Supernatural Station

Fresh Blood

Supernatural Season 3, episode #7.
Airdate: Thursday Nov 15, 2007.
Written by Sera Gamble.
Directed by Kim Manners.

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• Synopsis: Click here to read the episode summary

  The Winchesters are interrupted in the middle of a hunt when Gordon and his partner, Kubrick, set upon them armed with handguns. With Dean running directly into the line of fire, the brothers flee in a spray of bullets. They meet up at the motel where Sam expresses his frustration with Dean’s suicidal behavior and tells him he needs to stop it and “just be his brother again.” While searching for Sam, Gordon stumbles upon the vampire that had been Winchesters’ target and is captured. In a devastating irony for Gordon who has hunted and killed many vampires, he is turned into one himself. But this does not stop Gordon’s insane desire to kill Sam. He captures a woman and turns her into a vampire to lure the Winchesters into a trap. Separating the brothers, he attacks Sam and when about to kill him, Dean crashes in just in time to stop him. When Gordon attacks Dean, it is Sam who launches himself at him then proceeds to slice off his head with barbed wire in an excruciatingly slow manner. Later while working on the impala, Dean tells Sam that he should know how to fix the car himself…for the future…and shows him what to do it, just like a big brother.

• Praises: I absolutely loved this episode. Hands down, it was the best episode of season 3 so far. It had all the elements that make Supernatural a great show. It had suspense, it was scary, there was lots of fighting, great brotherly moments, and some Dean snarkisms. There weren’t any funny moments to speak of, but since that’s been overdone in the last few episodes, it is not missed. Gordon is as badass and as scary as ever. Sterling K. Brown was superb. He makes Gordon such a dynamic, believable character that I get completely engrossed watching him. Turning Gordon into what he hated the most, a vampire, was almost too cruel. And the way Sam killed him…yikes! I never thought I’d ever see Sam kill someone slowly, but he did it. I am actually a little sad that Gordon is no more. Like Meg from season one, he was such a good villain that fans like myself will remember him fondly. This episode’s piece de resistance, though, was it’s final scene. Dean’s words about Sam inheriting the impala and Sam’s accepting the responsibility of caring for it…felt so sad, so final…so heart-wrenching. I take my hat off to the writer of this one…only on Supernatural could there be such a tender moment between two brothers with absolutely no hugs or touching at all.

• Nags: Where was the classic rock music? Kripke, you said that you wanted classic rock to be a part of the show. This season seems to be the exception! Also, WTF was with all the vampire angst? I know there was supposed to be an analogy to Dean somewhere in there…but using such an unsympathetic character as a drug-dealing vampire…it just didn’t work. And did the boys behead the vampire or not? It wasn’t shown and I missed it, if it was said. Another problem with this episode was…yes, you guessed it…Bella. She was entirely forgettable and when her brief scenes were over, that’s exactly what I did. Though she did pretty well in the comedy-filled episodes, in this more serious, dramatic show, she seemed completely out of place. Maybe it’s that hoity-toity British accent that made her fit poorly into Supernatural’s dark, gritty vision of America. Her scenes did not flow well with the rest of this episode and felt more like they were put in after-the-fact to give her a role. [Hey, Kripke, I have a suggestion for you: how about making Bella’s accent turn out to be completely faked…and give miss silk sheets a dirt poor, white trash background…and make her real name “Stella”, while you’re at it…that would make her much more interesting and fit better.] Anyway, these are relatively small faults in otherwise great episode. I have to say that this was a nice way to end the first sequence of new episodes for season 3. I am now more eagerly looking forward to seeing more new episodes after the holiday hiatus.

• My Rating: excellent episode. 4.5 out of 5 stars.

This entry was posted on Saturday, November 17th, 2007 at 8:07 am and is filed under Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.