SUPERNATURAL Reunites Star-Crossed
Lovers
Season 12, Episode 13 “Family Feud”
Written by Brad Buckner and Eugenie Ross-Lemming
Directed by P. J. Pesce
This episode is part dysfunctional family dynamics and part romantic ghost story. Ghosts often
symbolize regret and guilt, even on Supernatural, where any unjustly killed person can become a
ghost if they stay around too long and refuse to go to their heavenly reward or Hellish
punishment. As a ghost, they become warped and vengeful whether they want to or not.
Quite a bit happens in this episode that is not related to the ghost story. The first of this that we
see is Mary Winchester (Samantha Smith) using a ray gun to fry the brains of some monsters. Mr.
Ketch (David Haydn-Jones) is clocking how long it takes to work on them. I believe it’s a good
weapon. The sound is horrible. She gets a call from Dean (Jensen Ackles), who invites her to join
their case, which is a school teacher with their tongue cut out and innards squished. She turns
him down nicely.
Photo: Dean Buscher/The CW
Later, Ketch, who seems quite admiring of Mary, points out that she is softer when talking to her
sons. He advises that she puts some distance between her and them.
We find out why Crowley (Mark Sheppard) hasn’t been around much lately. He’s been up to his
own no good tricks. He patched together Lucifer’s old vessel (Mark Pellegrino) and readied it for
occupation. It turns out that he diverted the spell that Sam (Jared Padalecki) used on Lucifer when
they drew him from the president and sent him to the vessel, which means I was right! He didn’t
go in the orb! And he wasn’t in the cage in the depths of Hell. This is a foolish move on Crowley’s
part. As difficult as it was to catch Lucifer and get him off of our realm, it’s not something you
want to have to do again. And why did Crowley do it? So he could make Lucifer grovel, they way
Lucifer did to him? He’s not getting that kind of satisfaction out of Lucifer.
A very frightened Kelly (Courtney Ford) is found by angels, who try to kill her. Dagon (Ali Ahn)
shows up and saves her and takes her under her wing.
Several teachers were killed in different locations but they had all taken a field trip to a museum
recently. The Museum houses artifacts from the Star, the ship on which Crowley’s son Gavin (Theo
Devaney) met his demise in — the first time around, before he was brought to this time by
Abaddon. Crowley is unwilling to help the boys. He has just found out that they left Kelly and
Lucifer’s unborn child alive. They call Rowena (Ruth Connell) to help them find Gavin and bring
him to the museum. She is thrilled to find out that she has a grandchild and seems quite taken
with him.
Uh-what did you call me here for? Photo: Dean Buscher/The CW
Gavin finds, to his alarm, that a locket he had given to his fiancée was in the list of items
recovered. Since he never made it on the ship, he didn’t know that Fiona (Candace Woods) was on
it. She wasn’t supposed to be. They have a seance so that Gavin can talk to her. She shows up and
says she was a stowaway on the ship but was brutalized when found without Gavin there to
protect her. The Fiona ghost is angry at teachers because her old teacher on the ship slut-shamed
her for pursuing Gavin and did not help protect her.
Sam and Dean think he should go back. For the record, that’s what they thought when he was first
brought to the future. Crowley made the decision to keep him in the future. Gavin thinks he should
go back, too. He wants to save Fiona. Rowena agrees to help and Gavin disappears into the past.
We see the couple, briefly, as ghosts together before they go to their heavenly reward. One hopes
that they had some happy moments together before the ship went down.
All of the teachers and the scoutmaster that were killed are still alive. As sweet as this was, I’m
not sure one should have to go back to the past. If one gets a “get out of fate free” card, run with
it.
Crowley and Rowena talk. He doesn’t believe that her motive was altruistic. She says she wanted
to get back at him for making her kill her apprentice in an earlier season. A boy she loved more
than she loved Crowley. I don’t think that was really her motive, but her motive in saying it was to
hurt him.
Photo: Dean Buscher/The CW
Mary comes home and tells the boys she’s been working with the British Men of Letters. They
aren’t happy, but they talk. In contrast to Crowley and Rowena, the Winchesters are a functional
family. They are trying to pull together, not apart. Rowena’s last jab at Crowley may be a
permanent rift. They could have pulled together over their mutual grief. He is more alone than
ever and vulnerable to Lucifer’s ploys.
Now I’m going to talk about Mary. In reading people’s posts and lurking other places I was
surprised to find so much anger towards her, and feeling that she has betrayed her sons, and not
understanding why she would work with the Men of Letters. I agree that the Men of Letters
should not be trusted. Ketch looks like a psychopath. Sometimes I wonder if he is even human. All
we know about him is that he admires a good weapon, and he looks at Mary the same way as he
did the Colt. Torturing Sam is a deal breaker for me.
And we know, although the Winchesters don’t, that Ketch killed the little girl in the bathroom just
because she had psychic powers and killed the soldiers who had held Sam and Dean captive even
though the brothers worked hard to spare their lives. Sam and Dean are right. Mary is wrong.
But I know why she is doing it. To me it was so clear I haven’t talked about it before. Mary was
born in a hunting family and tried hard to escape it. She never wanted this life for her own family.
She wanted a nice, normal, white picket fence life with a handsome guy who liked cars. And she
had it until she died. And she had it in Heaven. But she came back to Earth and found out that
Sam and Dean, her babies, never had that growing up after all, because she died and John turned
into a hunter.
It’s decades too late and there’s nothing she can do to fix it. So when her sons have disappeared
for six weeks, being held by the real authorities for nothing more than doing their jobs, she is
susceptible to Mitch’s pitch, which they even used in the voice-over in this week’s episode. ”Let
me paint you a picture of a world without monsters or demons or any of those little buggers that
go bump in the night. Of a world where no one has to die because of the supernatural. Of a new
world, a better world.”
Mary joined up with the British Men of Letters to eradicate every supernatural critter on the
planet. Or at least the U.S. That’s why she talked to Wally of efficiency, and body count. She’s
trying to put Sam and Dean out of their jobs. She’s trying to give them no reason to be heroes
anymore. It’s smart of her that she knows she can’t change who they are. And yes, she will do it
even if they don’t like it because you do things for your kids that they don’t like that are for their
own good. You get them shots and make them eat their vegetables.
So, no, she’s not going to betray them for this quest. It’s for them.
I think we’re going to find out some more about this in the next episode. I really wish the
Winchesters would get to see some of the horrible stuff that we’ve seen that the BMoL have done.
I would like to see their eyes opened.
Supernatural airs on the CW On Thursday nights at 8pm/7c.
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