Episode 2.15 Tall Tales

Once again, I shall use this space to laugh about something I didn’t even mention in the actual podcast: the snarky comment in this week’s title card. For those who can’t see it, it’s “That episode that makes fun of Urban Legends, you know that thing this show was originally intended to be about...” Because yeah, the original pitch Kripke made for Supernatural was (aside from “Star Wars in truck stop America” that we always hear) along the lines of “two brothers traveling the back roads investigating urban legends that are really real.”

I mean, just look at s1-- Bloody Mary, Hookman, the Woman in White. The show obviously branched out VERY quickly into a broader cosmology and mythology for the entire universe, and only occasionally delved back into common urban legends. So much for Kripke’s “original vision” of the show-- more along the lines of Kolchak: The Night Stalker that what Supernatural quickly grew into. I think it’s amazing that by mid s2 the writers are already comfortable poking at the silliness of the premise to carry a series past a season or two of stories. Good for them for realizing the potential they had to expand and elevate the universe they were creating.

And now that I took so much space typing about what this podcast episode ISN’T about, I’ll take this paragraph to mention that it *IS* about the narrative itself manipulating Sam and Dean for its own purposes in a startlingly meta way. Not because John Shiban knew what the show would eventually grow into, but because the writers leaned so heavily on the story’s foundations to keep building it bigger and bigger in later seasons. And Gabriel, to me, is so closely tied into that narrative. Our “As above, so below” character who keeps coming back to teach this lesson. So meta. :’D

Things I mention in this episode that might be of interest:

The Superwiki page for this episode

My tag for this episode (there’s some good stuff in there this week!)

Lizbob summing up how making the Trickster into the Archangel Gabriel is a retcon that levels up the whole narrative

My post attempting to explain how I see Gabriel’s role in the narrative as a mirror for Chuck

The Weekly World News dated February 19, 2007 with the tie-in article about Supernatural (and can we collectively cackle at the cover headline about “first photos of Heaven” being revealed in an episode where we get our first appearance by an Actual Angel in the show, even if we don’t KNOW it’s an angel for another 3 seasons? Because that’s just freaking hilarious)

Casting Sides for the Trickster

Casting Sides for the frat boy alien abductee

The entirely delightful Sam Samming post (it doesn’t have the screenshot I mentioned in the podcast, but the “you’re too precious for this world!” hug is in there)

Standard reminder you can find me on tumblr @spngeorg or at @mittensmorgul​, as well as at mittensmorgul and spngeorg on twitter, or via email at mittensmorgul@gmail, and mittens#4865 on the discord. Come say hi! I swear I don’t bite... mostly... :D

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