Supernatural, Episode 7.10 – Death’s Door

Picking up from last week’s baffling slowBobby ending, the Bros are rushing an unconscious, but still breathing Bobby to the nearest ER. He’s got a bullet in the head and we zoom into the hole on his skull right to his mind-world.

First, it’s the three of them in the woods looking for one of the Turducken’d people. He realizes he’s in his head and not in the “waking world” and writes numbers on a piece of paper and puts it in his pocket in an effort to communicate with the real Sam and Dean. Then he pops into a memory of one night with his wife Karen. Everything is just like the real night except he hears thunder now.

He looks out the window and sees darkness starting to engulf the horizon behind a young boy running towards the house. Bobby walks out the door and then pops into another memory, this time with Rufus on a job. He tells Rufus he needs help because he’s going to die. Rufus doesn’t mind him as the young boy comes up behind Bobby, grabs his arm and tells him “God’s gonna punish you!”

The boy disappears and Bobby follows Rufus into the church. But he gets left alone when the church starts to shake and the lights go out. He turns to meet his Reaper. The Reaper tells him he’s in a coma, but Bobby won’t go that easily.

He runs and pops into his old, not burned down home. Sam and Dean are arguing over Jet Li and Chuck Norris. He goes into the kitchen, he sees his mom setting the table and disappointed at how dirty he is before dinner. He closes the door and pops back into the church where Rufus is about smash a crypt open.

Smash back to reality as the doctors work on Bobby with Sam and Dean looking on. They get Bobby stable, for now, as he, in his mind, begins to stabilize himself. Rufus recounts his near death experience to Bobby, the “life flashing before your eyes,” and tells him about finding the exit through his worst, deepest memory.

Bobby wants Rufus, his partner, to come along with him to find that exit. He pops back to Karen who is upset and says everything was all a lie. Bobby didn’t want to have kids. Karen doesn’t understand how Bobby breaks everything he touches (as he says). It was three days after this argument that Karen became possessed (as we know the story).

Rufus suggests to try the door now, but they walk through and Bobby’s still in his head. This time, it’s a memory of him and a very young Dean tossing the baseball around. The walk to another door and Rufus asks why Bobby didn’t want kids.

He gets the answer when the pop back into Bobby’s memory of “every Tuesday” of his childhood; him and his mother scared of his likely drunk and possibly abusive (at the very least, verbally) father.

Bobby doesn’t want to go spelunking in this memory, even though Rufus thinks it’s worth a shot. Bobby gets the idea that instead of finding the exit, they’ll have to stop the Reaper.

Back in reality, the doctor tells the Bros he doesn’t want to give them false hope. Dean gets incensed when an “insurance mook” approaches him about Bobby’s wishes in terms of organ transplants. He scares him into walking away and then walks outside himself where he sees Dick’s car parked right outside.

He bangs on the window as people watch and take their camera phones out. Dick attempts to threaten Dean, but it ends up being the other way around.

“You’re either laughing because you’re scared or you’re laughing because you’re stupid.”

Seems to hit close to home and Dick leaves.

While Bobby tries to work some mojo in his head, Dean heads back inside to have Sam inform him that they’ve taken Bobby off sedation and respirator and is breathing on his own. But Sam says they should brace themselves, that Bobby dying could actually, really, truly happen this time.

Dean won’t accept it.

Back in Bobby’s mind, he has a quick memory of fighting with Papa Winchester about the Bros. He and Rufus finish the spell and they trap the Reaper. But the Reaper says it won’t last. He points out Bobby seeing blanks and darkness around him, which is the bullet eating away at his brain.

The Reaper says to come with him. He’s already done enough with his life, more than any drunk old man like him could ever do. Rufus kind of agrees. Does Bobby really want to turn into a ghost?

I don’t care, Bobby says. youngBobby pops in and Bobby knows where to go now. He follows youngBobby back to the scene of his abusive, alcoholic father. Bobby stands up to him, says what right does he have to hit women and children. That he’s been so afraid, even after his father had died, he didn’t want children of his own for fear he would turn into him.

“Good, you break everything you touch.”
“Well, as fate would have it, I adopted two boys and they grew up great. They grew up heroes. So you can go to hell!!”

As Bobby continues to fight, in the “waking world,” Sam and Dean get a glimmer of hope when the nurses tell them they’re taking Bobby into surgery to remove the bullet now that he’s showing signs of responsiveness.

Back in his head, youngBobby comes into the kitchen with a rifle and tells his father to stop. He won’t and is about to go back to hitting his wife before Bobby takes the rifle and shoots him in the head.

“Bobby! What have you done!? God is going to punish you!”

Bobby walks over to youngBobby and tells him this is where you learn they don’t thank you when you save ’em. He tells youngBobby to go get a shovel and to bury the old guy out by the shed.

The Reaper shows up, but Bobby goes to the door with bright light behind it.

Back in the “waking world,” Sam and Dean go in to see Bobby before he goes into surgery. Sam takes Bobby’s hand and says thank you but then Bobby wakes up.

He tries to talk, but Den gets a marker for him to write. He writes the numbers from the Leviathan info from earlier. He then looks at the brothers and says one final word… “Idjits.”

He flatlines.

Sam and Dean watch, distraught and helpless.

Bobby goes to the kitchen to get some beers. The Reaper shows up again and says this is his last chance to go with him and move on. This is his last memory, Sam and Dean in the living room fighting over Chuck Norris and Jet Li.

“Saved the best for last,” Bobby says and he walks into the living room to watch jerfaceSam and asshatDean disappear while fighting over licorice and popcorn.

The Reaper looks at his ticking stopwatch… “So Bobby, stay or go? What’s it gonna be?”

Episode Thoughts
Well, balls.

What an episode. Definitely not what I expected in a million years.

While I don’t agree or particularly like last week’s setup to this episode, “Death’s Door” made me forget about all of it. Especially in this up and down season, we’ve been having, this was an incredible episode.

Bobby has been just as much a part of Supernatural as Sam and Dean and a big reason for that is Jim Beaver. He’s been absolute money every time he’s been on screen.

So regardless of the outcome of the little cliffhanger, this was a great episode that highlighted Bobby’s importance to Sam and Dean as well as remind us, the audience of why many… most, the overwhelming majority of Supernatural fans have love and care about what’s always remained a regular recurring character on the show.

Let’s look past Supernatural‘s strange fixation on everyone having daddy issues. Let’s look past the very real possibility that Bobby may indeed cross over. And the very real possibility that Bobby ends up alive after all. That he’s going to die, not be a vegetable, not be a roaming, vengeful spirit. That he’s actually going to go with the Reaper and enjoy his heaven in his old home enjoying a beer.

It goes without saying Bobby’s last word was a real MaGMCM. I was bawling immediately, and it’s been a while since Supernatural made me cry.

The other line too that started the waterworks, when Bobby tells his ass of a father how he actually turned out to be a great father to two boys. Hells yeah he did.

Rob Singer and Sera Gamble crafted a great episode that was just right in tone and meaningful enough to connect especially with long time viewers and fans of the show.

It was a touching, sentimental and effective episode. No matter what happens when the show comes back in January, I’d say this was the perfect episode to say farewell to Bobby.

Not the perfect way to go down fighting because I still take issue with the last episode (really, what was that?!). But an amazing episode and one of the best the show has done in a very long time.

Miss the episode or want to watch it again?
Download full episodes of Supernatural on
Supernatural - Season 7 or at .

Share your thoughts!

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Back to top