Supernatural: Form and Void (11x02)

Damn, this season is awesome. Cas is a precious cinnamon roll and I want to hug him a lot. I have a lot of things to praise. But... unfortunately I have a few things to seriously complain about too.

Cons:

STOP KILLING ALL THE FEMALE CHARACTERS 2K15. For f**k's sake, Supernatural. Learn your damn lesson. There were four female characters in this episode, and three of them died. The grandma, Jenna, and Hannah. Hannah?! Are you for serious right now? As many people have said many times, it's fine to kill off a ton of characters, but when you kill off the very, very small part of the cast that's actually bringing some sort of representation of minorities, that's a big problem. There are so few women on this show. Jenna was new, and interesting, and they implied that she was queer. And Hannah was actually recurring. Now they're both gone?! I'm so frustrated!

Crowley had a lot of great moments in this episode, but at the end he pulls up in a van and offers a little girl candy. He has a bunch of other little kids in the back of the van. This seems... creepy beyond Crowley's usual creepiness. I don't know. He also makes a joke about altar boys while dressed up as a priest. Is it just me, or are these jokes crossing some sort of a line?

Pros:

I actually really liked that the three plots in this episode were pretty much entirely separated. Each one of them offered a lot of great material.

Sam, succumbing slowly to the madness of the zombie-curse, tries to find a cure. He finds somebody else who was infected, who tells him that there's no rhyme or reason to the infections. Some people succumb quickly, others hold out for longer. Sam runs in to a Reaper, who is pissed off at Sam and Dean for killing her boss, Death. She tells him that Sam and Dean aren't going to get any more repeat chances. Death had been amused by all of their deaths and coming back to life, but that's over now. The next time they die, the Reapers are going to take them, and instead of putting them in Heaven or Hell, they're going to be tossed into empty nothingness. Yikes! The Reaper tells Sam that he's "unclean, in the Biblical sense," and this causes Sam to think of Biblical purification. He uses holy oil to cure himself, and then sets about to curing the other zombies.

I'm so proud of Sam! He's such a hero. He's done a lot of harm, and I sort of sympathize with the Reaper who is just soooo done with the Winchester's bullshit. But at the same time, we're seeing the return of heroic Sam. He saves himself, and he saves the others too. Just like he told Dean he would. It felt like the Sam Winchester of earlier seasons. The Reaper character was really interesting too. Was she giving Sam a hint when she talked about him being unclean? Or does she really want him to die? I'm not sure!

My favorite Sam scene was when he went into the hospital chapel and prayed. It's so sad to see Sam in such a low and hopeless place. Then there's the hallucination/vision whatever-it-was, where Sam saw himself being tortured by chains poking into his skin. It almost seemed like it was a flashback to his time in the cage, or something. If that's the case, I'm really excited to see where this is all heading. I mean, last week we did get a mention of the cage, right?

Meanwhile, Dean has to put up with Crowley's crap. Crowley shows up at Jenna's grandmother's house, posing as a concerned Catholic, to help exorcise the demon in the baby Amara. Turns out, Amara eats souls. She eats Jenna's soul, and then Jenna goes crazy and tries to kill Dean. Crowley kills her instead. And then... the baby creepily grows into a little girl and runs away. Crowley escapes as well. All of this stuff was actually properly threatening. The Renesmee-from-Twilight baby was one of the scariest things I've ever seen on this show, and I love the fact that Crowley is becoming a bit more properly threatening as well. He angrily tells Dean that he's not his bloody sidekick. I can't wait to see what Crowley can accomplish if he really is a proper villain again.

Then there's Cas. Two of his Angelic brothers beat him to a bloody pulp, asking him where Metatron is, and then were Sam and Dean are. Cas refuses to talk, even when they threaten to cut off his hands, and then his genitals. Hannah then comes in (in a male vessel) and stops the two angels from hurting him. Cas is really grateful, but then when Hannah starts asking him where Dean and Sam are, he realizes that this was all part of the plan to get information. Cas refuses to talk. They try and torture it out of him, but Cas escapes. Unfortunately, Hannah dies in the chaos, as do the other two angels. Cas escapes, and ends up, weak and injured, back in the bunker just as Sam and Dean arrive there.

Cas is awesome. I love how the angels don't recognize him as one of their brothers because he chooses Sam and Dean (mostly Dean) every time. No matter what they threaten, Cas won't turn on the Winchesters. I find it interesting that the angels threaten to cut off Cas' genitals - angels are wavelengths of energy, right? Their identity as sexual beings is very undefined, and certainly considered transgressive when it does exist. I don't know if they meant anything by it, but it seems as if the angels see Cas as a human more than an angel. A race traitor. My heart broke for Cas when he realized that Hannah wasn't really his friend anymore. He's truly been rejected by all of his kind.

I was so excited to see Cas back in the bunker, even if it was under upsetting circumstances. I hope we actually get an episode or two where our boys can be together, but I know not to hope for that too much. All I can say is that I saw the promo, and I'm very happy to see Cas wrapped up in a blanket. The poor darling needs a bit of TLC right now.

I guess that's where I'll stop. I wish I could call this episode an unambiguous success. In terms of the plot, and what it's setting up for the future, it seems very solid. But I'm still side-eyeing the gratuitous death of all the ladies. Come on, guys. Step it up. You've been failing at this for a whole decade.

7.5/10