Let me start this recap piece with a single declaration – this show is gonna rock!  In the pre-coverage article written earlier, I made a bold prediction that “The Winchesters will turn out, like the mothership that launched her, to be more successful and eminently more tenacious than she looks to be at first glance.”

I will admit that there was a hint of doubt.  I worried that she might not live up to the hype.  It’s early days I realize, but so far, I stand by my prediction.  The pilot shined.  She left us all wanting more!  [Sideways glance] That’s my girl!

We’ve all seen new shows before.  Often, even if the writing is good, there is an air of clumsiness.  You can tell that all the cogs, wheels and pulleys are not yet in sync to propel the machine forward.  The on-screen relationships are fragmented and performances wooden.  Small details are overlooked that unhinge the audience from their enthusiasm to watch.

None of that happened here.  Every detail was lovingly given its due attention.  The location and sets were so good I could write an article on that alone.  The story was engaging, exciting, peppered with good humour and well-grounded.  The performances were fluid, connected, oozing with a chemistry that promises to take us places we long to go.  These young actors are a cohesive group.  They pop.  They are vibing.  It all just worked!  I looked at my husband when the show was over, and said… “oh, this is gonna be good!” and he agreed.  Which is high praise indeed.  If it doesn’t contain a ball, a bat, a net, or puck, he isn’t usually interested.

EPISODE RECAP

The CW-Samuel Campbell

Episode opens in New Orleans, March 1972, and we see a hunter (Samuel Campbell) entering a mausoleum.  Inside he approaches a circular concrete tomb.  He lights a torch, cuts his hand and with the blood, writes a rune looking symbol into a plate that sits beside the lid.  The lid pops open, and we see from the shadow cast on the wall that a huge spider like creature appears.  Samuel runs.  Back outside, he trips, goes down and the creature descends on him.

In the next scene, a bus passes by the “Welcome to Lawrence” sign.  The passenger on the bus, John Winchester, dozes off and begins to have a disturbing dream of his time in Vietnam and abruptly awakes.  He is obviously shaken.  He takes a piece of paper out of his shirt pocket, and it says “John Winchester” on the envelope.

We hear the voice of Dean Winchester as he narrates the following: “March 23, 1972, the day dad came home from the war, and the day he met mom.  Now I know this story might sound familiar but I’m going to put the pieces together in a way that just might surprise you and in order to do that, I have to start all the way at the beginning.”

The CW-John Winchester and Mary Campbell

John and Mary both run into each other outside a theatre.  She gives him her licorice drops.  They exchange some friendly chit-chat and go their separate ways after she calls him “Soldier Boy.”

Next John goes home and shares a tearful hug with his mom.  Their conversation reveals that John forged his dad’s signature on a waiver that allowed him to enter into the Marines before his 18^th birthday and he has been gone for two years.  His mom operates an auto garage, following in her own father’s footsteps.  John, is in a constant search to reconnect with his father.  It is what led him to go into the Marines in the first place and his mom urges him to let the past go.

In the next scene, we see John being confronted by a demon who wants the key in his hand.  Once the demon puts John in a choke-hold, Mary shows up and some hand-to-hand combat ensues.  It gets comical when John attempts to help and instead gets in the way.  The demon ends up in a wading pool of holy water but before he “smokes out” Mary asks him about her dad.  This is the first we hear about Maggie, who is apparently burning in hell.

Mary wants to know why John is there and John says that when he got back from Vietnam, a man he didn’t know gave him a letter from his father, which signified that his father was dead.  If he wanted to learn anything about it, he was to go to the address given in the letter, along with the key.  The same key the demon was just trying to take from him.  Mary said her dad called her from the road and he was being followed by demons and that he would meet her at home, but he never showed up.  He wanted a schematic from the place that John has the key for.  Her dad is after some box, but she hasn’t been able to get inside to find anything yet.

Mary tells John that magic is real, and we see a demon trap in front of the door they are about to enter.  Mary sees that the key chain John is holding is an anti-possession charm.  Mary also has one that hangs from the charm bracelet on her wrist.

Once inside, John sees a folder that has “Men of Letters” written on it, but Mary has never heard of them.  The place is covered in dust and cobwebs and has clearly been empty for many years.  John sees a locker with HEW (Henry Eric Winchester) on the door.  He packs up everything from inside the locker to take with him.  Mary finds the file her dad was looking for, which contains information about the box he was after.  Mary said that her dad tracked down a woman who was helping him, by the name of Ada Monroe and that when he called, he sounded afraid.

The CW-Men of Letters

Mary and John part ways and she tells him to let the past go and walk away from this kind of life.

Next we see that Ada Monroe is visited by a demon.  She tries to get away but drops her anti-possession charm and becomes possessed.

John finds Mary the next morning, bearing coffee and a newspaper article reporting that Ada Monroe is missing.  They go to the public library and Mary introduces John to Latika, who seems to be a hunter in training.  Mary asks her to investigate the box described in the file she found, and to solve the puzzle that will allow them to open the box.  Mary tells Latika that her and John are headed for Lubbock, Texas to investigate the missing Ada Monroe.  When Mary tells Latika that she does not want her to come along, Latika (also called Lata), encourages her to take another hunter along and suggests she take Carlos.  Mary said after Tupelo she can’t trust him.

As they drive to Lubbock John sees his dead soldier friend (Murph) in the back seat and thinks he’s being haunted.  Mary said she sees all the faces of people she couldn’t save.  Not haunted, just bad memories.  John explains that his friend stepped on a land mine and exploded.  The only thing left of Murph is the shrapnel of his silver cross embedded in John’s arm.

Once they get to Ada’s they see all kinds of evidence that Ada and her dad were working together.  The demon from the night before shows up and John and Mary go outside to investigate.  Carlos makes a well-timed entrance with Latika in tow, as they hit the demon with the van and send her flying.  Carlos tells Mary to “let Topeka go,” and commandeers John to show him how to subdue a demon and perform an exorcism.

Once back inside, all four are looking around and Mary finds that her dad was also looking for Men of Letters locations everywhere.  It’s obvious that the Men of Letters is some kind of secret society connected to her world of monster hunting.  She is confused why her dad would be working on this with Ada rather than involve his own family.  The general consensus is that Samuel was trying to protect them.  Mary said that given what they know about monsters, if she needed protection from whatever he is investigating, it must be pretty bad.

The CW-Latika Explains the Box

They discover that the Men of Letters have been around for centuries and operating in the shadows.  They also find out that the box is a monster trap, powered by dark magic.  It pulls monsters inside and kills them.  It was built by the Men of Letters.  It’s a very powerful weapon and they wonder why he was looking for it, but John points out, the demons want it too.  They find a scrap of paper and John deciphers it as geographic coordinates that point to New Orleans.

On the drive to New Orleans, we find out that Mary blames herself for whatever happened to Maggie, and that Samuel saved Latika’s life which is why she wants to join the hunt to find him.  The coordinates have lead them all to a cemetery in New Orleans and as they walk through it, Mary shares with John that Maggie was like a sister to her and that she was killed by a vampire.  She tells John how much she wants out of the hunter life and claims that once she finds her dad, she’s out for good.

They all get to the mausoleum where her dad was and see the circular concrete tomb with the lid still ajar.  Mary finds her dad’s lighter and lights the torches.  They open the lid and drop one of the torches down.  John and Mary descend into the tomb while Carlos and Latika remain up top.

Once below, John and Mary discover what looks like another circular tomb, but when they open it, they find the magic box inside.  Just as Mary puts it in her bag, a monster comes in.  It turns out to be a Loup-Garou.  Apparently, it was placed there as a watch dog by the Men of Letters.  Mary tells John that silver can hurt it, but only decapitation will kill it.  They don’t have a silver blade with them, so John cuts out a piece of the silver shrapnel from his forearm in the hope that it will hurt the monster enough to buy them a few seconds so Mary can escape.  He immediately runs towards the monster and Mary runs for the exit.

Up top, Carlos has wondered off and Latika is visited by Ada, who is possessed by a demon.  Carlos shows up in time to hit the demon with holy water and shows Latika the knife he went to retrieve from his van.  He is knocked out by the demon and as Latika runs to his side, she drops the file containing the information regarding the magic box.  The demon picks it up and reads it.

The CW-The Magic Box Opens

Mary climbs out of the tomb and sees the knife that Carlos dropped and throws it down the tomb to John.  She then throws Latika the magic box and tells her to open it.  As Mary and the demon fight, Latika gets the box open, and the demon is pulled out of Ada and into the box.  Below, John manages to find the knife and decapitates the Loup-Garou.

In the next scene they are back in Lawrence and John talks to his mom about all the stuff he found in his dad’s locker at the Men of Letters clubhouse.  He wants to know why his mom never told him.  She said it was to keep him safe.

He passed her the letter he was given and said that dad was trying to keep us safe too.  Henry’s voice narrates the words: “If you are reading this then I’m gone.  I’m sorry I kept the truth from you John.  There’s a dangerous world out there.  And our family has fought that danger for centuries.  The answers to all your questions are at the address below.  I love you and your mother.”

John is persistent about discovering all he can about his father and his mom Millie does not want her son to go down this road.  John said, “Mom, my entire life I have been searching for something.  This is good verses evil.  Saving people, hunting things – I was born to do this.”  She just wants him to come home and John promises that he will.

Next, we see Mary and John and while he’s “all-in” she still maintains that once she finds her dad, she is leaving the hunting life.  Carlos and Latika show up and they all go to chat with Ada.  Mary asks Ada why her dad was looking for the magic box and the Men of Letters locations.  We find out that all the Men of Letters disappeared 15 years ago.  The magic box is the only thing that can kill an Akrida.  The Akrida are a malevolent force – a monster not of this world.  For centuries they tried to invade this world and the Med of Letters stopped them every time, but they are gone now.

The Akrida want to wipe out everyone here, including demons and all manner of monsters to take over our world.  Samuel found evidence of a Men of Letters office in Savannah that contains records of how the Akrida have crossed over into our world in the past.  If they find where they are coming in, they can use the magic box to stop them.

Looks like our hunters are off to Savannah.

We hear the voice of Dean Winchester as he narrates again: “What they didn’t know was that the Akrida weren’t just a threat to earth, but to all of existence.  Now like I told you, there’s gonna be some surprises, hell I’m still trying to find all the puzzle pieces myself, but I’ll explain everything and until then, I’ll keep picking the music.”  Dean gets in his Impala (Baby) and drives away….

Lou Bollo

As a special side note, this episode of The Winchesters included an In memorium, to the late Lou Bollo.

Lou served as the Stunt Coordinator on 257 episodes of Supernatural.

NODS AND TRIBUTES

Some nods and tributes to Supernatural:

1. A nod to Lawrence, Kansas, where John and Mary first cross paths and in Supernatural build a life together.
2. The theatre in Lawrence, where John and Mary first bump into each other, is playing Slaughterhouse 5, which is based on the book by Kurt Vonnegut, mentioned in Supernatural, S04E18 The Monster at the End of This Book.
3. After John and Mary bump into each other, she calls him “Soldier Boy.” Not sure if this is just an obvious title she used because John was still in uniform, or if it’s a nod to Jensen Ackles’ character in The Boys series whose showrunner is Eric Kripke, the originator of Supernatural.
4. HEW being the initials of Henry Eric Winchester. Is “Eric” a nod to Kripke?
5. While at Ada’s bookstore Mary sees evidence of her dad’s investigation into the Magic Box and the Men of Letters, up on the wall. We see a nod to Kim Manners on a postcard, Manners Motel.
6. Also, at Ada’s John picks up a file that has D. Nutter on it. This is clearly a nod to David Nutter who directed the pilot episode of Supernatural.
7. We see a nod to Jared Padalecki via the Samulet as it is affectionately known (the amulet necklace that Sam gave to Dean as a gift when they were boys), is hanging on the rear-view mirror of the Impala.
8. “Driver picks the music. Shot gun shuts his cake-hole,” is a direct quote from Dean, and was said in first season of Supernatural back in 2005.  Now, Dean tells the audience during his narration, that he will “keep picking the music.”

QUESTIONS

• Where is Samuel Campbell?
• What happened in Tupelo?
• What happened to Maggie and why does Mary feel responsible?
• Will they find what they need in the Savannah office of the Men of Letters to stop the Akrida?

NEXT EPISODE

Tuesday October 18^th on The CW at 8/7c.