Vampires and ghouls and Djinns, Oh my!
This episode starts with one of the other world hunters, Maggie, on her first solo hunt in Claremore, Oklahoma (If you recall, she was the one who was murdered and then brought back by Lucifer last season). Decked out with the bunker’s newest body cams, she rushes into a mausoleum to confront what she believes to be a ghoul but is quickly overmatched and knocked out. Roll Titles.

Back at the bunker, Sam is in full leader mode again and is clearly burning the candle at both ends. Between teaching the new recruits and managing all the hunter’s cases, he is barely sleeping (and Dean is starting to notice). When Maggie misses her mandatory check-ins (one of Sam’s new policies) and does not answer her cell, they check out the body cam footage (which conveniently uploads straight to the bunker’s server) to figure out what happened. After viewing the footage and seeing her attacked by a pale-white old man, they decide to investigate. They check out the mausoleum but are interrupted by the groundskeeper. This time, their cover story is being from the historic preservation society (a nice change from their usual FBI routine).

He takes them to the house to speak to the owner and there are greeted by an enthusiastically friendly man who is excited to have the house preserved. However, he expresses his confusion that there would be four HPS employees working on it. They enter a side room and are greeted by none other than Mary and Bobby who are also looking into Maggie’s disappearance (yay, the family is back together again). After a few veiled comments (with respect to the fact that there was a person in the room who did not know about the supernatural world) between Bobby and Sam that boiled down to “why the heck didn’t you check in so this kinda stuff doesn’t happen?” “Because we don’t have to listen to you because you’re an idjit, you idjit!”. Sam takes Mary out of the room so they can talk more freely while Dean stays behind. When Dean asks the kindly man how long the house has been in his family that he reveals he is notthe owner, just the owner’s nurse.

In the hallway, Mary tells Sam that Maggie was nervous about her first mission and had been texting them the whole time for guidance. When she stopped responding, Mary and Bobby came out to investigate. She acknowledges that they should have told them about their showing up, but she is interrupted by Dean’s call. They rush upstairs and find that the owner is catatonic and hooked up to life support, even though this is the same man who attacked Maggie in the video. Meanwhile, Maggie is chained up to the ceiling somewhere, holding on consciousness as her blood is intravenously drained.

Back in the upstairs bedroom, the nurse tells our heroes that Mr. Rawlings (the owner of the house and mausoleum) had a stroke and has been on life support for some time now. Just at that moment, Mr. Rawling’s daughter Sasha comes in. She is less than enthusiastic about a bunch of strangers being in the house and it is clear there’s no love lost between her and her father. Sasha ends up getting overwhelmed and ordering all four of them away.

The team regroups outside and is at a loss for what this monster could be as the tests for a ghoul came back negative. Bobby so is upset over this case being so difficult that he impulsively and hurtfully calls out Sam’s leadership, saying that Maggie was not ready for something like this and if Sam was a real leader he wouldn’t have let her go on her own. Mary heads off any potential confrontation by breaking off the group; she and Sam go off one way and Dean and Bobby go off another. Out in the woods, Mary tells Sam that she sees how hard he has been working and that he is an amazing leader. Sam notes that Bobby and Mary have been getting “closer” since returning from Apocalypse World and Mary tells him that they were, but Bobby has pulled back and, as they are constantly out hunting, stalling any romantic possibilities. Sam reminds her that when you are closed off, there is probably a back story there, and if she really cares about him she should figure out what it is. They then come across some fake identifications that have been burned in a fire pit and that leads them to suspect that they belong to a hunter (though, not one of theirs). Meanwhile, Dean and Bobby are investigating in the other direction. Dean tells Bobby how hard Sam has been working and that he is nearly killing himself trying to do everything all at once. After a bit, they come across a hunting shack and find a hidden body. As Dean approaches it, he is suddenly attacked by Mr. Rawlins. Dean stabs him with a knife and the old man instantly disintegrates into Dust. Bobby then enters the shack, having not been there for the attack.

Back in the house, Sasha hears a strange noise in the attic, but before she can get there to investigate, she is attacked by a vampire (what?!). Sam and Mary come back to the house and find the woman visibly distraught. They then admit that they are hunters, and that there is something bad in this house that they are after. Dean then returns, and they discuss what they found in the woods and in the shack and verify that the body and the I.D’s belong to the same person. Mary askes where Bobby is, and Dean said that he had to get something out of the car; She leaves to go find him. The boys try to figure out what could appear as a ghoul and a vampire and Mr. Rawlings and they think it may be some sort of manifestation that Mr. Rawlings is creating in his coma (they’ve experienced reality benders before, after all). Sasha completely scoffs at the idea that her comatose father could be psychic (or any of that Supernatural stuff). Sam then asks why someone like Mr. Rawlings would manifest a vampire to scare his own daughter. Sam decides to check out the attic to see if there is something that someone does not want them to find.

Meanwhile, Dean takes this time to talk with Sasha. She reluctantly tells him that her dad was never there as he was always busy with work; she also blames him for not being home, being emotionally distant, and for her having to be the one to find her mom’s body after she committed suicide. Dean advises her to let it go and she will feel lighter (Great advice Dean, let’s take that one to heart okay?). Back upstairs, Sam enters the attic and finds Maggie chained up and unconscious. He releases her, but they are promptly attacked by a vampire. Sam attacks it, causing it to disintegrate and he then turns to comfort Maggie, telling her he will get her home. Somewhere outside, Bobby has a confrontation with his son Daniel (who should not be alive, let alone in this particular universe). Daniel’s eyes are hollowed out from Angelic smiting and he beats and taunts Bobby, eventually stabbing him with an angel blade and pinning him to a tree. Just as Daniel is about to deliver the killing blow, Mary shoots him and draws his attention. As they are fighting, Bobby frees himself and, apologizing, stabs his son with the blade, causing him to disintegrate into dust like all the others.

Back in the house, Dean enters Mr. Rawlings room and he stares at the life-support setup in confusion because there is no reason for a comatose old man to need a blood transfusion. Finally, everything clicks into place and he flashes back to when he saw a similar setup. He attempts to get Sasha safely out of the room by asking her to make him a sandwich (really writers? That’s what we are going with!?). She objects at first (you go girl!), but eventually clues in to Dean’s true motive. Once she leaves the room, Dean pulls a gun on the nurse who is revealed to be a Djinn that has upgraded by Michael’s experiments. Not only can he trap people in their dreams like a regular Djinn, but he can now read people’s minds and bring their fears to life (which is why Maggie saw a ghoul, Sasha saw a vampire, and Bobby saw his dead son). Dean had recognized the setup from back in season two (episode 20) when Dean had been a victim of a Djinn (and the first appearance of a Djinn in the show). Michael had ordered him in wait and to be a trap for any hunters that happen to come by (I love seeing the little divots of Michael’s plan unfolding). He knows he can’t damage “Michael’s favorite meat suit”, but he decides to see what is going on in Dean’s head and see what fears he can manifest. The Djinn starts to read Dean’s mind, but his satisfied smile suddenly turns to shock and horror (Dean has some… interesting memories to be sure). Dean takes advantage of the information overload to get the upper hand on the Djinn and beats him with a heavy bookend. Before dying, the Djinn reveals that he not the only trap set out by Michael and that there are dozens of other creatures out there hunting the hunters. In response to this delightful news, Dean gives the dead Djinn a gift of 5 bullets to the head, for good measure.

Back at the bunker, the team (and Maggie in particular) are enthusiastically welcomed back. Mary patches up Bobby in the infirmary and we finally get the tragic back story of apocalypse world Bobby. Bobby was a unit commander during the angel wars and his son (who was under his command) was captured and killed (and possibly worse) when they were separated. Of course, Bobby blames himself and he is wracked with guilt because he never found out what really happened. Mary comforts him (come on, just kiss already!) and they decide to go up to Donna’s cabin for a few weeks while Bobby is healing. Before they leave, Bobby apologizes to Sam for what he said earlier in the episode. In this week’s mandatory BM scene, Dean reveals his growing frustration with the fact as soon as he starts dealing with things and feeling “normal”, something like this reveals more of Michael’s plans and it drags him back down again. Sam assures him that they will figure out how to kill Michael and they will deal with everything together.

This was an okay episode. Nothing of note happened to progress the plot, but we did get a solid monster of the week episode again. I am growing frustrated that the writers revealed my baby (Jack) could be dying, but then go two episodes without any follow up. Where were he and Cass during this case anyway?! All in all, not a bad episode, but it left me wanting more. Next week, the return of a familiar face.