2.06 No Exit

Screencap from No Exit
Title	No Exit
Episode #	Season 2, Episode 6
First aired	2 November, 2006
Directed by	Kim Manners
Written by	Matt Witten
On IMDB	No Exit
Outline	Sam and Dean investigate the brutal slayings of blond women from the same apartment building and discover that the demon responsible is the ghost of the country's first serial murderer, H. H. Holmes.
Monster	Dr. H.H. Holmes, ghost
Timeline
Location(s)	Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
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Synopsis

The boys take on a case Jo has researched in Philadelphia where blonde girls in an apartment building are disappearing. The boys discover ectoplasm in the apartment of the latest victim, a sign of strong supernatural manifestation. As they search the building they run into Jo who has followed them from the Roadhouse. Jo explains that Ash has laid a false trail so that Ellen won’t know where she is.

With Sam covering part of the building, Jo and Dean scan the other part with EMF meters looking for supernatural activity. They argue as Dean criticizes her for pursing hunting, when she has other options in her life. Jo’s EMF meter starts registering activity, and within a wall vent they find a clump of hair from one of the victims. Unknown to them, at the same time another woman is abducted.

The next morning, while researching the case Jo shares with Dean that the reason she hunts is because it makes her feel connected to her father. They discover that the apartment building was erected over the place Dr. H.H. Holmes, America’s first serial killer, was executed and that he may be holding his latest victim in a hidden room.

While searching for the hidden room, Jo is captured by the spirit of Dr. H.H. Holmes. As Sam and Dean try to work out where Jo is being held, Ellen calls, having worked out that Jo is in Philadelphia with them. Dean confesses to her that Jo has being kidnapped and she declares she is catching the first plane there.

Sam works out that the spirit may be holding his victims in an old sewer system beneath the apartment building. Jo is indeed being held there, along with the previous victim Teresa. She manages to hold to spirit at bay with her father’s iron blade, until Sam and Dean discover an entrance and rescue them both.

In order to trap he spirit, Jo acts as bait to draw him out. When Dr. H.H. Holmes reappears, a contraption releases salt to line the perimeter of the underground chamber, trapping him inside it. As an added precaution, Dean uses cement to seal the chamber, and H.H. Holmes in it.

Ellen catches up with the boys and Jo, and there is a long uncomfortable drive back to the Roadhouse. Angry at the danger the boys put Jo in, Ellen reveals to Jo that her father was killed while on a hunt with John Winchester.

Characters

• Dean Winchester
• Sam Winchester
• Jo Harvelle
• Ellen
• Theresa (other abducted woman)
• Dr. H.H. Holmes (spirit of 'multi-murderer')
• See also William Anthony Harvelle

Definitions

• Harvelle's Roadhouse
• Ectoplasm ^PoD
• Moyamensing Prison ^PoD
• Dr. H.H. Holmes ^PoD
• Holmes Murder Castle ^PoD
• EMF ^PoD
• Iron ^PoD
• Salt ^PoD
• Ghost

Music

• Foreigner - Cold As Ice (played after the awkward silence in the car while driving back with Ellen and Jo)
• Cheap Trick – Surrender (played as Sam and Dean are driving to Philadelphia over the opening credits)

Quotes

Dean: A young girl been kidnapped by an evil cult?

Sam: Girl gotta name?
Dean: Katie Holmes

Sam: That’s funny! But for you - so bitchy.

Jo: [holding out case file] Three weeks ago, a young girl disappears from a Philadelphia apartment. [silence] Take it, it won't bite.
Dean: No, but your mom might.

Dean: That's ectoplasm. Well, Sam, I think I know what we're dealing with here. It's the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.
Sam: Dean, I've only seen this stuff like twice. I mean to make this stuff, you have to be one majorly pissed off spirit.

Sam: Where'd you get all that money from anyways?

Jo: Working at the Roadhouse.
Dean: Hunters don't tip that well.

Jo: Well, they aren't that good at poker, either.

Dean: Jo, you got options. No one in their right mind chooses this life. My dad started me into this when I was so young, I wish I could do something else.

Jo: You love the job.
Dean: Yeah, but I'm a little twisted.

Jo: You don't think I'm a little twisted, too?

Dean: Mazel Tov! You found your first spirit.

Dean: (to Jo) Sweetheart, this ain't gender studies. Women can do the job fine. Amateurs can't.

Dean: (to Jo) I was six or seven, and he took me shooting for the first time. You know, bottles on a fence, that kind of thing. I bulls-eyed every one of them. He gave me this smile, like... I don't know.

Sam: So? Is this job as glamorous as you thought it would be?
Jo: Well, except for all the pee-your-pants terror, yeah sure. But that Teresa girl's going to live a life because of us. It's worth it, isn't it?

Trivia & References

The episode is named after a play by French existentialist Jean-Paul Sartre, called Huis Clos (translating to "No Exit"). The best know line from this play is Hell…is other people. In the play, three people are locked in a windowless room expecting to be tortured. No-one arrives, but by probing each other's sins, dark secrets and thoughts – they torture each other. See also The Meaning of Episode Titles.

When Sam is researching H.H Holmes, we see an old photo of a dead woman. This is in fact a photo of one of Jack the Ripper's victims, Elizabeth Stride, not one of Holmes'.

Dean suggests they rescue a young girl in Los Angeles whose been abducted by a cult - Katie Holmes. When Katie Holmes started showing interest in boyfriend Tom Cruise's religion, Scientology, it was negatively noted by many, some suggesting she had been coerced or "brainwashed" into it.

Dean: That's ectoplasm. Well, Sam, I think I know what we're dealing with here. It's the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.

The Stay Puft Marsmallow Man was the mascot of the fictitious Stay Puft Corporation in the movie Ghosbusters.

Jo: I’m here to rescue you.

Jo's comment to Teresa is a direct quote from Luke to Leia in Episode IV: A New Hope.

The scene where Jo talks to Teresa through her cell door is reminiscent of a scene in the 1997 film Kiss the Girls where Dr Kate McTiernan wakes up after being kidnapped from her home to find herself trapped in an underground cell and calls through her cell door for help, a cry that is responded to by other imprisoned women.

Jared had time off during this episode for treatment on his wrist which was broken during the filming of 2.03 Bloodlust

Dean says "Mazel Tov" to Jo, in response to the discovery of a hidden vent. Alona Tal, the actress who plays Jo, is Israeli.

Minutiae

Sam's email address is swinchester@mail.srv. He has had frequent contact with Ash, someone named Ross (about something 'Important' and something 'WTF'), and dwinchester@mailer.srv, and received email from a few other addresses, including lgsprime@mail.srv, hellhounds@remailer.jpgsrv, sateyns_@2noob.srv, and prg_34@mail.srv. There are also multiple account service notices, and he either gets a lot of spam or doesn't bother clearing out his spam folder.

Screencap from No Exit

Sides, Scripts & Transcripts

• 2.06 No Exit (transcript)

Promotion

• Episode Promo: 2.06 No Exit
  • The promo for this episode "Tunnel", won two awards at the Promax/BDA Promotion and Marketing Awards in June 2007.

• Drama Program Promotion - "Supernatural" "Tunnel" :30 (GOLD)
• Sound Design - "Supernatural" "Tunnel" - Sound :30 (GOLD)