sweetondean: Leylin Vixen's Quick Draw SPN Roundup - 12x20 Twigs & Twine & Tasha Banes

Twigs & Twine & Tasha Banes

Opening words

I really liked this episode with the old school horror factor and creepiness. I hoped the twins would be back because I liked them the last time, but not like this! I guess I should have known because it is Supernatural we are talking about. The whole story of the hour was great and nope I still don't like the foreshadowing we are getting from the show. More and more I feel like I need a pile of tissues, whiskey and ice cream to survive the two back to back episodes!

But before that, lets check episode 20.

Details

Title: Twigs & Twine & Tasha Banes

Episode: 12.20

First aired: May 4, 2017

Director: Richard Speight Jr.

Writter: Steve Yockey

Monster: Borrower Witch

Location(s): Lebanon, Kansas; Rock River, Wyoming

Story

Tasha arrives and exchange pointed words at the boarding house with a mean older woman wearing an ugly ring. The woman is knitting. Late at night she searches the house, and she is killed at the start of the episode. Castiel is MIA and both brothers are worried as hell about him. Dean thinks Cas is controlled by the Nephilim, and they need to find him asap. One of Mary’s phone rings and it's Alicia Banes who is trying to find her mother with her brother Max. Sam gets Dean to tag along with familiar sounding phrase: "Their mom's on a hunting trip, and hasn't been home in a week." Oh Sam you sneaky you. He knows which buttons to press with Dean.

Dean calls Mary before they leave, he wants to talk to her but she doesn’t answer. Mary is being tortured by Ketch! I hear you. What is going on? But as we find out Mary and Ketch have snatched up a shifter. Mary is not impressed with Ketch’s work as he continues to torture the monster. Once it even turns into looking like Ketch himself, and and taunts him.

We get back to Rock River which we saw at the start, and the Winchesters meet the twins. Their mom was hunting a borrower witch, who got her powers from a demon. Max still feels nothing is wrong with their mom and he would rather spend some time doing other things. Alicia doesn’t listen and she is still worried. It seems Max and their mom are real witches and Alicia doesn’t have that power. Sam and Alicia also talk about Mary when Max and Dean are checking out Baby. Then all four head out together to the Mountain Slumber Boarding House where Tasha took a room. A creepy man rises from the cellar and Alicia charges in the house. Inside they find Tasha and she is alive… I smell something fishy going on here! Max introduces the boys to her and she invites them to her room.

Tasha gives a weak excuse as to why she couldn’t pick up the phone and answer her daughter. Parallels are really flowing through the whole episode for the Winchesters. Tasha offers them wine and we can hear a snap when she is opening the bottle. She hands it over and while the others are not looking she snaps her finger back into position. ICK! That is not their mother. Sam heads out to get food.

Meanwhile, back at the BMoL. After the torture scene Ketch tries to have some private time with Mary and again I can only say ewww! Luckily Mary is as put off by the thought of it as me and she declines. They have an argument about the torture and if the end justifies the means. Ketch is pissed so he hits Mary where it hurts. He implies that she is a bad mother and she should call Dean to show that mommy loves him. I think in her mind Mary really does think she is a bad mother and she carries a lot of guilt in her head. That is why she is keeping her distance from her boys.

Dean sips the wine holding the glass hilariously and he talks with Tasha about his mother and about Tasha’s family. Dean has that perfect family longing in his eyes when “Tasha” reminds him that when children grow up they notice that even their parents are just people, not superheroes or perfect. Meanwhile Mary listens to Dean’s message. She knows there is something fishy going on. Another call from Dean alerts Ketch so she pretends she was coming to check her email. Mick has sent her a new message which is very convenient so even more red flags rise up to Mary. She finally leaves a message to Dean who in turn does not see her call.

Sam returns with the food and he nods Dean to follow him out of the room. The suspicious guy they saw coming from the cellar was actually missing in a flyer Sam found. They head to the cellar to check it out and it smells like death. They find the innkeeper and said man dead with their hearts cut out on the floor and also Tasha on a table. They are talking when Max arrives who had left to go on his date and came to see what the light was all about. He sees his mother dead. Sam and Dean feel his pain when Max smoothes his mother’s hair. We see a scene where that obnoxious knitting lady is building a twig person.

At the BMoL HQ Mary goes to check out the box number she heard Ketch say. She was right to be suspicious because she finds Mick’s body stored in the box. When she leaves and tries to hide from Ketch she finds surveillance screens of herself, her sons, Garth, Claire, and Eileen with information and audio files. She immediately calls Dean and leaves another voicemail where she tells him they have a problem. When she tries to leave the room Ketch finds her.

The fight choreography that follows next was awesome. Mary could hold her own against Ketch and her punches really felt like they could hurt him. She twists his arm, and Ketch counters it by throwing her over the desk. Ketch again badmouths her sons and Mary tells him that her sons are decent. He is not. Mary hits him with her brass knuckles and knee to his family jewels and he falls to the floor. She almost escapes but Ketch Tasers her! I cry foul!

After that we head back to Rock River where Max charges to Tasha’s room and he pushes the “Twig lady” to the wall. He wants to know what she did to his mother. Alicia doesn’t know what the hell is going on. Max’s eyes flash purple and he tries to get the creature to talk. She tells them to go in the room in the hall up the stairs. The other two twig puppets attack them. Max sends the cellar guy out of the window and he breaks. They see from the window that he was not real. Max and Dean kick the witches’ door down. In the other room fake Tasha is out of commission and the inn keeper attacks Sam.

The witch immobilises Dean and she offers her demon deal to Max. She tells him that he can then have their mostly same mother back. Tasha refused the deal so that is why she killed her. She also says that if they kill her also Max’s mother will be fully gone. To accept the offer he only needs to put her ring to his finger. In Tasha’s room Sam is in peril and Alicia helps him to fight the twig man. When she turns the twig mother is back up and she tabs her in the stomach. Meanwhile Max is tempted to take up the witches’ offer but Dean shoots her. All the creatures turn to dust.

Sam calls for help but they are too late and Alicia dies of her wounds. Max’s bad day continues and he totally breaks down beside his sister’s body. They find him later outside and he is totally quiet. The boys try to comfort him but he tells them to go. He says he will take care of the bodies. Sam and Dean did not take the ring with them so you know what comes next.

In the Impala, when they are driving home, Sam tells Dean he did the right thing but Dean is not so sure of that. Dean was envious of their happy family but it didn’t really protect the family now did it? Sam still says Max will be fine but Dean knows and we know that is not the case. I love the music on this montage where Max picks up the ring and he reanimates his sister. Then he burns the house down while they leave that God forsaken place.

In the Impala Dean finally listens to Mary’s messages. He is too late to call her though as she is held captive by the BMoL. And yay! Toni Bevell is back, said no one, ever. It seems Mary will get the same treatment Sam did at the start of the season. Like daughter like son. Steve Yockey has grown into one of my favourite new SPN writers this season. So, I hope he continues on that track.

Characters

As usual the boys were great in this episode but we also had other interesting characters back and the storyline moved forward with several of our main players and with Sam and Dean. Mary finally sees Ketch’s true colours and that gets the ball rolling for one suspicious Winchester. One good thing about Ketch, who is being a bastard (smiley face) as usual, is that he makes Mary think how she is acting and being with her boys. If a guy like Ketch is seeing what she does is wrong then it must be really bad. Unfortunately she realises what kind of people the BMOL are too late and her battle continues as a captive. Also are Mary’s words too little too late for the boys? Many of the fans have crucified her already for not being a perfect mother. For me she is like any other human being. They make mistakes and so has she. For the boys sake I hope she survives and their relationship turns better.

David Haydn-Jones is marvellous as Arthur Ketch. We truly love to hate him. He is a total psychopath or is he? Is there something else brewing under the surface? I am not sure if he will be redeemed somehow but he has killed innocent people without mercy. And he captured Mary which is a big no-no in my book. Will Ketch be the villain we love to hate for a long time? Who knows…

I truly adored the twins when we first saw them and that continued into this episode, so their tragedy really made me sad. Also their mom Tasha was a great person and a loving mother. Also she was a fighter and a hunter to her very end. The trio had great chemistry with one another and the twins made me remember the thing I fell in love with the boys and Supernatural. I hope Max does not turn bad because of this but it still will be a sad story whatever the outcome will be. Alicia was sweet and loved her mother and brother a lot. I hope she knew in the end that it was not her mother that stabbed her.

Linda Darlow, Tim Carlson and Paul Rogic were all great and creepy in the small roles they had as the witch and her twig minions. We had new and very interesting monsters this time around.

Here is the full list of characters:

Jared Padalecki - Sam Winchester

Jensen Ackles - Dean Winchester

Samantha Smith - Mary Winchester

David Haydn-Jones - Arthur Ketch

Kendrick Sampson - Max Banes

Kara Royster - Alicia Banes

Alvina August - Tasha Banes

Linda Darlow - Demon Borrower Witch

Tim Carlson - Andy

Paul Rogic - Rick Walsh

Set design

We had it pretty easy with the sets this week. We had the bunker and BMoL temporary base again and also few outdoor sets. I don’t usually focus that much on the outdoor ones but I think I can toss few in this time. The area where the Mountain Slumber Boarding House is located was very pretty and so was the old house with the nice and cosy interior, not including the creepy fruit basement. The house is close by to a beautiful mountain and a lake landscape. We even get a small glimpse from Baby driving up the mountain road and we never get tired of that.

From the house we see a glimpse of the lounge, reception, hallways, Tasha’s and Alicia’s room and the witches’ room. All the rooms are homey and beautifully designed. Also the story and the twigs and nature can be seen all over that set even from the glass windows. Also nature colours are present in every room and nature imaginary is even present on the glass windows.

Steve Yockey‏ @SleepyPanda76 May 4

Note the wallpaper in the Mountain Slumber Boarding House. @dicksp8jr & the production design team are detail monsters. #Supernatural

Props

This episode had a lot of cool props that were something old and something new. We had The Colt back, yay!, but in pieces, Noooooo!. Mary also got to use the angelic brass knuckles which I think are always cool. We had also varied new ones that were crucial to the story no matter how big or how small they were. So let’s get to them, shall we. First we have Tasha’s magical search amulet. I love colour purple and the simplicity of this curious prop. The second is continuing the nature and its colours theme with the twine ball the witch is working on. It also adds to the symbolism of the story and to the control the witch has to the dead people. In the Third image we have the props that started this all, the purple demon deal witch ring that the borrower witch keeps in her finger.

In the last three images we focus on weapons and on puppets. The first image is from Alicia’s witch dagger that was simple and pretty cool. Are those Celtic runes on the blade? Her necklace that is seen on the image is also nice. In the second image we have the familiar Colt that has lost its prime. Hopefully it can be restored to its prime again. On the third and fourth image we have some creepy dolls. One is a creepy purple clothed old child doll. I swear the eyes are still moving in the picture… Then in the last one we can see the twig life sized dolls, puppets, scarecrows or whatever they were. They were creepy and cool at the same time.

Music

This week we did have two songs! They were A Real One by Raphael Lake, Aaron Levy and Dumi Maraire and In Peaceful Dreams by Seasick Steve. The last one was pretty damn great so the next small part is from that. It is fitting for the whole episode, isn’t it?

"Yeah, I’m not sure.

Oh, them old hollows

Hide the dark secrets

If the trees tell what they see

You’d never sleep again in peaceful dreams"