Supernatural takes a look at the other side of the Winchester family tree this week as Sam and Dean meet their Winchester grandfather in a time travel episode. “As Time Goes By,” written by Adam Glass, has an early season vibe and a strong performance from Gil McKinney as Henry Winchester. We also get a heavy dose of new mythology, which is welcome, as the quest story introduced in the premiere has been stalled for far too long. Unfortunately, we also get some continuity issues, leaving me as uncomfortable as Dean is with time travel.
I’ll start with the Winchester boys, as their relationship issues have formed the backbone of the season so far. Building on the shared decision to have fun in “LARP and the Real Girl,” Sam and Dean feel easy with other in “As Time Goes By.” The angry vibe is gone and they work off each other well. The brothers have different attitudes to meeting their grandfather, which is a call back to the different relationship each had with John Winchester. Dean has a very emotional reaction to the man he considers to have abandoned his father. Sam is more analytical and willing to consider Henry’s point of view. But both boys talk to each other, rather than fight, which is a relief after the angry exchanges we’ve grown used to this season.
Glass emphasizes the new rapport between Sam and Dean by setting up a choice for Dean and Henry: save Sam’s life or John’s childhood. Dean tells Henry he was wrong to prioritize his job (Man of Letters) over taking care of John. Henry defends his need to take up the legacy of his family, until a read through John’s journal reveals what a difficult, dangerous and pain-filled life he ended up leading.
Unfortunately, Abbadon knows the way to grab Dean’s attention is to grab Sam, which she does. She tells Dean she’ll trade his brother for a mysterious box Henry was given by his Men of Letters comrades. What to do? Henry feels the best choice is to try and kill Abbadon in the past, as that will solve so much. John will have his father, because Henry won’t die in the future. The Men of Letters will not be wiped out, so their knowledge won’t be lost. But Dean points out not only is there no guarantee Henry will be successful in killing Abbadon by himself, the change to the past may well wipe out Sam and Dean, as they may never be born. And they stopped the Apocalypse. Henry feels if he stops Abbadon, that will stop the Apocalypse, too, and the two men stare at each other.
Article comments
1 - kelios
I agree completely. I feel like this season has given me whiplash--Sam and Dean fighting and angry to everything fine and dandy after one ep. What was the point of the whole Amelia storyline? It did nothing to advance the plot of the season as a whole and certainly did nothing to explain why Sam didn't look for Dean or why he wanted to kill the person who DID help his brother escape from purgatory.
I'm happy to see Sam and Dean liking each other again. I'm happy that they chose each other instead of other people. But I haven't seen anything to convince me it was a heartfelt, meaningful choice on Sam's part, and I'm honestly not sure how Dean can trust him to have his back at this point.
2 - Gerry
Hi Kelios, great to see you here! And I agree--what WAS the point of the Amelia story line? Despite all the set up in Hunteri Heroici, it wasn't to fit into the theme of perception. The "living a lie" theme never made into the real time story, and neither did the idea both Sam and Amelia were using the relationship to avoid processing their losses. Which is a shame, as I would have liked to see Sam processing Dean's loss.
I'd also like Sam to do what Dean did, and admit where his own emotions drove his hurtful behaviour. Martin died--doesn't Sam have any thoughts of his own involvement, especially when his decisions were driven by his hatred of Benny? And that hatred appears to be rooted in jealousy over Dean's closeness with the vampire? Don't we get any exploration over Sam's change in what defines a monster? Doesn't he need to admit he doesn't get to define Dean's family any more than Dean gets to define his?
From the spoilery (SPOILER) Robert Singer interview, apparently not, as he thinks the boys are back on solid ground with each other. That just floors me, as I haven't seen any reciprocal growth with the boys. Dean opened up to Sam and admitted his errors. All we got from Sam was deciding he really loved Amelia, but his duty called him to the quest. So not satisfying.
It almost feels like this episode reset the season, and in many ways that feels like a relief. Except I loved the Purgatory scenes and I love Benny. I want to love Crowley, if he showed up more often, and I think Cas is being used well. I'm not willing to scrub their scenes from memory. So I have trouble just wiping out the first half of the season in my mind. But so little of Sam's story felt credible or well told, I hope I can let go of it so I can enjoy the rest of the season.
3 - shamangrrl
I really don't care about Sam not looking for Dean, because I do think it was explained - I just think a lot of people don't want to believe that "Sam ran" is the answer. But it makes sense to me, bacause it's been shown that Sam always runs. It's an unpleasant truth, but it is what it is. But what I can't get over is how Sam has been treating Dean, and how Dean was finally putting a stop to the whole doormat/Sam-on-a-pedestal cycle, and now that's all been stripped away. Dean is right back to being all about Sam, and Sam is fine with everything, now that balance has been restored to his world. *How* that balance was restored, I don't know. But if feels like a massive course correction, and it is extremely poorly done, because there is no rhyme or reason for this complete flip-flop. Even the mytharc feels like it's been revamped.
The guys have John's storage locker, Bobby's supernatural library (unless Garth now owns it?), the Campbell Legacy Library - and now one more, extra-special Repository. They've pretty much ignored the first three - now this new, extra-special legacy (that apparently did the Men of Letters absolutely no good), is supposed to change everything? Seriously, with everything that's going on, did we need another layer of mytharc? Because the current stories are going nowhere. Purgatory is not only over, but any advances to Dean's character ended by the second episode, and that portion of the story became Castiel's and Benny's, with Dean as participant. The guys aren't going after Crowley, apparently they aren't concerned about Castiel, they don't know about Naomi, Prophets can read tablets - except when they can't, they don't seem to care about any other tablets that might be out there, and now this?
Regarding Singer's interview, every time I read one, I want to pull my hair out, I find him that annoying, out of touch and frankly, condescending to the fans. Also, maybe if the writers wrote the female characters as actual characters, instead of "types", they would be embraced. The well written female character *were* embraced, and of course, killed off with all expediency. It's the "sexy, sassy, scantily dressed love interest" types (and that's the sum total of their character), that don't do well.
Anyway, until the urban-myth-brother-bond is addressed in a realistic fashion, I can't take Show. The past few episodes negate the first 10 episodes of the season - and I felt hope over those first 10 episodes. Now, I feel like we're back to the same-old-same-old.
4 - shamangrrl
One more thing: I'm already sick of seeing "Sam is the brains and Dean is the brawn. A perfect blend of the families!", in pretty much every review out there, so thank you for not parroting Singer and having that in your review. Frankly, the Show of the series (versus the Tell of the behind-the-scenes personnel) blows that right out of the water, as evinced by this very episode.
5 - Gerry
Hi shamangrrl, great to see you again! I agree with you on many of your points. I don't think the boys neatly split into brains and brawn--they both are interesting mixtures of both, in their own ways. Sam is more bookish and Dean likes to have a plan of action, but both have brains and both have brawn.
I also agree about the issues writing good women characters. I think when ever the writers craft a character for the express purpose of being a love interest, they fail to make her a believable well rounded character.
The idea of Dean loving a woman with no morality who would hurt him as soon as look at him was ridiculous. That the writers had to make Dean look stupid in order for Bella to look sassy didn't help. It was only when Bella was no longer the love interest that she became interesting as she fought her deal.
Same with Jo--the "sassy" teenager was so unbelievable as someone Dean would develop romantic feelings for. Once the writers figured that out and started writing for Jo as a real character, she became much more interesting. I was gutted when she died and felt at that point, she could have been a real love interest for Dean.
Lisa worked the best for me, because her attributes of attractive girl next door who was very comfortable in her own skin and dedicated to family felt right for Dean. But we only got to follow their story as it fell apart. We saw nothing of their relationship when it worked. I thought the unravelling of the relationship was well written with no bad guys, just real problems. But why would anyone have been pulling to keep Dean in that relationship with Lisa when we never saw them having fun in it?
On the Sam running question, I do think he has a history of running when he's upset. But he also has the same obsessive nature as John and we've seen him get obsessed when he loses something important. I think Sam runs as one way to show whoever he's upset that he is upset--usually Dean. But losing Dean, I think he'd be obsessive about finding out what happened. Unless he really did have a complete breakdown--but that would deserve a flashback to my mind.