seen from Türkiye
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Sam and Dean lacking personal space in every episode - 32/327
Pick one of my favourite episodes [s1 - s4]
Skin [1.06]
The Benders [1.15]
Croatoan [2.09]
Hunted [2.10]
Playthings [2.11]
What is and what should never be [2.20]
All Hell Breaks loose [2.21 - 2.22]
Jus In Bello [3.12]
No Rest for the Wicked [3.16]
Sex and Violence [4.14]
It’s a Terrible Life [4.17]
Jump the Shark [4.19]
dean winchester s2 e20 'what is and what should never be' is SOOOO 'I Saw The TV Glow' coded likeeee..."Within this mass hallucination of the perfect suburban dream where despite otherwise taking place in a stakes-free wonderland, his behavior is harshly scrutinized, there is a beautiful girl who haunts his periphery until it physically draws him away from the life of comfort he sought, and seeing her in this new context allows him to realize that the same thing has happened to him. That he is slowly dying somewhere thinking he's found the only way to be happy. And then the world begs him to forget by promising a lifetime in a matter of hours so long as he stays. The mundane joys of life. A wife and family he loves more than anything. But, of course, he can’t. Even if this can't means he has to literally kill himself in front of the people who promise a simple, safe life of distant love with the domestication he so desires.
And when he wakes up, the girl looks dead. But she's still breathing."
supernatural + silhouettes
2x10, “Hunted” (Dir. Rachel Talalay)
I’ve been listening to the Supernatural: Then and Now podcast, and overall it’s been a lot of fun for what it is. It’s an interesting perspective on the show, two guys who are completely involved in the show but who’d never really sat down and watched it from the beginning. Sometimes their thoughts are informed by what they’ve learned through fandom, or through their own work later in the series, but sometimes they’re... kinda out of left field lol.
But there’s a few things in this week’s episode (about 2.01 In My Time of Dying, with Jensen and Jeffrey Dean Morgan as guests) that I really feel I need to talk about. Let’s start with Jensen and JDM’s thoughts on John Winchester. There’s likely been a lot of fandom pushback on their insistence that John wasn’t a bad father, that he loved his kids, put them first, and was willing to die for them (and did!).
And it’s like... well yeah, nobody doubted whether he loved his kids or would be willing to die for them. But that doesn’t make him a good parent to them. It’s not just that Sam and Dean were latchkey kids who had to raise themselves. I mean most of my generation were latchkey kids who at least partially raised themselves (waves in gen x). They weren’t left for a few days in a comfortable and safe home with resources and neighbors to call if they needed help and plenty of food to eat. Dean KNEW what his father was doing when he left them behind, that there was always a chance he wouldn’t ever come back, and sometimes he DIDN’T come back when he said he would, or didn’t leave them with resources to fend for themselves without him.
(even JDM didn’t remember having come back in 1.09 Home, wherein he completely ignored Dean’s tearful, terrified pleas for help, let his kids almost die in the home where his wife had been killed, already knew far more about what was really going on than he was telling them-- ostensibly for their own protection despite the fact they both nearly died in this episode-- and then didn’t contact them again for weeks afterward... so yeah I think his memories are a bit hazy on how awful John was as a parent, even in s1)
The show depicted their childhoods as largely adrift, cut off from society in general, and forced to be silent about the circumstances of their lives. In addition, John “trusted Dean” to take care of Sam in ways that NO parent should-- to keep ALL of the supernatural stuff secret from Sam, leaving Dean to feel like a failure at age 12 when Sam learned the truth... and leaving Dean to feel like a failure at like age 9 when he disobeyed a direct order after days alone in a motel terrified that John would never come back, when a monster broke into their room and nearly killed Sam-- and then he had the nerve to passive-aggressively give Dean the chance to “correct” that mistake years later with nothing more than some texted coordinates to a town where the same monster was killing kids again... like... this is SEASON ONE of the show, not some later retcon that somehow changed our impression of John.
Sure, TO JOHN, IN JOHN’S MIND, he was doing the best he could for his kids in horrific circumstances. And I get why JDM feels this sympathy for the character he played, because he had to portray it. And I do not doubt that John loved his kids.
That doesn’t make him A Good Father.
That’s the disconnect here. Defend John’s love for his kids, but heck... his actions are understandable in his broken, revenge-driven mind, but not defensible in any way. That makes him a good CHARACTER, not a good father. And I appreciate that Rob and Rich, and even Jensen... and yeah even JDM a little bit, trying to make that point.
There’s also comments about what JDM was whispering to Jensen at the end of the episode-- which we the viewers find out the truth about at the beginning of 2.10 Hunted, when Dean tells Sam what John’s final words to him were: That Dean needed to save Sam, and if he couldn’t, then he’d have to kill Sam. That reveal is a gut punch to the audience, not only for us sympathizing with Sam for learning this after so long, but for Dean and the fact he’d been carrying this terrible secret and this horrific burden his father laid on him in the moments before he knew he was gonna die because he sold his soul to a demon-- along with literally their only weapon against that demon-- to save Dean...
And Jensen and JDM were both laughing over some of the inappropriate things JDM whispered to him for the first few takes of the scene. Nothing was scripted there, he was just told to pretend to whisper something in Dean’s ear. They were struggling to remember what Kim Manners eventually told John to whisper to Dean, and didn’t quite recall the exact language. One of them said something implying that Sam wasn’t really Dean’s brother before getting pretty close to what the actual reveal was in 2.10.
Now, I need to remind people (or inform folks who haven’t listened to this podcast yet) that at the beginning of the episode JDM and Jensen both said they’d just rewatched this episode for the first time in a very long time, and didn’t completely remember what it was about. Understandable, they filmed it in 2006, you know? long time ago! They didn’t remember what had come before it, or after it, either. I mean, I don’t remember what I was doing in 2006, either... wait... I went to the Daytona 500 that year... I think... pretty sure... wait... i moved into this house i’m currently sitting in that year. that’s a pretty big thing not to remember lol. whatever, point is, their memories are foggy on the details.
Now I found this pretty interesting, that they essentially DID remember what they were told John would be whispering in Dean’s ear here, which wasn’t written in the script but was clearly already planned as The Big Plot Arc of the season leading up to Dean eventually saving Sam by selling his own soul and thinking (hoping) that it truly DID save Sam from the vague Dark Destiny that John’s warning had implied he was doomed for otherwise.
I found it interesting that Jensen knew that big secret from the season premiere and literally did carry it with him until he revealed that truth to Sam nine episodes later. Kudos to him. Early s2 is an emotional wrecking ball for Dean. Though... that describes most of the series, too, I guess...
But hilariously, in the most awful of ways, at the end of the podcast Richard Speight went on a little headcanon journey that took the totally wrong takeaway from their little trip down misremembered memory lane, and had somehow latched on to the (totally wrong) comment about Sam not really being Dean’s brother as having been the true statement. He and Rob were like omg REALLY?! Because all these years I thought they were brothers! That’s like the premise of the show! Are they not brothers?! Did Mary have a demon baby?
And the whole time I’m listening to this, I’m driving, and I’m yelling at the radio NO! NO NONE OF THAT IS TruE?! WTF?!
I mean for folks who might not believe that, the rest of canon proves it just fine. But it sort of reminds me of fandom in general, where we’re all playing this long weird game of telephone with misremembered snippets from years and years ago, and it often leads to either the fuzzy haze of nostalgia creeping in where long debunked nonsense like this can instantly become fact(ish) again with a few misspoken words, or the rehashing of old drama that was put to bed years ago.
And sometimes it’s just nice to be able to sit back and laugh about it.
(while also still reminding myself that it’s a bunch of bunk)
Dean Winchester | Supernatural 2.10
Aah, Hunted. The truth of John’s final order to Dean finally comes out, and this episode goes to prove exactly why it took him so long to tell Sam. Their behaviors and actions in this episode, now that I’m really thinking about it, kind of set the groundwork for my tag sam sympathizes and Dean empathizes, even if the first post in that tag is my rant about 9.14... (i just reread that post and it goes a long way to explaining my thoughts about these two morons and their disgustingly unhealthy codependency, so it’s worth a read if for nothing else than to understand the pov from which i talk about them and the show).
Gordon Walker returns to again be humiliatingly bested by Sam and Dean, and we learn Jo has chosen to go out hunting on her own. So it’s not all just miscommunication and tantrums. :’D
Things referenced in this week’s episode:
The Superwiki page for this episode
My tag for this episode
specifically this post
and this one
Casting sides for Ava Wilson
And while we’re here, the ONE significant bit in this script that didn’t make it into the episode (the show and this podcast both lol...) is a little bit that would seem to provide motivation for Ava to ditch out on her fiancée and dive headfirst into the demon army hunger games, thus giving her disappearance at the end of this episode a more powerful ambiguous possible meaning. As aired, the episode leaves us with the assumption that Ava was content to return to her old life, eager to get back to her little bubble of personal happiness, but this one tiny bit of the casting sides script sheds just the tiniest bit of doubt that that was actually the case:
This is right after they steal Scott’s psych files. The scene as aired cuts right after Ava says, “I’m awesome!” at the top of this image.
[ID, beginning after the “I’m awesome!” line. Sam looks up at Ava. She’s giddy, grinning from ear to ear. SAM: You’re serious? AVA: Oh my god, I felt like I was in “The Sting.” That was the most fun I’ve had in my LIFE! Sam raises an eyebrow. SAM: Huh. AVA: What? SAM: Nothing. It’s just... you’re getting married in two months, and THIS is the most fun you’ve ever had? Ava’s smile fades. Oh shit, he’s right.
Kinda makes her look like she’s about to seriously reevaluate her entire life, giving credence to the read that maybe she was in a bit of a spiral, making her even more vulnerable to taking Azazel up on the whole Demon Powers thing we discover about her at the end of the season. But it was cut...
Alrighty then! With a final apology for just how long this episode ran (my goal is always to keep them under 100 minutes, and I squeaked this one in under the wire, even after cutting about 40 minutes from it >.>), listen now on AnchorFM or wherever you enjoy podcasts.
2x10 - Hunted
