In what has become something of a thing for this show (with the notable exception of last year's premiere, of course), Supernatural's newest season picks up exactly where the previous season left off, this time of course deep within the bowels of sepulchral St. Mary's, where the corpses of Ruby and Lilith rapidly cool in pools of their own blood while Our Intrepid Heroes cling to each other like the frightened little boys they are at the moment as Lucifer himself barrels upwards from the depths of Hell, borne upon a pillar of brilliant white light.

Our favorite Ginormotron Antichrist and Stumpy Little Bow-Legged Lamb Of God finally snap themselves out of their Satan-induced terror to flee, but Lucifer (I think -- I mean, I'm pretty sure) slams the doors on their pretty, pretty faces and proceeds to blast their eardrums with a bit of that shrill angelic sweet talk until Sam and Dean suddenly and inexplicably find themselves bodily yanked from the convent to cringe in a pair of coach seats on a Baltimore-bound jet that just as suddenly starts diving towards the ground when Lucifer's pillar of light erupts into the night sky, and Dean is never, ever going to get over his fear of flying, now is he? Poor Dean.

Of course, Our Dear Boys make it to the ground safely off-screen during the new, Raoul-approved title card ("EEEEEEEEEEEEE!"), and their first mission upon renting a douched-up Avis sedan is -- also of course -- to find out what happened to My Sweet Baboo during his finale showdown with Chuck's guardian archangel. Alas, when they reach the prophet's, Chuck has little choice but to inform them that his archangel "smote the crap" out of Castiel, who exploded like a "water balloon of chunky soup." Dean, naturally, is pissed to learn of his heavenly boyfriend's most untimely demise, and so quite expectedly gets mouthy when Zachariah arrives with a couple of whiteboy Motown backup singers to commence with The Apocalypse and whatnot, and it's all terribly uncomfortable in the extreme for everyone involved, so Our Intrepid Heroes quickly bail on the entire unpleasant situation in order to motor on over to yet another of Sucky John's many, many still-extant self-storage units in search of St. Michael's Sword, which their worthless bastard of a so-called father evidently acquired several years ago.

One problem: The ultimate archangel's ultimate weapon is Dean himself, which they learn when Zachariah And The Pips pop in for yet another terribly uncomfortable tête-à-tête. Yep, not only was Dashing El Deano destined to be the righteous man who broke the first of Lucifer's sixty-six seals, thereby setting this whole damn Apocalypse in motion in the first place, and not only is Dashing El Deano destined to be the person who ends up stopping Lucifer somehow at some undetermined point in the future, he's also St. Michael's "angel condom" -- that is, the predetermined human vessel St. Michael's to occupy if and when St. Michael decides to drop down to earth for a visit. Dean's having none of this crap, so it's quite fortunate for him that My Reconstituted Baboo flutters in from points unknown to tear Zachariah And The Pips several new ones. Seems the same unnamed force that ripped Sam and Dean from the convent at the top of the hour also kindly took the time to patch the blown-up balloon of chunky soup back together again, so Our Intrepid Heroes still have The Angel Of Thursday on their side for whatever's going to go down this season.

In other news, a sodden alcoholic named Nick agrees to host Lucifer for the duration. Also, Bobby's probably never going to walk again. Ooops.

Discuss this episode in our forums, then see who vlogger Sean Crespo thinks the brothers should be battling in No Prior Knowledge!