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Did you know that Successful Surprising Sioux City hosted an annual gathering of the world's douchebag illusionists? Yeah, neither did I, but apparently, it's a Supernatural fact, because Our Intrepid Heroes are forced to motor on over to The Gem Of The Mighty Missouri when those douchebags start dropping left and right, apparent victims of a magic most demonic. Initial suspicion falls upon The Amazing Jay (or whatever his stage name is), a broken-down, suicidal old sot who headlined at Radio City Music Hall a thousand years ago, but whose days center stage in the spotlight are now most firmly in his past. Well, until this week, that is. Jay, you see, has as of late been experiencing a remarkable turnaround in his performing abilities, packing in crowds who gasp and applaud in rabid appreciation of his death-defying stunts, but there is, of course, a catch: When he miraculously escapes with nary a scratch after a set of swords slams through his body, a douchebag on the other end of town winds up looking like a pincushion, and when he similarly manages to slip from a noose entirely unharmed, another douchebag's found dangling from his hotel room's ceiling fan, most assuredly dead.
However, in a shocking twist, it turns out it's not poor schlubby Jay who's been working all that horribly black mojo, though -- rather, it's his longtime and exceedingly long-lived friend Charlie, who acquired a grimoire from none other than P.T. Barnum himself way, way back in the day, and gradually worked his way through the wicked, evil spells he found therein until he achieved some sort of immortality. And because Charlie's never had a friend so true as Jay (and some other old guy named Vernon, who's pretty much an afterthought as far as tonight's main plot is concerned), Charlie would like Jay (and Vernon) to benefit similarly from the grimoire's actual, honest-to-Satan magic. Of course, this is impossible, because Jay comes to realize that Charlie's simply the biggest douchebag of them all, and Jay's forced to gut Charlie like a pig with some sleight-of-hand and a dagger to his own stomach. (Don't ask.) So much for that immortality dear old Charlie supposedly secured for himself a hundred and fifty years ago, right?
If you noticed a distinct lack of the show's leads in the preceding paragraphs, it's because they really have absolutely nothing to do with anything that's going on this evening. Instead, the main action between the elderly douchebag illusionists serves to reflect the trauma and tribulations of Our Intrepid Heroes' own miserable lives, but in a shocking twist that actually is, this isn't such a bad thing. And in the end, Darling Sammy decides he doesn't want to end up as the hunting world's version of washed-up old douchebag Jay, and he agrees to join Ruby on her quest to slaughter Lilith -- by any means necessary. DUN!
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Rattle, Rattle BLOOD-RED THEN! and oh, my. How shall I put this delicately? Let's see: While Dashing El Deano chilled out with all the cool beasties down in Hell -- flaying open the bodies of various rightfully condemned souls and wondering when he was finally going to get a chance at the truly deserving like Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Bremer, no doubt -- Ruby The Not-So-Sparkly-Haired Demon saved Darling Sammy's life with her magical undead vagina, and The Corpse Fucker came through the experience so reenergized, he was able to exorcise various smart-mouthed adversaries simply through the power of his almighty brain. How was that? "Most indelicate indeed!" shrieks Raoul The Big Gay Supernatural Dragon, somewhat appalled. "But accurate!" Excellent. As you know, accuracy is my primary goal. "Then you've succeeded! Do continue!" Thanks, friend of friends, but I almost missed the part wherein we learned The Corpse Fucker's almighty brain proved most ineffective against one adversary in particular: Alastair, who also happened to be one of Dashing El Deano's tightest beastie buddies, as it turns out. And when all was said and done, The Corpse Fucker vowed never to use his almighty brain ever again. Got all that? Good, because we must now request your silence for the...
...Slashy, Slashy NOW! Shortly after the Slashy NOW! advances into the blackness, the shot cross-fades to a clot of easily amused pedestrians clustered around a an affable-enough bespectacled gent who's sporting a ridiculously tacky crimson faux-leather sport coat. The gent's affixed a white, heart-shaped balloon to a tray, and after he carefully displays said balloon to his impromptu guests, the gent pulls something tricky that somehow transforms the balloon into a white dove, much to the appreciation of the onlookers. The camera pans up above the throng to linger upon a pair of street banners affixed to the nearby lamppost, from which we learn that Sioux City, Iowa, is celebrating something called MAGIC WEEK. The banners -- illustrated with top hats, canes, and pairs of white gloves -- are also careful to welcome THE INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF DOUCHEBAGS. Well, that last word might have been "MAGICIANS," but given the title for this week's episode, you'll forgive me for getting it wrong. Repeatedly. Throughout the recap.
Meanwhile, over in some bar, another douchebag showily riffles a deck of cards between his hands, but as that's all he does with them, I might be wrong in calling him a douchebag, as he might simply be a wandering, freelance croupier, but that's not important at the moment. What is important is that the camera eventually settles on this evening's primary douchebag performing a bit of sleight-of-hand of his own for the barmaid, and I realize The Rocky Horror Picture Show came out thirty-four years ago, but wow. When the hell did Barry Bostwick get to be so old? He's got liver spots on his hands, people. Liver spots! "How unsightly!" Raoul shrieks in agreement. "Now, while I myself have never been so misfortunate as to suffer from such depressing blemishes!" he continues, unbidden. "I can recommend Rozgé Cosmeceutical's simply blissful Original Formula Skin Whitening Cream, which will eliminate such tasteless discoloration without harmful side effects!" I'll be sure to pass that bit of advice over to him, Raoul. "You should!" Sigh. In any event, Horribly Old Barry Bostwick's liver-spotted and arthritic fingers fail to execute the trick correctly, much to the obnoxious glee of a much-younger douchebag at the corner of the bar. The younger douchebag -- "Patrick Vance," if my Internet sources are reliable -- continues to heckle "The Incredible Jay" while Vance's apparent assistant tosses her visibly drunk boss an irritated hairy side-eye. The barmaid, being kind, ignores all the snide commentary coming from the peanut gallery and encourages The Incredibly Old Barry Bostwick to try again. Incredible Jay, who's game face had fallen a bit during Drunk Vance's harangue, pulls himself together and suavely attempts one of those "Pick A Card, Any Card" deals, going heavy on the old-timey flourishes. Kind Barmaid's most encouraging when she discovers the card she'd chosen has disappeared from the deck, but the drunk douchebag in the corner's having none of it, and loudly hisses, "Check his pocket!" across his dirty martini. "For God's sake, Vance!" the annoyed assistant chides, but Drunk Vance will not be deterred, and slides off his barstool, staggers over to Incredible Jay, and pulls the barmaid's card from Jay's jacket pocket. "Thisssh your card?" Drunk Vance slurs, knowing it is. As Jay dispiritedly plucks the three of spades in question from Drunk Vance's hand to replace it in the deck, Kind Barmaid frowns, "Why are you so mean?" "Can't you just leave the old guy alone?" she unfortunately continues, eliciting a brief, "You're kidding with that shit, right?" eyebrow pop from poor, trod-upon Jay before she rolls her eyes a bit at her own stupidity and winces at her offended customer by way of apology. The Incredibly Insulted Jay just forlornly shuffles his deck.
Some time later, we find Jay and two of his equally ancient buddies grouped in the otherwise deserted audience of the festival's main stage, watching with increasing amounts of appalled disbelief as some douchebag supreme runs through his final tech rehearsal before that evening's performance. "You can't see me," screams the toolish hipster-punk testicle supplying the show's soundtrack, "you can't feel me! But I will make it real!" Shut up, asshole. While the music was playing, Douchebag Supreme had been lowered to the stage from the fly space, arms outstretched, Christ-like, with small tongues of flame dancing upon his upturned palms. One of Jay's friends leans forward, gaping in dismay. "Is he wearing eyeliner?" "Can't tell," the other friend snarks back from the depths of his seat, "I'm blinded by all the sterling silver." You see, and as if you haven't already guessed, Douchebag Supreme is a mindfreak of the Criss Angel variety, and so not only is he laboring beneath heavy amounts of guyliner and bling, he's also topless save for a black leather vest, the better for us all to goggle at his pasty, hairy chest. "The light has to find me!" Douchebag Supreme howls at his already-harassed underlings, baying for his spotlight. "Get it?" he screams rather divaliciously before repeating, "IT HAS TO FIND ME!" Charlie and Vernon -- Jay's two equally ancient buddies -- squint at the sequined putz on the stage and sneer, in unison, "What a douchebag!" And I'd start a drinking game right this instant centered upon that last word of theirs and how many times it's repeated this evening, but were I to do so, you'd all be dead of alcohol poisoning by the title card, so you should probably simply understand that we now have our episode title, and let's leave it at that. "Speak for yourself!" shrieks Raoul, stretching an elegantly manicured paw for his second flagon of healing booze this evening, and please try not to get too sloppy too soon, my faithful lizardly companion. We're only two and a half minutes in, and the noise you make after you pass out tends to overwhelm anything coming from the television set. "Well!" Raoul harrumphs. "Of all the nerve! I have never been so insulted in all my life! Why, I've half a mind...!" Stop right there, doll, because you've already dug yourself in far too deeply to continue. "Hmph!"
While Raoul's recovering from what I'm sure will be a temporary snit, let's continue, shall we? When Incredibly Irritated Jay orders his friends to stuff a sock in it already 'cause they're giving him a headache, Vernon -- played by veteran character actor Richard Libertini -- simply snorts, "Come on...he's shaking his ass like an Eighth Avenue hooker." "Used to be about skill," Charlie commiserates, and they've snagged the equally veteran John Rubinstein to play this character, though I should note that when this first aired, I could not for the life of me figure out what he'd done to his damn forehead -- it looks like he ran face-first into a cinderblock wall, and now there's this ugly, purplish bruise over his right eye. Of course, it's actually a Gorbachevian birthmark, as we learn at the very end of the evening, but for a while there, I kept expecting him to keel over dead from a subdural hematoma, and wondered what The Kripkeeper put these dear old gentlemen through just to get this episode in the can. In any event, Jay gripes, "Listen to the two of you -- it's pathetic! Bitter old men talking about the glory days, but you know what? This douchebag isn't the joke. We are." Charlie, concerned about his friend's tone, tries to lighten the mood with a playful challenge, but Jay doesn't rise to the bait, choosing instead to drop his head sadly for a moment before refocusing his attention on Douchebag Supreme, who's just now continued his tech rehearsal with some lame-ass trick involving interlocking rings. "That used to be us," Jay moans, feeling especially sorry for himself. "Maybe he is a douchebag, but he's playing the main stage and we can't even afford an assistant!" "What the hell are we doing?" he spits, and even though it's a rhetorical question, Charlie leans forward over Jay's right shoulder to insist they're doing all right. Jay denies this, countering that the three are instead "sad, old, and dying" before announcing his intention to perform "The Table Of Death" that evening in whatever crappy sixth-tier venue they've managed to secure for themselves. "You almost killed yourself the last time you tried it," Charlie protests as Vernon nods in agreement, "and that was thirty years ago!" "Who cares if it kills me?" Jay angrily retorts. "At least I'll go out with a headline!" "Well, he's not very cheery at all!" shrieks Raoul, and honey, that's the point. "Oh! My apologies, I'm sure! Please continue!" Oy.
Still later that evening, The Incredibly Suicidal Jay describes the illusion in question from the stage of a tiny cabaret for the benefit of the few bored, drunk, yawning patrons who have bothered to show up. Basically, Jay straps himself to a table, above which hang ten sharp swords. Once Charlie -- acting as Jay's assistant -- draws a backlit curtain around the contraption, through which we can see only the silhouettes of Jay and the blades above him, Jay will have a certain limited amount of time to escape his bonds before the swords plummet down through his body. Backstage, Vernon makes the sign of the cross while Charlie retrieves a crème brûlée torch he uses to theatrically light a fuse that'll eventually burn through the rope suspending the swords. Back on the table, Jay wriggles and struggles a bit with his binds, but it's pretty clear he's making little real effort to free himself. DUN!
Meanwhile, across town, Drunk Vance staggers from the bar and, after exchanging a few curt words with his assistant, stumbles off down the sidewalk.
Back in the cabaret, the soundtrack gets tense with violins as Jay struggles and struggles and struggles some more, with that fiery fuse all the while drawing closer to the swords' rope. Just as Vernon places a horrified fist to his mouth, the rope burns through, and the entire sword contraption slams down upon the still-struggling silhouette of Jay.
At that instant, Drunk Vance staggers to a halt, stricken, and clutching at his chest. With a strangled grunt, he collapses out of the frame down to the sidewalk, just as...
...Jay flings aside the curtains, entirely unharmed! The sparse cabaret crowd leaps to its feet as one for a standing ovation with cries of "Amazing!" and after a hesitant, shocked, apparently disbelieving pause, Charlie joins them in the applause while...
...Drunk Vance sprawls dead on the sidewalk, his dark hair fluttering in the breeze as ten slitted wounds beneath his tuxedo shirt open up to ooze blood through the white fabric. "GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!" Raoul howls, and while your faithful recapper's faithful recapping companion writhes about upon his overstuffed armchair in somewhat boozy bliss, Dead Vance and his slowly seeping wounds drip all the way down into the METAL TEETH CHOMP!
Flutter, Flutter RAAAWWWR! "Eeeeeeeeeeeee!" shrieks Raoul, once more with delight now that the memory of the late unpleasantness which recently marred his usual enjoyment of the title card has passed from his mind. "What unpleasantness?!" Never mind. "Okay!"
The day -- and no, I don't know how Our Intrepid Heroes heard about Dead Vance's mysterious death so quickly, so stop asking me -- Douchebag Supreme's menacing the sidewalks of Sioux City, performing a card trick of his own before a throng of adoring (and largely female) fans. And as he proceeds to describe the card trick not as a simple illusion, but rather as "a demonstration about demons and angels" and "love and lust," and considering the fact that he's brought along his own personal television crew to film the distasteful display, you'll not be surprised, I'm sure, when I agree with the just-arriving Dean's assessment of the performer: "What a douchebag." "It's Jeb Dexter," Darling Sammy corrects, a pleased smile growing across his face for reasons that will become obvious in a few, because as it turns out, Darling Sammy's a closet magic fanboy. Wait. I think that came out wrong. "It certainly did!" Raoul titters. I meant, he's a secret fan of magic and magici...you know what? The hell with it, 'cause I've got a crappy magic trick to recap. "Atta girl!" Be quiet, Raoul. So, Douchebag Supreme warns the crowd not to interfere, and proceeds to hurl himself into a jittery, spastic, teeth-clenching fake seizure, during which he pretends to expel the pretend demon inhabiting his all-too-real overly made-up body, and at the moment of supposed exorcism, he sprays his deck of cards across the plate glass window of an adjacent store, all the while screaming, "Go back to Hell, DEMON! And at the end of it all, one card -- the ace of diamonds -- appears to have embedded itself within the glass, which of course overawes the easily impressed Iowan chippies, and Douchebag Supreme of course finds himself the recipient of wild amounts of applause and flung panties and such. "I can't believe people actually fall for that crap," Dean pffts. Neither can I, Dean. Neither can I. The closet fanboy, however, hastens to note that it's not all crap, and as the two amble down the sidewalk away from -- as Dean puts it -- "the steaming pile of B.S." they just witnessed, Sam adds that the true magic professionals deploy a great amount of skill. Dean's still not buying it, mainly because he's suddenly remembered that Sam was totally into that crap when he was a kid, even going so far as to acquire his very own special wand. "[Snerk!]" Knock it off, Raoul. "I will if you will!" Geez. Dean eventually moves past the teasing to wax enraged about the whole thing, what with the fact that real demons and actual magic "will kill you bloody," which gives Sam an opportunity to remind us all of the Dead Vance at hand, and before we know it, we've...
...skittered on over to Dead Vance's hotel room, where his assistant busily slings props into a case while the LYING LIARS WHO LIE -- posing as FBI agents again, judging from their suits -- pepper her with questions regarding her late boss's untimely demise. Turns out Dead Vance was quite the kleptomaniac as far as his fellow douchebags' routines were concerned, appropriating anything and everything he could use to improve his own act, and for this unfortunate habit, he was not well liked in the douchebag community. There's a cute moment wherein the assistant basically pulls a rabbit out of a hat, much to Dean's surprise, before Dean pulls it together to ask if she's noticed anything unusual about Dead Vance's stuff. And wouldn't you know it? She has. Deep within a hidden pocket of the cape Dead Vance was wearing the last time she saw him, the assistant found a Ten Of Swords. And why is this so unusual, you ask? "He hated card tricks," she explains for me. "Never wanted them around, much less in his precious cape." Sam and Dean squint at the supposedly incriminating evidence. Um. DUN!? That is so not a DUN! "Not in the least!" Thanks for backing me up, friend of friends. "No problem!"
Meanwhile, over in a different and far cheaper hotel, Charlie arrives in Jay's room to wonder how Jay managed to pull off last night's illusion. He doesn't get a straight answer, but it's clear from Jay's demeanor that whatever had been troubling him the night before is gone, and on top of that, Jay's now able to pull three aces from the center of a deck, which he'd never been able to manage his entire life, so basically, we're meant to believe Barry Bostwick is the villain of tonight's piece, and that's pretty much all you need to know about that. Well, that, and the fact that Jay intends to top last night's triumph by successfully performing "The Executioner," which, as feats of prestidigitation go, has always been so dangerous that not even Houdini would attempt it. When Charlie again expresses his reservations, Jay -- a little too overeager for one last run in the limelight -- pleads, "Let's not end up like this, Charlie -- a couple of old farts doing birthdays and bar mitzvahs!" "Beats dying," Charlie counters, with a sad little shake of his head. "I would do anything for you," Charlie insists, "but I will not watch you die -- I'll miss that show." Jay calls him on this, because Charlie's always, always been there for him in the past, or something, and after another little card trick that supposedly proves Jay's really back on his game -- this involving Jay somehow slyly sneaking the deck's fourth ace into Charlie's pocket -- Charlie agrees to assist with that evening's performance. Things aren't looking too good for Charlie, right? "Right!" Wrong! "Oh, rats! What did I miss?!" Nothing, actually, because this entire scene's been nothing but an exercise in misdirection, but I'll be sure to let you know when it all actually matters, okay? "Okay!"
Later that morning, Douchebag Supreme bitches his way through a conversation with his agent via his cell while simultaneously ordering his TV crew to set up for an interview with The Incredibly Rejuvenated Jay at last night's cabaret. Meanwhile, Dean sidles up to Charlie and Vernon -- who'd been eyeing the douchebag's proceedings with barely concealed loathing from a table on the main floor, don't you know -- and, introducing himself as "Federal Agent Ulrich," announces he's investigating Dead Vance's suspicious demise. Charlie and Vernon, old pros at the art of deception, icily evaluate Dean's fake ID and studiously mask their true reactions to this utter nonsense from Our Intrepid Hero right before the camera cuts back to Douchebag Supreme getting Jay's name wrong. "What a douchebag!" Vernon unnecessarily repeats, but as Dean quite honestly couldn't agree more, he happily proceeds with the so-called interrogation now that he believes he has something in common with the ancient magicians involved, and he presents them with the Ten Of Swords. Vernon admits tarot cards were a big part of his act back in the day, but insists he hasn't used tarot or any other cards for years, offering Dean a hand virtually jitterbugging with the old-man shakes by way of proof. "Though there's a guy down on Bleecker Street," Vernon begins. "Oh, yeah!" Charlie readily agrees, instantly picking up on the scam Vernon's about to perpetrate. "He peddles that kind of specialty stuff," Charlie continues, and tarot cards are hardly specialty items, but whatever. "He have a problem with [Dead] Vance?" Dean wonders, his eyes lighting up at the possible lead. "In fact, Vance crossed him about a year ago," Vernon assures Dean. "Probably cost him about fifty grand in royalties." Dean, with little hesitation, readies himself to go. "Four-twenty-six Bleecker," Vernon instructs. "Ask for Chief," Charlie too-helpfully adds. Dean thanks them most sincerely, and the thing we know, he's...
...wandering down a dark alleyway on his own, eventually arriving at the address in question's heavily barred door. Dean bangs on the iron a couple of times, and his knock is eventually answered by a strong, silent type who lifts his eyebrows a bit in surprise when our dapper little fake FBI agent explains who he's there to see. The doorman lets Dean in, leads him down a set of stairs to the basement, and orders him to wait there. Once alone, Dean glances around at the dimly lit murals lining the walls for a bit until a heavy door even further below slams open to emit a few smoky rays of blinding yellow light, a thumping Eurotrash dance beat, and Chief himself, who just happens to be a very large leather-clad dungeon master. "Saucy!" giggles Raoul, leaning forward in his overstuffed armchair in titillated anticipation of the hilarity that's certain to ensue. And after giving Dean an appraising once-over and clearly enjoying what he sees, Chief grins, "You are really gonna get it tonight, big boy." "I'll say!" Raoul agrees. "Look at the size of Chief's whip!" Don't be vulgar, Raoul. "I'm sure I don't know what you mean! I was referring to his cat o' nine tails!" Yeah, I bet you were. "Hee!" In any event, Dean gulps and shakes his head a little bit at his own stupidity before apologizing, "There's been a misunderstanding -- I think I've been had." "Most unfortunate choice of words, if you ask me!" Raoul opines, and oh, Raoul, sometimes I hate it when you're right, for Chief offers Dean another silent and thoroughly justified leering appraisal before mincing -- well, as well as a 290-pound former offensive tackle with the Canadian Football League can mince, I suppose -- "Oh, you ain't been had 'til you've been had by the Chief!" Just as Dean's gay-panicky facial expressions threaten to make me put my fist through the television screen, however, Chief drops the act for a moment to ask -- quite properly, I should note -- "Before we get started, what's your safe word?" "Rita Moreno!" He was asking for Dean's safe word, Raoul, not yours. "Ooops! Hee!" I think Raoul's smitten. "I think you're right! Call me, Chief!"
And while you all furiously scrub your brains in a futile effort to rid them of the horrifically scarring mental image of a tubby little gay dragon getting had by The Chief, I'll head over to the week's motel room, where Darling Sammy diligently taps away at his laptop performing research on this week's case when someone knocks on the door. Sam, puzzled at who could be calling at such a late hour, rises slowly from his desk and eases his remarkably broad shoulders over to the door to peer through the peephole. On the other side? Ruby The Non-Sparkly Haired Demon, of course! And given the hilarious facial contortions she goes through to bitchface Sam -- yes, her bitchfacing Sam, of all people -- into letting her into the room, I'm inclined to call her Ruby The Stroke Victim. That temptation aside for the moment, however, the meat of what follows is this: While Sam and Dean were off ridding the world of cellar-dwelling mutant hillbilly bitch freaks and such, Lilith managed to break 34 of the 66 seals needed for Lucifer to rise, and Ruby can't believe Sam's here in "Magictown" "dicking around" on yet another meaningless case instead of out there decapitating Lilith like he ought to be. Furthermore, she thinks her darling little Corpse Fucker should just admit to himself that he actually enjoys using his almighty brain to rid the world of demons, but Sam is in no way willing to go there at the moment, so Princess Embolism prances on out in a somewhat lopsided huff, but not before yelling at him to call her when he's ready to knock it off with all of his pissypantsed whining and get the goddamned job done, already. "Well!" Raoul shrieks, appalled. "That young lady certainly has a mouth on her, I must say!" Raoul, I already made the "lopsided" joke, so you really shouldn't have bothered. "Oh, ooops! I should be paying closer attention!"
Still later, the boys meet up at Jay's Cabaret Of Death, and Deceptive Sammy right out LIES about recent events while Dashing El Deano prefers simply not to discuss his evening's activities, ever. I should probably note that we really have no idea how much time transpired since last we saw our adorable little stumpy bow-legged midget, so.... "What?! Pray continue!" I'm just saying the timeframe leaves the possibility open, that's all. "Among other things, I'm sure!" Raoul! That's revolting! "Hee! I thank you very kindly, indeed! Now be a dear and continue with your little story, because I've a feeling someone's about to die!" As you wish, and I think you're right, for Charlie's standing at Vernon's side with a straitjacket, which means, despite the heated little argument the elderly gentleman engage in regarding the nonexistent safety of the impending act, Jay's going to go through with it. But first, Our Intrepid Heroes must confront the elderly duo over Dean's little side trip to the IML beauty pageant, and the elderly duo must chide Our Intrepid Heroes for the latter's pathetically amateurish ruse with the FBI IDs. "We con people for a living, son," Charlie reminds Dean. "Takes more than a fake badge to get past us." Dean chuckles uncomfortably at this and attempts to alter his LYING cover story, but does so in so obvious a manner that I'll be skipping the details in favor of joining Jay on the stage as he explains The Executioner's details for the benefit of the considerably larger, more attentive, and more appreciative audience he has this evening. Long story short, he'll don the straitjacket and stick his elaborately coiffed head through a noose, after which he'll have sixty seconds to free himself before the trap door opens beneath his feet. Should he not make it in time, of course, he'll strangle to death. "VIOLENCE!" shrieks Raoul, clapping his impressive paws together with anticipatory glee, and for Christ's sake, Raoul, would you just wait for it? "Oh, I am so sorry, I'm sure! Do continue!" Thanks. After a volunteer from the audience confirms the straitjacket's integrity, Charlie draws the curtains closed, and the countdown begins with Jay's silhouette tussling mightily against his restraints.
Meanwhile, in the highest of high-end Sioux City hotels, Douchebag Supreme's making love to his image in a mirror, or something, dancing along with some horror punk wannabes he's got cranked up on his iPod, and that's all very unfortunate for Douchebag Supreme, for he's failing to notice one of his prop nooses as it sails of its own accord through the air behind him to coil around the ceiling fan right over his head. D'OH!
Back in the cabaret, the timer runs out just as Dean realizes Jay's not going to make it, and Jay's silhouette drops heavily through the trap door while various shocked cabaret patrons leap to their feet in horror. Meanwhile...
...the prop noose attacks! "VIOLENCE!" Douchebag Supreme's hoisted up into the air, where he gags and chokes with his feet spinning around beneath him just as...
...Jay emerges from the curtains, victorious! Enthused cabaret patrons -- plus Dean -- cheer Jay on, but Super Smart Sammy realizes, "That was not humanly possible!" DUH! Once again, guys: Do you not know the title of your own show?
Over in the highest of high-end Sioux City hotels, Douchebag Supreme twists in the air like the great big douchey piñata he now is until the METAL TEETH CHOMP! finally -- finally -- gobbles the guyliner aficionado right up into the commercial break.
Back in this week's motel room, the boys plow through their typical amounts of research, with Sam discovering that The Incredible Jay used to headline top-tier magic shows at Radio City Music Hall thirty years ago, which would make him Doug Henning's contemporary, and the less said about that, the better, because now I feel really, really old. Coincidentally enough, age eventually caught up with Jay, as it does to us all, and he's been in the "Where Are They Now?" file ever since. Dean surmises that Jay's using actual black magic -- a "death transference" spell, perhaps -- to stage a comeback, but neither can figure out what part the tarot cards play, mainly because they have yet to discover the one on Douchebag Supreme's rapidly cooling corpse. Ooops. Spoiler! In any event, none of that is important, because what is important in this scene is Our Dear Boys' subsequent ruminations on aging and death, and boring! Long story short, Dean's convinced they'll both be dead -- permanently this time -- before they've made it through their fifties, and he's pretty sure that's not going to be such a bad thing, as the elderly hunters they've met in the past have all been basket cases. "There's Bobby," Sam offers, but Dean succinctly snorts in reply, "Oh, yeah, there's a poster child for growing old gracefully," and much as I hate to admit it, Dean's got a point, what with Bobby so recently farting off to frolic in the Dominican clad in nothing more than a trucker hat and a banana sling. Ew. Bottom line is, to Dean it all ends "either bloody or sad," and that's just a fact, but Sam clearly won't settle for that, and subtly repeats (though he never mentions her name, of course) Ruby's argument for ridding themselves of Lilith -- that is, "cut the head off the snake" - is responsible for all their current woe, and everything might end up daffodils and lollipops and unicorns prancing across the rainbows that shoot out of Jensen Ackles's ass in the end. "The problem with the snake is that is has a thousand heads," Dean correctly counters. "Evil bitches just keep piling out of the Volkswagen," he elaborates, and as that visibly deflates Sam, Dean abruptly changes the topic of conversation and suggests Sam track down Jay while Dean himself tries to figure out what's up with the tarot card.
Sometime later, the two magically meet up at the highest of high-end Sioux City hotels just as the local coroner's office wheels Douchebag Supreme's now most thoroughly cooled corpse from the lobby. Dean somehow managed to rifle the corpse's pockets and turned up yet another tarot card -- The Hanged Man, natch -- so they're even more convinced Jay's responsible for everything that's been going on, with the tarot cards functioning as "black magic targets" drawn on the victims so the death transference spell knows whom to hit. One problem: Sly Jay eluded Sam's no-doubt expert tail, so now the boys have to...
...corner Jay in his shabby hotel room, which they accomplish with a minimum of fuss, but a maximum of Tough Guy Jazz Hands. Heh. Long story short, they kick down the door and, at gunpoint, confront Jay with the presumed details of his dastardly plan, but Jay apparently hasn't the slightest idea what they're talking about, so Our Intrepid Dimwits tie the experienced escape artist to a chair while they try to figure out what's really going on. Needless to say, Jay slips out of their simple boy-scout knots the instant their backs are turned and hides in the closet, which Our Intrepid Dimwits are too stupid to search, and by the time Sam and Dean have barreled out of the room and down into the lobby to find the old guy, Jay's called the cops on their idiotic -- albeit tantalizing -- asses. D'OH! And as they stare down the police's gun barrels, Our Dear Morons hesitantly raise their hands directly into the METAL TEETH CHOMP! "That'll ruin their manicures for certain!" Thanks for sharing, Raoul. "My pleasure!"
Back in the cabaret's dressing area -- which features a photo of Patti LaBelle, for some bizarre reason, like, I'm certain Lady Marmalade has never in her life stooped so low as to play Sioux City -- Charlie nonchalantly puts a high shine on his shoes while Jay and his ludicrous pompadour rant about Our Intrepid Heroes and their crazy ideas about black magic and tarot card targets and death transference spells. At some point, however, it all starts to make an uncomfortable amount of sense to Jay, so it's left to Charlie and that freakish bruise on his forehead to talk Jay down from the ledge of insanity. And it works, to a point, until Jay breaks down and admits he intended to commit suicide on The Table Of Death two nights ago, and has no idea how he managed to emerge from the evening alive. Charlie pep-talks that none of that matters, now -- what matters is that Jay did manage to escape the apparatus, and that Jay, for whatever reason, has regained his abilities as a performer, and so they must as a team take advantage of all that, and go on with the show tonight. Yeah, I'm guessing Charlie's the bad guy, now. "I should think that would have been readily apparent several scenes ago, you silly little man! After all, I myself realized it long before the most recent visit by that darling METAL TEETH CHOMP!, and I'm on my sixth flagon!" Oh, whatever, Raoul. It's the second week in a row the two leads have had so little to do with the evening's central mystery, and I guess I'm just not feeling it this time around. "There, there!" Raoul shrieks, trying to be comforting despite the fact that his volume levels are having exactly the opposite effect. "There's always week!" I suppose you're right. Should I get this over with, then? "By all means! Hurry along!" Thanks, friend of friends. "Don't mention it!"
So, a few moments later, Jay's strapped to The Table Of Death, and almost immediately after the swords slam down and Jay emerges, triumphant, through the curtains, a piercing backstage scream cuts short the audience's ovation. Jay rushes behind the scenery to find... Charlie? Sprawled dead on the stage, his silver hair still as ten slitted wounds beneath his tuxedo shirt open up to ooze blood through the white fabric? "GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!" But Raoul, I thought Charlie was the bad guy? "Oh, do hush your silly self up and just wait for the shocking twist!"
Well, in that case, I'm going to skip through the scene as it's simply more misdirection, this time centered on sure-to-be-blameless Vernon. During the commercial break and once Jay recovered from the shock of seeing his longtime friend (apparently) dead, he quickly dropped the charges against Our Intrepid Heroes, who now join him in the shabby hotel bar to confirm that they are telling him the truth, and that Vernon's the most likely suspect now that Charlie's (apparently) gone on to that great headlining gig in the sky. There's some sad-sack backstory regarding brotherlike relationships between Jay and his two friends -- and, indeed, between Charlie and Vernon themselves -- but that's not important right now because we've already left the shabby hotel bar to watch as Vernon's summoned from his room by means of a no-doubt duplicitous phone call placed by Jay on the boys' behalf, for no sooner has Vernon left than Sam and Dean break in to rifle through Vernon's belongings. !
Festival Main Stage. The Table Of Death's been transferred to the larger theater from the cabaret at some point, and Jay silently contemplates the swords hanging above his head as Vernon bounds up behind him with some good news: Jay's now headlining the remainder of the festival. Because of the aspersions Our Dear Boys cast upon Vernon's character in the scene, however, Jay's now convinced Vernon's responsible for every death that's occurred thus far, and wheels on his longtime friend to hurl accusations and whatnot until... "It's the twist! It's the shocking twist!" Indeed it is, my scaly friend, for Charlie's voice (and I do believe it's John Rubinstein delivering this line) calls out from the wings, "I wouldn't be so hard on him, Jay. He didn't do it." Jay spins back around just in time to catch a twentysomething -- who's sporting a freakish bruise above his right eye, don't you know -- emerge from the shadows onto the stage.
Vernon's room. Our Intrepid Heroes are about to abandon their useless search until Dean's wandering fingers land upon a very old hand-drawn poster. A very old hand-drawn poster featuring a twentysomething douchebag with a freakish bruise above his right eye. "Look like anyone we know?" Dean smirks. The camera flashes in on the poster's carefully illustrated birthmark, then jumps back over to...
...land upon the same birthmark -- Charlie's birthmark -- above the twentysomething's right eye. "Sweet Mary and Joseph," Vernon breathes as he slowly realizes who's standing in front of him. For his part, Jay has merely enough time to whisper his undead and freshly youthful friend's name before all three gentlemen magically vanish into the METAL TEETH CHOMP!
Main Stage, and long story short, Charlie's actually at least a hundred and forty years old, though in his present form, he appears to be about twenty-eight. You see, he used to shill for none other than Phineas Taylor Barnum himself, and Barnum was so impressed with the lad, he gifted Charlie with a grimoire, upon whose pages were inscribed actual, honest-to-Satan black magic spells. Charlie assiduously worked his way through each until he cast the final spell in the book, which granted him immortality. Well, of a sort -- he certainly was able to age, and he apparently can fake his own death in order to rejuvenate himself at the appropriate moments, but the hell with it. We're still seven minutes away from the end of the episode, and I haven't even mentioned that they cast John Rubinstein's actual son, Michael Weston, to play Charlie's younger self. Except for the part where I just did, I suppose. Now, where the hell was I? Oh, yes: Charlie's pretty much become the magical crackhead Dean warned about back in that bar scene I skipped through, and he cast various spells and slaughtered various douchebags to "save" both Jay and Vernon, because -- get this -- Charlie's never had friends so true as Vernon and Jay, and he wants the three of them to carry on as they always have, for all eternity. "That sounds pretty gay!" Indeed it does, my impressively fanged companion. Indeed it does. Unfortunately for lovelorn Charlie, here, Jay's having none of it. "Who else has to die," he demands, "so that we can live forever? What's the price tag on immortality?" Your answer, Incredibly Timely Jay, is just now arriving at the theater. "Not so fast!" Dean shouts out as he and Sam saunter down the main aisle with guns drawn. "I ain't Guttenberg, and this ain't Cocoon," Dean continues, and I suppose I should note that if you were Steve Guttenberg, Dean, I never would have started watching this show in the first place. But let's skip the irrelevancies in favor of advancing the action, okay? "Absolutely!"
Jay and Vernon back away from the boys and end up on either side of Charlie, until Dean waves them both off with the business end of his trusty pearl-handled automatic. "Immortality," Dean muses, advancing upon the unnaturally young douchebag remaining. "That's a neat trick." "It's not a trick," Charlie shrugs, and immediately, a noose shoots down from above to wrap itself around Dean's neck and yank. "It's magic!" Charlie smiles as Dean gets hoisted in the air. "VIOLENCE!" Dean's hands fly to his throat, struggling to tug the noose away from his neck and keep his airway open, as Sam immediately raises his gun to blast a round into Charlie's face. Charlie simply catches the bullet in his teeth and tosses off a smart remark before vanishing into thin air, reappearing at The Table Of Death's side. Stupid Sam allows himself to be goaded into physically attacking Charlie at this point, and it's naturally A Very Bad Thing because not only does Stupid Sam still suh-huuuuuck at the hand-to-hand, but Charlie also takes this opportunity to knock Sam flat on his back and strap Our Intrepid Idiot into the Table's restraints. D'OH! Of course, the rope suspending the swords immediately starts fraying apart, and so now both Sam and Dean are about to be sacrificed to whomever to secure eternal youth for Jay and Vernon -- neither of whom, by the way, agreed to it in the first place. And in the end, it falls upon Jay to stop it all, which he does by...shoving a knife into his own stomach? "VIOLENCE! WANTON ACTS OF UNREPENTANT SELF-INFLICTED VIOLENCE AND GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!" Oh, be quiet you dizzy lizard. What's actually happening, I believe -- and only after several lovely and talented individuals explained it to me on the boards -- is that Jay, still under the influence of Charlie's earlier death transference spell for whatever reason, has successfully sent the wound in his own stomach over to Charlie by surreptitiously swiping all but one of the remaining tarot cards from Charlie's jacket, and for whatever reason, this overrides Charlie's immortality. Just go with it, 'cause it's the best explanation you're likely to get as far as this nonsense goes. Charlie lives long enough to draw that remaining tarot from his pocket -- it's The Magician, of course, though how in hell Jay knew which one to leave in Charlie's possession, I'll never know -- and, after shooting an accusatory "You picked these strangers over me?" at his erstwhile BFF, Charlie clonks over to the stage floor, dead.
Naturally, as soon as Charlie hits the boards, both boys are freed, and Sam escapes The Table seconds before the swords slam down just as Dean drops from the flies to rip the noose from his neck. Gasping at each other, they assure themselves that they are, in fact, okay, before focusing their collective attention on Jay, whose destroyed expression sags all the way off his elderly face and into the final METAL TEETH CHOMP!
Shabby motel bar, aftermath. Sam and Dean wander in from the street to find Jay -- his arthritic hands once more deceiving him -- fumbling through a deck shuffle before the beaten old man gives up. "Hey, Jay?" Dean hesitantly begins. Once Jay's finally lifted his eyes to theirs, Dean continues, "We wanted to thank you for what you did yesterday." "I killed my best friend yesterday, and you want to thank me?" Jay bleats. That shuts them up, as well it should, until Sam awkwardly inquires as to Vernon's current whereabouts. Turns out Vernon's abandoned Jay as well, as Vernon could no longer bear the sight of the decrepit loser who supernaturally stuck their mutual acquaintance like a pig. Dean attempts a pep talk, but it does little good. "Charlie was like my brother," Jay seethes through a haze of booze and pain, "and now he's dead because I did 'the right thing.'" "So now I have to spend the rest of my life old and alone, and what's so right about that?" Jay finishes before stumbling out into the darkness, and I'm sure Sam and Dean would be very sad, indeed, had they not been knocked unconscious by the twin anvils that just slammed down onto their heads. Yeesh.
Fortunately for the purposes of this denouement, both recover from their injuries fairly quickly, and Dean ends his evening by suggesting they both indulge in healing amounts of beer. Mmmm. Beer. Sam, however, declines, and, with his voice unexpectedly tight, announces he'd rather head out for a walk. Dean blinks, then goes to hit on the waitress. Atta boy.
Out in the alleyway, Sam strides purposefully towards a waiting Mustang, and it's Ruby's, and no sooner has Sam slid into the passenger seat than he announces, "Okay, I'm in." "What changed your mind?" Ruby wonders, and Sam replies simply, "I don't wanna be doing this when I'm an old man." Ruby seems to find this answer acceptable, and as a mournful oboe accompanies their exit, Ruby steers the car directly into the final blackout. Wow. Even Ruby won't let Sam drive the car.
Well, that was depressing. "Have a cocktail!" Oh, Raoul. I think I shall. While you fix me a tasty flagon of my own, though, I should note that week's installment apparently drags Our Intrepid Heroes back to a high school they no doubt sporadically attended during their shared adolescence, and as the preview featured Dean dressed like a gym teacher, I'm sure hijinks ensue. So much for that huge, gut-wrenching decision Sam just made. "Worry about it later, you silly little man. Cocktails!" Thanks, friend of friends. "Kisses, my pretties! Kisses until week!"
Demian's snickering at your wattle. Raoul, however, has a healthy respect for age, and can't believe his rude host would even think of mocking such a vaunted symbol of experience and maturity. You may reach the former at demian_twop@yahoo.com. The latter is an imaginary gay dragon on the Internet.
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