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SPN 3x09: Malleus Maleficarum
This commentary is not 100% squee.
I could not watch the opening, with the woman and her teeth, because that is a major squick point for me. Ewww! Ewww!
One thing that made me smile -- I'm fairly sure that I called Sam trying to turn himself into Dean some time earlier this season, but then again, it was a fairly obvious thing. But I got the sense from Sam's dialogue that he has given up hope of Saving Dean and is now more worried about how to live without him. Which, on the one hand, is very Sam, but on the other is not really what I had expected. I mean, I kind of thought he'd keep looking until the end. I guess I can handwave and say that he's lying, but that was not the sense I got from the scene.
As for the origins of demons... I think we've hit the point in the mytharc where a bunch of people are sitting around in a room saying "Wouldn't it be cool if..." and then someone says, "That would be totally cool!" and no one bothers to think about it too much. I guess I can live with this -- it does tie into one of the themes I thought was there in the first season, that evil creatures at some point choose to become what they are. And I guess the older a demon is, the stronger it is? But ultimately, I can see my breakup point with this show coming, sooner and sooner, because I have been there and done that with random mytharc.
When the witch-demon (did she have a name?) had Sam sliding up the wall, did anyone else want her to get him all the way up to the ceiling, cut him open, and set him on fire? No? Just me, then.
The thing that stays with me -- aside from all the men live and all the women (except Ruby, who exists to help male characters rather than herself) die -- was the strikingly sexual nature of Dean thrusting that knife into the witch-demon, again and again and again. I get that sexualized violence is everywhere, really I do, but that was a little more obviously sexualized than most of it. Did anyone else see that? Again, I not only saw it, I saw my breakup with this show coming closer and closer.
Sigh. I like the fandom, for all its craziness, but I'm actually starting to dread new canon, because I have no idea what kind of awful thing they'll come up with next. And without an OTC to focus on, it may just be easier to step back. I don't want to be that person who watches and writes about how much she hates the show.
I could not watch the opening, with the woman and her teeth, because that is a major squick point for me. Ewww! Ewww!
One thing that made me smile -- I'm fairly sure that I called Sam trying to turn himself into Dean some time earlier this season, but then again, it was a fairly obvious thing. But I got the sense from Sam's dialogue that he has given up hope of Saving Dean and is now more worried about how to live without him. Which, on the one hand, is very Sam, but on the other is not really what I had expected. I mean, I kind of thought he'd keep looking until the end. I guess I can handwave and say that he's lying, but that was not the sense I got from the scene.
As for the origins of demons... I think we've hit the point in the mytharc where a bunch of people are sitting around in a room saying "Wouldn't it be cool if..." and then someone says, "That would be totally cool!" and no one bothers to think about it too much. I guess I can live with this -- it does tie into one of the themes I thought was there in the first season, that evil creatures at some point choose to become what they are. And I guess the older a demon is, the stronger it is? But ultimately, I can see my breakup point with this show coming, sooner and sooner, because I have been there and done that with random mytharc.
When the witch-demon (did she have a name?) had Sam sliding up the wall, did anyone else want her to get him all the way up to the ceiling, cut him open, and set him on fire? No? Just me, then.
The thing that stays with me -- aside from all the men live and all the women (except Ruby, who exists to help male characters rather than herself) die -- was the strikingly sexual nature of Dean thrusting that knife into the witch-demon, again and again and again. I get that sexualized violence is everywhere, really I do, but that was a little more obviously sexualized than most of it. Did anyone else see that? Again, I not only saw it, I saw my breakup with this show coming closer and closer.
Sigh. I like the fandom, for all its craziness, but I'm actually starting to dread new canon, because I have no idea what kind of awful thing they'll come up with next. And without an OTC to focus on, it may just be easier to step back. I don't want to be that person who watches and writes about how much she hates the show.
no subject
I think you can just replace witches with women there.
While his eps in some ways have been the best written, pacing and action-wise, I have had serious serious issues with them every time.
Dude has a PROBLEM with women and it's right there on screen wrecking our enjoyment of the show. Somebody needs to kick his ass unless the show is being intentionally editorially misogynist. I haven't seen Kripke say anything that leads me to believe they are, so they just aren't editing well.
I think maybe I'll actually write a letter. It's not something I do, but SERIOUSLY.
no subject
Yeah, I agree. There were some serious issue on display in the writing and filming of the episode, and some serious disinterest in women as people.
I think this is a show which has always been comfortable with disposing of women, so I don't know that it's just Edlund -- but I suspect the producers don't really know quite how bad it looks.
no subject
Malleus Maleficarum was all about murdering uppity women, midwives and women of skill. And the whole "book club" thing and all that.
Any time women gather (particularly doing something that requires education), men are in danger from their evil wiles. They must be stopped.
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I don't know enough about the genre to say -- is the "women are scary! yay for witch-burning!" attitude pretty common in horror? For some reason, when I think of horror movies, the villains I think of tend to be male.
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Women being there to fuck or fight for is common.
Women ending up dead to drive the men to be heroes is common.
Women being seductive/evil is common.
In fact, if a woman has sex in a horror movie she dies or is evil.
Sexual women = monsters.
Even female children are often monsters. Boy children are often heroes.
I really, really need to do my post on "The Descent." The horror movie with the all-woman main-character cast. I should get on that.
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As I watched it I just got more and more angry.
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But I'm still really curious as to what made you so angry in Descent? Because I get the feeling whatever it was went right over my head and it's been over a year since I've seen the movie. :(
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