I’m in Hawaii, y’all. My sense of the time zones are so effed up that I feel like today is yesterday. And maybe it is. Anyway, whatever time it is around the globe, I do know one thing. It’s Thursday. Or at least it is here. Mahalo.
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Sheila, I love that gif.
I thought it was great. Stuff I liked-
-Sam getting angry about God. Yesssss. This is what I wanted and didn’t get in All In The Family.
-Dean’s hideous sweater.
-Dean trying to casually vault over the gate and ending up stranded. Like….. ‘HUUUURK.’ And Sam not even commenting.
-Sam’s friendship with the girl was lovely.
-Mr. Ketch is… tailing them?
-Priest costumes!
-The teaser was great.
One quibble. Why are the family getting all squiffy about ‘papists’ if they’re Catholic?
Okay, so it wasn’t just me that was thrown by the derogatory “papist” and then crossing themselves.
Also why hadn’t the social worker demand to do an autopsy on Magda when she supposedly died? I’m pretty sure that IRL they wouldn’t have just accepted “she died of pneumonia and we buried her out back.”
Other than those couple of quibbles, I really enjoyed how the episode reflected and refracted what was going on in our boys’ hearts.
I was intrigued by Sam losing his cool with the mom. I am thinking he’s pretty riled up about Lucifer in the wind, and still cranked at God as well. He was hoping his visions were from God last year, and the lazy so-and-so couldn’t bother to lift a finger to help him.
I got more than a little Carrie vibe with the psychic daughter and crazy religious mom. I hope Mr. Ketch dreams of a hand popping out of the grave to drag him to Hell.
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//Priest costumes!//
Oh my God YES!
This episode was creepy as fuck, and visually so dark, so beautiful. What a nightmare! There was a lot of things I loved – Mr. Ketch is not one of them, despite the motorcycle.
All the actors were great – loved the guy at the morgue. It feels so good when SPN remembers that even the smallest roles should be played by good actors (yeah, angels and demons, I’m looking at you).
Sam keeps being locked up in basements, this season.
The relationship between the brothers has really evolved. Something shifted when Dean came back from being a Knight of Hell, right?
I’m loving season 12 so far.
//It feels so good when SPN remembers that even the smallest roles should be played by good actors// YESSSSS. One-off characters are so well cast. The convenience store guy in Black is STILL my favorite though. “Uh, porn?”
The Magda actress was so good. They’re great at casting kids.
Basements! Hmm. This time he was even locked up with ‘the devil’. (Loved the ‘No, you’re really not.’)
/The relationship between the brothers has really evolved. Something shifted when Dean came back from being a Knight of Hell, right?/
It feels much stronger. I think Baby was a turning point, too.
Great episode all the way around (except that odd bit about papists and crossing themselves AND we can throw in the self-flagellation as a bit of extreme medieval Roman Catholicism, right?)
Priest outfits would elevate any episode, but Sam recognizing Aramaic on the fly? Oh my.
We keep getting these great cinematic shots going down into creepy basements this season. I got goosebumps from how the camera moved through the door, down the stairs, across the floor to show us Magda’s face. Makes me wonder if there is a broader theme they are communicating? About families and things/secrets that are hidden.
I may be the only one but Mr Ketch should be very interesting to watch. Obviously he and BMoL are hard-core purists in their views on monsters. For a group that prides itself on systems and maintaining order, they sure relish torture and pain. In light of how the Winchesters are pulling together as a team (although it does remind me of Sheila’s analogy of The Defiant Ones), Mr Ketch appears as a solid and immovable object, a villain that will unite them even more as a team than angels or demons ever did, perhaps because of his humanity and how it’s a dark mirror to theirs.
/I may be the only one but Mr Ketch should be very interesting to watch/
You’re not the only one! The fact that they’re hiding his face gives me hope- a sign that they’ve cast well and know it, perhaps.
Right? There’s been no casting announcement or pics yet and his face hidden so purposefully, so I hope it’s because of an amazing casting choice. Would love to see a Harvey Keitel type ala Pulp Fiction. Fingers crossed, Wren!
I don’t hate Mr. Ketch. I’m just… not sold yet. I think after the end of last season, I’m a bit distrustful, you know?:)
I really enjoyed their argument over Vince’s music, lol. But the real absence of noticable music in the episode was… unbalancing. There were a couple notes played somewhere but the episode in general seems a bit empty without the musical background. Wonder if they did that on purpose?
So many parallels between the crazy religious family and the Winchesters, feels like the Benders episode a bit. This really spikes my interest, I want to see where they are going to drive the story with this.
Hate seeing Dean fall into that forgiving and understanding any crap his family throws at him mode. I liked his “thirteen year old girl” bitchiness, he was entitled to it. Mary ripped his freaking heart out and did the Mexican hat dance on it! He can and should be “cranky”, but Sam makes him fall back into line. Back to being the all-forgiving, all-understanding family whipping boy. Ugh, that frustrated me!
//Hate seeing Dean fall into that forgiving and understanding any crap his family throws at him mode//
But he didn’t share Mary’s text with Sam, so his default setting is still “secret.” So when he’s thinking, when he’s making a conscious effort, he’s able to behave differently. But the quick reactions are still the same as always. Pretty much how habit works in real life. Gee, think there will be consequences for all that?
Am I the only one who wants the annihilation of the BMoL? Or at least a spell to repel them at the coasts and airports? It’s kinda fun to have villains that you just hate again.
//But he didn’t share Mary’s text with Sam, so his default setting is still “secret.”// One step forward, two steps back, since he made the effort to reach out to Mary but then sat on the response to Sam.
Quite frankly, I was surprised that Dean acquiesce so quickly to send her a text like that, because it seemed more like it would have been Sam in his role as little brother and peacekeeper. And how angsty was that message – should I call you MARY?
Perhaps he is growing exponential in maturity as he struggles with all of this. Amara is a very interesting parallel, as someone who was stunted in their emotional development, put into a holding pattern, because of a perceived family need, now being asked to understand why.
/should I call you MARY?/
I took that to mean he was looking for a way to get her back. I thought more of need than angst or passive-aggressiveness.
Which could be growing up, to acknowledge his need. To Mom. Okay, maybe not growing up.
I was surprised at that, too. But less so as I ponder it.
That’s so interesting to think of his question as possibly being passive-aggressive. I can see someone reading it that way. I don’t think that’s how he meant it though: I think he was just trying to show his mother that he was willing to be whatever she needed, even if she wanted them to view her as just another woman instead of as their mom.
I agree with Barbara on Dean defaulting to forgiving anything and everything. (BTW, in early seasons, it seems like Bobby was often lecturing and scolding him about going after his brother, not giving up on his brother, seeking his brother, etc. no matter what he did – like beat him up and desert him for Ruby. I just don’t remember Bobby giving the same lectures to Sam.)
BMoL are already driving me nuts. I want the Winchesters to make those self-righteous bastards fall right off that high horse they’re riding! It’s good that the show can still produce a villain that gets viewers involved.
//the episode in general seems a bit empty without the musical background. Wonder if they did that on purpose?// Barbara – That’s an interesting thought. Perhaps because the subject was a family off the grid – no music, no tv, no pop culture – that they left it out on purpose? (There was some annoying background music. the episode was already tense enough that it was rather distracting.)
Maybe you are right. But I miss great song choices they used to make. Their absence is very noticable. Four episodes in with not a single memorable song to add to my playlist is harsh!
I did like the Sunday School songs that the girl in the basement was singing though! “I Have the Joy, Joy, Joy, Joy Down in My Heart” was a song that I sang as a little girl. I was happy to see the authenticity of that little detail (especially after the shocking crossing themselves but slamming “papists”). Was the other one “Joshua Fought the Battle of Jericho”? I sang that one in Sunday School too.
13 year old girls are getting a bum rap. First it was the demon who clearly found being hormonal more interesting than the hohum, reformed hipster he was currently occupying. Then Dean texting ‘Mom’ and likening his mixed emotions to a 13yog. Last week he was 4, this week 13. Is Dean ‘growing up’ before our eyes like Amara?
Seriously I liked the story a lot. I agree with the above – priest costumes (thank you!), creepy basements, morgue guy, sicko mom, DaVinci code super psychic daughter, and even the potentially interesting Mr. Ketch (really starting to hate him).
However… I usually like when MOTW ties in SUBTLY with the emotional arc, but going from last week’s emotional bomb to “we texted and it’s all cool” is jarring and derailing to what they started building up emotionally.
Yeah, I thought emotional tie-ins to their situation with Mary were very non-subtle; sort of hit you in the face with it.
Fully agree with these comments. I really can’t complain about the much-needed character development, but the turnaround from Dean’s reaction at the end of last week’s episode to the end of this latest episode was way too fast for my taste. I also loved when Sam lost his cool with the mum this week and thought it was a giveaway of his own (more well-hidden) frustrations about Mary leaving, but then nothing came of it.
This is about the episode “The One You’ve Been Waiting For”
This one felt very weird to me – like it couldn’t decide if it was funny or serious. The subject was serious, but it took a turn somewhere and I started looking at it differently. When the younger Nazi started complaining about how terrible Christmas was in a household run by a Thule. Then the actor who played Hitler 2.0 was really over the top after the blood transfusion. Also, I read that the actor from “Everybody Hates Hitler” was returning; I liked him so I was eager to see him again. He had about 4 lines and gone. Oh well. Also, where was Mr. Ketch at the end, to take out that Thule kid? There are other nitpicky things, but I’m not gonna bash this.
I had high hopes when I saw that it was directed by the same woman who directed “Red Meat”, but the episode didn’t make an impact on me – this is not one I care to rewatch – deleted it off my DVR.
I did like the brother interaction though – Sammy bringing Dean a pie. Oh, my sweet Sam.
The new one was a bit of a crack episode. Brother interaction was pretty cute. Dean like a little kid in the antique store, and Sam coming back with: “Maybe let’s not touch anything until we figure out if this stuff wants to kill us or not?”
Also, excellent LEGS ep (hell, this whole season has been so good for that). Ellie looked so tiny next to Sam that I couldn’t help but think of her as a child and had to remind myself a few times that she was an adult. A+ to Nina the director for shooting Sam in that one scene looking up from the table. So very tall from that angle.
I didn’t care for the last episode and wondered if they had deliberately scheduled it for election week – because they assumed HRC would win, so that the resurrection of a white supremacist dictator would seem funny – like “whew, that was a close one” to their American audience, and that Dean killing said dictator would have a “Hell yeah we just conquered the enemy too” feeling. Maybe the airdate was a coincidence (although I doubt it). Either way, it didn’t seem funny at all airing last week. In fact, it felt tone-deaf and I could barely get through it. Any other week …
I wasn’t going to say anything and I’ve had a longtime ban on discussing politics here – but not this week. Not this week. I probably won’t say anymore about this one.
That sounds like a reasonable reason for this episode’s unfortunate timing. All the live Tweeters commented on the horrible topic given the election results. Your explanation makes sense. Sadly this episode will always resonate as a big *thunk*. Aside for the bad timing in history, the episode itself seemed disjointed. Funny moments interspersed with WTH moments. Moving on to the rest of the season.