Note: Full spoilers for the episode follow.
The seventh season of Supernatural wrapped up with "Survival of the Fittest", an apt title when you look at who was left standing at the end of the episode.
"Carry On Wayward Son" launched us into the episode with a montage of what had happened earlier in the season. Using that song as the intro to each season finale is one of Supernatural's best traditions; the Leviathan storyline itself may have faltered this year, but the song managed to pick up some of the slack in raising the excitement level as the finale began. And for me the level of anticipation needed to be raised from about zero, so that was a very good thing. If the opening song wasn't enough old-school Supernatural for you, the return of the Impala was another great moment with "Born To Be Wild" blasting as Dean's car roared back into the action. It was a short-lived return since it was only used as a distraction, and Meg crashed it almost immediately, but they have fixed that car up from much worse accidents.
James Patrick Stuart as Dick Roman, head of the Leviathans, was the best element of the Leviathan storyline all season, and it was no different in the finale. The scenes of him hammering out the contract with Crowley (the excellent Mark Sheppard) were great; I loved the juxtaposition of modern businessman Roman working through old-school demon Crowley's contract that rolled out on the floor in a long scroll.
Although the Leviathans had been built up at the beginning of the season to be super-powerful villains, in the end, dispatching them wasn't all that difficult for the Winchesters and their allies, something that was a real flaw with the storyline. A simple distraction at the office and Sam and Dean were (apparently) easily into the building. Even chopping the Leviathan heads off didn't seem to be that difficult once the Winchesters discovered that a simple Borax solution would disable them. And although they had to gather a few supplies to make a weapon that would get rid of Roman, even that didn't turn out to be too difficult for them. As for the rest of Roman's plan, Crowley seemed to think that the rest of the Leviathans just needed to be rounded up and Kevin told Sam that they needed to blow up the lab. As unsatisfying as that was as a way to wrap things up, I will take it if it means that we don't need to do anything more with the Leviathans in the future.
All of that aside, where the Leviathans really missed the boat in being effective Supernatural baddies was that there was no sense of an emotional connection for the Winchesters, something that previous villains on the show have had in spades. Maybe the producers thought that having Castiel be the one to bring the Leviathans out of Purgatory would make it personal, but it didn't. The fact that Roman killed Bobby helped to give the Winchesters a direct connection, but even with that there was never the same sense of emotional high stakes that we have had in the past.
Crowley, on the other hand, did not disappoint. His sarcastic comments were great as usual, a favorite this episode being "text me when Sparkles here retrieves his marbles" after seeing the state Castiel was in. More importantly, Crowley behaved as a "proper psychopath": he betrayed all sides to his own benefit. He worked with the Winchesters to get rid of Roman and also managed to screw over Sam and Dean in the process while getting his minions to collect Meg.
Where the emotion was missing in the fight against the Leviathans, it was present in the goodbye to Bobby. I had not been a fan of the decision to turn Bobby into a ghost, but at least they made the gutsy decision to take that storyline to its proper ending, with Bobby recognizing that he was doomed to turn into a vengeful spirit unless Sam and Dean burned the flask that kept him from crossing over. Jim Beaver was an integral part of the Winchester family and he will be missed, but I was glad they said goodbye rather than ruining the character by having him hang around longer as a helpful spirit sidekick. The scene itself was nicely done - a somber, but not overly emotional goodbye.
I also appreciated the focus that was put on Castiel and his relationship with Dean. Misha Collins and Jensen Ackles have always been great together and while Collins put a new spin on the character of Castiel with his stream-of-consciousness thought process and inability to engage in the battle, his connection to Dean remained strong. "Nobody cares that you're broken Cas, clean up your mess" was a great line.
With a change on showrunners next season (Sera Gamble is out and Jeremy Carver is in) hopefully Supernatural can get back to how good it was a few seasons ago. They left things at a good spot, the betrayal by Crowley may not have been that surprising, he is a demon after all, but what he did was a shock. The weapon that killed Roman also tossed Dean and Castiel into Purgatory, leaving Sam bewildered and alone. Jared Padalecki did a good job conveying Sam's confusion and fear at what had happened. Purgatory was effectively creepy and Dean's predicament was only made worse when Castiel poofed away. That ending was the biggest success of the episode: where they left both Sam and Dean made me want to see what happens next. That is a major accomplishment after the tedious nature of most of the season.
Source : http://www.ign.com/articles/2012/05/20/supernatural-survival-of-the-fittest-review
