Don't Let The Backdoor Hit Your Ass On The Way Out: Supernatural Review, 9x20, "Bloodlines"
We've only got a few episodes to go until the Big Finale. By now the mytharc episodes should be coming thick and fast.
Instead, the network crams "Bloodlines" down our throats. Called a "backdoor pilot," it features five minutes of Sam and Dean, and the rest is an epic crapfest of pretty post-pubescents in fancy wardrobes. The laughable script is one gigantic exposition dump, with the occasional make-out session.
"Our love is forbidden. I'm a werewolf, and you're a shapeshifter. Wait...does that mean you can make your penis bigger?"
There are also breaks for the new lead, Ennis (Lucien Laviscount), to try to look tough and point his gun. With Dean in the room? Don't even try, kid.
thinks: "Don't let the monster know I just peed myself."
I'm not sure if I should call this the worst episode since "Man's Best Friend With Benefits" (shudder) because that was not a Supernatural episode. I have no idea what to call this. Soap opera with monsters? The Vampire Diaries with terrible acting and an even worse script? An hour-long exposition dump that made everything about monsters in the previous seasons meaningless?
Let's face it, if Sam and Dean found themselves in a city run by five monster/mobster families, they'd waste no time nuking the place. Doesn't matter if the chilly Snake Lady is in couture, folks, she needs to die. So does the executive who thought this up in the first place. From the first tracking shot, it's clear that writer Andrew Dabb and director Robert Singer are way out of their element.
"Bob, you want us to do...what now?"
Ennis, a teenager whose girlfriend is killed by a monster (what a great parallel with Sam!) and who has Daddy issues with a mysterious father who owns a gun with silver bullets (what a great parallel with the boys!) is a cop (when the hell did they start hiring cops before their voices changed?). Seeing Sam and Dean in all of their scruffy magnificence, and ability to act, made the whole thing even suckier. Worse: it looked like something Dean would be secretly watching on a motel tv.
"Hi. We're here to make you look bad."
"No way I'm telling him that I've haven't gotten pubic hair yet."
For those who care, there's going to be an epic monster war (yawn), a good shapeshifter; an evil cardboard villainess; Violet (Melissa Roxburgh, who's done time on a bunch of CW shows) as a damsel in distress who can rip your throat out, and...other people.
For once, it's not Sam that's tied up.
But it turns out that the REAL MONSTER WHO IS KILLING MONSTERS IS A CRAZED HUMAN SEEKING REVENGE FOR HIS DAUGHTER'S MURDER! When it looks like the villain is going to kill her beloved, Violet wolfs out and breaks the chains to attack him. Wait...what? Sam can't even get out of duct tape and this chick can bust out of heavy metal chains? Oh, wait, it's not Supernatural. My bad.
Thank god my husband woke me up for the denouement. Tragic lovers and stuff.
At the end, Dean gets a shoved-in telephone call from Castiel saying Cas has a line on Metatron! Off to the Batmobile, Sam!
"Cas, can you wipe my memory of this?"
"Hang on, Dean--this is my last chance to make them look bad."
Next week: shit, this episode was so bad I was too stunned to take in the promo.
Instead, the network crams "Bloodlines" down our throats. Called a "backdoor pilot," it features five minutes of Sam and Dean, and the rest is an epic crapfest of pretty post-pubescents in fancy wardrobes. The laughable script is one gigantic exposition dump, with the occasional make-out session.
"Our love is forbidden. I'm a werewolf, and you're a shapeshifter. Wait...does that mean you can make your penis bigger?"
There are also breaks for the new lead, Ennis (Lucien Laviscount), to try to look tough and point his gun. With Dean in the room? Don't even try, kid.
thinks: "Don't let the monster know I just peed myself."
I'm not sure if I should call this the worst episode since "Man's Best Friend With Benefits" (shudder) because that was not a Supernatural episode. I have no idea what to call this. Soap opera with monsters? The Vampire Diaries with terrible acting and an even worse script? An hour-long exposition dump that made everything about monsters in the previous seasons meaningless?
Let's face it, if Sam and Dean found themselves in a city run by five monster/mobster families, they'd waste no time nuking the place. Doesn't matter if the chilly Snake Lady is in couture, folks, she needs to die. So does the executive who thought this up in the first place. From the first tracking shot, it's clear that writer Andrew Dabb and director Robert Singer are way out of their element.
"Bob, you want us to do...what now?"
Ennis, a teenager whose girlfriend is killed by a monster (what a great parallel with Sam!) and who has Daddy issues with a mysterious father who owns a gun with silver bullets (what a great parallel with the boys!) is a cop (when the hell did they start hiring cops before their voices changed?). Seeing Sam and Dean in all of their scruffy magnificence, and ability to act, made the whole thing even suckier. Worse: it looked like something Dean would be secretly watching on a motel tv.
"Hi. We're here to make you look bad."
"No way I'm telling him that I've haven't gotten pubic hair yet."
For those who care, there's going to be an epic monster war (yawn), a good shapeshifter; an evil cardboard villainess; Violet (Melissa Roxburgh, who's done time on a bunch of CW shows) as a damsel in distress who can rip your throat out, and...other people.
For once, it's not Sam that's tied up.
But it turns out that the REAL MONSTER WHO IS KILLING MONSTERS IS A CRAZED HUMAN SEEKING REVENGE FOR HIS DAUGHTER'S MURDER! When it looks like the villain is going to kill her beloved, Violet wolfs out and breaks the chains to attack him. Wait...what? Sam can't even get out of duct tape and this chick can bust out of heavy metal chains? Oh, wait, it's not Supernatural. My bad.
Thank god my husband woke me up for the denouement. Tragic lovers and stuff.
At the end, Dean gets a shoved-in telephone call from Castiel saying Cas has a line on Metatron! Off to the Batmobile, Sam!
"Cas, can you wipe my memory of this?"
"Hang on, Dean--this is my last chance to make them look bad."
Next week: shit, this episode was so bad I was too stunned to take in the promo.