Supernatural - S10E15 - The Things They Carried
Previously on Supernatural, ‘The Executioner’s Song’
Supernatural returns from their 2nd hiatus on a new night (Wednesdays) and with the main plot point of the Mark of Cain somewhat resolved, at least for the moment; with the death of Cain this week, we shift into a more traditional “Monster of the Week” episode where the Winchester brothers team up with former adversary Cole to go after a monster that is infecting men.
The episode starts with a woman hanging upside down, before a man comes and slashes her throat and drinks her dripping blood. Sam is online searching for a cure for the Mark of Cain, when Dean walks in; Sam quickly closes his laptop, leading Dean to automatically assume he’s watching porn. Dean doesn’t judge, as long as it’s not where they eat. Dean brings up the mission with the girl; Sam doesn’t seem too interested, but Dean doesn’t give him much of a choice. As they are driving, Dean realizes Sam is still searching for a cure for the Mark. He tells Sam it’s time they face the facts: the Mark is not going away, and he would like to live his “normal” life until he can’t anymore and would like Sam to stand by him.
They arrive at the police station, where they learn the woman was killed by a Special Forces officer who drank a gallon of gasoline and lit himself on fire afterwards.
They visit the wife of the officer who tells them her husband came back from his last deployment very thirsty, and his skin was so dry it bled. She also revealed their friend Kit Verson was also deployed at the same place. The boys go to Kit’s house and find out from his wife he has been suffering from the same symptoms. As the boys leave, Cole (last seen in episode 7) is waiting for them outside. He tells them Kit is a childhood friend of his, and he’s going to go with them because he has connections that can get him answers the boys can’t get. He tells them he’ll only help them to find him; not hunt him. Dean and Sam are like, “Whatever,” but accept his help.
Kit arrives at a convenience store and starts drinking up all the water. One of the store clerks confronts him but gets his throat slashed. Kit stars lapping up the store clerk’s blood like a dog.
As the boys are taking a break from their investigation, Cole gets an email from his contact with a video attached that shows soldiers being attacked, as they go to rescue a POW. Kit’s wife tells Cole where Kit may be hiding, but before he tells Sam and Dean, he reiterates to them he doesn’t want to kill Kit. The boys tell Cole, if Kit is a monster—and it’s looking like he is—they will put him down, and Dean asks Cole if he’s in or out. Cole chooses out, as he goes after Kit alone. The boys, who suspected Cole was hiding something, follow him, with Dean telling Sam “and you fed him”
Cole arrives at the cabin where he follows a trail of half eaten rats; I guess they must’ve been great friends because he continues to look for him. When Cole finds him, Kit attacks Cole and, as they struggle, spits a slug into Cole’s Mouth. Sam and Dean arrive, but Kit escapes. The boys deduce they’re dealing with a Kham worm, which we last saw in Season 6 when one infected Bobby and caused him to kill Rufus. Cole asks if there’s a version of getting rid of the worm that doesn’t get him capped.
Sam mentions electrocution worked last time, and Cole’s game. Sam goes after Kit, while Dean stays with Cole. Dean uses two batteries to electrocute Cole, but it doesn’t work.
Dean and Cole figure out, since all the victims get really thirsty, perhaps they can dry the worm out. Dean creates what’s basically a sweat lodge, and they wait the worm out. While Cole is drying out next to the fireplace, Dean is being a dick and drinks water in front of him. Yeah, I’m pretty sure that’s not helping. As Cole feels his resolve start to fade, he asks Dean to tie him to a chair but goes for the water as Dean gets the rope. Dean tells Cole he needs to man up and sweat it out for his family. Cole appreciates the pep talk but tells Dean, right now, all he can think of is opening Dean up and drinking his blood like a fountain.
Meanwhile, Sam arrives at Kit’s just in time to prevent Kit from infecting his wife. They tie him up to a pole, and Sam proceeds to, very uncomfortably, explain to Kit’s wife that monsters exist and he hunts them. Why didn’t he just tell her Kit was infected, instead of telling her his life story? Kit escapes from the pole and eventually starts fighting with Sam; Kit gets the upper hand and starts to spit out the worm as Sam struggles to get his gun. Meanwhile, for some reason, Dean still hasn’t tied Cole up, and Cole attacks him, but before Dean could kill Cole, Cole starts to spit out the worm.
Dean steps on the worm and, after making sure Cole is alright, calls Sam to tell him it worked, but Sam informs Dean it’s too late; Kit is already dead.
The boys say goodbye to Cole. Dean tells Sam not to blame himself, but Sam can’t help it. Sam says he tried but feels bad he couldn’t save him. Dean says sometimes you could do everything right but the guy still dies. Episode ends.
Thoughts
- The way the episode ended could be some kind of symbolism as to how things could end up with Dean and the Mark of Cain. Either he could be saved like Cole was, or he could be put down like Sam did to Kit. Hopefully, it’s the former, as the latter probably means the end of the series.
- When Cole was saying goodbye to the boys, he mentioned he hoped to never see them again, but I hope that’s not the case; the character of Cole as grown on me, as he reminds me of a younger Dean (although the actor who plays Cole, Travis Aaron Wade, is 3 years older than Jensen Ackles).
- Overall, I liked this episode, but there were a couple of things which didn’t make sense and could’ve made the episode a lot better, like Dean not tying up Cole and drinking water in front of him.
