Review | 4x20 | The Rapture
This week’s episode The Rapture by Jeremy Carver was probably enjoyable for all the Castiel/Misha Collins fans out there, but for me it was one of the biggest let-downs of this season. I mean, seriously? It’s the third last episode in a season that featured the most complex and problematic turn in the relationship of the Winchester brothers and this is how they spend it? On the largely irrelevant backstory of a recurring character, cramming one of the most important reveals between the main characters somewhere in between? I think the only time I have been more disappointed with an episode this season was after Heaven and Hell, and that’s saying something.
When the angel plotline was introduced back at the beginning of S4, I thought that it was a bold and interesting plot choice that elevated the show’s mythology to a new level and re-energised the story-telling considerably. Now, at the end of the season, I still adhere to that opinion to a great degree, but the further the season progressed, I also felt that the angel arc occasionally started to overpower the story of the Winchester brothers, especially in mytharc heavy episodes. The angel storyline, in combination with the already prominent demon arc that we inherited from S3, turned the mytharc of Supernatural into a broad multi-stranded story and while I can understand that a lot of people enjoy the epic picture resulting from that development, I miss the personal touch in the mytharc that comes with a singular focus on the Winchester family.
We had only seven episodes this season that featured Sam and Dean alone, with neither demons nor angels involved in the plot and that’s not nearly enough for my taste. I’m also missing the variety of subplots from the first three seasons that were centred around Sam and Dean, like the Winchesters versus law enforcement or their encounters with the hunter’s community. These subplots always made for a nice change of pace and still managed to drive the story forward or deepen the characterisation. Don’t get me wrong, there were still plenty of episodes this season that worked wonderfully in combining the best of both worlds, like Death Takes A Holiday, Criss Angel Is A Douchebag or It’s The Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester, just to name a few, but it makes me regret the episodes where it didn’t work for me, and instead felt detrimental to the story of Sam and Dean, even more.
The Rapture accentuates that problem in the worst possible way by reducing Sam and Dean to mere side-kicks in their own story in favour of highlighting an inconsequential character. There are two main problems with this episode for me: Firstly, the story of Castiel’s vessel Jimmy achieved nothing in the greater scheme of things. It’s largely irrelevant to the mytharc and it didn’t further develop the characters, not even Castiel, who was absent for most of the episode. As a result it came off as a simple vehicle to showcase Misha Collins and, honestly, I like Castiel and I think that Misha is a terrific actor, but to spend a whole episode on Jimmy and his family made absolutely no sense, especially at this particular point in the season.
Secondly, the brother plot that unfolded around the edges of the episode - i.e. Sam struggling with his addiction when Ruby leaves him hanging and Dean finally finding out about Sam’s habit to consume demon blood - was by far the more compelling storyline, especially given how long the characters have been dancing around the topic this season. In my opinion the events leading up to the reveal of Sam’s secret should have been the central plot in a brother-centric episode, alas their story was crammed into a handful of short Sam and/or Dean scenes and the reveal itself was pretty anti-climactic. It left me hugely dissatisfied and frustrated.
I had the same problems with Heaven and Hell, where Dean’s post-hell storyline was largely overshadowed by the angels-versus-demons plot. Even if The Rapture was simply the opening act in a three-part finale, with (hopefully) plenty of time left to explore Sam and Dean, it’s not exactly promising that they started that finale off by sidelining the main characters. Given the fact that the apocalypse is looming around the corner and that Lilith, Ruby, Castiel and other recurring characters are likely to crash the party in the next two episodes as well, there is only limited space for character exploration as it is.
Dean: "You’re scaring me, man."
Sam: "I’m scaring myself."
Sam’s main theme in this episode was his addiction to Ruby’s blood and his growing inability to control his needs over a longer period of time. He is restless, snappish and desperate throughout the episode, withdrawal symptoms increasingly affecting his behaviour, when Ruby goes AWOL and doesn’t provide him with his regular dose of blood. While his withdrawal symptoms were to be expected, his sudden failure to even exact a simple exorcism was a surprising development though.
We know from Sam’s conversation with Ruby in Heaven and Hell that Sam didn’t drink any blood in between Metamorphosis, where he officially decided to stop using his powers, and It’s The Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester, where he exorcised the powerful ancient demon Samhain. However, Sam didn’t show any withdrawal symptoms during that time period, and he obviously had no problems to control his powers after such a long time without a new boost either. So, even if we assume that Sam didn’t get any new blood from Ruby since last week’s events, the rapid decrease of his powers seems a bit odd. I wonder if that’s an after-effect of his massive blood loss in Jump The Shark or inherent to the addiction itself, i.e. Sam needing more and more blood in shorter intervals to achieve the same result.
It’s interesting that Ruby left Sam hanging, knowing full well that he would go into withdrawal, and I wonder if that was a deliberate move on her part in order to demonstrate her power over him or if she had other reasons to not respond to Sam’s call. If the first was the case, I am not sure if that move didn’t backfire. She had to know that theoretically Sam is able to satisfy his needs with any demon and that his dependency on her specifically is endangered as soon as Sam realises that. So, it would be in her own interest to cater to his needs herself, unless she already reached her goal and feels that she doesn’t need to be at Sam’s beck and call anymore, finally revealing her true face.
In that light I had a disconcerting thought: The one interesting detail that I drew from Jimmy’s plotline was the emphasis on the fact that in order to be possessed by an angel, a chosen human needs to have a certain blood compatibility. The repeated insistence on that point made me think that it bears a possible significance for the mytharc. After all, Lucifer is a fallen angel as well, and maybe it needs a special vessel in order for him to manifest on earth once the seals are broken. The horrible conclusion to that thought would be that maybe Sam’s new blood make-up provides just the right combination for Lucifer to set up shop in his body. This speculation opens the possibility that Ruby worked with Lilith all along, preparing Sam for her plans. While at first glance this seems to contradict Lilith’s (weak) efforts to kill Sam, it could be an elaborate scheme to set up a feigned antagonism between her and Ruby, designed to make Sam trust her more easily. Only time will tell, I suppose.
Anyway, the scene where Sam finally loses control, succumbs to his addiction and feeds on a demon in front of Dean and Castiel, is extremely disturbing, and I find it regrettable that the writers thought it would be necessary to resort to this form of graphic gore to hammer the point home, how far gone Sam is. I think there’s a limit to what the show should visualise, if they don’t want the audience to lose any ability to relate to the main characters. To completely lift the visual barriers between the monsters of the show and the hero of the story is a questionable move in my opinion. However, the scene was clearly set up as a visual reference to the scene in Metamorphosis, where the rougarou Jack Montgomery lost his fight against his need for human flesh and sealed his fate by feeding on the hunter Travis. It was Jack’s death that convinced Sam back then that using his powers was playing with fire and that he needs to stop. Now, he finds himself in the same situation, thinking that he could control his need, only to find that in the end his need controls him.
It has to be said though that while it is clear that Sam’s addiction is extremely detrimental to his physical and mental health, the end result of his action once again proved to be beneficial, as he instantly uses his power to save Jimmy’s wife. Throughout this season so far it was demonstrated that the only danger that arises out of Sam’s powers is to Sam himself, rather than others, and that Sam’s initial motivation to "take the curse and make something good out of it" still stands firmly beside his need for revenge. Still, the question remains, if there will be a turning point for him that will negate all the good he has achieved so far. Did he ultimately play into the hand of the enemy by his desire to use his powers for good? I really hope we will get some definite answers in regard to Sam powers in the finale.
Dean: "What do you want me to say? That I am disappointed. Yeah, I am. But mostly I am just tired, man. I’m done. I’m just done."
Dean is in a completely different state of mind in this episode than Sam, and I think the opening dream sequence with Dean fishing at a pond is very telling in that regard. First of all, it’s comforting to see that Dean is finally able to leave his nightmarish dreams of hell behind, maybe not always, but at least sometimes. But while the scenery feels peaceful and Dean seems content, he is also alone and cut off from anyone and anything. His life has been incredibly burdensome lately, and it’s understandable that he feels the need to withdraw and find his way back to the simple things in life. His statement to Sam that he remembers the time when things were as easy as 'saving people, hunting things' just serves to drive the same point home as the dream sequence. Dean still feels burned out, exhausted and is fed up with the constant pressure on him.
His resigned reaction to the reveal that Sam drinks demon blood in order to boost his powers plays into the same tired sentiment and resonates convincingly with his disillusioned stance about Sam in Jump The Shark. I think that Dean had already concluded from Sam’s avoidance tactics that his brother is hiding something especially horrible and even if he couldn’t picture the exact circumstances, the reveal itself is hardly more shocking than any of the other hits he had to take these last couple of months. Still, his genuine worry about Sam and the instability of his powers earlier in the episode and the fact that he instantly sets up a plan to contain Sam for his own good, as soon as the truth is out, shows that his statement that he doesn’t care anymore is partly a front.
Dean does care - he just stopped believing that Sam trusts him enough to confide in him or that Sam is willing to take Dean’s brotherly advice or ask him for help. Sam’s "let me at least explain" is too little, too late. He stretched his brother’s patience thin and finally forced Dean’s hand. While I am not convinced that locking Sam up is ultimately the best course of action, especially since Sam so far didn’t exhibit any signs of being a danger to humanity and restraining him will only serve to fuel his conviction that he is in this alone and that nobody is able to relate to his side of the story, I can also understand that Dean and Bobby feel that they have no other choice.
Back in S2 Dean made a promise to save Sam, come hell or high water, and that’s what he is attempting right now. His instincts tell Dean that the powers are evil, and he has now first hand experience of the lengths Sam will go to justify the pursuit of his course. I don’t think Dean is foremost concerned of the danger Sam might pose to others, he is more afraid of losing his little brother for good and failing his promise to protect Sam again. From his perspective he gave Sam every opportunity to come clean and even made a valiant effort to stop being completely hostile where Sam’s powers are concerned, but his brother pushed him away time and again, strengthening Dean’s belief that a dialogue with Sam is impossible. Instead Dean resorts to more radical measures to bring his brother to his senses, presumably by forcing Sam into a demon-blood withdrawal treatment by locking him up at Bobby's. The success of that operation seems highly questionable though.
Jimmy: "I was confused. I was completely delusional. And I thought that God was calling me to something. And I thought it was important. And I was wrong. Heaven, hell, none of that matters."
We already knew from Castiel’s statement in Lazarus Rising that Jimmy was a willing vessel for the angel, so the fact that he was driven by his faith and the belief that he had been chosen by God for a holy mission was hardly a surprising point in his story. Still, it was interesting to see that the reality of the experience shattered his beliefs and in the end he came to regret his decision, realising that he sacrificed his family for an illusion. Even though Jimmy can’t remember much from his possession, it’s obvious that the presence of the angel was anything but a peaceful or spiritually uplifting exprience, and it’s easy to see how that would affect his faith. Anyway, while I thought that Jimmy’s story was too drawn out and the gist of it could have been told in a fraction of the time spent on it, it at least showed a lot of parallels to both Sam and Dean.
Sam, too, was thrown into a crisis of faith after meeting the angels for the first time. The discrepancy between his expectations and the reality tested his faith considerably and in the following months this disconnect only increased. The other parallel between Jimmy and Sam is that both their destinies are bound to a particular characteristic of their blood. As mentioned before, it was repeatedly emphasised that Jimmy was chosen because "it is in his blood" and given the importance of blood for the demonology in the show, it opens another disturbing similarity between demons and angels. While I am not necessarily convinced that my theory about Sam serving as a vessel for Lucifer is correct, it would strengthen this particular parallel between Sam and Jimmy.
The obvious parallel between Jimmy and Dean is that both have been chosen by the angels to aid their cause. Jimmy came out of that experience a broken man and in the end sacrificed himself for his daughter’s sake, foregoing the peace of his soul for an eternity of suffering as a vessel. His alliance with the angels brought him nothing but grief and I wonder if that’s foreshadowing Dean’s fate as well. He might not enter into his alliance with the angels as blindly as Jimmy did, but he still has to put a certain level of trust in them and it might as well be that this trust is just as displaced as Jimmy’s was. Still, ultimately Jimmy realised that family was more important than angels, holy missions, heaven or hell and I think (hope) that will prove true for Dean in the end as well.
What else was noteworthy:
(1) Castiel’s secretive and nervous demeanour at he beginning of the episode, as well as the mysterious battle that seemed to have taken place between the angels, suggests that something major is brewing on the angel front. My first assumption was that the loyal angel faction forced an open confrontation with the Lucifer supporters amongst them, but that wouldn’t necessarily explain why Castiel was so secretive about the issue, since Dean already knows about the rogue angels, or why he would order Dean to come to the battle site.
The other reasonable assumption would be that Castiel was about to warn Dean about something - maybe the same something that Chuck saw in his terrible vision at the end of The Monster At The End Of This Book - and that the destruction Sam and Dean witnessed in the derelict building where they found Jimmy was simply the result of the fight between Castiel and the angels that forced him to leave his vessel and return to heaven. This assumption is supported by Castiel’s final words to Dean: "I’ve learned my lesson. I serve heaven. I don’t serve man, and I certainly don’t serve you." Whatever Castiel wanted to tell Dean, it seems he had rather Dean’s benefit in mind than the angels’. It will be interesting to see how long Castiel is able to follow the orders he obviously received. It makes me wonder though why Castiel’s superiors allow him to stay on earth, if they perceive him as such a liability. In any case, the obviously harsh lesson Castiel was subjected to, in combination with Jimmy’s less than uplifting story, leaves me with the uneasy feeling that the angels' plans are more sinister than I suspected or at least that they don’t necessarily have the best intentions where Dean is concerned.
(2) I was majorly annoyed with Anna's completely useless appearance in this episode. Not only is her condescending tone at Dean's flirtatious but affectionate greeting rude and uncalled for, but she also comes off as arrogant and overbearing when she blames the brothers for Jimmy's disappearance. She doesn't offer any deeper insight into Castiel's vanishing act and shows no willingness to help the brothers to save Jimmy, although her angelic powers surely give her an advantage over Sam and Dean, as she would easily have been able to 'teleport' to Jimmy and get him to safety in a fraction of the time the brothers needed to reach him. So, all in all her appearance was utterly pointless and didn't exactly endear the character to me.
In conclusion: I really wished the episode had made an effort to achieve more of a balance between Sam and Dean’s story and that of Jimmy and his family instead of sidelining the main characters completely. I am sure, I would have enjoyed the episode a lot more that way. As it is, The Rapture is one of the weakest episodes of the season for me and I can only hope that the next two episodes make up for the negligences of this week’s instalment in the series. In any case the set-up at the end of the episode makes me extremely anxious for the future of the brotherly relationship. I am pretty sure I will get my heart severely broken, well, what’s left of it anyway.
When the angel plotline was introduced back at the beginning of S4, I thought that it was a bold and interesting plot choice that elevated the show’s mythology to a new level and re-energised the story-telling considerably. Now, at the end of the season, I still adhere to that opinion to a great degree, but the further the season progressed, I also felt that the angel arc occasionally started to overpower the story of the Winchester brothers, especially in mytharc heavy episodes. The angel storyline, in combination with the already prominent demon arc that we inherited from S3, turned the mytharc of Supernatural into a broad multi-stranded story and while I can understand that a lot of people enjoy the epic picture resulting from that development, I miss the personal touch in the mytharc that comes with a singular focus on the Winchester family.
We had only seven episodes this season that featured Sam and Dean alone, with neither demons nor angels involved in the plot and that’s not nearly enough for my taste. I’m also missing the variety of subplots from the first three seasons that were centred around Sam and Dean, like the Winchesters versus law enforcement or their encounters with the hunter’s community. These subplots always made for a nice change of pace and still managed to drive the story forward or deepen the characterisation. Don’t get me wrong, there were still plenty of episodes this season that worked wonderfully in combining the best of both worlds, like Death Takes A Holiday, Criss Angel Is A Douchebag or It’s The Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester, just to name a few, but it makes me regret the episodes where it didn’t work for me, and instead felt detrimental to the story of Sam and Dean, even more.
The Rapture accentuates that problem in the worst possible way by reducing Sam and Dean to mere side-kicks in their own story in favour of highlighting an inconsequential character. There are two main problems with this episode for me: Firstly, the story of Castiel’s vessel Jimmy achieved nothing in the greater scheme of things. It’s largely irrelevant to the mytharc and it didn’t further develop the characters, not even Castiel, who was absent for most of the episode. As a result it came off as a simple vehicle to showcase Misha Collins and, honestly, I like Castiel and I think that Misha is a terrific actor, but to spend a whole episode on Jimmy and his family made absolutely no sense, especially at this particular point in the season.
Secondly, the brother plot that unfolded around the edges of the episode - i.e. Sam struggling with his addiction when Ruby leaves him hanging and Dean finally finding out about Sam’s habit to consume demon blood - was by far the more compelling storyline, especially given how long the characters have been dancing around the topic this season. In my opinion the events leading up to the reveal of Sam’s secret should have been the central plot in a brother-centric episode, alas their story was crammed into a handful of short Sam and/or Dean scenes and the reveal itself was pretty anti-climactic. It left me hugely dissatisfied and frustrated.
I had the same problems with Heaven and Hell, where Dean’s post-hell storyline was largely overshadowed by the angels-versus-demons plot. Even if The Rapture was simply the opening act in a three-part finale, with (hopefully) plenty of time left to explore Sam and Dean, it’s not exactly promising that they started that finale off by sidelining the main characters. Given the fact that the apocalypse is looming around the corner and that Lilith, Ruby, Castiel and other recurring characters are likely to crash the party in the next two episodes as well, there is only limited space for character exploration as it is.
Dean: "You’re scaring me, man."
Sam: "I’m scaring myself."
Sam’s main theme in this episode was his addiction to Ruby’s blood and his growing inability to control his needs over a longer period of time. He is restless, snappish and desperate throughout the episode, withdrawal symptoms increasingly affecting his behaviour, when Ruby goes AWOL and doesn’t provide him with his regular dose of blood. While his withdrawal symptoms were to be expected, his sudden failure to even exact a simple exorcism was a surprising development though.
We know from Sam’s conversation with Ruby in Heaven and Hell that Sam didn’t drink any blood in between Metamorphosis, where he officially decided to stop using his powers, and It’s The Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester, where he exorcised the powerful ancient demon Samhain. However, Sam didn’t show any withdrawal symptoms during that time period, and he obviously had no problems to control his powers after such a long time without a new boost either. So, even if we assume that Sam didn’t get any new blood from Ruby since last week’s events, the rapid decrease of his powers seems a bit odd. I wonder if that’s an after-effect of his massive blood loss in Jump The Shark or inherent to the addiction itself, i.e. Sam needing more and more blood in shorter intervals to achieve the same result.
It’s interesting that Ruby left Sam hanging, knowing full well that he would go into withdrawal, and I wonder if that was a deliberate move on her part in order to demonstrate her power over him or if she had other reasons to not respond to Sam’s call. If the first was the case, I am not sure if that move didn’t backfire. She had to know that theoretically Sam is able to satisfy his needs with any demon and that his dependency on her specifically is endangered as soon as Sam realises that. So, it would be in her own interest to cater to his needs herself, unless she already reached her goal and feels that she doesn’t need to be at Sam’s beck and call anymore, finally revealing her true face.
In that light I had a disconcerting thought: The one interesting detail that I drew from Jimmy’s plotline was the emphasis on the fact that in order to be possessed by an angel, a chosen human needs to have a certain blood compatibility. The repeated insistence on that point made me think that it bears a possible significance for the mytharc. After all, Lucifer is a fallen angel as well, and maybe it needs a special vessel in order for him to manifest on earth once the seals are broken. The horrible conclusion to that thought would be that maybe Sam’s new blood make-up provides just the right combination for Lucifer to set up shop in his body. This speculation opens the possibility that Ruby worked with Lilith all along, preparing Sam for her plans. While at first glance this seems to contradict Lilith’s (weak) efforts to kill Sam, it could be an elaborate scheme to set up a feigned antagonism between her and Ruby, designed to make Sam trust her more easily. Only time will tell, I suppose.
Anyway, the scene where Sam finally loses control, succumbs to his addiction and feeds on a demon in front of Dean and Castiel, is extremely disturbing, and I find it regrettable that the writers thought it would be necessary to resort to this form of graphic gore to hammer the point home, how far gone Sam is. I think there’s a limit to what the show should visualise, if they don’t want the audience to lose any ability to relate to the main characters. To completely lift the visual barriers between the monsters of the show and the hero of the story is a questionable move in my opinion. However, the scene was clearly set up as a visual reference to the scene in Metamorphosis, where the rougarou Jack Montgomery lost his fight against his need for human flesh and sealed his fate by feeding on the hunter Travis. It was Jack’s death that convinced Sam back then that using his powers was playing with fire and that he needs to stop. Now, he finds himself in the same situation, thinking that he could control his need, only to find that in the end his need controls him.
It has to be said though that while it is clear that Sam’s addiction is extremely detrimental to his physical and mental health, the end result of his action once again proved to be beneficial, as he instantly uses his power to save Jimmy’s wife. Throughout this season so far it was demonstrated that the only danger that arises out of Sam’s powers is to Sam himself, rather than others, and that Sam’s initial motivation to "take the curse and make something good out of it" still stands firmly beside his need for revenge. Still, the question remains, if there will be a turning point for him that will negate all the good he has achieved so far. Did he ultimately play into the hand of the enemy by his desire to use his powers for good? I really hope we will get some definite answers in regard to Sam powers in the finale.
Dean: "What do you want me to say? That I am disappointed. Yeah, I am. But mostly I am just tired, man. I’m done. I’m just done."
Dean is in a completely different state of mind in this episode than Sam, and I think the opening dream sequence with Dean fishing at a pond is very telling in that regard. First of all, it’s comforting to see that Dean is finally able to leave his nightmarish dreams of hell behind, maybe not always, but at least sometimes. But while the scenery feels peaceful and Dean seems content, he is also alone and cut off from anyone and anything. His life has been incredibly burdensome lately, and it’s understandable that he feels the need to withdraw and find his way back to the simple things in life. His statement to Sam that he remembers the time when things were as easy as 'saving people, hunting things' just serves to drive the same point home as the dream sequence. Dean still feels burned out, exhausted and is fed up with the constant pressure on him.
His resigned reaction to the reveal that Sam drinks demon blood in order to boost his powers plays into the same tired sentiment and resonates convincingly with his disillusioned stance about Sam in Jump The Shark. I think that Dean had already concluded from Sam’s avoidance tactics that his brother is hiding something especially horrible and even if he couldn’t picture the exact circumstances, the reveal itself is hardly more shocking than any of the other hits he had to take these last couple of months. Still, his genuine worry about Sam and the instability of his powers earlier in the episode and the fact that he instantly sets up a plan to contain Sam for his own good, as soon as the truth is out, shows that his statement that he doesn’t care anymore is partly a front.
Dean does care - he just stopped believing that Sam trusts him enough to confide in him or that Sam is willing to take Dean’s brotherly advice or ask him for help. Sam’s "let me at least explain" is too little, too late. He stretched his brother’s patience thin and finally forced Dean’s hand. While I am not convinced that locking Sam up is ultimately the best course of action, especially since Sam so far didn’t exhibit any signs of being a danger to humanity and restraining him will only serve to fuel his conviction that he is in this alone and that nobody is able to relate to his side of the story, I can also understand that Dean and Bobby feel that they have no other choice.
Back in S2 Dean made a promise to save Sam, come hell or high water, and that’s what he is attempting right now. His instincts tell Dean that the powers are evil, and he has now first hand experience of the lengths Sam will go to justify the pursuit of his course. I don’t think Dean is foremost concerned of the danger Sam might pose to others, he is more afraid of losing his little brother for good and failing his promise to protect Sam again. From his perspective he gave Sam every opportunity to come clean and even made a valiant effort to stop being completely hostile where Sam’s powers are concerned, but his brother pushed him away time and again, strengthening Dean’s belief that a dialogue with Sam is impossible. Instead Dean resorts to more radical measures to bring his brother to his senses, presumably by forcing Sam into a demon-blood withdrawal treatment by locking him up at Bobby's. The success of that operation seems highly questionable though.
Jimmy: "I was confused. I was completely delusional. And I thought that God was calling me to something. And I thought it was important. And I was wrong. Heaven, hell, none of that matters."
We already knew from Castiel’s statement in Lazarus Rising that Jimmy was a willing vessel for the angel, so the fact that he was driven by his faith and the belief that he had been chosen by God for a holy mission was hardly a surprising point in his story. Still, it was interesting to see that the reality of the experience shattered his beliefs and in the end he came to regret his decision, realising that he sacrificed his family for an illusion. Even though Jimmy can’t remember much from his possession, it’s obvious that the presence of the angel was anything but a peaceful or spiritually uplifting exprience, and it’s easy to see how that would affect his faith. Anyway, while I thought that Jimmy’s story was too drawn out and the gist of it could have been told in a fraction of the time spent on it, it at least showed a lot of parallels to both Sam and Dean.
Sam, too, was thrown into a crisis of faith after meeting the angels for the first time. The discrepancy between his expectations and the reality tested his faith considerably and in the following months this disconnect only increased. The other parallel between Jimmy and Sam is that both their destinies are bound to a particular characteristic of their blood. As mentioned before, it was repeatedly emphasised that Jimmy was chosen because "it is in his blood" and given the importance of blood for the demonology in the show, it opens another disturbing similarity between demons and angels. While I am not necessarily convinced that my theory about Sam serving as a vessel for Lucifer is correct, it would strengthen this particular parallel between Sam and Jimmy.
The obvious parallel between Jimmy and Dean is that both have been chosen by the angels to aid their cause. Jimmy came out of that experience a broken man and in the end sacrificed himself for his daughter’s sake, foregoing the peace of his soul for an eternity of suffering as a vessel. His alliance with the angels brought him nothing but grief and I wonder if that’s foreshadowing Dean’s fate as well. He might not enter into his alliance with the angels as blindly as Jimmy did, but he still has to put a certain level of trust in them and it might as well be that this trust is just as displaced as Jimmy’s was. Still, ultimately Jimmy realised that family was more important than angels, holy missions, heaven or hell and I think (hope) that will prove true for Dean in the end as well.
What else was noteworthy:
(1) Castiel’s secretive and nervous demeanour at he beginning of the episode, as well as the mysterious battle that seemed to have taken place between the angels, suggests that something major is brewing on the angel front. My first assumption was that the loyal angel faction forced an open confrontation with the Lucifer supporters amongst them, but that wouldn’t necessarily explain why Castiel was so secretive about the issue, since Dean already knows about the rogue angels, or why he would order Dean to come to the battle site.
The other reasonable assumption would be that Castiel was about to warn Dean about something - maybe the same something that Chuck saw in his terrible vision at the end of The Monster At The End Of This Book - and that the destruction Sam and Dean witnessed in the derelict building where they found Jimmy was simply the result of the fight between Castiel and the angels that forced him to leave his vessel and return to heaven. This assumption is supported by Castiel’s final words to Dean: "I’ve learned my lesson. I serve heaven. I don’t serve man, and I certainly don’t serve you." Whatever Castiel wanted to tell Dean, it seems he had rather Dean’s benefit in mind than the angels’. It will be interesting to see how long Castiel is able to follow the orders he obviously received. It makes me wonder though why Castiel’s superiors allow him to stay on earth, if they perceive him as such a liability. In any case, the obviously harsh lesson Castiel was subjected to, in combination with Jimmy’s less than uplifting story, leaves me with the uneasy feeling that the angels' plans are more sinister than I suspected or at least that they don’t necessarily have the best intentions where Dean is concerned.
(2) I was majorly annoyed with Anna's completely useless appearance in this episode. Not only is her condescending tone at Dean's flirtatious but affectionate greeting rude and uncalled for, but she also comes off as arrogant and overbearing when she blames the brothers for Jimmy's disappearance. She doesn't offer any deeper insight into Castiel's vanishing act and shows no willingness to help the brothers to save Jimmy, although her angelic powers surely give her an advantage over Sam and Dean, as she would easily have been able to 'teleport' to Jimmy and get him to safety in a fraction of the time the brothers needed to reach him. So, all in all her appearance was utterly pointless and didn't exactly endear the character to me.
In conclusion: I really wished the episode had made an effort to achieve more of a balance between Sam and Dean’s story and that of Jimmy and his family instead of sidelining the main characters completely. I am sure, I would have enjoyed the episode a lot more that way. As it is, The Rapture is one of the weakest episodes of the season for me and I can only hope that the next two episodes make up for the negligences of this week’s instalment in the series. In any case the set-up at the end of the episode makes me extremely anxious for the future of the brotherly relationship. I am pretty sure I will get my heart severely broken, well, what’s left of it anyway.