Let’s Speculate: Supernatural 12.18 “The Memory Remains”
“The Memory Remains” was written by John Bring and directed by Phil Sgriccia. The episode opens in Wisconsin with a bunch of young adults around a campfire. Two young guys are talking, kidding each other, when one of them leaves to head out.
As he’s walking he starts noticing sounds and then finds an abandoned backpack. He reaches out for it and it’s booby trapped. He yells for his friend and a guy in a goat head approaches. Just as his friend arrives, the goat head guy kills the friend with a mallet.
Dean is trying to get in touch with Castiel, who is still out of pocket. Sam gets a text from Mick about the case while they are waiting for more news on Dagon and the Lucifer baby. Sam and Dean arrive in the small town. The first stop they make is the sheriff’s office. A sheriff is working on taxidermy as he relays that the young man who died was a victim of child abuse and he suspects that the kid skipped town. Sam and Dean follow the leads and find Jarrod’s friend, the one who witnessed the murder. The teen tells Sam and Dean that the sheriff won’t believe what he saw. He finally tells Sam and Dean about what he saw. He says that his friend was killed by a local legend, Black Bill. They review the case at a local diner, but Dean seems distracted by the attractive waitress. He says they’ll use the Colt to kill whatever they find and then proceeds to go and flirt with the waitress.
At the local plant, the young man who witnessed the murder is getting off work. When he gets in his car he’s attacked by “Black Bill.”
Sam meets up with Dean the next morning, after Dean has a fun night with the waitress. Sam has been doing research and posits that the monster is a satyr. They go to the meat plant and find out the sheriff owns the plant and that the plant has had some health issues.They meet up with the sheriff then learn that people have gone missing yearly.
In the plant, Daryn is trapped in the freezer, where the body of his friend is frozen to death. A real monster emerges from the shadows and appears to kill Daryn. Back at the diner, Dean is eating his burger while Sam reviews the story of the Sheriff and the plant. They agree to check out the creepy house. Sam gets a text from “Mick,” while the British Men of Letters, led by Ketch, investigate the bunker to understand the Winchester habits.
As they investigate the old creepy house, Sam and Dean go further into the house and find a dungeon of murder with all the accouterments of torture fit for a king. The Sheriff arrives and he pulls his gun but Dean has a gun pointed at his head.
Dean and Sam get the sheriff to tell them what’s going on. The reason the family is so wealthy is because they feed a monster with human blood. It turns out to be the god of sacrifice, Moloch. After the sheriff’s father died, the sheriff stopped the killing and kept Moloch locked in the basement, hoping he’d starve to death. The brothers go to look at the cage but it’s empty. A noise comes from upstairs. Dean goes up, armed with the Colt, while Sam stays down with the sheriff. Dean encounters Black Bill, who turns out to be the plant manager. He gets the best of Dean and knocks him out. He then locks Sam and the Sheriff in the basement.
Sam and the sheriff escape and go to find Dean. Back at the bunker, the BMOL are doing reconnaissance. Ketch rifles through Dean’s drawers and pauses when he finds a picture of Mary and a young Dean.
At the plant, Dean and the plant manager go back and forth about how the guy found Moloch after breaking into the sheriff’s house to find something to sell. Moloch promised riches for that human food. The conversation is punctuated by the guy throwing Dean in the fridge….I was going to make a joke about fridging but I won’t.
Back at the bunker, the BMOL finish up their work and head out.
Sam and the sheriff get to the plant and are searching for Dean. In the freezer, Dean is trying to avoid being food while outside Sam is trying to avoid being a human nail. The sheriff attacks the monster’s grocery boy but before he can kill him, Sam shoots the bad guy. Sam then goes into the freezer and kills Moloch with the Colt. He agrees with Dean’s earlier assessment – the Colt dusts anything (except Lucifer – putting that there because if they try to do that this season I want it noted).
In the final act, the sheriff tells Sam and Dean to go. He needs to take care of this since it’s his family’s legacy. When the boys get back to the bunker, they reflect on what their legacies might be. Dean wants to know if anyone will remember them. Sam doesn’t think so. They are not the kind of people that get into the history books. Dean takes out his knife and tells Sam he will leave their mark, and in a series of interwoven flashbacks to the boys carving their names into the Impala, we see them do the same to the bunker table. After they finish Dean says they should call Mick to debrief. When they call, Mick of course does not answer (you know, because he’s dead and all), but Ketch does. Dean is not happy and after they hang up, Ketch eavesdrop on the brothers as we see that he’s stolen the picture of Mary from Dean.
Specs, Thoughts, Reactions
- What do you think of Ketch? Is he bad or something else?
- Do you think the Colt will actually be important in the coming episodes? If so, why?
- What do you think the brothers will do when they find out about Mick, if they do?
- Share other thoughts, reactions, feelings below!
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