The Winchesters S01 E05 Recap: Legend of a Mind

This episode aired on Tuesday November 15^th on The CW at 8/7c.

Preamble

Lots to unpack from the previous episode (S01-E04), so lets get right to it!

• Samuel is still MIA,
• Mary wrestles with her lost childhood, and difficulty envisioning a life outside of hunting,
• Lata has some childhood issues of her own that haven’t been fleshed out yet,
• John is conflicted about wanting Mary to remain by his side as a hunter, and finding a new life for herself,
• They have the magical box, but it still isn’t working,
• The Akrida are on earth in great numbers, and continue to summon rare monsters to harvest their essence,
• Mary’s friend Maggie died some time ago, but her death is still shrouded in mystery,
• At the end of the Masters of War episode, we saw some healing take place regarding Maggie,
• Carlos moved into Maggie’s old room in Mary’s house,
• Carlos continues his healing journey at the Veteran’s hospital with Dr. Z,
• The Masters of War episode highlighted the depth and breadth of John’s war trauma.

Wow!  What’s in store this week?

Recap S01 E05-Legend of a Mind

Dean Winchester:  Spending a lifetime of hunting monsters, takes its toll.  There comes a time when you’ve got to let out that pain that’s inside you.  If you don’t, it will eat you alive.

The episode opens with a nightmare sequence being experienced by a prominent Councilman, Gordon Baxter.  When his assistant Patty enters his office to review his itinerary, the Councilman suddenly grabs the back of his head in pain and collapses on the floor to his death.

The CW-John and Mary Work on the Motorcycle

Back at the Winchesters Garage, John is showing Mary the repair work he is doing on his dad’s old motorcycle and takes the opportunity to teach her a few things.  Mary plays along for a bit, but pretty quickly it’s evident that she knows a bit about mechanics herself.  John suggests that she work at the family garage once she is done hunting.  This is when Mary tells John that as soon as she is done with hunting, she will leave Lawrence.  John manages to subdue his reaction but leaves the room immediately on the pretense that he needs to go find another tool.

John goes into his mom’s office.  Millie is glad he and Mary are working on the bike.  She offers him a little advice and tells him that if he opens up to Mary, perhaps she will do the same.  Mary walks in and tells John that they have their next case, showing him a newspaper headline regarding the dead Councilman, so the two head over to the clubhouse.

When Mary and John meet Lata, Carlos and Ada at the clubhouse the group are divided about their next move.  Carlos and Lata want to hunt the Akrida, and Mary and John think they should focus on the Councilman.  Ada breaks the tie by voting in John and Mary’s favor.

The group go to interview Patty, Councilman Baxter’s assistant and learn about his last days.  They are convinced that what killed the

The CW-The Team Investigating the Case

Councilman was a Djinn.  Carlos explains to John that Djinn attack their victims in their subconscious and feed off of their mental energy until they slip into a coma and die.  They are known for hiding out in abandoned buildings and warehouses, so the team begin their search there and after a few, they find a young man who turns out to be Ada’s son.

The group are understandably shocked to learn that not only does Ada have a son, but that her son is a Djinn.  Ada tells them that her son’s name is Tony, and he is only half Djinn, which he inherited from her husband Ali.

Ali meant to use his powers for good to help troubled people, but his hunger got the better of him and he turned into a monster, feeding off of people.  He was eventually tracked down by hunters and killed.  It wasn’t until after Ali’s death that Ada learned she was pregnant with Tony.  When he turned seventeen the Djinn marks started to appear on his body.  Tony walked into Ada’s dream and discovered the whole truth and that she was afraid of him.  He felt betrayed and ran.  Ada has been estranged from her son ever since.

Carlos reminded everyone that the Akrida have been doing things to summon monsters to Lawrence, and that is probably how Tony ended up in this warehouse.  The team agreed that they needed to find Tony before he hurts anyone.  All of Tony’s belongings are still at the warehouse and Ada believes he will return to get them, so her and Carlos will wait for him.  John and Mary will go see the police regarding the Councilman’s investigation and Lata will be going to get a copy of Baxter’s autopsy report.

The CW-John gets help from Betty

As John and Mary drive over to the police station, John has an idea that will help them in getting information they need without raising any questions.  He goes to visit his old girlfriend, officer Betty with an offering of her favorite take-out.

John learns that Betty is the only police officer who thinks the Councilman’s death is suspicious and learns that there have been two other victims who met similar ends; Garret Moles and Cynthia Kline.

No one has been able to establish a link between all three victims, but John and Mary know that doing so will help them to determine who the next victim is going to be.

Just as a side note:

• The playful banter between John and Mary not only makes their burgeoning relationship fun to watch, but it also ups the ante of tension. Mary’s inner conflict about remaining a hunter, her need to break free, the emotional price of searching for and failing to find her father, the fact that John is clearly falling in love with her and the inevitable heartache that will ensue when it all comes crumbling down.  The dynamic playing out so subtly on the screen just reels the audience in, even though we know the outcome.  It’s a prequel.
• We get to take that ride, enabling us to feel all the growing friction of “what if Mary quits hunting,” as we just sit back and be thoroughly entertained in how they get there. It is a fine bit of writing by Robbie Thompson and Sehaj Sethi combined with the on-screen drama being played out beautifully by Meg Donnelly and Drake Rodger that offers up this tight rope viewing experience.  It all works well.

In the next scene we get to see how the Djinn operate, creating a reality that is in fact a dream.  In this dream we see Tony visiting Ada.  Their first conversation is a complete rehashing of their family past, but soon, Tony tells Ada that he was summoned to Lawrence by a sound.

While in Lawrence he begins to help people by entering their dreams and helping them to work through their difficulties, only taking enough for himself to survive.  He enters the dreams of the Councilman and discovers that there is already something else in his mind.  Tony told Ada that he saw green lights and something that looks like a giant bug.  The monster he saw is in control and revealed who their next victim is going to be.  When Ada reaches for Tony, he snaps his fingers and Ada wakes up in the van next to Carlos.  Her time with Tony has not only revealed who is behind the killings (the Akrida), but now they know the next victim is Derek Fisher, and that Tony is not the one hurting people.

Back at the clubhouse, Lata shares x-rays and autopsy results she got from the coroner’s office, with the rest of the team.  They found three mysterious entry points in the Councilman’s brain and three splinters were found near the body.  These stingers are believed to be how the Akrida are taking control of the hosts that they attack.

Mary joins Ada in the solarium, to share the news that Lata confirmed Tony is not the one hurting people around town.  As they chat, Mary takes the opportunity to ask Ada about when she fell in love with Ali.  Knowing there were from such different worlds, would she make the same choice if she could do it all over again.  Ada said she followed her heart and that is never a mistake.  John hears their conversation from the doorway but doesn’t interrupt them.  Carlos comes into the solarium to announce he found out who and where Derek Fisher is, and they need to get to him before the Akrida do.

The CW-The Akrida

Carlos, John and Mary show up at an old warehouse to find Derek Fisher and while they try to convince him to leave the property, the Akrida shows up and makes a lunge to sting Derek, but Mary is attacked instead.  She faints into John’s arms while the Akrida escapes.  Once they get Mary back to the clubhouse, they all agree that the only way to remove the stingers and stop the toxins from killing her, is to employ a supernatural solution.  That solution is Tony.  If he can dream walk into her mind, they will stand a chance of saving her.

The CW-Tony entering the Dream World

Ada finds Tony and convinces him to help.  When he arrives back at the clubhouse, he explains that the stingers aren’t just embedded in Mary’s brain, they are also embedded in her mind.  Tony tells them all that nightmares are rooted in trauma, and they take shape in dark memories.  Where better for the Akrida to hide the stingers, then in a place you don’t want to go.  A place where your deepest, darkest fears exist.

Tony knows from experience that he will not be able to help Mary in their dream state as she will run from him, so John volunteers to help.  When Carlos knocks him out, he wakes up in Mary’s mind to urge her face her fears.  Mary finds the memory of her first hunter kill, when she is ten years old.  It was a boy who was part of a werewolf family, and he turned back to human and begged Mary not to kill him.  His name was Jacob.  Mary spoke with her ten-year old self and comforted her.

The next memory was much more difficult to face.  Mary fights against entering the room where the memory is, and John convinces her that it’s the only way for her to survive.  John reassures her that he is with her and that she can do this!  Mary relives the day her parents told her that monsters were real and that it will be her job to kill them.  Mary suffers the experience all over again while witnessing her five-year-old self trying to come to grips with it all.  Not only does that frighten the five-year-old version of herself, but it is also relevant to what she is going through in the present.

The CW-Mary Offering Comfort

She was forced to abandon any childhood dream she had of ever being anything else.  Mary’s anger flares and she punches a hole in the wall, while John does his best to console her.  He urges her to speak with her past self to tell her what she needed to hear.  Mary tells her young self that it is good to be scared so she can be brave, and that maybe it isn’t okay in that moment, but that she will find a way to open other doors for her.  They hug and the young Mary pulls back a pillow revealing the stingers.  Mary takes the butt of her knife and smashes them, breaking the hold they have on her mind.

While John, Mary and Tony were helping Mary to escape the Akrida in her mind, the others discovered the link between all the victims.  They were all connected by jobs at a building, a new radio tower.  A radio tower also turns out to be the perfect tool for sending out pied piper-type signals to lure rare monsters and bring them to Lawrence.

The CW-Roxanne Roxy Gilbert

Back at the Winchesters Garage, we see John tinkering with the motorcycle again.  Mary shows up and John tells her he agrees with her about leaving Lawrence when she is done hunting.  He wants her to have that fresh start and tells her that once the motorcycle is all fixed up it is all hers.  She can take the bike wherever she needs to go.

At the clubhouse, Ada and Lata are saying goodbye to Tony.  He shares with them that he heard in the Councilman’s mind that the Akrida are collecting the essence from the remains of rare monsters.  It dawns on Lata that their efforts to kill the monsters that show up is playing directly into what the Akrida want.  Ada goes along with Tony for the ride, but not before he asks Lata’s permission to write to her.

Back inside, John, Mary, Carlos and Lata continue to look at the documents about the Radio Tower and discover a single name on every document:  Roxanne Gilbert.  When the last scene shows Roxy and a fellow Akrida at the Radio Tower, she acknowledges that Mary didn’t succumb, but that the “hits will keep on coming.

Music

“The Windmills of Your Mind” by Dusty Springfield

“I Put a Spell on You” by Nina Simone

Cast

Next Episode

Tuesday November 22^nd on The CW at 8/7c.