Supernatural 502 Good God Y'all
Sep. 18th, 2009 09:29 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
noracharlesGreat episode. And they got to use mountains in the background!
Dean doesn't have freckles, or only very faint ones. Jensen does have freckles. But in the scene where they meet Ellen, Dean had a face full of pretty freckles! I just had time to go oooh, pretty! before she threw the holy water in his face. Then I went ah, that was why.
Dean loves his Sammy! I'm a sucker for episodes and fic about that. Even if I hadn't thought the episode was great, I probably would have loved it just for that. Dean doesn't want to part with the amulet! Dean is afraid of letting Sam out on his own with all the demons around! Dean offers Sam the impala!
Ellen and Jo love each other! It was so, so good to see Ellen and Jo again. In the past, I've had mixed feelings about them. I felt they changed the feel of the show too much, and were a bit too familiar with the Winchesters too quickly. But on reflection, I think that what I really hated was the roadhouse, and hanging around there for three episodes. I did like the crawling through the walls with Jo episode. Anyway, this episode I was able to love Ellen and Jo and appreciate their awesome.
Bobby is making Dean/Castiel jokes. Eh. Bobby is very upset about being lame, and wants to be healed. I really, really can't blame him or the writers for that. If they had somehow implied that he was not a whole person because he's lame, and therefore needed to be fixed, that would have been different.
Rufus kicked ass and was hot and brave and smart and authoritative. Yes please! More of him! You can quit it with the Lethal Weapon jokes right now, though. Being a black man and getting shot at while trying to protect people does not make him just like Murtaugh.
It was nice of Jo and Rufus to try to exorcise Sam instead of just killing him, the way Sam did with those guys in the convenience store.
Sam's an addict. I really appreciate the realism and commitment to continuity of it. Just because god healed him of the physical dependency doesn't mean he doesn't still have the psychological craving, especially in a situation where he believed he was surrounded by demons, and using his demon powers would be the only way to do a mass exorcism. On the other hand, I really hate addict storylines, and I won't be upset if they drop it or background it.
The amulet: hahaha! It's like fanfic.
Castiel calling on the phone to ask where they are: I love it. Also makes being out of coverage more suspenseful.
Ellen smacking Dean: poor Dean, the women who want to mother him tend to take a violent and scolding approach to it. Why does Dean have such bad luck with mothers?
Dean meeting Jo again: hahaha. Well acted Jensen and Alona, you both rock!
War: I liked the idea, and I liked the writing. I was bored by the actor. Why did they cast and style War to be such a walking cliche? I don't think the actor was very good at changing from innocent, scared human to sinister and gleeful embodiment of war. I sort of wish they had taken War in a more Pratchett direction, and am sort of glad they didn't cast a woman. I wonder why War introduced itself with Germany, Germany, Middle East, Darfur. Did it assume Sam would only be familiar with the wars extensively covered by American popular history documentaries and slick infotainment news? And as for the cliche: I know a lot of Latin people, and none of them act or look like the stereotypical oily, sinister Latin man on American tv. Why is this stereotype still alive and well? Isn't it so tired that it's not even funny in any ironic way anymore?
Ellen and Jo's hair styles: being barricaded in a house with 20 people sharing one or two bathrooms for days is no excuse to let yourself go. And that's why these ladies are superheroes and you and I aren't. I blow dry my hair straight and set it with hairspray maybe once every two months. I've never in my life given it cute little twisty curls, or made it curve beautifully in at the ends. And that's why I'm not cut out for hunting!
And now, the Bechdel tests:
Female Bechdel win! Three conversation between ladies, and none of them about men! No evil women! Important storyline about women: Ellen and Jo rescuing each other from possession. No sexualized violence against women! One understandably scared pregnant woman, whose symbolic victimhood was underlined again and again by her being young, blonde and her huge stomach being focused on all the time. One brave parishioner risking her life to run to the aid of her priest!
Race Bechdel fail, but not terrible fail. Two characters of color, both heroic. Rufus, who was a main character and totally awesome (except for having Murtaugh as a personal role model, that was weird), and the brave parishioner. No evil characters of color! Possibly some dead characters of color, it was hard to tell with all the caps and flannel and poofy vests, and shooting and stuff, but I think the town was almost all white north-western European type people, with the notable exception of oily and evil Latin man and determinedly heroic see-we-can-learn Rufus and brave parishioner.
Dean doesn't have freckles, or only very faint ones. Jensen does have freckles. But in the scene where they meet Ellen, Dean had a face full of pretty freckles! I just had time to go oooh, pretty! before she threw the holy water in his face. Then I went ah, that was why.
Dean loves his Sammy! I'm a sucker for episodes and fic about that. Even if I hadn't thought the episode was great, I probably would have loved it just for that. Dean doesn't want to part with the amulet! Dean is afraid of letting Sam out on his own with all the demons around! Dean offers Sam the impala!
Ellen and Jo love each other! It was so, so good to see Ellen and Jo again. In the past, I've had mixed feelings about them. I felt they changed the feel of the show too much, and were a bit too familiar with the Winchesters too quickly. But on reflection, I think that what I really hated was the roadhouse, and hanging around there for three episodes. I did like the crawling through the walls with Jo episode. Anyway, this episode I was able to love Ellen and Jo and appreciate their awesome.
Bobby is making Dean/Castiel jokes. Eh. Bobby is very upset about being lame, and wants to be healed. I really, really can't blame him or the writers for that. If they had somehow implied that he was not a whole person because he's lame, and therefore needed to be fixed, that would have been different.
Rufus kicked ass and was hot and brave and smart and authoritative. Yes please! More of him! You can quit it with the Lethal Weapon jokes right now, though. Being a black man and getting shot at while trying to protect people does not make him just like Murtaugh.
It was nice of Jo and Rufus to try to exorcise Sam instead of just killing him, the way Sam did with those guys in the convenience store.
Sam's an addict. I really appreciate the realism and commitment to continuity of it. Just because god healed him of the physical dependency doesn't mean he doesn't still have the psychological craving, especially in a situation where he believed he was surrounded by demons, and using his demon powers would be the only way to do a mass exorcism. On the other hand, I really hate addict storylines, and I won't be upset if they drop it or background it.
The amulet: hahaha! It's like fanfic.
Castiel calling on the phone to ask where they are: I love it. Also makes being out of coverage more suspenseful.
Ellen smacking Dean: poor Dean, the women who want to mother him tend to take a violent and scolding approach to it. Why does Dean have such bad luck with mothers?
Dean meeting Jo again: hahaha. Well acted Jensen and Alona, you both rock!
War: I liked the idea, and I liked the writing. I was bored by the actor. Why did they cast and style War to be such a walking cliche? I don't think the actor was very good at changing from innocent, scared human to sinister and gleeful embodiment of war. I sort of wish they had taken War in a more Pratchett direction, and am sort of glad they didn't cast a woman. I wonder why War introduced itself with Germany, Germany, Middle East, Darfur. Did it assume Sam would only be familiar with the wars extensively covered by American popular history documentaries and slick infotainment news? And as for the cliche: I know a lot of Latin people, and none of them act or look like the stereotypical oily, sinister Latin man on American tv. Why is this stereotype still alive and well? Isn't it so tired that it's not even funny in any ironic way anymore?
Ellen and Jo's hair styles: being barricaded in a house with 20 people sharing one or two bathrooms for days is no excuse to let yourself go. And that's why these ladies are superheroes and you and I aren't. I blow dry my hair straight and set it with hairspray maybe once every two months. I've never in my life given it cute little twisty curls, or made it curve beautifully in at the ends. And that's why I'm not cut out for hunting!
And now, the Bechdel tests:
| Episode | Speaking characters | Female characters | F-Bechdel | Characters of color | R-Bechdel |
| 501 | 12 | 4 (33%) | Fail, 0 conversations | 1 (8%), Fail | Fail, 0 conversations |
| 502 | 12 | 4 (33%) | Pass, 3 out of 3 conversations | 2 (17%) | Fail, 0 conversations |
Female Bechdel win! Three conversation between ladies, and none of them about men! No evil women! Important storyline about women: Ellen and Jo rescuing each other from possession. No sexualized violence against women! One understandably scared pregnant woman, whose symbolic victimhood was underlined again and again by her being young, blonde and her huge stomach being focused on all the time. One brave parishioner risking her life to run to the aid of her priest!
Race Bechdel fail, but not terrible fail. Two characters of color, both heroic. Rufus, who was a main character and totally awesome (except for having Murtaugh as a personal role model, that was weird), and the brave parishioner. No evil characters of color! Possibly some dead characters of color, it was hard to tell with all the caps and flannel and poofy vests, and shooting and stuff, but I think the town was almost all white north-western European type people, with the notable exception of oily and evil Latin man and determinedly heroic see-we-can-learn Rufus and brave parishioner.