The Summer Hiatus Begins

Well, it's that time of year again, when the fall season ends and the networks go into reruns. Well, they used to--now they do summer programming. Not much of it looks really interesting to me at the moment, though, so I'll likely be drifting off network TV for the summer.

What do we have to look forward to in the next few months?

Torchwood arrives on BBC America this summer, as does the third season of Dr. Who. I'm totally there for both of these. Eureka should be back around August-ish, I believe. Plus I've got a lot of stuff to catch up on, namely Rome, The Tudors, and whatever else I can think of.

Right now I'm watching Season One of Gilmore Girls and being terribly amused at Jared Padalecki's baby-face and how he's still taller than, well, everybody. This is quite a fun show. I'd watched some of it back when Gilmore Girls: Beginnings was on on Sunday nights, but I hadn't come back to it. I'm really enjoying it so far. Although I still think Stars Hollow should have an apostrophe in it somewhere...

What Happens When You Watch Too Much TV...

You prepare for a nice morning exercising on your stationary bike while watching Season 1, episode 2 of Gilmore Girls. And then freak out because Rory's teacher is the doctor guy from Angel who kidnapped Nina and tried to feed her to all his friends--or wait! Maybe he's the other doctor guy from Enterprise! No! He's both! And Lorelei! Don't date that guy! He's a serial killer and he'll wash your hair and steal your fingernails!

Then Chad Michael Murray started hitting on Rory and my head exploded.

Not to mention my confusion last week when everybody was inexplicably calling Sam Dean.

Supernatural—What Is and What Should Never Be

Wow. Just... wow. Just when I think this show can't get any better, they air another episode and raise the bar again. This episode took several threads that have been running through the season and wove them together to heartwrenching perfection, as Dean was forced to choose between the life he thinks he wants and the life he feels he's stuck with.

The monster of the week proves to be a djinn--and a damn creepy one, with crazy tattoos, glowy blue eyes and funky teeth. As Sam says, not like Barbara Eden in harem pants. (I find it amusing that Dean has the hots for women in all the shows I used to watch after school. Daphne... Jeannie...) Dean decides to go after it on his own. (Dean! That is never a good idea! What are you thinking?) In any case, he tracks the djinn to an abandoned building, and it corners him and lays blue glowy hands on him. That can't be good.

Dean wakes up in bed next to a woman. Then he puts his shirt back on for no really good reason (I consider that a plot hole), and calls Sam. Dean doesn't know where he is. And for good reason--apparently he's in an alternate universe where he has a cool TV and wakes up next to a hot chick named Carmen on a regular basis. And Sam is still studying law. Dean's in Lawrence, Kansas, the old hometown. He's also wearing a different necklace, or at the very least it's on a nicer chain. (I'd like to know what the necklace was, but they never showed a close up. I have to assume, though, that it wasn't the protective amulet he normally wears.)

Freaking Carmen out, Dean runs from his new home and heads for his old home. Where he finds his mother alive and well, and not burning on the ceiling or stranded in the house as a ghost. His father, however, is dead--but of a stroke, and presumably not burning in hell after a deal with a demon. Dean is understandably shaken. When he wakes up the next morning and is still in the alternate universe, he starts to research djinn, trying to work out what has happened to him. Has the djinn granted his dearest wish? Or is something else going on?

Dean falls into his persona in the alternate reality every bit as easily as he's fallen into every other alias he's assumed. And alternate reality Dean isn't the greatest person. It's heartwrenching to me that he accepts this--even says it sounds like him--so easily.

At first, Dean finds lots to love in this new life. Sam is back in law school. Jessica is alive, and she and Sam are engaged. Dean's found a woman who really gets him, he has a normal, everyday job at a garage, and he gets to mow his mom's lawn (with endearingly unadulterated glee). But strange, seemingly dead people keep appearing in odd places, like his closet and the fancy restaurant where they take Mary for her birthday. And worst of all, Sam and Dean are mostly estranged.

It seems to be the latter shift in reality that disconcerts Dean the most. His one wish, that Mary hadn't died, hasn't given him the perfect life he's thought it would. And then there's the kicker--the hundreds of people the Winchesters saved when they became hunters are dead in this world, sacrificed so Dean and Sam can have a "normal" life. Dean is devastated by this. In a scene that had me weeping on my chaise, he talks to his father's grave, wondering why he and his family have had to lose so much.

As it turns out, the alternate world isn't real, but it feels real to Dean. In reality, the djinn has dosed him with some sort of hallucinogen, and is feeding off Dean's blood, as well as the blood of other victims, all hung like slabs of meat from the ceiling of the abandoned building. In the fantasy world, Dean chooses the sacrifice--willingly this time--just before Sam arrives to save him and one of the other victims from the djinn.

Some particularly nice touches--when Dean breaks into Mary's house for the silver, the sequence mirrors Dean's initial arrival in the pilot episode almost exactly--though it's a bit shorter, especially since Sam, being a wuss in this reality, barely fights back. But in spite of their estrangement, Sam tags along with Dean on the djinn hunt, though he doesn't know how to respond when Dean calls him a bitch. Also, Dean still has the Impala, though the license plate is different.

So Dean has, perhaps, finally accepted the burden of his life as a hunter. But even knowing it was the right choice, his scars obviously run deep. And I can't say enough good about Jensen Ackles' performance tonight. Padalecki did a great job, too, though his screen time was severely curtailed.

Led Zeppelin--What Is and What Should Never Be



Lynyrd Skynyrd--Saturday Night Special



Joey Ramone--It's a Wonderful World

Supernatural—Heart

Madison, this week's damsel in distress, is hanging out in a bar with her friends after work when her boss comes on to her. She handles it smoothly, then freaks and leaves when she catches sight of another man across the bar. The next morning at work, she finds her boss mutilated on his desk.

"Detective" Sam Winchester views the body in the morgue and questions the doctor, who says the man looks like he was attacked by a wolf. Also, his heart was missing. Apparently there's a pattern of mutilated bodies with their hearts removed, the deaths occurring just before the full moon. Dean is stoked--he thinks werewolves are cool and is looking forward to facing off against one. They go to have a chat with Madison. Madison mentions that her ex-boyfriend Kurt recently attacked her boss--Kurt being the man she saw in the bar.

Detectives Landis and Dante (John and Joe, the directors of An American Werewolf in London and The Howling, respectively), head out to investigate Kurt and look in his freezer for human hearts behind the Haagen Dazs. In the street below, a cop is attacked by something growly. Sam and Dean find the cop mutilated.

Feeling Madison needs protection, Sam and Dean duke it out with rock-paper-scissors to see who gets to stay with the "hot chick." Sam wins. Dean's scissors obsession cracks me up. Sparks fly between Sam and Madison, and before it's all over we get one of the hottest sex scenes I've ever seen on network TV. And that includes last season's smokin' hot bit between Dean and Cassie in "Route 666."

As the story plays out, the parallels between Sam and Madison are obvious but not hammered home--it all just hangs there in the subtext waiting until we feel safe and then it all comes out and eviscerates us. And Sam, who has his heart ripped out every bit as thoroughly as the werewolves' victims. (Yes, this is a pretty on-the-nose metaphor, but for some reason it worked, unlike the on-the-nose metaphors in "Children Shouldn't Play With Dead Things"). Like Sam, Madison has a monster inside her, but with her it's explicit, and no one can cure it. Like Sam, Madison is willing to die to keep from being this monster. And like Dean, Sam must face the necessity of having to kill someone he cares about to save her from herself. Dean offers to take on Sam's burden, but Sam refuses. Faced with the unthinkable, he cowboys up and does what he has to do. If and when the time comes, can Dean do anything less?

I really didn't see anything not to love in this episode. Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles both knocked it out of the park, but Padalecki got another spotlight this week and he did it proud. This performance, while not quite as showy, was every bit as good as his turn in "Born Under a Bad Sign." Emmanuelle Vaugier was very good as Madison, and Sera Gamble gave us yet another heart-wrenching roller coaster ride. Kudos all around.


Supernatural at iTunes:

Supernatural—Tall Tales

First item tonight--in the "Then" section, they've switched from Dean's money shot coming out of the water in "Dead in the Water" to Sam's comparable shot from "Playthings." As pretty as that shot of Dean is, I think it's fair to give Sammy his due there.

Tonight's episode was... well, it was a trip. I laughed so hard I almost fell off the chaise. And the best part was, as goofy as it got, it all made sense in the end.

The teaser gives us a professor at a college, who approaches a student who's waiting for him out in the dark. Is it just me or does she look like a brunette Reese Witherspoon? The professor has written a book on Modern Morality. The girl isn't really a student. He thinks she's trying to seduce him because he's a celebrity and all. Man, I never get anybody wanting to seduce me cause I wrote some books. What's up with that? He acts all, "I don't want to take advantage of you, I respect you too much," and then macks all over her. But he gets what he deserves because she's a zombie and she throws him out the window onto the steps four stories below. He bleeds a lot.

One week later, Sam and Dean are researching in a ratty hotel and Dean is eating chicken wings in Sam's bed. Sammy is computerless and very tense, and Dean is being brattier than usual because apparently there's something wrong with the Impala. The tension is palpable. They've called in Bobby to help with the case, because it's so bizarre.

And here's where the fun begins. After a season and a half living in each other's back pockets, Sam and Dean are having friction. This comes out as they take turns relating the story to Bobby in a "he said/she said" fashion. Sam thinks Dean is a slutty horndog, Dean thinks Sam is an annoying pansy bitch. Bobby tells them they're squabbling like an old married couple. Which they are, and it's hysterical.

The case becomes more and more bizarre, as they find an apparent alien abduction and a man attacked by an alligator in the sewers. It's like every crazy urban legend that they couldn't spin into a full episode is crammed in here, and in this context it all works. Honestly, I want my very own slow dancing alien. I could do without the alligator, though. There doesn't seem to be a pattern, although Dean notices that all the victims were, in his words, dicks. Their fates are suited to their various crimes.

Bobby, providing a more objective point of view, points out that the fact that the brothers are at each others' throats is their biggest clue. They're dealing with a Trickster, who's been visiting retribution on the various victims. He's also been leaving Sam's laptop stuck on bustyasianbeauties.com and letting the air out of the Impala's tires to keep the boys occupied so they won't figure out what's going on. They work out that the janitor is probably their Trickster.

They hone in on their culprit, who tries almost successfully to distract Dean with a lecture hall filled with gorgeous women in a room with a bed, a disco ball and Barry White music. It's a peace offering from the Trickster, to bribe Dean to let him get out of town. In the final showdown, Dean gets the crap beaten out of him by girls in lingerie, but finally prevails. Over the hood of the Impala, Sam and Dean almost apologize to each other. And at the very end, we discover the Trickster isn't really dead. A predictable twist, but it still worked.

After last week's angst-fest, this was a welcome diversion into absurdity. Good absurdity, though, and I liked that the story supported even the most over the top bits of this episode, making them fit into the storyline, rather than just being gratuitously funny. The different kind of story let Ackles and Padalecki show a different set of talents than usual, and they carried it quite well. I'd like to see this show tackle comedy more often--they did a great job with it in "Hell House" last season, and once again tonight.

Now if we could just quit with these three-week breaks, I'd be a happy camper.

Supernatural—Born Under a Bad Sign

I don't know why it's so much harder to review shows I really like than ones I'm not quite so invested in. Maybe because I have to fight the urge to squee like a fangirl. So maybe if we get it out of the way up front--this was just--wow. Really, really good. Awesome. And I chewed off all my fingernails.

On to attempt a review.

This season has been moving toward the possibility of Sam going bad, driven by his unexplained connection to the Yellow Eyed Demon. And tonight we face this head-on.

We open with Dean looking for Sam--he's been missing for a while. Dean finally gets a phone call and goes to meet Sam, who's in a hotel room covered in blood and with no memory of what happened. Following what little they can dredge up out of Sam's fuzzy memory and jacket pockets, the boys end up at a storage locker. Inside is a VW Bug (so uncool) full of blood and a bloody knife. Following the trail, they discover Sam has been a Very Bad Boy. He's been smoking, and if you ever watched Buffy, you know that means he was evil. They finally make their way to a house, where they find the body of a Hunter. Sam is certain he did it, and it appears the victim was a Hunter. Security tapes clearly show Sam slitting the man's throat.

Convinced he's murdered the Hunter, Sam begs Dean to kill him. He's been suffering from random attacks of rage and hate, which he feels are trying to take him over. The Yellow Eyed Demon is finally making a play, turning Sam evil to serve his grand plan.

Only on this show could they have an intensely powerful, emotional scene in the middle of a hotel room full of weird trout pictures.

Dean, of course, refuses to kill Sam, determined to save him, instead. Obviously following another agenda, Evil!Sam pushes Dean right to the edge, threatening Jo, then begging Dean to kill him so he won't kill her. Jared Padalecki's performance is chilling here, reminiscent of David Boreanaz's Angel/Angelus tour de force in Season Two of Buffy. Jensen Ackles is equally good, as Dean fights to save his brother from what turns out to be a demonic possession. Jo's involvement added a lot to the story this time, too, instead of feeling a bit added-on, as some of her other appearances have. The twist--which isn't that much of a twist but it doesn't even have to be because this episode is that good--is that the demon now possessing Sam is the same demon that possessed Meg last season. He (or she) is after revenge--the Winchester boys sent him back to hell, and he wants to return the favor in terms figurative or literal or both. Again we're told John is suffering in hell. They've dropped this tidbit too many times now for it to not have some relevance on how the rest of the season will develop. Of course, there's the question of whether the demon's stories can be trusted. Did he tell Jo the truth about how her father died? Is he telling the truth about John's whereabouts? Or is all this just a demony way of messing with the Hunters' heads, throwing them off their game?

The rapid build toward the climax was masterfully written--the commercial break after Sam knocked Jo unconscious nearly gave me a stroke. And the climactic scene between Sam and Dean, with Evil!Sam torturing Dean, and Bobby's final rescue--wow. Really well-played by Ackles and Padalecki. And just enough humor sprinkled through the final, most intense scenes to vary the mood without breaking it.

Overall, a very strong episode, one that seems to be setting us up for a powerful second half of the season, as the question of Sam's good versus evil status is explored further, and hopefully more is revealed about the Yellow Eyed Demon's plans and the coming demon war. (This is conjecture--I've remained largely spoiler-free--but it does seem like the direction they're going.) I really only had one quibble--if Bobby had charms to fend off possessions, mightn't this have been a good thing for them to have earlier? That bit seemed a bit forced, but I have a suspicion it'll come into play later.

Next week's episode looks like a good departure after the intensity of this week's episode. I love the way they're playing with the formats of the trailers, going beyond a simple "Next week on..." to have a little fun with them.

Supernatural—Houses of the Holy

The streak continues.

Tonight's episode was penned by Sera Gamble, the co-writer of "Faith", from season one, which had similar themes of faith and holy vengeance. But this episode put a slightly different spin on these themes, to excellent effect.

The episode opens with an unsavory looking woman--we find out later she's a hooker--faced with a televangelist who she can't turn off. (This has got to be one of the scariest damn things I've seen on this show ever.) Later, she's visited by Sam in a mental institution. Sam's looking good in the scrubs, and wants to know why Gloria committed a murder. Turns out she was told to by an angel.

And she's not the first person in town to be incited to commit murder in the name of divine retribution. Dean, sequestered in the hotel because of last week's close call with the Feds, and bored to the point of enjoying the magic fingers at the hotel, doesn't take too well to the angel theory.

As the story develops, the boys discover that the people who were targeted were, indeed, not nice people. One murdered at least three women, while another was a pedophile. Conversation with the priest of the local parish leads Sam and Dean to develop opposing theories. Sam believes they could actually be dealing with an angel, while Dean is convinced it's the spirit of a young priest, Father Gregory, who was killed about the time the murders started.

The Winchesters are set at ideological odds, Sam clinging to the idea that there are powers of good in the world, Dean convinced there's no such thing. Both are stripped heartbreakingly bare as they try to explain why they believe--or want to believe--the way they do. It's more than just stubbornness. Dean's cynicism is directly related to the death of his mother, and Sam's faith stems from a desperate need to believe some power of good can save him from his destiny.

In a predictable but still effective twist, Sam sees the "angel," as well, and is told to stop someone who is about to do something horrible. He's willing to accept this task. Dean, not so much--he parallels proactive retribution with what he's been told about Sam, and is not in favor. Leaving Sam to summon the spirit of Father Gregory (with a SpongeBob placemat instead of an altar cloth), Dean goes after Sam's chosen target. Again predictably but effectively, Sam discovers the "angel" is, indeed, Father Gregory's spirit. But at the same time, Dean sees evidence he can't refute that something more is at work here, possibly even the will of God.

On the surface, the general plot and setup of this episode is pretty basic, and exactly what we'd expect given the circumstances. The theme is faith versus skepticism, which we've seen a zillion times before in various contexts. When characters are made to ideologically oppose one another in this way, it often comes off as forced and pedantic, but not in this case. The plot is layered so well with its emotional repercussions on the Winchesters, and tied in so organically with the existing plot and character arcs, that the final result is more than just a series of plot points, more than just a morality play, but a story that's intrinsically important to the development of both of these characters.

And holy cow--next week's preview...

Supernatural--Nightshifter

Whatever they're paying Ben Edlund, they should give him more. Every time his name pops up under "written by," we get an episode that pushes the show to new levels. It was true on Angel, as well. I mean, dude, the guy turned Angel into a puppet. Tonight, he turned Sam into a badass and Dean into Tommy Shaw. Rock on!

"Nightshifter" is essentially a followup to "Skin," from last season. To make the obligatory X-Files reference, it's the "Tooms" to "Skin's" "Squeeze," as it were. I liked that they did this kind of follow-up episode on The X-Files, and it worked equally well here. When Dean was declared dead in "Skin," we knew--or rather hoped, at that point--that there'd be consequences, that the event wouldn't just be ignored. And it hasn't been, much to the credit of Supernatural's showrunners. They addressed the storyline in "The Usual Suspects," tangentially, and here they've faced it head-on.

Investigating an odd series of robberies, Sam and Dean come upon Ronald Resnick (Chris Gauthier, Eureka), a slightly off-kilter UFO conspiracist type who's convinced the robberies were committed by a robot shapeshifter. He's got it half right--it is, indeed, a shapeshifter, of the same sort that the Winchesters faced in St. Louis in "Skin." Knowing the shifters like to live in the sewers, they work out where the next robbery is likely to occur. They find the shifter, but unfortunately their plans to deal with it are derailed when Ronald appears, taking everyone in the bank "hostage" for their own protection so he can conquer the mandroid.

What follows is a twisty turny plot that gets our boys deeper and deeper into trouble, as not only the local police but the FBI get involved. And the FBI agent has a special interest in Dean. ("Yes, I know about Sam, too, Bonnie to your Clyde." And yeah, that part's true, but don't be badmouthing Dean's dad cause you don't know crap about his dad.) The second act break is killer, and I have to say I didn't see it coming. Sam goes as badass as we've ever seen him, and damn if that Jared Padalecki isn't starting to look hot to me...

In the end, of course, our boys take out the bad guy, and slip away from the Feds to some of the very best use of music in a TV show I've ever seen. This show is known for that, but this was extra good. The song, by the way, was Renegade, by Styx, a tune which brings back a few rather uncomfortable high school memories, but still rocks.

So kudos to Ben Edlund for yet another stellar piece of TV writing. Maybe later he can turn Dean into a puppet? Cause that'd be cool.

Also for today's post, I hunted down links to a couple of the source books mentioned in the If Magazine interview with Eric Kripke and Robert Singer. They look interesting, to say the least. I might have to snag them, myself...

Supernatural—Playthings

Dude. I love this show. Need I say more?

In fact, the more I love an individual episode, the harder it is for me to write a review right after I've seen it. So the fact that I'm posting this on Friday morning should give you some indication of how good this was. The story was very well put together, and covered both the monster of the week and the Winchester Boys' Emotional Arc equally well. And while I usually go on and on about Jensen Ackles, tonight I'll give a nod to Jared Padalecki for acting his ass off. Kudos, oh Tall One.

Apparently a month has passed since the last ep. I'm not sure they've had this much time pass between episodes before, but I'd have to look that up. In any case, the passage of time has been indicated by shearing Jensen Ackles' hair into a semi faux-hawk. I really have no problem with this. Sam is still looking for Ava, who is apparently 5'5" and 108 lbs, which means she should be out snarfing cheeseburgers to get her BMI into a normal range. But he's willing to drop his search for a case Ellen has tossed their way.

So off the boys go. The case of the week involves a creepy haunted hotel where people die mysteriously. Honestly, that's never good. The deaths are connected somehow to a dollhouse that's an exact replica of the hotel. A mysterious force "kills" the dolls, and these events are echoed in the real world. The boys suspect hoodoo magic, but there are even stranger things afoot.

Penned by Matt Witten ("No Exit"), "Playthings" was an impressive piece of TV. Seriously, I think this show has been on a streak of near-perfection since "Simon Said." Veering from laugh-out-loud humor to nicely intense drama to complete creepiness, this episode covered all the Supernatural bases, and covered them well. Seemingly calm at the beginning--Dean comments on his lack of emo-ness--by mid-episode Sam descends into an unexpected drunken emotional purge. He's afraid of himself, of what he might become. Saving people, he thinks, will tip the balance and keep him from becoming a pawn of the Yellow Eyed Demon. But everyone around him is dying. He couldn't save Ava, and he can't save the people at the hotel. Desperate, he entreats Dean to kill him if he becomes "something that I'm not." Dean doesn't want to promise, but he does, because he has to. It's an intensely emotional moment, which undoubtedly had fangirls everywhere collapsing in squeeing heaps. (I don't squee in these situations. I slide gracefully off the side of my chaise.)

By the end, though, Sam gets to save another soul, in a scene reminiscent of Dean's heroic turn in "Dead in the Water." And, in spite of Dean's hoping he forgot their conversation, Sam remembers Dean's promise. I have no doubt that will come into play in upcoming episodes. Probably the season finale. I'm picturing a cliffhanger where Dean has to make that call--is it Sam or is it Memorex? Find out next week if he pulls the trigger... Because that would just be cruel. And also perfect. Except they'll probably think of something even crueller and perfecter, knowing these writers.

Favorite Moments:
The gay antiquing jokes. Honestly, the whole king or two queens joke just never gets old.

Dean's riff on how much Sam loves to dress up his dolls.

Sasquatch. Does Kripke read fanfic, or what?

Interesting to no one but myself:
The normally semi-desaturated nature of this show tonight seemed extra pronounced, especially with Susan, who seems almost black-and-white in some shots, and with anything red, which seemed overly prominent, especially in the cars and the paint on the dolls. I thought the effect made it all extra creepy.