This week on Supernatural, if you’ll pardon the expression, shit gets real. Hypable previewed Supernatural season 15, episode 17 “Unity,” so read on to find out more.
Supernatural sure has taken its sweet time to make headway into the boss battle. There are reasons why that the season has been paced the way it has – things it needed to achieve, messages it needs to hammer home, memories it needed to make – and I understand the why of that. But, as I wrote last week, the things we need to clean up were building and building with fewer and fewer moments left to achieve them.
But now? It’s on.
“Unity” sees Sam and Dean still at odds about the reveal that Billie’s plan to end Chuck (and Amara, as collateral damage) will not leave Jack alive. Jack is still determined, and so Dean accompanies him on a road trip with the purpose of completing the last ritual Jack needs to achieve Billie’s goal. Cas returns to the Bunker to find that Sam has stayed behind, burying himself in books in an attempt to find another way.
Guest star Emily Swallow was able to share a few teasers about where Amara is at right now in “Unity,” amidst our wider discussion of her experience on Supernatural (read our in-depth interview with Emily here) and after her initial meet-up with the Winchesters, her reunion with Chuck brings the reasoning behind episode’s title into clear relief. “Unity” is sorely needed between all parties in this episode, and the lack of it could lead to terrible things.
Spoiler Warning: This article contains generalized spoilers for Supernatural season 15 episode 17, “Unity.” If you do not wish to be spoiled at all, do not read this article in advance of the airdate.
The official synopsis for Supernatural season 15, episode 17 reads:
ONE WAY OR ANOTHER — Dean (Jensen Ackles) hits the road with Jack (Alexander Calvert) who needs to complete a final ritual in the quest to beat Chuck (guest star Rob Benedict). A difference of opinion leaves Sam (Jared Padalecki) and Castiel (Misha Collins) behind looking for answers to questions of their own. Catriona McKenzie directed the episode written by Meredith Glynn (#1517). Original airdate 10/29/2020.
If you want to know what to expect from this week’s Supernatural, here’s 10 teasers plus 15 single word clues from our advance viewing of Supernatural season 15, episode 17 “Unity.”
‘Supernatural’ season 15, episode 17 screener secrets
- This episode is full – like, really, really full, like, don’t blink, no bathroom breaks, no cellphone checking, no laggy livestream, glue your eyes to the screen full. There is pay-off of the season-long setups. There are brand new setups to boggle over. There are big definitive answers. There are big new questions. There will be shocks for some viewers, and satisfying “I knew it” moments for others. There is a very large volume of information and plot in this episode. That is in no way a bad thing – it’s checking- the-clock and saying “Whoa, I can’t believe how much we’ve just gotten and we’ve still got ten minutes?!” exciting-full, not “Oh my god, how do we possibly still have ten minutes..” dragging-full – think “Beat the Devil,” not “Family Feud.” Except for that because it is the real endgame, the impact is really unprecedented.
- It also has a bit of unusual structure, which serves that fullness well – it’s topped with various scene-setting elements in the first act, and it then becomes series of three vignettes, labelled for the core character of each track, and intentionally placed this way so that you get all the information from one track, then all the information from the second track, and then finally the third, rather than putting the pieces together about the episode’s consequences by cutting back and forth between various parties. All the tracks smash back together in the final ten minutes and Consequences Ensue.
- The promo pictures show that Jack and Amara meet in this episode, and Emily Swallow gave us a funny little teaser about that meeting. The reality is actually heart-warming – and a little heart-wrenching. It’s only a few beats, but Alexander Calvert, Emily Swallow, Meredith Glynn and Catriona McKenzie have spun me into a whole world of Auntie Amara fantasies based on this moment.
- Sam and Dean both give Jack some words of gratitude, praise, encouragement and pride about the sacrifice Jack is willing to make. Those are two very different conversations with some very different personal motivations and outcomes, but they’re each really special in their own way.
- Amara is a precious and noble soul, and she deserves the entire world. I love her, and I’m only partially saying this because she spends the whole episode dressed like Harry Styles, right down to the multiple pairs of leopard print boots. Since she calmed herself in season 11, her outlook about the world Chuck created has blossomed into something beautiful and we get to really delve on that here. I loved hearing her thoughts and feelings. She doesn’t deserve how her two best guys have been treating her.
- The teaser trailer showed us Adam – the Biblical Adam, not the half-brother Adam. He’s played by Alessandro Juliani of Battlestar Galactica fame, and he’s sort of… brilliant. He’s really interesting in a lot of ways, and visiting him is the focus of the Dean and Jack vignette. The woman you’ve seen in pictures and promos isn’t Eve, it’s Adam’s lover Serafina. They have been together for a very, very, very long time. Adam and Serafina are lovely and funny and chill and adorable, horny hippy-dippy weirdos, but there’s an old rage and a steel in Adam that hasn’t gone away, and there’s a moment it lights up in Juliani’s eyes where I was like “Oh, I entirely see how you and Tim Omundson’s Cain are related.” The fact that Serafina has stood by Adam, shared his anger and helped him make his plan also raises some fascinating questions.
- Speaking of things in people’s eyes, Jensen Ackles is absolutely mining his own resources to deliver some really incredible moments – faces, expressions, vocal tones that we have never seen from Dean before, and all that helps to signify how fractured he is by this point in the season. There are several great examples – particularly one where you see just it in his eyes, the panic and regret of not choosing differently a millisecond too late – but ultimately, all of Dean’s anger and fear and inability to come to terms with Chuck and trust his own sense of autonomy is going to come to a head, overtaking him and blinding him in a really shocking moment.
- We learn the ins and outs of the plan for Jack to die – what will actually happen to him that kills him – and the phrasing used to describe it, when placed next to the phrasing of some other ideas we hear a moment earlier from the same party, raised a few questions and both of my eyebrows about a potentially catastrophic catch. Alex Calvert is great in this episode, by the way – there’s a real change in Jack, a gravity and maturity that’s extremely sad.
- Sam’s biggest moments are hard to describe without being truly plot-spoilery, but let’s just say this: When Sam and Castiel are left alone together, the result is often some really truly reckless behaviour in the name of “finding a better way.” Without Dean’s objectonary oar stuck in, tempering them, both of them separately are liable to take massive personal risks and that gets exacerbated when they’re doing something important together without Dean’s knowledge. That is no exception here, and there’s a look they exchange where they both clearly know this is potentially a bad idea, but it is the best they have, so they push on. Sam’s resoluteness shines through at every turn in the episode – in what he believes is best for Jack, in his need for information, the plan he and Cas come up with, in what actually happens and who he faces when he executes that plan, alone and defenseless, and finally, in the moment of greatest need imaginable. He is so brave in this episode, and so terrified, and so reckless, and so smart under pressure.
- There’s a comment made by Chuck about Castiel – at a moment when Chuck truly has no reason to fabricate anything – that reveals or confirms the answer to a question about Cas that I personally have had for a very long time, and I think that many other fans have had as well, though some people may already feel firmly one way or the other. No, it’s not about the deal. No, it’s not about Dean – well, not directly. It’s a question that I’ve been asking about the fundamentals of Castiel’s whole being, since season 8, maybe, upon reflection, even since season 4.
Finally, have 15 random yet significant words from this week’s episode without any context whatsoever: Skittles, fans, courage, book, broken, spark, alive, crazy, scythe, gun, failure, fractals, tired, smile, Thursday.
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