Title Playthings
Episode # Season 2, Episode 11
First aired January 18, 2007
Directed by Charles Beeson
Written by Matt Witten
Outline Sam and Dean investigate two strange deaths at a small Connecticut inn run by a single mom whose young daughter plays with an imaginary friend.
Monster Spirit
Location(s) Peoria, Illinois
Pierpont Hotel (Cornwall, Connecticut)
Sam and Dean investigate an Connecticut Inn run by a single mother where mysterious deaths are taking place. They find evidence of Hoodoo, and try to figure out who is causing the chaos.
Music
Trivia
In-joke:
Dean goes to the hotel's bar for a drink; he's served by an elderly
bartender who knows everything about the hotel's history. Bright,
diffuse light illuminates them both from below. This is a homage
to a scene with Jack Nicholson in The Shining (1980). The Winchesters
also get room 237, which is the haunted room in the 1980 movie
(room 217 in the novel and the later remake in 1997), and both
versions feature two sinister sisters.
Jared Padalecki stated that he and Jensen Ackles were somewhat
freaked out by the room of blank-staring dolls in this episode.
They kept daring each other to "poke" one particular
eyeless doll in the eye sockets or to stand alone in the room.
The pranks escalacted slightly when Jared put a few of the dolls
in Jensen's trailer "just to freak him out".
Quotes
Susan:
What the hell happened out there?
Dean: You want the truth?
Susan: Of course.
Dean: Well at first we thought it was some kind of hoodoo curse.
But that out there, was definitely a spirit.
Susan: You're insane.
Dean: That's been said.
Dean: Feels good getting back in the saddle, doesn't it?
Sam: Yeah. Yeah, it does. But it doesn't change what we talked
about last night, Dean.
Dean: (evasive) We talked about a lotta things last night.
Sam: You know what I mean.
Dean: You were wasted.
Sam: But you weren't. And you promised.
Dean: (as Susan's taxi pulls away) Think you could have hooked
up with some MILF action there, bud. Seriously, I think she liked
you.
Susan: I don't believe this.
Dean: Listen, sister, that car didn't try to run you down by itself,
okay? I mean I guess it did, technically, but if a spirit can...
forget it.
Sam: This woman's had a stroke.
Dean: Yeah, but hoodoo's hands-on...
Sam: Yeah.
Dean: ...you gotta mix herbs, and chant, and build an altar.
Sam: So it can't be Rose. Heck, maybe it's not even hoodoo.
Dean: You know, she could be faking.
Sam: Yeah, what do you wanna do, poke her with a stick? (Dean
nods) Dude, you are not gonna poke her with a stick!
References
Dean: It's
a greasy pork sandwich served up in a dirty ashtray.
This is a quote from the movie "Weird Science", in which
two nerds creates the perfect woman.
Dean: We might even run into Fred and Daphne while we're inside.
Referencing to Fred "Freddie" Jones and Daphne Blake,
two of five characters featured on the TV series of Scooby Doo
which is the longest-running American animated television series
produced for Saturday morning television in several different
versions from 1969 to the present.
There are multiple references to The Shining throughout the episode.
Dean and Sam stay in room 237, the low tracking throughout the
hotel's halls are redolent of similar cinematography, and the
scene in which Dean wanders into the hotel bar to talk to Sherwin
is reminiscent of a scene in the film.
Many of the low tracking shots of the hotel's halls are reminiscent
of cinematography used in The Shining
MILF - Mother I'd Like to F*ck
The cinematography used in the scenes involving Rose (the grandmother)
in the upper storey of the hotel is highly reminiscent of Alfred
Hitchcock's "Psycho"
Maggie's line "We can have lots of tea parties. Forever and
ever and ever." is reminiscent of the twins line in The Shining.