Recap: Supernatural, Episode 9.07 – "You look pretty rockin' to me, Dean Winchester"

Recap: Supernatural, Episode 9.07 – Bad Boys

Sam is about to sit and enjoy The Wonderful World of Oz when a cell phone rings on the table. He answers it and the person on the other end asks for “D-Dog.” Sam knows of no “D-Dog,” but Dean does.

Dean tells the caller he’ll be there as soon as possible and explains to Sam. Years ago when they were on a job in the Catskills, Dean had gambled away their food money. Not wanting Sam to go hungry, he decided to steal some bread and peanut butter, but got caught. Instead of getting sent to jail, he got sent to a boys home run by a man named Sonny, which the man who called. Papa Winchester decided to leave him there to do some work on the farm and get reformed for a while.

This is the first Sam’s ever heard of it since he had been left alone at the motel before going to stay with Bobby for a couple of months.

They head over to Sonny’s and while waiting for him to come down, Dean remembers when he first arrived there. A punk kid, not afraid to punch the deputy in the eye or talk back to Sonny, but of course, with a good heart since first and foremost, he was going to take care of Sammy no matter what.

Sonny and Dean have a nice reunion. And after sending Ruth, the maid out of the room, Sonny explains what’s happened. Weird things, but worst of all, the death of Jack who worked at the farm and was killed by an old tractor that had stopped working. The Bros split up. Sam looks through the house and sees Dean’s old bed.

But he suddenly hears whispers. He storms into the backroom and he finds Ruth who was praying with a rosary. She says she knows why they’re really here, which is why she was praying… for the ghost that haunts the farm to leave.

Dean’s in the barn and sees there’s plenty EMF so he goes looking for the ghost. He finds a kid who says he’s there fighting monsters with Bruce the Monster Smasher. The kid introduces himself as Timmy. He daintily shakes Dean’s hand, but Dean shows him how to shake hands like man with a good grip.

“You shake like that, you’ll be alright.”

Timmy smiles. Dean then asks about Jack and Timmy says he and the other boys were in the barn the night Jack had his accident. He remembers that it got really cold.

Timmy asks if he can leave and do his chores before Ruth gets mad.

Back in the house, Ruth tells Sam her story. She grew up in this town and knew of Howard and Doreen who owned this farm. Jack was a farmhand and Howard was convinced he and Doreen were having an affair and tried to kill them both. Jack ran way, but Howard killed Doreen was sent to prison for life until he died last year. Howard had vowed to come back and get his revenge.

Sam and Dean dig up Howard’s body to salt and burn it and finish the job.

They leave. But back at the house, Ruth is in the bathtub when suddenly the lights flicker and the shower curtain falls on her face, suffocating her to death.

Sam and Dean stop at Cus’s Place. Sam says they could just pick up a burger somewhere else, but Dean’s here for ol’ time’s sake. He remembers when Sonny brought him here after the charges against him were dropped. Thanks to Sonny.

Sonny says Dean can stay as long as he needs to. And besides, he’s been doing well in school, making friends and even made the wrestling team.

Sonny asks if Dean is into some heavy metal, devil worshipping stuff since he saw some occult carvings on his bed and noticed how Dean would put salt in front of his bunk every night. Dean would rather not talk about it.

Sonny talks about how his loyalty to a gang only got him 15 years in jail. He realizes he should’ve been loyal to himself before anyone else. That when you look into a mirror, you should see you being your own man. Makes Dean think.

But not before a pretty young waitress named Robin comes to take their order. She and Sonny are good friends.

Fast forward back to the present day and here is grown-up Robin at their table to take their order. She doesn’t recognize Dean at first and even when he says who he is and how she and her mom would come to the house to give guitar lessons, she pretends to seem disinterested.

Robin gets called over to another table and embarrassed, Dean quickly gets up to leave. He refuses to tell Sam what that was all about when Sonny calls.

They head back to the house and Sonny tells them what happened. One strange thing, Ruth always had her rosary with her, but now it’s gone. Dean goes to look around and Sam goes with Sonny to look at his employee records. They head inside and Sam is surprised to see Dean was a county wrestling champ.

Outside the house, Dean sees two guys bullying Timmy. He flashes his FBI badge and tells them to git. He turns to Timmy and tells him that all it takes is for him to stand up to them one time and they’ll stop.

The bullies are mowing the lawn when something gets caught in the mower. The skinny bully checks and sees the rosary is stuck in the blade. He tries to pull it out. Timmy is watching from the upstairs window and suddenly the mower turns back on and slices the boy’s hand off.

He’ll be fine though.

Sam shows Dean Timmy’s records. He was found in an abandoned building a year ago and since then has been escaping orphanages. So Sonny offered to take him in.

Dean goes to look for Timmy while Sam searches through the barn. He finds an attic and interesting drawings on the wall of a car accident.

Back at the house, Dean walks through and sees Robin in the living room setting up for lessons. He flashes back to when they were younger and them talking about their lives.

Robin gets turned on by Dean talking about how awesome working on cars is and she kisses him. She asks if he’s kissed many girls before and he says of course he has. Lots.

“I guess we’ll have to keep practicing,” she says and they keep practicing.

Back to the present, Robin sees him. Dean says to trust him, but they need to get outta here right now.

Robin says she’s not really sure she wants to trust him, again.

“So you do remember me!”
“How could I forget?”

Flashback to them making out on the porch. She tells him that she hopes this lasts and Dean says he’s not leaving. Who else would bring her to the dance?

Present. Dean grabs Robin’s hand to leave, but the door slams. Timmy’s there and he says he’s sorry he can’t stop it. Things start to get hurled at walls and Dean takes Robin into the kitchen where Sam walks in as the door gets slammed behind him too.

They create a salt circle around Robin and Timmy walks towards them to again say sorry he can’t control “her.”

Sam knows it’s his mom and he asks Timmy to tell them about what happened. It was late at night when they crashed in the woods. Everything was on fire, but she had pushed him out before the car blew up. He ran through the woods and found an abandoned building where he hid and cried for his mom. Then she came. But she had changed.

They think it’s Timmy’s Bruce action figure that’s keeping her here, but when they burn it on the stove, nothing happens. A wind blows through the window and the salt circle is broken. Sam thinks what’s anchoring her there, is Timmy.

As Timmy’s mom has Sam in a death grip and after hurling him onto the table, Dean tells Timmy he can make her stop. He has to tell her to stop and to let go. Because she can’t move on, she’s going crazy. But Timmy can’t, it’s his mom.

“Sometimes, you’ve got to do what’s best for you even if it’s gonna hurt the ones you love.”

Timmy stands up and asks his mom to stop. To stop hurting people. She lets go of her grip on Sam and Dean and Timmy tells her she needs to go. He promises he’ll be okay.

His mom’s ghost face disappears and she’s her normal self before she officially moves on. Timmy tells her he loves her and he runs toward Dean into a hug.

That night, Robin calls Dean a rock star and understands why he left back then.

“You look pretty rockin’ to me, Dean Winchester”

She gives him a kiss on the cheek and heads inside with Timmy.

Sonny thanks Dean, they hug and says they’ll definitely see each other in the future.

Sam asks how Dean knew to tell Timmy to tell his mom to leave. Dean says he got lucky.

Like he got lucky with this place, Sam says. He was thinking this was the worst part of Dean’s life, but actually, it might have been the best. Why’d he ever leave?

Never felt right, Dean says. It was only two months. He couldn’t wait to get out of here.

Flashback. Night of the dance. Dean is getting ready. Sonny walks in and says Papa Winchester is outside. Sonny tried telling him what a big night this was for Dean, but Papa Winchester merely says they have a job.

Dean tries to hold back tears. Sonny says this place gave him a second chance when he got out of jail. And now it’s given Dean a second chance too. He offers to stick his neck out for Dean and try to have him stay.

Papa Winchester honks the horn and Dean looks outside to see Sammy playing with an airplane out the Impala window.

Dean thanks Sonny for everything and says he has to go.

“Dean, thank you. For always being there, for having my back. I know it hasn’t always been easy…”
“I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about.”

Episode Thoughts
Oh come on now. What is this episode? This is a “feels” episode isn’t it?

Well, it worked.

You know, as much as we’ve learned about the Bros over the last 8 seasons, it’s always interesting to see them come up with more stories to fill in those years before Sam and Stanford and burning Jess. These stories could feel so forced and if not careful, out of place and out of continuity. But so far, Supernatural has made them always work.

This episode is no exception. We know the Bros will always come back to each other, but it’s always good to see them being their own man, as Sonny taught Dean.

There were definitely some genuinely creepy moments in the episode, something we haven’t seen on the show in a long time. And I immediately thought Timmy was a ghost. But it all worked out to be a nice, emotional and touching episode for all the characters involved.

Thumbs up.

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