SPN Georg

Justice in war... the code of ethics that judges actions on the battlefield. On the surface, this episode makes us question what is right, cuts off almost every choice Sam and Dean could’ve made, and backs them so far into a corner they’re literally shackled together and shoved in a cage. It was a situation that we won’t find out for most of an entire additional season of the show that was specifically engineered to shove this exact pressure point to see what would happen.

It’s incredibly easy to watch this episode from that surface level and come to the conclusion that Ruby was right, that they should’ve listened to her and done her (morally questionable) spell-- sacrificing an innocent to save everyone’s lives. It’s easy to judge Dean for his refusal to cooperate with that plan without the later proof that he’d been 100% right all along.

But there are cues even within this episode that should at least cast doubt on that interpretation, starting with the title begging us to examine the morality of their choices. This is why I chose that tagline for the weekly graphic: “If that’s how you win wars, then I don’t want to win.”

Because Ruby does present this from the outset as “war.” As a battle that must be won. But it was ALL a manipulation-- at the time it was written, perhaps a more immediate manipulation intended to drive Sam to his original fate to corrupt himself in order to save Dean from going to Hell, but folded into a far larger narrative that would eventually unfold throughout s4 because the writer’s strike made it impossible to complete this arc over the four episodes they had left to work with in s3, and no guarantee that the show would even be picked up for s4 yet.

She berates them at the end of the episode for their failure to save everyone, but seven of those people they mourned were dead before Sam and Dean were even released from their shackles, and the thirty people Ruby’s plan would’ve saved also walked away safe and sound because of Dean’s plan. Only, he didn’t have to murder an innocent to make that happen. Only Lilith’s choices after the fact cost the lives of the three additional people who were killed. That had nothing to do with Dean’s plan being one with a “body count,” as Ruby put it. They were played, their emotions manipulated, and Sam was just a little more compromised morally because of it.

Okay, I think I summed up the entire episode, but I have FEELINGS about this one. It’s the intro to morality and manipulation in SPN, and I love it for that.

Referenced in this week’s episode:

The Superwiki page for this episode

My tag for this episode

But especially these linked posts focusing on the morality and free will aspects of this episode, and this one about the sexual innuendo of Dean and Victor’s comments

a flickr album of behind the scenes photos from this ep and 3.11

casting sides for Deputy Amici, Nancy, and Sheriff Dodd

and i think this is just about as many words as anchor lets you use before you run out of characters (3992/4000) lol

Aah, the one where Doris the average human waitress kills Dean Winchester at least twice! A pig in a poke. Yet another mirror for Chuck's Process encapsulated in a single episode... A message appropriately delivered by God's own little messenger, Gabriel. Heck, there’s just too much in this episode to tidily sum it up in one little blurb paragraph, yes?

So many memes have come from this one little episode, too. Clowns or midgets? Yesterday was Tuesday, but today is Tuesday, too! Heat of the Moment (I still feel like checking the calendar every time I hear this song, just in case). Do these tacos taste funny to you? You mean we can’t even go out for breakfast? Sam Winchester cries his way through sex, etc. You think you’re being funny but you’re being really, really childish. Dingo ate my baby crazy. What do you want, a Pulitzer?

I think my main takeaway is that the fandom lore states that Tuesday is Sam’s least favorite day after this, but I’m nominating Wednesday for Worst Day for him... that was the day he didn’t get a do-over for, you know? At least not until suffering through six months of Robo Sam hunting the Trickster in scary Travis Bickle fashion...

This week’s supplemental reading:

The Superwiki page for this episode

My tag for this episode

With a special focus on these posts:

When we left Dean at the end of the last episode, after spending the entire season to that point accepting his own fate, not fighting back against it despite being truly terrified of it, he’d finally learned something about that fate that was too big to ignore: the fact that all demons started out as human souls corrupted by Hell. He would’ve taken an eternity of torture in Hell, but becoming a demon? Becoming the thing he’d spent his entire life hunting and seeking revenge against, and being powerless to stop it? OW.

But that was the final push he needed to dig really, really deep in this episode to unearth the tarnished shard of his own self-worth. Or more accurately, that tarnished shard buried deep inside him finally trapped him in a lucid dream and kind of literally holds him at gunpoint and forces him to listen to it. Not very polite, Deano, but at least he gives him the good shake he needed (and that Sam had just about despaired of getting through to him about).

But time is running out, and even with a mote of self-worth, they’re still no closer to actually saving him. Abusive parents shattering their kids’ dreams, abused kids who’ve lost the ability to dream for themselves (the literal dreams, and the figurative “dreams for your future”). And the beginnings of Bobby’s hunter origin story.

Things referenced in this week’s episode:

The Superwiki page for this episode

My tag for this episode

but since my tag is larger for this one, have a curated selection of posts:

Casting sides for Jeremy

Casting sides for Dream Dean (yes, it’s just the Dean vs Himself scenes)

quick reminder you can always find me on tumblr or on twitter at SPNgeorg or mittensmorgul, on discord at mittens#4865, and at [email protected], if you’d like to chat :)

aka that one where we learn about witches, hex bags, and how demons are made...

For an episode that does a TON of work and covers a lot of ground creating lore that will become a core part of the show for the rest of the series, I am SHOCKED, I tell you, at how short I managed to keep this podcast ep! I think I finally settled on a good format that I can work with! YAY! So as always, I’m interested in feedback from listeners, if there’s anything I can do to make this more enjoyable, more informative, or more entertaining, I’m open to suggestions. Also, adding “the birds and the bees of demon creation” to my long list of specific meta topic podcasts I intend to make someday... >.>

Ruby though! Being her awesome manipulative self! Witches! Dean feeling specifically bad for the poor bunny rabbit! and Sam completely losing his shit and charging head first after a coven with zero info, immediately after telling Dean that Sam has to change to become more like Dean... well, there he is, demonstrating the point, with predictable results!

Also, Dean is forced to really look hard at himself, his lifetime of choices, and confront why he felt he’d had no other choice when he accepted some truly messed up self-sacrifices... i.e. oh look Dean might have just a kernel of self-worth buried down deep in there somewhere, and we’re gonna be poking a big pointy stick at it right at the end of this episode!

Things referenced in this episode that may be of interest:

The Superwiki page for this episode

My tag for this episode

Casting sides for Tammi, Renee, and Elizabeth

Also, you can always find me on tumblr or twitter at spngeorg or mittensmorgul, or discord at mittens#4865. Come say hi! :)

well, I’ve now been doing this for just a few days shy of a year. I’m mildly impressed with myself for sticking to it, never missing an episode even in weeks where real life and technical difficulties tried to interfere... like this week! When I lost an hour of recording and had to start over... I guess I can assume that the lost episode was probably a stellar performance that could never be replicated and nobody would ever know... but I won’t :’D

I love this episode. There is a LOT going on in here, and it’s painful for both Sam and Dean. Dean’s performance mask cracks and even Sam gets another look underneath. The monsters of the week’s entire shtick is that they’re performing normality with false cheeriness as a means of survival, blending in and pretending they’re Just Folks until it comes time for their annual sacrifices. And they even go through those rituals with the same sort of ingrained cheer they approach apparently everything with... we only get to see their mask crack a little bit, like thousands of years living that way just ~made the mask convincingly real~ even to them.

Remind you of anyone?

Also, we learn the origin story of the Samulet (and why I have no fondness for it), deal with young Sam’s regret over having pushed Dean into telling him the truth about their lives, and through that learn about how much Dean has served as a shield for Sam throughout his life. Ouch, right?

Things referenced in this episode include:

The Superwiki page for this episode

My tag for this episode

and specifically my rewatch posts dated June 2019, April 24, 2017, this collaboration between me and lizbob from November 2016, and lizbob’s gifs of Sam vs the Reindeer. Good stuff :’D

Casting sides for Young Sam, Young Dean, Madge and Edward

And because I am that kind of dork, have the childhood flashback-inducing special presentation graphic. :’D https://youtu.be/-4_d_6A8nE0

and because I am also this kind of dork, here have a link to the holiday fic I mentioned because Sam has a little rematch with a reindeer: McMansion Hell. Or... if you prefer Sam vs The Easter Bunny (since it is technically April Fool’s fic and hey... guess what day it is... have Plotbunny instead. They’re both canon case fic, and because it’s me, destiel. :)

I’ll begin this week by apologizing for the short length of this one, but I’ve had a migraine for the last three days and it was either record or miss my posting date... luckily I’ve typed up what serves as a nice summary of this one about three years ago, and my general thoughts on it. You can read that here (it’s pretty short for an episode post for me, too).

This episode is a turning point for both Sam and Dean, though. It’s also got a nice “nothing stays locked up forever” reminder with Gordon getting out of jail. Dean was ready to kill him after 2.10 and Sam thought he found a better way to deal with him, but even Sam now understands that Gordon will never stop trying to kill them. He didn’t even have to become *a literal monster* for Sam to accept it was an “us or him” situation, but that definitely helped in the final confrontation. I still think Sam’s shifting attitude adds to the s3-s4 arc of him gradually going to the dark side too.

For Dean, it takes Sam’s plea to “drop the act” he’s putting on, the false bravado Dean’s been using to cover his own terror about his rapidly approaching fate. Which... is Sam neatly explaining what we all mean by “performing Dean.” While Sam might know there’s terror lurking under Dean’s “everything’s fine!” mask, he’s not aware of the even larger pool of self-worth issues Dean is even more terrified to confront, and his own feelings about what compelled him to make that deal in the first place. But that’s coming up over the next few episodes. Wheee! I guess? :’D

Things referenced in this week’s episode:

The Superwiki page for this episode

My tag for this episode

Casting sides for Dixon

Network Draft full script

Production Draft full script

Blue Revision Pages only (24 pages)

Pink Revision Pages only (11 pages)

Let me just take a moment to scream YES! FIFTY! Thank you to everyone who’s listened. We’ve hit a milestone! And we’re still nowhere near close to done lol!

Here we are, though, at a one-off episode for both writer and director that Kripke has mentioned he doesn’t care for. All things considered, I do enjoy this episode. No big plot movement, but a nice bit of character respite before Dean takes a dive toward his own personal reckoning over the next few episodes. They do deal with the fallout over Sam killing the crossroads demon in the previous episode, and we do hear (however unintentionally intended) Castiel’s name for the first time in canon, so it’s not entirely one-off nonsense. Plus Bela once again getting the better of the Winchesters-- this time to an even more potentially disastrous end for her.

Things referenced in this episode:

The Superwiki page for this episode

My tag for this episode

The post I mention about the spell Sam uses with the name Castiel in it

Casting sides for Gert, aka Mzzzz. Case

Storyboards for the shower scene

and because I mentioned it in the little postscript to this episode, here have a gratuitous link to my own fic I’ve been rereading over the last few weeks:  The Exception to Every Rule (posted February 9, 2017, Actor!AU, Dean/Cas, rated M, 59k words, with notable guest appearances by Bela, Becky, Lisa and Anna all being the best possible allies to Dean and Cas, because it’s my fic and I can do that. Suck it, Kripke. lol)

This little MotW episode weirdly encapsulates the entire overarching metanarrative of Supernatural in miniature, and isn’t that incredible? A little girl’s spirit using fairy tales that bleed over into reality, manipulating people-- sometimes directly, but the Winchesters specifically because of who they are and can’t abide the suffering of others when they are able to step in and fix things-- through the retelling of those stories for her own reasons.

Does this make Chuck’s involvement and meddling in reality a desperate cry for help? Because it kinda looks that way. When paralleled to Callie in this episode, using the only stories she has to tell her own story, to speak her own truth and hope that someone will understand her, it’s hard not to see it that way. Only Chuck’s story he constantly sought validation over was built of his own history and actions, and not (as Chuck complained a lot in deflection of responsibility for the consequences of his actions) something that was done *to* him.

Still, an interesting thought exercise that really does encompass my personal understanding of Chuck’s narrative.

Oh, plus direct parallels through fairy tales to Sam and Dean’s current character situations, too. And a cute lil frog.

Things referenced in this week’s episode:

The Superwiki Page for this episode

My tag for this episode

Including these specific posts:

Casting Sides for Dr. Garrison

Casting Sides for the crossroads demon

Storyboard drawings for the cold open scene (if you check out nothing else, please take two minutes to enjoy this fascinating look behind the scenes of crafting an episode!)

Bonus: In this episode we also learn Sam is not a skilled artiste (with thanks to shirtlesssammy for this incredibly accurate screencap... also go read all their episode summaries, they’re all posted now and going up on ao3 as well!):

And as mentioned at the very end of the episode, Saturday is A More Profound Con! It will be a series of zoom panels with fic writers, fan artists, and meta writers (including lil ol’ me!). Registration is free and open right here, where you can also see the schedule and panelists. You can also follow the con on Twitter for more info. We hope to see you there!

I cannot BELIEVE I failed to use the phrase “it’s spirals all the way down” in this entire episode, but that’s what it boils down to honestly. This episode feels like it hits on so many themes that become the big spiral narrative of the entire show. Not to mention miscommunication between Sam and Dean, which knowing what the future holds for them even out through s4 and s5 sets up SO MUCH of their issues with Sam, his relationship with Ruby (which will be mirrored a lot in Dean’s relationship with Cas beginning in s4), Dean’s issues with Hell and his demon deal, right on through the entire narrative structure, the cosmology of the universe (in that “as above, so below” way Chuck loves), and I probably spend too much time flailing about Ruby’s entire arc, considering we’re only four episodes into her first season... :’D

Things referenced in today’s episode:

The Superwiki page for this episode

My tag for this episode

Blue revision pages of the script

Casting sides for Father Gil

Casting sides for Ritchie (aka Iggy in this draft)

Casting sides for Ruby (which anyone who cares about her entire narrative arc, the process of creating her as a character, and some insight into the writers plotting the s3-4 narrative in general should absolutely read... it’s three whole pages and so very worth it)

Destiny. Something that will become a core theme of the show, opposite Free Will. In this case, at least, it’s just a cursed rabbit’s foot that escaped the curse box John Winchester had stuffed it in and hidden away in his secret storage locker rather than actually destroying the thing years ago. Funny how what goes around eventually comes around again, yes? Locking up problems is never an actual solution on this show (or in real life, fwiw).

Rather than start singing the Circle of Life here, I’ll stay on point. :’D

Let’s begin with a moment of silence for Sam’s left shoe.

Things referenced in today’s episode:

The Superwiki page for this episode

My tag for this episode

Casting sides for Bela (really interesting since they were written for casting purposes and not taken from any part of canon at all)

Casting sides for Kubrick

Casting sides for Creedy (mostly overlap between the two, for obvious reasons)

The Network Outline for 3.03 (link now updated!)

And one last bit of business, apparently I failed to add the closing music to last week’s episode, and only just noticed. Only took 46 episodes to screw up that badly, so I guess it was time for a fail :’D