13.04 The Big Empty
Title | The Big Empty |
Episode # | Season 13, Episode 4 |
First aired | November 2, 2017 |
Directed by | John Badham |
Written by | Meredith Glynn |
On IMDB | The Big Empty |
Outline | When patients of a grief counselor begin dying at the hands of deceased loved ones, Sam, Dean, and Jack investigate and are forced to deal with their own unresolved grief. Meanwhile, in the Empty, Castiel learns that he is not alone. |
Monster | Shapeshifter |
Timeline | |
Location(s) | Madison, Wisconsin Lebanon, Kansas |
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Contents
Synopsis
Characters
Definitions
- Alcohol
- Aliases
- Costumes & Disguises
- EMF
- The Empty
- Impala
- Men of Letters Bunker
- Monsters
- Revenant
- Salt
- Shapeshifter
- Silver
- Table of Death
- Unconscious
Music
None
Quotes
Sam: So you're saying you want to move on from Mom?
Jack: You wanna save her.
Sam: Yeah. Yeah I do. But, if this doesn't work, if that can't happen, that's okay. Because I do care about you, but I should have told you. I'm sorry, it's a lot.
Jack: Dean can't even look at me. He wants to kill me.
Dean: Is that a bad thing?
Sam: You're saying his drill sergeant act worked with you, but it didn't with me. And that's not the way we're gonna get through to Jack.
Dean: I can see him. He keeps staring at me.
Sam: Right because this is so easy for you, huh?
Dean: It's not easy.
Cosmic Entity: Oh yes, excellent question. You see, before God and Amara, creation, destruction, Heaven, Hell, your precious little Earth... What was there?
Castiel: Nothing.
Cosmic Entity: Yes. That's right. Nothing. Nothing but Empty. And you are soaking in it. Angels and demons, you all come here when you die.
Castiel: Every angel that ever died is here?
Mia / Kelly: Jack, it doesn't matter what you are, it matters what you do. And even monsters can do good in this world.
Jack: You really believe that?
Dean: Don't say that.
Sam: What? You've been wanting me to admit that since it happened.
Trivia & References
- Damien refers to Damien Thorn, the son of Satan, who is the main character in The Omen series of films.
- Adventures in Babysitting is a 1987 comedy movie.
Jack: The computer said I'd like it. I do like Ashoka, kinda hate Anakin.
Sam: Uh, that's probably for the best... Never mind.
- Clone Wars is an animated series set in the Star Wars universe that ran from 2008-2014. Ashoka Tona is a Jedi who trains under Anakin Skywalker. Anakin, of course, goes Dark Side and becomes Darth Vader.
Sam: Yeah. Sometimes.
- John Bonham was the drummer for the British rock band Led Zeppelin. Bob Seger is an American singer-songwriter; his hits include "Night Moves', which featured in a Sam-Dean singalong scene in 11.04 Baby. "Anderson" may refer to Ian Anderson, flautist and lead singer of Jethro Tull, or possibly Jon Anderson, former lead singer of the progressive rock band Yes.
Dean: They're called ghosts. And hanging around makes them go Looney Tunes. They go crazy.
- Looney Tunes were cartoons by Warner Brothers that ran from the 1930s to the 1960s. As "looney" is slang for "lunatic" the phrase became slang for someone having a mental illness.
Dean: Yeah, well, what does these days? You know, I mean we got portals to apocalyptic words, we've got shapeshifting demons. Dealing with a whole new set of tiddlywinks. I say we just, do what we do.
- Tiddlywinks is a game where players try and flip flat discs into a container.
- Dean is referring to the Kool-Aid poisoned with cyanide that members of the People's Temple were made to drink during the Jonestown massacre.
- A reference to cannibalistic psychiatrist Hannibal Lecter.
Dean: Yeah, and doctor's gonna eat our liver with fava beans and a bottle of chianti.
- "Fava beans and a bottle of chanti" is a reference to this famous scene from The Silence of the Lambs.
- Spock is one of the most iconic characters from the Star Trek series.
Cosmic Entity: Oh, I'm just your friendly neighborhood cosmic entity.
- A play on Spider-Man's nickname of being known as, "Your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man."
Cosmic Entity: Oh yes. Yes, yes, yes. I show up in my real form and you freak out, rip out your own eyes, etc... that would be embarrassing for the both of us.
- An element of author H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos is that if a person were to lay eyes upon a member of the Great Old Ones, the sight would drive them mad.
- A reference to the 1929 song, "Tiptoe Through the Tulips".
Buddy: What? A monster? Well, so are you, and it's about time you embraced that. So I'm not gonna kill those boys, you are. You end them, or you die. Courtesy of Tweedledee's silver bullets.
- Tweedledee and Tweedledum are fictional identical twin brothers from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland.
Minutiae
- Sam used the same line in 4.04 Metamorphosis when he tried to reason with a rugaru who ironically is also named Jack.