
Supernatural Season 12, Episode 5
“The One You’ve Been Waiting For”
Posted by Dawn and Jaymee
DAWN: I would like to preface this recap by saying that my entire week was a shit sandwich, and SPN was supposed to be my BLT. It was not a BLT. It was barely even a B. Perhaps I put too much pressure on them. Perhaps I expect too much. Perhaps my shit sandwich got on their BLT. I don’t know. But one thing is for sure. Supernatural, I am disappoint.
JAY: I think the entire country’s week was a shit sandwich, Dawn, you’re not alone there. What I think the real problem was with this episode was there was no consistency. Episode 1 left us all DYING (in a good way). I died, multiple times, then I spasmed my way through live tweeting it. It was so good, it set me up for one of the best seasons to come out of Supernatural yet. Then Episode 2 happened, and ok I was good, I wasn’t Episode 1 good but we were working. Episode 3 made us angry but it was still good even though I was all WTF Mary. Episode 4 with Davy Perez behind the wheel really saved us, and Season 12 was off to a strong, strong start. And now, here we are, again, at the first the drop of the rollercoaster, it’s not a good drop. It’s a drop that yanks you hard and you bash your head on the stupid seat and you just kinda wanna get off because now your head hurts and this ride sucks. #sad
It all starts with a plot that sounds like the worst D-grade movie ever made. And we don’t mean the on-purpose ones like Sharknado, or beloved Ed Wood ones like Plan 9 From Outer Space, or Jaymee’s personal favorite Cube2: Hyper Cube. In fact, there is a 1968 made-for-TV movie called They Saved Hitler’s Brain. It is almost universally considered one of the single worst films ever made. You can watch the entire thing on YouTube. Dawn suffered through it one night and it was appallingly bad. Like not even tequila can save this kind of bad. Well, this episode comes this close to us telling you to go watch They Saved Hitler’s Brain instead. This fucking close.

Here’s the episode’s plot summary, from Dish TV: Sam and Dean race to prevent a group of Nazi Necromancers from resurrecting the Führer after finding out the soul of Hitler is trapped in a pocket watch.
That’s right, folks. A race with Nazi Necromancers who wanna resurrect Hitler’s soul from his pocket watch. We are not kidding.

Now here’s the actual plot summary of They Saved Hitler’s Brain, from IMDB: Nazi madmen preserve Hitler’s brain on a small tropical island until the time is right to resurrect him and, along with him, the Third Reich.
This is a joke, right? This is going to be some kind of haha, fooled you, Trickster thing, right?

Sadly, no. Also the fact that this ep is called “The One You’ve Been Waiting For” is just cruel. Because we were, kinda. This episode is connected to fan and critical favorite “Everybody Hates Hitler” (S8, Ep13), which brought the boys to the Men of Letters Bunker for the first time, and also introduced the character Aaron Bass (played to perfection by Adam Rose) and his golem. It was also the ep where we first learned about the Thule, aka the Nazi Necromancers (Dawn: Every time I write that, I get irrationally annoyed.) We love Aaron (and his golem), and we were super excited to have him back. Did we mention that Aaron hit on Dean and Dean’s squirming over that was glorious, and yea maybe we were hoping for more? (Jay: Also, because he’s all of our “gay thing” <3, and yes, we know he wasn’t actually gay.) Aaron is a legacy through his grandfather, in The Judah Initiative, though he in no way wants to be one, and he was stuck with a very pissed-off golem. Having Aaron back, hopefully with his golem, was like knowing ice cream was coming.
We barely got a sample of the ice cream. So here we are. Disappoint. Again.
Let’s try to split this up in as kind a way as possible: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly
The Good
The Winchester Family dynamic was on point in this episode. The boys were honest with each other, they were snarking, they were laughing, they were our boys again. Dean didn’t want any pie; Sam knew that meant something was terribly, terribly wrong.

And Dean actually told him what was wrong. Our hearts. They burst.
They went to a diner. Dean said “Gracias” to a waitress. We have missed this casual Winchesterness so much.
Dean was pretty much literally a bull in a china shop, and it was glorious, because for all Dean’s swagger and charm, he is as big of a doofus as his brother, and it was perfection to see again. The dialogue in that scene was also perfect, particularly Sam’s deadpan, “Maybe let’s not touch anything until we figure out if this stuff wants to kill us or not?”

Also, the boys kicked ass. It’s been a really long time since we’ve seen some serious hand-to-hand combat that didn’t result in them getting their asses handed to them, and we loved seeing some of Dean’s purgatory fighting skills coming back. The first fight scene was really nice. I mean aside from the fact that everyone got away and they lost their hostage. No matter. It was beautiful.

Dean and his rocket launcher. We all ship it.




source: littlehobbit13.tumblr.com
Ellie, our primary guest star, had some gorgeous eyebrows. Oh, and also she was played beautifully by Alison Paige, who was a fan fave all over Twitter the night the show aired. Also we loved her hair. But she also made us think of Charlie, and we are sorry, Ellie, but you are no Charlie. Jay has some words about this…
JAY: OK! No, SPN, Full stop, right there, do not proceed, do not pass GO, do not collect $200, YOU SHALL NOT PASS! Ellie is not Charlie, yes she is kinda cute and kinda dorky, but it’s almost like an off brand Charlie wanna be. And it’s not ok, and it’s not the same. Ellie is not Charlie, and you cannot make her Charlie. You can throw in as many Harry Potter references, and you can make her have a freak out, and you can make her talk to herself in the mirror (cause that was totally adorable but still…), she will NEVER be our Charlie, our Queen of Moondor, our Kick it’s Ass, taking on Dick Roman and the Steins and cracking the Devil be damned book of the..DAMNED! Our first, our best Woman of Letters. The baby sister they never had. You know what SPN, bring back Amara cause the fans have something to say. Give us what we REALLY WANT! #BringBackCharlie #CharlieIsOurQueen #HandmaidenForLife #Bradbury2017

DAWN: Why don’t you just take this nice Castiel doll I made you, and some ice cream, and this nice soft blanket that I totally did not sew calming sigils into, and I will put on “LARP and the Real Girl” for you, ok, Jay?
JAY: Yes, please. I’m calm now. And I guess I should just say that Allison Paige did a great job, no problem with her, or her fabulous hair or her fabulous eyebrows, or her adorable nose.
We are back on track with the Daddy issues in this episode, since we’ve really had our fill of the Mommy issues for now. At this point, the Mary Winchester issues are leaving us way more unsatisfied than the John Winchester issues did. It’s really strange to say that, but John left us feeling emotionally fulfilled, mainly because he was easy to hate, easy to blame. It’s not the same with Mary, who just sorta left us feeling kinda empty. As weird as it is, we are glad to be back on the daddy issues train, so we are putting it in the Good column. Plus, Dean’s reactions to Kristo’s complaining about his Nazi dad were pretty damn priceless. Kristo complains about what it was like to have a Nazi Necromancer for a father, how his dad showed up to career day and or what it was like at Christmas. Dean’s there just looking at him like he has three heads and we can just hear his thoughts, like “this kid actually got a Christmas,” and “this kid actually got to graduate from one high school instead of getting shipped all over the country” or “this kid’s dad actually showed up for Career Day.” Shit, we were all actually pondering the idea that a Nazi Necromancer who’s trying to raise Hitler via pocket watch is a better father than John Winchester. That’s…that’s good writing. Damn.

Last but not least in our good bits section is the SURPRISE TWIST! Who expected them to actually drain the blood out of Ellie, cause it wasn’t us, that’s for sure! And it’s been a pretty long time since we got a nice juicy surprise like that. Of course, we have a lot of issues with this little plot point, which we will discuss shortly, but to see her strapped to the table and getting drained like that was a really intriguing surprise, to say the least. Good on ya, SPN, for that nice little twist.
JAY: P.S thanks for that nice shot of them all walking to the Impala at the end. You know we all have a thing for Jensen’s bowed legs, so SPN more shots of Jensen walking places, please, yeah more of that, for sure.

The Bad
Oh, the bad. There was a lot of bad. The plot, for one, was so thin you could have written a golem’s command on it. It was disjointed, and the jumps from drama to comedy–something this show normally excels at–were jarring at best and, at worst, really, really out-of-place. Twitter fans started out strong and we were all with you, SPN, we really were, but by the middle, a whole lot of us were tweeting, “What am I even watching?” Let’s talk specifics.
There were tropes galore. Yes, we eventually got into Ellie’s corner, but her first appearance as the naive girl who didn’t really understand how Tinder works so she locks herself in a bathroom for a mirror pep talk was just terrible. And how we go from mirror pep talk to instant Nazi headshot, we will never know. This show has never really shied away from women who are unapologetic about their sex lives, so what the hell was that about? Was it supposed to make her more sympathetic? It didn’t work.
All the screaming. So much screaming. Way, way, way too much screaming. Maybe it was being played for comedy? We don’t know. It made us feel like The Grinch.
We aren’t sure if the SPN writers are dropping some serious foreshadowing or if we are just stuck in a “Mystery Spot”-esque loop, but did Sam just give another pep talk to another weeping girl about his time with the devil? Right now, we know that Lucifer is either trapped at the bottom of the Marianas Trench, stuck in Vince or he has abandoned that vessel and is bouncing around again. Either way we, need to know, is this going to be attempt three between Sam and Lucifer? Though we all love the way Lucifer and Sam get along, we’ve been there done that so much that we have to file it under Bad. Maybe Sam just into over sharing about his time being courted by the Son of Perdition to anyone with ears now, all “You think you have it bad? Well I was the chosen vessel of the Morning Star himself, courted, caged, and tortured by Lucifer in the heart of Hell!”

Yeah, we know, Sam. We were there.
Despite all the instant angelic healing, SPN usually does a pretty good job with treating injuries and medical stuff in a realistic manner. This week, not so much. There is only so much blood in the human body. On average, an adult human body contains around eight pints of blood. Losing one pint means confusion and weakness. Take that up to 3-4 pints and now transfusion is necessary. Get above four pints and shock sets in, organs begin to fail, and the patient need immediate, major medical help. They drained a LOT of blood out of Ellie. A whole lot. And yet she managed to pull herself off that gurney and jump right into the massacre. Uh, what? Look, we know we are talking about a show where people routinely die and come back on a regular basis, but sometimes it’s the little things that count. Like, perhaps, being able to use a gun, you say? Funny you should mention that.
JAY: I can hear the skeptical fans now, Maybe they put the Nazi guy’s blood into Ellie, or maybe they didn’t need a lot of her blood. Yeah, no. When we reviewed the scene (and we did, a bunch), there was only one line coming from Ellie, nothing going back in. So, science. There’s no way Ellie would be up and about and using a gun after losing even two pints of blood, let alone however many it took to make an adult male an appropriate candidate for Hitler’s soul.
DAWN: This.
It was great to see Ellie get herself up, dust herself off, and kick a little ass. We love our lady BAMF’s, after all. But then she picks up a random gun and not only shoots it, but manages a dead-on headshot? Come on, guys. Really? You couldn’t even have her miss a few times, maybe make the shot look like a fortunate accident? She just lost a huge percentage of the blood in her body two minutes ago and now she’s Rick fucking Grimes? Please. She wouldn’t have even been able to hold that gun, much less manage the recoil. Again, we expect better. Because you’ve always given us better.
“Heil this.” No. Just no. Look, we are glad Dean got to kill Hitler, we really are. Chuck knows, his ego needed a serious boost, and it doesn’t get much better than that. Yes, Dean, you absolutely deserve free drinks and all the pie you can eat, forever (that comedy worked beautifully, ftr), and Jared Padalecki nailed Sam’s long-suffering yet truly happy for his brother reactions. But that particular line was Tropey McTropesville
JAY: I cringed. I actually cringed. I’m cringing now just thinking about it.
DAWN: I said out loud, “Really, Dean? Really?”
The German accents were a terrible. Writers, it wasn’t Nazi dad who felt “inconceivable disappointment.” It was us. Were there no actual German actors available? Again, if it was played for comedy, it didn’t work. So bad.
Finally, and probably most importantly, NOT ENOUGH AARON. Yes, SPN, in fact we HAVE been waiting for this. And all we get is one lousy cell phone call? Maybe two minutes of Aaron screen time, total? No golem? Seriously? This show is amazing when it comes to fan service and they have a gift for making it work within the mythos, so the lack of Aaron was an unbelievable disappointment. We needed Aaron. And this is basically all we got:

And there was no Castiel, no Crowley, no anybody that we care about other than the boys. Uncool, SPN.
JAY: This is two in a row now, TWO IN A ROW. If I don’t get some Castiel soon, I’m going to revolt. And I know I’m not alone there. WTH are they even doing? Lucifer’s gone, for now; there’s no pending apocalypse (yet). So I just don’t understand where Crowley and Castiel and even Rowena are?! Someone give me some direction here.
DAWN: After this debacle, I want EVERYONE back. Cas, Crowley, Rowena, Lucifer, Jodi, Billie, Mary, everybody. Shit, I want Bobby and Gabriel back just as an apology.
The Ugly
On a sensitivity level, this episode was tone-deaf. This was arguably one of the worst possible weeks to do a Nazi-themed episode, more specifically an episode where they actually bring back Hitler. We don’t really want to talk about it but we also feel like we have to. SPN, you brought back Hitler and you made him a GIDDY SCHOOLGIRL. Needless to say, we have our reservations about the mental stability over at SPN headquarters. We might even go on to ask, W.T.F? Did no one on your staff realize that might not go over well?
Hitler is arguably the worst real-life villain this planet has ever seen and you made him HAPPY? We understand that, arguably, anyone would be excited if they were resurrected, but the schoolgirl level of Twitter-referencing, “doggie”-loving delirium of this Hitler was really unacceptable. It wasn’t funny, and to compound things, the day before this episode aired was the anniversary of Kristallnacht. For those of you who don’t know what that is please, find out about it here. We highly recommend you do because the airing of this episode the day after the anniversary of such a horrific event in Jewish and world history will really pull the rose-tinted glasses from your noses.
DAWN & JAY: Look, we LOVE this show. We love it. We love the fandom and we absolutely adore the camaraderie between cast, crew, and fans. So we hope that they just didn’t realize or that it was ultimately the network’s decision. That somehow this episode slipped through the cracks. When we really think about it, for 12 seasons SPN has had its nose so deep in mythos, so deep in lore and history, that we cannot fathom they didn’t know about Kristallnacht. Or that this episode would air the day after it’s anniversary.
The episode should have been postponed. Rewritten would have been better. Set on fire may well have been best. We could gif set it for you, but honestly we don’t want to give it any more screen time. Ever. Instead, we give you Dean.

This was not your first Nazi episode, SPN. It’s certainly not the first time Hollywood has used Nazis for comedy effect, even. (Mel Brooks, anyone?) But this time it really didn’t work. We know for a fact that it upset Jewish SPN fans in particular because they are petitioning for a formal apology. And we are sad to see that a lot of recap sites seem to be giving this episode a pass when it comes to this, but we can’t. This was a massive oversight, a huge error, and we expect better, because honestly SPN has always given us better and we hold them to a higher standard. You may feel differently, and we are happy to hear about it in the comments.
JAY: Is it bad that I was more excited by next week’s Bump then I was at any point during this episode? Cause I’m FUCKING STOKED about next week’s episode
DAWN: YEAH, LET’S TALK ABOUT NEXT WEEK.
Next week, we get Sheriff Jodi Mills and Reaper Billie back. Ladies, we are trusting you to save the day. Mary will be there and we will all be locked in yet another creepy house. Who’s going to be taking shots every time a trope shows up? We will be.
AND FOR THE REAL EXCITEMENT (and some gratuitous self-promotion): KINGS OF CON!
Clear all your plans for Tuesday, ladies and gents, because it is time for Kings of Con, Richard Speight and Rob Benedict’s new comedy series. Tuesday is every holiday rolled into one glorious day, as far as we are concerned, and those wonderful, funny, adorable men are giving us not just the premiere ep, but TWO premiere eps PLUS “Kings of Conversation,” a live, interactive aftershow with Rob and Rich streaming at 7pm PST on November 15.

Watch on CCHQ’s YouTube channel, on the show’s official Facebook page, or on Comic-Con HQ itself (paid subscription required; free trial available). Our tiaras–and our bodies–are ready. We will be live-tweeting it over @pieandshotguns (our tweet about that was OFFICIALLY favorited by the show, Rob, and Rich, be still our beating hearts). Also Follow us! Duh.
Bring it on, boys. Bring. It. On.

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