Supernatural (8.5): I'm Quite Satisfied, Want All the Details?

I’ll stop, I’ll stop, I promise. I don’t think I can maintain my tongue-in cheek sexual innuendo/double-entendre/whatever when I spent an hour laughing hysterically and then sobbing uncontrollably. My reaction might have been extreme; I spent nine hours at work and then five hours with a toddler. That could not have been the best frame of mind to watch Dean die over, and over, and over, and over again.

Before I get down into the nitty-gritty of last night’s episode, I want to say something about a conversation I had last week with my friend Jennie. The best way I can describe my relationship with Jennie is that when it comes to TV we are kind of like Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (or maybe Butch Cassidy and Mozart): we travel the TV-land together out for all we can get and jumping off cliffs. Since we live in separate states now, we have to discuss shows over the phone after we have viewed them in our respective time zones. Discussing last week’s episode she passed on a phrase to me that she received from her friend Emily: “anvilicious” which functions roughly as an antonym to “subtle.” I grant that Dean’s confrontation with himself wasn’t subtle, but subtle wasn’t working. Hell, direct wasn’t working. The kid needed to be hit by an anvil. I understand Jennie’s point, even if I disagree. Similarly, last night’s episode struck me as slightly un-even. I can’t quite put my finger on it, other than the fact that the second half of the episode needed more time, but it wouldn’t have work to make it two separate but continuous episodes, because the first half would have become frustrating if drawn out too long. I think this episode was wonderful, but there has been something just vaguely off about the last couple episodes. I read an interview with the show’s creator on "Watch With Kristin" in which he said that the final four episodes (of which last night’s was the third) that they completed before the (now resolved) Writer’s Strike had to be adjusted from his original plan for the season so it could have some sort of resolution. The preview for this resolution of sorts (because I’m fairly sure there will be more new episodes in April) almost made me wet my pants.

All of this feels like snobbery in light of just how fantastic this show is, and the huge question we all need to ask ourselves after last night’s episode: who really is the more fraked-up brother; Sam or Dean? They both qualify for a whole new sliding scale of damaged, but it’s kind of hilarious that all of the demons, evil gods, creatures, and so on have an opinion on this issue. Dean sold his soul to bring Sam back to life, which is not the most mentally balanced thing to do. On the other hand, we now know what Sam is without Dean, a glimpse of the life he will lead after his brother’s death. Post-Dean Sam makes their father look like a slack-jawed yokel. Apparently, Ruby has nothing to worry about when it comes to “preparing” Sam for his solo-fight. Speaking of Ruby, I am asking as politely as I can; will all the evil things please stop trying to teach Sam lessons? While overall I love the way that Sam and Dean learn from their interactions with that which they hunt, and the show is spot on that the way evil works is by bending and truncating the truth, but little Sam is getting hammered. Now, the Trickster (and I am so happy they brought this character back, one because he’s awesome, and two because my friend Calah and I were talking about that episode from Season Two just the other day) is not wrong that Sam and Dean have a mutually unhealthy pattern of sacrificing for each other, but when he told Sam that no good comes from any of it, he lied. The good is just for neither of them; the good is for those they save. The ancient Greek culture understood that he who protects the city cannot be an integrated part of it until he lays down his arms, and the same is true for Sam and Dean. Luckily, they never listen to the evil; Sam asks for Dean back knowing he will loose him again and knowing what is future will be like. Time and again this show reiterates that love is a vulnerability, but never a weakness.

As serious as all these concerns are, I have not laughed so hard in a while as I did for the first thirty minutes. Is there a more hysterical torture than to wake up to Asia’s “Heat of the Moment” over a hundred times? I would have just killed myself. Sam displacing all his anger onto the bottle of hot sauce he had to keep catching could not have been more priceless. Bugs Bunny would be so proud that Dean was crushed by a falling piano. Dean attempting to calm down the bound and gagged mystery-spot owner while Sam tore apart his place of business with an ax is something we have never seen before and will most likely never see again on Supernatural. The random, but carefully calculated, hilarity reached almost to Arrested Development level. I would give anything to see the outtakes from filming this episode.

The big bad showdown is in store for us next week. Not since Buffy fought the Mayor have I been so excited about confronting evil.

Final Thought: Does it make me a sick person that I think the trunk of their car is really sexy? I am not in any way shape or form some kind of gun aficionado and I have trouble with my own kitchen knives, but I can’t help myself, I start to drool every time they open the back of that car. Maybe this is something I should talk about with a therapist.

The TV Girl