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Sam and Dean are in the freight elevator and Dean is in wonder. "Just Dad, you know him and his secrets. Spent all this time with the guy and we barely know the man." Hmm, are you sure you aren't talking about Sam? Sam just wants to see what's there.
They enter the storage area and see devil's traps on the floor and blood. The blood is likely due to the booby trap that someone set off. Well that ruined someone's day. Dean notices from the tracks in the blood it was a two man job.
The brothers enter this dark, dank, incredibly dusty warehouse type area and junk is everywhere. Dean finds something amidst all that clutter and reads "1995." Sam is amazed since that's his Division Championship soccer trophy. He doesn't believe John kept it. "The closest you ever came to being a boy," Dean says. That's kind of sad actually. I would have speculated that Sam made a better basketball player but as we know now he was pretty short in his teens.
Dean finds something else and now he gets to reminisce. "My first sawed off. I made it myself. 6th grade." Aww Dean's joy is so adorable!
Sam moves on to a cage area and goes in. It's still really dark. Seriously, this place doesn't have lights? There's tons of weapons and artillery around, but they're all still there. Wow, they were stupid theives. Sam notices the binding magic symbols on the shelf and realizes they're curse boxes. Dean remembers that John's journal mentioned all sorts of cursed items but never said where they ended up. Of course not. John and his eccentricities! Sam then sees that one's missing. Ruh-ro! Dean decides to be an optimist. "Well maybe they didn't open it."
So naturally we jump to the next scene and hear, "Come on man, let's open it." Let the spiraling out of control plot begin. We are in an apartment with two losers. One has a bleeding shoulder and doesn't give a crap about the box. He's whining about bleeding to death. The other guy, who is called Grossman, won't give up on the box though and is choosing to open it. He theorizes there's something valuable in it and doesn't want to hand it over to "her." They took all the risk. "Wayne" even got shot and all for a lousy few hundred bucks. Somehow, I actually find that to be a sound argument. Especially when I know who "her" is.
Grossman breaks open the lock and opens the box slowly, grinning with hopes of finding bars of gold. Nope, these guys don't have that kind of luck. Yet. The item inside, the biggest and most realistic brown rabbit's foot I've ever seen. It's not some cheesy trinket. Wayne picks it up and is beside himself that he got shot for that. Hee, greedy bastards. Of course the background noises hints that a curse was released.
Knock on the door. Grossman answers. It's a neighbor that heard all the yelling and is a bit upset He comes in and sees Wayne's sorry state. Because good neighbor policy applies to scheming derelicts, "Foster" tells Wayne to fetch a medical kit under his sink and gets some water boiling. He used to be an Army medic in Vietnam. "I guess this is your lucky day." Oh, I see where this is going! Rabbit foot round robin.
Outside of their apartment pulls up the Impala. There's the Pinto! The 1979 Pinto that was time warped to 1973 in "In The Beginning." Remember, I wouldn't stop harping on it in my recap? I've since seen that Pinto is other Vancouver based shows too. It's so nice everyone shares up there. It's the Canadian way, eh? Dean confirms it matches the license plate from the security camera that they parked in front of. Yeah, Wayne and Grossman don't seem like rocket scientists.
Oh boy, here we go, one of the most entertaining scenes ever in this series. I mean the stunt choreography alone is brilliant! Back inside the apartment, the two losers are playing cards and Wayne can't lose. He keeps getting royal flushes. Okay, that makes only one of them is a loser. He makes the connection, the rabbit's foot is doing something. That "stuck up bitch" is never getting it. That's a pretty accurate description.
Sam and Dean are in the hall with guns drawn and man this is a big apartment for two clueless shady characters driving a Pinto to have. They eventually reach the living room and barge in with the edgy act going. Dean asks for the box and "Please tell me you didn't..." "Oh they did," finishes Sam. Dean gets all pissed and slams Wayne against the wall.
Wayne wants to know if they're cops. Um, maybe? No, Dean doesn't answer, repeating his question about what's in the box. He turns to the coffee table Wayne is looking at and the rabbit's foot is there. Dean stays all tough guy, asking if that's it and then it all hits him. "What is that thing?"
Wayne wants to know if they're cops. Um, maybe? No, Dean doesn't answer, repeating his question about what's in the box. He turns to the coffee table Wayne is looking at and the rabbit's foot is there. Dean stays all tough guy, asking if that's it and then it all hits him. "What is that thing?"
Wayne takes advantage of Dean's distraction and knocks the gun out of his hand. The gun hits the floor, goes off, hits the radiator and richochets to Sam's gun, knocking in out of his hand. The bullet hits the coffee table next and takes out the lamp near Dean. Sam and Grossman see Sam's gun on the floor and go after it, but Grossman pushes Sam away and he runs smack into Dean. We already know which brother is built like a tank, so naturally Dean goes flying onto the coffee table from the impact, crushing it solid. Sam gives him a sincere "Sorry" but a split second later is tackled by Grossman. Wow, that's a really impressive take down. The sound from landing on the floor is thunderous. I'm surprised they didn't crash through the floor.
The airborne rabbit's foot from Dean's impact with the table falls to the floor and Grossman wastes no time in taking advantage of his position on top of Sam to beat him soundly. Wayne grabs Dean's gun and points it forward, accidently taking out an unstable Dean who was getting up from the floor in the process. Back to an equally unlucky Sam, who's getting choked on the floor by Grossman now. After all, you can't have an attack on Sam Winchester without a choking! Oh, but a desperate Sam sees something to will help him. He reaches out and frantically goes for, the rabbit's foot? Seriously, that's going to fend off a choking attacker? Maybe Sam knew something we didn't!
Comments
Hindsight aside, I could have tolerated Bela and didn't mind her in the episode up until she shot Sam and then managed to snake the lottery tickets (even if it did give that great "son-of-a-bitch !" moment). I wouldn't have minded her in a few episodes trying to outsmart them, with a few witty exchanges back and forth. The thing that killed me about Bela was that she ALWAYS beat them (except that last time) and while Sam and Dean are many things, easy marks they aren't! (rant over)
Thanks Alice, this was a fun read!
This episode has some of the best faces on our heroes, bitch face here, surprise face here, I-lost-my-shoe face here, I'm-Batman face there.... I love, love, love it. And the dialogue is some of the best ever. And those little hints (like the stickers on Kubrick's bus - 'DOn't make me come down there - GOd' 'How Would Jesus Drive?', brilliant exposing of the religious fanatic)...
I know you can't abide Bella, but I learned to appreciate her role in the show and the kind of woman she became. But you know that ;-)...
Thanks again, Alice, for this fabulous recap! :D, Jas
I too came to the show in season 3, so never could understand why so many disliked it. I became a fan after watching Supernatural Christmas, bought the dvds and completely fell for Dean and Sam and haven't recovered since.
I never hated the actress who played Bela. I thought she did a great job being completely annoying. Hated Bela always one-upping our boys though and shooting Sam was inexcusable. So sorry poor Dean lost his windfall. That would have saved a lot of his time hustling for motel and food money.
for the record i actually liked Bella in this episode and if she had stayed a one episode character i would have continued to like her, in the end she just ended up irratating me which i think was probabyl more the fault of the writers than the actress. on a really pedantic note her accent really annoyed me, no one english actually sounds like that ... seriously!
anyway minor rant over with! again loved the recap! x
But good recap. Love this episode.
Alas, poor Kubrick, Jesus knew him well.
Once again loved the recap.
This is one my favourite episodes, definitely in the top 10.
I have to admit I didn’t even mind Bela. (runs for cover):o
I wanted to punch her out when she shot Sam of course, but I still enjoyed the banter between her and Dean.
Randal…I’m sensing you may have had a thing for Casey??? 8-)