Recap – “Good God Y’all”
War, using the meatsuit of a local named Roger, decides to play guessing games. “I was in Germany, then in Germany, then in the Middle East. I was in Darfur when my beeper went off. I’m waiting to hook up with my siblings, I’ve got three. We’re going to have so much fun together.” Yep, Sam knows who he is. I figured both the Winchesters would be well versed in The Book of Revelation by now. “There aren’t any demons in town, are there?” Sam asks. Nope, just frightened people. War points out he hasn’t had to do too much. “Take out a bridge here, lay in a little hallucination there, sit back, pop some corn, watch the show.” He calls humans vicious little animals and for whatever reason, Sam doesn’t believe him. Seriously Sam? What planet have you been living on?
As War cleverly points out, it doesn’t take much to get people to kill one another, even in a town that last week was “Mayberry.” They don’t need much of a reason like seeing demons in your neighbors. “I mean you seen the Irish? They’re all Irish.” Sam gives him that “you’re evil” type look. War notices that and guesses Sam thinks he’s a monster. “I’m jello shots at a party. I just remove inhibitions.” Sam does his tough guy “I’ll kill you myself” routine. Oh Sam, that’s an invitation for trouble. This guy can mess with your head, which he totally does. He calls Sam his poster boy. Sam wants to know what that means. Oh, why do you ask such questions? The answers are never pretty.
“You can’t stop thinking about it, ever since you saw it dripping off the blade of that knife.” Sam’s eyes go wide, his face turns white in fright, and he gives the weakest “you’re wrong” ever done. Give it up Sam! He’s a horseman, he knows. War tells Sam to save his protests for his brother, since he can see inside his head. It’s on one track, blood, blood, blood. Yeah, Sam often has trouble with that single minded focus thing. But it’s more than that. It’s his lust. Lust for power that is. (What were you thinking?) That lust for power that’s always been inside him. He wants to be strong again, but not just strong, stronger than everybody. Sam quietly listens to this with spooked expression because War is soooo right. War then hits Sam hard with the final comment. “Good intentions, quick slide to Hell buddy boy. You feel bad now, just wait until you’re thigh deep in warm corpses. Because my friend, I’m only just getting started.”
You ever notice that things tend to sink down deeper into Sam when he’s tied down and forced to listen? Dean should try that trick more often. Oh stop it you slashers! I don’t mean it like that. Anyway, War is done talking. He puts on his glasses and announces, “Showtime for the meat suits.” He turns his ring and blood trickles down his head. Sam watches him with trepidation. War knocks over the chair he was sitting on, falls to his knees and cries out in pain, making it look like Sam did it. He tells a charging in Rufus and Jo that the demons are coming to get them. Sam pleads with a raging Rufus and gets socked anyway. He’s tied down. How could he have done that? Come on Rufus, think clearly.
Back to the church, where the offensive is taking shape. Roger arrives saying the demons are coming, and then looks at Dean and smiles. He turns the ring and suddenly Dean and Ellen have black eyes. They escape before soldier boy can shoot them down. Back with Rufus, he’s wiring the windows with pipe bombs while Jo helps. She asks if this will hold off the demons. No, but it’ll slow them down after it blows their limbs off. Jo very wisely points out that one of those demons could be Ellen. Rufus says nothing. Yep, that’s the cruelty of the life babe.
Suddenly one of the charges goes off and a window blows out. The neighbors start firing on each other too, but I won’t go into too much detail there. The real story is when Rufus goes to investigate, he’s yanked through the window. It’s Dean! He and Rufus fight in between the battle scenes, where Dean tries like mad to convince him War is doing this. Inside, Ellen jumps on Jo and they fight, and Ellen pulls the “Now you listen up Joanna Beth Harvelle” authority voice and it works. Jo doesn’t see a demon anymore. You know, I buy that. I scare the Devil out of my children like that all the time. Outside, Dean finally gets through to Rufus with the horsemen story. Rufus suddenly buys it and Dean’s eyes return to normal. Rufus asks, “You figure this out all by yourself genius?” Yes he did and we couldn’t be prouder.
Dean and Rufus go inside, Ellen holds the shotgun up and asks if they’re all on the same page. Jo and Dean stare at each other, but this time it’s not awkward with Jo crushing on him. Dean simply says hello and she says hi back. How nice, Jo’s grown up. Shots come their way and Dean asks where Sam is. He’s upstairs. Yes Dean, now you can rescue him. Sam’s still tied to the chair, missing all the action, and Dean comes in. They both tell each other War is behind this while Dean cuts Sam loose. They can’t stop War, but they can get the thing that he’s controlling people with. Sam tells him it’s the ring. Off they go to find War.
Rufus goes to disable the snipers on his end while Ellen goes outside to help the basement survivors. Rufus takes out two shooters, but Ellen is overtaken by soldier dude. As they struggle, Sam and Dean find War headed for his Mustang. They grab him. Sam pulls out the knife. War points out he can be killed. Dean says they know and holds down War’s hand on the Mustang (don’t hurt the car!) while Sam quickly slices off some of War’s fingers. They and the ring to fall to the ground. Blood spatters all over Sam’s face. Considering all the blood and salt already over Sam, more just adds to the fact that the boy is in desperate need of a change of clothes and a shower.
The townspeople all snap out of the killing rage as they aren’t seeing demons anymore. This is especially good with Ellen, who was losing her knife fight until then. Dean picks up the bloody ring and they look around as War and the Mustang is gone. Congratulations River Pass, Colorado. You’re the first town to find out the apocalypse has started. What are you that survived going to do now? I doubt the answer is Disney.
Once again, stellar commentary, so I’ve got nothing to add, though my oldest finds it funny when dad cries like a Dean, but what the hell WAS with the Foreigner? Apocalypse, people. Really, CW, is snagging some, oh, I don’t know, BLACK SABBATH *that* expensive?
Oh Alice that was fantastic! So much ‘fun’ just reading, let alone watching 😀
Oh, um, happy to contribute to the therapy fund…do you take Aussie dollars??
*bawling on the floor, can’t take it, want it to stop*
I was screaming at the TV when the last scene played out: “Go back! What’s wrong with you! Go back and fix it!” Man, when a show gets under your skin …
Loved the review. It’s read-out-loud-able (that a word?) and you have such a clear voice. It’s pitch perfect. And I always love your car love, especially the Mustang comments here. 😀 Can’t wait to see the other horsemen.
And Castiel is tough. So glad he has a character arc this season. MC plays it so well (because angels could have been a really lame drag on this show, but In Kripke We Trust!).
Episode three … Jess comes back. Anyone else notice in the promos that she was wearing white like in Season One?
Symbolic?
To play devil’s advocate on the rock salt – There’s a river, people probably fish in it and perhaps they like to smoke their fish. To do that, most folks brine it first and so it could be that they use a lot of salt in this town.
Unlikely I know, I’m just sayin.
I was too wound up at the start to really register Foreigner, but you’re right … it was pants. Heaven and Hell would have been much better, Dio-era Sabbath are my favorite incarnation of the band. My personal top tune to end the world on would have to be Orgasmatron by Motorhead which fits the bill perfectly and would probably be pretty cheap as well as I suspect that Lemmy is far too fried nowdays to drive a hard bargain.
Loved the Mustang. I have happy memories of Mustangs … Snigger …
The ending was probably the most upsetting thing I’ve seen in the whole series and that’s really saying something!
I spent the entire day mentally rocking in a corner clutching a wad of soaked hankies and sniffing loudly. Mr. K owes us a huge wedge of feelgoodiness to make up for all this the woe … Hands up anyone who thinks we’ll get it … Anyone? … Er, Hello?
Sorry, dunno where that extra “the” came from, I was having a conversation about raspberries and trying to keep a kitten off the keyboard at the same time so my multi tasking mojo seems to have overloaded …
I successfully managed to lose my comment again 😕 Suze, I’m with you, The Krip owes us big time. At the very least, he should pay for all he kleenexes we have to use up and the comfort foods that usually follow.
And I agree, the song for the opening sequence was way off, but they did use Spirit in the Sky beautifully. Generally I’m just glad that we seem to be getting more of the music back.
As for muscle cars, I am completely uneducated about them, but the Mustang certainly looked great. I wonder what the other three horsemen drive, I hope they won’t all be Mustangs though..some variety would be nice.
As a whole, this ep was definitely more together than the last, except for the sudden reintroduction of so many characters – that was a teeensy bit too rocky for me. But hey, it’s still great to see Rufus, Ellen, and Jo all back. Also, Ellen splashed, hugged, and whoop-assed Dean, but barely looked at Sam….I wonder why…
Oh and the scene in the hospital was pure awe. Cas is truly refining his badassery, and I approve 😎 . I’m still curious about the amulet though. Bobby gave it to Sam to give to John, but he didn’t know what it was for? If he thought it was just any other old charm, why go through the trouble? What did he think it was?
Sam and all his man pain and all his Sam issues, Dean and his man pain and his trust issues, as well as that final scene…I can’t say anything *sniff sniff*
Great recap, as usual, Alice!
I’ve spend the all weekend playing that final scene in my head and feeling miserably (letting a tv show to get that way under your skin?! Freud would love us all in his couch 😉 ), so the best way I found to stop that was become really shallow….. let’s see… Sam tied up to a chair, Sam shirtless, Dean shirtless …… major drooling on my keyboard now!
It works! Guaranteed :-), well at least until next episode when Kripke will most likely do it again!
It’s episode tree for you there so hope you enjoy and I’ll be back tomorrow night after I see it (nop! this year I’m not reading anything before I see it first!)
Oh, Alice those crying smiles are great! Can’t you put those for us to use to on the comments?
Great recap Alice. Your recap of the last scene was right on. I know the storyline needed to have the brothers split for effect, but I always hoped they would work it out together. That was also a very viable option.
Good point about Sam not having told Dean about Ruby’s last comments. Had Dean known, he would have viewed the situation different. Sam was not addicted, at least not to the blood. And this ‘lust for power’ they are bringing in is not uncommon, just ask any politician, just much more of an issue for someone with Sam’s abilities.
I am also wondering if, on camera, Dean ever told Sam he broke the first seal. Is that a secret Dean is keeping? Maybe I missed it.
I think one of your poll options of locking the boys in a room until they work things out, might have some merit.
Loved the comment about a pretty car deserving a pretty boy. It FITS! 😀
Ooops…I meant to put a 😀 behind ‘politician’. Don’t want to upset anyone. Sorry
Alice, the fact that you nailed every single microsecond of this episode is just amazing, but did more than JUST that, you made us realize how sexy and gorgeous 😮 those two guys are under any and/or every circumstance.
Tks for remind me why I love SPN so much, and to made almost pee in my pants with your 😀 so funny comments..
Loved, and gonna just read it again, so
That’s that!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Thanks so much for your recap. It was uplifting to read your light humour comments,on such a very heavy episode. Kripke and Co. are really outdoing themselves so far (I wonder if they have shares in Kleenex). I don’t know if my heart is going to be able to take any more heart wrenching moments before totally disintegrating.
Thanks for your great recap Alice.
My heart is sore and broken from the last scene even though I understand the why of it. Poor boys! I hope that Sam finds a way to make Dean trust him again. Poor Dean is so broken and hurt right now and he has lost the most precious thing he has ever loved.
Can’t help hoping that before this series ends, I really really want to see a happy Dean again. A laughing Dean enjoying his life, his food and his flirting and teasing. And an indulgent Sam fondly smiling at his brother’s antics again. Want to feel the love between them again before it is all finished.
Please Mr. Kripke! If you do this, I will be able to survive the angst and the sorrow. A huge mutual hug with tears sometime in the future is a must! I must have these things to heal my broken heart!