Here's Remy's analysis: 

“Changing Channels,” Genre, and Realism in Supernatural

A garishly bright set, a laugh track, and a catchy theme song are classic markers of a sitcom, yet these are how “Changing Channels,” the eighth episode of horror show Supernatural’s fifth season, begins. In a show where most episodes open with a dark, violent scene, the audience is caught off guard. “Changing Channels” is not Supernatural’s first meta episode, nor is it their last, but this particular episode is the one that best uses genre to show the fictionality that television can provide and enhances the realism by contrast. 

A television critic often “[examines] the look, the sound, and most significantly the sense” of a TV genre to create a world which feels real to the viewer. Much of this “sense” comes from genre conventions: what we expect to see within a show of any given genre. “Changing Channels” uses a two-pronged approach: drawing attention to the featured parody genres and tricking the audience several times until they are satisfied that the conventions match the “reality” of the world of Supernatural. “Changing Channels” creates a RealFeel effect within Supernatural by contrasting the standard genre – horror – with other genres to give the alternate realities a sense of artificiality and make the actual setting the truth.

The opening sequence is not the only time the episode subverts the audience’s expectations. The first scene in the “real” world is led by characters in scrubs and a hospital setting before it is revealed that this is simply Dean watching television (Doctor Sexy, M.D., a parody of Grey’s Anatomy). Later, the audience will be startled when the Winchesters burst through a door, only to suddenly be in Doctor Sexy, M.D., complete with their own scrubs. When it’s revealed that this alternate reality is a construct built by the episode’s “monster,” a recurring character called the Trickster, the audience is prepared to watch a cycle of television genres. But that doesn’t stop the episode from tricking the audience one last time: after supposedly killing the Trickster, Dean wakes up back in their “real world” setting, only to find that Sam is now their beloved car, Knight Rider-style, using a show with a similar drama/fantasy base to tease the idea that this might be reality and dropping the charade entirely when they play the other show’s theme song. It’s only when the Trickster is revealed to be the archangel Gabriel – thus uncovering a false reality in line with the episode’s theme – that the real world is restored for good, and the audience can be satisfied that now all truths are on the table, including the setting.

The other half of establishing the RealFeel comes from the aforementioned cycle of genres. Once the audience is primed with a hospital show, the episode follows with typical formats for a Japanese game show (a suited host, product placement, and questions the characters have to answer in Japanese), a commercial for a drug treating genital herpes (serene imagery and a voiceover of side effects), a return to the sitcom, and a procedural cop show (sunglasses at night, comedically deep voices, and puns about the cause of death), only switching between them when the Winchesters “play their roles” and match the genre conventions. These genres are exaggerated to the extreme, and the Winchesters struggle to play along, helping to indicate that this is not their reality, and thus not the “real” world. Castiel, another recurring character, appears twice within the alternate realities to attempt to pull them out, only to be zapped away both times by television static, drawing another barrier between reality and fiction. As the characters grow more frustrated with the exaggerated fiction (“I hate procedural cop shows,” Dean proclaims, “They’re all the same.”) the audience becomes more anxious to return to reality in the form of the established genre conventions, until finally that wish is granted. Gabriel cues “TV land” to turn off, and the characters are left in the same dimly lit warehouse they started in, with their car outside, exactly as we expected.

Supernatural is not a realistic show. It features monsters and magic, angels and demons, time travel and alternate realities. But Supernatural feels real, in part because of the emotionally compelling plot arcs, but also because of meta episodes like “Changing Channels,” which break from the reality within the show so drastically that by contrast, the baseline of the show has to feel real. Even as two different characters remark ironically within the episode that they wish life was a tv show, the audience can’t help feeling that it is real, or at least realistic, because what they expect has been reaffirmed. The show returns to its genre conventions, and all feels right, and true, with the world.

References

Carver, J. (Writer). Beeson, C. (Director). (November 5th, 2019). Changing Channels (Season 5, Episode 8) [TV Series Episode]. In E. Kripke and R. Singer (Executive Producers), Supernatural. Kripke Enterprises

Narrative Complexity