode, I saw what happened. John had to leave in order to keep you and Dean safe. You – which judging by your whiny tone means ‘Dean’ in this instance – did not let Dad take off. John told you he was leaving, and you two agreed to it. I will let you off for this one, though, because this is the only episode of the show Trey Calloway wrote and he probably was not paying all that much attention.

This being Trey Calloway’s only writing credit on the show could also be the explanation for why the Dean-is-a-wanted-murderer plot is forgotten. Dean actually goes into the police station to find out whether there are any missing people who fit the description of the hanged girl when he knows he is in serious trouble with the law (because, if you remember, the rich girl in 1x06 Skin let him take the fall, and Sam laughed at him for it). The only way I can think of to explain this within the story is that the police in the Superverse (see, told you I would be calling it that) do not communicate much at all with police in other states, and do not co-ordinate their efforts to catch wanted killers.

I must stop here a second and draw the reader’s attention to Dean’s made-up word ‘persqueeter’: ‘Yeah, most of those websites wouldn’t know a ghost if it bit ‘em in the persqueeter.’ This is a word Trey Calloway made up, and dictionaries refer to this episode of the show when defining it. So, naturally, I am going to steal it and make it part of my lexicon. Try stopping me.

There were no missing persons who matched the girl’s description, and Dean concludes that the story was made up, and that something else is happening. He concludes Ed and Harry concocted it, which is a reasonable conclusion to draw given the evidence, but it does go beyond the evidence.

Ed and Harry’s introduction – which I realise I have skipped over – was amusing, and set up their characters quite well. They are utterly arrogant, smug, and dangerously ignorant. The supernatural is a game to them, but it is a game they do not understand the rules of. Paula R. Stiles was quite right to state that this case could well have been Ed and Harry’s last if Dean and Sam had not chanced upon them. Not only are they utterly clueless, but they were also stoned on the job and unaware that the power lines (to an abandoned house? O.K., show) were giving off enough electromagnetism to interfere with the EMF readers.

Given the fact that they reference Buffy later in the episode (“WWBD? What would Buffy do?” “I don’t know, she’s so much stronger than I am.”) I think it is safe to say the writers and producers were very much aware of Warren, Jonathan and Tucker’s brother in Buffy.These three characters embody the worst stereotypes of socially inept, geeky young men who end up involved with forces way beyond their skills with lethal consequences.

What I find interesting is that in spite of their differences, Dean has more than a little bit in common with men like Ed and Harry. Dean also loves cult films, old cartoons and ‘nerdy’ television shows, but he has had to force that side of him into dormancy because he is not in an environment which tolerates those aspects of himself. Episodes such as 13x17 Scoobynatural or14x04 Mint Condition show this part of Dean very clearly. 14x04 in particular displays how easily Dean gets on with a man who is clearly both a huge nerd and some kind of neurodivergent (autistic, perhaps). The Dean we see at first is not ‘fake’, but it is not the whole of him: he does like classic rock and cars, but he also likes cartoons, bad horror films, and nerdy memorabilia, though he does sneer at Ed and Harry for displaying this so openly and letting themselves be defined by it. Case in point: ‘oh look, action figures in their original packaging’.

I said earlier that I would criticise Dean again in this episode, and here it is: as annoying and arrogant as Ed and Harry are, they are very probably some kind of neurodivergent. This is my reading of the show, and the fact that they are on the margins of society and young men who clearly cannot mask to fit in with ‘normal’ society is evidence enough for me to suspect autism or ADHD. Mocking them for being irritating is one thing, but mocking autistic men for having ‘action figures in the original packaging’?

I have about sixty Funko Pops altogether (about ten of which are different versions of Dean), a few dozen Pokémon (from all generations, thank you very much), a handful of Digimon, a few monsters from Monster Hunter, and 009 gauge models of Skarloey and Rheneas from Thomas the Tank Engine. I am very aware that is risible to some people. I understand that to them it gives the impression of a stunted adult, a person who never grew up, or somebody with a Peter Pan complex who deserves to be made fun of.

I work an adult job, do all my own invoicing, pay my taxes, file my complicated tax returns, pay national insurance and my rent. I do all my own cooking, shopping, and cleaning. I speak and understand more languages than the majority of native English speakers, and I even teach Finnish in Swedish. I provide a vital service for people hoping to integrate into Finnish society, so if I want to have my electric trains and various models of my dearest beloved blorbo Dean, I bloody well will.

Anyway Dean, my heart, my love, my life: do shut up.

To be fair to him, he was probably mocking them on purpose because they were annoying, but jokes like that come across as neurotypical writers mocking neurodivergent people for being neurodivergent.

The first episode of Supernatural I watched was 3x13 Ghostfacers, the second episode with Ed and Harry in it. It is a shame they were not in the show more than the handful of episodes they got.

Before moving on from the Hell Hounds for a moment, Jensen Ackles and Travis Wester (Harry) appeared together almost a decade before this episode on the short-lived comedy series Mr Rhodes (1996-97), appearing in almost all the same episodes.

Returning to the hell house in question, it is time to discuss the tulpa a little. The word and the symbol may well be from Tibet, but we are not told where the tulpa itself comes from. This is irrelevant to story, however, as the point is that the tulpa comes from who ever believes in it. The monks Sam talks about focused on the symbol and brought a golem to life, but it is never stated that the symbol itself is necessary for summoning a tulpa. It could function simply as an amplifier.

For those who might have forgotten, the tulpa is a monster brought to life by people believing in it. The reason the teenagers’ accounts did not match each other’s, and the reason Mordechai’s mode of operation and even his appearance changed throughout the show is because each person saw what they believed they would see.

This leaves the viewer with the question: how much of the stuff Dean and Sam have encountered and will encounter exists because of stories and legends people have told? We have already seen something similar with the Scandiwegian god in 1x11 Scarecrow, an idea taken straight from Neil Gaiman’s American Gods where gods only exist because people believe in them. There are even different versions of the same god in that world, because people in different places and times believe in slightly different versions of their gods. Is the human imagination in the Superverse enough to bring all of these creatures into existence given enough time, people, and enough stories?

It is an interesting thought, but the show’s answer ultimately seems to be that most of the monsters exist apart from human imagination. In spite of its Christian/Abrahamic veneer, the mythology of the show – angels, demons, the dualism of God and the Darkness – is very Zoroastrian with touches of cosmic horror. The fact remains that monsters in this world stem mostly from God, Eve, and the Devil.

While on the subject of symbols, one of the first things I noticed was that the symbols of the walls and floor were all mismatched. Some were squarish whilst others looked like cursive letters, such as the tulpa symbols. That alone suggested to me that something fishy was going on, so I was a little surprised neither Dean nor Sam – Dean especially – picked up on that instantly. Sure Sam noticed the sulphur symbol which first appeared in the 1960s, but the fact that there were fresh candles on the mantelpiece should have tipped them off to the fact that somebody had recently been there doing stuff they should not have been doing.

Apropos Sam recognising the sulphur sign from the 1960s, it amused me when Dean said ‘That’s why you never get laid’. Dean, my heart, my love, my life, you recognised the Evanescence logo in blood splatters at the beginning of the previous episode. Stones, glass houses… Although thinking of the previous episode, Sam wasted no time in trying to make Dean feel like an idiot, so have at him, Dean: mock Sam’s lack of sexual allure.

That is most of the important topics for this episode. Some small observations I had were that the girl who actually got hanged and killed in the basement died very fast, or at least she was unconscious exceedingly quick. It is possible to hang a person in such a way that the rope cuts off blood supply to the brain, inducing unconsciousness within ten to fifteen seconds and causing the body to die within about four minutes, but she was out in much less than ten seconds. I am glad I did not have to watch somebody slowly choking to death because Heaven knows that is a trauma I do not need to revisit while watching my stories, but it stretched my suspension of disbelief.

Something else I found strange was Sam setting Dean’s car radio to mariachi music. When exactly did he do that? Did Dean leave the car unlocked when he went into the police station? Unlikely. So when did Sam have the opportunity to mess with the dials? The logistics do not make sense to me.

One last thing before I finish is a comment on General American English pronunciation. A development in both American and Canadian English is the pronunciation of t between vowels as d. Huge areas of North America have also shifted original o to æ or a (Standard British ’God’ vs General American ’Gaad’), and the vowel sound in words like ’caught’ has changed from o: like in ’horse’ to a: like in standard British English ’car’. This is possibly due to the influence of Irish English in America, but that is besides the point.

Americans have that one joke where they imitate Dick van Dyke’s attempt at a dead accent – ‘bo’ul o wo’a’ or ‘Bri’ish’ – and think they are hilarious, but they seem completely unaware that a) the glottal stop is all over their accents and b) ‘badul a waadurr’ and ’Briddish’ are just as innovative and divergent from the written norm as dead Cockney accents or the Multicultural London English they seem to think represents how 65 million people speak.

Anyway, the point of that was so that you can understand why I never understood what Dean meant when he said ’rod iron bullets’. What is rod iron, and how is it different than normal iron? Does it have to come from a rod, and why? I am confused.

Then I had a brainwave and realised he was saying ’wrought iron’. The ou has become an a: sound which my brain interpreted as o, and the t at the end is between two vowels, that being the ou and the i, i.e. ’wraad iron’. I am still not entirely sure why the bullets need to be made of wrought iron rather than any other kind of iron is beyond me, but at least it makes a little bit more sense now.

Interestingly, he pronounces his au sounds differently. His wrought has an a: in it where Standard British English would have an o: (like the sound in ’door’, ’law’, and ’more’), but his pronunciation of haunt is almost exactly the same as it would be in British English (and Australian and New Zealand English) with the same o: sound. I wonder whether the presence of n influences the pronunciation of the preceding vowel, but that really is more linguistics than I expect the majority of people reading this can stomach.

After some very sharp thinking from Dean, the hell house burns down with the tulpa inside: if there is no house, Dean reasoned, there can be no house to haunt. The house is essentially the tulpa, not Mordechai. It is the Overlook Hotel in this story, and as in The Shining (book, not film), the house burns down and that is the end. Well done, Dean.

A relatively short review this time, padded out somewhat with a tiny bit of Greek mythology and linguistics because I simply did not have much to say. This was a light episode with not much going on and not much to talk about. Not bad, but not great either. The next episode, however, will be quite a bit different, as we get given our first real glimpse at exactly what Dean and Sam – Dean especially – had to endure with John as their father, and the show presents one hell of a metaphor for the soul-sucking, child-killing figure of John Winchester. I am sure I will have much more to say on that.

#edvard's supernatural rewatch #spn rewatch #supernatural #spn meta #spn #spn 1x17 #1x17 hell house #ghostfacers #dean winchester #sam winchester

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