Reviews
By Pamela Hoffmann
Review of the TV Show:
Supernatural
Sometimes you’re watching TV, and you’re watching your favorite show, and you’re just not enjoying the episode. It’s pretty much the biggest let-down there is. You wait and wait and wait for the day of the week to come, and then you wait and wait and wait for the hours to pass until it’s finally on, and then blah. When Supernatural creator Eric Kripke does that to me, I’m more than upset – I’m disappointed. However, last week was no such instance. Kripke delivered the best episode yet of Supernatural’s third season.
Season three begins right where season two left them: Sam (Jared Padalecki) and Dean (Jensen Ackles) are hunting the demons they themselves let out of a devil’s gate, and Dean has a year to live thanks to a pact made with a Crossroads demon. All Sam wants to do is find a loop hole and get Dean out of the deal, and all Dean wants to do is “hunt some evil and raise a little hell.” But, there’s a catch: if Sam tries to meddle with the deal, he dies. He drops dead, just like that. Suffice it to say, the boys are in quite a pickle.
However, what’s bad for Sam and Dean equals good for me, the viewer. Disguised as a show about two brothers who hunt demons, Supernatural is more about the relationship between those brothers than the evil that they face. The show would be nothing without the bond between them that’s been building over two seasons and some change. That’s what I want to see. And trust me, hoards of fan-girls will agree. The creepy stuff is cool and fun, but we want to see Sam and Dean duking it out, emotionally and physically. We want to get at the core of what makes them who they are. We want to see them struggle and rise from it.
Season three’s “Fresh Blood” is a prime example of such an episode. Up until this point, the season has been okay. The opener was fun. It answered questions left hanging from season two, and revealed some of what’s to come in season three. But after that, the episodes have been spotty. The main arc of the season is how Dean is going to get out of his deal. That’s clear enough. But I’m not sure the episodes have pushed that storyline along very well. Any conversation (or, in Sam and Dean’s case, fight) about it is the same. Nothing new is learned: Sam is upset that Dean isn’t doing anything to get out of the deal; Dean is upset because Sam keeps trying.
“Fresh Blood” sheds a little more light on the subject. Finally I see more into what Sam is going through, and how Dean’s death would affect him not only immediately, but long after as well. In the best scene of the episode, and of the season so far, Sam explains to Dean how he has more insight into the situation than Dean thinks:
Dean: “You got no idea what you’re talking about.”
Sam: “Yeah, I do. You’re scared, Dean. You’re scared because your year is running out, and you’re still going to hell, and you’re freaked.”
Dean: “And how do you know that?”
Sam: “Because I know you –“
Dean: “Really?”
Sam: “Yeah, because I’ve been following you around my entire life. I mean, I’ve been looking up to you since I was four, Dean. Studying you, trying to be just like my big brother. So, yeah, I know you. Better than anyone else in the entire world. And this is exactly how you act when you’re terrified. And, I mean, I can’t blame you, it’s just…”
Dean: “What?”
Sam: “It’s just, I wish you would drop the show and be my brother again. ‘Cause, just ‘cause.”
That right there is the reason I come back to the show every week. Kripke has found success with those kinds of scenes alone, and will continue to as long as fans continue to care. No special effects, no crazy sets, just two brothers. ‘Cause, just ‘cause.
Review of a Book by Alex Irvine:
The Supernatural Book of Monsters, Spirits, Demons, and Ghouls
Sam and Dean Winchester, at your service. We’re hunters. Dispatchers of spirits, scourges of the undead and unnatural, feared by demons and shapeshifters and boogeyman of all shapes and sizes. In a nutshell? We track down monsters, and then blow the suckers away. Got it? Good.
Alex Irvine’s TheSupernatural Book of Monsters, Spirits, Demons, and Ghouls is more than just a guidebook for how to vanquish things that go bump in the night, it’s an insight into the minds of the two main characters of the CW’s Supernatural – Sam and Dean Winchester. Marketed as a companion to the show, the book offers background of the many evils the brother’s face on the show, others related to those evils, and of course, how to kill them. But, the best part? It’s told by Sam and Dean.
Fans of the show will recognize the boys’ voices immediately. However, if you’re not a fan, it’s not a big deal, thanks to Irvine. He has captured the essences of Sam and Dean’s personalities with ease – well, more so Dean than Sam, but more on that later. Having no affiliation with Supernatural’s production crew, Irvine adds in phrases that the characters would say, but at the same time, doesn’t overwhelm you with it. You might even forget that you’re reading something that’s supposed to be Sam and Dean’s notes on hunts they’ve been on, when suddenly you read over a sentence that jolts you right back into their heads. In the section on how to exorcise a demon, you’re reading along about the rituals and the Latin, and then you’ll get, “…but you should memorize the whole thing, because there is literally nothing worse than not being able to exorcise a demon when you really, really need to.”
The book also includes passages Sam and Dean have come across from their father’s journal. John Winchester became a hunter after his wife (the boys’ mother) was killed by something supernatural. Much of what Sam and Dean learn on how to kill otherworldly things comes from that journal; they never go anywhere without it. By employing this tactic, Irvine is also letting you in on what papa Winchester is like, and furthermore, how Sam and Dean turned out the way they did.
For a relatively short book (219 pages), it’s packed with information, including illustrations of the monsters, spirits, demons, and ghouls. Another feature is the two appendices: Herbs, Oils, and Hoodoo Hands; and Names and Attributions of European Demons. These two sections contain a lot of information that is just cool. The first appendix on ingredients and other materials used in magical traditions gives you a little background on many things still used today, and what it is exactly that they are used for, like chamomile, frankincense, and even graveyard dirt.
Irvine gets everything right, except for one little thing. Writing the book from the brothers’ perspective is the only way to write this type of book, but while he nails Dean’s devil-may-care personality, he misses with Sam. With less of a sense of humor, Sam doesn’t produce the one-liners as readily as Dean, making him harder to write for. The book just seems like Dean it talking to you the whole time. Given the nature of his character, it’s only natural that Dean would take over. But, as the book is supposed to be from both perspectives, Irvine should have brought Sam to the forefront as well.
That aside, Irvine’s books is really fun. Even if you’re not a fan of the show, you’ll enjoy this book. For anyone who’s ever tried to say “Bloody Mary” three times in a darkened bathroom, or told the Hook-Man legend around a campfire, this book will resonate. It even tackles evil clowns – now, who can’t identify with that?