Supernatural 8.20: Pac-Man and Ghosts of the Past

[Full Episode Recap! With a side of review.]

I have to admit to an abundant amount of skepticism with “Pac-Man Fever”‘s preview from two weeks ago.  I mean, Supernatural does meta like a champ, but a video game? Wasn’t convinced. Until I watched this episode that was both hilarious and so delicately emotional that I was proud of  the misdirected promo. The surprise and reveals in the episode were deep and touching. Finding out more of Charlie’s past fleshes out her character quite a bit, and tells us the real reason she’s been running for so long. We watch Sam slowly crumble even more as Dean tries to be normal as he attempts to hold on to all the pieces.

Before we can figure out why Dean’s woken up in a military compound in 1951, in uniform, in a facility full of dead people, we’re sent back 24 hours earlier.

Sam and Dean are at the Winchester Lair. Dean’s watching surveillance cameras when Sam stumbles in and Dean looks at him and his long hair and says, “Man, I’m telling you, give me five minutes with some clippers…” Really, what Dean’s addressing is how ill Sam looks. Whatever the trials are doing to his insides has been getting worse. The guy looks horrible from the inside out; that’s pretty tough to do to a Winchester. Sam’s just not in any shape to do, well, anything for now.

There’s an email from Charlie, who’s in town, but she can’t track their phone signals. Another win for the Lair! The brothers meet up with Charlie and bring her into the Men of Letters bunker. She’s completely wowed by it, but remarks, “Too bad they got wiped out, but that’s what they get for the sexist name.” The confused-then-considering look on Dean’s face is always worth the price of admission.

Charlie’s been doing fanatic-level research on all things evil, and has come across Prophet Chuck’s books. Be sure that Sam and Dean are thrilled with that. More so when they hear that the novels have gone online. Yep. Anyway, the case Charlie found is a guy with liquefied organs that the county tried to hide. And since Sam is… broken, Charlie insists on investigating with Dean. Who says no. Until he sees her shooting skills. But then, then he has to take her shopping for appropriate clothing.

It’s often easy to forget how all-business Dean is, but here is Charlie having montage time trying out some seriously nerd-referential clothing and the contrast is funny while being bittersweet.  There’s a heavy handed moment when Charlie says to Dean, “If it’s any consolation, having read your history, there is pretty much nothing the Winchesters can’t do if they work together.” Seeing the meta-adventures through Charlie’s eyes, a regular-ish person, it’s sobering to realize what they do on a daily basis. We have all this hero worship for Sam and Dean and they would have zero idea why.

Dean and a finally appropriately dressed Charlie head to the coroner, where the medical examiner stops an investigation for the first time in ever, refusing access without paperwork. Dr. Jennifer O’Brien is completely immune to Agent Hicks’ charm. (Who else here loved that Charlie chose Agent Ripley as her fake name?)

Elsewhere, two teenagers run across another body, which pops like a blister when one of the boys pokes it with a stick. I am not grossed out by much, but the sound the show made for the guy’s distended, gelatinous belly was horrific. Well done, sound team. Charlie and Dean show up at the scene where ta-da: Sam already is. Dean’s pretty concerned, which turns into brogument when Sam quotes Dean. To Dean.

I love this show.

Charlie gets a detail from the teens that the body had a blue handprint on the arm before it went to goo. Dean, flat out disgruntled old man now, drives away, leaving Sam and Charlie there. Which is totally fine, because Sam stole Charlie’s car. And now they’re going to do a bit of B&E. Which they do, and ta-da, that’s where they already are when Dean breaks in by his lonesome. Not finding much to go on except that things are not what they appear, the three regroup at the Lair.

In John’s journal, they find an entry about a bastard offshoot of the Djinn, ones who have glowy blue eyes, leave a blue handprint, and the belly in jello distress mode. Charlie ducks out for a victory snack, but in reality heads to an apartment where she pulls out multiple ID’s and does a little fund transferring.  Hearing strange sounds, she whirls around to find the coroner in the room. With eyes glowing blue.

When Charlie doesn’t return (with Dean’s pie, no less), and Sam finds there’d been no comic convention in Topeka for her to be here for, Dean pulls up her GPS signal. He’d thought Charlie had been off ever since arriving.

At her apartment, they find Charlie had been making donations to a woman in a coma in a nearby hospital. Dean heads to the hospital and finds that the woman was a survivor from a car accident she’d been in when she and her husband had gone to pick up their twelve-year-old daughter. Charlie’s childhood history is not full of happy memories.

Charlie’s current situation isn’t full of happy either. She’s bound to a chair and the coroner, using her blue hands, eats off her [heavily abundant] fear.  When the brothers arrive, they can’t rouse Charlie. They go looking for the Djinn who they find and kill – but the antidote doesn’t work like it does with regular Djinn. They quickly come to the same conclusion: the dream-like state should be accessible by African dream-root. Dean downs the tincture and has Sam punch him into unconsciousness.

And it’s there that Dean wakes up in 1951. Charlie’s video-game nightmare that she cannot win. It was this game she’d hacked and released that had her arrested as a kid. It’s from this point onward that she’d been on the run. Inside the game, she’s protecting her comatose mother in a loop that will not end. Dean, and his always surprising depth of sympathy, figures out that if they lose the fear in the game, the game stops. He’s right.

Safely back at the lair, we say goodbye to Charlie. She and Dean pull a Han and Leah moment, but in a sibling way and  with maybe, just maybe, a touch more humor. Dean walks inside and hugs Sam too, brushing away his apologies for following in the condition he’s in, getting directly to what they should be doing – together- in finding Kevin.

Which is a great lead in for next week’s episode where the promo shows us Kevin, Crowley, Naomi, and Castiel. And Sam being pushed to the edge of his living abilities. This week’s episode, while phenomenally emotional, didn’t help with the trials. And there’s only three episodes left to go for the season.

What the what?
1. The brothers are still coming to the LARP’ers Mid-Season Jubilee.  (Please make that another episode, guys!)
2. Charlie must appear again. Must.
3. Notice Sam’s quiet determination to not be laid low by this. Even though he apologizes at the end of the film, it’s killing him to not do anything.
4. Dean’s primary job has always been to protect Sam. What will it cost him to see him even worse than this episode showed us?
5. Dean’s getting more tech-savvy.
6. Someone get Sam a tablet. Please. And for heaven’s sake, digitize John’s journal.

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