Lower Decks

The following review contains spoilers for Supernatural through the current episode, “Sex and Violence,” originally broadcast February 5th, 2009.

For an episode involving exotic dancers, a hot doctor and a twist I didn’t see coming, “Sex and Violence” was ultimately a disappointment due to a trite ending. Up until the final few minutes it was actually great episode with an intriguing Monster of the Week. I was even able to forget that it had almost nothing to do with the 66 Seals. There was a minor subplot involving Dean’s suspicions of Sam but it never went anywhere.

The Brothers Winchester investigate a spate of wife killings by seemingly normal men. They trace each of the killings back to a strip club and ultimately a siren. While Bobby works to come up with a way to kill the siren it’s up to Sam and Dean to actually find the siren. They’re once again impersonating FBI agents (this time as Murdock and Stiles, characters from <em>Route 66). Dean is delighted to finally have a case involving strippers. But the strip club isn’t much help. How are they supposed to find the siren if it can “cloak” itself to match anyone’s ideal? Good question.

The two have a close call when they run into Nick Monroe, actual FBI agent working the case. Luckily they’ve anticipated this very problem and have Bobby ready to pretend to be their boss. Dean and Agent Monroe head back to the strip club while Sam tries to get his hands on blood samples from killers. He talks with Dr. Cara Roberts, who they met earlier, and discovers that the blood samples have been stolen. He then has a drink with Cara and eventually the two have sex.

Dean, thinking that Cara might be the siren, decides to try to handle things on his own with the help of Agent Monroe, who shares his love of Impalas and music. But Agent Monroe is the real siren and has taken on the role of Dean’s ideal friend. He wants Dean to kill Sam so the two can be brothers forever. And Sam is quickly overpowered by Dean, who has a knife, but then the siren manages to place Sam under its control and has them fight. They berate one another, with Dean attacking Sam about sleeping with Ruby and Sam calling Dean too weak to confront Lilith.

Just when it looks like Dean is going to kill his brother with an ax, Bobby shows up and stops him. He stabs Dean and then throws the knife at the siren, killing it. Bobby can’t believe Sam and Dean were taken in by the siren. It only took him one phone call to figure out that Nick Monroe wasn’t a real FBI agent. The brothers apologize for what they said to one another and insist they’re fine. But they aren’t. They can’t be.

Bobby’s sudden appearance at the end of the episode where he saved the day at the last minute was woefully uninspired and frankly, beneath Supernatural. On the other hand, it would have been a bit unbelievable to have Sam and/or Dean manage to fight off the siren’s “call” long enough to kill it. So I’m not sure how else it could have ended. I think my main problem was that Bobby happened to show up just in the nick of time. If, somehow, Dean and Bobby had a backup plan ready just in case.

I’m hopeful that Sam and Dean don’t simply ignore what happened in this episode. Given everything that has happened this season, their relationship has been strained, what with the lies and the secrets. If the two do have a falling out, and a big one, how will it affect the fight to stop Lilith from unleashing Lucifer? Not that Sam and Dean have done all that much lately to stop Lilith, aside from Sam going off with Ruby doing whatever they’re doing.