7.21 Reaction

[ash48]

Perhaps CONFUSED?! UNDERWHELMED, ANNOYED! What the hell was that?!

Yeah.. so, um... TURN BACK NOW because I am seriously struggling to find anything good to say about this one. Sorry. :(

I can't pinpoint whether it was bad direction, bad writing, bad acting or the fact that the writer was also the director (writer/director is a tricky combo to get right). It was Ben Edlund so I'm surprised it was so awful. He's written some pretty good episodes (Bad Day at Black Rock probably my favourite of his) but his directing is yet to impress me. This is his second directing gig for SPN (other one being The Man Who Would be King) and to be honest I'd think like to see it stay that way.

It was both too much and not enough. Too much new information (most of which made little sense) and not enough... well, everything else. It lacked energy and the pacing was woeful. It lacked the crucial element of tension. The was no build up - no urgency what so ever (compared to say last week that had us on the edge of our seats). It's not really fair to mention the bad acting because I think a director is mostly to blame for that but wow... there were some seriously medicore performances in there. I'm sorry but Hester never convinced me. Meg was better than last time I thought but there were still some issues.

I suppose I enjoyed Misha's performance. There were some nice laugh out loud moments but because the whole episode had that feeling of "what the hell is going on" he was kinda lost in there. There were some lovely little moments but they were surrounded with some truly awful ones. Something I did like was the feeling that he really was seeing "everything". I actually think that an opportunity was missed here to appreciate Castiel's plight. Or to connected with him in any way.

I suppose the thing that annoyed me the most was ALL THAT was going on in the hospital and NO ONE WAS AROUND! Ever! Hospitals are busy places... or did I miss something? Was there an explanation for why they could be going in and out like it was their home, chase and knock people out on the grounds etc.? Did I zone out and miss that? I just. IT MADE NO SENSE!

I did like Kevin Tran, but again because there was so much going on his character drew little interest or sympathy.

Our boys were sidelined and became observers. They seemed so out of their depth, (which might have been the whole point), but by doing that I felt we lost the connection to what was going on. We were left as damn confused as they were.

Some of the jokes seemed to be there just for us. Which, ok, sometimes that's fun but in an episode like this it felt try-hard. I'm not sure it ever made up it's mind what kind of episode it was going to be. It started of a little quirky, got quite serious, then there was that strange moment with action music, moments where Cas was "connecting" with first Sam and then Dean. Throw in suggested Cas/Meg romance and... yeah. A COMPLETE MESS!

So the boys now know how to kill the Leviathans. I probably should be more excited about that but I think because the way it came about seems so contrived I have little excitement for it. I suppose it might depend how they use that information now.

There's a lot more but I think I'm just depressing myself the more I write.

ACK!!! I DON'T KNOW?!! Is it just me? Am I being too harsh? Does it need a second viewing to appreciate it? (please no!) Other than some funny one liners was there actually anything good about that ep that I missed?

Sorry to be so negative. It's not usually like me. I always try to look for the positive but I'm struggling with this one. Thank God there are 2 more episodes. Please Show be building up to something interesting - something that actually involves the boys rather than having them watch other characters. Something that makes some sense would be good...*sigh*

Comments

[maenad.livejournal.com]

Sam would most definitely have known that angel AND he wouldn't have left the Word of God alone to run after Meg.

Yes - the bag thing was really peculiar and contrived. Sam picks up fully grown women and marches off with them like he's carrying air … but can't grab a bag with a little tablet in it when he needs to walk briskly down a hallway? No.

I'm not excusing the episode itself, just saying - well, it's possible that after three episodes they'd stretched themselves a bit thin on non-Sam-and-Dean plots and screwed up. Hopefully they'll have them back centre stage this time around, and things will be better. :)

There must also be something on there that's beneficial to them. I would hope that he didn't want to find it just so no one else could. That would irk me.

That would silly, even for leviathans. But Kevin did a lot of writing, and the information on killing them could only take up a paragraph or so. Screencaps aren't really helpful, because they just show the relevant bits - but there are words like 'great' and 'imbue' on the opposing page, which could indicate stuff the leviathans could use. Dick sounded excited when it was unearthed, and that would be odd if it was just about killing them. For that I'd expect a combination of relief and nerves, because they've got it, but now they have to defend it constantly.

It just so happens that when he's in an episode so are other angels and demons and that often results in confusion (for me!). They seem to keep changing the rules each time they appear.

I have nothing against Castiel, but angelic politics get repetitive because they don’t change. I'm more sympathetic to demon storylines, because they live in horrific circumstances and were trying to fix it and now they're dealing with a new kind of world entirely. The angels are miserable because they live in an oppressive society that they (and their god) created. I'm sorry for them, but they won't help themselves. They just show up with more existential angst every time, and my eyes start to glaze over.

Is Lucifer gone do you think? Was that the upshot of all that. Cas took on Sam's hallucination and in Cas's brain it ended up just going away? (grrrrr, if that's the case....)

I think they’ve sidelined Lucifer for the rest of the season, because they've got leviathans and Bobby to deal with and that's enough for now. Whatever Castiel took from Sam, it didn’t require Lucifer to be present, so he doesn't see him. I'm okay with that because Lucifer and Castiel had only the most tenuous sort of relationship - there's not a lot to be gained by having Castiel experience what Sam did.

I will be disappointed if that's the end of the matter, though. Magical fixes should have consequences, because that's the point of magical fixes - they're not as neat as they first appear. So I hope for more Lucifer. :)

I just do not know how to take Meg at the moment. I have to confess that I am disliking Rachel's performance enough for me to almost shut off when she's talking. And yet, I think her dialogue was interesting.

She seems to be trying too hard to sound like the first Meg, and not just like her, to put on that sultry, mocking tone she affected whenever she was trying to get under Sam and Dean's skin. I'm a little sympathetic to her position, because important demons don't swap bodies much and when they do there's usually a plot reason why they sound different. Meg's got a tough job, because she just has to sound like herself in a new body. But I still wish someone would take the actress aside and point out to her that the other Meg didn't talk like that all the time, and she really shouldn't try so hard. I found it really distracting at first. I guess I'm just resigned, now. :)

It's interesting - Meg isn't good, exactly, but she's right to say motivations can change. And on the one hand Sam and Dean destroyed her life's work as much as Crowley did, so she has a motive to hurt them. But on the other hand, she might be their friend now precisely because she was their enemy before. It's all right that they opposed her: she was trying to hurt them. It's not all right that Crowley did: he was supposed to be on her side. Meg gets betrayed a lot, so I can see how that would shape her choices.

[ash48.livejournal.com]

Thank you!

I agree that it would be difficult to fit Lucifer in when dealing with the Leviathans in the last 2 seasons. He might pop up at the very end or be carried over to next season. I would hate for that to be it... (especially as I love seeing Mark!

Meg gets betrayed a lot, so I can see how that would shape her choices.

Yeah - I really hope they do something with this. Give her a complete story arc, like they did Ruby. (Man, if I was a demon escaped from hell I would be hiding in the suburbs living a quiet, pain free life. I'd be a million miles away from the Winchesters *g*).

Really looking forward to the next 2 eps. SPN rarely let me down in the finales so I'd been keen to see where they take this...

xx