#also my girlfriend and i started watching season 2 of good omens | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

the-eternal-maiden616 · 10 months

Text

My Review of Good Omens 2

Warning spoilers for the entire Good Omens season 2. This will be a long one so bear in mind.

Well, holy shit, well what can I say at this very moment, am still trying to process literally everything that has happened in this goddamn show. First off am going to say this was an absolute blast to watch and it was definitely incredibly well done, all the episodes had something too it that just made it so interesting and fun and also tragic to see.

The characters and the development many of them go throughout this season is just insane and some of the things I theorized what was going to happened did end up happening. Many of my theories didn't come true which is fine while some just became all the while canon thanks to Neil and also big shoutout to Neil Gaiman and the cast and crew for what they helped create this season it was amazing and also just what you said Neil, tragic in some circumstances.

The entire plot of the season stemed on figuring out what had happened to Gabriel who has forgotten who he was and is seeking refuge with the Angel Aziraphale and his partner the retired Demon Crowley and well once it is all revealed what really happened why Gabriel did end up losing his memories not only makes sense and confirms one of the theories I had made on this situation.

And well SPOILER ALERT Gabriel had formed a partnership with the Prince of hell Lord Beelzebub and after interacting with each other after the failed attempt of Armageddon, they begin to see what Aziraphale and Crowley were experiencing this entire time and they understood why the two did all they could to save the world and this explains why Beelzebub was looking for Gabriel not just because of hell but because they grew attracted to the archangel and so did Gabriel to the demon prince of hell.

And when Gabriel had a change of heart and disapproved the second Armageddon to happen, the other Archangels and the Metatron tell Gabriel he can no longer be in Heaven and that he has lost his place as an Archangel. And as punishment his memories of his entire existence will be erased. When he gladly accepts this is goes to his office, grabs a box, writes something down on the box, gets unchanged and accidentally drops his matchbox which contains a fly that kept hanging around Gabriel when he was Jim and that Beelzebub gave it to him and he implants all his memories and powers on it.

And Saraquel with her tablet erases Gabriel's memories. And that's how he ends up vack at Aziraphale's bookshop naked and without his memories. In the finale, Beelzebub recovers the fly, and Gabriel regains all his memories and the ones where he and Beelzebub fall in love and well the Ineffable Bureaucracy was surprisingly confirmed and now Canon in the Good Omens universe.

I was hoping that this happened and well I am glad that they choose to do this because we now have more than one demon and angel character in love now. Maggie and Nina were hilarious and funny in this season and I am also very glad they are deciding to go slow in the relationship and are not fully in a relationship yet. All thanks to Aziraphale and Crowley. I also felt sorry for Nina especially since knowing now why she is so stressed out, a typical possessive, attention seeking and all right toxic person as her girlfriend is just tough to see and the way the text messages from the now ex girlfriend is illustrated in a scenes and seeing Nina's reactions was just brilliant but also sad to see. Because that demonstrates what it is like to be in such a toxic relationship with someone like that and I am so happy Njna has gotten away with her and is slowly started her relationship with Maggie who very much fell for Nina first.

Now the most important and most pivotal part of the show is undoubtedly the relationship between Crowley and Aziraphale and we get to see in more detail how the relationship has changed over time and especially in the minisodes that I enjoyed very much, the start of their relationship literally started at the very beginning of time, and Crowley is still an angel, a beautiful, joyful and a happy being to be sure and Aziraphale pretty much fell for him there and then but this would ultimately impact how Aziraphale sees Crowley for then onwards once he becomes an demon to the very very end of the 2 season which for a long time afterwards pretty much destroys their entire relationship, which we all know will be resolved in the inevitable season 3.

It is Canon now, it's confirmed, these two celestial beings love each other, they have been this way for a very long time, they have now held hands more than twice, they have danced with each other in the ball episode which was inspired by Jane Austin who they both knew for different reasons. Aziraphale had Crowley as his magic assistant in the Bliz epsiode. And Crowley has surprised and shocked Aziraphale with his tricks and plans more times to count here. And Crowley clearly is the one holding back all his love and emotions for Aziraphale, he hoped that Aziraphale would catch up to him and understand how he feels, and they many times looked at each other with such care, love and compassion it literally made my heart beat faster. Nina absolutely god bless her became the bridge into helping Crowley talk to Aziraphale and tell him everything, she was even jealous up to a certain point, cause she could clearly see the attention and especially the romantic tension between those two. She even outright asked Crowley how long he has been with Aziraphale for and if Aziraphale was his boyfriend or husband.

She saw right through them two and saw the love there. And evidently in the finale she and Maggie at first scold Crowley for forcing them to fall in love but that they also pretty much thank him for trying because they will slowly develop their relationship only when Nina gets fully over her ex and is fine to date again and when Maggie says something stupid, NINA LITERALLY CALLS MAGGIE "ANGEL" just like Crowley. Again it is obvious that Nina and Maggie are Crowley and Aziraphale respectively and I don't mind that.

But most importantly they both encourage Crowley to pretty much confess his feelings for Aziraphale and let it out there for the whole world to know. They said that by talking to each other, and acknowledge their growing feelings for each other it helped them understand and know what they both want and that they want to pursue a future relationship together. They encourage our poor demon boy into doing the same and hopefully Aziraphale will finally get the hint.

And well as expected it goes absolutely down hill for this. Aziraphale has just found out that the Metatron is interested with having him become the new Supreme archangel of heaven, basically Aziraphale got promoted big time and with this new status he would be able to control many things in heaven and he hopes to use this to change Heaven into good place, however Metatron also says that he could ask Crowley to come back to heaven and not only will he be forgiven but he will also be reinstated as a angel. This is where everything turns on its head. Aziraphale very much agrees to do this and hopes with great delusion that Crowley will happily join him back in Heaven.

Now in my opinion I believe that the Metatron is doing this to manipulate Aziraphale and him knowing that Crowley would never accept this would cause a massive irreversible rift between the two celestial beings and destroyed their relationship beyond repair in hopes of Aziraphale firmly being on heaven's side and hopefully being encouraged to begin the second coming/the final big war with the angels and demons siding together against Humanity in hopes of destroying the world.

Aziraphale and Crowley met up at the bookshop and the moment we have all been dreaming about and dreading of for four years has come and Aziraphale all giddy and excited tells Crowley what the Metatron has given to him and that he could become an angel again and that it will be just like the old times. This is when I realised that Aziraphale as much as he loved and cared about Crowley as a demon, he still pretty much or if more loved Crowley as the happy, joyful angelic being he first met in the stars.

Crowley is obviously angered by this and pretty much objects to join Aziraphale back in heaven, and sees that Aziraphale has pretty much been persuade to fully join back with heaven with false hop he will be able to change Heaven, Crowley tells Aziraphale once again that Heaven nor Hell cared about Earth and once the humans and planet is destroyed they will have to spend the horrible eternity they spoke about all those years ago. He then confesses to Aziraphale that they have known each other for so long and that they are a team and that for so long they had to admit to themselves that they didn't care for each other, and Crowley once again just like back in season 1 episode 3 and episode 4 asks Aziraphale to go off with him and saying that if Beelzebub and Gabriel could be together then maybe they can.

This reminded me very much of Rey and Kylo's talk after killing snoke and the guards and Kylo asks Rey to join him in taken down both the jedi and Sith and bring true balance to the galaxy. Kylo is Crowley and Rey is Aziraphale, Aziraphale can't or doesn't understand why Crowley isn't going to join him and see why being on either sides of the conflict will just bring upon death and destruction because in Crowley's eyes Aziraphale is still holding onto this time false hope that things will get better if they take in charge in heaven and when Crowley pleads with him to not leave his bookshop behind, and Aziraphale says that nothing last forever which is true but shows that Aziraphale is willing to give up all of the earthly delights just so he could try to fix something he eventually figures out he can't fix. Crowley walks away and Aziraphale pleads for him to join him, they could be together and that he needs Crowley.

Then the music stops and Crowley points out that there is no noise, no sound and no nightingales. He calls Aziraphale an idiot and that they could've been an us meaning they not just could've been together in the romantic way but also on 'their side' just in the middle, nor hell or heaven to deal with. And then with all his angst and emotions at an all time high he grabs Aziraphale and then kisses Aziraphale not just to show him how he feels about Aziraphale but also to hopefully persuade Aziraphale to rethink his choice. Aziraphale shocked and utterly unable to come to terms with his feelings for Crowley says to Crowley he forgives him, this this destroys Crowley and he rushes out of there heartbroken and completely unable to think. Aziraphale cries as he touches his lips but then the Metatron comes in and informs Aziraphale that Muriel will take care of the bookshop while his gone.

He and Aziraphale leave the bookshop and Crowley glances at Aziraphale as he prepares to leave for heaven and Crowley gets into the car and as it turns on the radio switches to the song sang at the very end of Season 1, night at Berkeley square, he turns it off and drives off after looking at Nina and Maggie and the credits role with the two celestial beings currently reaction to what has unfolded with Crowley looking indifferent while Aziraphale looks determined about what he is going to do now and it kinda crept me put alot. He kinda looks like his smirking in some sort of way but he also looks distraught as well.

This was just angst and what I pretty much believed was going to happened, it's literally the empire strikes back Our Flag means death shit all over again. But remember this love story is based on Pride and Prejudice and these two are Mr Darcy and Elizabeth, who do end being together in the end and this season will just build up to the inevitable season 3 most likely the finale to the Good Omens series. The second coming didn't come this season but will sure as hell arrive in season 3. This had to happen, Aziraphale and Crowley had to conflict in this way in order for them to reunite and Aziraphale finally catches up to Crowley and the two will be together and become bigger and stronger and better with each other by their side.

Anyway sorry for the long post but that's just my review on Good Omens season 2. It was amazing as well as heartbreaking but it just gets me pumped and prepared for the third season. Thank you for listening.

#good omens spoilers #good omens 2 spoilers #aziraphale x crowley #Ineffable Bureaucracy #ineffable husbands #good omens season 2

10 notes · View notes

trashboatprince · 4 months

Text

As is tradition since I think I started this account in 2012, I tend to do a post about all the more interesting things that happened in the year and what I hope happens in the next so...

Yeah.

Here we go.

Met David Tennant and got not only my photo taken with him and his signature, but I also got three hugs from him. He is a very lovely man, and gosh is he pretty in person. <3

Met Rhys Darby in person and made him burst out laughing when I told him I recognized him as the freaking Pistachio King from Milo Murphy's Law. He wasn't expecting that role of all things.

Last day of my trip for the con I discovered a lump on my chest that really hurt and for two and a half months I was stuck in a constant state of anxiety because they thought it was inflammatory breast cancer. Turns out it was just a really bad infection that had very similar symptoms.

Lost our oldest dog in October :(

My mom did get a pug puppy a few months beforehand tho, as she had been wanting a pug for years

Had probably one of the most absolutely obnoxious family reunions this year, but was able to go up into the mountains and had a lovely time in nature. And I got to pick huckleberries, which I've never done before. That was nice.

Went to Colorado and sat the Monsters of Metal tour's last show there, with Mastodon (third time seeing them) and Gojira (first time seeing them)

Had a fucking experience listening to The Chant live at that showing and it was just... impossible to describe. It was beautiful.

Went to the Devil's Tower on the way to Colorado, it was pretty dang cool. Lots of alien shit everywhere, the area really loves to play up on that. Also went to the Denver Zoo and Meow Wolf, both of which were delightful. :D

Went to my little brother's high school graduation, cannot believe he's out of high school.

Experienced season two of Good Omens and am still recovering.

I was there when EVERY happened, in just ten minutes it was known and then quickly NO LONGER SPOKEN ABOUT. That was a fun hour of panic from the fandom. :)

Watched OFMD season 2 and... eh.

Watched all four of the new Doctor Who specials when they dropped and now Fourteen and Fifteen are my favorite Doctors. I love them.

Had probably some of the most stressful months I've ever had with my job because we were down to just three people for a staff that is meant to run a home that is 24/7. I'm still dealing with the stress from it even after we got more people hired. My paychecks were beautiful tho, so much overtime...

Apparently I got a stress fracture on Thanksgiving, happened in my sleep. I should be out of the boot officially next week.

Participated in a David Tennant-themed zine

Absolutely dumb thing to add, but my mom got me a DT cutout who now lives in my room. He's wearing a paper crown from a Christmas cracker because he's a king Plans for the next year:

Going to see Hozier in August

Probably going to go back to Colorado, I want to see the aquarium

Going to ECCC for the third year in a row, going to get Jodie Whitaker's autograph

Hopefully I'll get to see my girlfriend again

Hopefully I'll get to finally see my best friends irl (We need to plan this better, guys!)

See if I can finally get my second tattoo

#john's commentary

5 notes · View notes

noirfos · 2 years

Text

I posted 1,647 times in 2021

53 posts created (3%)

1594 posts reblogged (97%)

For every post I created, I reblogged 30.1 posts.

I added 585 tags in 2021

#sanders sides - 86 posts

#good omens - 78 posts

#genshin impact - 69 posts

#spn - 58 posts

#mcu - 56 posts

#welcome to tumblr - 56 posts

#loki - 53 posts

#mine - 49 posts

#ineffable husbands - 41 posts

#sk8 - 39 posts

Longest Tag: 94 characters

#the fact that it was like the animation was made in mmd made it that much more endearing to me

My Top Posts in 2021

I’m watching Crazy Ex Girlfriend and I got to season 4 episode 10 and the fridge scene with Josh and I was suddenly hit with an INTENSE feeling of deja vu and I realized that I saw the fridge scene out of context at some point previously in my life and those deeply buried memories were suddenly reawakened.

Add that to the list of things I didn’t realize were from Crazy Ex-Girlfriend.

Also! Todrick Hall showed up in s4e9 and I heard 2 words come out of his mouth and I was like Todrick??? Todrick Hall? That really u? And it was. In the Cats parody, cause of course that’s what he would do.

49 notes • Posted 2021-02-06 09:05:08 GMT

Maybe the tag keeps disappearing because Asian lives don’t matter more than anyone else’s? Just a thought.

The tag is "Stop Asian Hate." What part of that says that Asian lives matter more than other people's? Stop Asian Hate is not asking that Asian lives be valued above anyone else's, but that people stop acting hatefully toward Asians.

The whole point of it is to protest and stand up against the targeted violence, racism, and harassment against Asians (especially elders, one of the most vulnerable part of our population) that has greatly increased since the start of the pandemic. We're asking that these lives that have been de- and undervalued be held to an equal regard. No one's saying that Asians matter more. We're saying that Asians should be treated with the same basic human decency and respect that everyone deserves, because that has not been the case.

In terms of the trending page, I understand that it's unclear whether or not staff pin topics. However, when both Black Lives Matter and Stop Asian Hate were kept that the top of the trending page for such a prolonged period of time, and one is suddenly gone then quickly put back, it's inevitable that many users on here will question it.

61 notes • Posted 2021-08-15 03:15:41 GMT

Congrats Simeon stans

71 notes • Posted 2021-02-05 06:38:51 GMT

I need more ninjago content on my dash if you’re a ninjago blog or reblog ninjago content please comment or reblog this so I can follow u

97 notes • Posted 2021-01-28 08:04:45 GMT

The zoom in on the orange with Thomas exclaiming, “There’s my snack!” implies that the orange side will, in fact, be a snack. In this essay I will-

188 notes • Posted 2021-11-15 23:11:20 GMT

Get your Tumblr 2021 Year in Review →

#my 2021 tumblr year in review #your tumblr year in review #year in review #mine

1 note · View note

letterstothemidnightsociety · 3 years

Text

CARRY ON MY WAYWARD SON IS JUST THE WHOLE MOOD FOR 2020, CAN WE ALL AGREE ON THAT?

Oh boy, guys, it’s here. The end. The very end. Tonight, Supernatural says goodbye for real this time. Maybe. Who really ever knows. But I’m not great at goodbyes, so instead let’s go back to the very beginning. It’s Supernatural!

So I’m here, at the season finale of Season 1. Very conveniently on the same day that the show is on the series finale of Season 15. It’s like I planned it, you guys! I did not plan this.

Also, let’s take a minute to appreciate the irony of using Carry On My Wayward Son in every season finale when the Winchesters will never be done, they’ll never have peace, they will never lay their weary heads to rest. Don’t mind me, I’m just laughing til I cry.

I genuinely think of the the last two episodes of Season 1 - “Salvation” and “Devil’s Trap” - as if they’re one episode. This is because a) I think they are designed to be a two-parter and b) they’re the only two episodes on the last disc of my box set BUT I think it’s important to note that these two episodes did not air on the same night. There was a week between them and that is...rough for an audience watching in real time. But when I watched it the first time, I was watching this exact dvd disc and of course I plowed right on through the cliffhanger in “Salvation” until the literal car crash that ends “Devil’s Trap”.

This disc! Right here! That has the real soundtrack on it, UNLIKE SOME STREAMING SERVICES!

Let’s look at a couple things:

Way back in 2006 when these episodes aired, Supernatural’s success was average at best? Even though it’s the 5th most watched show on the WB, it’s averaged a little more than 3 million American viewers per episode, which at the time, wasn’t great. In contrast, the #1 show of the 2005/2006 TV year was American Idol season 1 - an average of 12.7 million viewers per episode. So it’s not exactly a winner of a show, but it’s not too far behind the WB’s #1 show, Smallville, which averaged around 4 million viewers per episode. Still, Supernatural’s fate was uncertain. “Devil’s Trap” aired on May 4, 2006, but the show didn’t get renewed for season 2 until May 18. That’s two weeks of cliffhanger limbo, and lemme tell you, that would have been a real slap in the tits if the show had been cancelled.

Even further back, though, in January of 2006, it was announced that the WB and UPN would be renouncing their independence and merging under CBS and Time Warner company into what we know today as The CW. It was a network that was frankensteined together from the only working pieces of both networks and honestly I think that was a big reason Supernatural did get renewed. The CW was in need of some kind of programming to kick off the 2006 Fall Season and they greenlit new seasons for 13 of WB’s and UPN’s established programs. For a real blast from the past, here is their list of inaugural shows -

7th Heaven (WB)

Beauty and the Geek (WB)

Gilmore Girls (WB)

One Tree Hill (WB)

Reba (WB)

Smallville (WB)

Supernatural (WB)

America's Next Top Model (UPN)

Veronica Mars (UPN)

Everybody Hates Chris (UPN

Girlfriends (UPN)

All of Us (UPN)

WWE SmackDown! (UPN)

I think my favorite part of this list is that both Gilmore Girls AND Smallville were still on the air, arguably the origin stories for Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles respectively.

However, there’s evidence that Supernatural was in less danger of cancellation than you might think. In March, around about “Hellhouse” time, Supernatural gets moved from a Tuesday air date to a Thursday air date. If you follow American network TV at all, then you’ll know that Thursday is THE day. Historically, Networks believed this was the best day for programming. Advertisers paid extra for the combination of influencing your weekend plans and also influencing you before the weekend since you’re less likely to be watching TV and more likely to be spending money. Friends aired on Thursdays. Grey’s Anatomy is a Thursday show. Putting Supernatural on Thursday would indicate that the WB had some faith in it, although it’s possible they were simply removing something else that wasn’t working in that 9pm time slot.

Ratings aside, once we get to the finale Supernatural has a good thing going, and it seems critics agreed. I think the back half of season 1 is where the show really starts to shine and take on the semblance of what it will become. This is where you see it shift from Monster-of-the-Week, anthology-style, to episodes that focused more on character - what I like to call the Feelings Episodes. That’s not to say there won’t be a ton more Monster-of-the-Week episodes, just that those are the B-story line, less important than the Winchesters-Working-Through-Trauma A-story lines. There’s also a greater emphasis on the overarching mythos and story arc of the season in the back half. This is ultimately what carries Supernatural into season 2 and beyond. Everyone from critics to series creator Kripke agreed that the episodes that focused more on the relationships and the internal struggles of the Winchesters was what really captured audiences.

And all that gooey feelings stuff really comes to a head in the one-two punch that is “Salvation” and “Devil’s Trap”.

UGH. FEELINGS.

The day of reckoning is finally here - the Winchesters finally know who they’re after, where to go, and how to kill it. Thanks to Sam’s Oh yeah! He’s got ESP!, they know exactly who’s gonna get hit next. The search is finally over, the battle’s about to begin. But it’s not just the Quest that’s winding down, it’s a bunch of character arcs that are coming to light as well. In fact, the Quest really does get pushed aside in favor of big character moves.

John Winchester, hyperfixated on revenge for the past 20 years, is finally close to resolving his grief and guilt over Mary’s death and the way he raised his kids. He tells his sons “whatever it takes” and we know he means it. This plays out in his decision to split up the team, in his willingness to sacrifice his own life so his boys have the opportunity to kill the demon they’ve been hunting all season.

Who’s fault was THAT, you piece of shit.

Sam Winchester’s own feelings of guilt and grief are also on the cusp of absolution. We see just how similar Sam and John really are, specifically in their reactions to fridged girlfriends lost loves. For the first time this season, Sam follows John’s orders without question or complaint. He doesn’t hesitate to risk his own life to kill the demon, willing to literally walk into fire for a second shot at it. Sam’s here to do whatever it takes, and it’s only because of Dean that he doesn’t.

Dean, on the other hand, is finally struggling with following John’s orders. I love the scene where John yells specifically at Dean when he finds out about Sam’s visions (watch John’s eyeline, he is NOT looking at Sam on that line)

Exhibit A, because this show has turned me into a 19YO Stan again and I hate it.

and Dean yells back, pointing out that they were in much more dire straights than death omens and John never picked up the phone, not once, not even when Dean was dying.

It’s TRUE and he SHOULD SAY IT! And seriously, John, even MEG knows you don’t answer voicemails, that’s why she calls Sam.

More importantly, Dean is not willing to do whatever it takes if whatever it takes means losing what he already has. Dean, who was so gung ho about finding mom’s killer in the beginning of the season, understands better than ever what he stands to lose if he lets his family continue on this path. It’s a real reversal of his attitude from the beginning of the show, but the about-face has happened so gradually over the last 22 episodes that it doesn’t feel out of left field.

Because that’s what you get when you put Sam and Dean together on a cross-country road trip for nine months! The two grow and change just by proximity and the sheer number of hours they spend in the car together. Over the course of 22 episodes, Dean reminds Sam why they do what they do - saving lives - and Sam reminds Dean what and who they do it for - family, safe and sound and living their best life now. John’s got his own thing going on, so who even cares what his motivations are, I don’t, hurry up and get out of here, John, nobody likes you.

That being said, “Devil’s Trap” starts with a pretty ruthless Dean performing an exorcism on Meg. He’s not dicking around this episode, and based on the fight he has with Sam in “Salvation”, it makes sense. Dean won’t do whatever it takes just for vengeance, but he will do whatever it takes to save someone, especially if those lives are his brother and his father. You could even extend that motivation into his decision to exorcise the demon and essentially kill Meg Masters - she may be dying, but she’s been saved from being a human meat puppet and unwilling participant to any number of evil things.

In other news, Bobby Singer is a National Treasure and the Best Part of this Episode and Maybe All Episodes. He doesn’t have a lot going on in this episode, he’s just amazing and I love him forever.

I had to pull a still from the episode because lookit this glorious mullet that he loses immediately, thank GOODNESS!

After getting a reality check from Dean in “Salvation,” Sam’s still struggling to figure out where he is on this spectrum, and you get to watch him make that decision in real time. He has the choice to be like John, to do whatever it takes to kill the demon, even though that means killing his own father. And he does not hesitate to aim when John tells him to shoot to kill, and that says a LOT.

But it’s Dean who convinces Sam not to lose himself in this fight, even when he’s so close to winning it. It’s Dean’s tiny little “Sam, no!” that makes Sam put the gun down, and that ALSO says a LOT.

It also hits me right in my heart meats, just OOF.

And THEN, just when you think the Winchesters are at their lowest, beat to shit and barely holding on, THEN the show delivers its final blow: they crash a semi into the Impala.

Listen, I watch a lot of garbage, and I watch that garbage on purpose. Sometimes, that’s just what you want. I don’t rate movies and tv shows on a good to bad scale anymore because some bad movies are GREAT and some good movies are just really terrible and I don’t like watching them. I’ve started talking about movies and tv in terms of whether or not I enjoyed them. Does it spark joy? Will it spark joy in others?

My legitimate reaction to anything that looks like a dumpster fire.

I enjoy Supernatural. A LOT. And maybe it’s just because my calibration settings are off, but I’d also argue that this season is good. As in, it’s well-crafted, satisfying and (mostly) logical storytelling. Is it perfect? No. It’s a show that aired on the WB in 2005. And when I watched this for the first time in 2008, I didn’t dig too deep into character arcs or story structure, I just liked watching two hot guys fight ghosts and sometimes cry a little. Twelve years later, watching it with a more experienced eye and a more refined palette - er, well, maybe just more educated palette - I can see the skill that went into crafting this 22-episode long story.

Well, skill and and a little bit of sheer dumb luck. Cuz remember when I said that Kripke and Co. figured out that the Feelings Episodes ended up doing better than the Monster-of-the-Week episodes? That wasn’t until after they realized what a gift they’d been given in their two leads. It was the chemistry between Jensen Ackles and Jared Padalecki that both sold the show at the outset and built the foundation for seasons to come. Viewers cared about the show because they cared about the characters. They wanted to see these two beautiful dumpster fires struggle and overcome their internal battles way more than their external ones. If you need proof - I did not once talk about the Yellow-Eyed-Demon motives or plans from this episode. I barely even mention the quest, unless it’s in relation to how the characters are handling it, emotionally, and how that’s impacting others around them. When you come down to it, Supernatural is a show about a family struggling to survive just as much as it is about two guys saving the world, and that’s something that any audience can relate to. I’m never gonna perform an exorcism or face down angels and demons to stop the apocalypse. But I am gonna struggle with insecurity and doubt, grief and anger and family drama. That’s the human element. That’s what connects you to these characters. And when you’re lucky enough to have two lead actors that really sell the hell out of the family dynamics, you're setting up for some serious television gold.

Fifteen years after this season aired, both of these elements - the story-crafting AND the luck - are more important than ever. No matter what show you’re watching, when you get to a season finale, that finale needs to feel like a set of dominos tipping over. It needs to feel like you’ve set up for that final confrontation both externally (the quest arc) and internally (the character arc). It needs to feel satisfying and motivated when those dominos finally fall. Most importantly, you need to make sure your audience cares about why they’re falling in the first place. Who cares about anybody’s arc if you haven’t built that character connection with your audience in the first place?

For a TV show looking ahead to season two, all that resolution also needs to ask more questions. It needs to propel us through one conflict and into another. That’s what the finale of this season does. It threads the needle into that sweet spot between conclusion and new beginning. Will our heroes live or die? Will the yellow-eyed demon be defeated? What’s next? And on this side of 2020, how did they keep that momentum going for more than a decade?

I can’t think of any current show right now that I would follow for 15 years. Hell, I didn’t even follow this show for 15 years. But the longevity of Supernatural means that they’ll be the template for any show looking to last even half as long as they did. And no matter how you feel about this show, you’ve gotta admit that’s heckin’ WILD.

3 notes · View notes

elizabethrobertajones · 7 years

Text

13x01 Watching Notes

The common pronunciation around these parts for “Nougat” is "Nugget" FYI

There's a secondary mission here to find out WHY DID DABB TWEET "BUTT SHAKE"?

Expectations: I'd say a good 95% new plot action nonsense to 5% mourning and we've seen all of it in fragments because they're spoiling the good stuff to lure us in; we're doing well as a season if Asmodeus isn't horrifically hammy and looks like he'll be able to carry all the Buckleming episodes they'll surely shove him in, and Jack is either not a pillock or is clearly *supposed* to be a pillock and the writing reassures us of that, although I did start to warm up to him in those tiny glimpses of promo stuff so we might be good there.

Aside from that I'm so superbly chill about this season (not worried about Cas, assuming Mary needs to get back as well, I'm just going on trust that Michael is well cast based on the actor's fanbase after scrolling his twitter the other day and the fact he seems cool in the promo stuff in a way that does not make me nervous unlike the other 2 new characters, and like no preconceptions about what I need this season to be) that I've actually achieved what scientists may have thought was unpossible... I made it through an entire hiatus embedded in the heart of a wanky fandom and I don't really have strong opinions or needs for about what's to come :P

FUCK ME UP, DABB.

OH THE TITLE CARD IS GOING TO BE GOOD THIS YEAR

I say after just seeing "the road so far" because that looks classic. I can't remember which other season it most looks like because I'm way too hype but it looks good.

Gah I have the Worst Song Comprehension in the entire world WHAT IS THIS? There's just a montage of TFW hugs of various types going on and

"I never opened myself this way" and Dean in 12x22 opening up Mary and then the FREAKING GRENADE LAUNCHER MOMENT okay so the recap definitely is telling us the meta theme of season 12 in case we missed is so we're all on the same footing for season 13. This family loves each other a lot and we're busting down walls.

I watched the rest of the "road so far" then said out loud, "No. NO." as it wound up nursery first, because "no" are they not even going to show - OH SHIT IT'S THE SAME VIDEO AS THE ONE IN THE SUMMER. NO. We're ending this thing on dead Cas and Dean.

If this is how they mean to play it, I think I wanna take back that "fuck me up Dabb" from the previous point.

OH NO I got tagged in a post like this last week about the bit in 8x19 where Sam goes into Hell and there's the woman there in one of the cages who is like "we've been waiting so long! You finally came!" and like... did I think she meant she was mistaking Sam for Lucifer, and I always think YES that is a GREAT reading for that scene and fuuuuuuck me I should have reblogged that post and gone looking for links to some of the other cool posts about that because that's like one of the small redeeming things about 8x19 to me, because that is just such a good creepy amazing Sam thing and also I am still so freakin bitter that Lucifer was Nick in the cage because he should have looked like Sam and 11x09 and 11x10 should have been Sam v Lucifer!Sam moments because where the FUCK did Nick come from...

Anyway you can probably guess exactly how far I've got into this episode aka 1 entire one word line but it's already completely fucked me up.

If you all don't remember my season 12 experience, yes I am the biggest Destiel shipper on the planet but I actually get super hype for good Sam plot stuff and I dug every moment of the season 12 Sam stuff about his powers and everything and this is a confrontation that *I* personally think was built up and due because of the evolving way it's going - they confronted his past, the parts he had no control over happening to him in season 12, and I surmised that season 13 ought to be about the parts that WERE in his control, and Sam coming to terms with some other old mytharc stuff that happened to him, the way he managed to fuck up the world on a cosmic scale that Jack will have to come to relate to and he can use to guide Jack...

So yeah, this is not the first time this has happened to Sam, but this is definitely the much much better, more potent way it's happened and I am DELIGHTED and we're 1 word into the season :D

*Dean stares at Cas* *stares at Cas* *stares at Cas* Yep I need to go shoot something.

YEAH GIANT FLOATING EYEBALL TITLE CARD I KNEW IT.

Sauron is the big bad, but where is the one ring.

More seriously fuck yeah that gives complete continuity between my watching notes from 12x23 to this one because I am pretty sure I stopped them (aside from final whimpering notes to wrap up) thinking about Sam and Jack with yellow eyes and how this all looped back to the start. And how that was the key visual imagery, the way that Jack had yellow eyes and Sam's whole legacy of that stuff - things I've been screaming about since 12x12 and how it all came back into the story. I mean the scream I made in 12x12 when Ramiel flashed his eyes is a noise I've sort of low-key been making right until this point and I'm just so delighted about this imagery being given such a central place because it's not JUST Jack's eyes, even though he obviously has the most terrifying yellow fire floating around in his eyeballs, the colour is a motif that takes us right back to the beginning in terms of the story...

HECK YEAH MARY -

wait

this isn't a recap going to a Mary scene

LOL SUBTLE DABB

This nursery, as we were saying after season 12 ended, is just *soaked* in the vibes of the original nursery from the show... I kinda think the bad energy in that place would probably have given Dean that nightmare ANYWAY but it's symbolically super relatable to everything that's going on, especially as he's got to deal with re-losing Mary, and Sam's dealing with the massive heap of themes about trauma from the Pilot onwards...

I'm sort of vibing with 6x01 re-doing the burning on the ceiling thing to re-start from the start (8x01 also re-started from the start but borrowed different imagery and also addressed Sam's arc through the Trials stuff hence the 8x19 thing and also him talking about how pure he was in 8x21) - obviously we have been saying this all seems like a season 1 re-do in a weird way, especially taking the Winchesters back to basics (but in an awful way), and I think for Sam, just meeting Jack under those circumstances we ended the season on were enough to loop him back to the start, because baby in nursery and yellow eyes blah blah, but for Dean his trauma in the Pilot was Mary specifically (and 1x01 separated out him and Sam that his trauma was Mary, Sam's was Jess - which 8x01 borrowed for Kevin and his girlfriend, because Kevin was always a Sam mirror and had glowing golden god power eyes when he was activated in 7x21)...

So yeah Dean just got a top up of Mary trauma because the fucking WEATHER around here is pilot mirrors.

I would assume also probably maybe that was a semi-magical nightmare but I would not fucking put it past them to just show us Dean having a bunch of nightmares and like 7x05 maybe where he woke up from a dead Cas dream, we get stuff like that to show his absolutely wrecked mental state so I'll hold out hope it was kind of just Dean's imagination tormenting him, because we've only seen his nightmares extremely rarely in the absolute worst situations.

Just as a "the show is about more than sam and dean" stance, fuck the shipping, it needs to be so obvious on screen that Dean is suffering from losing Mary AND Cas in a way where it's obvious the dynamic can not just be Sam and Dean any more.

OH NO SEAGULLS

(Uh, I mean, they are by a big lake, but yeah they are a bad bad omen. I think there was meta about them circa 10x14, to give an idea of how bad hearing seagulls is.)

Wow Sam and Dean are having a lot of bad sleeps now.

"Wait, was that -" "Lucifer's son." look, Sam knows how Jack started his life. That he has the concept of "father". That it's about all he's said and all he's motivated by right now apparently. Sam sounds pretty freaked out and putting a LOT of weight on that concept - not "Kelly's son" or "the nephilim" - the fact Jack was born, and asked about Lucifer, and then walked buck naked out of the room and now we ain't got jack on Jack, like... This is a Lucifer related PROBLEM.

I just say, because I am pretty sure Sam's gonna be defending the kid in a couple of minutes so I need to lay out all the thoughts on what Sam knows and his headspace I possibly can as I go.

Oh nooo Cas's truck.

And I tell you what, I wrote a meta after 12x23 about how it was impossible to work out where Cas's truck was parked in the entire final conflict, and there was no fucking WAY the Impala and the truck were within shot of each other. Well guess fucking what. They are easily contained within frame now. I know you could just say minor continuity error but that's not why I'm yelling :P

I'm yelling because I was writing about how the placement of their vehicles shows their closeness to each other or other metaphorical things (such as the no personal space parking job from 9x10 where Dean then pulled away and left the pimpmobile behind) and aside from the super dusty car, I am pretty sure I am saying that Cas's truck has appeared in visible shot because now it's not getting in the way of the action they can use it to symbolically show that Dean and Cas's vehicles are basically flanking the shot - but also they're so far apart and the house, representing Jack, and Kelly, and how Cas died, is between them.

(This meta business is like riding a bike :D)

Nakey Jack getting the same walk shot as Amara did.

Amara got it because creepy feet.

He's getting it because penis.

Hey there's the pirate place Dean's going to punch.

Holy shit I have never laughed so hard at the show in my entire life. I had a coughing fit that's scared the neighbour's dog.

(wait, good laugh - 10x15 still owes me a drink)

Salty Butt Combo sounds good anyway.

(this must be why Dabb said "butt shake", the fucker. The absolute fucker. I am going to kill him.)

I'm laughing on a meta level too (I mean, hysterically, out loud, but also meta) because especially in season 8 burgers were connected to humanity and Dean's return from Purgatory, and Dean has a history on the show of eating cheesebutts all the time for various reasons... I mean... This is liiiitterally turning Dean's favourite, metaphorically significant, food into butts.

I mean... do I just... run with it? I mean like... is this the new meta thing? We now have to associate Dean digging into a burger with eating ass? I mean what are you doing Dabb?

I actually have a headache now because I laughed too hard and too loud.

Please please tell me Jack comes into this place, accidentally kills these dudes, and leaves a trail of destruction that when their supervisor gets to the store to deal with it, the police are like... trying to deal with the bodies but also cracking up a little and finally she looks up and it's like... HIGH SEAS BUTT COMBO

I mean that's going to make it into the newspapers

Oh wait, the inventor of the Buttshake is the guy from the police station that was talking to Jack so he's going to at least make it out of this scene.

See, that picture of Jack with pants on was in the PR photos and I was like "naaah" and defended that Jack did not have pants on and people didn't believe - no one understood. I knew this was gonna happen and because I don't lay down too much spec and what good would "Jack wanders around buck naked for like the entire first quarter of the episode" have done anyway so I was just making fun of him for being fully grown and naked in the hope that the fact he was naked was a major character trait because it was one of like 2 we knew about him... Yeah I'm feeling vindicated on a crack spec I can't really prove, especially as I was joking that Sam shames him into manifesting pants but I mean... I knew. Guys, I knew.

This has gone from horror to stoner movie classic in about 2 minutes flat.

I fucking love this show.

ALL THE CREATIVE WAYS THEY HIDE JACK'S NAKEDNESS THOUGH.

I am gonna make a gifset if I can stop cry-laughing for long enough

"Hi baby! .... *How naked*?"

Yep.

I mean I think it's adorable that Jack wandered down to the nearest place with more people to make enquiries but this is also wigging me out a bit because I thought that the smart thing to do would be to give him like all the functioning knowledge for this world (I do remember a post going around Tumblr that babies learn like 6x Les Mis amounts of words in the womb) BUT start him from scratch but that it would be super hard to pull off, and essentially they've decided to do exactly what I thought was going to be the most intelligent handling of the situation but not exactly the easiest, and he seems to really have been born with a single motivation and the most basic understanding of the world that his little baby cosmic supercomputer brain is going to have to piece together the entire world from context cues and natural intellect to deal with the rest...

I'm all for it as long as they handle his progression well. And don't use him as the ... butt ... of the joke.

I assume we all know the butt thing was because Jack is naked and it was joking about the fact he's wandering about butt out but they can't show it so they're just like butt butt butt on the menu board instead.

Promo scene! Oh no! We're not thinking about it. Not over it from last night. Dean is piiiissed.

Sam saying he had it under control is interesting now we have seen the actual scene in question. Sam did not really have it under control. He was babbling uncertainly like, no I'm not your father and also btw that freaks me out because he HAS possessed me before and being mistaken for him is SUUUPER uncomfortable and he's the reason for like 100% of my trauma past and present, and you're freaking me out... And yeah, between scenes he's decided they can't hunt Jack, that even if he seems to be laser focused on finding his father there has to be hope for him. This context is important: That Sam knows Jack's motivation and what it MEANS on a deeply horribly personal level and is defending him anyway. (I mean that "anyway" in the context of what Sam might think or feel rather than from my perspective where I can see it all from space and obviously Jack is not just any of this and anyway he'll be hunting with them sooner or later and there's presumably hope for Jack in this world...) But yeah, Sam knows how it is, searching for your father, for one thing. Which, interestingly, costuming aside, I don't think there's been MAJOR John and Lucifer parallels (hilarious that Lucifer changed his clothes just in time) in the same way that like, God and John were paralleled at a major narrative level. But now Jack wants to find his dad, which is the season 1 motivation for Sam and Dean, and that makes Lucifer and John narratively paralleled.

I don't think Sam is necessarily defending that Jack came out the womb with a one track mind to find Lucifer (maybe he wants to kill him, we haven't asked the guy his opinion yet) but that of course he thinks Jack can be reasoned with, saved from himself, and Sam relates heavily to being given powers beyond your control, and that there's hope for Jack to have a normal-ish life etc. None of which can be accomplished by just killing him outright.

Dean's just mad because Cas is dead and none of this would have happened if not for Jack

There's literally NOTHING TO META over on the Destiel side of things

I am feeling the void that they just left Cas there while rushing out to deal with Jack but I guess he's such an urgent problem Cas can wait and the house is remote enough that the milkman isn't likely to come round and see Cas lying dead in the back garden.

"Before he hurts anyone else" - he barely hurt you guys, it's more like he banged you up a bit and it was obviously a terrifying display of power and you don't want him to do *even that* again but - I mean - Dean, honey.

those words are going to be my approach to him for a while I think :P

That sheriff car really pushing the Twin Peaks vibe just because of the mountains on it... Was comparing it last season... Watched Twin Peaks for the first time shortly before the finale and caught Dabb just outright stealing an entire line from one of its episodes.

Either the police station is super close or Jack has been unintentionally terrorising the guys in the pirate restaurant for like an hour while just staring at the sign. He's thinking really hard about ordering the salty butt combo.

So we're really pushing how creepy Jack is. I mean, duh, it's the first episode and the first like 5 minutes of his screen time so he'll smile scarily for us.

They definitely cast him well for looking like Kelly but also having a really evil looking smirk.

Oh no. Cas.

They said Dean put the sheet over him and he's indoors so I guess that scene just happened in between things although right now we have no context for that so unless the angels say they didn't move Cas inside and put a sheet over him we don't have anything but actor confirmation this was a thing that happened, which is, of course, meaningless currency but makes for good headcanons...

I mean I paused it on his dead face and went "waaaah" so I need to watch the rest of the scene but this is where I'm at going into it anywho.

Nope, one angel had to ask which means they are investigating the house which meeeeans that this was how Dean left Cas and it's implied by the subtext that this is what happened in one of those "the subtext isn't an ineffable cloud of possible happenstance, they just didn't show it on screen so this fills in the blank for us" ways and I am not okaaaaaaaaay

Also we have them as our straw man angels - one saying he deserved better (LOL I HOPE ALL THE CAS STANS ARE HAPPY THAT'S BEEN SAID IN THE STORY) and one who is saying he didn't. Representing that Heaven is conflicted about Cas's actions and that some still revered him and some still loathed him.

Also the one who hated Cas called Kelly a "Brood Mare" so he's a dick and I hope he gets stabbed pretty soon because we know there's angel stabbings in this episode, and I just was not paying any attention whatsoever to them in the spoilers.

So the clothes Jack ended up in were spares from the police station. The kid who worked at the pirate place has come along with them because fuck responsibility (he is so the bad influence cool guy and I hope Jack kinda gets a little puppy love crush on him although he's calling Jack weird still...)

That statement that no one is weird but normal in their own way was really nice though. Positive influences around Jack! Yeah!

Hahaha they literally said "Lost and Found" for where the clothes came from. Subtle. Jack's lost and found - he's a spare thing left behind, to be collected by the original owner or taken by someone who needs them more.

I used that phrase for a fic title back in season 12 about Mary about how she had been lost and found - died and came back - but also how she felt lost in the world now and then was found again when someone who related to her situation bonded with her and - okay it just turned into Charlie taking Mary back to her place and them making out but the point is that's the emotional tone I was using the title for. I assume it also applies to Jack's emotional state, but he hasn't been "found" yet and I'm assuming Sam will do that for him, but I don't think they'll go back to their place to play video games, drink a few beers and learn the ways of luuurve.

(I know some people were (crack?) shipping them but even though Jack's an adult now and technically only like... well, the actor would be within the window to have a thing with Sam and for it not to be weird age wise, but the whole framing of it... Jack acting like a grown up baby... yeah. We'll see how it goes but the dynamic wider fandom has built for them has been with Jack as a child. The way I see it is more the intern dynamic if he joins up with TFW, but the way they relate to him will have to be as a child by necessity at least until he's demonstrated emotional and intellectual maturity to them, and even then I think the impression will linger for a while...)

that was a weird side note... these notes are a disaster. Look it's been MONTHS and I didn't do rewatch notes for season 10 over hiatus like I meant so I am out of practice at this.

I also took a short break to chat with Mittens to confirm I wasn't going crazy, that WAS the same song as the other video they released in the hiatus, and yep we got the Nothing Else Matters destiel music video as the season opener. No I haven't processed it yet :D

Oh gosh Jack remembers his mom (HI KELLY, RIP) and he says she's in Heaven (can't recall his surname), and that memory was basically the footage from the USB stick, so he's internalised that somewhere without watching it. It's 2 influences, good and bad - a pure perfect dead mom (booo tropes the show was supposed to have ditched dramatically via Mary) and a literal satan father who "should have been there" but wasn't - ironically removed from the narrative by the reformed pure dead mom from last season, Mary. These are the two biological influences on him, anyway. The 2 sides of his nature he may struggle with and the way the conflict may be framed for him.

Buuut and here's a thing that might be contentious. So he knew Lucifer was supposed to be there when he was born and that he has to find him? He seems to have had that low level awareness of the world around him even in the womb, or at least was born with messages or some sort of communication from Lucifer lingering in his subconscious. Lucifer seemed linked to him while he was in the womb and I suppose this confirms it may have run both ways. Bleh.

The Jack As A Blank Slate characterisation is good because it excuses his actions from season 12 as done without knowing intent as he's still figuring it all out now, but these lines do implicate him in the actions, by giving him a sense of at least semi-awareness, of having a missive from before he was even born, knowing that he was supposed to find his father.

I think that also goes with Kelly leaving him the USB stick with the message on it - he has a missive from both his parents. Kelly's of course being so positive and hopeful for him, and Lucifer just kinda... being threatening to his goodness by wanting to be anywhere near him.

OH GOSH and he remembers burning Dagon. He did have an awareness of what was going on towards the end of the pregnancy!

"I remember the universe screamed" well that would be opening the AU I guess

yeah the thumbprinting thing isn't going to do much good :P Blank slate imagery again - he's not on the system, he's new!

Oh boy the stoner movie kid is going to have a wild ride explaining this.

Jack's getting better at full sentences though.

*blink blink*

And that was the Invention of Sarcasm.

Or he was telling the guy how stupid he was like... I have a superior intellect. I know this is a chair and this is a floor and this is the planet earth. Thank you, moronic human who keeps asking me the most obvious questions ever, it's really helping me collect my thoughts and begin to understand my environment. Are all humans as stupid as you?

Uhoh, the "I'm hungry" did not bode well with Amara. But is this going to be a fake out? He didn't seem about to attack the guy for his soul, so is he just going to have a whole ton of junk food when we get back and the guy is like yeah I knew he had the munchies so I raided my stash of M&Ms I keep here and it's all good.

I really can't tell how much of Jack's story is Ominous Nephilim Shit and how much is Stoner Bro Movie Lols

Here's the context about the curly butt fries line and destroying the world. People took it literally and it always seemed like this would be the context that Dean was putting fake words in Jack's mouth because he does it ALL the time. Like the line about getting bored of croquet so you know what's really fun? MURDER. I love it when he does this. I need to make him do it more when I write him.

Anyway Sam understands Jack, he can guess his location. Dean is doubtful and *specifically* mentions torching Chicago I think because of the 5x21 reference to his pizza date with Death. I think that is actually a good comparison because cosmic being but one who was a good ally in his own massive cosmic way. It's a nice omen. Dean is being wrong/right with his sarcasm. It's complicated :P

The fact he is letting Sam go in there also means he doesn't think that Jack is in there probably because the shack is still standing. Sam is going to go find clues! But while they're sitting in the car and Dean's sending Sam into a shack alone I can't help but remember 2x21 which was of course where Sam got snatched in a fast food shack and Dean asked for pie and it aaaaall began. I also wonder why Dean punches the sign and that makes me think that something might happen to Sam somehow although I can't guess how.

I have never related to anyone more than Drunk Fries Girl except I've done it in reverse, just missing the deadline on hashbrowns in McD's and stomping out of the store instead of just ordering fries :P

Sam deals with the awkwardness of asking for a tall naked guy with a level of composure Dean wouldn't manage in a million fucking years.

That's the entire meta.

You were right, Sam!

Sam's asking after Jack as the FBI and it's a way to not have him act as his father on the phone. But the thought occurred to me and I wonder if it passed Sam's mind or if he's judged Jack's age that they're not terribly far apart - less than 10 years.

I don't think they're really playing into this comparison right now anyway - like it was just for the opening scene, or the sheriff would have asked, "are you his father" and put Sam into the awkward position and THEN have him say that he's an agent.

This is literally the best exchange in the entire show because Sam is having to pretend to be FBI while talking about Jack, with Fries Girl and Over Enthusiastic Pirate Guy watching, and his eyes just went to the cheesebutt menu and he saw it and he did not laugh on the phone.

I think Sam is strong and brave and of pure heart and fuck the "trials" or whatever the fuck shows the measure of a man, he just passed through the fucking abyss and came out the other side because he didn't laugh at Cheesebutt.

And, look, I laughed at the cheesebutt thing and the way it reflects hiiiilariously on Dean and the burgers thing. We all laughed at it. But Sam just blinked off in short succession a gay accusation and the urge to laugh at cheesebutt like it didn't even fucking affect him and I am just

Dabb

what

At the end of 12x23 my only conclusion was "i have been mindfucked"

and I thought

maybe season 13 will be you know... normal

Dabb it has been 15 minutes and I am so fucked up about everything :P

And now we cut to Dean with his messed up knuckles. Did he just go punch something off-screen?

(You know, the pirate sign that he punched in the promo for a totally random out of nowhere example of punchable things in the vicinity)

I hope he's not coping so badly that we're getting it in angsty flashbacks because that blood was not there before. And angsty flashbacks basically mean Destiel is canon.

OH NO FRIES GIRL IS HERE.

The drunk are an open and friendly people... Is she going to get Dean to open up? She's literally infodumping her life story on him because she's been up all night and her feet hurt and no one will give her fries, and I think she's about to fucking put the moral of the season in Dean's head somehow I don't know yet because I have literally paused because I was contemplating removing the dash between me bitching at Dabb for the wonderful fucked up episode and this commentary on it :P

Yep she told him that she punched Becky's stupid Elsa poster (what is Dabb's deal with Elsa from Frozen? Does he have a small daughter we don't know about that inflicted Let It Go on him in a loop? :P) and lit all her stuff on fire and started rambling about just burning the world down in her rage.

And then called Dean sensitive to Sam and this is amazing because her drunk wisdom sees right through his shit. I love fries girl.

I LOVE Fries Girl, she wrote "bitch" on the car :D :D :D

was THIS why Baby is all dusty? People are writing rude words all over everything this episode. I mean it's like a theme. A theme of desecration and burning the world down around you and who gives a flying fuck about consequences - you can change all the menu items to Butt because your mom's the sheriff and banging the guy who owns the restaurant or whatever, and if your roommate is a bitch, burn down all her things.

I mean then she writes it on the car which is sort of ominous about all their stuff being burned up.

I mean Dean did have that dream about Mary

He's lost Cas, that's his world burning down around him.

It's... Look, it's weird they have put off whatever Dean did in the intervening time Sam was eyeing up the cheesebutt menu to show later because we know we see it later because there's a hanging "what happened to your knuckles" question and we saw the clip in the promo. It's a storytelling decision to delay this, and we just see Dean dealing with it by drinking, splashing some alcohol on the cuts, and that's that for now.

What a fucking mess. Dean. Honey.

I suppose to keep the action flowing we deal with Jack but Dean's emotional story is running alongside it and it's being put off, held back... but it's not being held back forever. It's going to be opened up to us. But for NOW we just see kinda what Sam and outsiders see - the same thing I was meta-ing about the promo scene, about how they kept us outside the car for that conversation, about how we're not being allowed into Dean's grief and not being able to name Cas is another thing, another delay, another inability to confront it, just... we're outside, we're watching Dean struggle from afar. From Drunk Fries Girl POV.

This episode is fucking magnificent.

Maybe Jack is eating Clark, which is the name apparently of the kid.

Or are they laughing?? I think I heard laughter?

LAUGHTER and the munchies fake out.

I love you Dabb.

This literally says EVERYTHING about Jack and I now trust him completely.

Jack's first part of the story has gone from ominous to what a fucking cutie. He might not actually be a stoner but he's adorably sort of mascot-y to this guy and it's just hilarious that he can be like fuck the system I want candy, let's misuse my powers to get more candy because I love nougat. I mean I was wrong that the world would be saved in 13x23 because of trousers because that was a joke but I am legit thinking that this Human Things redux arc for Jack is going to save us all because fucking nougat. And that's a serious spec you can hold me accountable for at the end of the season.

The fact they're sitting on the floor giggling together is just sweet. Jack is learning about friendship so I doubt he would hurt Clark intentionally now, so if Clark does get hurt by Jack it's going to be a tragedy. Maybe something to show Jack how dangerous his powers are and make him want to be more careful and respectful to human life. I think Clark maaay be in the firing line as an adorable toy that gets mangled because Jack doesn't know how rough he's playing >.>

Also Jack you should probably not eat so much candy, because you'll get sick.

OH NO JACK. Is angel radio messing with your head?

OH NO he hurt the sheriff!

OH NO this is how he does the lights blowing walk? IT's AWFUL. PROTECT MY CANDY LOVING GIANT MAN BABY.

SAM TASED HIM

I am so upset. I apparently am extremely protective of my Nougat and angel radio hurts him and they're yelling about him and want to kill him and he's sensitive too :<

(whatever wizardry Dabb wove with the stoner movie subplot worked.)

Sam and Dean are not hailed as heroes for stopping Nougat, they're arrested to and given the first ever proper search to confiscate all their guns and knives by a cop who knows what the fuck she is doing. Now Dean has to answer for themselves, using his real name and actual job. He's not got a fuck to give.

She asks him if he's a superhero and some part of Dean just crumbles away inside and he says no. In 9x07 especially there was a strong theme of Dean being a superhero and Thinman also had superhero comparisons to them and it was part of the shine of the job wearing off - one of the more subtly horrible Dean moments in season 9 is that superhero action figure melting on the hob yelling "I clobber evil!" into a horrifying mangled sound. I think I just saw his face convey the exact same symbolic awfulness just in his eyes. Fuck you Jensen.

Note to self: gif that if somehow or other someone else hasn't yet.

I mean it's all shattered because the illusion is gone, Dean has nothing left to live for, he's just a guy doing a job. There's no meaning, no personal glory, no one to do it FOR. He's just the tool that gets it done because it has to be done, because what fucking benefit does he get from any of it if the job is also just watching everyone he loves die. That doesn't make him feel like a superhero that makes him feel like total bleak nihilism where you might as well just be upfront and dead inside and tell the truth because what's even the point of lying.

This episode has a lot of nihilism but some of it is fun buttburger style and some is killing me inside :P

Also Dean had to confirm angels are real, and the look on his face when he does THAT is ALSO AWFUL. Because everything is awful.

All that baggage where confirming angels are real he knows what people think. He knows what HE thought. He knows how what he thought was different from what other people thought about angels (see: the entire conflict between him and Sam in 2x13) and what angels eventually became to him. That one angel WAS watching over him. That there was one who broke the pattern and was ... Cas.

Help.

I tell you what I thought while I was getting dinner... This is the first time I've felt like we're in a show run by the guy who helped create Plucky's.

This is the tone. This is the exact right mouthfeel for Dabb era. This is what it SHOULD be.

FINALLY the Sam and Jack confrontation we deserve!

Sam is getting through and chatting! Jack is talking about why he was scared which is nice and symbolic about sharing and caring feelings for better communication and understanding!

Sam's still scared of being in the same room as Jack, flinching when he moves, much like when he's around Lucifer. He's legit scared of a thing and Sam is the biggest badass hunter in the world (like, no offence Dean, you have an impressive and showy history but in terms of brute strength and raw badass mofo power it's Sam :P He's Sam Fucking Winchester and you have a much more personal, over-dramatic flair to the big kills and such)

Jack moves forward intently because he doesn't know that this much eagerness is a trait stamped out of adults, and sits cross-legged, childish, but still imposing. He's learned cross-legged is a fun way to sit and I'm really liking the choices here to make him both naive and powerful.

He's fucking sitting with the Mr Burns hands i knew it i knew this was going to be a trait of his, I called it from like 2 promo pics. God damn I'm good at reading body language from just a few stills :P He's exactly what I was expecting but in full 3D animation.

It's just... a cute weird trait. He doesn't know what to do with his hands so he just rests them where they are and lets them hang, because he doesn't have any tics or mannerisms. He's mannerismless. He's so new he hasn't got the faintest trace of social anxiety. This is a raw, undamaged soul.

I am going to weep when Nougat gets hurt in the bits that make him so sweet.

See now he's apologising for hurting people. He sounds so confused when he says "I'm sorry" like he's sounding out the concept but the great thing is he's learning 1000 miles an hour. Anna told Cas he doesn't know what it is to be sorry and Cas still struggled with it in season 7 in the "playing sorry" game and only in 9x11 expressed that he truly understood empathy and human emotion now. Jack tries on an emotion for size, discovers it, and now seems to be fairly earnest about it.

Sam: *blink blink*

Sam was RIGHT. <3

Hahahah he says Kelly is a part of him. Another point for me! That was one of my specs for how he got to learn English and concepts so fast - that the reason it's fatal to birth him is because he's going to not just absorb the basic baby stuff like nutrients and stuff but he's going to suck her dry of facts and concepts and that's what destroys her. It's like what Amara did but far more complex.

Damn, I'm sorry you had to die for this Kelly, this is a pretty terrible idea in some ways. I better not overthink it.

He just said that his powers are him but not him - he sees them as something other from himself. The whole deal that he needed to be born powers and all, that taking the grace was taking a part of him - yeah. The Cas argument about his grace too, that it can be removed from him and he'll still be Cas, the grace is just power... If Jack sees it as a separate part of himself, a "Not Me" part of himself... That's a huge thing.

Oh my fucking GOD He thinks Cas is his FATHER OH NO OH NO OH NO OOOH NOOO.

(Also thanks a LOT people reading along with me for not telling me. Look, the analysis about Sam thinking it was Lucifer and Dabb's BIG Nougat Fake Out build up were all like... how it was meant to be read :P I guess that's why they backed off the father thing for Sam immediately after using it in the one place it would hurt the most.)

I mean Cas did basically act as the co-parent with Kelly and I am pretty sure our Nougat has some lines crossed here and OH MY GOSH DABB YOU MAGNIFICENT FUCKER

See when I said they were making Jack look SUPER FUCKING CREEPY when he was naked at the drive in obviously that was a fake out because I knew he was gonna be hunting with them later but oh my fucking fuck de fuck I want to go back and watch Jack's bits all over again where he's wandering around naked (as Cas is wont to do) asking for his father because FUCK.

He's born as Cas and Kelly die and now he's wandering around asking for Cas and that whole opening, that whole build up where he seems sinister... He remembered Cas all along... Oh gosh I said some things about him back there... I should go back to that scene immediately.

...

I nearly cracked a fucking joke that Jack doesn't have a last name just like Cas and it turns out that scene was a joke about Jack not having a last name because Cas is his father and HE doesn't have a fucking last name.

I hate everything.

"I'm trying to find him. I have to find him" YEAH SO JACK IS ON THE "WHERE IS CAS" TEAM AND THERE'S ANGELS SAYING CAS DESERVED BETTER, I THINK DABB HAS BEEN READING THE BLOGS AGAIN.

Jack picked Cas to be there to be his parent and guide when Cas said that thing about being his guardian to show him the righteous path and Jack heard it from the womb and was like YES I CHOOSE YOU PIKACHU and that was that, Cas was his father now. Found family in the extreme. Who is the best family, the good family? I'll have that one please.

Oh gosh and now it's sadder that the sheriff was asking for a phone number or address because Cas HAS those. He has a HOME.

...

Anyway back to the Sam and Jack scene, which I already watched through but I want to watch AGAIN DAMMIT.

Gosh this is magnificent though because it puts Cas so squarely in the middle of everything - even though he's dead he's Jack's focus and he's Jack's moral centre and everything that is good about Cas is what Jack wants to beeeeeee and oh my gosh is he going to choose the Winchesters to be his new guardians because they were Cas's family? HELP ME.

I'm still kinda not over Jack completely becoming Kelly in the womb and being born by sucking her goodness out from the inside.

What a godawful parenting metaphor/commentary on the mother's sacrifice.

Oh and the door to the other world thing as the lead in to talking about his father? I was so sure it was going to be about Lucifer and then -

oh god I am in pain.

Because he diverts from talking about the portal to talking about needing to find his father to protect him and I was like A: well you need the portal for that and B: nooo, Nougat, you don't need that fucker in your life! and then -

oh.

Ow.

Anyway Sam's face while talking about Cas is just... ARGH. And Jack's so earnest and happy about Cas protecting him and how he had to grow up

And then poor Nougat's face when Sam tells him Cas is dead and he's SO ANGRY. And THAT, my dear Nougat, is how you get to the lovely position of being furiously vengeful against your birth father in order to avenge your chosen father and I am delighted.

Cas is Jack's Bobby.

OH NO Clark has gone out to smoke with headphones. He's so gonna get angel murdered if Jack's not gonna kill him (because he is a soft squishy nougat person) and then Jack's going to be even more hurt.

STOP HURTING JACK.

FRIES GIRL IS AN ANGEL.

THAT'S NOT A GOOD THING.

SAM, TELL DEAN ABOUT THE CAS'S SON THING.

HE SAID LUCIFER'S SON, THAT'S NOT HELPFUL.

I suppose Sam doesn't want to convey that to Dean because he knows how Dean is with concepts he hates because he's currently flippantly talking about killing "Damien" out back rather than engage with the subject matter, but tbh I think bringing up Cas would be such a knock to the feels that Sam might be able to get in the line that "this kid seems to have a Cas-guided morality" while Dean is still emotionally picking himself up.

AHAHAHA Dean said "that won't do jack against her" - he's still using "jack" as a phrase

Dean's Becky... what a surprise :P Maybe Fries Angel writing "Bitch" on the car wasn't subtle enough.

The angels find Dean an annoying roommate whose drama they're always having to deal with.

Mittens just reminded me I wept about 9x07 to her and the poor melting action figure and how the angels want to burn Dean down. I am not okaaaay.

OOOH we're getting angel radio now because Jack's our in!

I don't think their eyes normally light up to communicate with it but new season new rules and this must be a mechanic we're dealing with more than just this one example.

Poor Clark - Jack briefly had a friend, learned to sit cross legged and eat nougat from him, and now his friend who made him laugh is dead. It's a HARD LIFE being a Winchester.

Also the main Winchesters are getting smashed up

Wait Dean just got back up with STYLE. Nice fight

Hey Clark is still alive-ish... Maybe Jack can heal him.

OH NO BANISHING HURTS NOUGAT TOO.

That was some great quick thinking by Sam.

Guess walls affect it or Fries Angel was too far away.

Fries Angel needed to stick around to deliver some Destiel exposition that she knows Dean's first thought to "Jack can do anything" was not "I will use him to reopen that portal and get mom back" but "I will get him to resurrect my dead angel" and just immediately goes from that to crushing Dean about Cas's death

"Castiel, he's dead. All the way dead. Because of you."

That is.. the worst line

"Or what, Other One?" Jeeeze the angels really do have more of a beef with Dean about the whole Winchesters thing for some reason. That really means in a couple of lines of exposition that every time heaven has mocked Cas about The Winchesters they really have meant Dean... Just, you know.. remember who wrote the eeny meeny miney mo scene for a sec, back when he had to be subtle about Dean calling Cas but that just being a random happenstance to what the angels were talking about, essentially :P

Oh no she stabbed Nougat!

I assume he doesn't die because... you know.. spoilers.

He's got his own Cas-like pull the blade out moment, but... Wow.

HOLY SHIT SOMEONE SAID THE LINE "I'M FINE" ON THIS SHOW AND MEANT IT

IT IS A NEW ERA

NOUGAT IS THE HERALD OF BETTER TIMES

Poor guy is stunned and confused and a little hurt though.

Oh no Clark is fine but going to hospital. I mean I assume this means doctors will help him. His mom is telling him he'll be brave and so on.

Poor Nougat is so sad about how horrible this world is. Cas isn't here to protect him and Sam and Dean just did a moderately adequate job at fending off the angels while getting the shit kicked out of them because angels are scary and powerful again.

Sam tries to bring up the keeping Jack thing again and Dean's like yeah we can keep him but he's evil so I guess that means you clean up the mess a la taking a puppy home?

Dean's still convinced Jack is evil and brainwashed Kelly and Cas - it's kinda more terrifying that he BECAME Kelly and absorbed her, and I do think he chose Cas to be his father and none of it was malicious, and they gave him the love and promise of protection he needs to be good and all and it's a billion times more nuanced than Dean thinks... He's being protective of Cas, depressed about their life and their chances... I think he's going to be pretty wrong about Nougat because from 12x19 it was obvious he had chosen Cas BECAUSE Cas was good and would protect him. Even when he didn't think he could do it himself. So I think Jack, uh... motivated Cas... because he wanted him... Like, I still think Jack did shit to Cas because he did creepy shit to Kelly which we're apparently going to move on from because he is an adorable squishy guy who I want to follow with a blanket and a stick to beat off people who will wear him down. But yeah, 12x19 is super weird and I don't *like* the method Jack acquired his mom and dad, even if I do think that he's not evil and the end result seems extremely positive if he popped out the womb determined to find Cas, and has a Cas-centric morality. Loving Cas is obviously the good and best thing you can do on this show and it's vindicating in spades he's a nice guy because he loves Cas and considers him a father for the protection he offered.

(Still think if he was pure good to start with he'd have SAID "hey I plan to be born a full grown adult, you don't need these diapers" but that WAS what caused him to open the rift so maybe his attempt to warn Cas went astray... :P)

But yeah I still find Jack "choosing" Cas to be his father and to create that bond out of nothing, almost instantaneously, to be a little suspect in the happenstance of it, even if as I've been saying all along I have been completely open to him turning out to be, well... Nougat.

But Dean doesn't care, he wants to kill Jack. "At least the only people he can hurt there are you and me" WOW DEAN.

WWWWOOOOOOW.

OH NO OH NO OOOOH NOOOOOOOOO O OoOOOOooooOOOooo o Sam is saying "are you sure about this Dean? It's Cas" - I assume in reference to burning him rather than burying him and Dean's gonna be like, Fries Angel said he was dead as dead.

I don't wanna see it.

"You don't think I've tried that" OH NO

Here's the flashback! Told you it was coming! (You have all seen this episode no one is mad enough to wait 18 hours just to watch for the first time with my notes) But yeah as I was saying, sidelining Dean's emo stuff to focus on the action, to set it aside, to put us away from it, to keep it back for when it would hit most. To do some god damn STORYTELLING around here. Some fucking ardfgjhlsksdfhjklslhfdjqp storytelling. That when all the action is done, when Dean has been ground down into a fucking paste by this day, the day of having to come to terms with the loss of Cas, when we know he went off to have some private punching things time and Sam was being the least gay to possibly gay in the comic stoner movie side of the story, Dean was having a moment SO POWERFUL that it could ONLY be conveyed to us by not showing it happening until we were deeply, truly, in the context of Dean mourning Cas and where we could focus on that with nothing left to distract us that this is the Worst.

.... I have been sitting here not pressing play for over 10 minutes

OH NO

I have paused it immediately

because they used the camera angle from Baby

the Roadhouse one

and the one from the fight where Cas was on the phone

so uh

Add hysterical weeping to the things this show makes me do because I was one stoic snarky hahaha isn't this ridiculous Jack planned to adult all along so the diapers thing was a massive prank kinda person and then bam Dean went out back to pray and I was scream-crying and then he said Cas was his everything and I am never going to be chill again

Okay, Chuck… or god, or whatever. I need your help. See, you– you left us. You LEFT us. You went off. You said… You said the earth would be fine because it had me… and Sam, but it’s NOT, and we’re NOT.

We’ve lost everything. And now you’re gonna bring him back. Okay? You’re gonna bring back Cas, you’re gonna bring back Mom, you’re gonna bring ‘em all back. All of ‘em. Even Crowley.

’Cause after everything that you’ve done, you OWE us, you son of a bitch. So you get your ass down here and you make this right, right here and right now.

Please. Please help us.

Thanks Mittens.

So.

Uh.

First name basis with the guy upstairs: this is a personal appeal in case he ever actually cared. (Spoiler alert: I don't think Dean is going to come out of this with a better opinion of God)

*I* need your help. Not we, *I*. This is on Dean's behalf for Cas.

He brings up the line which we went into Dabb era on and I ripped to shreds critically at the time that Chuck ever put that burden onto Dean because he has some broad ass shoulders but they are not big enough for the world and his whole problem is he's always been carrying it in the first place so Chuck didn't do SHIT to make him feel better AND NOW DEAN IS CRITIQUING THE CARETAKERS OF THE EARTH IDEA. THAT IT SHOULD NOT BE HIS BURDEN. MAYBE NOT BECAUSE HE CAN'T DO IT BUT BECAUSE HE SHOULD NOT BE EXPECTED TO DO IT. He was singled out as the firewall between light and dark but he doesn't feel like a superhero. He doesn't clobber evil. He's being STRIPPED DOWN AS A PERSON. WHO EVEN IS HE. WILL DEAN QUIT HUNTING? JESUS CHRIST, I SAID THAT LINE IN 11x23 WAS AWFUL FOR DEAN BUT I DIDN'T THINK DABB WAS GONNA GO *THERE*

And he says the world isn't fine - and they're not. Their emotional state reflects the world. The centre of the universe thing, in the storytelling, makes the world reflect Dean. His misery or happiness is on a cosmic scale. This tangledupness of him in the middle of it all is killing him because the world will be in danger and that can't all land on him. He can't be the Atlas of this world. But he is. OH how he is. But this isn't a world with superheroes. Just HUMAN GUYS DOING THEIR JOB.

And then the transition. The terms and conditions. The "you have given me a fucked up burden so pls unfuck it and here's how" swinging around from "everything" to "him". The implicitness of it all. The... The fact everyone knows it's about Cas. It's not about Mom. It's not about Crowley. He can say their names. He couldn't say that Cas was dead. Fries Angel immediately identified it. Cas is the answer to all the questions, where all roads lead. And they've come back to the house where he died, FOR Cas, and Sam asks about praying and Dean has already asked and got no answer, already been told Cas is permadead, and THIS is where we deliver the bombshell. Everything flows into "him".

Cas is Dean's everything.

And yeah he wants Mary back and fuck it fuck you God fuck everything just fucking include Crowley to because why the fuck not, you owe me. All that pointless stupid death and loss, it's enough to make me feel bad that Crowley is gone.

And oh the wank over the summer he would ask for Crowley back too (and I smacked the desk and hooted with laughter, with tears still in my eyes, reeling from the "everything" line because I called the way Dean would ask for him back. I knew it!), it just... Even Mary doesn't compare because she's tacked on in the repetition, the clarification that everything is him is Cas. And it's totally fine for Dean to ask for these others he's lost back, for them to be in the same sentence as Cas, because yes he lost them and it hurts and it's awful, but there is a very special awful reserved for Cas. The kind of awful where Sam has to pause and ask Dean if he's sure, if he doesn't want to find a way to bring him back. And we ALL know we're not supposed to bring people back because there's consequences. We're all adults in the room, they both have done it, seen and FELT the consequences for having it done TO them. But Sam knows. He just knows what happens when it's someone like Cas. And maybe we don't have any more bullshit, we just ask politely and carefully if this is going to be a "bring them back at any cost" situation, and how can I help?

And then at the end of the prayer Dean cracks out the exact look and angle of expression for his Plea To God face that he has used... once. In 5x14. When utterly at the end of his rope. This is what losing Cas has brought him to - the lowest point, the one back in season 5 that was a danger to the guardianship of the world lumped on Dean's shoulders, because it was where he was when he nearly said yes to Michael, the despair cycle he couldn't deny any more at the time... Yeah, this has kind of seen and waved at season 7 on the way to hurtling all the way back to the Worst Dean Has Ever Felt To Date.

Nice.

And Dean has given up all faith in God ever helping them or caring about them.

OH NO

NOUGAT

Sam has taken him to see his dead mom. :(

Time to grapple with the concept of loss.

*beeps her big toe*

Oh Nougat I truly feel bad for you now. Look at his big soft face. He consumed her to gain his life and powers and his intelligence and his GOODNESS and oh no that means he's gonna feel baaad about it.

But Dean is downstairs with Cas, alone. Can this episode get any fucking worse.

THOSE SERIES OF ACTIONS QUALIFY AS WORSE I AM WEEPING AGAIN.

Oh god Dean.

You should have told him.

You should have fucking told him.

Oh Nougat you... sweetie. He has no clue what to say. :(

Sam tells him to say thank you, because he devoured Kelly, and to say sorry.

Oh Sam, he's crying for Cas as well.

OH NO Dean's so defeated about Mary it's just... UGH.

I assume these are the first things he says today where he gets immediately proven wrong - I assume the last scene will be a hop across the universe lines.

"They're all gone"

This is simultaneously the best Sam stuff in 1000 miles of canon and the worst Dean episode ever and I am in agony.

Yep that billisecond of footage was completely right. Sam is sad, Jack, who we didn't see, is struggling sweetly with the concept of death and what it means and how to act and feel right now, and Dean... has checked the fuck out.

RUN, MARY

I LOVE HER.

FUCK YOU LUCIFER BTW

Ugh her face is like mine when he says he needs her. The shot looks like the fucking Titanic poster. I'm assuming they do not get very far before Michael gets involved, though.

I'm gonna go back to ugly-crying about the rest of this.

This is Dabb's best solo episode hands down. I laughed, I cried, I struggled with the complex philosophy of being human and if you should consume your mother from the inside out in order to be born as a full-grown man.

I think I'm keeping Nougat.

#13x01 #season 13 spoilers #I say fuck every 3 words #also fuck you dabb and your fucking nihilistic stoner comi-tragedy nightmare of a show #Dabb vs cars #my stuff

228 notes · View notes

tialovestelevision · 7 years

Text

Smashed

“Coping.” Right? It’s “Coping?” Anyone?

Another dialogue post! But before we start…

T: That’s Creepmeister on the Netflix splash screen for this episode, isn’t it? Goddammit.

{*\../*} : Because nothing says fun like proto-Gamergate dudes on my screen.

T: Previously On calls back all the way to Gingerbread in Season 3. Remember when Amy was a human? Remember when Amy was a character instead of a running gag? It’s also very long.

{*\../*} : Buffy is really damn funny in this opening scene as she’s fending off muggers (muggers! In Sunnydale!) and generally acting like a woman with her head together. Which goes really weirdly with the end of “Tabula Rasa,” I gotta say. And now Spike has show up, gotten jolted with pain for attacking one of the (human) muggers and generally embarrassed himself, and is now hitting on Buffy. “To that, an extreme ‘see you later.’” Oh, Buffy, if only that would sink this ship.

T: I was about to comment on Spike also being funny, but then he showers her with slut-shaming metaphors and pointing out her isolation. Lovely guy, that Spike. You’d almost think he’s a soulless monster. You’d almost think a guy has to be a soulless monster to behave that way.

{*\../*} : Meanwhile, Willow is opening her door on a silent house and staring gloomily, then wandering back into her room. Sad music is playing. Am I supposed to be feeling sympathy here? Is that what’s going on? Because I gotta say that the girl who MIND-CONTROLLED her girlfriend to maintain her relationship is not getting sympathy from me at this time. ‘Cause even if I take the magic mojo out of the metaphor, she is the abuser in this situation and I am not inclined to feel sympathy no matter how big her puppy-eyes are.

T: I feel sympathy for Seasons 1-5 Willow because she has to be put through this storyline and thus shed my sympathy going forward. Oh, look, it’s Rat-Amy. And Willow missing the point. And trying to cover just how awful what she just said is with calling it joke.

{*\../*} : “And leave you for no good reason.” Um.... REASONS! There are A LOT. Like you literally dragged your Buffy out of the grave and moved her into the house you share with your girlfriend, had a fight with her and wiped her memory - not once, but twice, and the second time after promising to ease off trying to solve every problem with your big magic hammer! Bad Willow. Bad!

T: I think Sweet lacks Willow’s talent for wrecking relationships this season. And for causing trauma. And he’s an evil mind control fire music demon. Can we get him back? He was fun. Willow casts a spell and summons paper. It’s a magic scroll. She should scribe it to her spellbook before she uses it… hey, it’s Amy. It worked. Wait, she could have summoned paper any time? Opening credits. No Tara, but given that I’m pretty sure she’s been written off the show for a bit that’s not a surprise.

{*\../*} : As an aside, screaming Amy right before the credits. Not a good omen for this spell, either.

T: “I was a mouse. I had cheese. I had four legs. I was happy. Now I’m a human again, with human troubles. Everything is cold and nobody lets me run on a wheel.”

{*\../*} : Stop making up dialogue, honey. It confuses the readers. Even if it is better than the show’s right now.

T: If they’re going to bludgeon us with the metaphor, they need to use a big bludgeon. No pussyfooting around it.

{*\../*} : We resume with Andrew doing a ridiculous entry to a museum which is thoroughly unnecessary. Much Trio ‘witty banter’ which is not. “Phase One of the plan is now complete.” That’s the dialogue that really makes a girl’s heart beat faster. They use a freeze ray on the guard, and Creepmeister dismisses the idea of the guard telling on them in a way that screams “murderous intent” to me.

T: Unless he’s already murdered the guard via Jonathan’s very chilly and almost certainly frostbitten hands and hasn’t told them. I’m not sure whether to expect Cinematic Freezing, which wears off with various degrees of side effects, or Actual Freezing, which kills you stone dead, in this show.

{*\../*} : Meanwhile, Willow is trying to ply a very nervous Amy with hot chocolate and looks guilty when Amy says she felt like she was in the cage “for weeks.” Because, you know, the girl who’s been a rat for years because she was in your coven and had to turn herself into a rat to avoid being burned to death because of a.... You know what? Nevermind. Feel guilty about your abused girlfriend who moved out of the house to we-don’t-know-where!

T: I forgot Larry died. The Mayor killed him in “Graduation Day,” for the record - had to go look that up. Amy wants to go to prom with Larry. Larry is gay, Larry is dead, and prom is very far past over. Apparently, Rat-Amy has no sense of time. Also, I will note that the fancy rat, which is the most common pet rat subspecies and likely what Amy was, lives for 2-3 years if taken care of well. Amy keeps getting forgotten by the writers and often was simply absent from dorm scenes in season 5 - I’m not sure if they moved her cage to the Tara/Willow dorm room set. Magic must have kept Amy alive, because I don’t know what else would. Maybe she drained the life of Miss Kitty Fantastico, who appeared in “Family” and hasn’t been seen since. “Family” was set more than a year before “Smashed,” as a note.

{*\../*} : “How have you been?” “Rat. You?” “Dead.” So Buffy comes home and comes up the steps to talk to Willow, and they’re sitting down to talk, and Buffy asks Willow how she’s doing in a far too sympathetic tone and then launches into a conversation about choices - good, bad, living with them - and I think she’s about to talk to Willow about Tara and magic and then I realize no, she’s about to talk about kissing Spike. And then Amy walks in, and that’s when we get the classic dialogue I just quoted while Buffy is sitting there with a huge stunned look on her face and radiating a general air of “I should leave you two alone” after MISTAKING AMY FOR TARA as if Tara would just happen to be there again. I don’t even know where to start unpacking what a huge mess this scene is after barely a minute..

T: I think Buffy thinking Amy is Tara is one of the more sympathetic moments in the scene. She’s in Willow’s room and someone comes out of the bathroom; to Buffy’s reflexive reactions, of course the person coming out of the bathroom is Tara. Also, I have to say… while I’m really not into the arcs we’re working on here, the dialogue in this episode is really snappily written. Buffy’s scene in the cold open and this one here both do some wonderful things with that.

{*\../*} : All true. But not only is Willow acting like a girl who got dumped instead of a girl who’s abused girlfriend walked out, but Buffy is acting like a woman whose friend is having a ‘normal’ fight with her girlfriend. I mean, granted Willow isn’t Angelus in the abuse department, but seriously? Nothing? We’re just going to sit down and have girl talk like we used to in high school?

T: Honestly, I buy that too. I don’t LIKE it, but I buy it. Buffy is basically going through super-trauma (like regular trauma, but with superpowers). She wants to talk about her problems. Willow doesn’t want to talk about hers. Might as well meet somebody’s needs, right?

{*\../*} : Stop enabling abuse, Buffy! Anyway, we should roll on while I fume.

T: I really don’t like it. On the other hand, Amy wants cookies, and not cheese. I want cookies and cheese.

{*\../*} : And now Buffy is leaving without talking about her issue after making sad-face when Willow talked about it being nice to have a magically-inclined “friend” around. Are the writers trying to play a romantic jealousy angle here or are they just really oblivious? Because as a lesbian girl, I’m sitting there going “Buffy is there to reestablish her prime straight-but-intimate placement with Willow and then gets beaten out by ex-coven-mate Amy and looks upset by that.” Is that not how I’m supposed to be reading that?

T: What I read in the scene, from Buffy’s perspective: “I have Problems. I have an emotionally intelligent friend who I have relied on in the past when I have had Problems. I will go tell my emotionally intelligent friend! Wait… my emotionally intelligent friend is busy. And holy fuck that thing she just said was heartless and oblivious and awful, wasn’t it? My emotionally intelligent friend is not a safe place to bring my problems now. I will go to the living room and set up a sofa bed.”

{*\../*} : Legit. That does make more sense.

T: Amy has all the cookies. There will be no cookies for Dawn. Amy is watching the news and it looks like Rusty survived the freeze ray and is in critical but stable condition. But when we get to the museum, he’s still frozen solid and being removed from the building on a hand cart, which would make measuring his vitals a little difficult.

{*\../*} : Now Buffy is talking with Spike at the museum. More priceless dialogue. The way that Buffy is wearing her hair and the turtleneck is weirdly artificial, now that I’m looking at her, and oh God the writers are playing a “she wants to get with Spike but is trying to talk herself out of it by armoring up her look” angle, right down to the pigtails as a provocative touch to encourage him to push, aren’t they?

T: Pretty sure they are. I wouldn’t have caught that, but now that you point it out it’s really obvious. I really want to hate this scene - it’s very Buffy/Spike, with the unhealthy and the slut-shaming and the Spike everywhere, but the dialogue. The dialogue. It’s so GOOD!

{*\../*} : “When I kissed you, you know I was thinking of Giles, right?” “You know, I always wondered about you two.” “What? Oh! Gross, Spike!” Sarah does a wonderful little-girl-on-the-playground cadence on gross which is great acting but also makes me want to take an icepick to my temple.

T: Did Spike just punch Buffy then not have his chip go off? I think that happened. Yep. That happened.

{*\../*} : Yep. And then he tracks a girl into an alley with intent to kill, gives himself a rousing “I’m still a monster, I’m not housebroken!” speech and then has blinding pain when he tries to bite her. Soooo the chip is working (probably), but Buffy isn’t reading as human anymore, which was neatly suggested by Buffy’s venomous delivery on calling him an inhuman thing. Because that’s not ominous at all.

T: So now Buffy isn’t human, according to a piece of evil military technology. What was the last time one of our cast thought they weren’t human? Pretty much it was the same time we last saw Miss Kitty Fantastico. “Family.” With Tara. Hey, it’s Tara! She could have been added to the opening credits!

{*\../*} : She’s having a milkshake with Dawn, which is adorable. Tara is encouraging Dawn to eat leafy greens and gently prodding her about the size of her milkshake, and breaks with minimal encouragement into the “I will always be there for you” speech. This is playing like a mom-with-daughter-in-midst-of-divorce scene, and a cute one. Please, writers, acknowledge Tara moved out because she was being abused. Any moment now. Oh God, Dawn is deploying the “You still love her” defense. Oh... God. “She’s been really good about careful about stuff.” The writers are not off-point, actually, because this is not the nice sunny scene it’s being shot as at all. This is the daughter from an abusive household trying to tell the abused mom who moved out that the remaining parent has changed because it has been X days since the last incident. It becomes really obvious if you change the gender pronouns in Dawn’s dialogue here. “[He’s] been doing a lot better lately. [He’s] been really good about being careful about stuff.”

And now we’re having a nice normal investigation scene with the gang, everyone sitting around the table, more brightly lit shooting, but when Anya says they don’t have the right text and Willow says “We’ll do it another way,” sudden Buffy and Xander are on red alert. “I don’t think we need to resort to...” Buffy stumbles out, and Xander’s mouth is hanging open to add something, and then Willow pulls out her laptop and suddenly Xander is enthusiastically talking about going “back to basics.” Apparently “Tabula Rasa” didn’t actually vanish from everyone’s minds after all.

T: And Willow magics the computer. Magic hacking. That’s… a neat idea, or would be if not for the fact that we’re in Buffy Season 6. I believe magic hacking more than I believe TV hacking, which basically treats computers as magical anyway. Xander wants to go away from her. And Anya gets everything out in the open.

{*\../*} : Except she makes it about Tara having left her, which is NOT THE POINT. Which is okay from Anya, but then nobody else corrects her. Also, “It’s better this way,” Willow? Really?

T: Truth. Though Anya did point out that nobody wants to talk about anything. Either they don’t understand, or they do and they don’t want to talk about anything. Either way… I don’t have an ending to that sentence.

To be fair, it IS better that Tara has left her abusive, memory-deleting girlfriend. Willow is right on that note. That Willow is the abusive, memory-deleting girlfriend makes me less sympathetic to her rightness. Then she finishes her sentence and is no longer right. Oh god I hate this scene.

{*\../*} : “This time away will help us sort things out” (while she does nothing to acknowledge what the problem is in the first place). “Now let’s get through this. I don’t want to leave Amy alone in the house so long.” Umm.....

T: Now we’re talking about Amy. Willow implies that Amy might not remember how to use a toilet. Buffy is now good with this not leaving her alone in the house thing. Ye gods, though, Willow, straight to insulting Amy?

Season 6 Willow might be worse than Spike. If not for Creepmeister’s presence, she might be the worst character in the season. Is Creepmeister there to provide a counterargument to “Willow is the very worst?”

{*\../*} : Speaking of whom, we cut to the diamond. And a dick joke.

T: PENIS JOKES! And here’s Spike, to ruin days. MORE PENIS JOKES! He is threatening Boba Fett. I think Creepmeister is revealing things we already knew based on him being Creepmeister here.

{*\../*} : The comedy here is wonderful, but the most interesting thing is that Spike just walked into the headquarters of the season Big Bads and did not in fact notice they were doing anything. Including, say, the big diamond on the table. He’s so focused on himself and his chip and what’s going on with Buffy that he doesn’t see them as anything but an easily-dismissed tool for his agenda.

And now Willow is home and talking with Amy, who wants to make her dad forget the last three years. And Willow is making jokes about the poor aim of her forgetfulness spells, because ha-ha that’s funny.

T: I hope we’re meant to be horrified that Willow thinks that’s funny. Oh god, I hope we’re meant to be horrified that Willow thinks that’s funny. Amy wants to go somewhere. Not to her father’s. Was her father involved in the attempt to burn her at the stake? Amy is playing on Willow’s old insecurities. Willow wants to have fun.

And now we get Creepmeister doing diagnostics on Spike’s chip. Then the aftermath. Andrew is trying to impress Spike with his Doctor Who viewing. Spike yells for Creepmeister. Creepmeister says the chip works still. Spike understands what’s going on. “Nothing wrong with me. Something wrong with her.”

{*\../*} : Tara is walking into the house with Dawn. Who is pressuring her to stay and invoking her own loneliness. That’s horribly manipulative. I really feel for Tara here. Dawn’s being a pretty typical teenager, but Tara’s in a situation where her maternal feelings about Dawn are being used to hold her hostage in the house until her abuser (who is out hitting the town with the ex-rat) gets home so that Dawn can try to push them to reconcile. Icky.

T: I feel for both of them. You’ve hit why I feel for Tara - whose situation is among the worst of a whole cast of people in bad situations - but Dawn is basically out of even partially functional parental figures. Giles left. Willow’s utterly ‘round the bend. Buffy is broken on a fundamental level and, even if she’s hiding it better than she was a few episodes ago, Dawn knows it. Tara’s the closest thing to a safe adult she has left in her life. That’s… really terrifying, when you think about it.

{*\../*} : And the correct answer is for her to move out with Tara, but Dawn’s need to keep an eye on Buffy and her attachment to the house and her refusal to really process what Willow having done what she did means is keeping her where she is. Someone writing this knows about abusive households.

T: It’s not just refusal. Dawn can’t escape. Not processing that is a psychological survival mechanism.

{*\../*} : True. Sorry, that’s correct. That it has the effect it has doesn’t mean it’s something she’s making a choice to do or that she somehow ought to be pulling herself up by her mental bootstraps to get out. She’s fifteen and ‘grew up’ in a household run by Joyce, for heaven’s sake - even Season 5 Joyce didn’t exactly teach her kids how to identify and stand up to abuse.

T: Willow and Amy are playing pool and talking about Xander and Anya. And are drunk. And it’s magic pool. Amy’s going to dance with a boy. And now Amy is casting attraction spells on girls regarding Willow. We know that’s a thing she can do. Willow, at least, is begging off this, though her stated objection isn’t “this is overriding their free will,” which really needs to be brought up because Amy does this, but is instead “I’m getting over a breakup” or maybe “I’m still into my girlfriend who I expect to get together with again any day now.” Goddammit, Season Six Willow. Amy is going to dance. And is dancing. Michelle Branch isn’t playing the Bronze today. Willow has a sad face. Now she’s drinking alone and threatening her olive. Amy runs back over and apologizes, which is better than Willow’s done about her much worse offenses so far. Amy says yet another really good line of dialogue (the dialogue writing, as I’ve said, is REALLY ON this episode), and now the guys are insulting Willow and harassing Amy.

{*\../*} : Homophobically insulting Willow. She and Amy are swapping significant looks. Incoming magical doom in 3, 2, 1....

T: And now they’re in Speedos dancing in cages. The guys, I mean. Really? That’s the magical revenge/justice? It… honestly feels very “exploiting gay panic” to me.

{*\../*} : The guys are clearly meant to be acceptable targets and we’re either supposed to laugh or be horrified at that moment. Or maybe the writers are splitting the difference, with the idea that we’ll laugh now and be horrified when the fridge logic kicks in?

T: Inasmuch as this show ever creates acceptable human targets (remember: violence against humans in this show is described as basically always evil), the guys come close. But this particular approach to responding to them just reinforces the stuff they were doing in the first place. How can an episode with such good dialogue keep tripping over basic plotting and themes?

D&D manuals don’t look like that, writers.

{*\../*} : That’s Dragons of Summer Flame. It’s a Dragonlance novel. No-vel. With novel cover art. I know because it’s sitting on my shelf in my bedroom. They stuck a D&D novel in his hands and called it a monster manual? I don’t know if I’m impressed they had a D&D book lying around or horrified they got it so wrong.

T: It’s too bad, because the actual pages of the Second Edition AD&D Monster Manual would make a GREAT sight gag here. With the little rectangles in the corners that have the monster pictures? If they were worried about copyright, they could just make sure Xander had it open to the Invisible Stalker page, since its rectangle was empty.

{*\../*} : Xander and Anya and Buffy are sitting around talking about how bad they are at research. Then they talk about Willow. Then Spike calls, and there is wonderful farce comedy with the conversation. Soo.... lots to talk about here.

Anya and Xander are pitching the idea that you have to watch out for quiet, responsible people because when they get a taste of being bad (or connecting to something bigger than them, or getting out of control) then they explode into a frenzy of bad decisions/power use/out of control. They’re worried that Willow was using too much magic before Tara left and now it’s going to get worse. “It’s human nature,” Xander says, and Buffy is immediately launching into a defense of responsible people and the importance of not assuming everyone is being seduced right before Spike calls. At which point the camera gets very close to her face and we watch her eyes get all huge while Spike growls at her over the phone, followed by protestations of how professional the call is from Buffy, followed by her immediately jumping on his double entendre on which he then doubles down. The camera work here is just screaming “bad boy, good girl, they’re thinking about having sex” and Buffy’s ditched the pigtails and turtleneck for a semi-transparent white blouse over a camisole that bares her neck and tied her hair back in a way that’s designed to make those close shots provocative. The costuming department is loudly telling us that this is a woman setting herself up to be seduced by a soulless dead guy who she was trading punches with earlier and who is now excited to know he can hurt her and planning to meet up in a CEMETERY.

Help me, Tia. I can’t even start to explain how problematic both those conversations are.

T: I feel like we’re beating a horse that is not only dead here, but has been turned, stabbed and thrown into Hell, returned from Hell, regained its soul, and become an unlicensed private investigator in a hotel in Los Angeles, but, once again, the entire cast - and probably the writers and almost certainly the director? - have fixated on the magic thing without acknowledging that Willow was abusing Tara, or that they were there, in the room, being Randy and Joan and witnessing it. Hell, Anya made out with Giles in the middle of the evidence; that’s how much in the middle of it they were. And nobody - ever - even Anya who talks about everything - has so much as brought it up. “She’s using too much magic,” they say, like when I walk into a room and find there’s blood everywhere and a corpse and I say, “Huh. This person uses too many knives.” The knife addiction is NOT THE PROBLEM HERE. I really don’t know how long I can go repeatedly saying “They’re not acknowledging the abuse and the writers are giving no indication that that’s supposed to be a problem,” but this episode keeps throwing at me in the midst of its immensely clever dialogue.

Buffy and Spike’s dialogue here? Immensely clever. Seriously, this is the way those characters talk at its very best. As for the content of it… I think you covered why it’s fucked up pretty well there, with a side order of “Buffy the Vampire Slayer, especially when it comes to its main protagonist, has a bad habit of being generally sex-negative and that makes it even harder to tell whether it knows this particular moment is extra-problematic and super-creepy.”

Heh. “Captain Peroxide.” Good one, Xander.

{*\../*} : Buffy is making excuses about Spike. Like a bad boyfriend she doesn’t want to admit to. And now he’s stalking her outside the magic shop. And they’re trading threatening banter, and she hits him. He hits her back, and there is a distinct lack of pain. Buffy’s horrified face. “Don’t you see? Don’t you get it? You came back wrong.” More horrified face. Cut to black. Credits.

T: Did you know that Russian scientists are trying to bring back the fauna of the Ice Age to combat global warming? We might live to see wooly mammoths on Earth, which is a happy thought.

Less happy is Spike exploiting Buffy’s already-extant insecurities about her resurrection in his continued fucked-up pursuit of fucked-up fucking.

{*\../*} : Sex and violence is a longstanding literary mixture. No question, it gets a lot of people’s motors running, but let’s be clear - Spike is now literally threatening Buffy with physical harm and psychologically abusing her while pursuing having sex with her in a dark alley, and the writers have just spent an episode coding “She wants him to fuck her” into every interaction they have. This is not an okay set-up for a show being made in a culture where women are routinely raped and then face attacks on their personal worth, credibility and whether it was “true stranger rape” or not. If you do not explicitly give verbal consent or if you withdraw consent at any time and someone continues trying to have sex with you, that is rape. Period. It is never okay.

T: I think the last time Spike got this rapey was that scene with Willow right after he got his chip. Remember that one? The one we were supposed to laugh right after when they started making impotence jokes? This is an attempted rape scene, and… yeah. They loaded it precisely how Dragon is describing. So now they fight. Buffy throws Spike into an abandoned house. Amy and Willow are still at the Bronze, watching the guys dance and listening to the music… and… holy fuck really? Dragon? I can’t even. Can you even?

{*\../*} : I can very even. So let’s start with Amy and Willow up on the railing of the Bronze, with the guys from before still up in their cages dancing and a guy next to them doing the Robot and looking incredibly freaked out. Both of them look like the cats that ate the canary. Willow decides she doesn’t like the music and flicks her fingers. Disney sparkles. And then the male band leader turns into a woman in a tight shirt and sexy-makeup fronting a band playing a completely different sort of music. The rest of the band are also women. Right before he got hit with the magic, his eyes got huge with terror. Question: did she just transform them into the bodies of girls and magically compel them to play, or swap them for a different band who are not being magically compelled to play, or erase them from reality and replace them with magical replicants who exist to play the music she wants them to?

Hint: none of these answers is good, and the problem is not that she did it with magic.

Now Amy is making a guy fly, and Willow is making one guy incredibly tall and shrinking another, and Amy is turning people into sheep or possibly just summoning sheep. More magic sparkles, I can’t even tell what they’re doing now except making the club look like something out of Lewis Carroll by way of Circe and mind control fiction. Willow has a creepily sexy look on her face and is pressing her tongue to the back of her teeth. Cut to Buffy and Spike beating the shit out of each other in the abandoned house they charged into before. Spike is doing a creepy laugh and swinging on a chandelier that’s coming out of the ceiling. They’re throwing each other through stairs and the fireplace mantle. Buffy has started in on the verbal abuse now, too. “I’m in love with you,” Spike says in a creepy voice, and Buffy fires back with “You’re in love with pain. Admit it. You like me ‘cause you enjoy being beat down. So really, who’s screwed up?” And Spike, bless whoever hit this line and James Marsters for delivering it, says “Hello? Vampire. I’m supposed to be treading on the dark side.”

Yes. Yes. Stake him now!

No. More punching with a sexy camera angle. “What’s your excuse?” he says. She throws him into a wall and then flying tackles him.

Cut back to Amy and Willow still hanging over the rail. Guy floating in the background. Flying music. “So we’ve kinda played this scene,” Willow says, looking bored. “Return.” And now everyone’s back to normal and nobody seems to remember what just happened. And Willow is talking about somewhere bigger. Amy makes a joke about it being too early in the night.

Cut back to Spike and Buffy. Spike: “I wasn’t planning on hurting you. Much.” Creepy smile. Buffy: “You haven’t even come close to hurting me.” Is this supposed to be foreplay? Am I supposed to be getting hot for this? Because I’m gonna level with you, readers, I am a kinky girl who is into all sorts of stuff that isn’t allowed in mainstream movies and what this making me is excruciatingly uncomfortable.

More beating up the walls. And now Buffy’s kissing him and he’s shoving her into walls and they’re mixing fighting with more kissing. And literally taking the building down around them while we hear the sound of his zipper. And they’re having sex with their clothes on and staring at each other. Dramatic music chords. Building is come down without a sound, but we hear their noises and they go right through the floor without breaking penetration (yeah, right, that’s NOT how that works boys and girls) and finally, finally the credits roll.

T: Finally. Mercifully. At long last. So… “Smashed.” It’s not the worst episode? It’s got clever dialogue. Nobody tries to burn their children at the stake. That’s… all it has going for it, isn’t it?

This was an actively painful watch. I know we talked about it a lot during the synopsis, but the whole thing nobody acknowledging the fact that Willow was abusing Tara and the story as a whole not making clear that it was aware either (the scene with Dawn and the milkshake indicates it might be, or that someone in the writer’s room is, but… I don’t know).

This is Season 6. During Season 6, Joss Whedon was basically ignoring Buffy (though he wrote “Once More, With Feeling”) and left it in the hands of lead writer Marti Noxon, who was herself suffering from a huge, severe bout of depression. It’s possible that, in addition to that affecting the show’s creative direction, the lack of effective leadership on the creative side led to poor communication among the writers?

{*\../*} : Something is certainly going on in the production, here, because we’re being told several contradictory things here. On the Willow side - 1) The Dawn scenes tell us that Willow abused Tara and they’re broken up, and 2) the gang scenes are pitching us a Willow is high on the rush of magic, Tara was a speedbrake on that, and now she’s going out of control with Amy as her enabler-buddy. Depending on which of the two we believe, we can read Willow’s scenes as either her being in denial about her own actions and their costs and trying to hide from it with Amy’s devil-may-care recklessness - taking an active pleasure in flaunting what Tara was warning her about - or we can read them as a soon-to-be-junkie ceasing to be functional on her first night of binging. But we can’t do both. We just can’t - the text dissolves into nonsense if you try. Similarly, the Buffy scenes are telling us one of two things - either Buffy is in a state of existential despair and discomfort and her willingness to charge into Spike’s rape fantasy game is an act of self-destructive self-loathing, or Buffy is a responsible girl who’s been trying to live for others and Spike is the bad boy who’s about to introduce her to rough, reckless sex and embracing the kind of self-centered aggression that isn’t heroic. You can reconcile those two if you squint, but it requires saying that Buffy’s retreading Faith’s path from Season 3 and doing it while keeping it a secret from all her nominally supportive friends, and even Faith only looked like the second one - it was very clearly put out there toward the end of Season 3 that her bad girl attitude was very much a mask over the self-loathing and self-doubt that the Mayor eventually assuaged by being (perversely) a good father figure. And even then, the script doesn’t seem to know if we should be cheering her on or shouting no.

T: If it does know that, it’s certainly not telling us. I’m really not sure what to do with this episode… from the episode titles and the way it closes out, I’m pretty sure it’s supposed to be a cliffhanger or a two-parter, but that also felt like they tried telling two complete, mutually exclusive stories with each lead within the course of an hour. Maybe “Wrecked” gives it some context, but I don’t expect it would be enough.

{*\../*} : Well, we’ll find out?

#buffy the vampire slayer #smashed #buffy season 6 #season 6 #dialogue post

4 notes · View notes