Dan Vs. The Wolf-Man
Jacob Black is an idiot. There, now that I've gotten my werewolf hatred out of my system, we can continue.*
So we begin with Dan saying "I can't believe how much I hate everything."
BAM! Establishing Character Moment in the opening line. See, I mentioned in my New Mexico liveblog that I didn't think the episode was supposed to be the first one. Interestingly, the DVD does place this one first, which leads me to believe that maybe this was intended to be the first episode.
As a first episode, it works much better than New Mexico did. But we're here to judge it as a second episode.
A beautiful lady knocks on Dan's door and says to him:
- "Hi, Dan. I just moved in next door. I'm a supermodel.""I don't care who the IRS sends! I am NOT paying my taxes!"
Name-drop! It's like all of the problems from the first episode are gone. This further adds to my opinion that this one should have come first.
This unnamed lady goes on to talk about Dan seductively, wanting him to kiss her. She even offers to make him pancakes if he does, so he agrees. note
EDIT: For some reason that note isn't working for me. I put it in proper Wiki Markup, but whatever. See if you can find what I did wrong, and I'll fix it:
[[note]]A lot of people seemed to think this scene cemented Dan as being gay, since he refused to kiss a [[{{Added Alliterative Appeal}}sexy seductive sensual supermodel]] except for the pancakes. I'll go into more detail about Dan's orientation in a later entry, because it is a point worth exploring.[[/note]]
Just before he kisses her, her face turns into a screaming demon with an alarm clock ringing for a voice. Dan wakes up. He throws his alarm clock out and it breaks, explaining why it's a different alarm clock than the one in the previous episode.
He goes out to his car, and sees that it has claw marks scratched across the door, a hair ball on the side mirror, and a combination of footprints and pawprints leading up to it. Therefore, he declares his revenge on The Wolf-Man. Clearly.
Couldn't it just as easily been a human with an animal pet? Or, you know, something other than this!? But whatever, if alien flying saucers exist, a werewolf isn't too out of the question.
Dan calls Chris over for help, once again name-dropping in the first sentence. Chris doesn't believe Dan about the Wolf-Man, and more importantly promised Elise that he wouldn't help him anymore. So naturally, Chris has to go help Dan and make up an excuse to Elise (who, again, is name-dropped in the first sentence of her on-screen appearance).
Chris points out that is an animal shelter right across the street. The fur and paw prints could have been any animal. But Dan points out that it is the Wolf-Man because... I dunno, Insane Troll Logic.
- Dan: The Wolf-Man must pay! Next month!
Why next month? Because it needs to be a full moon, so Dan sends Chris home. They're not doing anything today. So in other words, this entire episode so far has been totally pointless.
Cut to one month later, a full moon on Halloween Night. You'd think that now it makes sense for this episode to air after New Mexico, that they wanted this episode to premiere near Halloween. However, this episode's original airdate was January 1st. So the argument does not work, and it makes no sense to put a Halloween Episode here.
Dan calls Chris over, and Elise is happy to get rid of Chris, who is eating all of the candy before the trick-or-treaters can get to their house. So Chris goes to help Dan.
But Dan doesn't need Chris's help, since he already caught the Wolf-Man. That is, he kidnapped a trick-or-treater dressed as one. After Chris convinces him to let the kid go, Dan sees another trick-or-treater dressed as what he thinks is a Wolf-Man. It's actually a Yeti.
Regardless, Dan gives chase. A policeman sees this and does nothing.
And thus, Dan and Chris get arrested.
The cop in charge of the police station looks through all of their stuff. Chris has a wallet, some keys, a comb, a locket with a picture of Elise in it*, three bouillon cubes*. Dan has his revenge list and letters to his grandmother. He also has brass knuckles, which are confiscated due to being illegal. Dan demands that he can't confiscate the knuckles because he knows people who pay taxes. Dan then proceeds to hilariously confiscate the station, from the free water to the cop's hat, to a bunch of other stuff, so he gets tased.
Chris has had enough of Dan's antics and intends to just return home, but they hear the real Wolf-Man, so Dan insists that they follow the howls. Unfortunately, a lot of people are coming home from Costume Parties, so traffic is bad.
While arguing over whether or not to continue the mission, they get a glimpse of the real Wolf-Man. They chase after him in their car, in a truly epic chase scene.
Failing to track him, they deduce that he was probably going home, so they will search here next month. In the meantime, they need to forge silver weapons, a werewolf's weakness.
Chris's only silver is a family heirloom coin though, so they end up with just a single arrow head. Dan lacks the money to buy a bow from a sporting goods store, so they decide to do some graverobbing. Once Dan has the bow though, he's disturbed the tomb, and so zombie skeletons come out and try to attack the pair.
WHAT THE HELL AM I WATCHING!?
Like, seriously. That's the most complex plotline ever. They went from "Wolf-Man attacked me" to "I kidnap children" to "You're under arrest" to "Drive after him" to "We need silver" to "Graverobbing" to "Zombie skeletons."
Freaking kudos to these writers. I never saw that coming. I like the complexity of it.
Oh yeah, and there's a pointless sub-plot about how Chris has to have breakfast with Elise's parents, but is too tired due to Dan keeping him up all night. Elise's parents are not impressed by Chris. Given how complex this story is already, you don't need this on top of it, although it does a good job setting up for a later episode. That said, it also introduces a Voodoo Shark. Elise's Parents hate Chris. But if they hated him before, especially to the extent that we'll see later, then why would they agree to have breakfast with him? And if they liked him before, why would they be so unforgiving to him here? The only possible explanation is that they have never met him before. But he married their freaking daughter!
So how is this possible?
Cut to another month later. Dan and Chris are doing a stake-out in Chris's car, complete with donuts and coffee.
- Dan: Man, I hate coffee.Chris: Then why did you get it?(cutting the dialogue here, as it's mostly unnecessary to this liveblog)Dan: We're on a stake-out! How can you possibly have a stake-out without coffee!?Chris: All right, fine. I don't care anymore.Dan: These donuts suck.
Okay, seriously? Dan is an idiot if he wants to waste his money on stuff that he doesn't want. So much for the Lead You Can Relate To that he had going for himself in the first episode.
Chris then questions why they use his car for Dan's revenge scheme. Dan points out that gas is seven dollars per gallon and he doesn't want to waste his own. Finally, the plot calls them, so Dan throws his coffee cup out the window. Once again, forgetting to open it.
The coffee bounces off the window and gets all over both Dan and Chris, burning and soaking both of them. They search for the Wolf-Man, and eventually find him eating tacos. Dan fires the silver arrow. "Fetch this, Fido."
The Wolf-Man is hit, and leaves a trail of blood to his house. Dan sees that he lives in apartment 314. So he goes down to the basement. On the way, Chris points out that now they need to get more silver to kill the Wolf-Man. Dan is appalled that Chris would suggest such a thing.
Instead, Dan decided to steal from the dead, ruin Chris's car with a coffee stench, get rid of his silver heirloom, all to find the Wolf-Man's car and key it. Now they're even. The joke here is that this is the only time in the series where Disproportionate Retribution is averted. As a premiere episode, though, you wouldn't know that, so while this episode is good for beginners, the ending falls flat on its face.
Especially in a scene at the end, where the Wolf-Man sees that Dan keyed his car, and declares revenge on him with a Skyward Scream and Angry Fist-Shake, which you don't know is Dan's Mad Libs Catch Phrase if this is your first episode.
Oh, and in case you were wondering about the zombie skeletons that they fled from, they're seen again at the end and are hit by a car. No Sequel Hook here.
This episode works. And it works well. There were plenty of legitimately funny scenes throughout this whole thing, and the story was so complex that I'm honestly surprised they managed to get it all in a 22-minute episode. If I did have to complain about one thing, though, it's the ending. There's no real easy way of saying it, but the ending felt rushed. Mostly due to the fact that they didn't have much time left due to the needlessly complex storyline.
It would have been better if they, instead of keying his car, decided to kill him a month later with more silver, as Chris suggested. It makes very little sense for this show to avert (or would it be subvert?) Disproportionate Retribution. Especially if this was intended to be a premiere. This early into the series, either episode 1 or episode 2, you want to familiarize your audience with the concepts of the show, including the fact that you never avert that trope.
Now, the ending would have worked better if this were a Season 2 or Season 3 episode, or possibly even late Season 1, when we are more ready to expect Disproportionate Retribution than we are here. But in this episode's defense, the rest of the story, from the buildup to the climax, is very well-done, especially for a 22-minute episode.
But after a Deus ex Machina and a Rushed Ending, this seems to indicate that the writing, while a vast improvement over New Mexico, still has a ways to go, particularly with endings. Hopefully we can get some better endings in the future.
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