Jesus.

You and me both. And brenda, too!

okay, my LJ-fu is not up to snuff, link to this hot and bothersome header?

We're talking about the pictures in ita's link, above, which includes the one used in the header.

I found this meta on LJ and highly recommend it: What Happened to Sam Winchester?. (Although from the title you might expect it to maybe just be a Go Team Sam!! diatribe, it's a clearly thought out exploration of the lack of Sam's character development and the problems with Supernatural's narrative structure as a whole.) I found the meta and the comments worth the time it took to read them. There were only a few Team!Sam and OMG Jared Padalecki is just the bestest actor in the entire world!1! posts -- most are well reasoned.

I have been growing more and more disenchanted with Show, even unto the levels of Seasons 6 and 7 of Buffy, and the meta's author describes many of the reasons why. The characters have been mutated beyond what I had hoped to follow, and I have lost all hope that Sam will ever be allowed to regain anything of his earlier glimmers of interest. The writers had shiny new toys they wanted to play with, and it was certainly their prerogative to do so, but they did so at the expense of Sam and the older storylines.

What makes me want to weep most of all is the wasted potential. Just one example of a lost opportunity: what happened to Sam those two days when he died? Was he, like Buffy, finally safe and warm and away from all the fighting, finally allowed to rest? (unlikely as that may be). Or was he more likely in hell? If so, what happened to him there? Azazel had been grooming him to lead his armies. Demons had already been deciding who would and would not follow him. The Seven Deadly Sins recognized him, as did War -- don't you think once he arrived in hell the denizens (pro and anti-Azazel) would have leapt at the chance to get their hands on him? (Before people start pointing out that Sam's length of time being dead isn't close to the same as Dean's, I realize that, I'm not saying that it is. (Of course, that all presupposes that time progresses in a linear fashion in hell anyway.)) We don't know. The writers didn't care enough about Sam to tell us. And if he had gone to hell, it would have taken maybe one line to tell us. That roadside scene when Dean was telling Sam that he did remember but didn't want to talk about hell because “What I saw…there aren’t words ... There’s no making it better.” What if Sam had just quietly said "I remember" in an understanding voice? Fade to black. How awesome would that have been?

And I know this means I'm missing the show that only ever existed in my head rather than the Show that's been airing on the TV. But I've been turning more and more to fanfic trying to regain my love for the characters because I'm not feeling it from the Show and I've lost my faith that the Show actually cares about the characters. And it hurts.

And I will stop whining now and return you to your regularly scheduled Friday night.

Morgana, I have some of the same issues with Sam's characterization--in fact with both brothers' characterizations. I'm not prepared to drag out the scales or the yardstick, but I think all too often, as is common in screenwriting, character has been sacrificed for gimmick. SPN is not the only show to suffer from the syndrome, Buffy did at times, so did Angel, and so have other shows before and since. Sometimes it's at the behest of the network who want some audience-grabbing stunt, sometimes it's a writer with a sudden rabbit hunt. I think the writers sometimes lose sight of who their characters are, and that's regrettable. But it's also endemic to tv, and often to film as well. I think we as viewers have to be the ones to hold characters we connect with together for ourselves, and hope things get better. Failing that, remember fondly the characters as they made those connections.

It's far from ideal, but sometimes it's all we have.

Beverly, I think you hit the nail right on the head. Same thing happened with Stargate SG-1 after three years. Character development and storylines shifted, and after a few more years, writing was lazy and even the actors seemed disengaged.

Kinda goes with the territory, I suppose.

Anyway, here is a new Space promo for next week's ep. I CAN'T WAIT!!

Morgana, I have some of the same issues with Sam's characterization--in fact with both brothers' characterizations. I'm not prepared to drag out the scales or the yardstick

Oh God yes, I never intended to imply that Dean's characterization isn't lacking as well. It's just that I believe Sam's is more grieviously wanting. But yes, Dean's had major holes in his storyline as well. For instance, the bleeding eyes in "Bloody Mary" that were never explained. And I think I'd like just a tiny little explanation of why Dean, who rebels against just about everything else, followed everything his father dictated like it was holy writ. I accept that he did, I just want to know why. Other than "it's called being a good son."

Or more recently, I think there should have been more psychological fallout from his being forced into acting as a torturer again. Particularly since he was forced into it by the so-called "good guys." Also it would have been interesting if there would have been fallout from his interaction with Alistair, since we've been led to believe Alistair was his chief tormentor in hell, particularly since he was unable to break Alistair and therefore Alistair more or less "won" over him. (And by the by, does Dean even know that Sam was the one who vanquished Alistair, not Castiel?)

Also, I would have liked to have seen Dean telling Sam that he was the one who broke the first seal rather than having it be a throwaway line. It's an important dramatic point, it bookends Sam's predicament, and JA could have knocked it out of the ballpark.

I know a lot of fans are unhappy with the directions the show has taken, but I think some things don't get considered. Or, I should say, *I* try to consider them.

a) The constraints of writing episodic TV don't leave as much room for some aspects of character development as fans might want.

b) See a; it's not a novel, and some broader, shorter strokes have to stand for what might be explored more in depth in another format. Example: I thought the episode where we see Sam post-Dean's death was exactly enough to give me an idea of what he went through. More episodes of him drunk, furious, and frustrated wouldn't have gone anywhere, I don't think.

c) See b; sometimes I think fic, much as I love it, leads to dissatisfaction. Fic writers *can* take time to explore issues the writers can't.

d) I think Kripke has enjoyed providing fan service a little too much, but I still think *I* can see the Sam and Dean we started with; I just think they've evolved. And that's realistic to me -- people change based on circumstances, and Dean and Sam both certainly have. But I don't feel like Kripke and co. aren't being faithful to the core people Sam and Dean are.

Just, you know, my take on it.

Amy, obviously it's a YMMV kind of thing. I'm glad for you that you still are happy with the state of the show. I still find moments within the show, and it's still appointment television, but the disappointment factor is growing.

Example: I thought the episode where we see Sam post-Dean's death was exactly enough to give me an idea of what he went through. More episodes of him drunk, furious, and frustrated wouldn't have gone anywhere, I don't think.

There was a big problem with how it was presented. We saw Dean's reaction to Sam's death immediately, and it was like a punch to the gut. It was visceral and painful and shocking when he made his crossroads deal, but we understood why in his pain he did it. Dean died in 3.16, but we didn't get to see the episode with Sam's flashback to him being "drunk, furious and frustrated" until 4.09. And when Sam was drunk and in agony and seduced by Ruby, part of fandom said "Oh God he must be in so much pain!" but the bulk of it started howling. Half of it started howling that he was sleeping with a demon, and the other half started howling that he was fucking a corpse. And they all seemed to overlook the emotional agony Sam was feeling about his brother. Combined with everything he did offscreen and never explained and how unlikeable he's been made, I don't know how they'll be able to redeem him.

My personal perspective? (Why thank you for asking. I had entered this in someone else's LJ, so here it is again:) I think a case can be made that Sam was not in his right mind at the point where Ruby slithered in and influenced him and got him hooked on demon blood by promising him greater strength and revenge against Lilith, and hadn't been for a long time. Look, Dean had made his crossroads deal and Sam slowly started his slide. He started a year of incredible stress trying to research everything he could and search out every occult lead he could that might save Dean. Then they ran into the Mystery Spot. And Sam got to watch Dean die in front of him in incredibly grotesque ways over 100 times. He finally broke the cycle, only to have Dean get shot by a mugger outside the motel room. He spent at least the next 3 months alone, OCD tendencies in full display, hunting the Trickster, before he had to kill something that looked like Bobby to bring Dean back. Only to begin the countdown to the crossroads deal again. Then he watched Dean being torn apart by the hellhounds. After that he spent another 4 months alone, trying to make deals and figure out how to get Dean back. (And we've seen the Winchesters do not deal well with being alone.) After all he had lost by that point, and in such a short period of time (Jess, John, Dean) why wouldn't he be unbalanced?

Which is also something I wish to hell Sam or the writers would bring up sometime when Dean keeps repeating that Sam chose a demon over his brother. As far as I can tell, he didn't. That's Dean's point of view. But from Sam's point of view, he was trying to increase his ability to "pull" demons, or whatever you'd call it -- to get as strong as possible before the Lilith showdown and Ruby's blood was a means to an end. Not to mention that he was lonely, and she had proven to be an ally in the past. But we need to hear that from Sam.