The eighth episode of the season, “Hunteri, Heroici” is a silly little piece that basically gives the writers an excuse to tell us Sam’s schmoopy flashback story, which I don’t really care about because it is SO SCHMOOPY. Ugh. Why are Sam’s romantic storylines always so awful? He’s cute and smart and brave, he deserves a good love story, right? Sheesh.

So while I could care less about Sam in this episode, I am amused by the cartoon-y goings on, and the exaggerated Castiel as hunter trifle is amusing enough, and the local detective is good in her deadpan-ness. Not much else to say about this episode, but there are some good quotes which I have listed below:

Dean: “Cas, stop smelling the dead guy.”

Castiel: “I understand. The bird represents God, the coyote is man, endlessly chasing the divine, never able to catch him. It’s hilarious.”

Dean: “Oh okay, we’ll have a slumber party, braid Sam’s hair…”

Dean: “All right, let’s gear up. It’s wabbit season.” Castiel: “I don’t think you pronounced that properly.”

Episode nine, “Citizen Fang” goes dark, and even though we are still subjected to Sam’s schmoopy-ness, the joy of having a Benny episode eclipses it. I love Benny, so this one was a bummer, even though it was good stuff.

The brotherly angst is back in full gear in this one, with Sammy sending Crazy Martin to keep tabs on Benny out in Louisiana. Pretty sure Sam is holding onto a grudge with this move, and he is surprized when Dean agrees to head out to see if Benny is indeed drainin’ folks. Those of us who have a history of loving redeemed vampires (see: Angel) know that the apparent victims of Benny are most likely some kind of set-up.

Which, of course, it is. Some upstart vamp is looking to set up a nest, and is killing to get Benny to join him. Dean believes him, but Sammy and Martin are dubious, and Sam’s anger makes him choose Martin. Here’s the thing, Dean was the one mad at Sam for not looking for him when he disappeared into purgatory, and going off and having this schoompy relationship instead, and I guess Sammy is so heartbroken over Amelia choosing her long lost husband over him, that he takes it out on Dean? The thing is, this whole episode, Dean does nothing but talk up Sammy, while Sam questions Dean over and over. It’s so frustrating!

And as much as I’d like to be on Dean’s side on this one, his trick of sending Sam an SOS text from ‘Amelia’ to get him out of the picture is just mean. So neither one of them get out clean in this one. It makes for good storytelling, but makes me agitated. You know I like it when the brothers are on the same side. Meh.

A tight episode that gave us some good brotherly angst to keep us rolling through the winter. I really liked it, partly because of all the Benny goodness, and the Amelia stuff was low on the schmoopy meter. I have no idea what is coming next, as this was the episode that my DVR decided to ignore, and hulu doesn’t give us previews, which is just as well, because it’s nice to be surprized from time to time. Next episode airs this Wednesday, the 16th!