Supernatural Preview: Episode 7.14 – “Plucky Pennywhistle’s Magical Menagerie”

Episode 7.14 “Plucky Pennywhistle’s Magic Menagerie”

Sam: “At least I’m not afraid of flying.”
Dean: “Planes crash.”
Sam: “And apparently clowns kill.”

And that basically is what “Plucky Pennywhistle’s Magic Menagerie” is all about…more killing clowns. Let me say right now – I hate clowns.

This Friday the Winchester brothers investigate mysterious murders stemming from the Plucky Pennywhistle’s Magical Menagerie pizza chain in Kansas. (Where do they come up with these names?)

Robert Singer describes the pizzeria in the producer’s promo as “a pizza emporium for children, with bad pizza, lots of games, and in our case because it’s supernatural, some mysterious deaths. A place of absolute innocence and joy and we turn it on its head and make it a scary dangerous place to be.”

Yep it does seem like a mighty fine place until you look closer and see weird employees and a wall of very scary children’s drawing. In the show the brothers run afoul of Howard (played by Michael Blackman Beck), “an employee who comes off like Peter Pan, but underneath is probably more like Captain Hook.” Seems during parties and social events that children attend, the kids are encouraged to draw pictures of their worst nightmares, and post them on a wall.

At some point an embodiment of that fear manifested itself and came back to kill the child’s parents, hence the wild unicorn chasing down one of the murdered parents.

And who are the main perpetrators of all the murders? Clowns!!!!…. and of course we all know, clowns are Sam’s No. 1 phobia. Unfortunately the spoilers tell us, that he is left there to face the irate clowns while Dean hunts down the source of the magic.

The photo stills released show Sam in a fight with the two clowns, which end with Sam shooting one of them…supposedly. We see Sam pull the trigger but the clip ends before was see it’s effect on the clown.

I’m guessing it doesn’t work to well. (If bullets were the answer to the clowns, it would just be too simple)

Freaky aren’t they. Did I say I hate clowns? I’m with Sam on this one, but not so for Padalecki.

“The guys playing the clowns were both extremely nice,” Jared Padalecki, who plays Sam, says in an interview. “One of them I’d already met before. A big, burly, powerful, awesome, nice fellow. The other one was an actual guy who had worked with the circus before. But once you deck them up and doll them up in costumes, they look pretty scary. There’s a big twist to their costume, which you’ll see. They’re certainly not just big, happy clowns.”

In the same interview Padalecki states he loves clowns in real life. “I think there’s real fear in my eyes in the fight scenes, but it’s the real fear of getting hurt or beat up,” he says. “But I’ve never been scared of clowns. I used to love clowns. I think I spent a few Halloweens as a clown. One of my favorite clowns is from “IT”, the movie.”

In case you’re wondering, that movie is based on a Stephen King book of the same name and the clown is “Pennywise the Dancing Clown” the monster of the book and the one that turned me off of clowns forever. Hmm, just noticed that ‘Pennywise’ and ‘Pennywhistle’ are very similar. Wonder if the writers patterned the name of the menagerie after King’s clown. Arguably the most frightening clown in literature!

The first promo clip introduces the new hunt and at the same time puts a wrap on last week’s show. It starts with the boys standing outside a phone booth waiting for a call. Phone rings, Sam looks up from his paper and Dean answers.

   
The caller is Frank, and he is as paranoid as ever…much to Sam’s amusement.

With one of Ackles classic ‘eye-rolls’, Dean reluctantly replies to Frank coded password, “I am the egg man”…

Frank finally talks to Dean, who is not happy about being in a phone booth, which was apparently Frank’s idea. (I didn’t even know there were any left.)

We only hear Dean’s side of the conversation, but it’s punctuated with pretty funny dialogue, Dean: “Fred Savage, really?” and “Yeah, I know. Big mouths are everywhere.” And “Ah well since you asked, some actual intel on the Dick Roman guy would be nice.”

That seemed to pique Sam’s interest… 

…but it doesn’t seem Frank has much to share. At least we find out that Frank is still very much in the picture.

After hanging up, Dean make a very cautious exit from what he perceives as a booth full of germs. Hehehe…can you say OCD?

Dean asked if Sam has found anything interesting in the paper, hoping he will find something quick since the present ‘protocol du jour thing’ is creeping him out.

But Sam wants to confirm what he overheard from the conversation first. Cue the ‘dick’ jokes, “So we got dick on Dick,” he asks? That earns him a very funny glaring look from Dean…
 
…and an equally interesting reply, “That’s a very vivid way of putting it.” Cute! (Smile)

He then asked Sam if he found anything on Wonder Woman, i.e. the Amazons they lost last week. “Nope,’ Sam replies, “and there probably won’t be. They are definitely gone.” But, he continues, he might have found something over in Kansas.

Poor Sammy, he has no idea his new find involves his number one phobia…CLOWNS!

For Dean its cool, the more work the better, BUT he does decide to set some rules for this hunt… again much to Sam amusement.

“No babies. No baby’s mama. No bars. No booze. In fact, no hot chicks of any kind.”

 
Sam, greatly amused, wants clarification…

…..to which Dean adds, “Hey, you spot a monster baby and see how quick you want to dive back into the pool.

Guess most would think that’s funny, and maybe it was meant to be, but actually for me it’s very sad. One less outlet Dean has for his grief and that won’t bode well for someone down the road. Let’s just hope the leviathans are the ‘someone’ that Dean finally vents on.

The trailer shows us a variety of scenes about the episode and all surrounded by balloons. Cute. We see employees and kids welcoming us to Plucky’s and appearing to enjoy the fun they are having there.

 
The place is awash in bright colors and huge over exaggerated figures of clowns and wall hangings of various children memorabilia.

  

Then a shot of a youngster caught cheating by one of the other kids at a house game. (Hmm….have to wonder if bad sportsman ship has any dire consequences here.)

We then shifted to Dean very happily taking a big bit out of a child’s pizza, only to see him quickly change his mind a few seconds later.

 
Yep…bad pizza and if Dean won’t eat it you KNOW it’s bad! His comment to the kid, “That is mud.” Guess, the kids don’t come here for the food.

More happy fun scenes switching to the plastic face of a smiling clown that quickly becomes distorted and unfocused all the while a voice is saying in the background “Plucky’s where a kid can get revenge.”

Cue the unicorn chasing down a man as we hear Sam asking how a unicorn can come off a sketch? Magically of course!

We also see a person, hopefully not one of the brothers, hitting a car windshield at what looks like a good rate of speed and then various quick shots of Sam and very scary clowns in the same basement/garage as the photo stills. All the while we hear a very child-like voice say, “Plucky helps kids.” I’m guessing that’s one of the two clowns responsible for all the murders. Creepy! Did I say I HATE clowns!

Last shot is Dean and Sam(?) in a basement standing around a barrel full of growing flames. Should we speculate that they are casting the spell they need to kill the entities? I hope so! A dead clown is a good clown!

In the promo clip, narrated by Robert Singer first we see Dean and Sam on the phone and while we don’t here the first part of the conversation, I’m assuming Sam is telling Dean about his experience at the Menagerie in such a way the Dean suspects Sam is hiding something.

Dean laughing, “Wait this isn’t about your clown thing is it.” “What? No” replies Sam.

   
Suspicious, Dean pushes, “Sammy?” “No!” Sam replies again, but no go, big brother can read right though it all.

I’m guessing this is after Sammy has visited the pizzeria and before he was attacked and as the clip continues, we do see Sam’s initial visit to Plucky’s and his visible discomfort at all the clowns.

But Sam isn’t the only one having fun at Plucky’s. The photo stills also show Dean chasing down a man in an animal costume.

I wouldn’t want Dean after me with that look on his face. Looks like a fun episode….except for the clowns. Did I say I hate clowns!

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Official Synopsis: Sam is forced to confront a childhood fear when a case takes him and Dean to Kansas to investigate Plucky Pennywhistle’s Magical Menagerie, a local pizza chain that hosts children’s birthday parties. Sam and Dean discover that the victims’ children had recently been to the restaurant and drawn a picture of their worst fear, which then came to life to kill their parent. While Dean confronts the man behind the magic, Sam is left to deal with some very angry clowns. Written by CW Publicity.

Mike Rohl directed this episode. He has 30 other directing credits to his name including “Eureka,” “Smallville,” and “Haven” besides “Supernatural.” He has been with the series since 2006, has 9 other episodes to his credit and some are my absolute favorites, “The Usual Suspects,” “Folsom Prison Blues,” “On the Head of a Pin,” “The Monster at the End of This Book,” “Appointment in Samarra,” and “The Mentalists” to name a few.

The episode was penned by the writing duo of Andrew Dabb & Daniel Loflin who are also not new to the series. These two veteran have written 13 other “Supernatural” episodes including “Frontierland,” “Yellow Fever,” “Weekend at Bobby’s,” “Dark Side of The Moon,” “Season 7, Time for a Wedding,” “The Girl Next Door,” “Unforgiven,” and “Family Matters.”

Cast (IMDb) includes Jensen Ackles, Jared Padalecki, Michael Blackman Beck (Howard), Jennifer Spence (Jean Holiday), Jakob Davies (Tyler), Laura Jaszcz (Bereaved Woman), Timothy Wallace (Balloonist)

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Socialitelife.com and Zimbo took BTS set photos for this episode. The links to them are below.

http://socialitelife.com/jared-padalecki-jensen-ackles-suit-up-for-supernatural-photos-12-2011

http://www.zimbio.com/photos/Jensen+Ackles/Exclusive+Stars+Set+Supernatural+Vancouver/lvcDkpOuBqZ

Zimbo reported, “Actors Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles on the set of”Supernatural” in Vancouver, Canada. A crew member showed Jensen an article during break about how much celebs spend on items and he was shocked to find out that Suri Cruise was bought a Halloween costume for over 6 thousand dollars. He yelled the info out so everyone could know.”

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The promos and sneak peak videos are below:

Official promo photos can be found our photo gallery.

Trailer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0zvpwBT_8A

Promo Sneak Peek:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1iE-2WalK0

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=82SDb4_tUKA

Canadian Station CHCH promo:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8CZ5t05UfQ

HAPPY EPISODE EVERYONE!

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