“Supernatural” Episode 10.9, “The Things We Left Behind;” Starring Jensen Ackles, Jared Padalecki, Misha Collins, and Mark Sheppard; Written by Andrew Dabb; Directed by Guy Norman Bee.
The “Supernatural” mid-season finale might have coasted on some fumes towards the finish line, but it got one hell of a kick start when lurching into the cliffhanger.
Continuing the show’s more recent overt discussion of family themes, Castiel went in search of Jimmy Novak’s family so that he might make amends. It seems Hannah’s revelation on angelic abuse of humanity struck a chord, and Castiel’s emotions took hold. He returned to Illinois to seek redemption. Meanwhile back at the bunker, Dean is having gory, detailed nightmares about slaughtering a room full of people. His black eyes might be gone, but the Mark of Cain is all welty and gross and both brothers exist in varying states of worry that the Mark is in fact, still the boss of Dean. Crowley remains in Hell, processing his feelings and making questionable decisions.
I’m breaking format again for like the fortieth time this season, because I really think that the show broke format. In a really good way. This episode felt a lot like watching a network drama – it was often easy to forget the supernatural elements and genre tropes.
The scenes between Castiel and Jimmy’s daughter Claire were almost unbearable. Not because they were cheesy or poorly written – quite the contrary. We as viewers wonder what Castiel could possibly be thinking: Is he going to raise this girl? Is he going to turn her loose to a fate far worse than a group home? What could he possibly plan as a good end game in this scenario? Turns out he has no plan, and his motives were far more selfish than he realized. Claire called it perfectly: “You’re not sorry, you feel guilty.” Nailed it, and it stung. Sydney Imbeau’s performance as Claire was definitely a favorite when it comes to younger guests. She played a perfect “bad girl” without sneering, smirking, or posturing. She was just a hurt little girl learning all the wrong ways to be strong.
Misha Collins in turn got some of the best scenes of his “Supernatural” career. Castiel has placed all the weight of healing the wounds of humanity (at least those caused by angelic interference) on allowing this one girl to live happily ever after. Unfortunately, this one girl was abandoned by her mother after her father was possessed by an angel and then disassembled on a subatomic level, and now she lives in a group home where it’s implied she’s abused, is friends with hoods, and prays every night to an angel with whom she is on first-name terms to bring her father back and end her misery.
Can we just think on that one for a moment? I am not religious. I was not raised as a churchgoer. I have very vague and oft-shifting ideas of what I believe, but I pray. Sometimes I pray. But to those who were raised in a structured belief – you pray, and you assume someone is listening or hearing. It’s faith based and intrinsic, which is a “knowing” of sorts, but it is different than having emperical evidence that there is someone on the other side of the soup can. Now imagine having that fact based knowledge and knowing that your angel hears you and chooses to ignore you every single night.
That, to me, is horror. And it seemed horrific to Sam and Dean, too, when they realized that Castiel had been ignoring the prayers of a little girl for five years in order to further his own agenda. Which, granted, was sometimes super helpful. Apocalypse 1.0 and 2.0 and all. But still. That’s a burn.
And then there’s Crowley. The King of Hell is making some of the piss poorest decisions EVER. I mean, I know he had that thing with the human blood and The Feels recently, but goddamn. Tony Soprano would smack you, and Regina George would not let you sit at her lunch table, and yet he somehow remains the King of Hell. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think this makes Crowley a poor character. I still love him to death. But he’s a shitty regent, yeah? In three minutes, Crowley’s centuries-old demon-killin’ witch mother convinced him to release her from the cell. And mister, that’s gonna end in tears.
Sam and Dean had some lovely anecdotal moments throughout the episode that lent to the prime time drama feel, but we all knew it was going to come crashing down. I mean, it’s “Supernatural.” Turns out both Dean’s nightmares and Castiel’s philosophic waxing were prophetic, and Dean definitely did his worst.
Do you guys have that one friend, the one that you can see just the slightest change, like maybe a twitch of the eye or eyebrow, or maybe a flicky finger, and it’s because someone said the wrong thing and you just think “aw shit son you better run”? Dean was that friend to the beastly degree. One member of a loan shark’s crew sassed the wrong ex-demon, and the next thing you know there’s four dead gangsters and Sam’s hysterical and screaming “TELL ME YOU HAD TO, TELL ME IT WAS YOU OR THEM!!”
But it wasn’t. Dean could have easily laid them all out Vulcan style, but instead he went Anya-in-that-one-episode-after-Xander-ditched-her-at-the-altar style. Dean Winchester savagely maimed human beings. And ye tho’ they were far from innocent, they were child molesting thugs, this is easily the gravest transgression a Winchester has ever made.
And so now we have to wait until God knows when to find out if Castiel will put an end to Dean’s terror, or they’ll work to seek out Cain and remove his mark so that the Winchesters can live a normal-ish life.