Supernatural: The Executioner’s Song. The One Where I Was Sadly Proven Correct

So a while back I made this prediction about Dean when he took on the Mark. This seems like a huge thing for everyone to be ignoring. The Mark of Cain came from one brother killing another so if Dean has the Mark. . .

However up to this point Cain gave Dean the Mark and then took a hike. Yeah they talk about him every now and then, but they’ve avoided this one huge point. We start this episode finally getting to see him again and we see him killing a horrible nasty murderer on death row. So far I don’t have many issues with that. Plus Cain looks pretty amazing. Life off the farm has done him well. His hair alone is pretty fabulous.

So we now have a mystery to solve, but more importantly we have a reason for Dean and Cain to meet up again.

Cut to Crowley and Mom. Rowena is definitely trying to manipulate Crowley still. I don’t quite get her end game. She’s causing issues in his court, but if he is weakened she will also be weakened. She needs to die. . .soon, but I’ll come back to that later. She tries to get Crowley to kill her enemies for her and even though he sees through it he still seems like he’s going to do it. She also does her best to cause strife between the Winchesters and him. Which isn’t that hard since their working relationship has never been smooth sailing.

Meanwhile Sam and Dean have figured out that Cain is killing whole families and while they are telling that to Cas Cain shows up. Once again I really like Cain. He’s killing people like crazy, but unlike other crazed demons we’ve seen in seasons past he’s not killing because he’s enjoying it. He’s killing because he sees it as his duty. And he doesn’t want to kill people that aren’t on his list of descendants. BTW that would be so many people. That long ago his descendants would be a crazy amount of people. Which they touch on, but still— so many people. One might even say that he’s on a mission from God, Blues Brother’s Style.

Finally the boys figure out where Cain is headed next and they prepare for a battle between Dean and Cain. They do this by pulling Crowley in to help (and by lying to him in the process which just help’s out Rowena’s case) and by using some misdirection to trap him. Long story short he is trapped and Dean comes in to finish him off.

This is where it gets interesting. Cain puts up a good fight, but is it just me or does his heart not seem in it. I’m just saying with the power we’ve seen from Cain it seems like he should have been able to make short work of Dean. So maybe he just wanted to talk to Dean before getting him to take his life. Cain has lost his family, his love, and now his humanity again. The only way he can control himself is to live in isolation. I don’t blame him for wanting all of that to end. So even though the boys have won this fight I don’t think they were ever meant to lose it. Cain seems almost bored with this turn of events.

But what he revealed is what is most important. He finally said what I’ve worried about all this time. Dean taking on the Mark means that he will eventually kill Sam. What I found interesting is that Cain states that Dean will kill Crowley first, then Castiel, then finally Sam, So here’s my new prediction: Crowley is about to die. Once Dean kills him it will cause Dean to panic and really try to find a cure (which they already know if they would just think hard). Other reasons I think Crowley is about to dies are: the writers don’t seem to know what to do with Crowley these days. He’s not near the bad guy he used to be and with his control over demons that whole storyline has kind of fallen to the wayside.Also Rowena is undermining his power which will come to no good end.

As much as I don’t want Crowley to die it feels like the way things are moving.

Although I’m sure it was detrimental to Dean’s mental health to kill Cain I feel like it was more because he wanted to believe that he could keep the Mark under control and everything that happened up in that loft told him that he was doomed to go down the same horrible path that Cain had gone down.

Sam is really worried about Dean now so maybe he really does see the writing on the wall.  I know Sam will do everything he can to help Dean so hopefully he’ll get Rowena or Crowley to cast a less extreme age spell on Dean to get rid of this curse.

I can only hope.

What do you think? Will Dean kill Crowley? Will they finally put together the answer that is right in front of their face?

Jonesin’ for some Sherlock? Check out Endeavour.

I have my DVR set to record all of Masterpiece Mystery and Masterpiece Classic just to check out the new BBC shows that I might not have heard of. So since it’s summertime and there’s not too much new TV on right now I started working my way through my PBS backlog on my DVR. That’s when I ran into Endeavour.
The second season just recently aired and I watched the first episode with interest. I like Inspector Morse and although he’s not my favorite British Detective I was interested to see what a prequel deliver. I have been very pleasantly surprised.

The show is set in the 60’s and follows young detective Endeavour Morse as he works his way up the ladder. He has the intelligence of Sherlock Holmes and the heart of John Watson. His intelligence allows him to be an amazing detective, but you also watch him struggle trying to create a normal life for himself.

What he’s got going for him: Intelligent, attractive (but not so attractive that it distracts– it’s a realistic attractiveness), caring, doesn’t have a super established love interest which leaves that storyline open for future development,  and he’s witty.  Like someone who says things that you’re thinking, but know better than to say out loud witty. He also has this hair that gets messed up when he’s very upset or engrossed in a case.  And it’s adorable.  I applaud the BBC.  He’s really perfect main character material. He’s normal enough to relate too, but extraordinary enough to keep you watching.

 

Now no show is just about the main character.  This show is no exception.  There a lot of Easter eggs and future main character appearances to satisfy the people that are old school Morse fans, but they don’t allow these appearances to distract from the current story.  I could talk about many of these people, but the only other person I’m going to talk about is DI Fred Thursday.  

Thursday takes Morse under his wing and stands up for him when others mock him for his theories and methods.  Thursday also has an interesting back story and reflects what they are doing with the Morse storyline.  Thursday, we are reminded frequently, joined the force after the war and still is affected by the things he witnessed during the war. Most shows follow people directly post WWII or  during a war, but this show shows a time period that I haven’t seen much of.  The time between wars when the world was changing, but not many people had realized it yet.  Thursday connects the two worlds and grounds the other characters.  

What he’s got going for him: He’s got the gruff, yet fatherly character down pat.  He has a somewhat mysterious past that speaks of more knowledge and experience than you would think and fully supports Morse in all his endeavors ( you see what I did there?). Once again way to go BBC.  He’s a great supporting character and brings the show to life.

So instead of sitting in a corner staring at photos of Benedict Cumberbatch watch some Endeavour.  There is a special free on Amazon Prime along with season one also free on Amazon Prime. Season 2 is available for purchase on Amazon and I’m assuming it’ll be out soon on Prime since it’s already aired on PBS in America.  With each episode lasting over an hour and a half it’ll occupy you for a while until the new season of Sherlock comes out.  Or who am I kidding– it will give you something to binge watch this weekend.  

After all you know it’s gotta be good.  After all it has that extra U in the Endeavour so it must be amazing.. 

The Silver Chair Announced As Next Narnia Movie

I got excited when I saw the announcement that The Silver Chair was going to be the next Chronicles of Narnia to be released.  This is one of my favorite books in the series and it’d be awesome to see this book come to life in a big way.  I don’t know about the rest of you , but The Chronicles of Narnia were a big part of my childhood. My parents read us the books, we watched the cartoon and we owned (and watched repeatedly) the BBC movies.

The BBC movies had their issues admittedly. The people in animal costumes, the horrible casting of Lucy, and the special effects in general.

They grew and learned (some) from their mistakes. Granted the special effects by the time The Silver Chair was made weren’t much better. The owls were very odd and the serpent at the end with the purple blood was not very believable. The really good bad thing was definitely the earth men jumping down into the lava. I laugh every time I see that sequence. They did, however, do a much better job casting Scrub and Pole and the biggest, most amazing thing they did was cast Tom Baker as Puddleglum.

I can’t say that I had really understood his character before or appreciated the humour behind it until Tom made him come to life. The dry, straightforward delivery is genius. I can’t re-read this book without Tom Baker as my Puddleglum in my imagination. All the other characters change and evolve, but Tom Baker IS Puddleglum.
So here’s my request/hope/desire please, please casting people recast Tom Baker in this role.  If he could revisit this character again with a larger special effects budget it could be epic.  Or if Tom is too old or not what they are going for visually I really hope that the person cast in this role will watch how Tom plays it and take notes.

Most importantly I hope that Hollywood doesn’t feel the need to add a new plot line to this awesome story like they did with The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (which admittedly is one of my least favorite of the books).  I do believe Dr. Jon Sprinkle summed it up best when he said:

“I’m glad they’re making it, because what we’ve had too much of in Hollywood lately is bobance and bounce and high spirits. We’ve got to learn that life isn’t all fricasseed frogs and eel pie. We want something to sober us down a bit.

Now a movie like this — an adaptation that will be compared to a version shown chiefly on VCRs, with actors who will mostly be in front of a green screen, shot in 3D for its limited run in the theater and filled with action sequences that aren’t in the book — will be just the thing. If that doesn’t steady a chap, I don’t know what will.”

(Who is Dr. Jon Sprinkle?  From UA’s website: Dr. Jonathan Sprinkle is an Assistant Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Arizona. In 2013 he received the NSF CAREER award, and in 2009, he received the UA’s Ed and Joan Biggers Faculty Support Grant for work in autonomous systems. Until June 2007, he was the Executive Director of the Center for Hybrid and Embedded Software Systems at the University of California, Berkeley. His research interests and experience are in systems control and engineering, through modeling and metamodeling, and he teaches in controls and systems modeling.—- and he’s also my brother, but doesn’t all that other crap sound more impressive?)

Remember, “many fall down, but few return to the sunlit lands.”

Here’s a clip from the BBC version to leave you with:

Related articles

• Mark Gordon Company Brings NARNIA Franchise Back to Life with Plan to Adapt THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: THE SILVER CHAIR (collider.com)
• Narnia Movie Franchise to Continue With The Silver Chair (toplessrobot.com)
• Fourth ‘Chronicles Of Narnia’ Movie In Works From Mark Gordon Co (m.deadline.com)