Supernatural is getting a little scarier this season.

Robert Englund, best know as Freddy Krueger in the original A Nightmare on Elm Street movies, has signed on to guest star on Supernatural. Though, in this role, he won’t be killing anyone, instead, he’ll actually be trying to save the Winchester boys.

Inside sources say that Englund will play a character known as “Dr. Robert.” According to executive producer Sera Gamble, “Hunters often find themselves in situations where they need medical attention but can’t exactly stroll into an ER. … Robert plays an unlicensed doc who makes his living stitching folks up on the down low. One of our guys goes to him with a life-or-death problem.”

Englund instantly became known as one of the scariest men in American after portraying Freddy Krueger in the Nightmare on Elm Street movie franchise. Recently, he’s guest-starred on Bones as a creepy janitor, and will appear in next week’s Halloween-themed episode of Chuck.

Englund will appear as Dr. Robert in the Dec. 10 episode of Supernatural.

Things open up on a cold winter night with Alice and Russell, a young couple who are on a first date. Things progress from chaste, jewelry-commercial kissing to heavy petting and even heavier biting back at her apartment, taking the phrase “I want all of you inside me” to a very cannibalistic level.

Fast forward to the morning after with Sam talking to Alice’s roommate and getting the inside scoop.  As it turns out, Alice and Russell eat each other to death. Making things even more interesting, Alice would have been very unlikely to take a guy back to her apartment since Alice was a virgin with a Jonas Brothers promise ring and all that jazz. 

Sam reports back to Dean who is more laid back than usual.  When Dean claims that his formerly-favorite holiday, Valentine’s Day (which he re-dubbed “Unattached Drifter Christmas”) has lost its luster for him, Sam becomes concerned.  

Meanwhile, across town, a man named Jim has just started dating a girl named Janice and is obsessed with checking his phone for messages and texts from her.  His co-worker chides him for being whipped when Janice walks in, asking Jim where the hell he’s been and freaking out that he just can’t choose work over him.  Jim’s co-worker mouths off to Crazy Pants Janice and she shoots him point blank in the chest.  Janice then launches into a teary confession that she can’t stand to be apart from him and Jim feels the same way, fearing that work, life, and now probably jail will come between them.  However, Jim has an idea how they can stay together forever: A sweet little thing called Double Suicide.

Posing as Agents Cliff and Marley, Sam and Dean hang out for awhile at the city morgue with Dr. Corbin, a portly older man who seems to have quite a bit of fun with his job.  He allows them to take a look at the “leftovers” of the decedents that he has in the fridge.  Lo and behold, the hearts of all of the victims have identical markings. Castiel literally appears on the scene and confirms that the markings are angelic script.  More specifically, they’re a mark of union for man and woman intended to mate. Castiel then surmises that the culprit behind these murders is a Cupid gone rogue (like Sarah Palin).  What human myth has mistaken for Cupid is actually a Cherub, Third Class, and in spite of the fact that they are seen wearing diapers, Castiel adamantly tells Dean that they are not incontinent. 

In order to catch this Cupid in the act, the Winchester boys and Castiel have dinner at a “nexus of human reproduction” — a fancy, jacket-required restaurant where Cupid lust-ifies a couple.  Castiel steps outside to work some mojo commanding Cupid manifest himself and he does, popping up behind Dean with a giddy bear hug.  Apparently, the “cherub handshake” is a gregarious version of a soul hug.  Making things even more uncomfortable, this hyper-affectionate, pudgy angel is butt naked. 

Castiel tells Cupid that he knows that the humans he’s marked as intendeds are murdering each other and believes something nefarious is afoot.  Cupid breaks down in tears, insisting it wasn’t him. He loves love and if that’s wrong, he doesn’t want to be right. He’s just making his rounds and following Heaven’s orders, matching up couples that The Powers That Be.  He also divulges that “the John and Mary Winchester union was a top priority for Heaven” and that orders were clear that Sam and Dean had to be born.  Angered about being further confronted with this destiny schpiel, Dean tries to punch Cupid and hurts his hand.  He also hurts Cupid’s feelings and the chubby naked guy disappears.

Back at the morgue, Sam and Dean put in a visit and Dr. Corbin shows him the latest arrival: a dude who committed Death by Twinkie, jamming snack cakes down his gob until his stomach band burst who then began cramming them down his throat with a toilet brush.  He gives the boys the straight dope that in the past couple days, there have been eight suicides and 19 O.D.s, which is really uncharacteristic for this time of year. 

Sam notices that there’s a creepy, skinny balding guy in a suit with a briefcase is seen walking around all over the place.  Sam confronts him and recognizes him as an angel… Or a demon, slicing him with the knife before Men In Black demon/angel recognizes him as a Winchester before taking off.

Sam brings back the abandoned briefcase that Men In Black demon dropped and a blinding light flies out that Castiel clarifies is a human soul.  He tells the boys that Famine is afoot.  Famine, as in one of the Four Horsemen.  The town is ravenous and nearly everyone in has been consumed with a hunger, explaining the nature of the death — Even Castiel who’s chowing down on burgers by the bag full, apparently, the vice of choice of Castiel’s vessel.  All of the people who died, committed suicide, or succumbed to Death by Twinkie all found themselves plagued by the things they craved most, be it love or even food.  This is totally Famine’s M.O.

Between bites of burger, Castiel tells Sam and Dean that Famine must devour the souls of his victims. Lucifer sent his demons to take care of Famine and feed him, getting him ready for his march across the land.  The Winchester boys ponder how to take out Famine, recalling how they took out one of the other Four Horsemen, War.  Last time, they cut off the ring that War wore and Dean wonders aloud if Famine has a class ring, too.”  Castiel says that Famine does have a ring, but right now, there’s a slight crimp in plans to go after the Horseman when Sam is also affected by Famine’s touch, finding his craving for demon blood has returned.  Sam going somewhere else wouldn’t rectify the problem, but would just spread Famine’s disease elsewhere.  This time, Dean and Castiel must face Famine alone and lock Dean down Wolf Man-style in the bathroom until they can quell his craving.

Famine, as it turns out, is a withered old man in a black suit, plopped into a motorized wheelchair with a breathing tube.  He’s none too pleased with Bald Men In Black Demon for losing the delicious soul of Death By Twinkie dude.  In lieu of the cream-filling flavored soul, Famine snatches Bald Demon Guy’s soul from his vessel and gobbles it up.  Mmm-mmm good!

To bait Famine, Dean and Castiel head to Dr. Corbin’s morgue and discover that the good doctor is dead.  A co-worker told them that Corbin had been for 20 years and then went home and drank himself to death for no real reason.  Castiel notices that Dr. Corbin’s soul hasn’t been harvested yet and this will be great bait for Famine.

Back at the hotel, more Men In Black Famine henchemen come for Sam and he attacks, draining the female of blood and then sending the male flying backwards to save for snacking later.

While staking out Famine’s digs, a local greasy spoon, Castiel asks Dean what his hunger is, wondering why Dean is the only one who hasn’t been affected.  Dean insists that he has none.  When he wants to drink, eat, or have sex… He does it.  He’s just really in touch with his id.  Dean goes to explore and Castiel doesn’t have his back since Castiel has got his face in a vat of raw hamburger meat, feeding his addiction.  Dean gets captured and treated to Famine’s speech that “hunger doesn’t just come from the body, it comes from the soul.” Looking into Dean’s soul, Famine sees Dean as a hollow, broken being who keeps fighting as an almost mechanical response even though he knows the Apocalypse is a fight he can’t win.  Dean is dead inside.  (Hey, a trip to Hell complete with 300 years of torture can do that to a guy.)

Sam shows up in the nick of time, full and recharged from the delicious snack that Famine provided for him.  Famine tells Sam he’s the exception to the rule, just the way Satan wanted him to be and cannot die from drinking too much blood, unlike everyone else who will die from their addictions. When Famine encourages him to drink his MIB demons’ blood, Sam conquers his hunger and sucks their souls out.  Since he won’t drink the blood, Famine makes use of the souls and ingests them himself.  While it temporarily strengthens Famine, Dean is able to use those demon souls to suck them out and destroy the Horseman.

Afterwards, the Winchesters and Castiel head back to their hotel room and Sam is in some agonizing throes of detox. Meanwhile, Dean has a well-deserved drink or three, then goes outside for a good cry looking skyward and asking The Almighty to please help him be able to feel again.  Whether or not Dean is able to get in touch with his feelings will have to wait until Thursday March 25^th when Supernatural returns from yet another month-long hiatus.

It’s dream time for Dean and the elder Winchester brother rocking out to Warrant’s seminal cheeseball hit of the ’90s, “Cherry Pie” as a devil and angel-attired team of stripers gyrate wildly in front of him in his slumbering visions.  His dream is met with an insta-flurge when Anna (the red-haired former angel/human-turned-angel-again) interrupts with a special message asking Dean to meet her at 225 Industrial. She’s now a renegade angel once again who has been let out of Heaven’s prison. 

Cassiel meets Anna instead of the Winchesters.  She complains that the boys don’t trust her, but Cassiel tells them that he’s the one who doesn’t trust her.  His mistrust is confirmed when he points out that she’s carrying a large knife, one that doesn’t work on angels — unlike the one that Cassiel is carrying.  Now that’s a knife!

Anna tells Cassiel that her mission is clear.  Sam is the only vessel for Lucifer that matters. If Sam is killed, that means that there will be no war with Michael (presumably in Dean’s meat suit) and no Kroatoa Virus. Cassiel refuses to help Anna because Sam is his friend and threatens to kill her if she so much as harms a pretty-pretty hair on his head. 

Anna falls into the past, literally, in an attempt to kill the Winchester’s parents before either of the boys are born.  After working some angelic mojo, Cassiel discovers she’s plopped into 1978 and needs to go back to the past (which prompts Dean to make several DeLorean jokes).  Sam and Dean insist on coming along, even though Cassiel tells them that bringing the three of them to the past will compromise his power. 

When they get to the past, Cassiel is bleeding from the mouth, so Dean puts him up in the honeymoon suite of a hotel run by a dude who tries to sell them dope. After finding out where Ma and Pa Winchester are living now, Sam and Dean stop by to visit the Fam. Dean knows Mary will not be too pleased to see him, considering the last time, he had been Mary, the boys’ mother, knows exactly who they are and tries to shoo them out of the house, but John, their father, is excited to have company.  Company that he has no clue that happen to be his sons, 32 years in the future.

Their little sit-down is interrupted with a phone call. John is being threatened on the phone that he’ll lose his job unless he comes into discuss it with his boss, Mr. Woodson.  Although the manly voice on the other end would lead John (and the audience) to believe it’s just Mr. Woodson, the voice on the other end is actually Anna the Terminator Angel.  When John arrives, he sees Mr. Woodson with his eyes burned out of their sockets, having seen Anna in her true form, before Anna throttles him into a wall.  Dean and Mary arrive on the scene with Dean getting thrown into the wall, leaving Mary to attack Anna with the angelic knife. She gives Anna a pretty good run for her money, but gets thrown into the window of a car.  Attempting to stab Anna with a crowbar doesn’t kill her, but Sam arrives in time to cast an angelic banishment charm on the wall which whisks Terminator Angel away.

On the way home, Mary, Sam and Dean fill John in on the fact that Mary comes from a long line of Hunters and has fought monsters since she was a kid.  When they get home, Mary shows John how she’s demon-proofed their house by hiding a Devil’s Trap under their area rug, iron fixtures on the walls, and holy water and sea salt stocked in the pantry.

John is fascinated with the sigil and asks Dean how to draw them and how big to make them.  He has no hesitation to slice open his own palm when Dean tells him that the sigil needs to be drawn in human blood.  This no-nonsense departure from his happy-go-lucky demeanor earlier prompts Dean to tell John (oh-so-ironically) that at this moment, he really reminds him of his dad. 

John and Sam have a heart-to-heart, as Winchesters are wont to do, and tells John that his father brought him up to be a Hunter.  John freaks out, appalled that someone would actually put their children in jeopardy by exposing them to demons and monsters.  Sam refutes this, saying that his father did the right thing, attempting to teach his kids to protect themselves.  Sam tells John that his father died before he was able to tell him that he loved him and forgave him for bringing them into the Hunter fold because he knew that he meant to protect them by arming them with knowledge.

Dean, on the other hand, comes right out and tells Mary that he and Sam are her sons. Dean tells her the details of how and why they came back to the past. He tells her many miniscule details that only they would know to prove this, such as Mary making him tomato rice soup when he was sick and that he would sing “Hey, Jude” to him in lieu of a lullaby.  She’s aghast that she raised her kids to be Hunters.  That’s when Dean drops the bomb that she didn’t raise them, because she’s dead, killed by the Yellow-Eyed Demon.  John became a Hunter to seek revenge.  Sam, however, tells her that this can be avoided if she leaves John now before events are set in motion.  It’s too late, however, when Mary tells the boys that she’s already pregnant. 

An even problem arises when the sigils John drew are smudged.  Just then, all of the windows in the house shatter.  It’s Uriel, wearing a much younger vessel, having met up with Anna in the past.  Telling Terminator Angel that he is more than happy to “do some smiting,” he tussles with the Winchesters at their home.  Anna shoes up and knocks John out of the house and then stabs Sam in the stomach.  Things don’t look too good when Sam starts bleeding from the mouth.

While nearly unconscious outside, John is visited by the Archangel Michael who tells him he can save his wife if he allows him to temporarily take over his body as his vessel. Michael-in-John’s-body enters the fracas and shows up to waste Anna, incinerating her after she recognizes him instantly as Michael.  He also tells Uriel to get lost and the other Archangel beats it, immediately.

While in John’s body, Michael tells Dean that he is only fighting his destiny.  He can wear John’s body, as well as Dean’s because the Winchesters are part of an ancient bloodline of warring brothers that can be traced back to Cain and Abel. Dean marvels at this “Six Degrees of Heaven Bacon” as Michael tells him more about his fate and that free will is merely an illusion.  He and Sam have been destined to be vessels and it was no mere chance that, out of millions of possibilities, Mary and John would meet and have Sam and Dean.  All of these circumstances were pre-destined.  He also parallels his relationship and brotherly love for Lucifer to Dean’s relationship with Sam: He loves his brother and helped to raise him, but will kill him because it is his father’s will and he is a good son. 

Dean still protests and will find a way to save Sam and the world no matter what.  With that, Michael transports a healed Sam back to the future and wipes John and Mary’s minds of all of the details they had learned.  Michael tells Dean that he will change his mind, as will Sam. 

Back in the future, Sam and Dean are holding up Cassiel who’s ready to heave a quart of woozy, angelic vom.  Dean tells Sam what Michael had told him, and that they will both eventually crack and say “yes” to the whole vessel thing.   Meanwhile, back in the past, a very pregnant Mary and John fawn over a sweet-faced cherub angel statue stationed in Baby Dean’s future nursery.  She pats her belly telling her “little troublemaker” not to worry… Angels are watching over him.

This week’s episode of Supernatural sees Sam swap bodies with Gary, a teenage burger-flipping student by day and an aspiring warlock by night.  Although Sam appears to be Gary to the outside world and to the mirror, instead, the viewer sees Sam in Jared Padalecki’s body on the screen even though everyone else thinks it’s Gary the Gawky Teenage Witch (played by Colton James of 7^th Heaven).

The Winchester boys find themselves in Housatonic, Massachussetts, attempting to help out their former baby sitter, now with a family of her own.  In between discussing how she was the best baby sitter ever, her husband tells them about the crazy ghost-flavored shenanigans in the house, particularly their daughter having the words “Murdered Child” scratched in blood Exorcist-style across her stomach.  Sam and Dean tell them spend the next night or so in the hotel and they will take care of this ghost problem for them. 

Doing some research at the local pub, Dean chows down on the customary bacon cheeseburger while Sam has an oh-so-metro salad shaker, reciting his bit of research on previous owners of their former baby sitter’s house.  (A baby sitter that Dean, incidentally, had the major hots for back in the day.)  As it turns out, the house was owned in the 1720s by a man named Isaiah Picket who hung himself a witch on the property. 

Little do the boys know that they’re being watched intently by the teenager running the register and wearing a horrible red, white, and blue Patriot Burger uniform.  It’s Gary the Teeanage Witch who’s got his eye on both the brothers Winchester.

A little magical switcheroo-ing thanks to a blowdart, and Sam wakes up in Gary’s body (wearing the awful Patriot Burger uniform) in the middle of the woods.  Stumbling around, a police officer happens upon him, calls him Gary and politely asks him to get in the car because his folks are worried about him.  The officer takes him back to his parents house and Sam has a mini-freak out seeing his Gary-flection in the window of the cop cars.  Fortunately (or unfortunately), Gary’s parents think he’s drunk.

Meanwhile, Gary is in Sam’s body, and bribing Dean with more bacon cheeseburgers and chili cheese fries to soften the blow that they have to leave their motel room ASAP since the maid saw their weapons collection sprawled on the floor.  Dean heads to the crapper before heading out, giving Gary-in-Sam’s-body time to dump all of the Winchester’s phones, which Sam-in-Gary’s-body has been frantically calling and leaving messages for Dean to inform him about his new “condition.”

Across town, Sam-in-Gary’s-body has to deal with Gary’s overbearing parents, particularly his father, who chastises Gary for deviating from “the plan” he has laid out for him.  Even though Daddy wants Gary to become an engineer and drinking booze in the woods is most certainly not a part of the plan, Sam finds out quite a bit about Gary by going through his room. He comes to the conclusion that Gary is A.) a smart kid, B.) a frustrated virgin and C.) a “little Satanic bastard” judging by the nudie mags and witchcraft paraphernalia hidden in his room. Doing additional recon, Sam-in-Gary’s-body calls the motel he and Dean had been staying at and the owner tells him that one leather jacket and one Sasquatch left in the middle of the night. 

After dealing with more fallout from Gary’s parents, Sam-as-Gary discovers from Gary’s sister that he has a really big, really old leatherbound book that he keeps in his locker at school.  Figuring out the combination on Gary’s locker, Sam finds the book and that Gary has been a very naughty, very demonic dabbling boy.  However, he’s not the only one.  Gary’s two teenage friends, Nora and Trevor also dabble a bit, having conjured a demon.  Trevor nails Sam-as-Gary with a blowdart again and the two manage to haul him back to Trevor’s house since his parents are gone.  Uh-oh!

On the road and en route to the Pickett House, Dean should have been tipped off when Gary-in-Sam’s-body asked him to drive the Impala. First of all, you do not ask to drive the Impala.  Secondly, when given the keys to the Impala, you do not back it into a dumpster.  After apologizing profusely, he clues Dean into more information on the witch that inhabited Isaiah Pickett’s house. Having researched the subject thoroughly, Gary-as-Sam mentioned that the witch was actually carrying Pickett’s child, hence the “Murdered Child” scrawlings across the babysitter’s daughter’s stomach.  At the Pickett house, Dean and Gary-as-Sam dig up the witch’s body and prepare to burn the body and salt the bones.  While Dean does the dirty work, Gary-as-Sam picks up a shotgun and attempts to kill Dean.  He doesn’t get a chance to do it since the witch takes a semi-solid ghost form and blasts both boys back into the walls.  As the witch advances on Dean, Gary-in-Sam’s-Body grabs some lighter fluid and torches the corpse.  Dean’s safe and the two scamper off to the bar where they bond over Bob Seeger and bacon cheeseburgers with a fried egg on top.

As if the abandoning of the salad shaker in favor of more cholesterol-soaked deliciousness weren’t a big enough tip off, nor the request to crank “Rock n’ Roll Never Forgets” at top volume were glaring signs that this was not Sam, then Gary-as-Sam proceeds to do some shots with Dean, telling him what an awesome guy he is, before spilling his guts about how he hates feeling that his whole life has been decided for him, which, I guess is supposed to make us see the parallels between Sam, Dean, and Gary. 

The Winchester/faux-Winchester heart-to-heart reaches an abrupt conclusion when Gary-in-Sam’s-body decides to make full use of the awesomeness of looking like Sam and makes a play for a cougar at the bar who’s eager to make him her cub.  He heads back to her place and as Gary-in-Sam’s-body is losing his virginity and getting his Vili Fualaau on with Mistress Cougar, Sam-as-Gary has been tied up by Gary’s friends. 

While tied up at Trevor’s house, they tell Sam-in-Gary’s body that Gary is on a mission right now to kill Dean as part of a pact with the demon they summoned from the book.  Apparently, Dean is Hell’s Most Wanted with a price on his head… And these teens, particularly Trevor who seems the pushiest, are going to collect it. 

Sam tries to talk them out of it, but Trevor makes with the chanting and Nora, the girl, gets possessed by the demon.  Trevor tells the demon that they’re really close to getting Dean and Gary’s off on a mission now to kill him… And that Gary is actually in Sam’s “meat suit” right now.  The demon seems rather intrigued by the prospect of an empty vessel waiting to be filled.  Trevor, however, gets pushy about the reward and doesn’t think it’s good enough to have the demon’s undying gratitude.  Instead, he barters for

$10 million and the love of Mindy Schwartz.  The demon plays Deal or No Deal with him and her counter-offer is reaching in and grabbing a fist-full of blood and soul.  Bet Trev’s parents won’t be too happy to see his dead carcass in the living room when they come home.

Back across town at yet another motel, Gary-as-Sam has returned from Cougar Fest ’10 and is hanging out with Dean.  Just when he attempts to kill him again, Nora-possessed-by-a-demon shows up.  Seeing Dean right there in front of her, she tells Gary he can have anything that he wants in exchange for Dean, but he’s got to meet “The Boss” first, and she don’t mean Bruce Springsteen.  Gary’s dreams of super witch powers dissipate as he gets really freaked out and refuses.  The demon-in-Nora’s-body throws him aside and begins to advance on Dean.  Together, both Gary-in-Sam’s-body and Dean exorcise the demon from Nora’s body.

After a commercial break, Gary restores Sam and himself to their rightful bodies with his teenage witch powers and apologizes to the Winchester boys for the trouble.  Dean tells him that were Gary of voting age, he’d have killed him.  Sam, having walked a mile in Gary’s Star Wars t-shirt was more sympathetic, telling him that he would wish to have Gary’s life and that Nora’s not into witchcraft, she’s into Gary.  Gary seems somewhat happier and walks back into his suburban Massachusetts home with Nora in tow as Sam and Dean hop in the Impala.  While in the car, Sam tells Dean how much Gary’s life really sucked and it made him glad that he’s a hunter… And he tells him to turn the Bob Seeger on the stereo down.  Looks like things are back to “normal.”

After what seemed like forever, Supernatural resumes Season 5 after one of the bleakest episodes of the series.  Jo and Ellen are dead, Lucifer went on a little field trip, and the Winchester boys came out on the losing end.  This week, Sam and Dean check themselves into a loony bin to help their father’s friend, a hunter named Martin who is shacking up in a cookie jar where the inmates are being picked off by an unseen monster that makes the murders appear to be suicides.

The episode kicks off with Susan the Schitzo, a 40-ish woman who sees her dead, young son standing behind the doctor in her one-on-one patient time with him. She’s been refusing to sleep or take her meds since her roommate Annie was killed by a monster.  The doctor Dr. insists that Susan’s roommate Annie killed herself, although Susan attributes Annie’s gruesome death to monsters. At lights out time, Susan begins screaming for help back in her room.  No one comes to her rescue as the monster drops in and kills her, making it look like she slashed her wrists in a suicide attempt.

After toe commercial break, Sam and Dean check themselves into the very same whacky ward where Schitzo Susie just got ganked, saying that they were referred by Dr. Babar (like the elephant).  Little does the good doctor know that they’re there on a mission to bail out a hunter friend of their fathers. To ensure that they will be enrolled in their studies at Nut U., Sam tells the doctor that he started the Apocalypse and hangs out with angels in trench coats.  Dean also solidifies his ticket to the padded play place by telling asking the doctor to fix him up so that they can go back to traveling around the country and killing monsters.”

Following a rather thorough observation by a chipper attending nurse that Dean dubs “Nurse Ratched”, Sammy and Dean, get the ol’ Silkwood shower, a rubber gloved thumb up the bum, and spiffy blue regulation jammies in addition to a padded room of one’s own.

The usual heart-to-heart between the boys ensues….  As much of a heart-to-heart as possible since Dean is doing his Dean thing and holding back emotion about Ellen and Jo’s death.  In turn, Sweet Sammy berates him for not letting it out. 

Meanwhile, Martin, Papa Winchester’s hunter pal is stoked to see them.  Martin also ends up in the group session with Sam.  Dean, however, has been dubbed “dangerously co-dependent” on his brother and is split into a separate group.

During Sam and Martin’s group session, a dude who saw the monster that killed Ann and Schitzo Susie speaks up during group about what he saw.  Faster than you can say “500 milligrams of Thorazine,” the dude is shut down and shut up first by the doctor, and then by another loony who insists that she saw it to, with a much more fantastical claim.

Dean, meanwhile has been assigned to a (semi) hot shrink to talk about relationships, his father, and his narcissistic and religious psychosis. Dean, as per usual, holds back a bit.  Soon after, we’re introduced to Wendy, another inmate from group therapy who walks down the hallway and decides to french Dean in the hallway.  Ladies and gentlemen, we have a clinical nympho!

While Dean gets the better gig with playing hallway tonsil hockey with the resident sex fiend, Sam informs dean about the dude who saw the monster from his group session.  As Sam and Dean go to meet with the dude from group, they hear a noise coming from his room.  Racing towards it, Sam tries to open the door as the dude keeps screaming and his foot flies at the window.  By the time Sam is able to jimmy open the door, the dude has been hanged with a bedsheet from the pipe in his room.

After a commercial break, the Winchester boys break into the facility’s morgue and check him out on the slab.  They find a deep puncture wound on his neck that, when prodded with a Q-tip, goes all the way through his brain. They decide to further investigate what this means and Sam is all too eager to saw through the dead dude’s skull while Dean stands outside on watch.  Sam removes the dude’s brain and discovers it had been sucked completely dry. 

Just then, someone’s coming and Nurse Ratchet (the one who admitted the Winchesters and “thoroughly” checked them out) comes in.  Dean alerts Sam who puts back the dude’s brain and closes the slab door.  Just as the Nurse enters and asks what they’re doing in there, Dean embraces the power of crazy, drops trou and screams “Pudding!” shaking his (off-camera) junk around.

The boys are free to go and reconvene with Martin, who has a bunch of Gacy-esque clown pictures that he painted on the wall.  Martin and the boys discuss their findings and Martin believes the brain sucker is a Wraith, a monster that takes the form of a human, eats brains, and can be killed by a silver object, which burns the Wraith, even in its concealed form.  It won’t be too hard to figure out who the Wraith is since its true form is revealed in its reflection.  After catching a glimpse of the Doctor in a mirror passing by, the boys figure out exactly who their Wraith is.

But not before Clinical Nympho Nympho decides she no longer wants Dean and plants one on Sam because he is larger.  Martin bails on the boys, saying that he can’t help them go after the doctor/Wraith, still shaken and damaged by an incident in Albuquerque that’s never elaborated on.  They bust into the doctor’s office and Sam attacks the Doc with a silver letter opener.  He makes a cut on the doctor and Martin comes in to stop them.  Whaddya know… The cut isn’t burning, like it would if they attacked a monster. Whoopsie!  Guess he’s not the Wraith after all! 

For nearly taking out the facility’s doctor, Sam gets dosed with a lot of meds… happy, fun, wonderful meds! When Sam comes down off the meds, somewhat, he apologizes to the doctor for nearly murdering him.  The Doctor tells Sam that monsters are the least of his problem, that he had never seen anyone with so much pent-up anger rush him like that and found Sam to be like a man possessed, and not quite human.

Meanwhile, Dean has a therapy session with Hot Shrink, who brings all sorts of awful, uncomfortable feelings to light, such as Dean’s shortcomings, guilt about Jo and Ellen, and things he never told anyone about….Including calling him by his real name, since he checked in under the name “Eddie” at the boobie hatch. This is a good indicator that Hot Shrink is the Wraith… or, as it turns out, a creation of the Wraith to attack Dean since an orderly doesn’t see him chatting with Semi-Hot Shrink, but talking to the wall.  With Sam still high as a kite, Dean chats with Martin, feeling a little fuzzy, doped up, and all sorts of crazy himself.  Trying to figure out what happened, Dean believes that it was a possible exchange of saliva that the Wraith may have used to trigger the dose of crazy in each of the patients and what made them all see the doctor as a Wraith. 

In light of this recent revelation, Dean and Martin think the Wraith may actually be Clinical Nympho Wendy who’s been swapping spit with nearly everyone in the cookie jar (except Martin).  The two go off to find Wendy and nab themselves a Wraith.  By the time they get to Wendy’s room, Dean and Martin (heh… Anyone else notice that this time around it’s a nod to the Rat Pack with “Sammy and Dean” and “Dean and Martin”?) rush in and find smiley-smiley Nurse Rached hovering over Wendy with these retractable projectiles coming out of her hands and trying to suck Wendy’s brain.  They chase her off and Wendy’s still alive.

However, Nurse Ratched has a doped-up Sam strapped to a gurney, prepared to suck his brain.  She explains how crazy brains taste better and her touch is what gives everyone a good dose of The Crazy Virus, which makes for a more delicious dining experience for her. 

Just as her projectile wrist spikes emerge, Dean breaks in and stops her from sucking Sam’s brain, tussling with her and breaking off the spike and jabbing her in the heart with the scalpel.  Smoke comes out and the hospital loses its resident Wraith as the fuzzy, crazy feelings instantly wear off of Sammy and Dean, who make a break for it and bust out of the hospital.  Whether they Chief Broomed their way out of there or took a more subtle approach is debatable since this happened prior to a commercial break.  After finding the Impala, the boys had yet another heart-to-heart chat about Sam’s anger issues and Dean’s feelings of inadequacy in terms of saving one another.  Regardless, they’ve still got each other.

After several weeks of episodes that were heavy on the humor, Supernatural turns dark. Very dark.  In one of the bleakest episodes of the series, the hunters reunite to track down the Colt, face down Lucifer and attempt to stop him from resurrecting He Who Rides a Pale Horse, losing two members of the team in the process.

The episode starts off with Dean and Sam tracking the Colt, now in the possession of a demon named Crowley.  (A nice little play on Aleister Crowley, since Aleister was the oh-so-charmingly polite British demon who tortured Dean in Hell for three centuries, and this guy was the supposed chum of Bella, the irritating British chick.) Unable to get close to Crowley, the Winchesters concoct a plan to infiltrate his mansion. They recruit Jo, Ellen’s daughter, to stand around in a short skirt and pretend her car broke down. After Crowley’s demon goons try to make a move on her, Jo ices all of them and gains Sam and Dean access to Crowley’s mansion.  Interrupting Crowley’s “me time” (which consists of (watching footage of Nazis goose stepping to Motown music), the Winchester boys have a surprisingly easy time getting the Colt. 

Crowley himself had been dropping hints all over town to get the Winchesters to come to him to claim their occult peacemaker. He wants them to cap Lucifer with the Colt, explaining that essentially, they are on the same side.  Crowley believes that once humans are eradicated, Lucifer will then turn his attentions to the demons he created as his own army to take out the humans.  Rather than sit around and wait to be destroyed, Crowley wants to strike first and have the Winchesters take out Lucifer.

After doing a smidge of research back at Bobby’s place and having a Hunter’s Reunion with Sam, Dean, Castiel, Bobby, Jo, and Ellen in attendance, the gang finds out that they will likely find Lucifer in Carthage.  Not Roman Empire, Hannibal-and-his-elephants Carthage, but rather Carthage, MO – the scene of one of the bloodiest battles in United States history during the Civil War.  There, Lucifer is trying to resurrect Death himself, who was laid to rest in the ground of the town.  Before scampering off towards certain doom, Dean makes a play and flirts with that sassy lassie, Jo, who turns him down cold. Undaunted, Dean laughs it off and has a beer before Bobby takes a group photo to remember the gang all together before some of them (inevitably) die.

The Brothers Winchester, Castiel, and Mama and Daughter Harvelle head off to Carthage to find a ghost town.  Not just any ghost town, but a ghost town packed with Reapers and Hell Hounds… oh, my! Even worse, they encounter Ol’ Yellow Eyes’ daughter, Meg.  After Castiel separates from the pack to do some digging on what’s going on, he finds himself trapped in holy fire by Lucifer, whose human vessel is deteriorating rapidly and he’s desperately seeking Sammy.  While Lucifer goes off to dig up Death, Meg babysits Castiel, blabbering about every phase of the plan. Castiel manages to knock Meg into the circle of Holy Fire with him and then pimp-smacks her to the ground, using her as a bridge to walk out unscathed.

He doesn’t quite arrive in time, however, to help the Winchester boys and Harvelle women.  The Colt takes out several reapers and hellhounds, Dean decides to take one for the team and leaves himself to the mercy of an invisible Hell Hound (which is familiar territory for Dean).  Jo rushes in to save the day and gets seriously mauled by a Hell Hound herself.  Dean scoops her up and the foursome seek refuge in a hardware store to treat Jo’s wounds and regroup.  Jo, on death’s door thanks to being nearly eviscerated by the hellhounds, offers to stay behind and detonate a homemade iron nail and salt bomb to allow her mother and the Winchesters to escape and take out Lucifer.  Dean kisses Jo goodbye and Ellen offers to stay behind with her little girl to detonate the bomb, buying Dean and Sam enough time to escape.  Jo dies in Ellen’s arms and a teary-eyed Ellen blows up the hardware store along with herself, Jo’s body and a whole mess of reapers and hellhounds. Women don’t seem to do too well around Winchesters. Seriously.

Sam and Dean take off to Carthage where Lucifer has been hard at work digging a mass grave for the town’s residents.  The men had offered themselves as a sacrifice and the women and children met their demise first, already stacked several high in the massive crater Lucifer has dug.  Sam takes a shot at Lucifer and the Colt temporarily air conditions Lucifer’s brain for about ten seconds or so before he springs back and the wound heals itself.  (Although it wasn’t directly explained, the Colt probably could not kill Lucifer because he’s an angel – albeit a fallen one – and not a demon.) Sam and Dean are temporarily incapacitated as Lucifer launches into a chant that zaps the rest of the town’s menfolk dead and resurrects Death (who we don’t get a glimpse at, and likely won’t until January 21, 2010).  Everyone’s screwed.

Castiel pops by and whisks Sam and Dean back to Bobby’s hunter headquarters where they brief him on everything that’s happened and they mourn Jo and Ellen by burning the photograph of the old hunting gang.  It don’t get much more depressing than that. This time around, Supernatural’s take on the Apocalypse is perhaps the bleakest yet, making Buffy the Vampire Slayer look like an episode of Seinfeld by comparison.

At the behest of Carver “Chuck” Edlund, who they believe called them, Sammy and Dean speed off in the impala to their destination.  As it turns out, Carver didn’t call them to the first ever Supernatural Convention based on his wildly popular series of (supposed) fiction novels.  It was actually Becky who engages in some fangirl squeeing after seeing Dean – and particularly – Sam drive up. 

Carver explains he wasn’t the one who called them there and has to explain such concepts as “live action role playing” (LARP-ing) to the Winchester boys who take in the sights of hundreds of fans wandering around dressed as them, or as some of their past Monsters of the Week, including the Scarecrow and The Hook.  Posters and t-shirts emblazoned with “Got salt?” abound and Carver Edlund is a keynote speaker at the event, announcing a symposium on the homoerotic subtext of Supernatural and, much to the delight of fans, that there will be more Supernatural books, in spite of the fact that the character of Dean had been banished to Hell. 

Sam and Dean do not take too kindly to Carver mining their personal lives and struggles for fun and profit.  Carver explains that he’s gotta eat, too, and that he has no choice as an angel had charged him with being the Winchester’s official chronicler of deeds.

The Winchester boys’ attention snaps back to the convention when one of the attractions is a “ghost hunt” in which the attendees must find and salt the bones of Leticia Gore, the headmistress of an orphanage during the late 1800s who had murdered four young children before killing herself.  Ironically, the site the convention is being held at is the very same orphanage where Leticia went on her killing spree. 

Soon, the LARP-ing gets out of control and the real Leticia Gore and the murdered kids come out to play. The creepy dead kids greet the convention-goers with a chorus of sad, little “Miss Gore won’t let us have any fun”s as a hired actress portraying Leticia Gore for the RPG game confuses the issue even more. 

Leading the pack of LARP-ers are FatDean and GawkySam who declare this the best game ever, particularly when they encounter the real Sam and Dean who aren’t amused.  (Dean gets called “Bobby,” which just might have upped the non-amusement factor.)  Even better, FatDean and GawkySam seem to have the real Dean and Sam’s gravely, super-deep, super-serious voices down pat!  Dean is mystified that these two guys would actually want to be the real Sam and Dean, angrily asking them to explain the allure to him. 

Before he can get an answer, both sets of Sams and Deans encounter the ghost of Leticia Gore’s own son who tells them that “Mommy loves me this much” – stretching his hands out to show how much and revealing a chunk of his missing scalp and head cut to the bone.  Incensed by this, Dean wants to nuke the ghost of Gore big time.

They get their chance when the Sams and Deans head to the on-site graveyard and begin to dig up her grave.  Leticia Gore’s ghost attacks FatDean and GawkySam.  Sammy is slugged to the ground and can do nothing, leaving Dean to successfully salt and torch Leticia’s bones by himself in the nick of time. 

As it turns out, Leticia Gore’s ghost was the only thing maintaining order in the Gore-phanage-turned-Hotel.  It wasn’t Mommy who gave her son the scalp job, but rather the three creepy kids who claimed that Miss Gore wouldn’t let them have any fun.  The creepy kids start to have all kinds of fun, wielding knives and giving a scalp job to the snide German dude playing The Hook.  Mommy didn’t give him the scalp job.

Realizing what’s happening and that the little bastards originated LARP-ing by playing a hardcore version of cowboys and Indians, Sam and Dean corner the hired actress who’s pretending to be Leticia.  Protesting that she’s “just a Hooters waitress,” FauxLeticia needs to convince the kids that she’s the real Leticia Gore to restore order and buy Sam and Dean time to find the bones of the real kids and send them back to that big, flaming orphanage underground.  Things are going surprisingly well until FauxLeticia’s cellphone goes off, playing a horrible dance song that (rightly) angers the creepy kids. 

The real Sam and Dean get tied up rushing in to save FauxLeticia and almost getting Haircuts From Hell from the creepy kids in the process. Meanwhile, FatDean and GawkySam FatDean save the day, digging the graves and finding the bones.  The two LARP-ers salt and torch the kiddie corpses and all is restored to (semi) normal. 

In the aftermath, FatDean and GawkySam reveal their real names (Damian and Barnes) and identities to Dean.  In a touching moment, Damian explains why he would want to be the real Dean, he admires and wishes that he could save the world every day and have a brother that would die for him.  He also tells Dean that he and Barnes met in a Supernatural chatroom and that they’re more than just friends… They’re partners… Partners who hold hands and lean their heads on one another’s shoulders. 

Meanwhile, Fangirl Becky decides to gently let down a relieved Sammy, letting him know that although she will always love him in her own, strange, geekily obsessive way and continue to write incestuous slash about Sam and his brother, her heart truly belongs to Chuck, with whom she hit it off at the Convention.  As a parting gift, however, Becky and Prophet/Best Selling Author Carver Edlund let Sam know that Bella, the annoying British Chick from several seasons ago didn’t give the magical mystical Colt revolver to Lilith.  Instead, she gave it to Crowley (Dean’s mentor/tormentor in Hell).  Armed with this knowledge, the Winchester boys take off to get their Colt back.

In one fell swoop, Supernatural managed to combine a humorous episode with one that advances the season-long Mega-Apocalypse storyline.  Trapped in a Trickster’s paradise which conveniently resembles (thinly veiled parodies of) television shows, the Winchester boys discover the identity of this candy-loving Trickster and just how large a role he plays in the war between angels, demons, and humanity. 

Things open up “before a live studio audience” and Sammy and Dean mugging the camera on a sitcom-esque set.  And for the first time ever, Supernatural has a theme song with awesomely cheesy lyrics and opening credits that feel like a cross between Perfect Strangers and Family Matters. 

After Dean claims “son of a b*tch” as his comedic catchphrase, the boys are shuttled into a C.S.I.-type scenario, interviewing a local woman whose hot-tempered hubby was killed by a bear.  After much prodding, she admits that it wasn’t a bear, but rather her husband was killed by the Incredible Hulk.  Not just any Hulk, but the Lou Ferrigno Hulk, which was at least some consolation since “those movies were terrible.” 

Perplexed by this seemingly random death, Sam discovers that there are candy wrappers at the scene of the crime. And if there’s one metaphysical entity that loves him some candy, it’s The Trickster. Althout Dean wants to off the Trickster (still taking that whole killing him a bunch of times thing rather personally), Sam suggests aligning forces with him and tracking him down on the off-chance they’re on the same side in this Apocalypse thing.

Just when the boys get a clue, they’re zapped into the drama of Seattle Mercy Hospital on “Dr. Sexy M.D.”  (complete with loud background soundtrack music featuring whispy-voiced female vocalists, the feminine equivalent of John Mayer). Hijinx ensue as the boys get slapped numerous times by several melodramatic medical interns in surgical scrubs and they encounter a hospital ghost who had a relationship with one of the staff  — a nice shout-out to Jeffrey Dean Morgan (Pa Winchester)’s other TV gig on Grey’s Anatomy.  Dean finally cops to his guilty pleasure and takes notice that Dr. Sexy M.D. isn’t what he appears to be.  Because this particular Dr. Sexy is wearing unsexy white sneakers and not sexy cowboy boots.  Just as Dean grips up the Trickster in disguise, he gets shot in the back by the husband of a face transplant patient and Sammy must operate on him with MacGuyver-esque tools: a bottle of whiskey, pen, and sewing kit.

Dean comes to and finds himself and Sammy on the set of a zany Japanese game show that translates to “Nutcracker.”  Faced with answering questions in Japanese or getting wailed in the ol’ sushi roll, Castiel shows up to attempt to save the day but gets shut out by the host/Trickster in disguise who notes “Mr. Trickster does not like pretty boy angels.”

While the Trickster had iced Dean plenty of times at the Mystery Spot, this time around, he seems keen to humiliate the heck out of Sweet Sammy, dropping him into a Genital Herpes medication commercial as the spokesperson for the gift that keeps on giving.

Back on the sitcom set, Sammy and Dean are reunited and joined by the surprisingly powerful Trickster who urges the Winchester boys to play the cosmic roles they were assigned to.  Raging against the machine, Dean makes the Trickster mad when he realizes that he must be a puppet for some larger force.  The Trickster angrily retorts that Dean shouldn’t presume to know who and what he is. 

As punishment, he drops Dean and Sam into a procedural cop show, complete with requisite David Carruso sunglasses and theme song by The Who (or a soundalike).  In order to decipher where the Trickester is in this scene, Sam and Dean must get in touch with their inner douchebag and offer up their worst, painfully pithy puns on crime scene evidence.  They stake the wrong guy and the Trickster gets away yet again, putting Dean on the road in his beloved Impala – now given a Knight Rider-esque makeover with Sammy as K.I.T. 

Like the A-Team’s Hannibal, Dean loves it when a plan comes together and devises a solid one that gets the Trickster to show up, turn Sammy back into a boy, and allows the boys to trap him inside a fiery circle lit with holy oil.  A few more Dean-sputtered “son of a b*tch”es later, the Trickster reveals that he’s another archangel: Gabriel.  Following the war, he placed himself in his own angelic witness protection program and reinvented himself as the Trickster.  Gabriel turns all sorts of emo, telling the Winchester boys that this war is no different than an argument at Sunday dinner to most people with Lucifer and Michael leading the ultra-heated food fight with each other. 

Hearkening back to the whole lesson of them playing roles in TV-themed scenarios to survive, Gabriel parallels it to survival in a much larger picture: the Apocalypse. Again, he stresses the importance that all this annoying fighting could be over with if Big Brother Dean just allowed Michael to possess him and engage Little Bro Lucifer wearing a Sammy Suit in a Celebrity Death Match.  He also outlines that there is no coincidence that they were chosen for these roles from the outset, being brothers who do not always see eye to eye, loved each other, and then betrayed one another.  Sammy and Dean allow Gabriel to go free and lament that they wish life were as easy-breezy as a television show before hopping back into the Impala and onto their next destination.

In another detour from the Megapocalypse storyline, Supernatural falls back into Monster of the Week format.  The twist this time is that the monster in question actually has a heart. 

A rash of young men turning up old brings the Winchester boys into contact with a Nathan Detroit-like He-Witch.  Taking his game on the road from town to town, the 900 year old witch wins years from people who sit down to his card table and lose. As a result, he’s dewy and fresh, as is his female companion.  At 900 years old, we see how good you look, yes? Mmm…. 

Sam and Dean place a call to Bobby and the first phase of the hunt leads them to an elderly woman whose husband has been presumed dead and missing for years.  With Sam and Dean’s Spidey sense tingling, the brothers track the elderly woman’s husband, Cliff Sam and Dean follow the trail to a hotel room and bust in on a decades younger-Cliff getting in touch with his inner-Superfreak with two chicks… And he only had to pay for one of them!  Recognizing Cliff by the tattoo on his arm in the photo, Sam asks him for info on the person who is stealing youth and giving it to others.  On the condition that Sam and Dean not tell his wife that he’s alive and young, he lets them know that the creature in question is a witch who allows players to bargain for years towards or against their life.  You lose, you age.  You win, the He-Witch turns back the clock.

After being told to be on the lookout for a floating crap game at bars with a handsome, young Irish lad, Sam and Dean place a call to Bobby.  Instead of doing research, angsty, paralyzed Bobby grabs the keys to his truck and makes use of his handicapped plates to get a good spot in the parking lot and get in on the He-Witch’s game and gain back the use of his legs.. 

After losing 25 years off his life and beginning to age, Dean spots Bobby wheeling through the lot and questions him as to what he’s doing there.  After getting the scoop, an angry Dean finds He-Witch and buys in a hand attempting to win back Bobby’s years.  He gains Bobby’s quarter century back, but after the commercial break, valiant Dean turns into Old Valiant Dean. 

Back at the hotel, Bobby’s still middle aged-crazy and wheelchair bound, which is an upgrade over being paralyzed and old.  Dean, on the other hand, is now played by Chad Everett and has aged about 30 to 40 years.  After a bunch of jokes likening Dean’s new look to Emperor Palpatine (I *heart* Supernatural and all of its geek shout-outs!) and John McCain, ultimately, it’s Sweet Sammy’s likening Dean and Bobby’s dueling, irritable banter to Grumpy Old Men that earns a “Shut up, Sam!” in stereo.

Dean gets serious about coming up with a plan to get the witch to pull a Benjamin Button on him and reverse the age adjustment after being hit with a round of acid reflux while trying to consume one of his beloved Bacon Double Cheeseburgers.  The combination of a need for Mylanta and Viagra after macking on the hotel maid and coming up with an epic fail jolts Ol’ Dirty Dean into action mode.

Bobby, Sammy, and OldDean head back to the bar to wait for He-Witch to come out and arrive in time to see He-Witch get hit by a car before getting up and speeding off in the sweet convertible that creamed him.  .

OldDean chuckles his approval of He-Witch’s style, that is, until the elevator to the building they track him to is out of service.  That leaves wheelchair-bound Bobby to sit this one out as Sammy and OldDean take the stairs, and OldDean gets winded.   

OldDean attempts to crack the safe in the swanky, candle-lit pad of He-Witch (failing eyesight not withstanding) with a little help from Sam. Things are going swimmingly when they see a bunch of the playing chips they believe are the key to restoring their youth, but head south in a hurry when He-Witch’s girlfriend busts them.  She tells He-Witch not to hurt them, and surprisingly, He-Witch obliges and tells the Winchester boys (well, one Winchester boy and one Winchester old man) that the chips aren’t magic, just a prop.  The real magic comes from being a 900 year old witch. 

He also cites that he’s not a murderer and has no desire to see Dean breathe his last and sends them away… Only not after giving Sweet Sammy a mystical case of the clap.  (Which I’m honestly surprised he never contracted before, having played “hide the pitchfork” with a demon before.)

Seeing that OldDean is in rough shape and has already worn out his welcome to play with He-Witch, Sam takes it upon himself to come up with a plan to get back his brother’s lost years.  Before he can concoct a plan, She-Witch is sitting in their hotel room and even more surprisingly, hands them a spell that will reverse all of the aging and Benjamin Button-ing of everyone (who’s still alive) that He-Witch had ever worked his magic on.  When the Winchester boys question the She-Witch’s motives, she mysteriously fingers a silver locket and says she has her reasons.

While Sam keeps He-Witch busy with a round of Texas Hold ‘Em, Bobby and OldDean head to gather ingredients for the spell.  The last ingredient they need is a strand of He-Witch’s DNA.  Sam attempts to snap up the toothpick that He-Witch has been obsessively chewing and hands it off to Bobby and OldDean.  As it turns out, He-Witch figured something was up and swapped the toothpicks so Bobby and OldDean got a bogus one, rendering the spell null and void. 

Forced to find a new means of acquiring He-Witch DNA, OldDean and Bobby take off to the warlock’s apartment in an attempt to find hair, or anything else.  On the way, Bobby and OldDean share a moment with Bobby breaking down and giving the Hunter’s version of Mickey Rourke’s speech from The Wrestler.  Basically, that he feels like a broken down piece of meat, and useless to the team without his legs.  OldDean is stunned and gives him a stern talking to. 

He-Witch now knows for sure something’s up and shows Sammy his choke game is pro.  She-Witch steps in and says she was the one who gave them the spell.  Stunned and shocked by the betrayal, He-Witch asks why.  Again, She-Witch touches the locket and again, insists she has her reasons. 

Thoroughly cheesed off, He-Witch tells Sam that his brother is running on borrowed time.  It seems those bacon double cheeseburgers have taken their toll on OldDean’s ticker and Dean-o has a heart attack while searching He-Witch’s candle lit pad for any sort of DNA. 

Sweet Sammy ups the stakes and employs some demon spawn mojo of going out of his head to effectively play He-Witch for his brother’s lost years.  He ends up winning the hand and YoungDean is back in action, emerging from the building, kicking up his heels and grinning like an idiot as he heads back to the BobbyMobile. 

He-Witch, in turn, doesn’t lose any of his mojo and is quite thoroughly impressed with Sam’s madd poker skillz, not having lost to a mortal for quite some time.  Sam goes forth in peace with 900 year old He-Witch’s blessings.

Revealing himself further to be not so bad ancient gambling guy, He-Witch tearfully grants his She-Witch companion her wish to lose to him in a hand of poker.  She cashes in her centuries worth of chips after reminding him how much she misses her daughter, whose picture is in the silver locket she kept alluding to – a picture of her both as a child and as an old woman whom She-Witch had to bury.  A sad little He-Witch bids her goodbye as she loses her hand and begins to age rapidly, leaving him without an eternal companion. 

Speaking of eternal companions, Dean gets all emo on Bobby who is uncomfortable with this sudden (figurative) sprouting of girl-parts. While Bobby apologizes to Dean for calling him an idiot (or “idjot,” in Bobby-Speak), Dean goes for broke and tells Bobby he’s family to him.  And that Dean doesn’t have a lot of family left.  With or without the use of his limbs, Bobby is still an integral part of Team Winchester and he better not plan on checking out anytime soon. 

Dean then calls Bobby “Ironsides” before they head off into the sunset.

This week’s Supernatural combines the Monster of the Week formula along with the running Apocalypse story arc with the Winchester boys making contact with a surprisingly sweet demon spawn. 

Posing this week as FBI Agents Page and Plant, Sammy and Dean learn about a rash of deaths resulting from joke store pranks gone seriously wrong: A babysitter, quite literally, scratches her brains out after her charge puts itching powder on her hairbrush and a nursing home resident accidentally cooks his roomie with a joy buzzer. 

After testing the joy buzzer and discovering a really quick way to cook a delicious ham and reference Babe in one fell swoop, Dean grabs Sam to pay a visit to the babysitter’s charge.   The kid gives them the info where the unusual murder objects were procured.  Turns out, both the joy buzzer and itching powder came from the same store: The Conjurarium.  Its militant, middle-aged owner — wearing a snazzy, homemade Siegfried and Roy — nearly soils his matching Monticore underroos when Dean melts a rubber chicken with the cursed buzzer.  Realizing that nearly dropping a deuce on the store’s floor is hardly the reaction of someone who had known the objects were cursed, the brothers Winchester hop in the Impala and head to the local hospital to follow their latest tip.

At the hospital, the Winchester boys hear about a father who had all 32 teeth extracted by a Tooth Fairy who resembled Danny Trejo in a sparkly pink and purple tutu with twinkly wings.  After his daughter was creeped out by the story of the tooth fairy and put her tooth under her dad’s pillow, the fairy paid him a visit, leaving 32 shiny quarters behind.  At least he can put that towards his new dentures.  Good job, kid.  You just frittered away your college fund with that little stunt. 

This isn’t the only urban legend gone wonky taking up residence at the hospital.  Pop Rocks and Coke,  and people’s faces sticking a certain way also round out the beds.  Back at their motel, Sammy plots each of the incidents on a map.  They also discover that their motel happens to be in the middle of this two mile radius, thanks to Dean’s case of hairy palms acquired during a round of spare time (and something else) on his hands. Dean goes to shave his palms before the two embark to find what may be the source of these occurrences. 

Tracking the source to a neighborhood home, Sammy and Dean’s search leads them to a little boy named Jesse Turner whose parents instilled him such values as hideously ugly wallpaper, that Pop Rocks and soda will land you in the hospital, and that the Tooth Fairy is a large, hairy, cross dressing dude with wings.  Doing some quick thinking, Dean realizes that the boy’s belief that these urban legends will cause harm are affecting the town, realizes they have to convince him that these things are harmless.  As a test, he tries out the Electro Joy Buzzer of Death on Sammy, having convinced latchkey Jesse that it’s not lethal. 

Problem solved?  Not quite.  Doing some more recon, Sam and Dean find out that Jesse Turner is adopted and track down the tyke’s birth mother, Julia Wright.  Julia throws salt on Sam and Dean and the two are legitimately surprised to find someone else who engages in that sort of greeting.  Realizing they’re not demons, Julia spills the details surrounding her pregnancy, and boy, it’s a doozy.  Julia was a virgin when she became possessed and pregnant, killing people and doing all sorts of demon-y things that a virgin mother-to-be does when she’s carrying hellspawn for nine months.  She felt that she couldn’t kill the child, so just gave him up for adoption.

Sammy and Dean tell Castiel about this latest development, only after making him sit on a whoopee cushion.  Castiel is not amused.  Well, not just with the whoopee cushion thing, but that Jesse Turner is the Anti-Christ.  After clearing things up for the Winchester boys that the Anti-Christ is not necessarily Lucifer, but rather a half-human, half-demon child born of a virgin (the flipside of Christ’s virgin birth), he elaborates that this child is prophesized to destroy the host of Heaven – or “nuke the angels” in Dean’s layman’s terms.  Although this being would be the greatest weapon of the demons, the built-in safeguard of this child is that because it is neither human nor demon, it can’t be tracked by angels or demons.  Castiel claims that it’s imperative that they kill the child before he can be used as a weapon by Lucifer and his minions since the Anti-Christ child also has power over angels and demons.  Sam and Dean believe otherwise, feeling that they are capable of making the right decision and refuse to do it. 

However, demons can still track the kid’s biological mother.  Having kept tabs on Julia, the Daddy Demon that had possessed her gleaned enough info to track her son and possessed her a second time. 

Not the only supernatural being to make with the visitations, Castiel also decides to pay a visit to Jesse, bringing a large knife and preparing to go all Gregory Peck in The Omen on the kid.  Before Castiel makes with the stabbing, Jesse turns the tables and turns Castiel into an action figure… more like an inaction figure, actually.  At least Castiel was turned into a cool action figure, like one of those Mego ones from the ‘70s… Complete with removable trench coat!

Sam and Dean drop by yet again to visit the Anti-Christ and see Castiel in his inaction figure form sitting on the mantle and have a little chat with the kid.  Not wanting to kill the boy, the Brothers Winchester feel he can be used as a force for good and tell him that he is, in essence, a superhero.  Even better, they’re going to take him to their super-secret hidden base in South Dakota where he can learn to use his powers for good.  Adding to the neat-o, super-riffic X-Men factor, they’re even taking him to a guy in a wheel chair who can teach him a bunch of cool stuff! (Ah, Bobby’s new immobility makes for much hilarity this season!)

Just as they’ve got the kid convinced to leave his beloved, adoptive family, the kid’s repossessed mother shows up and Mommy/Daddy roughs up Sammy and Dean before spilling the beans that he’s the Anti-Christ.  Not exactly a pushover, Jesse’s issues of abandonment come into play and he tells Mommy/Daddy to “sit down” and “shut up,” thrusting a chair beneath the demon and rendering it mute.

Without a demonic being talking in his ear, Jesse takes time out to address Sam and Dean and their motives for wanting to not kill him.  Ultimately, sweet, conflicted, demon-blood addicted Sammy tells him he wants to see Jesse live because even if he couldn’t make the right choices, he believes someone else could.” 

That satisfies the boy who banishes the demon from his biological mother’s body with a simple “Get out of here.”  Jesse goes up to his room to ponder his existence while Sam and Dean debate what to do over Mego Castiel. They go and seek the boy out in his room, but the child has wished himself to (where the viewer is led to believe is) Australia.  Prior to that, he wished everyone back from the cornfield and healed all of those who hadn’t died as a result of his pranks/beliefs.  Castiel joins Sammy and Dean upstairs, reading the note Jesse left saying that he had left so that his parents would be protected.

On the drive to their next adventure in the Impala, Sam and Dean reminisce about Pa Winchester, wishing their father had lied to them for protection the way that Jesse’s adoptive parents did to protect him.

So far, Season 5 of Supernatural is progressing nicely.  This combo of Monster of the Week/story arc plotline was a nice change of pace.  As it stands now, Supernatural is the closest thing television fans have now to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, widely considered to be the holy grail of supernatural-themed, fangeek favorites. It’s got it all: Characters you can actually care about – including peripheral characters.  The show’s writers do their homework, and there’s plenty of snark from the show’s intrepid heroes.  While Supernatural takes their plotlines and character development seriously, it’s not dry or bland and makes its own funny, even in dark situations.  I still have no clear-cut speculation as to how this story ends, but I’m looking forward to the show possibly introducing the Archangel Michael this season and spending more quality TV time with Lucifer.