Monsters of Television

“My name is Dean Winchester. I am an Aquarius. I enjoy sunsets, long walks on the beach, and frisky women. And I did not kill anyone.“

"This is my hope box. It only has your picture in it, bro."

Not quite as strong a disc as the first one was, but still there’s a number of nice things going on each episode, even if some of them, as a whole, aren’t particular riveting or interesting.

I am picking up on a slight imbalance in the episodes’ focus this season. If last season was about Sam’s re-entry in the life of hunting and coping with all the stress that motivated and came about because of it, this season thus far as been about Dean dealing with the repercussions of John’s deal with Azazel.

And this is good stuff. I appreciate that this hasn’t just gone away, or been pushed down to pivotal episodes, and instead flows through many of the episodes as a subtext (later made text). But the show doesn’t seem to know what to dean with Sam now. He doesn’t do much computer legwork or journal referring, as much of it has been outsourced to Ash, and he spends more time protecting the Victim of the Week than battling off the demons.

The balance between the two, narratively speaking, was evener in season 1. It could just be the early goings for the season in which this happens, but I hope things shake out a bit soon, with a more collaborative approach to the hunting between the two. Likewise, Sam is taking John’s death significantly better, and that seems a little odd to me, despite their estrangement.

But that was just a quick look at a larger thought about the disc and its episodes. Thoughts on the individual episodes after the jump.

“Simon Said” – “Are you really this stupid? You learn you’ve got a twin: You call him up, you go out for a drink! You don’t start killing people!”

So I kind of bitch about Sam’s lack of narrative focus and the first episode on the disc is an episode that is largely about his concerns about his abilities. I do like the return of the visions here, since it’s really all Sam has going for him at this point. Even better, the show doubles down on the influence of the powers these children being ambiguous. Two good, two bad. Is it free will, or just Azazel stopping by and giving things a little nudge all it takes?

But the episode is fun overall (up until the end when it gets dark with girls jumping off dams). Andy doesn’t abuse his powers too much, which I like. He does just enough to be happy, sits in his awesome van while he reads philosophy and gets high, but doesn’t go beyond that, asking for riches and mansions. The smallness of his aims is what makes the character endearing.

I’m a little frustrated that the folks Azazel may be targeting don’t follow a set pattern of birth, making them a little harder to track down as it would make for a nice arc for Sam to have through the course of this season (being concerned with finding them), but instead turning that path into something that will just kind of happen. I get the motivation behind it, but it kind of robs Sam of any agency in a narrative that already isn’t giving him much to do.

“No Exit” – “Ah! Should have cleaned the pipes.“

Check out the longer write-up about “No Exit” by clicking here.

“The Usual Suspects”– “You have your job, I have mine.”

I should say upfront that I generally like stories that unfurl using a frame device like this. My distaste for in media res openings doesn’t extend to these types of stories, perhaps because they never feel exactly in media res since the need to go back to earlier events in the plot is actually motivated by a situation as opposed to creating (often false) senses of suspense or anticipation.

As a result, I enjoyed most of “The Usual Suspects” from a structural standpoint. Like its namesake, I appreciated the narration overlaid with the action, and the two not exactly syncing up. It’s a trope for this frame, but I grooved on it nonetheless. I also appreciated, after “Bloodlust”, that the spirit demonstrated a benevolent purpose. It was a nice change of pace for the show, and it gave a nicer sense of closure to the episode.

But boy oh boy. Linda Blair is a really horrible actor. I mean it. She’s dreadful. I’m thrilled that the episode avoided any sort of evil demonic associations with her character, that it didn’t center on a child and possession, or any of those really easy things to do with such a notable guest star (Dean’s craving for pea soup, however, remained a nice nod.) And since much of the episode revolved around her, the episode fell largely flat for me despite all the nice stuff around it.

“Crossroad Blues” – “You think you could…throw in a set of steak knives?”

Like “Children Shouldn’t Play With Dead Things”, “Crossroad Blues” is one of those episodes that does a great job of using its monster of the week framework to tie things into larger character issues. Also like that episode, it goes out of its way to make subtext text by having Sam explain it to us.

The episode as a whole is kind of a shaggy dog, with an uneven pacing, clunkily building up to the confrontation between Dean and the demon. Luckily that sequence has a lot of good stuff going for it, including the reveal of John being in hell (where else would Azazael make sure John ended up?). I do wish there had been more tension in the idea of Dean struggling with the idea of bringing John back, but given that it wouldn’t happen anyway, I suppose it’s for the best that it wasn’t played too hard.

But Ackles does hit the beats well, and he gives Dean’s normal sarcasm a lovely sadness in his face-off with the demon at the crossroads.  Sadly, Padalecki’s given very little to do other than look scared and try and keep the victim safe. I can only assume that this was a production issue to accommodate his wrist/hand injury. I hope it is.

To read what I about the episodes on disc 1, click here.