Back in form

Supernatural holds a special place in my heart. It’s been around 8 years since I started watching it. The show like every other has seen ups and has seen downs. It’s safe to say that supernatural has never gone below mediocrity. I’ve spent my best hours of television with this show in it’s incredible run. While season 6 and 7 weren’t the best, they were still more than average. The show picked up with a good season 8 but in season 9 lacked a definitive point and season 10, though had arguably one of the best, gut wrenching finales of all, failed to explore all opportunities Demon Dean provided. And so for all those reading, it gives me great pleasure in saying Season 11 is not only the best the show has seen in 6 years, but is also right up there with 3,4 and particularly 5.

The past few seasons have lacked the scope. The conflict has been very restricted and personal, especially in the previous season with demon dean. I’m not saying that these personal conflicts are bad because the weren’t and they aren’t. They’re just not enough to carry 23-episode-seasons because they run out. They stretch out like too little butter over a lot of bread and so the first thing the season got right was raising the stakes. God’s sister. Doesn’t get much bigger than that. All of the Amara material was handled so well that I was reminded of what the show can do at it’s best.

The performances have to be mentioned here. Misha Collins was fantastic. This could’ve easily turned into a performance where Castiel was simply doing Lucifer but it was never reduced to that. I, for once, always knew who I was seeing on screen. Plus it was loads of fun seeing this wicked version of Lucifer allowing the actor to flex some muscles. In the little time that he was given, Rob Benedict was excellent as well. He was witty and clever but gave us the wrath when he needed to. As is always the case, performances were great all across the board but the show rests on the shoulders of the two brothers and as usual, they delivered. Jared Padalecki was as rational as he always is with Sam. The younger brother had to finally give in to letting the other sacrifice himself for the greater good and even though no speeches were made in the farewell, that scene was just as powerful as any. Jensen Ackles was at the top of his game. Witty, sly, clever as ever and just hitting it right when it counts. Try not welling up during a scene at the end with the goodbyes at his mother’s grave. Bravo. The scene where he questions god, that was where he really sold it.

Now let’s dig deep. Filler episodes haven’t been the show’s strongest lately. The monster-of-the-week parts suffered from inconsistency, magnitude of this inconsistency was far lesser. Episodes ranged from decent, like ‘Love Hurts’, to great like ‘The Chitters’ to just mind-blowing like of course- Baby. The show didn’t fail to experiment, often deviating from conventionality with things like Baby or Red Meat or even Don’t You Forget About Me and each time it delivered with quality. What’s more, the episodes that followed the main storyline were amazing too, especially ‘Don’t Call Me Shurley.’ Given that Chuck was revealed to be god at the very beginning, episode could’ve felt like a stretch but his conversations with Metatron as well as him revealing himself to the Winchesters, the whole dink’s song sequence which easily ranks as the show’s best moments of all time, were so beautifully done that it just felt right.

Character development is always important, otherwise half-baked characters like Rowena are what the show leaves behind and the show did a very decent job at developing Amara. All the scenes that had her were tense and had that intensity building throughout. The episode where she is revealed to be God’s sister had really tight final minutes. I was left in awe when Metatron said and I quote,”The Darkness, his sister.” Those are the moments you look forward to and when they deliver, the satisfaction that is generated is priceless. The end of the last episode where Dean sees his mother and the screen cuts to black with silence following, I got goosebumps three times. The Sam-cliffhanger is a bit predictable but all that is forgiven if the season ends at the right note and it did. It didn’t give us exactly what we’re heading into like season 10 did with the darkness, but I’m more than happy with the Men Of Letters potential that the future carries.

In the end, Season 11 was very very good. It wasn’t the show’s best but the best is so hard to beat that anything that comes close has to be considered. The season gave us big baddies, a god (finally), cassifer and to match it all, gave us much-appreciated new techniques of storytelling. 11 years in, such things give me a reason to watch the show with the same damn enthusiasm I used to have watching it nearly a decade ago. The season proved that at the top of it’s game, Supernatural can more than just ‘deliver.’