George Lucas has apparently sent a letter (no, not to us!) and we quote:

“Don’t tell anyone,” Lucas wrote, “but when ‘Star Wars’ first came out, I didn’t know where it was going either. The trick is to pretend you’ve planned the whole thing out in advance. Throw in some father issues and references to other stories — let’s call them ‘homages’ — and you’ve got a series.”

Now, to some of you in the good old Fandom of SUPERNATURAL (should it still exist) this may sound like something you can refer to. Many times Fandom has made the connection between SUPERNATURAL and STAR WARS (as can be read here) but maybe much to your disappointment, this comment was not directed at SUPERNATURAL or its creator Eric Kripke, but at the makers of LOST, a hugely successful show with a season finale up and coming this very weekend.

The real question this raises or me is: IF you have seen one plot, can’t you simply figure out every other plot by relating them all to one another? And at what point does a TV show stop being unique and original and becomes predictable and therefore boring? Are we done and have we tried everything so we’re just bored now seeing the same old themes over and over for two generations at least? And does this mean, that if you are still surprised by a shows “sudden turn” or “outcome”, you haven’t either paying attention to the subtle hints, or you haven’t seen enough or you simply don’t care?

A not so recent episode of  BOSTON LEGAL (“Juiced”) has, much to my delight, sued American TV Networks for NOT showing enough shows for senior citizen. Now, don’t get me wrong, I am not a senior myself (far from it) and a kid at heart, but I fully agree with the pledge. What was said is so true. Young, beautiful people act like experienced professionals in a job for which they’d have to study at least 10 more years in the real world…or until they are maybe not so pretty anymore. High School girls play hard-assed private detectives, while in my childhood a man of 40 with a mustache and and a military background was the perfect and most experienced person, suitable enough to portray a realistic  private detective (as far as “real” is concerned in LaLaLand). The general life expectancy if you will, has been lowered from mid 30s to mid 20s – 10 years lost. While humans never lived longer, we also revert back to a world where you are being told your life is over once you reached 30. Maybe a show like LOST was nice to see, as most actors where, still pretty to look at, not so young. And the plot required you to pay attention and stay sharp. Who says we need to be told all the answers? Why are we not willing to think for ourselves anymore?

The plot of SUPERNATURAL started out great – I didn’t watch it from the start as the ads put me of thinking “Not another teeny show with pretty faces” – but I caught up with the first season pretty fast and until fans had the whole discussion about whether Dean was going to hell or not (predictaaaaable!) I was really enjoying it. Then the next season came and brought in Angels as a way of getting Dean back on screen. Yes, ok, it’s somehow understandable that they have done it, but also ever since then, the show has always used the “easy way out” of prickly situations. In season 1 and 2 the boys always had a reasonably hard time to get a job done… it was the way the coped with the obstacles that made the plot realistic and enjoyable. They did it the hard way.

But then soon came the “easy explanations” and the show got bigger than life: Now you have an angel snap its fingers and voila! People are back on the show. Everything about SUPERNATURAL has become too easy, too common and therefore predictable equaling boring.  The boys always find a solution for everything and it all works out (even though they are spending a lot of time lamenting about having no choice, no plan and said father issues holding them back) . While this is very convenient for every storyteller, it’s also very annoying and the anti-thesis for great storytelling.  A good story isn’t about stuff working out, but about heroes, preferably broken ones to make matters more difficult. It now just seems logic that the story tellers of SUPERNATURAL have become lazy.

See, I think I know a thing or two about this subject matter. Call me sad, but I have made a list, and in about 25 years I have seen at least 270 TV shows/series that I know of and even remotely remember (not taking into account those that I have forgotten and not even starting to attempt listing every film I have ever seen. TV shows always work two ways: you have episodes that end in 45 minutes every week, or you have a show that drags on like Dynasty.  If you have ever seen the X-Files you might remember that feeling of despair you where left with at the end of each episode, when all the answers were taken away from Mulder and Scully. You kind knew, but really, you never knew. The same goes for LOST. You get a lot of bits and you can either work it out or give up.  I have seen lots of great shows being canceled because viewers simply couldn’t follow the plot. They expect easy feeding, not bits to chew on for days after. But why can’t these people not watch half hour Soaps and Telenovelas then and leave the good stuff to those who like the challenge of watching something a bit different? – This is were TV networks come in. They simply lack bravery I’m afraid. They count numbers, and don’t need intellectual satisfaction.

So which type is SUPERNATURAL? We have small plots that wrap every 45 minutes (like in the X-Files) but then we have these “underlying issues” people call the story arch that spans over the entire series. It’s woven into every episode, but it has become so repetitive as if viewers have to be reminded every week that the Apocalypse is nigh, that there is no way out and so on. It’s like the shows seems to thing that viewers forget, don’t pay attention, have become careless. But are they? Are SUPERNATURAL fans like that? – I think not. I have never met fans who got more involved in a show and creating a whole new world of Fandom out there. I have watched people go nuts over a TV show, cry, shout, rant and get silly. But lately, I have seen not much of it around. This website has said it before, there is a good chance that Fandom is dying out. People have already moved on to Twillight and other Vampire stories, which I cannot bring myself to watch as the themes are overused since Buffy and Angel. There is no need for more Vampire shows and two reasonably enjoyable ones have been cancelled off, while the ones hyped by teenagers are still going strong.

So BOSTON LEGAL was right in suing TV. Its made for kids – have you ever seen the Baby Channel? The BABY CHANNNNNNNEEEELLL??????? Where the hell is this all going? I am not sure I want to know anymore. Maybe I am finally too old for TV and we have to part like old friends:  Sorry TV, you have become so predictable to me now, so shallow, so superficial, so dumb. I don’t think we should be seeing each other anymore.

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2. O Death
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Right. I can see it’s about time that I weighed in here with my comments on the finale episode of Supernatural. Everyone is entitled to their own views, and I am not saying that anybody is wrong in anything they have said. What I am saying is– Oh come on, people! Did you seriously think that there was any other way series five could finish? Do you even watch the show?

Hundreds of fan fiction writers have already seen this, and in fact have already written variations on a theme of Sam chucking himself into the pit. It was inevitable. If it had happened any other way it would have been lame, it would have been a cop-out, it would have been bloody obvious that it was just an excuse to bring them back for season six.

Why was it inevitable? Because of Sam. Sam is the stuff of legend: Sam is the literary figure, Sam is the doomed hero, Sam Winchester is Talyn (Farscape fans know exactly what I’m saying), the person who has spent all of his TV time fighting a losing battle against what he thinks everyone else wants for him. The thing is, he was never going to beat this, and he was never going to be anything else but destiny’s whipping boy. The only surprise that came with the series finale was the twist that Sam could not control his possessed Lucifer form – not until family came into it. And I’m not even talking about Dean, I’m talking about the Impala. It just surprises me that so many people seem to think there was any other way the finale could have happened. Consider the series three finale. The only way that could have ended was Dean going to Hell – if they had miraculously found a way to get him off his deal, or they have managed to somehow delay or resist the inevitable, I probably would never have watched the show again.

There were problems with the finale, I’m not saying there weren’t. Killing off two characters just to bring them back a moment later is a little bit excessive, even for the Kripke. And that moment where the two characters died: that was the moment you knew a reset button was coming over the hill. That was the moment that Kripke took a step over the line in a Russell T Davies kind away, to try and up the ooh-aah quotient of his last hour. I can’t blame him: it’s his show, it’s his baby, and he slaved over it and protected it for five years. The show has being threatened with cancellation so many times, but it’s still here.

Speaking of Russell T Davies, I am so relieved that the finale didn’t all go crappy all-out hands-down balls-to-the-wall loopy, just to try and somehow make it all sparkly and amazing. The way the episode was written made it very clear that this episode was always going to be the end. The tone of the narration, the archived footage used for the flashbacks, the tying up of a few loose ends (“and for the record, this time next Thursday, Bobby will be hunting a rugaru in Dayton”) – it all added up to The End.

So what do we make of The End? The very last moments of the episode I believe are what upset more people than anything else this series. We see Dean carrying out his promise to Sam – even though Dean never actually promised anything to Sam. But then again, Dean probably considered it the best way to go after all was said and done. Dean is never going to be happy with this new life, and I’ll be surprised if he stays longer than a weekend. There’ll be tears, I have no doubt, but Dean will have to say goodbye to Lisa and Ben and take his own five minutes out to accept what’s happened.

But Sam… Oh yes, Sam. What has happened to Sam?

This is where season six will really decide whether it’s any good at all, or it’s just a pile of pants that people are trying to hang on the washing line of bandwagons. Please please please, let the demons and angels be over.

What worries me is the fact that the streetlamp buzzed out behind Sam’s head as he watched Dean through the window of the house. The light didn’t explode all angel-like, it buzzed out, all demo- like. Either somebody else was standing behind Sam at the time the light went out (and please please please let that be Crowley!) or Sam himself causes the light to go out. This would make some kind of twisted sense, seeing as Sam was supposed to have chugged down three gallons of demon blood before he threw himself in the pit. However, wasn’t it Lucifer who said that Sam knew that his real family was ‘them’? Is Lucifer referring to the body of angels that have been haunting the Winchesters for the last generation or two? But that would be ridiculous – if Sam does turn out to be an angel after all this time I really will be the most disappointed in the show that I have ever been.

What would be interesting is a reverse Stanford manoeuvre – where Dean is either trying to make a life with Lisa and failing miserably or he’s leaving and moving on to try and find a life he can put up with somewhere else, and it is Sam who comes to him, to tell him that he needs to come back to hunting. It would make beautiful symmetry, as Chuck would appreciate.

Oh yes, Chuck. There’s been a lot of speculation as to who Chuck really was – I prefer to believe Chuck was actually a real man and a real prophet, as real as prophets are, anyway. I’d like to believe that he was only impersonated in the last episode – and then only at the end. Somebody was sitting back and having a monumental chuckle at The Boys and what they were getting up to – someone in a very tall-man-watching-ants-scurry-around kind of way. I like to think in the last scene that we see of Chuck, it was either God himself – although that would be the juiciest M. Night Shyamalan moment ever, wouldn’t it? – or one of the other archangels. Whoever it was, they cheated with something Chuck could not have had, giving the location of the face-off. And I believe whoever this person was, sitting at Chuck’s keyboard in a very clean shirt, enjoying his virgin hookers and whiteness, he also brought Sam back. Because Sam and Dean did alright in The Test, Job-style? Or because nothing ever really ends?

For me, the series did go kind of tits-up when we found out that an angel had brought Dean back in season four. That’s when it crossed the line between hunting urban myths and legends and trying to create its own. Some fans have been tired of the angel-demon arc in the later seasons, and I have to say I have been a little too. A few more run-of-the-mill monsters would have been nice – good old-fashioned salt and burns, which they don’t seem to have pulled in the last few series. I really hope, really really hope, that in season six we get back to some normal monster-stabbing rocksalt-burning silver-cutting box-standard monster hunts. I think we, as fans, deserve it, for sticking with the angels and demons plot line for the last two series.

I have enjoyed all five series, don’t get me wrong. But a few less demon plots, a few less angel playground fights, and a Hell of a lot more monster hunts – if you’ll pardon the expression – would have gone down much more easily.

And that’s all the news that’s fit to print. More articles coming soon. We have a new Hellatus before us (with gratuitous re-runs on a millions different channels, not least of the CW), but I’m not taking it without a fight. We have #SPNrewatches via Twitter, we have spoilers to dodge, and we have DVD and BluRay releases in September – supposedly before season six reaches our screens. We can only hope that the new crew on board, this mix of old and new, don’t screw up this last series. Give us the last series to be proud of, people! Get us back to the season one and two fun of salting and burning, and leave the Russell T Davies plot lines to Doctor Who.

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2. Commentary: Is everything on TV predictable?
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This season finale of Supernatural has got to be the worst in the entire history of TV. Did you people serious sat on the edge of your seat the whooooooooooole time not knowing that Sammy was going to jump in a hole?

It wasn’t funny, it wasn’t sad, it was just the worst episode of Supernatural. Ever. I don’t care if you faithful fans out there want to throw things at me right now, Go ahead. I feel numb…. I just can’t take it anymore… man this was bad. This sucks ass. It really does. Somewhere, someone took a really great show, with a really nice, solid core idea ….and blew it! Completely. It is so messed up a season 6 can only be more torture.

For me it started to go sour when the writers were in strike… and Kim Manners died. The show hasn’t been the same since. It’s like an half-arsed attempt to make some money with it, keep some girl’s fantasies entertained…but where, in all this, was the story? It’s turned into an interactive game of “ooos” and “squeeees” and “aaaawwwwwsss” – but all the cool stuff is gone. The fighting, the music…oh wait! Was it not about some Urban horror stories in the beginning?

When they brought in the angel I had a hard time believing this was going to end well. Now Cas has grown on me so much, I want him to get his own TV show. Misha is great… the rest? Not such much. I really hope Jensen and Jared get their feet off the ground and find someone who wants to give them some good film roles, because they both slaved away for years saying the same old, boring lines… saying “seriously” and “Dean – Sam – Dean – Sam…” – they both got talent that needs to be developed. So here is my vote against them being in another season.
Let them be. Let us be. Enough is enough – Eric knows it and jumped ship… it’s time the Buckets are jumping too.

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Ah, the wonder of buying DVDs. That beautiful, shiny shiny moment where you stand in the shop and pick up the boxed set of your favourite TV series (Supernatural, anyone?). You slide your hands over the cover, you gleefully turn it over to check out the special features, you make yourself walk v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y to the counter to purchase the twenty-five-odd hours of pure gun-flashlight-eyelash-puppyeyes-eyebrowofdoom-arms-singlelayers-Impala p0rn.

You take the box home. You watch pretty much all of it over the next few weeks.

And then it goes on your shelf. It gathers dust. It waits. It knows that, when the stars aline, when fates gel, just at the right moment, there will be cause to liberate it from its resting place and use the DVDs once again.

That moment is coming soon. We don’t need stars or fates or any of that. We just Tiny and her Very Ben Edlund Supernatural Marathon:

Bunny Time! A Very Ben Edlund Supernatural Marathon Twitter Party

Easter Monday 5th April

2pm Australian Eastern Standard Time

Hashtag #SPNRewatch

Episodes:

2×18: Hollywood Babylon

3×03: Bad Day at Black Rock

4×08: Wishful Thinking

You’ve never done a rewatch before? No problem.

Rewatching Supernatural: A Guide

1. Make sure you are online and that you are logged into your Twitter account. If you don’t have one, it takes minutes to start one. Once logged in, we favour TweetChat – cos it’s easy and simple and clean and you can keep up that way. And if we use TweetChat, it automatically puts the #SPNRewatch hashtag on the end of your messages, so they all get lumped in with the right group of replies and general chattiness.

2. Get your DVDs/downloads/copies/versions/whatevers ready beforehand. This means the other people don’t have to wait if say, oh, your copy of Monster Movie will not let go of the disc holder and you struggle to get it out of the packaging without snapping the sodding thing in half. Ahem.

3. While watching, feel free to comment on anything and everything. It’s a watch-along, peoples, we’re here to chat about what happens therein. (Words like ARMS! GBS! GCS! Eyelash p0rn! Puppy Eyes of Doooom! etc. are expected and amusing.)

4. When the first episode finishes, make another cup of tea and get ready for the next one.

FAQ:

1. I’m not in the Sydney time zone – what do I do?

Take a look at Time and Date dot com to see how far out you are. If it’s still practicable, we’ll see you there!

2. Why don’t you use AIM, MSN or a similar messenger client that has a chatroom?

We want this to be seen on the Twitter timestream, as it promotes the show and helps find like-minded fools fans that would join us later for more. Also, setting up a Twitter account can be tonnes easier than making up a new messenger account. Without any nonceing about with Windows Live Fudged-Up-Enger.

3. I can do one, but I can’t stay for all three episodes. Is that ok?

Hey, you come in and out whenever you want, dude, that’s the beauty of it. I know that at least Tiny and I will be there the whole time for a triple whammy, but no-one is under any obligation to stay the whole time. It’s supposed to be fun!

4. Can we swear?

Hell yeah! At least, I do. And we do point out all the gratuitous p0rn moments.

5. What do we talk/tweet about?

Whatever you want. It’s like chatting amongst friends whilst watching – if your friends are on a different continent and you have to type what you would normally just say.

And that’s pretty much all you need to know!

You can follow Tiny and/or me on Twitter if you really are desperate for friends. Or someone to chat about SPN with.

Till next time, peeps.

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1. Bring Dr Badass back to Supernatural

Oh yes – as fans, we’re really quite smart. Which is why it pains me to deduce that The Powers That Be – be they Warner Brothers or a channel in your own lovely country – really have no respect or in fact a single thought for the show’s fans.

Why am I led to this conclusion? Hmm, let me see.

First, for overseas fans of the British persuasion, there was the Great Season Four DVD Debacle of 2009. In short, season four in its complete boxed set went on sale in the UK shortly after it did in the USA. It proudly boasted of its gorgeous extras and shiny, shiny special features. Imagine the fans’ dismay when, instead of six discs in order, they in fact opened the case to find two disparate sets of discs, each labelled ‘1-3’, each one bereft of any special features whatsoever. It drove many fans to question if it were in fact the correct boxed set, or if Warner Brothers UK had simply emptied out all the unsold sets of volumes one and two and stuffed the two sets into one case. And they would have got away with it, too, if it weren’t for those meddling fans. They wrote, they called, they complained, they argued. Eventually Warner Brothers UK agreed to let the purchasers post their DVD sets to them, whereupon they would replace them with the proper anglicised version of the original USA region 1 boxed set – containing all the extras.

The lying region 2 UK DVD case.

This was done, this was settled, and life returned to normal. (And by the way, you can still get your boxed set changed here if you need to: Warner Home Entertainment, Freepost -RSAR-ZTSK-ZTBT, Rabans Lane, Aylesbury, HP19 8TS. England.)

Then the viewers in poor old Blighty were dealt another blow – the airing of (or non-existence thereof) season five. First, ITV2, who ran endless promos and adverts (commercials) for pretty much all of their other dead-beat shows, said they had the rights. Then they said they didn’t. Things looked bleak in Mudville as it transpired that there would be no airing of the fifth season of the show in the UK, be it on free or paid channels. War was about to ensue.

Then those lovely chaps at Virgin 1’s Living channel bought the rights to show the series and everything was fine again. Viewers were spared the awfulness and general crappiness of ITV2 in general, and still got their show. Bargain.

Over several ponds, it was Australia’s turn to get the finger from The Man. They waited and waited to get their favourite show on their screens, and Channel Ten did not disappoint. Until they did: they showed the first ten episodes of season five on Monday nights, and then they opted to drop it. If anyone can find a good reason for their motivation, seeing as the show’s ratings were actually increasing from season to season, I’m sure a prize would be in order. Those bloody ace Aussies are taking it upon themselves to make sure their disgust is heard both on the official site and in their own ways, but, for now, it seems there is no happy ending in sight. Again, if anyone can fathom why this was done by TV executives, I’m sure there would be a reward before plans to burn down said TV executives’ offices are finalised.

LATE EDIT: Aussies! Send your polite but firm letters showing why the show should be brought back to the channel’s snail mail address (Channel 10, GPO Box 10, Sydney NSW 2001) or in a similarly swearword-free but demonstrative way, jam up their goddamn message boards with good reasons why the show is sorely needed.

And doesn’t striking the programme from the schedule make you want to reluctantly go to the computer and get hold of the new episodes by other means? Why do channels and networks piss and moan about people downloading and stealing their programmes when it gets snatched away from viewers in the first place? If it were available to watch and DVR from home, how many people would bother to try downloading it? Not many, I’m willing to bet – on the grounds of poorer quality, wasted time and internet and bandwidth concerns. Then of course there’s the entire annoyance of paying for a channel (or, in the case of the UK, the criminally exorbitant license fee) and then having nothing to watch on said channel – and no way to cancel it lest you incur charges.

However, back in its own home of the USA, things appear to be going from strength to strength. On the one hand, episode eleven of the show gets aired 21st January 2010 and it looks like it’s going to be a real doozy. On the other hand, it’s also now in syndication, a boon for any purr wee tiny show. The hoopy froods over at TNT are going through season one as you read this, and are even planning marathons later in the schedule. Good times.

So it seems only viewers overseas miss out – for now. I live on a different continent to all the places mentioned above. This means that on the downside, seeing as they’re showing season four right now on TVB, there is no recourse but to obtain each week’s new episode by other means. (Ahem.) The upside? I don’t have to wait, and because I live in Hong Kong, I can stroll into my local HMV store and simply buy the region one USA copy off the shelf, no problem. Right now I have seasons one to four nestled quite happily on the top shelf of my DVD cabinet, and I know the complete season five boxed set will join it just as soon as it’s released (which, by the way, is the same as the US date).

So what say you, readers? This pulling of the show from other countries’ TV networks and channels, mixing up (some would say ‘deliberately’) merchandise until you’re caught out, being torn from your favourite show because it just is not on any channel where you live: should we take a snapshot and send it to Oxford with a note about adding it into next year’s dictionary under ‘taking the piss’?

You decide.

Pictures kindly supplied by @acquiesceh20.

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One men’s silver ring: double tiered, size ten. Slightly used, some slight scuffing on outside. Also lost: one men’s bracelet of elasticated twine with brown/dark faded red and cream skulls, approximately half an inch tall, separated by black spacers.

Last seen 5×07, ‘The Curious Case Of Dean Winchester’. Not, as previously suggested, borrowed by Castiel. That was only one unisex amulet of possibly Mesopotamian origin on black leather cord.

Last sighting: The Curious Case Of Dean Winchester.

If either item is found please contact the owner, Dean Winchester, on 866-907-3235. In case of no answer, please try Sam Winchester on 785-555-2804.

Missing In Action: 5x08 'Changing Channels'.

Missing In Action: 5x09 'The Real Ghostbusters'.

Missing In Action: 5x10 'Abandon All Hope'.

Whereabouts and how the items got there presently unknown. Owner understandably anxious to get them back.

Many thanks.

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1. WINCHESTER RUMBLE!

Once upon a time, there was a show called ‘Supernatural’. It was creepy, funny, angsty, dramatic, thrilling, and the best kept secret on the east coast of the USA. But soon after season one started airing, its fame and appeal spread all across the States. Soon it started to creep onto other continents, through such means as we won’t go into for legal reasons, and a cult hit was firmly established.

Although fans were made and fans were broken by various storylines, plot arcs or characters (not to mention choices of actors/actresses), by and large the show’s viewing numbers grew a little each season. Not only was the show unexpectedly picked up for a second season, but another, and another, and another – until season five began to air just a few months ago.

Fans were happy. Fans were pandered to. Some fans appreciated the open love-letteriness of some episodes, and some were shocked and appalled by the bald-faced liberties taken in others. But, by and large, the fans were fed.

But they also noticed that their favourite show was not getting the attention or promotion it deserved. Some fans banded together to rectify this atrocious disregard for a definite hit amongst all the dregs choking the broadband channels around the globe. Minion camps were born, postcard campaigns were waged.

And then people stumbled upon Twitter.

Actors and actresses of the show, real, bona fide people verified as owning their Twitter accounts (such as @mishacollins, @jumblejim – Jim Beaver, @groovegoddess – Traci Dinwiddie, and @ChadLindberg) also tweet their support for the show. The story of Twitter is pretty much already told.

However, the next chapter has not yet been written.

This is where Twitter users come in – namely, the readers of this litany.

Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to use Twitter to send a message about the show, whatever that message may be, and include the tag #FindTheColt – all one the same day, at the same time around the world.

Confused? Let me help you.

Q: Does it matter if I use caps locks?

A. No. You could use #FINDTHECOLT, #findthecolt, #FindTheColt or pretty much any mixture of upper and lower case letters – thankfully, Twitter filters and bean-counters don’t care.

Q: Can I just type #FindTheColt with no message?

A: We would rather you didn’t. To prevent being mistaken for spam or robot accounts, it’s best to actually tweet something about the show to connect the phrase to. Including “Thursday, 9pm, The CW” would be a good way to keep it in the counted tweets.

Q: Can’t I just use #Supernatural or #SPN?

A: We’re still not sure if Twitter is letting those astoundingly Satan-worshipping tags (whoops, sorry, did you step in my sarcasm?) in again, after the whole P Diddy affair of September 2009. DiddyGate pretty much made it impossible for anything remotely supernatural or spiritual to become a trending tag (one of the top ten most widely used tags on Twitter at that moment). Thanks, P Diddy.

Q: I can’t keep typing “I love that show on the CW at 9pm on Thursdays” over and over again. How many times do I have to tweet?

A: Everyone only need tweet the hashtag #FindTheColt once. It’s not about how many times a single person does it (so no need to repeat it in a single message), it’s about how many individual users write it. If everyone who watches the show (according to Nielsen) does it once, we would have close to four and a half million tweets – enough to get us to the number one trending tag (TT) spot, surely. (Yes, it would, and don’t call me Shirley.)

Q: So what do I tweet?

A: Anything and everything to do with the show. Some people tweet their favourite Deanisms, or Samisms, or Winchesterisms (quotes from the show). Some people just mention they’ll be watching the show (without naming it, of course). Personally, I’ll be tweeting my top ten places The Boys would like to be looking for the Colt. I believe @WrathOfKripke will be tweeting his usual ditties including the hashtag du jour.

Q: Why use #FindTheColt anyway?

A: It was an excellent suggestion made by @SuperWiki, in that it does not mention anything censored by Twitter, it isn’t in any way spoilery, and it’s easy to do. And anyone who knows anything about TV will probably recognise it as the Winchester’s charmed Colt Paterson.

Q: When does this happen?

A: @SuperWiki is urging an organised approach – something which is sorely needed, judging by the lack of structure to previous weeks’ Twitter conquering attempts. Tweeting should commence on and close to:

Thursday 19th November, 2009 – 4pm (16:00) Eastern USA time.

For the rest of the world, that will be:

Ankara, Turkey: Thursday 23:00

Athens, Greece: Thursday 23:00

Auckland, New Zealand: Friday 10:00

Bangkok, Thailand: Friday 04:00

Beijing, PRC: Friday 05:00

Berlin, Germany Thursday, 22:00

Brasilia, Brazil: Thursday 19:00

Canberra, Australia: Friday 07:00

Hanoi, Vietnam: Friday 04:00

Hong Kong, S.A.R.: Friday 05:00

Lisbon, Portugal: Thursday 21:00

London, England: Thursday, 21:00

Madrid, Spain: Thursday 22:00

Los Angeles, USA: Thursday 13:00

Moscow, Russia / Russian Federation: Friday 00:00

New Delhi, India: Friday 02:30

Paris, France: Thursday 22:00

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia: Friday 00:00

Rome, Italy: Thursday 22:00

Seoul, South Korea: Friday 06:00

Shanghai, PRC: Friday 05:00

Tokyo, Japan: Friday 06:00

Toronto, Canada: Thursday 16:00

Vienna, Austria: Thursday 22:00

Zürich, Switzerland: Thursday 22:00

If I have missed anyone out, I apologise. I hope this post finds you close enough to a Twitter client or the internet to just send one message at roughly the allotted time.

We promise if you send one message each, Bill Gates will not get a single cent of anyone’s money from the proceeds.

Now isn’t that a good reason to send just one tweet containing #FindTheColt…?

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Danger! Danger! Spoilers Will Robinson!

Supernatural season 5 episode 8 spoilers are contained in the following post!

So that question that had been nagging everyone since series three – namely “why does the trickster care what happens to Sam when Dean’s contract is up?” has finally been answered.

Or has it?

Was he ever the trickster? Or was the trickster subsumed by Gabriel after series two’s Tall Tales? Who knows…

What we do know is that Gabriel thinks he knows the future – he thinks he knows how it ends. He gives The Boys a scenario with two options: take on their vessels and get down and dirty in a scrap to the death for pretty much the entire planet… Or live in TV shows forever.

(Incidentally, was that his only threat? What if Dean replaced Dr McSteamy – sorry, Dr McSexy – and enjoyed living in TV Land? Was that the only threat the trickster could come up with? Sam could have made very good money in something like, I don’t know, Gilmore Girls or something…)

Well I say: we are nothing but the sum of what our culture teaches us. These immortal truths, lore of our society, if you will, are boiled down into film and, ironically, TV. And I say: if I’ve learnt anything from TV and film, it’s these little tidbits:

1) Even toys (and action figures?) know the single painful truth: there’s always a third option.

Exhibit A: Toy Story 2:

“You must choose, Sheriff Woody – how shall she die? Sharks? Or death by monkeys?”

“I choose… Buzz Lightyear!”

“What? That’s not an option!”

2) Good men can try but ultimately they fail; heroes do the impossible.

Exhibit B: Batman Forever.

“Just one little touch, and your two friends are gull feed on the rocks below. Not enough time to save them both. Which will it be, Batman? Bruce’s love or the Dark Knight’s junior partner?”

“Poor Edward. I had to save them both. You see, I’m both Bruce Wayne and Batman, not because I have to be. No, because I choose to be.”

I’m thinking Sam is a Toy Story kind of thinker. (See his “We could use him” argument, re: the trickster himself.) When the options they give you are shit, throw ‘em together, mix them about, check them through a few different lenses and voilà – another option presents itself.

I’m thinking Dean’s more the Batman type – let’s face it, he is Bruce Wayne without the family inheritance. No super powers, no psychic whatever, no demon blood, just pure old stubbornness and a Russell Crowe refusal to take it lying down, just because someone he doesn’t like tells him to. And give him a choice, he’ll find a way to do both impossible things.

Question is, can these two chuckleheads actually work together long enough to pull it off?

On a side note: how long will it be before Jeremy Carver supplants Ben Edlund as my personal writing god? We shall wait and see.

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Yes, you are cute, you were an intern at the White House and YES, you play an angel on Supernatural and made the Columbo trenchcoat sexy again…ja ja ja… we have heard it all! -Enough!

Enough with the Twitter-crashing #mishasminions hash tag bashin’ sessions! We have a live life, you know and we would like to use Twitter occasionally without YOUR army infiltrating OUR system. Have you even trained them properly yet? Huh? Do you have some kind of Quality Management set out. Talks, skills sets? ANYTHING?

Gheez, you come to England, insult the Queen (so she didn’t have any biscuits for you tea, boohoo! Waaah, waaah! Did you ever stop and THINK that she is a really busy Queen and had no TIME to go shopping for McVities Biscuits-which are endorsed by the Royal Fa’mly, and quite morish we may add!)?

And what is this thing about the Must ‘aves, ey? Must we now wear certain kinds of shoes (until we lose one) and actually LEARN stuff to have a smart conversation with you? It’s not like you are farting rainbows of wisdom over there on your Twitter page… have you even read what your sweat-shop-monkey types there, or do you just let him get on with it?

So we are quite tolerant Buckets, you know. After all, we HAVE put up with Jared and Jensen for quite some time. Sat through every fruit-loopery and smiled politely – and then YOU came along, Misha and went all intellectualt…intelll…intellectual and sarcy on us. Godamn you evil witted man. Your plan for world-domination is only a few months old and look what you have done! There is even a new are even TWO new websites in your honour…your HONOUR!!!!

www.mishasminions.webs.com & www.mishasminions.com

update: And we think we got ourselves right in the middle of a gang war!

When is this madness EVER going to end, when?

For a possible answer watch this video at your own risk, small kids look away!

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Anakin is way cooler than Luke –

or “How Season 4 turned me into a Sam-Girl”

An analysis by Calena

The most pressing question every female Supernatural fan faces is: am I a Dean-Girl or am I a Sam-Girl? (of course some refuse to pledge their allegiance, but that’s lily-livered! J )

I couldn’t decide for the first 10 episodes, but Scarecrow (Season 1) settled the issue for me once and for all (or so I thought at the time): I was a Dean girl. The emotion and vulnerability beneath that Han Solo cockiness was just irresistible. And Dean even had his own Millennium Falcon! [Editor's Note: It takes the form a black 67 Chevy Impala and is altogether in much better shape than the Falcon… except for squeaky doors] – [Writer's note: In her defense, the Falcon did make the Kessel Run in less than 12 parsecs! She's an awesome ship!] – [Editor's Note: "According to Star Wars creator George Lucas" was " inspired by a hamburger, with the cockpit being an olive on the side" aaanyway…back to your story…]

The show’s actors and writers have drawn comparisons between Han/Luke and Dean/Sam in various interviews

But as the huge Star Wars fan that I also am, I couldn’t help but notice, that in Season 4 the Supernatural characters resemble the ones in the Star Wars Prequel Trilogy more than they do the Original Trilogy characters. (I’d love to know if that is intentional, completely accidental, or just what happens when you are an alumni of the Joseph Campbell “Heroes’ Journey” School, like all the writers whose work I enjoy most and who I respect the most are –namely George Lucas, Joss Whedon and Eric Kripke).

Kripke talks about casting Jared and Jensen: “When we started casting, we had archetypes in mind, which were Han Solo and Luke Skywalker. We were really looking for Sam to be empathetic, kind, and likeable, and really the audience surrogate. The person who the audience would most see themselves as and really carry the story through their eyes. And that required a really unique likeability. For Dean, we were looking for Han Solo. We were looking for devil-may-care, charismatic, a little rough around the edges, a little edgy, says things that are not always the kindest thing, as long as they’re funny. And that was really what we started out with. ”

So Season 4 Sam, who formerly resembled Luke, eventually turns into Anakin. It was foreshadowed in Season 3, when he was willing to sacrifice a virgin, something “old” Sammy would never even have thought of before and when he was more than willing to let Dean be treated by the Zombie Doctor, even at the expense of other people lives, Sam is finally prepared to go darkside in order to save Dean (just like Anakin did for Padme) because Dean is what Sammy loves the most in the entire universe.

Sam, like Anakin, was always the “chosen one”. Sam, like Anakin, was kidding himself into believing he was doing morally questionable things for the Greater Good, that he was the only one who could not only save the person he loved most (no, not in the slashfic sense! I despise slashfic!), but in turn save the whole world. (One reason Sam was so single mindedly focused on preventing the Apocalypse by whatever means necessary, was that he didn’t want to fail “again” – like he in his own mind had failed when he couldn’t save Dean from going to hell) [Editors Note: During Season 3 fans have coined a phrase borrowed from TV Show Heroes: Save Dean, Save the World]

Sam claimed to “not doing the demon blood for kicks“, but that wasn’t entirely true, was it Sammy? You relished in the power it gave you, and you know what, unlike many other people, I don’t blame you. I still stand by my opinion, even though I’m pretty alone with it, that Sam could have been right. There was no way to know for sure that “using the power against them” wasn’t a good plan.

When Dean, the one for whom he is primarily doing this, turns against him, tells him to stop, Sam is deeply hurt and in his anger almost kills Dean – like Anakin did with Padme.

If Season 4 turned Sam from Luke into Anakin, what does that make Dean? Obi-Wan Kenobi, of course! The one who is used to calling the shots, who is always advising caution, and who is unable to trust his “pupil” (yes I know, the caution and mistrust were justified, but see my above point, it could have been different. And yes, I kind of made Dean out to be Padme and Obi-Wan at the same time. It’s my blog entry, and I’ll write what I want to, bite me J. While we are at it, what is Bobby in my little Star Wars analogy? Qui-Gon Jinn, my favorite Jedi of them all. Not afraid to think for himself, not suffocated by following rules, and having authority over both, Anakin and Obi-Wan ) [Ed's Notes: You go girl! It's your post. And Sam btw can be two roles as well. We always thought of him as Chewie Chewbacca.We know. It's a looong shot] – [Writer's note: Well, they both do have great hair ...]

Like Anakin, Sam after unintentionally having brought mayhem to the world, will now have to redeem himself. Something that will happen in Season 5, I assume. I just hope that he doesn’t have to die for redemption like Anakin did. The possibility of a Season 6 at the horizon quells my nagging worry that Eric Kripke will kill Sam off – a little bit.

So, why does Sam’s transformation from being Luke to being Anakin make me a Sam-Girl when I said I was a Dean-Girl?

A character who is basically good, gets drunk (ha!) on his special powers he initially used to save the world, involuntarily brings on the Apocalypse, but who you know will redeem himself enduring great suffering and personal sacrifices, is simply irresistible. With Luke you could always be sure he’d stay on the light side. But someone crossing over to the dark side and then coming back is much more interesting.

The possibility of redemption that now hangs in the air for Sam is as consoling as it is fascinating, because Sam has to earn forgiveness and acceptance not only from his loved ones, Dean and Bobby, but also from himself.

Power IS sexy. I love watching Sam doing the Hand of Ipecac
[pictured], and it is very reminiscent of Vader force-chocking someone. How can anyone not be impressed by how Sam strode in and offed Alastair?

How heroic is a Sam who is willing to sacrifice what he desires most – the love and respect of his brother – to save Dean and the world?

It was so impressive to see how Dean willingly went to hell, knowing full well he would SUFFER. (I have a little theory that what Dean did was a lot braver than what Jesus did, but that’s another topic). Sam’s sacrifice of Dean’s love and respect is equally impressive. The common belief [Ed's Note: amongst fans because Dean said so] is that Dean is Batman, but judging from the Dark Knight, Sam is willing to be hated so he can save the world, so he is more like this new Batman than Dean.

When I’m watching Sam in S 4, Sam’s despair, his inner conflict, his determination to make everything alright, it makes me want to hug him (ok, I want to hug Sam and Dean every time I see them, but this is different!) [Ed's Note: Who doesn't? Everyone is just watching the show for its huggability factor] and tell him it’s going to be ok -although we’d both know that is a lie. At the same time Sam is invoking some motherly instinct in me (something that I am truly not overburdened with) I also deeply respect him for being such a hero by willingly taking responsibility for saving the world. Some may call it delusions of grandeur of a demonblood-junkie and of course the ending of S4 proofed them right, but the overall storyline made Sam much more interesting to me than he was in his “Luke-years” in Season 1&2.

Conclusion

After having written a 1000+ words (starting off as Dean-Girl) analyzing why the new darker Sam is a character that I respect and love much more than I did goody two-shoes Sammy at the beginning of the show [Ed's Note: We can't help it and have to say it: He lost a shoe!] – [Writer's note: OMG! That was another element of fore-shadowing! How great are these writers!] – [Ed's Note: How great are WE for noticing? :) ]
, I want to stress that I never did not like Sam. I never begrudged him his wish to live a normal life and he was often right in his more cautionary approach, like in Season 2 episode “Bloodlust”, when he refused to kill vampires on the simple grounds that they are vampires (It so being that vampires are my favorite supernatural creatures, Sammy earned a lot of brownie points with me for this one). I also could always relate to his desire for revenge, first with YED, than with Lilith.

I also want to stress that I have not gone off Dean at all, of course I still love him. I have heard people complain that the “new Dean” was whiny (come to think of it, 100% of them were male, two friends of mine who I brought to watch SPN, plus Bobby). That is a little bit unfair, me thinks, after all Dean went through, but I understand where they are coming from.

What turned me from Dean-Girl to Sam girl is Sam’s newly found take charge attitude – something that was until the end of Season 3 solely associated with Dean – and Sam being willing to risk becoming the thing he fears most, a monster, and to lose the love and respect of his brother, if that is what it takes to save the world. Sam as the lone cowboy, misunderstood by everyone, but nonetheless undeviatingly continuing to fight what he thinks is the “good fight” – I didn’t want to appear fickle and was in great denial for some time about my allegiance having shifted to Sam, but by the end of Season 4 I couldn’t resist the appeal Sam’s change of character. (It doesn’t matter to me that it turned out Sam was wrong and didn’t save the world at all) [Ed's Note: well, it's not all over yet. Who knows what happens in S6]

When in “Wishful Thinking” Sam said what he wished for most was “Lilith’s head on a plate. Bloody.” it was clear that little brother Sammy was no more and the new Sam was now a lot darker. Many fans want old “Sammy” back, but I thank the writers for giving Sam such an interesting character development. I also give huge credit to Jared for portraying whatever agony is thrown at Sam so convincingly. I look forward to seeing how Sam will manage to come back from the darkside in Season 5.

Commentary by guest writer Calena, Austria

[Writer's Note: Oh, and btw, I love Jared's hairstyle in S4 :) ] – [Ed's Note: We do too! :) ]

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