god help me, the rumors are true, i've started watching smallville. just finished season 1 actually, and though i feel no small amount of shame because of this, i am totally enthralled and completely enjoying it.
i've never been particularly interested in superman. sure, i watched "lois and clark" in my youth and i saw the bryan singer film when it came out, but i always found the man of steel to be a bit on the boring, goody-two-shoes side of super heroics. i tend to prefer darker heroes a la batman or the crow. but it seems that clark kent's farm boy aw-shucks-iness is quite a bit more charming when he actually IS a farm boy and still coltish enough to be believable as a small town teen hero.
to be honest, though, it wasn't the allure of the origins of superman that drew me to the show. like most things recently, the real reason was because of "supernatural." "smallville" airs right before spn on friday nights and being the diligent fangirl that i am, i turn the tv to the right channel well beforehand to make sure i don't miss a minute of winchestery goodness. as such, i've caught the back end of all of season 10 of "smallville," therein realizing that tom welling is SUPER hot. (heh. get it? super.)
anyway, the jist is, i'm boy crazy. always have been, always will be. so i'll suffer through some ridiculous writing and cliched scenarios (not a few of which are clearly stolen from buffy episodes), for the chance to see a big sexy man fight crime. i'm just shallow like that.
here follows the pros and cons of the smallville universe, or at least my first impressions...
pros:
1. strong, capable badass women. i like a show where women are shown driving tractors and running businesses while still in high school. the cw network isn't exactly known for it's portrayals of independent women (at least after buffy went off the air) so it's nice to see a show where the women are consistently badass, even more so in a show that's pretty darned masculine on the surface. in fact, if it weren't for clark's biological advantages, the women would be outshining the men!
martha kent manages to help her somewhat cantankerous husband run the farm, keep the peace between the men in her life AND raise a son who's not only the sweetest boy next door there ever was, but also ends up saving the lives of half the town. she also snakes drains, feeds the elderly and plows fields in her spare time.
and then there's chloe. who i freaking ADORE. she may be a little on the naive side when it comes to her relationship with clark, but other than that tiny flaw, the girl is badass. she (single-handedly?) runs the school paper, scooping the big city news desks with her "wall of weird" exposes. she is consistently upbeat and refuses to take any shit from pete or clark, admonishing them several times for not treating her as well as they should. being in high school and standing up for yourself like that against the guy you're into? not easy, but chloe pulls it off with panache. and she drives a 1961 ford falcon. nuff said.
2. the charm of mid-western america. god, i really really really want to live on a farm in kansas with jonathan and martha kent, which brings me to...
3. possibly the best television parents EVER. i love them and wish they were mine. except for i'd have a gigantic oedipal complex due to the overwhelming sexiness of john schneider. i mean, bo duke was no slouch, but the man is infinitely better looking now.
4. rad vancouver guest stars. like the chief, callie and tory from "battlestar galactica." also non-vancouverites like amy adams, shawn ashmore and adam brody. (*squee* seth cohen!! *squee*)
5. the slashiness. at one point, lex gifts clark with a sword as a going away present. a SWORD. and i always give bonus points for homo-erotic phallic imagery.
cons:
1. worst theme song ever to assail my ears. somebody saaaaaaave meeeeee from the sappy lameness of remy zero, not to mention the other assorted bad pop songs that crop up during the show. "supernatural" has really ruined me with all it's classic rock awesome.
2. pete's token-ness. srsly, what is the point of his character? to highlight the chemistry in clark's only other male friendship? other than bringing some cultural diversity to the white bread mid-west, pete seems completely useless.
3. the romantic obliviousness of, well, everyone. i suppose i should cut them some slack, smallville being a show populated by teenagers, but oh-my-chuck is this shit ridiculous. everyone is in love with clark and he is just too much of a puppy-eyed sweetheart to hurt anyone's feelings, though he clearly only loves lana. (or lex, depending on your preference.) and lana is rockin too much guilt to leave her quarterback boyfriend, even though they don't ever spend any time together and he's kind of a douchebag. so clark ends up asking chloe to prom and i just know he's gonna end up breaking her heart. then i'm gonna cry big crocodile tears even though i know it's coming and i just don't want so much angst with my cheese. smallville should leave the angsting to the winchesters, who are better at it anyway.
4. the cheesiness. although sometimes it's just so much fun.
5. the too-slow build up. someone freaking say the word kryptonite already! "meteor rocks" for the loss. and when the hell does clark discover that he can fly?!? running really fast is cool, but it does not compete with flying! or leaping tall buildings in a single bound, for that matter. i demand more awesome kryptonian abilities!
December 1, 2010
October 27, 2010
kansass
1. introduction to the prairie. i like it. it's pretty and open.
2. we avoided all interstates and took smaller 2 lane state highways for the majority of the trip. i was so into it. i felt at peace.
3. and 4. at some truck stop in texas. it was incredibly windy and i really struggled with that map for a minute. thankfully, i avoided DANGER!!
5. at our first food pit stop, the cracker barrel. i was kinda horrified, but it didn't turn out so bad. also our first interaction with completely bemused and incompetent waitstaff who were flummoxed by our paying together.
6. an awesomely awesome license plate spotted in norman, ok.
7. - 11. the diner in norman, ok. this place was incredible. the waitresses were rad, the food was super yummy and the decor was pitch perfect.
12. sailors. yum. double yum.
13. aquarium covered in splattered blood stickers, courtesy of a thai restaurant in norman.
14. hot chicks in glasses.
15. sisters caught off-guard
16. goddamn right.
17. main street, u.s.a.
18. doc faces off with a strange creature in front of the lawrence public library.
19. famous people from lawrence mural
20. hard to tell, but the flier says "death becomes hair"
21. and 22. i did not know that ford made a car called the maverick, but i am so into it.
23. - 25. we found this cute little eastern themed park in the middle of downtown. when i live in lawrence, i will go there when i miss doc.
26. and 27. there are three independent bookstores in downtown lawrence. so clearly we had to take pictures in front of at least one of them.
28. and 29. the main drag in lawrence is massachusetts avenue, where the buildings are old and beautiful. (except sometimes they get turned into urban outfitters. sad.)
30. and 31. lawrence is home of the marvelous free state brewery. doc was especially fond of the ad astra ale, though all the beers we tried were delicious.
32. suspicious bar texting...
33. and 34. the famous stull cemetery just outside of lawrence. it is said to be one of the 7 gates to hell in the u.s. the foundation in the background is from an old church (possibly subversively satanic) that mysteriously burned down a few years ago. and yes, it was featured in the season 5 finale of supernatural.
35. and 36. we saw this SWEET camaro driving through topeka. meow.
37. also spotted: this rad vintage dr. pepper mural.
38. - 40. the beautiful, rainy road homeOctober 16, 2010
have you seen this car?!?
about a year ago, i became obsessed with a certain 1967 chevrolet impala. sure, i had admired the contours of the classics when i saw them on the road, but never before had i truly understood the inherent beauty of detroit's finest exports.
today, classic cars occupy a rather large portion of my brainspace. i watch for them when i'm driving, on the road, parked on the side, inside garages, hoods popped, waiting for examination. i want one so badly i practically taste the cold steel.
part of the attraction is the overwhelming dudeliness of possessing a muscle car; when the awakening of my masculinity happened, so did my awakening to the hotness of american heavy metal. there is an obvious sexuality in almost every classic car. they come from a time when miles per gallon wasn't even a thought, the engineering focusing on speed and horsepower. if she roared like a lion when her engine was revved, who gave a frak about gas mileage? the classics are machines of power and beauty, not economy and ecology.
but more than the aesthetics and the raw power, classic cars give me a chance to reconnect with a past i never experienced, to bring my idea of a perfect existence in the past a little bit closer to the reality of the present. in the same way that wearing vintage polyester, watching a steve mcqueen flick or listening to ludicrous amounts of bad company makes me nostalgic for a time i never lived in, the thought of cruising around in a late '60s chevy makes my heart melt a little.
which is how i became a classic car stalker. haven't seen the dreamboat on the road yet, but there are beauties all over town. following here, my first victims...
1976 ford mustang(at the auto shoppe, burnet rd.)
1975 mercury monarch/1976 ford mustang(at the auto shoppe, burnet rd.)
1970 mercury cougar(at the auto shoppe, burnet rd.)
1970 chevy el camino(justin lane at airport)
1975 chevelle malibu(justin lane at lamar, behind a garage)
September 9, 2010
if i were the king of the forest...
i would have 4 homes in melbourne, paris, edinburgh and new york. and every year i would travel in a loop between them, hitting each tennis grand slam along the way.
ah, dreamlife, you sustain me.
ah, dreamlife, you sustain me.
September 4, 2010
letters for thought...
so i was watching the us open tonight, a match between james blake and novak djokovic. after staring at their names for two hours, i thought, "damn, djoker (as i affectionately call him), your name would be kick ass in scrabble! it's so full of interesting letters!"
which led me to ask, what makes a letter interesting? is it simply it's rarity of use? i don't feel like k is a particularly underused letter, especially in internet speak, and yet i find it rather appealing. perhaps it's the multitude of angles. maybe it's having angles at all, because v, w, z and x are certainly all interesting. though of course, they are pretty rarely used.
q of course is at the top of the list, simply because it requires the presence of u. expect for qatar! and probably some physics words.
y isn't particularly interesting, but when found in the middle of a word, often seems intriguing. see: scythe, stylus, psyche, etc.
so i dunno. perhaps it's just the foreign-ness of djokovic's name, the silent d, the double v's. all i know for sure is that his name is worth at least 37 points in scrabble, which is nothing to scoff at.
which led me to ask, what makes a letter interesting? is it simply it's rarity of use? i don't feel like k is a particularly underused letter, especially in internet speak, and yet i find it rather appealing. perhaps it's the multitude of angles. maybe it's having angles at all, because v, w, z and x are certainly all interesting. though of course, they are pretty rarely used.
q of course is at the top of the list, simply because it requires the presence of u. expect for qatar! and probably some physics words.
y isn't particularly interesting, but when found in the middle of a word, often seems intriguing. see: scythe, stylus, psyche, etc.
so i dunno. perhaps it's just the foreign-ness of djokovic's name, the silent d, the double v's. all i know for sure is that his name is worth at least 37 points in scrabble, which is nothing to scoff at.
August 16, 2010
flashlights and blood splatters: recapping season 1 of supernatural
it's been a little under a year since i sidled up to this crazy fandom and went totally batshit for the winchester boys. i find comfort in the existence of thousands of other fangirls and the knowledge that i'm not the only one that finds supernatural to be something other than just a tv show. that being said, i feel a compulsion to recap and blog and generally squee about spn at all given opportunities. thus, after three viewings, a season one recap, mostly just to make myself happy.
episode 1.1 - pilot
4 stars
location: jericho, ca
awesome guest star: sarah shahi
the pilot episode is pretty solid, regardless of the shit tons of exposition required to lay out the show's premise. thankfully, it's blended so well into the story of the boys re-bonding that it never seems overly garrulous or out of place. in one minute long conversation, the writers manage to establish that 1. all dean eats is junk food 2. their money comes from credit card scams/hustling 3. dean is in charge of the impala and 4. the classic rock soundtrack. and that's half the show right there :-)
episode 1.2 - wendigo
3 stars
location: black rock, co
awesome guest stars : callum keith rennie aka leoban and donnelly rhodes aka doc cottle
aside from dean's delightfully whimsical attitude, what really struck me about this episode is the mention of sam's anger issues. so early on! destiny is such a bitch, especially when your destiny is to become lucifer's bitch.
episode 1.3 - dead in the water
4 stars
location: lake manitoc, wi
awesome guest star: amy acker
awesome song: movin' on - bad company
awesome aliases: agents ford and hamill
ah, the first of sera gamble's episodes and the first truly good episode of the series. dean's efficacy with children is introduced, hinting at how all those years raising sammy made it easy to communicate with little guys :-) and to teach them how to say "zeppelin rules!" also notable is dean's profession of love for green army men, one of which will eventually save the world. ah, unintentional foreshadowing, you make me happy.
episode 1.4 - phantom traveler
3 stars
location: nazareth, pa
phantom traveler is saved from crappiness by all it sets up for future story lines, as sam and dean encounter their first demon. therefore, we also see black smoke for the first time and hear the first mention of sulfur as a demon calling card.
also, dean's fear of flying is adorable and this is the ep that contains the rather infamous long pan up dean's sleeping body. thanks again for that, mr. singer :-)
episode 1.5 - bloody mary
3 stars
location: toledo, oh
the teaser for this ep is like every slumber party i ever went to, except with liquefied eyeballs and bloody mayhem at the end of the night. it's a pretty solid episode, but not particularly interesting. although, all those broken mirrors in the antique shop could account for all the winchesters' bad luck over the years.
episode 1.6 - skin
3 stars
location: st. louis, mo
awesome song: ina gadda da vida - iron butterfly
apparently, someone in the spn boardroom said, "more horror!" because there is plenty of scary and gory going on in this ep! the opening sequence with the commandos busting in a house to find a beaten girl tied to a chair, with "ina gadda da vida" in the background, is pure excellence. very intense. and dean ripping his skin off in the sewer?! gross, but rad! we also see dean as a bad guy for the first time, though i will alwaysmaintain that sam is the better villain.
episode 1.7 - hookman
3 stars
location: eastern iowa university
awesome guest star: bulldog from frasier
awesome song: peace of mind - boston (best song EVER.)
best part of this ep? the introduction to rock salt shotguns! dean's idea, of course. everything else? kinda meh.
episode 1.8 - bugs
2 stars
location: oasis plains, ok
awesome song: rock of ages - def leppard
frak this episode. of course i hate it, as i hate all things involving bugs. but even if i didn't have a phobic fear of insects, this would still be a terrible episode. it is saved from utter derision by three things: 1. dean hustling pool, which is always ultra hot 2. the first instance of the boys being mistaken for a couple and 3. dean in the steam shower. still, it's probably the worst episode of the whole show.
episode 1.9 - home
4 stars
location: lawrence, ks
awesome secondary character: missouri mosely and motherlovin papa winchester!
oh, lawrence, kansas, my future home and the genesis of the entire winchester saga - so full of secrets and family bonding opportunities! sam finally learns that dean rescued him from the mom-fire and the boys discover that missouri mosely is responsible for papa's introduction to the occult. dean sheds the first of what will be many manly tears trying to get papa on the phone, but to no avail. of course, pops being a sneaky fuck, he then shows up at missouri's place after the boys have left.
also, i would be remiss if i didn't mention the garbage disposal attack on the repairman! so freaky and disgusting! i miss the show being so scary.
episode 1.10 - asylum
3 stars
location: roosevelt asylum - rockford, il
again, sam's anger issues are mentioned, even before dr. ellicot zaps him with the "rage juice," which surely didn't help his natural ill-tempered tendencies. i just can't believe his anger was such an issue so early on! how could i have not noticed it? srsly, sometimes i think this show is so well planned out and sometimes i think they just got lucky and/or are just as obsessive as the fangirls.
episode 1.11 - scarecrow
4 stars
location: burkitsville, in
awesome guest star: william b. davis aka cigarette smoking man!
awesome song: bad company - bad company
awesome secondary character: meg! original meg. love her.
le sigh. the first brotherly fight and it leads to the freakiest scarecrow EVER on dean's end and demon meg on sam's! of all unholy terrors to run into on the side of the road!
the epilogue is probably my favorite of the whole show, with meg slittingtruck van driver throats and bad company's "bad company" pumping in the background :-)
episode 1.12 - faith
4 stars
location: true believers revival, nebraska
awesome guest star: julie benz!
awesome song: don't fear the reaper - blue oyster cult
this ep is the inception of 100s of hurt/comfort fics because nothing is as sexy as someone who loves you so much they would go to any length to save you. and because dean looks hot, even on his deathbed.
"faith" also boasts one of the best sequences this show has ever seen, certainly the best in this season, i.e. the girl running from a reaper, while the screaching guitar of boc's "don't fear the reaper" plays in the background. mind-bogglingly awesome.
episode 1.13 - route 666
3 stars
location: cape girardeau, mo
awesome song: she brings me love - bad company
it's good to see inside dean's gruff exterior and finally see that he can care about someone other than sammy. cassie is all right, certainly better than most of dean's women. and the sex scene set to "she brings me love"? drool. i do wonder why dean never dreams of cassie in later years. his dreams of apple pie existence always revolve around lisa, with whom he had a much briefer affair. i suppose his and cassie's story just played itself out and ended with this episode.
episode 1.14 - nightmare
3 stars
location: saginaw, mi
awesome guest star: the aunt with the sexy voice from sabrina the teenage witch
"nightmare," not surprisingly, begins with a nightmare, causing sam to wake dean up in the middle of the night. the kicker is that dean is surprised! meaning, they are still in the habit of sleeping regularly through the night. better enjoy it while it lasts boys. you're about to be faced with the nightmare hunt for azazel.
also awesome? the infamous priest outfits. whose idea was that? i love the wardrobe department and their collective crazy, not least of all for inspiring some interesting fantasies/fanfic.
episode 1.15 - the benders
a rather surprising 4 stars
location: hibbing, mn
i was so surprised by "the benders"! i remembered this ep as kinda boring and annoying because the guys were fighting hillbillies instead of monsters. hardly supernatural.
but unholy crap! there is a real spooky leatherface-iness to the whole episode, which also benefits from a very talented guest star in jessica steen, who plays the deputy. in addition, we are treated to super! fighty! boys, who beat the crap outta some backwoods crazies. and then they walk off down the road after their victory, laughing and joking together. i loves it and i misses their easy camraderie.
episode 1.16 - shadow
4 stars
location: chicago, il
awesome guest star: elosha from bsg
awesome secondary character: papa winchester and meg
three things: 1. oh my god the uniforms for the "alarm company" are so blue collar delicious. drool. 2. this related interchange: "these uniforms cost hard earned money." "whose?" "ours. you think credit card fraud is easy?" and 3. sam, dean AND papa all get torn to motherfrakking shreds by meg's deva. how do those scratches on sam's face not leave a permanent scar? hmm. sometimes i wish they had more visible scars, instead of just the ginormous emotional ones.
episode 1.17 - hell house
5 stars, one just for jared's just out of the shower half-naked bod
location: richardson, tx
awesome secondary characters: the origin of the ghostfacers!
awesome music: tons of blue oyster cult
made. of. win. interstate 35!!!! ghostfacers!!! blue oyster cult!!! small town teen life!!
i really kinda hated ed and harry the first couple times through, but now i am part of their cultish sliver of this wacky fandom. they provide the show with it's first truly comical episode, which sets the tone for the less angsty side of the story. they're just homoerotic, silly, stoner hunters, so basically the equivalent of me, if i were a hunter :-)
episode 1.18 - something wicked
4 stars
location: fitchburg, wi
awesome secondary characters: the wee!chesters! and vintage papa too!
weechester alert! oh how i love the flashbacks to young sam and dean! codependency certainly began early for these two :-) and sam's always been a bit of a whiney baby.
episode 1.19 - provenance
3 stars
location: upstate new york
blah is what this episode makes me feel. although i do love it when sam's smarty pants side is showcased.
the spacey/disco motel room the boys stay in marks the beginning of the supernatural's trademark wacky motel rooms, one of the best non-human characters on the show.
episode 1. 20 - dead man's blood
3 stars, only b/c of papa
location: manning, co
awesome secondary character: our fair lady, the colt! who is totally a character in her own right. also, papa.
spn does many things right, but it really misses the mark when it comes to vampires. they are completely ridiculous pseudo-gothy vamps of the lost boys variety, which is to say, kinda lame and laughable.
the episode is saved by the family dynamic, especially the big fight between sam and papa, with dean interceding, as usual. then later, after the vamp victory, all 3 winchesters are back together, armed with the colt and on the hunt for the y.e.d. (though he has not yet been mentioned as having yellow eyes...)
episode 1.21 salvation
4 stars
location: salvation, ia
awesome song: carry on wayward son - kansas. it begins :-)
awesome secondary character: meg and papa
everything the season has been leading up to finally comes to a head in these last two episodes. and they totally deliver! the history of the winchesters entanglements with the y.e.d. are exposed and we finally see dem yella eyes.
episode 1.22 - devil's trap
5 stars
location: iowa, south dakota, all over the damn place
awesome song: fight the good fight - triumph
awesome secondary character: bobby singer, papa
ah, man, the season really wraps up so well with the brothers standing together against a y.e.d.-possessed john. they may have been searching for him this whole time, but not even papa can come between sam and dean.
there is a nice parallel drawn between john holding in the y.e.d. and begging sam to shoot him and sam holding in lucifer and dean letting him die in "swan song." are john and sam really so similar? always ready to martyr themselves to the cause, and be damned the people they leave behind?
and then, BOOM! the end of the first season. kripke was sooo wrong to end it like that with all 3 winchesters presumably dead in the crushed impala...what a cliffhanger!
so it took three viewings, but i have now come to appreciate both the highs and lows of season 1. the storytelling is often dodgy and the writers are clearly still finding their way, but they cover a lot of ground and managed to emerge with more good episodes than bad.
the way season two starts, the creative team must have figured out the rest of it over hiatus!
episode 1.1 - pilot
4 stars
location: jericho, ca
awesome guest star: sarah shahi
the pilot episode is pretty solid, regardless of the shit tons of exposition required to lay out the show's premise. thankfully, it's blended so well into the story of the boys re-bonding that it never seems overly garrulous or out of place. in one minute long conversation, the writers manage to establish that 1. all dean eats is junk food 2. their money comes from credit card scams/hustling 3. dean is in charge of the impala and 4. the classic rock soundtrack. and that's half the show right there :-)
episode 1.2 - wendigo
3 stars
location: black rock, co
awesome guest stars : callum keith rennie aka leoban and donnelly rhodes aka doc cottle
aside from dean's delightfully whimsical attitude, what really struck me about this episode is the mention of sam's anger issues. so early on! destiny is such a bitch, especially when your destiny is to become lucifer's bitch.
episode 1.3 - dead in the water
4 stars
location: lake manitoc, wi
awesome guest star: amy acker
awesome song: movin' on - bad company
awesome aliases: agents ford and hamill
ah, the first of sera gamble's episodes and the first truly good episode of the series. dean's efficacy with children is introduced, hinting at how all those years raising sammy made it easy to communicate with little guys :-) and to teach them how to say "zeppelin rules!" also notable is dean's profession of love for green army men, one of which will eventually save the world. ah, unintentional foreshadowing, you make me happy.
episode 1.4 - phantom traveler
3 stars
location: nazareth, pa
phantom traveler is saved from crappiness by all it sets up for future story lines, as sam and dean encounter their first demon. therefore, we also see black smoke for the first time and hear the first mention of sulfur as a demon calling card.
also, dean's fear of flying is adorable and this is the ep that contains the rather infamous long pan up dean's sleeping body. thanks again for that, mr. singer :-)
episode 1.5 - bloody mary
3 stars
location: toledo, oh
the teaser for this ep is like every slumber party i ever went to, except with liquefied eyeballs and bloody mayhem at the end of the night. it's a pretty solid episode, but not particularly interesting. although, all those broken mirrors in the antique shop could account for all the winchesters' bad luck over the years.
episode 1.6 - skin
3 stars
location: st. louis, mo
awesome song: ina gadda da vida - iron butterfly
apparently, someone in the spn boardroom said, "more horror!" because there is plenty of scary and gory going on in this ep! the opening sequence with the commandos busting in a house to find a beaten girl tied to a chair, with "ina gadda da vida" in the background, is pure excellence. very intense. and dean ripping his skin off in the sewer?! gross, but rad! we also see dean as a bad guy for the first time, though i will alwaysmaintain that sam is the better villain.
episode 1.7 - hookman
3 stars
location: eastern iowa university
awesome guest star: bulldog from frasier
awesome song: peace of mind - boston (best song EVER.)
best part of this ep? the introduction to rock salt shotguns! dean's idea, of course. everything else? kinda meh.
episode 1.8 - bugs
2 stars
location: oasis plains, ok
awesome song: rock of ages - def leppard
frak this episode. of course i hate it, as i hate all things involving bugs. but even if i didn't have a phobic fear of insects, this would still be a terrible episode. it is saved from utter derision by three things: 1. dean hustling pool, which is always ultra hot 2. the first instance of the boys being mistaken for a couple and 3. dean in the steam shower. still, it's probably the worst episode of the whole show.
episode 1.9 - home
4 stars
location: lawrence, ks
awesome secondary character: missouri mosely and motherlovin papa winchester!
oh, lawrence, kansas, my future home and the genesis of the entire winchester saga - so full of secrets and family bonding opportunities! sam finally learns that dean rescued him from the mom-fire and the boys discover that missouri mosely is responsible for papa's introduction to the occult. dean sheds the first of what will be many manly tears trying to get papa on the phone, but to no avail. of course, pops being a sneaky fuck, he then shows up at missouri's place after the boys have left.
also, i would be remiss if i didn't mention the garbage disposal attack on the repairman! so freaky and disgusting! i miss the show being so scary.
episode 1.10 - asylum
3 stars
location: roosevelt asylum - rockford, il
again, sam's anger issues are mentioned, even before dr. ellicot zaps him with the "rage juice," which surely didn't help his natural ill-tempered tendencies. i just can't believe his anger was such an issue so early on! how could i have not noticed it? srsly, sometimes i think this show is so well planned out and sometimes i think they just got lucky and/or are just as obsessive as the fangirls.
episode 1.11 - scarecrow
4 stars
location: burkitsville, in
awesome guest star: william b. davis aka cigarette smoking man!
awesome song: bad company - bad company
awesome secondary character: meg! original meg. love her.
le sigh. the first brotherly fight and it leads to the freakiest scarecrow EVER on dean's end and demon meg on sam's! of all unholy terrors to run into on the side of the road!
the epilogue is probably my favorite of the whole show, with meg slitting
episode 1.12 - faith
4 stars
location: true believers revival, nebraska
awesome guest star: julie benz!
awesome song: don't fear the reaper - blue oyster cult
this ep is the inception of 100s of hurt/comfort fics because nothing is as sexy as someone who loves you so much they would go to any length to save you. and because dean looks hot, even on his deathbed.
"faith" also boasts one of the best sequences this show has ever seen, certainly the best in this season, i.e. the girl running from a reaper, while the screaching guitar of boc's "don't fear the reaper" plays in the background. mind-bogglingly awesome.
episode 1.13 - route 666
3 stars
location: cape girardeau, mo
awesome song: she brings me love - bad company
it's good to see inside dean's gruff exterior and finally see that he can care about someone other than sammy. cassie is all right, certainly better than most of dean's women. and the sex scene set to "she brings me love"? drool. i do wonder why dean never dreams of cassie in later years. his dreams of apple pie existence always revolve around lisa, with whom he had a much briefer affair. i suppose his and cassie's story just played itself out and ended with this episode.
episode 1.14 - nightmare
3 stars
location: saginaw, mi
awesome guest star: the aunt with the sexy voice from sabrina the teenage witch
"nightmare," not surprisingly, begins with a nightmare, causing sam to wake dean up in the middle of the night. the kicker is that dean is surprised! meaning, they are still in the habit of sleeping regularly through the night. better enjoy it while it lasts boys. you're about to be faced with the nightmare hunt for azazel.
also awesome? the infamous priest outfits. whose idea was that? i love the wardrobe department and their collective crazy, not least of all for inspiring some interesting fantasies/fanfic.
episode 1.15 - the benders
a rather surprising 4 stars
location: hibbing, mn
i was so surprised by "the benders"! i remembered this ep as kinda boring and annoying because the guys were fighting hillbillies instead of monsters. hardly supernatural.
but unholy crap! there is a real spooky leatherface-iness to the whole episode, which also benefits from a very talented guest star in jessica steen, who plays the deputy. in addition, we are treated to super! fighty! boys, who beat the crap outta some backwoods crazies. and then they walk off down the road after their victory, laughing and joking together. i loves it and i misses their easy camraderie.
episode 1.16 - shadow
4 stars
location: chicago, il
awesome guest star: elosha from bsg
awesome secondary character: papa winchester and meg
three things: 1. oh my god the uniforms for the "alarm company" are so blue collar delicious. drool. 2. this related interchange: "these uniforms cost hard earned money." "whose?" "ours. you think credit card fraud is easy?" and 3. sam, dean AND papa all get torn to motherfrakking shreds by meg's deva. how do those scratches on sam's face not leave a permanent scar? hmm. sometimes i wish they had more visible scars, instead of just the ginormous emotional ones.
episode 1.17 - hell house
5 stars, one just for jared's just out of the shower half-naked bod
location: richardson, tx
awesome secondary characters: the origin of the ghostfacers!
awesome music: tons of blue oyster cult
made. of. win. interstate 35!!!! ghostfacers!!! blue oyster cult!!! small town teen life!!
i really kinda hated ed and harry the first couple times through, but now i am part of their cultish sliver of this wacky fandom. they provide the show with it's first truly comical episode, which sets the tone for the less angsty side of the story. they're just homoerotic, silly, stoner hunters, so basically the equivalent of me, if i were a hunter :-)
episode 1.18 - something wicked
4 stars
location: fitchburg, wi
awesome secondary characters: the wee!chesters! and vintage papa too!
weechester alert! oh how i love the flashbacks to young sam and dean! codependency certainly began early for these two :-) and sam's always been a bit of a whiney baby.
episode 1.19 - provenance
3 stars
location: upstate new york
blah is what this episode makes me feel. although i do love it when sam's smarty pants side is showcased.
the spacey/disco motel room the boys stay in marks the beginning of the supernatural's trademark wacky motel rooms, one of the best non-human characters on the show.
episode 1. 20 - dead man's blood
3 stars, only b/c of papa
location: manning, co
awesome secondary character: our fair lady, the colt! who is totally a character in her own right. also, papa.
spn does many things right, but it really misses the mark when it comes to vampires. they are completely ridiculous pseudo-gothy vamps of the lost boys variety, which is to say, kinda lame and laughable.
the episode is saved by the family dynamic, especially the big fight between sam and papa, with dean interceding, as usual. then later, after the vamp victory, all 3 winchesters are back together, armed with the colt and on the hunt for the y.e.d. (though he has not yet been mentioned as having yellow eyes...)
episode 1.21 salvation
4 stars
location: salvation, ia
awesome song: carry on wayward son - kansas. it begins :-)
awesome secondary character: meg and papa
everything the season has been leading up to finally comes to a head in these last two episodes. and they totally deliver! the history of the winchesters entanglements with the y.e.d. are exposed and we finally see dem yella eyes.
episode 1.22 - devil's trap
5 stars
location: iowa, south dakota, all over the damn place
awesome song: fight the good fight - triumph
awesome secondary character: bobby singer, papa
ah, man, the season really wraps up so well with the brothers standing together against a y.e.d.-possessed john. they may have been searching for him this whole time, but not even papa can come between sam and dean.
there is a nice parallel drawn between john holding in the y.e.d. and begging sam to shoot him and sam holding in lucifer and dean letting him die in "swan song." are john and sam really so similar? always ready to martyr themselves to the cause, and be damned the people they leave behind?
and then, BOOM! the end of the first season. kripke was sooo wrong to end it like that with all 3 winchesters presumably dead in the crushed impala...what a cliffhanger!
so it took three viewings, but i have now come to appreciate both the highs and lows of season 1. the storytelling is often dodgy and the writers are clearly still finding their way, but they cover a lot of ground and managed to emerge with more good episodes than bad.
the way season two starts, the creative team must have figured out the rest of it over hiatus!
May 6, 2010
mark sheppard makes everything better.
"the devil you know" episode 5x20
initially, this episode left me cold and kinda bored aka super disappointed! only 3 eps left and they give us this low action, super expositiony stuff? but i think i was just over-excited (surprise, surprise) and my adrenaline flow didn't match that of the show's. upon second viewing, this episode is as brilliant as any of ben edlund's previous efforts and really ties together the whole mythology of the show.
the teaser opens on an animal testing lab, total "outbreak" style. there are some monkeys, a couple lab coats and a random janitor. (do they usually clean labs while in use? doesn't that pose a problem with sterility?) anyway, the scientists are discussing the new swine flu vaccine, which is being put into production without proper testing. then, uh-oh! suspiciously conspicuous janitor is really a demon sent by pestilence to help spread, well, pestilence. he injects one guy with what i suppose is croatoan virus because the guy goes bonkers and kills his colleague. and the demon gets away.
cut to the boys in investigator mode, wearing medical masks in the lobby of a hospital and interviewing a doctor. the town has been hit by a mini-epidemic of swine flu, a tell tale sign of the horseman of the week. this whole scene seemed really surreal because you couldn't see anyone's mouth move. it kinda freaked me out.
i wonder if this scene was a deliberate suggestion on jensen's part to show how he can emote, even only working with his eyes. you can totally tell how big his smile is here. the eye crinkles give it away!on with the hunt, the boys drive along, heading east when pure awesome appears in the backseat. that's right, pure awesome in the form of crowley the demon, played by the utterly charming, scene-chomping, sexy beast mark sheppard (aka badger from "firefly", romo lampkin from bsg, etc) this man makes everything he's in better and is pretty much solely responsible for my reassessment of this episode. sheppard has a magnetic personality and that coupled with his ridiculously sexy voice makes his crowley the most charismatic motherfucker in the room at all times. i wouldn't trust him, but i'd do what he told me to anyway.
on a side note, the impala's been getting a lot of love/screen time lately. it is a coincidence that everyone's heading
so crowley pops in to propose that they all work together to kill/cage lucifer. he's oozing charm and snake oil smiles, but due to his somewhat spotty history with the brothers, the winchesters are pretty pissed that he'd show his face.
even pretty when he's pissed.
sam has a 'roid rage moment and tries to kill crowley, who eventually explains his offer of satanic assassination assistance. lucifer knows that crowley gave sam and dean the colt, which puts crowley squarely in the hunted category, right along with the winchesters.
crowley also discloses that he's been watching over the winchesters with the help of a magical coin planted in the impala that allows him to see and hear the boys. with a smirk crowley drawls, "and my the things i've heard." (what exactly have you hear!?! i'm gonna pretend it was wincest!)
eventually, they agree to work together. crowley confesses that while he can't deliver pestilence and the third power ring, he can give them the "horseman's stableboy" in the form of a possessed pharmaceutical company exec.
the name of the company is niveus, which means snowy or white. a reference to the morningstar, perhaps? lucifer!sam was wearing that white suit in "the end." i could just be reading too much into, but i think the writers are just as nerdy about that shit as the fangirls, so i doubt it's a coincidence.
sam's so emo.dean gets sent upstairs alone to face the demon, tries his usual cocky smartass routine and gets the ever living shit kicked out of him. this demon does work for the horseman after all, so he's kind of a badass.
dean wiping blood on the demon's suit jacket. just delightfully insouciant, that dean :-)
dean ekes out an escape, takes the world's longest elevator ride down and regroups with crowley. the demon, of course, reappears, but crowley has the latest in devil's trap headwear handy and uses it to capture the evil exec.
this makes me giggle :-)en route to their hideout, crowley instructs dean to drive in the opposite direction, away from sam. apparently, the younger winchester has a history with this demon and crowley doesn't trust sam to not kill their hostage. but dean ain't having that shit, so they go back to the lair. when they arrive sam somehow immediately knows something's up and pops up to investigate.
sam's spidey sense is tingling!dean and crowley unmask the demon for sam to reveal....dundundun...brady! wait, who?
we learn that brady was sam's college friend, the man who introduced him to jess. brady was apparently possessed throughout most of their friendship, on assignment from azazel. brady was sent to put sam back on the "right" path, as yellow eyes thought sam was becoming too much of a civilian. the demons conspired to hook him up with a beautiful innocent girl, and then kill her, in order to ignite sam's anger switch and steer him back toward the dark side.
basically, sammy's been screwed since forever. poor puppy.
the puppy doesn't last long though and then, out comes angry sasquatch sam!
dean has to physically keep sam from killing brady then and there, as they still need him to find pestilence. crowley thanks the winchesters for getting brady "nice and fluffed" and takes a swing at trying to pry pestilence's whereabouts from the demon. the negotiations don't go well, and crowley rather abruptly leaves to pursue an alternate plan. sam takes advantage of their demon den mother's absence, locks dean in a closet and goes after brady with ruby's knife. he gets this close...
...and then doesn't kill him! sam takes control of his temper! hallelujah! does this mean he could take control of lucifer too? has sam finally mastered the force?
i found this recently, but couldn't find out who made it. but they are clearly awesome.team free will isn't out of the woods yet though. turns out a demon planted a magic gps tracker on crowley and sent hellhounds after them. dean looks suitably terrified, poor thing, and crowley promptly skedaddles. not knowing what else to do, sam and dean prepare for a hellhound fight, shotguns at the ready. just as dean's about to get mauled (again), crowley reappears with a jumbo sized hound, who rips the others to shreds. demons and winchesters all escape in the impala.
later, brady hands over directions to pestilence and acknowledges that he's now on the lam, just like the rest of them. job done, crowley takes off and dean draws a salt line in the alley behind him, hemming in the winchesters and brady. they stand at opposite ends, showdown style and dean brings the butch saying, "we're the one's you should be afraid of."
intimidating as fuck.and then sam stabs the shit out of brady! and nearly smiles while he does it! his mannerisms and facial expressions are becoming more and more like lucifer!sam in "the end." which makes me sad cause i'm just starting to like sam again. i don't want either of the brothers to say yes!
this is part snarl, part smile, all lucifer's vessel.after the demon slaying, sam walks off into the shadows and dean just lets. him. go.
dean just stands there, like he's finally resigned to sam's tremendous anger and aggression. or maybe he's just finally letting sammy become sam? or is he resigned to the whole damn apocalypse? these guys really have the worst lives and they are stressing me out. srsly.
let's see...final thoughts. 1. when they first introduced brady, i immediately thought of eric brady, jensen's character on "days of our lives." i find comfort knowing i am not the only one :-) 2. sam stabs the impala's upholstery when crowley first shows up in the back seat! i couldn't help but think how mad dean must have been. 3. the flies in the blood chalice when brady was communicating with pestilence were super cool and clever!
next week, more pestilence, hopefully some castiel action and (finally) hello death!
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