General Sam meta and thoughts on S4

[ginzai]

So I think I need to rewatch S4. As in, all of it. From Lazarus to Lucifer and yes, that unfortunately includes Yellow Fever and ASS and CAIADB. There are just so many interesting themes and nuances that keep getting brought up and even each of the MOTW throwaway episodes does something to refer to the overall mytharc in some way or another,

Comments

[blahbaby]

I never realized I was a Sam fan until this season, I still don't know if I'm a Sam specifically, or if this season just left me leaning more toward Sam because of how it ended. I still have mixed feelings, but I think there was a lack of good writing for Sam's storyline this season, the fact that you have to go back and re-watch and look for clues or people writing fic, trying to suss out how Sam possibly got to that place or how he felt, just feels like fanwank. Sort of liked the show failed at making this clear. Keeping it a mystery would have worked great if let's say S4 had started with Lucifer rising, and then y'know it went back to see who was responsible then it was an awesome twist. Cause Sam was such a mystery, you wouldn't have seen it coming. With good writing, you shouldn't have to go back and view again to see how everything fits, everything should just suddenly make awesome sense at the end. The only hints given this season was Dean thought it was wrong. Now if that's how we're supposed to take things as viewers, that because Dean said it's wrong it is, then I guess I would have to accept that and continue being a little bitter. :)

Just judging by the responses Sam's actions are so wildly dependable on the fans views. Some people say oh, Sam had his reasons, others say oh, but Sam totally had this coming and he's always been an ass... Just Sam has seem to become a real controversial character. Everybody is going to see what they want to see in his actions, and honestly, I'm gonna have to go with the enthusiastic Sam haters on this one. The show pretty much came down on Sam's actions. They even took away the main reason Sam would be going after Lillith, revenge over Dean. They made it about Sam just wanting to exert his power over Lillith. Monster is a monster is a monster. Just like the turnaround with Ruby. A demon's a demon. The show seems to be pushing the whole sometimes you can't help who you are, despite your intentions. People bring up Jack the Rugaru and how he turned, and a lot of Sam's story is incomplete until next season it seems.

Whoah, apparently I am still bitter over this season. Heh, sorry this totally turned tl;dr.

[ginzai]

I am the LAST PERSON ON THE PLANET to talk about TL;DR. XD

I see what you're saying about Sam and having to almost border on fanwank to get at his motivations, but I think that we're in a FAR better place now to figure those out than we were while the season was airing. I saw what I considered a lot of distasteful fanwanking back in the middle of the season so people could twist around plot threads so Sam came out in a far better light than what I personally saw up on the screen. Most of that ignored the evidence that we received from the tertiary characters as well as the ongoing changes in Sam himself, but though I found it annoying, I can't really speak against it because there was so very little known at the time. Now though, with all of S4 at our fingertips, it's a lot easier to look back and try to figure things out.

I rather like how Sam's story was told, personally. I enjoyed how much deception and subterfuge was involved, how wonderfully subtle the storytelling tended to be. It does get a bit frustrating, I'll admit, that there's so very little actual confirmation of Sam's motivations. Even now, I can talk about what I see as most likely to be his motivations, but those can be argued six ways from Sunday because there's no absolutes in Sam's story in S4. I do tend to agree with you though; IMHO, Sam's motivations were very much less than noble this season and I'm pretty sure they've been that way practically since the moment Dean died.

I think we got more than just Dean to point it out that Sam was making mistakes though; we had the angels telling Sam to knock it off, Ruby's sinister smiles, Sam being thematically linked with the MOTWs, Sam's own increasingly disturbing behavior in terms of both his interactions with Dean and the PIP, we had Pam and Chuck both also tell Sam that they thought he was making a mistake, and so on. There were a lot of hints about Sam and the path he was taking.

What makes it a bit worse to me is that we had so much criticism of Sam's methods without any real evidence for why they were bad. Dean was very much against Sam's powers and their usage since the beginning of the season, but there was no real reason given for this. Nothing concrete, at any rate, and like with Sam's motivations, I can extrapolate any number of reasons for why I think Dean was uncomfortable with Sam's powers (and much more so now than in S1-S2) but it was a risk they took in keeping that mystery there.

I think that worked a lot better in Sam's case than it did in Dean's. It does come across as flat and unoriginal to have a demon always be a demon and therefore always evil and keeping the hint of ambiguity to Sam's motives in play did a lot to help ease that and mix things up a lot. That said, to me the whole thing plays out less as an angel:Dean:good :: demon:Sam:bad so much as a comparative look at what happens when Dean follows orders against what happens when Sam refuses to follow orders and makes his own decisions.

I mean, each time Sam made a choice of his own free will this season, something bad happened and it lead him closer to his breaking the final Seal. In turn, whenever Dean followed an order and gave into someone else, bad things happened again: Dean following orders lead to him breaking his Seal. It's a reversal of the tropes we've had for them throughout the entire series - Dean as the "good little soldier" and Sam as the independent one who rarely considered what impact his actions would have on others before taking them. Reducing both Dean and Sam to those stereotypes is very much a gross oversimplification of their characters, but I think it's very important that Dean broke his seal by giving in to someone else and Sam his in turn by refusing to listen to others.

To me, that's where the difference lies. It's not that Sam was wrong because he's tainted with demon blood; Ruby confirmed that everything Sam did was of completely of his own free will. It's true that we've never met a confirmed good demon, but I'm okay with that. Aside from Castiel, we've never met a "good" angel either and even he comes with some major issues and caveats.

[blahbaby]

When I think about it, I think Sam's story wasn't told. Sam sort of comes across as a plot device this season. We don't get his motivations and we don't really get his story, but his actions or kind of what drives the plot forward this season, because you have the angels, who start Dean on the path telling Dean that he has to stop Sam, and then they have Ruby like you said, smirking towards the end, and we get none of the middle. I know you say there's a reflection of Sam's story of the MotW of the week, and possibly that's true, but even then I am not sure that comes across in all of the MotW, just the eps where Sam had a little more to do. IMO it doesn't matter if Sam's story is partially reflected in the MotW because aside from Metamorphasis which sticks out to me, we get none of Sam's story. No MotW even comes close to the scenario of what Sam actually went through while Dean was dead. They waited like more than a quarter episodes in before they even touched on Sam's feelings and showed what happen, and even then there was only like Sam trying to bargain his soul for the first ten minutes. Then Ruby shows up, and there's more drinking and then he decides to use his powers. And that's disappointing when they had Sam say in the first ep this season what he tried to do, and how he even tried to open the devil's gate again. But they didn't even mention that again.

Now I don't think Sam is wrong because he's tainted with demon blood. But his powers come from demons and there doesn't seem to be shades of gray where demons are concerned on the show like there are with the angels. I could see some demons not wanting Lucifer free. They try so hard to get out of hell to come to Earth, why would they want to bring hell here when they try to escape it?

Okay, I'll stop. I think I can go on forever about this season, hee and Sam. I think my other disappointment is that I really liked this season and that finale just felt like we came to a middle. I hate finales like that.

[ginzai]

I think I can appreciate the way Sam's story was told easier because I'm not a Sam!girl, so it's not as frustrating to me for it to be partially cloaked and hidden away. The way they told Dean's story in turn was somewhat frustrating for me because it left him just as objectified as Sam was in a lot of ways (the dropping of the PTSD, that he "got over" Hell thanks to Zachariah's speech, et cetera).

I think part of the issue with Sam's story is that they really couldn't tell it straight out. Others before me have noted that had they done so, Sam either would have come across as a dupe and a chump or as having gone dark side already, neither of which is quite true. If Sam were the only main character or if the apocalypse storyline had been brought up earlier, they probably could have told Sam's story from a different perspective, one that would have offered more insight to his character. As is though, they were pretty limited in terms of how much time could be devoted to Sam and his struggle. Overall, I think they achieved a pretty fair balance.

As for the demons, you raise a very good point about how the majority of them escape Hell for a damned good reason. Of all of the demons we've met, only one seems to actually enjoy Hell. I'd love to see a demon a la S2!Spike come along - amoral but not particularly wanting the world to end. I know some people were hoping Ruby would take on that role, but I could never fit her into that line. (I'll admit, that was partially because I was quite pleased with her as the evil mentor figure.)

I think my other disappointment is that I really liked this season and that finale just felt like we came to a middle. I hate finales like that.

THIS! So very much this! 4x22 felt like the first half of a two parter, not an actual finale. I think it was all the exposition in the first half and even the climax didn't particularly feel all that, well, climatic. Drove me crazy.