Supernatural: Abandon All Hope
Okay, I think I am composed enough to talk about this now. The writers really did an amazing job with this one. I will not be over it for a while.
First off, maybe it's just me, but I found the beginning a little abrupt. Like, "Hey, everyone's here and we're off to see the wizard"! It loses a bit of the urgency when you have a chunk of unrelated episodes slotted in between the mytharc ones. Now I'm not sure where we are and will have to go back and rewatch those earlier episodes to get the right effect. (Not that I'm complaining, but I really could've done without Paris Hilton fouling up my screen if it meant getting to the main story quicker. It's a sacrifice, I know, but I could deal.)
Drinking contest with an angel! Who is handling his liquor very well for someone who doesn't have much experience.
I can't decide if I like Jo for teasing Dean and keeping her self-respect, or thinking she's dumb for not sexing him up. I mean, come on - if you suspect it's your last night on earth, and a guy like that is around, you'd be silly not to hit that. Throw him a freakin' bone! (I wonder if she regretted that later?)
I don't understand why Bobby took the photo, only to burn it later. If you want it to remember someone you might not see again, then you keep it somewhere safe. You don't burn it when the person is gone. A few people have said that maybe it was like an effigy for them, which I guess I can see, but I still think it's dumb.
Hmm, the boys found Crowley a little too easily.
I was pretty much crying for the rest of the episode once the hellhound got Jo. You could see the terror on Dean's face as he remembered his own gruesome mauling. I'm a little confused though: I thought hellhounds could only go after people who had made deals? Or was the hound aiming for Dean and Jo got sliced up instead when she tried to save him? I need to see that again. Still, it seems like open season in this town either way. That is a pretty nasty wound too. No way she would have really stayed conscious that long.
The death...well, that was just heartbreaking. Of course Ellen was going to stay with Jo. She wouldn't leave her there, and she wouldn't want to go on without her. So they barbecued themselves. I've read a couple reactions where people were angry that they had died in vain, and that's a valid point - it does seem awful to bring them back after so long only to kill them off, and reducing the remaining female characters to virtually nil. But they went out like heroes. They had the best kind of send-off you could hope for. So I'm grateful for that. Both actresses completely rocked that scene.
Though I am not particularly a Dean/Jo 'shipper, I'm glad that we got a kiss between them, finally, and how it communicated so much: I love you, I'll miss you, I'm sorry. I still can't believe how set against Jo some people were in the beginning. Maybe initially they weren't right for each other, but I think if we'd seen her grow more and mature into the woman she became, there was there was some real potential there which unfortunately went unfulfilled. I guess that's what the focus on both of them in the photo was for, because not only had Dean lost another person he cared for (as they all had), but also one of the few people who knew what he was going through and had faced the same kind of losses. It was the loss of possibility and realizing how much he missed her now that she was gone. It was just a nice moment.
Ooh, so Michael is like the ultimate reaper? Interesting. Maybe that means if Dean becomes Michael, he will have to take Sam?
Meg must be a lot more powerful than I thought if Lucifer is her father. What happened to Yellow Eyes?
It's a bit of a relief that the gun couldn't kill Lucifer. That thing has been relied on a little too much to get them out of situations. Plus, it's meant for killing demons, and Lucifer isn't a demon; he's an angel. So I don't know why they thought that would work in the first place.
As for the apocalypse, I have an idea of how it might go down. I recently read American Gods by Neil Gaiman, since it is supposed to be an inspiration for Supernatural. The premise of the book is that there are gods living in America who have been there for ages, and they've tried to blend in with society and change with the times, but it hasn't gone so well. People worship new things now-technology, and so on-and have forgotten about the old gods. So they decide to take the land back and stage a rebellion. But the thing is, their war is only visible to the beings involved. No one else would know it was going on. The general public has no clue. So I could conceivably see that happening here too. We know the show doesn't have the budget for a large scale apocalypse, so if it was a little smaller, a little quieter and more desperate... I think that could work. But it's just a theory.
Now we have two months of hiatus ahead, and as sad as that is, I kind of feel like I need the break after that. But I've got a couple Supernatural related projects lined up that I've been trying to get to, so stay tuned for that. :)