What a way to start an episode of Supernatural huh!? That’s certainly going to be remembered for a while.
No, I don’t mean some police officer literally splatting himself onto to the floor. I mean Jared Padalecki making girls melt and guys want to be him.
But more on that later. There actually was a story in this episode you know.
After Sam having some fun with a woman of the night, he calls Dean to tell him about some suspicious deaths in a town in Pennsylvania. They meet at the police station, both ready in their FBI suits with Dean just getting off the phone being a father to Ben.
They find out the deaths mimic Biblical plagues. Dean suggests they call Castiel, but Sam says he’s tried ever since he’s been topside but that “son of a bitch” never answered. Dean tries some rhyming prayers and they don’t think it works until Castiel flies on in.
Sam can’t believe Cas shows up first time Dean calls. “Do you like him better or something?” Sam asks. Cas says he and Dean have a “profound bond.”
Dean stands up for his Sammy, telling Cas he could spare at least five minutes to answer his questions, if not, take the time to tell Sam he has no answers.
Cas says God is still AWOL and he only came down because of the mysterious deaths. Cas says the only thing to have brought about such deaths is one of their heavenly weapons, the Staff of Moses.
“The weapon isn’t being used to its full capacity,” Cas says. “I think we can rule Moses out as a suspect.”
“What is Chuck Heston’s disco stick doing down here anyways?” Dean asks. Cas tells them before the apocalypse, heaven was corrupt but stable. After the war, it has been chaos and in the craziness , a couple of their weapons were stolen.
Cas uses air quotes to ask the boys to help him find the Staff before it endangers more people. The guys have only one lead connecting the three deaths. A teen that was shot and killed by one of the dead officers who was set up as a dangerous, armed suspect. The boy’s father had called for an investigation.
They fly on over to the family’s home to question the father, but it turns out his younger son is behind the Biblical deaths using a piece of the Staff of Moses. Cas flies over to him to take the stick from him and they question the boy. He tells them he prayed to God every day for justice, but God never answered. Instead it was an angel who gave him the stick… in exchange for his soul.
Cas flies them all, including the boy, back to the hotel. He says he can find out who sold the boy the stick as angels leave a mark or brand when they lay claim to a soul.
He says it’ll be excruciating for the boy as he looks to read the mark. Dean says Hold up. But Sam is fine with it as long as there’s no permanent physical damage. Dean is surprised.
As soon as he finds the name, he can do a ritual to find the angel. He sticks his hand into the boy and finds the name, Balthazar. He was a good friend of Cas whom he thought died in the war.
Just then a suited angel comes and thanks Cas for the name. They fight and then hurl themselves out the window. They land on Sam’s Charger. Dean thinks that’s a silver lining.
Cas comes back upstairs and says the guy was a soldier of Rafael. He and his followers want him to rule heaven and get the apocalypse, as it was written, back on track. They’re traditionalists. But the rest of the angels don’t want that.
It’s a civil war up there!
So they need to find Balthazar and the weapons so they won’t get into Rafael’s hands. Cas does the ritual and they head off to Balthazar’s location.
Cas heads inside the home (which has frogs hopping around) and finds Balthazar. He had faked his death so he could do whatever he wants. Live it up. He was inspired by Castiel doing the ultimate rebel, tearing up the script that was written. Balthazar just wants to be free.
Cas asks for the weapons, but Balthazar says the fighting will never stop. He still sees Cas as his brother, but he won’t give up the weapons. He leaves as Rafael and his guys arrive.
“Why won’t any of you listen,” Cas says to the baddies. But Rafael does a number on Cas and is about to kill him when Balthazar comes back with one of the weapons and turns Rafael’s vessel into stone. Or salt.
They trap Balthazar to get him to remove the mark on the boy’s soul. He clears the boy’s debt. He tells them that souls can be very powerful to have. Sam and Dean aren’t going to let him go that easily, but Cas kills the fire to settle his own debt and they both fly off.
Dean clears out some room in his trunk for some of Sam’s new things since they’re both back in the Impala now. Sam sees a homemade Windigo mask Sam made for Ben’s Halloween costume. Cute.
Dean asks if Sam is okay. Yeah, he’s great. But Dean wonders why he had no problem with torturing the kid to get the intel. He felt Sam didn’t care. You’re wrong, Sam says. But Dean feels Sam is different. Sam says yup, he feels different. He’s been spending the last year out in the wild hunting, so he may be a little rough around the edges.
Dean doesn’t think he’s getting the whole scoop. He thinks it might be him going to hell, but Sam says he’s fine. It didn’t affect him like it did Dean. “We’re different,” Sam says.
Episode Thoughts
A pretty straightforward episode. It sets up the heavenly civil war and it has Cas reappearing to the bros.
But probably the most memorable part of the episode was the gratuitous and long! shots of shirtlessJared. It’s no secret both of the guys have been pretty adamant about not wanting to do the shirtless scenes, but I guess that’s all changed in season 6!
And hey, if I had a body like that, I wouldn’t be shy about it. Worried about not being taken seriously as an actor? Jared and Jensen have certainly proven their worth for years. Nothing wrong with being a hot actor, right?
Anyway, a good episode and nice to start getting more into the post-apocalyptic collateral damage and repercussions. From the preview of coming episodes, looks like there will also be more emo drama from the Winchester bros.
6.03 – THE THIRD MAN
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