"Phantom Traveler" Supernatural S1:Ep4

 First let me start off by saying this episode was special in that it did not contain even one hint of Dean's usual objectification of women. There were, of course, moments when Dean displayed his usual "macho" persona, like when he denies being haunted by the job despite keeping a knife under his pillow when he sleeps, but none of his comments, even when he's talking with the "damsel in distress" character Amanda.

First things first. The monster this episode is a demon who possesses people. As we'll be seeing those crop up often in the coming episodes, I'll take a minute to explore the lore. From my history of watching the show previously, I already knew it was a demon the moment I saw it. Demons are always depicted as black smoke when they are not possessing someone and always cause the victim to have black eyes and act in a way that they normally would not. Later in the episode, Sam suggests that the concept of demonic possession is inherent to all religions, and Japanese culture also links them to natural disasters. Demons leave behind a sulfuric residue, and victims of possession have no awareness of anything they did during possession. Later in the show, the lore suggests that demons are like a different type of ghost, they are human souls which have been tortured in hell for enough time that they have become warped beyond recognition. They are also hard to kill and the only way to save the victim they're possessing is to exorcise them, which is also difficult. While possessed, the human gains super-human strength. Unlike vengeful spirits, the demon has no underlying motive and is generally not tied to a specific place but has the ability to move freely. Without corporeal form the demon cannot do much, hence the possession, but after possession it becomes very powerful. 

The show starts out in the lobby of an airplane. A man fidgets around, then goes to use the bathroom where another man reassures him that the odds of dying in a plane crash are infinitesimally small. The man does not seem to have been convinced, but smiles awkwardly and nods. After the other man exits, a black smoke finds its way out of the vent and enters the man's body through his nostrils. His eyes become black and he seems to have gained confidence suddenly. Upon entering the plane, the man tells the stewardess who tells him she's sure he'll have a good flight, that he's "counting on it". After the flight is up in the air, the man asks his fellow passenger how long they've been up. "About forty minutes" he's told. He responds "time really does fly" but the other passenger doesn't find this as funny as the man apparently does. At that, the man says he needs to stretch his legs, and gets out of the seat. He promptly walks over to the exit hatch and opens it. He's sucked out of the plane and the depressurized cabin is suddenly in chaos as the pilot struggles to land. The stewardess manages to find a seat and don her oxygen mask. The horror element relies on the suspense, but there is also a darkened atmosphere at play. The plane's dim lighting, cloudy conditions. It is obvious the plane will crash, but we don't know if there will be any survivors to help solve the mystery of why it happened.

The scene cuts to Dean sleeping. Someone enters but we can't see who it is. The suspense is held for just a moment before Sam speaks up. He has brought coffee. It turns out Sam has not been sleeping well. He's still having nightmares.  Sam asks Dean if the job ever bothers him and Dean denies it. "But don't you ever get scared?" Sam asks. Dean says he never does, which Sam counters by revealing that Dean sleeps with a large knife under his pillow. Dean says that's not fear, that's precaution. Later in the show, it will be revealed that Dean is afraid of flying, so this is a nice little setup for that "macho" masquerade to be knocked down a peg.

Then the boys receive a phone call from a man (Jerry) that Dean and their father had helped out a few years ago. Dean says they took care of a poltergeist for him, but it is unclear at this point whether a poltergeist is a different monster than a vengeful spirit. Jerry works with planes in some capacity, they meet in a hanger, he has possession of the black box from the crashed plane, but it never says specifically what Jerry's job is. He does not have clearance to allow them to view the wreckage which is locked up tightly by homeland security. They listen to the recording and there is obvious interference, but you cannot tell what's being said.

There are survivors, the pilot is one, but the boys zero in on a specific one in particular. He is currently in a mental hospital. The boys, posing as homeland security agents, go to interview him to find out if he saw anything. After some prodding, the guy answers that he thought he saw a man open the emergency hatch, but that he's researched it and there's two tons of pressure on the door. There is no way someone could open it, so it must have been a hallucination. They ask if there was any type of glitch when he looked at the man, and the patient asks if they are sane. He tells them the the man was another passenger and that he was sitting in front of him. Sam and Dean find out who the passenger was, and visit his widow. They think he might have been some type of superhuman monster, but find that he was just an ordinary dentist with ulcers. 

The boys decide the must have a look at the wreckage, and buy themselves suits so that they look the part of homeland security. While studying the wreckage, Dean uses a EMT to find evidence of supernatural activity. Sam asks why it looks like an old Walkman. Dean replies that he made it out of one, and seems quite proud, although Sam is less than impressed. The two find a substance on the exit hatch handle, which they take a sample of just before actual homeland security agents show up and the boys make a hasty retreat over a fence. Dean uses his suit jacket to avoid the barbs and the boys' escape is final. Jerry is able to analyze the substance for them and tells them that it's sulfur. That is when Sam and Dean decide it must be demonic possession. Dean then verbally wishes their father were here to help them because demons don't "want anything, they just want to kill and destroy" and it's going to be difficult to take down. 

The next scene shows the pilot nervously preparing to fly his first plane since the crash. A black smoke exits the vent and enters him. Suddenly he doesn't seem so nervous. He is in the air with a co-pilot who tells him he'll be back to flying the big planes before he knows it. The pilot says "time really does fly" and knocks out the co-pilot before sending the plane into a nosedive. As it crashes, the plane takes out telephone wires. The scene cuts to Jerry telling the boys that the pilot is dead. Dean suggests that perhaps the demon was after the pilot all along, but Sam has another theory. Both flights went down 40 minutes into flight. In the past ten years, there have been six other flights with this same pattern. For the other flights, there were no survivors. The interference on the black box said "no survivors". Sam and Dean decide that the demon is targeting the survivors.

Most of them are not planning to fly any time soon, but the stewardess, Amanda, has a flight that departs that evening. Sam and Dean decide that the demon will try to tamper with her flight and the best way to prevent that is by keeping her off of it. The problem is that she will not answer her phone. They arrive at the airport and succeed in paging her to a phone nearby, but they are unable to convince her not to board the plane. It is then that Sam suggests that they need to get on the flight and exorcise the demon to prevent the plane from going down. Here's the payoff from the earlier claim Dean made that he doesn't get scared because his face goes white. He is afraid of flying. Sam tells him that he needs to get a grip, because if he's got a chink in the armor, he opens himself up to demonic possession.

Dean has brought holy water with him to help find the demon, but Sam suggests a subtler approach. He says that the demon will flinch at the name of God and tells Dean he needs to say it in Latin "christo". Dean goes to find out if the stewardess Amanda is possessed. Despite the fact that she is a woman, Dean does not go his usual route of hitting on her. Instead, possibly because he is nervous from flying, or perhaps because he's on a mission, the two simply exchange light conversation about flying. He ends it by saying "christo" but she doesn't respond and he walks off with her obviously thinking he's a little strange in the head. Next, Dean attempts to find the demon by walking around with his EMT, but he has scanned all the passengers and had no luck. Suddenly, the EMT starts going off when the co-pilot enters the cabin for a moment. Dean says "christo" and the man flinches and looks back, his eyes black. Sam and Dean convince Amanda that she needs to bring the co-pilot back so they can "have a talk with him". When the co-pilot enters the back of the plane, the two jump him and duct-tape his mouth shut. Amanda is horrified by what they're doing until they sprinkle the man with water and his skin begins to smoke. They use Dean's strength and the holy water to keep the demon incapacitated while Sam chants the exorcism in Latin. The exorcism rite has two parts. The first part gets the demon out of the body of the victim, but it corporealizes him making it so that the demon can wreck havoc without a body. The second part sends the demon back to hell. Sam is almost finished with the first part when the demon, who has managed to rip the duct-tape of his mouth, turns to him and says "I know what happened to your girlfriend. She must have died in agony." Sam falters, but quickly regains his composure and continues the exorcism. The demon flees into the vents and the book has been knocked out of Sam's grasp. The plane begins to experience turbulent conditions as the demon, now corporeal, shakes it. Sam struggles to find the book so he can continue the ritual. He finally gets it, the lights are flashing, the plane is shaking, the passengers are all terrified, and Sam is shouting in Latin in the center of the aisle.

Sam succeeds, of course, and the plane calms down. Next it shows the crew being interviewed. The co-pilot says he has no memory of even boarding the plane. Amanda is telling her story but she manages to mouth "thank you" to the boys who are standing off to the side. They decide it's time to go. Jerry thanks them and it is only then that Dean wonders how Jerry was able to get his new number since he's only had it for about six months.

"Your dad gave it to me." Jerry says. Dean and Sam are taken aback, but Jerry explains that he didn't actually talk with their father. "It was on his voicemail."

Sam wonders how this could be since he's tried calling their father and it hasn't gone through like his service had been disconnected. Dean tries and they get the message. "This is John Winchester. I can't be reached. If this is an emergency, call my son Dean." The boys look at one another and Sam is visibly upset. Their father knew he was going to be unreachable, and had the temerity to send people looking for help their way. The episode ends with them driving their car down the road.

This show has a bit of mystery, but not as much as "Dead in the Water". It doesn't show Dean's lascivious side, which is good, and it takes down his toxic masculinity a peg, which is great. It also shows both boys being vulnerable in different ways. I didn't really like that they rescued yet another woman, (does it always have to be a woman?) who was grateful. Jerry doesn't count even though he's the one who called them in, because he was never in any danger. The horror and suspense elements are pretty good too, capitalizing on the fear of flying which is a common phobia even though flight problems are rare. After carefully weighing all elements, I give this episode an 8.5/10, slightly lower than the last episode which had a better mystery element.