SPN 3x09: Malleus Maleficarum
Feb. 1st, 2008 10:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
vaznettiThis 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.
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Date: 2008-02-02 12:17 am (UTC)It's not harshing my squee -- this ep made me feel very uncomfortable, but I loved what I loved about it. The fact that the ep made me uncomfortable I take as a good sign, for the show. That it's not what I expect from Supernatural, and most weeks I'm not terribly conscious of the gender issues, not in the sense that it's hugely problematic. So this one ep, I look askance at, while the Sam and Dean stuff and the Ruby and Sam and Dean stuff made me squee. I can assume every ep in February won't be like this. (You can ask me again in March if you want).
And Ruby did rather get to show her awesomeness in this ep, IMO. Doesn't make up for the ick factor and gender issues, but it exists and for that I'm pleased.