Sam Winchester

Sam Winchester
Name	Samuel Winchester
Actor	Jared Padalecki (adult Sam) Alex Ferris (age 5) 1.18 Colin Ford (age 8 and age 13) 3.08 and 4.13
Dates	1983-
Power	Precognition, Telekinesis
Nursery fire	Yes
Episodes	All

Background

Basic stats

• Born May 2, 1983
• Son of John & Mary Winchester; younger brother of Dean
• Sam dies in 2.21 All Hell Breaks Loose: Part One after being stabbed by Jake Talley.
• Sam is resurrected in 2.22 All Hell Breaks Loose: Part Two after Dean makes a deal with a crossroads demon.
• In 3.12 Jus in Bello we learn that Sam and Dean got matching tattoos depicting a pentagram that protects them from demonic possession.

screencap of police records from 1.15.

Sam's police record appeared in 1.15 The Benders as follows:

Samuel Winchester:

Born: May 2, 1983

Place of Birth: Lawrence, Kansas

Physical description: 6'4" Height 180-190 lbs Brown Hair, Brown Eyes

No distinctive markings or tattoos

Pre-series

Age 6 months: Sam is visited in his nursery by Azazel, who drips demon blood into his mouth. When Mary interrupts him, Azazel kills her, pinning her to the ceiling and setting the house on fire. John saves Sam and Dean carries him from their burning home.

Age 6: Left in Dean’s care in a motel room in Fort Douglas, Wisconsin while John is on a hunt. While a bored Dean leaves briefly, Sam is attacked by a shtriga, but is rescued by John. 1.18 Something Wicked

Sam aged eight, played by Colin Ford

Age 8: Dean and Sam are again on their own in a motel in Broken Bow, Nebraska on Christmas Eve. Until this age Sam believes his mother died in a car accident, and doesn’t know John is a hunter. On finding John’s Journal, Sam confronts Dean, who confirms that supernatural beings exists, that one killed their mother and that their father hunts them. 3.08 A Very Supernatural Christmas.

Age 12: Sam wins a Division Championship Soccer trophy, which he later finds in John's Lock-up in 3.03 Bad Day At Black Rock

Age 13: In summer 1997, Sam, Dean and John hunt a werewolf. 4.13 After School Special.

around Age 15: Sam was a Mathlete in high school, as remembered by Travis in 4.04 Metamorphosis.

Age 18/19: Sam leaves his family to study at Stanford. See Canon Discrepancies

Age 20: Sam starts dating Jessica Moore. (He tells Dean in 1.13 Route 666 he had lied to Jessica for ‘a year and a half’ about what their family did).

Season 1

Sam is 22 and about to enter Law School, when Dean turns up unexpectedly at his apartment in Palo Alto. The two have not spoken for some time (see Canon Discrepancies for how long]]. But their father is missing, and Dean asks Sam to help find him. After a weekend of searching, Sam returns to the apartment he shares with Jessica only to find that she has been killed in the same manner as his mother.

This spurs Sam to embark on a journey to find their missing father and get vengeance on the demon. While John Winchester is missing, he occasionally contacts the boys to leave them new missions to complete. The boys fend off mystical creatures such as the Woman in White, the wendigo, folklore's Bloody Mary, and shapeshifters. Through these missions, Sam begins experiencing episodes of precognition and once displays telekinesis.

The season finale concludes with Sam, Dean, and their father John escaping from a clash with The Demon in Salvation, Iowa. While Sam is driving the Winchesters to a hospital after Dean and John were hurt, a truck crashes into them, causing massive damage to Dean's Impala with the Winchesters inside.

Season 2

In the beginning of the second season, Sam takes a more active role in the hunting. He tells Dean that this is what their dad would have wanted him to do. The Demon's plans for Sam are still unknown. Dean and Sam meet with three people that John once knew: Ellen Harvelle, her daughter Jo, and their computer genius associate Ash. They assist the brothers in their hunting. In the episode "Simon Said", Sam displays immunity to Andy Gallagher's power of mind control. He is also immune to the demonic sulfur virus in the episode "Croatoan".

Since "Hunted", Sam has learned what his father told Dean moments before his death: that the Demon plans to cause Sam to become evil and use him and "children like him" as soldiers in an upcoming war. Dean was told that if he could not save Sam, he would have to kill him. Sam is convinced that he must save as many people as he can in order to change his destiny, as he drunkenly states in "Playthings".

In the episode "Born Under a Bad Sign", Sam is possessed by the same demon responsible for Meg's possession in Season 1. It becomes clear that if the time comes for Dean to shoot his brother, Dean would not be able to do so.

In the episode "What Is and What Should Never Be", Sam and Dean aren't close in the alternate reality created by a djinn. Neither Sam nor Dean had ever hunted, and Jessica is Sam's fiancee.

The first episode of the season finale of season two, All Hell Breaks Loose, Part 1, Sam is trapped in a haunted abandoned town in South Dakota with "Others" of his kind. It was revealed that there is demon's blood in Sam and his mother Mary Winchester knew who the demon was, much to Sam's surprise. He is stabbed by a soldier named Jake and dies in his older brother's arms just as he and fellow hunter Bobby arrive to the rescue. In the second episode of the season finale, Dean made a deal with a "Crossroads Demon" to deliver himself to Hell in one year, in exchange for Sam's life. Sam doesn't know of what happened while he was dead, and is in fact unaware he was ever dead in the first place. In the following battle to prevent Jake and the "Yellow-Eyed Demon" from unleasing a demonic army, Sam shoots and kills Jake, unloading over ten bullets into his body. This is the first time Sam kills a man, or someone that isn't a demon, and seems to show no remorse. The "Yellow-Eyed-Demon" questions Dean if he is sure that what he brought back in Sam is 100% pure, a statement that will probably be elaborated on during the third season. Sam figures out that he was dead, and tells Dean he'll get him out of the deal he made, no matter what.

Season 3

Throughout Season 3 Sam's quest is to find the loophole in Dean's contract with the Crossroads Demon in order to save Dean from going to Hell. For a while, Sam is quietly and fondly exasperated about Dean's hedonistic tendencies, but Dean's borderline suicidal behavior is bothering him a lot. Sam tries everything in his power to save Dean, he even goes as far as to summon the Crossroad Demon and shoot her with The Colt.

He receives unlikely help from Ruby, a demon who reveals that not everybody in Hell is opposed to Sam, that in fact, there a demons who are very much behind Sam. Sam also learns, that he holds dubious fame as the "boy-king" or rather "The Anti-Christ", something that brings fellow hunter Gordon Walker to pick up his trail and hunt him down. In the episode 3.07 Fresh Blood Sam kills Gordon using nothing but his own two hands and a wire.

A notable episode is 3.11 Mystery Spot, in which, after having lived through a groundhog-day like setting for over 100 times in which Dean is killed and Sam can't save him, Sam has to fend for his own with Dean in Hell. The episode shows what will become of Sam when Dean goes to Hell - namely a single-minded, dead-inside hull of a person.

To save Dean, Sam even goes as far as to consider using a questionable scientific method which helps a homicidal doctor, Doc Benton to stay "alive" in a Frankenstein-like body.

Ruby, who claims to know a way to help Sam save Dean - but who revealed to Dean that she was lying in episode 3.07 Fresh Blood - is trying throughout the season to get Sam to embrace his demonic powers.

In the season finale, 3.16 No Rest For The Wicked, Sam still hasn't found a way to save Dean, and has to watch, helplessly and powerless, Lilith sick her Hellhounds on Dean and tear him to pieces.

Season 4

Season 4 begins with Dean waking up back in his own body, in his coffin, alive. Four months have passed, and he does not know why he is alive again. He experiences first suspicious, then joyous reunions with Bobby Singer and Sam (and the Impala). He and Bobby Singer try to summon the force that brought him back from Hell, and discover that it was the Angel Castiel, on orders from higher up. Throughout the course of Season 4, Sam's activities while Dean was in Hell are slowly revealed. Sam was in despair after Dean's death, and tried to make a deal with a crossroads demon, but no demon would deal with him. He drinks to excess and acts recklessly—he has a death wish—until Ruby makes contact with him and begins to teach him how to use his demon-given powers. Ruby possesses the body of a comatose woman whose soul has already fled. In a short time, Sam and Ruby become lovers, and Ruby is able to shake Sam out of his depression to some extent. Together, they hunt demons and Sam exorcises them and sends them back to Hell using his powers. Sam is overwhelmed when Dean returns from Hell, but the two quickly begin fighting. Castiel informs Dean of Sam's use of his powers, leading up to a minor fallout between the brothers, as Dean tries to get him to stop using them and stop hanging out with Ruby. Sam, who is religious, is delighted to find that angels are helping he and Dean, but is severely disillusioned in "It's the Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester", when he finally meets Castiel and another angel, Uriel, and the angels attempt to destroy an entire town. Also a shock is that Uriel treats Sam with complete disgust, threatening to kill him as soon as Sam is no longer useful. Sam promises Dean to stop using his abilities, but quickly breaks the promise.

Meanwhile, Dean lies to Sam, claiming he remembers nothing of Hell. But in "Wishful Thinking," he reveals that he does remember, but does not want to tell Sam. Finally, in "Heaven and Hell," Dean reveals the awful truth about Hell to Sam—the four months he was there were like forty years, and Dean was tortured for three-quarters of that time under the ministrations of the demon, Alastair, until he finally agreed to himself become a torturer. He confesses he wished he couldn't feel at all, because thinking of his past actions in Hell is tormenting him.

In "Chris Angel's a Douche Bag," Sam had a short-lived fight with Ruby about his powers. She argued that he shouldn't be going on these meaningless hunts and go "cut the head off the snake." He says "It's not the psychic stuff I have a problem with." which may mean he hasn't revealed everything to Dean about what is going on and why the angels want him to stop. Eventually he relents and is seen leaving with Ruby, saying when she asks him what made him change his mind, that he didn't want to be hunting when he was old.

Season 4 shows a Sam much changed. He's a colder, less emotional person. he blatantly lies to Dean and to the spirit of a young boy, promising him that he can be saved from the Reaper who is there to take him. Whether it's living without Dean for 4 months or his demonic powers that have caused the change is uncertain.

Trivia about Sam

Samuel Winchester was born second son to John and Mary Winchester. Sam is different from his 4 years older brother, Dean, in that he is rational, sensitive, and seemingly more concerned with living a "normal life" than his brother. In spite of this, it is apparent that he would do anything for Dean. He also rebelled against his father's attempts to raise him as a demon hunter and enrolled in Stanford University. When Dean came to ask Sam for his help in the first episode, the viewers are introduced to Jessica, Sam's girlfriend. It is apparent that Sam was somewhat popular, despite no one knowing what it is his family really does. His brother, Dean, is the only one allowed to call him by his nickname, Sammy.

Equipment

Sam uses a stainless steel Taurus PT-92 9mm pistol (similar to the Beretta M92 on which Taurus based this gun) with mother-of-pearl grips, and uses a pistol grip 4-shelled 12 gauge pump shotgun loaded with rock salt.

He owns what appears to be a Dell Precision M65 laptop, which he uses to gather information for hunts. The first time he uses the laptop is in the second episode "Wendigo" where he plays a video message. The laptop may not belong to him, as his possessions were destroyed in a fire in the previous episode "Pilot". In that same episode, his brother Dean references using computer software which may indicate he is the actual owner of the laptop.

Sam also appears to own a Verizon-branded Motorola Q which has on at least one occasion been used to visually track unseen ghosts. (As seen in "Hollywood Babylon")

Psychic Powers

During the course of Supernatural, Sam has been shown to have telekinesis and precognitive abilities (manifesting as visions). However, the telekinesis has only been shown once, under extreme pressure, while the precognitive abilities are the primary. They have occurred in several episodes, manifesting before the series, and continuing throughout the series.

Premonitions/Visions

Sam's premonitions begin "about six months" before Jessica's death (1.05). Initially they only occur when he's sleeping (as dreams), but by 1.14) they occur when Sam is awake. Sam cannot control when the premonitions occur or what they're about, and they cause intense pain. Sam and Dean theorise that Sam only has premonitions when they are somehow related to The Demon.

Occurences (in chronological order)

• Pre-series: About 6 months before Jessica's death, Sam begins having 'nightmares' - visions of her death while he's asleep (admitted in 1.05).
• 1.09 Home: Sam has a sleeping vision about the occupants of the Winchesters' old house in Lawrence being in danger.
• 1.14 Nightmare
  • Sam has a sleeping vision about the death of Max Miller's father.
  • Sam has his first vision while awake - the death of Max's uncle.
  • Sam has a waking vision of Mrs Miller's death.
  • Sam has a waking vision of Dean's death.
• 1.21 Salvation: Sam has visions of another woman being killed by The Demon.
• 2.05 Simon Said: Sam has sleeping & waking visions of other PsyKids, Andy Gallagher and Ansem Weems.
• 2.09 Croatoan: Sam has sleeping visions of Dean killing Duane Tanner.

Telekinesis

Sam is unable to control his telekinesis as of "Nightmare", and does not use it again until "Death Takes A Holiday." He seems to have gained mastery of it some time after "Criss Angel's a Douche Bag."

Occurences

• 1.14 Nightmare: Sam moves a cabinet trapping him in order to save Dean's life.
• 4.15 Death Takes A Holiday: Sam throws Alistair with telekinesis after he proves immune to Alistair's own telekinesis. He seems to be able to simultaneously hold a Demon telekinetically and use his exorcism powers on it.

Power of Exorcismn through Mind Control

Occurences:

• In 4.01 Lazarus Rising we learn that Sam is now able to exorcise a demon by holding out his hand and forcing the demon to leave the possessed body and return to Hell. He was taught that skill by Ruby.

• In 4.04 Metamorphosis Dean finds Sam practising his exorcism powers and brings him to promise him that he will never use them again.

• Sam breaks that promise in 4.07 It's The Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester when he exorcises Samhain.

Immunity

Sam has shown immunity to certain demonic powers.

Occurences

• 2.09 Croatoan : Sam is immune to the demonic virus that was spreading in the town through blood-to-blood contact.

• 3.16 No Rest For the Wicked: Lilith turns her power on Sam after killing Dean (in the same manner she used in "Jus in Bello") Sam shields himself with his arm, and after the light dies down, he is shown to be completely unharmed, and apparently immune to Lilith's power.

• He is also able to withstand Samhain in 4.07 It's The Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester

• 4.15 Death Takes A Holiday : Sam proves immune to Alistair's telekinesis.

Sensing the Supernatural

Sam describes this as a "vibe" (1.10) where he's able to get impressions or a sense of supernatural presences.

Occurences

• 1.09 Home: Sam is able to sense supernatural presences in the old Winchester family home.

Notable Episodes about Sam

As one of the stars of the series Sam has appeared in all the episodes. However, most episodes are focused on either Sam or Dean.

Episodes that are clearly Sam-centered:

• "Pilot"
• "Dead in the Water"
• "Bloody Mary"
• "Home"
• "Provenance"
• "Asylum"
• "Nightmare"
• "Simon Said"
• "Croatoan"
• "Hunted"
• "Playthings"
• "Born Under a Bad Sign"
• "Heart"
• "All Hell Breaks Loose, Part 1"
• "All Hell Breaks Loose, Part 2"
• "Fresh Blood"
• "A Very Supernatural Christmas" (from Sam's pov)
• "Mystery Spot"
• "Lazarus Rising"
• "Metamorphosis"
• "I Know What You Did Last Summer"
• "Chris Angel's a Douchebag"
• "After School Special"
• "Death Takes a Holiday"

Relationship with the Yellow-Eyed Demon

• Sam is one of the Special Children
• A link between Sam’s powers and the YED is first suspected by the boys in Nightmare, when Sam discovers that Max Miller’s mother dies the same way Mary Winchester did.

Sam: I mean, either telekinesis or premonitions, we both had abilities, you know? Maybe it was after us for some reason.

• In Devil’s Trap, the YED reveals that he killed Mary and Jess because they got in the way of his plans…

YED: My plans for you, Sammy. You... and all the children like you.

• In 2.01 In My Time Of Dying we find out that John knows “the truth” about Sam and the other children like him.

• In Simon Said Sam meets two other people with powers, Andy and his evil twin Ansem. Ansem reveals that a man “with yellow eyes” has visited in his dreams and revealed he has big plans for the Psykids.

• In Simon Said Sam and Dean also discover that not all Psykids had their mother die in a fire when they were six months old.

• In Croatoan, Sam is infected with a demon virous. This is revealed to have been an experiement enginnered by the YED, when Duane Tanner contacts him on a blood goblet to report:

"I don't think any more tests will be necessary... The Winchester boy, definitely immune as expected."

• In Hunted Dean reveals that before he died John told Dean that he would have to save Sam, and that if he couldn’t do that he might have to kill him.

• In 2.21 All Hell Breaks Loose: Part One The Yellow-Eyed Demon appears to Sam in a dream, and explains that his plan is for the children with special powers to fight amongst themselves until the strongest is left to lead the Demon’s army. He tells Sam, with his leadership qualities and hunter training, is his favorite.

• In the same dream, YED admits to killing Jessica so Sam would go back to hunting. He then shows Sam a vision of what happened the night Mary died. Sam sees that YED fed drops of his blood to baby Sam, and that Mary knew the Demon. Sam does not tell Dean about this.

• After Sam's resurrection the Yellow-Eyed Demon implies to Dean that Sam came back changed.

Other close encounters of the supernatural kind

• In 2.13 Houses of the Holy (episode), Sam has a vision of what he thinks is an angel, telling him he has been chosen to kill someone evil. The angel is later revealed to be the spirit of Father Gregory. We learn in this epsiode that Sam has faith and prays regularly.

• In 2.14 Born Under a Bad Sign (episode), Sam is possessed by the demon which had previously possessed Meg. While possessed Sam killed Steve Wandell, attacked Jo and shot and beaten up Dean. It is initially difficult to exorcise as it has used a spell (signified by a brand on Sam's arm) to bind itself to Sam's body.

Further Reading

Events in the series and prior to it as far as they are known are collected in the Timeline.