gabriel! gabriel! gabriel!

only three episodes left til armageddon! kinda wish i had them all at once because the waiting is making me crazy. crazier. scary to think what will happen to me this summer, during my first hellatus...

anyway, onto the recap...

"hammer of the gods" episode 5x19

first of all, kudos to the production staff. the sets for this episode were stunning! especially the transformation of the super spooky abandoned motel into the "4 star hotel on a no star highway." scary or spectacular, you guys do it right, every time. also, there was tons of blood splatter this episode, which always makes me happy.

so who is responsible for the newly spruced up elysian fields? well, this creepy motherfrakker, who we later find out is the roman god mercury. acting as herald, he is sent ahead to clean up the place and make it suitable for holy-types because...
"they're coming. all of them." oh, really, messenger boy? every last god out there? so are we supposed to believe that the deities eventually gathered are the only ones left? 'cause how the hell would mercury survive and not pluto or janus or just about any other roman god? and what about the rest of the norse or hindu pantheons?

anyway, so the boys arrive at the motel amidst a torrential downpour and looking like adorable wet puppies.

they get all checked in, suspicious of the creepy clerk and overly nice digs, until dean finds out there's free pie. which leads to these shenanigans...

lol! he looks like this is the hardest decision he's had to make in months!

oh, dean :-) stay classy, darlin'!

and free pie leads to our first glimpse of kali the destroyer, who looks...odd. srsly, what the hell happened to cylon tori's kali's face? (methinks some botoxing went awry somewhere.) and anyway, who the hell does she think she is, turning down dean winchester? i turn my back to you, crazy lady. and then i mock you.

see?!? her face looks waxen.

dean's face, on the other hand, is doing just fine. fucker.

the boys chat for a bit and there are some intense moments, as per usual. dean tells sam to "unpucker" and to get some sleep, as it looks like they may actually have a night off. sam gets all angsty and implies that dean is unconcerned about their rapidly approaching doom. dean counters with, "nobody's giving up. especially me," delivered with his trademark stoicism.

all is resolved for the moment and the fellas decide to turn in. there is an adorable moment when dean is flabbergasted at their lodging windfall ("we're like the rockefellers!) and becomes overly excited by pillow chocolates and on-demand porn. but the winchesters being the winchesters, happiness is fleeting and they quickly find trouble in the room next door. after informing desk clerk mercury and being further creeped out by him, the boys decide to investigate on their own.

sam's determined face! a hilarious and personal fave from the padalecki oeuvre.

dean with his emf reader! seems like ages since we've seen that. and we've never seen an elephant!

after scoping the joint, the boys find hostages locked in the walk-in freezer and bloody eyeball soup on the stove. yikes! then they get captured and tossed in here...

again, kudos design team! this is spectacular!

...with a roomful of gods! everyone is duly introduced through a series of flashes of "ancient" images and texts intercut with the god in question. it looked super badass. several pagan religions are represented, though haphazardly, and there are a couple of characters that are never introduced and it's nigh impossible to read their name tags. because, yes, the gods are wearing name tags. lol. wouldn't they know each other already after spending several millenia together? sometimes, this show is so silly!

i rest my case. silliest and best line they're ever had on the show.

and then gabriel shows up!! unf unf unf. i love you. i'm so glad you're back.

and i love the boys expression at gabe's grand entrance. priceless padalecki. sam looks like a mentally challenged, wounded rabbit.

so then gabriel zaps team free will back to the room, hits on dean, snarks on everyone and decides to seduce kali to save the day.

"bite me, gabriel" "maybe later, big boy!" (dean/gabe, ftw!)

see, the pagan god collective has decided to wage war on lucifer and stop the xtian apocalypse. easier said than done. since gabriel (as loki) and kali used to be an item, he decides to use his sexual prowess to convince her to not take on his brother.

work it, archangel.

the seduction routine, sadly, does not work out, though there is some rather awkward kissing. turns out kali knows that gabriel is really an archangel and not a norse god. oops.

meanwhile, sam and dean are out trying to save the frozen townspeople and stumble upon a slaughter in progress. sam pulls them against a wall to hide and has to pin dean against the wall, so he doesn't charge in, guns blazing. sam insists, "it's too late" and what appears to be physical pain crosses dean's face. he cannot bear to lose anyone, but sam doesn't think twice about holding him back and sacrificing the victim. is this their true natures coming out? or is sam just more practical/logical? and dean is pure intuition and constant action?

so eventually, everyone gets captured again and kali sprouts a long metal phallus steals gabriel's angel killing sword. then kills him with it. or does she?
so then dean, seemingly at his wits end, gives a seriously xenophobic speech, preaching that they all need to join forces to kill lucifer, using gabriel's pilfered blade. while putting their plan to action, dean discovers that gabriel is still alive and that the blade kali used on him was actually made "out of a can of diet orange slice." (lolwhut? why does gabriel get so many weird lines? also strange, "so i got wings, like kotex.") anyhoo, dean lectures gabe for a while, comparing the two of them, saying, "i see right through you, you know that. the smartass shell, the whole i-could-give-a-crap thing. believe me, it takes one to know one." it's good to know dean is at least a little self-aware, but in the context of a speech about possible fratricide...i just do not like where dean is going with it. at all. you should never kill your brother, dean. no matter the circumstances. never.

but right now, bigger problems. lucifer shows up and wastes everyone with no effort at all. a mind-boggling bloody mess. apparently, lucifer really is the shit, if he can waste a motel full of gods.
kali gets scared and turns on her fighting arms of fire, which, while awesome to behold, don't slow lucy down one bit.


thankfully, gabriel shows up all eleventh hour-like, having decided to take dean's advice and stand up to his big brother. which prompts this look of hotness...

your face is a criminal offense, you so pretty.

gabriel's badass moment. i love that he's dressed like sam and dean.

gabe goes head to head with lucifer, declaring himself a member of team free will. he says things like, "damn right, they're flawed. but a lot of them try to do better, to forgive" and "no one makes us do anything." le sigh. and this is the moment when i knew he was gonna bite it for real. right after joining the gang. because badass or no, gabriel's still no match for lucifer, who "taught him all his tricks." though, lucy sure does look sad after killing his little bro. pellegrino's bringing a nice complexity to the character.

the wings make it true. :-(

the boys escape the lucifer/gabriel melee, with kali and a copy of casa erotica 13, given to dean by gabriel. they stop on the side of the road to watch and discover that the trickster is up to his old tricks. gabe has inserted himself into the porn and proceeds to explain how the winchesters have no hope of icing the devil, but they can lock him back in hell. all they need is the 4 horsemen's power rings. and they already have 2.

this is my fave cap. i love you, impala.

way to subtly work in porn, writers. fanservice?

naturally, cut to max headroom trashcan man pestilence, who is one nasty fucker. i can't wait to see how they take him down! it's bound to be a snotty, bloody mess.

this cap is included simply because damn! vancouver is beautiful.

the third ring of power

free kittens. lol.

oh, show. awesome.

in conclusion, i loved this ep. i loved that sam and dean seemed almost incidental, which makes sense as they are in the company of gods! the winchesters are important sure, but still kinda secondary; just fancy meatsuits. um, other things i haven't mentioned: 1. dean was totally wearing his jacket from "the end." what does it mean? is everything already decided? can the winchesters change destiny? 2. where the fuck is cas? not to mention adam. at least we get crowley back next ep. mark sheppard, always ftw! 3. another not-so-subversive dig at xtianity, as lucifer basically says the god squad rules the world now because they took power by brute force. sheesh, i love this mythology.

books are my friends. and dracula's too.

in my imagination, heaven has always been a library. i can only hope i am destined to spend my afterlife in the behemoth bibliotheque of my dreams, complete with rolling ladders and spiral staircases. 'twould be a glorious amalgam of the beast's library in "beauty and the beast" and the library of san barnaba in venice.* pure opulence. a perfect setting for so much literature. and i would be perfectly content to wander amongst the stacks for all eternity! the thought of smelling the musty odor of old ink and paper and the countless tomes dazzling my mind with all their knowledge and fancy; surely, no other imaginable heaven could compare.

this longstanding love of books and libraries, combined with the nerdy excitement garnered from reading a novel about book lovers, led me to the decision to start writing book reviews. again. **

so, book report, number 1! how to start? no longer constrained by the stylistic requirements of professional journalism, i sorta don't know how to begin. i suppose i should give the title and author. it's always important to identify your subject...

"the historian"
by elizabeth kostova.

from reading the dust jacket and pseudo-analyzing the cover art, i expected this hefty tome to verge somewhat toward the lurid and overwrought. it is about the search for dracula after all and most novels featuring vampires tend to follow this approach. (i blame anne rice, which is not to say i don't love her.) "the historian" definitely delivers it's fair share of melodrama and angst, but the drama is so rooted in actual history and folklore, it can take itself seriously without delving into self-mockery.

the story follows three generations of historians on an international search for the elusive vlad the impaler. a monster of medieval history, the impaler, or vlad tepes, was a renowned military leader and "turk killer," who was also responsible for the deaths of many of his subjects. though his legacy is soaked in blood, vlad tepes is as much revered as feared in his native land, the romanian province of wallachia. vlad's rule was unquestionably fierce and brutal, but he was one of the only romanian princes successful in turning back the tide of ottoman conquerors. with such success at sustaining autonomy, it is not surprising that so many stories of the impaler linger in romanian and turkish culture. the wonder is at kostova's insistence that her dracula tale be so dependent upon the historical facts and the "most authentic" vampire lore.

the inclusion of the world's most famous blood sucker aside, kostova dismisses or upends many of the tropes of the vampire tale. Gone are the distressed damsels victimized by scary monsters. the women of "the historian" are fierce, determined and utterly capable of overcoming any obstacle. perhaps fittingly, the men are the weaker characters, forever chasing after the more prepared and decisive females. dracula is the only truly imposing male in the novel and even he is eventually thwarted by both female protagonists. ***

though my love of feminist vampire killers is abundant, my favorite thing about "the historian" is that the entire book is based upon the characters' collective love of literature and history. or as i originally said upon finishing the novel, "dracula is a book nerd!" because, in the end, we find that vlad's search for immortality is rooted in his desire to remain part of history forever. taking this one step further, he decides to use his infinite years to keep a secret library, filled with all the literary treasures of antiquity. mindless blood lusty killer? i think not! just an intellectual romanian war lord, with a bit of a superiority complex and a penchant for beautiful manuscripts. now that's a dracula i can believe in!

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*see "indiana jones and the last crusade"

**long long ago, when i was just a fancy-free journalism freshman, i dreamed of writing criticism for a literature or entertainment magazine. unfortunately, after 4 years of j-school, i thought i never wanted to write again, professionally or otherwise. but time being a wound healer, 6 years later, here i am writing again. and still being me, the two things i want to write about most are still books and movies.

***though in no way related in tone or narrative, this is the part of "the historian" that i felt directly connected to because of "buffy the vampire slayer." now, i love joss whedon more than is rational, nevertheless, i think he deserves credit for this kind of role reversal in vampire stories.

my firstborn shall be named dean.

um, massive spoilers ahead. also, a fair bit of ranting. you have been warned.

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basic synopsis of "point of no return" episode 5x18:

kripke and co., "o hai fangirls, minions, wincest shippers! you say you want homo-erotic subtext, well, here ya go! happy 100th episode!"

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squee-heavy synopsis of "point of no return" episode 5x18:

oh, Show. srsly. you have to stop this. you are making me into a crazy person and i just can't handle it anymore. i may need a supernatural intervention because i will never willingly give up this much awesome. i am consistently impressed with your ability to wow me in truly unexpected ways.

oh, and jensen? you are my king. i bow to you and your awesome powers of awesomeness. you are entirely too pretty to be such an emotive, sensitive actor, and yet you manage to bring dean's pain to life each week with dumbfounding magnetism.

because seriously, dean really had me going this time. the complete sincerity on his face when he told zachariah that he was finally ready to give in to michael? oh, man. i was yelling at the screen i was so mad! but then! dean looks at sam, their eyes lock, dean just barely smiles and winks. i was tensed up the whole time, but with that tiniest of winks, i knew that it. was. ON. zac did not stand a chance. when you stand between dean and his sammy, no deception or weapon will ever be enough! just when i thought i was losing faith in dean, like he was losing faith in everyone else, he goes and does something totally amazing like stabbing an evil angel in the throat! *

my glee at zac's death aside, he will forever hold a place in my heart as the one who finally outed sam and dean's "erotic co-dependence." thanks zac! good to know you support wincest :-) and does that mean it's canon now, kripke? two weeks ago, you told us the boys share a heavenly space that only soul mates share, and now with the blatant sexy references? **

not to mention all the dean/castiel 'shipping that was going on. example 1: "blow me, cas!" pardon me, dean-o? i don't believe i've ever heard that expletive on spn before, probably because the writers know all the fangirls will be uncontrollably squeeing in our shiny tin hats. example 2: first example neatly followed by intense angel on boy fisticuffs (and tension relief?). maybe it's not sex, but it's the next best thing on network tv. example 3: "the last time someone looked at me like that, i got laid!" really dean? was it cas then too? was sam there?

speaking of castiel, he was one bad ass holy man in this episode. carving the banishing sigil into his chest after killing at least 3 other angels? and already being blown away by dean (heh!) once in the same day? and sensing and reaching adam before anyone else? he certainly seems to have regained some of his heavenly powers. what does it mean? could he really be god? and if so, does he not know it? what about the damn amulet? if sam doesn't have it, i will completely cry. not that it would be the first time Show has reduced me to tears. (like in the first 5 minutes of this episode, when sam first walks into dean's room (#100!) after tracking him down. see dean, he loves you just as much as you love him. you can find him, he can find you. always. so just trust him.)

but all is right in spn-land because now the true winchester brothers are back together!!!!!!! after sweet apologies and relationship rebuilding, they drive off in the impala to bring the fight to heaven AND hell. if anyone can save us from the demons and the angels, it's the brothers winchester.

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*and all because of sam's eyes. le sigh.

**if you end the show with sam and dean living in sin/happily ever after, i'll bake you a cake!