When did Reapers become Angels? Or have the writers just decided to toss that canon by the wayside too?

The writers announced it around when they got Sam into Purgatory. But they never wrote it in, IIRC.

That's... pretty contradictory to the episodes where Reapers interacted with demons back in early seasons. And to the way the series has treated Reapers in general.

I agree with Amy on show retreading old ground. I do comprehend how family takes roles with each other, and keep falling into those roles without some dedicated effort and constant attention, but it can be done.

After all the personal growth of each brother in 1-5, I would have hoped 6 and onward would have been renegotiating the ways they dealt with each other, accomodating that growth. Instead, the writers had them fall immediately back into old patterns of behavior, repeating them and wearing those ruts even deeper. Whatever lessons had been learned were scrapped in favor of retreading old emotional ground.

I think Sera had a real grasp of the characters, and under her guidance there was at least adherence to canon. But Singer took over mid-7, there was a shift at the network in personnel and outlook, and notes came down to deviate strongly from Kripke's canon. Which, okay, they kept the tall guy and the short guy and the car. Pretty much every other consistent element changed.

Suddenly instead of a trip to the Grand Canyon together being a goal, they'd already been there as kids. And there were other bits of canon that had been carefully fed viewers over seasons as accrued mythos, that were junked and left behind carelessly, as though people who had watched for previous seasons hadn't paid attention or didn't care. And I'm sure that's true of many.

But to those who did pay attention and did care, it's not the same show. I know it's up to the showrunner to make the show s/he wants. But I do think it's pretty callous to thumb a nose at previously established canon, and completely redesign the personalities of main characters and how they relate to the world and each other. It's like reading bad fanfic, although the characters and that world resemble what you know, you've landed in some strange AU.

I'll watch till they pull the plug, because I *want* to love the show and I still care about the characters. But it's been a long time--since Sacrifice, actually--since I gasped or teared up, or even got angry on behalf of the characters, as opposed to wavering between apathy and simmering ire at the writing.

I'm happy for those who are enjoying it. But I miss my show.

Suddenly instead of a trip to the Grand Canyon together being a goal, they'd already been there as kids. And there were other bits of canon that had been carefully fed viewers over seasons as accrued mythos, that were junked and left behind carelessly

I'll say this in the writers' defense: I can't remember minor details or throwaway lines (some of which become really important to readers, because that's what readers do, even if I was just trying to add detail or change the rhythm of a sentence) from books that I've written. When something's being written by committee, it has to be really easy to miss little things like that. Especially since the writers may be fans, but they're not necessarily fans the way we are. They're not living it in their imaginations and writing fanfic and debating interpretations.

Or if they are, it's part of the job, which I imagine puts a different spin on it.

I know it does have a different spin, if it's your job. I can't believe there are staff writers who have never watched earlier seasons. I mean I believe it, but it's not the way I work, in any endeavor. But I'm a ferret for history, if only to try and avoid repeating mistakes.

On the other hand, coming in new under a showrunner with his own mandate from the network, you follow his lead. I suppose lack of attention to the past is normal, in concentration on what's next.

I don't think it's lack of attention so much as not knowing what fans consider important. That line about the Grand Canyon, just as an example, was just a line. The fact that the fandom took it and ran with it doesn't mean it's loomed as large in the writers' imaginations.

And every show does it -- over time there are always continuity mistakes, sometimes big ones. Friends has lots of them. That said, it drives me crazy, too, I just don't think anyone does it maliciously.

No, I doubt it's maliciously done.

Poor writers. Poor people who lock their office door and leave the story at the end of the day. I'm sure they *know* that viewers and fans rewatch, a lot. But I'm not sure they have any concept of how ingrained canon becomes for some fans, due to rewatch and dissection and discussion and meta discussion. Let alone fic and grey canon. I think few, if any, writers actually comprehend fandom, and I think they'd be a little alarmed--although maybe a little gratified--at how intense some fans can be about character and story. As opposed to fans who are preoccupied about the actors, or fandom itself.

Aw, at the up-fronts: [link]

And Superwholock gets closer to reality--Captain Jack is behind Jared! Yes, I know Barrowman's currently on Arrow. Fun to fuel the cross-fandom flames, though.