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ep 7.17 reaction and all that...
My feeling are ALL OVER THE PLACE with this episode. Seriously. What do I do with these...?! (sorry for such a rambly review...)
First, I just have to....SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
MY HURT!SAM GIRL WAS IN FRIGGIN' HEAVEN! HOLY HELL!!! IT WAS ALL THERE! Sam AT THE END OF HIS TETHER! Sam HIT by a car! Sam in HOSPITAL, Sam cut up with broken ribs! RESTRAINED!! (did I mention heaven?!) SHOCK THERAPY!! Holy.... *happy place*
HOWEVER... as much as I like a bit of Sam!whump (and Dean... I don't play favourites when it comes to whumping! *g*) it also made me shed a little tear. I really, really felt his pain and torment and I kept muttering...oh Sammy... :((( This is a man who rates broken ribs as a 3. High tolerance... no kidding! I was on the edge of my seat through all those hospital scenes.
All righty roo. Time to get serious and to try and make sense of all those damn FEELINGS...
I will definitely need to watch this episode again because overall it felt a bit...um... messy. I loved some of it and I enjoyed watching it but it felt kinda uneven and I'm not entirely sure why. Maybe because there was such a lot GOING ON - lot's of surprises (I knew Cas was back but I didn't know about Meg or what was going to happen to Sam). It felt like they were trying to cram SO MUCH into one episode- the disintegration of Sam's mind and body, the return and subsequent redemption of Cas and the return of Meg. I loved all those things but, as a viewer, I felt like I was being pulled all over the place - edge of my seat worry for Sam, interest in Dean's response to Cas returning, fascination with Cas' back story and trying to figure out what the hell Meg was saying! (I will be having to check out the transcript for a lot of her dialogue (eyes
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zebra363)). On top of all that there there was also a hunt! Oh man.... /o\Some thinky dissecting:
1. Sam and Lucifer:
I felt like all the hospital scenes held together pretty well. Mark Pellegrino's performance as Lucifer was (as always) both amusing and unsettling. I didn't think his lines were as witty as they had been in past episodes but his forms of torture were inventive. The megaphone was particularly amusing (hee...yeah...as a teacher I'm familiar with that one!). And firecrackers!... that'll keep you awake for sure. And his singing...
I loved that even though Sam was suffering his own mental torture he was able to put that aside to help someone else in need. It's very Sam. I also LOVE the idea that mental patients could possibly be suffering from very "real" supernatural issues. It makes sense and I loved this was explored. I probably would like to have seen a really mentally tortured girl but I get that this is television and they have to be...um...very pretty.
I STILL DON'T GET HOW LUCIFER WORKS! If he was "transferred" to Cas then surely that means he's somehow "real". Or was it just a transfer of a memory? Cas took Sam's memory of the cage and Lucifer. If so then the Lucifer Cas sees can only be as Sam "remembers" him. Is Sam's brain still scrambled? Is Cas' brain now scrambled? Or is Lucifer actually, really around. AM I OVER THINKING THIS TOO MUCH!!?! (probably...) Do I even need an answer to this? Maybe it doesn't matter how Lucifer works. It's just that he's there. Or something...
2. Meg
I have to admit I think this is where I had the most problems. I LOVE Meg. I've always loved her ambiguity. If we have corrupt angels then why not have a potentially "good" demon? But. IDK. It's not just that she looked so different (though I did find that rather distracting) but her mumbling was hard to make out. She also seemed less re-assured.(I'm not sure if this was the actress or the character) Of course, that might have been the WHOLE POINT! In that case....ok. I was sold. Meg is not so confident when she hasn't got the backing of other demons. Ack... I need to re-watch. I'm torn. But I will confess I didn't enjoy her as much I have done in the past. (*sniff*)
3. Castiel
I get nervous talking about Cas because I know how much passion surrounds this character. I don't have that level of passion, but neither do I dislike him. In fact, I've always enjoyed seeing Cas and tonight was no different. I really REALLY loved that we had a born again Cas. I was keen to see how they were going to introduce him back into the show and...ok... it was a little predictable, but I was SOLD and totally bought that he crawled out of the lake to be discovered by a women passing by..(what? Maybe she WAS sent by God...in this 'verse that makes some sense...).
There was a lovely sense of "clean" about him and I thought Misha really embodied that innocence. I also loved his conflict when he realised who he really was and what he had done. But... WOW... what a lot to take in. In an amazingly short time we found out that: Cas survived, he MARRIED, he lost his memory, he was a man called Emmanuel, he had powers to heal, he was discover by Dean, he found he was Dean's friend, he found out he hurt Dean by hurting Sam, he wanted to make amends, he MADE amends and now sees his brother. HOLY HELL! I'm not sure whether to admire the writers for managing to get so much in or slap them about the head for being so ambitious. (possibly the latter...)
4. Dean
Arghh.... I feel that out of all the characters in that ep he was the most underwritten. Idk. Again it comes down to there being SO MUCH going on. Not only did he have a brother DYING in a mental hospital he also had to confront Cas returning (and ALLTHE FEELINGS associated with that - disbelief, relief, bitterness, memories etc.) AND deal with seeing Meg after all this time. He was pulled all over the place with emotions and maybe that's why I felt I was too. I was following Dean's journey during the episode (though captivated by Sam's) and feeling torn in the process. Like Dean must have. He was bombarded by SO MUCH!
It's either extremely clever story telling or rather messy story telling. I haven't figure that one out yet.
5. Where we are now:
So. Cas came, he discovered stuff, he redeemed himself and he now has his brother in his head and is left behind in a mental hospital. I'm not entirely sure what to do with all that. I like the mirror (any parallels in an ep excites me) between the girl and her brother in her head and now Cas with his brother in his head. I like that he has redeemed himself by fixing Sam and essentially doing what Sam did to save the world (locking himself in with Lucifer) but... idk, that just seems so quick. Would Dean and Sam be happy leaving him behind like that? I suppose they've left their half brother in the cage so maybe they are actually ok with that.
I JUST DON'T KNOW!! They set our boys up to CARE about family and then have them drive away from them. (And I really did need Dean to at least TOUCH SAM!! Come on Show! They are brothers!! Dean was concerned, sure, but A LITTLE BIT OF COMFORT WOULDN'T GO ASTRAY!! A squeeze on the shoulder at least!)
(Side note: I get that having Cas around is a "problem." If he's so powerful then he'd be able to solve all their problems and we wouldn't have a show. Having an angel around is problematic for that reason. I'm not sure if Show (STILL!!!) knows what to do with him. I think because he has been so popular they keep him (which I'm cool with) but they really have to decide what to do with him...)
I keep saying "I don't know" because I really don't after this one. I really enjoyed watching it but as I pondered it I was left rather empty. It solved Sam's hallucinations (and yeah...when I knew Cas was returning I also knew he'd be the one to heal Sam...*sigh* ::koff:: cop out...) which I think is good. A bit like Dean's angst...it can't go on for a whole season.
So yeah. It felt messy and crowded. Dean's loyalties were divided and conflicted. Cas seemed to re-appear more as a "tool" to save Sam and Meg...um...not sure why Meg was around really. Though i did like the idea of a human, and angel and a demon working together. I also liked the mirror of Sam saying he could't "fight" because he was tired the same was Dean was when he wanted to say yes to Michael. It was also reminiscent of Faith. Just not as well written me thinks.
THOUGHTS!?! Am I being too harsh?! I've been loving season 7. I didn't dislike this ep as such, I just feel like they crammed in far too much.
no subject
Saying that the hospital parts were way and above the best parts. Sam dealing with Lucifer finally, finally got top place and felt real and horrible and like he was falling to pieces. But like everyone else, Lucifer himself and what he is and how Cas could now have him and why Cas (a fully charged angel going by the way he blew through those demons) doesn't seem to be coping anywhere near as well as Sam was just baffles the shit out of me.
I loved the reflections to Faith, even to Dean sitting on the bed with his phone which mirrored Sam's hunt for a healer for Dean - that worked really well and I also loved the fact that as sick as Sam was he was still doing the job, hunting things and saving people, it's been a while since I felt that, so that was great. Actually I really would have been happy with just those hospital scenes because the Dean, Cas, Meg stuff was totally flat for me. Half the time I couldn't understand what Meg was saying and the other half just didn't make sense at all - still not sure why she was needed in this one.
In a way it was all there, Dean was worried about Sam, Dean was angry at Cas and Cas was sorry about what he'd done to Sam, but that episode was one of the very few where Ackles just hasn't sold it to me one bit, I was underwhelmed and kind of bored by those three. By the end I felt manipulated by the machination of just getting Sam fixed, I didn't feel the emotion, I didn't feel the worry or the anger, it just felt very old and flat.
Once again show creeped me the shit out over women who take in strange and troubled (and this time naked) men and fall all over them - *ugh* show, just *UGH*.
Compare it to Faith and it fails, totally and utterly because that was ALL about the emotions and the worry and the care, and this? Not so much. Although I did squee once with delight and that was because once it was known Cas was Emanuel and had no memory? Bobby must be the one helping them and I've been so hoping it was him and not Cas. Yeah, I know, maybe it's my mood, maybe I read too much bloody good caring and in character fic, but this one had such a good premise and I felt they pissed it all away somehow. **sigh** Don't mind me...I still love show, just want more out of show than it's giving me lately.
Editing to add - now that I think about it...don't laugh, I do think occasionally! :)) When Castiel was fixing Sam, it was a little like how he touches the soul, so I'm thinking perhaps Castiel took most of the damaged parts of Sam's soul? But instead of charging him up like it did when he touched Bobby - it drained him and that's why he's kind of catatonic? *shrug* I'm still not sure, but I'm still stuck on where Castiel was getting his powers from, didn't he have to get them from heaven before? I guess whoever is in charge up there now is still on Castiel's side? Who knows....
no subject
I hesitated saying that I was bored by the Meg, Cas and Dean scenes...but really? *nods* I was so on the edge of my seat with the hospital scenes it really powered me through the whole episode but as I re-watched I found myself fast forwarding through those other scenes because I just wasn't feeling them.
I have to say, I really feel for Dean in all of this (and maybe Jensen...) He had to feel SO many things in this ep...worry for Sam, surprise (and all those other emotions!) in seeing Cas and then deal with seeing Meg. Jensen must have read the script and thought...what the fuck...? How does Dean deal with all this? Do I just have a permanent "What the hell... ?" look on my face...
I agree it would have been more interesting to have just concentrated on the human emotions. Dean had that desperation, but it was lost as soon as Cas appeared. It would have been interesting for this episode to explore just how alone they really were. Sam stuck and a hospital and Dean with no where to turn. I know they needed a solution, but it all just happened so fast. I keep hearing this should have been 2 episodes... I tend to agree.
Dammit. There are moments like these I wish I wasn't so damn invested in this show. This is the kind of turmoil I felt during S6..... I was enjoying not feeling it during S7 (which is why I have been enjoying this season so much...)
I hope the next ep holds some answers!
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