May 02, 2015

Supernatural: Angel Heart (10x20)

Aww. This episode tugged at the heartstrings. I'm getting mighty nervous for the finale...

Claire Novak is searching for her mother. She finds somebody who supposedly had some connection to her, and meets with him. An altercation in an alleyway leads to Claire being knocked out. Cas is called to come to the hospital. He calls Sam and Dean for backup in dealing with Claire. The boys decide to help Claire track down her mother.

Sam teaches Claire how to hack into accounts and set up fake credit cards and such. Meanwhile, Dean and Cas go to talk to Ronnie, the guy who inadvertantly put Claire in the hospital. Dean is pretty rough with him, but he eventually talks, revealing that he did know Amelia Novak - he had referred her to a supposed "faith healer," who sometimes helped people, and sometimes seemed to feed off of them. This guy's name is Peter Holloway. Sam is able, with help from Ronnie's info, to track Holloway down. (Holloway kills Ronnie for divulging his whereabouts).

Sam and Cas go to find Amelia and track down Holloway, leaving Dean and Claire behind - Claire is too inexperienced, and Dean has to go easy because of the Mark. Dean and Claire play mini-golf together, and while they're hanging out, Dean has an epiphany about Holloway. Further research confirms that Holloway is a Grigori, a type of angel that feeds on humans! The two of them go to find Sam, Cas, and Holloway.

Cas has, in the meantime, found Amelia, who is very weak after having been fed on by Holloway. Sam is caught by Holloway and tied up. Holloway reveals his true name as an angel: Tamiel. He has been on earth since the beginning, feeding on humans. Claire and Dean show up, and Claire is briefly reunited with her mother. Tamiel tries to kill Claire, but Amelia gets in the way, sacrificing her life to save Claire's. The guys try and fight off Tamiel, but Claire delivers the final blow, stabbing Tamiel with his own sword.

The guys decide to send Claire to stay with Jody until she figures out her next move. Dean gives Claire a book of lore about angels, knowing that she wants to become a hunter. We see Jimmy and Amelia reunite in Heaven.

Sniff sniff. Poor Claire! Jeez, how much can one girl go through? I honestly don't really have much in the way of complaints on this one. If I were to nitpick, I'd say it's pretty unbelievable that Claire would be so bad at living her life incognito. She doesn't even use an alias when checking in to a hotel! How has she survived this long?

Also, on principle I have to be a little bit annoyed that Amelia is dead. I think ultimately it did serve a good narrative purpose, and I would certainly watch the hell out of the new made up spin-off everybody's been talking about: Wayward Daughters. Picture it - Jody Mills and her two hunter pseudo-daughters, Alex and Claire. They're the female Bobby, Sam and Dean! Ahhh too cute! But even with that really enticing possibility for a future episode, I still really wish we didn't have to ax off another Supernatural lady. They're a rare breed.

But seriously. Any episode that can include Dean Winchester and Claire Novak playing mini golf together cannot be all bad. The scenes between the two of them were just the best. Obviously we've got a very complicated dynamic going on here. Claire has reasons to despise Dean, and the last time they saw each other, Claire nearly got Dean killed. But here, we see them start to explore their similarities. They have similar taste in movies, and they can be huge dorks. But at the same time, Dean is no slouch when it comes to hunting, and he wants to pass along information to Claire to make things safer for her.

Sam and Claire also had their moments of bonding. Sam helped Claire learn how to more effectively be a hunter by committing credit card fraud and using fake names. In fact, while Dean taught Claire about research (something we tend to think of as Sam's domain), Sam taught Claire more about the stuff Dean typically is shown to be in charge of. It was a nice little role reversal there.

Cas and Claire's relationship is so messed up. In the most delicious possible way. We get two conversations wherein Cas asks first Dean, and then Sam, what he should do about Claire. Dean says that maybe Claire would be better off on her own. Sam later tells Cas no - they're family, even in an unconventional sense, and Cas should do whatever he can to protect her. Obviously, we're seeing how Sam and Dean are dealing with the whole Mark of Cain thing. Dean is saying that maybe Sam would be better off without him anyway. Sam is saying that he'll keep fighting for Dean, even if he doesn't want it.

Cas gets a moment with Claire at the end that pretty much broke my heart into a million pieces. He and Claire share a hug, and then as Claire walks away, Cas says "someone just tell me she's going to be okay." Oh my God. That hurt. In the best possible way, but still. Poor Cas!

I feel like there's a lot more that I could say about this episode, but ultimately. I enjoyed it. It's sort of B-plot, but leading in to next week, the second to last episode of the season, I still think there was a lot of good stuff going on here. And hey, we got Cas and Dean alone together for the first time in forever!

8/10

No comments:

Post a Comment

I'd really appreciate hearing what you think!