Supernatural Season 7 Episode 2: Hello Cruel World

After a strong start out of the gate, Supernatural spend this episode laying the groundwork for this season's conflicts. The questions it raised are almost more important than what actually happened.

Since that does matter what happened however, in brief: the Leviathans make The Vessel Formerly Known As Castiel wade into a municipal reservoir. From there, they go out and and take over various people, preying on humans as all good Supernatural monsters do. One of them, posing as a surgeon, has the bad fortune to cross paths with sheriff Jodie Mills, who quickly figures out that something's wrong, and involves Bobby Singer. In the meantime, Sam's hallucinations continue to mess with his sense of reality. By the time the episode is done, Bobby is missing and the brothers are in an ambulance--Dean with a broken leg and Sam still tripping hard. What the ambulance crew doesn't know (but the brothers do) is that there's a nest of Leviathans waiting at the hospital where they're headed.

First, I have to say that it's always good to see Sheriff Mills. She once again proves to be a tough cookie in this episode, pulling a couple of badass moves even though she's recovering from surgery. (I think “Doctor Monsterface” is going to become one of my favorite epithets of the show.) The odds are against women in the world of Supernatural, so I really hope she sees the other side of this one. (Okay, in fairness, it's a dangerous world for everyone, but it seems to be particularly so for women.)

For the second week in a row, the show suggests that we've seen the end of Castiel. I honestly think that shot of his trench coat floating in the reservoir was intended to make people cry. Bobby directly addresses the potential emotional impact of this loss on Dean—but of course, Dean won't talk about it, because he's Dean.

In thinking over the possibilities, I realized what I wanted least: For Castiel to com back in another vessel-- female, white, thin, conventionally hot—and finally hook up with Dean. For the Destiel 'shippers, that would seem to be a cheap solution to the subtext created by the actors and played on mercilessly by the writers. For everyone else, it would cheapen the friendship itself. If another actor must be cast as Cas, what would be poignant would be for Dean to be so happy that his friend, his angel was okay that he paid no attention to the vessel. Whether you 'ship Dean and Cas or not, it's easy to see the poetry of a friendship between a mortal and an angel who ended decades of torment for him and saved him from the fate of becoming a demon. “I'm the one who gripped you tight and raised you from perdition.”

“Hello Cruel World” caused me to question once again to question Dean's wisdom in getting Death to get Sam's soul back. It really bothered me at the time, because once Sam found out the risks, he didn't accept them. (I'm still not clear on what was animating Sam if his soul was absent, but then, I haven't seen all of Season Six.) I mean, sure, it's terrible to think of Sam in the Cage—but he had told Dean to leave him there. The only way I can think to excuse overriding Soulless Sam's wishes is that he is a danger to innocent people, as we find out from flashbacks from his year with the Campbells. In fairness, though, the worst thing he did—attacking Bobby—he did to prevent a charred mess of a soul being forced on him. At one point, Castiel told Dean that if he'd wanted to kill Sam, he should have done it outright. As awful as that would have been, it was an option—and it's on that Dean considers in “Hello Cruel World”.

The friend that I watched Supernatural with last night suggested that perhaps Sam is still in Hell---that the writers, if they wished, could use that idea to reboot entire parts of the storyline, if they wanted to. I don't think they're going to do that—I think we see too much from Dean's POV for that to be what's happening. But I suspect that something similar may be going on. It could be that Sam's soul really is back on Earth, but that Lucifer really is there with him. I don't think he's free from this cage, or he'd be out doing his thing the way he did in Season Five; but I think it's possible that some part of him got grafted onto Sam's soul in the process of extracting it, allowing him to interact with Sam and only Sam. Yes, I know, it would be a very Harry Potter turn of events, but it wouldn't be the only parallel between Sam and Harry. It also seems like one of the few ways that anything could be done about what's going on.

At the same time, there are plenty of other irons to fry and fish in the fire. For one thing, how is Dean going to hunt with a broken leg? The brothers have come back from the dead plenty of times, but I believe this is the most serious non-lethal physical injury that either of them has had in several seasons. Hopefully Bobby is still out there, because they are going to need help, both in the short and long term.

Supernatural Season 7 Episode 1: Meet the New Boss

On Friday, the Winchester brothers returned, after last season's dramatic finale left their audience facing a long summer. The brothers' angel ally, Castiel (also a fan favorite and slash darling) used all sorts of questionable mojo to become God, taking the place of an absent heavenly Father. He unsuccessfully demands worship from Sam, Dean and Bobby, but gives up when he sees that it wouldn't be sincere, sparing their lives and leaving.

Castiel's next order of business is to start destroying hypocritical religious leaders and hate groups like the KKK, leaving Dean wondering if this new God is really such a bad thing. In the meantime, Sam is having intermittent hallucinations of the time he spent in Hell, thanks to Castiel's decision last season to break down the wall protecting him from those memories. Eventually, Castiel's body count grows too high for the taste of the hunters, but they have no weapon that would work against God. However, back in Season Five, Death himself told Dean that he (Death) would reap God eventually. Crowley, the King of Hell, has been forced into a compromise by Castiel and is only too happy to give the hunters the spell they need to bind Death.

The hunters break into a home to get the final item for the spell and, for some reason, decide to conduct the spell on the premises, in front of the terrified homeowners. Death shows up, bound, and everything seems to be going well until Castiel shows up and frees him with a snap of his fingers. Death explains that Cas's vessel is breaking down under the power of the Leviathans—ancient beasts absorbed from Purgatory. Placated with pickle chips (no, really), Death arranges an eclipse during which the portal to Purgatory can be reopened. After committing a massacre at a senatorial campaign office, Castiel is finally ready to come to the brothers for help, even if preventing disaster will mean sacrificing his life.

At the time of the eclipse, the Purgatory is reopened again, something returns to it. After going down for the count again for a second, Cas appears to be okay. That is until the Leviathans, speaking in Castiel's voice but referring to themselves in the plural, take over, claiming that Cas is dead and throwing Dean and Bobby across the room. In the meantime, Sam is having his worst hallucination yet: Lucifer, telling him that he's still in Hell and that being free was the hallucination. The episode ends with Leviathan!Cas menacing Dean and Bobby and Sam's condition unknown.

I call this a very strong start to the season. The most exciting thing, to me, is that this season, Supernatural appears to be going Lovecraft. ”Old Ones”, as Death refers to the Leviathans, evokes the Great Old Ones from H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulu mythos. Lovecraft came up several times in the last few episodes of Season Six. The web is already buzzing about this connection. If I know anything about Supernatural (and I feel like I do), Lovecraft is likely to be cited as someone who found out about the Old ones somehow, and wrote about them as if they were fiction.

This episode held a lot of treats for fans. There was sort of wry, relevant humor that you would expect—jokes about anime porn and trench coats on tortillas. It was wonderful to see Mark Pellegrino back as Lucifer, as he's always creepy and effective. Also a thrill was Julian Richings as Death. (Can I say just how much I love the fact that Death has a weakness for junk food?) Mark Shepherd, who plays Crowley, is a joy in pretty much everything he does (which is a lot). It was amusing to see Crowley living in a trailer park after having whined about the loss of his mansion is Season Five. When summoned by the hunters, Crowley even seemed to pout for a second about the possibility that they might not want to conspire with him.

And then, of course, there's Castiel. Oh, Misha Collins. I saw you give a panel at a convention this summer, and understand why you are a fan favorite. You may be the Supernatural actor that I'd most like to have a beer with—although Jim Beaver is growing on me, just based on his Twitter account. Unsurprisingly, Misha made us feel sympathy for Castiel in the premier, in spite of everything he'd done. He'd only been trying to make things better, but—to use a metaphor Dean would appreciate—it reminded me of someone trying to cobble together a couple of unrelated car parts to replace a missing car engine. It might work for a little while, but in the end, it's just not an engine. Death had it right: an angel is not up to playing God.

Is our sweet Castiel, whom we'd seen through so much for three seasons, really gone for good? I sincerely hope not. We already know that Misha won't be in every episode this season. Hopefully Castiel is still in there and can take back the reins at some point, like Sam did at the end of Season Five, and be redeemed. Either way, Leviathan!Cas will make a great Big Bad, if that's what he's going to be. Misha turned in a unsettling performance, very different from Castiel

From the look of the preview, the next episode focuses on Sam's Devil-adjacent problems. I predict that Dean and Bobby will have to make a quick getaway at the beginning of the next episode, with an almost-incapacitated Sam in tow, or that the Leviathan!Cas will just walk away, sparing them yet again for no obvious reason. Either way, I, or many others, will be tuned in, watching eagerly.

Starting up again, putting out the hat

Well...it's been a while, hasn't it? Two years almost.

With the leaves turning in the Northern Hemisphere and Fall TV returning, I've decided to start blogging again. Hopefully I'll be able to do so pretty consistently. It will be mainly TV recaps and (hopefully) movie reviews, with occasional commentary on entertainment news and reposts of things I found interesting. The shows I will be focusing on include

• Supernatural (my new obsession this year)
• Castle
• How I Met Your Mother
• NBC Thursday Night Comedy - Community, Parks and Recreations, and The Office.
• Fairy tale reboots - Grimms and Once Upon a Time.
• Modern Family
• Anything older that I end up re-watching on DVD--hopefully including Gilmore Girls, Carnivale and Defying Gravity.

I do have a day job and a career as a fiction writer, so I may occasionally have to lump several episodes of one thing together in one post. The older shows, in particular, are likely to be written about a season or half-season at a time. I hope to make my posts stand out by incorporating concepts from social justice movements, literary criticism, psychology, and comparative religion. I hope to post at least twice a week. Assume that there is a spoiler alert on everything--in the case of TV shows both for the episode(s) in question and anything that came before it.

I'll be installing a PayPal button. This is because I think my time, and my words, are worth something. Other bloggers doing this kind of writing don't have PayPal buttons, and that's fine. I'm just making a different choice. You are more than welcome to read if you can't or just don't wish to pay; but if you want to throw contribute monetarily, that's greatly appreciated. In fact, page hits, friendly comments, word of mouth, retweets--just your time and attention--it's all appreciated.

I'd also like to say a word about my commenting policy. I am perfectly open to having mature, good-faith differences of opinion in this space. You don't have to like what I like, or share all my political opinions either. But comments that are just intended to stir up trouble or play devil's advocate, or which include bigoted words and ideas, will be deleted. (By by "bigoted", I'm referring to racism, sexism, transphobia, sizeism, sectarianism, classism, and similar things.) This is not censorship, as I am not the government. This is my playground, and you have the whole rest of the world in which to say whatever you want.

If you are also a blogger, please don't drop your links in comments. Message me and we can talk about promoting each other. I'm also very open to doing guest posts on group blogs.

Well, that's about it! Pull up a chair, make yourself some coffee. This should be fun.

Imma let you finish, but...

Hopefully, this Kanye West thing will blow over soon.

For those who somehow don't know, he interrupted Taylor Swift's acceptance speech at this weekend's MTV Video Music Awards, to take issue with her victory. Yes, this was mind-bogglingly rude, and easily arguable as sexist. He deserved scorn, and he's gotten it. People will never forget this...nor should they.

However, he has now apologized in several forums, including by phone to Taylor Swift. If it won't be forgotten, it should be forgiven.

And I believe that the punishment has now exceeded the crime.

The reason for that is that is that yesterday, TMZ.com broke the news that President Barack Obama had been caught calling West a "jackass" on a hot mic.

For a Black musician with a passion for racial issues, I cannot imagine how painful this would be, coming from the first Black president. It must have been agony. Simply agony. Agony that the President did not intend for West to have.

Obama did not know that he was being recorded, and thought his statements were off the record. He should know by now, though, that with the press, his words are never off the record unless explicitly stated...and maybe not even then. I wish he'd been more circumspect, considering that West has shown real contrition as he's gone on damage control. Obama may have never done anything so breathtakingly boorish, but he knows what it is to stick his foot in his mouth. (Special Olympics, anyone?)

At this point, I feel sorry for everyone involved: Taylor Swift, Beyonce' Knowles, President Obama and Kayne West.

RIp Patrick Swayze

I am very sad to learn of Patrick Swayze's passing, although he had been suffering for some time. He was in many movies I enjoyed, including Dirty Dancing, Point Break, Ghost and To Wong Foo. He also always seemed like a good person and a class act.

I really wanted to post a YouTube video from Dirty Dancing, because he deserves a tribute that moves. But the embedding on all of them seemed to be disabled.

So go. Watch anyway. Listen. Have one last dance.

And please accept this macro instead, from Rofflrazzi.com user Jax.bot.

The Quotable Paris Hilton

Yesterday, I read online that Paris Hilton will be included in a new book, The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

Her quote? "Dress cute everywhere you go, life is too short to blend in."

As much as I don't dig the whole "celebutante" thing, I have to say, I can get on board with this quote.

In fairness, I would say that life is too short to always worry about how you look. The quote, however, is not about consumerism, or wearing the right brand. Nor is it about dressing up to please other people. It's about nonconformity, about chosing something you like and projecting a confident image.

And that's hot.

Pon farr of the vanities

This week, I had planned to bring you a review of Wolverine and the new Star Trek. I saw them in a self-made double-feature this weekend. Perhaps it will suffice to say that if you can only see one, see Star Trek. Tonight, though, I've got old Trek on my mind.

Today, I found myself reading about pon farr—in Star Trek canon, the condition that comes upon adult Vulcan males (and bonded females) every seven years. It strips away their logic, making them feel like their blood is boiling, and compels them to either mate or die—unless they're lucky enough be able to to fight or meditate through it. There's even a fan magazine called “Fever”, devoted exclusively to pon farr fanfiction. Of course, my interest in this topic may have something to do with how much I loved the pairing of Spock and Uhura in the latest movie. Just maybe.

At any rate, tonight, I watched “Amok Time”, the episode of the original Trek series which introduced the concept of pon farr. In brief, Spock is stricken by the blood fever and returns to Vulcan to marry his betrothed. During the ceremony, however, she invokes her right to subject him to a challenge...and selects Kirk as her champion, to be fought to the death. Bones saves the day with some medical meddling, and Spock lets his faithless female go with the guy she really wants.

Much of what I found in this episode was unexpected. First, I have to admit that William Shatner was a better actor than I thought he'd been at that at point. He had impressive range and subtlety. It was interesting to see Nimoy play twitchy in his role for once, but Spock's agitation was not as convincing as his embarrassment over it. The next thing was the scene where Kirk's clothing gets torn and suddenly, I'm looking at William Shatner's nipples. Perhaps I haven't seen as much old Trek as I thought, but I kind of thought that nipples in the original series would be like or crying in baseball (there is none); but it was more like the Spanish inquisition (unexpected!)

Most unexpectedly, though, I finally saw the sexual undercurrent that so many fans see between Kirk and Spock! Kirk goes out of his way to save his friend, risking even the wrath of the Federation. Spock reacts more strongly to seeing Kirk okay at the end than he reacted to his betrothed. Perhaps I shouldn't have been surprised, though. That is one of the oldest non-canonical pairings in all of sci-fi fandom. People have been writing stores about Kirk and Spock before there was an internet to share them on. In fact, the phrase “slash”, as it refers to same-sex pairings, was first used to designate stories which were “Kirk/Spock”.

On an related note: Star Trek has not been out a week, and already I'm tired of the “Trekkies don't have sex” meme. Jay Leno said something to that effect last night, and there was a similar implication in an online article about the Vulcan salute. Excuse me, but by my reckoning, sci-fi, fantasy and comic book movies have been mainstream since the first Batman, if not since Star Wars. Watchmen was the first movie this year that anyone gave a damn about. Even our hip, beloved President has seen Star Trek...and no one would accuse him of not getting any (he has proof). Of course, all things in moderation, but for the most part, fandom is cool these days.. I guess some folks missed the memo.