Romanian Characters in American TV Series: Don and Maggie Stark in Supernatural S07E05
About
Genre: Horror, Fantasy, Mystery, Drama, Adventure, Action
Episode: Season 7, Episode 5
Directed by: Phil Sgriccia
Written by: Eric Kripke, Brad Buckner & Eugenie Ross-Leming
Original Air Date: October 21, 2011
Synopsis
Characters: Don and Maggie Stark
The show focuses around Sam and Dean Winchester, two brothers that have dedicated their lives to "saving people, hunting things, the family business". During the many seasons of the show, the two fight various mythical and biblical monsters, with the help of various other characters. The most notable side characters are Castiel (angel) and Crowley (king of Hell).
In this particular episode entitled "Shut Up, Dr. Phil", the two brothers investigate some unusual deaths in the town of Prosperity, Indiana. Their investigation leads them to Don and Maggie Stark, which turn out to be a very powerful couple of witches that have killed innocent people while fighting each other. Sam and Dean try to fix their marriage in order to solve the conflict, and they finally manage to do so and save the day once again.
What is very interesting about Don and Maggie is that they appear to be Romanian witches, and they have been together for 800 years. When they try to kill Sam and Dean, the chant "puterea magiei negre [...] la suferinta si moarte [...] supune-te ordinelor mele" (bits of it are unintelligible because Sam and Dean talk over them). This roughly translates as "the power of black magic [...] to suffering and death [...] obey my orders".
Personal Opinion
To me, this episode was simply ridiculous. Although I still enjoy Supernatural, even though it has been airing for at least three seasons too long now, I did not enjoy this episode in particular due to the very poorly-constructed portrayal of Romania and Romanian witches. While associated Romania with witches is a harmful trope in itself, the execution behind it also severly lacked any sort of nuance. The Romanian spell was delivered by the two characters in very poor Romanian. I could barely make out what they were saying, and I am a native speaker of the language. Besides that, not much was there to indicate their heritage, and anyone that did not pay too much attention could have missed it entirely. I am not sure whether this is a good or a bad thing, but it clearly indicates that the writers could not be bothered too much with it.
