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Tense, well-directly, well-acted and genuinely scary, “Long-Distance Call” is still too much of a stretch.
The episode begins with a married man plagued with late night phone calls from another woman named Linda. She begs him to reconsider, but he continually hangs up on her. At one point, he tears the phone of the wall, but it keeps ringing. Eventually, the man gives, saying ,"You win” before shooting himself in the head.
While searching for a way to break Dean’s deal with the devil, the Winchesters Brothers are frequently at each other throats after lead upon lead turns up dry. Sam also learns Ruby has no way of saving Dean – a secret Dean has kept from Sam for several episodes. Determined to stay active in hunting, Dean agrees to take another case from Bobby involving strange electronic disturbances in Milan, Ohio, and Sam reluctantly agrees to follow. Once there, they follow up on the married man’s suicide and quickly found the victim had good reason to be distraught – “Linda” had been dead since a high school car accident!
The Winchesters discover the entire neighborhood is plagued with phone calls from the dead. The two pay a visit to the phone company, and after obtaining a list of phone calls from a century-old phone number thanks to a porn-hungry telemarketer in a fly-infested office, the two begin searching through the phone records. Sam in particular connects with a teenage girl getting phone calls from her three year dead mother, but this is nothing compared to the phone call Dean receives – from John Winchester, who later indicates he knows where the demon who holds Dean’s contract is, and more importantly, how to kill him.
The brothers erupt into bitter argument into the legitimacy of Dean’s talk with his father. Dean points to the existence of a spirit phone invented by Thomas Edison, whose home town was none other than Milan, while both Sam and Bobby doubt the exorcisms John has provided Dean. As the teenage girl is besieged with suicidal AIM messages from her long-dead mother, Sam begs Dean not to go anywhere alone before he goes off to protect the girl. Not surprisingly, Dean has other ideas.
After saving both the girl and her little brother from the faulty message, Sam realizes it’s a malignant monster at work. He calls up Dean, who seemingly gives him the predator’s lair – the phone company. Sam ambushes the telemarketer – but unfortunately it’s his supervisor who is the real monster. The creature knocks out both Sam and the telemarketer, and then proceeds to eat the latter’s soul. Dean, meanwhile, prepares the exorcism and lies in wait for the “demon” to show up, unaware the creature has sent him to the home of police officer who lost his little girl to a rapist years before, thanks to a demonic tip-off.
The creature reveals how vulnerable phone lines have left the world, allowing him to easily prey on victims he once only had access to in isolated communities. At the last minute, Sam slips his bounds and wrestles with the monster, while Dean does the same with the police officer. Sam impales the creature on a spike, and Dean realizes he’s been fooled when the exorcism fails. After subduing the police officer, Dean apologizes, and reveals to the sobbing cop he doesn’t know why he’s there.
Back at the motel, Dean apologizes to Sam, and chides his own blind faith, realizing only he can get out the deal – though Sam also reaffirms his commitment. Dean gives Sam a hard time for another chick flick moment, and two end the episode drinking beer while watching the tube.
Overall, this was an effective episode marred by the post-strike atmosphere. Given the premise, we know John’s phone call is a fake from the beginning. In fact, the entire idea should be quite obviously erroneous to Sam and Dean considering it’s she, not he, who holds the car – namely Lilith. Despite good acting and suspenseful direction, the episode fails to make much impact. While the creature is relevant to our times, he’s not much use to the ongoing story about Dean. All of this could have been avoided if he was in cahoots with Lilith, but there’s not even that, and we end the episode knowing not much more than we did going in. The previous Ghostfacers served as both hilarious jumping-on point and refreshing break from mytharc, but even in contrasting purposes, Long-Distance Call achieves neither advancing the story nor expanding the mythology of the show. Hopefully the next episodes are more promising; with only two episodes left, they had better be! 
