Episode ten – Asylum (Rockford, Illinois)

Supernatural idioms, Season One, Episode Ten.

Two officers are inspecting an old asylum. They find a couple of teenagers hidden there for fun, but also something way, way worse…

You shoved me kind of hard in there

shove = push roughly. Sam “pretended” to punch Dean to get to talk to one of the two officers involved. He probably took the occasion to retaliate after Dean’s bossy behavior of a few hours earlier. I had to sell it, didn’t I? He replies, which means “I had to make it seem true”.

Even-keeled / on an even keel

progressing smoothly and steadily, without sudden changes; characterized by stability or consistency; stable, balanced. Sam is talking of Kelly, the police officer who went crazy after the inspection at the Roosevelt Asylum.

It was mostly smooth sailing

easy, or without problems

Had some deep-seated crazy waiting to bust out

A hidden madness ready to explode

Three kids broke into the south wing

break into = enter forcibly, force one way into a place

One of his friends went nuts

Go nuts = become insane, act in a way that is wild or out of control; get crazy

But if kids are spelunking the asylum, why aren’t there a ton more deaths?

Spelunking = the exploration of caves (used in a derogatory way, to indicate stupid or unprepared cave trips).

Let me know if you see any dead people, Haley Joel

Haley Joel Osment was the protagonist of Sixth Sense, the kid who saw dead people, in fact. Dean is pulling Sam’s leg because of his brother’s nightmares and supposed psychic abilities. He also uses the ESP acronym, meaning “extra-sensory perception”. This prompts Sam’s response (dude, enough, meaning stop it, “piantala”), but Dean sometimes just doesn’t know when to stop. In addition to a dangerous spirit, in this episode Sam has to deal with his rage towards Dean and his bossy attitude (and often stinging jokes).

Twisted  = strange, mad, mentally disturbed or unsound

“What do you think? Ghosts are possessing people?” “Maybe is more like Amityville or the Smurl haunting”

They are both references to cases of paranormal activities reported by families who claimed their homes were haunted

A history buff

someone who has an interest in the history of a particular period of time, person or place.

We’re on your dollar, Sam

You’re paying for my time, you should use it (to talk about you and not about some local incident). Dr. Ellicott’s won’t be fooled, he’s quickly realized Sam is not there for a psychological session, but to get information. He forces Sam to talk about his “road trip” with his brother, and Jared Padalecki’s face in this circumstance is great acting.

Let’s cut the bull, shall we?

Stop telling lies or avoiding a subject

Gory  =  involving a lot of violence and bloodshed

Scour  = submit to a thorough search; comb; ransack

Good times = sono bei momenti (both literally and ironically)

Getting readings?

Does any EMF show on the instrument?

Yeah, big time

very much, to a large extent, on a large scale

This place is orbing like crazy

Orbs are balls of light that are sometimes seen in photographs and believed by some to be ghostly entities. Sam’s saying that there’s plenty of those balls of light.

It’s probably multiple spirits out and about

Active, going out and doing things.

“This was weird”. “You’re telling me”!

You’re telling me means I’m aware of that, I completely agree (“Non me lo dire/ non dirmelo” or “a chi lo dici”). Sam has just seen a spirit, and that’s actually weird, but Sam was referring to the fact that the spirit didn’t attack him or try to hurt him. Dean replies “It looked pretty agro (angry, hostile) from where I was standing”. We have already begun to see that not all spirits are evil or hostile. Over time, the two brothers will have to learn (especially Dean), that shades of gray do exist, even when it comes to spirits and “monsters”.

“Why would anyone want a job like that?”. “I had a crappy counselor”.

This is one of many lines that say a lot in very few words. As usual, Sam’s jokes are not jokes, but truths in disguise. He’s probably still angry at his father for having brought them up as “hunters”, but of course he wouldn’t say so in so many words. At the same time, he doesn’t want to sound “heroic” and say he’s doing it to save lives. So he’s confirming he doesn’t like the “job” so much and did not exactly “choose” it, but also, in a way, that he feels he had no choice at the time (and, perhaps, has no choice now either).

This is why I get paid the big bucks

I get paid a lot of money because I’m really good at what I do (of course, Sam and Dean’s “job” is not paid, it’s one of Dean’s typical jokes)

Soak it up

Enjoy! (Dean is talking ironically to the skeleton of Dr. Ellicott (senior) , which he is going to salt and burn, and it’s a double meaning, as he is actually soaking it with petrol).

I’m not really in the sharing-and-caring kind of mood

I don’t feel like sharing an emotional moment just now.

This post is part of the English Language category and of the Nerdy Passions category.

This is all for Supernatural Idioms – Season One, Episode Ten. The eleventh one, tomorrow!

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Episode seven – Hook Man (Ankeny, Iowa)

Supernatural Idioms – Season One, Episode seven.

People seem to meet with strange, violent deaths around Lori, a pretty college girl with a rather rigid family background (her father’s a reverend). In all cases, nobody was anywhere near the victims, and the police have no clue. Sam and Dean look into the Hook Man legend, which is widespread all around the Country, but seems to have originated in Iowa.

Too Martha Stewart?

Martha Stewart is a well-known businesswoman, Lori, who is asking her friend Taylor for advice on how to dress for a date, probably means the clothes she was about to choose were too serious.

There’s a hot chick buried somewhere in there

you are attractive although you hide it (by the way you dress, your behavior, etc.).

He’s not gonna know what hit him

he’ll be shocked, taken by surprise

Your half-caf double vanilla latte is getting cold, Frances

Dean is teasing Sam for his “very customized” coffee order. Also, Sam is all for healthy food and does not share Dean’s taste for snacks and street food.

Bite me

used for rudely telling someone that you are upset or annoyed with something they have just said or done. Sam is slightly touchier, but neither of the brothers likes irony when it’s directed to them…

A drifter passing by

a tramp, a wanderer

Our hearts go out to the family of the young man who perished

We feel sorrow or sympathy, usually for someone who’s gone through a loss.

We’re gonna do tequila shots and watch Reality Bites

Taylor tells Lori:ì they will drink tequila (in small glasses): to “do a shot” means to drink it in one gulp (usually an ounce). Tequila shots are a bit more specific. The ritual is to lick some salt off your hand, gulp the tequila, and then bite into a wedge of lime- Reality Bites is a 1994 movie (the first feature-length film directed by Ben Stiller) with Winona Ryder, Ethan Hawke and the same Ben Stiller, which is said to have “captured Generation X” (The Atlantic).

I was so scared, I guess I was seeing things

Lori thinks she was imagining things or saw someone that didn’t really exist

Nice job Dr. Venkman

(Dean to Sam). Dr. Venkman was Bill Murray’s character in Ghostbusters

Talked the sheriff down to a fine. Dude, I’m Matlock.

Dean, who, unlike Sam, tends to boast a bit about his heroic actions and his abilities, tells his brother that he’s managed to convince the sheriff to just give Sam a fine instead of arresting him. However, he has done so in a somehow unorthodox way…

Told him you were a dumbass pledge and we were hazing you  

I told him you were a fool probationary member of a college fraternity and we were playing a trick on you. Essentially, Dean has “helped” Sam by making him look like a gullible greenhorn. Immediately afterwards, a “Hall Week prank” is a practical joke that people typically play during the Halloween (Hall) Week. In this case Sam, who is usually not a little touchy, seems rather amused.

Let’s find the dude’s grave, salt and burn the bones, and put him down

this may either mean put him to rest (put a baby down means put them in bed) or to kill him (although, since the “dude” is already dead and acting as a spirit, the killing takes a different meaning anyway).

Man, you’ve been holding out on me

you’ve withheld information from me, you’ve kept a lot to yourself. Dean is talking about parties and college girls. When Sam replies that this wasn’t really “his experience”, and Dean retorts “let me guess. Library, studying, straight-A’s”, as if it was something to be criticized, Sam’s look seems to say “yeah, of course, what’s so strange about it?”, and he looks around at the people supposedly having fun as if he was thinking “now, this is actually strange”. I love this man!

It was bugging me, right?

It was bothering me

The spirit latches on to the reverend’s repressed emotions, feeds off them…

latch on to = attach oneself to (someone) as a constant and usually unwelcome companion.

Take your pick

make your choice (Sam and Dean are about to search Lori’s house and the church where her father preaches to find the hook or a silver object into which it may have been reforged. Dean tells Sam to choose which one he wants to search).

This post is part of the English Language category and of the Nerdy Passions category.

This is all for Supernatural Idioms – Season One, Episode Seven. The eighth one, tomorrow!

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Episode six – Skin (Questione di pelle) – Saint Louis, Missouri

Supernatural Idioms – Season One, Episode six.

Sam receives a message from Rebecca, an old friend from college. Her brother Zach is in trouble, charged with a murder which he has actually been seen committing, but, on the other hand, he was with her at the same time. Dean is not keen on going, but we have confirmation once again that sweet as he is, Sam is also strong-willed and determined (and even more so when his friends are involved) and will not take no for an answer.

Roger that

message received

I figure we hit Tucumcari by lunch, then head south…

I think we’ll reach T. by lunch, and then we continue in the southern direction

You still keep in touch with your college buddies?

Dean has cut all ties (or rather, never had any), and he can’t believe Sam is still in contact with his college friends. A job like this, you can’t get close to people, Dean says, mainly because you can’t tell them the truth. But of course, Sam gets attached to people much more than Dean. As the seasons go on, we’ll also see that Sam tries to be honest, as far as he can be, and this usually pays off (although not always).

It sounds like the cops have a pretty good case

have evidence enough to charge Zach with murder

Dude, what kind of people you hanging out with?

What kind of people do you know / spend your time with/ socialize with? (che gente frequenti?).

I was just crashing here for the weekend when everything happened

crash at a place = stay at someone else’s house for the night, especially without having planned it in advance. Rebecca was at her parents’ home when Zach got into trouble.

I’m off duty now

a police officer who is not working at the moment

You’re a real straight shooter with your friends     

an honest and forthright person. Dean, who is much more at ease than Sam in telling all sorts of lies, is giving him hard time, first because he is annoyed at his brother for having forced him to make a deviation, but also because he knows how difficult it is to maintain relationships in their job. Truth is, Sam is not at all sure he’ll go on hunting, and Dean knows that, and is jealous of all people his brother knows from outside the family.

There’s no sign of a break-in

there’s no sign that someone entered the house by force.

The lawyers, they’re already talking of a plea-bargain

plea-bargain is an arrangement between prosecutor and defendant whereby the defendant pleads guilty to a lesser charge in exchange for a more lenient sentence or an agreement to drop other charges. In Italy we have the so-called “patteggiamento”, which is subject to different rules, though.

I’ll make it up to you

Alex is telling Lindsay: “I’ll do something good for you as I know you’re upset because I have to go away now”.

What you think this is, Hooters?

Do you think this is a restaurant? (Hooters is a restaurant chain).

Like a Doppelgänger

a spirit that looks exactly like a living person, or someone who looks exactly like someone else (same as a “dark double” used immediately before)

A trail the police would never pursue

A line of investigation the police do not intend to follow.

When a shapeshifter changes shape, maybe it sheds         

to shed = to lose a covering, such as leaves, hair, or skin, because it falls off or because you get rid of it: in this case, the shapeshifter gets rid of the skin it was “temporarily using” when it impersonated someone.

This whole gig, it ain’t without perks

this job has its advantages, there are some extras that come with it

Who knows how many murders he’s gotten away with

how may times he’s escaped punishment for or the consequences of other murders he’s committed.

He sure got issues with you

the shapeshifter has a way to learn the past of the persons he takes the shape of, Dean in this case, and he tells Sam that his brother has problems connected with him, reasons to be angry.

He ditched me. Left me with your sorry ass,

Your sorry ass = your worthless self.        Dad went away (although I always did everything he asked me to) and I had to look after you. This isn’t the first time that a demon, a spirit or another “monster” chased by the two brothers reveals a deep feeling of or a truth about either or both of them. Dean’s inner thoughts were transparent enough; the shapeshifter just makes them more explicit.

A genetic freak, a freak of nature

This word, “freak”, occurs frequently in the show, not so much to refer to someone with a physical abnormality, as to someone who for some reason does not “fit in” with ordinary people. In fact, the brothers often use it in a self-deprecating way, and here the somehow moving speech of the shapeshifter could have easily covered the unexpressed but real feeling of Dean himself. With the difference that Dean would never talk like that, especially to a girl he’s just met (and hopes to sleep with).

You mean like the Vulcan Mind Meld?

This is a reference to Star Trek; it was a telepathic link between two individuals. It allowed for an intimate exchange of thoughts.

You’re gonna put an APB out on me

An all-points bulletin (APB) is a broadcast issued from a law enforcement agency: it typically contains information about a wanted suspect who is to be arrested or investigated. Dean is telling Sam if he calls the police, they will go after him (i.e. Dean).

An anonymous tip led the police to a home… where a SWAT team discovered…

A SWAT team is a group of elite police marksmen who specialize in high-risk tasks such as hostage rescue.

First I’m gonna find out that handsome devil and kick the crap out of him

Kick the crap out of someone means to beat him very violently      Dean uses the expression “handsome devil” in a curious way here. Apart from being the title of a song of the Smiths (and we already know there are numberless musical references in the show), it usually indicates a very handsome man who is well aware of his own attractiveness (well, like Dean, in fact), but here, the fact that the shapeshifter took his own shape seems to infuriate Dean and yet to flatter him somehow. It’s a sort of cheeky self-irony.

That’s killing me

(the fact that he may be driving my car) makes me mad. This seems to hurt Dean even more than the fact the shapeshifter is “walking around with his face” and has caused him to be charged with a few serious crimes!

Everything went white

(Rebecca says): I fainted, or however, I was shocked to the point of (almost) fainting

I wound up here

I found myself here (without knowing how)

Murder in the first

short for “murder in the first degree”: a particularly serious murder, especially one that is deliberate and premeditated (i.e. planned), and/or a murder committed against certain types of people (such as a child or, as in this case, a close relative).

“You and your brother, you hunt down these kinds of things?” “Yeah, Pretty much”.

Pretty much = nearly, more or less, almost completely.

This post is part of the English Language category and of the Nerdy Passions category.

This is all for Supernatural Idioms – Season One, Episode Six. The seventh one, tomorrow!

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Episode five – Bloody Mary (Terrore allo specchio)

Toledo, Ohio, and Fort Wayne, Indiana

Soundtrack: Bones to Dust

The journey goes on: Supernatural Idioms – Season One, Episode Five.

A little girl says “bloody Mary” three times in front of a mirror during a “truth or dare” game, and soon afterwards her father dies in a very weird way. Apparently, a spirit is at work. Other deaths follow, and it won’t be so easy for Sam and Dean to find out who this Mary is and why is she killing these people. It certainly has to do with secrets and guilt, whether misplaced or not, and Sam, who is still having nightmares about Jessica, decides that the best way to stop “Mary” once and for all is to evoke the spirit himself, much to Dean’s dismay.

Truth or dare

A game in which each player must choose between answering an awkward question honestly or dealing with a difficult task.

Do you wanna make out with Benjy Swartz?

Make out with someone        kiss or have sex

Lame

boring, uncool

Is that the best you can come up with?

Come up with something       produce, suggest, think of something

You mind keeping it down?

Please be quiet(er)

That’s a first for me

it’s the first time I see/say/do anything like that.

Go right ahead

Do it

See if we can find a Mary who fits the bill

a person who is suitable / exactly right /has the necessary characteristics for a particular situation. In this case, a person who may be the spirit.

I take it back. This will be very annoying

I was wrong (to say that it won’t be annoying). We already know that Sam loves research… but not when the library computers are out of order!

We could use your help

We would like/ we need (also, for instance, “I could use a drink” “their website could use an upgrade”, etc.)

It’s for the greater good

for a good purpose, it will help other people

Beats me

I don’t know, I don’t understand, I don’t get it

He was killed in a hit-and-run

a road accident in which the vehicle involved did not stop

I think I should stick around

Stick around = remain in or near a place

The NCIC         the National Crime Information Center

the United States’ central database for tracking crime-related information.

Now everybody packs it in with a few loose ends

Sam and Dean have gone to talk to the detective who worked on Mary’s case many years before: he says everybody (in the police etc.) leaves something that still needs to be explained or some unsolved cases when they retire.

It still gets me

the detective is saying the case still makes him angry, upset, or moves him after all that time.

I think he cut her up good

the man killed Mary by slashing and stabbing her.

Crazy doesn’t even begin to cover it

Charlie is trying to make her friend believe in the presence of a spirit, even if it “sounds crazy”, and Donna replies that crazy is an absolutely inadequate word/a very weak word, she clearly thinks Charlie has lost her mind.

Mary’s hard to pin down

to pin someone down means to find or get a hold of them

This post is part of the English Language category and of the Nerdy Passions category.

This is all for Supernatural Idioms – Season One, Episode Five. The sixth one, tomorrow!

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