Let’s all talk about Hell House (S1 E17)

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    • journalbookbinder
        March 16, 2021 at 10:58 am #6235

        It’s where we first meet the Ghostfacers! Well, back then they were The Hell Hound’s Lair. I love the concept of a large group wishing something into existence.

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      • journalbookbinder
          March 16, 2021 at 10:58 am #6238

          This one had some fun elements. I used to watch those real ghost hunting shows so skewering them is easy and fun. Ghostfacers was much a much better episode in that vein…funny and so sad…but we haven’t gotten there yet.

          This is where we meet Harry and Ed. They are hilarious. Harry so reluctant and timid. Ed with all these illusions of grandeur. Ed is such a douchebag! And it’s fun to watch Sam and Dean “play dumb” with them about ghosts.

          The main idea behind this one is a great one…the tulpa in the internet age with the aggregated power of all the people online thinking something into existence…then changing the lore with new posts that they believe and it actually changes the lore. A cautionary tale of messing with things you don’t understand…like painting an ancient symbol that might actually summon something or start something in motion.

          There was a lot of “filler” here with people creeping around the basement of the house, looking at the canning jars, etc…but overall, I did like it. I forgot that the prank war between Sam and Dean was also part of this one! The final prank being the one they both played on Harry and Ed as they drove off to stardom based on a call from a producer that was actually Sam.

          After all of that research…the idea of changing the story so that iron rounds WOULD kill the ghost was a great idea! But then it didn’t work when Harry and Ed failed to post the changes and Dean ended up burning the house down which seemed overly-simple after all the trouble they went to to try to change the lore and kill the thing with iron rounds.

          But I guess Dean was working off the cuff there. True; if the thing is tied to the house and the house no longer exists, I guess it will work, but I agreed with Sam – what if someone posts in the lore that it CAN leave the house??? Dean didn’t really have an answer for that.

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          • kate38
              March 16, 2021 at 10:58 am #6340

              “The main idea behind this one is a great one…the tulpa in the internet age with the aggregated power of all the people online thinking something into existence…then changing the lore with new posts that they believe and it actually changes the lore. A cautionary tale of messing with things you don’t understand…like painting an ancient symbol that might actually summon something or start something in motion.”

              Yes, JBB — a cautionary tale, indeed. Humans are capable of thinking up such horrors when we put our minds to it. And with the force of the internet behind us, the possibilities are frightening.
              And yes — let’s hear it for stupid kids who dabble in magic without realizing they’re dabbling in magic.

              I kinda liked Dean going off script with burning the cabin down. He didn’t have a lot of time, and had to come up with something. And Sam tricking the Ghostfacers into thinking they had jobs in Los Angeles (after agreeing to take down their website) was clever, too.

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            • kate38
                March 16, 2021 at 10:58 am #6341

                “…if the thing is tied to the house and the house no longer exists, I guess it will work, but I agreed with Sam – what if someone posts in the lore that it CAN leave the house??? Dean didn’t really have an answer for that.”

                Guess you could be right, but didn’t Sam trick the Ghostfacers into shutting down their website? Of course, someone else could change the lore about the house (what’s left of it), but they’d have to set up a whole new website to do it, right?

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                  • Shannon
                    March 16, 2021 at 10:58 am #6344

                    No. Sam knew they wouldn’t shut down their website. Which is why he gave them Intel on Mordechai being afraid of shotguns, so the lore would change upon posting the website. Then they can kill Mordecai, the tulpa. The ghostfacers lied and put the info on their site, just as Sam knew they would. Their computer crashed. Therefore, was not up long enough for people to see and believe the new lore and couldn’t change how to kill him.

                    I have watched episode recently. The server says, “gents.” It’s a very common, rather quaint form of address in many bars and diners.

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              • kate38
                  March 16, 2021 at 10:58 am #6337

                  Feel free to hate me, but I NEVER liked the Ghostfacers. They’re not as bad as Bela, in terms of lying to people and taking their money. But at least Bela was the real deal. These guys were just frauds. Sigh…

                  Aside from the Ghostfacers, and the fact that I had NO sympathy for the stupid kids. I liked this episode. I loved the story, the tulpa, and even the practical joking between the brothers. It added so much “color” to these characters in season 1, when we were still trying to figure out who they both were. Ironically, I remember Jensen and Jared both saying that in the early seasons, they used to play practical jokes on each other, but it quickly got out of hand and it became apparent that things were escalating – so they turned their attentions to other people. Then poor Misha comes along in season 4 and has to bear most of their pranks for the next 11 years.

                  NICE sets by Jerry Wanek and his peeps – both the abandoned cabin and the motel room with the Alamo on the wall and steer horns for headboards. LOL!

                  Okay – never ending Supernatural fandom debate. When the guy at the fast good joint hands Dean his food, is he saying “Here you go, gents.” Or “Here you go, Jensen.” I think it’s the latter – mostly because that joint looks a lot like the food truck on the CW’s lot, so the guy handing Dean the food probably sees Jensen every day and just slipped up. We’ve seen that on-lot commissary in behind-the-scenes videos before, right?

                  Location cameo: Hey, in the scene when the boys go to the trailer park to ask the Ghostfacers to shut down their website, the brothers are walking back to their car and we can see a motel in the distance. That’s the same motel from “Bloodlust” (when Sam gets knocked out and kidnapped by Lenore and will-eventually-be-Benny) and “Remember the Titans”.

                  This was a fun one overall. I think the tulpa was a cool monster — as only human imagination can create.

                  kate

                  • This reply was modified 3 years ago by kate38kate38.
                  • This reply was modified 3 years ago by kate38kate38.
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                • journalbookbinder
                    March 16, 2021 at 10:58 am #6688

                    I still use “tupla” as kind of a verb. “We’re going to tupla that ______ into existence.”

                    I am amused by the Ghostfacers as comedic characters. And they do make Sam and Dean look that much cooler (like they need that!).

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                  • PigNaPoke
                      March 16, 2021 at 10:58 am #7056

                      Okay – never ending Supernatural fandom debate. When the guy at the fast good joint hands Dean his food, is he saying “Here you go, gents.” Or “Here you go, Jensen.” I think it’s the latter – mostly because that joint looks a lot like the food truck on the CW’s lot, so the guy handing Dean the food probably sees Jensen every day and just slipped up. We’ve seen that on-lot commissary in behind-the-scenes videos before, right?”

                      Hi kate38, I always thought “gents” and my subtitles also said “gents”. 🙂

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                    • PigNaPoke
                        March 16, 2021 at 10:58 am #7058

                        I always thought the was a fun episode but with every rewatch it has gained more relevance to the zeitgeist for me. With everything going on NOW with social media, manipulation of public opinion, herds of sheep running with some screwed up “leader’s” opinion and so on…..this episode seems so ahead of its time.

                        I also do like the Ghostfacer dudes. They are so charmingly clueless and overconfident. HA. Their weird camper lair is hilarious to me. And of course I LOVED their mantra of “WWBD” (What would Buffy Do) because….YES….I ROCKED that sticker on my car when the show was on!

                        Of course they are doing the ghost hunting for ALL the wrong reasons and it is super sad that in the later episode that costs their co-worker’s life BUT here I find it amusing and a little bit of a cautionary tale NOT to bite off more that you’re willing to chew…. It’s all about how NOT to do and to leave specialty work to the experts. And that goes for the stupid kids painting the symbols in the house, too.

                        The case was structured well for me too. I loved that this was something totally new to the Winchesters and they BOTH had to show their smarts and observational skills to figure it all out.

                        The house was nicely creepy – I mean give me rickety stairs into a dingy basement full of glass jar with highly questionable content any day and I will shudder.

                        And the MOTEL room was awesome! I would constantly hit my head on the steerhorns but it looked perfect.

                        Just like you, kate, I LOVED the simple but effective approach Dean took at the end in burning the cabin down. Seemed logical to me.

                        I really enjoyed the little prank war between the brother’s too – they seemed so young and careless like that – and, hey, first NICE glimpse of a Sam torso. Can’t be mad about that.

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                    Let’s all talk about Hell House (S1 E17)

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