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Long-Distance Call, Time Is On My Side
Rather than do an in-depth analysis of each of these eps, I'm going to talk a little bit about where we are at this point in S3.
"Long-Distance Call" and "Time Is On My Side" both highlight the problem with the last portion of S3. Thanks to the WGA strike, the show lost six episodes. That's almost a third of the season. Up until now we had Dean in denial. Well, maybe not so much denial as keeping his game face on--taking advantage of his situation with his continual dying wishes, and workin' the job, trying to prevent Sam's interference in the deal (which he believes would put Sam at risk), basically being stoic and accepting of it.
Then at about the mid-way point, Dean learns some things and has some revelations and actively decides he doesn't want to die, he doesn't want to go to Hell. He and Sam are on the same page now, and Dean even expresses a desire to stop working cases and track down Bela and the Colt.
So far, so good. Logical progression as the inevitability of the deal coming due approaches and becomes more real.
If we'd have had those six eps, I would strongly expect them to be very much along the lines of LDC and TIOMS. How so? I'd expect the third portion (the third third) of the season to be the Boys working cases while trying to find a way to break the deal, or conversely, finding a possible way to break the deal while working a case. Similar to a quest format, like Quantum Leap (Sam hoping to leap home and in the meantime putting right what once went wrong) or The Fugitive (evading capture while searching for the real killer), or, heck, even S1 of SPN (working cases while hoping to find John--"Maybe he'll meet us there!")
LDC brings them to a case that, they discover and Dean hopes, might provide a way to get him out of his deal. Sam is more cautious than Dean, as he wants to figure out what's going on, but Dean is desperate, and if he can kill the demon who holds his contract, he's willing to take the phone calls at face value.
TIOMS gives us Sam tracking down what would otherwise be a case (that John thought he'd taken care of), but that Sam believes might be a way out for Dean (and himself).
In both instances, the cases and the quest dovetail together and provide conflict without detracting from either brother or their relationship. In the first instance, Sam was right to get more information before following "Dad's" orders. In the second case, Dean was right not to become someone who would need organs from donors who couldn't spare the parts. (I imagine it would eventually grow suspicious to the medical community at large when the same person(s) kept showing up for transplants of different organs over a period of 50, 75, 100+ years.) But the desperation of both brothers (Dean in the first instance and Sam in the second) makes sense, and we feel for them. We feel the clock ticking along with them, and we want them to find a solution.
If we'd had those other six episodes, the writers could have fleshed out other possible avenues, other guest characters, other cases to tie things together.
As it is, that all was reduced to a brief exchange of dialogue. "We've talked to every professor, soothsayer, and carny act in the Lower 48." Because the strike eliminated six eps from the season, we're reduced to being told about the quest rather than shown the quest.
It think it might be fair to suggest that with the strike, the overall arc lost its rhythm, lost it's stride, and though they tried to recover, things never quite fell together as well as they once did from a storytelling POV.
In other news, I really liked the addition of Rufus, and hearing the hellhounds baying in the distance as the screen goes to black at the end of TIOMS was chilling. The reflection of the "ghost" in Lanie's computer in LCD was so creepy, as is pretty much any electronic device working when it shouldn't (you know, like phones that have been ripped out of the walls, or toy phones, and the like). Dean's desperation in LDC and Sam's hope in TIOMS are just heartbreaking. And even among all of this, we still get the brother banter, with Sam deliberately trying to make Dean lose his appetite. (Geo got a particularly hearty chuckle out of that.)
Also? Dang but the guys looked good.
"Long-Distance Call" and "Time Is On My Side" both highlight the problem with the last portion of S3. Thanks to the WGA strike, the show lost six episodes. That's almost a third of the season. Up until now we had Dean in denial. Well, maybe not so much denial as keeping his game face on--taking advantage of his situation with his continual dying wishes, and workin' the job, trying to prevent Sam's interference in the deal (which he believes would put Sam at risk), basically being stoic and accepting of it.
Then at about the mid-way point, Dean learns some things and has some revelations and actively decides he doesn't want to die, he doesn't want to go to Hell. He and Sam are on the same page now, and Dean even expresses a desire to stop working cases and track down Bela and the Colt.
So far, so good. Logical progression as the inevitability of the deal coming due approaches and becomes more real.
If we'd have had those six eps, I would strongly expect them to be very much along the lines of LDC and TIOMS. How so? I'd expect the third portion (the third third) of the season to be the Boys working cases while trying to find a way to break the deal, or conversely, finding a possible way to break the deal while working a case. Similar to a quest format, like Quantum Leap (Sam hoping to leap home and in the meantime putting right what once went wrong) or The Fugitive (evading capture while searching for the real killer), or, heck, even S1 of SPN (working cases while hoping to find John--"Maybe he'll meet us there!")
LDC brings them to a case that, they discover and Dean hopes, might provide a way to get him out of his deal. Sam is more cautious than Dean, as he wants to figure out what's going on, but Dean is desperate, and if he can kill the demon who holds his contract, he's willing to take the phone calls at face value.
TIOMS gives us Sam tracking down what would otherwise be a case (that John thought he'd taken care of), but that Sam believes might be a way out for Dean (and himself).
In both instances, the cases and the quest dovetail together and provide conflict without detracting from either brother or their relationship. In the first instance, Sam was right to get more information before following "Dad's" orders. In the second case, Dean was right not to become someone who would need organs from donors who couldn't spare the parts. (I imagine it would eventually grow suspicious to the medical community at large when the same person(s) kept showing up for transplants of different organs over a period of 50, 75, 100+ years.) But the desperation of both brothers (Dean in the first instance and Sam in the second) makes sense, and we feel for them. We feel the clock ticking along with them, and we want them to find a solution.
If we'd had those other six episodes, the writers could have fleshed out other possible avenues, other guest characters, other cases to tie things together.
As it is, that all was reduced to a brief exchange of dialogue. "We've talked to every professor, soothsayer, and carny act in the Lower 48." Because the strike eliminated six eps from the season, we're reduced to being told about the quest rather than shown the quest.
It think it might be fair to suggest that with the strike, the overall arc lost its rhythm, lost it's stride, and though they tried to recover, things never quite fell together as well as they once did from a storytelling POV.
In other news, I really liked the addition of Rufus, and hearing the hellhounds baying in the distance as the screen goes to black at the end of TIOMS was chilling. The reflection of the "ghost" in Lanie's computer in LCD was so creepy, as is pretty much any electronic device working when it shouldn't (you know, like phones that have been ripped out of the walls, or toy phones, and the like). Dean's desperation in LDC and Sam's hope in TIOMS are just heartbreaking. And even among all of this, we still get the brother banter, with Sam deliberately trying to make Dean lose his appetite. (Geo got a particularly hearty chuckle out of that.)
Also? Dang but the guys looked good.