sweetondean: Leylin Vixen's Quick Draw Recap - Stuck in the Middle (With You)

Opening words

Well, holy crap. I have no idea how I will recap this story. It was amazing and awesome and I immediately knew that recapping this will be hell. I love when the show takes risks and shows us new ways to tell the story. I also must say that I love Tarantino movies and the new canon they introduced in this episode got my interest peaked. I really don't dare to present the story in step by step order so I think it is chronological recap just for my sanity.

Wish me luck!

Details

Title Stuck in the Middle (With You)

Episode 12.12

First aired February 16, 2017

Directed by Richard Speight, Jr.

Written by Davy Perez

Monster Ramiel

Story

We start with Ketch in a diner and he tells someone to tell him a story so here we go. Wish me luck! Mary has been working with the British Men of Letters and she asks Wally to be a decoy for their job that Sam, Dean and Castiel won't ask the wrong questions. All I can say is, what are you doing Mary? Secrets are not good mmmmkay. Wally doesn't trust the BMOL as we know and he has never even fought a demon. When he said those words I knew he was a goner which is a shame.

They call on the others and we get a pretty nice breakfast scene with all our heroes. They go over with the plan while Dean is giving the waitress pep talk to Castiel. No wonder Mary uses her mom voice for everyone on the table. In no time at all they are scouting the demon house. After Cain was shown as bee keeper I have come to be suspicious about bad guys like this demon that should have been just a fisherman. Turns out I was pretty right about it.

The one they are hunting has a schedule when he actually goes fishing so the group can prepare a trap for him meanwhile. Everyone else are making things ready and Mary takes the opportunity to vanish to the basement and in a moment we find out that the real case is a heist. She brakes in to a safe and steals something from inside that glows golden. A hat dip to Pulp Fiction. When Mary comes back up Cas questions her. She gives him an excuse and the matter is left alone.

The demon is whistling and heading home. The hunters are ready and when he steps through the front door Dean immediately shoots him but the demon bullets don't work. Sam stabs him with the demon knife but that doesn't work either. The demon seem to have even bigger beef with angels than normally. He notices the demon trap but walks just over it. Something is very wrong with this demon. You can guess it. After this everything goes sideways with the plan.

Like we saw at the start two more demons enter the fight when Cas and Mary are separated from the others. Wally dies and Sam is saved by Dean. Inside the house the demon reveals that he has yellow eyes. (I screamed on this spot) and Cas tells Mary to run and she does. Cas is tossed outside from the window and the YED grabs a lance from his back and he stabs Cas. Mary drives over the demon and she takes Cas to safety to a barn nearby.

Cas is not well. Sam and Dean head there after a call and Mary sends an angry text to the BMOL that their intel was wrong. They tell her to run but Cas can't be moved. The boys arrive and Mary tells Sam that the demon had yellow eyes. Crowley enters the scene and he pretty much says that they are all doomed. The additional demons were actually his and they were guarding none other than a prince of hell called Ramiel.

This is the kicker. The new lore we got. It seems that Ramiel and the other princes are the oldest generation of demons after Lilith. After Lucifer turned them they were supposed to lead demonic armies against heaven. They all had yellow eyes like Azazel that was one of them. This all is made clearer with a flashback where Crowley gives the lance of Michael to Ramiel and he is promoted to King of Hell after he gives another present to Ramiel.

The Lance of Michael kills demons and tortures angels and that is what Castiel was hit with. Ramiel was meant to be left alone because of the deal but as he wasn't he is now pissed. Crowley tries to make another deal with Ramiel while Castiel prepares to die as there is no cure to the stab wound. He wants the Winchesters to run because they are his family. Sam and Dean refuses and then Ramiel steps in from the hole on the wall from which he threw Crowley inside the barn.

They trap him in a holy oil ring and Ramiel gives them his ultimatum. They should give him the thing they stole in thirty seconds or he will kill each and every one of them. Only Mary knows what he is talking about but she does nothing. WTF?! The time runs out and Ramiel grabs his spear again. He strikes down the flames and proceeds to fight against all of the three. Sam kills Ramiel but it doesn't help Castiel. He is still dying.

Crowley saves the day when he remembers what Ramiel said about the lance and he brakes it in half. The magic is released and Castiel is healed. They head home and in the end we see that Mary was telling the story to Mr. Ketch and the item she stole was none other than THE COLT, OMG! Mary, Mary, Mary, you are way over your head. In conclusion we find out that Crowley is keeping Lucifer in prison and he is played by none other than Mark Pellegrino.

Characters

I am starting to feel sorry for the boys. What has Mary gotten them into? When they will find out everything that has been going on there will be hell to pay. Hopefully with no more casualties. In this episode we almost lost four Winchesters because of Mary's secret. And that is too big of a price for me. Castiel and Crowley shined in this episode. For a while I have seen Castiel part of the Winchester family so his scene when he said how he felt was strong. If you know you are done for and you have only few minutes to say goodbyes you would really say what you mean and something you would not normally say. Cas was done for and I think his words made a huge impact to all, even Mary.

We also learned something new about our favourite king of hell Crowley. Who would have thought that finally we would find out how he came to be the king of hell? Well, we did. It was one of the many surprises we got from this episode. And also that Crowley gave Ramiel the Lance of Michael and the colt. We also saw that Crowley really doesn't want the Winchesters nor Castiel to die. But Lucifer might be whispering doubtful thoughts in his ears now.

Now my apologies beforehand because I really like Mary but what is she DOING?! This can't end well. In a way I do see that she wants to rid the monsters from the world and the BMOL "seems" to be the best way to do it to protect her boys. She wants to give them safe and normal life. I think she doesn't know how to show her love, to be close to her boys so she does what a lot of parents do on that spot. She tries to give them a gift to show how much she loves them because she is not emotionally connected to her boys. She also must feel guilty about the secrets and her deal that started everything. She is a complex character so I hope her goal and reasons will be made clear later. But all that I know now is that there will be world of hurt coming their way.

Wasn't Ramiel sinister like the demons of old were? It was a shame that he died this fast but he DID leave a lasting impression on us. I can't wait his brother Asmodeus and their sister Dagon to appear if they are as sinister as he was. That whistling was creepy and he wasn't playing around.

Of course last but not least we got Mark Pellegrino back as Lucifer and I got hand it to him. He is Lucifer. Nobody can does it better.

Here is the full list of characters:

Mary Winchester

Castiel

Crowley

Lucifer

Mr. Ketch

Wally

Ramiel

References

I will leave costume design be for this episode as I am a sucker for Tarantino movies I decided to list the references this episode had for his movies. So buckle up! Supernatural wiki had collected them all.

"Stuck in the Middle (With You)" is a name from 1974 by British folk/rock band Stealers Wheel. Most famously known from Reservoir Dogs. The style of the episode is a homage for Tarantino with the use of non-linear storytelling and the use of title cards in scene transitions which include Castiel "The Wounded Angel", may be a reference to the 1903 painting of the same name by Finnish symbolist painter Hugo Simberg, Mary's "Mother Mary", a reference to the lyric in the Beatles song "Let It Be." and "Mr. Crowley," referencing the Ozzy Osbourne song of the same name.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2Xi3ioasik

The opening scene of the hunters sitting in the diner is a reference to the opening scene to Reservoir Dogs. The scene of the hunters walking down the alley in slow motion is a reference to the opening credits to Reservoir Dogs. Castiel spending the majority of the episode bleeding from a gut wound in an abandoned barn is a reference to the character Freddy Newandyke / Mr. Orange from Reservoir Dogs, who spends the majority of the film bleeding to death in an abandoned warehouse after being shot in the gut.

Dean: All right ramblers. Let's get rambling.

A line of dialogue used in the Tarantino films Reservoir Dogs and From Dusk till Dawn.

The glowing light coming from lock box when Mary opens it is a reference to the MacGuffin from Pulp Fiction, itself a reference to the glowing briefcase from the 1955 film Kiss Me Deadly.

Last title card "One last thing" is also pretty close to Kill Bill's quote: Bill: One more thing, Sofie... is she aware her daughter is still alive?

Like that sentence we also got two surprises in the episode when in the movie we found out that the daughter of the bride is alive. The glowing item Mary stole was the Colt and Crowley has Lucifer held captive.

Props

Oh wow... The props were like no other in this episode so I will just focus on the most extraordinary ones because this episode had plenty. There were actually few props that I would like to own. They were that amazing. And the funny thing is that we had OLD and NEW ones and they were all amazing. So maybe I will start from the old and head forward to the new ones.

I can't believe we got THE COLT back. The whole history of that weapon makes me squeal like a western fan girl. All the western music lead us to the colt and I am glad we got it back. Also I need to wonder if there is a deeper meaning that we got it back. Where will the story take us now that it has emerged. As this episode was inspired by Tarantino there was a lot of focus on weapons. The colt was one but we got some other old timers too.

I love Dean's gun that was shown pretty clearly when he loaded it with Devil's trap bullets. Also Sam had his signature demon killing knife that also did not work like Dean's gun didn't. Same could say Mary and her angel blade. Does this mean that dogs need to learn new tricks to something that is ahead of them. Or is it implying everyone should give BMOL the benefit of the doubt?

That leads us to the new props and like I said. They were not left behind from the old of how remarkable they were. When Ramiel made that Lance appear we were already gasping that Castiel was in trouble. We just didn't know how badly until the weapon was seen on a painting and it was held by none other than archangel Michael. The painting was beautiful itself. We also found out that it was given to Ramiel by Crowley. It is nasty against demons but if it used on angels they will suffer. That means Michael wanted Lucifer to suffer. If he is this cruel he might be a villain that we never want to get out of the cage.

Last but not least the BMOL and their toys. That safe opener was kinda cool. And we also saw the return of the brass knuckles in the hands of Dean. That was btw... Well hot. This episode raise my suspicion that we might have still huge surprises ahead of us. Because even the looming threat might be something that are among our heroes already. Like Crowley said: "Asmodeus has his hobbies. Dagon has her toys." Both of which can be hiding... I don't know for example in the BMOL.

Music

We had loads of music in this episode but it was rather unusual for Supernatural. So let's see what did we have. Lover Boy (Instrumental) by Toodlum Barker & Emil Lomax (Extreme Music), Walk with a Winner by Gene McDaniels, La donna è mobile by Jerry Trimble Jr., Not for Me by Bobby Darin, Crop Won't Ever Come by Robin Loxley & Jay Hawke and Colt .45 Opening Theme by Mark Pellegrino. This was a no brainer. Here are the lyrics for Colt .45.

" There was a gun that won the west.

There was a man among the best.

The fastest gun or man alive.

A lightning bolt when he drew that Colt... .45.

He carried the message of law and of order,

Into a wicked land.

With a Colt single action Army revolver

Blazing from either hand.

There was the right, there was the wrong.

The gun was quick, the man was strong.

And peace was made when they arrived,

A lightning bolt when the drew that Colt... .45.