.spn 6.07: or, SCHOOLED
Big exciting news: I'm on antibiotics for a sinus infection! And also some amazing allergy medications. Feeling much better.
Now that I have delivered my State of the Upper Respiratory System Address...
"Yes, Dean, because your problems always come first." (Paraphrased.)
Oh, Dean, you just got told. Castiel schooled you so hard, you actually stopped to think for, like, .5 seconds, that there are issues in the world other than your shit, and that Cas might--just might--have to take some time to handle them. I mean, yeah, we get that you're epically pissed at Sam, and freaked out--and who wouldn't be?--but as awesome as Cas is, there's only one of him to go around. And really, you're being that friend--you know, the friend who is all "oh my god, let me tell you about my miserable life and could you give me a ride my car is busted," but the second your friend says "Hey, by the way could you do something for me?" you're all OH MY GOD WHY DO YOU ASK ME TO DO THESE THINGS??? Don't be that friend, Dean.
Sorry, I had to get that out of the way.
We-hel, this was one of those episodes I wish they'd planned a little better so everything wasn't in the last highly-fragmented ten minutes. One of the things I like is that a few more Campbells have bitten the dust; really, aside from Gwen, the rest of them I could really do without. As for Christian being possessed, I find it really, really hard to believe that the Campbell home base doesn't have things to keep demons out, and that none of them have anti-possession tattoos going on. That seems highly unlikely to me, but we'll pretend Grandpa Campbell has been going around scratching holes in devil's traps for Crowley's sake.
Crowley is horrible and EBIL and devious, and I don't know... I love him anyway. Back when it was announced that Crowley would be coming back, I read a comment someone left on a blog, to the effect of "I'd watch Mark Sheppard be an asshole to a busload of orphans," and I agree with that sentiment. I would. I'd watch him be an asshole to Dean and Sam Winchester, and I just did, as a matter of fact. I did it gladly, because Crowley is, as I said, horrible and EBIL and devious, and it's kind of amusing that everyone is just a bit surprised that he's as horrible and ebil as he is. His expansion plans could also spell further difficulty for Cas, particularly if Purgatory is a place from which one might possibly access Heaven.
Speaking of which, I am really, really loving the theology here. Sam's soul (which I'll get to in a minute), and Heaven being screwed up, Hell being screwed up, and now Purgatory! I'm sorry, but I study this stuff and it's one of those things that is conceptually interesting but difficult and annoying to read about, and so I get ridiculously excited when the theological structure of the cosmos gets talked about in literature and popular culture. I JUST LOVE IT OKAY I CANNOT HELP IT. So, interesting point: apparently straight-up human souls don't do time in Purgatory; you either go to Hell or you go to Heaven. That's a hell of a pass-fail exam. And it would be kind of disconcerting in SPN!verse, to be a human soul that gets sent to Purgatory and ends up being surrounded by vampires, werewolves, and shapeshifters. Anyway, if Crowley believes Purgatory's being under-utilized, even though it's currently serving as a holding facility for monster spirits... you kind of have to wonder what's going to happen to said monster-spirits, if there's going to be some crazy, fucked-up colonization activity, or if the monster-spirits get evicted back to Earth (or sent to Hell--which is completely unfair).
Doctrinally, SPN's use of Purgatory brings up an interesting question. Namely, what, exactly are the monsters being purged of? Standard purgatory doctrine holds that you go there to work off the debt you incurred by sinning, but sin is always an act of will. Disordered, unnatural will, yeah, but it's will. In the case of vampires, where they have to kill to survive, does that count as sin? For that matter, most vampires and werewolves, like Madison, are victims of a curse they never wanted. The two shapeshifters we've met both hate what they are, the same for the poor guy who turns into a Rugaru. So what, exactly, is being purged here? Their monstrosity? Something else? Whut?
Sorry, like I said, I wonder about these things.
And Sam's souuuul. I had a cruel thought earlier, about how it's hard to tell the difference between soulful!Sam and soulless!Sam, but that's unfair and I shouldn't have thought it. Sorry, Sam. I also had some thoughts about what, exactly, a soul is, and it would maybe interest you to know that there is a very long tradition of thought in which the human is a trichotomous being (that is the term for it, yeah, it sounds like an insect), composed of a corporeal body, the soul/mind, and the life-force or anima that is responsible for keeping the person alive. When the soul leaves, the life-force goes with it and the body dies. The soul is usually the thing with memories, perception, will, that sort of thing. So yes yes yes AGAIN, I really like what the writers are doing here, because it makes me feel like the dusty old things I study have some kind of afterlife and find their ways into unexpected places. No, I don't think that the SPN staff is all fannish over St. Augustine, I just like that they're messing with the same stuff my relatively boring life is made out of.
Anyway, Sam's soul. I like it. It seems like your soul is what makes you human--not just in the sense that it's a thing you have, but that it's your empathy, your ability to connect with other people, your openness, and your weakness. And we haven't seen much of that from Sam for a long time, not just this season. I hope we'll finish off this year with Sam being back to the way he was in S1, when I kind of liked him a whole lot, and that would make me really, really happy.
And now Cas. Oh, Cas. "Are you speaking in tongues?" TAKING OFF HIS BELT. And now he's been in Sam, too. Poor Dean.
Cas's remark to Grandpa Campbell about how he's in a vessel and his true form is the size of the Chrysler Building... Does this mean Jimmy's back? Or just that he's sort of got the deal that Anna has: a body of his own, NSA? Because OH MY GOD JIMMY :( :( :( I can't imagine him saying yes to Cas again, even though Cas's mission is clearly extremely important, so I'm going to go with my first supposition, that the body Cas has--scrawny, pfft, shows what you know, Grandpa Campbell--is his own.
Like Cas trying to pack himself into that small, hot package, though, I wish he didn't have to pack all his awesome into a handful of minutes. Give the guy more airtime, writers! Jeez! STOP TEASING US. Thank you.
Okay. I just finished the first alcohol I've had in two weeks, and it involves Merlot, so I can't feel my face right now. I'm going to bed.
Before I go, though... wow, eight episodes in a row without a break? The midseason hiatus is going to be hard, you guys.
Now that I have delivered my State of the Upper Respiratory System Address...
"Yes, Dean, because your problems always come first." (Paraphrased.)
Oh, Dean, you just got told. Castiel schooled you so hard, you actually stopped to think for, like, .5 seconds, that there are issues in the world other than your shit, and that Cas might--just might--have to take some time to handle them. I mean, yeah, we get that you're epically pissed at Sam, and freaked out--and who wouldn't be?--but as awesome as Cas is, there's only one of him to go around. And really, you're being that friend--you know, the friend who is all "oh my god, let me tell you about my miserable life and could you give me a ride my car is busted," but the second your friend says "Hey, by the way could you do something for me?" you're all OH MY GOD WHY DO YOU ASK ME TO DO THESE THINGS??? Don't be that friend, Dean.
Sorry, I had to get that out of the way.
We-hel, this was one of those episodes I wish they'd planned a little better so everything wasn't in the last highly-fragmented ten minutes. One of the things I like is that a few more Campbells have bitten the dust; really, aside from Gwen, the rest of them I could really do without. As for Christian being possessed, I find it really, really hard to believe that the Campbell home base doesn't have things to keep demons out, and that none of them have anti-possession tattoos going on. That seems highly unlikely to me, but we'll pretend Grandpa Campbell has been going around scratching holes in devil's traps for Crowley's sake.
Crowley is horrible and EBIL and devious, and I don't know... I love him anyway. Back when it was announced that Crowley would be coming back, I read a comment someone left on a blog, to the effect of "I'd watch Mark Sheppard be an asshole to a busload of orphans," and I agree with that sentiment. I would. I'd watch him be an asshole to Dean and Sam Winchester, and I just did, as a matter of fact. I did it gladly, because Crowley is, as I said, horrible and EBIL and devious, and it's kind of amusing that everyone is just a bit surprised that he's as horrible and ebil as he is. His expansion plans could also spell further difficulty for Cas, particularly if Purgatory is a place from which one might possibly access Heaven.
Speaking of which, I am really, really loving the theology here. Sam's soul (which I'll get to in a minute), and Heaven being screwed up, Hell being screwed up, and now Purgatory! I'm sorry, but I study this stuff and it's one of those things that is conceptually interesting but difficult and annoying to read about, and so I get ridiculously excited when the theological structure of the cosmos gets talked about in literature and popular culture. I JUST LOVE IT OKAY I CANNOT HELP IT. So, interesting point: apparently straight-up human souls don't do time in Purgatory; you either go to Hell or you go to Heaven. That's a hell of a pass-fail exam. And it would be kind of disconcerting in SPN!verse, to be a human soul that gets sent to Purgatory and ends up being surrounded by vampires, werewolves, and shapeshifters. Anyway, if Crowley believes Purgatory's being under-utilized, even though it's currently serving as a holding facility for monster spirits... you kind of have to wonder what's going to happen to said monster-spirits, if there's going to be some crazy, fucked-up colonization activity, or if the monster-spirits get evicted back to Earth (or sent to Hell--which is completely unfair).
Doctrinally, SPN's use of Purgatory brings up an interesting question. Namely, what, exactly are the monsters being purged of? Standard purgatory doctrine holds that you go there to work off the debt you incurred by sinning, but sin is always an act of will. Disordered, unnatural will, yeah, but it's will. In the case of vampires, where they have to kill to survive, does that count as sin? For that matter, most vampires and werewolves, like Madison, are victims of a curse they never wanted. The two shapeshifters we've met both hate what they are, the same for the poor guy who turns into a Rugaru. So what, exactly, is being purged here? Their monstrosity? Something else? Whut?
Sorry, like I said, I wonder about these things.
And Sam's souuuul. I had a cruel thought earlier, about how it's hard to tell the difference between soulful!Sam and soulless!Sam, but that's unfair and I shouldn't have thought it. Sorry, Sam. I also had some thoughts about what, exactly, a soul is, and it would maybe interest you to know that there is a very long tradition of thought in which the human is a trichotomous being (that is the term for it, yeah, it sounds like an insect), composed of a corporeal body, the soul/mind, and the life-force or anima that is responsible for keeping the person alive. When the soul leaves, the life-force goes with it and the body dies. The soul is usually the thing with memories, perception, will, that sort of thing. So yes yes yes AGAIN, I really like what the writers are doing here, because it makes me feel like the dusty old things I study have some kind of afterlife and find their ways into unexpected places. No, I don't think that the SPN staff is all fannish over St. Augustine, I just like that they're messing with the same stuff my relatively boring life is made out of.
Anyway, Sam's soul. I like it. It seems like your soul is what makes you human--not just in the sense that it's a thing you have, but that it's your empathy, your ability to connect with other people, your openness, and your weakness. And we haven't seen much of that from Sam for a long time, not just this season. I hope we'll finish off this year with Sam being back to the way he was in S1, when I kind of liked him a whole lot, and that would make me really, really happy.
And now Cas. Oh, Cas. "Are you speaking in tongues?" TAKING OFF HIS BELT. And now he's been in Sam, too. Poor Dean.
Cas's remark to Grandpa Campbell about how he's in a vessel and his true form is the size of the Chrysler Building... Does this mean Jimmy's back? Or just that he's sort of got the deal that Anna has: a body of his own, NSA? Because OH MY GOD JIMMY :( :( :( I can't imagine him saying yes to Cas again, even though Cas's mission is clearly extremely important, so I'm going to go with my first supposition, that the body Cas has--scrawny, pfft, shows what you know, Grandpa Campbell--is his own.
Like Cas trying to pack himself into that small, hot package, though, I wish he didn't have to pack all his awesome into a handful of minutes. Give the guy more airtime, writers! Jeez! STOP TEASING US. Thank you.
Okay. I just finished the first alcohol I've had in two weeks, and it involves Merlot, so I can't feel my face right now. I'm going to bed.
Before I go, though... wow, eight episodes in a row without a break? The midseason hiatus is going to be hard, you guys.