Bergamot

I like this idea very much! If only we could have had a young Jensen to play Dean at a younger age in flashback episodes, it would have added so much. Unfortunately not possible, since there is only one Jensen Ackles!

I thought you said you liked her? LOL! (RIP Madison, Sara, Eileen, etc, etc) LOL, gonzosgirrl, maybe you're right! Might not be a good idea! I liked Dirk too, and I liked watching Dean bonding with him. Especially that scene in the hospital where they are comparing their favorites in the slasher movie series and quoting in unison from the movie trailer. Dean looks kind of shy and unsure at first, and keeps darting glances around as if he is expecting the Fun Police to show up and stop the conversation. But he gradually relaxes as they talk, and in the next scene where they are talking about the movies you can see that he is having such a good time! :-) I know that Sam was just teasing Dean about having so much in common with Dirk -- implying that they were both weirdos, I guess -- but actually I don't think it's an insult to be compared with Dirk. He seemed to be easy to get along with, comfortable with who he was and what he enjoyed. He bravely threw himself into the line of fire on behalf of both Stuart's mother and Dean. And he was loyal to his friend Stuart. I can see why you would compare Dirk with Ronald Reznick, in the sense that they were both oddball characters that Dean befriended. But I think that Ronald was a darker character, with a more complex story. Was he crazy to do what he did, or was he admirable to at least try to do something? Was he really like the Winchesters? (People think they're crazy, too!) Should they have told him the truth or kept him in the dark? Was his death inevitable? Ronald was ultimately a tragic figure, and when he was killed, his death was meaningful -- to Dean, especially. Dirk was just a nice geeky guy -- nothing wrong with that, but that's all there was to his story. (Now I want to go back and watch "Nightshifter" in addition to re-watching "Hollywood Babylon"! This episode really makes me miss Ben Edlund!)

I agree with those who thought the explanation for Sam's dislike of Halloween was kind of lame. I never thought it had anything to do with Jessica's death, since obviously it preceded that. I just assumed that it was because he knew that monsters and ghosts, the things that people were dressing up for as fun, were actually real and deadly. The fact that the explanation actually had nothing to do with the "messed-up childhood" that he had mentioned to Samantha sort of made the whole discussion a little pointless, or at least not very illuminating. On the plus side, I was afraid that the reason might be something Dean would have to apologize for, like Sam's fear of clowns somehow turning out to be Dean's fault in the Plucky Pennywhistle episode. So at least we were spared that. But again, the explanation fell kind of flat for me. I would have preferred that they just left it a mystery. I liked Samantha, though. I thought she was cute and smart -- she was the one who figured out the significance of the key ring, and noticed and grabbed the isopropyl alcohol for Sam so that he could burn it in time -- and also loyal to her friends. Maybe Sam could ask her out. Of course, if she is a comic book geek, they may not share many of the same interests, but that is not always a deal-breaker. I liked that too. Dean said it in a very offhand, understated manner, about how when he was growing up, he needed to "check out" once in a while, and that he liked to watch movies where he knew the bad guy was going to lose -- but those casual words revealed a lot about the pain and awfulness of his childhood. I also liked the casual way he mentioned that he had been in a lot of hospitals at night, and "trust me, they get pretty empty" -- again, there is a lot of pain hidden under those words.

YES!! And wearing a henley and socks, and propping himself up on his pillow to watch the movie -- so adorable! I was thinking the same thing! I really thought that in that last scene, we would see it lying in the back seat of the Impala. I think the sloppiest plot point for me (and it was an important plot point, which makes it worse) was the way that the front door of the comic book store being locked meant no one could get out of the building. There is absolutely no way on earth that the store would have been allowed to stay open to the public if there was no emergency fire door exit. The writer could have explained it by having Sam and Samantha be trapped by some supernatural means, but the way that it was done was just stupid; it took me right out of the story and made the part about Sam exploding the door open to get out seem kind of silly.

I guess it might be something movie-related, but nothing comes to mind. To tell the truth, I just assumed that this was Dean's idea of what an insurance agent would look like, and I loved it! Dean has lived such a completely strange, unnatural, un-normal life since the age of four that he actually doesn't have any idea what it is like to be a normal, ordinary person, and when he tries to play the role of a normal person, he always gets it somehow weirdly off-kilter. It is very endearing. Remember him mowing the lawn in "What Is and What Should Never Be"? (I especially liked the glasses he wore -- LOVE Dean in glasses! And it's not just me. Remember that one time when he was wearing them to hunt a hellhound, and Crowley complimented him and said how they really brought out his eyes? Hee!)

Very true. Dean's not going to go around telling people what he did to protect them from Lucifer and Lucifer's imminent plans to "unravel the universe" (although it would be nice if someone else mentioned it) but nonetheless, that's what he did. And if he didn't care what happened except to Sam and Jack, he wouldn't be feeling the way he does now. Dean always feels that he must save everyone ("the whole wide world of sports", as he says in "Sam, Interrupted".) It's one of the most fundamental truths of the character, and has been from the beginning.

I think that they were trying too hard to copy "Hollywood Babylon" -- I guess you could call it a "homage" if you wanted to be kind. But "Hollywood Babylon" had a more complex story with so many clever and fun elements -- it's really a great episode, in my opinion. Imitation may be the sincerest form of flattery, but let's face it, this writer is no Ben Edlund. On the whole, I enjoyed this episode, but overall it was pretty thin.

If Dean had not been there, I don't really picture Kaia saying much of anything to Sam. Neither she or the original Kaia seem to have taken any particular notice of him, at least that I can remember. Now, I can maybe see Kaia taking on Jody, and making a few comments about Claire to antagonize her. But here's a question, what if Claire had been there instead of Dean? Kaia definitely has a grudge against Claire, and I can see her blaming Claire for what happened to original Kaia, but there is no way I could imagine her contemptuously referring to Claire as weak and afraid and implying that she is a bully. I just don't picture something like that ever happening, not on this show. I can see her maybe saying something about how Claire' courage makes her a dangerous adversary. Or maybe even making a sarcastic comment about Claire's golden curls, in order to make a point of how attractive Kaia actually finds her. But nothing like what she said to Dean. The encounter would have a totally different slant to it, but it would be as equally clear to me what was going on.

LOL! Thank you, gonzosgirrl! Yes, I'm afraid that over the years Dean fans have grown all too familiar with this type of gaslighting.

That would be interesting! I would not mind if the story went in that direction. I was reading some of the interviews that were released recently, trying to look for clues at to what is coming. This is from this article: https://variety.com/2018/tv/features/supernatural-season-14-andrew-dabb-interview-michael-dean-sam-lucifer-1202992073/ And then we have this article: https://tvline.com/2018/10/17/supernatural-spoilers-season-14-big-bad-not-michael/ Am I wrong to think these two comments are connected, that the awakening of the "bigger, scarier things" (apparently something Michael has done on purpose, since Dabb says it was by design) is the same as the "something else" that will take a "bigger toll" on Dean? Hopefully this huge, terrible, scary thing is not something like Jack's illness because, well, that would be just stupid. What could be so big and scary, especially considering what they've already faced? The dinosaurs from the Bad Place finding a way into our world and trampling around like Godzilla? Surely not, because again, that would be really stupid. Some kind of Elder Gods, like Cthulhu from the H.P. Lovecraft mythos? Or maybe Michael has taken a trip to the Empty in order to release something into our world -- or who knows, maybe to release everything? Maybe Michael is going to empty the Empty! I wish I could believe that whatever is going to take a bigger toll on Dean is connected to the Michael!Dean storyline. "Bigger" and "scarier" does not really interest me, unless there is that connection to characters that I care about.

Exactly. Of course we all know that Dean is afraid that he will not be able to save those he loves. Everyone knows this, including Dean. He has lived with this fear his whole life. He doesn't need anyone to give him "insight" into this fact, and neither does the audience. Anyway, if Kaia was really just attempting to help Dean out by sharing her great wisdom and insight into who he is (because she is just so awesome that she already understands him better than he knows himself, I suppose), then I guess Berens didn't know this. He stated that Kaia said what she said only because she has a grudge against Dean and was trying to get under his skin. I agree with this; I just disagree that the audience was supposed to see her words as totally unjustified, based on the way the episode was written. When she says, "I saw what you did. When you got angry, you shoved your gun in her [original Kaia's] face", followed by a flashback to that scene, there is no indication, either in what she or anyone else says, or in the flashback itself, that Dean had just found out that his mother was in danger. What we are clearly shown is someone who is being a bully, both to original Kaia and this Kaia. She immediately follows this by saying, "You're scared. And you're weak." There is no sympathy or understanding in her face, unless the actress is doing a really bad job; what really comes across is contempt. If his fear "is not a sign of weakness", why does she call him weak? She doesn't even hint that the fear behind his anger is not for himself or that it comes from his desire to save people -- she says that it comes from him being weak. She is insulting him. Of course, if someone thinks that Dean as a character is weak and pathetic and a bully, then perhaps they would see Kaia's words as a useful insight. However I don't agree that he is. I would love to see Kaia have to eat her words, but it is obvious to me that she is a Mary Sue, and so I doubt she will ever will have to. For this type of character, the other characters will always be used to make her look good, not the other way around.

I LOVED that scene where Dean shot Jack and told him he was acting like a psycho! It was clever and funny, especially when Jack squawked indignantly, "You SHOT me!!" Hee! And you are absolutely right, it did not frame Dean negatively. Not at all. For all the blather from a certain writer about "authorial intent", if the writer is competent, it is almost always perfectly clear how the narrative wants us to view a character. Yeah, we got your number, Berens. If that scene had happened now, Jack would have just stood there all sad-faced, with the tears starting to well out of his eyes. And Cas and Sam would have rushed forward to comfort him, telling him he was a good boy and that they were proud of him and that everything was going to be okay -- all the while shooting poisonous glances back at Dean. It all reminds me of that scene in "Tall Tales", where Sam is talking to the college kid, and (in Dean's re-telling) hugs the kid with a lugubrious expression and gets all choked up while assuring him that he is a "brave little soldier" and "too precious for this world". Something that the show used to be clever enough to make fun of, is now the same thing that they want us to take seriously. (Who wrote "Tall Tales"? Was it John Shiban? Now there is a writer that I wish we still had!)

You have reasoned it out very logically here, BabySpinach! My impression after the end of episode 2 was that Dean himself was somehow "the trap" that Michael was talking about and that he was so pleased and smug about. I was interested to see where that went. But then this episode gave me the impression that the writers had somehow dumped that whole idea in favor of making Michael's disappearance all about Kaia and her spear. The only thing is, as you explained in your comment, that this doesn't even make sense given what we saw in episode 2. As you said, I still have a slight bit of hope for a Dean storyline that is about Dean, but not much.

I guess it was the only place she could find to stay where she was allowed to decorate with the heads of her enemies stuck on poles! :-)

Okay, I shouldn't have, but I couldn't resist going to take a look at this. Good lord. Yes, that's a classic Mary Sue right there. Even if I wanted my show to morph into the saga of a teenage girl with magical powers (which I don't; they are a dime a dozen and I'm not interested -- not to mention that this show is the story of the Winchesters, and I don't appreciate it being hijacked) -- but even if I wanted to watch the story of Kaia, I wouldn't want it written like that. Can you in your wildest dreams imagine Eric Kripke, back when the show first began, sending out a tweet like that about one of his characters? ( Ha! Not that such a statement wouldn't have been absolutely true! But I mean, come on -- so ridiculous!)

I agree, but I also want to add that I don't see Sam's response as revealing anything about who Sam is in this case. It's just that, in my opinion, it was written that way because having him say anything else would not have fit in with the effect that they wanted from the story. Thanks G-girrl! Huh, I didn't know that the writers actually responded to criticism on Twitter. Sounds to me like something might have hit a nerve -- very interesting! Well, I know what I saw and how it came across. As far as I'm concerned, either the way it came across was intentional, in which case I'm not buying it either, or it was unintentional, in which case it was poorly written. And if I could talk to the writer directly, I would challenge him to show us what I mentioned above: have Kaia interact with Dean, have those interactions change her mind about him, and have her say so.

What did he say? No, it wasn't about saying he was just like Michael. (I don't even know what was supposed to be conveyed by that remark -- that Dean is just like an inhumanly strong and powerful and merciless archangel? That he has been not nice to Kaia?) It was about bringing up Dean threatening the other Kaia with a gun -- something that was never brought up or discussed or resolved, but instead was reserved just for this special moment, so that Kaia could use it against him in a way that completely stripped it of its context or any reminder of what was going on with Dean when it happened. It was about Dean punching out Kaia, and tying up this little girl with big ropes, and then having the story reveal that Michael had sent monsters to hunt her. It was about Dean threatening to get answers out of Kaia, and have Sam and Jody react with horror and dismay. It is about having the story go to great lengths to show us how strong and cool and awesome Kaia is, and then have her call Dean weak and bravely heap scorn on him as he ineffectually threatens her. (Have we ever seen Dean be so un-scary and pathetic before when he is threatening someone? Not that I can remember. It's almost like all of sudden we are supposed to see him -- could it be? -- as a weak, ineffectual bully.) It is about having Dean, afterwards, struggle with guilt -- not for "being like Michael" but for being weak and stupid, and not having Sam strongly refute the very idea. So yeah, absolutely, the narrative does give weight to what Kaia says about Dean. When the angel Flagstaff, in "Stairway to Heaven", who is being interrogated by Dean, scornfully calls him nothing but a killer with oceans of blood on his hands, and says that she hates "men like him" ("Honey, there ain't no other men like me" Dean responds) -- that didn't bother me at all. There have been strong anti-human feelings among the angels from the moment they appeared, and the scene tied into that and into what was going on with the angels at that time, and I never felt like the story was saying that Dean was nothing but a killer -- Flagstaff was. Now, maybe if later on, the show has Kaia get to know Dean as the strong and good person that he is, and she indicates that she was wrong to say what she said here, then I will happily withdraw my objections. But I'm not going to hold my breath.

Thank you, BabySpinach, for your entire post, and for magnificently expressing my feelings! :-) Berens is pushing so hard to make the character of Kaia TOTALLY AWESOME in every single scene that it is kind of creeping me out. It's like I can hear him just behind me, watching over my shoulder and panting heavily with eagerness to point out her AWESOMENESS. Calm down, dude. Everything she does, like jumping over a fence or killing the monsters, is framed like a crucial and dramatic full-page panel in a comic book. Considering that this is not her show (they didn't want Wayward Sisters, Berens), obnoxious is a good way to describe it. Yes, obnoxious is absolutely the word for it! I feel sorry for Castiel fans, especially those that don't like Jack, as I think his character has been treated badly. You know, there was a moment there, when he was unable to heal the girl, and he stopped and looked chagrined for a second, that rather than saying "This might take a while, go on without me" I imagined he was going to say, "I'm afraid I neglected the fact that I am not permitted to be a part of the main plot of the episode, so go on without me." I mean, he might as well have said that.

I enjoyed this as well, although my pleasure in his absence was diminished a bit by the way they had to have Sam ask about him -- you know, because Nick is just so important and crucial and enthralling a character, that the audience might be upset if his name didn't come up. Oh, okay! Thanks for this, ahrtee, since I actually wasn't sure what the point of that part of the episode was. Unfortunately I have to admit that I didn't quite follow exactly what Jack did in the end to save the damsel in distress, due to my total and profound indifference to what was going on there, but maybe it won't matter. I did find two moments from the story to be kind of funny, except I don't think I was supposed to. First, the part where Jack is packing up his little knapsack and leaving his note on his pillow! as he prepares to run away from home! because no one appreciates him! -- maybe this was supposed to tug at my heartstrings, but it seemed so silly to me that I couldn't take it seriously. And second, the part where Cas and the random hunter are loudly chanting the spell together to produce the big poof of purple smoke -- they both looked so earnest and solemn and very ridiculous all of the sudden. I don't know, somehow when Rowena works her spells it doesn't look as stupid to me as this one did, I don't know why. I think maybe because she does it with panache, as well as an underlying understanding -- almost a flaunting -- of the silliness of it.

You're right -- no one seemed to even care. Well, except for Jody maybe. She didn't thank him, but in an episode dedicated to diminishing and demeaning my favorite character, she helped a little. At least she was overjoyed to see Dean again, she understood why the hunt was so important to him, and wonder of wonders, she even told him that he didn't need to apologize for anything. She is a good person. Also, I think that the character of Jody is well-acted. The realness and three-dimensional humanity that Kim Rhodes brings to the role is really refreshing when compared to the flatness of a cardboard character like Jack. The more the show tries to push his story, the less interesting he becomes to me.

Yes, I thought that too, about how electric that moment was! It has nothing to do though with the characters sharing the scene -- Jensen as Dean himself just generates that kind of electricity and energy on the show; it is as if the show kind of "wakes up" when he is onscreen. I noticed this too, but I wasn't sure if it was too soon to know what it meant going forward. However I thought this abrupt disappearance of the AU hunters -- not just from the bunker but from the entire episode -- was pretty strange. I mean, in the season premiere, Dabb made a big elaborate point of showing how the bunker had turned into a veritable buzzing hive of hunter activity. Sam was like an overworked executive (complete with business trips to Atlanta); he could not even sit down to eat a bowl of soup without being interrupted by the necessity of organizing the hunters for a vampire hunt. Sure, every single one of them could have been out on a hunt, but it was odd how suddenly as a group they just weren't there, without even one character -- their former leader Bobby, maybe -- asking, "Hey, where is everybody?" The implication in the first episode was clearly that the bunker had become both the hunters' headquarters and their home. I thought that we would see hunters passing casually in the background of scenes that took place there, on their way to and from hunts, or returning to eat and sleep and recuperate from injuries. I imagined that future scenes in the bunker where Sam and Dean were talking about Michael would be interrupted by hunters needing guidance from their "Chief", by the "Soup's On!" Guy asking what they want for dinner, or by Maggie with a question about how to hack a traffic cam. If not, then frankly, what was the point of showing all that activity buzzing around in the bunker for that one episode? Sure, sure, I know, we can all fanwank various excuses as to why the AU hunters are no longer around, although it is strange if one week they can't even hunt vampires without Sam directing them, and the next week they have all gone their own way. And if the show is going to insert them into the story only when the writers don't have more important things going on, I don't see how they are not going to come across as a contrived and inorganic plot device. It is too soon, I guess, to say whether the buzzing hive of hunters in the first episode was an anomaly or not. To me it came across almost as if the season premiere was a pilot episode for an entirely different show -- just not one I think I would want to watch.

I cheered for your comment, BabySpinach, especially the bolded part. So true! That was kind of a bizarre scene, I thought. One minute Cas is soothing and coddling and upholding Jack, as they all always do -- praising him for how "kind" he supposedly was to Kelly's parents. Then there is a beat of silence, and the next thing you know, Jack is angrily telling Cas off because Cas maintains the importance of saving Dean. And you're right, Lemuria, there is no underlying concern or sadness from Jack regarding Dean's fate -- there is not even any sympathy or concern for Cas's feelings, for how upsetting this must be for him. I mean, Jack says he "gets it", but there is no indication that he really does. And Jack being a very young human is no excuse, as far as I'm concerned. The importance of people's feelings should be the one thing he can comprehend, considering that he spends most of his time brooding over and pondering his own feelings. But I guess the lesson everyone has been teaching Jack, by constantly asking about and fussing over how he feels, is that it is only HIS feelings that matter. Unfortunately, poor Cas is still not human enough to understand the importance of not letting the other person get the last word. :-) He should never have remained silent as that little twit made his remark about "what Dean would want" and then just waltzed out of the room, leaving Cas standing there -- even if the best he could do was to shout after Jack, "Oh, yeah? Sez you!" :-) Seriously, though, what Cas should have said is something like, "Of course Dean would never ask us to put him first. And that is why we need to save him."

Since you phrased this as a question -- my answer is no. How could I be? Having Dean possessed by the archangel Michael is something new, the character has only been give a handful of scenes, and he is played by Jensen Ackles. Maybe ask me again after Michael has been brought back as many times as Lucifer has been brought back on the show over the years, and has been given as much screen time and writer attention and story focus as Lucifer has gotten.

In regard to Jack's visit to Kelly's parents, I have to say that it makes me very angry that the writers are STILL trying to shove down our throats the narrative that Kelly's story was essentially nothing more than an illustration of a perfect and pure mother who loved her precious baby Jack so much. Aww, look how happy her parents were to learn about Jack's birth! What a blessing he was! The fact is that Kelly was raped by Lucifer when he possessed the body of her lover, and then even though she chose to die rather than be used by him to bear his offspring, she was then brainwashed by the supernatural creature inside of her into happily serving as his incubator. (Which killed her, by the way, although among all his angst and self-pity Jack never seems bothered by this.) It infuriates me that she was NEVER ONCE allowed to express her rage at Lucifer for what he did to her, but instead the writers had her simper to Jack about how it was natural that he would want to get to know his father. She was literally never allowed to say one bad word about him. It is horrible, and I think Dabb and his writers should be ashamed of themselves. At the very least they could stop bringing her up and using what happened to her as some kind of simple and heartwarming story. Also, I don't agree with Castiel that it was "kind" of Jack not to tell her parents that she was dead. I think it was cowardly. He didn't have to tell them what really happened, he could have made something up, but now they will never know or understand why they will never hear from her again, and it seems very cruel to think of them waiting for news about Kelly and the grandson that they were so happy about.