I was planning to write about Project Runway today, but as the internet appears to be unusually withholding in that quarter, it’ll have to wait until later. In the mean time, allow me to briefly express some further appreciation for Supernatural, which may not have the flash of Big Love or the epic complexity of Lost, but it continues to do what it does very well.

Last night’s Valentine’s themed episode was a great example of the show firing on all pistons. It began with a super creepy, gore-tastic opening scene where two cute people on a first date start to make out and then transition into actually eating each other to death. It followed that up with some humor, a guy who killed himself by using a toilet brush to cram himself full of Twinkies, the arrival of Famine (of Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse fame), and a brief but moving exploration of Sam and Dean’s evolving, twisted relationship.

Supernatural isn’t built to be a powerful, world-changing television show, but it’s so consistently effective at being scary, funny, and thoughtful that it’s head-and-shoulders above other, similarly lowbrow shows. Perhaps more than any other positive feature, Supernatural is just exceptionally good at balancing its conflicting story demands. The usual strain between week-to-week episodic stories and the long arc apocalypse plot is almost absent, letting minor ghost problems and the end of the world get all mixed up together, to the benefit of both plotlines. It’s also reliably fun, which is more than I can say for The Vampire Diaries.

***

A few updates on the crazy Chuck-pocalypse:

There were a lot of great things written about the whole shipper angle of the blow up, particularly this piece by Linda Holmes, and this one on Cultural Learnings. This blog also got a link on the LA Times Show Tracker blog, which was pretty cool. Most importantly, though, this interview with Chuck creators Josh Schwartz and Chris Fedak addresses both the special relationship between Chuck and its fans, and gives Schwartz and Fedak an opportunity to mildly reassert that they are actually the ones in charge of the story. Shipping can be positive and build loyalty to a show, but a show’s plot is not a matter for popular vote.

As I’ve been watching most of my television in concert with my sister this week, I thought I’d be lazy and get some help for my blog post today.

read more…

Whooo fall season fall season fall season fall season! I am pumped!

My pumped-ness is a little premature, sadly, because the majority of the new fall season beginning this week is on the CW. I have a long and tragically traumatized relationship with the CW, dating back to its launch in 2002, my obsession with the first season of Veronica Mars, and the subsequent failure of that show. That experience aside, I have nothing else seriously against the network other than its persistent veneer of trashiness, but it’s not like it’s VH1 or anything. Through no subsequent fault of their own, I will just always have a slightly negative reaction to their lime-green logo. Anyway, CW programming is new this week, so I will be blogging about it, including the zombie-like return of America’s Next Top Model and the new Vampire Diaries pilot. (No current plans to write about the new Melrose Place, largely because I never watched the original and therefore feel unqualified.)

Dean and Sam Winchester (confusingly for those Gilmore Girls fans out there, Jared Padalecki plays Sam, not Dean)

The CW show I’m most excited for this week I actually will not be blogging about – the dark and twisty monster mash Supernatural is coming back for its fifth season. It was one of those show I’d never gotten around to watching, and then it was already several seasons in and required many hours of catch-up, and was too easy to shelve for later. Recently, though, I started watching from the beginning in the hopes of being on track for the fifth season premiere, but I’m still two seasons behind and it’s just not going to happen. I hope to be fully caught-up by next week or the week after, but for now, some impressions on what I’ve seen so far and why I’m excited for the future.

Supernatural deals with the life of Sam and Dean Winchester, two brothers who inherit a career of demon hunting from their hard-boiled father. Particularly in the beginning of the show, it’s your standard monster-of-the-week format, as the Winchesters travel from town to town in search of spirits, werewolves, vampires, zombies, any ghoul with a legendary past, and pretty much whatever goes bump in the night. From what I’ve seen so far, the show isn’t perfect, and there’s a noticeably frequent pattern at the end of many episodes that goes something like this –

Dean: You hold him off, I’ll go salt and burn the bones!

Sam: GAHHH!!! [Spirit hurls him against wall, approaches menacingly]

Dean: Damnit, where are they? [Digs frantically into nearby gravesite]

Sam: GAHHARRRCHHnnnnn – [Spirit continues to approach, constricts windpipe]

Dean: Die, you bastard. [Pours salt and lights match in dramatic slow motion]

Sam: nnnnnnGASP GASP GASP [At the last second spirit bursts into flames and is dead]

Monster of the week

But there’s so much endearing about Supernatural that I’ve been more than willing to keep watching. For one, it’s been clear from the beginning that there’s a long arc plotline meant to anchor the episodic stories into a larger scheme. Sam’s burgeoning psychic abilities and the continued hunt for the demon who killed their mother pop up at regular-enough intervals that it’s easy to stay focused on the bigger issues at hand. For another, Sam and Dean’s relationship develops in appealingly complicated ways, neither predictably antagonistic nor tiresomely sentimental. The plausible, recognizable dynamic of their brotherly relationship is a nice counterweight to the perpetually appearing monsters.

I have a feeling that the third and fourth season will go the way I want them to – there will be more emphasis on the long plot, the world of their fellow hunters will grow more familiar, and their enemies will become long-term foes rather than short-lived baddies to destroy and forget. Fingers crossed, but in any case – whoo fall season! Also, if anyone tells me what happens on Supernatural this week, I’m going to be pissed.