I was pretty bored with the episode too. I seriously dislike Metatron and Crowley's mom, and Cas' "daughter" doesn't do much for me either.

Dean was looking mighty hot though.

With you about Metatron. I do think writing plays a part though, he's just one facet of the continual process on the show where anything that was once majestic or otherworldly gets ground down to human-scaled, tawdry and boring. See also: demons, angels, leviathans, reapers, and the afterlife in general. So far Death himself has managed to avoid it, but there's still at least a season and a half to go.

Notice how they forgot that angels' vessels were virtually indestructible to anything other than forces brought to bear by another such being? In earlier seasons Dean wouldn't have been able to hurt a run-of-the-mill demon by punching it, let alone an angel.

I love CrowleyMom's accent, but am similarly bored with that character. I just don't see the point of her.

As for Metatron, in the beginning, I thought Curtis Armstrong was great but the character is so poorly written, and the 'persona' is so static, there is no development to find interesting.

For me, Crowley's mom, Claire for Cas, and Metatron for Dean and Sam, just feel so much like busy work. I'm glad Claire got addressed, but I don't know how much I want her sticking around, Metratron continues to be a fuckton of annoying, and Crowley's mom, I don't know why he hasn't killed her and is letting her run amok through his home when supposedly she's a prisoner. I'm not buying latent familial bonds because 1) DEMON! and 2)sounded like she was a shite mom when they were both human. Yet, of these three, Mom annoys me the least, oddly. Maybe because the actress is fun to watch as she traipses around being naughty. I thought for a moment that she was going to be petty and cut up all of Crowley's ties for spite. Maybe my issues with her are explained in that Crowley is still affected by the human blood he was dosed with?

And, I fcr one think that Cas should track down Amelia's ass and confront her about abandoning her kid. That shit is not on and shouldn't be swept under the rug as a done deal.

When Dean showed up for Cas and Sam's conversation about him and started talking about how he'd never thought he'd be a killer, or something to that effect, I had to pause. Wasn't there an ep in season 6 or thereabouts with the truth spell and Jo where he talked about how that's exactly what he was?

I've been trying to figure out Crowely's purpose now on Show. Originally he was a Big Bad figure, but since his elevation to King of Hell he's sunk further and further from that position. He pops by to chat with the guys whenever, they summon him when they need to talk to him, he helps them find information they need... And Rowena scampering around over-enunciating as though she's acting onstage and leading Crowley by the nose only makes him seem even weaker. And the weaker he is the less worthy a foe he is for the Winchesters.

At first I was willing to be sympathetic towards Claire because truly her life has sucked beyond the telling of it. But at this point she is just proving herself as stupid as a box of hair, and so I have no patience for her.

Claire maybe stupid but seriously, Cas, letting a 15 year old go wandering off wherever? What sort of plan is that.

Metatron is just annoying to me. I am still kind of hoping that Rowena has some sort of evil plan, possibly involving the First Blade. I agree that Crowley putting up with her has something to do with residual humanity. Hmmm, I wonder if Crowley's humanity and Dean's Mark if Cain demony could be resolved together somehow.

and I must confess that I didn't recognize the mystery lady, who is she?

The one with Evans?

Tessa! Best reaper ever!

Oh! How could I have not recognized her!

The episode being dedicated to someone hit me hard.

I don't think I understand why Crowley does anything that he does anymore. And quite aside from my general Metatron issues, springing him briefly from angel-jail to drop a couple of cryptic hints seems pretty pointless.

It was a crap episode and I found myself thinking that it wasn't up to ita's standards. and the dedication at the end was kind of ...like you said, -t, hard. In my mind I filled in ita's name instead.