The Magicians, Season 4, Episode 2: Lost, Found, Fucked

Marina has gathered most of our cloaked magicians together to try and break the spell on them… which doens’t work, doesn’t work at all

She also gets a magical automated voice mail from Henry Fogg telling her to cease and desist and that trying - or succeeding - in breaking the spell that is shielding them will only cause everyone to die horribly.

Marina being Marina, is not going to listen to any automated warnings. More, she realises that the cloaked people must be Henry’s most favoured students, who else would they be? She begins poking and prodding at Penny until she finds the spell that suppresses his Travelling ability (we’ve seen previously that his Travelling ability is non-human magic so isn’t subject to the limitations of magic rationing) which he uses to buzz around quite merrily.

The rest of the group are torn - and Kady puts it best: their lives are fake. Even when their fake lives are awesome (Josh’s biggest conflict is his penis is too big, Penny has legions of groupies and Kady is like a super-cop bordering on a hero) they’re blatantly comic book. No-one really has lives like this.

Marina uses Penny’s travelling ability to nip into Henry’s office, steal his shiny disguise potion and inject him with it - all witnessed by Todd. Her plan is to convince Henry to reveal the antidote to save himself. He refuses, protecting these students is too important to him. He also questions which of the many many many time lines this Marina is from. Honestly, I’ve lost track. I know one of the Marina’s was Henry’s lover but I’m pretty sure that isn’t this Marina.

It has gotten rather confusing.

Instead Henry embalks on a rather epic goodbye session, having Todd record his memoirs and laying out his deep, abiding pain in a moment that would be almost funny if it weren’t so poignant - from his alocholism, his self-loathing, his gambling and his general self destruction. He finds it cathartic, but it’s super emotional as well. We also remember that he is one of the few who remembers all 50 of the alternate time lines - 50 lifetimes all of them ending in absolute horror and awfulness. With that, even magic is a grand and awful disappointment to him. He almost welcomes losing his identity. Todd watches all of this casual revelations from his suicide plans to all his confessions with a growing sense of horror

Until he meets with Etta, his tailor who seems to know him better than anyone, knowing his clothes are a shield to keep people at bay and, ultimately what a good man he is before he breaks down in tears and tells her everything. Including how he tried to make the best lives he could for his “most annoyingly millennial of students” but Marina has doubtless planned something far worse

Someone else who learns the truth is Julia, still stuck in the identity of Kim, who is worried about him leaving since he’s the only one who believes in her (since she’s so bad at magic)... but Todd is incapable of keeping a secret and has told her everything. She realises she is one of the masked people and asks who she really is.

Of course Henry doesn’t tell her - but he can actually talk about it, since he cast the curse he is quite capable of stopping random things killing him from talking about it. He urges her not to poke this for her own safety. He, again , refuses to reverse the spell

And he goes to Marina to have his identity erased and replaced with a homeless person - and Marina calls him dad. And it’s possible among the whole time line thing I just missed that?

Supernatural, Season 13, Episode 23: Let the Good Times Roll

CARRY ON MY WAYWARD SON, THERE’LL BE PEACE WHEN YOU ARE DONE, DON’T YOU CRY NO MORE

This song now creates a pavlovian response in me. It also makes watching the finale hard since I keep rewinding every 5 seconds to hear the opening scene.

Anyway, opening scene aside, everyone is enjoying the new world. Sam gives everyone an update on the state of the world and Bobby sums it up with “Damn fool idjit from the apprentice is president”. Bobby is a wise man.

Dean and Sam call in Castiel and Jack to kill some werewolves arguing about the Kardassians which seems a little overkill. But it’s filling Dean with something alien and new: hope. Our super angsty boy is talking retirement - retirement they’ve earned, retirement they can take because with Jack’s power they can probably commit utter genocide against creatures which while inclined to do evil have plenty of outliers and capacity for good.

Sorry, Supernatural, you can’t have several episodes expanding the humanity and morality of monsters and then casually consider killing them all as a morally neutral or good act. Hey those werewolves weren’t even doing anything expressly evil beyond enjoying reality TV. Ok… maybe they did deserve it.

Jack has some nightmares about the terrible things he’s seen and the people he’s been unable to save - but Dean is awesome in comforting him here. He mentions his own nightmares casually as something everyone has all the time (I imagine with what he’s been through, nightmares are pretty normal for him which again is one of the ways this show subtly reinforces how traumatised and mentally ill Dean actually is - nightmares every night is his normal).

Dean is a perfect father to Jack at this moment

Bobby and Mary are taking a totally platonic and not romantic honest walk summing up everyone else - apparently Charlie and Rowena have gone on a road trip and WOULD WATCH THIS SHOW. Ketch is off doing Ketch things.

And then they find of a body of Maggie, an apocalyptic world person - apparently murdered by mundane means. Well that puts a damper on things

They try to figure out who killed her and learned she had a crush on a local shop assistant so Jack charges off to do some murdering, only stopped by Sam, Dean and Castiel - Dean actually shooting Jack to get his attention. The point out the obviously innocence of the man in front of him and Jack goes on another spiral of self hate and rage because he always hurts people

Points to Castiel claiming they’re Agents Knowles, Williams and Rowland. Because shout out to Destiny’s Child

He’s found in his self-flagellation by Lucifer who is there to offer him a new path. Staying with humans is bad, humans are bad, things always go wrong and you end up hurting them - instead let’s explore and remake the galaxy like Star Wars and leave the humans to it!

It’s not exactly a well thought out plan but let’s remember Jack is like, 2, at the moment so has no real grounding in maturity to see the glaring holes in this plan and he is also all torn up about the fact he does have a habit of hurting all those squishy squishy humans.

Jack asks him for something in exchange: Maggie to be resurrected. Lucifer warns that this can often go wrong and often does (Sam is a special case on account of him being awfully weird anyway) but goes ahead to keep Sam on side

Stranger Things, Season 2, Episode 8: The Mind Flayer

Ominous lab is now under attack by waves and waves of what I’m going to call demigogs because that’s what Dustin is calling them. And, no matter what Grandfather scientist claims, the polycarbonate glass is not going to keep them out

The facility is in utter chaos, people are dying left right and centre. Bob, Jim, Will, Mike, Joyce and Grandfather Scientist whose name I should really look up - Dr. Owens - make it to the security room. They have to drug Will as he fights them so he can’t psychically transmit their location or plans to the big shadowy monster.

The rest of the facility is an utter horror show - and kudos for the writers and director for truly creating a scary horrifying setting.

To get out they need to reactivate the power and use a computer. Which is very very Jurassic Park, I’m going to give homage points. And while Jim is quick to step up to help, he knows nothing about computers. None of them do, except Bob.

Bob, the genuinely good, normal guy, doing his best and being nicer than nice. Of course Bob is willing to do it, despite the huge risk and despite knowing nothing about guns.

He makes his way to the basement with massively horrible levels of tension, and rests the computers and the locks, giving everyone else a chance to make it to the exit - which they do

Except Dr. Owens - he stays in the security room so he can guide the others using the CCTV to help them avoid the demigogs. Yes it seems like a genuine moment of self-sacrifice from a the head of Hawkings Laboratory, showing again how well this show has taken an ominous lab and utterly humanised the leader (which adds to the complexity as well of Kali’s revenge plot).

Dr. Owens guides Bob to the exit - and it’s unbearably tense. Again, massive points to the horror movie directing of this. It’s awful to watch, there’s a near moment and almost almost almost I think Bob is going to make it. Despite already being sure he’s going to die to clear the way for Joyce and Jim, I thought he was going to make it

Of course a demigog catches him just as he reaches the exit

Raise a glass everyone for Bob, genuinely nice guy. You were too good for this world.

While they were escaping, Dustin, Lucas, Steve, Max met up with a returning Jonathan and Nancy at the lab where they notice shenanigans afoot

Dustin and Lucas also have a lot of arguments about Lucas telling Max everything (which seems to be part of his Steve-led advice to shun Max into liking him) while Lucas is supremely pissed (for better reason) at Dustin keeping Dart secret.

They’re outside the lab when those inside make a run for it and they provide getaway cars to go to Joyce’s house

Stranger Things, Season 2, Episode 6: The Spy

Dustin is with Steve trying to lure out Dart the slime monster, and finally manages to get in touch with Lucas to get him to come help

Dustin and Steve check the basement where Dustin left the slime monster - only to find slime, what looks like an open cocoon or shed skin, and a tunnel. Dart has escaped which is not good.

They decide to lure the creature and, along the way, Steve gives some dating advice to Dustin. This ranges from the good: that keeping an interdimensional slime monster as a pet is unlikely to impress girls to the very awful: that the best way to impress a girl is to completely ignore her and shun her so she will then become obsessed with you. This is terrible, awful advice and thankfully crashes and burns

He also tells Dustin how he does his hair meaning that a) yes his hair is like that on purpose and b) he is trying to perpetrate it on others. The 80s had much to answer for. Also this teenager is completely devastated by his break up with Nancy and more than a little pouty

They leave a trail of meat behind them to the abandoned bus yard where they plan to ambush it with big clubs and fire since that kind of worked with the adult demigorgon

Lucas has not given up on reaching out to Max, going to her house to try and meet her. She continues to be afraid of her brother, the arsehole’s reaction since he hates Lucas (probably due to racism) and is generally a terrible person. She seems to be trying to repair her skateboard which after his threats last episode suggests he broke it

Lucas has come to collect her to show her proof, taking her to the bus yard with Steve and Dustin so he can show her the slime monster and offer proof for her story. Dustin tries his new found tactics on Max who duly shuns him for being a sudden arsehole. Instead she gets closer to Lucas as he expresses an interest in her, her family (her father is still in California) and her toxic relationship with her abusive step-brother. He reassures her, offers praise and is generally pleasant to her and interested in her. This is much better than Steve’s advice

Which is when the slime monsters arrive. Yes, plural. Dart is not alone and Steve is nearly caught outside by them before he hurries to hide in the bus with the others, desperately trying to defend themselves. It seems inevitable that they’ll all be eaten very very soon - when something calls all the monsters off. More on that lately

Catching up on Nancy and Jonathan doesn’t take much. For the most part they celebrate spreading their little exposure tape with the media, drink a lot of vodka and deal with creepy guy being way too invested in their relationship. Even if he is extremely accurate and insightful about their obvious issues between them

Stranger Things, Season 2, Episode 5: Dig Dug

So, Joyce has a mystery - this means it’s time to radically redecorate her home! I have to say this habit of plastering random stuff on every flat surface every time something odd happens is more than a little disturbing. I like to think that this is only happening because of supernatural nastiness

Actually that’s a terrible lie. I like to think this is a constant habit and any random problems will set her off into a series of truly bizarre collages, because that would be kind of hilarious.

So she has plastered Will’s tunnel network all over her home, while Will is comforted by Mike. Will is not doing well, clearly disturbed by all the shadowy stuff he sees and is now sweating profusely presumably due to the big monster’s love of cold. Mike offers the hope that since Will senses what the big monster senses he can be some kind of awesome spy.

Jim has been examining the Ominous tunnel - and some random tentacle goo creature on the wall squirts poison nastiness into his face, leaving him unconscious on the floor. And the hole he dug is then plugged by vines. This is not good. Even when he manages to regain consciousness, he still stumbles around, tries to find a way out, tries to dig through a wall (for some reason) and in general is in a creepy horror set full of slimy, tentacle nastiness. Eventually he ends up on the floor, covered in tentacles. Really really not good.

Luckily for him, Will psychically senses this and dreams of where he is - pointing it out on his map, which no-one can read. Oops.

Well along comes Bob. Who is quietly awesome. Here to provide some kind of help and comfort for Will who he thinks is sick. After initially worrying that Bob is going to see her disturbing collaging, Joyce realises Bob is super clever and can be really useful in interpreting the pictures - so recruits him on the understanding that he asks no questions

Ah, Bob. He is the definition of a nice guy. And I mean nice guy, as in genuinely decent, caring human being, rather than Nice Guy, arsehole who thinks he can buy sex with common decency. Bob is very worried that both Will looks kind of ill and Joyce has reacted to this by taking up Disturbingly Craft Projects  and though he respects her wish for him not to ask questions he is clearly concerned. But he’s also a brilliant lover of puzzles who, after quickly realising the collage is a map, excellently starts pinpointing where it corresponds to and gets completely lost in the joys of the puzzle and figuring it out

I like Bob. I feel Bob will be eaten by something by the end of this season. But I raise a glass to Bob before this inevitably happens. With his help he pinpoints here Jim is

Let’s also check in on the Ominous People in the Ominous Lab have done some soil sample testing from the various rotting farmers fields and realise that if you apply fire then all of them form disturbing whirlwinds. Note applying fire to one, makes them all whirlwind because they’re all spookily connected. Ominous Lab People decide that this is a definite Oh Shit moment and also head out to try and stop this

Which means when Bob and Joyce find the hole Jim went down, carve their way through vines and rescue Jim (was there any doubt that Joyce would charge in?), they’re soon followed by the Ominous Lab People with flamethrowers

This seems to be their solution to everything. And I approve. So many of the books I’ve read and shows I’ve watched would see all of their problems vanish if they applied the “kill it with fire” method. Also points to Bob and Jim exchanging polite greetings like they’ve just met. It makes my English heart proud to see two men who maintain proper dignity in complete denial of the randomness around them

A downside to this flamethrowy-ness is that Will, connected to the shadow monster, collapses and starts screaming. Only I think it’s less a “I’m in agony and dying” scream and more a “the unholy noise I’m making signals the end times and summons the Thing That Man Was Not Meant To Know” scream.

It is not a good scream. Though I do have a friend who makes a similar noise when she realises there’s no vodka left.

Supernatural, Season 13, Episode 10: Wayward Sisters

This is clearly a back door pilot for Wayward Sisters - and much better than the ill prepared hot mess which was Bloodlines

This is how you do a spin off properly. The whole point of a spin off is to take some of the beloved characters of a show and develop them and make them more - its to build on the history you’ve already built. It’s the key to success: and something Bloodlines didn’t have. But Jodie, Donna and their charges? This is exactly what a spin off needs

More importantly - THE SOUNDTRACK! THE OPENING MUSIC! I swear at least 10% of Supernatural’s success is the awesome choice of music (Carry on Wayward Son is iconic and if you don’t like it you have no soul). And how Halestorm’s: I Am The Fire

We start by seeing Claire kill some werewolves - continuing her aim of hunting solo and being a completely awesome badass capable of murdering all kinds of monsters with lots of viciousness. Because she’s lethal and has been killing a whole lot of monsters

Which is when she gets a call from Jody asking her to come home because Sam and Dean are missing.

It’s a lovely reunion with lots of hugging between Claire and Jody and with Alex. They introduce her to Patience and Claire has some hostile moments at Patience moving in with her ominous visions of Claire’s death. She wants to dismiss it, doesn’t like Patience moving in but at the same time she does acknowledge that she was the one who left. Alex and Claire do have a good sister relationship

A voice mail message left by Sam reveals they were looking for Kaia, which is a mission for Jody & co as well. Claire and Jody clash over claire hunting alone, not believing Patience’s vision of her death and having a general principle of charging in without a plan: because not charging in without a plan can get victims killed. While Jody asks what about

Alex now works the night shift in a hospital. Claire and she clash a little over Alex still keeping up her job rather than focusing on the hunt. But that sister relationship continues and when Claire comes to the hospital to speak to her: Alex makes a point that she supports Jody even if she doesn’t want hunting - and Claire looks guilty on her leaving.

This is where this recap gets difficult because every interaction between the women here has a whole lot of levels, love and respect, anger, but caring, guilt and so many other elements. It’s really well done and makes me really look forward to this show because we have such excellent relationships already

With Alex’s hospital contacts they find Kaia - who really really doesn’t want to get involved again. She tries to leave and is attacked by a monster. Jody and Claire deal with that straight away with their usually awesome skill.

Well that recruits Kaia and she has an awesome heart to heart with Claire, comparing scars as Kaia explains her visions of the Bad Place and how the monsters attacked her and left her with scars - though she opted to flee not fight

Inside they do a necropsy - with us seeing more of Alex’s expertise while Kaia warns them that these creatures run in packs in the Bad Place. The presence of this monster means there is still a gate open there - so they can rescue Sam and Dean. Though Kaia thinks if they’ve been in the bad place for this long then they’re probably dead

Patience thinks that she’s delivered her warning and it’s time to leave and go back to her dad especially in light of Claire’s doubts; but Alex asks her what she wants, whether she wants to ignore her powers and, yes, again it’s another excellent character moment (especially when P. Especially when Alex points out she’s not a fighter either but that they all help in their own way (which is another excellent thing this show does). Patience starts to leave when she gets a vision of the Bad Place monsters attacking - she runs back in to warn them. Claire wants to stand and fight but Patience calls her out -she’s given up a lot to help them for Claire to now dismiss that sacrifice.

Stranger Things, Season 1, episode 8: The Upside Down

Last episode Joyce and Jim were captured by the Ominous people

They try to convince Joyce to join sides by telling her about the monster that eats people and they totally want her to help them save people because they’re good people who just want to save people, Joyce

These would be the people who faked the death of her son, presented a fake corpse to her to bury in a fake funeral. In other words, Joyce would like to set them all on fire then hit them with hammers.

While they’re questioning Jim with tasers and planning to fake is death via drug overdose. But Jim remains confident and strong and makes a deal - a deal which seems to involve giving up El in exchange they get to see the portal they have in the basement. They’re dressed up in Haz mat suits to head into the ominous black void - all the while Jim has devastating flashbacks of his daughter dying from her illness as they examine the alien landscape, the ruins of Will’s camp, ominous eggs and general ominousness, looking for Will

Nancy and Jonathan are not hanging around, they gather all their monster tools, all their weapons, set an array of weapons and are totally ready to take the monster down. Which is when Steve arrives to make nice with Nancy and then freak out when he sees the state of the house and Nancy and Jonathan on high alert waiting for the monster to come. He won’t leave, he and Jonathan argue - and Nancy points a gun at him

Ok, I want a spin off series of Nancy the monster hunter, I’m just saying.

The lights blink… the monster arrives and since Steve keeps freaking out she just kicks him out. I say again, spin off

The monster tries to eat Jonathan and Nancy’s bullets don’t do a whole lot - but Steve comes back in time to part save the say so they can lure the monster into a trap. And set him on fire

Seriously, these three, monster hunters. Nancy the boss. Make it so Netflix, make it so.

In the void, Jim and Joyce find evidence of the monster’s burning injuries.

The kids are still hold up in the school gathering pudding for an exhausted El and arguing what to do (there’s talk of helping Nancy but everyone recognises now that Nancy has taken several prestige class levels of badass and probably doesn’t need them). El and Mike keep building on that chemistry, talking about dances, El joining Mike’s family and them eventually kissing.

This moment is interrupted when the Ominous squad arrives to try and kidnap El

Stranger Things, Season 1, Chapter 4: The Body

We begin with the most horrendously painful scene we on the show: Hopper breaking the news of Will’s death to Joyce. She does… not take this well. And it’s agonising to watch, Winona Rider is the second most talented set chewers out there.

She screams about christmas light ouijah boards and Jonathan just can’t - he turns and walks out. Hopper tries to appeal to her. One element I like is that Joyce knows she sounds ridiculous, at no point does she say she’s being reasonable - but she still saw what she saw and pleads for belief. It’s painful and awful and of course she completely denies the idea Will is dead. Hopper, himself a father of a dead child, tries to reach her and encourages her to come to the morgue to see her son’s body.

But when they do Hopper is suspicious - because lots of men from the State have come to take it over, have sent his own pathology people sent away. That seems… extreme for a missing child in a rural backwater and Hopper (and Gary the pathologist) are super suspicious by this. Hopper also tries very very hard to comfort poor Jonathan who can’t bring himself to keep looking at the body

Joyce is, of course, equally doubtful in her own denial and demands to see a birthmark Will has - of course it’s not there and she storms out, refusing to sign anything and refusing to bury “it.” and screaming about the faceless monster that has her son. This is also not convincing

Poor Jonathan is pretty devastated by this and they have a huge, furious, public row. I really feel for Jonathan here because this teenager is having to step up and do things no kid should have to do with no support.

While Hopper tracks down the man who claimed he found Will and tries to question him and when that doesn’t work, he beats it out of him. Someone told him where to find the body, to keep his distance and not let anyone need the body. He also, ominously, says “they” will kill him - and there’s an obligatory ominous black car watching them.

Hopper’s suspicions drive him to investigate Will’s body (this involves more violence because Hopper has a relatively limited skill set) which he finds completely whole (it’s supposed to have been autopsied) and clearly feels wrong. Hopper cuts into the body and reveals it is full of stuffing.

And the painful act of cutting into an apparent child’s body is clear

Over to Mike who is off school again because his mother, Karen is super understanding and kind. He’s furious with El, she promised she had found Will and how he’s alive and hiding. Mike is hurt and angry and upset (hey it may be mature for a kid of his age, I do appreciate that he expressly said he was hurt, to make it clear to El who doesn’t understand human interactions why he was anger)

Stranger Things, Season 1, Chapter 2: The Weirdo on Maple Street

Mike, Dustin and Lucas take Eleven back to Mike’s house and quickly realise Eleven is not a usual child, being disturbingly silent and having little concept of privacy. They can’t go to their parents because doing so would reveal they were out at night looking for Will when they were told not to so concoct a plan to have Eleven (dubbed El by Mike, seeing her tattoo) knock on the door in the morning and introduce himself to Mike’s mother and get whatever help she needed.

El remains creepily silent (Dustin and Lucas are not exactly on side with helping her) and the next morning she is adamantly against the plan, signally she doesn’t want to tell anyone as bad people are after her who will kill them all. By what we’ve seen she’s not wrong with poor Benny.

Mike skips school (understood by his very understanding mother who thinks he’s traumatised by his missing friend) to show El the wonders that this era has to offer - reclining chairs and so El can slowly become a little more talkative. We do get an insight into her terror of confined spaces with a flashback of people in an institution locking her in a small room while she screams for her father. Clearly not a happy childhood

She also sees a picture of Will and seems to recognise him. When the rest of the Geek squad return, Lucas is done with them harbouring, what he assumes, is an escaped mental patient and tries to tell a parent - only to have El hold the door closed with her telekinetic powers. This is duly impressive to the three kids who love all things magical and super-powered. They’re totally on side with helping her hide out now. They also thinks she knows where Will is - and she reveals via DnD models because communcation is somewhat difficult for her. Will is hiding from a monster

Jonathan and Joyce are dealing with missing Will… badly. Joyce is imploding messily and emotionally and it’s painful to watch. She’s making flying, melting down all over chief Hooper and convinced that the weird phone call she received was from Will, though it did fry her phone making her go to her place of work, get an advance because she spent all her money on missing papers, to buy a new phone. It’s really excellent acting because it is terrible to watch her completely implode

Jonathan is trying to hold it together and support his mother which is- he goes to see his dad Lonnie to see if Will ran away him. Clearly not - though we do get a suggestion from Lonnie that Joyce is partially to blame for their break up. I’m not entirely convinced as he’s pretty much the worst from what I can see.

We do get a flashback into just how much Jonathan supported his little brother in the face of their parents’ arguing and how Lonnie was trying to force Will into having hobbies he wasn’t interested in but Lonnie considered better or more appropriate (sports vs computer games it seems). It seems Jonathan has been a rock for this family for some time.

Supernatural, Season 11, Episode 19: The Chitters

So that was a little unexpected

It’s a fairly standard monster of the week episode (monster cicadas who go dormant every 27 years then arise, possess people and make them have lots of sex before burying them to unleash a new generation in 27 years for more murders and orgies). The episode also has a bit part for Kandyse McClure, which I only mention because she’s my “oh hey it’s her!” actress – y’know you always recognise them but can never place them (she’s also tragically underused).

What was surprising was that one of the random young victims was gay (ok he’s dead now, so no points – but a young tween gay kid? Not common on TV even if his screen time is 10 seconds then death) and, much more notable, a couple of hunters they run into who are also hunting the monster turn out to be a gay couple (they badly need to go back to acting school, but still. Actually, that’s wrong, “back” implies they actually went.) And they manage to dodge the usual full Dean freak out (oh so common) and go for a much more easier-to-swallow surprise and any other terrible tropes. The two even live. Between this and the lesbian couple earlier in the season and the fact that both couples included POC and the presence of Rufus in Safe House almost makes me think a writer has finally looked back on some elements on Supernatural’s record and said “what have we done?!”

Yes, I realise I’m giving rather a heavy positive slant on something I would just give a nod to in most shows: after all, 11 seasons and managing a couple of episodes of non-recurring LGBT/POC characters that weren’t terribly troped isn’t exactly worthy of a parade and fireworks – but it speaks volumes for how low my expectations of this show have sunk. So I’m almost torn, a lot of me is really happy to see this – but a fair part of me is a little annoyed by my own happiness because is it really enough to be worth this much hope and even potential glee?

Bright Blaze of Magic (Black Blade series #3) by Jennifer Estep

Lila has worked with the Sinclairs to disarm the Draconis, doing their utmost to sabotage the rival family’s master plan to take over Cloudburst Falls

And it works – but not enough – when the Draconis move it only leaves them with a few slim bargaining chips to try and stave off destruction – and for Lila to finally have a reckoning with the murderer of her mother.

I love this series and I really like this book – or I tried to. I tried really hard, because there are a lot of elements of the book I really love. But there’s also a major issue – the plot.

My issue with this book is the plot requires just a little bit of unreasonable character stupidity.

The whole big dramatic moment of this book is that the Draconis are planning an attack against the other families – and we know from the very beginning of the book that the attack is imminent.

We also know that all the families are apparently going to gather with minimal guards and no weapons. All conveniently in one place and unarmed. When do we think the Draconis will attack?

Why, after this of course! I mean he’ll show up to the UNARMED GATHERING and play nice and then wait a few weeks and then attack. When everyone’s in their own secure compound with armed guards… right?

Surprising the whole cast, the Draconis attack during the unarmed party. That doesn’t even count as a spoiler because anyone with a slight ounce of intelligence should have realised this. Really really should have realised this.

Supernatural, Season 10, Episode 15: The Things They Carried

Ok that was a very random series of flashbacks.

And now we have a kidnapped woman hanging from her feet with some dripping water because we’re really pushing the horror movie vibe. A man cuts her throat and gathers the blood in a bucket

Now can we calm down the camera angles please? The obligatory deaths is over

To the Winchester cave where Sam I still illicitly researching ways to cure the Mark of Cain despite Dean telling him to stop. Dean assumes he’s looking at porn (his only comment on that is “not where we eat”). Dean has a case – that woman was eaten and had her bone marrow drained and she was an excellent martial artist. Dean calls case, Sam tries to distract him (still all Cain worried) but fails. Sam keeps unsubtly studying even while they’re travelling and Dean, again, calls him on trying to fix the unfixable. Dean wants to move on and do what they can until he can’t do it anymore – and he’d kind of like Sam to keep going with him, not be lost in research

Time to imitate federal agents as they do on a regular basis and get away with it because absolutely no-one ever checks (they don’t even bother with the fake badges this time, the suits are enough. I have this idea that somewhere in America there are several confused lawyers, accountants and undertakers being drafted into police investigations because local law enforcement has assumed they’re FBI). The local police think they’ve found who did it – a guy who conveniently suicided soon afterwards; one of several suicides which the sheriff puts down to it being a military town. Also no bite marks on the body so probably not cannibalism

Still not convinced it’s not supernatural given the gruesome nature of the suicide, Sam and Dean interview the widow of Rick, the suspected murderer. She knows he was deployed, but not where, and that he had a raging thirst

They also learn that another soldier, Kit, is showing similar symptoms. To make things more complicated because Cole is back, yes the guy who wanted to kill Dean but then was beaten up then talked out of it and generally hasn’t been that effective. He wants to team up with the Winchesters to make sure they help his friend Kit rather than just yell “monster” and stab him a few times

Speaking of, Kit kills a shop assistant over bottled water then drinks the blood.

The gang gets news about this just as Cole’s contacts reveal Rick and Kit were in Iraq in a cemetery with an odd, raging POW on their last deployment.

Cole does have a lead on where Kit is but, fearing Winchester wrath, he decides to go alone. He nearly gets himself killed before the Winchesters save him – yes they followed him, they’re not that big a fool, and the raging Kit spits out a nasty wormy thing that the Winchesters kill; but not before something goes down Cole’s throat