As a demon, Belphegor has never had Sam, Dean and Castiel’s full trust — nor ours. Right from the moment he opportunistically crept into Jack’s vacated body in the Season 15 premiere, we knew to be wary of Supernatural‘s newest addition. After all, despite his claim that he’s just a lazy demon who enjoys the status quo, why would a recently liberated creature from Hell go straight to the people who want to seal him away in it again?In the third episode of Season 15, Belphegor’s real aim comes to the surface and, with it, seemingly the end of his time on the show.
With the barrier that Belphegor set up to keep the escaped spirits confined to one small town crumbling, the group needs a more permanent solution. Rowena is doubtful her magic can provide one, which is when the “helpful” demon has a brainwave: Lilith’s Crook. As in, the thing that shepherds use to control a herd.
“When Lilith began sending demons off to Earth to do her bidding, there was little problem,” Belphegor details. “I mean, yeah, she commanded absolute loyalty in Hell but there was no guarantee that once her minions were topside that they wouldn’t just take advantage of the situation. She needed to control her flock. It could — can — retrieve all of Hell’s lost creatures and bring them straight back home.”
Castiel, standing in for the audience, questions why they’ve (we’ve) never heard of the relic before, to which Belphegor explains that it was enough for Hell’s rebellious rabble to just know that she ruled down there, while her successor, Crowley, had other forms of discipline of the more bureaucratic nature. The Crook — which is really more of a ram’s horn than a round-headed staff — is in Lilith’s chamber in Hell, which is now open thanks to God.
His plan is simple: sound the crook and call all the spirits, forcibly, back home. On top of this, Rowena says she might be able to seal the rupture once the spirits are inside of it with a spell of her own devising. Castiel pulls the short straw, accompanying the wise-cracking demon into the bowls of the Underworld. All the while, Belphegor does what those in Hell do best: torture the angel by scratching away at his fractured relationship with Dean. He also questions why Castiel is so irritated by the demon’s presence, to which Castiel tells him it’s because he’s wearing the face of someone he thought of as a son. “You’re an abomination.”Once they find Lilith’s chamber, it’s just a small matter of Castiel saying — no, singing — the Enochian song of praise that Lilith wrote for her master, Lucifer, that is etched into the Crook’s locked chest to open it. Castiel hesitates when Belphegor asks him to hand the relic over, which is when Ardat — the demon who hired Arthur Ketch to assassinate him — comes bursting into the chamber to do the job herself.
Coming to blows with Castiel, she lifts the lid on Belphegor’s real motivation: “I knew the second those doors flew open you’d be looking for a way to take power. […] Do you have any idea what he is?” A knife to the back cuts her off, but the cat’s out the bag. It turns out that the Crook isn’t just a whistle to recall the troops of Hell, it’s a ciphon through which to absorb all of the collective soul power. “Lilith, Crowley… they’re nothing,” a smug Belphegor gloats. “I’ll be a god! Or, close enough.”
He sounds the horn and its power starts to take effect, but Castiel takes his treachery as an excuse to finally smite the biggest thorn in his side — along with the Crook — even if it means messing up the plan and forcing Rowena to play the ultimate price instead.
For now, it looks like we may have seen the last of Belphegor, as well as, judging by the withered husk that was left of his body, Jack’s original form.
Airing Thursdays at 8 p.m. ET/PT on The CW, the final season of Supernatural stars Jensen Ackles, Jared Padalecki, Misha Collins, and Alexander Calvert.
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