Supernatural: Clap Your Hands If You Believe
September 3, 2021 5:07 AM - Season 6, Episode 9 - Subscribe

The brothers investigate a series of abductions attributed to aliens. However, when Dean disappears and then reappears hours later, they realize that the culprits are fairies and that only those who have been taken to the fairy realm can see them.

Quotes:

Dean: [into his phone while running from a light in a cornfield] Holy sh...! UFO! UFO!
Sam: Whoa, dude, stop yelling. You're breaking up. I didn't catch that last part.
Dean: Close encounter! Close encounter!
Sam: Close encounter? What kind? First, second?
Dean: They're after me!
Sam: Third kind already? You better run, man. I think the fourth kind's a butt thing.
Dean: Empathy, Sam! Empathy!

Sam: My brother was abducted by aliens, I'm pretty good on the proof part.
Sparrow: Your brother was abducted by aliens?
Sam: Yeah.
Sparrow: Oh my God!
Sam: It's OK. I've had time to adjust.
Sparrow: Did it happen when you were kids?
Sam: No, like, a half hour ago.

Sparrow: [grabbing her clothes] Okay. It’s all right, Sam. I so totally understand that you need time as a family. [to Dean, on her way out the door] But it’s just—what were they like?
Dean: They were grabby, incandescent douche bags. Good night!
Sparrow: Too soon… ? Okay. [leaves]

Sam: Say you got a soul and you're on a case, your brother gets abducted by aliens.
Dean: Then you do everything to get him back!
Sam: Right. You do. But what about when there are no more leads for the night? I mean, are you supposed to just sit there in the dark and suffer; even when there's nothing that can be done?
Dean: Yes!
Sam: What?
Dean: Yes. You sit in the dark and you feel the loss.
Sam: Absolutely. But couldn't I just do all that... *and* have sex with the hippie chick?
Dean: No.
Sam: It would be in the dark.

Dean: Why are the fairies abducting people?
Marion: Hmmm... There is much theory and little fact. We know they only take first-born sons... like Rumpelstiltskin did. Personally, *I* think they're taken to Avalon to service Oberon, King of the Fairy.
Sam: Dean? Did... you service Oberon, King of the Fairies?

Dean: [getting arrested, yelling to Sam] Fight the Fairies!

Leprechaun: You're not like the rest of them, are you?
Sam: Nope.
Leprechaun: I could see that right off. You're missing a certain piece, right in the centre, ain't you?
Sam: Says who?
Leprechaun: We fairy folk, we're all about energy. And the human soul gives off a certain perfume. Your soul is far away. But not completely out of reach.
Sam: Is that so?
Leprechaun: Sam, I can get it back for you... for a price.
Sam: That's adorable. It's locked in a box with the devil.
Leprechaun: *Your* devil, not mine.
Sam: There's no freaking way a leprechaun can do what angels cannot.
Leprechaun: Angels? Please. I'm talking about real magic, sonny. From my side of the fence. Got a way of getting in back doors.
Sam: So you're my blue fairy? You can make me a real boy again?
Leprechaun: When you wish upon a star.
Sam: Yeah, I got a wish. [shoots the Leprechaun with an iron bullet]
Leprechaun: [winces in pain, but immediately straightens up] Iron! Painful, but not a deal breaker.

Sam: [Asking about the fairies] Are they here?
Mr. Brennan: Yeah, but it's all right. Cream hits them like tequila.

Dean: So on top of all the demons and the angels... and ghosts, and the skinwalkers, it turns out that there's--- [sighs] So if aliens are actually real, what's next, huh? Hobbits?

Sam: What the hell was it?
Dean: It was a -- a little naked lady, okay?
Sam: It was -- a what?
Dean: It was a little, glowing... hot... naked lady. With nipples. And she hit me.

Trivia:

The opening title sequence that replaces the usual shattering glass opening titles of season six is a replica of the opening titles from The X-Files, with the black lettering against a grey background and the phrase "The Truth Is In Here" at the end of the sequence, while The X-Files opening titles read "The Truth Is Out There".

After the encounter, Dean is stalked by a burly man in a bright red cap. In Irish and English folklore, redcaps (usually portrayed as ugly humans wearing red caps or hats) are malicious beings, typically acting as enforcers for the fair folk court (what said character essentially does) or simply harassing humans for their own entertainment.

At a convention Jared Padalecki had said that he felt it strange Sam had the salt all along and didn't think to use it, so after pouring the salt he ad-libbed the line, "Why didn't I do that before?"

The line "fight the fairies!" is another The X-Files reference as the first The X Files movie is (unofficially) called "Fight The Future".

When Dean is fighting the fairy, David Bowie's song "Space Oddity" is playing in the background.

The high school jacket Patrick is wearing in the opening, looks exactly the same in every detail (i.e., same colors, same patterns) with the Smallville Crows jacket design from Smallville. The only difference is that the letter on the chest is a capital C this time but is a capital S in Smallville.

The title is a reference to the J.M. Barrie stage play Peter Pan. Tinkerbell is dying because people stopped believing in fairies, so Peter Pan asks the audience to clap their hands if they believe in fairies. As the audience claps, Tinkerbell gets better.

Right after Dean is kidnapped and when the UFO camp is shown, the music playing -- five distinctive notes with an electronic instrument making it sound like an alien music -- is actually the theme song, with two notes flat one half step to avoid royalties, from Close Encounters of the Third Kind, a film which is actually referenced by Dean at the moment of his abduction.

When Dean exits the watch shop, he tells Sam that the shop is full of "Keeblers". He is referring to the elves who make "uncommonly good" cookies using elfin magic for the Keebler Company, a subsidiary of Kellogg.
posted by orange swan (4 comments total)
 
I thought the "Dean having to explain to Sam how to act" thing was overdone. Sam has all his memories/life experience. He knows what's appropriate and doesn't need that sort of thing explained to him. He is, however, getting tired of having to stay within lines that don't make sense to him.

Dean's chagrin over finding that Sam spent the time of his abduction banging a woman he picked up at the UFO enthusiasts camp was very funny. He was so outraged that he didn't even feel any embarrassment/delicacy over having barged in on Sam while he was having sex with Sparrow.

The interesting thing about Sam having become soulless is that he's become just a little more hedonistic than Dean, and even when he's not doing anything actually wrong, Dean doesn't like it. He likes his brother to be more conscientious than him even though he complains about it, because in a way he relies on Sam as a check and balance for his own behaviour, and as a sort of moral centre.

It was hilarious watching Dean whipping out his knife and gun in response to the alien spotlight. They're not going to do you any good, chum. Also funny: Tinkerbell kicking his ass until he cooked her in the microwave. Sam and Dean had no experience with fairies and had to wing it, while at the same time being flabbergasted that fairies even existed.

Loved the visual of Sam and Dean trying to manage those tiny teacups with their big paws.

Marion really wasn't crazy -- she was right. Fairies did exist, and she was very knowledgeable about them and how to deal with them. Dean's scorn seems rather out of line, especially for a guy who has to lie constantly because no one will believe him if he tells the truth about who he is and what he does. I don't think Sam and Dean ever have to deal with fairies again, but if they had she would have been a useful consultant for them.
posted by orange swan at 5:26 AM on September 3, 2021 [1 favorite]


I remember being really turned off by this episode when it aired. All those 'fairy' jokes. As if the writers felt they got a free pass to make homophobic jokes because they were talking about evil supernatural fairy creatures, or that it's dark humor to have Dean beating up a guy while calling him a fairy because 'haha all the bystanders think he's a gaybasher lol'. Bleah.
posted by oh yeah! at 7:50 AM on September 3, 2021 [5 favorites]


Ah, so this is the season where they pivot into doubling down on the silly?

The motel room with the floor to ceiling photorealistic wallpaper of the middle of a forest - I wonder if its a mockup, or actually vintage? It screams affluent PNW 70s to me.
posted by porpoise at 12:52 PM on September 3, 2021


"Had a soul. Was a soul. Whatever." well. That's a question. But Soulless in his filters-off mode is fun in moderation.

They really asked Robert Picardo "you can do an Irish accent right" and he went "idk, sure" and then they just turned the cameras on and let that happen.
posted by jameaterblues at 8:20 PM on September 3, 2021 [1 favorite]


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