Escapade 23.02: Supernatural Cafe
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I can't believe it's been a week since Escapade ended! This time last week, I was at breakfast, sitting next to a wise individual whose plate bore a scoop of scrambled eggs and a mountain of bacon. "Clearly, I'm here for the bacon," she said. As a bacon connoisseur, I do have to say the bacon at the hotel was unfailingly fantastic. One day, when I'm less of a newb, I'll have the confidence to skip all the other respectable items (like fruit and stuff) and just load up with what I *really* went to breakfast for!
I also can't believe I forgot to include the Supernatural panel that I co-led in my con report, which I'm now ret-conning as 23.01. This was the 23rd "season" of Escapade, and this is episode 2 of my report :)
A number of different Supernatural topics were on this year's Escapade ballot, but nothing actually made it to the final schedule. By the last day of accepting alt programming topics, I still hadn't seen anything, so I went ahead and submitted one. Lo and behold, it was the last panel to get into the program book!
The panel was co-moderated by the wonderful
devilc and attended by about a half-dozen SPN fans. Most were long-term fans who felt that Season 8 was a great improvement over the last few seasons. Among the comments:
- Season 8 is a more mature version of Season 1. It's a good re-boot and a good place for disappointed fans to jump back in.
- Dean's commitment to hunting is validated by Benny.
- Sam finally gets to be an academic.
- The Men of Letters sanctuary is a stable base that means Dean gets to nest and to have a safe place: his safe place was his brother, but he had to protect him, so it wasn't really safe.
- Everyone loved the concept of the Men of Letters, but there were some disappointments with the execution, for example, rushing Henry Winchester's story.
- There's a possibility that Naomi is not an angel, but a Fate. Recall that in 6.17 My Heart Will Go On, Atropos mentioned a more powerful big sister. "What if Castiel is Fate's bitch?"
- The Winchesters drove an angel to a crisis of faith!
- The show has more plot now.
- Everyone was jazzed by the episode, 8.13 Everybody Hates Hitler. It treated the golem (the character and the lore) with respect. It neither demonized nor lionized the Nazis. It was clear that the occult evil was being perpetrated by the Thule Society, and did not let human Nazis off the hook for their crimes.
- The new elements are very intriguing and could lead to more fic to explore the Men of Letters. [If anyone knows of such fic, hook me up!]
- Crossover fic recommendation: Owls in the Impala: what if Harry Potter was a lost Winchester? [Does anyone have this in sharable, aggregated form? I will send cookies! If not, will this work with Calibre?]
- WHERE IS ADAM? Everyone wants to know. [I found some Adamandriel in AO3.]
- Note the logocentrism of the show: the tablets, the golem, the library, Samandriel's word.
Speaking of Samandriel, he was a kind of a sub-theme for the panel. I called it Supernatural Cafe, mostly to sound catchy, and hadn't figured out how to represent the cafe part until
devilc brilliantly suggested that we visit a nearby liquor store (we did *not* drink it), where we found a libation to accompany the discussion: a muscato by Lost Angel. Muscatos are sweet wines, and who do we know who's a sweet lost angel? Samandriel! (In more recent developments, I'm trying to establish whether his named is spelled Samandriel or Samandiriel. The work of a fangirl is never done.)
Although SPN fic writing tapered off when fic writers' interest in the show tapered off, I'm optimistic there will be enough interest in another Supernatural Cafe next year. There are so many possibilities with the introduction of Benny, Kevin, Samandiriel, a room of Dean's own (!) in the Men of Letters HQ and Sammy's newfound librarian chic. At least, that's what I'm looking forward to :)
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