DittyDotDot

Leverage was filmed in Portland, Oregon. Mark Sheppard is just one of those actors who works both sides of the border a lot.

My theory has always been that Sam got the letter saying he got a full ride and, yeah, kinda sprung it on John, but because he was proud of it and thought John would probably be proud too. But, John not being someone who could deal with surprises well, told Sam he couldn't go and it probably kicked of an epic back and forth fight ending in John telling Sam if he was going to leave, don't come back...and Sam being epic-ally pissed obliged. I'm guessing Sam wasn't planning this for weeks, but applied and was surprised he not only got in, but got a full ride. I think everything just exploded and Dean was caught in the middle of everything...like usual. I think what hurt Dean more wasn't that Sam did indeed go when John told him too--because I can only imagine Dean being proud of Sam finding a way to go to college--but that Sam assumed Dean was a part of John's ultimatum. But, at 18 years old--and a stubborn Winchester--one may not see things very clearly.

Personally, I don't think Mary is wrong; nor are Sam and Dean. They all have valid points of view and I don't think show has ever suggested that they don't. It's a crappy situation that none of them asked for. They're all just trying to do the best they can with it, IMO.

Oh, I think Mary of the past could've connected with her children. But, unfortunately she died and spent 30 years in Heaven with memorex versions of her children. To Mary, these two grown men are good men, but they're not her sons and I don't think any amount of time with them will change that for her. Mary of now simply isn't the person she once was. Which, being resurrected 30 years after your death can do that to a person.

I'm not sure if he could've killed him with his mind, but I don't think he needed his hand of Ipec if he wanted to kill Dean. The demon blood had him all juiced up and created a power imbalance between them just with his fists, IMO.

Isn't the act of a loving mother to not cause pain for her children? If she can't connect to them, but stays with them anyway, won't her disconnect be felt by Sam and Dean everyday? Loving mothers come in different shapes and forms and there are many different ways to show love, IMO. Just like mothers who know they can't take care of their children and giving them up would give them a better life, I think Mary stepping away from Sam and Dean is actually an act of love for them. I don't believe she can ever connect, it's just not in her, IMO--some women just can't. And quite frankly, they're grown men who have lived most their life without her; they don't actually need her and know how to live without her. This way they don't have to witness her death again and they can think of her fondly, fighting the good fight like they do rather than struggling to have a relationship with her that she can't manage to reciprocate.

Who is calling Dean a dictator or comparing him to John? Granted, I skimmed the last page of the thread, but before that it seemed most were saying that was a well-thought out and reasoned plan. The only part I thought was foolish was that he was rushing to open the rift and agreeing to everything Ketch said, because, that didn't seem very well thought out or reasoned.

If Mary feels she doesn't fit in the original universe and has found a place she feels she fits in the Alternate, I say she's better off staying in the Alternate rather than coming back and causing more pain for Sam and Dean. They're never going to have the relationship Sam and Dean--and fandom--want with her. She just can't connect with them. Too many years passed and she missed too much of their lives, not to mention her own guilt about it all. I can't really blame Mary, she didn't ask to be brought back and now she doesn't know what to do with herself and everything she does do seems to cause more pain and heartache. I think Mary staying on the other side is the best thing she can do for Sam and Dean--and herself.

But, that's kinda my point, that was a well thought out decision that wasn't made out of desperation--I'm of the opinion Dean has been forging that part of the plan since they started looking for the ingredients--opening the rift right then and agreeing to anything Ketch said was not. So, I totally agree Dean's had a well-reasoned plan why Sam should stay behind, but everything else was just winging it. But, it wouldn't be Supernatural if they weren't winging it and getting themselves into trouble as a result either. I'm quite certain Ketch will end up being the spanner in the works on this one ::shrugs::

TBH, I don't think Pamela was particularly interested in either of them, but would've been happy to have some fun with both of them.

I'm just saying that every time they act out of desperation instead of taking a minute to prepare, they usually end up in bigger trouble than they already were in. Of course, Dean has no way of knowing exactly what he's walking into on the other side of the rift, but it never hurts to take a minute and double check you got the matches to go with the holy oil. And, instead of making rash deals with idiot psychopaths, maybe take a minute to realize he doesn't have anything to bargain with so you don't need to agree to his every term simply because you're in a hurry and don't want to deal with him at all. ::shrugs::

TBH, I think Ketch played right into Asmoedeus's plan. Asmodeus wants Jack back so he worked Ketch up and got him pissed off enough that Ketch took his archangel and gave it to the Winchesters so they would have the ingredients they needed to open the rift and bring back Jack. I get why Dean was rushing, it's just that's usually when they get themselves into trouble--when they rush to do something without getting their ducks in a row first. But, it wouldn't be Supernatural if at least one Winchester wasn't rushing in and getting themselves in a pickle as a result, now would it?

Gabriel created Loki as a form of witness protection after he ran away from Heaven. He'd been hiding out being different tricksters for centuries.

My understanding is that spell forced the angels out of Heaven and sealed it off so they couldn't get back in. The angels still their grace, so they could heal, but their wings were burned off as they fell through the atmosphere, so they couldn't teleport anymore. If there were any angels on earth before the spell was completed, they shouldn't have lost their wings. That's why Lucifer can still teleport, he was in the cage when the fall happened. Yes, they were cut off from the power of Heaven until the backdoor was opened up, but their grace allowed them some power while they were stuck on Earth. Cass was a special case because his grace was taken and he was sent back to Earth before the spell was completed. Technically, his wings should be in tact, but clearly they aren't. Perhaps not-so-marvy Marv did have Cass fall, burning off his wings, but made sure the fall didn't kill him without his grace to heal him? ::shrugs::

I think @SueB was simply suggesting that the reason Cass could heal Dean from the Jefferson Starships in S6--and maybe couldn't have cured Claire of werewolf-ism in S12--was because he had access to a bunch of soul power in S6 which made him more powerful and able to do more. ETA: TBH, I'm not sure I agree. I mean, I agree Cass was more powered up in S6, but Jefferson Starships were basically like any other monster in that they were mutated humans. I'd say that werewolf-ism is also virus-like, it just spreads by bite instead of being airborne. I think Cass probably can cure werewolf-ism as long as it's in it's early stages like the Jefferson Starship was for Dean. I would say by the time they called Cass and got him there, it would've been probably too late for him to do anything to help Claire except be moral support.

S6 was all about the souls and how they powered Heaven, Hell and Purgatory. The more souls you had, the more power you had. Cass may not have used the souls from Purgatory throughout the season, but he was using Hell's soul power to wage his war against Raphael as part of his bargain with Crowley until they found Purgatory. Without Crowley's help, Cass would've never been able to stand up to Raphael in the first place, let alone wage a war with him for almost two years.

Cass absorbed the souls from Purgatory at the end of S6 in order to power up and beat Raphael. He returned most of those souls at the start of S7 once he realized he couldn't control that much power, but the Levis hung on. So, yes, it was personal power, not to power his army. ETA: Crowley also loaned him 50,000 souls from Hell at the beginning of the season in order to power up to make his stand against Raphael. But, that wasn't enough power to defeat him, only enough to give a show of force to get other angels to follow him.

My reading of it was that if you want to kill an archangel with an archangel blade, you need another archangel to wield the archangel blade. I'm sure there are other ways an archangel can die, though. From The Devil's Bargain transcript: Asmodeus: The only known weapon capable of destroying an archangel -- the archangel blade. Ketch: You'll forgive me, but my reading of the lore suggests that the... blade is only effective if wielded by an archangel. Asmodeus: Oh, really? Thanks for the news flash. Allow me to make an introduction. Mr. Ketch... Meet the Archangel Gabriel.

No, he didn't go to college on a baseball scholarship, but he did play baseball in high school--and a couple other sports too, I believe.

I had a big eye roll at the archangel grace too. I mean, I can imagine the spell was noted someplace else other than just the demon tablet, but where the MoL would've gotten the archangel grace is beyond me. I mean, it's not likely that any of them gave up their grace willingly, so did they capture an archangel and steal it's grace. Um, okay, sure. You didn't need something that had been in the other dimension to open the rift, you only needed it to help guide you to the right one. Which, I got the impression they didn't get the right one and that's how they ended up with the tentacle monster instead of the god they were hoping for.

I wouldn't call myself a Dean-centric fan--or any-centric fan--but I think it does make a certain amount of sense. I mean, I don't think they really smoothed it out very well, but I think Dean just got manic and impatient when there was something to do. Like with Kaia, they were standing around talking when they could've been getting to Mary. But once they ended up in The Bad Place, it was time to switch to survival mode and Mary had to go on the back burner since they had no way to get to her anyway. Then once they got back, they still didn't have a way to get to Mary. I think he was still just as motivated to get to Mary but there was nothing to be done about it until Ketch gave them the archangel grace. Then Dean's back in action mode. I actually think it's kinda Dean's standard operating procedure.

I found the episode to be entirely predictable and boring--I kept checking to see how much longer it was going to take to finish--and I stayed away from all the previews and spoilers this time as an experiment to see if the episode would be more of a surprise. It wasn't. Personally, I thought Sam and Dean were pretty dumb throughout the entire episode, too. First, they unchain a 100-year-old woman without as much as a question of what she was doing there in the first place; which, of course she's a monster, come on guys! Then they open the rift without taking two seconds to talk to Gabriel first. And, there is no reason why Ketch is still alive. At the very least I would've locked him in the dungeon, at most I'd have shot him in the head, but I definitely wouldn't have allowed him to cross the rift with me. Whatever. Anyhoo, I guess it was an inoffensive episode, it just seemed to drag on and on and on and on and on... . What a ridiculous fight too. I mean, what a waste of angel grace. Even without the angel grace Ketch is no match for Asmodeus. I believe they were the decedents of the original group who summoned the creature. Only an archangel can use it to kill another archangel, but I suspect it works like any other angel blade in non-archangel hands--meaning, you can kill some things, but not other things.

I thought the animation was just fine. I wouldn't say they captured Jared or Misha any better than Dean, but I could tell who they were--and not just from their voices--and that's what's important here, IMO. Sure, Jensen would probably be easier to capture in a different style of animation, but this wasn't an artistic study of Jensen and they had to work in the style of Scooby Doo. IMO, the animators did a fantastic job.

I don't have the numbers, but my understanding is that Sunday Night Football draws a much larger audience than Thursday Night Football.

Or, John-related. I've been saying for a couple years that they could do something with Matt Cohen as John since JDM has been unavailable. Of course, I don't think he could play their father now, but depending on the story, they could do some wee Winchester flashbacks with Matt.