Hmmm... I wouldn't say that the episode was bad. It just wasn't as good as spn's season finales usually are. The Prisoner was honestly a better episode than this one.
I liked some stuff, like the whole 'Team Free Will is evil' part of Sam and Dean's conversation(I'm just gonna ignore everything Sam said about it not being the case because seriously), and also Death. Because Death. <3

I'm disappointed that Cas didn't really get to do anything at all in the finale. He just stood around and watched Rowena and Crowley complete the spell, and while I love Rowena, giving her that emotional, personal story in the finale might not have been the best choice. Crowley I just have no interest in, and I'm still hoping for Cas to kill him asap(not happening, I think).

And last but not least, I think it was a bad directing choice to have pretty much the whole episode happen in daylight. When you want to portray awful horrible apocalyptic stuff, you might not want to have the sun shining in the background the whole time. Especially not when you aren't really creating any mood dissonance by doing it. I get that they were trying to go for the symbolic 'day turns to night & light becomes darkness' approach, but imo it didn't work very well.

I think that that's the whole episode's main problem, actually. I can see what they were trying to do, but in many ways they failed to hit the necessary emotional beats. The episode worked okay in some respects, but a season finale should be a lot stronger than 'okay'.

I'm not going to stop watching, but I might become more of a casual viewer. I'll still watch every episode, but it might be by watching 5 episode marathons every 5 weeks, or something like that. Not gonna make the decision before we get some info about the next season, though.

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Besides, even if they had it, there are 5 things it cannot kill. My headcanon is that these are God, Death and his siblings, the archangels, other gods(not sure about this, but they fit best) and Knights of Hell, aka all the heavy hitters of the spn universe. :)

I vote 3 cvtf :)

ITA with you. The angels see the Winchesters as a couple things depending on how they see Cas. They're either his pets or some awful monsters that have brainwashed him into betraying heaven.

Metatron probably saw them as nothing more than the villain's dear minions, and so he decided to break said villain by killing one of them. It was completely unnecessary and extremely petty, very much like when a villain is shown kicking a dog just because they can - except that in this case the dog is the hero's beloved pet.
(Naturally this isn't the reality of the situation, as Dean and Sam are Cas's family of choice, but from the angels' perspective it fits)

Do You Believe In Miracles?

Cas and Sam lock up Dean in their dungeon, where he then starts to cough up blood. Once again, he looks into a mirror.

Sam and Cas find the injured Gadreel, who says that Metatron has left to go to 'humanity'.
I wonder if he means just all of humanity in general, or Dean specifically? After all, Metatron wants to break Cas, so he wants to kill Dean. And he's already planned every move.

Dean escapes the dungeon and summons Crowley to demand answers.
It turns out that Dean either has to kill constantly for the rest of his life or die, and so he teams up with Crowley and leaves the bunker behind.

They go to a diner, where Dean orders food he doesn't intend to eat, and Crowley immediately says that he's there basically as a replacement for Sam.
Crowley asks Dean if he's ever wanted to 'howl at the moon' instead of hunting, and of course he has. Then Dean leaves the burger behind- a hint that Crowley's plan is working.

While Cas and Gadreel go to heaven, get caught and are locked up in heaven's jail, Sam is waiting for Dean and Crowley elsewhere.
Sam explains everything to Dean, and agrees to let him try to kill Metatron, even if he dies doing it. But he insists on working as a team.

Dean:"About, you know, the last couple of months..."
Sam:"I know."
Dean finally apologises, in his own way. Too bad that the next thing he does is knock Sam out.
"Sorry, little brother. It's not your fight." This sucks. But thinking about it, what Dean is really saying is that he wants Sam out of the way both to keep him safe, and to keep him from protecting Dean if things go sideways.

In Heaven's jail Cas and Gadreel are arguing with Hannah, and it doesn't seem to be working out for them.

The first sign that something is about to go horribly wrong in Dean's fight against Metatron is the red light and shadows forming bars on Dean. He's just walked into a trap.

And then Gadreel kills himself, releasing Cas from his cell in the process.
"Do you believe him now?" Gadreel dies for a reason, and in a way he even deserves to die. But it's still sad.

Dean confronts Metatron, who says that God didn't like being God. He also explains that that's the reason why he's decided to take over the job in his stead, despite lacking the necessary qualifications.

Dean directs all his pent up rage towards Metatron, blaming him for everything, and at first it seems to be enough, since he manages to injure the angel with only his bare hands.
Except that it's not even nearly enough. The beatdown is brutal, and Sam arrives just in time to watch his brother be stabbed.

Both Sam and Cas are just seconds too late.

"The angel tablet, arguably the most powerful instrument in the history of the universe, is in pieces, and for what again? Oh, that's right. To save Dean Winchester. That was your goal, right? I mean, you draped yourself in the flag of Heaven but, ultimately, it was all about saving one human, right? Well, guess what. He's dead, too."
I don't think that that was Cas's only motivation. He truly wanted to help the angels, but as always, Dean's safety was his main priority.

Cas wins the war, but the price is Dean's soul. He gets the angels back on his side, but it must still feel like a huge loss.
"I just wanna be an angel." Because it hurts less that way. :(

Sam, alone in the bunker, decides to summon Crowley, either to sell his soul to him, or, as I like to think, to demand Crowley to restore Dean's life.

Crowley's speech to Dean is incredible.
He asks Dean to come back from death for one purpose. He wants to Howl At The Moon with him.
Dean wakes up, and it truly is a miracle. :D

Finally.



My original reaction from spoils:
YESSS DEMON DEAN!!!!! Although... Sam having to watch his brother die, and Cas's face after Metatron told him Dean's dead... Not okay, show, not okay!

...Though now I'm just thinking about how many bad jokes could be made about team free will. Because now there's one human, one angel and one demon in it. The, um, (un)holy trinity???

---

I was crying my eyes out by the time Dean died... and then during Crowley's speech all I could think was "YesYesYesYesYesYes!!!" :D

(rewatch liveblog in the comment under this one)

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Ohg, lrnu, V frr jurer lbh'er pbzvat sebz, naq V'q ybir sbe gurz gb tvir hf n svany frnfba shyy bs snzvyl obaqvat naq unccvarff, ohg V qba'g guvax gur argjbex jbhyq nterr.

Yrg'f whfg nterr gb qvfnterr ba fbzr guvatf naq ubcr gung ab znggre jung gurl qb, gurl qb vg jryy. :)

Guvf zvtug npghnyyl jbex. V qbhog gur jevgref unq gubhtug guvf sne jura gurl perngrq gung ergpba, ohg guvf jbhyq or n tbbq jnl gb tvir vg na npghny checbfr va gur cybg. :)

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That would make sense, but I also see the situation as a possible mirror image for what happened in s9.
Back then Dean saved Sam, leading to the deaths of Charlie(who got resurrected), Cas(who got resurrected) and Kevin(who didn't get resurrected).
This season we have Sam struggling to save Dean, leaving to the permanent death of Charlie, to Dean almost but-not-quite killing Cas, to Crowley -nearly- dying, and then possibly ending in Sam's death, just as Dean died for what he'd done in s9.

There's too many ways for this to go to be sure about almost anything, but one thing I'd be surprised about would be if nobody died at all. ...And then again spn is great at finale surprises. :D