One of the several things about this episode that pleased me is the reveal to Sam that Azazel ordained Sam and Jessica. It makes a terrible sense that the taste of safe was only ever an illusion. Losing that illusion leaves Sam with more guilt. Information from demons must be suspect though they can, I think, be counted on to deliver truth or lie with the most hurtful spin.

It’s a twist on learning, in 5.14 My Bloody Valentine, that Cupid brought about the John and Mary union. Dean reacted angrily (throwing a punch) to that illusion being broken. Again, it takes away the little he hadn’t already lost – leading to new views of Mary manifesting in Dean’s heaven memories of  5.16 Dark Side of the Moon. Here again, I don’t find angels more reliable than demons as providers of information, and I’m coming to count on the idea that angel interests don’t necessarily coincide with Dean’s.

What both do is tighten the noose around the boys and their illusions of free will.  Both boys are seeing new and deeper manipulations in the events that shaped them. Dean finally says his parents’ marriage wasn’t perfect until she died. I love the universal truth in that. What I wonder is whether that was a new revelation to him as he looked back. Is the acceptance genuine because it was always true and known/suppressed or because he recognized a new truth given the new perspective?

Does that even matter? Who benefited from the illusions? And who benefits from pulling aside the curtain? It would be interesting to me to see another reference to Jess after there’s been time for Sam’s understandings of her role to percolate. Of course, maybe that came first when we got a nightmare-ish Jess as Sam dreamed of Lucifer coming to him in her guise in 5.03 Free to Be You and Me?

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