By John Keegan
Both brothers are challenged in terms of the lengths they will go to change Dean’s fate. In previous seasons, Dean would probably have been the one with questionable morals, or at the very least, the one willing to take chances with his own existence. The past year has forced Dean to consider what he has to live for, and with the war still escalating and Sam’s nature still in doubt. Saving Sam is not purely a matter of keeping him alive.
Sam, on the other hand, has allowed his desperation to save Dean to undermine his usual compassionate perspective. With a bit of time to reflect on the matter, it’s unlikely that Sam would have suggested that Dean endure an existence like that of Doc Benton. After all, would Sam really want Dean to have to replace worn or damaged organs and body parts to survive? And there was no guarantee that immortality would have saved Dean at all.
In the process, however, Dean managed to get one over on Bela, whose motivations were finally clear. Hopefully, Bela’s exit was not purely a response to fan pressure; fans should never have that much power, as it is inevitably abused by those with an extreme point of view. Instead, I would hope that Bela’s demise was a response to the writers’ inability to give her a solid and balanced role on the series. The potential was there, and the character has its place, but the writing staff never seemed to find it.
But the writers did manage to give her a logical exit, and it provided the link between Dean’s current situation and Sam’s competition for control of the demonic horde. In my opinion, Sam’s attitude about Doc Benton and Lilith’s interference adds to the long list of plot elements pointing to Sam’s decision, possibly in the finale, to assume the mantle of Antichrist. Sam’s character arc this season has been pointing in that direction for quite some time, and if they don’t go in that direction, the alternative will need to be equally compelling.
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