She's a regular Martha Stewart, except for the devil worship.

Supernatural – Malleus Maleficarum
Unrequited love becomes vengeful witchcraft, which in turn leads Sam and Dean into a coven of suburban witches whose black magic is drawn from a much more sinister source. Photo © The CW.

Ahhh … Dean Winchester. My life is again complete. Although why the CW chose to pit this new ep against the Lost premiere is beyond me.

We open with a man and woman coming home from a party. The woman goes to brush her teeth, and we cut to an unknown figure casting a spell over a toothbrush. The woman’s teeth start falling out, and blood is pouring down her chin. Supernatural seems to have a boundless capability to gross me out. The woman dies, and her boyfriend is sad.

Sam & Dean pose as the CDC (what?) but the boyfriend, Paul, is evasive when questioned. Sam finds a hex bag, so the brothers realize they are dealing with a witch, and Dean is bummed because the problem with witches is that they’re human. No killing allowed.

We cut to a new character, Amanda, who arrives home looking sinister. She takes rotting meat out of her oven, and looks fondly at it. Apparently this is meant to imply that she’s a witch. Cut to Paul in a car, listening to “Every Rose Has Its Thorn,” eating a burger, and missing his dead girlfriend. Back at home, Amanda casts a spell over the rotting meat, and Paul’s burger turns into maggots. Gross! Paul chokes, but Sam & Dean save the day. At the same time, however, Amanda is slashed to bits by an unseen force. The bros break into her house and find another hex bag, and Dean has some choice lines, including “I hate witches, always spewing their bodily fluids everywhere” and, “A little witch on witch violence. Why are witches ganking each other?”

WHY do more people not watch this show?!?! Anyway, Sam thinks Amanda’s book club – Renee, Elizabeth, and Tami – is a coven. Which is true. But they use their powers for … not evil. Like winning raffles. Sam & Dean visit Elizabeth as detectives Bachman and Turner (nice), and she acts totally guilty.

Sam tells Dean the women have to be stopped, and Dean replies, “Stopped, stopped? They’re human, Sam.” But Sam doesn’t care. He tells Dean that he needs to become more like him so that he can survive once Dean is gone. Suddenly, the Impala breaks down and Ruby appears. She tells them to leave town because the witches serve a demon that is more than they can handle, but Dean refuses to trust her.

When they get back to the hotel, Dean starts spitting up blood. Sam can’t find a hex bag, so he goes to Elizabeth’s and realizes that Tami is the demon. Meanwhile, Ruby saves Dean’s life with some weird green liquid. Back at the ranch, Tami gets the upper hand and tells Sam they’ve been looking for him. He says he knows, he’s the chosen one, destined to lead a demon army. And this is where it really gets interesting…

Tami tells Sam that he’s not their Messiah; that they don’t believe in him. There is a new power rising “in the West,” and they want Sam gone. This is both ominous and kind of cool, that they would use that particular word. I know I'm a geek, but this is what Wikipedia has to say on the concept [my emphasis]:

In English today, it is used in three main contexts: in a Jewish context, it refers to the anticipated king of the Davidic line prophesied by Isaiah. In a general sense, it means any saviour or liberator of the world. Among Christians, it refers to Jesus of Nazareth.

"Liberator of the world" has a lot of potential if this show continues into a fourth season. Anyway, Dean & Ruby arrive and Ruby fights the demon. We learn that Ruby was once human; that she was a witch and therefore a servant to the Tami demon “around the time of the plague." Elizabeth does some sneaky magic that disables Tami momentarily and allows Dean to stab her with the demon-killing knife, but Tami takes Elizabeth down with her. There seems to be a lot more human death than usual in this ep.

Back at the hotel, lights flicker and Dean looks panicked. Ruby appears and they have as close to a heart-to-heart as is possible. She tells Dean that every demon was once human (this is something the Winchesters didn’t already know, which seems odd). Being in hell destroys their humanity. And yes, it will happen to him. Ruby admits that she cannot help save Dean, despite what she has told Sam. But she does want to help them; she is different from other demons because she remembers what it is to be human. And she wants Dean to toughen Sam up so that he will be able to fight in the coming war without his brother by his side.

IF this is to be the last season of Supernatural, which I can easily see because I don't think it's ratings are that great, I kind of want Dean to die in the finale. I’m a sucker for sad endings. Perhaps he could die but end up in heaven rather than hell, just to sweeten the deal. The rational side of me knows he probably will not die, although thus far the show has done nothing but tell us that he cannot be saved. No way, no how. According to TV Guide, we have three eps to go. This should be interesting…