Reviews I Missed: Supernatural 8.07, “A Little Slice of Kevin”

“A Little Slice of Kevin” is an odd duck. It’s clearly a continuation of “What’s Up, Tiger Mommy?” This time the writers are Brad Buckner and Eugenie Ross-Leming, and I did like this more than Dabb and Loflin’s episode 8.02. The issue is, it’s the seventh episode of a season that’s clearly getting off to a slow start, and the previous episode, “Southern Comfort” finally had some movement between the brothers. This felt like an odd step backwards, even if they tried to cram in a lot of mythology at once.

The clear pro of this episode is the long overdue return of Castiel. It did feel disjointed, but Castiel especially should have been in that state. He went from supposedly dying to losing his memory to the nuthouse then living over a year in Purgatory killing monsters. Speaking of which, those monsters couldn’t have killed him right? Angel blades are not prevalent in Purgatory and those things weren’t the smiting kind. Anyway, he casually appeared, cleaned himself up, and suddenly he was back at work like nothing happened. Well almost. He’s a little low on power, but that’s expected.

I love that it was Castiel that saved the day, first by being there to know the name of the prophets when Sam was running off the names of the missing people and then later taking on Crowley and winning…for the most part. They got Kevin back and half the demon tablet, so that’s a win. Kevin also got a new finger out of the deal too, so that’s another big plus of having an angel handy. The episode did trigger one big smile from me and that was when Castiel came out of the bathroom clean and fresh, smiling with new trenchcoat and everything. It was never revealed how angels did that, but I assume it was just one angelic touch and the same clothes are back brand new. Was it ever explained why they are always wearing the same clothes?

Another big pro, I loved the twist that Castiel was pulled out of Purgatory by Heaven even though he chose to stay there as a penance. He’s needed to spy on the Winchesters and he’s just damaged enough where he can be mind controlled into that sort of thing. Interesting. The introduction of Naomi was well done. She had that ambiguous vibe that her intentions might be good but that oh so wicked smile and calm demeanor telling us they probably aren’t. Ah well, it was at least a believable twist to explain the return of Castiel and it was a setup for something new other than two brooding brothers. This season needed a momentum builder and this was something.

Dean is still off. So he’s been plagued by guilt all this time for leaving Castiel behind? So his blaming Sam all this time is a projection of that? Maybe, whatever, I dunno. It seemed a little extreme, but that’s melodrama for you. I’m glad he was finally able to talk to Sam about it, but Sam’s reassurances didn’t help one bit. Sometimes I wonder why he talks about it then, but I guess that’s supposed to tell us the audience that Dean is making progress. I like Sam’s breakthrough in the previous episode better when he read Dean the riot act. Talk about pissed off! I was so proud.

The biggest problem of this episode is it was typical Brad and Eugenie short attention span theater. They want to throw many kitchen utensils at us but did so in a way that was random and hard to follow. It was too much at once in a season that has done very little so far. The plotting and dialogue was weak, particularly in the first half, because it just jumped around erratically from one thing to the next. The plotting did improve when Sam and Dean met up with Mrs. Tran and from there followed a natural flow. I liked Kevin’s reading of the tablet with Crowley in between the rescue happening around them. It was a great chance to reveal important information while still building the action. I especially caught the mention of Metatron. That actually does become important for later! So this becomes a relevant episode in the mytharc.

As with any Brad and Eugenie script though, I had lingering questions and thoughts. Like…

If Naomi was manipulating Castiel and inserting him into the situation, why didn’t she rescue poor Alfie/Samandriel??? She let him be brutally tortured and reveal the name of the prophets to Crowley?? What a bitch.

If Kevin has been one step of everyone and ultra careful all this time, why did he trust this scheme his mother hiring a Craig’s List witch? He showed his face online to her? They let her in their hideout? He should have been all over that. I know it was his mother initiating but he’s better than that.

Don’t you think Brad and Eugenie went out of their way to find out what was on Craig’s List? Some of the jokes about it felt like it was coming from people that never used it.

Kevin lets a woman get killed, but caves to Crowley when his finger is cutoff? I’m disappointed.

I’ll have to explore my season 11 lore, but if these were the known prophets, present and future, where did Donatello come from?? He had clearly been born before then. Was that ever explained?

Metatron is an archangel?? Weren’t there only supposed to be only 4 of them and they were all brothers? He wasn’t very archangel-y when it came to power. It doesn’t add up.

Dean is all worried, guilt ridden, and protective of Castiel but doesn’t give two rats about Sam? Yeah, I raised that issue before, but it’s still not sitting right.

Don’t you love how ruthless and scheming Crowley is right now? He’s still an enjoyable and smart villain to watch, which makes his neutering and dumbing down in the coming seasons that much more criminal. He knows his limits, and a powered up Castiel meant it was time to go. What a smart demon.