Top Ten Kim Manners Episodes

The Good: Zoroastrian shadow demons!  Awesome.  Throwing Meg out the window was pretty cool, too.  And that teaser with all the “Meredith” whispering?  Ooh, that was scary.

The Sad:  I get choked up at the reunion with John, especially by Sam’s reaction.  And Dean just wants his family back together hunting again!  Oh!

The Funny: “You mind doing a little thinking with your upstairs brain, Dean?”  “Hey, Sam, next time you want to get laid, find a girl that’s not so buckets of crazy, huh?”

#9 – Children Shouldn’t Play With Dead Things

The Good: Zombie!  Sam is so worried about his brother in this episode.  Zombie!  The scissors in the chest thing was awesome.  Zombie!

The Sad: Dean has so much guilt about the fact that his father made a deal to bring him back to life.  Maybe you’ll remember that for later in the season, Dean?  No?  Okay, then.

The Funny: “Neil…It’s your grief counselors.  We’ve come to hug!”  “Nah, I think she went out to rent ‘Beaches.'”

#8 – Fresh Blood

The Good: Sam’s decapitation of Gordon was epic.  The part where Gordon wakes up as a vampire and hears those heartbeat sounds and the watch is really, really cool.  It’s menacing.  Dean’s teaching Sam how to fix the Impala!

The Sad: Sam’s whole speech about knowing when Dean’s terrified because he’s been looking up to him since he was 4 is really sad.  Just be his brother again, Dean.  Just ’cause.

The Funny: “Can you think of a worse hell?”  “Well, there’s hell.”  “What rhymes with ‘shut up, Sam?'”

#7 – All Hell Breaks Loose Part II

The Good: Sam’s alive!  The YED is dead!  John’s out of hell!  The boys have work to do!

The Sad: Dean’s breakdown over his brother’s corpse is devastating.  What a brilliant job by Jensen.  Dean selling his soul to bring his brother back is so hard to watch.

The Funny:  “Well, check that off the to-do list.”

#6 – Heart

The Good: I’m with Dean on this – werewolf!  Sam is so inept at flirting.  Madison was awesome, even if she was a werewolf.

The Sad: Gee, I don’t know.  Maybe it’s the entire last five minutes of the episode?  They should just rename this episode “Heartbreaking” and be done with it.

The Funny:  “Dean, always with the scissors.”  “Shut up. Shut up.  Two out of three.” *Dean throws scissors* “God!” “Bundle up out there, all right?”

#5 – Devil’s Trap

The Good:  Bobby!!!!!! Since I watched it on DVD, I loved the cliffhanger ending.  That crash was so jarring.  But I bet it was horrible having to wait all summer for that to resolve.  Sam taking Dean’s side twice instead of John’s was perfect.

The Sad: Did they just kill the Impala?  Wait, did they kill all four of them?  Dean figuring out his dad isn’t his dad because he was being nice to him is so rough.  John!  Be nice to your boys!

The Funny: “What is this, holy water?”  “That one is.  This is whiskey.”  “I got a Yorkie upstairs, and he pees when he’s nervous.”

#4 – No Rest for the Wicked

The Good: Holy water sprinkler system?  Brilliant!  I loved Bobby cramming his way into the fight.  I also liked Dean’s escalating panic about seeing Demons and such.  Good continuity from Crossroad Blues, and it really added to the tension.  Dean’s last words to Sam were perfect.  Lilith was so creepy!  Loved that!

The Sad: Dean’s death.  Watching him get ripped apart was horrible, but I think the worst part for me was the fact that he died thinking Lilith was going to kill Sam.  Dean on meathooks was also very, very bad.

The Funny: “Ain’t you just bringing down the room?” “Yeah, well, it’s a gift.” “And I wish you’d shut your pie hole, but we don’t always get what we want.”

#3 – In My Time of Dying

The Good: Tessa was an awesome character, and I’m glad she showed up again.  The Ouija board scene was fantastic.  I really loved how Kim shot that with the circular camera and Dean sometimes being there and sometimes not.  This episode was where Dean started realizing his father might not have been as infallible as he previously thought.  Finally!

The Sad:  Even though I frequently cursed him for not being a better father, I was still upset when John died.  Dean getting shocked by the crash cart is so hard for me to watch, even worse than watching him get ripped apart by hellhounds.

The Funny: “I full-on Swayzed that mother!”

#2 – Lazarus Rising

The Good: Dean’s back!  Bobby and Sam are so happy to see him that they hug him!  The Hell flashes are really cool.  I really liked that we never saw full-on Hell.  It’s so much worse to just see the flashes and how they affect Dean.  Castiel’s two attempts to contact Dean are awesome, with the high-pitched whine and the bright light and the “holy crap, what the heck is going on-ness” of the whole thing.  And the whole scene where Castiel shows up in his Jimmy suit was really excellent, too.  And Pamela Barnes!!!!  Loved her.

The Sad:  When Dean accuses Sam of making a deal to bring him back and Sam tells him he tried but the demons wouldn’t deal is really sad to me.  Sam is so upset that he couldn’t save his brother, then couldn’t bring him back.  And Dean’s startled reaction, where he sort of starts to realize what the whole ordeal did to Sam is nicely understated but still quite emotional.

The Funny:  “I said take care of her not douche her up.”  “You’re invited, too, grumpy.” “You are not invited!”

#1 – Mystery Spot

The Good:  Everything!  Everything about this episode is good.  I could go on and on about it ad nauseum, but I won’t.  It’s brilliant all around, and it’s one of my favorite episodes ever.  It becomes even more poignant knowing that the Trickster is actually Gabriel, too.

The Sad:  Sam’s OCD reaction to Dean’s multiple deaths.  Man, he goes so far into the deep end it’s scary.  Even Sam’s eventual reprise was sad because while Dean came back this time, Hell still loomed.

The Funny:  So much funny in this one.  All of Dean’s deaths, but especially the tacos, the shower, and the axing by Sam.  “Rise and shine, Sammy!” “Sammy, I get all tingly when you take control like that.”  “Sam Winchester wears makeup.  Sam Winchester cries his way through sex.  Sam Winchester keeps a ruler by his bed, and every morning when he wakes up — all right, enough!”