15.04 Atomic Monsters

Title	Atomic Monsters
Episode #	Season 15, Episode 4
First aired	November 7, 2019
Directed by	Jensen Ackles
Written by	Davy Perez
On IMDB	Atomic Monsters
Outline
Monster	Vampire God
Timeline
Location(s)	Lebanon, Kansas Beaverdale, Iowa Wisconsin
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Characters

• Sam Winchester
• Dean Winchester
• Chuck Shurley / God
• Becky Rosen
• Benny Lafitte
• Billy Whitman
• Janet and Henry Whitman

Definitions

• Aliases
• Alcohol
• Alternate Universe
• Cameras
• Costumes & Disguises
• Dead Man's Blood
• Demonology
• Demon Blood
• Food
• Impala
• Leviathans
• Men of Letters Bunker
• Monsters
• Specialty Bullets
• The Supernatural Books
• Table of Death
• Telekinesis
• Vampires

Music

• "Sounds of Someday" by Radio Company

(plays over the montage of Billy Whitman accepting his death)

Quotes

Dean: The past few days, you've barely come out of your room. Look, man I get it, okay. With Jack, and Rowena. Rowena knew what she was getting herself into, she knew what needed to be done.

Dean: You know, local police are freaked. Never seen anything like this, they got no idea how to deal.
Sam: Of course not. Because That's our job, we keep them from dealing with the truth, with what's out there and we carry the weight. It's great. Meanwhile, they get to go back and live in their white picket fence bubbles.

Dean: You know ever since you were a little kid, you wanted to live in a town like this. Lame. Normal.
Sam: Yeah, we don't get normal. These towns, everything is the end of the world. Late for work, kid doesn't get in the right school. Whatever. They don't -- they have no idea what's out there.

Becky: I run the most successful Etsy site for unofficial "Supernatural" merchandise in the country. Probably the world.

Becky: I realized I wasn't in love with the real Sam Winchester. I loved his character. So instead of reading your stories, I kept writing my own.

Chuck: Your own... "Supernatural"?
Becky: Where the guys didn't have to hunt monsters all the time. They just sit around and do laundry and talk, you know? I mean, that's what people like the most, anyway.
Chuck: Well, I mean, people like monsters.

Becky: Meh.

Becky: "You're a writer, a writer who's not writing. And when a writer's not writing, they feel sad, and they get lost. And the writer asks themselves, "Why do I feel this way? Why am I so sad and lost?" And what does all this navel-gazing and hair-pulling amount to in the end? Procrastination, distraction. Just one of a million ways the writer avoids doing the one thing that is all but guaranteed to make the writer feel better."

Dean: Look, man I get it. I get it. We've lost, way, way too much. And it's hard not to feel like just cashing out. I felt like that, after Chuck back at the crypt. But you know what brought me back? You did. Saying that what we do still matters. I mean that's why I dragged us out here, that's why I wanted to work a case. To save lives. You know? Because it is, it's a crap job. We do the ugly things so the people can live happy.

Sam: Yeah. Yeah, lucky them.

Dean: Yeah, lucky them. But it doesn't change a thing. You know what I mean? We still do the job. But we don't do it for us. We do it for Jack, or Mom. For Rowena. We owe it to anybody that has ever given a damn about us to keep putting one foot in front of the other, no matter what. Hey, man like ou said, now that Chuck's gone, we're finally on our own. We're finally free to move on, you know?

Trivia & References

"Atomic Monsters" may be in reference to the concept of the nuclear family, and how the Whitmans each have done monstrous things to protect their family.

The opening gunfight in the Men of Letters Bunker was meant to evoke the action scenes in the John Wick films.

Sam uses the alias Mr Plant referring to Robert Plant, lead singer of Led Zeppelin.

Sam: Yeah, but every time I ask for it you say and I'm quoting, "I don't want any of that hippie Sarah McLachlan grass-eater crap in the Meat Man's kitchen." Which, by the way, for what it's worth, you gotta stop calling yourself the "Meat Man" it-it doesn't mean what you think it means.

Dean: Yeah it does.

Sarah McLachlan is a Canadian singer-songwriter, however she no longer claims to be a full vegetarian or vegan.

A "Meat Man" is a "man with a big ass dick" or literally a man made out of meat. It is uncertain which definition Dean is aware of.

Chuck: What are these?

Becky: My maquettes.

A maquette is a scale model of a sculpture, building or, in tv and movies, a set.

Becky: So, you want me to fluff you?

In the adult entertainment industry, a fluffer is someone whose job it is to get the male participant erect before a scene starts.

Becky: This was supposed to be my catch-up day. I have billing to do, orders to fill, three AU Fic deadlines breathing down my neck.

A "AU" in fanfiction take a number of forms. They include stories that have one or two major points of divergence from canon, for example a world where John was killed by a demon, and Mary raised Sam and Dean as hunters. The other main group of stories takes characters from canon and places them in totally different lives - for example a story set around Sam, Dean, and Cas as college students, or pirates, or burlesque performers on a space freighter.

Minutiae

"Atomic Monsters" marks Jensen's sixth and final directing credit for Supernatural.

Alison Araya, who plays Vice Principal Bailey, previously played Jolene in 6.11 Appointment in Samarra.

Jensen with stunt coordinator Rob Hayter working out moves for a fight scene.

Ty Olsson's appearance as Benny at the start of the episode was not originally scripted, and was suggested at the behest of Jensen.

Per Variety: In it, Ackles directed himself in hand-to-hand combat and stunts, as well as a couple of key emotional moments, including bringing back “a character who’s one of my favorite characters of all time,” Ackles says. “It wasn’t even on the page. I said, ‘Can we make this character this person?’ And they were like, ‘If you can get this person — I believe they’re working right now.’ I made the call. He was literally working one day, had the next day off, so he flew in, did one scene, flew out and was working on his other project the next day.”

Sam's nightmare is of a world where he embraced the demon blood and went full Dark Side. It's revealed that he had killed Bobby and Jody and is the leader of a demon army, as Azazel intended at the end of 2.21 All Hell Breaks Loose: Part One. When he kills Dean with his psychic powers, his eyes go black as they did when he killed Lilith in 4.22 Lucifer Rising. In addition, this nightmare appears to be an extended version of the vision Castiel had when he tried to heal Sam's wound from The Equalizer in 15.01 Back and to the Future.

The date on the security camera footage of Tory's abduction is 11/6/2019, one day before the episode originally aired. This means that most of the episode occurred on the same day that it originally aired.

Becky's notes about Chuck's new manuscript can be seen as a meta commentary on the episode itself. Many of her notes such as there being no classic rock and neither Sam nor Dean mentioning Castiel and a cornered Sam and Dean listening to the "villain's" monologue happen in the episode. Her claims of low stakes cause Chuck to write a new dark ending, which is mirrored in the episode when He disintegrates Becky and her husband.

Sides, Scripts & Transcripts

• 15.04 Atomic Monsters (transcript)

Promotion

• Synopsis & Photos
• Promo
• Sneak Peek

Interviews

• Jensen Ackles on Directing His Final ‘Supernatural’ Episode, Bringing His Music Into the Show by Variety
• Jensen Ackles previews 'Dean Winchester as John Wick' for his final time directing Supernatural by EW
• Jensen Ackles Looks Ahead to Directing Post-SUPERNATURAL with Give Me My Remote