Diminishing Returns

[trinityvixen]

As this season of Supernatural has gone along, I've not missed the anvil-laden clues that, well, the apocalypse is coming. For real and for true. All the Winchesters have died at this point, so since we have no other heroes on this show, it's time to literally F up the planet in order to generate suspense/anticipation. So, okay, bring on biblical armageddon.

Except, what do you do for an encore? It's already been established that the show will be on for at least another year. As it became clearer that they were heading to a literal Heaven vs Hell showdown and dropping the Winchesters in the middle, straddling the divide (huh, huh, straddling / pervert), I kept coming back to this question of how one tops the apocalypse. Buffy managed to keep creating apocalypses (skewered in a blase and awesome fashion in song from "Once More With Feeling"), but it's the sort of thing that definitely puts you in a position of diminishing returns. To continue the Buffy analogy, surviving graduation = amazing! Dealing with Adam and the army guys = meh. And it was "meh" only corrected by having Buffy herself die in the next season--the ultimate end to a series being the death of its protagonist. The exploration beyond the death of the protagonist was okay, but not great. It could be interesting, but it frequently isn't, and you're right back to "well, why should I be worried? Buffy came back before..."

So, Supernatural. The apocalypse to end all apocalypses is coming. You don't really get much bigger. What to do, then, to justify another year? While we can accept that the Winchesters, when they win (and they will, for a given value of "winning"), will go back to doing what they've always done, it's not really narratively satisfying. That would be a season of aimless wanderings leading to a face-off with that season's Big Bad, regular as clockwork. It still pales in comparison with armageddon.

I didn't have answer to the question of "What now?" until last night. Uriel's betrayal of heaven was not unexpected. If you've seen one angel-gone-bad plot, you've seen 'em all. The second an angel starts calling humans "monkeys," it's a foregone conclusion that he/she/it is not on the side of the...well, angels. However, this was the first time that I've seen an angel break ranks with Heaven in favor of Lucifer. Whatever their issues with God's preference for humanity, most renegade angels in fiction never really want Lucifer back in power or on their side; they're in it for themselves (no matter how they pretend to cloak themselves in righteousness). Uriel is making a very sympathetic, almost human sort of stand against the "natural" order here by defying Heaven to rescue his brother--not unlike what Sam attempted to do for Dean. (And that Dean successfully did for Sam.)

What does this have to do with narrative structure (apart from the lovely symmetry)? Well, maybe I'm just slow, but it dawned on me last night that the show isn't going to stop the apocalypse. I defend my slowness with the evidence that, despite numerous mini-disasters climaxing at the end of the season, the Winchesters always avoid the worst sort of disaster. The Yellow-Eyed Demon does not get the sons to kill their father in season one. The Yellow-Eyed Demon is killed at the end of season two. Lilith is not able to kill Sam at the end of season three. There are consequences to all the victories, of course (S1's car crash leading to the exchange of John for Dean; S2's exchange of Dean for Sam; S3's killing Dean and sending him to Hell), but the major disaster doesn't happen. The heroes, for lack of a better word, "win." (Again, for a given value of "winning.")

So there are three ways this season can play out. One: Lilith fails to open all the seals, is defeated, the world is saved. (Thanks to the Powerpuff...er, Winchester Boys.) I would feel a little cheated there, but it wouldn't be all that bad. (Because the apocalypse didn't happen, it could always happen later when the show does want to end.) Two: Lilith opens all the seals, but Lucifer and she are defeated. That's fine; what the fuck do you do for season five?

Or Three: end with Lucifer escaping and have it be the sort of Rapture-long apocalypse that the Left Behind sort are always assuming will happen. Apocalypses don't have to happen overnight! Lucifer can be the Big Bad to come of season five, when, hopefully, the brother-on-brother violence will have been over and dealt with. (As should, rightfully, be the continued focus of this season.)

Comments

[trinityvixen.livejournal.com]

Given their history, I think that there isn't a way for them to be together at the end. I honestly think that there isn't a way to have Dean survive this. Because Sam is too spiteful about Dean trying to rein him in, I don't think Dean will be successful at doing so. As a result, the only way for Sam to be stopped from going fully dark is to have Dean fall on that grenade and use the guilt to contain Sam somehow. I have a reeeeeally hard time imagining that both will survive the ultimate finale.