Supernatural - 6x22 "The Man Who Knew Too Much" Rewatch
Added 2024-11-17 07:25:03 +0000 UTC
Comments
There have been many many different versions of stories passed around regarding this. The BTS of SPN has become as mythical and lore-heavy as the show itself...lol. Either way, as much as I would like to just take Misha's word for something like that, I also know that he likes to embellish and exaggerate for dramatic effect. That's not me disparaging him either. But LBR, he is who he is. A lot was going on BTS at that time, and Sera was trying to move in a different direction, that part was true. But episodes are storyboarded and written weeks or months before they actually film. A lot goes into preproduction. With the technicalities and the timelines I really find it hard to believe that this was done spur of the moment, but I can concede that it's probably somewhere in the middle. Bob Singer was brought back too, and they had a vested interest in going back to angels and demons because that's what he wanted, and Sera was thrown under the bus. There were a lot of factors that contributed to the ratings drop as well. One of the biggest was the "Friday Night Death Slot" which is usually relegated to unpopular shows that are on the chopping block. If you look at the actual numbers of viewers in each of the episodes, you'll see which episodes were more popular than others. And as much as I LOVE 7x17, it's not one of the highest viewed of the season. Neither are the ones that followed. Also, wasn't S7 the one that won two awards? Best Science Fiction AND Best Drama overall? I think that was the only season they won the bigger awards like that back to back. I have no issue with people having their own versions of what they think happened though. We can agree to disagree on that. I just have a skeptical nature and question the things that don't make sense to me. I don't think we will ever truly know what happened. And that's okay.
Vel
2024-12-18 13:05:48 +0000 UTCMisha has talked about it more than once at cons that Sera did pull him aside and tell him the beginning of filming season 7 that he was going to die and not come back. But then the network called her pretty far into s7 and asked, "You're bringing Cas back, right? I mean you're not planning on keeping him dead are you?" Because he was one of the fans most loved characters and ratings dropped when he left. She then reached out to him to let him know he would be coming back.
BunkerGirl
2024-12-18 02:13:22 +0000 UTCAccording to what Sera and the writers have said, she wanted to focus more on monsters and introduce different types of lore instead of the show just focusing on angels and demons. I think, personally, that making Cass a "monster" full of monsters was a way to keep him around longer, and perhaps that could have brought some interesting new stories into the show, but we will never know. I have heard and read interviews that they were always intending to bring Misha back to (at least) finish off the storyline and give him some redemption, but I can't say how much of that is absolutely true given the craziness that happened BTS during S6 and S7. There are a lot of fandom rumors about how they were trying to get rid of Misha and that the fans saved his job, but that's not how the television industry works, or at least how this one worked back when this was filmed. It was an interesting time to be watching the show and be a part of the fandom.
Vel
2024-11-25 17:02:11 +0000 UTCThey spent so much time carefully crafting Castiel as the big bad, it makes no sense to just be like, oh there's actually these random monsters that are actually the next problem.
Kyle
2024-11-24 02:07:06 +0000 UTCI absolutely adore this finale. Behind Sacrifice, and Swan Song it is my third favorite finale over all. Watching both Cas and Sam's stories, it is really just such a powerful episode. With regards to Sam, personally, I love that they included the Robin/Sam stuff. I think it was less about showing the lengths Soulless Sam would go to, and why he couldn't stick around, and was more about showing Sam's whole story and his whole arc over the season, both what we saw, and what was implied. She met Sam before the story even started when Sam was hunting on his own. She is a manifestation of Sam's guilt for all the things he did while he was soulless, both before and after he joined back up with Dean. And she is the literal warning of what's ahead for Sam once he goes to Bobby's and meets the third piece. With how they wrote this story (and Sam's amnesia) they couldn't really use Bobby or Dean to be Sam's guide as he went on this journey to pull himself together, so I think Robin was a really clever way to manifest the past, present and future of Sam, from the outside perspective, while we got the internal perspective from Amnesia!Sam, Soulless!Sam and Hell!Sam. I think they did a beautiful job of kinda summarizing everything Sam endured this season, as the consequences of everything unravel and explode and hit us and Sammy like a freight train, setting the stage for next season for Sam beautifully. And while I know season 7 isn't everyone's cup of tea, personally I deeply love it, and it is one of my favorites. The leviathan threat is super well done, imo. It is insidious and deep and such a subtle attack that I think it gets underrated, compared to the demons and angels and Apocalypse that were so exaggerated. But what makes season 7 great for me is the heavy focus on the mental health of the boys. We get really deep dives into Bobby's trauma, we get a beautifully tragic look at Dean's depression and PTSD and grief that we don't usually get to see. With Cas, we get to explore kind of a rebirth of his character, and what it can be like to kind of break out of one way of living (being an Angel of the Lord, a soldier, a commander) and to try to find ground in a new one (finding humanity, becoming a friend, a family member, a protector). And of course, Sam's arc with his own severe PTSD, the anxiety, the grief and guilt and psychosis. In a culture where we don't really get to see men in particular, but specifically soldiers and warriors deal with the after effects of trauma and pain, to have an entire season where their mental health and coping mechanisms is on full display is really, really powerful to me. Especially with Jared, and his activity in promoting Men's mental health awareness, I love that he got to do this arc with Sam, and he does it so freaking well. And then with Cas this episode, it is such a beautiful wrap up to me (in a terrible painful sort of way lol) of Cas' mission, and story and arc this season. It is tragic and infuriating and painful. But I disagree (politely of course), that they never really give him the chance to redeem himself. I think a lot of Cas' arc in seasons 8-10 is the story of Cas redeeming himself (or at the very least trying desperately to do so). I think a lot of Dean's anger towards Cas was absolved while they were trapped in Purgatory, but at the end of the day, it really fell on Sam. Sam was the one who needed to forgive Cas, and I think Dean knew that. Once Sam was able to absolve Cas, and after all the hits and losses they take next season, all of the work Cas puts into redeeming himself, I think Dean is able to learn from that and use it to forgive Cas himself
Elisia
2024-11-18 00:55:04 +0000 UTCThere’re theories that Cas arranged (offscreen) for some deus-ex-machina solutions, like putting up various wardings from demons and all supernatural creatures, and at the same time erasing Dean’s (and Sam too) presence in the Braedens' lives. Or, the simplest would be to go back and arranged so that Lisa and Dean didn't meet at all. So instead of Lisa, Sam asked Dean to go find Cassie. When Sam came back, Dean and Cassie broke up, again We've seen that Cas alone can bring Sam and Dean back to Samuel's Colt era and Balthazar can unsink the Titanic this season. I supposed we can headcanon that a couple of angels can achieve this. And if some of the things don't gel nicely in this timeline, the offending things will be erased from existence. Heck, the details of what is being done in the erasure process don’t matter, the important thing is that in this SPN universe, it can be done. Dean felt he had brought a world of hurt into Lisa and Ben's lives. In this episode alone he slapped Ben, saying hurtful things to him to snap him out of his nightmare of seeing his mother stabbed herself, his possessed mother saying she regretted having him, he holds her back, yada yada, and watching his mother nearly died. Ben would be overwhelmed with PTSD after this. So by having Cas erased their memories of Dean, he is erasing this nightmare of a situation that Dean felt he had brought into their lives. And by extension their knowledge of supernatural beings, I guess. Dean doesn’t want them hurt because of him anymore, and at the same time having ignorance of the supernatural can bring peace to some. Should some creatures and/or demons try to threaten the Winchesters via the Braedens still, it would be useless if they don‘t know how to find them and/or their connections to the Winchesters in the first place, in order to threaten them with, wouldn't it?
rose mnor
2024-11-17 09:14:45 +0000 UTCFor 6.21 Let it Bleed: Yes, thank you, Shelley, for understanding why Dean did what he did to Ben and Lisa's memories. I am with Dean on this one. Dean, for the most part, always would try to solve problems he faced in front of him, trying to solve and/or anticipate future issues is not him - it's a problem for another day. They will cross that bridge later. From his POV, he's the one that brings so much hurt to the Braedens, THIS is his priority right now. Reminded me of what zombie Karen said to him about Bobby from 5.15 Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid: DEAN: So why don't you just tell him you remember? KAREN: I'm gonna go out on a limb here and say you've never been in love. He's my husband. My job is to bring him peace... not pain. Ben will get ptsd from what happened to him and Dean definitely wouldn't want that. He wants to give them peace again - as having ignorance of the supernatural can bring peace to some people. That is what that scene is about, and it is such a Dean thing to do. I always rolled my eyes whenever I saw comments - what if, in the future, demons used the Braedens as leverage to get the Winchesters. So in the reply are my comments that I wrote back in the day in the first watch on Shelley's YouTube reaction, in which I elaborate on why, IMO, Dean did what he did, and my headcanons on how Cas can help in solving any arising problems from the erasure of Dean and Sam's presences in the Braeden's lives going forward.
rose mnor
2024-11-17 09:14:21 +0000 UTC
