Supernatural - Episode 8.03 - Heartache – Recap/Review

Recapping a recap? So not going to happen.

Now – Minneapolis, Minnesota

Dude is jogging at night with earphones in. Person is jogging behind, passes that guy like he’s running for his life and then stops in front of him some ways down the path. “Congratulation, you’re fast.” First guy says to second. “I do a lot of cardio.” Second guy says as he rips original guy’s heart out.

Dean is checking his phone and finds this case with an additional one six months ago. Dean is a little less than happy with Sam that he’s at a farmer’s market and is certain that they’ll find Kevin but meanwhile innocent people should not be put on the backburner because Sammy is shopping. Dean and Sam go to the local PD dressed in suits so I’m guessing FBI again. They have second guy on tape but not on tape killing first guy so they don’t think he did it. Sam and Dean are a little less convinced so they go talk to Paul (second guy) who says he ran past first guy and never saw him again. Sam questions the fact Paul was able to outpace first guy but Paul tells them that he was scared straight by his heart problems last year.

At a diner, Dean tells Sam that he found nothing in Paul’s apartment and Dean finds a fourth vic in the Ames, Iowa part of Minneapolis. A police officer has been arrested in the murder which occurred two days after the third. Both guys alibi out for the other murder. The accused murderer is chanting in a language neither boy understands. Dean tries the ever popular tact of asking louder then Sam tries – same result nothing. Dean calmly tells the suspect he’s going to pour holy water on him, does, and nothing happens. Back to the loud questioning with no responses. Later that night, their suspect is still chanting before he pulls a makeshift knife from under the bed and stabs himself in the eye.
Sam has the chant on tape but neither can make heads nor tails of it until Dean tries a translation app. Language unknown. Sam answers the phone and gets the information of the suspect severing his optic nerve with part of the bed frame. Dean notes the different colored eyes and finds out it was transplanted and that was the eye Arthur tried to remove. Back at the hotel Sam pulled Paul’s medical records and finds he also had a transplant a year ago. Sam also puts forth the idea that the language is dead so he e-mail the translator from last season’s (Amazon episode). Dean suggests they get on the road to Bolder Colorado incase the cycle truly is repeating itself.

As a man propositions a stripper in the alleyway, one gets the feeling the boys are going to be to late. And yep! But this time the girl pulls out the guy’s heart. Dean shares some awkward car conversation with Sam then tells him he gained perspective that he’s at his best “driving down crazy street” with Sam. The doctor gets back to Dean and confirms that all the murders are from Brick Holmes who was a quarterback who was at the top of his game for “like a million years.” And donated eight organs – but none of them to Colorado.

The stripper starts a chant that sounds like a calmer version of Arthur’s over her vic’s heart and the room starts to shake, black smoke goes into her chest, and her eyes glow red.


Sam and Dean drive to talk to the mother of Brick Holmes. Sammy spouts out a lot of stats and his mother tells them that his fan didn’t seem to realize he was human. She doesn’t think he thought he was going to ever die. Dean asks how he drove off the side of a bridge. Sam mentions that no one knows much about Brick’s personal life. Never married, no new hobbies, definitely not the occult, and she tells them she has to go to a dedication for her son. “Son of a bitch, it happened.” Dean says when he sees that someone has had their heart ripped out. The stripper, Rana walks down the stairs and tells the mother that Brick’s heart now beats in her and threatens the mother for the yet unexplained magic.

Sam lies his ass to the professor and learns that Arthur was mumbling in Ancient Mayan to the god Maize. As his name might suggest, he was the god of corn. Dean e-mailed the Phoenix police about another transplant and they haven’t heard from him for days. Dean is less than happy to see Sam applied for admissions at some university.

Dean and Sam look thru Brick’s house. Dean finds lots of peroxide. Sam finds his mother’s clothes in his closet to which Dean suggests Brick and his mother were sleeping together. Dean finds a hidden room, enters it, and finds a room full of trophies and equipment for a ton of different sports. Sam suggests that Brick was a collector. Dean finds a lot of love letters to a Betsy from a long time ago to now from when he was on the road with a wide variety of sports teams all to Betsy. Sam pulls up the photos of the guys names on the trophies and finds that Brick Holmes has been all of these men going back 70 years.

Sam wonders how he could have pulled it all off. Dean provide the research that Cacao also the god of sports. The way they did sacrifices was to rip out an opponent’s heart and eat it. This way proves that Brick could have been over 900 years old. They find a photo of Brick from the 20s next to a woman named Betsy and guess that his “mother” was Betsy. They go to talk to her and she tells them that his Mayan name was Enu and he had made a deal with Cacao so he could be young forever with two sacrifices a year one for the planting and the other for the harvest. She played his wife and when she reached her 40s, his mother. She thinks that Brick could see the end for her and didn’t want to live without her and that’s why he drove off that bridge. Dean says that they have to deal with eight killers and Eleanor (Betsy) tells them that “the heart is key” and also tells her where to find Rana the stripper.

They investigate with flashlights and all the sudden the real lights turn on to reveal Rana who threatens to kill Eleanor once she’s thru with the boys. Paul and the guy from Phoenix hold Dean down as Rana straddles Dean and tries to show him his still beating heart. Sam pulls the guys away just enough so that Dean can stab Rana up thru the ribcage and into the heart. She dies with a big explosion of red light and passes out on the stage.

Eleanor tells them that she thought they would fail and Rana would have come after her and wishes them good luck. In the car, Dean tells Sam that he got the whole warrior thing Rana and Brick felt. Sam tells Dean that he wants to be done after they find Kevin and the tablet.

Flashback Sam calls to Amelia frantically and then the dog before finding Amelia in a meadow with a birthday cake for him. Back in the car, Sam mourns for better days.

So, how good was the direction on this episode, right? Congratulations to Jensen Ackles for a beautiful episode, visually and otherwise.