From MadCap's Couch - "Supernatural: Asylum"

I was going to make a "Welcome to Sanitarium" joke, but this episode just had to use a different word for it. Figures.

So, so far in Supernatural we've had a vengeful ghost, a Wendigo, a vengeful ghost, a demon, a vengeful ghost, a skinwalker, a vengeful ghost, a Native American bug curse, and not one but two ghosts...you might think that the Supernatural writers are on a bit of a kick involving ghosts. Don't worry, though, because this one is a very original idea...a story about vengeful ghosts!

What a refreshing change of concept!

After the brief recap, we come to the Roosevelt Asylum in Rockford, Illinois. It's dirty, dingy, and has several broken windows. Apparently the State of Illinois has a dim view of mental health rehabilitation. I joke, of course - anyone from Illinois, please don't shiv me. No, instead, Roosevelt Asylum is apparently haunted and is a hot spot for teenagers to break into as an older cop tells a younger cop who is definitely not local. Finding that the kids brought bolt cutters, they split up (big mistake!) and the younger cop heads into a cell marked "Biological Hazard" because he's an idiot.

The older cop finds some teenagers and shoos them off. New cop heads back after finding something...and is acts strangely. Getting home, he is dead silent to his wife before shooting her and then himself.

"Please tell us we aren't in Scary Movie!"

Sam and Dean are in yet another motel, contacting leads and reading from John's journal. Sam expresses some worry about trying to find him, but a text message gives the boys a set of coordinates and Dean does some quick Googling to find the place - Dean cross-references with the journal to find that, yes, the asylum was earmarked by John. He refuses to take an argument and they head out.

At the bar, Dean tries to get the information from older cop, but he isn't having it. Sam storms in and throws Dean out of the bar, pulling a perfect convincing con. This leads to Sam and Dean having a few lines of dialogue about Sam's shoving abilities (and where he might have gotten the inspiration for his method acting) and Sam reveals that he learned about the younger cop - he was a good guy, he and his wife were thinking of having kids. Nothing that would warrant a double homicide.

The boys go poking around in the titular asylum, Dean giving a history lesson about the South Wing - namely three kids broke in in the 1970's and only one survived, saying one his friends went crazy. Going in through the now-open door of the South Wing, the brothers find a disused electroshock therapy lab and they muse on what might be the cause of the supernatural occurrences. They also discuss John not being there, and Sam pulling on the reins that John is putting on them even now.

This is why Dean always gets the extra cookie, Sam.

After the melodrama, Dean finds a sign leading them to a Sanford Ellicott, the former director. This leads them to a James Ellicott, his son.  James is a psychiatrist, so Sam poses as a patient to get more information. James isn't buying into it, though, and Sam gets a psychotherapy session because James believes he's avoiding talking about his own problems. Eventually, James agrees to tell him about the riot at Roosevelt Asylum if Sam talks about himself.

A long enough time later for Dean to have issues with it, Sam returns and tells Dean about the riots - namely that in '64, there was a riot where several patients and staff were killed including Sanford Ellicott himself - whose body was never recovered. So a bunch of missing bodies on top of the incredible levels of violence. Goody!

A couple of teenagers break into the South Wing because they're stupid, the girl insisting that they leave but her date not having it. He wanders off, alone, into another room and a door closes behind him. He doesn't think anything is quite wrong until his flashlight goes out and mauled up looking ghost of a patient starts making out with him.

Luckily, Sam and Dean are on the case and head in to investigate. We get a lot of "spooky" shots here such as moments where something runs around in the foreground out of view or the speed up-slow down effect happens to a person. More luckily, there aren't any jump scares and Sam and Dean have the joys of rock salt on their side. Sam notes, however, that the female ghost that appeared didn't seem intent on hurting him, despite her menacing appearance. They find the teenage girl, Katherine, freaking out after losing her boyfriend - Gavin. The last she heard of him was him screaming. She's determined to not leave without him, despite Dean and Sam's insistence.

"He's not the one they call Doctor Feelgood."

With Sam on one path and Dean and Katherine on another, Sam eventually finds his way to Gavin while Dean chastises Katherine for not paying attention while watching horror movies...which is rich coming from a guy who just suggested they split up. This gets paid back to him when a ghostly arm grabs Katherine and pulls her into a cell. Dean tries to break her out, Sam and Gavin rushing up to tell her that she has to face it. When she does, the ghost leans over and whispers something in her ear - "137" as she tells Sam and Dean right after.

Dean heads off to Room 137 while Sam leads Gavin and Katherine out. Sam gets a short scene where Katherine acts him a few questions about what they do and whether or not Dean is his boss.

In the Room, Dean finds an office while Sam and the teenagers find...a locked and barred door. They aren't getting out. Dean finds a hole in the wall and finds an old journal within. It seems that Doctor Ellicott was doing some rather insidious experiments. Dean calls Sam, his call getting cut off, and so Sam goes looking for him after giving the teens a shotgun. Sam enters the same "Biological Hazard" door from earlier and finds a secret passage way that opens all on its own into a mini-lab...and he finds Doctor Ellicott's ghost, who grabs his head and tells him that he's going to make him all better as his head starts crackling electric blue.

...yeah, I'm sure he's totally fine.

Dean returns to Katherine and Gavin, the former of who is breaking up with the latter, and learns that Sam went to the basement after him...but Dean made no call to him. He Commando's up and goes after Sam. Dean tells Sam what he found out - namely that Ellicott went poking around in the heads of patients to take care of their mental problems but only succeeded in making them worse. Hence, the patients rioted against him. Dean totally doesn't recognize when Sam is acting strangely up until Sam's holding him at gunpoint.

Sam shoots Dean with the rock salt and we get first Sam and Dean fight because of their complete lack of communication skills. It doesn't go far before Dean gives Sam his gun and tells him to kill him. Sam pulls the trigger...but it's empty. Dean then gets up, chastises Sam for think that he'd give him a loaded pistol, and knocks him out. Poking around in the lab, Dean finds the ever-so fresh corpse of Doctor Ellicott and prepares to salt and burn him. Ellicott jumps him, but not before Dean can set the body on fire. The ghost is destroyed and his influence is broken.

Gavin and Katherine get warned off of going to any other asylums and leave, and Sam and Dean have a chat. Sam insists that, while he remembers everything, he didn't mean any of it. Dean, however, puts off any talking about it, just wanting to sleep. It is as he sleeps, the fangirls getting a shirtless Dean scene, that his phone rings...and to Sam's surprise, it's John on the other end.

"My mind to your mind...my thoughts...to your...thoughts..."

There's really not much to be said about Asylum. It has a fairly stock horror set up with the haunted asylum with the director doing some morally questionable things that lead to ghosts. Not good, not bad. If you are in the mood for a ghost episode of Supernatural, then it is certainly on the roster. The ghosts are pretty minimalist throughout, apart from Ellicott going all Shock Treatment near the end on both Sam and Dean. There's really nothing objectionable about it, but nothing that really makes it stand out, either.

Like I pointed out in the opening few paragraphs of this review, there are a lot of ghost episodes in Supernatural's first season. So much so that they all kind of start blurring together. Next time, however, is not a ghost episode. Instead, we're going to see a god.

...okay, it's a sight that's rather amusing to viewers now, but back in the day this was a big deal. If you're following along, you know what's coming...and very appropriately, too, given a certain holiday coming up in a little over a week that you might have heard of. Next time...it's time for Scarecrow.

Supernatural is the property of the CW and Warner Brothers.

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