Carry on Supernatural fans, Wednesday has come and gone and we have a whole new batch of feels to obsess over. Great.
We open in Chicago where a creepy dude in a fedora opens up his safe deposit box for the first time in a long while. He pulls out a bone and proceeds to splatter the pretty and perky bank teller. Ah Supernatural, I’ve missed you.
We check on Dean and Kevin, the former cramming his face full of burger (he must have been having withdrawals) and the latter wanting to go home to see his mom. Dean’s meat fever has him confused as to why the prophet would want to see his mother so Kevin has to remind him that HI HELLO DEAD GIRLFRIEND MUCH?! Sam agrees that Kevin should be able to go but Dean stomps all over that idea; there is no need to check on her since Crowley will have guards all around to keep her safe and to keep an eye out for Kevin. As Dean so eloquently puts it they “have Crowley by the short and curlys,” no need to charge in there. But our beloved AP student puts his foot down. Mom. Now.
They Impala up to Michigan and spy on Tiger Mom and find that she is indeed surrounded by demons in disguise. They Ruby’s-knife demon!mailman and demon!gardener and get Kevin in to see his non-demon mom (holy water tested, Winchester approved.) They then have to knife demon!Eunice, mom’s friend, right in front of her. Kevin attempts to explain demons to his mom via The Exorcist. And she’s all Pop culture Really Kevin? You Asian student slacker. But she takes it all in stride, seeming to appreciate that her precious baby is a Prophet Of The Lord. But she balks when the boys mention sticking her in a safe house. Oh no, mama’s coming tablet hunting with the boys. Just try to pry her son out of her claws. So the boys attempt to scare her off by saying both Trans need anti-demon ink. The look on Kevin’s face when his mom is all bitches please this ain’t my first tat rodeo was priceless.
Also priceless? Kevin’ squeals of pain in the tattoo parlor. Poor AP baby.
They head to Wyoming to check out a train station locker, presumably where Kevin hid the tablet. Except what’s actually in the locker is a diaper bag. Maaaaaybe should have kept a closer eye on the word of God. The boys suit up and head down to the local prison where the locker thief is. Sammy questions the guys while Dean FLASHBACKs to Purgatory where he last performed an interrogation whilst looking for Cas. He then imitates his past and threatens the felon like he did the monster…with a knife. The felon gives up a location just as the monster did about Cas. Whatever gets results I guess.
They hit a pawn shop where the owner is none too obliging to share any details on the tablet. Tiger mom to the rescue! Noticing the sexy (and hoo boy do I mean smoking hot) Ferrari Spyder outside the shop with expired stickers, she busts out all sorts of tax knowledge on his ass, (also enlisting Kevin and Sam for some rapid fire math facts – nerds.) Not wanting to lose his shiny wheels, the dude obliges to give them the information.
They hit the motel where the tablet was sold. Before they can bust in the door, a dandy (I’m serious – top hat, cane, pinstripe suit) appears. Plutus – the god of greed – has sent his man to invite the boys to an auction where the tablet will be on the block. The boys have no cash to their name to bid with and for a second Sammy considers the Impala. BLASPHEMER! Instead of the car though, they decide to just have Kevin memorize demon-forever-banishing spell when the tablet is shown to the interested buyers.
At the auction warehouse (where Dean sets off the metal detector and has to dump every weapon on him, including the Ruby knife) they check out the items up for bid. Da Vinci’s codex, a Grecian Helmet, Mjolnir – there a quite a few treasures being scoped out by all sorts. Including CROWLEY! YAY! Something tells me he has more cash flow than the Winchesters. Mama Kevin decks Crowley – she even “HI-YAHed” – but they can’t do anything more than that, or risk being chucked out of the auction. Dean is approached by a skinny teenager in a fast food uniform, who is actually an angel named Samandriel in a vessel. And he knew Castiel. And he wants to know what happened to his friend. Upset by the non-answer that Dean gives, the angel admonishes him and says that having too much heart was Castiel’s problem. The glare-daggers he gave Dean with that sentence went right through the TV and into my heart.
But we get a FLASHBACK and there is Cas, washing up by a stream where Dean finds him, all scruffy and not super pleased to see his friend. He looks concerned. Cas admits that he ran away and left Dean alone on purpose. Furious, Dean yells at him, that he prayed to him every night but he never showed. And then Cas explains – he was running because Leviathan are chasing him. And above all else, he wants to keep them from finding Dean. (UGH FEELS) Dean refuses to let Cas save him like that, and no matter how much he disagreed Dean refuses to leave without his friend (THE LOOKS! THE LOOKS THEY EXCHANGED! ALL THE FEELS!)
Back in the auction, Team SAVE!THE!DAY pools as much cash as they have. Crowley taunts Sam (this time with Samantha instead of Moose – still good) not quite understanding why the tablet is so important to them. Doesn’t matter though because they apparently have to pay in dwarven gold and virigin flesh, not stolen credit cards and Costco memberships. Dean goes to use the restroom and takes a detour to maybe just perhaps attempt to possibly steal the word of God when no one is looking. (Nice try but no) Crowley continues to smarm the boys and then bids 3 billion dollars for the tablet. Here begins the best back and forth in the episode. Samandriel jumps up and bids the Mona Lisa. Crowley counters with the real Mona Lisa (where she’s topless). Samandriel offers Vatican City. Crowley attempts to outbid him with Alaska, but the gods say no thanks, no Palin for them, so instead he offers the Moon. Not satisfied with the bidding, the dandy auctioneer adds in an object to sweeten the lot: bona-fide, genuine, 100% American Prophet of the Lord – poor Kevin Tran.
Tiger Mommy tries bidding her 401K, but it doesn’t work, so she bids her soul. Crowley’s souls aren’t sacrificial enough, and heaven won’t trade in them. So Kevin’s mom wins the bid, but um… yeah no soul. The boys try to offer her comfort in the form of answers, but they both get an F in Effort. Samandriel tries to offer her help in the form of Kevin-protection, but she explains that she has more faith in the Brothers Winchester. Which doesn’t work out so hot for her. See, it turns out that Crowley paid off the dandy to explain some loopholes and burn off Mama Tran’s tattoo in order to possess her. Tiger!Crowley kills the god of greed and his lackeys and attempts to escape with the tablet; Dean and Ruby’s knife chase after. The dandy pulls a gun on Kevin, but Sammy Winchester bashes his head in with Mjolnir, the hammer of Thor. It was kind of awesome. The old man from the opening of the show, who bid with 5/8 of virgin, asks for his hammer back, but Sam realizes what he had done takes a swing at him too. Again – awesome.
Crowley jumps out of Tiger Mom and back into Mark Sheppard because we wouldn’t like him any other way. Grabbing the tablet he taunts Kevin and gives him a word of advice: run. And not from him, but from Sam and Dean who leave a trail of dead loved ones in their wake. Ouch right in the truth. And Kevin seems just about done with them both. His mother is comatose, and he cares nothing for Dean’s speeches. The brothers have a secret hallway conversation where Dean admits he would have killed Mama Tran to kill Crowley because hey what’s one more nightmare in exchange for the King of Hell? Ouch again. But hark, the room with Kevin in it is suddenly too quiet. And empty. Kevin took off because, as he said in the note he had four and a half seconds to scribe, he figures without the tablet they won’t need him. And people who Dean no longer need end up dead. Woof. We are just full of daggers to the feels today.
But it ain’t over yet because Dean FLASHBACKs once more. And we see Cas struggling to stand, holding on to Dean’s hand. Calling his name. And Dean (although we don’t see his face it looks like him in profile) just lets him go. Still calling his name.
SUCH a good episode. The return of Castiel! Sort of! So while we didn’t get him in the flesh, we saw him in Purgatory. Nothing much was actually explained as to what happened to the angel, just that it looks like after everything they both said Dean left Cas on purpose. Crowley is still smarmy and now Kevin is missing. Three FLASHBACKs were much easier to handle than the million from the last ep, and NONE of them were Moose-related. Thank goodness.
No classic rock tracks this week: bummer.
