In honor of the show's upcoming 200th (!) episode, let's take a look at twenty episodes that brought the scary, the crazy, the drama, and, of course the feels.
There's no recap this week, because due to something called an “election” there’s no new Supernatural. But, as we wait impatiently for the show’s landmark 200th episode, and hide from some depressing election results, I thought it would be fun to take a look back at 20 essential Supernatural episodes.
Now, my criteria in selecting these episodes is that one word: Essential. I tried to pick episodes that changed the course of the show and set characters on new paths, the ones that set a favorite ship sailing or are unique fan favorites, and most importantly, episodes that exemplify the best of Supernatural. I’ve gotta tell you, my first list was 75 episodes long. That means I had to make some really painful cuts. There were more than a few episodes that it broke my heart not to include, and a few I did include that might raise some eyebrows. I also tried to keep things even between the seasons, and well, as you’ll see, I may have had to cheat a little bit.
But without further ado, let’s Carry On, Wayward Sons.
Um, spoiler alert, btw.
1. “Pilot” Season 1, Episode 1
“Dad’s on hunting trip, and he hasn’t been home in a few days.”
With that perfect sentence, we all were ready to follow the Winchesters wherever their road would go. Over nine years since it first aired, and the pilot episode of Supernatural not only holds up, but it’s still one of my favorite hours of television of all time. The pilot kickstarts the show's mythology, establishes a perfect and perfectly creepy tone, but also gives us the two most important elements of the show: Sam and Dean. A lot of shows take a while to find their feet, for characters to become the people we love: Sam and Dean were perfect from the get go. Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles were perfectly cast, with excellent brotherly chemistry. And if the episode’s final “Holy Crap!” moment of Sam’s girlfriend burning on the ceiling, dying the same death as Mary Winchester, doesn’t hook you, well…I don’t know what will.
2. “Faith” Season 1, Episode 12
When I’m convincing people to watch Supernatural, I freely admit that season 1 does have its share of shaky episodes as it finds its footing. I just tell them that if they can make it to "Faith," they’ll be with the show to the end. "Faith" is the first episode where we really start to see who the Winchesters are, especially Dean. When the series began, it was conceived the Sam would be our main gateway and the protagonist, but with this episode it became readily apparent that not only was Dean just as compelling, but he was the heart of the show. The producers themselves are on record saying that this is the episode where they truly discovered what Jensen Ackles could do as an actor. "Faith," the story of the first of many times Dean is saved from death by supernatural forces isn’t just heartwrenching, it sets up themes of free will, destiny, the Winchesters’ devotion to one another, and yes, faith itself, that will define the whole series.
3. “In My Time of Dying” Season 2, Episode 1
Whereas Season 1 has uneven stretches and a few, well, not so good episodes ("Bugs" anyone?), Season 2 is nearly perfect from start to finish. Picking up immediately after the season 1 cliffhanger that left survival of all the Winchesters in doubt, this episode sets the stage for the wild ride that is Season 2 with Dean as a sort of ghost, Papa Winchester trying to save his boys, and Sam caught in between, trying his best. Like “Faith” before it, “In My Time of Dying” takes the series' themes of sacrifice, free will, and hope and turns them up to eleven. It’s a tense and devastating hour, especially the final, shocking death of John Winchester, and everyone, both regulars and guests, bring their acting A game.
Bonus Essential SCENE: “Tall Tales” Season 2, Episode 15. Winchester Roshomon and Wrestling. So there were a lot of tough cuts, so I had to throw in some additional favorites in terms of awesome scenes from the episodes that didn't make the list. "Tall Tales" is great because half the episode is Dean and Sam relaying their own tall tales to Bobby. It’s a hysterical look at the way the brothers see each other, especially Sam hugging a witness and telling him he’s “Too precious for this world.” Perfection.
4. “All Hell Breaks Loose, Part 1 and 2” and Season 2, Episodes 21 and 21.
See, I told you I’d have to cheat. As I said, Season 2 is almost perfect, from beginning to end, so picking an episode from the middle for this list was kind of impossible. The season-long arcs of “what’s wrong with Sam?” and Dean's guilt over living at the cost of his father's life culminate in epic fashion in these final episodes. We learn Sam and other children like him are competing to lead the army of the Yellow-Eyed Demon who killed the Winchester’s parents. There's a gate to Hell in the middle of Wyoming. Oh and there’s that little thing where Sam dies and Dean sells his soul to bring him back to life. The scene of Sam dying in Dean’s arms is heartbreaking, Dean's crossroad deal is sexy and tense, every scene with Fredric Lehne as the Yellow-Eyed Demon is completely electric, and the moment Dean finally shoots Yellow Eyes down (with an assist from his father’s ghost) is the verydefinition of badass. These two episodes aren't just great, they cap the first major arc of the series but set up for an apocalyptic roller coaster that we’re still riding.
5. “A Very Supernatural Christmas” Season 3, Episode 8
This episode makes the list because it’s a perfect example of a lot of the thing that make me, and other fans, love Supernatural: weirdness, humor, horror, and brotherly love. Supernatural’s version of holiday cheer involves death by chimney, the boys hunting for the anti-Calus, and touching flashbacks showing us was Christmas was like for tiny Sam and Dean. And then there are the pagan gods with their perfect Martha Stewart Living Christmas who the boys literally kill with a Christmas tree. The episode is by turns gross, hysterical, twisted, and touching, sometimes all at once. The final scene of the boys celebrating what they thing might be Dean’s last Christmas is perfect – especially the part where Jared actually slipped Jensen real spiked eggnog for one shot. A holiday classic.
6. “Mystery Spot” Season 3, Episode 11
This is one episode I’m pretty confident will make any fan’s top ten. The premise is simple: an evil trickster god puts Sam into a Groundhog’s Day-style time loop that end each (Tues)day with Dean dying. It’s understandably hysterical as Dean’s deaths become more and more absurd (death by golden retriever and taco botulism are definite highlights) and then, when the boys seemingly stop the cycle and Dean dies for good, it’s suddenly not. The jarring shift from funny to incredibly dark and disturbing, is shocking but makes for great drama. This episode is essential not just because it explains why Supernatural fans are obsessed with Tuesdays and Asia’s “Heat of the Moment” but because it a perfect example of the wonderful extremes to which this show can take us.
But seriously: Death by Tacos.
Bonus Essential SCENE: “No Rest for the Wicked.” Season 3, episode 16. Bobby lays it out. In terms of season finales “No Rest for the Wicked” certainly packs a punch with the final image of Dean Winchester dead and in hell, but the essential scene is a quieter one, where Bobby Singer catches up with the boys when they try and face the demon Lilith without him. Bobby gives Dean, and us, a very simple lesson that defines the show and also the fandom: “Family don’t end in blood.”
7. “Lazarus Rising” Season 4, Episode 1
If there’s one episode that redefined the entire mythology and dynamic of Supernatural, it’s this one and it comes down to one thing: Castiel. In one of the most awesome entrances of any character ever, Castiel brings in a whole new world of angels and apocalyptic destinies. Interestingly, the angels weren’t necessarily part of Eric Kripke’s original plan for the show. Dean wasn’t supposed to die and go to hell at the end of Season 3, but the 2008 writer’s strike derailed the original plan for the elder Winchester's salvation. Thus, angels were introduced to grip Dean right and raise him from perdition and the show has never been the same.
Not only does the episode introduce us to angels in general, but to our favorite angel in the form of Misha Collins as Cas. Misha was almost an instant fan-favorite, and has continued to win fan's hearts in his years on the show, not just as a great actor as character, but a funny, quirky personality who has been a great addition to the dynamic, and as truly amazing human being (check out the charity he started based out of fandom www.therandomact.org or the madness that is GISHWHES).
8. “Yellow Fever” Season 4, Episode 6
Here’s another episode I’m pretty sure is on every fan's list of favorites. Season 4, like Season 2 has very few missteps, so it takes something extra special to stand out among such a great line up (Seriously guys, the fact “Monster Movie,” “It’s a Terrible Life,” “The Rapture,” and “On the Head of a Pin” aren’t on this list physically pains me). The thing that makes “Yellow Fever” stand out is probably Dean Winchester screaming like a banshee when a cat jumps out of a locker. Suffering from the brilliant MacGuffin of “ghost sickness,” our rugged hero, Dean, is reduced to a quivering, anxious mess of fear. Jensen Ackles gives a hysterical performance in this episode, delivering one of my favorite monologues of the series wherein he admits that the only people who would do what the Winchesters do are insane. It’s one of the straight up funniest episodes of the series and that doesn’t even count Jensen Ackles bonus “Eye of the Tiger” lipsynch scene tagged on at the end.
9. “The Monster at the End of This Book” Season 4, Episode 18
Again, Season 4 is chock full of amazing episodes (just go watch the whole thing; it’s okay, I’ll wait) but this episode had to make the list because it does something pretty damn unique. At this point in the series Supernatural had done some tapping on the fourth wall, commenting of moviemaking and producers with “Hollywood Babylon” in Season 2, and a few other winks, but this episode goes miles further. The boys discover a series of books called....“Supernatural,” about brothers named Sam and Dean who fight monsters. The books have a small but passionate fandom and some less than nice critics. I can’t really think of any other series that found a way to comment on their own stories, writing and fandom the way Supernatural has with this episode (and subsequent episodes addressing the books and their fandom such as “The Real Ghostbusters”). The author of the books is a guy named Chuck Shirley, who in turn is a stand in for series creator Eric Kripke, who also may or may not be god. It’s all very meta, and weird, and also funny, thought-provoking and brilliant.
Also Sam and Dean discover slash fanfiction and Wincest. “They know we’re brothers, right?” “Doesn’t seem to matter.”
Bonus Essential SCENE: “When the Levees Break” Season 4, Episode 21, Brother against brother. The fight at the end of this episode between Sam and Dean is no-holds-barred, both physically and emotionally. It’s culmination of a season of manipulation, distrust and pain and it hurts so good.
10. “The End” Season 5, Episode 4
Sometimes, as you can tell by now, Supernatural likes to do some really crazy things. And that crazy usually leads us to some of the most entertaining episodes of the series. “The End” is one of those episode. When a douchebag angel shoot Dean five years into the future to see what will happen if he doesn’t consent to be the vessel of the Archangel Michael and fight Lucifer (whose vessel is Sam) in the apocalypse, the result is scary, painful, and give us some of the best acting of the series. Jensen Ackles gives a tour de force performance as two versions of Dean fighting it out, and Jared Padalecki is absolutely chilling as Lucifer. As many have said, if Supernatural were the kind of show that got Emmys, this would have been the one to win it for either of these boys. Plus Cas is a hippie that has orgies!
11. “Changing Channels” Season 5, Episode 8
Can you tell I like the meta episodes? As I just said, when Supernatural gets weird, it gets awesome. And boy is “Changing Channels” weird and awesome. When The Trickster (he of the endless Dean-death-loop) pops Sam and Dean into TV land the show gets to have a field day poking fun at other TV genres: procedurals, gameshows, sitcoms and, my favorite, medical soaps. The Grey’s Anatomy parody is perfect – from Dean’s obvious crush on Dr. Sexy, to the mention of the show including ghosts, as a subtle reference to Papa Winchester actor Jeffrey Dean Morgan’s actual role on Grey’s. It’s also a hysterically rough episode for Sam, who gets nailed in the crotch in a game of “Nutcraker,” has to do a genital herpes treatment commercial, and actually gets turned into the Impala. The final reveal that the Trickster is the Archangel Gabriel is also a great twist.
Bonus Essential SCENE: “Two Minutes to Midnight” Season 5, Episode 21 Oh Death. Castiel actually has competition for greatest character introduction on TV character from none other than the fourth horseman of the apocalypse. Death himself is introduced in a haunting sequence set to Jen Titus’ song “Oh Death.” Julian Richlings as Death, perfectly creepy and calm, arrives in Chicago and the first jerk to bump him on the street ends up falling down dead as Titus’ haunting voices tells us “Oh my name is death and the end is here.”
12. “Swan Song” Season 5, Episode 22
This is one of those episode where if you say just the name to a Supernatural fan, it’s highly likely they’ll burst into ugly sobbing. Especially if you add something along the lines of: “I’m not gonna leave you” or “It’s okay Dean, I’ve got him” or even "Hey! Assbutt!" The culmination of a storyline Eric Kripke started laying track for all the way back in the pilot feels more like a series finale than a season final and in a way it is. This is where Kripke said goodbye, his avatar Chuck disappearing as he does so, but not before ripping our hearts out as Sam allows himself to become the vessel of Lucifer and jumps into the hell to save the world, all thanks to his brother's faith and devotion. But Kripke and Chuck don’t depart before telling us one final time what it all meant: “So, what's it all add up to? It's hard to say. But me, I'd say this was a test... for Sam and Dean. And I think they did all right. [Flashbacks play.] Up against good, evil, angels, devils, destiny, and God himself, they made their own choice. They chose family. And, well... isn't that kinda the whole point?”
Cue fangirl sobbing.
13. “The French Mistake” Season 6, Episode 15
Season 6 was all about what happens after the world didn’t end. The show had a new show runner in longtime writer Sera Gamble, and in some ways was showing its age. There are many great episodes in the season and a lot of great subplots. Some might even say too many, which is why the standout episode is one where the show takes a break from the various mythologies and breaks the fourth wall into smithereens.
“The French Mistake” is a reference to famous scene in “Blazing Saddles” where one set of characters breaks through a set wall into another movie. In this episode, Sam and Dean are hurdled through a window into OUR reality. Yes, that’s right. They’re sent to the world were Supernatural is a TV show in its sixth season that not a lot of people watch. Not only do we get to see “Eric Kripke” gunned down by an angel with a shotgun and “Misha Collins” as a conceited douche who tweets everything (who also gets killed), we get a scene where Jensen and Jared, are playing Sam and Dean, pretending to be “Jared” and “Jensen,” playing Sam and Dean, in the manner of Misha Collins playing “Misha Collins” playing Cas. It’s brain-melting and perfect.
14. “The Man Who Would Be King” Season 6, Episode 20
You know how I mentioned episodes, the very mention of which, will make Supernatural fans burst in to gross sobbing? Well, this is another one. Most likely the weeping will be interspersed with cries of “Cas, baby, no!” As far as essential game changers with seasons’ long repercussions go, this is one of the biggest. We learn that Castiel has been conspiring throughout Season 6 with Crowley, the demon king of hell, so that he can win an angelic civil war. Learning of Castiel’s betrayal is bad enough, but it’s learning why that really break our hearts: Dean. And here's where the shipping comes in (did you think you'd avoid it? When these are the queer recaps on Geeks OUT?). Before this episode, Destiel was just another ship for most fans, but after this, when we learn that Castiel sacrificed his principals, his friends, his safety, everything, to give Dean a chance at peace, it became THE ship for many viewer. “The Man Who Would Be King” reset Season 6 and set it on its final trajectory, towards Cas opening the gates of purgatory, becoming god, unleashing the season seven big bad the Leviathan and, oh yeah, dying. Like I said. This episode gives us a lot of feels.
He watched him rake leaves, guys.
15. “Death’s Door” Season 7, Episode 10
Essential episodes mean episodes that changed the show forever, in a dramatic, and sometimes soul-crushing way. “Death’s Door” is another one of those episodes that’s more ugly crying than hysterical laughter, but it, like “The Man Who Would be King” also changed the show in countless ways because it’s where Bobby Singer, the Winchesters’ surrogate father, meets the reaper. Jim Beaver gives one of his best performances of the series as he runs from his reaper through his own most painful and treasured memories. It’s a heck of a send-off for a beloved character (though some argue it’s cheapened a bit by Bobby’s return as a ghost seven episodes later). Bobby’s final memory is of a simple night watching movies with the boys and it’s absolutely heartbreaking, especially considering Bobby’s earlier declaration that his life did matter, because as fate would have it, he adopted two boys, and they grew up heroes.
16. “The Born Again Identity” Season 7, Episode 17
Season 7 was about taking everything away from Sam and Dean on which they had depended: Cas, Bobby, the Impala, their very names and identities, and even each other. Sam is lost to madness from his memories of being trapped in hell with Lucifer, and Dean spends most of the season drinking away his grief over losing Cas and Bobby, and the toll of lives hunting has cost him. That’s why this episode is essential, because it’s where things start turning around for our boys: Sam hangs on to who he is by helping save a girl from a ghost even while he’s in the mental ward and Dean finds something he, and the audience, were missing for a while: Castiel. Season seven was rocky, both for the fandom and for the show itself, but this episode was where things really started to turn back around. Castiel’s return – as an amnesiac in a Mr. Rogers sweater -was wonderfully handled and acted (the look on Dean’s face was what we were all feeling). And the inclusion of favorite demon Meg in the season ending arc was also a great addition. All it took was Advanced Placement Prophet injecting new life into the show a few episodes later, and a rocky season ended very strong.
17. “Everybody Hates Hitler” Season 8, Episode 13
I really struggled chosing between this episode, and the preceding episode “As Time Goes By,” because together they introduce what has been a defining and very essential element of the most recent seasons of Supernatural: The secret society known as the Men of Letters. The reason this episode wins out over “As Time Goes By” (which is great) is because we’ve had a lot of really emotional episodes on this list, and we frankly need a break from the pain, and because “Everyone Hates Hitler” has necromancing Nazis. NECROMANCING NAZIS! Also important: while the previous episode introduces the concept of the Men of Letters, this is where Sam and Dean finally touch down in the Bunker. It was a big step to finally give the Winchestrs their own home base eight seasons into the show’s run, but it’s paid off big time. Add in a pretty awesome scene of Dean getting flustered by “a gay thing” and the aforementioned Nazis and it’s nearly perfect.
Bonus Essential SCENE: “Goodbye, Stranger” Season 8, Episode 17, “I need you.” What, you thought the queer recapper on the queer site would just ignore the slash-iest scene to ever slash (and on this show, that’s really saying something). A brain-washed Castiel beating Dean bloody until Dean breaks through the control of heaven with the friggin’ power of love is one of the most emotional scenes of the season, and series, whether you ship it or not. And it’s the reason three little words can reduce us shippers to quivering piles of mush.
18. “Sacrifice” Season 8, Episode 23
While Supernatural is a fun, scary, and surprising show about monsters, ghosts, angels and demons, the true drama (as should be the case with any show) comes from the characters: their development, their relationships to one another, their flaws and mistakes, and what they will live and die for. "Sacrifice" gave us not only some huge plot twists – the boys don’t close the gates of hell! Abaddon makes a play for the crown! All angels ejected from heaven! Castiel is human! – it is filled to the brim with amazing moments for every single character we’ve come to love. Castiel's reluctance to leave earth, Crowley’s HBO inspired breakdown as he teeters on the edge of human, and Sam and Dean’s massively emotional scene as Dean tries to convince his brother not to sacrifice his life to save the world. It’s all not just hear wrenching to watch, but it’s also subversive in hindsight, now that we know the decisions everyone made in this episodes had cataclysmic consequences we’re all still dealing with, more than a year down the line
19. “First Born” Season 9, Episode 11
Speaking of consequences. As I said above, the church scene in "Sacrifice" wasn’t just an emotional affirmation of the brother’s bond, it was also an example of how broken the Winchesters and their relationships are. Sam and Dean are, to say the least, destructively codependent, and Season 9 was all about the consequences of that and the choices Dean made to keep them Sam in his life. Dean tricked his brother into getting possessed by an angel who ended up kicking human Castiel out and killing Kevin Tran, tiny, awesome prophet of the lord. Angel-free Sam wouldn’t let Dean off the hook, and neither did Dean, who in this episode channels his profound self-loathing and need for revenge into a search for the First Blade, an unstoppable weapon. This, naturally leads him to the first murderer, Cain, played brilliant by Timothy Omundson. Dean’s election to take on the Mark of Cain so that he can use the blade sets him on a path we haven’t seen the end to yet, and which certainly changed the course of all the characters paths in an essential way. Add in Dean versus a mess of demons in one of the best fight scenes in the show's history and we have the very definition of an essential episode.
20. “Meta Fiction” Season 9, Episode 18.
After “The French Mistake” most of us didn’t think this show could toy more with the fourth wall between audience and creators more than it already had. Boy howdy were we wrong. “Meta Fiction” does something so mind bending that it become more of an exercise in modern literary theory than an episode of television: It directly addresses not just the audience, but the very concept of being a consumer of stories and media. Metatron, mega-douche and scribe of God, has set himself up as the author of his own grand story. We’ve already explored the idea of the “writer as god” in previous episodes of the series (several on this list) but here, the episode opens with this new god directly addressing the audience and asking questions that would be at home on a ‘death of the author’ themed term paper: What makes a story work? Is it the plot, the characters, the text? The subtext? And who gives a story meaning? Is it the writer? Or is it you?
This voice of god is telling us that what we see in the story, in the subtext, matters. God himself, the writer is an unreliable and biased narrator. And we’re told, again and again, that what matters is what the reader believes, not necessarily what an author intends. I think that’s amazing.
What’s kept Supernatural on air for ten seasons now is a passionate, devoted and creative fanbase that’s willing to question the show and enjoys episodes and character that subvert tradtional ideas about all sorts of things – media, the relationship between creators and character, toxic masculinity, the proper methods of exorcism and more. “Meta Fiction” directly acknowledged that. It takes a good show to make you cry, but a truly great one to affirm the power and importance of you yourself as a fan.
Super-mega final bonus round SCENE: “Do You Believe in Miracles” Season 9, Episode 23. “Open your eyes, Dean.” What you thought I’d forget the most chilling final image of a season finale…ever? Nope. Nothing is ever gonna beat the absolutely chilling sight of a seemingly dead Dean Winchester’s eyes opening to reveal demon black in the final seconds of the season nine finale.
Well, I hope this has given new fans some starting points to dive into this amazing show and old fans something to argue over. Tell me what you think in the comments, especially if there’s an episode you think it was criminal that I missed (I probably agree with you) and come back next week for my recap of episode 200: “Fan Fiction.”
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