In which there is Supernatural viewing
Jan. 5th, 2008 02:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eve11Just think... WWBD?
"What Would Buffy Do?" Probably not watch ten episodes of Supernatural over a two-day span. On Thursday D and I watched "Home", "Asylum" and "Scarecrow", and then last night we watched "Faith" through "Something Wicked". Yes, seven episodes. Yes, I especially have no self-control.
Overall, I like this show, but at the same time a lot of the episodes remind me of other shows. They're mostly predictable, but well-scripted so you don't really mind.
Home: Seems like this should have been a good episode, but it just fell flat for me. Lots of mythology in it, but it was, I don't know, way clunky. It was more interesting than the last one ("Bugs"), but not by much. I didn't buy Dean's panicked phone call. The protracted "Oh for God's sake just get your hand chewed up already" scene was just annoying and kind of gross. I liked the psychic lady. We weren't sure if she was going to survive but I'm glad she did. I hope she shows up later. but I totally called Mom being a spirit in the house, but didn't see John Winchester showing up at the end though, that was a good surprise.
Asylum: I'm beginning to see a theme, here, of kids going where they shouldn't go, and Sam and Dean ending up in dank, dark, scary buildings. Still, I liked this as a good, scary one-off. And I liked that the inmate ghosts weren't the evil ones. But, I'm also beginning to see a theme of "large plot holes"-- things like, why would all of that stuff still be there if people keep getting in? It reminded me of Byberry in Philadelphia, but heck in there even the copper piping has been looted. And the shrink guy wouldn't have searched for his dad's body? Lucky for me I can handwave things like that. Plot is incidental to the characters and to telling a cool story. Plus it's John Shiban-- as long as there are no Chupacabras, I'll be happy.
Scarecrow: This one I liked a lot, weaving the old Norse mythology into the story. Again, it was pretty predictable, but in a good way. Also, Hi Cancer Man! Nice to know you're still morally ambiguous leaning toward evil! :) The apple pie better be worth it, lol, Dean gets the best lines. Also, I was curious about Meg showing up on the side of the road, but I didn't really peg her for *evil* per se. Nice twist. No, my suspicion was aroused on a totally meta-note. People in this show are all just too pretty. Jeez. It messes with whatever little bit of realism we've got, folks! My thought was, "That girl is too pretty to be hitchhiking and running away from home." But that's meta. I mean, look at Sam and Dean. They're too pretty to be poor ghost hunters too. Ah well.
Faith: I liked this one a lot too. This was helped by the fact that I am a total Julie Benz fangirl, but overall I think it was one of the stronger eps I've seen. That last scene with Leyla and Dean in the motel room nearly had me in tears. She knew exactly how to play it. Not just anyone could have made that scene memorable. Also the preacher was cool, and the Reaper was really good and creepy. I called it that the preacher's wife was the one pulling the strings though, as soon as she opened her mouth about how his flock grew. Also, I liked the use of "Don't fear the Reaper". I knew something bad was going on but I didn't think "reapers" until they said it on the show. I figured this story would be a "hunt for Dean's Cure" kind of thing, so it was a nice twist that he got cured by the end of act 2.
Route 666: What was the line? "I don't have any time! I'm being chased by a ghost truck!" It's nice to know that they called themselves on the silly-sounding premise to this story. I thought the girl was kind of ho-hum, but I guess there was actual substance to the story too. It's one of those ones I think, that walks a fine line between telling a story and falling into a clunky kind of anti-racism kitsch or even exploitative (didn't Shiban write "Teliko"?), but I think they did okay with it. Still. Killer ghost truck! Killer. Ghost. Truck. Another one wherein I wonder about the writers' perceptions of trauma and loss, though. People seem to recover very quickly and/or brush off a lot of that in these stories. Her father just died! And okay, that doesn't preclude sex or investigations or whatever, but it was like, if I'd missed the first ten minutes of this show, I wouldn't have known anything had happened to her. *handwaves*
Nightmare: Sam in Pain! And gaining strange psychic abilities! This was a much better mythology episode than "Home", I think. Mainly because I didn't figure it out, and so when the kid (btw, poor kid, male pattern baldness starting at 16??) revealed the thing about his mother I was like "Holy Crap!" And is Sam going to be telekinetic now too? I didn't call Max being the bad guy, kudos to the writers for that. The actor did a good job too. Though, Sam and Dean as priests? Omg, what a stretch. Oh, and Dean has the coolest toys. That green-light-shooty thing, and the ghostbuster PKE reader thing? Classic.
The Benders: InHome Countrycide The Benders, we run again into my neighbors crazy country woods people. This one was a stretch for realism. Kind of dull, though the scene where Dean gets discovered in the house was a good fight scene (and the backdrop beforehand of the dad butchering something... ugh, *shudders*), and the interrogation was well-done too. I think that the lady cop was way too much of an idiot though Also, I think the thing that gets me on these types of stories is, I can't escape the feeling that the people writing them have (a) never really been anywhere near the country and (b) probably don't know anyone who really is an outdoorsman or hunter. The same way racial tension stories can walk that line of exploitation, I think these types can too. And it's all meta, because it's about the political view and perceptions of the person who's writing them coloring the context. It's the same reason I got annoyed with RTD in Doctor Who for assassinating the American president. Ah well. Sometimes you just have to roll your eyes and move on, I suppose.
Shadow: Meg's back! And Sam is not fooled, thank GOD! If the boys had not been completely and utterly suspicious of that chick, I would've written them off as fodder for the very first succubus they ever encountered. Good for the Winchester boys! Well, good for Sam anyway. Keep Dean away from succubi. Yet another one of those 'wtf' moments though-- that girl dressed like she was about 18 (though I suppose she was at least 21), worked as a waitress at a seedy bar in Chicago, and afforded that apartment? You've got to be kidding me. In fact, later on in the show when they introduced the bar I said to D, "If they say that girl worked there, I don't believe them," and he totally agreed with me. And hey, Dad finds them, and then they all nearly get killed and Dad has to leave again. How, though, will them just driving away be enough to get the shades off their tails? *handwave* Oh, and more evidence for the "too pretty to be real" argument, both of them got their faces scratched wide open, with no scars to show for it as the next episode rolled around. You know, I had a gouge similar to those on my shin from 11th grade (I fell on a pile of concrete that had hardened but hadn't been scraped or smoothed), and the scar is *still there* mumblety-something years later. Too. Pretty.
Hell House: Sam in a towel Sam in a towel Sam in a towel Sam in a towel... Did something else happen in this ep? Oh right, Yes! It had the ghost-hunting geeks! Now see, it's a lot easier to make fun of these guys, because in some context I think the writers probably come from a culture much closer to them than to the backwoods folks. Also, I thought the plot from this story was pretty cool-- that the Internet rumors were fueling and shaping the spirit. It was a cool idea. D knew *exactly* where that symbol came from, though. As soon as he saw it he was like, "Hey! it's the Blue Oyster Cult symbol!" So it was funny seeing Dean trying to remember it throughout the ep. The pranks were campy but it's nice to see an ep that's not all gloom and doom. And I hadn't thought that the original "dead girl" was the record store guy's cousin playing dress-up. That was kind of cool, actually. Poor ghost geek guys though. You knew Sam and Dean were going to totally school them. And omg, are Sam and Dean just *huge*, or were those guys particularly small? Also, they used my idea! As soon as we figured out what was going on I said, "Just start a rumor that he's really easy to kill!" And they did! Pity it didn't work though.
Something Wicked: Okay, this was a Buffy episode, wasn't it? With the fever and the thing going after kids and the hospital etc etc etc. But it had the undercurrent of family, and of poor Dean having to grow up too fast and look after his brother. There's an interesting tension between them-- it showed up in Shadows too, where Dean insinuates that Sam is betraying his family by running off to try and be normal and go to college, but at the same time you can see too that without his Dad he's totally alone, and that probably scares him a lot. lol, Sam is the pissy one and Dean is the moody one, right? ;) Ah, lonesome anti-heroes. What would television be like without you?
"What Would Buffy Do?" Probably not watch ten episodes of Supernatural over a two-day span. On Thursday D and I watched "Home", "Asylum" and "Scarecrow", and then last night we watched "Faith" through "Something Wicked". Yes, seven episodes. Yes, I especially have no self-control.
Overall, I like this show, but at the same time a lot of the episodes remind me of other shows. They're mostly predictable, but well-scripted so you don't really mind.
Home: Seems like this should have been a good episode, but it just fell flat for me. Lots of mythology in it, but it was, I don't know, way clunky. It was more interesting than the last one ("Bugs"), but not by much. I didn't buy Dean's panicked phone call. The protracted "Oh for God's sake just get your hand chewed up already" scene was just annoying and kind of gross. I liked the psychic lady. We weren't sure if she was going to survive but I'm glad she did. I hope she shows up later. but I totally called Mom being a spirit in the house, but didn't see John Winchester showing up at the end though, that was a good surprise.
Asylum: I'm beginning to see a theme, here, of kids going where they shouldn't go, and Sam and Dean ending up in dank, dark, scary buildings. Still, I liked this as a good, scary one-off. And I liked that the inmate ghosts weren't the evil ones. But, I'm also beginning to see a theme of "large plot holes"-- things like, why would all of that stuff still be there if people keep getting in? It reminded me of Byberry in Philadelphia, but heck in there even the copper piping has been looted. And the shrink guy wouldn't have searched for his dad's body? Lucky for me I can handwave things like that. Plot is incidental to the characters and to telling a cool story. Plus it's John Shiban-- as long as there are no Chupacabras, I'll be happy.
Scarecrow: This one I liked a lot, weaving the old Norse mythology into the story. Again, it was pretty predictable, but in a good way. Also, Hi Cancer Man! Nice to know you're still morally ambiguous leaning toward evil! :) The apple pie better be worth it, lol, Dean gets the best lines. Also, I was curious about Meg showing up on the side of the road, but I didn't really peg her for *evil* per se. Nice twist. No, my suspicion was aroused on a totally meta-note. People in this show are all just too pretty. Jeez. It messes with whatever little bit of realism we've got, folks! My thought was, "That girl is too pretty to be hitchhiking and running away from home." But that's meta. I mean, look at Sam and Dean. They're too pretty to be poor ghost hunters too. Ah well.
Faith: I liked this one a lot too. This was helped by the fact that I am a total Julie Benz fangirl, but overall I think it was one of the stronger eps I've seen. That last scene with Leyla and Dean in the motel room nearly had me in tears. She knew exactly how to play it. Not just anyone could have made that scene memorable. Also the preacher was cool, and the Reaper was really good and creepy. I called it that the preacher's wife was the one pulling the strings though, as soon as she opened her mouth about how his flock grew. Also, I liked the use of "Don't fear the Reaper". I knew something bad was going on but I didn't think "reapers" until they said it on the show. I figured this story would be a "hunt for Dean's Cure" kind of thing, so it was a nice twist that he got cured by the end of act 2.
Route 666: What was the line? "I don't have any time! I'm being chased by a ghost truck!" It's nice to know that they called themselves on the silly-sounding premise to this story. I thought the girl was kind of ho-hum, but I guess there was actual substance to the story too. It's one of those ones I think, that walks a fine line between telling a story and falling into a clunky kind of anti-racism kitsch or even exploitative (didn't Shiban write "Teliko"?), but I think they did okay with it. Still. Killer ghost truck! Killer. Ghost. Truck. Another one wherein I wonder about the writers' perceptions of trauma and loss, though. People seem to recover very quickly and/or brush off a lot of that in these stories. Her father just died! And okay, that doesn't preclude sex or investigations or whatever, but it was like, if I'd missed the first ten minutes of this show, I wouldn't have known anything had happened to her. *handwaves*
Nightmare: Sam in Pain! And gaining strange psychic abilities! This was a much better mythology episode than "Home", I think. Mainly because I didn't figure it out, and so when the kid (btw, poor kid, male pattern baldness starting at 16??) revealed the thing about his mother I was like "Holy Crap!" And is Sam going to be telekinetic now too? I didn't call Max being the bad guy, kudos to the writers for that. The actor did a good job too. Though, Sam and Dean as priests? Omg, what a stretch. Oh, and Dean has the coolest toys. That green-light-shooty thing, and the ghostbuster PKE reader thing? Classic.
The Benders: In
Shadow: Meg's back! And Sam is not fooled, thank GOD! If the boys had not been completely and utterly suspicious of that chick, I would've written them off as fodder for the very first succubus they ever encountered. Good for the Winchester boys! Well, good for Sam anyway. Keep Dean away from succubi. Yet another one of those 'wtf' moments though-- that girl dressed like she was about 18 (though I suppose she was at least 21), worked as a waitress at a seedy bar in Chicago, and afforded that apartment? You've got to be kidding me. In fact, later on in the show when they introduced the bar I said to D, "If they say that girl worked there, I don't believe them," and he totally agreed with me. And hey, Dad finds them, and then they all nearly get killed and Dad has to leave again. How, though, will them just driving away be enough to get the shades off their tails? *handwave* Oh, and more evidence for the "too pretty to be real" argument, both of them got their faces scratched wide open, with no scars to show for it as the next episode rolled around. You know, I had a gouge similar to those on my shin from 11th grade (I fell on a pile of concrete that had hardened but hadn't been scraped or smoothed), and the scar is *still there* mumblety-something years later. Too. Pretty.
Hell House: Sam in a towel Sam in a towel Sam in a towel Sam in a towel... Did something else happen in this ep? Oh right, Yes! It had the ghost-hunting geeks! Now see, it's a lot easier to make fun of these guys, because in some context I think the writers probably come from a culture much closer to them than to the backwoods folks. Also, I thought the plot from this story was pretty cool-- that the Internet rumors were fueling and shaping the spirit. It was a cool idea. D knew *exactly* where that symbol came from, though. As soon as he saw it he was like, "Hey! it's the Blue Oyster Cult symbol!" So it was funny seeing Dean trying to remember it throughout the ep. The pranks were campy but it's nice to see an ep that's not all gloom and doom. And I hadn't thought that the original "dead girl" was the record store guy's cousin playing dress-up. That was kind of cool, actually. Poor ghost geek guys though. You knew Sam and Dean were going to totally school them. And omg, are Sam and Dean just *huge*, or were those guys particularly small? Also, they used my idea! As soon as we figured out what was going on I said, "Just start a rumor that he's really easy to kill!" And they did! Pity it didn't work though.
Something Wicked: Okay, this was a Buffy episode, wasn't it? With the fever and the thing going after kids and the hospital etc etc etc. But it had the undercurrent of family, and of poor Dean having to grow up too fast and look after his brother. There's an interesting tension between them-- it showed up in Shadows too, where Dean insinuates that Sam is betraying his family by running off to try and be normal and go to college, but at the same time you can see too that without his Dad he's totally alone, and that probably scares him a lot. lol, Sam is the pissy one and Dean is the moody one, right? ;) Ah, lonesome anti-heroes. What would television be like without you?
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no subject
Date: 2008-01-05 08:03 pm (UTC)I agree that the show can be campy and predictable but the brother's relationship is just so interesting that I don't care. It doesn't hurt that Dean is insanely pretty either. Apparently I'm shallow. And yes the guys are huge. Sam is something like 6"4 or 6"5, and Dean is 6" or 6"1. Poor Dean, he looks so short next to Sam but he's actually a really tall guy!
I handwave a lot of the horror plots and just focus on the family plots most of the time. They have such a great dynamic!
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Date: 2008-01-05 09:12 pm (UTC)I'm planning on another marathon soon. It is a pretty cool show. Reminds me of the X-files a bit. I was a religious X-files fan for the first seven seasons.
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Date: 2008-01-05 11:42 pm (UTC)One of the main directors for Supernatural was a big director for X-Files.
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Date: 2008-01-07 05:05 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-07 09:55 pm (UTC)I couldn't watch X Files because it gave me nightmares. *g* Only reason I can watch Supernatural is because I've now done an independent horror film and two horror genre stage shows since X Files was cancelled. Apparently being part of the process of making scary entertainment, allows me to not completely spook myself. *g*
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Date: 2008-01-05 09:16 pm (UTC)The monster of the week plots really go from bad to okay back to bad again (but isn't that true of almost any horror show/movie ever made?). The meat of the show is the fucked up life these boys have, the relationship between all three of the Winchester men.
Sam is the pissy one and Dean is the moody one, right?
Dean tries to deny it, but he's a big ole girl half the time. Moodier than a sixteen year old with PMS.
It's interesting to see which eps you like compared to me. I liked Home and Asylum way more than Scarecrow. But then, I don't have much expectation when it comes to plot, other than that it be entertaining. Your response to Hell House cracked me up. Yes, as I mentioned last weekend, it's not that the other actors are tiny (although, okay, the reverend guy from Hookmn is only 5'7). Those boys are big. And excessively pretty. And Sam in a towel is very distracting. (There's a Dark Angel episode with Alec (Dean) in a towel and it's every bit as distracting. Too much wet, shiny pretty, it's...um... where was I?)
Anyway, Yay for watching Supernatural! Now I have someone to talk to about it, even if you don't get into it enough to fangirl it. :)
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Date: 2008-01-05 09:31 pm (UTC)Home was one of those ones I really wanted to like, but it just didn't work for me. It was too melodramatic, I think, in the pacing and the acting more than the plot itself. On the other hand, Faith was a kind of melodramatic-like plot too, but I liked it better.
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Date: 2008-01-05 11:24 pm (UTC)Anyway, here's one to start you off. Fire in the Hole, by
And one that's just lighthearted silliness - Doll House, by
As I remember which fic I really liked and which ones were only so-so, I'll post some recs onto
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Date: 2008-01-05 11:45 pm (UTC)They did have a few occations where they let a scar linger for a little while, but it's far and few between. I wished injuries lasted a little longer, but I do understand the practicality of it.
And I'm currently re-watching Dark Angel, so Alec is top of my pretty list. *g*
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Date: 2008-01-07 05:07 pm (UTC)lol! And I just got done watching the zombie girl episode in season 2 and cried my eyes out at the last scene. Poor Dean!
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Date: 2008-01-07 09:57 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-06 12:28 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-07 05:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-06 05:10 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-07 05:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-01-14 01:58 am (UTC)Your reactions pretty much are similar to mine when I first started watching this show, though I am able to hold my suspension of belief more than you can, apparently. LOL It doesn't bother me if they rip things off because in the end, all shows do. What works with this show is that they are taping into actual urban myths that exist *holds up her folklore book* and the chemistry and emotion is enough to glaze over the plotholes. Yay!
My first taste of SPN was the last 20 minutes of In My Time of Dying. Imagine how confused I was ;)
But I love it now, despite its flaws. Even writing fic for it. No hope for me. None.
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Date: 2008-01-14 03:19 am (UTC)Boy, the last 20 minutes of that one is quite an introduction, that's for sure.
I don't know about fic writing. I don't really have any ideas so far. I wouldn't mind *reading* some good long stories though, if I can find them.
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Date: 2008-01-14 03:33 am (UTC)That's how it was with me at first. I never thought it would happen. And then one day, I had an idea. I still wasn't going to write it. I finally caved and I'm working on my first now.
As for reading, I don't know. I'm kind of afraid of that fandom. I'd rather just watch the show and share it with people on my flist and people I like because it's more fun that way. Fandoms just have way too much negativity. But if I know people, like them, and trust them and they were to write some SPN fic, I'd probably read it.
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Date: 2008-01-29 09:58 am (UTC)While I do think that TV tends to exaggerate characteristics of country "hicks", I'm not sure what you mean by a stretch of realism. Sadly, I have encountered people that did have the same manner of stereotypical speaking as the Benders in this episode. On top of that, there have been real cases that occurred similar to what the Benders did (I believe one was even the background for this episode).