SPN 6.03 - Hmmm
I think one thing this show needs is more Ben Edlund episodes. There are things that could have been a little more organic here, but this was a pretty interesting episode in various ways, and it was fairly well put together.
Some of the positives
1) If there's one thing I always want to see from SPN, or any show that has an overall arc, is follow through of some kind from episode to episode, as well as internal consistency in episodes. An example of the latter might be the way that the cop in the cop car is talking to Officer Colfax right before he dies. This is never stated outright, but it becomes clear that this is what Edlund was going for with that reference. Also, we later see Dean, who has established that he is good at picking out liars, figuring out that Aaron is lying when he said he was simply given the staff. So within the episodes there are little clues and signals that hang together when the episode ends.
I felt that this episode definitely delivered in that respect, making some suggestions about what's up with Sam, showing why Castiel has been so occupied in the past year, and giving us our new powerful entity of the season. We have already had more payoff in this episode to Castiel's "heaven's sheriff" storyline than we did to last season's "searching for God" one. I hope that bodes well for the season ahead. It also seems very likely that the issue of the angel civil war and the value of souls are likely to come together in the seasonal arc, and my guess is that the souls are potential weapons.
While it hasn't been clearly explained that all the Campbell clan are, in fact, back from the dead, I like the idea that Sam's silence on that issue may not have been a dodge by the writers but instead a hint that this was true. And if, as Balthazar says, souls are valuable, then I have to assume one of the most valuable ones around would have to be Sam's, who was able, through the use of his, to gain victory over Lucifer. Perhaps in order to obtain his soul, Sam had to be brought back to life. I'd also assume that anyone in his bloodline would be considered of particular value. Now why no one would have made a move on Dean in all this time remains in question. Maybe it's too obvious he would never make a deal again. Presumably he still has the rib sigils and simply wasn't easy to find (in which case how did Castiel find him so quickly here?) But on the face of it, you'd think it would be like choosing teams -- your first picks are the top players and Dean is still off the board.
Another possible issue here is how much Sam knows about what happened. At least in this episode it would seem that the seller must still make a deal, even with an angel. So presumably none of the Campbells could have had their souls taken without their consent. At the same time it's not clear that the same rules would apply to individuals who were dead. Perhaps they could still be taken? After all, this season seems to take as its premise that "the rules are different now" when it comes to monsters.
But it's possible that if Sam is soulless, he doesn't know what happened, because it would be the Sam with the soul who made the deal. Or perhaps God is involved and taking souls off the table to prevent their use as weapons? There's all sorts of possibilities here and I think this episode gives us just enough to start speculating.
2) Continuing the Dean and Lisa storyline. Although we only get a few touches of that -- his dream, the phone call, Ben's mask -- the connection continues in this episode. I also like how the call to Ben doesn't just establish that continued tie, but what Sam says to him about shaping the young minds of tomorrow. This establishes that, regardless of what Dean thinks, he really is the moral center of the show at this point. And that issue of innate morality seems to be tied to souls in the SPN verse meaning that, however not-up-to-speed Dean may be in some ways, he has something at his disposal that is valuable and likely to be needed.
I love how they have Dean still dreaming of Lisa, as we saw him do in earlier seasons. It kind of makes me wonder though, what Dean was dreaming of while he was with Lisa? Especially given how that scene moved into parallel cuts between Sam and Dean, it made me think that the two of them may have been more alike than indicated in often wanting to be somewhere they weren't.
Otherwise though, I liked the sequence in its contrast between Dean dreaming of a relationship he still has, and standing in the outdoors with nature and the world around him, compared to Sam, mechanical and distant in his exercise routine. On the face of it, Dean, stiff and relatively unfit, chowing burgers and unused to Sam's rapid-fire work schedule, seems to be a contrast between in-the-game and out-of-the game. But I think it's also meant to contrast a certain reality for Dean versus nothing real at all for Sam. This leads me to …
3) The hints laid down. I'm pretty sure one of the key lines in this episode was Castiel's, "I was ashamed, I expected more from my brothers." The idea of being betrayed by someone close, family in fact, certainly seems to be building as a theme this season. It makes me wonder if betrayal by a loved one isn't going to play into the Lisa storyline as well. However, I thought Balthazar's line about being free and this being a bad thing, a descent into chaos and dissolution, was an interesting phrase given that "destiny," or Sam as the focus of destiny, has been gone.
At the same time, I found there to be an interesting parallel between Dean and Castiel in this episode. Dean seems to be expecting, for no clear reason, that just because he's involved, he's in charge. He thinks Sam is trying to be the boss, trying to prove himself better than Dean. He races Sam in the car, he calls him out, and he tells Cas "If Sam calls, you come" as if he has any reason to believe he can order an angel about. Similarly, Castiel decided to appoint himself heaven's sheriff at the end of S5 and has found it rough going. He's clearly special to God given his dual resurrections, but he's not an archangel and there's nothing to indicate he's supposed to be taking over and giving orders. And he is clearly as out to sea on what's going on regarding almost everything in this episode as Dean is on what's going on with Sam. Both Dean and Castiel see themselves as agents of order, even though both were (as Balthazar pointed out to Castiel) instead the agents of change -- the unpredictable elements that threw a wrench into millennia of destiny. It is Destiny that is ordered and controlled, free will that is unpredictable and anarchic. In this sense both are badly suited for the roles they are trying to play.
Castiel's tossed off line about how knowing what matters "does help one to focus" certainly says a lot about Sam. Despite Sam's lack of connection to anything he is still operating in a way that is very ends-oriented, and the intention would certainly fall into the good camp. But how you feel about your job, your motivation, is important when it comes to "means."
Speaking of which, Balthazar's comment about "grab something valuable and fake your own death" sounds pretty familiar (right down to the finger snaap). I rather wonder if this was what Gabriel did.
4) Considering the relatively serious issues popping up here, this was a funny episode. Not a comedic episode, but still, consistently funny throughout. Obviously Castiel always has his humorous fish out of water moments, and Sam and Dean have always had moments of entertaining banter. But there were a series of good lines from Darryl Birch's "The hell kin of Fed are you?" to the comment about the "sawed-off" shotgun staff of Moses, to "help yourself" to "more Dr. No, less Liberace", etc. Also a plus? Attention to detail such as leaving an unconscious boy alone in a hotel as they head off, possibly to die. I wish a line could be spared more often to other victims.
The Not So Good
1) The biblical plague idea is something I would have expected to see last season. There's nothing wrong with it as an episodic plot, though I thought the whole idea of breaking a staff into pieces to dilute its power a little questionable. My problem with this plot is that it follows on from last season.
On the one hand, this would normally be expected from a show. But on the other, I thought we were done with the issue of wars and apocalypse and the angels in general. Clearly not. The fact that Rafael now wants to rekindle the apocalypse, and that Balthazar speaks of the freedom that comes from destiny being denied, would certainly suggest that at least part of this season is going to be a ride on the same merry-go-round. Frankly, I was hoping for something completely new.
2) I'd still like to know how Castiel is reconstituting himself. He says in this episode that he has no humanity to him (and he and Sam certainly seem sympatico in this respect). He also says he has spent the last year as a "multidimensional wavelength of celestial intent." Personally, I loved this description of what an angel is, but it does seem to suggest that he can now manifest in another form at will which also seems to be a big change to the rules, particularly since we are told that Rafael will now be looking for a new vessel. If an archangel still needs one but Castiel does not, that would seem to leave him one up in my book.
3) The whole "stopping Raphael" bit. How is it that neither Balthazar nor Castiel were affected by Lot's rock? Does it require an angel to activate it? Also, how could Sam and Dean possibly have known where Balthazar would appear or be stealthy enough to pour oil around him? Ridiculous. For that matter, how can Castiel be bleeding in those final scenes if he has no vessel?
4) I like the subtlety of the trunk packing scene to demonstrate that Sam and Dean had gone back to the motel for their things and the car. I also liked the shoutout to Wendigo with the mask because in a sense this was the new version of the "we've got work to do" scene. What I didn't like was the rather anvilicious dialogue between Sam and Dean at the end. This seemed forced and out of place given the nice flow of the rest of the episode. We already know Dean thinks Sam is different, and we saw from the first scene that something is probably wrong with him. Of course, given our extra long preview this episode apparently ran short anyway. Pity we didn't have another Eye of the Tiger type bit to fill up the time instead.
What also didn't really work for me was the level of upset over the kid's temporary pain. He had every right to want his brother's killers brought to justice, maybe even killed depending on how it went down. But the ways they died were pretty gruesome and I didn't see any remorse there. What's more, he's damn lucky all he had to do was suffer the "angel taser" treatment, considering what was in store for him if his deal wasn't broken. They saved his afterlife, that was a VERY small price to pay for it. Hopefully the upset of the incident will be enough to keep him from doing it again since presumably there's nothing keeping Balthazar from going back again and offering him a new deal.
Other Stuff
1) Ew to that opening sequence. But that was a pretty funny line for the situation. Shades of Edlund's MBV last season.
2) * snorts * Apparently Sam is living the male fantasy of being a semi-superman in and out of the sack. The prostitute who doesn't charge (and who doesn't get paid upfront)? I think he needs to hunt down that urban legend.
3) "Who died and made you boss?" Heh, love the layers in that.
4) "What's your mileage again?" Finally an acknowledgment of what it takes to run our girl.
5) They caught their own goof in time, it seems, by changing Sam's line. Given that the dead patrol officer saw Sam zoom by, the original script line of "He was brought in yesterday" didn't make a lot of sense. However, given how sloppy SPN generally is about how long things take, I would have found this goof more easily handwaved than some others.
6) I'll bet JP loved imitating Castiel's "Hello" in that scene.
7) "Like a shirt tag at camp?" I get why Castiel didn't know what that meant. How did Sam?
8) I have to admit they came up with a clever way to get Sam's car out of the way. Great stunt.
9) I wonder if the frog came from the same frog wrangler as in Bedtime Stories?
10) "Even I know that's a bad joke" Hee!
11) The fight scene between Castiel and Rafael really needed more lighting. It didn't look ominous so much as alternating between dark and washed out.
12) I found it pretty interesting that Dean thinks finding a case in a day and a half is a short time. It suggests far more downtime in the first few seasons than we ever saw.
13) Like the follow through of "Kojak," though "We're the Fed, Ed" was what made me laugh. So did Sam doing the thighs of steel move.
14) "We share a special bond. I wasn't going to mention it." Heh, bet all the Dean/Cas shippers were happy with that one.
15) Interesting notation about soul claims leaving brands. No doubt this is why all demons knew about Dean's deal just by looking at him.
16) Nice CGI of the frog in the throat.
17) Dean's hand must be mighty useless after all that slicing.
18) I wonder if anyone bothered to retrieve those two angel swords lying around in the mansion? What's more, what happened to Raphael's? He was about to kill Castiel with it and then got powdered. Did it also disingtegrate? Isn't that a problem since an archangel's sword is special to the angel?
Comments at Dreamwidth
.
Some of the positives
1) If there's one thing I always want to see from SPN, or any show that has an overall arc, is follow through of some kind from episode to episode, as well as internal consistency in episodes. An example of the latter might be the way that the cop in the cop car is talking to Officer Colfax right before he dies. This is never stated outright, but it becomes clear that this is what Edlund was going for with that reference. Also, we later see Dean, who has established that he is good at picking out liars, figuring out that Aaron is lying when he said he was simply given the staff. So within the episodes there are little clues and signals that hang together when the episode ends.
I felt that this episode definitely delivered in that respect, making some suggestions about what's up with Sam, showing why Castiel has been so occupied in the past year, and giving us our new powerful entity of the season. We have already had more payoff in this episode to Castiel's "heaven's sheriff" storyline than we did to last season's "searching for God" one. I hope that bodes well for the season ahead. It also seems very likely that the issue of the angel civil war and the value of souls are likely to come together in the seasonal arc, and my guess is that the souls are potential weapons.
While it hasn't been clearly explained that all the Campbell clan are, in fact, back from the dead, I like the idea that Sam's silence on that issue may not have been a dodge by the writers but instead a hint that this was true. And if, as Balthazar says, souls are valuable, then I have to assume one of the most valuable ones around would have to be Sam's, who was able, through the use of his, to gain victory over Lucifer. Perhaps in order to obtain his soul, Sam had to be brought back to life. I'd also assume that anyone in his bloodline would be considered of particular value. Now why no one would have made a move on Dean in all this time remains in question. Maybe it's too obvious he would never make a deal again. Presumably he still has the rib sigils and simply wasn't easy to find (in which case how did Castiel find him so quickly here?) But on the face of it, you'd think it would be like choosing teams -- your first picks are the top players and Dean is still off the board.
Another possible issue here is how much Sam knows about what happened. At least in this episode it would seem that the seller must still make a deal, even with an angel. So presumably none of the Campbells could have had their souls taken without their consent. At the same time it's not clear that the same rules would apply to individuals who were dead. Perhaps they could still be taken? After all, this season seems to take as its premise that "the rules are different now" when it comes to monsters.
But it's possible that if Sam is soulless, he doesn't know what happened, because it would be the Sam with the soul who made the deal. Or perhaps God is involved and taking souls off the table to prevent their use as weapons? There's all sorts of possibilities here and I think this episode gives us just enough to start speculating.
2) Continuing the Dean and Lisa storyline. Although we only get a few touches of that -- his dream, the phone call, Ben's mask -- the connection continues in this episode. I also like how the call to Ben doesn't just establish that continued tie, but what Sam says to him about shaping the young minds of tomorrow. This establishes that, regardless of what Dean thinks, he really is the moral center of the show at this point. And that issue of innate morality seems to be tied to souls in the SPN verse meaning that, however not-up-to-speed Dean may be in some ways, he has something at his disposal that is valuable and likely to be needed.
I love how they have Dean still dreaming of Lisa, as we saw him do in earlier seasons. It kind of makes me wonder though, what Dean was dreaming of while he was with Lisa? Especially given how that scene moved into parallel cuts between Sam and Dean, it made me think that the two of them may have been more alike than indicated in often wanting to be somewhere they weren't.
Otherwise though, I liked the sequence in its contrast between Dean dreaming of a relationship he still has, and standing in the outdoors with nature and the world around him, compared to Sam, mechanical and distant in his exercise routine. On the face of it, Dean, stiff and relatively unfit, chowing burgers and unused to Sam's rapid-fire work schedule, seems to be a contrast between in-the-game and out-of-the game. But I think it's also meant to contrast a certain reality for Dean versus nothing real at all for Sam. This leads me to …
3) The hints laid down. I'm pretty sure one of the key lines in this episode was Castiel's, "I was ashamed, I expected more from my brothers." The idea of being betrayed by someone close, family in fact, certainly seems to be building as a theme this season. It makes me wonder if betrayal by a loved one isn't going to play into the Lisa storyline as well. However, I thought Balthazar's line about being free and this being a bad thing, a descent into chaos and dissolution, was an interesting phrase given that "destiny," or Sam as the focus of destiny, has been gone.
At the same time, I found there to be an interesting parallel between Dean and Castiel in this episode. Dean seems to be expecting, for no clear reason, that just because he's involved, he's in charge. He thinks Sam is trying to be the boss, trying to prove himself better than Dean. He races Sam in the car, he calls him out, and he tells Cas "If Sam calls, you come" as if he has any reason to believe he can order an angel about. Similarly, Castiel decided to appoint himself heaven's sheriff at the end of S5 and has found it rough going. He's clearly special to God given his dual resurrections, but he's not an archangel and there's nothing to indicate he's supposed to be taking over and giving orders. And he is clearly as out to sea on what's going on regarding almost everything in this episode as Dean is on what's going on with Sam. Both Dean and Castiel see themselves as agents of order, even though both were (as Balthazar pointed out to Castiel) instead the agents of change -- the unpredictable elements that threw a wrench into millennia of destiny. It is Destiny that is ordered and controlled, free will that is unpredictable and anarchic. In this sense both are badly suited for the roles they are trying to play.
Castiel's tossed off line about how knowing what matters "does help one to focus" certainly says a lot about Sam. Despite Sam's lack of connection to anything he is still operating in a way that is very ends-oriented, and the intention would certainly fall into the good camp. But how you feel about your job, your motivation, is important when it comes to "means."
Speaking of which, Balthazar's comment about "grab something valuable and fake your own death" sounds pretty familiar (right down to the finger snaap). I rather wonder if this was what Gabriel did.
4) Considering the relatively serious issues popping up here, this was a funny episode. Not a comedic episode, but still, consistently funny throughout. Obviously Castiel always has his humorous fish out of water moments, and Sam and Dean have always had moments of entertaining banter. But there were a series of good lines from Darryl Birch's "The hell kin of Fed are you?" to the comment about the "sawed-off" shotgun staff of Moses, to "help yourself" to "more Dr. No, less Liberace", etc. Also a plus? Attention to detail such as leaving an unconscious boy alone in a hotel as they head off, possibly to die. I wish a line could be spared more often to other victims.
The Not So Good
1) The biblical plague idea is something I would have expected to see last season. There's nothing wrong with it as an episodic plot, though I thought the whole idea of breaking a staff into pieces to dilute its power a little questionable. My problem with this plot is that it follows on from last season.
On the one hand, this would normally be expected from a show. But on the other, I thought we were done with the issue of wars and apocalypse and the angels in general. Clearly not. The fact that Rafael now wants to rekindle the apocalypse, and that Balthazar speaks of the freedom that comes from destiny being denied, would certainly suggest that at least part of this season is going to be a ride on the same merry-go-round. Frankly, I was hoping for something completely new.
2) I'd still like to know how Castiel is reconstituting himself. He says in this episode that he has no humanity to him (and he and Sam certainly seem sympatico in this respect). He also says he has spent the last year as a "multidimensional wavelength of celestial intent." Personally, I loved this description of what an angel is, but it does seem to suggest that he can now manifest in another form at will which also seems to be a big change to the rules, particularly since we are told that Rafael will now be looking for a new vessel. If an archangel still needs one but Castiel does not, that would seem to leave him one up in my book.
3) The whole "stopping Raphael" bit. How is it that neither Balthazar nor Castiel were affected by Lot's rock? Does it require an angel to activate it? Also, how could Sam and Dean possibly have known where Balthazar would appear or be stealthy enough to pour oil around him? Ridiculous. For that matter, how can Castiel be bleeding in those final scenes if he has no vessel?
4) I like the subtlety of the trunk packing scene to demonstrate that Sam and Dean had gone back to the motel for their things and the car. I also liked the shoutout to Wendigo with the mask because in a sense this was the new version of the "we've got work to do" scene. What I didn't like was the rather anvilicious dialogue between Sam and Dean at the end. This seemed forced and out of place given the nice flow of the rest of the episode. We already know Dean thinks Sam is different, and we saw from the first scene that something is probably wrong with him. Of course, given our extra long preview this episode apparently ran short anyway. Pity we didn't have another Eye of the Tiger type bit to fill up the time instead.
What also didn't really work for me was the level of upset over the kid's temporary pain. He had every right to want his brother's killers brought to justice, maybe even killed depending on how it went down. But the ways they died were pretty gruesome and I didn't see any remorse there. What's more, he's damn lucky all he had to do was suffer the "angel taser" treatment, considering what was in store for him if his deal wasn't broken. They saved his afterlife, that was a VERY small price to pay for it. Hopefully the upset of the incident will be enough to keep him from doing it again since presumably there's nothing keeping Balthazar from going back again and offering him a new deal.
Other Stuff
1) Ew to that opening sequence. But that was a pretty funny line for the situation. Shades of Edlund's MBV last season.
2) * snorts * Apparently Sam is living the male fantasy of being a semi-superman in and out of the sack. The prostitute who doesn't charge (and who doesn't get paid upfront)? I think he needs to hunt down that urban legend.
3) "Who died and made you boss?" Heh, love the layers in that.
4) "What's your mileage again?" Finally an acknowledgment of what it takes to run our girl.
5) They caught their own goof in time, it seems, by changing Sam's line. Given that the dead patrol officer saw Sam zoom by, the original script line of "He was brought in yesterday" didn't make a lot of sense. However, given how sloppy SPN generally is about how long things take, I would have found this goof more easily handwaved than some others.
6) I'll bet JP loved imitating Castiel's "Hello" in that scene.
7) "Like a shirt tag at camp?" I get why Castiel didn't know what that meant. How did Sam?
8) I have to admit they came up with a clever way to get Sam's car out of the way. Great stunt.
9) I wonder if the frog came from the same frog wrangler as in Bedtime Stories?
10) "Even I know that's a bad joke" Hee!
11) The fight scene between Castiel and Rafael really needed more lighting. It didn't look ominous so much as alternating between dark and washed out.
12) I found it pretty interesting that Dean thinks finding a case in a day and a half is a short time. It suggests far more downtime in the first few seasons than we ever saw.
13) Like the follow through of "Kojak," though "We're the Fed, Ed" was what made me laugh. So did Sam doing the thighs of steel move.
14) "We share a special bond. I wasn't going to mention it." Heh, bet all the Dean/Cas shippers were happy with that one.
15) Interesting notation about soul claims leaving brands. No doubt this is why all demons knew about Dean's deal just by looking at him.
16) Nice CGI of the frog in the throat.
17) Dean's hand must be mighty useless after all that slicing.
18) I wonder if anyone bothered to retrieve those two angel swords lying around in the mansion? What's more, what happened to Raphael's? He was about to kill Castiel with it and then got powdered. Did it also disingtegrate? Isn't that a problem since an archangel's sword is special to the angel?
Comments at Dreamwidth
.