tessathereaper

I agree. This isn't the last we've seen of him. I do think they probably should have come at their finale differently because frankly it kind of made everyone on the "good side" look like idiots. I'll give MM a pass because he had a deeply personal reason for his actions vs Soldier Boy and if he wasn't necessarily putting the good of the world ahead of that, I get it. But that's why the others are there, THEY should be the ones thinking of the greater good. But for Soldier Boy specifically IMO he had a good amount to work with considering it was mostly in 4 episodes. They needed him to be the guy Vought basically built the whole billion dollar post War company on - he was super charismatic, he was charming, he was of course incredibly handsome. So they needed someone who basically could be be terrifying bully but also be as genuinely charming, even charming when he was an ass. That's why they were probably having a hard time casting the role and why they did cast Jensen when he came along. He's capable of portraying that complexity and making the character have a depth that isn't necessarily spoken.

This is setting itself up to be a great season I think, I like how they updated the name of the show to fit this season's big new mystery "Big Sky: Deadly Trails". It seems like they are pulling out the stops to make an intriguing case with a lot of interesting characters.

Because it's set in Montana, which shares a long border with Canada, and someone in the sheriff's office, perhaps even Sheriff Tubbs himself, picked up a Canadian football on a trip? The show filmed Season 2 in New Mexico(and Season 3 is going to be filmed there as well).

Kind of like Lost. :) The whole final season was basically "the waiting room" for Heaven(well specifically the church was, the rest was them realizing they had each individually lived out their lives and were now dead) and heading to the Church). Then from there they'd move on to whatever was next, together.

I got one wrong as well. I really don't remember Soldier Boy saying it. So I just chose Dean, even though I couldn't think of a situation he'd have said it, I thought maybe one of those eps where they had to make up a story about killing a creature. I think maybe Soldier Boy didn't say it outloud, but it was in one of the articles that was shown on screen about the night MM's grandfather died. So kind of a trick question.

Thanks for doing the hard part for me! 😃 I saw it just as I was running out to get a bite to eat. Great interview and pictures.

I don't have time to post a link but y'all new pics from the Man About Town shoot used for a couple articles in Men's Health, article online, saw the links on twitter.

That's a reason why I think Dean dying halfway through the finale wasn't any good, besides the fact it didn't at all fit with the themes they set up, I just don't think heaven would give Dean peace, no matter who he was with. I can't see there really being any situation where inaction would actually give Dean peace. Even when Dean sort of vaguely talked about retiring it seemed more like a vacation, or maybe not actively hunting himself but still helping people in some other capacity, either as a gathering place(like when Michael had him trapped in his mind, a bar, where others might come for a break between jobs and for helpful info possibly if they needed it.

I don't really understand what both of the points are here that you two are talking about? I don't think they are mutually exclusive. I would say no I don't think Dean would be all that at peace in "heaven" doing nothing, stagnating, having no purpose but existing for the sake of existing, no matter who he was with. I do also think Dean loves his brother and would certainly want him to be part of any existence he might have if he's given the choice. I don't think he needs to be with him every minute or even every day. But he would want to able to see him and talk to him and hang out with him on a regular basis.

Yeah all it really showed was that without Dean there was no story. The thing that made Supernatural most itself, was Dean Winchester. Supernatural came to life the minute Dean showed up in Sam's apartment in the pilot and it died when Dean died. It should have ended on episode 19. Episode 20 exists for one reason only to get Dean out of the way of Sam's "normal life" and for Dabb to try and make sure there couldn't be anymore show.

I wouldn't blame "the audience" just because you can't do something. I have no trouble seeing the different characters for what they are no matter what an actor looks like, if they are a good actor. I don't need to forget who an actor is, to see the character.

Of course not, it wasn't about the kid or even AMY, it was as usual for Sam, all about Sam and Dean "trusting"(aka obeying without question) Sam even when it's a stupid idea.

Also in Season 8, don't forget Sam killed Dean's daughter, Emma, his own niece, ALSO still because of Amy. Amy the friend he knew for ONE day 15 years earlier and met up with again because he caught her KILLING PEOPLE. Emma hadn't killed anyone yet and there was some possibility Dean was getting through to her. But Sam shot her and then had the nerve to say she wasn't really Dean's child anyway. At least Dean got to say "yes she really was" but then it was forgotten about. Can you imagine if Dean had done that to a child of Sam's? Oh my god we'd never hear the end of it, in the show or from his fans. We heard more about AMY, who Sam barely knew and was actively murdering people, it caused directly or indirectly two deaths of people involved with Dean(Emma and Benny--and a third if you count Martin, who Sam made his flunky) because of Sam's ridiculous grudge about Amy for a season and a half, than we did about Sam killing Dean's and his own flesh and blood Emma, who hadn't actually hurt anyone yet and was confused and scared. If it had been Sam's monster child who hadn't hurt anyone yet and Dean had shot her, we'd have had at least 2 seasons of Dean groveling and everyone telling Dean how wrong he was and Sam crying about how dare he do this to him, etc, etc.

Because the writers do it for them, the writers are always justifying Sam's behavior, no matter what he does, Dean is put in the wrong. It's like if they were arguing whether the dress was blue or white(remember that?LOL), Sam would be it's blue it's blue it's blue and if Dean said it was white, he'd be framed in the wrong, Sam says it's blue, so it's blue. Then the next day Dean would say the very same dress was blue and Sam would say "no it's white it's white it's white" and now suddenly the show would frame it as the dress is white, has always been white and Dean is wrong for saying it's blue. This is absolutely right. Right from the start Sam had this thing where he needed to show himself as better, smarter, stronger, more everything than Dean(I mean it was literally in his dialogue a few times when he was particularly angry or possessed, only somehow we were supposed to take it at face value, which just makes Sam arrogant as hell). It literally drives a good number of his actions and his ridiculous envy is NEVER called out. Dean is just blamed for you know, existing. Dean exists, therefore whatever Sam does, is Dean's fault, therefore if Sam says he feels something about Dean's existence, it's therefore correct and again Dean's fault. It was ALWAYS a competition with Sam to the point he'd be contrary basically just for the sake of not letting Dean be right and causing an argument he would then blame on Dean being bossy/controlling/not letting him grown up/not trusting him, take your pick whatever he could use to best make himself the victim with that day. And somehow the show would always take Sam's side. Even when the action seemed to show Dean was right, somehow he would still be wrong. Well yeah it was right, but not right the right way. Honestly that could have been a halfway interesting storyline to play with, but...that would require Sam actually taking the blame for a genuine character flaw, admitting that Sam was part of their co-dependent cycle in a BIG way and admitting, not just on the part of the character Sam but on the part of the show itself, Dean actually had things being worthy of being envious of, that he was THAT good and THAT smart and that he was genuinely really better at certain important things than Sam was. Not just when Sam wanted to guilt trip Dean "Oh I'm the least of you you must let me do what we just literally beat you up to stop you from doing"/"oh you are such a genius hunter you must let me do the trials to prove they can be survive(proceeded to try and kill himself over them::eyerolls::)". Those words almost never came, on the rare occasions when they came at all, when Dean actually NEEDED to hear them, or for Dean's sake alone, they came when Sam wanted something from Dean.

Yeah I don't see Jensen, I don't see Dean, I don't see Alec. He's a great actor and he makes his characters DIFFERENT. That's why I enjoy watching him. It's because, not only the more obvious changes like hairstyle or clothing or the way he uses his voice(which a lot of actors who are considered excellent don't even do, unless they are doing a different accent but Jensen will sometimes change the timbre or rhythm of his voice, like he did with Soldier Boy for example) but the look in his eyes is different. The person looking out of his eyes, the brain that appears to be working there, is different. I can't really explain it but it's not the same. When they say an actor is "Cary Grant is always Cary Grant" it's because the actor is playing a specific persona in a specific way, it has nothing to do with their looks. I mean John Wayne was always John Wayne, people sometimes comment that nowadays Tom Cruise is always Tom Cruise(though he is capable of more he just doesn't now). Actors in general, esp American actors or actors who hit it big here, DO tend to be very good looking but that's not the reason for it. I don't really see Jensen in Jason, Jason just wasn't a "character" as you might say. He was kind of a bland guy in the sense that he wasn't written to have much in the way of personality quirks, he was just Lana's boyfriend, Clark's coach, Guy with the mommy issues but that didn't get explored that much before he had to leave but boy they appeared to be doozies, but Jensen did a really great acting what he was given, esp when the character's relationship with his mother was revealed and also with Lex like when they were captured.

Right? And it wasn't even Dean's fault. EITHER TIME. Sam and Amelia had basically broken up by the time Dean got back and Dean brought Sam back to Stanford and drove off and only came back because he recognized the signs of something fishy going on. It was SAM who decided to dedicate himself to revenging Jessica. And the show never had Sam take any of those things back either, he was always wishy washy on the Jessica thing when it was brought up. "It's complicated". No. It ain't complicated. Dean had nothing to do with Jessica's death, Dean was perfectly and entirely reasonable in asking for some help looking for your missing father. Dean brought Sam back exactly when Sam asked him to and left with no drama. I've always said Sam's issue for a big chunk of the show, as presented in the show but never acknowledge by it, isn't that he wanted Dean to treat him as an equal, He wanted to be John. He convinced himself Dean was John's "yes man"(despite the times we know that Dean either didn't yes him or snuck things behind John's back like the fireworks Sam wanted so much). Sam wasn't satisfied with that and constantly found fault with it, and saw it as Dean "not treating him like an equal" because Sam wanted Dean to follow what he said, to not question him. He wanted to take what was John's place while Dean still played the role he thought Dean played to John. LOL It's sort of like how studies show men think women talk 50 percent of the time in a conversation when in fact they've only talked 30% and the men 70%. To Sam equality was Sam being in charge and Dean doing what Sam said without questioning. Dean treated him as equal from the start, far more than he should have been frankly. Sam didn't know about hunting until he was 8(by which time Dean had known about, and unbeknownst to Sam started training for, for 8 years even if he was still a child himself), Sam dedicated himself to school and generally tried to avoid hunting if he could, then he went to college for 4 years. Dean had literally at least twice as much experience as Sam, including hunting on his own, and yet Dean pretty much treated Sam as a partner from the start whereas he quite rightly should have been reminding Sam of his greater experience and basically made him an apprentice.

You know and it wouldn't even have been as bad if they'd make Sam's character have to deal with that honestly and not in a pass the buck somehow it's Dean's fault and/or Dean was the one with the problem for being upset about it. But as usual, it was Dean gets treated badly or betrayed and it's HIS fault he doesn't just roll over and accept it and act like it never happened and it's all fine. When what they really should have done was have Sam deal with his unreasonable resentment and jealousy of Dean which goes all the way back to the beginning of the show and Sam was never called out on and never made to deal with. Meanwhile Dean had to go through 100 variations of "Dean needs to let Sam grow up, Dean needs to let Sam go, Dean needs to accept Sam as an equal, Dean is co-dependent(guess what you can't be "co dependent" alone idiot writers)" even when he was DOING all those things, until they suddenly wanted to absolve Sam of blame for the other things and suddenly they'd blame it on Dean not doing those things. I mean that Season 4 to Season 5 transition was ridiculous, Dean in Season 4 literally was letting Sam do what he wanted, he was trying to accept everything Sam wanted him to accept(despite Dean literally dealing with hell memories and being the one who actually really NEEDED the emotional support, he had to ignore it all to watch out for Sam), he literally says "Do what you want just don't lie to me about it" only for Sam to go back to lying to him about it in the next sentence but next season in early season 5 it was "yeah I went with Ruby because you are bossy and controlling and won't let me be me!!!". What? And every time Dean was shown trying to break that cycle himself, they forced him back into it but again never with the pay off that Dean was doing the right thing trying to do so, Dean was trying to break the cycle but "the universe" or Sam himself literally would not allow him to(like post The End where they were forced back together by both Zachariah AND Sam suddenly being like "OK we need to be together now that I've found I'm Lucifer's vessel, even though I didn't think we needed to be together when we found out YOU were Michael's vessel"). It's like they are the writers WHY are they writing him trying to break the cycle, a cycle in every other circumstance they are critical of,, only to accuse him of doing the wrong thing, being a bad brother, friend, person, whatever.

But he played it differently, it wasn't the same for Alec as it was for Dean. On the surface, as I said, on the page, it would have been easy for them to be very similar but they in fact felt like very different people. They'd never be mistaken for each other.

Funny when I watched it, I was impressed by how NOT Dean Alec was, esp given on the surface in the writing they could seem sort of similar, but they really didn't have the same type of vibe at all, IMO.

Yeah it made zero sense. ZERO sense. But it was just like that idiotic excuse they had Sam try to give for not looking for Dean after the season 7 finale when he went to Purgatory, that never before seen or heard of "promise to not look for each other"(when literally just a few episodes earlier in Season 7, for the Elliot Ness episode, Dean had disappeared in front of Sam in a flash of light and he'd immediately started looking for him because, with their lifestyle and experiences, WHY would he just ASSUME he was dead?). So Dean disappears, they successfully reunite because Sam looked and Dean knew Sam would look and left clues for him, and THEN decide "hey if one of us disappears again we should DEFINITELY not even try to figure out what happened"? And it happens off screen of course.

Oh yeah I mean I should say I certainly didn't mind being left in the car(often with a book😃) while my mom and/or dad shopped, or being left alone for a few hours at home. I don't think it was a bad thing for kids to have more freedom in general. But yeah what John did was well beyond that. I agree, I believe this is what Jensen is talking about, Dean didn't feel he needed his father's approval or was trying to win it, it's I don't know how to put it's more complicated than that. As someone mentioned above, it was more John's disapproval he wanted to avoid. Esp because in his mind, it would mean HE had put his family in danger and because he didn't do what he was supposed to they could have died. You know it's kind of like MM's OCD in The Boys except without the repetition of specific activities. Basically for Dean, every failure potentially led to his family being dead and that is largely something that happened with John's encouragement. Because he literally started making responsible for his little brother's life before he was in 4th grade.

Dean was 9 years old when John left Dean and Sam alone for 3 days in Something Wicked and it clearly wasn't unusual by then. It may not have been 7 or 8 but 9 years old is still very young to be left with total responsibility for oneself and a younger sibling for an entire weekend. And yes it was in the 60's,70's and 80's. I was a kid in the 70's and 80's, I remember them. It was different in the sense that you had more freedom and weren't being hovered over but no most people did not and would not leave their kids alone for 3 days, hundreds of miles from the nearest "sanctioned" help(Pastor Jim in the case of Something Wicked) in a motel in a strange town, oh and given a gun and told shoot first and ask questions later.(responsible for life and death of yourself and your sibling). He was gone for at least a week in the Christmas episode and Dean was only 12. And there were not cell phones back then, only very rich people had them and they were big, not the sort of thing you could carry in a pocket. That didn't happen until the mid-late 90s by which time Dean was grown and Sam were almost grown. Dean lost the money gambling because they were almost out of money and he gambled hoping he could get more of it. We already know Dean went hungry at times, and Sam didn't, so he was probably used to them running out of money for food before John got back and he decided to try and use what little they had left to win more. He lost but it's not like oh he's just some dumb irresponsible teenager gambling for giggles.

Dean was a kind, caring person, he didn't let his life stop that. He tried sometimes but it never took, because his heart was just too big.

I wouldn't say it was positive, but yeah it wasn't John's approval he was looking for. He knew how to get John's approval if he wanted it. He didn't take actions based on John's approval but on the fact that he felt, due to John putting him in that position, his family's survival depended on him taking certain actions, playing a certain role which all started when he was way too young to put in those positions.

The episode that made me admit to myself I was sticking with this show and it was because of Jensen Ackles was Skin. I liked the show from the first(esp Dean), joined fandom immediately but I don't at first I told myself "oh it's just a fun guilty pleasure" but Skin was where I admitted to myself "nope it's about time I admit I'm really loving this guy(Jensen) as an actor, Dean Winchester is taking over my mind, and I'm here for however he's on the show". LOL I didn't expect it to last 15 years though.