Just had to say...and then it got ranty...
SPOILERS.
I hate to blog about Supernatural so soon, but since this isn't strictly about the show- well it is a little, but not lots- AND talks about fancommunity, I thought I'd talk about it anyway.
I ran across this little gem; Apparently Supernatural's 200th episode is gonna be a musical. Ish. Since we know Jensen can sing, this isn't a huge shock, considering the wack-do stuff SPN has done, it was only a matter of time. There might be dancing, which fits right in. Anyway, neither here not there, though I'm sure the boys will have a blast. Is it too much to hope for for Dean to sing either Real Life's 'Send me and Angel' or Belinda Carlisle 'Heaven is a Place on Earth' OO or Beyonce's 'Halo'? Madonna's 'Like a Prayer'... THE OPTIONS ARE SO AWESOME AND VAST.
For this reason, I am 100% positive this episode is going to bum me out. All the awesome things they could do, and I think, as with most things SPN does, it will be played safe, and might be cute, but won't rise above its gimmick status. That was the amazing thing about 'Once More With Feeling', the Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode which kicked off this fad; it didn't just make its actors sing, but it wrote a musical. It incidentally had singing in it, and all the songs, like in post-Oklahoma musicals, had a purpose in the story, helping either plot or character. That was the brilliance of Joss Whedon. He isn't my God, but he and his team knew what they were doing. Even the Fringe episode 'Brown Betty', though it just did covers, chose very well what songs it would use to amplify and communicate, like using 'The Candyman Can' for Walter...as sung by corpses.
The Supernatural team (I refuse to call them creative) only seems to see as far as making Jared and Jensen soft-shoe. We'll probably get some classic rock cover- maybe even Kansas and the Carry On My Wayward Son... but not what they could do with this medium, which is to use simple words to express that which we might not have the words for.
Anyway, I didn't come to chat about my advanced disappointment. but I kind of can't help it. I've heard Jensen sing. If allowed to, he could probably destroy us with FEELS.
More amusingly about the deal, the followig quote from the announcement:
“We're going pretty meta. I would just describe it as something of a love letter to our fans and there will be songs,” --Jeffery Carver, showrunner
All very well and good, except for one little problem; SPN doesn't love its legion of fans. It's embarrassed by them, and rather than just ignore them, they shame them inside the show these people love.
And this makes me almost blind with rage.
Does this man watch his own show? Doesn't he have some assistant who gauges show response within the fanbase? When has he- or any other showrunner- ever written a love letter to the fans?
Actually, when has the show ever portrayed the fans positively at all? Fandom is all over this show and it is never good. In fact, Jeffery Carver is indirectly (or perhaps directly) responsible for the most egregious example of this, when the two title characters talk to the screen, making of fun of, essentially, the audience and their relationship with the show. Or the examples of fan culture the show trots out, not to appreciate them, but to point a finger at them and laugh. And talk about how sad and pathetic they are. And damn should they appreciate the fans. Do they think the casual viewers are invested and tuning in after ten years? Giving them free advertising on Tumbr? Growing their viewer base through fan rumor? Clue: THEY AREN'T.
Let's be clear; the show isn't having a fun little jab that we can chuckle at. The fan avatars, like Becky Rosen or even Metatron are viewed as delusional losers. Fan activities like Role-playing or pointing out hackneyed-tropes or fanficing or- gasp- writing slash-fiction, are further painted as pathetic wastes of time.
Try to imagine J.K Rowling writing a scene in Harry Potter where she made fun of grown adults who dressed like Hogwarts students. Doesn't sound loving, does it? It isn't. Look, like your fans. Just don't mention them on your show.
The Supernatural team are also CONVINCED their fans are male, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Then again, whoever runs SPN has got blinders on the size of Texas, and refuse to understand that someone in that writer's room is writing a closeted bi-sexual in love with an angel. Some day, in the decades to come, I pray someone writes a biography about this show. I suspect the serious lack of cohesion and any kind of emotional resolution found in the text of the show has some direct meddling from some source; there have been three 'show-runners', Eric Kripke, Sera Gamble and now Jeremy Carver. Consider other shows that shift show-runner hands; there is a flavor shift, a stressing on different aspects or themes. Take Doctor Who; when Moffat got his greasy hands on it and took it up into the BOYZ ONLY clubhouse so those yucky girls couldn't touch it, the tone shifted. The plots became even more convoluted and a basic understanding of human relationships vanished and the most important thing in the Whoniverse was the Doctor and his ManPain.
SPN, by contrast, has not changed in those subtle tonal ways. No showrunner has resolved emotional arcs, no showrunner has highlighted theme or ideas not present in other showrunner eras, and no show-runner has stopped killing off women and minorities. Women are still regularly refrigeratored, and the complicated relationship in our three leads never changes. No matter how many lessons Dean and Sam and Castiel have learned, they are still in the same place. It's a show that somehow is convinced of its heteromasculinity, and yt reada s pheomenally queer, and then denies that.
There's also the queerbaiting. That hasn't stopped either.
I can only conclude that someone up the foodchain at the CW has a tight, tight fist on the show, and so long as that is in place, we can expect nothing in the text of the show to change, and that the fanbase will continually be mocked with meanspirited glee while we line their pockets as they achieve the 200 episode landmark.
But it's done with love.
I
I hate to blog about Supernatural so soon, but since this isn't strictly about the show- well it is a little, but not lots- AND talks about fancommunity, I thought I'd talk about it anyway.
I ran across this little gem; Apparently Supernatural's 200th episode is gonna be a musical. Ish. Since we know Jensen can sing, this isn't a huge shock, considering the wack-do stuff SPN has done, it was only a matter of time. There might be dancing, which fits right in. Anyway, neither here not there, though I'm sure the boys will have a blast. Is it too much to hope for for Dean to sing either Real Life's 'Send me and Angel' or Belinda Carlisle 'Heaven is a Place on Earth' OO or Beyonce's 'Halo'? Madonna's 'Like a Prayer'... THE OPTIONS ARE SO AWESOME AND VAST.
For this reason, I am 100% positive this episode is going to bum me out. All the awesome things they could do, and I think, as with most things SPN does, it will be played safe, and might be cute, but won't rise above its gimmick status. That was the amazing thing about 'Once More With Feeling', the Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode which kicked off this fad; it didn't just make its actors sing, but it wrote a musical. It incidentally had singing in it, and all the songs, like in post-Oklahoma musicals, had a purpose in the story, helping either plot or character. That was the brilliance of Joss Whedon. He isn't my God, but he and his team knew what they were doing. Even the Fringe episode 'Brown Betty', though it just did covers, chose very well what songs it would use to amplify and communicate, like using 'The Candyman Can' for Walter...as sung by corpses.
The Supernatural team (I refuse to call them creative) only seems to see as far as making Jared and Jensen soft-shoe. We'll probably get some classic rock cover- maybe even Kansas and the Carry On My Wayward Son... but not what they could do with this medium, which is to use simple words to express that which we might not have the words for.
Anyway, I didn't come to chat about my advanced disappointment. but I kind of can't help it. I've heard Jensen sing. If allowed to, he could probably destroy us with FEELS.
More amusingly about the deal, the followig quote from the announcement:
“We're going pretty meta. I would just describe it as something of a love letter to our fans and there will be songs,” --Jeffery Carver, showrunner
All very well and good, except for one little problem; SPN doesn't love its legion of fans. It's embarrassed by them, and rather than just ignore them, they shame them inside the show these people love.
And this makes me almost blind with rage.
Does this man watch his own show? Doesn't he have some assistant who gauges show response within the fanbase? When has he- or any other showrunner- ever written a love letter to the fans?
Actually, when has the show ever portrayed the fans positively at all? Fandom is all over this show and it is never good. In fact, Jeffery Carver is indirectly (or perhaps directly) responsible for the most egregious example of this, when the two title characters talk to the screen, making of fun of, essentially, the audience and their relationship with the show. Or the examples of fan culture the show trots out, not to appreciate them, but to point a finger at them and laugh. And talk about how sad and pathetic they are. And damn should they appreciate the fans. Do they think the casual viewers are invested and tuning in after ten years? Giving them free advertising on Tumbr? Growing their viewer base through fan rumor? Clue: THEY AREN'T.
Let's be clear; the show isn't having a fun little jab that we can chuckle at. The fan avatars, like Becky Rosen or even Metatron are viewed as delusional losers. Fan activities like Role-playing or pointing out hackneyed-tropes or fanficing or- gasp- writing slash-fiction, are further painted as pathetic wastes of time.
Try to imagine J.K Rowling writing a scene in Harry Potter where she made fun of grown adults who dressed like Hogwarts students. Doesn't sound loving, does it? It isn't. Look, like your fans. Just don't mention them on your show.
The Supernatural team are also CONVINCED their fans are male, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Then again, whoever runs SPN has got blinders on the size of Texas, and refuse to understand that someone in that writer's room is writing a closeted bi-sexual in love with an angel. Some day, in the decades to come, I pray someone writes a biography about this show. I suspect the serious lack of cohesion and any kind of emotional resolution found in the text of the show has some direct meddling from some source; there have been three 'show-runners', Eric Kripke, Sera Gamble and now Jeremy Carver. Consider other shows that shift show-runner hands; there is a flavor shift, a stressing on different aspects or themes. Take Doctor Who; when Moffat got his greasy hands on it and took it up into the BOYZ ONLY clubhouse so those yucky girls couldn't touch it, the tone shifted. The plots became even more convoluted and a basic understanding of human relationships vanished and the most important thing in the Whoniverse was the Doctor and his ManPain.
SPN, by contrast, has not changed in those subtle tonal ways. No showrunner has resolved emotional arcs, no showrunner has highlighted theme or ideas not present in other showrunner eras, and no show-runner has stopped killing off women and minorities. Women are still regularly refrigeratored, and the complicated relationship in our three leads never changes. No matter how many lessons Dean and Sam and Castiel have learned, they are still in the same place. It's a show that somehow is convinced of its heteromasculinity, and yt reada s pheomenally queer, and then denies that.
There's also the queerbaiting. That hasn't stopped either.
I can only conclude that someone up the foodchain at the CW has a tight, tight fist on the show, and so long as that is in place, we can expect nothing in the text of the show to change, and that the fanbase will continually be mocked with meanspirited glee while we line their pockets as they achieve the 200 episode landmark.
But it's done with love.
I