For those Supernatural fans who say that they haven't gotten enough insight into Sam's brain this season, the past few episodes have given us quite a tour of Sam's head.  The problem is, I'm not sure it's a place that we want to be.

In the beginning of the episode, Dean gets a visit from Castiel while dreaming about fishing. (Has there ever been any indication that Dean likes to fish?  Or is this like the dream that I keep having that I'm playing doubles ping pong with Betty White against Ben Stein and George Washington and we're all using penguins as paddles.  What?  Like you don't have that same dream all the time!) 

Castiel has to tell Dean something, but he's afraid of spies overhearing.  So he asks Dean to meet him in a secure location.

Dean and Sam comply, only to find Castiel has left the building.  In the literal sense.  His vessel  – the accountant named Jimmy – is now back in control.  Jimmy can't remember what happened, and the first moment that Sam and Dean's back is turned he splits. (It doesn't help that Sam is out jonesing for a demon blood fix while trying to find his pusher – I mean Ruby, who was notably absent this episode.  It also doesn't help that Dean is sleeping like a dead man.  Apparently he really likes to fish.)

As Jimmy rides a buss back to his home, we see through flashbacks that Castiel's coming wasn't the blessed event that he told Dean it was.  Jimmy's leaving broke his family up. (Kind of like a soldier going to war.  Only since it's a secret war that his family doesn't know about, it's actually kind of like the Judge Crater vanishing.)  Since Jimmy was missing for over a year, his wife was pretty sure he was dead.

Meanwhile, Anna pays a visit to Sam and Dean and tells them that whatever Castiel had to say, it was important and that if he got dragged back upstairs, it's not good.

Sam and Dean follow so that they can protect him from the demons who want the vessel, including Jimmy's best friend.  In a shocking twist, his wife turns out to be demon possessed and takes his daughter hostage. 

Jimmy surrenders and is shot, but in the struggle Castiel returns using Jimmy's daughter as a vessel.  In the ensuing melee, Sam attacks a demon and drinks her blood like a vampire while Dean looks on in horror.

 

Castiel assures Jimmy that he is going to a better place, but Jimmy says that he would rather serve as Castiel's vessel so that his daughter doesn't have to (Which Castiel assures him is like thousands of years of being hitched to a comet). 

In the end, Castiel switches vessels.  He tells Dean that he learned his lesson when he got called home and that he serves Heaven, not man or Dean.  (I think that Castiel was trying to warn Dean about what Chuck saw.  Which makes me wonder why Heaven is so keen on stopping him. I'd better stop that train of thought right there, because I'm about to think deep theological thoughts.  And then we'll be here all night.)

Dean and Sam head toward Bobby's house for the next big demonic crisis.  Along the way, Sam practically begs Dean to beat him up over the blood drinking (He's a guilty, guilty boy, our Sammy).  Dean declines, but once they get back to the junk yard, Bobby and Dean trick Sam into the panic room and lock the door in the most justified intervention that I've ever seen.

Overall, this episode felt weak to me.  The big conflict just didn't feel that big.  It was more of a filler to get us to the last two episodes of the season.  And the B-plot, Sam's road-to-hell  blood addiction, has been the most annoying plot point to me this season. 

(Excuse me while I digress for a second, but I'm just working out for myself why the blood addiction plot has bothered me. )

I think that's partially because of the repeated anvils that have been dropped (by Pamela Barnes, Prophet Chuck, even God through the angels) about how bad what he's doing is.  But I think the larger part of my problems with the demon blood storyline is that Sam has been so obvious with his sneaking around and drinking blood that it seems that the show had to either dumb everyone else down or just make them not care that he's playing with his powers. (Or, in Dean's case, turn him into a heavy sleeper/avid fisherman?)

On a positive note, Misha Collins goes on my 'actors deserving of an Emmy' list.  His switch from Castiel to Jimmy and back was amazing.  As Castiel he radiated confidence and childlike wonder.  But the second he was playing a human, he turned that all off.  I could really believe that there were two different people inside that head.  And Misha was just selling it for all he's worth.

I also thought the visit from Anna was a nice light moment.  Everything from her liking the element of surprise to snarking on Dean's inappropriate horn dog tendency was a welcome break of levity.

So next week we get to see where this intervention leads.  Hopefully, it'll be the end of Sam's sneaking around while everyone else around him adopts the IQ of a potato.  Otherwise, I may shoot my TV screen to put it out of it's misery.