Review – “Dream A Little Dream of Me”
“Dream a Little Dream of Me”
–Robin’s Rambles by Robin Vogel
Bobby, terrified, enters his own home, flashlight in hand. He opens a pair of double doors and a screaming woman attacks him, sending both of them to the floor. We realize Bobby is asleep and dreaming this. A maid enters his room with her cart, apologizes, and starts to back out. Noticing something is wrong with Bobby, she calls, “Wake up!” In his dream, Bobby’s fight with the woman escalates. The maid shakes Bobby urgently, trying to awaken him; failing, she screams for help.
“Long Train Running” plays on the juke when Dean joins his brother at the bar. Sam is, to Dean’s dismay, drinking whiskey at 2 PM. Sam insists, that he, like Dean, gets drunk in bars all the time and picks up girls. Dean remarks on the slim pickins’ here, and asks, “What’s going on with you?” I tried to save you, says a morose Sam. “Whiskey, double, neat,” orders Dean. “I can’t stop where you’re going, what you’ll become,” continues Sam, “even Ruby can’t, because you don’t want to be saved. How can you care so little about yourself?–What’s wrong with you?” Dean’s phone rings, the caller asking for a Mr. Snyderson. “What? Where?” demands Dean, wide-eyed.
The Impala speeds down a highway, clearly heading somewhere at breakneck speed.
In a Pennsylvania hospital, Bobby lies in bed, eyes closed. His doctor explains to Sam and Dean that he’s in an inexplicable coma; there’s nothing wrong with him, but he apparently went to sleep and never woke up. Bobby never gets sick, worries Dean, Bobby’s emergency contact, Mr. Snyderman–so what the hell is this?
In Bobby’s Pittsburgh hotel room, Sam opens the closet and finds information about the case Bobby was working on tacked up behind his clothing. Dr. Walter Gregg died in his sleep; perhaps he was dealing with something that came after him? They find something written about silene capensis, aka dream root. They decide to split up; Dean heads to Dr. Gregg’s office.
Dean questions a pretty lab assistant of Dr, Gregg’s. She’s apparently already spoken to Bobby posing as a lawman and really doesn’t want to do it again, but when Dean threatens her with nebulous “new evidence” and says he’s taking her down to the police station to question her all “official-like”, he gets her to relinquish all Dr. Gregg’s records on his sleep study.
In a dorm room, Dean shows creepy-eyed “Fish” his badge, but Fish assures him he’s only growing “fernsâ€. (hee!) Assured Dean is only here to discuss Fish’s association with Dr. Gregg, Fish offers Dean a beer, which he accepts and drinks thirstily, despite his on-duty status. Fish explains that he has Charcot-Wilbrand syndrome–he had a bike accident as a kid, hit his head, and can’t dream. The study helped him sleep and dream vividly, like a bad acid trip. Yeah, I know what you mean–no, I don’t, corrects Dean hastily. I left the study after that, I was too scared, says Fish.
Concerned, Dean sits at Bobby’s bedside. Sam joins him. “No change,†reports Dean. Sam explains that, in using African dream root, which shamans have been using for years, you can become a regular Freddie Krueger, getting inside peoples’ dreams, making good ones bad, bad ones good.
Bobby presses his back against a door, holding it closed, clutching a broom in his hand like a weapon. A woman behind the door screams. The camera pulls back, back, back, as Bobby begs, “HELP MEEEEEEE!”
“How do we find a homicidal sandman?” asks Dean. Maybe one of his test subjects?” suggests Sam, “we’d normally be asking Bobby for help.” Dean suggests they do just that–take the dream root themselves and get inside Bobby’s head. They both agree it might be a scary place to go, but even worse is having to ask Bela for help in securing the dream root. CRAP! is their mutual opinion about that. (Some fans pointed out that securing this root on-line is very easy, the stuff isn’t rare, but perhaps since time was a factor, that’s why they didn’t try it. Obviously, they wanted Bela in this ep!)
Sam is working at his computer in Bobby’s hotel room and stops to answer a knock at the door. Bela! he says, surprised. He didn’t think there was a chance in hell she’d show up. I’m full of surprises, she says, slipping her coat off her shoulders to reveal she’s only wearing sexy black lingerie. “I’m here because of you, I can’t stop thinking about you,” she murmurs, kissing him. “Are you sure?” he asks. They fall onto the bed, Bela on top, but Sam rolls them over. “SAM, SAM, SAM!” moans Bela, rolling her head from side to side in ecstasy.
Sam wakes up from his erotic dream with a goofy grin on his face and drool running from his mouth. Dean wonders if he was dreaming about Angelina Jolie or Brad Pitt. Sam wipes the drool away, grossed out, and can’t immediately help his brother read Dr. Gregg’s research because he gazes at his crotch and realizes he can’t stand up right away. Bela shows up seconds later and the scene goes exactly like Sam’s dream–except she isn’t wearing naughty lingerie and doesn’t try to seduce him. She’s brought the dream root to help Bobby–he saved her life once in Flagstaff. Dean refuses to let Bela join them on this Magical Mystery Tour, however, and places the dream root in the safe along with the Colt. Dean tells her to get her own room, even though it’s 2 AM. She leaves, livid. Bye, Bela, says Sam awkwardly, remnants of his dream still fresh. Dean looks at him oddly.
Dean hands a glass of dream root potion to his brother. Should we sync up some Wizard of Oz from Dark Side of the Moon? suggests Dean, grinning. “Why?” asks Sam. “What did you DO during college?” wonders Dean. Sam gives Dean a pinch of Bobby’s hair to add to his glass and puts some in his own; you need a bit of the person’s body in the potion to enter his dreams. (Dirty-minded people, QUIET!) They drink up, wincing at the awful taste. Both agree they don’t feel any different.
Dean rises from the bed and notices it’s raining–upside-down! They are in Bobby’s head, his house, which is cleaned up as it was years ago and weirdly sepia-tinted. They call him and search, but can’t find him. Over Dean’s objections, Sam goes outside, where the color is like in the Emerald City, bright and eyeball-shocking. Sam finds himself locked out of the house, however, and Dean can’t hear him when he pounds at one of the windows.
Dean opens a set of double doors and enters the kitchen, where he finds a terrified Bobby, whose face is all scratched up. Dean tries to explain about Dr. Gregg and the dream root, but Bobby has no idea what Dean is talking about. The lights flash. SHE’S COMING! says Bobby fearfully. “It’s a dream, it’s not real!” insists Dean. Bobby points at the wild-eyed woman with bleeding stab wounds coming toward them. “Who is she?” asks Dean. “My wife,” replies Bobby brokenly.
In Bobby’s hotel room, Sam and Dean keep on sleepin’ on, the empty glasses still held loosely in their hands.
Sam walks around the brilliantly colored outside of Bobby’s beautiful house, where flowers and trees grow, and there is a lovely little pond. It’s idyllic, peaceful.
“Why did you do this to me, Bobby?” begs his wife. “I’d rather die myself than hurt you,” says Bobby, miserable. “But you DID hurt me,” she reminds him, “you sent that knife into me again and again and again–you watched me bleed, die–how could you?” “She’s not real!” Dean pleads. “You were possessed, rabid, baby,” Bobby tries to explain,” and I didn’t know then what I know now.” “If you’d loved me you would have found a way!” she screams. Dean manages to close the double doors, separating him and Bobby from the screaming woman.
In the perfect backyard setting, Sam wanders past white sheets hanging on a line, blowing in the breeze. Suddenly, he’s struck on the head by Fish, who clutches a huge baseball bat.
In his sleep, Sam twitches his head, reacting to being struck with the baseball bat in the dream. Sam falls to the ground under Fish’s attack. “Who are you–what are you doing in my friend’s head?” demands Sam. “Self defense,” replies Fish, “he came after me, he wanted to hurt me.” “Because you’re a killer,” says Sam. “I’m a god in here,” warns Fish, brandishing the bat, “you’re just an insect.“
As Bobby’s wife bangs at the door, trying to get at him, Dean explains to Bobby that the house, his wife, it’s all a nightmare. I killed her, insists Bobby, leave me alone, let her kill me already. Dean grabs Bobby by his jacket lapels. “I’m not gonna let you die! You’ve been like a father to me. Believe me, please, take control of it!” Dean’s sincerity finally gets through to Bobby. The screaming and pounding cease. Dean opens the doors; the wife is gone. “I don’t believe it,” says Bobby. “Believe it,” says Dean–“and please wake up!”
“Sweet dreams,” says Fish, raising the bat to deliver the killing blow to Sam.
At the hospital, Bobby sits up in his bed.
The brothers each sit up on their respective beds, sweating, looking very grateful to have awakened at all.
At the hospital, Dean asks Bobby if all the stuff about his wife is true. Everybody gets into hunting somehow, says Bobby evasively. Sorry, says Dean. Thank you, says Bobby (for saving my life, which is unsaid). Sam enters and reports that “Stoner boy,” aka Fish, aka Jeremy Frost, was not in his dorm and must be long gone by now. Bobby shows the boys paperwork he had on Jeremy–IQ of 160, but after his father hit him over the head with a baseball bat 10 years ago, he lost the ability to dream. Bobby accepted a beer laced with dream root from Jeremy before knowing about him. Uh oh, confesses Dean, embarrassed–so did I! Which means Jeremy can now enter both Bobby’s and Dean’s dreams and do serious damage if they fall asleep. They have to find him first. Coffee up, advises Bobby, and don’t fall asleep.
Two days later, Dean, driving the Impala, rants at Sam–where could Jeremy be? Sam, noting how edgy Dean is, offers to drive. Bobby calls to inform Dean that the strip club he checked was a bust on finding Jeremy. Frustrated, Dean bangs on the steering wheel and yells at him, which pisses Bobby off. In the room behind him, Bela checks her cards and reports the spirits are quiet. “I’ll just blow my brains out!” shouts Dean, clearly at the end of his rope. In the Pittsburgh hotel, Bobby, curious, asks Bela, “Why are you helping us again?” “Surely you remember Flagstaff?” she says. “Oh, yeah,” he says, clearly trying to recall what the hell she’s talking about.
Dean, pissed off and exhausted from driving and too much coffee, pulls into a clearing in the woods. He’s decided he’s going to sleep and bring Jeremy to him. Determined to help, and despite his brother’s protests that he doesn’t want Sam rooting around in his head, Sam grabs a pinch of Dean’s hair to put into his leftover dream root potion.
Sam and Dean awaken in the Impala and exit the car as “Dream a Little Dream of Me,” plays. Dean sees Lisa sitting on a blanket with a picnic spread around her. Sit, she urges, we only have an hour before we have to pick up Ben from baseball practice. I’ve never had this dream before, Dean defensively tells Sam, who doesn’t believe him. “Stop looking at me like that!” adds Dean. “I love you, Dean,” says Lisa, but then the entire image flickers and disappears. “Where did she go?” asks Dean, disappointed. Jeremy appears behind a tree, and they both take off after him. In a hallway papered exactly like the woods, Dean is alone. Sam continues to walk the real woods, searching for Dean, calling his name.
In the woodsy hallway, Dean walks to the end, where a door opens. He enters. Someone sits at a desk, turning a lamp on and off. “Jeremy?” he asks, but when the man turns around, he’s looking at himself. I’m my own worst nightmare, realizes Dean, such a handsome son of a gun. Like the scene in SUPERMAN 3, going mano y mano with myself. His other self points out that Dean feels worthless, that he hates himself. Dean tries to snap his fingers and send away this cruelly taunting dream version of himself, but it doesn’t work. Instead, this Dean closes and locks the door, holds up a gun and says, “We need to talk.”
Sam awakens in the Impala and turns to Dean. “Wake up,” he urges, but it’s Jeremy, who strikes him with the bat. Sam falls out of the car and crawls away from, trying to avoid more hits. “You’re a psycho,” accuses Sam. “Doc got me hooked, then took it away,” explains Jeremy, “but I needed it and he wouldn’t let me have it.” “So you killed him,” says Sam. “I can dream again, and rest, after 15 years,” says Jeremy, “do you know what happens when that’s taken away?” “Let me guess,” says Sam sarcastically, “it makes you go crazy. “I just want to be left alone,” insists Jeremy, “I want to dream.” “Sorry, can’t do that,” says Sam. “Wrong answer,” replies Jeremy. Sam finds each of his hands tied to two stakes in the ground and his feet tied to a third. “I’m getting better and stronger all the time,” says Jeremy grimly, “and neither you nor your brother is waking up this time.”
Editor: Scary scene. The dark woods, Sam lying spread-eagled, helpless, Jeremy looming over him with that oversized bat–I just so feared for him, especially since Dean is pre-occupied battling himself in his own corner of the dream world.
“You’re going to hell and won’t lift a finger to stop it!” Dean taunts himself. “You don’t even think your life is worth saving!” Wake up, wake UP! Dean urges himself. “You got nothin’, you’re as mindless and obedient as an attack dog! What do YOU want, what do YOU dream? taunts Dean #2–your favorite car, jacket, music, all Dad’s! Have you ever had an original thought? It’s all about Sammy, protect him, boy, take care of him! He trained you, bossed you around, but he loved Sam, doted on him. You were only a good soldier, Daddy’s blunt little instrument! Your own father didn’t care if you lived or died!” Dean screams back, “My father was an obsessed BASTARD! He was the one who couldn’t protect his family, he let Mom die, I was the one who protected Sammy! I don’t deserve to die, and I don’t deserve to go to hell!” He cocks the gun and shoots himself over and over and over, then stares, gasping, at his dead alter-ego.
Bobby’s backyard – Jeremy continues to strike Sam’s tied-up body over and over, hitting him on his legs and torso. Sam grunts in pain.
Dead Dean wakes up, sits up straight and, eyes demon black, face flecked with blood, says, “You can’t escape me, Dean, you’re gonna die! And THIS is what you’re gonna become!”
(This scene, on first viewing, was terrifying. I wasn’t expecting Dean to suddenly come back to life, and his voice was terrifying! Coal black eyes, demon-saturated voice, blood-spattered face–SUPERNATURAL rarely scares me, but this time, it did!)
Jeremy, holding the bat to Sam’s throat, says, “You can’t stop me. There’s nothing I can’t do in here, because of the dream root.” “You’re forgetting something,” says Sam, eyes glinting, “I took the dream root, too!” Jeremy’s father appears, wiping the bravado right off his face. “You look at me when I’m talkin’ to you, boy!” commands Frost senior. Jeremy cowers.
Jeremy, sleeping on what looks like a bed in a jail cell somewhere, awakens.
In the bedroom, Demon Dean rises to stare at Dean.
In Bobby’s backyard, Sam strikes Jeremy violently with the baseball bat. In Jeremy’s room, Jeremy gasps for breath, then dies, eyes wide open in horror.
Dean gazes at the clock on the wall.
In the Impala, Dean and Sam awaken, gasping in unison.
While walking together in the hospital hallway, Bobby asks Sam, So, you did a little dream weaving of your own?–none of your psychic stuff?” “Yeah,” says Sam, “I concentrated and it just happened–at least I think so.” “Good,” says Bobby.
In the hotel room, Dean tells the others he hasn’t been able to reach Bela. Bobby says he never saved her life in Flagstaff; he sold her an amulet for a good price, that’s all. Check your pockets, advises Bobby, and when the Winchesters start to do just that, Bobby gives them an eye-roll for being so naive. They check the safe–Bela has stolen the Colt! Dean orders Sam to pack up–they’re hunting that bitch down!
In the parking lot, as they’re packing the Impala, neither Winchester will admit to the other what they really saw while under the influence of dream root. When they’re sitting side by side in the Impala, Dean says, “Sam, I don’t wanna die. . .and I don’t wanna go to hell.” “All right,” says Sam, pleased that his brother is finally on his own side, “we’ll find a way to save you.” Dean looks hopeful, but in his head, in black and white, he sees: Blood-spattered, black eyed Demon Dean: “You can’t escape me, Dean! You’re gonna die! And this–THIS is what you’re gonna become!”
A clean-faced demon Dean, smiling, snaps his fingers. Fade to black.
I loved this episode. The brothers saved Bobby, who has saved their butts many times, and that is always great. The whole concept of going into other peoples’ dreams is fascinating, because I believe that’s the true US in there, and I doubt I’d want anyone in there, ever, to find out about me! SCARY stuff! 8 out of 10! Do you agree?
1. What did you think of the premise of this show—that someone can kill you in a dream?
2. Did you feel a bit sorry for Jeremy, or did he deserve what he got? How did you feel about our Sammy unleashing this on him? Pretty powerful after only his second time in someone else’s head, hmm?
3. Did Dean dreaming about Lisa in such a sweet, romantic, DOMESTIC scene seem weird to you? Wouldn’t you have expected this more with someone he claimed he’d loved, like Cassie?
4. Do you think the boys have learned their lesson about Bela NOW? She ALWAYS has an underlying motive for EVERYTHING she does, right?
5. Dean has NEVER turned into a demon or become possessed by one, despite what he was told in this episode. He was in hell for the equivalent of 40 years. That’s one of this show’s biggest mysteries. Why do you suppose that is?
6. Were you surprised to learn how Bobby became a hunter? Had you suspected it was because a family member, probably his wife, had been involved with the supernatural?
7. That very last image, with a clean-faced demon Dean snapping his fingers, never made sense to me. Can you tell me what it meant?
Another one of my favourites.
1. The Nightmare on Elm Street factor is a great premise. But to have someone actually entered your mind and dream world really creeps me out. I don’t even want to see what going on in my own head at times never mind anyone else’s.
2. I did feel sorry for Jeremy to a point. To be abused and never being able to have a proper nights sleep will definitely take it tow on someone. But it didn’t justify the means.
As for Sam he had to do what he could to survive….pure self defense.
3. I loved that scene… I would love to see Dean with Lisa if he ever decides to pack in the hunting life.
4. I would say that TRUST has been tossed out the window.
5. I get the impression that one has to be in Hell for centuries before it takes an effect.
Mind you one might construe torturing and enjoying it as a sign that demonic tendencies were developing.
6. I figured it was due to a family member, but it was never something I gave much thought about until this episode.
7. Always thought the Demon was just being smug figuring he knew for sure that Dean was going to hell.
How serendipitous for your review of this to land nearly the same time as another Bobby-centric piece. This is an excellent episode, really plies those emotions and the family dynamic between all three dudes.
1. One can never go wrong with a Freddy Krueger special, especially since it was so deftly handled here.
2. What Karen said. Very similar situation to Max Miller. The bad guys are so rarely black-and-white on this show (non-Castiel angels and Lucifer excepted. Wankers, all.) and that is always a dramatic plus.
3. For all of Dean’s surface (and I really do think he legitimately digs cars and rock and roll and boozin’ etc.), a deep part of his WANTS that domestic bliss. One can have that and not be a Mr. and Mrs. Cleaver square. Cassie, like the girl from Hook Man, were flubs which I don’t count. 😎
4. Certainly, but if they did manage to lay their hands on the Colt, I’d wager, given that they’re heroes, they still might have tried to save her bacon. Maybe. Possibly. Ask again later.
5. Certainly not long enough. Ruby was there since the Black Death, we’re talking the 1340s, so around 660 years of our time.
6. Something had to push him into that life, and family, whether through a tragedy or simply the “family business,” is usually the culprit.
7. For me, that was Dean’s psyche messing with himself, the “demon” id scoffing at the “heroic” super ego, one could say.
Just rewatched this episode, and I still can’t quite figure out the last scene, either…Anyone else gonna comment on this? I love how I can find articles on almost everything Supernatural on this site, btw 🙂