SPN - 7.02 - "Hello, Cruel World"
These eps this season are talking me forever to watch, again insta-reaction from last night's watching....
SHUT THE FLIPPING FRONT DOOR, FOLKS!! MY MIND IS FLIPPING AROUND LIKE A CRAZY SAM ON STEROIDS!!!
HONEST TO GOD, I DON’T EVEN KNOW WHAT TO DO WITH THIS???? I SWEAR THERE WAS LIKE A HALLELUJAH CHORUS GOING OFF IN MY HEAD MULTIPLE TIMES!! Sam seeing Luci a la Beautiful Mind, CHECK. Bobby getting some cracks to show through that Dean’s not really all that fine either? CHECK. Sam being straight with Dean and Bobby about the hallunications and all the other cup overfillith Bro moments, I DON’T EVEN REMEMBER WHAT TO DO WITH THESE! By the time I heard Dean mention a word of his Hell experiences to help Sam in the warehouse, my brain totally shortcircuited at the amounts of wish fulfillment just cashed in (seriously THAT WAS ALLLLLLL I wanted from this season, wishlist FILLED by episode TWO)....
AND THEN THEY DID THE HAND THING.
....and by Dean‘s ringing “BELIEVE. ME.”? My world flipped back on its axis.
IS THIS REALLLLL?????? HOW IS THIS REALLLLL??????
SERIOUSLY, HAS HELL FROZEN OVER OR SOMETHING???? I’m looking over my shoulder like, wait whats the catch??
‘Cause I kinda feel like Sam, what if you assume this is real life and bask in the glory of your show finally getting their shit together and then they snap their fingers, cackling ‘JUST KIDDING!‘ and you find yourself still waiting out back in tv show hell. Yes, Kripke and Gamble are totally Luci in this metaphor. DON'T TAKE IT AWAY!!!!
...Um yea, so basically I thought I had died and gone to heaven the moment at the Hell bonding. AND THEN THE REST OF THAT HAPPENED AND I THINK I DIED IN ECSTASY. NO REALLY AT ONE POINT I WAS AT CHOKING LEVELS BECAUSE I WAS BETWEEN SOBBING, LAUGHING LIKE A LUNATIC, AND FORGETTING HOW TO BREATHE. NOT A RECOMMENDED COMBINATION. SPN. STILL LETHAL, after all these years. I can't remember an ep more overwhelming than this....ever. And certainly I can't even remember the last time I ENJOYED an epsiode as thoroughly as this one. Enjoyed isn't even the word. POSITIVELY GIDDY GLEE at every single second is probably a more accurate description.
I actually can’t stop rewatching that scene. From Sam pulling the gun on Dean to Dean’s final “you’ve gotta make that STONE number ONE and BUILD on it”, I keep watching mesmerized like one long gif. How Sam keeps trying to compose himself and yet freaking the fuck out at the same time. Dean trying to remain calm but flipping the fuck out inside himself and feeling helpless and just PLEADINNGGG Sam and anyone in the universe listening because that's all he really can do. The ringing of ‘Believe Me’ in silence of the warehouse after Luci leaves was deafening. STONE NUMBER ONE!!! The hand, everything they did with it, shocked the hell outta me because there was some talk about how Sam falling on that might have made a bad blood combo that caused the hallucinations. And instead it was used it as a tool for Dean to pull Sam back. Through the real, simple, human pain of it. That is just SO right at the heart of this show and what it has always been about most and best that, ugh...*draws hearts all over it*
And Padalecki totally needs some props while we’re at it. Im SUCH a critic when it comes to people playing crazy, but he played the whole episode SCARILY EXCELLENT. I was wowed and so captivated by SAM and damn playing crazy is hard. Playing crazy good and convincing as shit? Props, man. He knocked it out of the friggin PARK. The way his face just CRUMBLED when he turned that gun on Dean, all "I thought I was with you, Dean" UGHHHHH. RUIN ME WHY DON'T YOU.
Man, Padalecki wasn’t kidding when he said this season is scary as shit. Mostly because the thing they’re most scared of that they still haven’t confronted? Is themselves. Sam having Luci in his head convincing him to turn the gun on him? BONE CHILLING. Almost as much as Dean telling Bobby in the voicemail that he’d strap Sam in the car and drive off the pier (NICE ALLUSION TO THE MOST CHILLING NON-SAM&DEAN IMAGE OF THE SHOW BTW, 3.02 anyone? My mind also did a straight shot to Croatoan, and the voicemail was highly 'Home' reminiscent.) Of course the downright scariest was REAL SAM spinning around to aim his gun at Real Dean thinking he might not be real. MY HEART LEAPED INTO MY THROAT.
Retrospectively, I should have realized opening any episode with this shot was a portent of the things to come:
Oh, and Misha’s “The overcoat is at the dry cleaners”! He kept saying that at BosCon, and it really stuck with me at the time as more than just a joke. So it was the first thing I thought of when I saw the coat wash ashore. Dean’s face crumbling picking it up and folding it away made me all sniffly. It was kinda beautiful, yo. I'm a sucker for a good water motif. You know what was really cool though? How Leviathan Cas walked into that water in the daylight with the sun shining down like it was a baptism or something. They hit the religious tone perfectly. I thought it was interesting because of the Cas=John parallels I saw in 7.01 with the impala fixing. Now John went in the night by fire [2.02]. And Cas went in the sunlight by water. I find that curious and dare I say hopeful?
Of course, the Leviathans as a Big Bad have this total ABSURDITY quality to them in a way that's half fascinating, half hysterical. They take on the memories and brain capacity of whoever they inhabit. Hence, by inhabiting Cas, they know absolutely everything Cas knew about the Winchesters and Bobby. And they can take over other high important officials and assume their jobs and take on everything they know as well. And you know THEY APPEAR INDESTRUCTIBLE. I literally started laughing as the black goo regenerated itself after the car dropped on the one. IT REALLY IS ABSURDITY HORROR. I LOVE IT! Also, it's clear now the black ink in the credits meant to point to the Leviathans, first and foremost. Of course you could say it's just a symbol for all the black goo the last five years has accumulated. But animotus pointed out in my 7.01 post that the 'that which is hidden' title thats revealed with the splash? The black ink hangs off the edges but it fails to permeate the white letters themselves. Interesting, in context of this episode, no?
In other news, SAMMMMMM. DEANNNNN. SAMNDEAN. I JUST WANTED TO BUNDLE BOTH OF THEM UP IN LITTLE HOODIES AND FEED THEM CHICKEN SOUP. I FEEL LIKE THIS IS GOING TO BE A THEME THIS SEASON, ISNT IT??
You know what else was still a theme? HOLY CRAP REDS AND BLUES. I love that they got their mileage out of Bobby’s kitchen/living room red/blue contrasts to the fullest extent playing them hardcore for the last time with the Luci hallucinations. That's an awesome final cash-in. I wish I had time to do a full picspam post but I'm pretty sure it's not gonna happen, and some of the best stuff probably better seen in motion anyway. Just follow the red. Red dots and lights told the whole story perfectly. Two of my favorite single-caps:
SOOOOO SADDDDD SEEING THE HOUSE ALL BURNED UP LIKE THAT!!! IM GONNA MISS THOSE PRETTY LIGHTS AGAINST THE RED WALL PAPER. THEY HIGHLIGHTED THE BOYS SO PRETTILY!!! Not worried about Bobby himself, ‘cause of obvious things. BUT GUYS, WAS THAT JOHNS JOURNAL DEAN PICKED UP CHARBOILED?!?!?!? ‘Cause on one hand I'd love it that that link is severed for help finally in a last bit of growing up, no more daddy’s help, but at the same time, I TOTALLY TEARED UP AT THE THOUGHT!!!
Real story. Before watching this I said to myself, self, you just equated the premiere with IMTOD, that makes this episode the “Everyone Loves A Clown’ equivalent. That is a high order, you’re going to be disappointed with those expectations. It’s true. ELAC is one of my favorite top eps ever. BUT THIS. SO DELICIOUS, I LAPPED IT RIGHT UP. That scene with Dean and Sam and Luci and the hand wound is absolutely up there with that brothers field scene I always considered to be the prototype brother argument/confrontation. I love that thing, I could watch it a million more times and never get sick of it. But this. Yea. It’s like exactly the subversion of that prototype. Because instead of the two fighting coming from two different but equally sensible and emotional perspectives, they're meeting each other in the SAME PLACE to support one another. Because Sam didn't just need Dean to help him find reality there, Dean literally needed Sam to find it too. Because they're both at the end of their tethers. Dean's small "Oh no" at seeing Bobby's house smoldering made me whibble, you could just hear the jiggling of that lead marble box. How long you think before they spill out all over the floor? I said somewhere after the premiere that it looks like we're speeding to an all out Dean breakdown at some point, and the last 15 minutes of this couldn't have reinforced that more.
The thing I’m loving so much about these two episodes? There’s really not that much too them. THEY ARE ALL TALKING EPISODES REALLY. But that’s why I’m loving it. The Winchesters have made NOT TALKING ABOUT ANYTHING an ART FORM the last couple years, I’m literally basking in it, and crying tears of joy, and kinda flailing and slapping myself like I don’t know what to do with it. AS I SAID, IS THIS REAL????
So yes, I say if this is Cruel World, BRING IT ON!!!! I'LL EAT THE BOYS PSYCH ISSUES FOR BREAKFAST, NOMNOMNOM!!!!
I’m guess the only way Sam goes off on a hunt by himself in the next episode is ‘cause it’ll actually all be taking place in his mind, if seizuring Sam is any indication. Next friday can truthfully NOT COME FAST ENOUGH.
ETA: Quotes ringing in my head. Sam's subconscious mentioned Martin. “Bury it. That’s how we don’t end up like Martin” my response to that has always been no, dean that’s exactly how you become like Martin. That lead box is cracking the hell open, for both of them, have fun!
ETA2: another total sniffles moment: “Sam, Sammy? Come on now, I’m the one with the broken leg, you gotta carry me” The shot of them both on the ground unable to get up hit me right in the gut. That Dean had nothing else to do but call 911 for an ambulance? UGH. Also, must be said, more IMTOD allusions, only other time they've been picked up by an ambulance, yes? Only then it was Sam conscious and screaming for Dean while Dean was the one with the head trauma. Now it's the opposite. I want to equate them being on the same page again from that warehouse scene right to Sam in 'Devil's Trap' looking at Dean through the Impala rearview window ("No sir, not before everything"). Is it sad that's the only eye-to-eye same page moment I can remember of the last six seasons? From S2 onwards, it was the secret, then Sam's density, then one year left and the "I'm gonna save you" "you can't" waltz, then Hell, Ruby, Lilith, Lucifer, Hell again, soullness, Cas's Heaven problems, the wall. UGH THESE BOYS HAVE HAD A LOT OF CONFLICT BETWEEN THEM THE LAST SIX YEARS, how am we even still around?
ETA3: There was some distant part of me that thought the reason Luci was able to convince Sam so easily that this world wasn't real and all in his head was because things between him and Dean had been BETTER since the wall was put up, I'm thinking specifically of Dean saying his 'clean slate' line, and after three years of distance and fightings and happenstance leading to Sam still thinking that that 4.21 hallucination and 4.22 voicemail where Dean called him a monster he needed to put down WAS ACTUALLY DEAN? It'd probably be easy for him to think 'He's right, Dean would never be able to forgive me for all of that, it must not be real'. They left a heck of that open for fic writers to go mad with, eh?
ETA4: My ONLYYYY ONLYYY criticism of this episode is that Bobby didn't mention Lisa and Ben in his rundown of Dean's mounting heartaches. Does he know about the mindwipe? Or anything that happened in that episode?
ETA5: I couldn't resist. HANDSSSSSS MOTIF!!!!
ETA6: Someone should talk about this shot, just saying:
Pretty, no?
SHUT THE FLIPPING FRONT DOOR, FOLKS!! MY MIND IS FLIPPING AROUND LIKE A CRAZY SAM ON STEROIDS!!!
HONEST TO GOD, I DON’T EVEN KNOW WHAT TO DO WITH THIS???? I SWEAR THERE WAS LIKE A HALLELUJAH CHORUS GOING OFF IN MY HEAD MULTIPLE TIMES!! Sam seeing Luci a la Beautiful Mind, CHECK. Bobby getting some cracks to show through that Dean’s not really all that fine either? CHECK. Sam being straight with Dean and Bobby about the hallunications and all the other cup overfillith Bro moments, I DON’T EVEN REMEMBER WHAT TO DO WITH THESE! By the time I heard Dean mention a word of his Hell experiences to help Sam in the warehouse, my brain totally shortcircuited at the amounts of wish fulfillment just cashed in (seriously THAT WAS ALLLLLLL I wanted from this season, wishlist FILLED by episode TWO)....
AND THEN THEY DID THE HAND THING.
....and by Dean‘s ringing “BELIEVE. ME.”? My world flipped back on its axis.
IS THIS REALLLLL?????? HOW IS THIS REALLLLL??????
SERIOUSLY, HAS HELL FROZEN OVER OR SOMETHING???? I’m looking over my shoulder like, wait whats the catch??
‘Cause I kinda feel like Sam, what if you assume this is real life and bask in the glory of your show finally getting their shit together and then they snap their fingers, cackling ‘JUST KIDDING!‘ and you find yourself still waiting out back in tv show hell. Yes, Kripke and Gamble are totally Luci in this metaphor. DON'T TAKE IT AWAY!!!!
...Um yea, so basically I thought I had died and gone to heaven the moment at the Hell bonding. AND THEN THE REST OF THAT HAPPENED AND I THINK I DIED IN ECSTASY. NO REALLY AT ONE POINT I WAS AT CHOKING LEVELS BECAUSE I WAS BETWEEN SOBBING, LAUGHING LIKE A LUNATIC, AND FORGETTING HOW TO BREATHE. NOT A RECOMMENDED COMBINATION. SPN. STILL LETHAL, after all these years. I can't remember an ep more overwhelming than this....ever. And certainly I can't even remember the last time I ENJOYED an epsiode as thoroughly as this one. Enjoyed isn't even the word. POSITIVELY GIDDY GLEE at every single second is probably a more accurate description.
I actually can’t stop rewatching that scene. From Sam pulling the gun on Dean to Dean’s final “you’ve gotta make that STONE number ONE and BUILD on it”, I keep watching mesmerized like one long gif. How Sam keeps trying to compose himself and yet freaking the fuck out at the same time. Dean trying to remain calm but flipping the fuck out inside himself and feeling helpless and just PLEADINNGGG Sam and anyone in the universe listening because that's all he really can do. The ringing of ‘Believe Me’ in silence of the warehouse after Luci leaves was deafening. STONE NUMBER ONE!!! The hand, everything they did with it, shocked the hell outta me because there was some talk about how Sam falling on that might have made a bad blood combo that caused the hallucinations. And instead it was used it as a tool for Dean to pull Sam back. Through the real, simple, human pain of it. That is just SO right at the heart of this show and what it has always been about most and best that, ugh...*draws hearts all over it*
And Padalecki totally needs some props while we’re at it. Im SUCH a critic when it comes to people playing crazy, but he played the whole episode SCARILY EXCELLENT. I was wowed and so captivated by SAM and damn playing crazy is hard. Playing crazy good and convincing as shit? Props, man. He knocked it out of the friggin PARK. The way his face just CRUMBLED when he turned that gun on Dean, all "I thought I was with you, Dean" UGHHHHH. RUIN ME WHY DON'T YOU.
Man, Padalecki wasn’t kidding when he said this season is scary as shit. Mostly because the thing they’re most scared of that they still haven’t confronted? Is themselves. Sam having Luci in his head convincing him to turn the gun on him? BONE CHILLING. Almost as much as Dean telling Bobby in the voicemail that he’d strap Sam in the car and drive off the pier (NICE ALLUSION TO THE MOST CHILLING NON-SAM&DEAN IMAGE OF THE SHOW BTW, 3.02 anyone? My mind also did a straight shot to Croatoan, and the voicemail was highly 'Home' reminiscent.) Of course the downright scariest was REAL SAM spinning around to aim his gun at Real Dean thinking he might not be real. MY HEART LEAPED INTO MY THROAT.
Retrospectively, I should have realized opening any episode with this shot was a portent of the things to come:
Oh, and Misha’s “The overcoat is at the dry cleaners”! He kept saying that at BosCon, and it really stuck with me at the time as more than just a joke. So it was the first thing I thought of when I saw the coat wash ashore. Dean’s face crumbling picking it up and folding it away made me all sniffly. It was kinda beautiful, yo. I'm a sucker for a good water motif. You know what was really cool though? How Leviathan Cas walked into that water in the daylight with the sun shining down like it was a baptism or something. They hit the religious tone perfectly. I thought it was interesting because of the Cas=John parallels I saw in 7.01 with the impala fixing. Now John went in the night by fire [2.02]. And Cas went in the sunlight by water. I find that curious and dare I say hopeful?
Of course, the Leviathans as a Big Bad have this total ABSURDITY quality to them in a way that's half fascinating, half hysterical. They take on the memories and brain capacity of whoever they inhabit. Hence, by inhabiting Cas, they know absolutely everything Cas knew about the Winchesters and Bobby. And they can take over other high important officials and assume their jobs and take on everything they know as well. And you know THEY APPEAR INDESTRUCTIBLE. I literally started laughing as the black goo regenerated itself after the car dropped on the one. IT REALLY IS ABSURDITY HORROR. I LOVE IT! Also, it's clear now the black ink in the credits meant to point to the Leviathans, first and foremost. Of course you could say it's just a symbol for all the black goo the last five years has accumulated. But animotus pointed out in my 7.01 post that the 'that which is hidden' title thats revealed with the splash? The black ink hangs off the edges but it fails to permeate the white letters themselves. Interesting, in context of this episode, no?
In other news, SAMMMMMM. DEANNNNN. SAMNDEAN. I JUST WANTED TO BUNDLE BOTH OF THEM UP IN LITTLE HOODIES AND FEED THEM CHICKEN SOUP. I FEEL LIKE THIS IS GOING TO BE A THEME THIS SEASON, ISNT IT??
You know what else was still a theme? HOLY CRAP REDS AND BLUES. I love that they got their mileage out of Bobby’s kitchen/living room red/blue contrasts to the fullest extent playing them hardcore for the last time with the Luci hallucinations. That's an awesome final cash-in. I wish I had time to do a full picspam post but I'm pretty sure it's not gonna happen, and some of the best stuff probably better seen in motion anyway. Just follow the red. Red dots and lights told the whole story perfectly. Two of my favorite single-caps:
SOOOOO SADDDDD SEEING THE HOUSE ALL BURNED UP LIKE THAT!!! IM GONNA MISS THOSE PRETTY LIGHTS AGAINST THE RED WALL PAPER. THEY HIGHLIGHTED THE BOYS SO PRETTILY!!! Not worried about Bobby himself, ‘cause of obvious things. BUT GUYS, WAS THAT JOHNS JOURNAL DEAN PICKED UP CHARBOILED?!?!?!? ‘Cause on one hand I'd love it that that link is severed for help finally in a last bit of growing up, no more daddy’s help, but at the same time, I TOTALLY TEARED UP AT THE THOUGHT!!!
Real story. Before watching this I said to myself, self, you just equated the premiere with IMTOD, that makes this episode the “Everyone Loves A Clown’ equivalent. That is a high order, you’re going to be disappointed with those expectations. It’s true. ELAC is one of my favorite top eps ever. BUT THIS. SO DELICIOUS, I LAPPED IT RIGHT UP. That scene with Dean and Sam and Luci and the hand wound is absolutely up there with that brothers field scene I always considered to be the prototype brother argument/confrontation. I love that thing, I could watch it a million more times and never get sick of it. But this. Yea. It’s like exactly the subversion of that prototype. Because instead of the two fighting coming from two different but equally sensible and emotional perspectives, they're meeting each other in the SAME PLACE to support one another. Because Sam didn't just need Dean to help him find reality there, Dean literally needed Sam to find it too. Because they're both at the end of their tethers. Dean's small "Oh no" at seeing Bobby's house smoldering made me whibble, you could just hear the jiggling of that lead marble box. How long you think before they spill out all over the floor? I said somewhere after the premiere that it looks like we're speeding to an all out Dean breakdown at some point, and the last 15 minutes of this couldn't have reinforced that more.
The thing I’m loving so much about these two episodes? There’s really not that much too them. THEY ARE ALL TALKING EPISODES REALLY. But that’s why I’m loving it. The Winchesters have made NOT TALKING ABOUT ANYTHING an ART FORM the last couple years, I’m literally basking in it, and crying tears of joy, and kinda flailing and slapping myself like I don’t know what to do with it. AS I SAID, IS THIS REAL????
So yes, I say if this is Cruel World, BRING IT ON!!!! I'LL EAT THE BOYS PSYCH ISSUES FOR BREAKFAST, NOMNOMNOM!!!!
I’m guess the only way Sam goes off on a hunt by himself in the next episode is ‘cause it’ll actually all be taking place in his mind, if seizuring Sam is any indication. Next friday can truthfully NOT COME FAST ENOUGH.
ETA: Quotes ringing in my head. Sam's subconscious mentioned Martin. “Bury it. That’s how we don’t end up like Martin” my response to that has always been no, dean that’s exactly how you become like Martin. That lead box is cracking the hell open, for both of them, have fun!
ETA2: another total sniffles moment: “Sam, Sammy? Come on now, I’m the one with the broken leg, you gotta carry me” The shot of them both on the ground unable to get up hit me right in the gut. That Dean had nothing else to do but call 911 for an ambulance? UGH. Also, must be said, more IMTOD allusions, only other time they've been picked up by an ambulance, yes? Only then it was Sam conscious and screaming for Dean while Dean was the one with the head trauma. Now it's the opposite. I want to equate them being on the same page again from that warehouse scene right to Sam in 'Devil's Trap' looking at Dean through the Impala rearview window ("No sir, not before everything"). Is it sad that's the only eye-to-eye same page moment I can remember of the last six seasons? From S2 onwards, it was the secret, then Sam's density, then one year left and the "I'm gonna save you" "you can't" waltz, then Hell, Ruby, Lilith, Lucifer, Hell again, soullness, Cas's Heaven problems, the wall. UGH THESE BOYS HAVE HAD A LOT OF CONFLICT BETWEEN THEM THE LAST SIX YEARS, how am we even still around?
ETA3: There was some distant part of me that thought the reason Luci was able to convince Sam so easily that this world wasn't real and all in his head was because things between him and Dean had been BETTER since the wall was put up, I'm thinking specifically of Dean saying his 'clean slate' line, and after three years of distance and fightings and happenstance leading to Sam still thinking that that 4.21 hallucination and 4.22 voicemail where Dean called him a monster he needed to put down WAS ACTUALLY DEAN? It'd probably be easy for him to think 'He's right, Dean would never be able to forgive me for all of that, it must not be real'. They left a heck of that open for fic writers to go mad with, eh?
ETA4: My ONLYYYY ONLYYY criticism of this episode is that Bobby didn't mention Lisa and Ben in his rundown of Dean's mounting heartaches. Does he know about the mindwipe? Or anything that happened in that episode?
ETA5: I couldn't resist. HANDSSSSSS MOTIF!!!!
ETA6: Someone should talk about this shot, just saying:
Pretty, no?