Supernatural

Biggest regret of my life, this fight. You’d think it was when I had to stab her to death, but… no. All through that… I was thinking we never got to get past this. If I’d have known, I’d have said anything she wanted to hear.

It didn’t take any extra thought to see parallels between Sam and Dean and the Bobby and Rufus scenes of the episode. But, now I’m wondering if there isn’t something to learn about Sam and Dean when paying attention to the dynamics of Bobby and Karen.

This is Karen’s third appearance. She’s introduced in season three with Dream a Little Dream of Me. We learn then (as Dean enters Bobby’s nightmare and Sam plays God to deal with Jeremy) that Bobby had to kill her after she was possessed. We’re told this is how he entered the world of hunting.

In season five’s Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid, a zombie Karen returns to Bobby. He’s able to enjoy some time with her before things go to shit (the wishes go bad?) and he’s put in the position of killing her again. It turns out she has a last minute message for him from DEATH that Bobby is a target for helping the Winchesters hold out against destiny.

This newest episode brings a new revelation. Bobby and Karen were arguing prior to her possession. It was major difference of vision for their lives. She wanted children and Bobby was unwilling to risk what that would bring out in him.

I can’t help thinking about the fundamental differences Sam and Dean have had and how very rotten that has been from both sides. I believe Bobby’s desire to heal the rift with Karen even at the cost of placating her or subjugating his own wishes is an illustration of the extremes that were gone to to stay connected to Dean when he was resurrected. He needed to hear (or say?) something and expected it to be awful. If it yet comes down to John’s last words of saving or killing Sam, it’s becoming clear that there are worse situations. Being at odds with your partner is an even bigger regret and one that we can hope will be resolved with an actual meeting  of the minds.

There’s a definite theme with the quotes I’ve selected for the two 7.10 entry titles that ties back to an ongoing show theme. How many times have Sam and Dean excused the other with “You didn’t know” over the course of the series?

Tags: 7.10 Death's Door

- Rufus is wearing a feather earring and responds to Bobby’s appeal for his partner’s help. He and Bobby are dressed in PEST CONTROL uniforms. Remember Dean in 6.01 Exile on Main St talking a little fondly of his life working in pest control with a partner helping people with the stuff in their walls!

- Rufus advises Bobby to look for the exit door at his worst buried deep memory. DEAN is the champion of “bury it!” DOORS! The crazy thing is I still don’t know if I believe the boys will end up dead and moving on when they go through the right door together, or if they will go through to ‘wake up’ alive in the real world and find those loved and lost waiting for them. I do know I don’t want the boys separated by doors as the show has done all too often.

- There are flags on the counters at the hospital. A fan is revealed in Kid!Bobby’s kitchen after Dad strikes Mom. There’s yet more preoccupation over organs (Bobby’s dying brain, and the organ transplant solicitor angering Dean).

- There’s a couple that comes over and argues and causes Sam and Dean to move their (non-)conversation about the likelihood of Bobby dying. (BuryIt!DEAN does not want to have the conversation. I note Sam’s line that they need to brace themselves because this is real.) Throughout the episode, there were more extras in the background than usual, but this bit pushed right into Sam and Dean’s space.

- I posted at spnematography about the screencaps of Dean punching his own reflection in two separate scenes of the episode.

- I’m spending a lot of thinking time wondering about Bobby’s world progressively blanking out. The choir members disappear, the book pages are blank, the drawer is empty, the faces fade from photographs, the outside world darkens into a void, and eventually the boys evaporate from Bobby’s final memory. It heartbreaking to wonder if that isn’t paralleled in the way Dean has been stripped down over the course of the series: the Impala’s searchlights, his silver ring, the leather jacket, the amulet, the car itself, his father, the psychic, the Harvelles, the Braedens (who Dean chose to be blanked from), the angel, the adoptive father….and on and on.

It reminds me of 5.17 99 Problems when Sam notices the town’s restrictions amounted to outlawing ninety percent of Dean’s personality. Dean’s response then was a “whatever” and that’s been his attitude of late.  Bobby advised Dean in the previous episode that he needed to find his reason to hunt. The biggest spark we’ve seen lately from Dean was during the confrontation with Dick outside the hospital.

Tags: 7.10 Death's Door, doors, livejournal link

7.08 Season Seven, Time for a Wedding

The art department must have been having fun this week! All of the set design touches have me wanting to spend time continuing to think about the episode.

I loved Becky’s apartment – especially the magnetic letters spelling out SAM AND BECKY on the refrigerator and Sam and Becky’s Investigation wall. I recently noticed Sam and Dean dressed in green and red in the S4 After School Special episode. That is echoed in Becky’s apartment.)  Becky’s family cabin was an excuse to bring out a wonderful set of fisher bedsheets.

The elixir Becky uses on Sam is purple and reminds me of the amulet of Anna’s grace that Uriel had in his custody.

BECKY:  But I want you! And this is the only way!

BECKY takes the vial out of her pocket.

SAM:  Becky. Becky, you’re better than this.

BECKY:  That’s sweet, but… I’m not so sure.

If I’m looking for parallels… Becky is coercing Sam into staying with her and loving her by drugging him. That isn’t a new theme for the show. Put baldly (WILDest of speculations follow), I think Sam is not a real boy and hasn’t been since the fire when he was a baby. I suspect four year old Dean was unable to let baby Sam go and that has been the root of their story ever since. (My alternate, alternate head-canon is that Dean is a manifestation of a Beautiful Mind Sam born of the pressures when he dreamed of the threat to Jessica – who had Dean’s birthday, natch.)

Over the years, the boys are pushed closer to realizing this. Sam is (currently) managing his situation, but Dean has been freaked out since John bought Sam’s life with his own and extracted that awful promise.  In hell, Dean was made a monster, and while he was raised from Perdition, he wasn’t able to accept the grace of redemption. He is the Monster at the End of This Book.

I identify everyone with Sam and Dean now. Becky is Dean trying to hold onto Sam. The beautiful thing is she is guided by Sam’s appeal to her better nature though she doubts herself. I’ve seen supportive messages to Dean about him not being alone and “it” not being his fault, etc.

Sam choosing monsters is Sam choosing Dean. The scrawny “Temp” hunter Dean partners with is Sam without the aid of drugs or blood and grateful that Dean thinks he doesn’t suck. (This new hug reminded me so strongly of teen Sam’s fireworks hug for Dean in Dark Side of the Moon.)

Of course I’ve simplified this way too much. I actually believe there’s a lot of give and take about whose issue is influencing any given player.

There were two references in the dialogue to “walls.” Sam catches on to what Becky is doing by listening through “thin walls.” And Crowley talks about hell not being Wall Street. (This is on top of last week when Dean described his lack of trust in Sam’s judgment about Amy and discomfort with lying to Sam as “climbing the walls.”)

****

7.09 How to Win Friends and Influence Monsters

- Loved the boys attempting to trying to jump start the house they are squatting in. Sparks!

- Dean in the red tie while Same wears blue is the pattern this season.

- The waiter’s nicknames for our guys made me laugh: Big Bird, Ken Doll, and Creepy Uncle.

- Turducken = your top three edible birds… a triple bird reference!

- I really enjoyed all three guys blasting away at the creature when it came back to life.

- The autopsy ending with the mutated adrenal gland continues the season’s focus on bodily organs.

- Dean not caring about not caring reminded me of 2014 Castiel.

- Sam and Bobby talking about Dean while he sleeps off the effects of the turducken seems really major to me. I, of course, think they’ve been doing something similar since Dean’s resurrection, and the show if finally letting us in on the fact. Sam saying that seeing Lucifer was better than how some others have it had to be talking about the monsters Dean has been facing.

- The idea that “experiments” could go bad is not unlike the wishes going bad (or the projections/manifestations/etc.?).

- Bobby calling Dean out on his depressed state was well done, I thought.

- All the “dick” jokes had me thinking about how often Dean has been cast in that role (Yellow Fever, After School Special, etc.). And from there I remember my theory that Dean is the Monster at the End of This Book.

- The perfectly complacent family unaware the grandma had passed seemed a clear reference to the Sloth Family of the season three opener The Magnificent Seven.

- The perfect timing of the ACME cleaning crew’s arrival for more than luck. It had to be (divine?) intervention.

- There were certainly a lot of white crosses in the frame with Dick Roman while he talked to Bobby. I havne’t come up with a theory to explain that.

- Sam and Dean waiting for Bobby to make it out the door was a lot like Sam and Bobby waiting for Dean to exit the hospital when he broke his legs. Bobby and Dean have switched places – as we’ve seen Sam and Dean do before?

- I wish the boys were in the Impala getting Bobby to help.

Tags: 7.08 Season 7 Time for a Wedding, 7.09 How to Win Friends and Influence Monsters

I rewatched both episodes this morning before heading back into work to continue with the moving and organizing. (No way I’ll be ready for Monday.)

My favorite line of Slash Fiction come when the leviathans were talking about the boys escaping. The fake FBI guy reports to Leviathan Dick Roman that the boys are “in the wind.” (I’ve decided that the wind means something in the show and that it is something good and as essential as the breath of life.)

I also loved the knowing benevolent smiles Jody Mills had for Bobby. She might as well have been an angel sent to provide the encouragement and solution needed.

I was inspired to change the thread title at icine after my Mentalists rewatch. The waiter’s free-with-your-order affirmation for Dean is that he’s a “virile manifestation of the divine.” He’s another of those Winchester appreciating characters I’m glad to have show up even if only to pass through and balance the disparagement characters like Crowley heap on the boys.

The Impala was missing throughout this episode. I like the baby blue Challenger Dean stole but am afraid Dean’s lost another talisman like his ring and amulet. It’s got me wondering when we last saw his leather coat….

In the very few episode discussions I’ve skimmed, I saw people reminded of S1′s Provenance and S5′s Real Ghostbusters. I get those and would include S2′s The Usual Suspects for the spirit acting and having the message misunderstood. S4′s Criss Angel’s magician convention was definitely analagous to the psychic festival. Also, the reveal of the bones in the bad guy’s bed had me thinking of both S6′s Mannequin and S3′s Ghostfacers.

Sam and Dean get past the worst of their disagreement about Dean killing Amy despite Sam’s wish that she resume a normal life. Dean explains that he knew in his gut that she would kill again. I think that’s what Ellen was referring to with her psychic-delivered advice that Dean tell how bad it is with him. The monsterous part of him – the part that still deserves hell? – is nearly irresistible and not to be trusted. If Amy were representing strictly Sam, Dean would be more torn up about the no hope decision.

I’m looking forward to going through screencaps. I’m pretty sure I saw the starburst clock in the Emporium and wonder what else was brought in to create all that clutter.

Tags: 7.06 Slash Fiction, 7.07 The Mentalists

Hurray for a day off! I used the afternoon to watch War of the Roses and found myself pausing mid-movie to write down quotes that connected right to Supernatural.

Gavin: How do you hold on to someone who won’t stay? And how do you get rid of someone who won’t go?

The narrator-lawyer’s line leads into a five minute ‘truce’ in the movie after war has been declared and each refuses to compromise about ownership of the house.

Barbara: We’ve made a mess of things, Oliver. (How many times have the Winchesters been accused of making making a “mess” or taken on the task of cleaning up “mess?” )

Barbara: I want to start living a normal life again. (We hear the line and connect it to early series Sam, but Dean is the one who most recently spent time living a normal life.)

Oliver never really gives up on his desire for Barbara even though when asking for the divorce she tells him she wants to smash his face in and would be relieved to be free if he had died during a health scare.

Oliver: It’s hard to believe we can’t be happy.

Barbara: We can be happy, just not together.

Oliver: I still love you. I still… want you.

Barbara: I don’t want you.

There’s an exchange where Oliver urges Barbara to tell him how to patch things up and she can’t.

Oliver: I guess you don’t want to talk about it,

Barbara: No. I don’t want to talk about it. Oliver, if you don’t get out of here now, you have no idea how far I’ll go.

Oliver: Sure, we’ve been horrible to each other, but we had something. We still do. We haven’t passed any point of no return.

This is where Barbara leads Oliver into believing the pate she’d served him was made from his missing dog and is followed with a scramble and fight on the stairs. (There are lots of scenes on stairs in this movie.) (I must also mention making a connection between the liver pate Barbara builds her business on and Supernatural’s use of body organs as a recent motif.)

It felt as though that five minutes of film has been directly influencing our story for years. I’ll also mention the pivotal chandelier. Several times it is shot from angles to emphasize its web-like qualities. The movie’s final shot of the Roses after their fall is so reminiscent of Sam and Dean in 6.06 You Can’t Handle the Truth (and other ‘couples’ going back to season three).

Tags: 7.05 Shut Up Dr. Phil