From MadCap's Couch - Supernatural: "I Know What You Did Last Summer"

Can you hear me now? ... good!

It's time for Season 4's big two-parter to cap off the mid-season! Let's do it!

We get the long-form recap of the events of the Season leading up to Sam banishing Samhain on Halloween. After that, we get a view of a young redheaded woman who is a psychiatric patient in a therapy session. Her name is Anna, and she apparently believes that the Devil is going to rise and that the end of the world is coming. She explains to her therapist that Lilith is breaking the Sixty-Six Seals (and that 600 of them exist, and she only needs to break 66) to free Lucifer and start the Apocalypse.

...seriously, Chuck. What the hell is this syst-?

But Anna reveals to her therapist the truth: the angels are losing the war and they're all going to die.

Later, an orderly comes in to see Anna drawing... and it turns out he's a demon, with Anna being able to see his true face. With some telekinesis and a filing cabinet, however, Anna is able to knock him out and escape, which leads into our title card.

Sam and Dean hustling people are pool is interrupted by the appearance of Ruby, who passes some information about Anna - namely that she escaped from the ward and the demons are under orders to capture her alive. Dean and Ruby exchange barbs and then Sam and Dean head out to check out the lead that Ruby gave them. Dean remains skeptical of the case and of Ruby's actual intentions, but Sam is adamant that Ruby is on their side. Dean attempts to needle in on what happened to Sam, but Sam rebuffs him much as Dean had him in the previous episode.

We get a flashback to six months ago, Sam buries a box at a crossroads and is met by a well-suited Crossroads Demon. In a fit of drunken rage and despair, Sam attempts to bargain for Dean... namely, he wants to trade places with Dean in Hell. The Demon refuses and Sam stabs him with Ruby's knife for all his trouble.

"Nothing in my pockets, nothing up my sleeves, and... presto!"

Back in the present, after a three-day trip, Sam and Dean arrive at the ward and speak to Anna's therapist. She gives them the low-down on Anna, explaining that she was perfectly normal until two months ago when she began to show signs of extreme schizophrenia. She also was an accomplished artist, drawing things like the Rising of the Witnesses and Samhain's emergence back on Earth.

Heading over to the Miltons, the boys find that Anna's parents have shuffled off the mortal coil by way of their throats being slit. Finding sulfur at the place and putting the pieces together, they think that highly religious Anna would go to a very specific place if she were scared and thinking demons were hounding her: the church her father was a deacon at. Heading in, the boys find Anna... who knows them, at least by their names. Anna is able to hear the voices of angels and the first words that she heard were "Dean Winchester is saved" on September 18th, the day that Dean was released from Hell.

So Anna isn't crazy, she just hears the voices of angels in her head.

...so, makes sense that the demons want to get a hold of her. But what of Heaven? Let's find out...

Ruby arrives not long after this and tells them that they need to get out now before a really powerful demon shows up. As Dean starts to bicker with Ruby, Sam points out a statue of the Virgin Mary... with its eyes bleeding. Sam stows Anna in a closet and prepares to exorcise the incoming demon... with his mind powers, which Dean objects to until Ruby makes it very clear that if Sam doesn't then they're dead.

And in comes Alastair who coughs lightly when Sam tries to exorcise him and then proceeds to throw both him and Dean around. After a few punches to the face, Dean realizes who this is and his tone immediately shifts. Sam manages to get the drop on Alastair and stabs him with Ruby's knife... which, surprisingly, doesn't kill him. However, it does seem to wound him and distract him long enough for Sam and Dean to leap out through the stained glass window of the church and escape. Ruby, by this point, has taken Anna and ran.

Back at their motel, Sam and Dean have an incredibly bloody patching session. Dean chastises Sam for losing Ruby's knife and Dean ducks talking about Alastair, mostly because this isn't the episode for that exposition. Instead, we get Sam giving exposition about... well, what he did last summer. Dean, in particular, wants to know why Sam trusts Ruby so much. What could have happened that made Sam's entire demeanor toward her change so rapidly?

We get a flashback to drunk, miserable, depressed Sam stumbling into a motel room to be jumped by two demons - Ruby in a new body and some stunt demon that won't be important in about three minutes. Ruby taunts Sam about his brother and about the things that Lilith did to her in Hell, telling him that Lilith gave her one last chance and all she had to do was kill Sam.

She stabs the stunt demon with her knife and tells Sam they need to leave immediately. In the Impala later on, Sam essentially casts Ruby out both for not being able to help him save Dean and for riding a human body. Ruby then hops into the body of Jared Padalecki's (then-) future wife who is playing a coma patient until she isn't. Presenting the actual paperwork to Sam, she promises that she can give Sam the next best thing apart from Dean being back: Lilith's head on a plate. To her surprise, Sam's completely game on using his demon blood powers.

Ruby tells him that there are whispers of something apocalyptic, but they can take their time and he can learn properly: all she asks for is some patience and some sobriety. Sam, presumably, agrees. We cut into another flashback - Sam and Ruby have captured a demon and Sam attempts to put to use his exorcising mind powers. Despite a few efforts, all that Sam gets is a nosebleed and a laughing demon (who Ruby stabs in the mouth).

After this we get... a complicated scene. Sam is in full free fall, still taking down booze like a fish drinks water, and Ruby attempts to form some sort of emotional connection with Sam and then seduces him. We get a scene that showcases that (as we already know from previous sex scenes) Sam Winchester does not make love.

Sam Winchester fucks.

"Okay, Jared. Now look like you're trying to inhale her face..."

The music is sinister and twisted, as if marking this as a terrible and unholy thing... and just at the right moment, the tension gets cut as we cut to Dean looking rather disgusted and telling Sam that it's too much information.

...which begs the question, since we're seeing the actual footage of the story that Sam is telling Dean... how in the holy hell did he just describe that?! And to his brother, no less!

Just... damn, Sammy. Eww! Big ewww!

We'll circle back to this scene in a bit. Not because of Sam scarring Dean, but for other reasons.

Regardless, the story continues as Sam fulfills Dean's request to skip the nudity. After the intense demonic banging, Sam had gathered signs that Lilith was near and he wanted to strike out first and take her out before she realized he was there. Ruby cautions him to be careful (as he's the only one who can kill Lilith), then tries to talk him out of it as she realizes that he's going on a suicide mission. Ruby insists that this isn't what Dean wanted or died for. He rebuffs her and leaves.

In suburbia, Sam breaks into a house and discovers an adorable little girl in a little blue dress who may as well be named "Is Bait", because she is bait and Sam gets jumped by demons. Ruby ends up jumping in to save him and Sam returns the favor by exorcising his first demon to save her in turn.

Hence, Sam trusts her now. Ruby brought him back from brink and allowed him to live again.

They are interrupted by the cleaning lady who brings in fresh towels, closes the blinds, and gives Sam a piece of paper with an address and explains that they need to leave now. Ruby has temporarily possessed the cleaning lady to pass on the information, seeing as demons are outside waiting on Sam and Dean to come out. Pointed in the right direction, the boys make their way to a cabin in the woods. Because, as well all know nothing bad ever happens to the Winchesters in a cabin in the woods.

Anna is no longer having panic attacks about Ruby and Dean and Ruby have somewhat of an awkward moment as he stumbles through both an apology and a thank you to her for saving Sam without ever really saying any of the words that make up those things. Seems like this might be a turning point in their relationship and a development of, if not friendship, at least a grudging respect for one another as Dean finally accepts Ruby as an ally.

Oops.

Anna asks to call her parents and Sam and Dean can no longer dodge the question any longer and have to break the truth to her.

She does not take it well. Then the angels start talking and very, very loud.The door bursts open and Castiel and Uriel come in. At first thinking they're here to help, the Winchesters and Ruby get a very big correction: they aren't here to help Anna, but to kill her.

She has to die.

And that's the end of the episode.

"Hello! Do you have a moment to talk about our Lord and Savior Eric Kripke?"

I Know What You Did Last Summer is a pretty good episode and one that answers at least a good many of the questions we've had since the start of the season. We understand more Sam's attitude change toward Ruby and why he's so keen to trust her despite Dean's reservations. The relationship between the two of them is complex, or at least it has the appearance of being so. I can't really get into the full extent of it all until we get to Lucifer Rising, but my short answer is that I am not in favor of this ship.

I certainly used to be. I thought legitimately that it would go somewhere.

Oops.

And yes, I'm aware of what happens in Season 15. I don't care and I can't imagine anyone else did by that point. It was really only done because Jared and Genevieve got married and they wanted to give the shippers hope.

I'll get into more when we get into Lucifer Rising.

As for this episode itself, it has a few noteables. We get the introduction of Alastair and visual proof that not all demons can be killed with Ruby's knife. We get the introduction of Anna, a character that sadly not nearly enough is done with before her departure next season. We get a lore drop, telling us of the at least six hundred seals that exist that Lilith can break that makes me think that God was really, really, really gleefully making the most safety-proof system He could think of to prevent an apocalypse.

Pretty good episode, more lore, and a few elements that will be more problematic later on.

Next time, Heaven and Hell will have their first onscreen clash in... Heaven and Hell.

Be there!