S01.E12: The Tears of a Clown

[AnimeMania]

THE HARDEST LIES – Mary (Meg Donnelly) and John’s (Drake Rodger) tense discussion is interrupted when Carlos (Jojo Fleites) and Latika (Nida Khurshid) arrive to discuss a mystery involving a creepy clown. Meanwhile, Ada (Demetria McKinney) makes an interesting discovery. 

Original Air Date: February 28, 2023      8pm      CW 
Ruth Connell as Rowena MacLeod

[BornToDie]

Sorry, Jensen and Robbie, I wanted to like it, but the episode was again kinda meh.  Seeing Rowena was cool, but I guess I’m not surprised her scenes only added up to five minutes. The Akrida stuff is just way too much tell instead of show.  Yes, the clowns were creepy, but the scenes toward the end just came off as silly to me.  I hope I feel something about next week’s episode, since I’m sure Dean will be in it.

[PAForrest]

Other than the fact that I don't see how they're going to wrap up this storyline next week, I liked this one more than last week's if for no other reason than clowns are always terrifying. And it was cool that they actually managed to save everyone who ever disappeared into Limbo's realm, even though most of them were suddenly way out of time.

I do think the Limbo thing is a clue as to what's happening, most likely to Dean.

I liked seeing more of Ada, and of course connecting with Rowena was all kinds of awesome. We can never have enough Rowena. If the series survives to a second season, my guess is that Ada will go a little darkside missing part of her soul.

I continue to maintain that John and Mary should never have hooked up. I still doubt that's the message they're trying to convey here, but for me that's very much canon - they shouldn't have hooked up in the OG series either.

So we got a little bit of a different mix with the character pairings this week, but I'd want a lot more if there's a second season.

[iMonrey]

I don't know if it was the creepy clowns or the guest appearance by Rowena but I thought this was a pretty decent episode. I was actually engaged for once and I couldn't say that about the last several episodes. However, it does confirm my belief that the show would have been better off with a monster of the week format, at least for the first season. The whole Akrida ark has been a giant snoozefest (or as BornToDie put it, "too much tell instead of show," especially the last several episodes).

One thing that annoyed me was when Carlos and Lakita were banging on the door John had gone through while all the walls around them were made of canvas. Couldn't they just have lifted up the canvas? I'll hand-wave that it was magic or something (which, I guess it kind of was).

Taking bets now: We won't see Dean next episode until the last three seconds, which will be that episode's cliffhanger. I'd put money it. It wouldn't even surprise me if we didn't see him at all. I think the whole Dean thing has been a carrot to keep people engaged in a story that's been bleeding viewers by the week. 

[Noneofyourbusiness]

14 hours ago, BornToDie said:

Sorry, Jensen and Robbie, I wanted to like it, but the episode was again kinda meh.  Seeing Rowena was cool, but I guess I’m not surprised her scenes only added up to five minutes. The Akrida stuff is just way too much tell instead of show.  Yes, the clowns were creepy, but the scenes toward the end just came off as silly to me.  I hope I feel something about next week’s episode, since I’m sure Dean will be in it.

I didn't find the clowns silly (and I liked the music), but I did find John being cleared that easily silly. Especially after the moral that he should be more visibly upset about being framed from murder and in exile from Lawrence.

Also, although The Winchesters is far from the first show to ignore this, the fact that he escaped custody (and violently, to boot) would still land him and his accomplice Mary in hot water regardless of his being cleared of the original charges.

4 hours ago, PAForrest said:

I liked seeing more of Ada, and of course connecting with Rowena was all kinds of awesome. We can never have enough Rowena. If the series survives to a second season, my guess is that Ada will go a little darkside missing part of her soul.

So we got a little bit of a different mix with the character pairings this week, but I'd want a lot more if there's a second season.

I'd have liked to see Rowena interact with the whole group. I also get that impression about Ada, but I wouldn't like seeing her become a villain, at least not permanently.

I'd also like to see more different lineups when it's "Let's split up, gang" time, instead of almost always being Mary with John and Carlos with Lata.

That said, I really love all the characters and hope this show is renewed so I can continue seeing them in crazy situations. The Winchesters has more of a Buffy feel to it for me than the original show, which is a good thing, and feels more streamlined and not weighed down by years and years of sometimes-contradictory continuity.

 

Edited March 1, 2023 by Noneofyourbusiness

[BornToDie]

I feel like the only reason the viewership increased is because the show moved back to 8 pm and the appearance of Rowena.  It’s kind of obvious that the big reason it was announced she was coming back was because the show needed to increase its ratings to help with renewal chances.  It’ll be interesting to see how much Dean is in the finale and what the explanation is for the canon differences between this show and the OG.  For me, I think I just can’t connect to this show the same way I could with the mothership.  The clown stuff came off as silly to me because it felt a bit tacked on and trying to connect it with John and Mary’s issues seemed way less genuine than it did in “Everybody Loves a Clown.”  The ending to this episode felt rushed and a bit disjointed, too.  The Dean tidbits are the only thing keeping me tuned in so far, but I really have no clue how he’s being worked into the story.  

[Casseiopeia]

3 hours ago, BornToDie said:

I feel like the only reason the viewership increased is because the show moved back to 8 pm and the appearance of Rowena.  It’s kind of obvious that the big reason it was announced she was coming back was because the show needed to increase its ratings to help with renewal chances.  It’ll be interesting to see how much Dean is in the finale and what the explanation is for the canon differences between this show and the OG.  For me, I think I just can’t connect to this show the same way I could with the mothership.  The clown stuff came off as silly to me because it felt a bit tacked on and trying to connect it with John and Mary’s issues seemed way less genuine than it did in “Everybody Loves a Clown.”  The ending to this episode felt rushed and a bit disjointed, too.  The Dean tidbits are the only thing keeping me tuned in so far, but I really have no clue how he’s being worked into the story.  

It's interesting the viewership increased but the demo was still 0.05. Not a good sign for renewal. I wonder if viewers increased because fans thought with only one more episode to go next week the mystery of Dean would become more fleshed out. A lot needs to be wrapped up next week. 

Jensen said that Sam would also be addressed in the season finale as well as where and when everyone is.