Review of the Supernatural season 7 finale - 7.23 “Survival Of The Fittest” by sweetondean
Warning: Spoilers ahead!
See here’s the thing when dealing with Crowley, he will always find a way to bone you.
Supernatural season finales, is there anything as exciting and harrowing? I must admit I spent the whole week sweating on it. I’d managed to stay relatively spoiler free. I didn’t read any of the preview articles. I didn’t watch any of the preview clips. Then the Upfronts came along and I’m afraid I’m weak willed and couldn’t stay away from Jensen in that grey suit, shiny tie and hiatus scruff…so bam…suddenly I knew more than I wanted to know about where the brothers were going to find themselves at the end of “Survival Of The Fittest”. Between Mr Ackles and his extra tall buddy, apparently masquerading as Grizzly Adams, I was spoiled rotten; both in plot possibilities, prettiness and the wonderful visual of the boys voting with their 5th extremity. Thank you Jensen. That will forever be seared into my mind’s eye to muse over………………
What was I saying? Oh right. Finale.
So Saturday comes along (remember I’m an Aussie) and I wake up extra early, feeling slightly nauseated and in a flop sweat. The closer it gets to the time the more I’m overcome by a sense of dread. I mean I literally feel like I might throw up a little. I’m so concerned about Sam and Dean Winchester I’m having a minor panic attack! Is this normal? I know most of you would say, yes, yes it is and I know nearly everyone outside of my Supernatural family would say, no Amy it certainly is not, please get a life. Then I would explain to them how I have a life, rich with stories of love and loyalty, of brothers and family, of heroes and villains, of rising above expectations, of falling to temptation, of shiny black cars and the myriad of emotions and frailties that make up humanity and they would walk away shaking their heads as I grinned triumphantly! But I digress. I was so nervous before watching this finale I didn’t know what to do with myself. Then Carry On Wayward Son started and then I cried….
Posted May 20, 2012 at 2:11pm in Supernatural season 7 survival of the fittest 7x23 dean winchester Sam Winchester
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Review of Supernatural 7x 21…….. “There Will Be Blood” by sweetondean
Warning - Contains spoilers
So what, we keep going while he’s out there like this?
Do we have any other option?
After the sometimes baffling and very complex episode last week, this week we were served a pretty straightforward, let’s just get in there and set up the season finale kind of episode. “There Will Be Blood” laid a lot of ground-work for the big shebang and while on the surface it didn’t appear to be particularly action packed, for me it was a satisfying hour of television that seemed to be over only minutes after it begun. We were reintroduced to a couple of well loved villains, got more time with Dick and his creepy henchman Edgar, witnessed further disturbing developments with Bobby’s anger management issues and were party to some thoroughly enjoyable brotherly interactions that were topped off by Dean’s no junk food freak-out. I’m with you Dean, you don’t win friends with salad.
Though as a whole, I found this a mostly enjoyable outing, there were couple of moments that made me scratch my head and I might just get them out of the way up front before I move on. This episode was written by Andrew Dabb and Daniel Loflin who, throughout season 7, have not been able to recapture the lofty heights of previous work like, “Weekend At Bobby’s” and “Frontierland”. I feel like they’ve become all sizzle and not enough sausage, putting too much emphasis on the snappy one liners and witty pop culture references and not paying enough attention to the detail, and though I think this was possibly their best effort for the season, there were a couple of stinkers in there that made me want to grab them by the scruff of their necks and rub their faces in it. First up, how come Bobby could zap his way into the vampire house to scout it? The boys have been popping that flask in the car so they can slip away…a few feet if you go by the service station scene…to have a natter about Bobby going bad and yet he can zap practically across the street with no effort at all, flask still tucked into Dean’s spunky new leather jacket (I’ll get to that later). Bookdal and I had a little chat about this on twitter, surmising that maybe he’s learning, maybe he’s getting stronger, but it’s when your viewer is sitting there trying to connect the dots with maybes, you know you’ve had a fail. Now, if Sam and Dean had looked at each other with WTF faces and we’d found out that indeed Bobby can now zap without the flask, that would have been an awesome and powerful moment, because that would mean there’s no more stashing him…but alas…nup. The other thing that kind of bugged me was the little boy and the Alpha. Um, ok we know he’s a creepy monster and all but now I’m not entirely sure what else he is and I like him and I don’t much care for him having little boys around for nefarious reasons. That simply squicked me out. I know there was little girl twins in Dean’s confusing and never explained vamp dream and I know vamps are all about creating new families so they don’t live out eternity alone and then something about young pure blood, but wasn’t the Stockholm Syndrome chick enough? I think adding in a wee boy went too far up the ick meter and then caused the awkward, wait we’re not going without the kid scene followed by the even more awkward motel hallway scene where Dean explained what just happened to Sam even though Sam would’ve been standing right beside him at the time. Exposition much? It reminded me of Kripke lambasting himself for the exposition in the Pilot at last year’s Paley event. Lastly, let me just get this out of my system, I hated, hated to the power of a bazillion, the “See you next season” line. I hated it when Crowley said “…haven’t seen you all season” to Cass and I still hate it. Who says that? It’s not a natural way to speak and it was forced and awkward. We’re smarter than that. That was a great big clunky meta shout-out in the middle of a serious and dark moment and it made me want to bang Dabb and Loflin’s heads together. If the Alpha had simply said, “See you next time” that would’ve been cooler and creepier and we’d have still got it, the Alpha will be back. There are times for meta and that wasn’t one of them. It totally took me out of the moment and jarred me back to reality. Ok…I feel better. Moving right along…..
Posted May 14, 2012 at 6:46am in Supernatural There Will Be Blood dean winchester Sam Winchester
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Review of Supernatural 7x 21…….. “Reading Is Fundamental” by sweetondean
Warning: Contains episode spoilers.
The Angels, they don’t care. I think maybe they just don’t have the equipment to care. Seems like when they try, it just breaks them apart.
Supernatural is a complex show. It sounds pretty simple on paper, 2 brothers travelling the back roads of America, hunting monsters and saving the world, but any one who watches it knows that there is soooooooo much more to it than that. It’s a deeply layered story, rife with multi-faceted relationships, profoundly damaged characters and rich mythology. “Reading Is Fundamental” is a perfect example of the kind of show Supernatural can be. Layered, multifaceted and rich. One that sometimes leaves you not knowing how to feel, or feeling all the feelings, or flip-flopping between the two. This was an episode screaming to be dissected, if that’s your bag, and for the first time in a long time, I actually made notes….on my 3rd rewatch….because there was so much happening, I found it hard to keep track of it all. I will, of course, miss stuff. I always do. I never read anything before I write an episode up, but after that I go and read everything and half the time I wind up going, “Awww. Nuts!” because I’ve totally misread a situation or didn’t pick up on a nuance in a certain scene. I have a feeling “Reading Is Fundamental” is going to be one that makes me go, “Awww. Nuts!” a lot and probably loudly.
Ben Edlund wrote and directed “Reading Is Fundamental” and if you know anything about me, you know that I’m a massive fan of this man, his crazy brain and his brilliant writing. Edlund knows how to tell a story. This was the 21st episode of Supernatural he’s written and the 2nd one he’s directed. Looking back at Ben’s work, one thing jumps out, there’s always more to his episodes than initially meets the eye. Even with the funny ones there are layers upon layers and he manages to bring all those elements together without it feeling disjointed. Other writers on the Supernatural team don’t quite have the same level of skill. When they attempt this layering they somehow just miss the mark in making the whole thing feel cohesive and their episodes wind up feeling tonally disjointed. It’s one of the things I love most about Edlund’s work, that he can deliver complex narrative and still maintain cohesiveness in concept and tone. On some level “Reading Is Fundamental” was baffling, because it confronted us with changes in characters and relationships that we may not have been prepared for, but tonally it never waivered. The comedy, though still there, took a back seat to the guts of the story, which built momentum as the hour progressed. It’s an episode that’s in desperate need of a rewatch. If you got everything going down on the first pass through, you’re way brighter than I am….
Posted May 6, 2012 at 2:30pm in Supernatural 7.21 Reading Is Fundamental Sam Winchester Dean Winchester Castiel
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Review of Supernatural 7x20 “The Girl with the Dungeons and Dragons Tattoo” by sweetondean
Warning: Contains episode spoilers
“She’s kinda like the little sister I never wanted”
Well that was fun! Kinda Supernatural meets Ocean’s 11 or Leverage even. A caper comedy! Complete with gadgetry and split screens! I don’t think we’ve seen them do a caper style episode before. After so much angst it’s always good to get a bit of lighter fare. Though we can’t be completely angst free now can we? We still have the “Bobby issue” to contend with, just so we don’t get too happy. This is Supernatural after all.
I thoroughly enjoyed “The Girl With The Dungeons And Dragons Tattoo”. It was a geek-gasam the like of which I haven’t had since I went to see Joss Whedon talk at the Opera House. It was geeky reference after geeky reference. Star Wars, The Lord Of The Rings, Harry Potter, Wargames, Star Trek, Dungeons And Dragons, Comic Con, Batman and Wonder Woman mugs and the pièce de résistance…Veronica Mars. Veronica Mars! I screamed…..
Posted April 29, 2012 at 5:24pm in supernatural the girl with the dungeons and dragons tattoo dean winchester Sam Winchester 7.20
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Now that Sam and Dean know that Bobby decided to stick around and not go with his Reaper, they face a tough decision. Keep Bobby with them? Or help him move on for good?
Post episode scene for 7.19.
“Do you think this is far enough?” Dean indicated a sign ahead that said ‘Bar’.
Sam nodded, “Yeah, I’d say we’re out of range.”
Dean swung the car into a parking space and got out.
“This ain’t right Sam. I feel bad.”
“I know. Me too. But we’ve gotta talk and we can’t do it with him around.”
“Yeah but leaving him behind like that….”
They’d entered the bar and were making their way to a booth in the back.
“We told him we were going out. We’ll explain later. He’ll understand.”
“Hmm maybe…” Dean mumbled as he slid across the seat. “Don’t make me feel any better though.”
Sam simply shrugged.
A waitress came to take their order. “What can I get you two?”
“Just a couple of beers sweetheart.” Dean said, flashing her a weary smile.
“You got it,” she said and Dean absentmindedly watched her sashay away.
“So, what are we gonna do?” Sam asked.
Dean turned to his brother and sighed. “I don’t know Sammy, I don’t know. What can we do? I mean, short of burn the flask, which obviously we are not going to do.”
Posted April 25, 2012 at 7:45pm in Supernatural fan fiction Dean winchester Sam winchester
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