tag:dreamwidth.org,2013-11-13:2115834vampvampireisthenewblackvamp2016-10-20T08:13:19Ztag:dreamwidth.org,2013-11-13:2115834:18538[SPOILERS] SPN 12x01 - Reaction Post2016-10-20T08:00:13Z2016-10-20T08:13:19Zpublic0<p>Okay, so I was days late for the party, I knew SPN was restarting in October, but I hadn't gotten around to actually noting the date, and last night I figured I should check, and, lo, it started last week. So I had surprise-new-SPN to watch \o/ It's a bloody good thing I don't spend any time at all in my tumblr timeline, because I can imagine I would have been epically spoiled and we all know how much I hate that.</p>
<p><a name="cutid1"></a></p>
<h2>Mary Winchester is cool</h2>
<p>Okay, so I've always thought so. I honestly don't know why I expected S12 Mary to be different from the Mary in the time travel episodes, especially considering the last time we saw young Mary was only about 5 years previous to the character we have now.</p>
<p>Okay, so she <em>looks</em> like more time has passed than that. I've had two children, I can buy that. I don't know if it would have worked as well if they'd used the 'young Mary' actress, because she was brought back to life from the night she died.</p>
<p>All that doesn't matter. She's Mary.</p>
<p>I don't know why I didn't expect to like her. I've always liked her before. Maybe I thought she'd get in the way, change the feel of the show, clutter things up. Okay, it's only been one episode, and Sam's not around, but it doesn't feel cluttered. Especially coming from the end of S11, it definitely doesn't feel cluttered.</p>
<p>I did totally expect her to be all fucked up and traumatized. Which is dumb. She was raised a hunter, she's not some fainting flower. She's kickass, and a little back from the dead situation isn't going to completely freak her out.</p>
<p>She's a little freaked out, sure. She's, again, got to deal with the fact that the children she refused to raise as hunters, were raised as hunters. But I expected to want her story wrapped up nicely and pushed to the side, but I'm not feeling that at all. I want her to endure.</p>
<p>Not all the peripheral characters have to die. Most of them have, sure, it's kind of the peripheral character thing that they have an expiry date. I think I'll be pissed beyond telling if Mary finds the same fate Kevin and Charlie found.</p>
<p>Please, god, don't kill her horribly. Been there, done that, the boys have suffered enough. I can't even imagine what that would do to them.</p>
<p>I do have to say that Mary's return was a whole lot lighter than I expected it to be. She was relatively cool about it, and we even got a joke out of it.</p>
<p style="text-align: center">
<img style="display: inline" src="http://i.imgur.com/7hJhzbJ.gif" />
<img style="display: inline" src="http://i.imgur.com/2QOzCi3.gif" />
<img style="display: inline" src="http://i.imgur.com/A67vVJ2.gif" /><br />
[<a href="http://wefoundthebatcave.tumblr.com/post/152037244346/spn-12x01-keep-calm-and-carry-on">tumblr</a>]
</p>
<p>There's always been that parallel between Sam and John and Dean and Mary, but never has the Dean and Mary parallel been more evident than here, as she calls the Impala 'sweetheart' and stares fondly at the interior with that 'I had sex in this car' look on her face.</p>
<h2>London Chapter</h2>
<p>The Men of Letters have got England sorted. That's impressive. I've actually always wondered what the monster sitch was in the UK, and even wrote in one (unpublished) fic that Britain was monster-free (except for ghosts, which they left alone, because England does like it's history).</p>
<p>I mean, it would be a relatively simple operation, as Toni-whatshername said, to close the borders to monsters. It's an island!</p>
<p>Which is why it pisses me off beyond all recognition that Toni seems to be blaming Sam and Dean for the fact America is still full of monsters? WTF, seriously? I mean, the MoL in America went dark in the 50's and the London chapter didn't think to check that out? Oh, no, we just cleaned out all the monsters in Britain by the 60's and then sat back and let the US get munched, not our problem, oh, until a couple hunters get too high profile and too long-lived, and then we'll just pop over and blame them for all the shit that's gone down since before they were born, that'll make it nice and tidy.</p>
<p>What a bunch of wankers.</p>
<p>(Random observation. They can't keep demons out, as proven by Crowley popping over to Scotland to pick up his bones that time.)</p>
<h2>Lucifer and Crowley</h2>
<p>Lucifer is burning through whole families of vessels. You know, you might wonder why, when a person sees several members of their family burn through their eyeballs one after another, they'd say 'yes'. But, continuity error notwithstanding, Lucy isn't coping well. Is he running from Crowley? I get why Crowley wants him dead, he was his dog, after all, and he wants his throne back, but is Lucy actively running or is he just fucked up and broken and not able to stick in any one vessel?</p>
<p>I can't help but wonder if he's going to find Sam...</p>
<h2>Sammy</h2>
<p>Thinks Dean's dead. He's still got it reasonably together, considering he's been tortured and they're fucking with his mind, but he thinks Dean's dead and I'm convinced that Lucy is going to find him, his true vessel or whatever, and because Sam thinks Dean is dead, he's just going to say yes now that his attempt to escape has been foiled and he might feel as though he's got no other option.</p>
<p>I'm kinda like partly 'oh, that would be fun', because one of my problematic faves is totally Sam and Lucifer, but also, when Sam finds out that Mary is back, I want that reunion to be pure, not messed up with the fact that it's not really Sam.</p>
<p>I'm all torn.</p>
<p>Yeah, I think that's all my rambly post-12x01 feels out.</p>
<p></p>
<br /><br /><img src="https://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=vampthenewblack&ditemid=18538" width="30" height="12" alt="comment count unavailable" style="vertical-align: middle;"/> commentstag:dreamwidth.org,2013-11-13:2115834:18393[SPOILERS] Gifs: SPN S11 Finale2016-05-26T14:12:31Z2016-05-26T14:14:32Zpublic0<p>Just some gifs from the episode.</p>
<p>Made entirely in the terminal cos I'm getting a better result and it's quicker and I'm learning new things and shit \o/</p>
<p><a name="cutid1"></a></p>
<p style="text-align: center"><img style="display: inline" src="http://i.imgur.com/bxCU0SX.gif" /> <img style="display: inline" src="http://i.imgur.com/nqbVfjH.gif" /> <img style="display: inline" src="http://i.imgur.com/fKxt46B.gif" /></p>
<p></p>
<p>Want, take, have, don't be a dick.</p>
<p>As for the rest of the ep, I can't even talk right now.</p>
<br /><br /><img src="https://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=vampthenewblack&ditemid=18393" width="30" height="12" alt="comment count unavailable" style="vertical-align: middle;"/> commentstag:dreamwidth.org,2013-11-13:2115834:17576I will go down with this ship [SPN 11x17-20 SPOILERS]2016-05-06T13:26:33Z2016-05-06T13:26:33Zpublic0<blockquote>
<p>Caveat: contains epic spoilers and wild speculation</p>
</blockquote>
<p><a name="cutid1"></a></p>
<p>So. Here's this thing I noticed several weeks ago. In 11x17 - <em>Red Meat</em>, the one with the werewolves where Sam got shot and then choked by the dude they were trying to save (there's some gratitude for you), Dean believed Sam was dead (hell, <em>I</em> believed it), and essentially committed suicide.</p>
<p>Okay, so, his intention was to make a deal or sweet talk the reaper that turned up and bring Sam back. But. Seemed like, if it didn't work and he didn't get saved, that he wouldn't be too cut up about it. Last ditch effort was to offer his own life for Sam's. The general impression I got was that if Sam was dead, Dean didn't see much of a point to being alive.</p>
<p>I'm a big Romeo and Juliet fan, so I spotted the parallels right away, though I honestly don't think the writers were terribly subtle about it. It kinda ticked all the boxes.</p>
<p style="text-align: center"><img style="display: inline" src="http://i.imgur.com/JVryfzx.gif" /> <img style="display: inline" src="http://i.imgur.com/NL6wjnQ.gif" /></p>
<p style="text-align: center"><img style="display: inline" src="http://i.imgur.com/ADPCAuZ.gif" /> <img style="display: inline" src="http://i.imgur.com/vJekN1H.gif" /></p>
<p>(just as an aside, hubby thinks I've got my wincest-tinted glasses on, but he didn't <em>see</em> the ep, just heard about it when I flailed and squeed at him the next day)</p>
<p>The ep kind of made my year, and set my brain working overtime, because the way the ep ended, and the fact that it kind of slapped us in the face with the R&J-ness of it all, set me to speculating on future events. For a long time I've believed that the only way either of them is ever going to stay dead, is if they're both dead. The end of S10 kind of brought that into perspective. The only way to lock MoC!Dean away and have him stay locked up was to kill Sam. For example. I think it's a distinct possibility that hhe series will finally end with the boys both checking out, if not at the same time, at least within a very short time of each other (but not this season, because SEASON TWELVE HOLY SHIT).</p>
<p>So I've been obsessing about that ep for the last several weeks, and then last night, 11x20 - <em>Don't Call Me Shurley</em> (and wasn't that title just a dead giveaway?), aired, and we got this scene:</p>
<p style="text-align: center"><img style="display: inline" src="http://i.imgur.com/VxrizQG.gif" /> <img style="display: inline" src="http://i.imgur.com/j1vMwKv.gif" /> <img style="display: inline" src="http://i.imgur.com/cHAZHLc.gif" /></p>
<p>So, here, Sam's sucked down some of the Darkness Fog, and he's done for. Telling Dean to get out and save himself, and Dean's all like "I'm never leaving you, ever!!" and shit, which is what we expect from him. But then, he very obviously (and yet this particular suicide attempt is a fuckload more subtle than the one in <em>Red Meat</em>), inhales deeply as the fog swirls around his face.</p>
<p>It would probably have been very easy to miss. I even tried to talk myself out of it, until I went back and watched that scene again. I'm convinced. That was a conscious suicide attempt. It was Dean, completely going down with the ship.</p>
<p>Of course, it didn't work, because Amara needs him for something (and that's a whole 'nother blog post right there), but he tried. So. Romeo and Juliet theory cemented. If Sam dies, and without the ability to bring him back, Dean's going to try his darndest to follow him.</p>
<p>Which, in my opinion, is just the most perfect thing I could ever imagine, being a massive R&J fan and all. It all feels like some major foreshadowing, but I don't know whether to expect something over the next few eps for this season, or if it's particularly farsighted on the part of the showrunners. It wouldn't surprise me, I mean, I've been waiting for Chuck to turn up again since 10x05. They're certainly capable of it.</p>
<p></p>
<br /><br /><img src="https://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=vampthenewblack&ditemid=17576" width="30" height="12" alt="comment count unavailable" style="vertical-align: middle;"/> commentstag:dreamwidth.org,2013-11-13:2115834:16509SPN 11x09 [SPOILERS]2015-12-10T11:33:24Z2015-12-10T11:33:24Zpublic2<p><a name="cutid1"></a></p>
<p>Holy fucking evil cliffhangers, batman!</p>
<p>I am very very very excited about this episode. There is just <strong>so fucking much</strong> and it's only just this minute finished and I want to watch the damn thing all over again (but I'm not allowed because god forbid I wear off the shiny before the end of the season when I will finally allow myself to sit down and marathon the whole thing).</p>
<p>From Rowena fangirling (and drooling) over Lucifer, to Sam's face (omg, was that just, complete and utter terror, or what?) when Lucifer appeared, to Lucifer asking Sam if he wanted to share a bunk (I'll admit, I fucking died of squee), to the surety that Sam was going to say yes (and yep, my timeline is all over the fucking place but my brain is basically mush r/n), to the reveal that it was Lucifer sending him visions this whole time, to the seeming validation of <a href="http://vampthenewblack.dreamwidth.org/15558.html">my Darkness theory from earlier in the season</a>, to the fact that the boys teamed up with Crowley again (I <3 Crowley completely, so I was so very pleased), all the way to the absolute glee that I'm going to get to properly ship Sam/Lucifer (I didn't start watching SPN till S8 was airing, so previous seasons were speedily marathoned and Lucifer went by so fast I didn't really have a chance before I was all about Dean & Benny...). *gasps for air*</p>
<p>The entire ep was just so beautiful... And then it cliffhangered. I could scream.
</p>
<br /><br /><img src="https://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=vampthenewblack&ditemid=16509" width="30" height="12" alt="comment count unavailable" style="vertical-align: middle;"/> commentstag:dreamwidth.org,2013-11-13:2115834:16003Baby (spoilers for SPN 11x04)2015-10-29T08:18:09Z2015-10-29T08:18:09Zpublic2<p><a name="cutid1"></a>Impala!POV episode for the fucking win. That was kind of awesome. I was scared it was going to end badly, to be honest. You know, watch Dean's baby die a final death kind of thing. Much relieved that it didn't, I would have cried, no shit.</p>
<p>Short post is short.</p>
<br /><br /><img src="https://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=vampthenewblack&ditemid=16003" width="30" height="12" alt="comment count unavailable" style="vertical-align: middle;"/> commentstag:dreamwidth.org,2013-11-13:2115834:15558Shiny Happy People (spoilers for SPN S11 thru E03)2015-10-22T21:23:05Z2015-10-22T21:23:05Zpublic2<h2><strong>Spoiler warning for SPN 11x03</strong> (and the previous eps in the season by default).</h2>
<p><a name="cutid1"></a>So it just hit me this morning that Amara/The Darkness (okay, I'll never not be able to say that without singing ~<em><a href="http://i.imgur.com/M5Dq8eE.jpg">I believe in a thing called love</a></em> in my head, just saying) has a lot in common with Jasmine, from Season 4 of Angel.</p>
<p>Old thing, older than God, perhaps (I'm not entirely clear on that with Jasmine, not that God is even a thing in the buffyverse, but we'll go with that anyway). Now, it's some of the shit Amara said in 11x03 that made me start thinking. She questions Crowley on the evil in the world, wouldn't it be better if it was gone, kind of deal (and I'm letting my own interpretation/first impressions guide me here, because I'm not doing rewatches till the end of the season, so the shiny doesn't rub off too quick). My first thought was, oh, is she not this big evil horribad thing that they've all built her up to be? Maybe she could be kinda good for this world full of monsters and evil and HAVEN'T SAM AND DEAN SUFFERED ENOUGH!?</p>
<p>You know? </p>
<p>But shiny happy la la candy land has some serious free will issues, proven by Jasmine (will it be the same here, if it happens? Probably).</p>
<p>And there's the fact that Amara eats souls (though, yay her for eating demons, no bad there, and isn't it nice that she can get all big and strong on what one would think would be a dried out old husk, but no, apparently demon souls are good eating). <-- that's a big old Jasmine similarity, there - though Jasmine didn't leave a trail of soulless madpersons in her wake because she et the whole person, no waste or inconvenient byproducts.</p>
<p align="center"><a href=""><img alt="A kid that grows uber-scary-fast. What a surprise (and Crowley, because he's awesome)." src="http://i.imgur.com/CYHNGwR.jpg" /></a><br /><span style="font-size: smaller;">A kid that grows uber-scary-fast. What a surprise (and Crowley, because he's awesome).</span></p>
<p>So, of course The Darkness (~<em>I believe in a thing called love</em>) isn't a 'good' thing, but I don't know that she's flat out evil, either. Death, did, of course, call her destructive, but he also called her amoral, which, by definition, isn't good <em>or</em> bad. So there's that.</p>
<p>So it'll be interesting to see how it all turns out. I was so ready for a more interesting big bad (it's been a few years since we've had one, Metatron is a boring dick (though Metafiction was fun), Abaddon was too evil to be interesting, and all that other angel/heaven shit was totally yawn—the Mark of Cain was certainly gripping, but a bit hard to think of the Mark/Dean as the traditional big bad. There was epic value in manpain there, but I'm ready for something the boys can punch, so to speak), and I'm curious to watch it unfold. Will we end up with candyland and kittens and rainbows? I want to see what moral quandaries that puts before the Winchester boys.</p>
<p><em>[please don't tell me anything that might have been indicated regarding the rest of the season—I am spoiler-free, and prefer to remain that way, thank you]</em></p>
<br /><br /><img src="https://www.dreamwidth.org/tools/commentcount?user=vampthenewblack&ditemid=15558" width="30" height="12" alt="comment count unavailable" style="vertical-align: middle;"/> commentstag:dreamwidth.org,2013-11-13:2115834:12093Teen Wolf Season 4 - Done and dusted (S4 SPOILERS)2014-09-09T09:25:59Z2014-09-09T09:27:38Zpublic4<p>Season 4 is done and dusted \o/ What a funny season. Like, weird. I've heard on the grapevine (my only means of non-canon knowledge, because of my solid 4th wall), that it was supposed to be a reset season? The gist I got was that they were trying to get back to some of what the series began with, with a focus on the central characters.</p>
<p><a name="cutid1"></a></p>
<p>Well. I didn't see jack shit of that. Okay, sure, there was a focus on Scott, and a focus on Stiles, a focus on Lydia, and a focus on Derek. Well, that's not like Season 1 at all. Maybe I don't understand reset at all. Even though I qualify myself as pretty high on the fan scale, I watch the series like a casual viewer might. And I didn't get anything near a 'reset' or 'return to the beginning' feel from that season.</p>
<p>And it makes me wonder if they on the other side of the 4th wall said 'alright, we're doing a reset season', perhaps to placate the fans who were bitching about the last few seasons being too dark or whatever, and just hoped like hell that with that word in their minds the fans would kind of believe it, or cling to tiny little bits that maybe were a nod to season 1 or whatever.</p>
<p>IDEK. I don't get it at all. Tiny bits, yes. Wee, wee, wee bits. It wasn't a 'reset season'.</p>
<p>Weird arse season altogether. What the hell was the whole Benefactor thing about, huh? I felt sure that somehow, someway, Kate and/or Peter were going to be involved in that more than they were. Nope. The Benefactor thing was like this island in the middle of the real story. Yes, we're used to having more than one big bad per season in Teen Wolf, their stories interconnecting toward the finale. Um. I have no idea what the hell was going on here, but this rang like, well, we've got this Kate story, but there's not enough of it to fill a season. So we'll just chuck this other thing in the middle. No, they've got nothing to do with each other, but no one will notice, right?</p>
<p>*cough*</p>
<p>Yes, they used it to pull out some other stories. Liam, the new beta, and the method by which Scott comes back to himself again. It passes some time while Derek turns human and then 'dies', triggering his evolution. We find out that Parrish is, as we suspected, a something. We know how Lydia got her Banshee powers. I think they could have done all of this with a more fleshed out Kate season (and goddammit, now that Peter's locked up, I guess Kate is going to be our season after season after season bad guy), because surely that big old monologue she did at the beginning of the finale could have been shown, not told.</p>
<p>Holes, man. So many fucking holes. Again, probably some 4th wall fuckery. I don't know for sure, because I avoid everything (except <a href="http://vampthenewblack.dreamwidth.org/10877.html">Parrish</a>) on the other side of it, but surely they must have released some kind of statement regarding the mysterious disappearance of Isaac and Danny.</p>
<p>For someone who avoids the other side of the 4th wall, who does watch like a 'casual viewer', and knows only what I see on the screen (aka, actual canon), both of those boys have simply gone poof. The only clue I have is a single rant by Finstock. Early in the season (I don't recall the ep), he rattles off a few names, the players they don't have on the lacrosse team this season. Jackson and Isaac among them.</p>
<p>Jackson, no problem. Yep, he went poof, too, but at least we got an expositionary statement back in 3a that made it clear what happened to him and where he'd gone. But what about Isaac? All we know is that he isn't there. THAT'S IT? Where's my exposition that 'splains that he went to frickin Tibet to meditate? Or that he moved to Hollywood to find fame and fortune? Or that he went with Chris to France because they were shagging and decided to stay there? WHERE?!</p>
<p>And Danny. End of 3b we found out that he knew about werewolves the whole time. And sure, no, he's never been an integral member of the scooby gang. So what. We can assume that he's still in Beacon Hills, still at school, still on the lacrosse team because he wasn't on Coach's list of gone. I like Danny. I miss him. I think he was sufficiently part of the cast that his character deserved to at least be written out gracefully if the actor wasn't going to return. Same with Isaac.</p>
<p>Okay, so I'm not a 'casual viewer'. Casual viewers don't care this much. I'm a fan, so I analyse canon. CANON. Not the crap they (one assumes) tell us outside of canon to fill in the gaps they can't be arsed writing.</p>
<p>So, yeah, I have issues with this season. And this is a quick rant after watching the finale. I haven't marathoned yet, and I'm sure that when I do I'll see more, and whether it makes me see things I missed before that fill some of those holes, or whether I see bigger holes remains to be seen. I'm not going looking for 4th wall hole fillers just yet, if I do at all. When it comes down to it, I'm a canon purist, and so as far as I'm concerned, Isaac and Chris were shagging, then when Chris went to France, Isaac went to Tibet. And Danny is so there, he's just keeping his nose out of all werewolf business because he's smart like that.</p>
<p>And I still love Teen Wolf. I ♥ the universe and the characters, and I ♥ the darkness and the light, and I will always accept canon, no matter what happens. I've had my rant (which I might add to post-marathon), and I feel better XD I'm not going to flounce dramatically, even though I do have critiques.</p>
<p></p>
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