First of all, I apologize for the late review this week. It won’t be a regular occurrence, I promise… but let’s get to the reason why you’re really here reading this. Onto the Winchesters!

We open this week with a scene in Bobby’s (Jim Beaver) house where he’s being chased by something, or someone… there’s a woman screaming and then we flash out of the scene to find that it’s all happening inside Bobby’s head. A nightmare you can’t wake up from… definitely a creepy, brilliant idea following in some of the best horror genre’s footsteps. I’m also excited about the fact that we’re going to see some back story – find out some of what makes the enigmatic Bobby Singer tick.

Joining up with the Winchesters, we see Sam’s (Jared Padalecki) starting the day off early in a bar. When Dean (Jensen Ackles) joins him, Sam tells him that he can’t save him. How late in the year is it now, I wonder? How many months does Dean have left and how many options has Sam exhausted that he’s finally accepted Dean’s fate? It’s hard to watch Sam acknowledge it without any hope in his voice. Also important to note: Sam telling Dean that he doesn’t want to be saved, which is a theme that’s been bubbling under the surface of the show all season and that is going to come out full force in this episode. There are echoes of early season two here.

But a phone call cuts the brothers’ conversation short and we jump into the casefile portion of the evening. It turns out that Bobby was in Philadelphia, looking into a case of dreamwalking. The Winchesters are his emergency contacts and so they rush to his side, only to find him lying in a comatose state, unable to wake up.

There’s some entertaining sidenotes in the first half of the episode, from Sam having a full-on sex dream involving Bela, (awkward!) and finding out that Dean experimented in his younger years when he bonds with college boy Jeremy Frost (G. Michael Gray) over illegal substances while investigating the case.

A surprisingly accommodating Bela (Lauren Cohan) produces some dreamroot, allowing Dean and Sam to walk among Bobby’s dreams in order to find out who’s trapped him there. I have to stop here and just mention the beautiful cinematography in all the dream sequences - the sepia-toned rooms of Bobby’s house, the overly color-saturated outdoor shots when Sam’s walking, and the fantastic shot where Dean is running through the forest only to stop and turn around and suddenly he’s in a hallway.

Anyway, it turns out Bobby has a white-nightgowned woman in his past as well that started him on his way to hunting, his possessed wife who he was forced to kill. It’s interesting to compare and contrast Bobby and John Winchester’s choices in how they entered the hunting life. John by choosing to pursue the hunt to avenge his wife and Bobby by choosing the scholarly aspect of hunting.  

Unable-to-dream Jeremy is the culprit who trapped Bobby and the boys end up going into Dean's dreams to try and trap him. Interesting to note here that part of Dean's dream apparently includes Lisa (Cindy Sampson) and her son Ben from "The Kids are Alright".

The big scene of the evening is, of course, Dean facing his dream (nightmare?) self, who makes him face and own up to all his demons, in a matter of speaking. For John fans, it must have been hard to hear Dean slamming him, but I think there’s more there than just an I-hate-Dad speech. Dean is rebelling- against dying, against his role in a life he never really got to choose, against the unfairness of this life. Something he apparently never did when he was younger. It’s a part of growing up- we’ve all done it before. Despite being badly damaged, there’s a part of Dean that recognizes that he does deserve to live and he’s rediscovering that part. And despite some of the anvilious dialogue, Jensen really sold the intenseness of this scene.

Let’s not forget about Sam either, in his showdown with crazy-dreamer Jeremy. Were those his psychic powers starting to wake up again? Also, I’m pretty sure I wasn’t the only who noticed the Christ-like pose when he was tied down, right? What’s happening here? Signs of what’s to come?  

We begin the end of the episode with the revelation that Bela stole the Colt. While I’m sure I’d detest her on sight if I were in the Supernatural ‘verse, I can’t help but enjoy Bela as a character. She’s a foil for the Winchesters, pursuing her own goals, which makes her a wildcard.

We end with a subtle, touching scene where Dean lets Sam know about his recent newfound will to live. And then we flash to the demon version of Dean, just as freaky and chilling as when we first saw him earlier. Kind of a strange way to end the almost hopeful episode.

What’s going to happen next, now that Dean wants to live? Isn’t that breaking his contract with the Crossroads Demon? And with the Colt gone… the Winchesters are back to the old exorcism routine when dealing with demons. Stay tuned, it looks like the fight’s going to be heating up in the next little while.

Supernatural 3x10, "Dream a Little Dream of Me"
Writer: Sera Gamble, Cathryn Humphris 
Director: Steve Boyum
Guest Stars: Jim Beaver, G. Michael Gray, Cindy Sampson