Recap – Supernatural 7.14 “Plucky Pennywhistle’s Magical Menagerie”
Now for what has to be easily the best brotherly scene of season seven (okay this and the Sam breakdown scene in “Hello Cruel World”). I mean, when was the last time we saw them laughing like this? I swear, I’m honestly wracking my brain trying to remember when!
Dean waits outside Plucky’s as Sam pulls up. Sam gets out, he looks exhausted, and oh yeah, he’s covered in glitter. He knows what’s coming. I think we all do! Dean fighting back the laughter is so adorable, but at least he’s trying. Sam holds out his arms wide in humiliation and gives Dean the go ahead. Dean busts out in laughter! I mean full fledged, from the gut laughter.
“I’m sorry, you look like you got attacked by some PCP crazed strippers.” What’s even better is Sam is laughing now too. I think the last time I remember Dean laughing is “Free To Be You and Me.” I don’t ever remember Sam laughing like this. I’ve got to dig back way farther than that. “Tall Tales” I think, and he was fighting it there. So Sam decides to keep the funny story going to sweeten the moment. “Dude, one of them sprayed me with seltzer from his flower.” Now Dean is really laughing!
Sam looks at him weird, letting Dean have his glory. Dean calms himself down and decides that since Sam let him have his laugh, he’ll try to be a good big brother. He apologies for psychologically scarring him. “Which time?” Sam asks. BWAH! That’s such a good point. Older siblings do exist to torment. I know since I are one. Dean means ditching him when they were kids, especially with the clown thing. Lucky for Dean, Sam’s latest ordeal has given him a clown epiphany.
Sam: You know what man honestly, getting my ass kicked by those juggalos tonight was a…it’s therapeutic.
Dean: You faced your fear.
Sam: Exactly. And now what else could a clown possibly ever do to me? I feel good.
I love seeing Sam in a good mood like this, especially given what he’s about to do. He’s in a celebratory mood and goes to the jeep to retrieve something, wincing over the soreness he still feels from fighting clowns. I’m sure aside from the numerous bad bruises that are probably all over his body, he’ll be sore for a while. So guess what Sam managed to score for Dean? You got it, the giant slinky.
Dean is all excited. “No, did you win this?” “We earned that,” Sam says, so that tells me Sam wants to play with the giant slinky too! I hope that turns up in a future episode. Sam’s feeling blue about his head thing and Dean gives him the slinky to play with. Is so wonderful of Sam to think of big bro like this.
Turns out, Dean has a gift for Sam as well. He throws Sam a Plucky clown doll, and now Sam isn’t so brave about clowns anymore. He has another small freak out. Dean’s rationale is sound. “What you said you were over it. You can think of it as a — clown phobia sobriety chip.” Sam gives him a HUGE bitchface instead. I guess the moment of Dean’s apology about scarring him psychologically is over. The parting shot is the Cougar driving away while the Plucky clown doll is left behind on the pavement. It winks before the shot fades to credits. Hee! Good thing Sam didn’t see that!
My grade for “Plucky Pennywhistle’s Magical Menagerie?” An A-. For pure fan joy, an A+, but some of the investigation scenes dragged a bit that hurt the overall grade. That doesn’t matter too much though, for this will be on my rewatch list for a while. It’s nice to finally get an entertaining light episode before things get really dark again next week. Man, I thought I was worried for Sam this week! This seems like a walk in the park now after seeing the previews. At least we have this happy episode to cling onto.
I only got through the second paragraph and had to stop and comment. You put that you feel Hammer of the Gods Is the worst episode ever written. I feel otherwise, that the episode is in fact a great one and great written at that. Therefore I cannot take your opinion on this episode or any other episode seriously, though I plan on reading this whole review. I would like for you to give an explanation why you believe Hammer of the Gods to be the worst written episode ever, as I can think of many other episodes much worse than that one. Thank you.
Finding my old reviews are pretty easy. I’ve been writing them since season three. Go to our episode guide (easy to find on the menu on the top left side). Here’s the link to the one I wrote for Blogcritics and the full length recap for here.
[url]http://blogcritics.org/video/article/tv-review-supernatural-hammer-of-the/[/url]
https://www.thewinchesterfamilybusiness.com/article-list/category9/7874-recap-qhammer-of-the-godsq.html
Ever since that episode aired, I have made it no secret how much I hated it. MANY times. Sorry you’re offended by that, but I can’t change almost two years worth of complete and total disgust for it. If you think that hatred for one episode is going to reflect on what I write about others, I’m not sure that’s being very open minded. After all, I’ve written of ton of these things and haven’t gotten many complaints.
As we say here, we’ll agree to disagree. So what did you think of the actual episode being reviewed here?
Obviously people have different tastes. I too hate Hammer of the Gods but I also hate Yellow Fever. What can you say? I always go into reviews knowing that on some episode the reviewer and I will not agree. I still love your reviews. If we disagree, I look on it as getting another POV so I can see the episode through fresh eyes.
In other words, thanks for all your reviews. I look forward to them.
Oh wait you’re Alice? My apologies! How I failed to realize that is beyond me! Much apologies to you, I am a grateful fan of all you do and I have enjoyed reading things from you and am a fan of the facebook page. I will keep an open mind as I’m now about to read this review along with the one for Hammer of the Gods as I enjoy my first cup of coffee and will give my thoughts when I am done. Sorry again for sounding so hatred toward you.
No problem! I apologize too if my response sounded a little defensive.
I certainly don’t expect people to agree with me (any many times they don’t) but I still have fans to this day come back to me blasting me for reviews I wrote years ago. It’s really funny how some cling onto those grudges. I’m glad to see you aren’t one of those people.
Honestly, when he used the term Juggalo, I nearly keeled over! I’m from MN, my oldest daughter is a Juggalette. I couldn’t believe it! She couldn’t believe it! LOL
Too funny! I must admit, I’ve never heard of the term before now. Great to see it used!
Hey, Alice! This was a wonderful review! Oh, and I agree with you “Hammer of the Gods” was not a great episode. It’s on my “yuk” list, but “Yellow Fever” is on my must watch list. I’m adding this current episode to that list. 😆
Anyway, at first I only really liked this episode, but the more I’ve re-watched it…it’s jumped up to a LOVED one! Definitely a solid “A” in my book! My number one thing that I loved…Dean laughed hard! It was a big hearty laugh. I haven’t seen that since “Free to be You and Me” although Dean did give a big smile at Rufus in “And Then There Were None”. The second thing was Sam’s look when he first entered Plucky’s. That was priceless. That look of raw terror! Jensen and Jared hit this one out of the ballpark! 😀
Now, the creepy guy was just that creepy! I read somewhere that he’s Julie McNiven’s husband. Wow! That’s really cool. He did a good job. His eyes were just…. 😮
I agree with you. There were loads of clues in this episode. I really think that the theory that one of the brothers is having a dream fits. You think it’s Sam and I think it’s Dean. The time references going back to coordinates could be…but I still don’t see where the 4 hour clue fits into the puzzle unless that’s the actual time. Reality seeping in. I’m going have to ponder that one for a while.
Now onto the next one! I don’t know about you, but I’m going to have the tissues, wine, etc. on standby and I’m going to try to stay off Twitter…since I’m on the west coast! (I’m not sure if I’ll be able to…that old curiosity killing the cat and satisfaction bringing him back thing) Oh, well…. 😉
So glad you liked both the episode and the review. These full length recaps are a bit overwhelming! To think I actually wrote these for every episode once.
Yeah, I’m really not sure if it’s Sam or Dean or both if it’s a dream scenario. I just wonder why they keep putting all this crap in. It’s my guess to torture bored fans!
Yes, Friday’s looks intense. We’ll see what comes of it. We just might need a few weeks break after it.
I was waiting for your take and i loved both your take and the episode.
1) About thinking it was an angel i think Sam was referring to gabriel like angel.
2)I liked that they gave both Sam’s and Dean’s pov on the same childhood memory.Whereas Dean thought Sam would have fun at penny’s Sam actually hated it.I really don’t think Sam was scared at that time of clowns,So that is why Dean left him at a place where children of Sam’s age group enjoy to do something he enjoys. I am no psychologist but i think people can develop phobias at any age.So i don’t think Dean was insensitive.
Thanks! Glad you like the review.
I don’t think Dean is ever intentionally insensitive. I’m sure things like childhood fears are something he just doesn’t get though. After all, he saw his mother toasted on a ceiling. Once you’ve had that happen to you, all other horrors pale in comparison. Dean just doesn’t realize that Sam has a different perspective. At least he doesn’t until it’s too late! Plus, what sibling doesn’t rib the other about fears? Sam seemed to have fun both times with the flying thing.
Oh, Alice. You did love this episode. I did too. I really like D&L as writers. I don’t always like their episodes (After School Special, Jump the Shark, Unforgiven, Time for a Wedding), but they know these two characters and I know I’m going to get insight into them when they write an episode.
Mostly I like D&L because they usually introduce deep insight and elements into the two boys and the story that become canon. For instance, Dean’s alcoholism was introduced in Yellow Fever. Sam’s unforeseen anger management was introduced in Sam, Interrupted. Also in that episode, Dean was seen to be truly crazy, which had only been hinted at before. John as a complete douche bag (or, as some may think, purely human) and Dean’s crumbling hero worship of John was introduced in Jump the Shark, and it showed that Sam was exactly like John. Dean discarded the amulet in Dark Side of the Moon, when Dean realized that Sam’s leaving for Stanford was a reflection of how Sam had always felt about his family. After School Special showed more insight into Sam’s character than any other one. I Believe the Children Are Our Future solidified Dean and Cas’s friendship, which we are still seeing played out. I’ll stop here on this point.
D&L episodes usually also set up what is going to happen in the rest of the season. I’m not sure I can tell what that is at this point, but Plucky’s did show that Dean is quite adept at using black magic and he didn’t flinch once about killing a human in doing so; whereas, in Family Remains when he killed the feral boy in self-defense, he did show regret. All I can really tell about this one right now is that the brothers were back to being the brothers we all love, for whatever that means, and that is a complete reversal of how we saw the brothers at the end of The Slice Girls.
I’m still really skeptical about this all being a dream season. If it is, I’m not going to like it one bit and will call BS for a complete wasted season that went nowhere.
I’m not convinced it’s a dream season, but I wonder if parts are an hallucination or dream of some kind. It just seems so strange they would keep throwing all that at us.
I’m so with you on what you said about Dabb and Loflin. I still think “Dark Side of The Moon” is a cannot miss classic. “Unforgiven” thought is one of my favorite episodes of season six, if not one of my personal favorites overall. I LOVED the way it was shot and how Sam kept quietly falling apart with each memory. Too bad all of that went nowhere. Kind of like “I Believe The Children Are Our Future.” Great setup that went nowhere.
Couldn’t agree with you more on Dark Side of the Moon. That one may be my No. 1 of the series (on the drama side of things).
Funny how a episode can be seen differently I dont like Dark side of the Moon at all for my own reasons. And Time for a Wedding was one of the reasons I stopped watching for a while .
And yet this episode from these two I enjoyed so these writers can be hit and miss for me.
That was a great recap, I do enjoy them so. I’ve already posted a few times on how I thought this episode was all kinds of awesome, so I won’t do it again.
Just a small comment on this: “There are phone booths left somewhere?†The show being filmed in Canada, yes we still have phone booths. Our shopping centers still have them too. And thank God, cause I don’t have a cell phone and it’s handy when you need to call someone. But I’ll agree with Dean about the yuck factor. I don’t lean the phone on my ear when I need to use one, and I purell like crazy afterwards.
Ah, that explains it. You Canadians are mucking up the works! 🙂
There are probably plenty of phone booths around in major cities but in the suburban and rural midwest US, they’re completely gone. I’m shocked to find they found one in rural anywhere.
Thanks for commenting!
Hi Alice
I loved this episode for all the reasons you and all the other reviewers and commentors have given. It was light humoured, fun (except for Sam’s beatdown, poor Sammy) and I just loved the brotherly moments.
As for the countdown clock I took those numbers to be the countdown in hours, minutes and seconds. The first one indicated 60:00:00 meaning they went back 60 hours(2 days and 12 hours) from Sam’s first NOW moment. When Dean is looking through the bloodied hole that the Unicorn made it was 36:36:07 meaning it was now 36 hours, 36 minutes and 07 seconds away from Sam’s NOW moment.
Hi Karen!
Oh sure, it was a countdown clock to hours, minutes, and seconds, but I was questioning whether that was supposed to mean something else too. These time references are popping up all over this season and I just wondered if this could be another clue.
I’m really glad you loved the brotherly moments. They seem so few and far between these days. We got to treasure them when they do happen!
Ok, now I understand.
D’oh! 😳
The glitter part was the funniest thing I’ve ever seen in this season so far. They are probably still cleaning glitter from Sam’s clothes and I’m pretty sure Jared kept finding it in weird places lol. it never goes away.
THREE rolling smilies in one recap! I’m going to hazard a guess and say you liked the episode….
Re: the different cars, I never noticed that. Why the hell do they have different cars? Could it be a sign of Sam’s need to be in control (because if he’s not then hello Lucifer) and also of Dean um, reDeaning himself, slowing making his way back to the Impala, which will be the final sign that Dean is really Dean again, not this half a guy we’ve seen for most of the season?
The Impala has to be a metaphor for something. It’s no coincidence that she’s been absent for most of the season and there have been numerous connections between the destruction of the car and the destruction of various stages of Deans life ie rebuilding it after Sam’s collapsed wall and after his father’s death. I guess once we see him sit back into the Impala that will means he’s (properly) back.
Re: the octovamp. The same day this episode was on there was a programme on about Humboldt squids. Now those guys are soil yourself scary. Ten arms, more teeth than our freaking national debt, a bloody BEAK!! Oh, and apparently they’re hitting the west coast of the U.S at an allmerciful rate (thought you guys would like to know that….) Anyway, I’m not surprised that Octovamp was on some kid’s scary list.
Wonder if the slinky will become like the new amulet. Admittedly it’ll be a pain to hang around Dean’s neck but at least it will brighten up the place (once Dean stays away from trashcans!)
Is JP pulling a Dorian Grey on us because I think he’s getting younger looking? Either that or absolute terror knocks years off you.
Up until reading DixieThorns reply I thought ‘Juggalo’ was a made up word, like some sort of strange type of gigolo. (What, I didn’t know it was a real word…)
I love the attention to small detail like the bits of glitter flying out with the clown tooth.
I think I’m buying more into your ‘The whole thing is a dream’ idea for this season. Maybe it’s because I’m on hollerdays (yay!) and I’ve had time to think about it but yeah, there’s definitely something there (either that or they’re overcompensating). I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see Sam or Dean get out of the shower at the end of the season and then see John sitting on the motel room bed, cleaning weapons (now that bit might be wishful thinking but still).
Thanks for this, Alice.
I’ve never been a fan of Dabb and Loflin’s episodes – I hated both Yellow Fever and DSOTM and was just meh about all the others – but this one I absolutely loved. It was a great big glittery, rainbow slinky, brotherly love hour of fun. Plus it had those wonderful clips of ELAC!Sam – one of my all time favourite episodes, not to mention my all time favourite Sam!Hair – at the beginning. 😆 I felt so bad for Sam in this week’s episode (I hate clowns too) but whilst half of me wanted to grab him and take him someplace clown-free and safe the other half of me was laughing too hard at the poor boy’s misfortunes. 😆 There were so many scenes I loved – Dean reassurring Sam over the phone and his ‘Sammy’ (awwww…) when Sam protested ever slightly too much, Sam’s near to overwhelming panic when he first went into Plucky’s, Sam’s bad cop routine, Dean’s ‘oooohhh…I want one…’ face when he first saw the giant slinkys at Plucky’s, the way Dean’s eyes narrowed so dangerously when the bad guy said Sam was the next to be targeted, Sam’s dimples and smiles in the scenes at the beginning when Dean was on the phone to Frank and shortly after when the boys were discussing monster babies. But my favourite scene has to be the last one. Dean’s laugh – oh how I’ve missed happy Dean, Sam’s happiness at seeing Dean happy, Sam giving Dean the slinky and the sparkly awesomeness that was Glitter!Sam. Fabulous stuff. Now roll on next week. I am SO excited to see what’s ahead for Sam.
Thanks for the review. I do love reading all the reviews here. Although I’ve got to say I hope the ‘it’s all a dream’ idea doesn’t actually materialise on the show. I really don’t want to see that scenario at all.
Fun review for a fun episode! Jared sold Sam’s fear and exasperation so well, though having lost many a game of skeeball, I do sympathize with Dean’s plight.
My only complaint for this episode is that is didn’t seem to fit into this part of the season. There was a lack of continuity in tone. However, Glitter!Sam makes up for so much.
I am starting to buy the dream theory. This whole season would make more sense if that was the case, with its odd time jumps and call backs.
As long as “Hammer of the Gods” is being discussed, I thought it had a couple good moments, and was nowhere near the train wreck that was the first 7/8ths of “Seven 7: Time For A Wedding”, but I respect all opinions – unless there is someone out there who has “Bugs” in their ten best episodes list.
Thanks Alice!
First time responder. I have wondered since last season if things were off because we were in Dean’s head, maybe a bad djinn trip. To me cas exploding and Bobby dying in that order were reminiscent of stull battle. Then I rewatched s 6 and realized …. oh the mytharc is purgatory. So not my favorite season but makes more sense. This season is Also off. In addition to everything noted in the speculative articles/comments I would add the conspicuous use of genre iconic. actors. We have seen Buffy /angel, x-files, and vmars/moonlight alumni. If we are in anyone’s. Head it feels like Dean. It feels like his pov mostly and his fears. And he is more the pop culture junkie.
[quote]
I don’t think Dean is ever intentionally insensitive.
Dean just doesn’t realize that Sam has a different perspective. [/quote]
i agree
Seasons 1-5 were the Winchester Gospel presented to the viewer as a cohesive and editted tale of the brothers and their roles leading up to the averted apocalypse, courtesy of chuck. Maybe seasons 6-7 have a different feel because the story is no longer edited per se. We are seeing events more piecemeal. In fact season 6 might be best described as castiel’s story and we and the Winchesters were in the dark as to his role for most of the season. If cas started it he may have to finish it. Season 7 may still be his story even though he has been indisposed. Who knows maybe cas is the “dreamer” somehow both aware and disconnected from events.
The Hammer of the Gods is very poorly researched. Hindu Gods are vegetarians and to show them as cannibals was shocking. Goddess Kali is the destroyer of demons and not a destroyer of the world and she is the most powerful God out there. Ganesh is the God of Plenty and the most kind-hearted, gentle and loving God in Hinduism. In Hinduism animals are worshipped as anyone with even a bit of general knowledge should know. That is the reason why Hindu Gods don’t eat flesh and that is why in India we have preserved wildlife for so long. That is why vegetarianism is so common in India.
I am a Supernatural fan, and the only reason I did not take offense at this episode is because I realised that it was just stupid writing. I mean how would Christians feel if Jesus was depicted as a cannibal? They would laugh I guess!
Just discovered your side two days ago. Finally, I can enjoy other fan-girls opinions on the episodes I am recently watching because I am new to the Winchester Universere and am still catching up.
I looooved your review for “Death’s Door” btw. It left me in tears again.
I felt like commenting on this review because I have a total different opinion on this episode, which makes me wonder why. IMO it was the worst episode ever. Totally unecessary and crappy. Normally I enjoy the more lighter, funnier episodes. They ease my hearth because it’s good to see the boys having some fun once in a while. I hysterically laughed watching “Yellow Fewer”.
But the whole clown thing totally lost me. I start wondering if it is because I cannot relate to those play paradises (what are they called?) one can put their kids into. The whole concept of such places is new to me (do they even excist in Europe???) and maybe that’s the reason I did not get all the jokes and the overall funny-ness of the Winchester brothers in such a place?
On the other hand I was really waiting for some moving-forward the character development and the overall story-line. So far Season 7 confused me with it’s sudden jumps in mood and non-comprehensible character twists.
But well, jsut my two cents. 🙂
Welcome to the site! Your two cents are most valued!
I don’t think this is the funniest episode ever to hit the show, but I did love the beating by clowns. Also compared to a lot of season seven, this ended up being one of the better ones. You are right, the writing was wildly inconsistent most of the season.
Those pizza places here are basically called Chuck E Cheese here in the US. I’ve spent a few times there when my kids were younger, and trust me, they’re the seventh circle of Hell! 🙂
Thanks for commenting and spending time with us!