Recap – “A Very Supernatural Christmas”
The episodes shift to the lighter side again, for Sam and Dean approach a cozy Dutch Colonial, complete with Poinsettias, a sleigh, a snowman, a lighted train, a Santa, and strings of holly everywhere. It looks like a giant Christmas store threw up on the home (since its Michigan, I say Bronner’s). “Don’t you just feel the Pagan vibe,” Dean says sarcastically. Actually, I do. Anyone that cheery over the holidays must be evil. Dean knocks on the door and a Harriet Nelson clone answers. She is the stereo typical 50’s housewife with the white cardigan, a string of pearls, and a bright cheery smile. Dean does some fake cheer back, asking if she’s the Madge Carrigan that does the meadowsweet wreaths. She cheerfully proclaims that’s her. Sam does a fake smile in response and says they were admiring her wreaths at the store the other day while Dean checks out the grossly over-the-top decorated holiday interior. “Well, isn’t that meadowsweet just the finest smelling thing you ever smelled?” Sam agrees, but says that all the wreaths sold out before they had a change to buy them. “Oh fudge!” She replies. Oh yeah, she’s evil.
Dean asks if she has anymore. Nope, those were the only ones she had this season. Why did she decide to make them out of meadowsweet? Well, nothing smells finer of course. Sam points out she mentioned that and then Edward, complete with tie, brown cardigan and pipe, ala Jim Anderson from Father Knows Best, comes and joins them. He’s there to point out, “The wreaths are fine, fine wreaths.” Then he offers them some peanut brittle! Dean goes to accept but Sam intercepts. He knows the rule, never accept candy from strangers or Pagan Gods. They’re evil alright. While Dean is sharpening wooden stakes Sam confirms on the computer his hunch about those two. The Carrigans lived in Seattle last year where two men went missing. What they had in their house wasn’t boughs of Holly but Vervain and Mint. Serious Pagan stuff. “So what, Ozzie and Harriet are keeping a Pagan God under their plastic covered couch?” Hee! How does Dean know people in the 50’s actually had plastic covered couches? Is Bobby sure the stakes will work? He’s sure. So, Sam and Dean go back to the house at night and break into the front door carrying wooden stakes among all those brilliant Christmas lights without generating an ounce of suspicion. Dean then actually sees the plastic covered couch! Yep, they left no touch unturned in this episode. Everything is bright and cheery upstairs, so they go downstairs to the locked basement. This is just gross. Even Sam is gagging. Bones, body parts, a detached eye, loads of blood, it’s a human meat grinding factory. They look around in the dark and Sam actually sees a bloody bag hanging.
For extra added creep factor, he goes to touch the bag. It starts moving. No, I don’t think an actual live body was in there. I think these Gods were messing with Sam. Sam jumps but is then put into a one armed chokehold and held against the wall by Mrs. Carrigan. She’s a little stronger than Harriet Nelson by the looks of it. Dean goes to save him but Mr. Carrigan takes him out with head slam against the wall. He goes over to his wife who easily handles Sam, giving him a talking to. “Gosh I wish you boys didn’t come down here.” Sam’s flashlight shows the darkened shadows of their face. She then slams his head against the wall that takes Sam out. Duh Sam, they’re the Pagan Gods. Rough way to find out, huh? I’m so thinking twice about my perky neighbors.
This is the most ingenious scenes ever done on television. It’s the epitome of dark humor. Brutal, horrifying, squirmy, yet laugh out load funny. It all starts with the cheery, perfect holiday picture of the Carrigan home. You know, just to deliver that scowling message that evil lurks behind the bright cheeriness of suburbia. A theme Kripke loves to drive home over and over again. The irony surely isn’t lost here. Sam and Dean are tied to chairs and Sam comes to. He calls out to Dean, who is also coming to. “So I guess we’re dealing with Mr. and Mrs. God. Nice to know.” Yeah, too bad you didn’t see that one coming.
The happy couple enters and they’ve changed their clothes. Their attire now involves loud holiday sweaters. Mrs. God’s sweater even has flashing lights. Oh, that’s definitely evil. She so pleased to see Sam and Dean are awake for all the fun. “Miss all this? No, we’re partiers,” Dean says. No Dean, you are. Sam, not so much. Mr. God calls him a “kick in the pants” and he’s figured out they’re hunters. Good to know the introductions are done. Dean points out they’re Pagan Gods, so why don’t they call it even and go their separate ways. Yeah, that didn’t work. The motive is clear, they don’t want them bringing back more hunters to kill them. Sam pulls the moral card, telling them they should have thought of that before snacking on humans. “Oh now, don’t get all wet,” Mr. God says. Even Mrs. God is shocked they would think that way. After all, they used to take a hundred tributes a year. Now they only take two or three. “Hardy Boys here make five,” Mr. God points out. Mrs. God doesn’t think that’s so bad. To-ma-to, to-mah-to. She says all this of course while putting napkins on Sam and Dean’s laps. There’s proper manners to be followed during bloody human sacrifices, don’t you know that? “Well, if you put it like that, you guys sound like the Cunninghams,” Dean says. Mr. God tells him to show them some respect. “Or what,” Sam says, “you’ll eat us?” Oh, the tag team Winchester put down. Love it!
No, there’s rituals to be followed first, which gets Mrs. God all excited. They’re sticklers for rituals after all. Dean tries again for an out, mentioning they don’t have the meadowsweet needed to kick off the sacrifice. Of course she does, and now they get these ridiculous garnishes draped around their necks. “Don’t they just look so darling!” An excited Mrs. God says. “Good enough to eat,” Mr. God adds before going on. “Alrighty roo, step number two.” Yes, this is getting as absurd as it sounds. Mr. God takes his very sharp knife and a bowl and goes over to Sam. He slices Sam’s arm and Sam screams while his blood drips into the bowl. Wussy. Dean shouts “Leave him alone you son of a bitch!” All that manages to do is trigger a diatribe from Mr. God about how they once used to be respected, but suddenly Jesus came along and their altars were being burned down and they were being hunted like common monsters. Mrs. God finishes the story of their plight. “Two millennia. We kept a low profile, we got jobs, a mortgage, what was that word dear?” “We assimilated.” Hee, someone Jeremy Carver worked in a Star Trek Borg reference into that. Brilliant!
Mrs. God goes onto explain they’re just like everyone else and even play bridge on Tuesdays. Then, again with the ironic twist, tells Dean “this might pinch a bit” before slicing his arm open. Gotta love her manners. Dean responds to his searing pain by yelling “you bitch!” Mrs. God, being the perfect 50’s housewife, chastises his use of such language and tells him to put a nickel into the swear jar. “You know what word I use? Fudge.” She says this while waving a very sharp knife at him (this might pinch a bit dear). A very irritated Dean will try to remember that.
Alice Jester is the founder, editor-in-chief, head writer, programmer, web designer, site administrator, marketer, and moderator for The Winchester Family Business. She is a 30 year IT applications and database expert with a penchant for creative and freelance writing in her spare (ha!!) time. That’s on top of being a wife, mother of two active kids, and four loving (aka needy) pets.
Hi Alice
Loved the recap. Always enjoyable…Thank-you!
I have added this episode as part of my yearly Christmas shows that I have to watch at least once. I think it lines up well with Bill Murray’s Scrooged.
Of course can’t forget the classics! A Christmas Carol (Alastair Sims version), It’s a Wonderful Life, Holiday Inn, White Christmas, Going My Way, A Muppets Christmas Carol (no, not kidding):oops
Man! I’m a total Sap around this time of year!
Karen, I’m a total Sap at this time of year too. Alice, once again a recap masterpiece. So much in the episode, as you pointed out, and so much a tribute to the Christmas spirit. I guess Kripke’s friends would think he needs a psychoanalyzing because they really don’t get the message he was sending, in his own SPN way. Their loss; our gain!
What Bobby meant by the amulet as being special, is open to interpretation. From the series aspect, no one thought the show was going to be around in season 5, so the original idea behind the amulet being ‘special’ was just for Sam to think the gift he was giving would be exception to Dad, a way to once again try to reach his father. Something so special, his Dad would have to sit up and take notice of Sam. Something Dean did Sam’s entire life. At this point in the series, the amulet was not endowed with any magical abilities. That developed between season 4 and 5, and I hope when it’s returned to Dean, it’s ‘magic’ will give us all the same warm and tingly feelings the amulet did when it was first given to Dean. The final domino in cementing the boy’s relationship before facing Lucifer. That would be fabulous to see!
You are completely right with the concept that Sam gave his special gift to Dean because he finally realized Dean meant much more to him than Dad did. This wasn’t something he didn’t know for a while either, just something he now could accept. I guess I would say, Dad’s not showing up for Christmas was just the last straw for Sammy.
It’s funny to know Jared REALLY spiked Dean drink! I didn’t know that before. Those two seem to have so much fun together…and it really comes across in the show. Hummmmm…wonder if in another life, Jensen and Jared really WERE brothers. 😮
The intense silence between the boys after the toast did contain all the ideas you brought out, but I think it would have meant a LOT to Dean to hear it verbalized, and it would have been so good for Sam’s soul to speak it. Maybe the return of the amulet will remind the boys of that moment, and why, for their lives, all that matters is being together.
Only thing I missed was a screencap of the Merry Christmas on the wall. Like what you have on the count-down clock. Really would like to have it for wallpaper for the holidays. Can you post it please?
Just Pong? Didn’t the Odyssey have a couple of other games, too, like Son of Pong?
Not funny? Oh well. 😎
Anyone ever screw up a fingernail? It hurts like a MOFO and I cannot even fathom having one completely torn out. That’s right up there with the melonballer.
Totally awesome recap of a, like, gnarly episode. (is Valley Girl speech too new for the youth of us old people?) I know Xmas is over, but I think I’ll watch this again when I get out of work.
That was wonderful Alice! Got me all teary again.
That episode is an A+ for me too. An up and down roller coaster of hoots of laughter and sobbing tears, one after another. The final shot of them through the window with the lights reflected on baby and knowing that it is Dean’s last Christmas just gets my waterworks gushing. Those poor boys! I love them so.
This is my one and only traditional Christmas show. I guess I’m sorta a grinch as well as Sam.
Sweet Peter on a popsicle stick! Those gods were absolutely fabulous characters. So very funny and macabre and creepy altogether. The actors were just perfect in their parts.
And we need that amulet back. Come on Cas, get a move on with your quest. Dean wants it back. (By the way, where is his ring and bracelet? Did Cas steal them too? I miss them also.)
What a great recap. This is my very favorite episode. There is not a single wrong note and every time I watch I catch something new and wonderful. I “strongly encouraged” several friends to record this episode this year and think it is a wonderful introduction to our wonderful show.
I recently watched this wonderful episode again when it was on television on Christmas Eve, and like grayj1133, I also usually catch something new every time I watch it. Therefore, I will have to disagree with her statement that there is not a single wrong note since I caught one with the last viewing. As the screen shots show in this recap, Dean’s jacket collar was initially down when Sam handed him the eggnog, but then the jacket collar was up when he was drinking the eggnog. This inconsistency in collar positions happens another couple of times before Dean finally takes off the jacket. Within what is about a minute of screen time, Dean’s collar starts off down when entering the motel room; then it is up; then it is down again; then up again; then down again; and when he finally takes off the jacket, the collar is up again. Such an unimportant inconsistency will never prevent me from loving this episode; however, I know I will never be able to watch the final motel scene in this episode again without having a mental image of Dean flipping the collar of his leather jacket up and down – not a bad mental image at all actually – in fact, it might even add to my love of this episode.
Alice, thanks so much for this recap, another of my favourite episodes re-invented…. You’re a master! I adore how your account of this episode matches the dark humour of it. You can’t watch a tooth pulled out? Wuss… 😉
Well, here comes my wuss-moment: I have a problem with the fingernail – I had a small accident in a pool once, slipped and ripped one nail (on my foot) out, there’s a lot of blood, actually (come on, you can’t expect me to be gentle after such an episode). It grew back, of course, but I remember the pain as if it had been yesterday (I was about fifteen at the time)… So, every time I watch that scene, I’m tempted to scream along with Sam… (yep Randal, I’ve had it…)
And I think you’re right, the Easter Bunny tradition (I believe) is of German but also French (Alsace, if I’m not mistaken) origin, going back to a German fertility Goddess. I don’t really care for the bunnies, though, Christmas is hardly gone and you already find the chocolate bunnies in some shops… Come on, it’s still freezing out there!
Always great fun, Alice!! Love, Jas
You are right, Alice, AVSC is one of the best episodes of the series. My favorite little detail is at the very end of the episode, when the camera is pulling away from the hotel room where Sam and Dean are celebrating Christmas, and one of the lights decorating the hotel, which looked liked it had burned out, suddenly lights up.
I will have to watch next time for the change in Dean’s collar position in the final scenes, that one of the posters above mentioned, or the victimized wife’s black eye that you referred to, neither of which I have ever noticed.
One thing I have noticed, however, is how unsynchronized the editing of the opposite camera angles is when Sam and Dean are tied to the chairs in the pagans gods’ kitchen. Like when the camera is facing Sam after the fingernail is taken out he is slumped down, but the very next shot from behind him he is not slumping. Then he is slumping again when we see him from the front. Also Dean turning his head from our back view of him does not match the head turning in our front view of him. It’s like the scene is on two slightly different timelines, depending on which angle the camera is shooting from. In a way it kind of adds to the wackiness of the scene for me.
These pagan gods were among the best MOTW in the series, so much better than the pagan god in “Fallen Idols.” And the porn-loving Santa was also one of the most memorable secondary characters. Just a great episode.