9.16 Blade Runners

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SN916-0012.jpg
Title Blade Runners
Episode # Season 9, Episode 16
First aired March 18, 2014
Directed by Serge Ladouceur
Written by Brad Buckner
Eugenie Ross-Leming
On IMDB Blade Runners
Outline In order to find the First Blade, Sam and Dean must track down a rogue Man of Letters.
Monster Vampires
Shapeshifters
Timeline
Location(s) Lebanon, Kansas
Kansas City, Missouri
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Synopsis

At the bunker, Sam is researching the Mark of Cain, while Dean is frustrated as he repeatedly calls Crowley to no avail.

Crowley is holed up in a hotel room with a sexy demon named Lola, subsisting on sex, pizza and indulging his human blood addiction. His humanity is coming to the fore and he spends his day watching romantic movies and reading sad books. Lola, however, is reporting Crowley's degeneration to Abaddon, through a minion called Aldo. She passes on that Crowley provides little opposition due to his addiction, but also that he is helping the Winchesters look for the First Blade which can kill Abaddon.

Sam and Dean summon a crossroads demon—who turns out to be reality star Snooki. She tells the boys that Crowley was last known to be in the Western Pacific, and that even his supporters are considering defecting to Abaddon.

Lola returns to Crowley, but he knows she has betrayed him and kills her. In desperation, Crowley calls the Winchesters for help. They take him back to the bunker, and lock him in the dungeon to detox from the human blood he has become addicted to. Sam keeps watch, and Crowley tells Sam of what he knows of the blade's current whereabouts which has ended up on the black market. Crowley gets sentimental, reminiscing about what he refers to as the "bond" he and Sam shared during the final trial. Sam is unmoved and reminds Crowley he is only alive because they need him to find the blade and kill Abaddon, who is even more evil than him.

Sam, Dean and Crowley meet with the black marketeer André Develin. He refuses to give them any information, but Crowley enters him in his incorporeal form, extracts information and then smokes back to his own meat suit. Crowley informs the brothers that the blade is at at the National Institute of Antiquities in Kansas City, Missouri.

At the Institute, two demons have taken over the guards to the vault. When Sam and Dean arrive posing as FBI agents, they see the security footage which shows the guards kill a research assistant, and then shooting each other. The curator, Dr. McElroy, informs the boys the vault has been empty for weeks, claiming she couldn't authenticate the blade, so she had taken it from the vault with the intent of selling it. Dr McElroy, in between flirting with Dean, reveals that she sold it to a buyer she knew only as Magnus. Once the curator leaves, Sam reminds Dean that that the Men of Letters used "Magnus" as a pseudonym and wonders if one of them survived the 1958 massacre.

Back in the bunker, with Crowley's help, Sam and Dean try to find out if any of the Men of Letters survived the massacre. They discover a man called Cuthbert Sinclair, who was the Master of Spells and responsible for all the warding spells in the bunker. He was expelled from the Men of Letters in April, 1956 because they saw his work as reckless. Crowley reveals that, back then, he had tried to track Cuthbert so that he could use him to enter the bunker.

Crowley takes the Winchesters to a site in the woods he had tracked Sinclair to. Sam and Dean introduce themselves as Men of Letters, and a portal opens up. When they enter, they find themselves inside a grand house, and are immediately attacked by vampires, which they kill. Cuthbert Sinclair welcomes them, explaining that his house is invisible due to a spell. He still appears a young man, also due to a spell. Sinclair reveals that he is a collector of supernatural artifacts and creatures, which he keeps in his zoo. The Winchesters tell him they are hunters, grandsons of Henry Winchester. Sinclair tells them he was Henry's mentor before he was expelled. Dean explains the threat Abaddon poses, and why they need the First Blade, also showing that he has the Mark of Cain necessary to use it. Sinclair casts a spell, sending Sam back outside. Sinclair tells Dean he wants him for his collection and points out that Dean can't leave the house as it has no normal exits. Dean goes for his knife, but Sinclair melts it with a spell and then steals Dean's pistol.

Sam starts reading through Men of Letters files from the trunk of the Impala, while Crowley keeps insisting that they're a team. Sinclair ties Dean up, and makes him take hold of the First Blade. As he does so, the Mark of Cain begins to glow, and pain and intense feelings come over Dean. In the files, Sam discovers a reference to what Sinclair had proposed to do to the bunker—making it invisible and only able to be entered with a spell. Reasoning that is what he has done here, Sam sends Crowley to collect the ingredients for the spell. When Dean refuses to cooperate with Sinclair, he uses a spell on him that removes his will. He warns Dean that with repeated use of the spell, Dean will eventually become under his control.

Once Crowley collects the components of the spell, Sam performs the ritual. The portal opens and he and Crowley enter the fortress. Sam finds Sinclair and takes him hostage at knife point. He orders Sinclair to take him to Dean but, when they get to the room where Dean is held, Sam is shocked to see the real Sinclair standing there. The shapeshifter Sam is holding transforms to another form and attacks Sam, who kills him.

Sinclair overpowers Sam and ties him up. He takes out a knife and prepares to torture Sam in order to compel Dean to obey him. However, Crowley, who has remained undetected, frees Dean. Dean grabs the blade and decapitates Sinclair. The murderous rage he experiences does not dissipate after the act, and Sam needs to talk Dean out of the state.

Once they exit the fortress, Dean is distraught to find Abaddon's demons have searched the Impala, except the warded trunk, and keyed a warning on the doors in Enochian to Crowley: "Be Afraid - Your Queen." Sam tells Dean that they should kill Crowley now they have the blade. Crowley uses his power to pin them to the side of the car and tells them he's aware they will kill him. He takes the First Blade and informs them that he'll hold onto it until they find Abaddon, and then disappears.

Characters

Definitions

Music

  • "Medley (Ilsa Returns / As Time Goes By)" by Max Steiner
(Casablanca score playing from the TV)
  • "Heroin" by The Velvet Underground & Nico
(plays as Crowley kills Lola)
  • Two Part Invention No. 1 in C Major, BWV 772 by Johann Sebastian Bach
(playing as Sam and Dean sit down with Magnus)

Quotes

Sam: It's Crowley, he's not exactly a team player.

Dean: Yeah, but his ass is on the line too, he goes missing for weeks on end without a peep. Well, not one that makes sense anyway. Listen to this.
Crowley: Dean... [indecipherable]

Sam: Wait a second. Did he drunk dial you?
[Snooki appears in the devil's trap]

Sam: I-is that, uh...
Dean: Well, that explains a lot.
Sam: Okay, uh, look Snooki. Can I call you Snooki?
Snooki: No, it's Nicole now.
Sam: Okay then, Nicole. We can do this one of two ways: the easy way, you talk or... [pulls out the demon-killing knife] the easier way you still talk.

Dean: I vote for number two.
Crowley: You don't know what it's like to be human... it's your DNA. My addiction. My cross. My burden!
Sam: Focus. Okay. You swept the Mariana Trench. And...?

Crowley: And the First Blade was not, as hoped, in the Trench. It had, in fact, been scooped up by an unmanned sub, from whom it was stolen by a research assistant, who reportedly sold it to Portuguese smugglers who, in turn, lost it to Moroccan pirates in a poker game.
Sam: What?

Crowley: Poor moose. It's always a little tricky keeping up, isn't it?
Dean: You know, at least when Cas was human, he was an okay guy. Should've known Crowley would be a douche version.
Magnus: Dean, I am offering you the moon here -- to be part of the greatest collection of all time, to be young forever. Let me teach you my secrets, hmm? Be my companion. I have to be honest with you, it has gotten lonely here over the years.
Dean: When you were saying any of that, did it feel at all creepy?
Sam: Remember -- stay close, do what I say, shut the hell up.
Crowley: I'm growing on you, aren't I?
Magnus: Oh, come on Dean. This is the object of your quest! Tell me Henry Winchester's grandson isn't curious to see if it works.
Dean: Demon mitts all over my baby. Oh, come on! Now they're keying cars??
Crowley: Now this is the way it's going to go: I'll hang on to old donkey teeth here until such time, as you locate Abaddon. Then, you'll destroy her. You're right Moose, you can't trust me, sadly I can't trust you either.

Trivia & References

The title "Blade Runners" is a reference to the 1982 science fiction film Blade Runner, which is about a "Blade Runner," a retired special operative for the LAPD, who's job it is to track down replicants (bioengineered androids) on Earth. It also plays on the fact that Sam, Dean and Crowley are making their "run" to get the the First Blade in the episode.
Dean: He had one job... find the First Blade, bring it back.
"You had one job" is an internet meme used to highlight blunders or "fails."
Crowley is tearfully watching Casablanca when Lola returns to the hotel room with pizzas. He is also seen reading an 1896 illustrated edition of Little Women by Louisa May Alcott.
The FBI aliases the boys use for the crossroads summoning are for an Agent J. Lynne and Agent R. Tandy, referring to Jeffrey Lynne and Richard Tandy, members of the band Electric Light Orchestra. They had previously used these aliases in 8.17 Goodbye Stranger.
Crowley: I see the darkness of it now, the Anthony Weiner of it. It makes you needy.
Anthony Weiner was an American politician infamous for a scandal in which he sent lewd pictures of himself, including his wiener, to women to whom he was not wed. Sometimes he used the alias "Carlos Danger."
The phrase "I see the darkness" could be a reference to the Bonnie "Prince" Billy song "I See a Darkness," which was later covered by Johnny Cash.
Sam: Wait a second. We just want some answers.

André Develin: Read Sartre. Jean-Paul Sartre. I'm merely a facilitator between the buyer and the seller -- a conduit. So, unless I'm being detained --

Jean-Paul Sartre was a 20th century French philosopher in existentialism. He was also a Marxist, playwright, novelist, screenwriter, political activist, biographer, literary critic and phrenologist.
Magnus: Quite the wild hair your grandfather was.
"Wild hair" refers to a person who does something sudden or unexpected. It is derived from the expression "to have a wild hair up one’s ass" or various variations of the phrase.

Minutiae

The painting on the webpage about Cain and Abel that Sam is reading at the beginning of the episode is Cain Slaying Abel by Peter Paul Rubens (1608/09). The painting on the webpage about Abel: Adam & Eve's Second Son is The Body of Abel Found by Adam and Eve by William Blake (1825).
Crowley's caller ID for Dean is "Not Moose."
In the original script, the crossroads demon Sam and Dean summoned was scripted as being Ryan Seacrest.
Snooki was previously mentioned in 6.14 Mannequin 3: The Reckoning written by Eric Charmelo and Nicole Snyder.
Dean: Paterson, New Jersey. Hey, maybe we'll have a Snooki sighting.
Sam: What's a Snooki?
The set for Cuthbert Sinclair's house is the same one used for Jared's in 6.15 The French Mistake.
Kavan Smith who played Cuthbert Sinclair previously appeared as a victim of Doc Benton in 3.15 Time Is on My Side.
A unicorn skull can briefly be seen in Magnus' fortress.
Some of the paintings seen in Magnus' fortress include:
Deleted scene: The deleted scene from this episode included on the Season 9 DVD and Blu-ray is an extended scene of the scene where Sam, Dean, and Crowley are in the bunker reading about Cuthbert Sinclair. Read the transcript here.

Sides, Scripts & Transcripts

Promotion

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