Supernatural Season Finale

I was trying to remember just when I started watching Supernatural. I know I saw the first DVD of the first season and went out and bought the first season for myself. And I didn’t get to finish it before the second season started, so I was recording those shows on the VCR (yes, my love of SPN predates my love of Tivo). 

That had to be 2003, I guess, and my passion knew no bounds. SPN was appointment TV. I had T-shirts and a messenger bag and kitchenware, for crying out loud. As the mythology got more twisty, my husband started enjoying the show more--and I less. I own every season on DVD but never even opened the last two. And this last season, with so much of what I loved about the show stripped away, I would even forget it was on until I saw it on the Tivo. That made me very sad. 

While I’m happy for the actors and writers to get another season, I think it’s time for me to say good-bye to the show, and maybe go back and rewatch those DVDs that made me love it years ago. 

I’m so glad to have been a part of the Supernatural Sisters and I thank all of you who visited!

So, onto the season finale...

Wow, there’s a lot of THEN going on. Nearly the entire song of “Wayward Son.”

Crowley is trapped in Dick Roman’s office. I so love Crowley. He’s so nonchalant about his blood being the key to everything. Dick offers Crowley Canada, gives him a vial of blood from a regular demon to give to Sam and Dean, telling them it’s his. Crowley goes for it and produces a contract so long it rolls onto the floor. He pulls out a magnifying glass and says, “I do so love this part, don’t you?”

Now to Sam and Dean, in search of a righteous bone. They flick on the radio long enough to hear a news team talking about stocks and Dick Roman and that he’s holed up in Sucrecorp. Meanwhile Bobby, in the body of the maid, learns the same thing.

Sam and Dean enter a mausoleum or something, reading biographies of nuns to figure out who is the most righteous while Crowley and Roman hammer out the details of the contract, whcih takes them all night. 

Okay, this jumping back and forth is making writing this hard. Dean and Sam cast the spell, but nothing happens. Then there’s a knock at the door and here comes Meg. Apparently Emo Boy (Castiel) zapped her back from the other side of the world. Dean walks out to Castiel, who’s listening to “Vincent” in the car. (I didn’t know that. My husband supplied it.) Castiel is worried about monkeys being used for cosmetic testing. And, wow, does Jensen get better looking every year or what?

Castiel comes in and sniffs the righteous bone, and correctly identifies the nun it belongs to. Castiel’s been waiting to hear from the garrison, but when he went to look for them, they’re all dead. If any are alive, they’re in hiding. He suspects Leviathans. Dean and Sam are worried about Kevin. 

Meg notes the supplies on the counter and Dean and Sam say they’ve summoned Crowley, but he didn’t show up, but then he does, of course. He confronts Castiel, and asks why he’s still alive.

“I don’t know,” Castiel says.

Rain Man Castiel is going on about insects being the reason he hasn’t gone back to heaven, since insects are creating miracles every day. Crowley hands over the vial, but Sam is suspicious. Crowley admits his deal with Roman, and tells them the vial is his. The brothers don’t know if they should believe him but take the vial.

And here comes the maid/Bobby, with a newspaper with Roman’s face and what looks like a knife wrapped in paper. She touches something in the back of a truck and Bobby is cast out of her body. It’s iron. She begs him to let her go, but he sees Roman’s picture and possesses her again.

Meanwhile, Dick and his assistant are walking through the halls with their smartphones and talking about 3 rules to contract negotiations: 1) bring breath mints, 2) get it in writing 3) have a plan for when they screw you.

Poor little prophet boy Kevin is locked in a room and they bring him a pretty blonde girl who doesn’t seem to know why she’s there.

Sam and Dean are casting the spell when Cas returns with sandwiches that he made from farm products himself, including killing the pig for the ham. I’d forgotten they couldn’t eat processed foods. 

Dick opens a box with a severed arm and calls it Mr. Roman. I’m confused, and dang they’re jumping around a lot. They dress up the little blonde girl and bring food to Kevin, who says he’s a vegan. Then he tries to pick the lock of the room.

Dick Roman is holding a board meeting. “The last time we were in one room, it was inside that angel.” He talks about the slaughterhouses going online next month. Kevin overhears the plans and hurries for the exit, but of course he’s caught. In the board meeting, Dick introduces the little blonde girl to everyone. 

Outside, Dean and Sam have a feed to the Roman corporation and see that there are more than one Dick Roman. So he cloned himself?

They injected the girl with something and she spits up and collapses. They’re genetically....I don’t know. It’s science. I hate science. Something to do with breeding people to make them the best food source.

Outside Sucrecorp, Sam recognizes the maid from the hotel and knows it’s Bobby. He leaves Dean watching the feed and goes after Bobby. He warns Bobby he’s going to get the maid killed, and Bobby fights back, CHOKING Sam! He sees his own reflection in the side of a van and casts himself out of the maid, who collapses. Sam picks her up and takes her to the hospital.

Back at the cabin, Meg demands to know why they left when they were so close. Sam tells her, “Dick made more Dicks.” As Dean gives him a look, Cas wonders if they should get a cat. “Doesn’t this place feel one species short?” (He can have mine. She just peed on my new couch. Again.) 

Dean wants to know when Cas is going to help. But Cas doesn’t want to fight anymore. Dean demands that Cas clean up his mess, but Cas wants to play Twister, then disappears. Meg says, “Nice, you’ve scared off the Empire’s only hope.” Since the Leviathans were in Cas, he can see past the meat suits to the real Leviathans. 

Bobby appears and tells the boys they should have burned the flask. He’s jonesing to go back after Roman, an itch he can’t scratch out. He’s afraid of grabbing another poor bastard and getting them killed. He tells the boys when it’s their time, go. He thought he could outsmart the vengefulness.

The boys stand over a fire with Bobby’s spirit and the flask, and crap. Hard to type when I’m crying. There goes the flask--what the hell was it made of to melt so fast? And there goes Bobby, illuminating Dean’s face as he goes. Cas watches from the stairway.

After the commercial, Cas is setting up another board game when Dean asks him to be his wingman. Angel, get it? Wingman? OH YES THE IMPALA!! YES YES YES!!!! Just so you know my love for the Impala, my phone is called Metalliphone. 

Oh, there’s a conversation going on. Probably should pay attention. Cas feels cursed, that resurrection is punishment, worse every time. Dean still wants him on the team. Cas senses forgiveness in Dean’s speech. Cas agrees to do his best. 

Oh please play “Back in Black!” 

Huh, “Born to Be Wild.” Not the same. She drives like a tank, you can see it as she skids, then SLAMS THROUGH THE SUCRECORP sign. That is NO WAY TO TREAT MY CAR! Meg gets out with a bunch of Borax (I bought some of this the other day. It’s used in a lot of homemade cleaners on Pinterest.) Meanwhile Dean and Cas are sneaking in, trying to figure out which Dick is real. Meg is strutting around when someone comes up behind her and sends her flying. Apparently Crowley wants her back in hell. Now.

Sam gets to where Kevin is held and Kevin says they can’t leave until they blow up the lab because Dick’s going to kill all the skinny people (THANK YOU, Kevin. THAT I can understand.) Sam agrees to blow up the lab. 

Dick is in the lab taste-testing the coffee creamer when his scientist gets beheaded. Dean and Cas confront Dick, and Dean stabs him with a weapon but nothing happens. Dick demands to know if they really thought they could trump him. Dean shows him a second weapon while Cas comes up behind him and stabs him through the neck with a third. Dick starts pulsing--he’s a bomb! No one moves, and he explodes! Black slime everywhere. 

Kevin wants to go, worried about more chompers. Crowley appears and tells them he has an army of demons outside. “Cut off the head and the body will flounder.” They’ve had one king and don’t know what to do without him. He tells Sam they’re just another animal, hard to kill, but the Winchesters love a challenge. They need to keep them from organizing. 

Dean and Cas are gone, and Crowley’s minions take Kevin. Crowley won’t tell Sam where Dean and Cas are, and he leaves Sam in the middle of the slimy lab, alone.

Dean is on the ground in the forest, and Cas orders him to wake up. He’s in Purgatory, where all monsters go to prey upon each other. Dean wants to know how to get out but Cas thinks they’ll be ripped to shreds. Creatures with red eyes appear around Dean and Cas disappears. 

The brothers are alone...and apart. 

Okay, that was a pretty awesome, if busy episode. What did you think?

Supernatural Love

Once upon a time, I fell in love with a show. And like any kind of love, I wanted to share news of it with others. So when I realized there were other romance writers who also loved this show, the idea for a group blog devoted to said show was born.

The show in question was Supernatural, of course, and what a ride the blog has been. We've talked about monster-of-the-week episodes versus big story arc episodes, whether or not we liked the females cast on the show, our favorite hilarious quotes, how many times the Winchester boys could possibly say the word "dude" (sometime I'm going to watch all the episodes and count this), and "OMG, where are they going with this storyline?!" We've laughed at "bitch/jerk", "idjits" and how the boys always seem to stay in the crappiest motels known to man. We've squeed when we met Jared, Jensen, Misha, etc. We've increased our love for classic rock songs. We've snorted at the funny outtakes and goofy videos online (seriously, I'll never be able to hear "Eye of the Tiger" again without thinking of Jensen). We've cried when beloved characters have been killed (Bobby -- wah!). We've just developed a deep and abiding love for the show, its creators, the actors, basically anyone affiliated with it in any way. We're the Supernatural tribe, and that's okay. More than okay. It's pretty dang cool.

Thank you for being part of our tribe. So I'll sign off with something I hope will make you laugh. I know it does me every time I see it.

http://youtu.be/HsyMtYoSkC0

More Than Entertainment

Most TV shows have "water cooler" moments, where people who enjoy watching chat excitedly about something that happened on the previous night's episode.

Many also have devoted fandoms, often young people, who create fanfic and fan art and fanvids and so on.

But very, very few achieve the all-ages cult following that Supernatural has achieved.

How many TV shows have worldwide conventions featuring guest stars who were on one episode? The opportunity to meet some of those actors, all of whom are tremendous personalities, gave me some of the best memories of my life.

How many TV shows are responsible for building dental clinics and refurbishing orphanages in Haiti? Misha Collins, of course, gets all the credit for turning the fandom into a force for good, but the fact that the fandom exists made Random Acts possible.

Who would have guessed that Jared Padalecki could turn a birth announcement into $80,000 for St. Jude Children's Hospital?

"Experts" are always talking about how technology and the Internet and social media are distancing us from our communities, but this blog has helped me make great friends in Texas, Colorado, Tennessee, and Georgia, and connect with fans in Brazil and Australia and Russia and South Africa. How can you put that in a negative light?

Watching a good TV show is relaxing and entertaining. Talking about it is fun. Dissecting, analyzing, debating, and speculating is fantastic, and it has made the last few years some of the best. It's stimulated my creativity and helped me write books I love, and even better, stimulated other authors' creativity so I had great books to read.

I love you all, and I thank you from the bottom of my heart for sharing all of this with me. Trish, Tanya, MJ, and Terri, no matter where our paths take us, whenever I hear Carry On, Wayward Son, I will think of you.

After, of course, I imagine Sam and/or Dean Winchester with no shirts on.

Waving Goodbye

The problem with going third after other intelligent, articulate ladies is that it feels like goodbye has already been pretty well summed up! Nonetheless, let me add my (cyber)voice to theirs in saying thank you so much to everyone who has ever visited or left comments on the blog. It's been fun--which may explain how the time has flown by so quickly! I can't believe how many seasons the show has been on (and, correspondingly, how many years have passed in my real life). I have to say, sometimes I feel a twinge of surprise that the show's still on the air and frown at some of the changes (such as the glaring absence of the Impala for most of this season!) But there are still really funny episodes (such as the recent The Girl with the Dungeons and Dragons Tattoo) and episodes that make me tear up (such as when we said "goodbye" to Bobby) and moments that surprise me. I will definitely keep watching! (I will also be reading Terri's Hollyweird, partly inspired by SPN, as soon as I meet my looming deadline! Have you bought your copy yet?)

Thanks for joining us here! May your apocalypses be few and your musical playlist always be kick ass.

A Sad Adieu

I’m so sad to be bidding Supernatural Sisters adieu. Each one of us will be saying goodbye this week. I just want to say how much I’ve enjoyed the camaraderie of my sister fangirls. It has been a pleasure to share our love of the show, to debate the pluses and minuses of each episode, to better get to know the SPN community and, of course, to rhapsodize about our love for Jensen and Jared.

As writers we may view the show from a slightly different perspective. We know what it takes to build three dimensional characters you can fall in love with, the finesse necessary to write believable relationships the viewer or reader will willingly invest in, the art of escalating conflicts to keep things from being staid while furthering a character’s story arc, the challenge of keeping storylines fresh, the skill of juggling humor, horror and human emotion and the thirst to push our boundaries as artists. The writers of SPN do all of this and so much more which is why we became the Supernatural Sisters.

As the show has grown and evolved, so have we. It has been a privilege and a thrill to see my sisters achieve so many successes. And I know there are tons more to come. I only have three regrets. One, we never got to do that set visit. Two, Jim Beaver never got back to me with that interview. And three, we never had a Supernatural Sisters get-together at a con. Maybe we could still pull off that last one….

In the meantime, thank you to our readers, the authors who’ve guest blogged and the Supernatural super stars who’ve granted us interviews.

I’ll still be watching. Nothing short of the actual Apocalypse could keep me from finding out how things finally end for Sam and Dean Winchester. 'Til then, see you later idjits.

Love & hugs, Terri Clark

Supernatural Sisters Must Say Goodbye

It's hard to believe we've had this blog going for over three years. When we started, we were five authors early in our careers, super-diehard fans for Supernatural, eager to discuss all the aspects of the show we loved so much.

We've had recaps, guest posts, interviews with guest stars and related celebrities (or "celebrity-adjacent" as Harry of Ghostfacers would say :) ). We've run contests and debated storylines with some of our favorite fellow fans, and we've loved every minute of it.

Unfortunately, times have changed. Supernatural is continuing, but alas, the Sisters cannot. We've exhausted much of our passion for the show, but more importantly, the demands and responsibilities of our careers and families have grown so much that we aren't doing this blog justice.

We're not disappearing completely. The blog will stay live indefinitely, as some of our most popular posts are three years old, and we're always eager to bring new members into the fandom.

Our books will continue, too. Though we've tried not to make this a place for Blatant Self-Promotion (or BSP), we've occasionally mentioned new releases, especially those that were inspired by the characters or worldbuilding on the show. We invite you to check us out online, chat with us on Facebook and Twitter, and, if you are so inclined, read our books. :)

This week, we will each have a post saying what the show and this blog have meant to us, culminating in our final episode recap/review. We hope you'll all comment on that recap so we can share our final episode with you.

Thank you so much, every single person who's ever visited Supernatural Sisters, but especially our regular readers and commenters. The journey we've taken with a TV show has been far richer and more exciting with all of you along for the ride.

Trish Milburn/Tricia Mills
Tanya Michaels/Tanya Michna
MJ Fredrick
Terri Clark
Natalie J. Damschroder

There Will Be Blood

Argh! Something is wonky with my TiVo, and it was recording a rerun of Deadliest Catch instead of the first run episode of Supernatural. I also realize that I've missed a couple of other episodes. I was confused about how and when Bobby made a reappearance. And after reading Tanya's recap of the episode with Felicia Day, I may have said many ugly words to my TiVo. I love Felicia Day! Wah! Note to self -- do a Google search to figure out why TiVo is acting wonky.

Anyway, I realized what was going on when I started watching at about the 25-minute mark. As you can imagine, I was confused for a while. I came in at the point where Sam and Dean are talking to a vampire on a bench drinking what looks like a Big Gulp. Evidently, something wonky is going on because the vamp doesn't act like a vamp. I find out later that Dick Roman and his Leviathan buddies are putting something in the vamps' food supply (??) that's making them dumb. Later Edgar the Leviathan reveals that they plan to take out the vamps, werewolves, shifters, basically anything that feeds on humans so all the humans are left for the Leviathans. Wow, I'll be so glad when the Leviathans are gone.

Anyway, after a little online research, I figure out that there are three things that Sam and Dean need to make a weapon to kill the Leviathans. Something from Castiel, something from Crowley, and blood from the Alpha vampire. There's also a girl named Emily who Sam and Dean are helping, evidently because she'd been kidnapped as a child by the Alpha. Only she's playing Sam and Dean, and she's really on the Alpha's side. Dean, being Dean, makes a smart-ass comment about Stockholm syndrome.

When the Alpha's henchmen grab Sam and Dean, the boys try to tell the Alpha what Dick and his crew are up to, but the Alpha insists he's on good terms with Dick. But you see a hint of question in his expression, so it's not a surprise when Edgar shows up and the Alpha brings up what the boys said. Fighting ensues, and the boys, who have managed to free themselves, cut off Edgar's head. The Alpha gives Sam and Dan a glass of his blood for their weapon and sends them on their way, but not before agreeing to let a little boy he has taken go with them.

Meanwhile, back at the motel, Bobby jumps into a cleaning lady's body, figures out the code to the safe that holds his flask (to which his spirit is evidently attached), and heads off to presumably kick Dick Roman's ass. You know, for killing him. When Sam and Dean return to find Bobby and the flask gone, they worry about where Bobby is and what he's going to do, but they have no idea where to look for him. They talk about being partway to being able to take down Roman, and how the plan rests with Crowley now. "What could go wrong?" Dean asks.

Cut to a scene where Dick is calling up Crowley into a devil's trap and telling him they need to talk.

Word is that someone on the good side is going to bite it in the season finale, and I'm afraid it's going to be Castiel. I really don't want to see him gone for good, but then I want him and Bobby back to the way they were. My favorite episodes are the ones where Sam, Dean, Castiel and Bobby were working and wisecracking together. I miss that.

HOLLYWEIRD release

Yay! Today's the official release date of my Supernatural inspired YA novel, HOLLYWEIRD. This paranormal romcom is about two teens who win a trip to meet their favorite TV star only to realize he's the son of Satan and the lone person who can save them is a fallen angel working undercover as his personal assistant.

I got this idea by fantasizing about a visit to the SPN set. At one time the Supernatural Sisters were trying to arrange a tour. Alas, that didn't work out, but it certainly got my imagination running wild. Fortunately for me I found lots of information about Supernatural's set online and in the Supernatural magazines. I used those details to help create my fictional show's set.

Jensen was the model for the fallen angel, Jameson, and Jared inspired the sexy, but evil Dakota. There's a lot of little nods to SPN that fans will catch and the Supenatural Sisters each make a cameo during the set visit scene.

As you can imagine, I had a blast writing HOLLYWEIRD. I hope you'll consider checking it out and spreading the word to other Supernatural fans who might be interested.

Wishing you more halos than horns, Terri
www.terriclarkbooks.com

Season 8 and Revolution News

Of course, by now everyone knows Supernatural was renewed for an 8th season. I know a lot of people won't be happy about that. They don't want the show they used to love dragged out forever, to die a whimpering death.

No one will be surprised that I'm thrilled! I'm in the ever-shrinking minority who wants Sam and Dean as long as they'll give them to me.

Both camps will be excited, I hope, to hear that the new Eric Kripke show produced by JJ Abrams, Revolution, has gotten a series order by NBC. (As reported by Entertainment Weekly's Inside TV.)

So what do you think? Intrigued by this show about survivors of a no-power apocalypse? Or meh on the concept? Tell us where you stand!

"Reading is Fundamental" Supernatural Recap and Review

I was out late tonight, so I started watching late. I generally watch through once, then again with pausing to do my recap/review. But I don't have time for that this week, so I'm pausing at the commercials to write my impressions of each act.

So we open this episode with parallel storylines. Kevin Tran, a stereotypically driven Asian-American teenager, is following his rigid schedule and fretting about getting a perfect math SAT score and having nothing to say for his college application essay. In the meantime, Sam and Dean are holing up in another abandoned property, this time with their stolen goodies: Whatever Dick was so desperate to find with all his archeological digging.

I love that the boys wear safety glasses. I mean, they live the most reckless, death-defying lives... They don't wear seatbelts! But protect those eyes, kids.

Dean, ever subtle, strikes the hardened clay with a hammer. Which immediately kicks up a thunderstorm. After it happens again, he says, "Does that sound like 'wait, no, stop' to you?" Then he shrugs and does it anyway. As he pulls out an ancient tablet, Kevin Tran is possessed by something we've never seen before, and Cas awakens.

In the morning, Sam has found nothing about the item or the writing, which he doesn't recognize. But it caused very odd lightning storms and every woman within a month of her due date to go into labor. Bobby's around, but his juice was apparently sapped by the haunted house adventure, a good enough reason to explain why Jim Beaver didn't guest star in this episode.

Since Dick will be coming after the tablet, they agree to go to ground in Rufus's cabin. Before they can, though, Meg calls, says Cas is awake and different, and tells them to start driving.

In the meantime, Dick's right-hand man gets a call from his boss, for whom he seems to have little respect. "Strange, isn't it? That someone would choose to be named Dick?" He's been going over plans for a building, and says something about the line panicking when they turn the corner and see the blade assembly up ahead. I'm thinking they're building their human-processing plant.

Also in the meantime, Kevin Tran awakens in control of his body, but only enough to really panic that he's missing his test. Then his possessor takes over, and next thing we know, the day is over, he's in a suit and driving his mother's car to who-knows-where. He's with it enough to answer the phone and relay his orders (take the car, don't stop), but not enough to apparently comprehend what's going on. He's in a total trance.

Okay, on to Act II! :)

And OMG I want to just transcribe this whole scene. I died laughing! Cas is back in his trench coat. Despite Sam and Dean's concerns, he's pretty calm and happy, even though he claims he remembers everything. He plays "pull my finger" and blows out all the lights. And snickers!

He apparently turned into the kid from Touch. "It's all right there, the whole plan, there's nothing to add." He does manage to convey some relevant information. He heard a ping pierce him and wake him up. Sam shows him the tablet, and Cas is all, "Oh, of course. You were the ones. If someone was going to free The Word from the vault of the earth, it would be you two. I love you guys!" Group hug!

But wait, wait. This is the best part.

"Did you know a cat's penis is sharply barbed along its shaft? I know for a fact the females were not consulted about that."

And then this exchange:

Cas: "This is the handwriting of Metatron."

Sam: "Metatron! You're saying a Transformer wrote that?"

Dean: "No. That's Megatron."

Sam: "What?!"

Dean: "The Transformer. It's Megatron."

Sam: "What?!"

Cas. "Me-Ta-Tron. He's an angel. He's the scribe of God. He took down dictation when Creation was being formed."

I loved Sam's reaction. That's what I think whenever I hear his name! LOL Given Sam's research geekhood and all the religious texts they've had to consult, some might scoff that Sam had never heard of Metatron. But no one can know everything. And his repeated "What?!" is said in the manner of someone not used to knowing something, so I thought it was all in character.

Cas can't read it, though. It wasn't meant for angels. When Meg reaches for the tablet and the boys tell her to back off, Cas says "Don't like conflict" and disappears, dropping the tablet, which breaks.

Meg, annoyed by Sam's silence, takes off. He chases her, leaving the bag in the room. Of course, it's gone when he hears something and goes back. He chases Kevin Tran, and he and Meg stop him. But Kevin, who is again himself, has his arms locked around the bag. He literally can't let go.

I love the music in this episode. Very reminiscent of season one.

Dean goes to find Cas, and wants his help with the Leviathans. He asks Cas if he remembered what he did. Cas picks up the game of Sorry and shakes the box, laying out the board and pieces in half a second. "You go first," he tells Dean, a little pointedly. They play, Cas being all philosophical and stuff. Dean gets pissed and sweeps the board. He wants Cas to take ownership for what he did. Cas seems to keep deflecting. I'm not sure if he's actively implying that Dean's as culpable as he is. If so, he's not wrong. Dean did contribute to Cas's path. He ignored him, demanded help but offered none in return. But the thing is, Dean never stopped trying to fix whatever mistakes could be laid at his feet, so he's justified in his anger at Cas.

Kevin tells Sam and Meg the tablet is for him, he's supposed to keep it. When Sam has him open the bag, he heals the pieces. He can also "read" the text, in a manner of speaking. More like understand it. It talks about Leviathans. Sam wants to know how to kill them. But two angels appear. They call Kevin a prophet and are about to kill Sam and Meg (his demon lover—once you have a reputation...). But Cas sensed them and comes in, smiling. Hester and Anais seem shocked, maybe a little happy, a little angry. Cas can't give them what they're looking for, though. He gets flustered and awkward. Hester says, "You're insane." But Dean uses the old blood symbol and blows all the angels back to their corners, buying them a few hours. Kevin goes a little crazy himself, pushed to the limit by these nonstop revelations.

They go to the cabin, Meg bringing Cas back to them. He helpfully explains the angels from his garrison want to take the prophet to the desert to learn the word of God. Instead Dean takes Kevin to the basement ("Is this a sex torture room?") to translate the Word. Kevin freaks again (yay, someone who has realistic reaction to the supernatural! LOL). He's been reported missing and it's gone federal, and Meg has a couple of demons on her tail. She dispatches them (wow, equipped with an angel blade and a demon knife, this chick's got some serious survival focus!) and goes back to insist to the others that she's on their side. She says she figured out this world, that one has to have a cause, a reason to get up in the morning. She's simpler than they think. Her cause used to be YED and raising Lucifer, but things change. Now it's taking down the King. She insists Crowley is always the problem.

But killing the demons alerted the angels, who blast their way in. Cas and Dean try to convince them they'll take care of the prophet. Dean says they're trying to clean up an angel's mess, but doesn't out Cas. Cas backs him up. "Even after they begged and begged him not to." Hester wants none of it. She's furious about everything, and she's about to kill Cas when Meg kills her. Cas looks more than a little in love at this point.

Anais says these are strange times. Cas says they always were, and declines to go with him, saying he's not part of the garrison anymore.

Kevin has finished translating the "in case of emergency note" and the angels take him home to watch over him. Nice! Someone who has crossed the Winchester path and came out okay on the other side.

Meg's gone. Cas says she enjoys laying low.

Sam finds the recipe for slaying the Levs. "A bone of a righteous mortal washed in the three bloods of the fallen." They have to start with the blood of a fallen angel. Cas looks like he knew this all along, a little smug as he says, "You know me, always happy to bleed for the Winchesters." He hands over a bottle. Dean asks what he's going to do. "I don't know. Isn't that amazing?" Very.

I'm suspicious of this FBI guy. Yep, He's a goo-man. He kills both angels and turns into the right-hand man. I wish I could remember his name. Victor? Oh, man. I spoke way too soon about Kevin!

Whew, what a preview! The blood they need appears to be Crowley's and the alpha vamp's, but the vamp decides his interests lie on the other side. Yikes!

Only two episodes left! What did you guys think of this one?

Leviathans, Ghosts & Felicia Day!

This episode was so up my alley!!! Gore was minimal, geek references were aplenty, and I love guest star Felicia Day (although she has a tendency to die in stuff I'm watching, so I was very worried for her.) And I love Jim Beaver, so seeing him was great. (Not sure I'm on board with the writers bringing him "back" after such an emotional and perfect goodbye, but since they did, I will enjoy his guest spots when I can.)

The ep. opened with Dean swigging from the ghost-flask, and Bobby appeared, finally explaining the numbers he wrote on his death bed. Bobby gives us our first sci-fi/pop culture reference when he says Roman is building a slaughterhouse--and the meat will be Soylent Green. Apparently, Leviathans have decided to dumb people down (ala the Biggersons episode, which, ew) and herd them off for food. While the guys are digesting this (my apologies for using "digest" in the midst of the Soylent Green convo)Sam gets an email from Frank, whose blood-spattered trailer left us to believe he was dead. Which is exactly what his email confirms: "if you're reading this, I'm dead, and someone is attempting to hack my hard drive." But Frank was canny enough to install a GPS in his hard drive and Sam and Dean track it to inside Roman Enterprises, or as Dean puts it "in the middle of the Death Star."

Then we flash back a few hours to Felicia Day--whose name I think is Charlie but I forgot to write it down--going to work (at Roman Ent.) and jamming out to Walking on Sunshine on her headphones. I appreciated her geek dancing in the elevator because it's possible I myself have been known to do that. (Although you can't prove it.) She does some hacking on company time (and the company's much faster internet) and her cubicle neighbor is impressed. We get another, more subtle, Star Wars ref when he tells her "I love you," and she responds, "I know." Then she's called into her boss's office--where HIS boss, Dick Roman awaits. She worries that she's in trouble but Dick tells her he finds her hacking "adorable" but now it's time to hack something for him. Or else. She has three days to crack Frank's hard drive. When she returns to her desk, she tells computer neighbor, "The Eye of Sauron is upon me." Did I mention I am freaking loving the episode? (Although I am, of course, still worried about "Charlie's" life span because I literally watched something day before yesterday where she died. Again.)

There's some War Games repartee as she cracks the hard drive, summoning enough info to make her really nervous. Even though she doesn't think Frank's crazy Leviathan talk can be true, she's freaked enough to go home--where Sam and Dean await. They all pour Borax on themselves to prove none of them are Leviathans and they try to draft her to go inside and hack Roman's email. (There was an earlier suggestion from Bobby that they mail the flask into the building so he can take a lookie-loo, but Sam & Dean, already worried about him sticking around as a ghost, are afraid he'll go Vengeful if he comes face to face with Dick. Who shot him.)

Charlie freaks out at the magnitude of what she's about to do and Sam has to give her a pep-talk via the head-set about how she needs to kick ass like Hermione (causing Dean to comment, "Way to go, Dumbledore.") It's adorable, but not as good as when Charlie has to flirt with a guard and blanks (due to a combo of nerves and her being a lesbian) and DEAN has to feed her lines, telling Sam, "This NEVER happened." Amid it all was a great tattoo reference--Charlie has a Slave Leia straddling a 20 sided dice that she got while drunk at Comic-Con. Charlie turns up that Dick is expecting a very important delivery (and also that is password is w1nn1ng--ha!). The boys go to the private airport to swap out his delivery, giving us Sam and Dean in goggled bright orange vest doofusness, but Charlie's trapped in the building with Dick. Busted.

Who should come to her aid but ghost Bobby, who errs on the side of Vengeful?

The boys get Charlie out of the building, and I'm both surprised and jubilant that she lives. (Their final exchange outside a hospital: She tells them they can repay her by NEVER calling her again. "Peace out, bitches." And Dean calls her "the little sister he never wanted.")

So at the end of the day, score one for taking the piece of red clay that's for some reason important to Dick. But lose a point because now they're worried Bobby is going down a Bad Path. So there's probably carnage and sorrow to come, but at least I got one great episode that made me laugh and had Dean making a Veronica Mars reference. Did this episode make you guys happy, too, or was I alone in my geek gushing?

Guest Star Favorite has an Appearance on "Ghost Adventures"

I miss Ash. So I was happy to read Dread Central's report that Chad Lindbergh is going to be a guest investigator on this week's "Ghost Adventures" on the Travel Channel.

If you miss it tonight, check the schedule. It looks like a show that airs several repeats. Also, click the link above for the press release and some photos and videos as a sneak peek.

I Just Gasped Really Loud. BIG (HUGE!) Supernatural News!

My inbox was just flooded with news stories that Sera Gamble will be stepping down as showrunner and Jeremy Carver will take over.

Where the heck do we begin?!

First, the show seems almost guaranteed to have an 8th season. The new CW head had intimated as much, and Jared recently said so in an interview, and now they're announcing a new showrunner. Since they're close to filming the finale (if they haven't already), that's pretty strong evidence of a return.

Far cry from our held breath for seasons 2-5, huh? :)

Let's take a look at saying goodbye to Sera Gamble. I liked a lot of her early episodes. I liked her. I loved the show having a female showrunner, and thought it amusing that no one ever expected her to "girl" it up. In fact, we all feared how bloodthirsty she is...and she more than lived up to that fear. Some of the articles out there mention fan dissatisfaction with the "convoluted" plots of the last two seasons, but honestly, I don't think they were any more convoluted than Kripke's five-season arc and individual season mini-arcs. I thought a lot of the plot threads were clever.

No, the problem with Sera has been, of course, that she took away the things we loved most. She made Dean a dick in the truest sense of the word (ref. "Weekend at Bobby's" and his treatment of Cas). She killed every major character and took the car off the show. The humor got a little less sharp. So some of the things that were done well didn't necessarily hit us the same way because of all the rest of it.

Now let's see what Jeremy Carver brings to the table, beyond 60 episodes of Supernatural and 26 of Being Human. Here are the SPN episodes he actually wrote (source: IMDB):

Sin City
A Very Supernatural Christmas
*Mystery Spot
Long-Distance Call
*In the Beginning
Family Remains
*Death Takes a Holiday
The Rapture
Free to Be You and Me
*Changing Channels
Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid
*Point of No Return

The *s indicate some of my favorite episodes. To me, this bodes VERY well. If Carver can bring back the perfect blend of humor and wrenching emotion of Mystery Spot on a more regular basis, Season 8 could be a return to the show we've missed for the last two seasons.

And that's something very few shows of this age can achieve!

So what do you think? Joyful, annoyed, or cautiously optimistic? How do you feel about this announcement?

Supernatural's "Party on, Garth" and SQUEE Surprise!!!

THEN

Wow, I feel stupid. I never connected DJ Quall's awesome Garth with the "how are you still alive" hunter from "Weekend at Bobby's." Man, I love seeing Bobby, even in flashback.

NOW

This campfire thing reminds me a little of "Wendigo" even though they didn't do campfire ghost stories. (Coincidentally, That Haley Girl from "Wendigo" was on tonight's episode of Fringe!)

Anyone who saw the previews knows what's coming. Wasted Trevor sees/hears something in the woods. He runs off, and when his brother goes after him, he finds a gruesome scene. Nice touch with the down from his vest floating around.

Oh, yeah, Garth appears to Bell Biv Devoe's "Poison," which somehow fits him very well. He approaches two of the women from the campfire, who dis him until he throws his badge and gets amusingly sudden respect. I love when dorks rule! They tell Garth about the real Jenny Greentree. He salts and burns her: "You've been Garthed." Bell Biv Devoe come back, while Garth hits himself in the face with his jacket when he tosses it over his shoulder, and the small grave fire gets bigger and bigger. Love it!

Trevor's brother is getting drunk in the woods now. You don't have to have seen the preview to know something bad is going to happen. Do you think he has salt rounds in his shotgun? Oh, wait, I think that's a rifle. He's "hunting" his brother's killer, but he gets hunted.

Garth "hearts you more"--Number One (my oldest daughter) thinks he was talking to Becky. What do you think? Garth hears about Trevor's brother and is angry. "I Garthed her!"

Finally, we get to Sam and Dean. Dean's getting an update from the bitch Meg. Apparently, Cas is still catatonic or something close. Dean asks Sam how his custard is. Sam says it's getting better, but he feels guilty for passing on the crazy. Dean's phone interrupts him, and it's Garth. How did I know Dean wouldn't remember him right away?

Fed Dean and Fed Sam show up at the morgue, and Corporal Brown--James Brown, ha!--is there to pay respects to his cousin, but clearly doesn't know the victims were brothers. An exasperated Sam takes over, checking the files and doing quick research. Dean asks if he's allergic to a suit, but Garth just looks good in a uniform. Doesn't everyone?

Dean gets EMF when Garth hadn't, but the details point to monster chow rather than ghost. A witness says it was invisible, so Dean goes with invisible ghost werewolf. Sam finds Thighslapper Ale (beverage for douchebags), and the owner is the father to the dead brothers. Dean assures Sam that Garth grows on ya. (He does, Sam! Give him a chance!)

The manager of the brewery is the sister. The place is run by two guys, with a third partner recently dead. I'm going to quickly encapsulate the storyline here so I can get to the good stuff. Sam, Dean, and Garth trace clues and family intricacies to learn that:

Three partners in the business, two want to sell to a giant distributor, one doesn't, he committed suicide a couple of months ago. But he gave them a gift "that would show them I forgive them," a saki bottle from Japan containing an alcohol spirit that was programmed to go after the kids of the ousting partners. I don't know why it kills the wife/mother instead of the little girl who accidentally drank from her mother's screwdriver, but probably they had the girl witness the trauma instead of dying herself because they know my husband's rule about quitting shows that do harm to kids.

I love that Sam and Dean consult, what, a sushi chef? He reads the curse on the box (and Dean very nicely pays him for his time) and later helps Dean bless a samurai sword with spring water poured from a plastic bottle. Dirty, but it works! Garth, who's not as hapless as he seems, figures out that Ray's son is the company janitor. He also saves Sam and Dean by tazing Ray when he discovers Sam and Dean drunk in the office, watching security footage of the spirit being set free.

Garth goes to the company (drunk on mini bar bottles) and sees the spirit stalking the unrecognized son. Sam, who's been getting drunk while watching out for the older sister, has to take a cab to the company. Dean meets them there with the sword, but he's the only one sober enough to fight the thing, but too sober to see it. (Sam to Dean when they got drunk in the office: "Can you even get drunk anymore? It's kind of like drinking a vitamin." Another good line: Drunk Sam saying the spirit followed the kid to the place with all the thingies. Dean thought that was smart. I love drunk Dean!)

Garth gets drunk on one bottle of beer. "Party on Garth." He doesn't usually drink beer because it messes with his depth perception, especially when he skinny dips. LOL He gets the young daughter's story out of her with a sock puppet, Mr. Fizzles. He also figures out that Bobby's old flask set off the EMF meter.

And that's the stuff that's REALLY good. Garth thinks Bobby might be haunting them. Sam admits that after the beer disappeared, he used a talking board to try to contact Bobby. It didn't work, or he'd have told Dean. But during the battle, the spirit throws Garth through a wall (again) and Sam against a wall (knocking him out) and knocks the sword from Dean's hand. Dean's a bit desperate, with Sam knocked out, the kid useless, and the sword five feet away...until it slides across the floor, right into his hand.

Dean's convinced now. He thinks he's alone and begs Bobby to do something. God, Jenson does tortured well. Sam, however, still needs a haircut. I mean, Sam hears Dean, but nothing happens. Later, after they say goodbye to Garth (I love the hugs...and the music!), we have this huge buildup of anticipation as Sam confronts Dean about the Bobby thing. Dean tries to blow it off, calling it his imagination, but Sam pushes. Dean catalogs the sword, the beer, the page, the book. But Sam thinks regular people see people they've lost all the time, too. They're actually close to normal.

I'm dying here!

Dean says "who knows more about being a ghost than Bobby?" Of course Bobby would let them know. They leave the motel room...come on come on come on...the camera pans over...

BOBBBYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!

Dean goes back inside, and kills us by glancing around, landing his eyes on something, and saying "there you are." Bobby thinks he sees him, but Dean just came back for the flask.

"I'm right here, ya idjit!" A gray-looking, heartbroken Bobby ends with "Balls!"

GAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

But OMG, that preview! I can't believe we have to wait three more friggin' weeks!

I love being unspoiled. I don't know if there were hints in any of the interviews I avoided, but I had no clue he'd actually show up and prove right those of us who called "he chose to stay" from the last fadeout on "Death's Door."

As a classic episode, I liked this one. I like Garth (which means we'll get three episodes with him next season and then he'll die) and the new spirit and the down-and-dirty blessing ritual and even the way figuring out what was happening was kind of like an episode of Castle or something, with all the family intrigues and unseen connections.

But as a Bobby reveal, it was even better. I made some strangled screaming noises when it happened. I think my family was ready to perform CPR on me (or make me Cas's roommate).

After this next hiatus, we should get the last five episodes all in a row. Which is nice, but it makes me sad that it's almost over when it feels like it just started.

What did you think?

The Born-Again Identity

So, Sam’s hallucinating again, bad. He’s been up 5 days straight and runs into a junkie who offers to knock him out, while Satan taunts him. I bet Jared is really going to look like that now that he has a newborn. I do think Mark P is having fun with this role. Sam is running away from Satan and gets hit by a car.

He’s admitted for broken ribs and lacerations, but he’s been admitted to the psych ward. The doctor believes he’s having a psychotic episode. They’ve pumped him full of sedatives and he still won’t sleep. (Oh, hey, Misha’s going to be in this episode! Interested to see how THAT will come out.)

Lucifer is keeping him company when Dean walks in and suggests a faith healer. Also, what kind of creepy hospital is this? The headboard is all rusty and scraped up. Sam sends him on his way, but Dean uses Bobby’s list of contacts (would Bobby have a list of contacts?) to look for help for Sam.

(While Lucifer reads a diagnostic textbooks and comments about having narcissistic personality disorder...) Sam takes his meds, and Dean gives up making calls. He tosses the address book on the table, but when he looks again it’s on the floor, and there’s a business card beneath. Dean calls and leaves a message.

Sam’s hallucinating that the doctor is Lucifer, that there are maggots in his sandwich, etc. Some redheaded chick appears in his open doorway, and he’s probably hallucinating again. Dean gets a call back. The hunter said he set every trap for a faith healer but he passed every one. He tells Dean this guy is the real deal.

The redhead is back and brings Sam a candy, and why is his door open? Dean goes to find Emmanuel the faith healer and catches sight of a bound and gagged woman through the window. The man claiming to be Emmanuel flashes black eyes and tells Dean whoever Emmanuel is, Crowley’s going to want him. Dean stabs him and he rolls down the stairs to land at Castiel’s feet.

Dean is freaked as Emmanuel/Castiel unties the girl. Emmanuel introduces himself to Dean and introduces the woman as his wife. Emmanuel doesn’t know about demons on the earth. Dean is still freaked but not hesitant about asking for help.

On the way to Sam, Emmanuel tells about how he wandered into his wife Daphne’s path drenched and confused and naked, and she took care of him.

“Who named you Emmanuel?” Dean asked.

“Bouncingbabynames.com.”

Dean comments it must be hard to not know who you are, if you’re a bad person or not. Emmanuel says he doesn’t feel like a bad person.

Sam makes friends with the redhead who is depressed and wants to die. She asks why he’s there, if it’s because voices in his head. She admits to Sam that her dead brother is the voice in her head, telling her to kill herself or he’d do it for her.

Dean leaves Cass in the car while he goes into the convenience store, and a demon follows him--wait, 2 more. Dean kills the first with the magic knife, and another demon is killed by a knife through the back. Meg’s back! Though, seriously, I miss that little blonde. They team up.

The little redhead tells Sam he needs sleep or his hair and nails will fall out. This cracks up Lucifer. She tells Sam she feels cold when she feels her brother coming. Her brother set the room on fire and she barely got out. Sam tells her that her brother is a ghost, but he’s been cremated. She has a bracelet he made that he bled on, and Sam asks for a lighter.

Okay, shouldn’t an episode with Cass and Meg being back be a little more exciting? Maybe I’m just underwhelmed after seeing Hunger Games, but.....yawn. I don't like this actress, I guess, and Dean is so INTENSE and Cass is old-humorless Cass, which was fine when Dean had humor.

So Sam sets the bracelet on fire and the girl’s brother disappears and the men in white coats tie him down. They’re talking about a surgical solution to Sam’s problem so he doesn’t overdose. Lucifer asks hopefully if they’re considering a lobotomy but...no.

Maybe it’s that it’s so choppy--a bit of Sam, a bit of Dean...

Meg spills the beans about Cass being an angel and that he can smite every demon, but he doesn’t remember how. Still, he walks down to the demons outside the hospital where Sam is kept and smites them. As he does, he remembers more and more about who he is. He remembers everything and is pissed at Dean for not telling him who he is and what he’s done.

Oh, hey, shock treatment for Sam from a demon-nurse, while Dean tries to convince Cass to come help. Cass is suffering from guilt over what he did. He deserved to die, so why did he walk out of the water? Dean says to fix it, and pulls Cass’s bloody trench coat out of the trunk. He touches Sam, saying he’s here to make it right, but Sam can’t believe Cass is real.

Whatever Cass did, didn’t work. Sam is listening to Lucifer read him The Three Little Pigs. There’s nothing left of the wall--it’s completely crumbled. He can’t fix it, but maybe he can shift it. He places a hand on Sam’s head and both start glowing red. Now CASS is hallucinating Lucifer and staying in the psych ward. They can’t protect him so they’re leaving him there.

Sam doesn’t like making a deal with Meg, but Dean says it’s not making a deal, it’s mutually assured destruction. Besides, they don’t have any friends, all their friends are dead.

So please tell me you found this episode more compelling than I did. At least Sam’s not hallucinating anymore.

Have we Talked about Felicia Day?

Before the Google alerts filled up with "It's a Boy!" links, they were full of "Geek Cred" stories about Felicia Day's upcoming appearance on the show.

Many of of, of course, love Felicia for many reasons. Buffy. Dr. Horrible. Dollhouse. Eureka. The Guild. Dragon Age. Some of us also love her because she's a reader of popular fiction and loves to tweet about books. :)

Felicia is reported to be playing a hacker named Charlie in the awesomely named episode "The Girl with the Dungeons and Dragons Tattoo."

Thoughts?

It's a boy!

Congrats to Jared and Gen! Jared announced the big news last night on Twitter. We know that's going to be one beautiful baby and we can't wait to see a picture.

What I Loved About "Out with the Old" (and the little bit I didn't)

I've had a long, tiring day and my laptop battery only gives me about half an hour now, so instead of a long, detail-by-detail recap of this week's episode, I'm going to give you my thoughts as I watch it a second time. Spoiler alert: I was completely delighted.

During the opening sequence with the ballerina literally dancing her feet off, I wondered if the shoes were cursed or if the janitor was responsible (yes, despite the curse boxes in the "THEN" section). Nice parallelism with the mop, though.

Delight number one: Sam and Dean talking openly. Sam's not trying to hide his Lucifer hallucinations from his brother!!! Dean's not trying to father Sam about it!!! This is (one of) what we've been craving for six years!

Oh, backing up a little, I love Frank and Dean's banter. Frank is hilarious. We're getting a nice, quick overview of just how big Dick's reach is, even if nothing makes much sense.

Opposite of delight number one: Isn't this girl a little old to be completely unaware of the absolute creepiness of shoes showing up where they're not supposed to be and then adjusting themselves to her size? Okay, they cast her well--she has the build and moves of a dancer. BUT IT'S CREEPY.

My husband would not watch this episode if they didn't save the girl. I kept expecting someone to walk in and think they were attacking her. Phew that they just saved her, after poor Dean getting kicked in the face a few times. I thought the actress probably had a lot of fun with that scene, but I might have been projecting.

OMG, when they wanted to put the shoes on! "Do they...look like they're your...size?" "Shut up." "Are you..." "Getting the urge to French Siegfried myself into oblivion?"

I thought Joyce and George were awesome. A little cliche with the door thing, but as awful as the Leviathans are, they're FUN.

Oh, oops, we're not supposed to know they're Leviathans yet.

Hey, Scott Freeman is my husband's cousin! Sam and Dean are seeming a bit impatient with the whole flashing-the-FBI-badge routine. Like they think they shouldn't have to bother, that everyone should just see them as feds and do their bidding.

OMG, the scene with the knives was a total throwback to the scary first season. I expected, of course, knives chopping up fingers. Instead, I channeled Tanya and hid my face while the woman boiled herself to death with the cool ornate teapot.

I kept feeling like Scott's mom had to be more important. She had this safe full of curse boxes full of cursed objects. But she's the Macguffin? I don't actually understand what that is, so maybe not.

Sam. Dude. Get a haircut. Please.

They don't even show a hint of dismay at the dead body. I mean, why would they, after seven years? But usually there's some emotion at not getting there in time to save a life. When Sam called it in, I was a little eye-rolly that he wasn't prepared with a response when they asked his name. How many times have you done this, Sam? But I guess I should give him a pass for not having slept in, oh, six weeks. And "Bruce Hornsby" was funny.

So who's next on the list? A gramophone sold to Brenda Gluck and a vintage gentleman's magazine sold to Peter Yanket. Okay, immature and ridiculous, but also very funny.

Uh, oh, another kid thing. He's totally gonna kill his mom. Yet another threat to my husband watching this with me tomorrow. They brought it right down to the wire. Good thing Sam didn't knock! "Kid. This would be a really good time for a lesson in gratitude. Lucky for you, I'm too tired." Interesting that these two aren't more upset about Sam coming in here. Why do they seem to understand exactly what happened and aren't all freaked out?

Wow, I can't believe we're only 20 minutes into the episode. It took Sam WAY too long to get across town. I expected something to have happened to him with the gramophone. In the meantime, Dean's getting clues and is actually pretty into this, more than just "avenge Bobby" and stuff. I guess he listened to Elliot Ness.

I was a little shocked when Joyce turned into the hardware guy. I thought she was killing him with the handshake but then she went all Leviathan. I wasn't sure if George just worked for Mr. Roman and was human or if Leviathans actually have weaklings. I guess they actually have weaklings. Though George had a lot more to him in the long run.

This episode was no "Mystery Spot," but I liked the way all the threads drew together. HATED Sam falling asleep at the wheel (inevitable) and almost doing a head-on with an eighteen wheeler. (Deliberate connection to the end of season 1, or laziness? Given the song they play at the end of the episode, I'm going with deliberate connection. What it means, if anything, I don't know.)

Sam's progression of extreme fatigue brought him logically to the late-night barrista, as did George being sent there by his dictator of a boss ("How about you eat me?" "Don't tempt me." I guess he is a Leviathan!) I loved how George recognized Sam by his voice and seemed simultaneously excited and scared.

"I don't mean to double-dip in your crazy sauce." Ha! I have to remember that one!

"We have a chain of command here, George. You see a Winchester, you don't eat him! You tell me, and *I* eat him!" She's so over-the-top and yet so natural at it.

Frank's sarcasm is awesomeness. That Dean, the King of Sarcasm, never seems to get it is funny.

So Leviathans are Walmarting mom and pop stores in Portland and Lucifer is on a constant "Stairway to Heaven" loop, 50 times and counting. Poor Sam!

I watch Nikita before Supernatural, and Nikita and Michael and Birkhoff and (to a lesser extent) Alex and Sean are almost always one step ahead of their enemies. So it bothered me that Sam and Dean rushed in to save Scott with no preparation and no suspicions, even though they just figured out that Leviathans are operating here and most likely killed Scott's mother.

George doesn't seem thrilled about the idea of being Scott for 30 years. But I was nicely surprised when Joyce was kicking Dean's ass and George seemed about to do the same to Sam but had somehow prepared a bucket of borax and sacrificed himself to it so Sam had time to get the sword and cut off Joyce's head.

"Thank you, I guess." I think everyone Sam and Dean have helped in the last few years could have said it the exact same way. Bye, Scott. Good luck.

Despite the vast history of alliances-with-the-enemy falling apart, I still like the idea of having a Leviathan on their side. Luckily, Sam and Dean aren't so ready to take George at face value. But it's weird, after all the evil stuff we've seen them do, he's so corporate, even talking about the size of the plan.

"Listen to me, you gooey son of a bitch. You're gonna tell us what you're building here, or I'm gonna wash your mouth out with soap." Hee.

Okay, raise your hand if you saw this coming: "It's going to be a research center. This, gentlemen, is where we are going to cure cancer. We're only here to help." What a smug look on his face!

So, wait. That's where they leave it? Sam and Dean believe George? And there's no punchline about not being able to eat you if you're diseased?

And here we are, the very ominous return of "Bad Moon Rising" that transitions them from Oregon to wherever Frank's trailer is, I don't remember. Noooo! Don't kill Frank! He's so awesome! Not Bobby awesome, but awesome.

Well, crap. It looks like they killed Frank.

Guess who's back next week! And he's not the only one!

So what did you think of this episode? My appreciation average tends to be way above that of my fellow Supernatural Sisters here, but am I alone in liking this one a lot? Please share your thoughts!

A Public Service Announcement :-)

As you may know, some of us here at SPN sisters have strong feelings about remaining unspoiled. So we've decided to pass along this (highly entertaining) video from stars of Dexter, True Blood, Walking Dead and more about the epidemic of spoilers and what you, concerned citizen, can do about it.

Enjoy *g*


http://tinyurl.com/spoilertutorial

The Rest of the Season Approaches...

All of the episode titles for the rest of the season have been revealed. Of course, that doesn't mean they're not subject to change, but here's what we have right now:

“Out With The Old” (March 16)

“The Born-Again Identity” (March 23)

“Party On, Garth” (March 30)

“Of Grave Importance” (7.19)

“The Girl With The Dungeons And Dragons Tattoo" (7.20)

“Reading Is Fundamental” (7.21)

“There Will Be Blood” (7.22)

“Get Dick” (7.23/season finale)

I love all the plays-on-words. I have, as usual, been avoiding spoilers, but I've caught some of the returning character/actor buzz. We'll be getting Castiel, Garth (DJ Qualls), and Meg back. Who else would you like to see? I'd love to see the professor who had the dragon-killing blade. And, of course, BOBBY. Do you think they'd be able to keep that one hush-hush? Jim Beaver could be exaggerating the length of the shoot for the AbomSno movie he's doing.

Of course, they could be teasing us with the beer and Greek paper stuff. That would kill me if they were just teasing us.

No word yet on season 8. How many of you think we'll get it?

This Just In! Season Finale News

First, Happy Birthday to Jensen Ackles! He turns 34 today, which suddenly sounds very young to me. That's never happened before. :(

Anyway, as reported by Dread Central, the Supernatural season finale will air Friday, May 18, 2012.

Which is, of course, smack in the middle of my annual writers retreat. It usually is, and I knew it would be (last year being an aberration due to the extra-long Smallville season finale), but it's still kind of a bummer.

On the one hand, I have several fans on retreat with me. We can download the show when it appears on iTunes and watch it together. Yay! On the other hand, I'm not going to be home to watch with my oldest daughter (aka Number One). She hates not having someone to hash out the finale with, and ends up driving my husband insane. This year he'll be in Vegas for work, so that's even worse for her!

What are your season finale plans? Group watching? Live Tweeting? Or are you all "It's season seven. Meh."

Cranky Tanya's Review of "well, at least we got to see Mark Pellegrino."

I know I've lucked out before and got to recap some really fun episodes of Supernatural. This was not one of those episodes (not that the title "Repo Man" particularly suggested a romp...) Anyway, if you don't mind major SPOILERS for the episode, stick around and I'll tell you what I did and didn't like.

(But first, random anecdote! Mark Pellegrino, the show's recurring Lucifer, recently turned up on the Castle episode "The Blue Butterfly." I said, "Hey, it's that guy from--" "Practically everything?" my husband joked. Like the show's recurring demon Crowley (played by Mark Sheppard) Pellegrino does turn up on several of the shows we like, including a vampire on Being Human and mystical island guardian dude on Lost. My husband and I cracked up at a reference to Pellegrino "not aging" on Castle since he's played some sort of immortal on pretty much everything we've seen him in.)

The show opens in Idaho "four years ago" when the boys were exorcising a serial killing demon from a local guy named Jeffrey, a sensitive postal employee. Unfortunatley, they had to torture Jeffrey's body to get info from the demon within but the upside of that was, since the demon squealed on higher-ups, they felt confident it wouldn't be allowed topside any time soon. It would be in hell for a good long while. The flashback included a white magic practicing Wiccan who helped them track down Jeffrey and ended with Dean dropping Jeffrey off at the hospital.

Flash forward... Bad news for the Winchesters (and Idaho in general), the killings have started again. Since Sam and Dean can't get a new lead on Leviathan leader Dick Roman, they decide to return to Idaho on what they consider unfinished business. The Wiccan is their first stop and she says she has to take care of a few things and then she's getting out of town (since the demon threatened her last time) and asks if they've checked on Jeffrey.

We then go to some sort of group therapy session where a guy is complaining about no access to Cinemax and discover that Jeffrey is in a halfway house but is doing better. He's just received permission to care for his very own pet and as soon as he went to get the dog, I turned to my husband. "If the dog doesn't survive this episode, I am going to be upSET." My husband waved away my concerns.

Sam and Dean nab Jeffrey and ascertain that he is not possessed again. (My CW was a bit on the blink, but I think they did this by pressing a magical blade to his skin.) Then Jeffrey tries to recall what he "heard" while the demon was living in his head to give them clues.

What I probably should have mentioned sooner is that Sam has been hallucinating the devil again for this whole episode. Mark Pellegrino's Lucifer is both playfully disturbed and truly scary. He's angry that Sam won't talk to him and acts out for attention not unlike a middle school boy (only, you know, way more gruesomely). When he stuck out his tongue at Sam, I was utterly repulsed (the tongue was forked) but may have also laughed out loud accidentally.

Jeffrey says that he thinks he knows who the next victim his (town librarian) and Sam goes to check on her, with pretend-Lucifer working as his creepy, unwanted but ultimately helpful sidekick. You know how Sam presses on his old wound to ground himself in reality and make Lucifer disappear? He did this several times and my favorite moment was when he reached to do that and Lucifer groused, "Oh, don't bother" and winked out.

Meanwhile, Jeffrey and Dean go to the demon's old nesting grounds. When they get there, Dean is surprised to find a young guy with a bloody wound on his head chained to a chair. (To date, the demon's killings have all been women.) Then we see a hand behind Dean inject him with something and realize...this can't be good. As soon as Dean and Jeffrey walked into the creepy place, I told my husband I did NOT have a good feeling about Jeffrey. He told me he thought Jeffrey would get a chance to help destroy the demon and find closure that way after the last few troubled years. (No, dear, that would be what we in the biz call a happy ending.)

Sam realizes that he's been sent on a wild goose choice and his subconscious (played by Lucifer) points out an inconsistency between the recent killings and those four years ago--the victims now have been tranqued. They also discover a summoning spell written in familiar handwriting and go to see the Wiccan for answers. She greets them by trying to bop Sam upside the head--but have you seen Sam? Tough for a woman to get the drop on him like that and he thwarts her pretty quickly. She tells him that Jeffrey took her son (the wounded college kid) and was holding him hostage for the summoning spell. He wants to bring BACK the demon who possessed him. But he needs the blood of the demon's exorciser (Dean) and the heart of his pet and, I ain't gonna lie, I pretty much checked out in disgust at that point.

Turns out Jeffrey had only been a wishy-washy WANNABE serial killer before his possession, which gave him the power to act on his darkest thoughts. And he misses that power. So he brings back the demon. But the demon inhabits the Wiccan's son and Jeffrey doesn't get what he was after. (Oh, boo hoo for Jeffrey.)

In the end, the demon is vanquished and the woman and her son are reunited but it's hard to feel like this was a victory for the good guys. Especially when Sam tries to banish his hallucinated Lucifer at the end...he won't go. Sam made the mistake of interacting with the devil in head throughout the episode and now he appears stuck with him.

Maybe this episode just seemed so flat and despairing after last week's fairly funny one, and maybe I'm just still bitter (really bitter) about the dog, but I really disliked it. What about you guys? Did you find the moments of genius in it that I haven't done justice here?

PLUCKY PENNYWHISTLE’S MAGICAL MENAGERIE

You know from the moment we see poor Sam getting cornered in a garage between two maniacal, green-haired clowns that this is going to be an amusing episode and it didn’t disappoint. I especially loved the opening splash page exploding into a garish splatter of glitter and paint.

The episode toggles back and forth between Sam’s battle in the garage and the events that led to the clown showdown. For now we’ll rewind 60 hours

Dean’s talking to Frank on a clap-infested pay phone, trying to see if he’s learned anything about Bobby’s murderer. Unfortunately, the answer is he’s got dick on Dick. So the boys head to Wichita, Kansas. (I’ve got relatives there. I’ve always known that place is ev-il!) Dean is happy for the diversion because he’s sworn off bars, booze, babies and hot chicks of any kind. (Dear Lord those Amazons really did a number on him!) The latest strange involves a man with suction marks all over his body from a giant Pacific octopus and a bite mark on his neck that bled him out. It’s Octo-vamp, not to be confused with Octo-mom, but equally scary. The next casualty is a man who was impaled in the chest by a unicorn who appears to have rainbow farts.

The boys soon discover a commonality between the victims. They’d recently taken their kids to Plucky Pennywhistle’s Magical Menagerie, a scarier version of Chuck E. Cheese. It seems Sam’s Coulrophobia stems from the fact that his big brother would dump him off at the kiddie pizzeria while Dean trolled for chicks. Sam doesn’t want to investigate Plucky’s but Dean tells him 99.99% of all clowns can’t hurt you and if it bleeds, it can die.

At Plucky’s, “Where All Your Dreams Are Good” ( I think not!) the walls are decorated with children’s drawings. In an effort to aide childhood development the kids are encouraged to draw their worst nightmares so Plucky can make their fear disappear. A janitor overhears Sam’s discussion with the manager and tells him to come back after closing so he can tell him something in private. The poor guy never gets the chance. After some kid pukes in the ball pit the custodian climbs in to sanitize the balls and—in a clever homage to Jaws’ opening scene—is quickly dispatched by a land shark.

Something or someone didn’t want him to blow the whistle, but the remainder of the victims are all less than stellar parents. The next one on the hit list looks to be a Plucky employee. The harried mom actually gives her son, who looks to be about seven, money so he can take the bus home on his own. Eek! Instead he settles into a table and draws a picture of a robot with laser eyes.


Federal Agent Sam returns to Plucky’s to “lean on” the employees. Dean will then follow them post-interview to see if they reveal their guilt. (But really he’s all about earning the super-sized Slinky by winning double-tickets on Skeeball.) Using every bad cop cliché maneuver Sam hilariously questions the manager, the prize guy (who’s so chipper you want to punch him) and the Lion mascot who takes off running. Only he’s not guilty of Mary Poppinsing the kids pictures into reality. He thought he was being busted for his Breaking Bad bro’s meth connections. However, he does reveal that the basement is uber-scary.

Sam seeks out the kid and his mom before she gets blasted by a robot, while Dean checks out the boiler room (always a bad idea). Wow, it turns out perky prize guy has been taking the kids drawings and a personal item he’s lifted off their parents and thrown them into a fire pit set into the middle of a pentagram. Dean finds the boy’s robot pic and tears it up. Mom might be safe, but prize guy had already thrown Sam’s business card and a clown picture into the fire. That brings us to Sam’s clown chase. The poor boy is getting his butt beaten. Apparently, these juggalos are in the rare minority of clowns who CAN hurt you.

A desperate Dean tries to figure out how to save Sam. It seems prize guy went all berserk because he was passed up for management. But the real reason for his revenge goes back to his childhood. His brother was drowning and when he tried to get his parents attention in order to save him, they ignored him. Dean quickly makes the connection between the story and a picture prize guy had drawn. He takes the artwork and a clown figurine and throws them into the fire. Prize guy’s brother then shows up and causes Plucky’s perky employee to drown. Fortunately for Sam, his clown duo then explodes in a cloud of glitter. When Dean sees him again he laughingly tells his little brother he looks like he’s been attacked by some PCP crazed stripper. (It’s SO good to see Dean genuinely laugh and smile!) He then apologizes for psychologically scarring Sam.

You know, I had a boyfriend in high school who was terrified of clowns. He literally shuddered at the mere mention of them, which of course meant I had to tease him unmercifully. Sorta the same way Dean teases Sam. As the boys get ready to leave Wichita behind, Sam gifts Dean with a giant slinky. Dean says he has a present for Sam too. Unlike the slinky, the clown doll is left on the asphalt as they drive off.

I thoroughly enjoyed this episode. There were tons of great one-liners, Jared did an awesome job acting skittish and his bad cop routine had me in stitches. It was also wonderful seeing Dean in a lighter—i.e. not self-destructive—frame of mind and the phobias were fun. That’s all over now. The previews for next week show things are about to take a very dark turn.

News Monday...on TUESDAY!

Been a while since we did a full news post. Here's what's been coming through my inbox!



Geekgasm Alert: Most of you probably know that JJ Abrams and Eric Kripke got together for Revolution, a network TV drama with a lot of secrecy over the storyline. NBC hesitated, but finally green-lit the pilot. So cross your fingers that the pilot does well! Here's the story description (we'll ignore the flaws inherent in the way it's described...):

"The project is described as a high-octane action drama that follows a group of characters struggling to survive and reunite with loved ones in a world where all forms of energy have mysteriously ceased to exist."

Jared Padalecki did another interview with TVLine about Misha and Jim being off the show, what's coming, and what he'd want in season 8.

Zap2It did a set visit with a video interview. I love the details, like the Super Bowl pool and the wardrobe from a recent episode.

I won't post a link for this, because it's everywhere, but Rachel Miner will be returning. She most recently housed Meg-the-Demon in season 6.

In this Friday's episode, Dean swears off booze and chicks. (Click link for clip from the episode posted at BuddyTV.)

There've been spoilers running around about Castiel's return in episode 17. I keep getting glimpses, but don't follow the links, so all I see is "Castiel's missing something" with all kinds of "oh noes!" connotations. But... Isn't that one pretty easy? He won't be wearing the infamous trench coat, because when he went all esplody in the water, Dean pulled the coat out. Anyone have another suggestion?

Recap of "The Splice Girls"

When a Supernatural episode starts off with some person you've never seen before home alone, you know that person is going to bite it. And the guy sitting on his couch looking at his laptop while it rains outside did, in fact, die -- very, very bloody. Poor dude got thrown against a wall, his hands and feet cut off and some weird symbol carved into his chest.

Switch scene to the Winchester boys in a beater car (am missing the Impala) with Sam driving as Dean sleeps. When Dean wakes up, he immediately reaches into his jacket for a flask that I'm sure isn't filled with chocolate milk. Sam notices that it's Bobby's beat-to-crap flask and gives Dean a little grief about it. Dean says it's his way of honoring Bobby's memory. The boys meet up with the local medical examiner who shows them the poor sliced-up dude, the latest in a string of sliced-up dudes. The medical examiner tells them that the DNA evidence they collected from all the scenes isn't human. As they leave the morgue, Dean reluctantly admits this might be in the ballpark of their kind of thing. Sam says, "'Didn't match anything human' usually seals the deal for me."

Sam also finds out from one of the dude's neighbors that he'd had a one-night stand with a woman recently. Hmm, that can't be good.

Dean goes to a bar called the Cobalt Room and hooks up with a gal named Lydia (hey, it's Jenna from The Vampire Diaries), and they go back to her place to have sex. When Dean calls her the next day to tell her that he left his flask there, we see that Lydia is big-time pregnant. Whoa! The next thing we know, Lydia is having the baby while a group of creepy, detached women watch. When she pops the kid out, she asks the head creepy lady what they will call her and the lady says Emma. Dean shows up at Lydia's apartment and she mistakenly calls him Don (LOL! He is SO not a Don.), signaling that he meant absolutely nothing to her. He sees the now several months old baby and swears Emma is talking like an adult when she says, "Hey, Mom, who's that guy?" He stakes out the place and sees two of the creepy ladies drive up and Lydia escort Emma, who is now like 5 years old, out to their car.

The creepy ladies take Emma to a place where there are other girls, and they are being branded and asked to eat something (I missed what, and I don't think I want to know) as an initiation.

Since the boys don't have Bobby to call for research help, Sam finds a Professor Morrison who can read Greek and knows something about ancient symbols. Morrison tells them that the symbol on the dead guys' chests is a variation of one on the temple of the Goddess Harmonia, who coupled with Ares, God of War, to produce the Amazons. The Amazons have no use for men other than procreation. They mate every two years and have their babies within 36 hours, then, you guessed it, kill off the fathers. In the midst of figuring all this out, the boys are looking through Bobby's books and papers when Dean swears the papers moved by themselves, leaving a paper written in Greek on top. Dean thinks it's Bobby's spirit because he could read Greek. Sam tells Dean to stay in the locked hotel room while he takes the paper to Professor Morrison. The professor reads it and tells Sam that the offspring are the ones who kill the fathers as part of their initiation into the tribe. Meanwhile, back at the hotel room, Emma, now a teenager, arrives at Dean's room and tells him she wants to run away and he's her only hope. Yeah, I didn't believe her. Even though Dean didn't trust her either and pulled a gun on her, he hesitates to shoot her. But Sam arrives and does it for him.

When the boys are driving away, Sam confronts Dean about wavering and being off his game. Sam had to kill an evil being for Dean the way Dean had to kill Amy, Sam's friend, for Sam. The episode ends with Sam telling Dean, "Don't get killed." Dean simply replies, "I'll do what I can."

So, what do you think? Is Bobby still around somehow, helping the boys? Or is it just Dean hoping Bobby is still there? What did you think of this episode?