Supernatural 06 x 08
So, latest episode of Supernatural. What was that?
All good series have their low points. Star Trek had "Spock's Brain." BSG had "Black Market." Happy Days had that episode where Fonzie water-skis over a shark. These episodes are so bad that they manage to inspire both fond chuckles in fans, and give ammunition to critics who argue that Show X is silly, brainless and insulting.
Having watched the series three times now, I still think that Supernatural has produced a hell of a lot of objectively good TV. Even the worst episodes (Season One's "Bugs", for my money) had funny sequences, witty dialogue, or at least offered some good character development that advanced the overarching season-long plot. But god. The latest episode, "All Dogs Go to Heaven," might just take the top prize of Worst. Episode. Ever. It's not quite "Spock's Brain"-bad, since it seemed to lack the ambition to be anything but truly mediocre, but then SPN has always been a series that has swung for the fences. This ep failed to provide either momentum or wit, and as a result committed a cardinal sin against a show that has always, at the very least, tried to do something new. "Dogs" was just a forgettable episode. Except for the part where I thought that maybe I'd time-travelled and was stuck back in my '80s Canadian childhood watching The Littlest Hobo. (Seriously, the shot of the German shepherd walking away at the end? Totally an homage).
It's not like this idea didn't have potential. Okay, stuff with a) kids or b) animals is always going to be corny, but there were a couple of moments that could have worked if every ounce of vitality hadn't already been sapped by uninspired direction, dull scripting, and (dare I say it) lackluster performances by the Jays. Jared seemed oddly subdued, particularly during the physical scenes, and while it takes a lot to mute Jensen Ackles' ability to sell a scene, he looked mostly exhausted by the end of the dumb, meandering plot about shapeshifters who have infiltrated suburbia in the guise of domestic pets. Their evil plan? To...make more shapeshifters. And then? Um, more, I guess. Actually, I'm not sure what the endgame was supposed to be. The writers of this episode didn't think that far ahead. Script problems created by an attempt to juggle several different anxieties (domestic terror sleeper cells; Dean's fear of betraying the kindness extended to him by Lisa and Ben; Sam's slippery, shifting identity issues; the lingering trauma inflicted by Hell Hounds from various seasons) emerged in the second act, and only became more muddled as the episode dragged on. Even the Dean n' Sam chat that bookended the show came off more as a lazy structural choice than a chilling lead-in to the midseason Threat Down. How many times can we watch the Brothers Winchester have a soulful chat in a scenic Vancouver shooting location during the last five minutes of an otherwise unrelated storyline?
I'm still on the fence re: Season 6. A big part of me is thrilled to have one more season and a shot at redemption for both Sam and Dean, even if everything is different and (therefore) ruuuuuuuined! Season 6 has given us "Weekend at Bobby's" and a couple more quality episodes, but I'm left wondering if we really needed another episode about a mother/child combo in peril, an oddly humane inhuman suspect, and Dean and Sam fighting about the pitfalls of working with demons. To misquote Cowely, that's sooooo 2007.
And for the record, shots from a dog's blurry black-and-white perspective? Not scary. Never scary. Now I'm gonna go hunt down more Littlest Hobo clips.
All good series have their low points. Star Trek had "Spock's Brain." BSG had "Black Market." Happy Days had that episode where Fonzie water-skis over a shark. These episodes are so bad that they manage to inspire both fond chuckles in fans, and give ammunition to critics who argue that Show X is silly, brainless and insulting.
Having watched the series three times now, I still think that Supernatural has produced a hell of a lot of objectively good TV. Even the worst episodes (Season One's "Bugs", for my money) had funny sequences, witty dialogue, or at least offered some good character development that advanced the overarching season-long plot. But god. The latest episode, "All Dogs Go to Heaven," might just take the top prize of Worst. Episode. Ever. It's not quite "Spock's Brain"-bad, since it seemed to lack the ambition to be anything but truly mediocre, but then SPN has always been a series that has swung for the fences. This ep failed to provide either momentum or wit, and as a result committed a cardinal sin against a show that has always, at the very least, tried to do something new. "Dogs" was just a forgettable episode. Except for the part where I thought that maybe I'd time-travelled and was stuck back in my '80s Canadian childhood watching The Littlest Hobo. (Seriously, the shot of the German shepherd walking away at the end? Totally an homage).
It's not like this idea didn't have potential. Okay, stuff with a) kids or b) animals is always going to be corny, but there were a couple of moments that could have worked if every ounce of vitality hadn't already been sapped by uninspired direction, dull scripting, and (dare I say it) lackluster performances by the Jays. Jared seemed oddly subdued, particularly during the physical scenes, and while it takes a lot to mute Jensen Ackles' ability to sell a scene, he looked mostly exhausted by the end of the dumb, meandering plot about shapeshifters who have infiltrated suburbia in the guise of domestic pets. Their evil plan? To...make more shapeshifters. And then? Um, more, I guess. Actually, I'm not sure what the endgame was supposed to be. The writers of this episode didn't think that far ahead. Script problems created by an attempt to juggle several different anxieties (domestic terror sleeper cells; Dean's fear of betraying the kindness extended to him by Lisa and Ben; Sam's slippery, shifting identity issues; the lingering trauma inflicted by Hell Hounds from various seasons) emerged in the second act, and only became more muddled as the episode dragged on. Even the Dean n' Sam chat that bookended the show came off more as a lazy structural choice than a chilling lead-in to the midseason Threat Down. How many times can we watch the Brothers Winchester have a soulful chat in a scenic Vancouver shooting location during the last five minutes of an otherwise unrelated storyline?
I'm still on the fence re: Season 6. A big part of me is thrilled to have one more season and a shot at redemption for both Sam and Dean, even if everything is different and (therefore) ruuuuuuuined! Season 6 has given us "Weekend at Bobby's" and a couple more quality episodes, but I'm left wondering if we really needed another episode about a mother/child combo in peril, an oddly humane inhuman suspect, and Dean and Sam fighting about the pitfalls of working with demons. To misquote Cowely, that's sooooo 2007.
And for the record, shots from a dog's blurry black-and-white perspective? Not scary. Never scary. Now I'm gonna go hunt down more Littlest Hobo clips.