Supernatural, “Halt & Catch Fire,” was written by the team of Eric Charmelo and Nicole Snyder and was directed by John F Showalter. Charmelo and Snyder have written some of my least favorite episodes but deliver a solid enough effort here. It continues the trend of taking the brothers – and the show – back to their roots. For me, there were a lot of moments that felt like throwbacks to seasons one and two of the show. While that’s not necessarily a bad thing, it does feel a little ho-hum. Shows need to grow and develop – just like people. However, there are also a few things that do make for nice touchstones showing how things have changed.
The title of the episode, “Halt & Catch Fire” is clearly a reference to the AMC series of the same name. The series is about the personal computer revolution of the 1980s. The central horror of the episode is how computers have really taken over every aspect of our lives. Showalter does a good job in having people on their phones or tablets or computers or all three, in every scene. Even the one guy, clearly coming out of the shower is on his phone!
The central event – the Sigma Theta Delta kids killing Andrew (Jeremy Thorsen) – is a PSA for texting and driving. Hozier’s “Take Me to Church” is the perfect song to be playing in the background in this scene. In the AMC show, HCF refers to a machine code instruction that causes the computer’s central processing unit to stop working. Do all of our devices make something within us stop working? Have we put the machine before people? The episode touches up against some interesting questions, though they aren’t really fully developed.
In the “THEN” montage there’s a clip from season one or two of Dean (Jensen Ackles) and Sam (Jared Padalecki) interviewing a twenty-something woman. She scoffs at them in their jeans and layers and asks, “What are you, cops?” In the Pilot, one of the cops says they look to young to be US Marshalls – their cover. Now, however, no one questions whether they are FBI agents and they really look the part, despite the Cobain and Grohl (Nirvana!) covers. Hey! Does that make them a cover band?
The opening teaser really felt like the date in “Hookman” or even the beginning of the “Pilot” and that bridge really reminded me of the bridge from the “Pilot.” My favorite moment from the scene in this episode had to be Trini’s directions: “Destination dead ahead.” The blond being strangled by the power cord also looked an awful lot like the scene in “Home” when Sam is strangled by a power cord.
We get a glimpse inside of college life in season one’s “Hookman.” Throughout the episode, Dean is thrilled to oogle the co-eds. It’s no secret that Dean Winchester is a love and leave ‘em, one night stand, hang out in strip clubs (“Sex and Violence, “ “Heartache,” “The Song Remains the Same”) kind of guy. Hasn’t this always been one of his endearing qualities? Yet, now that he’s 35, it’s rather creepy that he’s staring at these young girls – or at least that seems to be the backlash on social media. It’s clear that the young women aren’t paying him any attention and his admiration doesn’t go beyond his eyes almost falling out of his head or almost giving himself whiplash looking around. There aren’t really any overt comments other than “They’re everywhere.” I’m not that bothered by Dean’s admiration for pretty women. What did bother me about the episode in this regard was the overall depiction by the show itself. We have close ups on one woman’s breasts and another’s behind. It’s classic objectification. Worse than that even is that all these women seem to talk about is being drunk. Julie (Debs Howard) is apparently having sex with TAs in order to get good marks because clearly, why would she study or use her brains to do so? The fraternity is STD – sigma theta delta – or as Dean and Sam clearly think, and the woman sexting the one frat boy – sexually transmitted disease. Do better show. Too many of your viewers are women to stand for this. It only makes it worse that one of the writers is a woman.
The dialogue in this episode was not as clever as last week’s, but there is more evidence of how the relationship between the brothers has changed. When they first get to campus, Dean remarks that he should never have made Sam leave college. Again, in the past, this might have been a sore spot, but Sam just laughs. Dean makes fun of Sam for ordering a café au lait – I half expected him to call him Scully…
Dean’s plan to control the mark by altering his behavior is completely abandoned. Faced with plentiful, cheap, disgusting food, Dean is an eating machine – “College is better than Vegas!” In the opening scene, Dean is enjoying a “crosookie.” They’re actually called a
“crookie” and were invented in Toronto. Sam is excited to tell Dean that Cas (Misha Collins) is closing in on Cain. Dean isn’t interested, and points out that if Cain could remove the Mark, he likely would have removed his own a long time ago. It’s interesting that we consistently see that it’s Sam that is in contact with Cas and never Dean. Instead, Dean has found them a hunt.
Once again, I found these writers went out of their way to show how dumb Dean is. Janet (Maddie Phillips) and Sam roll their eyes at Dean not knowing what Trini is – “it’s a talking map.” And Sam tells her Dean’s just learned how to poke on Facebook. Now, given Jensen Ackles utter reluctance to join any social media and the fact that he just got Twitter and Facebook accounts recently, that scene is pretty hilarious. What annoyed me more is in going through Julie’s Internet history, Sam tells Dean that nothing is ever really gone from the Internet. Again, there is a funny moment when Dean looks utterly gob-smacked and guilty (and yes, I DO want a gif of that moment), but are we totally forgetting everything they learned from Frank Devereaux? Remember when Dean could show Sam a thing or two about hacking into surveillance cameras?
The brothers both conclude that they are dealing with a vengeful spirit pretty quickly. The first murder leads them to believe that the ghost is Billy’s (Madison Smith) brother Joey who is tied to his truck. I did like the explanation that Dean gives to same of honoring the deceased by driving their truck – or vehicle – after their death. Because, of course, that’s exactly why Dean is so attached to the Impala. A nice touch for the truck plates to be Semperfi, reflecting John also being a marine. Of course, they both forget that Sam drove the Impala while Dean was dead as well.
The episode follows the pretty stock formula of a monster of the week episode with them finally realizing who the vengeful spirit is. Dean is left to look after the last potential victim, Delilah (Ali Milner) while Sam goes to figure out how the Andrew is getting around – wifi – and talk to the widow – Corey (Barbara Kottmeier – who was also in “Wishful Thinking”).
Dean asks Delilah if she’s tired, and she says she’s used to it because she’s been staying up all night studying to avoid the nightmares. Dean says he can relate, and we’ve seen the evidence last week when he stayed in his room researching. After Dean tells her that he’s made mistakes that haunt him too, she asks how he deals with it. His answer is telling: “Whiskey. Denial. I do my best to make things right. Whatever that may be. For you, maybe it’s coming clean. You know, finding a way to ask forgiveness but not breaking the bank at your local florist. I mean real forgiveness. You can’t just bury stuff like this. You gotta deal with it.” Given how many times Sam has said the same to Dean about dealing with things, I think he might be pulling his hair out in frustration if he heard this conversation! But clearly, Dean has been paying attention to his brother.
Once Sam discovers that Andrew is travelling through wifi, Dean wants to kill the Internet – again, I really need a gif of his face when he asks if they really could – and again, it’s a funny send up of Ackles reluctance to join the social media age. Escaping to the basement works until they realize that someone has left a cellphone there. I did like the portable salt containers Dean and Sam had brought with them and the explanation for why the salt didn’t work. Dean is able to 911 Sam with the phone and then they are able to use the phone to have Corey talk to Andrew.
There’s a nice parallel between Sam and Corey and Andrew and Dean. Corey was just happy to have her husband back, but she did notice him slowly changing and fixating on revenge. She realizes it’s time to let him go. Dean tries to get Andrew to realize what he’s become and to let go before it’s too late – a technique we first saw in “Roadkill.” Dean tells Andrew, “You have every right to be pissed, but take it from me, the3 more you kill, the crazier you’ll get. The blood fuels the rage. It looks like to me, you got two choices. Keep killing, and become something that you won’t recognize or you can move on, cuz that is the only thing that is gonna give you peace. Peace or pain?” Now this echoes what Tessa tells Dean in “In My Time of Dying,” but there’s also a direct parallel to the Mark being fueled by killing. It’s very much a role reversal from what we saw in season two with Dean watching as Sam struggled with going darkside.
In the final scene, the brothers take Delilah to make her peace with Corey. Then we have a classic brother moment in the Impala. Both Ackles and Padalecki are fantastic in this scene. Dean tells Sam that he’s going to choose peace too: “My peace is helping people, working cases. That’s all I want to do.” It brings us squarely back to the family business. There was also a shot in the “THEN” montage of John choosing peace and moving on after helping Dean kill Azazel. Even John, fuelled by revenge for 23 years after his wife’s death, finally opted for peace.
Dean also drops a bit of a bombshell on Sam when he tells him that he’s done looking for a cure for the Mark. This is a nice parallel to season three when Sam was determined to save Dean from going to Hell. Sam urges him to keep hoping, but Dean tells him, “We don’t even know if there is a cure” and they’ve looked pretty hard. Sam starts to get mad when he feels that Dean is simply giving up. Dean takes his own advice and opens up to his brother, seeking understanding for his decision if not forgiveness.
Dean tells Sam, “No. I’m not just gonna give up. I appreciate the effort, okay, I do, but the answer is not out there. It’s with me. I need to be the one calling the shots here, okay? I can’t keep waking up every morning with this false hope. I gotta know where I stand. Otherwise, I’m gonna lose my friggin’ mind. So, I’m gonna fight it til I can’t fight it anymore. And when all’s said and done, I’ll go down swingin’.” Dean has gone back to basics. It’s also what he wanted to do after John died and when he got back from Hell – he just wanted to hunt. It’s where he finds purpose and worth in himself. Dean has to look for the answer within himself which is why trying to be something he’s not wasn’t working and wouldn’t ultimately be sustainable. It also goes back to what Crowley said about the Mark really just drawing on what was inside Dean anyway.
Sam listens quietly and he’s clearly concerned when Dean finishes speaking, but he doesn’t say anything. He just gives quiet support. It’s unlikely, however, that Sam is going to give up. It’s in his nature to save his brother – he did it in this episode when he got Casey on the phone to convince Andrew to move on.
There were also lots of things to remind us that this is supposed to be a horror show. The special effects on Andrew were quite good as was his transition to peace. There were also lots of great references to classic horror. I loved that while Janet tags Dean as Gen-X, she doesn’t know who
Christine is (classic Stephen King book and movie about a possessed car). There’s also a reference to
Ghostbusters,
Shocker (1989 Wes Craven film), and
The Lawnmower Man. I’m not sure why they had to bring back ectoplasm – which was laughably introduced back in season two’s “No Exit.” The EMF would have alerted them that the truck was haunted anyway.
While there were elements in this episode that irked me, I think it did build on some of the history of the show, and show that the brothers have evolved at least a little. Dean is talking and Sam is listening. I’ve seen some comments that people didn’t love this episode. There’s been a large contingent of fans clamoring for a return to the formula of seasons one and two, and this episode definitely fits that bill, but it also shows why the show – and the brothers – can’t really go back. At least not on a permanent basis. What did you think of the episode? Do you think Dean is right to simply look within himself for the strength to resist the Mark? Do you think there’s any way that Sam won’t keep researching and looking for a cure? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below.
About the Author - Lisa Macklem
I do interviews and write articles for the site in addition to reviewing a number of shows, including Supernatural, Arrow, Agents of Shield, The Walking Dead, Game of Thrones, Forever, Defiance, Bitten, Glee, and a few others! Highlights of this past year include covering San Diego Comic Con as press and a set visit to Bitten. When I'm not writing about television shows, I'm often writing about entertainment and media law in my capacity as a legal scholar. I also work in theatre when the opportunity arises. I'm an avid runner and rider, currently training in dressage.
