“Metatron acts as the voice of God. Any documented occasion when some yahoo claims God has spoken to them, they’re speaking to me. Or they’re talking to themselves.” -Alan Rickman as Metatron, from the movie “Dogma” (1999)
So of course we meet Metatron in this episode. We’ve met pretty much everyone else, haven’t we? I don’t know why I was so surprized. Anyhoo, on with the recap.
We open with Prophet Kevin in the boat of doom, looking stressed out, as usual. There is a banging on the door, and with a panic, Kevin approaches the door. Why it’s Dean, looking perky and full of smiles. Kevin, perturbed that Dean forgot the secret knock, sprays a super-soaker of holy water on him. And this, ladies and gentlemen, is one of my favorite running gags on Supernatural.
And then, Sam peeks his head in and gets soaked as well. Hee! It’s funny every.single.time.
The boys have the missing part of the Word of God, and Kevin immediately gets to work. Sammy is looking quite fresh and even perkier than Dean. And this is where I get a clue. There is NoWay that Sammy has recovered from the misery of the last episode like this. And he’s full of snappy remarks. And HEY! Didn’t the last time we see Kevin, he had been kidnapped by Crowley? Wait a minute…
Yes, I fell for it. I blame the whiskey I had imbibed before I got to watching this episode. But I did figure it out before ‘Sam’ and ‘Dean’ walk through the veil into Crowley’s lair, which is set up like an impromptu movie shoot. Crowely gives them some pointers on how to better impersonate those beautiful boys, while gloating that he’s got the deal. Three trials!
Meanwhile, in the Cave of Men, the real Sammy looks even more awful than last we saw him. Dean is doing his level best to nurse him, but Sammy is not having it. Dean wants Sam to get better before they get to the third trial, but Sam insists that he just needs to push through it.
Sam and Dean get a video from Kevin, telling then he must be dead if they’re seeing it. Kevin is not taking his demise well! Included with the video is all the work he’s done with the translation. Kevin is sorry, and Dean angrily knocks a bunch of books onto the floor. They got, in Dean’s words, “Squat.” And then Dean says what the fans have been saying for a while, “We should have moved him here.” Everyone is so sad!
Even in his sorry state, Sammy notices a symbol that keeps showing up in Kevin’s notes. An ancient Native American glyph that means Messenger of God. On Sam’s insistence, they head out to find these Native Americans, as it is their only lead. They show up at the Indian casino and hotel, and the place is EMPTY. And Sam starts hearing things.
Sammy is remembering things from his long ago past. He is delirious from fever, and Dean puts him to bed, and heads out to the history museum, where a local native tells Dean about the stories. But of course Sammy, in a heated fog, wanders out into the hallway, where he sees the stoic front desk guy add some boxes to a pile in front of a hotel room door. Finding them full of books, Sammy gets back to the room, pulls out his phone, dials Dean, and promptly passes out. Heh.
After an ice bath courtesy Dean, Sam tells him that he knows where Metatron is. He can hear him! Dean connects the story’s dots and they scramble down the hall. Sam is remembering all kinds of ancient details about his childhood. He thinks that he knew as a little kid about the demon blood, and he is sure that this illness brought on by the trials is purifying him. It feels sad to me, but it gives Sammy the strength to get through it all. I kinda like the idea myself.
Sam and Dean enter Metatron’s room, and I have to say it. You thought it too. Booger is Metatron? Now I love Curtis Armstrong, and I am thrilled anytime she gets a good gig, but it took me a few minutes to get past the fact that Booger is Metatron.
Moving on. . Seems Metatron has been reading every story ever. Sam can hear the noise get louder, is shouting, and is a little mad that Metatron hasn’t heard of The Winchesters. After a quick recap of all that Metatron has missed, he realizes that Sammy is doing the trials. Sam seems to be resonating with Metatron or the Word of God or something mystical. Metatron maybe sorta says that God really left the building ages ago. Yest another confirmation that God hasn’t been running the show for some time.
Metatron goes on about how storytelling makes humans gods, and blah blah blah (it’s cool, but hard to recap, my dears), but Sam has had enough of his sitting on the sidelines. Dean guilt’s Metatron about Kevin and his misery. And once Metatron brings Kevin back from Crowley’s grip, Dean asks Metatron if he will join them. Metatron asks Dean if what they are about to do is really worth the outcome and some other philosophizing. Well, if I know Dean, I’m pretty sure I know the answer to those questions.
Third trial: cure a demon. Hmmm…. I wonder which demon the Winchesters will pick. And just as Sam and Dean drive off in Metallicar, they find Cas in a crumple on the road. “A little help here.” is the last word from that sweet little angle before the final credits roll.
In prophet haps…
Back in the fake boat, Kevin sends ‘Sam’ and ‘Dean’ on a food run and while Crowley’s minions are kissing his ass, Kevin has figured out that all of this is fake. Yay, Kevin! He toys with the fake brothers a bit more, sending them off on an errand for the tablet, leading them right into a devils trap.
Having heard of his trick, Crowley makes a visit to a very confident and cocky Kevin. Crowley doesn’t like this turn of affairs, and is annoyed that his demons were too polite. Kevin’s taunting makes Crowley mad, and just as he is choking him out, the light gets bright, the angel song rings out, and Kevin is gone.
Remember when the archangel came and saved Chuck when he was threatened back in season 5? I wondered why Kevin didn’t have the same courtesy when Crowley came for him. Now we know, his angel, Metatron, had been hiding out in a hotel room reading books.
In angel news…
Castiel has been camping out at Biggerson’s, because of course he has. He looks tired and disheveled. After ordering the Smart Heart Beer Battered Tempura Tempters (hee!), the familiar angel calls rings and rumbles, and Cas flits out of there. Shortly after, an appearance of one of Naomi’s flunkies who looks like a poor man’s Jake Gyllenhaal, flits in. Seems as though Castiel has been using his angelic powers to be at all of the Biggerson’s at the same time. Sort of. It’s been really hard to track him, is what it is. “There’s just so many Biggerson’s.” poor man’s Jake whines to Naomi.
So the angels decimate a Biggerson’s to lure Castiel out of the loop, leaving one poor blinded waitress mumbling, “They say you have to stop.” Cree.Pee. Cas goes to comfort her and is nabbed by the angels. Rats. Naomi tells Cas that she thinks he came off the line with a crack, “You don’t even die right.” She sends her flunky angels off to find the Angel tablet. Which as we find out later, will be quite an impossible task.
Naomi doesn’t understand why Castiel won’t help her as Crowley makes one of his typical noisy entrances. Cas is very upset to figure out that those two sneaks have been working together. Crowley has cleverly melted down an angel sword and made it into bullets. He shoots Castiel in the gut and brings him to his office to question him. After some exposition blah blah blah, Crowley has figured out that Cas has stashed the table inside himself! Crowley reaches right into his belly and digs the bloody thing out. EW.
Castiel has a conversation with poor man’s Jake about how everything has basically gone to hell, pulls out the angel sword bullet, and shoves it in Jake’s eye to cast him out and apparently escape!
At the end of the episode the gang’s back together, pretty much everyone knows everything about the trials, Sammy thinks he’s being saved (but is he?), Dean is stressed (as usual), and the beautiful boys plus one bloody little angel have an angry Crowley and Naomi to contend with. I thought this was the second to last episode, but it seems as though we’re getting 23 episodes this season, so YAY, two more!
No quotes this recap, because the lovely and talented Ben Edlund wrote this sucker, and along with it being a doozy to recap, it is jam packed with HEE-worthy quotes that would basically just be the whole script re-written here. I love that man.
Next! I don’t even know what to make of that promo.