T’s Supernatural Spring Hellatus Journal

Dear Journal,

The (mini) Spring Hellatus started the moment The Show ended last week.  I’ve been collecting my Hellatus Survival Kit ever since.  I’ve managed to get several links to some pretty decent fan fic.  I’ve watched #NashCon footage on Periscope…. And I’ve made my favorite episode list to begin rewatching this week.  I’ll be re-watching two episodes a week to help stave off the dreaded Hellatus Depression.  I’m considering live tweeting the episodes listed below, and you can join in the fun, Journal just by following me on twitter at @totalconfushun.  All the fun will start on twitter @ 8pm (US Central Time Zone) on March 3, then the same time every Winchester Wednesday.

Week 1 (March 2) – Mystery Spot (S3E11) & Lazarus Rising (S4E1)

Week 2 (March 9) – Yellow Fever (S4E6) & Weekend at Bobby’s (S6E4)

 Week 3 (March 16) – Fan Fiction (S10E5) & About A Boy (S10E12)

The Originals S3E14 – ‘Takes Us All For a Ride’

The Originals – A Streetcar Named Desire

Written By: Julie Plec & Diane Ademu-John

Directed By: Matthew Hastings

I know I’m starting to repeat myself here but…

If you’re not already watching this show, why not?  There’s no answer that good enough.  Seriously.

I was wondering how they were going to continue on with their story line while also managing to wrap of Stefan’s (Special Guest Star Paul Wesley) visit to New Orleans, but they did it quite nicely.

This season has been all about Klaus’ and Elijah’s sire lines trying to de-sire themselves so that they can take out the vampires that made them.  Leading the charge are The Stricts (from Elijah’s line) and Klaus’ old flame (who really puts the CRAZY in Crazy Ex Girlfriend) Aurora (from Klaus’ line).  The prophecy said that the three remaining Originals would all fall… one by family, one by friend and one by foe.  Several episodes back, Rebekah handled the “family” part of the prophecy by demanding Elijah “dagger her” and put her in a box, safely hidden from their enemies, telling her brother that with that part of the prophecy out of the way he could quit worrying about Klaus putting a dagger in his heart.  Thus leaving Elijah and Klaus to worry about their foes…and their friends.

In this episode, Davina has gotten all the pieces together for the spell that would de-sire her friends from Klaus…and, oh yeah, Elijah’s sire line as well, since Aya is demanding that before she’ll make The Strict’s Coven help Davina bring back her boyfriend, Kol from the dead.

Thanks to Camille taking what was left of the white oak that had been carved into a little statue of a knight on horseback as a gift from Klaus to Rebekah, Aurora got her hands on enough of the white oak (the only thing that can kill an Original) to make bullets with which to take out Elijah.  Aurora agrees to work with Aya and finish this game.  Aya has one of her witches send Aurora’s mind to the magical place where her brother Tristan’s mind is residing instead of his body which is locked in a shipping container and resting at the bottom of an ocean somewhere so that he drowns over and over again (yeah, that’s what happens when you piss off the Mikaelsons).  This same witch manages to use “representational magic” to put Elijah and Klaus there too.  They have to figure out what is in that room that represents them and destroy it to escape, all while dealing with jagged barbs being thrown their way from the other siblings inhabiting the room with them.  It’s in that room that the best line of the show is uttered.  Usually, the greatest lines come from Klaus, but this time it’s Elijah who gets the juiciest tidbit.  Tristan is berating him for not paying more attention to the vampires he has sired, to which Elijah sighs wearily and asks, “Would you mind terribly, if you spared me the dead beat dad lecture?”

While Elijah and Klaus are in magical time out, Marcel, Hayley and Freya are racing to try and save them…along with help from Stefan Salvatore.  Stefan figures that he sort of owes Klaus this one.  Besides, Stefan is in Klaus’ sire line, so if they do manage to take out Klaus before the de-sire-ing can occur, then Stefan will die as well.  I just loved the scene with real life couple Paul Wesley and Phoebe Tonkin (Hayley) in the trunk of Marcel’s car as he drives them right up to the front steps of The Stricts lair.

I did see what happened next coming before they ever made it to the front steps of the lair.  Stefan removed the magical bandage that Freya applied to his wound to keep Rayna from being able to track him and basically sicced The Huntress on all the enemy vamps causing the much needed distraction so that they could rescue the Mikaelson brothers.

Davina begged Marcel to trust that she could remove the sire bond and save him, but he couldn’t put his fate in the hands of a teenage witch with substitute spell ingredients.  He helped Stefan and Hayley save the Mikaelsons instead.

But, he didn’t stop Davina from getting the ingredients she needed to achieve her long sought after goal.

There’s another new episode next week.  And, I just have to ask if after reading this review if you caught the pun that is the title… because I only caught it while I was writing it.

The Vampire Diaries S7E14 – ‘Goes To the Big Easy’

The Vampire Diaries — “Moonlight on the Bayou” — Image Number: VD714a_0217.jpg — Pictured (L-R): Paul Wesley as Stefan and Joseph Morgan as Klaus — Photo: Annette Brown/The CW — © 2016 The CW Network, LLC. All rights reserved.

The Vampire Diaries – Moonlight on the Bayou

Written By: Kevin Williamson & Julie Plec

Directed By: Jeffery G. Hunt

This is another one of those shows where I have to ask if you’re not already watching it…. why the hell not?

The fans have been waiting for this episode since S5E11 when Katherine was “dying”.  Dying is in quotation marks there because she didn’t really die, but that’s a whole other episode and review.  We’ve all been waiting for another visit from everybody’s favorite, love-to-hate anti-hero Klaus Mikaelson (Special Guest Star Joseph Morgan) to show up again.

And, boy, did he make an appearance…

But, I’m getting ahead of myself.

All season, we’ve been given glimpses of “Three Years From Now”.  It started in the season premiere with Stefan opening a casket “Three Years From Now” and waking a desiccating Damon by announcing that his scar has reopened and he needs his brother’s help.  You’re probably asking the question the whole fandom’s been asking almost all season… What scar?

Well, it’s come full circle and we finally know what’s going on three years in the future.  Stefan is running from The Huntress Rayna Cruz (played by Leslie-Anne Huff) who has marked him with the Phoenix Sword.  But, before that, he ran to New Orleans to get help from our favorite Original… Klaus.

However, Klaus recognizes Stefan’s wound for what it is and throws a typical Klaus like tantrum.  How dare Stefan bring Rayna Cruz to a town filled with vamps for her to kill, some of which are his family and people he cares about?  He orders Stefan from the magically protected bar, threatening to kill him if he doesn’t leave.

While Stefan is busy hiding in Klaus’ favorite bar that’s warded with magic to keep locator spells from working, Damon and Bonnie are being introduced to Enzo’s new employers, The Armory.  The best line of the episode (as usual) goes to Damon.  Enzo says, “They’ve taken great pains to keep themselves out of history”, to which Damon quips, “And for 3 easy payments of just $19.99, we too can be a member.”

Enzo turns on Damon and Bonnie… and boom boom bang… he loses his hand, Bonnie saves Damon from being Tyler’s doggie bone (oh, did I forget to mention that Tyler was in this episode too?), but not before Tyler manages to drive some points home with Damon.  Tyler tells Damon that everything is all his fault.  That Stefan is being chased by The Huntress because he saved Damon, and that if Bonnie manages to get the door unlocked and saves him, it will be too late and Tyler will have turned into his werewolf alter ego and will hurt her too.  Oh, and that will be Damon’s fault too.  In the end, Damon sees Tyler is right, and we get to see a tiny peek of how he ends up in that coffin “three years from now”.

After Stefan leaves the bar and his phone behind, Caroline calls.  After seeing her name in the window, Klaus can’t resist answering.  They share a sweet moment while Klaus gives her baby advice and then promises that he’ll keep Stefan safe.  So, of course, he then saves the younger Salvatore in the nick of time.

This was a fast paced episode with a lot of information crammed into one hour (including commercials).  With this episode we start to see how all those things they’ve been showing us in those glimpses of “three years from now” came to be.  We’re no longer wondering why Stefan left Caroline or how she ended up engaged to Alaric.  We know how Damon ended up desiccating in a coffin in New York City.  Although, I’m still a little sketchy on how Bonnie ended up in a romantic relationship with Enzo, I mean she did just cut off his hand.  Awkward.

But, I’ve got to hand it to the writers (yes, that’s an intentional pun).  They’ve neatly handed (oh, what do you know, there’s another one that I didn’t even notice at first) us three years of our favorite inhabitants of Mystic Falls’ lives all in one season…. without any of the boring after taste.

And, there’s another new episode next week to look forward to!

Supernatural Series 11 – EP 15 Goes Beyond the Mat

Supernatural 11.15 Beyond the Mat

Written by: John Bring and Andrew Dabb

Directed by:  Jerry Wanek

If you’re new to the show – Why aren’t you watching already?  No, seriously, if you’re new to the show, there’s a few things you should know.  First, it’s about two brothers named Sam and Dean Winchester who are hunters… not the normal kind of hunters.  Hunters that hunt all the things that go bump in the night.  And second, that Family Don’t End With Blood…. that’s actually the overall theme of the show.

Now… why aren’t you watching the show?  Not a good enough answer.

Warning:  There be spoilers ahead!

This episode was what the fandom refers to as a Monster of the Week (MotW) episode.  The guys took a break from fighting the Big Bad for this season (The Darkness – Amara, played by the talented Emily Swallow) to handle a petty demon.  Because as Sam says “The world’s still gonna be screwed tomorrow, right?”.

Dean sees an obituary for a childhood hero, and the boys decide to make “the day’s drive” to pay their respects.  But, of course, paying their respects turns into a case.  At the funeral, Dean and Sam meet some of their childhood heroes.  In the funeral scene be sure to look for the cameo appearance by Clif Kosterman, J2’s bodyguard.  Turns out, one of those heroes, Gunnar Lawless (played by guest star Aleks Paunovic) isn’t all that heroic.  Special guest star, Mike ‘The Miz’ Mizanin plays newcomer upstart  wrestler Shawn Harley.

Throughout the episode we get glimpses of Crowley’s ‘Summer Vacation in Hell’ with Lucifer/Castiel.  My, how the mighty have fallen.  We see the former King of Hell on his knees scrubbing the floor with a toothbrush, no less.  As the Crowley Capers play out, we see glimpses of the old King of Hell as he tries to make his play and take out Lucifer.

Some of the best scenes of the show involve Dean fanboy’ing over ‘Top Notch Wrestling’, complete with his playing in the ring….played so well by Jensen Ackles.  But, let’s not forget Jared’s Sam who manages to get all gushy over his first crush, former ring girl Rio, played by Jackie Debatin.  I giggled over Dean calling Sam out for having a poster of Rio over his bed when he was a kid.  Gunnar Lawless gives Dean the advice that you “gotta keep on grinding no matter what you do”, which leads to Dean’s speech at the end of the episode … The Keep On Grinding speech that fans have heard in previous promos for the show.  Misha Collins gets to channel his best Tommy Lee Jones as Lucifer/Castiel quotes The Fugitive with the Hen house, Outhouse, and Dog house speech.

But, the best line of the episode goes to Jensen Ackles as Dean says, “Did he get in a tickle fight with Edward Scissorhands?”

The worst part of the episode is that it’s the last new one until March 23.