The Companion

Oh that was definitely meant in a joking manner.

I agree with all of this up and including the Warehouse 13 bit. I have been warned that this season is frustrating in part because of conflict between the brothers. We will see how I feel later, but in this episode I think both of them are very understandable. Dean: Dean has always been super black and white anyway and he isn't going to see value in a long term partnership with a demon. He is scared for his brother, who is messing with powers he doesn't understand. I found invoking God to be a bit manipulative, given that we know Dean is skeptical. I suppose you could say he knows Sam isn't and Sam should have the information when making the choice. I am a little surprised that Dean isn't more skeptical of the angels. Maybe the answer is that this is less about Castiel being right/good and more about Castiel threatening his brother. I guess I am just cynical, but we don't know much about the angels except that they have their own agenda. I am not ready to accept their inherent goodness in this world yet. I am such a Dean 😆. Anywho, it is understandable where Dean is coming from, but I think his approach isn't necessarily effective. I don't disagree that Ruby is a ticking time bomb. She has an agenda and she isn't sharing it with the class. She has already shown herself to be manipulative. Even if you were going to use these powers, maybe using a demon as a tutor isn't the best plan. As an aside, how can they be so sure she is who she says she is. What is to stop a different demon from claiming to be her? Lilith already did. Sam: I honestly really get Sam on all of this. I get why he didn't tell his brother who continues to think this part of him may make him a monster. Dean has said on multiple occasions that you are human or monster. And monsters have to go. He is often pulled back by Dean. There is no way Dean is going to understand Sam thinking maybe there is something in between. Plus his brother didn't want him working with Ruby, but he was gone. Sam knows his brother isn't going to react well. As far as the actual attempt to be a hybrid, I think it is totally understandable. First, we all have a tendency to think we have things under control. It is so human. The just one drink for an alcoholic. I can hook up with my ex and nobody will get hurt. I will wake up early to study. We believe we have control over so much more than we do. And sure, sometimes we are right. And sometimes we are not. Second, he wants meaning from what happened to him. What happened to his mother. Why not use this against them. Third, I do think he is correct that there is some good here. He is saving lives. They were using that knife to kill demons without regard for the person being possessed. The initial fight scene was so great and true to life. I didn't love some of the later discussions because Sam's attitude wasn't a departure from his prior characterization. First Dean is worried Sam is too ready to kill and now he is not. Any yes, that is an oversimplification because Dean is more worried about motive. It is just a little frustrating to watch Dean fret for a season that Sam is too hard because he is part demon/not himself just to watch him impute the same motives for the opposite behavior. I get it. It is just frustrating for the viewer. But then, I think the treatment of the MotW is little too on the nose anyway. I think both are plausible. I actually had the same thought about the baby as a trigger. I think they said Jack was a baby when his father turned too, so they could have just had kids around the same age or it could mean something. As a Louisianan, I was excited for a rougarou story. I wish we could have delved into the lore a bit deeper. The rougarou is a werewolf creature and I always heard about it taking kids who misbehaved, but there are so many variations.

Someone mentioned it and I should have acknowledged that here too. The pacing was very likely affected by that. I assume it is also the reason for the shorter season.

Yes, as acknowledged my love of Doctor Who makes me a hypocrite on this point. 😆 I do prefer the running around in space ship bits, but my love of River Song means I am a total contradiction. Doctor Who spoiler below.

Gonzosgirrl pointed out I never commented on this thread and the reason was mostly because the one advantage of watching a series very late is that you don't have to wait all summer to find out what happens, and there was no way I was waiting to see what happened next. This was a really great episode, but in that "guts you like a fish" way. As discussed above, that death scene was intense. Hard to watch. The entire episode did such a great job building dread. Dean's quiet desperation that he tried to hide, Sam's heartbreaking pleas. And then there was Lilith as the little girl torturing her family. Her mother begging "do it" and the horror that she was actually restored at that point. Looking back over the season story arc, I still think some of it was rushed and some of it dragged, but this last episode was so perfectly paced that it's hard to complain.

On the Impala, it is largely my dislike of time travel episodes. Bless his heart. As if telling a Winchester not to rush into danger has ever worked.

Oh that's partially because I couldn't stand to wait for the next episode. 😆 I usually post between episodes (though not every time). That thread also so thoroughly addressed my thoughts. I may still go back and comment.

Same. I am not a huge fan of time travel stories, my love of Doctor Who being the exception to the rule. There is this tendency to hit you over the head with it from a costume perspective which is thankfully absent here, other than some minor costume pieces. I will note that the costuming on this show is actually fairly timeless. Unlike my Veronica Mars watch (which was like a time capsule of 2000s fashion with the low rise jeans and the plaid skirts and the chokers), things rarely look out of place today. There is also this tendency to have the time traveling character say things that make no sense to anyone but the audience. They didn't overuse that trope. I think this episode struck a good balance, using what the audience knew to have some really great emotional beats (just want a normal life, don't want my kids to grow up as hunters, etc.) without overusing it. Agree with all this. They hit just the right emotional beats and kept it from being overdone. It is so sad to watch and know she will only get it for a little while. The houses, the kids, the husband. Some additional thoughts: - I loved that she named the boys after her parents. It was a sweet touch - Castiel talks about destiny being unchangeable but then says they don't know where Sam's path leads. This feels like a contradiction. My guess is either there are certain points that can't be changed (like fixed points in time in Doctor Who) or you can't change your own timeline. I suspect we will delve much deeper in the future on this - one of the places I thought they missed the mark was Dean talking his dad into the car. None of the information he gave his Dad should have been new information to a mechanic. I don't know. It just felt a little WINK WINK, AUDIENCE.

Yes. I am on maternity leave. I don't remember why I didn't watch beyond the pilot originally but have always wanted to go back. There are so many episodes though! I actually did this with Veronica Mars first and was joking that I am very specifically catching up on shows I missed around 2005. Now, I have been spoiled over the years on a few things, naturally, and there have been spoilers in some of these threads. But for the most part, I am doing this blind. I actually didn't expect any comments on my comments and am impressed by the number of fans who have responded (and by the amount of detail they recall). Over the years I saw the name Castiel over and over and always thought it was Cas-teel. I guess I have never heard it pronounced or never put it together.

This was such a great episode. Beyond bringing back really great characters a d the tense moments that resulted, I also loved the theological debate. I am really intrigued by the contrast of Sam's and Dean's views. Speculation would probably seem silly given that everyone else is effectively a decade down the road from this episode. 😆 However, I do like the angel/demon dichotomy and find the similarities interesting as well.

I don't have anything to add except that the extra's reaction to the redefining the definition of necrophilia comment made me laugh so hard.

This episode was awesome. I loved the mistrust when Dean showed up. I may change my mind as the season progresses, but I don't mind the brothers being out of synch initially. I particularly think it rings true that Sam would have trouble sliding back into letting Dean lead. Most critically, I learned that I have been pronouncing Castiel wrong in my head for years. 😆

I guess we will just have to disagree on this. We have seen a lot of pretty terrible monsters. The week before featured a monster that psychologically tortured its victims by pretending to be their loved ones. We have seen werewolves (who also rip out their victims' heart), monsters that steal children and lock them in cages to feed on their mothers, clowns that slaughter entire families, etc. This guy wasn't any worse than any number of the other monsters. The typical treatment is to kill the monster. Their father tried and failed that method, but Dean himself seemed to think it was possible to cut him into little pieces. Instead they settled on burying him alive.

Poor Corbett. There were some really great parts of this episode. They really nailed the look and feel of the ghost hunting reality shows. The setting was creepy. The ghost party was creepy and horrible. I will say that the documentary style got a little old for me, but I liked this one overall.

Needs to die, yes. Buried for eternity alive and aware? That is pretty intense.

Agreed. She needs a good attorney. Should be plenty in hell.* 😆 She lacked capacity and made the contract under duress. *I kid! I am an attorney and you know what they say about lawyer jokes. Nobody likes them. Attorneys don't think they are funny and non-attorneys don't think they are jokes. In the end, I like Bela's story. She is on borrowed time and uses her knowledge to make her own way. In the end, Lauren Cohan does a beautiful job, especially that moment of vulnerability when she considers telling the truth. But all of that is distraction from the huge WTF of leaving a still alive and conscious person in a grave for eternity. Seriously, WTF? I guess eventually he will rot enough to actually die. Otherwise why worry about the parts. At least I am telling myself that because that is next level horrifying. I mean, try burning him. Destroy his brain. Something other than burying him alive. Yeah, he killed but only when he "had to." And he was never intentionally cruel. He was definitely not the worst monster we have seen. The resolution just seemed truly awful to me. Obviously, this episode was about desperation and the things it can drive us to do. The lengths to which we will go when desperate. I loved the doctor who was part Frankenstein and part his monster. But the totality of the episode had too many threads and it lessened the impact. Maybe they were rushed as noted above. But it ended up messier than intended, I think. PLUS THE WHOLE BURYING THE MONSTER ALIVE THING.

This was a loss to me, and probably my only problem with the episode. We see so many hunters who are already there and almost all of them have that moment when they encounter the supernatural. It would have been awesome to see that unfold. I will note that even after one person had their gun taken, he was holding his gun and standing awfully close to the bars. I loved the tension in this one. It was well done. The claustrophobic feeling was intense. Oh and I loved the reanimated corpse. It was a good touch to have one of the murdered men kill the agent.

I admit that I am a sucker for Groundhog Day stories (I loved Russian Doll more than I can quantify) so I was predisposed to love this, but it really did hit all the right notes. I was even a huge fan of bringing back the trickster, who was sort of played for laughs/light hearted. Sure he killed some people but they deserved it. But instead, he is killing Dean which hits hard. He is still hilarious about it though. The consistency in the trickster's humor is really amazing. The guy/demigod who made a frat bro slow dance with an alien is definitely the same as the guy/demigod who has Dean choke on sausage because he knows they are trying to change something.

Oh man, I can see how that would have been stressful. I still mourn Pushing Daisies, though the strike DID give us Dr. Horrible, so silver linings, I guess.

Oh, you are right. I guess something about disappearing in the parking lot made me think about it and then I got a little tickled thinking about her being stuck in corporeal form and just running really fast. It never occurred to me with the crossroads demon. That does make sense, though. I know there were some complaints about the psychic kids storyline and perhaps I will find it less engaging down the road when I see what they do with the more structured seasons that I am told come later. I think that, for me, I liked the addition of the psychic kids themselves. Partly, probably, because I liked the actors. So, even though the mystery wasn't that complex, the story was a little more interesting to me because it expanded the world by adding a few intriguing characters. I don't know what is going to happen to Dean, but I don't buy that he gets written off the show so I assume the resolution isn't as catastrophic as they are selling any more than Sam's death was. The "Sam has to be more like Dean" thread seems a little ridiculous to me. Partly because I think Sam is capable of tackling this stuff in his own way and partly because I don't see a huge discrepancy in Season 1 and 2 Sam and Season 3 Sam. Don't get me wrong. I am enjoying the season overall with a few exceptions. I am just struggling with this plot arc.

I liked this episode. The treatment of witches was interesting and I liked the concept of suburban witches who didn't quite understand what they were getting into. The teeth and the maggots were pretty horrifying. I haven't had the teeth dream, so it really grossed me out more than anything. I actually gagged at that scene and the maggots. I think that is a compliment in horror. Lol. I am feeling a bit disconnected from the season and I couldn't put my finger on it, but I realized it's because the loose underlying story is about trying to prevent something that isn't happening and that means that largely nothing is happening. We are learning more about demons, but I just don't find is as interesting as the psychic kids storyline from last season. That being said, the final scene seemed to give us a lot and move the story forward somewhat. I am not sure I trust the demon, but it was interesting. Maybe I missed something, but isn't she inhabiting a human body like the other demons? How is she disappearing? I know demons are stronger and faster than their hosts, but I don't understand the disappearing. Is she using super speed to run away? Cause that is actually a hilarious image.

I can see how this one would hook you! It's a great one

This episode was fudging fantastic. KidDean and KidSam were heartbreaking and so sweet. It reinforces the conclusion I came to in Bedtime Stories. Dean didn't get fairy tales. He wasn't watching the kid's movie with Sam. He missed that experience, instead becoming a caretaker. The Christmas celebration was sweet and very them. I loved the overly cheery, anti profanity pagan gods. This was a fairly gory (the red suit got its color from blood, brutal and horror filled episodes (that fingernail!!!). But it still managed to be funny and enjoyable.

I think this is the first episode that I actively disliked. I just found the monologuing during the fight to be tedious and I found myself zoning out. I loved the ending but it had nothing to do with the rest of the episode. They did finally delve into some of my questions regarding vampires, but it took a backseat to Gordon's obsession.

I like Bela and the ghost ship was pretty cool, but I am with y'all that the "comedy" where Sam is being groped against his will is uncomfortable and it makes it hard to watch. Take those parts out and it is a pretty good episode. Not amazing. Not my favorite. But pretty good.