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!