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When a trio of small-town police officers starts dropping dead in a variety of inventive and intensely gruesome ways, Our Intrepid Heroes motor on over to nonexistent Easter, Pennsylvania, to try to figure out what's going on. Super-Smart Sammy quickly realizes the deaths have much in common with the Biblical plagues of Egypt, what with the throat-choking boils and the brain-eating locusts and such, so Dashing El Deano summons My Sweet Baboo down from Heaven for a consult. The fact that Castiel flutters down immediately upon receiving Dean's page of course irritates Sam, who you'll recall tried and failed several times to speak with everyone's favorite TV angel after his miraculous off-screen resurrection, but Castiel basically announces he hasn't the time to deal with the boys' angst-laden bullshit, and the three soon get down to business.
Seems last season's abortive Apocalypse has left Heaven both leaderless and rudderless, and the angelic coalitions that have since formed around Castiel and his old antagonist, Raphael, are on the verge of a civil war. Not helping matters is the fact that several rogue angels have absconded with many of Heaven's most powerful weapons, which is where the Egyptian plagues come in, for The Staff Of Moses was among the first weapons to go missing. A little detective work reveals that the three dead cops riddled an African-American suspect with bullets, then planted a gun on the corpse to make the incident look like a clean shooting. So, the boys plus Castiel flutter on over to the dead kid's former home, where the dead kid's younger brother threatens them with a sawed-off fragment of Moses's disco stick, for which he traded his soul to the angel Balthazar so he might avenge his brother's death.
Castiel easily enough relieves the misguided kid of the weapon, then flutters himself with the boys over to Balthazar's palatial digs somewhere else within the continental United States (I'm guessing), where the two angels have a little heart-to-heart about something I totally didn't pay attention to while Sam and Dean attempt to fight off Raphael and his minions. Unfortunately, while the minions are soon dispatched, Raphael manages to battle his way into Balthazar's, and things are looking pretty grim, indeed, for My Sweet Baboo until Balthazar whips out another of Heaven's purloined super-weapons and turns Raphael's vessel into a pillar of salt. Which was pretty kick-ass, if you ask me.
And in the end, Castiel flutters back up to Heaven to rally his troops again, some more, leaving Sam and Dean to yak away at each other back at the Impala over the changes to Sam's personality since he rose from the depths of Hell. Of course, the chatter resolves absolutely nothing, but it might become important later in the season, so, you know: Make a note of it.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Rattle, Rattle Tacky Blue Glitter THEN! Something sprang Darling Sammy out of Hell over a year ago, but because Darling Sammy didn't bother to inform Dashing El Deano of his return topside until the season premiere, Dashing El Deano worked his big-boy man-panties into a tremendous wad and yelled at everyone, after which Bendy Lisa told him to take a hike, so Dashing El Deano yanked Metallicar out of storage and hit the road. Also, as you'll no doubt recall, My Sweet Baboo had rather a complicated relationship with The Archangel Raphael -- the latter of whom, when last we saw him, was trapped for all eternity in a flaming circle of holy oil. Or, you know, until he mojo'd that rattrap they'd left him in to the ground, after which he could presumably have clambered over the wreckage to freedom. Your choice. And at the end of last season, after the abortive Apocalypse, Castiel fluttered back up to Heaven to kick truculent angelic ass now and take traitorous angelic names later, for My Sweet Baboo is, at heart, one mean motherfucker.
Rattle, Rattle Tacky Blue Glitter NOW! Cop Shop Locker Room. As one surely imperiled officer of the law ambles on in from the outside to fetch his jacket, his equally imperiled partner loiters at the sinks, rinsing his face one last time before heading out for that evening's shift. Unfortunately for The Imperiled Partner, his careful ablutions seem to have opened up a pair of shaving nicks on either side of his face, and -- even more unfortunately for The Imperiled Partner -- when he lifts his fingers to apply pressure to the cut on his right, his hand basically turns into a Spanish Tickler, and he strips a four-inch slice of fresh meat from his cheek. "GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!" shrieks Raoul The Big Gay Supernatural Dragon, writhing about atop his overstuffed armchair with amounts of delight both copious and profuse, so gleeful is he to receive so much of the good stuff so early in the episode. "EEEEEEEEEEEEE!" The Soon-To-Be-Dead Partner allows that initial clump of bloody, mangled flesh to slop wetly onto the porcelain below before whispering a panicked, "What the Hell?" at his reflection and backing away from the mirror with a couple of slow and horrified steps made even slower and more horrific by the fact that he appears to be leaving the soles of his feet behind him. "GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!" Meanwhile, some grue-filled abscess on his back chooses this very moment to erupt, and now a positive river of blood is coursing down the back of his white t-shirt. "GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!" Honey, at least try to take a breath -- you're going to pass out. Again. "I can't help it!" shrieks Raoul. "It's just...! It's so...! It makes me...! GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!"
And while Raoul shrieks himself into a barely conscious tizzy, "Gerry" The Soon-To-Be-Dead Cop manages to spin around to face his gape-jawed partner and burble, "I think I'm bleeding!" through a mouthful of liquefying gum tissue and loose teeth. "EEEEEEEEEEEEE!" With that, Gerry's eyes roll back into his head, and he drops out of the frame for the -- wait for it -- SPLAT! "GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!" The camera focuses in on the light spray of blood now soiling The Partner Of Gerry's shoes before tracking along the linoleum to land on...the rapidly congealing puddle of rendered guts where Dead Gerry used to be! "EEEEEEEEEEEEE! GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE! EEEEEEEEEEEEE! GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE! EEEEEEEeeeeee...!!!" We're barely sixty-eight seconds into the episode proper, and Raoul's already passed out from all of the excitement. "Glalalalalalalalaalalalallaaallaaaah!" That's got to be some kind of record. "Glalalaaaaaah!" And I'm sure the shrieks of Dead Gerry's Partner would be almost as impressive as Raoul's at this juncture, were they not swallowed up by the...
...Tinkle, Tinkle RAAAWWWR! Good thing Raoul's not awake to witness the pathetic Season Six title card this week. "Glalalaaaaaah!" I'm not sure if you remember this, but he pretty much hates it. "GlalalaaaaACK!"
Shirtless Dean slumbers peacefully beneath his expensive-looking duvet at New New Bendy Estates, so we know this is a pointless dream sequence almost as soon as it begins, so long story short, Bendy Lisa wakes him up, and they do it. Of note: Dream Dean lacks the seared-in Hand Of Castiel he'd been sporting on his shoulder ever since My Sweet Baboo gripped him tight and raised him from Perdition all those many years ago. Now that I think about it, he's probably also missing that Demon-B-Gon tattoo in this dream sequence, but the camera never gives us a good enough look at his chest to confirm that. And God knows I rewound several times to make sure. "Glalalaa -- DIRTY! -- lalaaah!" Anyway, an insistent heartbeat soon overwhelms the soundtrack, and Dean...
...snaps awake in the front seat of the Impala, just as a semi screams past! He'd parked himself off the side of the road for a little shut-eye, you see, and is now most thoroughly discombobulated by the sleepy-time vision of Bendy Lisa his brain just barfed out at him. Or something like that.
Meanwhile, Darling Sammy is also shirtless. And doing push-ups. And sit-ups. And chin-ups. And just when I'm about to Glalalaaaaaah my way into my very own Coma Of Overexcitement, a floozy hoochies her way out of the bathroom of This Week's Motel Room to strumpet, "Last night was, um...a high point, if you don't mind me saying." Shirtless Sweaty Sam simply passes her a couple of hundreds, so I'm guessing the floozy is actually a whore. "Right!" Shirtless Sweaty Sam's streetwalker sparkles. "I almost forgot!" And as that is far too ridiculous and asinine and stupid for me to deal with so early in the episode, I'll be skipping past it to note that she then goes on to offer him a freebie the time he's in town, and as that is even more ridiculous and asinine and STUPID for me to deal with so early in the episode, I'll be skipping past it to note that she then leaves. Bye-bye, dimwit! Fortunately for my sanity, Sam's cell chirps at this moment, and it's Dean, calling to note that he's "about eight hours out of the Campbell base." "Change of plans," still-shirtless Sam announces. "I need you to meet me -- I'm in P-A, a town called 'Easter.'" Which does not exist, apparently, but we'll go with it for now. Still-Shirtless Sam abruptly snaps shut his cell, so Dean grumbles a bit about how bossy Sam's become over the last year or so, but he does climb into the Impala with his breakfast from Burger Heaven to head out towards the Interstate, so I guess he doesn't really have a problem with it. Until, you know, we hit the end of the episode, where Dean will throw an enormous, pissy-pantsed tantrum about it all, but we can ignore that bridge when we get to it, because...
...over in Nonexistent Easter, Pennsylvania, yet another Imperiled Cop lounges at a speed trap in his prowler, and as we've gone nearly four full minutes with absolutely no gore whatsoever, I'm getting a little bored. "Me, too!" agrees the freshly awakened Raoul, and are we feeling better? "Much, thanks! Now please do hurry along! I can't wait to see how this one dies!" As you wish, friend of friends. "Hooray!" I must first note, however, that we know Yet Another Imperiled Cop is a Very Bad Man Indeed, for he's spiking his Big Gulp with vodka. "And what," Raoul shriekily inquires, "is so wrong with that?!" He's spiking it with Popov. "DEATH! DEATH TO HE WHO WOULD BEFOUL HIS BIG GULP WITH DISCOUNT LIQUOR FROM A PLASTIC BOTTLE!" So, we agree on this gentleman's obvious lack of character? "DEATH!" Excellent.
So, Bad Cop spikes his Big Gulp with Popov, and we get a few through-the-trees shots of his car, because someone's lurking in the bushes, don't you know, and at first I thought it was Raphael, because of the THEN!, but then I was thinking to myself, "Self, what the hell would an Archangel be doing scampering through the underbrush like a..." "A-him!" Oh. Sorry, Raoul. Got a little carried away, there. "Never mind all of that, you foolish man! Kill him! Kill him!" Well, I would, but first we've got to listen to the suspicious cell phone conversation Bad Cop has with an as yet unknown colleague. "Fie!" Did you just say, "Fie!"? "FIE!" Okay! Okay. Jeez. ANY-way, Bad Vodka Cop tells whoever's on the other end of the line to calm down and shut up, already -- Dead Gerry's gone, and there's nothing they can do about it, so they need to keep their noses clean and carry on like usual. Got it? "KILL HIM!" Good.
No sooner has Bad Vodka Cop hung up his phone than whatever was lurking in the bushes sneaks up to the prowler's driver-side window and...well, does something that triggers a series of yellowish, pus-filled boils to erupt all over Bad Vodka Cop's neck and hands. "EEEEEEEEEEEEE!" Oh, God, this is disgusting. "EEEEEEEEEEEEE!" The boils spread almost instantaneously across his face and his bald head, and there are, like, clusters of the damn things clinging to the sides of his mouth, and some of them are obviously leaking oily slime down his cheeks, and... "GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!" Soon-To-Be-Dead Bad Vodka Cop attempts to radio for help, but by now the boils have raced down his throat, and as he chokes and gags and, like, swallows his blistered tongue, or something, The Creature From The Forest scampers back into the bushes, and the thing we know...
...Dapper Sam's cooling his well-shod heels outside Nonexistent Easter's police station, and that was certainly anticlimactic. "GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!" Ah. It would seem Raoul's still reveling in the pus-filled boils. "EEEEEEEEEEEEE!" Well, I'll just leave him to all of that while I find out what's going on with Our Intrepid Heroes. "EEEEEEEEEEEEE!" Excellent. So, Dean grumbles up in the Impala, dressed in a suit of his own as the LYING LIARS WHO LIE are once again masquerading as FBI agents, but Dapper El Deano must first chide Bendy Lisa's brat over the phone, the better to prove to both Dapper Sam and the audience that he's become a perfectly capable parent over the last year. And because neither Dapper Sam nor the audience gives a shit about any of that, we'll skip ahead to the point wherein Dean condescendingly disparages Sam's Charger with, "You still driving that plastic piece of crap?" "What's your mileage, again?" Sam retorts. "Shaddap," snorts Dean, for Dapper El Deano doesn't go for that touchy-feely self-help environmental crap, bitch.
Inside the morgue, Our Intrepid Heroes rattle off the facts of the case thus far: "Officer Gerald Hatch," a seventeen-year veteran of the force, exploded like a water balloon full of chunky soup during the pre-credits sequence. "GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!" Or, as Dapper Sam would have it, "most of the meat, bones, and dense tissues just turned to blood." "EEEEEEEEEEEEE!" Victim Number Two is officially known as "Officer Toby Gray," and his rather disgusting death has been attributed to an "extreme allergic reaction." Dapper Sam slides Officer Grey's chilly remains from the cooler so we can all get another really good look at those suppurating boils. "GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE! EEEEEEEEEEEEE! GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!" You're starting to scare me again, Raoul. "EEEEEEEEEEEEE!" Ugh. Anyway, the boys quickly rule out witchcraft, as Dapper Sam found no sign of "hex work" anywhere, so we're off to interview the only surviving witness, "Officer Ed Colfax," who was of course Dead Gerry's horrified and somewhat spattered partner at the top of the hour.
Sam's Charger peels around a corner. Dean's far-superior Impala peels around a closer corner faster, so Dean gets to park directly in front of Chez Colfax, and Sam is forced to wheel up to the curb behind Metallicar. "Were you racing me?" Sam too-casually wonders once the boys have disembarked. "No," Dean scoffs. "I was kicking your ass." Heh. The tussling two-year-olds proceed to Officer Colfax's porch, and when Officer Colfax answers the door, it's immediately obvious he'll soon be joining his colleagues in an early grave, what with his ashen pallor and his slurred speech and his obviously insane insistence upon wearing his full dress uniform at all times and such. "Kill him!" shrieks Raoul, already clapping his expertly honed paws together in anticipatory delight. "KILL HIM!" And in the interest of reaching Officer Colfax's sure-to-be spectacular demise posthaste, we'll cut through the lengthy and rambling scene that follows in favor of touching on the most important points. "Hooray!" Oh, crap. "What!?" I forgot about this fascinating bit. "Rats!" Officer Colfax, you see, has been spending the last couple of days carefully scratching out the faces in every single photograph in his home -- wedding photos, vacation shots, what appears to have been an otherwise lovely rendering of a prison clown -- and is now busily doing the same to his official department portrait. "KILL HIM! KILL THE CRAZY POLICE-TYPE PERSON WITH THE CRAZY POLICE-TYPE CLOWN FETISH!" Long story short, Officers Hatch, Grey, and Colfax are all linked to one "Christopher Birch," whom Officer Colfax describes as "a kid with no face and a planted gun," and Officer Colfax is convinced "God" will not be satisfied until all of the suspiciously connected policemen are dead. Before we learn more about this mysterious Christopher Birch, however, a thin stream of blood emerges from the band of Officer Colfax's dress hat, and proceeds to trail down his sallow cheek. "GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!" Dean's all, "You've got red on you, Ed," so Officer Colfax drags his fingers through the stuff, mumbles something barely coherent about his itchy scalp, and face-plants into the table he'd been sitting at, dead. Dean hears a few chittering noises emanating from the general direction of Dead Ed's head, so Sam flips off the corpse's cap to find...a swarm of locusts, chewing their way out of Ed's skull! "GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!" Oh, that's even more disgusting than the boils. "EEEEEEEEEEEEE!" Though how Dead Ed was able to talk with so much of his brain missing, I'll never know. "GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE! EEEEEEEEEEEEE! GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE! EEEEEEEEEEEEE! Glalalalalalalalaalalalallaaallaaaah!" And there goes Raoul. "Glalalaaaaaah!" And just as Dean's about to hurl, we...
...skip ahead to This Week's Motel Room, where Our Intrepid Heroes have already realized they're dealing with variants on the traditional Plagues Of Egypt. You know, from the Bible. Super-Smart Sammy's also unearthed Christopher Birch's backstory. Seems the kid was shot in the head last month after a "vehicle pursuit," and the officers involved -- yep, Hatch, Gray, and Colfax -- filed identical reports after the incident. Identical reports that claimed Christopher Birch emerged from the vehicle brandishing a firearm, so the officers had little choice but to plug him full of holes. Given Officer Colfax's dying utterance regarding the planted gun, the boys realize they've got someone or something rather aggressively seeking vengeance for the dirty shooting, and the talk soon turns to the angels, who after all have little to do now that The Apocalypse has been averted. "We should call Castiel," Dean grunts, though he uses that unfortunate nickname I swore I'd never type rather than My Sweet Baboo's full name. Sam testily reminds his brother that Castiel answered exactly zero of his many, many pleas for guidance and assistance over the last year, but Dean decides to give it a shot, anyway, like so: "Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray to Castiel to get his feathery ass down here." "You're an idiot," Sam snits. "Stay positive," Dean counsels. "I am positive," Sam insists, but as he's said before, "The son of a bitch doesn't answer." Soft, fluttery noises hit the soundtrack. "He's right behind me, isn't he?" Sam dejectedly guesses. Indeed. "Hello," My Sweet Baboo mildly offers. Sam unleashes the full force of his mighty bitchface upon Dean, who simply shrugs his way into the METAL TEETH CHOMP! all, "Hey, what can I say? The adorable little bastard loves me."
"'Hello'?" Sam angrily parrots once we've returned from the break. "That is still the term?" Castiel innocently wonders. Hee. Sam peeves some more about what we already know, all, "I call you thousands of times, and nothing! But Dean calls you once, and you show up? What gives? You like him better, or something?" "Dean and I do share a more profound bond," Castiel apologetically admits. Dean blinks. Several times. "I wasn't going to mention it," Castiel apologetically bumbles in Dean's direction, and with that, I'm afraid I'm going to have to veer away from a direct transcription of the scene that follows, for while most of Castiel's lines are as amusing as those mentioned above, I'm on a deadline. Long story short, and as you might have surmised, given the way no one in Heaven ever talks to each other on this show, Castiel has no idea who raised Sam from the cage, so badgering him about it is and always has been more than a little pointless. Castiel would also like us to know that while he does indeed share a more profound bond with Dean, his primary motivation for returning to earth after all these many months is the case Our Intrepid Heroes are currently working on. You see, the only thing that could have brought these variants on the Plagues Of Egypt into existence is The Staff Of Moses, which is one of many "weapons" that have gone missing since Heaven went to hell in the wake of the abortive Apocalypse. Sam breaks in at this point to note that he was under the impression that The Staff Of Moses turned entire rivers into blood, rather than liquefying individual human beings. "The weapon isn't being used at full capacity," Castiel intones. "I think we can rule Moses out as a suspect." Hee! Dean would like to know "what Chuck Heston's disco stick is doing down here, anyway," so Castiel explains the current situation Up There, noting that Heaven's lost all stability, and in the confusion that followed the abortive Apocalypse, several rogue angels swiped certain weapons and vanished with them. Fortunately, Our Intrepid Heroes have stumbled across one of them, but Castiel can't retrieve the thing without the boys' help. "That's rich," Sam snots. Castiel takes a moment to process the attitude emanating from Sam's remarkably healthy and remarkably petty form, and then My Badass Baboo gathers his considerable strength to smack the whiny bitch up like so, complete with air quotes: "My 'people skills' are 'rusty' -- pardon me, but I have spent the last 'year' as a multidimensional wavelength of celestial intent, but believe me: You do not want that weapon down here!" He's so cute when he's angry. "Glalalaaaaaah!" Aw. Poor thing. It was a terribly exhausting fifteen minutes for him, wasn't it?
Anyway, Sam and Dean, suitably chastened, bring Castiel up to speed on their investigation, and no sooner have they pressed a relevant newspaper clipping into My Sweet Baboo's hands than we jet over to...
...the former home of Christopher Birch, where we find the dead kid's grieving father reading The Nonexistent Easter Eagle's coverage of Officer Hatch's untimely demise. "How many times you gonna read that thing?" the sullen teen who's just wandered in asks. "We should just throw it away," the little snot continues. Father Birch quietly tells the adolescent aggravation to go outside and play and, once the annoyance has left, he begins cutting the article out for the scrapbook he's been keeping. Of course, it's at this moment that Castiel flutters in with Our Intrepid Heroes. "The hell?" I'm sure Father Birch yelps as he leaps from the sofa with surprise. The boys quickly get down to business, and it just as quickly becomes evident Father Birch was not responsible for the officers' delightfully gruesome deaths, especially when the insufferable snot returns from the yard, leveling The Teeny Tiny Staff Of Moses at Our Intrepid Heroes like it's a gun. "Shouldn't it be bigger?" Darling Sammy guhs. "It's been sawed off," Castiel squints. Heh. Good one, show. Father Birch orders "Aaron" -- yeah, another good one, show -- from the room, but Annoying Aaron just wiggles The Sawed-Off Staff Of Moses around some more, so My Sweet Baboo zaps Father Birch into unconsciousness, then flutter-zips across the room to relieve Annoying Aaron of the weapon.
Now facing the third degree from Sam, Dean, and Castiel, Annoying Aaron quickly spills his guts, admitting he used the foreshortened disco stick to kill the lousy cops, while adding he originally obtained the thing from an angel in exchange for his immortal soul. Sam, Dean, Castiel, and the audience in general were unaware that angels could trade in souls, but My Sweet Baboo wastes no time in realizing that the angel involved likely hacked The Staff into smaller pieces in order to sell those pieces to a large number of people, so it's vitally important they figure out who's responsible before more stick shards fall into amateurs' hands. To that end, he zaps Annoying Aaron into unconsciousness. "What'd you do that for?" Dean protests.
"Portability," Castiel replies, after having fluttered everyone back to This Week's Motel Room, where he slings the kid down upon Sam's Bed Of Sin. "I do hope housekeeping's stopped by since this morning's sordid shenanigans!" Raoul shrieks, and I hadn't realized you'd rejoined us, my scaly friend, but from the looks of those sheets, I'd say housekeeping hasn't visited this room in years. "Filthy!" Indeed. In any event, and long story short, if an angel actually bought Annoying Aaron's soul, then that angel will have left a mark on his new property. Castiel can, of course, read that mark, but it's going to cause the annoyance no small amount of pain, so that's why he whisked the brat back to Our Intrepid Heroes' room. I think. I mean, the desk clerk at this No-Tell's probably not going to call the cops if someone starts screaming in one of the rooms, am I right? "Absolutely!" Excellent. Of course, Dean protests mightily that they can't torture a teenager, but Sam's all, "Whatever, dude," because Sam Came Back Wrong For The Third Or Fourth Time Since This Show Began, and he's now all cold-blooded and whatnot for the foreseeable future. "TORTURE!" shrieks Raoul, growing impatient. "TORTURE THE ANNOYING CHILD!" For once, the strange little people inside the television listen to the imaginary gay dragon on the Internet, and Castiel -- get this -- shoves his entire arm into the kid's torso. "EEEEEEEEEEEEE!" Annoying Aaron howls and screams and such, but it's over all too soon, and Castiel has the name they've all been looking for: Belthazor. Whoops! Sorry! Sorry, my bad -- it's actually "Balthazar," but I spent so many goddamned years typing that other thing that I wouldn't be surprised if I slip up eight or nine times during the rest of this evening's presentation. And by "slip up eight or nine times," I of course mean "don't even bother trying to get it right." The fact that Sebastian Goddamned Roché was heavily featured in an especially egregious episode of that atrocity certainly won't help matters, either. "Demian!" What? "Stop babbling!" Oh, I apologize. There's violence impending, isn't there? "Yes! Yes! VIOLENCE!" Then I shall attend to it right away. "Whee!"
No sooner has Castiel realized that his old buddy Belthazor's responsible for this evening's wacky stick-related hijinks than a dark-suited Heavenly traitor flutters into the room to sneer, "Belthazor? Thanks, Castiel -- we'll make good use of the name!" And then? Angel fight! "VIOLENCE!" Yep, Castiel and the Heavenly intruder whip out their Angel-Smiting Scimitars and start hacking away at each other while Sam and Dean stand agog on the sidelines. And because My Sweet Baboo still rivals Darling Sammy with the hand-to-hand suckage, the Heavenly intruder quickly disarms him and stands by the room's sixth-floor window to taunt, "By the way, Raphael says hello!" So My Badass Baboo tackles the guy through the glass. "VIOLENCE! WANTON ACTS OF UNREPENTANT WINDOW-SMASHING VIOLENCE AND GOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!" Well, not so much with the gore this time around, Raoul. "Phooey!" But Castiel and the Heavenly intruder do tumble about sixty feet to the ground, where they land on Sam's Charger. "EEEEEEEEEEEEE!" And well you should shriek at that, friend of friends, for it is awesome. "EEEEEEEEEEEEE!" Of course, The Heavenly Intruder vanishes almost as soon as they've smashed the Charger into tiny little bits, but Castiel has the good grace to shuffle to his feet, dust himself off, and peer up at Our Intrepid Heroes, who are now gawping through the shattered hole where the window used to be. "My car!" Sam whispers, all heartsick and forlorn. "Okay!" Dean mugs. "Silver lining!" Sam's mighty bitchface is both fearsome and immediate, but even it cannot prevent the METAL TEETH CHOMP! from dragging us all into the commercial break.
This Week's Motel Room. Immediate aftermath. Our Intrepid Heroes stare down at Castiel staring down at the ruins of Sam's Charger until My Sweet Baboo flutters back up into the room behind them. The three immediately start nattering at each other, with Sam and Dean hurling question after question in Castiel's direction while the angel putters about the room, rummaging through duffel bags for supplies. We learn through all of this that the now-vanished dark-suited Heavenly traitor is working for The Archangel Raphael, who returned Up There at some point after the abortive Apocalypse to wrest control of the place now that Michael's locked away in Hell and God is still missing. Raphael's ultimate goal is to restart The Apocalypse by any means necessary -- presumably because he's some sort of traditionalist, or something like that -- and he's managed to assemble a not insignificant force of like-minded angels in order to destroy the planet and whatnot. Most of the other, non-Apocalyptic angels have rallied around My Sweet Baboo in opposition to Raphael, and now Heaven stands at the brink of a civil war, with numerous rogue angels, as mentioned before, choosing to sit it all out this time around by fluttering earthwards with a number of God's most powerful secret weapons. Got all that? "I do not!" Doesn't matter, because I'm sure we'll be reminded of it many, many times throughout the course of the season. "Okay!"
And when the chattering's over, Castiel chalks a sigil onto This Week's Motel Room's table, sets a silver bowl at the center of the symbol, slices open Dashing El Deano's palm with a hunting knife so Our Intrepidly Outraged Hero might spill a bit of his human blood into the Belthazor-tracking potion My Sweet Baboo's decided to concoct, adds myrrh and holy water to the mix, and finally Enochiates over the brew for a very lengthy period of time in his most growly -- and therefore most authoritative -- tone of voice. Smoke almost immediately rises from the bowl, and as Castiel stands over it all, meditating, a series of police and fire department sirens below herald the arrival of some certain-to-be hostile authorities. Sam hisses at My Sweet Baboo to hurry things up a little, but Castiel takes exactly the amount of time he needs, after which he announces, "Got him." "What about him?" Dean asks, hiking a thumb in the direction of the still-unconscious adolescent annoyance over on the bed. "Don't you think the police will take him home?" Castiel all but duuuuuuuhs by way of response, and the thing we know...
...Castiel's fluttered the boys over to the nighttime lawn of a palatial estate somewhere else. Dean snarks something about Dr. No and Liberace that even Sam doesn't understand, and the three start hoofing it across the grass.
A short time later, Castiel wanders into the main hall alone as some very loud smooth jazz filters down from above. He eyes a suspicious-looking bullfrog that's improbably managed to perch itself on a stairwell banister high above the floor, then flutters himself up to the landing to track down the source of that very loud smooth jazz. Castiel quickly finds himself in an apparently empty and disco-lit ballroom, but when the doors swing shut and lock behind him seemingly of their own accord, he lets his Angel-Smiting Scimitar drop into his hand from its hiding place in his trench coat's sleeve. Soon enough, Belthazor materializes behind him. As mentioned before, Belthazor's being played by Sebastian Roché, an actor who seems to have cornered the American television market as far as sleazy, pasty-faced, middle-aged, booze-swilling Eurotrash go, so it should come as no surprise to you, gentle reader, to learn that Belthazor's a sleazy, pasty-faced, middle-aged, booze-swilling Eurotrash type with -- it almost goes without saying -- an absolutely tragic patch of douchetastic facial scruff growing around his mouth. My Sweet Baboo greets the walking, talking slime pit that's just joined him in the ballroom, and Belthazor admits he's been expecting Castiel, as that dark-suited Heavenly traitor from a scene or two ago managed to beat everyone's favorite angel to Belthazor's estate. At that, Belthazor snaps his fingers, shutting off the smooth jazz while bringing up the ballroom's house lights, and we can now see the earlier dark-suited Heavenly traitor lying in a crumpled heap on the far side of the ballroom floor. And in a gross little effect, the apparently dead traitor's throat pulsates as yet another bullfrog wriggles its way up from the apparently dead traitor's esophagus to peek out of the angelic corpse's mouth. "EEEEEEEEEEEEE!" Aw. It's like they wrote this episode especially for you, Raoul. "EEEEEEEEEEEEE!"
In any event, after Belthazor makes a supremely unfunny crack about "a frog in one's throat," Castiel and his Eurotrash feather buddy get to chatting with each other, and does anyone really care about Belthazor's backstory or his boring brotherly psychodrama with Castiel at this point? "Certainly not!" Didn't think so, so long story short, the guy faked his death at some point last season and, taking a page from Castiel's very own destiny-defying playbook, swiped all those humanity-destroying goodies from the celestial armory and descended to Earth to live the good life for a while. Because of his eternal sense of loyalty to Castiel, though, he of course would like to help My Sweet Baboo in any way he can, but as he flat-out refuses to surrender the weapons, Castiel has little choice but to kick his dissolute behind. "VIOLENCE!" Well, Castiel would have little choice but to kick Belthazor's dissolute behind, I'm sure, but at this moment, a crash of thunder erupts outside on the estate's grounds to announce Raphael's arrival, so I'm afraid the mighty booting of debauched derrieres will be delayed for a moment or two. "Rats!" "Tell Raphael to bite me!" Belthazor smirks, and with that, Belthazor snaps his fingers again, plunging the ballroom into darkness while vanishing into the METAL TEETH CHOMP!
Palatial Lawn. Immediate aftermath. Amid flashes of unworldly lightning, Raphael warns his henchangels to be on the lookout for any stray, snakelike Winchesters, while Castiel quietly panics upstairs in the still-darkened ballroom. A short time later, one of the henchangels tippy-toes up the palatial driveway with his Angel-Smiting Scimitar at the ready when Darling Sammy pops up from out of nowhere with an Angel-Smiting Scimitar of his own. The henchangel immediately zaps himself over to Darling Sammy's side to sneer, "You think you can knife-fight an angel?" "Who's fighting?" the suddenly appearing El Deano smirks from a nearby alcove, and no sooner have those words left his mouth than sneaky El Deano slams a bloody palm against the Angel-B-Gon sigil he'd smeared onto the estate's outer wall. The henchangel explodes backwards in a blast of brilliant white light, leaving Sam and Dean by their lonesome on the drive as...
...yet another burst of unworldly lightning lands the remaining henchangel in the still-darkened ballroom. Castiel at first attempts to reason with the guy, then sighs at the futility of it all and sends his Angel-Smiting Scimitar flying end over end into the remaining henchangel's chest. "Why won't any of you listen?" Castiel despairs as the remaining henchangel howls and wails and drops to the floor, dead. Raphael immediately materializes at Castiel's side and, yanking Castiel's head back by the roots of My Sweet Baboo's feathery coif, answers that question with, "They never listen, Castiel, because their hearts are mine." Um. DUN? I think that was a DUN!, but I'm not completely sure, and it doesn't really matter at this point, anyway, because Raphael's just hurled Castiel through a wall. "VIOLENCE!" Castiel, still suh-huuuuuucking at the hand-to-hand, basically lies there and takes it as Raphael boots him across the carpeting to the grand, curving, two-story stairwell, at which point Raphael sends My Sweet Baboo ass over end down the stairs like he's Meryl Streep in Death Becomes Her. "I LOVE THAT MOVIE!" I know you do, my scaly friend, but let's focus, here, okay? "ISABELLA ROSSELLINI IS A GODDESS!" Raoul. "A GODDESS!" Would you please... "A GODDESS DIVINE!" Oy.
ANY-way, Castiel somehow manages to pull himself together at the bottom of the stairs and straggles to his feet, only to have Raphael bop him on the top of his head with the hilt of yet another Angel-Smiting Scimitar. "Somehow," Raphael intones, clearly enjoying the sound of his own mellifluent voice as he twirls that scimitar around so its pointy end is all but poking My Sweet Baboo in the eye, "I don't think God will be bringing you back this time." Things are looking mighty grim, indeed, for everyone's favorite angel, so it's quite fortunate that Belthazor decides to pop back in at this point to smite Raphael. "VIOLENCE!" Not this time, I'm afraid. "Phooey!" Nope, this time around, Belthazor simply removes a glowing crystal from his pocket and waves the thing around in Raphael's face, at which point the smug archangel turns, eyes first, into a rapidly disintegrating pillar of salt. "Same thing happened to Lot's wife," Belthazor needlessly explains before enthusing, "Ionize the poor sucker, and your kitchen is stocked for life!" Shut up, Belthazor. "DEATH! DEATH TO ALL EUROTRASH WHO WOULD MAKE SUCH HORRIBLE, HORRIBLE JOKES!" I'm sure Belthazor won't last the season, friend of friends, but unfortunately, he won't be dying anytime soon. "Oh, poop!" Aw. Don't pout. "Hmph!" Tell you what: Since they're not getting rid of this grease stain tonight, and since the episode's almost over, why don't you go whip up us a couple of tasty flagons instead of sitting through the crap that remains? "Capital idea, if I do say so myself!" Atta girl.
And as Raoul toddles off to...wait. Where the hell was I? Oh, yeah: So, Belthazor and Castiel trade a few more remarks of no importance to anyone, and Belthazor's about to snap his fingers and disappear again when suddenly appearing El Deano once more pops up from out of nowhere to flick open his Zippo and ignite a conveniently appearing circle of holy oil around Belthazor's feet. I'd call bullshit on all of this, but as I believe I noted in the paragraph, this episode's almost over, so I'm going to let this crappy bit of abject nonsense slide. Long story short, Our Intrepid Heroes threaten to immolate Belthazor with a jug of holy oil (I think) unless the dirtbag angel releases the hold he has on Aaron Birch's soul, because God knows we should all still be caring about that pathetic little assclown so late in this evening's goddamned presentation. Belthazor snipes and sneers and whatnot, but eventually complies. "Why you buying up souls, anyway?" Dean snaps. "Do you have any idea what souls are worth?" Belthazor snaps back. "What power they hold?" No, we don't, actually, so why don't you explain it for us? Oh, what's that? You'd rather keep your simpering mouth shut on the matter while Castiel smothers the circle of flame that surrounds you, thereby allowing you to escape? Well, fuck you too, Belthazor. Castiel decides to flutter away as well with no further explanation, and so Our Intrepid Heroes are left to rage their way alone into this evening's final METAL TEETH CHOMP!
By the morning, Sam and Dean have somehow made it all the way back to Nonexistent Easter from wherever the hell Belthazor's palatial estate was supposed to be, and even more asinine than that is the fact that Sam's now loading his cache of weapons into Metallicar's bottomless trunk, despite the fact that the Nonexistent Easter Police Department had the better part of the last twenty-four hours to confiscate the ruined Charger and all of the materiel Sam left with Unconscious Aaron in This Week's Motel Room. Whatever, Supernatural. And after all of that stupidity has passed, Sam and Dean have the unmitigated gall to lean against the Impala for a marathon three-minute-long chat about How Sam Might Possibly Have Come Back Wrong For The Third Or Fourth Time Since This Godforsaken Show Began, and if Supernatural thinks I'm going to transcribe this crap, Supernatural can take a flying leap down a crocodile tube. Long story short, Dean thinks Sam Might Possibly Have Come Back Wrong For The Third Or Fourth Time Since This Godforsaken Show Began, and Sam denies it. The end! "Hooray!"
Oh, Raoul! I was so irritated by that last scene that I hadn't noticed you toddling back with that cunning little drinks cart of yours. "[Slurp!] Have a flagon!" I don't mind if I do. Would you care to cover week's promo? "Oh, my! [Slurp!] I'd love to!" Excellent.
"Gather close, my pretties, for week's no-doubt enthralling installment prominently features that delightful little hairball of a human being, and as much as it pains me to admit this, I do believe the irascible midget is in danger! I know! Well, you remember that saucy little demon man from last season?! The black-hearted knave who kissed the little hairball, and then told absolutely everyone about it!? He's back! I know! The beastly blackguard! Will that hapless little hairball of a man find himself positively humiliated in front of all of his friends and neighbors yet again?! Or will the saucy little demon man finally propose!? You'll have to tune in Friday to find out, my pretties! Until then, kisses!"
Yeah, maybe I should have handled that one myself. "[Slurp!] Hee!"
Demian suspects there's some sort of horrific fan fiction floating around out there involving Crowley, Bobby, and a sling. Raoul simply hopes that the course of true love could this once run smooth. "Sigh! [Slurp!]" You may reach the former at demian_twop@yahoo.com. The latter is an imaginary gay dragon on the Internet.
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