This week on episode three of season 12 of Supernatural, we get a bit of a hybrid episode which continues the ongoing story of the hunt for Lucifer and mixing it with the monster-of-the-week format that usually ends up being just as entertaining. We begin with a couple in St. Paul, Minnesota walking from a restaurant. They are discussing the area when they hear the sound of a baby crying in an old abandoned house. The place looks completely empty, but as the cries become louder and more worrisome, they call 911 and enter the building. Following the sound, they find a room with a crib and a lone flickering light above. Instead of finding an infant in the crib as they expected, they discover a creepy doll. When the woman feels something touch her arm and they move to escape, the door slams shut, trapping them in the room as the doll’s eyes open.
The show now takes us to the bunker, where Mary (Samantha Smith) is reading through John’s journal, unable to sleep. It is obvious that she has a lot on her mind. Castiel (Misha Collins) finds her there and she decides to try sleeping again. As she goes, Mary asks him how long after coming down from Heaven it took to feel like he fit, giving a hint at part of the trouble plaguing her. He admits that he’s still not sure he does but encourages her that she is where she belongs. She seems relieved, yet back in her room she begins to cut her hair.
The next morning, Dean (Jensen Ackles) and Sam (Jared Padalecki) discuss the British Men of Letters. They have been looking for any information about them in the bunker, with very little luck and nothing useful. The conversation ends when Cas informs them he has to leave for Cleveland. He has a lead on Lucifer and wants to check it out. They try to join him, to back him up but he declines. Castiel feels responsible for Lucifer being out of the cage and thinks it is his duty to put him back. Yet they all know this isn’t a fight he can take alone, so he assures them he will call if the lead turns into anything and mentions that the boys are needed more at the bunker. Sam realizes he means Mary and tells Dean he is concerned. Dean, however, feels she is fine and just needs some time.
When the woman they had just been talking about enters, Sam asks about the haircut, to which Mary responds that it is more practical for hunting. Of course, Dean can’t resist joking that he’s been telling Sam that for years. As the discussion turns serious again, Sam asks about the hunting comment. Apparently, Mary found a case. It’s the couple in Minnesota, found dead, locked in the room of the empty house. Dean is excited about a family hunting trip while Sam seems uncertain about whether it’s a good idea but doesn’t have much choice but to go along with it.
In Cleveland, we find Castiel talking to Vince’s bandmate about his last encounter with the rock star where he saw the red eyes and claimed that it was not the man he knew anymore. As Castiel is leaving, Crowley (Mark Sheppard) gets his attention and tries to convince him that they should work together since they have the same goal: putting Lucifer back in the cage for good. Castiel has no interest in them teaming up. However, Cas doesn’t have any clue where to look next. Whereas, Crowley had been in Vince’s room and found some postcards from Vince’s sister, Wanda, which include an address for them to check out.
Meanwhile, the three Winchesters are at the morgue discussing the dead bodies with the coroner when they notice a handprint burned into the arm of the woman. When they ask about it, they learn that’s not even the weirdest thing about the deaths. The people died of hypothermia in a room that was over sixty degrees. Definitely a sign that this is right in their wheelhouse. So they do the next logical thing, at least for a hunter, by heading into the house with their EMF meters to search for ghost activity.
Mary’s meter goes crazy as she finds the room with the crib and the doll. Just like the couple we saw before, she immediately gets locked in the room. As Dean and Sam frantically try to get the door open, a hand grabs Mary and she glances down to see a child staring up at her. The guys do manage to break open the door and the boy disappears, yet Mary now has the handprint burn on her arm too.
Back at the hotel, Dean and Sam are on their laptops researching any information they can when Mary mentions that they should get out and knock on doors, talk to neighbors, etc. An awkward moment begins as they explain that the internet has made a lot of that obsolete. Sam shows that by hacking into the St. Paul Police database he was able to find a series of kids that died in the house. So much about hunting has changed since Mary’s time, and it visibly upsets her despite Sam’s assurance that they’ll teach her all of the new ways to get the information they need.
Cas and Crowley are out knocking on doors though, only to have it slammed in their face when Wanda answers and they ask about Vince. Crowley decides to do things his own way, appearing in the house in time to hear Wanda leaving a voicemail for Vince and mentioning how strange he was acting the previous day. As he lets Castiel in, the angel can tell that Wanda has recently been healed. They see a wheelchair and realize that she hadn’t been able to walk before the visit from “her brother.” When Crowley threatens to take away her new gift if she doesn’t talk, Cas stops him, appealing to her that they want to help Vince. She explains that yes, he did heal her but he was very cold about it, like he was just doing an errand. She also mentions the red-head he was with, which Castiel immediately realizes she means Rowena.
Cas is a bit irritated that Crowley didn’t tell him Rowena was with Lucifer then makes the assumption that this devil-hunt isn’t so much about revenge as it is to save Crowley’s mother. The demon will not have his reputation of being heartless ruined, explaining that Rowena is way too powerful of a witch and Lucifer will use her for his own purposes.
Lucifer (Rick Springfield) is having some problems of his own at that moment as Vince’s body is already showing signs that it won’t hold him for much longer. Now we know a big reason he kept Rowena, he wants her to make the body strong enough to be his vessel moving forward. Rowena (Ruth Connell) states that she would need the Book of the Damned and doesn’t know where it is, which he knows is a lie on both parts. Not only does she know where it is, he knows she already learned what she needed from the book. And if she wants to live any longer, she has to do the spell.
Not having any other choice, she does what he asks while trying to convince him that she can continue to be valuable so he won’t kill her as soon as the spell is over. Lucifer won’t make any promises, only responding with, “We’ll see.” However, like mother like son, Rowena has some tricks up her sleeve and the spell actually speeds up the decaying process instead. Of course, Lucifer is furious as his vessel starts to decompose before our eyes. He states he is going to kill her and make sure it sticks this time, but she is defiant and uses another spell to send him far, far away.
A while later, Cas and Crowley make it to the address Wendy had given them to look for Vince and find Rowena. After telling them what happened, she admits that while trying to put all of the witch-stuff behind her, she had tried to forget about Lucifer and how much she hated him. Crowley takes this as an offer to help them. Although Rowena doesn’t agree to help them find Lucifer again, she does promise that when they track him down and have him cornered she will be there.
Now, back to our Winchester family. Internet research has led Sam and Dean to some Scandinavian lore about mylings, vengeful souls of unbaptized children. They believe this is what is haunting the house. Mary isn’t so certain, saying that the boy she saw didn’t want to hurt her. He was scared. The lore fits the signs so far though, and the boys decide that the best course of action is to salt and burn the bodies of the children who died in the house. At that moment, Mary has a vision of the kid and the house, appearing to nearly faint. Dean and Sam are concerned, yet she doesn’t share what she saw so they leave her behind to rest while they take care of their task.
As soon as they’re gone, Mary starts making some phone calls and ends up speaking to the mother of the last child who died in the house. The woman tells Mary the story of the night her son died, how she couldn’t understand how he was fine one minute when she checked on him, then freezing cold and dead the next. Mary asks what the woman’s son, Lucas, looked like and realizes that it was the boy she had seen.
Next, we flash over to Sam and Dean as they salt and burn the bodies. Sam mentions again that he’s worried about their mom. Dean, not the best at talking through problems as it is, just wants to have something good and not make everything into a problem when it doesn’t need to be. He insists that Mary is adjusting and that she will be all right. Yet Sam disagrees, claiming she’s burying herself in hunting to avoid thinking about how hard the adjustment is. They continue to ponder that thought while returning to the motel. But when they get there, Mary isn’t in the room and neither is the weapon bag.
That’s because she’s at the house, armed up and ready to deal with whatever is truly causing these deaths. The boy appears again and this time she tries to talk to him, calling him Lucas and telling him she talked to his mother. Once she puts down the weapons which were frightening him, he silently leads her over to a boarded-up door before disappearing again. Taking this as a sign of where she needs to go, Mary removes the boards and enters the basement. But what is she supposed to do there? Lucas shows up again, speaking this time, asking for help. Before she can find out exactly how to help, a call comes in from her own sons. She’s at least able to tell them where she is and that burning the bodies didn’t work, since Lucas is still right in front of her, before the call drops.
Returning upstairs, Mary finds the ghost of a man in the room now, recognizing him as the father of the little girl that first died there. Placing a hand on her chest, the ghost begins to freeze her heart. Thankfully, Dean and Sam get there just in time to stop him from killing her. All is not good, however, because Mary is now possessed by his spirit. She attacks them, throwing Sam against a wall and pushing Dean against another, saying they’re her children…forever. Mary begins to freeze Dean as he tries to appeal to his mother somewhere still in her body to get her to stop.
Showing her strength again, Mary fights the spirit controlling her, letting Dean go and managing to tell them to go to the basement. Sam follows her instruction while Dean stays behind to help her fight the ghost, getting his butt kicked in the process. As soon as the spirit realizes that Sam is in the basement, having torn down a wall to reveal another body and is giving it the salt and burn treatment, it gets angry and intends to go stop him until Dean wraps Mary in an iron chain. The body burns, the chain rips the spirit out, and the ghosts of the children appear as their captor/killer also burns. Finally, the kids are able to move on to Heaven.
As the episode concludes, the Winchesters return to the Bunker where Dean apologizes to Mary if she felt like they sidelined her when this was her hunt. He also compliments her on how well she did, which she doesn’t feel quite so much. He reminds her that she was right, the kids were innocent and mentions that he wishes they knew why the events in that house occurred. Mary shares that she knows exactly what happened, saw it when she was possessed. When the man lost his daughter, he went mad. He walled himself up and starved to death. Then as new families with children moved into the house, he wanted them for his own so he took them.
The knowledge understandably bugs her to which Dean consoles that everything is okay, she’s home now. Her response surprises him when she says no, she’s not. She misses John and how she remembers her boys as small children. Apologetically, Mary states she has to go and that she needs some time on her own. She says goodbye to them, giving a saddened Sam a hug. Dean is sad too, but is also angry and hurt, backing away and unable to look at her as she takes John’s journal and leaves. They sure do like to toy with our emotions! Now we have to wait until the next episode to see how our boys handle getting their mother back for such a short amount of time, and what kind of danger they’ll get themselves into next.
