He was in Hell, he was undergoing unimaginable horrors, I don't think that his surrendering to avoid further suffering is unforgiveable. What I DO think is morally questionable is the rest of his confession, the "and I enjoyed it" part. I find that as chilling as Sam and the nurse.
I find it a more understandable and forgivable breed of morally questionable, though, as well as one that was textually acknowledged by the character as very much wrong and horrible. After 30 years of torture, I expect the power and channeling of rage into torturing others would be a head rush of the most viseral kind.
We've also not touched on the fact that the people Dean's sins were committed against were already dead and in Hell. Given that the demons devoted well over a century of subjective time to torturing both him and John in trying to fulfill that prophecy about breaking a righteous man, I'm not left with the impression that the place was particularly brimming over with undeserving people.
The emotional and metaphysical cost to the torturer is probably the same either way, but from a third party perspective it's a lot easier to forgive if it wasn't innocent people who were pleading for mercy.
The "Dayenu" line had me falling out of the chair.
I know, right?
Morgana, wikipedia explains it better than I could, I think. [link]
I missed that line entirely. Must rewatch. My life, so hard.
No one remembers what the Raphael actor was in before? It's making me itch. It's at the tip of my brain. IMDB is no help.
He didn't look at all familiar to me. But I loved his voice.
Without imdb I am useless. I want to know who he is, too.
Was the non-Raphael part of his character named Reggie Hull? If so, the actor is Colin Lawrence. And according to IMDB he was also in "Faith."
e.t.a -- nope, I got it wrong. See Polter-Cow's post below.
spoils self silly
Glad to hear that it sounds like it was a pretty good ep!
Pertaining to Dean and his flaws - whilst watching Season 2 of
True Blood,
I found myself suddenly hit by the appalled conviction that Dean Winchester is basically Jason Stackhouse, if Jason Stackhouse were raised to be a good little soldier and given 'defend your sibling' as his Number One Commandment, and 'protect the civilians' as his Number Two Commandment.
...I like to think that Dean is a bit smarter than Jason, and I'm still reeling in horror (because I do love Jason, in a reluctant oh-my-god-you-are-utterly-pathetic-and-kind-of-dangerous-but-oddly-endearing kind of way, much as one might feel about a baby rottweiler peeing on the carpet and then looking guilty about it), but - yeah. I can't help thinking it's true.
