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mittensmorgul · 5 years ago

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i obviously did not think this through

So the other day I thought it would be fun to make up my own Essential Rewatch List leading up to 15.01, and boy howdy was I ever wrong! This post is the result of that. Instead of a conveniently streamlined list of important episodes for meta and character development highlights, instead have this 15k word probably-useless behemoth...

I debated not even posting this on tumblr because it’s just so massive. But heck this was a lot of work so here it is.

For reference purposes, I refer a lot to my rewatch notes, but mostly in later seasons. If you’d rather just go to the beginning of my tag for the most recent rewatch, 1.01 is the last post on this page, and then you can just continue chronologically from there:

https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/tagged/s14+hellatus+rewatch/chrono/page/3

If you want to read more about a specific episode, every singe episode is filed on my blog with the episode tag. For example, all posts about 1.01 are tagged like this:

https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/tagged/spn-1.01

To find a different episode, just plug in the correct episode number and voila.

If you’d prefer to skip an episode but don’t fully recall it and just want a quick refresher, every episode is linked on this page of the superwiki. Those links will serve you up a tidy synopsis as well as link you to the transcripts for every episode (linked at the bottom of each episode page):

http://www.supernaturalwiki.com/Category:Episodes

I started out making reasonable, logical entries for every episode, and then... kinda went off the rails toward the end... apologies for how chaotic this might read. Most of it was typed off the top of my head, and I haven’t edited it so apologies for any errors. Under a cut because FIFTEEN. THOUSAND. WORDS.

Good luck.

1.01 Pilot Obviously this episode sets up everything that comes after, and gives us a platform from which to understand exactly how the show’s mythology will eventually evolve. It also establishes a baseline for understanding Sam and Dean and their personal character evolutions and family dynamics. Probably essential viewing in any rewatch...

1.02 Wendigo Like so many early episodes, we learn more about Dean and Sam, and the missing father they’re searching for. And here we get “Saving people, hunting things, the family business” that becomes the motto of the Winchesters.

1.03 Dead in the Water

Sam is shocked to learn that Dean’s good with kids, and how Dean was traumatized as a 4-year-old. Like, dude, he practically raised you, Sam… makes sense he’s good with kids...

1.04 Phantom Traveler Specky the Wonderdemon, who was terrifyingly beyond their pay grade at the time. Kinda hilarious in retrospect… (also first use of Dean’s homemade EMF meter)

1.05 Bloody Mary Aah, Sam is keeping secrets from Dean (about his psychic powers and that he’d foreseen Jess’s death), and we learn ghosts can be attached to items that must be destroyed to banish the ghost.

1.06 Skin ooh Dean, take off that shirt yes… no… wait… stop… you can stop with the shirt you don’t… no please put your skin back on… (no, seriously, we learn A LOT about Dean from the shapeshifter, and so does Sam… There’s a heck of a lot Dean keeps buried. Also a reminder that shifter episodes tend to involve these sorts of buried secret things for Dean. Also Dean’s first “legal death” even if not actual death)

1.07 Hook Man Another ghost attached to an object, Sam’s first flirtation with anyone after Jess’s death, and Dean’s proficiency and innovation in hunting techniques continues to surprise Sam-- with the first use of salt shells for a shotgun.

1.08 Bugs Oh look more first season talking of their different experiences and memories of childhood and especially their very different relationships with John. If you can ignore the bug-related portions of the episode. Also I think still the only time in canon Sam and Dean have used umbrellas.

1.09 Home

Well if you absolutely need an in-depth exploration of the Winchester Family Dynamic as it stood in s1, this is a good baseline episode. Mary’s guilt expressed by her ghost in the house where she died, more exploration of Sam’s psychic powers, and we first see John on screen in the “present day.” Sam also learns it was Dean who carried him out of the house when he was a baby, and uses the exact same line John told Dean in this episode (take your brother outside as fast as you can and don’t look back)

1.10 Asylum So much of s1 was Dean getting orders from John and… following them. We get an interesting glimpse inside Sam’s head (having heard some of Dean’s dark secrets in 1.06) and via ghost interference Sam says some pretty bitter things to Dean (and would’ve shot him if Dean had been dumb enough to hand him a loaded gun. lucky Dean’s smarter than that). But now we have their baseline issues laid out on the table for us.

1.11 Scarecrow Sam is sick of taking orders from John and decides to go find John on his own rather than following another order. He meets Meg hitchhiking, and she tries to lure him in. Luckily Sam realizes Dean is in trouble and goes back to save him. They decide to stick together again. Of course.

1.12 Faith Here we go… the first moment the show realized it had the potential to be something bigger than a MotW horror/fantasy road trip. Dean’s first brush with capital-D Death (in this case, a reaper). The first time in canon anyone suggests that Dean was “chosen by the Lord” for a greater purpose.

1.13 Route 666 Racist Ghost Truck. But also the first time we learn an important difference between Dean and Sam. Sam hid everything about his life from Jess (a woman he was planning to propose to), but Dean fell in love with Cassie over a matter of weeks and told the whole truth to… and she dumped him for it because she thought he was lying to her. That heartbreak goes a long way toward the cavalier attitude Dean puts on toward relationships in general in the early seasons. Tell them the truth and they’ll leave you for it, but he won’t live the lie that Sam was perfectly happy to...

1.14 Nightmare Aah, more of Sam’s powers (darkest timeline edition with Max), and Sam credits John for being a better father… until he sees Dean’s reaction to that comment… and we get that Dean stood between Sam and John’s… lack of parenting skills >.>

1.15 The Benders “Plain old people are often worse than monsters”

1.16 Shadow The return of Meg, who is Up To No Good messing around with scarier demons than good old Specky was. We finally have John in the picture, but he deems it too dangerous for them to stick together, blaming their vulnerability on their care for each other, and just PFFFFFFT how often has the show kicked this notion to the curb? Give it a few more episodes… Sam also expresses his desire to finally get their revenge so he can leave hunting for good and go back to his “normal life.” Dean is crushed and upset by this revelation.

1.17 Hell House Aah, the prank war :’), and the idiot ghostfacers :’). It’s a tulpa.

1.18 Something Wicked Well if you need your heart ripped out with Dean Feels, you’re in the right place. Sam learns even more about Dean’s struggles as a kid under John’s orders, and what “failure” to obey meant to Dean-- that it once almost cost Sam his life. Sam gets a better idea of the burden of guilt and the weight of responsibility that Dean has carried for far, far too long. And Dean gets a bit of closure, finally killing the shtriga.

1.19 Provenance Sam gets to unburden himself a bit from Jess’s death and make a real connection with a wonderful woman who gets a real peek into the reality of their lives and the supernatural. Still, he walks away, and completely loses touch with her for like… 7 years...

1.20 Dead Man's Blood Sam and Dean are sick of blindly following orders, and sick of wild goose chases. And they demand answers from John. We learn about vampires for the first time, and are finally introduced to The Colt, which will take on so much significance over the seasons that it’s RIDICULOUS. A weapon Mary heard bedtime stories about as a child, now become real to be used to get their revenge on the demon who killed her? Which will resurface again and again to either become their hope or destroy their hope… so much baggage attached to a single gun.

1.21 Salvation So much plotting, but the demons get their way and get the Winchesters separated and set up. Sam fails to shoot the demon with the Colt and John is captured.

1.22 Devil's Trap As the title suggests, this is where we learn about the Devil’s Trap. And see the “single step” exorcism performed (not the two-step Specky exorcism from 1.04). Dean rejects John’s orders and “wastes” a bullet from the Colt to save Sam’s life. But it’s still all a trap, because the demon is possessing John. Dean realizes it when John is NOT FURIOUS that he “wasted” that bullet. It nearly kills Dean, and Sam refuses to kill John in order to kill the demon. The demon escapes, the Winchesters have one bullet left in the Colt, and then they’re run over by a demon-possessed semi trucker.

2.01 In My Time of Dying Dean’s second brush with Death (again, reapers). He learns a lot while mostly dead that unfortunately he won’t remember for a long time (until 4.15, to be precise) about reapers and their powers (manipulating reality, etc.). Sam is desperate to save Dean, and John trades his life (and the Colt) to the Demon for Dean’s life, lays one HELL of a burden on Dean-- either save Sam, or you’ll have to kill him. No further details, just that horrific fact which Dean will try to shield Sam from as long as he can, which will (as per usual) probably only make things worse when they eventually come out. Dying wishes on this show SUCK DONKEYS. Remember that when we get to 5.22...

2.02 Everybody Loves a Clown Spoiler alert: nobody actually loves a clown, especially not Sam. But heck Dean driving the soccer mom minivan is priceless. And we’re introduced to Ellen, Jo, and Ash at the Roadhouse. Sam and Dean are like… whoa there are actual hunter gathering places? And begin to uncover just how sheltered and weird their lives have been, even for hunters.

2.03 Bloodlust like 1.15, “sometimes people are the worst monsters,” with a generous side helping of “sometimes monsters aren’t actually monsters.” Dean gets to question a lot of what he was taught his whole life by John, via the proxy of Gordon Walker and his hate-on for vampires. But Dean realizes there’s a limit to killing everything not-human… the beginning of the era of “killing what deserves to be killed and not just anyone will do”

2.04 Children Shouldn't Play with Dead Things Zombie. Considering Jack’s longtime fascination with zombies, and how 14.20 ended… possibly relevant thematically on several levels… Girl resurrected by a dude for love (she didn’t love him in life… but was basically a “soulless person” as a zombie, as we will come to understand in later seasons). It’s a terrible idea to try and bring back the dead… >.> But this is all wrapped up in grief and how Sam and Dean each deal with grief in their own ways, and how they don’t really understand how the other is processing John’s death. In the MotW language of the show, zombies are about grief for the past and an inability to express it or move past it. They’re just emotional baggage (like shapeshifter eps reveal hidden truths and vampires are about revenge)

2.05 Simon Said More special children affected by the demon exhibit psychic powers… Sam is unsettled by the mind control, but unlike Dean he’s immune to it… He’s scared he’s gonna turn “evil” (and this is the first hint he gets that Dean might feel the same, based on the horrific dying promise John extracted from him that we still haven’t heard, and which we’re reminded is clearly weighing on Dean anyway)

2.06 No Exit Aah, Jo. They hunt the ghost of HH Holmes with her and learn some terrible things about their father’s history-- that he probably played a part in Jo’s father’s death. We also learn Dean sleeps real funny in chairs...ow it just looks so dang painful :’D (but they do comeuppance real well on the ghost…)

2.07 The Usual Suspects I love this just for the structure of the episode, showing us Hunting with Sam and Dean 101-- how to avoid arrest and imprisonment edition. This just gives us so much insight into how well they work together as a team, and the degree to which they’ve developed code words and references and how they are able to craft seamless backstories in the event a hunt goes south. It’s just… delightful.

2.08 Crossroad Blues The introduction of Crossroads Demons. And the first confirmation to Dean that John did indeed sell his soul for Dean’s life. Uncomfy revelation. The demon offers Dean a deal… his father resurrected and ten years to enjoy his company before Dean’s soul would end up in Hell instead. Dean declines. But their arsenal of weapons against demons (and the newly-introduced Hellhounds) grows to include goofer dust.

2.09 Croatoan Aah, a terrible time was had by all… the demons are scheming, creating demonic viruses and testing Sam’s immunity to them. But of course Dean and Sam don’t know that… Dean’s comment as they leave town: “I'm already starting to feel like this is the one that got away.” And ends on a cliffhanger of Dean about to tell Sam what John told him in 2.01.

2.10 Hunted Sam is enraged Dean would keep that from him, and wants to seek out more Special Children to learn what they can, but Dean wants to hide out and bide their time for safety’s sake. And maybe it’s just because I was in my 30’s when I first watched this show, but Sam pulls what I still think of as one of his signature childish moves and runs away in the night. But down that path lies revenge against the demon, so of course Sam runs into vampire-adjacent Gordon Walker. We learn more about how the Winchesters work together, the secret code word “funkytown,” and that sometimes they actually get the authorities to work in their favor. They’re good at manipulating the system...

2.11 Playthings Ghosts, Hoodoo that wasn’t to cause harm, but to protect against the ghost. Sam gets spectacularly drunk and makes Dean promise to actually kill him if he goes bad. Yikes. We also have the “why does everybody think we’re gay,” and Sam’s reply of “you’re kinda trying too hard to be butch” that Dean… doesn’t have a response to. Sam gets to SAVE somebody (he puts a gold star in his book as proof he’s not turning evil yet)

2.12 Nightshifter This is one I recommend actually watching… another shapeshifter (not a mandroid), so uncomfortable truths time. Sam lies thinking he’s protecting someone from danger, but it just drives Ron into even WORSE danger (and gets him killed). Everything about this hunt goes sideways, except they do actually kill the shifter, but now they’ve got the FBI on their tails. This is Winchesters Scrambling In A Tight Spot nirvana.

2.13 Houses of the Holy The first hint that the show… could possibly someday include angels, but they’re still on the BS list by the end of this episode. We learn more about Sam’s belief in God, Dean’s utter disdain for the idea of God, and the fact that Mary had believed in angels. Dean witnesses something he can’t explain, and Sam points in Dean’s direction when asking, “That’s Michael, right?”

2.14 Born Under a Bad Sign From holy to Hell… Sam is possessed by Meg, who leads Dean on a wild goose chase and does some pretty horrific stuff with Sam’s body. >.> They learn about the antipossession charms from Bobby (and probably get the tattoos shortly after this). Dean still refuses to kill Sam even when he begs (though we learn it was Meg testing or goading all of them).

2.15 Tall Tales We’re introduced to the Trickster (who’s even tricking them about his actual identity). Sam and Dean are completely bamboozled until Bobby shows up and points them to what’s really going on. There’s a lot of fun stuff about Sam and Dean’s relationship and how they see themselves and each other in here, though. And of course we know who the trickster actually is, which makes this all so much more interesting in retrospect… bit of comeuppance and lessons learned.

2.16 Roadkill An interesting take on a ghost MotW episode, where one of the ghosts doesn’t realize she’s dead, and how Sam and Dean work with her to save them all.

2.17 Heart Sam’s first actual sort-of-relationship with a woman. Who happens to be a werewolf… oops. There’s a lot of Sam Pain in this one, and Dean feeling like he’s failed in protecting Sam, yet again. But we are introduced to werewolves, which take on the monster meta shorthand of exposing or understanding their own inner monstrousness.

2.18 Hollywood Babylon And it’s Dean’s turn to have a little fling, where their concept of a “vacation” is “deal with mysterious haunting and death on a movie set.” And like in 1.12, this all comes about because some dingdong thinks he can do whatever he want. ALSO! The true monster of the week here… IS A WRITER. A writer who is furious that his story was trashed, and produced into something unrecognizable as his actual writing. I think this one might be HIGHLY relevant to 14.20, just for that. For the deadly tantrum of a writer who didn’t get his way. (plus the brilliance of Dean going from complete noob to the best PA in the history of Hollywood in like… a day… he’s just that good :’D)

2.19 Folsom Prison Blues In doing a favor for their father’s marine corps buddy (so the ghost of John hangs all over this one), they deliberately get themselves arrested and put in jail. Dean fits in there just as well as he did as a PA. He’s… really just that good at acting. Now I have Green Onions stuck in my head and I want a milkshake. And a donut.

2.20 What Is and What Should Never Be DJINN. aka the monster meta signal of deep personal introspection. What we learn about Dean in this episode is just heartbreaking. What he would wish for (Mary alive, Sam happily at Stanford Law School engaged to Jess) and the consequences he’s willing to endure for that to be a reality (his own life’s work negated, where everyone assumes he’s a drunk and a thief and a loser).

2.21 All Hell Breaks Loose: Part One Dean just wanted pie. Instead Sam gets taken by demons. We finally find out what the demon wanted with him (sort of). Sam plays in the Demon Hunger Games, and loses at the last moment… (Dean gets to feel what it’s like to have a psychic vision, and hates it)

2.22 All Hell Breaks Loose: Part Two Dean sells his soul to resurrect Sam for the bargain price of one year before he’ll be dragged to Hell. Well learn about Samuel Colt’s Hellgate, which can ironically be unlocked with the Magic Kill Anything Gun (the Colt). In retrospect, this was just the beginning of the larger narrative arc of the Apocalypse, where Azazel released Lilith (along with a lot of other demons) to get that party started now that they had their hooks in Dean’s soul, but hey, at least Azazel won’t live to see it all happen (Dean finally shoots him with that last Colt bullet, rendering the gun useless but at least it did what they needed it to, with an assist from John’s ghost).

3.01 The Magnificent Seven The Seven Deadly Sins, the introduction of Ruby and her Magical Demon Killing Knife. Dean tells Sam he can’t be saved because if he breaks his deal, Sam would die.

3.02 The Kids Are Alright We meet Lisa (who Dean had a fling with years earlier) on Dean’s “relive his greatest hits before he goes to Hell denial roadtrip.” And Dean thinks he has a son for a hot minute (he does not, but he likes the kid anyway). Weirdness with them will ensue until they finally get to move on with their lives in s6. >.> But we’re introduced to our first fairie-adjacent creatures: Changelings. And Sam learns Ruby is actually a demon...

3.03 Bad Day at Black Rock Sam lost his shoe. We learn about curse boxes, Sam and Dean learn that John kept a secret storage unit full of weird and possibly dangerous stuff. But also some relics from their childhood-- Sam’s soccer trophy, Dean’s first sawed-off shotgun. And if that isn’t shorthand for the fact they had very different childhoods, I don’t know what is. Anyway, we meet Bela, and are entertained by good luck going bad… kinda the theme of s3?

3.04 Sin City more demons, we learn more about bigger plans they had for Sam, and Dean comes THIS CLOSE to actually considering letting a demon go… but Ruby helped Bobby make the Colt work again, and Sam kills both demons.

3.05 Bedtime Stories A pseudo-ghost of a girl trapped in a coma acts out fairy tales as a cry for help. Dean doesn’t want to kiss a frog. The pie is poisoned and Dean has to fight the big bad wolf… I swear that all makes perfect meta sense.

3.06 Red Sky at Morning Bela again. And like the ghost they’re hunting, we learn she got her revenge against a family member. The first use of the name “Castiel” in the spell to summon the ghost’s brother’s ghost so they could splish-splosh each other out of existence. That’s… all you really need to know.

3.07 Fresh Blood Gordon Walker, vampires, and vengeance. Taken to an extreme. Dean basically throws himself into danger because what does he have to lose if he’s already destined for Hell? But he’s beginning to crack, and Sam’s getting pretty desperate to get Dean to admit he’s scared and do something to save himself. Gordon’s desire for revenge gets him captured by a vamp and turned… and Sam ends up beheading him with razor wire. Yikes… so much for that revenge, eh?

3.08 A Very Supernatural Christmas Yuletide fun and eggnog. Pagan gods they end up killing with a Christmas tree. But they do reach a personal emotional plateau with Dean’s whole “half a year to live” clock ticking down.

3.09 Malleus Maleficarum Witches. Ruby. And a demon who knows Ruby leading a coven of suburban housewives who believe they’re just doing something harmless and not slowly selling their souls to said demon. Ruby saves Dean’s life, earning his reluctant gratitude for the time being, but not exactly his trust. This is the first we learn of Lilith, the demon apparently leading all the rest of them. Dean also learns that demons are just human souls that have been tortured in hell, and that’s what awaits him after he dies.

3.10 Dream a Little Dream of Me VERY IMPORTANT EPISODE. African Dream Root, which mimics the sort of djinn-dream experience. Dean has to literally confront his demon self. For the first time he admits he didn’t deserve any of this, any of what John put him through. And he admits to Sam that he is scared of going to Hell. Oh, and Bela steals the Colt, aka the only weapon they have against Lilith.

3.11 Mystery Spot If 3.10 was about Dean’s internal trauma, 3.11 is about Sam’s. The trickster puts him through a time loop forcing him to relive endless Tuesdays, and Dean dies each time and he wakes up again. The power to do this is just… insane. Just when they think they’re out, Dean apparently dies “for real,” and it drives Sam on a six month long rather terrifying revenge mission. Only to finally come face to face with the trickster again after having proven the horrific lengths he’s willing to go to in order to save Dean. Also a very, very important episode. Trapped eternally in someone else’s looping story and forced to act it all out endlessly? Yeah. That’s not 14.20 at all >.>

3.12 Jus in Bello very nearly the series finale. They work with Ruby after FBI agent Henriksen discovers they weren’t lying about the supernatural and they exorcise him from demon possession. Dean gives him The Talk about what’s real, and refuses to sacrifice someone to perform Ruby’s spell that would supposedly save them all and kill all the demons. Everyone lives… for a little while, at least. At least Sam and Dean are marked among the dead, so they won’t have to worry about law enforcement chasing them for a while, but Ruby holds this over them (in addition to losing the Colt, if they’d just listened to her everyone would still be alive… in theory… she’s really good at this manipulation thing!)

3.13 Ghostfacers And interesting perspective to see what Sam and Dean would look like uncensored and unbound from the traditional episode format, and through the eyes of other people.

3.14 Long-Distance Call Crocotta. Dean is lured in by John’s voice over the phone, believing it might be a ghost situation, and that John may have a way to save him from Hell. It’s all just a trap that leaves Dean feeling even more hopeless, knowing he can’t expect John (or anyone else) to save him from this.

3.15 Time Is on My Side Sam gets desperate, and we have another mention of zombies… which if you’ll recall, signals grief and desperation and an inability to let go of the past. Which kinda defines Sam’s state right now. Dean tracks down Bela to retrieve the Colt (but it’s long gone, and Bela’s about to be dragged off by hellhounds herself). Sam tracks down Doc Benton hoping to get him to share his secret for immortality as a last desperate attempt to save Dean. But Dean doesn’t want to live like that, killing other people for their organs as his would wear out, just to keep himself out of Hell. And honestly good for him because ugh.

3.16 No Rest for the Wicked Dean’s seeing through the veil, able to see demons’ true faces, and the hellhounds that are on their way. They steal Ruby’s knife and go after Lilith, and fail completely. Dean’s dragged to Hell, and Sam’s immune to Lilith’s powers.

4.01 Lazarus Rising CAS GRIPPED DEAN TIGHT AND RAISED HIM FROM PERDITION. Honestly if you don’t know the meta import of this episode, this list ain’t gonna help you.

4.02 Are You There, God? It's Me, Dean Winchester We really learn about the Apocalypse, the seals breaking that will eventually free Lucifer. Supposedly the angels want to stop them from breaking… and Dean and Cas have their first real conversation about all of this. And this is the episode my tag for God comes from, “If you say mysterious ways, so help me I will kick your ass.” Dean’s already set himself up with Cas to defy God.

4.03 In the Beginning Angels can send you back in time! Dean sees Mary and John’s relationship, the death of Mary’s parents, and the fact Dean talked John into buying the Impala AND now feels responsible for having lured Azazel to Mary in the first place… he witnesses the deal she makes to bring John back that would effectively shape the entire narrative on both sides of this episode. The things we do for love… Cas told Dean to stop it, and in the end tells him he never could’ve stopped any of it. It is what it is. It’s the first instance of Dean getting this glimpse at the bigger picture, and taking away his OWN lesson from it rather than the one he was supposed to learn…

4.04 Metamorphosis Dean finds out about Sam working with Ruby to exorcise demons with his psychic powers. And the inevitability of falling victim to those psychic powers plays out in the MotW, the rougarou who gives into his hunger. Sam promises to give up using his powers lest that happen to him.

4.05 Monster Movie A straightforward, black and white case. A shapeshifter (so buried truths), but this one becomes Hollywood movie monsters trying to give the monsters a happy ending… essentially trying to rewrite his own story. Sound familiar? Dean gets the girl, at least. I love this episode.

4.06 Yellow Fever Dean vs his own fear, compounded by the fear of a ghost who infects him with ghost sickness, inflicting his own suffering on Dean. This was Dabb’s first episode, and as such, is definitely worth watching for the themes, and what Dean is truly afraid of-- i.e. of going back to Hell and being tortured by Lilith, of Sam being a yellow-eyed demon. The rest is just awkwardly fun watching Dean squirm.

4.07 It's the Great Pumpkin, Sam Winchester Sam breaks his promise not to use his powers when Samhain rises. We meet another angel- Uriel- who isn’t as fond of humanity as Cas. Sam meets Cas, too. But this is truly the episode where Cas begins to differentiate himself and show his doubts in Heaven’s orders. He warns Dean that bigger tests are coming, but he doesn’t know what they will be yet. This is still the true foundation stone of Cas’s entire personal character arc for the entire series, when he went from maybe-three-episodes-then-dead interesting side character to 11-years-and-counting truly a Winchester.

4.08 Wishful Thinking I love this episode… you can’t just wish for what you want without consequences. This was like primer-level Cosmic Consequences stuff.

4.09 I Know What You Did Last Summer Dean learns what Sam was up to while he was in Hell being tortured by Alastair (conveniently the antagonist in this episode), why he trusts Ruby now, and voluntarily works with Ruby to save Anna-- a woman who hears angels talking. This is effectively continued in:

4.10 Heaven and Hell Where Anna remembers that she’d been an angel who fell from Heaven by choice, removing her grace to experience life as a human. Which… is kinda important a concept to know exists… >.> Heaven (and Cas) judge her harshly for that choice, and yet… there’s just too much just go read my rewatch notes from this episode at the very least.

4.11 Family Remains They think it’s a ghost but it’s not a ghost. All you need to know is this is the episode they wrote on a dare to see if they could write an episode that the network would refuse to air ever again. They were actively trying to write the worst possible episode they could imagine, and this is the result.

4.12 Criss Angel Is a Douchebag

Sam had a thing for stage magic as a kid, but now he runs around with a demon. The concept of “will we be in this life until we die or it kills us” and “what would life even look like to us if we were actually to grow old” is batted around for possibly the first time.

4.13 After School Special

From contemplating retirement to flashbacks to high school. Another look at Sam and Dean and who they are as people, and how their very different childhoods shaped them into who they are now.

4.14 Sex and Violence Dean’s Siren was a dude. (oh, and the director of this episode? whose last episode was 6.15? is directing 15.03, so maybe worth a peek...)

4.15 Death Takes a Holiday Dean vs Death again. The return of Tessa the reaper from 2.01, and Dean finally remembers. They save Tessa, save a seal, and capture Alastair, but discover they’ve been manipulated into doing it by Cas/Heaven. Heaven loves its manipulations… Pamela the psychic warns Sam that what he’s doing, despite his intentions, is not good. He ignores that advice. At the very least read my rewatch notes for this one. >.>

4.16 On the Head of a Pin There is absolutely too much going on in this episode to sum up in this post. Read my rewatch notes, read the superwiki, watch the episode. This one is huge, for Dean and for Cas.

4.17 It's a Terrible Life Heaven’s Grand Manipulator, Zachariah. Or he thinks he’s pretty grand… he’s really not all that good at his job

4.18 The Monster at the End of This Book CHUCK. The inevitability of destiny, or at least his attempt to write that version. In this episode, all of Chuck’s plans go according to plan… until Dean drags him back into the story and forces a different ending. (and we learn Sam’s demon blood drinking is so distasteful to Chuck he didn’t even include it in his books) Remind you of anything? Like, oh, 4.22, or 5.22, or 11.23, or 14.20? Yes, this episode is the key to everything.

4.19 Jump the Shark Since Adam will reportedly be back in s15, watch this one and understand Dabb’s exact intention in creating the character in the first place-- literally as a decoy who never existed with any narrative weight of his own, as a ghoul (a creature that feeds on the dead and takes their shape). I wrote about this one recently, so I won’t waste space repeating myself here.

4.20 The Rapture CAAAAAAAASSSSSS. He gets dragged back to heaven for disobedience, and is tortured back into obedience. Obviously this one is huge for Cas as a character, and for Dean’s relationship with him. But they both learn about why Sam’s powers were getting stronger, and are not pleased...

4.21 When the Levee Breaks Sam’s detoxing from demon blood until Cas lets him escape. Cas rounds up Anna and has her sent back to Heaven for her own round of torture/reprogramming. And Dean and Sam have her Big Falling Out that drives Sam to do the horrific… however good his intentions are, what he’s doing is still bad.

4.22 Lucifer Rising The grand manipulation is unveiled. Dean talks an angel into rebelling from Heaven to stop the apocalypse, but they’re still not in time to stop Sam from breaking the world. Chuck… is less than fully helpful, despite Cas literally volunteering his own life to protect Chuck. Pretty sure this is a critical episode for rewatching. Chuck’s mostly pleased his story is going to plan.

5.01 Sympathy for the Devil Ugh, no we do not have sympathy for the devil on this blog. Chuck recruits his biggest fan to deliver cryptic messages to Sam and Dean. Dean learns he’s Michael’s true vessel, destined to be his tuxedo for the apocalypse. Cas returns without having a clue how he’s even alive. And it’s all Chuck’s doing… even if we don’t know that yet.

5.02 Good God, Y'All

The apocalypse is in full swing, and the Horsemen are coming out to play. In this case, War manipulating people into destroying each other. Cas sets out on his mission to find God and convince him to help stop this mess. We learn Dean’s amulet had the power to find God all this time, and they’d never known it until now. Convenient!

5.03 Free to Be You and Me Just watch it already, you know you want to. Defines Dean and Cas’s relationship for years to come, though. Plus Sam learns he’s Lucifer’s destined vessel. I’m sure that will all go fine…

5.04 The End I know most people will disagree with me on this, but the only useful meta takeaway from this episode is the same as one from 4.17: Dean doesn’t learn the lessons he’s “supposed to.” He makes his own lessons. There is literally zero other relevant information to take from this episode, aside from it being Cas who saves him from it. Watch if you enjoy it… but literally nothing about it is any more real than the djinn dream in 2.20 or the dreamroot dream in 3.10, and it’s all been rendered irrelevant by later canon anyway. Especially by 14.20 and that moment Dean refused to play Chuck’s game anymore.

5.05 Fallen Idols More John baggage disguised as an old god. Worth watching just to hear poor Consuela the housekeeper wail about Abraham Lincoln killing Mr. Hill, and Sam being attacked by Ghandi.

5.06 I Believe the Children Are Our Future Dabb’s second gag on the fandom… the antichrist. Dean admitting Cas is his friend. :’)

5.07 The Curious Case of Dean Winchester Dean gets to be an old man for a day.

5.08 Changing Channels Just watch this one, read about it, whatever. Refresh yourself on it. The trickster is unmasked as the Archangel Gabriel, and he’s attempting his own ploy to force Sam and Dean to “play their roles.” They convince him they’re not gonna do that, but to break out of the endless loop of literal television shows he’s forcing them to act out for his own entertainment (and sort of to teach them that lesson), they’ve got to do more than just refuse to play their roles, they’ve got to best him at the game. Kinda like they’re probably gonna have to do with Chuck in s15.

5.09 The Real Ghostbusters Oh, speaking of Chuck… here have a Supernatural fan convention, and a key piece of information on what actually happened to the Colt after Bela stole it. But most importantly, Dean gets to yell about how much he doesn’t appreciate the story of Supernatural.

5.10 Abandon All Hope… They find the Colt, and Crowley, and discover it never would’ve worked against Lucifer anyway, and then promptly lose the Colt again. Lucifer gets to stare down Cas and Cas doesn’t blink, Meg’s hellhounds kill Jo and Ellen, and really everything’s kinda bleak. Lucifer raises and binds Death.

5.11 Sam, Interrupted WRAITH, aka a monster that uses mind altering venom to “cook” her victims to perfection, so like a djinn and other mind-altering, perception-altering creatures, when they sneak up on you unawares, things get… complicated. Massive insight into the essential character of Sam and Dean.

5.12 Swap Meat Body Swap. That one time Sam was actually Gary.

5.13 The Song Remains the Same More time travel, Sam’s second resurrection, we finally meet Michael face to (Young John Winchester’s) face. Mikey seems pretty confident in his “destiny.” Dean’s second warning to Young Mary about her death is wiped from her mind. Contemplation of Cosmic Consequences: it’s better never to be born if it means stopping the Apcoalypse-- clarified in 12.23-present that… nope, definitely worse. “Team Free Will” coined. Watch this one. It’s the stage on which all the s12-present Family Dynamics will be set.

5.14 My Bloody Valentine We learn Heaven set up John and Mary, that they couldn’t stand one another before Cupids intervened and made them “the perfect couple.” I’ve written a lot about the effect the Horseman Famine had on all of them-- especially Dean and Cas, with the reminder that s5 was the season of “lol nope” to the category of beings attempting to manipulate all of them, including the Horsemen. Important just for all of that (and Edlund’s confirmation that Cas’s cravings were actually his own, and that my read that he was being a shifty liar blaming it on Jimmy was correct-- Cas does have his own human cravings, going all the way back to this point, that he was ashamed of, or terrified of, or both...) As well as Sam’s struggle against demon blood addiction, and his fear of and gradual acceptance and internalization of his own powers)

5.15 Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid ZOMBIES. ZOMBIE PIE. JODY MILLS. As I’ve said above, zombies are grief and unresolved baggage from the past, and in this episode, the denial was so strong even the normies in town were willing to accept the return of their dead loved ones, clinging to them until they “turned” and devoured them… the Mary parallels, Karen’s talk with Dean about what we do for the people we love… this one’s important.

5.16 Dark Side of the Moon Dabb, and our first look at the structure of Heaven, and how human souls see the place. Probably one of THE most misunderstood episodes in the entire series. Please see everything I’ve ever written about it for reference. FINALLY they toss out the toxic, worthless samulet. (which we literally learn in 11.20 that chuck “switched off” and INTENTIONALLY rendered worthless, because it suited his plotline and amused him). Still think this is vital to understanding Dabb Era overall.

5.17 99 Problems We see what it looks like when Dean gives up, loses hope, and is about to do Stupid Things™. Cas too. Probably useful just for that.

5.18 Point of No Return We finally see Cas really let loose on Dean, and admit what he gave up because he believed in Dean. Because Dean asked him to. Dean nearly gives in to destiny, but because of Cas, because of Sam, he fights through it. Zachariah and his manipulations end (getting stabbed in the face tends to end that sort of thing). Also the irritating return of Adam only to be the meatsuit for Michael when Dean refuses. (and we learn the truth about Adam-- that everything ghoul!Adam told them had been a straight-up manipulation, and Adam only ever cared about his mom. by the time he learns the truth, it’s too late for him, the gullible idiot vs the power of propaganda)

5.19 Hammer of the Gods The return of Gabriel, aka Loki, and a ton of other pagan gods Lucifer will slaughter. Interesting in light of Gabriel’s return in s13, and because of the mirror of Chuck in each of his archangels. And the Winchesters win another angel to TFW.

5.20 The Devil You Know Crowley’s good at manipulation, but again proves himself to be… mostly trustworthy (as long as they’re all working toward the same end). And re: manipulation, Sam gets a glimpse of just how thoroughly his entire life has been manipulated by demonic forces, which… relevant to the revelations of 14.20 vs Sam’s persistent faith in God despite everything.

5.21 Two Minutes to Midnight Cas is effectively human. Bobby sells his soul for Death’s location, and Pestilence falls to teamwork. Cas learns the value of a shotgun. Dean has pizza with Death, who WANTS him to succeed at locking Lucifer back up and explains exactly how to go about doing it. Sam thinks he can overpower Lucifer if he gives in and says yes.

5.22 Swan Song Sam was not totally wrong in 5.21. Cas resurrects Bobby, and explodes and is resurrected (again!) himself. Sam drags two (2) archangels into the cage and is promptly pulled out (only missing one critical bit…). Dean… actually tries to live up to at least one of Sam’s dying wishes, and it basically ruins his life for the next year. Chuck is a smug, self-satisfied bastard who pats himself on the back for a story well-told before flapping off and proceeding to write variations on his original fic using his favorite characters. >.>

6.01 Exile on Main St. All I can hear is Dean’s heartbreak and anger that Sam had been “alive” for a year and forbade anyone from telling Dean that he wasn’t actually suffering tortures in Hell all that time. If ever there was a YIKES moment on the show, this is it for me. This one’s probably good to watch just for the setup of soulless!sam and s6 in general.

6.02 Two and a Half Men Dean’s even good with monster babies. And after a year of unsettled living with Lisa, he’s more duty bound to protect them than he is wanting to stay because he’s actually happy there. Sam is a creepy hunting machine.

6.03 The Third Man CAS! But heck he’s acting shifty, but so’s Sam, and Dean’s feeling even more alone now. The introduction of the concept of Angel Marks on souls, the Profound Bond, and biblical weapons. And the war in Heaven, and the seasonal antagonist stepping up into Michael’s shoes: Raphael.

6.04 Weekend at Bobby's BALLS. Woodchippers trump everything. We discover that burning a demon’s human bones will perma-kill them, and learn a bit of Crowley’s backstory.

6.05 Live Free or Twihard Dean becomes a vampire for a hot minute. We learn there is a vampire cure that works as long as they haven’t had human blood yet. And we learn something really, really is wrong with Sam...

6.06 You Can't Handle the Truth Dean is now 100% positive that something is horrifically wrong with Sam, and is distraught that nobody else seemed to know it for a YEAR.

6.07 Family Matters Cas figures out what’s wrong with Sam and promptly becomes even shadier around the Winchesters. We meet the Alpha Vampire. And vampire eps are about revenge, right? There is a LOT of shady going on here.

6.08 All Dogs Go to Heaven weird dog episode that I always forget exists between rewatches.

6.09 Clap Your Hands If You Believe… hands down the best soulless!Sam episode. You fight those fairies! I’m still waiting for another fairie episode where Dean can still see them and nobody else can :’D. Just watching Sam try to logic his way into being more human is educational about the struggle to be human in general.

6.10 Caged Heat Family betrayal, Sam and Dean nearly get fed to ghouls, Cas would rather be with them then fighting his war in Heaven. Angel blades can kill hellhounds. They finally entrap meg into working with them instead of always trying to kill them >.>

6.11 Appointment in Samarra I think this is still in my top five favorite episodes ever, and one I think everyone needs to rewatch. Dean and Death episodes usually are. And in this one, Dean IS effectively Death for 24 hours. But there is a LOT in this episode, from Death “testing” Dean on multiple levels-- forcing him to make choices AND process the consequences of his actions and how it affects other people… this is a big one for the cosmology of the SPN universe and Dean specifically. Even in Dabb era.

6.12 Like a Virgin Dragons are a thing. Eve pops over from Purgatory.

6.13 Unforgiven Sam’s soul/hell flashbacks start when he goes poking at the wall, but he keeps poking anyway. Giant spider people. Eurgh. But unfortunately the whole “web of lies unraveling” thing kinda fits.

6.14 Mannequin 3: The Reckoning The haunted kidney episode. But Dean finally breaks it off with Lisa (again… >.>)

6.15 The French Mistake We actually learn something about the angel wars… sort of. We also learn AU’s are actually real. (this was also the last episode the director of 15.03 directed, so probably worth watching if they’re bringing him back after all these years…)

6.16 ...And Then There Were None Monster Possession is apparently a thing now. The last of the Campbell hunters die (that was a quick trip through the family dynamics there >.>). The main takeaway here is from Rufus’ funeral: Life’s short, and it’s not worth carrying guilt and regret (takes them a really REALLY long time to actually internalize it with each other, but at least they got the spirit)

6.17 My Heart Will Go On Cas just lying to their faces, creating an alternate timeline just to generate souls as a power source (the specific number of 50k souls comes up, and will come up again in 6.20, as the number of souls Crowley “loaned” Cas at the beginning of the war in Heaven, with the suspicion that Cas was attempting to “buy his way out of their deal”, but the plan fails and he’s forced to put everything back… but he does ensure Sam and Dean both remember the entire experience, but we get an idea of the extent of the power angels can actually wield.

6.18 Frontierland Dabb has referenced this one several times during his era, but again, the history of the Colt is involved, a Phoenix, and Dean in a cowboy hat. We learn even the other angels think Cas is up to something super shady. But it’s their first real moment of hope.

6.19 Mommy Dearest Eve uses Mary’s face to torment Dean, we learn Crowley is not dead, and Cas… has been doing shady things with him. Cas is again effectively human for an episode.

6.20 The Man Who Would Be King Well this is where everything both falls apart and comes together. This episode makes sense of the entire rest of s6, as painful and sad as it is. If you only watch one episode from s6, it should probably be this one.

6.21 Let It Bleed Dean’s worst fear comes true, and people he cares about but leaves behind for their own protection are used against him. Not just by bad guys, but by Cas. Ouch. Still incredulous that Dean did recognize HP Lovecraft, or even make a Metallica reference at the mention of “Call of Cthulhu.”

6.22 The Man Who Knew Too Much Sam putting himself back together. Cas tearing things apart.

7.01 Meet the New Boss That one episode where it looks like Cas will be the unwitting bad guy and s7 will be about saving him, until it’s really really not. That whole exchange between Dean and Cas about forgiveness and finding some way to make it up to him, though… that’s what will carry us through the bleak middle of s7 and generate the grief arc for Dean in the meantime.

7.02 Hello, Cruel World It looks like Cas is really, truly gone, and all Dean has of him is his trenchcoat. And we’re stuck cleaning up his oozy black mess for the next 15 episodes before getting him back again. Sam’s Hallucifering all over the place and finds a connection to reality through squeezing the scar on his hand, which will become a symbol in show for reconnecting with reality for him for years to come.

7.03 The Girl Next Door Sam thinks pie and cake are the same. In their own respective messed up mental states, Sam thinks Amy is worth saving, Dean doesn’t trust that and kills her. Let the guilt ensue.

7.04 Defending Your Life A good setup of Sam and Dean’s issues for s7.

7.05 Shut Up, Dr. Phil I can’t believe they melted Tula’s painting. But it takes a couple of bickering witches for them to finally get a hold on the Leviathan, so that’s something.

7.06 Slash Fiction Aah, going back to the beginning as a trap for Sam and Dean-- the Leviathan using the Supernatural books to lay a trail case by case from Sam leaving Stanford (Crowley will do the same in 8.22, and the end of 14.20 gave a lot of people the impression there will be a similar progression in s15… but honestly that’s really only sustainable for a single episode, but this may be relevant for like… 15.01-02). Also, Dean finds it satisfying to behead himself (or the leviathan version of himself)… so yikes.

7.07 The Mentalists I love this one just for the Dean feels. He’s really hurting.

7.08 Season Seven, Time for a Wedding! Sam’s love-spelled. Mind control is always a terrible thing. Demons trying to game the system and cash in on deals ahead of schedule. So that’s a thing.

7.09 How to Win Friends and Influence Monsters I love this one. Poor Dean. This is the first time he’s actually felt good in like… ever. Too bad it’s from monster goo.

7.10 Death's Door Bobby :’( And Dean essentially falls apart.

7.11 Adventures in Babysitting Vetala. Which only Dean knew hunt in pairs, so hunter after hunter had been falling victim to them, including Sam. Meanwhile Dean finally got a decent nap.

7.12 Time After Time Dean gets booped back to the 1940’s to hunt with Eliot Ness. Still, they defeat Chronos, yet another god whose prophecy will be tossed aside by the Winchesters.

7.13 The Slice Girls Dean accidentally has a monsterbabby, Sam kills her. Amazons.

7.14 Plucky Pennywhistle's Magical Menagerie Just watch it. This is the only episode in the entire series that just… is purely good and fun. Sam has to confront his fear of clowns, Dean faces a villain who was blamed for his brother’s death when he was just a kid and his parents should’ve been doing their jobs instead. I mean...

7.15 Repo Man The guy who was trying to lure back “his demon” exorcised during the Apocalypse era, by continuing his murder spree. Sam loses to Hallucifer by acknowledging his existence as separate from Sam’s own subconscious. There’s… a lot in this episode. At least read my rewatch notes.

7.16 Out with the Old Sam eventually succumbs to his Hallucifering, Dean nearly succumbs to a pair of toe shoes. Peter Yankit of Johnson Lane nearly succumbs to a cursed porn magazine. Cursed objects are fun.

7.17 The Born-Again Identity CAAAAASSSSS! He’s back, even if he doesn’t remember who he is. Dean tries to break it to him slowly, but instead unburdens a lot of his personal hurt over Cas’s actions to the oblivious “Emmanuel,” And Cas tells Dean his feelings are completely understandable. This is setting up the entire rest of Cas’s arc, probably through the end of the series. This is what motivates him, his need to repent. And He gets a start by taking on Sam’s trauma, healing Sam.

7.18 Party On, Garth An alcohol spirit enacting personal revenge, and despite all evidence, Sam continues to doubt Dean’s theory that Bobby is somehow still around. Dean’s season-long grief-drinking becomes a punchline, and Dean’s literally the only sober one in the final fight scene.

7.19 Of Grave Importance Yep, Bobby is a ghost, been there all along. Also, ghosts can sort of… cannibalize each other? For their power? whatever, moving on.

7.20 The Girl with the Dungeons and Dragons Tattoo CHARLIE.

7.21 Reading Is Fundamental KEVIN. But also CAS! Is awake but not quite himself and in full denial mode, like he was awakened against his will before he was done cooking >.>. we learn a bit more about prophets as we see Kevin awakened to serve the Leviathan Tablet.

7.22 There Will Be Blood more manipulation, and the Alpha Vampire is back, so we get a double whammy of manipulation/deceit AND revenge. The alpha vampire cooperates with the Winchesters. So does Crowley.

7.23 Survival of the Fittest Cas doesn’t want to fight, but in the end he steps up. They get the Leviathan, Dean and Cas are beamed to Purgatory, and Sam’s left alone and pulls a Sam. He runs away from reality.

8.01 We Need to Talk About Kevin Dean comes back from Purgatory without Cas, but with a vampire friend… so s8 is about Dean making pals with revenge. This will fuel his arc for a good long while to come until he can finally make his peace with it. It affects his interactions with Sam for most of the first half of the season… because while Dean was fighting for his life, Sam was… pretending to be a normal guy and ignoring everything else. Including Kevin.

8.02 What's Up, Tiger Mommy? The push to do something drives them to seek out the Demon Tablet with the promise of closing the gates of Hell forever at Kevin’s suggestion. Plutus, the God of Greed is the baddie in this one, if that’s any sort of meta statement on their overall plan to take this particular course of action… the narrative basically condemned their plot before the season even started. Hubris, ahoy. But we also find out why Cas ran away in Purgatory-- to protect Dean. And why he wanted to stay-- guilt and penance.

8.03 Heartache Oh, a case where a curse is passed on to others after death? And the original death didn’t actually end the curse as intended? Nice.

8.04 Bitten I love episodes were we see Sam and Dean through other people’s eyes. And this one, an episode where we learn new things about werewolves (remember: an examination of inner monstrousness).

8.05 Blood Brother I’d point out the agony of Winchester Secret Keeping being toxic, but since we’re largely out past that by the end of s14… *shrug emoji*. Dean helps his vampire friend get revenge against the vampires who killed him. Double revenge! And Sam… does not like Benny. But we know exactly why DEAN does… he literally saved Cas’s life in Purgatory, despite repeatedly wanting to leave Cas behind. He saved Cas for Dean.

8.06 Southern Comfort Garth again, and his serenity is basically there to point out how toxic Sam and Dean are by comparison. The spectre that possesses Dean to leech off his vengefulness has zero effect on Garth. But Dean gets out his feelings of anger that Sam never looked for him in Purgatory, so that’s on the table to provide drama for years to come.

8.07 A Little Slice of Kevin CAS IS BACK AGAIN! But he has no idea how he got here (he’s been mind controlled by Heaven again, and is desperately trying to make amends, but is literally blocked from doing so at every turn, which is a tidy mirror for what Chuck’s done to the entire story since… forever… so this is probably a must-watch episode, or at least read my notes on it.

8.08 Hunteri Heroici This one’s fun, until it’s owie, and then sad. Magical powers don’t save the day, they only end up hurting people. Cas desperately wants to make amends, but he is afraid to face what he’s done. Instead, he just gets manipulated even harder. At least read my notes for this one, too.

8.09 Citizen Fang Oh, manipulation moves directly to the Winchester brothers, no heavenly interference required. Vampires again, but this time Dean again sides with Benny, but against Sam… who again refuses to hear the truth and pulls another Sam. He forgot the lesson that sometimes it’s not the monsters being monstrous, and it’s important to kill the RIGHT monster, not just the convenient one.

8.10 Torn and Frayed Just like the episode sounds… Cas goes to Dean for help, and then brings Sam onboard and asks them to stow their crap. By the end of the episode, Sam and Dean will have resigned themselves to being on their own again because Cas is… something is not right with him...

8.11 LARP and the Real Girl CHARLIE! Fairies! Dean does one (1) fun thing for his birthday. But this is about using a book to manipulate events to suit the Bad Guy’s whims. Sound familiar?

8.12 As Time Goes By Sam and Dean meet their grandfather, fill in a huge gaping hole from their past, and discover their legacy, the Men of Letters, and the Bunker that will become their home.

8.13 Everybody Hates Hitler Yep. It’s true! Nazi necromancers, and another new ally in Aaron. They settle in to the bunker.

8.14 Trial and Error They take their first steps toward closing the gates of Hell, killing a Hellhound. I wrote about this one recently, so go read that. :’D

8.15 Man's Best Friend with Benefits another weird dog episode

8.16 Remember the Titans Prometheus, Artemis, and Zeus. Curses passed down through families to fall on innocent children. And Zeus is delighted because it causes even more suffering.

8.17 Goodbye Stranger oh the agony. We see what it took for Heaven to control Cas, and what it took for Dean to break through to him, only to fall to yet another mind whammy by the angel tablet. Of course Dean takes this personally, abandoned again. Definitely watch this one. Read the notes. All that.

8.18 Freaks and Geeks In case anyone missed the point, we have manipulation and vampires. And Dean reminding everyone that finding the truth is important (let’s not be so bloodthirsty that just anyone will do).

8.19 Taxi Driver The second trial, the horror that Bobby’s wrongfully been in Hell all this time, and Sam is stranded in Purgatory until Benny shows up to escort him to the portal. Sam finally gets why Dean’s loyalty to Benny never wavered. He was literally willing to die for Dean. This guilt will carry Sam into the third trial eventually but for now...

8.20 Pac-Man Fever Let’s look at Dean’s guilt/fear. That he’s failed to protect Sam and won’t be able to save him from the trials. Fear is a terrible thing. But we have djinn AND dreamroot, so all the false realities.

8.21 The Great Escapist This is still among my favorite episodes, but Cas finally begins fighting for himself, and we uncover the extent of Heaven’s duplicity, and meet Metatron, aka Chuck Lite. Definitely watch or at least read.

8.22 Clip Show Aah, I mentioned this one back in 7.06. This is Crowley’s turn to use the boys’ history against them, but instead of manipulating them, they trap him (at the beginning of 8.23, after whoopsie accidentally freeing Abaddon because of Crowley’s manipulation distracting them from their job…) We learn that “curing a demon” is a thing.

8.23 Sacrifice Cas is so embittered by his experiences with heaven that he refuses to believe Metatron is lying, and thus falls victim to the worst manipulation yet. Sam’s dying from the trials, Cas is human, and angels fall. (and also some of the worst, most toxic relationship stuff between Sam and Dean, which contributes to all of that, along with their hubris to think this was a good idea in the first place… I mean it’s literally what the big bad of s9 did to Heaven so why were they trying to do the same to Hell again?)

9.01 I Think I'm Gonna Like It Here Cas is human, confused, and alone. The big bad is basically Diet Chuck, and Dean is manipulated into doing a Terrible Thing to save Sam that will strain their relationship for the rest of the season. (Don’t worry, Sam will return the favor in s10 >.>) Buckle in for a season all about manipulation by more powerful cosmic forces but with all new levels of guilt over having caused these problems in the first place!

9.02 Devil May Care Abaddon makes a play for the role of big bad, but will ultimately lose the title to Metatron.

9.03 I'm No Angel The Worst Possible Take on Human Cas. Mostly I ignore this episode.

9.04 Slumber Party Oz. Dorothy. Wicked Witch of the West. Sam’s angel possession gets a bit tricky… Direct mind control instead of the manipulative sneaky kind we usually see. and CHARLIE. The Winchesters lives are directly compared to Dorothy Baum’s, where her “fictionalized” version didn’t even come close to describing the horror of her lived reality. (also that one line swap incident that still pisses me off… and pissed Robbie Thompson off enough to write a whole SCENE in 11.04 they couldn’t screw around with like that… “god helps those who help themselves”)

9.05 Dog Dean Afternoon oh look another weird dog episode

9.06 Heaven Can't Wait the Best Possible Take on Human Cas. Well, while Dean’s still being held hostage against telling the truth to him about the angel possessing Sam… and not being able to just bring Cas back home with him. :’)

9.07 Bad Boys Sam learns another major lesson about just how much Dean was manipulated into lying to him his whole life, and another look at what Dean has given up over the years to protect Sam. The origin of my “the story became the story” tag.

9.08 Rock and a Hard Place Breaking vows is frowned upon. Vesta. And Dean tries to tell Sam about the angel possessing him, but he’s prevented from doing so. And he’s really beginning to realize just how bad a decision this may have been...

9.09 Holy Terror Cas is back in town. He can’t stand by when he might be able to help, but again Gadreel (because now we know that’s the angel possessing Sam) refuses. Gadreel is lured in by Metatron, and things for Sam go from bad to worse. Cas steals another angel’s grace because he had no choice. And Gadreel kills Kevin and runs off. All of a sudden, Dean’s alone.

9.10 Road Trip Just when Dean can finally tell the truth to Cas, Cas isn’t human anymore. They literally never got to actually just BE. Crowley poughkeepsie’s Sam into kicking Gadreel out. Abaddon is becoming more of a problem. Probably at least read the notes on this one. At the end, it’s Dean that “pulls the Sam” and runs away. Which is interesting because they’re essentially gonna swap narrative roles for like… the next season and a half. Buckle up. Things get rocky >.>

9.11 First Born And definitely watch this one. Cas and Sam bonding hour, while Dean goes off with Crowley and is manipulated into taking on the Mark of Cain so he’ll be able to kill Abaddon for Crowley… (and for everyone else, but mainly for Crowley).

9.12 Sharp Teeth Sometimes family can be a werewolf pack. And Garth is now part of one of those, but there’s still zero monstrousness in Garth. As Dean’s beginning to wonder if he should regret taking the Mark (just as Cas wondered if he should regret cannibalizing grace… which he said made him barbaric)

9.13 The Purge A genuinely altruistically intentioned monster, or at least one who attempted to use her monstrousness for good. But her blind spot was her brother, out there just devouring whatever he wanted and not wanting to play by the rules of society or worrying about staying hidden and safe. Plus, DONNA. Even if she doesn’t get to play a big part in the monster hunting.

9.14 Captives We learn more horrors about the s6 angel war from Bart, and pushing Cas toward siding more and more with humanity and against all the heaven nonsense (until he’s manipulated back in DIRECTLY by Metatron and his magic typewriter… but that’s four episodes in the future yet). Linda Tran gets a bit of revenge for being held prisoner for half a year anyway...

9.15 thinman ghostfacers, back to face their own ghosts. If you like getting hit in the face with anvils...

9.16 Blade Runners Crowley’s addicted to humanity. Dean finds his own addiction in the First Blade. And we get our first glimpse of the darker side of the MoL.

9.17 Mother's Little Helper Misha directed it, and it’s got one of the most beautiful scenes in the whole series (Sam freeing the stolen souls, but Dean drinking and playing pool ain’t half bad either). Soullessness, which Sam handles on his own, and learns the truth of how Abaddon infiltrated the MoL.

9.18 Meta Fiction A MUST WATCH. Writers lie. Read my posts. What makes a story? Seriously, Metatron is just Chuck with training wheels.

9.19 Alex Annie Alexis Ann Vampires. More revenge. This time for stolen childhood and lost family. Plus Jody, and the first seed that would become Wayward. Dean is also beginning to succumb to the Mark’s darker urges.

9.20 Bloodlines Dabb’s idea of a joke, I’m pretty sure.

9.21 King of the Damned Well, Abaddon’s dead, at least. Time trave wtf’ery. Dean is… not okay...

9.22 Stairway to Heaven Sam and Cas pop culture road trip. The level of Metatron’s manipulation becomes horrifically apparent. And Cas gives up his army because he refuses to kill Dean. (also Dean really loses it at the end…)

9.23 Do You Believe in Miracles? Crowley reveals the truth about what the Mark is doing to Dean, and we see the final truth when Dean wakes up as a demon.

10.01 Black Demon Dean Part 1. Bad karaoke and random murder. Cas is languishing because of stolen grace, and Sam is off the rails interrogating demons for Dean’s location.

10.02 Reichenbach Demon Dean Part 2. Cas struggles to teach Hannah about humanity, Sam struggles to find Dean.

10.03 Soul Survivor Demon Dean the conclusion. Cas hugs the demon outta Dean. Er… that’s what happened, pretty sure. But he’s still got the Mark.

10.04 Paper Moon More fun with Werewolves: Siblings edition. While Dean struggles to come to terms with his own literal inner monster...

10.05 Fan Fiction Just watch it. And read my rewatch notes for it. I mean, it’s about rewriting the story. And Chuck shows up at the end and gives it a “Not bad.” Probably kinda relevant.

10.06 Ask Jeeves Supernatural: Clue edition. With a shapeshifter that Bobby had known about for decades. Buried secret things again.

10.07 Girls, Girls, Girls Our first real introduction to Rowena. :’) She’s not a friend in this one...Hannah finally gets a taste of humanity through her vessel’s grief and pain, and decides that it’s wrong for her to remain in her vessel. She returns to Heaven, and Cas is left to ponder how he affected Jimmy’s family (since Jimmy’s long dead now) by his possession.

10.08 Hibbing 911 DONNA AND JODY. Donna gets “the talk,” in a vampire case, and finally gets to prove her mettle as a hunter.

10.09 The Things We Left Behind Cas has found Claire Novak, and does what he can to help her. She’s been taken in and manipulated by an unsavory character, who Dean kills in a fit of mark-induced violence (granted he was surrounded by dudes who wanted him dead, but it was still upsetting and mirrored his nightmare from the opening scene). The burger date. (go ahead and watch it)

10.10 The Hunter Games More Claire drama, but this time she stops it. The Longing Retcon. Cas uses emoticons. And Dean nearly kills Metatron while demanding he tell him how to cure the Mark. Things are getting kinda desperate on that end… All Metatron says is “the river ends at the source”

10.11 There's No Place Like Home OZ. CHARLIE. At least read my watch notes. I’ve been banging on about this episode since it aired. But at the very least read the last round of watch notes. Possibly relevant again because of how it was relevant to Chuck and Amara in 11.23 (yes, this is basically how Dean saved the universe).

10.12 About a Boy Dean gets zapped into a 14-year-old version of himself by a witch. Plus: the mark disappeared for a few days, probably giving him a mini-vacation from enduring it and refreshing his control a bit.

10.13 Halt & Catch Fire ghosts in the machines… plus a John reference that is reinforced when a clip from this episode is reused in the horror movie trailer in 14.04 (so skim my rewatch notes for that if you’re still following along for that sort of thing… post 14.13… *shrug emoji*)

10.14 The Executioner's Song Watch it. Read the notes. This is a big one. Free will-wise.

10.15 The Things They Carried Khan worm: homoerotic sweat lodge edition.

10.16 Paint It Black Worth it just for Dean’s confessional scene. At least read my rewatch notes.

10.17 Inside Man We learn some interesting things about Heaven, Cas gets Bobby’s help to break in and talk to Metatron, they sneak him out, steal his grace, and have their leverage over the one person who might know how to cure Dean AND get Cas what’s left of his own grace back… Meanwhile Rowena tries to kill Dean, and he has a heart to heart with Crowley about what Family really means. Definitely watch, or at least read my notes. A lot happens in this one.

10.18 Book of the Damned CHARLIE. And the wtf’ery of the Styne family begins >.> Sam has a good chat with Charlie about his own life. Metatron leads Cas to another book containing his grace and then escapes with the demon tablet. Family dinner. At least skim my notes on this one. (basically anything with metatron is probably relevant to Chuck stuff…)

10.19 The Werther Project Watch this one. I just wrote notes on it. The beginnings of an interesting relationship between Sam and Rowena (yes that started in 10.18, but this is where it gains weight in Sam’s own subconscious). Dean confronts himself in his own vision about the burden he’s laid on Cas (to kill him if he goes off the rails again). There’s a lot of emotional baggage in this one, too. But seroiusly-- watch this one for the Sam and Rowena stuff, because Rowena… isn’t even really there…

10.20 Angel Heart Claire, and Cas’s finally laying to rest his baggage associated with the Novak family. Dean and Claire finally bonding. Dean and Cas went to the Hot Topical.

10.21 Dark Dynasty w. t. f. (if you want to be pissed off, give it a watch)

10.22 The Prisoner If you just want the comforting revenge portion of the program, just watch this one instead. Or if you can’t bear to, at least read my notes on it.

10.23 Brother's Keeper Whoopsie, Dean kills Death. Whoopsie, Sam doesn’t stop everyone else from executing the spell to cure the mark. Whoopsie, that releases the Darkness. Also for people who don’t “see Samwitch,” uh… please note that this is a major inciting incident in Sam and Rowena’s relationship-- she’s being held prisoner to complete this spell, and literally kills the only person she ever loved for it, on Sam’s order… (technically…), which will fuel the ongoing antagonism of early s11. Their relationship isn’t fluffy. It’s built on this mutual pain.

11.01 Out of the Darkness, Into the Fire Amara. I think a lot of s11 is gonna be relevant thematically to s15, but...

11.02 Form and Void I think a better focus of “what is relevant thematically” will be found by looking at Dabb’s episodes and influence over this season… I’d start a rewatch with this one, and the introduction of Billie, who will become Dabb’s in-show avatar as he takes over the reins.

11.03 The Bad Seed Rowena finally undoes the spell she’d cast on Cas. but they’re all traumatized. Please at least read my notes on this one, too.

11.04 Baby This episode sets the new tone for Sam and Dean’s relationship going forward. They are more open with one another, and the main drama isn’t them hiding things that eventually blow up in their faces like it had been in the past. There’s still elements of that, but things never really go back to the toxicity of s9 and s10 after this. Ghoulpire.

11.05 Thin Lizzie Fake haunting at Lizzie Borden’s house, Amara eats souls.

11.06 Our Little World Cas is clearly struggling with PTSD, hiding in the bunker until he spots Metatron by chance and finally gets upset enough to go after him. Dean’s first confrontation with Amara outside of his Darknado Vision, and she… tosses him aside like a used tissue. Sam’s still having visions of the Cage and still thinks the visions are coming from God… >.>

11.07 Plush Donna! And haunted masks! Foreshadowing that Sam’s about to confront Lucifer in the cage-- creepy clown in the elevator.

11.08 Just My Imagination Sam’s childhood imaginary friend was actually real.

11.09 O Brother Where Art Thou? Dean is yoinked from a park by Amara to have a chat about how they’re destined to become one and all that creepy nonsense, while Sam decides to go directly to Hell to talk with Lucifer and doesn’t wait for Dean. Granted, Rowena has been manipulated with lies from Lucifer in this scheme… but she’s about to learn how bad a decision that was. Dean does get to see just how casually Amara can destroy angels, though… which will become relevant it...

11.10 The Devil in the Details Where Dean tells Cas to run if Amara isn’t actually dead… but Cas is convinced he’s useless by the end of the episode and says yes to Lucifer. Owwwwww. At least read my notes on this one. They’re from last week...

11.11 Into the Mystic We meet Eileen, and I just wrote notes about this episode a few days ago. Banshee, which feeds on broken hearts, Dean’s told he’s pining for someone, and is concerned that Cas doesn’t seem himself… >.> He’s also asked if he wants to know the secret to a long and happy life… “Follow your heart” (and he confesses his powerlessness in Amara’s presence to Casifer) https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/186891847375/1111-into-the-mystic-heck-ive-written-a-lot

11.12 Don't You Forget About Me Wayward! Family learning what it means to be family. Vampires-- so the element of revenge, but this time it’s the vamps seeking revenge on a human.

11.13 Love Hurts Quareen. A monster that basically feeds on obsession, toxic “love.” For Dean, that manifests as Amara trying to rip out his heart. I mean… this is the episode he confesses to Sam that he can’t control himself in Amara’s presence, and Sam reassures him it’s not his fault. And he explicitly says it’s not love. It’s horrifying to him, because this episode, this monster, had nothing to do with love, but with possession and control.

11.14 The Vessel What a wonderfully apt and layered title. Thus begins Dean’s s11 “pining for Cas” arc, where his entire focus shifts to Cas after unburdening his Amara issues onto Sam in 11.13. I also consider this episode to fall definitively into Dabb Era. Probably goes for episodes back to 11.10, but this is where that shift is truly evident to me. Definitely watch this one, read my notes, etc. etc.

11.15 Beyond the Mat https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/186962895400/1115-beyond-the-mat-jerry-wanek-directed (just read my notes, this is a Dabb co-writing credit episode)

11.16 Safe House Maybe I should just start copying my rewatch notes here for every episode… https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/186963627365/1116-safe-house-more-blasts-from-the-past-in-a

11.17 Red Meat You should just watch this one, and remember this episode isn’t glorifying the codependency between Sam and Dean, it’s shattering it… It’s werewolves, after all (inner monstrousness brought to light) and read some of my past notes on it.

11.18 Hell's Angel The first half of the episode is just a lot of talking, but hooboy.. Rowena is back from the dead and we learn more of why she seeks out power-- self-preservation. Worth watching just for the second half, the failed Poughkeepsie scene, Dean’s heartbreak and fear for Cas, and Amara’s shock that with Cas standing between them, she doesn’t seem to have any affect over Dean at all…

11.19 The Chitters For a MotW episode, I think this really captures on a meta level what Dabb intends for the whole series. It’s worth watching for itself, but have my notes as to why: https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/184690946610/weve-finally-hit-1119-on-the-tnt-loop-this

11.20 Don't Call Me Shurley Chuck, and Metatron. I think everyone really needs to watch this one, just to remember how absolutely shady Chuck was. Basically from here right through the end of s11, if you pay attention to these episodes, nothing about 14.20 is the least bit shocking...

11.21 All in the Family Just like 11.20...

11.22 We Happy Few Just like 11.20 and 21

11.23 Alpha and Omega Do we not all think s14 is gonna end on a similar thematic note? Minus all the cliffhangery stuff?

12.01 Keep Calm and Carry On I can picture Dabb rubbing his hands together preparing to run the narrative in loops ad infinitum until he gets word they’ve got one season left to wrap it up. Worth it for the Dean and Mary and Cas. :’)

12.02 Mamma Mia https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/184126233100/cass-flashback-to-his-time-hunting-with-mary-as (written recently…)

12.03 The Foundry The companion notes to the link in the last episode: https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/187007192830/1203-the-foundry-yes-ive-already-written

12.04 American Nightmare If you haven’t noticed, I’m just pasting rewatch notes links now… >.> https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/184740345285/im-watching-1207-on-the-tnt-loop-and-yeah

12.05 The One You've Been Waiting For See the link at 12.04 (Dean also killed Hitler)

12.06 Celebrating the Life of Asa Fox see the link at 12.04 (Also Billie is in this one, so of course I think it’s important to the ongoing Dabb Era narrative)

12.07 Rock Never Dies see the link at 12.04 (Lucifer’s nihilism laid bare, no different from Michael’s in s14)

12.08 LOTUS The episode that brought us Jack. Well, eventually… I’m putting these notes here, even though they also cover 12.09: https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/184761652205/so-the-tnt-loop-has-continued-into-s12-and-after

12.09 First Blood (see above, plus Billie, plus Cas laying it out on the table what he will do because he loves the Winchesters... he does a lot of pining for Dean)

12.10 Lily Sunder Has Some Regrets Nephilim, Lily Sunder, Human souls as angelic power sources, the deceptions of heaven (and love versus obsession again). https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/184762915965/last-ep-on-the-tnt-loop-today-1210-reminders

12.11 Regarding Dean Watch this one, 100%. But also have my whole tag for this episode… I haven’t actually made rewatch notes for it recently, apparently? Which is a shame, because we have Sam working with Rowena, Dean riding Larry BEFORE losing his memories to a curse. There’s a lot of excellent character stuff in this one, for all of them.

12.12 Stuck in the Middle (With You) Watch this one. Cas is family. He loves them. This is the point I became frustrated with myself because there’s a huge gap in my hellatus rewatch notes that I thought I covered and apparently… did not… I don’t have recent notes to point you toward for convenience...

12.13 Family Feud Rowena gets her revenge on Crowley for making her kill Oskar in 10.23. Too much time travel wtf to even bother mentioning anything else.

12.14 The Raid The lengths Sam will go to to have any sort of relationship with Mary… including lying to and manipulating Dean. Vampires… and the Colt, and Sam finally kills the Alpha Vampire.

12.15 Somewhere Between Heaven and Hell between the Crowley and Lucifer drama, Sam kills the Alpha Hellhound (essentially). A lot of other deceptions and lies come to light though, and Cas disappears off to Heaven and from just one call, Dean’s already concerned about him. https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/184853801830/still-on-s12-in-the-tnt-loop-and-heck-s12-looks

12.16 Ladies Drink Free (covered in the notes linked in 12.15) Werewolves, and an actual werewolf cure.

12.17 The British Invasion (covered in the 12.17 post) Eileen is back for her last real episode.

12.18 The Memory Remains https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/184854556715/that-last-scene-of-1218-where-sam-and-dean-are

12.19 The Future https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/184875554515/i-find-it-endlessly-fascinating-that-i-can-rewatch (this post covers… most of the rest of s12 and loads of s13)

12.20 Twigs & Twine & Tasha Banes (see the link in 12.19)

12.21 There's Something About Mary Mary is being stripped of her will. And Free Will has been what this show has been about… forever. And what will be recontextualized in the wake of 14.20.

12.22 Who We Are And here’s where Mary’s will is restored to her.

12.23 All Along the Watchtower The proof of the spiral narrative. But also the point writing this post that I’ve determined this is all probably neither useful nor interesting to anyone other than myself, and I lose the ability to simply discuss these episodes individually anymore. From here on out, it becomes a weird blur of everything. This post is already over 14,000 words long and I still have 43 more entries to make, and I have no idea how to convey the meta import or Character Development highlights from this point forward. I don’t even know how to eliminate most of these from a watch list of essential character and meta points. So I’m just gonna… wing it…

13.01 Lost and Found Watch this one for the soul-crushing agony, and our intro to the Nougat.

13.02 The Rising Son Jack is nearly manipulated by the Kentucky Fried Demon

13.03 Patience Our second Wraith. Watch it for, if nothing else, Dean shouting down Sam about Cas.

13.04 The Big Empty TFW in group therapy with a shapeshifter. Cas vs the Empty, defending his life with a statement that he wants to live, but… again he is unclear on his mission going forward.

13.05 Advanced Thanatology Must watch for Billie, for Dean’s complete loss of hope, and Sam’s inability to “fix him” with things that worked in the past.

13.06 Tombstone Yeehaw! Cas is Dean’s big win.

13.07 War of the Worlds Michael has been effectively “playing God” in the AU. The first rumors that Rowena is actually alive after 12.23, and Cas is captured by Asmodeus, who manipulates the Winchesters into thinking Cas is still at liberty… That’s probably all you need to know. >.>

13.08 The Scorpion and the Frog https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/184946657745/so-im-still-out-ahead-of-the-tnt-loop-but-i (this also covers 13.15)

13.09 The Bad Place Wayward!

13.10 Wayward Sisters Wayward again!

13.11 Breakdown Donna! Wayward part 3! And the reminder (via Vampires) that not everyone who has a brush with the Supernatural will feel compelled to pick up a life of hunting.

13.12 Various & Sundry Villains Zombie! (which makes it relevant to Jack stuff even indirectly) Rowena! And Sam giving Rowena what she needed to protect herself, which honestly is what she’s been seeking since her introduction in s10. Sam. Just handed it to her. Let that sink in. Maybe watch the episode. It’s fun, anyway.

13.13 Devil's Bargain Heaven sucks. The bits about Sister Jo describing the feeling of weakened grace allowing her to feel a little bit human is relevant to our interests, though.

13.14 Good Intentions Watch this one. It sets up Cas’s special power to strip memories from a human mind, and the results of that. And Dean’s wishy-washiness about just telling Cas he’s wanted, not just needed.

13.15 A Most Holy Man (see 13.08)

13.16 Scoobynatural Dude… it’s scoobynatural. just watch it because you want to.

13.17 The Thing this post covers 13.17-13.20, for convenience’s sake: https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/184996231285/so-ive-watched-four-more-episodes-since-my-last

13.18 Bring 'em Back Alive (see above)

13.19 Funeralia Billie and Rowena, Sam’s “destiny” to kill Rowena, and Castiel’s forgiveness by Naomi in Heaven as she explains how badly heaven is broken and shows him to the door, knowing he won’t stay. This is a must watch.

13.20 Unfinished Business Revenge doesn’t fix anything.

13.21 Beat the Devil https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185000752455/still-watching-s13-and-1321-is-owie-but-im

13.22 Exodus (see 13.21) https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185000920730/dean-in-1322-so-close-to-ready-to-letting-all

13.23 Let the Good Times Roll (see 13.21) But I have a list for this episode… maybe just read my tag starting with the posts I made on May 19, 2019… https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185002926095/1323-vs-1420-lets-start-with-1323-jack-tell and https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185003462010/1323-was-so-ridiculous-i-mean-dean-basically

14.01 Stranger in a Strange Land At this point, I think everything is at least tangentially relevant… I mean look at this nonsense: https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185004920575/on-to-s14-and-one-of-dabbs-big-pet-themes-for

14.02 Gods and Monsters https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185014835950/aah-only-18-more-episodes-to-go-and-48-hours-to

14.03 The Scar https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185016627975/aah-1403-power-doesnt-fix-anything-dean-is

14.04 Mint Condition https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185018115175/im-gonna-lump-1404-and-1405-together-here-for

14.05 Nightmare Logic (covered in the post linked for 14.04)

14.06 Optimism https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185030339610/1406-jack-im-already-writing-isnt-that and https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185030940270/jack-vs-zombies

14.07 Unhuman Nature (see that first post in 14.06)

14.08 Byzantium https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185042798280/omg-wait-literally-in-1408-while-theyre-all

14.09 The Spear https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185043896890/haaaaa-1409-and-michaels-speech-at-the-end

14.10 Nihilism Not rewatch notes, but a post made after the episode aired: https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/182171684160/were-working-on-the-power-of-love

14.11 Damaged Goods https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185047861195/the-boxes-of-1411-omfg-a-demon-trapped-in-a-box

14.12 Prophet and Loss https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185048948905/aah-1412-tony-you-cant-you-cant-do-this

14.13 Lebanon https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185050918250/ive-been-holding-off-starting-1413-because-i

14.14 Ouroboros aka the point where I firmly believe they were 100% sure s15 would be the final season, and began actively setting up the endgame. (I mean I think they knew well before this, but this was where the turn happened narratively) https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185052705595/i-wrote-a-little-about-1414-earlier-today-in

14.15 Peace of Mind WHEEE! My delightful personal vendetta against Chip, the MotW, the direct Chuck parallel who even called himself a god, and who manipulated everyone else around him to make HIMSELF happy… like seriously, major definitely must rewatch. https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185074234960/mittensmorgul-once-again-in-1415-cas-is (I wrote so much about this episode it’s ridiculous)

14.16 Don't Go in the Woods https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185056380525/so-i-started-watching-1416-intending-to-write

14.17 Game Night (see 14.16)

14.18 Absence https://mittensmorgul.tumblr.com/post/185065385445/1418-and-1419-both-will-require-additional

14.19 Jack in the Box (see 14.18)

14.20 Moriah Writers lie. I think this is now officially my favorite episode of the series…

#s14 hellatus rewatch #spiders georg of the tnt loop #how the heck else can i tag this one i mean YIKES if any post ever qualified for the tag #too many episodes to tag them all #it is definitely THIS one yikes #and i never ever tag my posts this but #supernatural meta #destiel #samwitch

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mariemarvelbear · 5 years ago

Text

Who’s there

Avengers x Reader

Warning: Angst.So much Angst.Slow burn angst.Abuse.Mention of rape.Brainwashed.ANGST.Blood.Torture.Swearing.Kidnapping.

Part 26

The gates creaked open and the team marched into the fort. Fear and dread coursed through every knight’s veins, swarming like ants, dressed in blood-red scarlet. The team caught everyone off guard, the cavaliers not even prepared to offer a good fight against Earth’s mightiest heroes. No one was even sweating as they kill anyone trying to block their path towards the very end of the tower. Steve groaned, throwing his shield as it knocked off a handful of armies, Natasha somersaulting a knight that attacked her-Wanda and Pietro killing silently as the witch used her magic, her twin catching anyone off guard. Everyone was doing their tasks effortlessly; chuckling- Thor gazed at the captain and Tony at his far left “This is odd. They’re all…weak.” The mighty God mumbled, easily swinging Mjolnir; rolling his eyes as he saw a bunch of guards on their way to attack him- half of them dead as Bucky and Sam tackled them. Thor quickly regretted his statement, From the shadows of the mere guards a while ago, comes a creature along with a noise enough to make all of them look up. They lifted their heads in confusion, needing to ascertain what the hell was making that noise. They saw the thing-the guards becoming kronans-they heard its snapping and its new whining. Peter saw it rearing up, spinning in circles, pounding the dirt and the already previously trampled rapeseed with its foremost legs. Making a shoddy looking crop circle, with various elongated edges.Their legs snapped outwards no more than an inch, running towards them as all of them jump into a fighting stance. Wanda chuckled, Pietro looking at his sister weirdly- they’re in a fight and- the witch was smiling. But for Wanda, the guards transforming to kronans was a confirmation-that she was right. You’re here, and they’ll finally bring you home.Steve and the others finally catching up with her, and now-they would never give up now that they knew that you were alive and somewhere out there. So, It was right out of the same old playbook - dehumanize, destabilize, antagonize-anyone who’d come to their way.To get you home.

The scream that rent the air was as good as a siren. Nobody screams like that unless it is terror beyond endurance. It was unmistakably a child and a young one. Every head turned and several sets of legs sprinted in the direction of the cry, until a pair stopped the others. Wanda looked at Tony and Bucky who was on their way towards the direction she’s about to take “What was that?” Bucky muttered, confusion evident on their faces as they chase their breaths away. Fighting kronans wasn’t as easy as they all thought it to be, and as the numbers of the mentioned creatures multiply-Wanda knew the others would be needing these two towards the wing where they think you are detained. “ I don’t know.” Wanda lied, her heart sinking more as her powers worked perfectly-instantly knowing what that scream was-or who was it. “ I’ll check on it.Go, Help the others.” She sprinted away from the team, not giving the pair any more looks as Tony looked at her weird. Pietro quickly followed her, it was a millisecond just before he was already in front of her “You feel something?” He knew her too well, and he knew that the way she was sprinting and panting-it had to be urgent, enough to pull her out of her trance on getting towards you. The real mission. Wanda gulped, looked away at her brother as they both fought the guards that was stopping them. Oh, how badly she wanted to be wrong. “What is it?Wanda?You’ve got to answer me sis.”

Wanda was about to answer Pietro was gone, he was behind her holding a pillar that was about to fall off just right to her head. “How can you not feel that?!” He yelled, angry as to why she didn’t even feel the force nor the sound it made. “What’s going on Wanda?”

“They need you there ‘silver.” Their heads turn, seeing the other red-head; her eyes direct to Wanda’s ones. “We’ve got this.” Pietro was about to oppose when Wanda told him to go, Pietro didn’t understand. But he knows his girls knows what their doing. Quickly, the three went on their ways. As the two woman sprint towards the end of the hall, the primal yelps of need getting louder.

“Mama!I want to see my Mama!”

“Is it-“ Natasha gasped, her eyes wide as both of them opened the doors- “Eviana?”

“It’s not.” Wanda mumbled, her eyes filled with tears as she dare star at the blue doe one’s looking at her- “It’s her child.”

The acrid smell of stale gunpowder envelops in Steve’s nasal cavities. The war has grudged on for five years now. And their sanity was on the verge of extinction. Looking around, all they can see are stray limbs and dead creatures - once fine young men, women and kronans, who now are no longer recognizable as human. Then the gunfire starts, yet again. The fight continues, as all of them were on their own assigned wing. Him, Tony, Thor, Clint and Bruce took the North, As the others took the South, East and West wing.

Tony panted, he may have looked calm on the exterior, but he was locked in his own mind, his own anxiety and worries were paralyzing him. The visions of losing you the first time kept playing like a recording stuck on replay; he could hear the screams as if he were in that moment again right now. How could he possibly survive that loss again? Losing you once, one of the people he loved the most in the world was traumatic enough- but if he ever knows that this day would end and they wouldn’t be on the winning end -yet again, he knows it would destroy him.

“Isn’t this a delight?” A loud eerie voice stunned the men, fighting their way towards the end of the hall. No one ever expected to hear him ever talk again, that this was the end of their mission; of finding you, as Korvac stood tall in front all of them-behind his team of growling creatures. “I can’t help but feel disappointed Captain,” He smirked, irking everyone as Steve took a stance in the middle-ready to battle, more than ever. “It took you and your team five years to find her. Made yourselves fool for one of my tricks!Ha!” He laughed, Tony growling at the sound of his chuckles lingering with pride and mischievousness, remembering Mystique and how they were all fools to fall to his trap,letting you down even more.

“You son of a bitch.” Clint was the first one to answer, anger boiling up in him just like the rest of his teammates.

“Oh,I thought your captain didn’t like that kind of talk?” Korvac jested, his eyes all knowing as if to say that he indeed was watching them for a long time before taking you in captivity.

“It’s you.” Tony threatened, “We can say whatever the fuck we do.” Korvac loved what he was seeing. The men in front of him was evidently heartbroken, shattered really, robbed of anything that is necessary to put their souls back together.And it was because of him, He won and the Avengers lost.

“Finish them.” Korvac exclaimed, his eyes wide as his minions of kronans growled their way towards the already in-fight Avengers men. “Make sure no one enters the Queen’s quarters.”

The sounds of gunfire and explosions filled the hall along with their comms, As Tony tried and summon any of the team, “Hello?Anyone?!We found Korvac!” Steve grabbed Tony’s arm as a group of kronans was about to ambush them from behind, the billionaire looked at the Captain with wide eyes-panting as both of them started fighting again,killing the creatures with no remorse.

Steve and Tony ran towards the end of the hall as fast as their legs would allow. Their eyes locking to Korvac’s golden ones, instantly-Korvac was floating as Tony tried to charge towards him with his repulsor beam. “You’re a coward!” Tony grunted.

“You call me a coward?!I did everything I wanted. I planned it perfectly, and I got what I want- and all of you fell into my trap. You were all suffering and devastated enough to not know that the girl in front of you wasn’t the girl your looking for!You’re all idiots, fools!” Korvac spat, proud of his actions as he charge his power towards the two, completely missing them but enough to separate and distance them from him. “And Eviana,”

“She was perfect.So perfect.” He mumbled, his eyes going back to it’s human colors as he daydreamed about you. “ So innocent of everything. And no one of you dare to teach her how to be a proper woman!She was a masterpiece waiting to be noticed-And then I saw her, in the news back at Midgard.She was a goddess, But then- years later, I saw her with the god of thunder and his brother-walking in the garden back at Asgard,and the stories pale in comparison to her beauty when looked upon with my own eyes.”

Every word stung, only fueling the fire that burned inside of Steve and Tony as they listen to what Korvac did to her, on what he meant on “teaching her to be a proper woman.”. You can see it first in Tony’s eyes, then a tension of his muscles, an inability to think clearly soon followed. His rationality was long gone and offline and the primitive Tony who reverted to his old habits was in the room-and suddenly his liberal opinions were gone, his ability for nuance and emotional generosity were gone too-just like with Steve, as.every phrase violated him and was like gasoline to the anger boiling in his heart, his fists began to clench as his jaw rooted. “What did you do to her!” Steve couldn’t take it anymore, He felt the tears brimming his eyes as he forcefully threw his shield towards the deity’s head-knocking him out. There was stillness on both sides. If hatred was visible the air would have been scarlet. Then suddenly movement, so much force in every blow. Tony and Steve rained blows onto Korvac’s as if they meant to smash him into the very earth and Korvac did the same.Thor swung Mjolnir perfectly toward’s Korvac’s head.Tony was quick to follow as he let his repulsor beamed with its highest force of power directly hitting Korvac, as Thor followed their lead as he let his surge of power combine with Tony’s. Bruce’s eyes widen as he witnessed a different set of beam merge and blend with Tony’s and Thor’s-Vision’s. Each didn't just want the other dead, they wanted him smashed, obliterated, nothing left to bury.

Clint,Bruce and Pietro backed down as the felt the heat of the trio’s power, all of them knew that it would be impossible for him to bear that and still be alive-or even be conscious.

Pietro was quick enough to notice that no one was guarding the room at the end of the hall, it’s golden gate made his and Clint’s heart beat faster. It was the only door different to all of the other’s rooms, and it only had to mean one thing. “It’s the King and Queen’s quarters.” Bruce mumbled, his throat dry as all of them hear shuffling and sniffing at the other side of the door.

“Who’s there?”

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langwrites · 5 years ago

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Lang Plays Fire Emblem: Three Houses

So a while ago I said I was planning on playing the story routes in this order: Blue Lions, Black Eagles, Church of Seiros, and then Golden Deer.

The Golden Deer made a liar out of me.

So, here’s an approximation of What Happened During Verdant Wind.

So many spoilers below the cut, you guys. I do a lot of route comparisons.

Okay, I’ve been staring at the “which house do you want” selection screen for an embarrassing amount of time.

This shouldn’t be hard. I had a plan.

But no.

I clicked the Golden Deer, just like that. What the fuck, Claude. I blame you.

Immediately upon talking to this rop of students again, I can feel the difference in the social group from what the Lions were like. The latter were really a bunch of noble kids around their prince, and they felt really tight-knit. Classic Fire Emblem starter crew.

The Golden Deer is the fucking Scooby Gang.

First impressions of individuals:

Raphael, thank goodness, is the one character who absolutely has his shit in order. Sure, he’s bad at book work and thinks everything comes down to MUSCLES, but all of his emotional issues are handled by the time he arrives at Garreg Mach. He’s the brightest of sunshines.

Ignatz needs some more confidence in his art, and also I want to see his painting of Seiros. Now, if only both of his offensive stats and growths weren’t incredibly bad.

I was so close to making him my dancer. Just because he sure as hell wasn’t gonna be useful anywhere else.

Lorenz! I don’t like him. His haircut is a monstrosity.

Leonie! We are going. To be. Besties. Even though the timing of your support conversations are incredibly bad.

Marianne no please don’t be sad everyone loves you

Hilda is the greatest enabler I have ever seen. By which I mean she enables other people to do all her work for her.

Lysithea is going to have the last word with God. And especially he Death Knight.

And finally Claude! Teamwork makes the dream work, so obviously meme work does the same.

I’m sorry.

PRE-TIMESKIP

Mock battle! Marianne’s great and I love her and also the only healer oh god.

OKAY. I have access to New Game+ bonuses. What do I do first?

Immediately crank the Professor Level stat to max to avoid ever having to run short of activity points again.

Next, raise all skills I can’t easily get to at least Rank D+. HEAVY ARMOR IN PARTICULAR.

Third: Boost supports with people whose support ranks are an absolute pain in the ass to earn. Lookin’ at you, Rhea.

Also, put glasses on Byleth (named “Yuri” for this playthrough). Glasses are the bomb. I am the evil genius.

LEVEL GRINDING TIME.

It’s a lot harder with Blacksmith access being story-locked, but I can do this!

As a direct result, every single battle after this point is a complete curbstomp in my favor. Because the grind don’t stop.

I broke a lot more weapons than last time, though.

I will befriend Leonie and Ferdinand if it’s the last fucking thing I do. I will befriend everyone, and I will not get timeskip-locked out of supports! >:(

Ferdinand was my first recruit. Oh dear.

Okay, there are like five born cavaliers in this game. Leonie, Ferdinand, Lorenz, Sylvain, and I guess Dimitri if you’re on the right route.

Last time, Sylvain was a great paladin and a decent Dark Knight before he started getting one- or two-stat level ups for like thirty levels. Similarly, Dimitri was great until all his ultra-secret-awesome promotions didn’t use a fucking horse.

Contrast Leonie who, despite sitting out 99% of the game out of spite from me getting locked out of her support chain, went to endgame with a ten-level deficit and still rocked.

Ferdinand didn’t count since I failed to recruit him last time and he died. These two facts are directly related.

I didn’t use Lorenz at all; I recruited him to keep from having to kill him later.

This time, Lorenz straight-up sucks, Sylvain did the terrible level dance for like the entire game, and Dimitri’s not recruitable.

Contrast, again, Leonie. Her support chain with the player character is hot garbage, but she plowed through most of the game as a mainstay of my team and made it to Bow Knight first out of anyone.

Bernadetta and Ashe as Bow Knights don’t even come close to being as durable as she is, except for Ashe’s absolutely bananas Resistance. 29?! WHY?!

And Ferdinand is also awesome. His only real weak point is Resistance, but he doesn’t need it. He dodge-tanks everything, is faster than Leonie, and has two Saints’ relics he unknowingly stole from Seteth.

He still talks in MLA format, though.

I started putting off recruiting people so I wouldn’t have to level-grind them up to par with the rest of my team.

But if these people wanna join, of course I’m saying yes.

Lord Lonato’s rebellion and Miklan yoinking the Lance of Ruin feel way less relevant on a Golden Deer playthrough than on a Blue Lions one. None of the Herd really know who the hell these people are.

I say that despite having already recruited Sylvain for this playthrough and deploying him in the relevant level. He wasn’t treated as there by the game’s preamble cutscenes.

At least the Holy Mausoleum stuff feels more...handled? Claude actually asks questions about rebellion and about the “assassination plot,” where Dimitri didn’t really.

OKAY SO there’s this whole plot thing where Flayn goes missing for a month. With the Blue Lions, this is handled like a manhunt. Dimitri’s seriousness about the issue rubs off on everyone except Sylvain, and Felix actually correctly identifies the culprit almost instantly. He doesn’t know he’s done it, though, because basically everyone is just throwing out accusations. Manuela is the real MVP.

CONTRAST THE DEER. The very first meeting reads like a Scooby Doo episode, when they’re piling up clues and throwing out suggestions like the gang of goofball teenagers they are. Claude’s got this group running like Persona 4′s Investigation Team. None of them are jaded or frantic, they’re just doing this.

Why did Rhea entrust the investigation to a herd of teenagers.

Anyway, the rest proceeds as usual.

I don’t know why the game tries to drop the same set of hints for each route. “OoooowoooooOOOOoooo, your house leader might be the FLAME EMPEROR.”

The Flame Emperor wears heels. And is still too short to be either Claude or Dimitri. Especially Dimitri. Who the fuck let this kid get so tall.

The only real result of all this bullshit is that my wyvern-riding sniper of doom is not available during the first map where Yuri personally beat the Death Knight into the ground.

Which, by the by, was hilariously cathartic.

It doesn’t exactly matter, since the only unit who can make real use of the Dark Mage and Dark Bishop classes is unrecruitable, but bragging rights.

Remire Village’s drama is about as bad while playing as the Golden Deer. One of the foreshadowing cutscenes, though is excellent:

Claude actually finds a book that depicts The Immaculate One before its debut, only to have it confiscated by Seteth and learn that it wasn’t a library book at all; it belonged to “Tomas.” Like, all of his suspicions--which he shares with the player--start lining up. Censorship! Monsters! Sword of the Creator! What the hell is going on here??

Dimitri’s version of the cutscene involves him being caught investigating Lord Arundel by the player and Sothis. Which--since his route doesn’t meaningfully deal with the Morlocks faction aside from steamrolling them as incidental opponents--seems kinda useless.

Kicked the Death Knight into submission again out of spite.

Sylvain was useful! Mostly because I had him sit there and distract the incidentals while Claude and Lysithea cleaned house, but still!

Claude is the only lord character who seems to understand that the transforming Morlock faction probably needs to be taken more seriously. For the remainder of Part One, no one does so.

Rhea you’ve got some ‘splainin to do.

Marianne’s my team’s dancer this time. She’s a sweetheart. She seemed happy to be asked and to pursue the lessons, and being able to use Physic is a good trait in someone who’s nearly always going to be waaaaay behind the rest of the group.

Dad-stabbing happened.

Again.

Boop boop Solon’s dead.

Again.

Dear diary: I learned the definition of irony and set the Flame Emperor on fire.

I kid.

But Claude took her out in one completely overpowered shot, because crits are a thing, Flame Emperor class skills don’t reduce damage enough to survive it, and his Dex stat is through the fucking roof. And he was on a wyvern at the time because fuck it, why not.

Claude’s reaction to all of this is a minor letdown compared to the fully-rendered cutscene in the last route.

This would become something of a trend--taking out OP bosses with unexpected critical hits.

I didn’t expect to like Lorenz and now I do. How.

This is hilarious simply because he seems to be the only character that Mercedes hates. What the fuck, man.

Once again, Edelgard invades! Once again, I drop someone unexpected on her head!

Not really. It was Yuri.

Yuri does the timeskip shuffle and we’ll see everyone again after a nap.

FIVE YEARS LATER.

Aw, Claude was waiting for Yuri to show up. Adorable.

The post-meetup fight is actually harder than it was in the BL route, despite excessive level-grinding. This is due to three factors:

Claude is automatically on a wyvern, meaning that he has inherent class vulnerability to archers on a map with at least five of them. And less range than they did, for some fucking reason.

Lorenz and Ignatz started out on the same corner of the map and both of them are shitty offensive units who could barely kill a mage between them. (Neither of Ignatz’s offensive stats cracked 20 for another thirteen levels.)

I don’t have Ashe and his personal skill Locktouch, and nobody started with a Chest Key or Door Key, which meant I had to keep various enemies alive long enough to steal all of their stuff. And the enemy item drops came up one short of the number of chests on the map. I want my stuff, dammit.

LET’S MAKE A SCENE.

Randolph, as a boss in Verdant Wind, did not get any better at figuring out when he’s outmatched. Therefore, I killed him with Raphael again.

At least he straight-up died this time.

Claude didn’t even get to set the damn place on fire.

Ingrid is turning out to be way better of a unit this time than she was last time. She’s a little slower, but a lot stronger.

FELIX, WHERE THE FUCK WAS ALL THIS STRENGTH HIDING LAST TIME. YOU’RE TEN POINTS AHEAD OF THE GUY WHO HAS STORY-BASED SUPER STRENGTH.

AND SPEED.

Iiiiiiiiit’s JUDITH!

She only shows up on one map in the entire Azure Moon route, and that’s a damn shame. She’s so cool in Verdant Wind.

A lord-class character who isn’t also a Lord! WOO!

Also her spies are better than anybody’s apparently.

I am choosing to believe that because Ingrid’s family is related to Judith’s, her badassery in this route is the direct result of meeting her distant cousin and absorbing badass radiation.

There’s something funny about having to pull one over on Lorenz’s dad to get anything done. The Great Bridge falls not to power, but Claude baiting Count Gloucester’s entire army to be somewhere else. (FEAR THE DEER.)

As a result, Ladislava dies alone. (As opposed to taking Ferdinand with her due to plot shenanigans.)

Lysithea and Ferdinand’s paralogue was really quite sad, for all that the only named guy who died was deeply unsympathetic. Ferdinand’s dad was an asshole, but he wasn’t the asshole for this particular scenario, and now both of his parents are gone. :(

Felix...hasn’t heard from his dad in a while. Worrying.

Oh, and Caspar’s uncle is still dead, in case we were keeping track of that.

Dorothea’s happier with Ferdinand alive. She did an impression of the Gatekeeper. :3

Gronder Field! FUCK.

I delayed playing this chapter for two solid days because I already knew what was gonna happen. Specifically: Edelgard gets injured and evacuated, and Dimitri drops of exhaustion just in time to get run through like ten times by the Emperor’s rearguard.

I eventually got my shit together enough to do the thing.

Marianne, Raphael, and Ferdinand went after the Kingdom army first. Leonie and Felix hung back and then reinforced them after taking out the archer on the central hill.

Claude killed everyone in the center of the map, which meant Edelgard set the entire hill on fire and if Bernadetta had not been recruited she would’ve burned to death there on the spot.

Ahem.

I sent Yuri to clear the entire left side of the map by herself.

She succeeded.

Raphael KO’d Dimitri with a luck Gauntlet crit, got blasted down to half health by a Warlock, then plunked ineffectually at Dedue until Marianne used her Levin Sword to sort him out.

Ferdinand killed everyone else on that side of the map.

Claude once again got the kill on Edelgard with a lucky crit, after Yuri had killed everyone else (up to and including the Demonic Beasts) single-handedly.

And then the plot moved on. Hilda’s account of Dimitri’s death was awful, Dedue’s reaction was worse, and off we go to punch Edelgard’s teeth in.

Again.

Annette’s dad is probably dead now.

Felix’s, too.

(I THOUGHT WE WERE DONE WITH THE DAD-STABBING.)

FOOOOOORT MERCEUS.

No matter how many times I think about it, Claude’s Almyran army reinforcements only make so much sense. How the hell and fuck did he manage to sneak an entire foreign army across a whole country to help with one battle?

But hey, they’re here, and Claude almost admitted the reason why he could do that. And the arrow greeting between him and Nader was cool.

(Spoiler: On top of being the Alliance’s leader, he’s also the crown prince of Almyra!)

The Death Knight had the gall to run from my army.

Yuri punched his ticket for the third time, which was not the charm.

And then Fort Merceus took an intercontinental ballistic missile and suddenly defeating the fort’s garrison feels a lot less triumphant.

Spot the miscolored eyes in this cutscene!

Welp. Fuck it, we’re off to Enbarr. Time to also punch Hubert this time! What a change of pace.

Eyyy, it’s the Enbarr map. I totally forgot to bring Seteth and Flayn along to check out the opera house, despite a whole bunch of characters talking about how they totally wanted to check that place out at some point. No room for deadweights in a map that has SO MANY ARCHERS.

Managed to get the special dialogue between Ferdinand and Hubert, and now I’m sad again.

Killed Hubert with Claude.

And because this is a two-part map, we immediately run off to chase down Edelgard. Due to the player army not doing a really weird 180 in the middle of the plot to kick Cornelia out of Fhirdiad, she didn’t have time to turn into a giant demonic thing! She just has WAY TOO MANY MAGES.

Strategy: Forget what Door Keys are, split the team by Avoid rating, and go to town.

Claude nearly died thanks to a critical mass of Gremories and Mortal Savants (and still, what the fuck is that name), but Dedue-as-guest-character didn’t, so I count that as a win! His defense was so high that the Giant Demonic Beast couldn’t even scratch him.

Claude, Petra, and Ingrid all having Alert Stance as a skill means dodge-tanking is hilariously easy.

Also, Ingrid was supposed to just take a chunk out of Edelgard’s HP bar for the final assault and ended up crit-killing her on the first attack. With a bog-standard silver lance.

Weird as the situation turned out, I guess that means one of Dimitri’s friends really did avenge him after saying they would. Even if Dedue was the only one who had a special cutscene about it.

We rescued Rhea! And the characters being happy about it doesn’t mean I’m happy about it. I want answers, same as Claude, and being forced to RP Yuri being oh so worried about Rhea’s safety felt incredibly disingenuous.

Claude actually yells at her over the “...” she seems to think is an explanation. THE TIME FOR SECRETS IS PAST.

WHY DID ALL THIS SHIT HAPPEN.

WE’VE BEEN AT WAR FOR FIVE YEARS.

A WHOLE BUNCH OF PEOPLE DIED HORRIBLY FOR BASICALLY NOTHING.

Incidentally, this is why I didn’t end up playing Edelgard’s route as planned. Her logic for kicking two other sovereign countries in the balls felt incredibly self-centered.

At least Catherine’s happy. Same with Alois and the rest of the Church crew.

They are soon going to be not as happy.

I’m filling out the ENTIRE support log before endgame. I have absolutely no idea what characters are going to end up together as a direct result.

The last conversation? Seteth and Manuela’s A+ support!

Because so many of the support conversations are romantic at A/A+ level, I guess we’ve managed to turn this ragtag army into a polyarmory.

Oh boy, Thales sure is a sore loser.

I say, as though I didn’t kill EVERYONE he knew over the course of an hour and also split his skull open under Seteth’s axe. His racism would have keeled his ass over before death set in.

That sure is a ICBM.

GOD DAMMIT RHEA, THERE WAS SUPPOSED TO BE A Q&A SESSION AFTER THIS.

WHY DOES EVERYONE WHOSE JOB IS EXPOSITION UP AND DIE.

Meanwhile: THE UBER-DEAD PEOPLE.

Claude, your route is batshit. What is this genre anymore?!

I wanna point out that, despite seeing Rhea/Seiros do the dragon thing, the player character never told Claude what the fuck that was about. I feel like one of the first things I would have done after the class reunion would be going, “By the by, did anyone else notice the fucking dragon?!” WHO IS ALSO THE POPE???

Bah.

ANYWAY. Looooong-overdue exposition time!

I notice that Rhea didn’t out Seteth or Flayn, which was nice of her.

Claude, she can turn into a fucking dragon. I don’t think immortality is that far from being plausible.

GOD DAMMIT NEMESIS, CAN YOU FUCK OFF FOR TEN MORE MINUTES.

Uuuuuuugh fine, fuck everything, I’m putting your head on a pike.

CLAUDE, THE SWORD OF THE CREATOR LOOKS LIKE A SPINE.

OF COURSE IT’S MADE OF BONES. A BUNCH OF THE HEROES’ RELICS MOVE ON THEIR OWN!

The frantic music is not helping.

Time to kill a bandit king.

“My flabber is completely gasted by now.” Okay, that made me laugh.

Nemesis’s boss mechanic is pretty neat. To kill him at all, you need to kill all of the minibosses in the level and take down his friendship-based-plot-armor.

Or it would be, if I didn’t already make a habit of steamrolling everyone else on the field before tackling the boss at the end.

CUTSCENE.

Cutscene lesson: “Fuck honor duels.” It’s time for CHAIN SWORD LIMBO.

Claude, your bow shoots LASERS. SINCE WHEN.

Also getting kicked across the field by a dude twice his size didn’t seem to actually affect his mood much.

Awww, Yuri smiles now. Adorable. :D

AND THAT’S A WRAP.

Pairings: Yuri/Sothis (mostly to get them out of the way and see what everyone else would do), Claude/Petra, Raphael/Marianne, Catherine/Shamir, Lorenz/Mercedes, Ashe/Annette, Felix/Sylvain (bad end; the former straight up disappears), Seteth & Flayn wander off, Manuela/Dorothea, Lysithea/Linhardt (again), Leonie/Ignatz, Ferdinand/Bernadetta, Caspar/Hilda, and a couple of people are alone. Cyril gets to actually be a student after the story’s done, though!

Whew, that was fun. Gonna mix up the pairs a bit next time I play through the endgame and see what happens.

#fire emblem three houses #Lang plays Fire Emblem: Three Houses #Lang Plays #spoilers #long post #fire emblem

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lockdaisy · 6 years ago

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Unpopular Opinion: Shinobu's Ultimately in the Wrong and Law’s Justified in his Feelings of Anger against Her

Ok, since it seems like everyone and their mother in the fandom and in the narrative itself has set up a Shinobu defense squad and is 100% devoted to shutting down any criticisms of her, I know that this is going to be an extremely unpopular opinion, but still, I just wanna say it

Honestly, I don’t think any of Shinobu’s treatment of Law in the past few chapters (accusing his crewmates of betraying the alliance and threatening to kill them) was justified in any way whatsoever, and I believe that Law’s right in feeling angry at her

I mean...

1. It’s at least partially Shinobu’s fault that Penguin, Shachi, and Bepo were captured and are being tortured

Before they were captured, Bepo, Penguin, and Shachi were dutifully laying low and carrying out their part of the plan in the Flower Capital. However, most likely because of the heightened security at the Flower Capital, they ended up getting captured and tortured. Now, pray tell, what caused this heightened security in the first place? Why, it was caused at least in part by Shinobu, Nami, and Robin causing chaos in Orochi’s palace and messing around in the bathhouse for no discernible reason. Consequently, Shinobu’s at least in part responsible for Law’s crewmates being captured and tortured

Granted, Shinobu didn’t mean for that to happen. Nevertheless, regardless of whether she meant for it to happen or not, she should take at least some sort of responsibility for the suffering that her fuck-ups helped inflict on Law’s crew

And just... listen, Shinobu blaming Bepo, Shachi, and Penguin for being in a situation that the consequences of her own mistakes are at least partially responsible for putting them in is a really bad look, ok??

2. The emotional reasoning underlying her accusations and threats falls flat because of her actions

Apparently, according to literally every character who was present at the scene, Law’s anger at Shinobu is overblown and unreasonable because the reason why she did what she did is that she’s frustrated over seeing the plan 20 years in the making go awry and that all of them have to take any and all precautions whatsoever to prevent their plans from falling apart since “this isn’t a game.”

On its own, this statement seems incredibly fair. However, just two chapters before she accused and threatened Law’s crew, Shinobu was just messing around in the bathhouse for no reason and ended up getting exposed because of it (which, as I mentioned before, helped cause the heightened security that led to the capture and torture of Law’s crew). As a result, because her cavalier actions contradict her assertion that “this isn’t a game,” Shinobu herself makes it seem like the situation not only isn’t all that dire, but that it certainly isn’t serious enough to threaten to kill Law’s crew, which is never a declaration that you should throw around lightly. Similarly, because her carefree and risky frolicking at the bathhouse contradicts her assertion that that they have to take any and all precautions possible to prevent the plan from getting ruined, Shinobu not only comes across as a massive hypocrite, but it also seems like she’s selectively picking and choosing which types of risks she’s willing to allow, and apparently while messing around in the bathhouse is an “acceptable” risk that isn’t worthy of censure, Law’s crew getting captured is worthy of death

3. Out of all the allies that were captured, Shinobu specifically and only accuses Law’s crew of betraying the alliance

Like... pretty much any of those captured allies--and many who weren’t--could’ve leaked the plans, and yet she automatically accuses specifically and only Law’s crew of betraying the alliance!!

Granted, in comparison to the other allies, who are presumably people she knows very well, the Heart Pirates are practically strangers to her, which might explain why she’s much more willing to lay the blame on Law’s crew rather than on any of her other allies. However, she doesn’t even entertain the possibility that it could’ve been one of them and that Law’s crew is innocent. Like, it’s not a case of her going “oh, there must be a traitor, and because I’m almost completely sure that it wasn’t any of our Wano allies that leaked our plans, do you think it’s possible that the Heart Pirates betrayed the alliance?” Instead, it’s a case of her going, “It’s 100% certainly a fact that Law’s crew betrayed the alliance, and I’m going to kill them for it.” And listen, considering the weight of these accusations and the fact that she’s apparently planning to kill whoever snitched, it looks really bad that she’s just immediately rushing to blame Law’s crew of betrayal

Also, her immediate accusation of Law’s crew looks even worse when you consider the fact that she never even entertains the possibility that other non-Wano allies that she doesn’t know all that well--such as Luffy--could’ve been the ones to leak the plan instead!! Yeah, Shinobu saw how strong-willed Luffy was when he attacked Kaido, but she still doesn’t know him well enough to know that he wouldn’t squeal if he were tortured. And while we as an audience know that Luffy would never do such a thing, Shinobu doesn’t, making the reasoning underlying her insults against and apparent decision to kill Law’s crew seem even more arbitrary. I mean, she’s just singling out the Heart Pirates for pretty much no reason by now!! And considering that she’s seemingly arbitrarily singling them out for the purposes of accusing them of being traitors and threatening to kill them, it just looks really, really bad!!!

4. Shinobu never took back her words or apologized

Listen, I understand that Shinobu said these things in the heat of the moment out of frustration and panic. I understand. But listen, accusations of betrayal and death threats against one’s crew are never things that should be said lightly. These are serious and grave things that can pretty much amount to a declaration of war. So if Shinobu took back what she said and apologized to Law after she got scolded by Kanjuro, while I would be thinking that she’s playing a real dangerous game saying such serious things, I could ultimately view her actions as not being damning

However, the fact of the matter is... she never took back what she said or apologized. As a result, Shinobu is essentially sending Law the message that she not only isn’t sorry for insulting and threatening to kill his crew without any real justification, but that she stands by it and that she really did mean every single word of it

Like can you imagine if Shinobu not only insulted but threatened to kill members of the Straw Hat crew who were captured and being tortured, but also refused to apologize after the fact?? Luffy would be furious. Like, Law’s in this exact same situation, and??? Honestly??? I don’t blame Law at all for getting upset

5. Speaking of that, think about how Luffy would’ve reacted in this same exact scenario and how we as a fandom would’ve reacted as well

If it were Nami, Zoro, and Sanji instead of Shachi, Penguin, and Bepo who were captured and being tortured, and Shinobu were accusing them of being snitches and threatening to kill them, Luffy would be unimaginably pissed at her. Not only that, but the narrative would be treating her as a bad guy as well, and we as a fandom would rake her over the coals. But apparently, if it’s Law’s crew that it’s happening to, then all of a sudden the narrative and the fandom and narrative as a whole decide to bend backwards in order to justify everything that she said??? What??????

6. She did the exact same thing she accused Law’s crew of doing and that she threatened to kill them for

Shinobu accuses Law’s crew of leaking valuable intel to the enemy and threatens to kill them for it, yet like 15 minutes after Law leaves she basically spills all the plan’s details to someone she outright admitted she doesn’t even know??? What???? Listen, this is another case of Shinobu seeming like a hypocrite--apparently if she or one of her friends does it, it’s forgivable, but if Law’s crew does it, then they’re worthy of death smh

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Overall, you gotta admit that, on every front, it makes Shinobu look bad and it makes the narrative’s depiction of them being in a “they’re both right, so you can’t blame either” situation look... really unfair to Law at best, let’s be honest here

Also, another reason why this annoys me so bad is that the narrative is??? doing everything to make Law look unreasonable in this situation???? Like

1) Nobody backed Law up during the argument at all. Shinobu literally threatened to kill his crew, but apparently nobody aside from Law was upset by this or felt the need to have Law’s back in this situation

2) Contrastingly, several characters leapt to Shinobu’s defense by trying to rationalize her behavior by saying “don’t be angry at her, think about her ~feelings~ in this situation”

3) The way several characters discuss Law after he leaves (“geez/sigh, he just stormed off”) basically makes it look like they’re portraying Law as an unreasonable drama queen throwing a hissy fit just because he’s angry that, y’know, Shinobu threatened to kill his crew

4) The casual way that they’re talking about Bepo, Penguin, and Shachi’s situation, aka conversationally musing over how long they would last if they were in their shoes, really trivializes the direness of their circumstances and makes it look even more like they think Law’s getting angry over nothing

Just... I absolutely love the Straw Hats, and I absolutely love Law (Law, Sanji, Nami, Usopp, and Luffy are like in my top ten faves of the series). So I hate how uncharacteristically callous the narrative’s defense of Shinobu makes the Straw Hats seem to be right now in regards to Law’s feelings and the safety of their Heart Pirates allies, and I hate how this basically makes many of Law’s interactions with others in this arc cases where Law has genuinely been treated like garbage by his allies when before it was more of a lighthearted “oh, Law’s suffering because of the alliance” gag

#listen is this a Shinobu hate post? No. It's more of a criticism of how the narrative's defense of her gives off really bad implications #trafalgar law #heart pirates #bepo #penguin #shachi #my stuff #opspoilers #op #queue #long post #lockdaisy rants #technically I am so I'm using the tag #tw: murder mention #tw: death mention #tw: torture mention #tw: violence mention

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jennycalendar · 7 years ago

Text

Imperfections (27/?)

ao3

i love @strelkatherocketdog lots

“Lagos is out of luck,” Buffy informed Giles as she entered. Jenny looked up, feeling a vague sense of nausea. “I got the magic mitten thingy.” She stopped, looking around the room. “What's with all the tragedy masks?”

The gravity of the situation was suddenly hitting Jenny very hard. For Buffy to be that cavalier when she was hiding Angel from all of them—as much as Jenny had meant her advice to Rupert, there was a part of her that was starting to really understand how little Buffy had thought about Angelus’s impact on her. Her research on the cure, her hours of torture…Jenny was pretty sure that Buffy had thought about not telling Rupert, but she had a feeling that Buffy hadn’t thought much of not telling her.

“Better take a seat, Buffy,” said Rupert heavily.

Xander got up out of his chair, moved it to the head of the table, and stepped away to stand next to Cordelia. A little warily, Buffy stepped over to the chair. “What's going on?” she asked apprehensively, sitting down.

Jenny stepped closer to Rupert, taking his hand. Rupert held it tightly without looking up. “We know Angel is alive,” he said without preamble. Buffy’s eyes widened with shock and guilt, but she didn’t argue. “Xander saw you with him. It would appear that you've been hiding him and that you lied to us.”

“Nobody's here to blame you, Buffy,” Willow added. “But this is serious. You need help.”

Buffy looked up at Willow. “It's not what you think,” she began.

“Hope not,” said Xander coldly. “Because I think you're harboring a vicious killer.”

“Xander,” said Jenny, gripping Rupert’s hand. Buffy’s eyes went to her, and she resisted the sudden urge to bury her face in Rupert’s shoulder and block out the entire discussion.

“This isn't about attacking Buffy,” Willow cut in. “Remember, 'I' statements only. 'I feel angry.' 'I feel worried.'”

“Fine,” said Cordelia. “Here's one: I feel worried…about me! Last time around, Angel barely laid a hand on Buffy. He was way more interested in setting up hour-long torture sessions with Giles and Ms. Calendar.”

“But he's better now,” Buffy persisted.

“Better for how long, Buffy?” Xander inquired angrily. “I mean, did you even think about that?”

Suddenly, something hit Jenny. Angel being better now— “The curse,” she said.

All eyes went to her. “Yeah, we’ve covered that,” said Xander sarcastically.

“Xander, not now,” said Jenny, her voice shaking. “Buffy—did the curse work?”

“Is that really our priority right now?” Xander asked. No one answered him.

Buffy faltered. “I don’t—didn’t Giles tell you?”

Rupert flinched.

Jenny turned towards Rupert. “Tell me what?” she said. Rupert looked down and didn’t answer. “Tell me what?” she repeated.

“I didn’t—” Rupert looked up at her with pleading eyes. “I thought—if I’d known—you said Angelus was back, and then I thought it wasn’t relevant, or that Buffy must have been mistaken, and if I’d told you, it would have destroyed you to know—”

“God, every time I think you’re finally being honest with me, something always comes up, doesn’t it?” Jenny demanded, more out of fear than anything else. It had been a long time since she’d seen Rupert look that guilty.

“Giles, Ms. Calendar, I don’t think now is the time,” said Willow nervously.

“No, this is important.” Jenny tugged her hand free of Rupert’s, crossing her arms in front of her chest. “Rupert, what are you not telling me?”

“Angel was cured when Buffy sent him to hell,” said Rupert quietly. “Your restoration ritual did the trick.”

Jenny felt like she’d been punched in the stomach. “My ritual sent Angel to hell?” she said, voice breaking.

Buffy’s eyes widened. “Ms. Calendar—” she began.

“This is way off topic,” Xander interjected.

“Xander, shut up,” said Rupert shakily, looking up at Jenny. “Jenny, please—”

“I had a right to know,” said Jenny.

“You said—when you had that concussion, you said you wanted me to keep you out of situations involving Angelus.”

“You know that wasn’t what I meant!”

“No one’s using the ‘I’ statements!” said Willow in a high, anxious voice.

Jenny turned to Buffy, eyes wet. “The curse worked, then,” she said.

Buffy nodded. The defensiveness was gone, replaced by visible guilt and sadness. “Yeah,” she said. “Ms. Calendar…I-I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”

“It’s okay.” Jenny twisted her hands.

“It’s not.” Buffy looked down. “You got hurt so many times trying to help Angel, and I just—I thought you knew about the curse working. I figured Giles or Willow would have told you.”

Slowly, Jenny turned to look at Willow.

“I didn’t want you to get hurt, Ms. Calendar,” said Willow nervously. “It’s not like this is exactly happy news.”

“What was the game plan, then?” Jenny demanded. “Keep me in the dark about this for the rest of my life? Rupert—haven’t we already had this discussion about honesty about four times in the last year alone?”

“I think we’re getting distracted from the—” Xander began.

“Intervention,” Jenny finished. “Yeah. You all finish with your intervention. I don’t think I can handle any more of this.”

“Jenny.” Rupert caught her hands in his. “This—wasn’t out of a desire to protect you from truths I didn’t think you could handle. You’ve been through so much trauma in this last year—I wanted to at least spare you this.”

“I’m responsible for another few hundred years of Angel suffering,” said Jenny, and laughed a little hysterically. “This isn’t something you can spare me.”

Rupert breathed out, the sound almost a sob. “I acted wrongly,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

“I need to go home,” said Jenny, pulling her hands away from Rupert’s and leaving the library without looking back.

Jenny drove home, but she didn’t even make it halfway through unlocking the front door before she was crying uncontrollably. She wasn’t much of a crier, even under the most stressful of circumstances, but this situation took the cake. Sure, her boyfriend had been lying to her in some misguided attempt to make her feel like she was a better person than she was, but that didn’t at all compare with the fact that her desire to help had ended up sentencing a good person to possible centuries of torture.

Angel was good. Angelus was fucked up and evil and she would probably never forgive him, but Angel was good. That was the one truth that had hurt Jenny about sending Angelus to hell, but she’d been comforted by the fact that at least Angel had had a relatively peaceful end. Angel was good, and because Jenny was a complete and total idiot, he’d been down in Acathla’s hell dimension for god knows how long.

Of course Buffy would want to hide Angel from Jenny. Jenny’s good intentions would probably end up killing Angel all over again.

It took nearly ten minutes to manage to unlock the door and enter the house, at which point Jenny half-fell onto the couch, shaking. She heard the sound of footsteps, and then Rupert was holding her as she cried. “I’m sorry,” he was saying, his voice shaking. “I’m so sorry, Jenny.”

“It’s my fault,” Jenny sobbed.

Rupert held her tightly. “It isn’t.”

Jenny buried her face in his shoulder and cried. She wasn’t really keeping track of how long, but it felt like a while, because she’d run out of tears when she finally managed to stop. “I thought you were going to stay at the library,” she said quietly without raising her head from his shoulder.

“I wrapped things up as quickly as I could,” Rupert murmured. “I thought you might…need someone.” He hesitated, pulling back a little. “Or—to be more truthful, I hoped. I-I understand if you’ll want me to leave now, though.”

Jenny sniffled and shook her head, keeping her arms draped around Rupert’s neck. The fierce anger at Rupert had dissipated with the crying. “Don’t be an idiot.”

Rupert faltered. “I’m sorry?”

Raising her head, Jenny felt a little better just looking at Rupert. He was rumpled and exhausted-looking, and it looked like he’d left his jacket at school running to catch up with her. “I’m kind of done breaking up with you every time one of us makes a mistake,” she said softly. “Yeah, this was big, and you weren’t honest with me, but—we can talk it out now, right? I think we’re getting better at that.”

“I like to hope so,” Rupert agreed. He pulled a handkerchief out of his jacket pocket, gently dabbing at Jenny’s face. “I wish the world would stop throwing things like this at you,” he said softly.

“Yeah, well, this one isn’t on the world.” Jenny felt a lump in her throat. “God—” She curled inward, hiding her face in her hands. “I wanted to help,” she said, the last word almost a sob. “I didn’t want to hurt him, I wanted to help him, and somehow I ended up hurting him more than any of my family ever could.”

She felt Rupert kiss the top of her head, wrapping his arms around her. Jenny let her hands drop to his shoulders, resting her cheek against his chest. “You can’t blame yourself for this,” he said quietly, stroking her hair.

“You didn’t tell me because you knew I was going to blame myself,” said Jenny, smiling a little ruefully. “And you’re still saying you don’t think it’s my fault?”

“From a purely technical standpoint, it is,” began Rupert thoughtfully. This was so ridiculously unhelpful and so very Rupert that it made Jenny laugh out loud. “No, no, bear with me,” he added, sounding brightened by her laughter. “You couldn’t possibly have known that Buffy wouldn’t be able to hold Angel off long enough to save him. You couldn’t have known that he would open Acathla. While your determination to cast the spell is what brought it to our attention, it wasn’t you that cast it, it wasn’t you that opened the portal, and it wasn’t you that killed Angelus. It—it takes a village, as the saying goes.”

Jenny closed her eyes. She still felt wrung-out and guilty, but Rupert’s words had a comforting ring of truth to them.

The phone rang.

“For god’s sake,” said Rupert emphatically, which made Jenny laugh again. He kissed her nose, pulling reluctantly away. “I’ll only be a moment.”

“No, I’ll get it.” Jenny stood up, hurrying to the telephone. “Calendar-Giles residence, Calendar speaking.”

“You guys okay?” There was a note of worry in Faith’s voice. “I showed up at the library and Willow said you left school early.”

“Oh,” said Jenny, wincing. “Um, yeah. Some stuff went down, and Rupert and I had to go home to talk it out a little, but we’re all good now.” She glanced over at Rupert, who gave her an adoring grin. “What time is it?”

“If you left for a nooner, just tell me, Jen,” Faith teased. “It’s two-thirty. I ducked out of math class to call you.”

“Okay, don’t do that,” said Jenny, smiling slightly. “Go back in and study. Rupert and I will drive back to the library and pick you up after your classes are done.”

“Cool. See you then.” Faith hung up.

Jenny placed the phone back on the hook, turning to Rupert. “So tell me, England,” she said as brightly as she could, “on a scale of one to obvious, how much does it look like I was sobbing into my boyfriend’s shoulder for about an hour?”

Rupert stood up from the couch, crossing the room to hug Jenny tightly. She held him close, breathing him in.

#fic #imperfections #An Important & Vaguely Angsty Chapter

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fenicerinnovata · 5 years ago

Text

The Nine Towers of Fillindo the Faithful

By Bruce Sterling

Preface

Why have I translated these nine obscure poems by a 17th-century Savoyard courtier?

Well, the author happens to be my landlord. I worked on these poems while in residence in the attic of one of his Turinese villas — a historic palace called the “Vineyard of the Royal Madame.” The Count Philip Saint Martin of Agliè (1604-1667) was a central figure in the Turinese Baroque building boom. He was also one of the inventors of ballet and opera.

D’Agliè was best known in his day as a dazzling showman. He designed, created, and directed the public festivals for the Duchy of Savoy, a small, yet regally ambitious, European autocracy. D’Agliè, born and bred in Savoy of a prominent local family, was a soldier, singer, composer, dancer, musician, diplomat, political strategist, costume and set designer, and the manager/financier of many massive urban construction projects. As the right-hand man of his sovereign, d’Agliè did most anything and everything she asked from him.

The life of il Conte Filippo San Martino d'Agliè was all about a polished public front. A gentleman of glamour himself, he created glamour for the public, and he made his ruler majestic, within a magnificent city. This lifetime effort was a full-time career for him.

He also left a few written traces of his private thoughts, especially these nine poems.

I have some understanding of what d’Agliè did as a Savoyard public official, because his Baroque architectural legacy is everywhere in Turin, and I work inside the building where he died. However, I’ve always wondered what d’Agliè himself thought he was doing. By translating these poems of his, I’ve tried to get closer to his sensibility.

These poems come from a book, or rather pamphlet, called “The Prison of Fillindo the Constant.” This arcane little book contains all the known poems written by d’Agliè while he was a political prisoner in France, in the period 1641-1643.

So I have translated nine of them, which are a linked cycle of poems, and I must warn the reader that these English texts of mine are more like decryptions, or re-inventions, than proper translations. I’m neither a poet nor a translator.

However, D’Agliè wasn’t having an easy time with these strange compositions of his, either. This is work in the highly difficult genre of prison writing. As poetry it’s not much good, but as a political intervention, it made his reputation for the ages.

The “Fillindo the Constant” in the title is, of course, d’Agliè himself. “Fillindo” was his courtly nickname, which he used as a star intellectual of the “Academy of Soligno,” an elite clique of Baroque culturati in the Savoy court in Turin.

So, although d’Agliè wrote these poems in prison, and with incarceration weighing heavy on his soul, this is not a private diary, meant for himself. He’s not jotting down his passing mental impressions: this is a literary contribution to the prestigious Soligno Academy of Turin. D’Agliè is struggling to write to the highest rhetorical level of his brilliant fellows there, prominent men such as Emanuel Tesauro, Jesuit, poet, eulogist and official Savoy court historian.

So, in accord with period belle-lettres, d’Agliè is required to pile some Pelion on plenty of Ossa. Classical references abound, running metaphors are strained past the breaking-point, capitalized Symbols and Emblems add an air of somber refinement, and his emotion is expressed in full-throated operatic arias. And, of course, it’s all done in rhyming Italian verse with proper meter.

Also, as an additional layer of baroque masquerade, D’Agliè, as a political prisoner, is living under surveillance. He can’t simply write a searing tell-all, with names, dates and places, about how the French minister, Cardinal Richelieu, had him kidnapped from Turin during a posh New Year’s party and then held him hostage in a French castle. If D’Agliè speaks too directly, his warden, the commander of the French fortress of Vincennes, can bring in some musketeer heavies in helmets and cuirasses, and they can bind his wrists behind his back and string him up, dislocating his shoulders (quite a common punishment in this rough-and-ready era).

So these refined and enigmatic poems serve to remind his captors that Count Filippo San Martino d’Agliè is a learned gentleman of distinction, and not some nameless victim to be trifled with. His poems are high-flown and abstract, and not intended for mere common consumption. When the Duchess Christina appears in the text, she is “The Muse,” or a reference to a “diamond.” Richelieu is called “Rigor.” There are no given names, no dates, and no places. D’Agliè doesn’t even name himself.

As a final structural complication, d’Agliè, who like all baroque Savoyards was obsessed with fortress construction, has decided to frame his poem in occult sympathy with the architecture of his prison. The castle walls of Vincennes have nine watch-towers. Since the towers look inward as well as outward, the towers are spying on d’Agliè; the towers prevent his escape, much like the spies who are reading his poems.

So he decides to metaphorically associate the towers with the miseries of his imprisonment. As a master of construction himself, d’Agliè is not just “in” the enemy fortress, he is “of” the enemy fortress, a political actor who transforms the cold stone of Vincennes into his operatic stage-set.

I sympathize with these unusual constraints under which d’Agliè poetically labored. His text has the clotted, baroque, trompe l’oeil feeling that is typical of Savoy decor, including the villa that I myself write in, which d’Agliè once decorated. Sometimes his overstrained verse has almost an Oulipo feeling of an experimental text with hidden invented parameters. Whenever he seems most abstruse, tentative and foggy, it is usually political satire.

Sometimes his rococo flourishes become comically surreal, with some faint echo of Vaclav Havel acting the witty comic under totalitarianism, deliberately slipping-one past the censor, and winking to see if we can catch it.

A literal word-for-word translation of these poems would be hard to parse. So I’ve taken many liberties, and probably blundered many times. However, it’s important to understand that the poems were successful. Although d’Agliè was trapped in a French prison-fortress, and could easily have cracked, turned his coat and become a double-agent, once he returned to Savoy, everybody in Savoy regarded him forever more as a stainless patriot whose loyalty to the state was beyond question.

D’Agliè gave himself that public reputation. It was Fillindo himself who named himself “The Constant,” and his reputation for good faith has been constant ever since these poems appeared. He’s an archetypical Turinese cultural figure: the selfless patriot devoted to a higher national good. The legendary “Bel Filippo” is a moving figure of tragic devotion, the handsome and gallant cavalier-patriot who loyally serves the woman he loves, and yet, sadly, can never marry her, because she is above his station. The notoriety of his love affair with Cristina just adds some spicy galanterie to his branding.

However, the French certainly never liked Count Filippo D’Agliè. The Spanish and Austrians cared for him even less. He and his ambitious court family had plenty of powerful, angry enemies within his own country. He was also having a long-term, notorious love affair as the much-indulged court favorite of a female head of state. As a further demerit, he was a posh and fancy dancing-boy who spent huge sums making up ballets and opera-costumes.

Framed in that way, d’Agliè sounds like a decadent, lustful Machiavellian intriguer, so it’s an impressive feat of public relations that he’s still regarded as the most devoted patriot of his era.

However, prison can certainly do that for a political activist. D’Agliè had done some hard time for his beliefs. His potential critics had not. These poems were his manifesto about that situation. Nobody refuted it. That was his poetic achievement.

We now come to the interesting problem of what actually happened to d’Agliè, in reality, as opposed to what he claims about it in rhymed baroque verse much adorned with Sphinxes.

First, let’s explain how he became a kidnapped political hostage.

Imagine the era of the Three Musketeers, when war and intrigue swirled. D’Agliè, the younger son of a prominent Savoy family, had spent some time in the fleshpots of Rome and Paris, fought a duel, and ridden in war with the cavalry. Handsome, well-spoken and always well-dressed, he was chosen as a captain of the Ducal bodyguard, and was therefore in the busy center in Turinese court life.

Then the Duke of Savoy died suddenly, and handsome Captain D’Agliè had to guard the widowed Duchess. The Duchess Cristina was a vivacious French aristocrat with small children, who had never thought to run a country herself. So D’Agliè went right on guarding his Duchess, through an ever-mounting panoply of rising threats against her. The captain of bodyguards had her trust, and he never left the widow’s elbow. Intimate complications ensued.

The Duchess Cristina declared herself Regent of the child Duke, but her faltering authority was challenged in the Piedmontese Civil War. The Duchy of Savoy was split between armed factions. These two power-cliques were the proxies of two rival great powers, Richelieu's France and the huge Hapsburg Empire, which, at the time, included Spain, Austria and most of Italy (as well as much of the New World).

Savoy was normally the buffer state between these bristling combatants, but with their capital Turin in crisis, luck ran out for the Piedmontese in their fruitful Alpine foothills. The Hapsburgs and the French quickly turned hapless Savoy into yet another killing-zone of the ongoing Thirty Years War.

The partisans of the widowed Duchess-Regent Cristina, the “Royal Madame,” were the pro-French “Madamisti” faction. The pro-Spanish “Principisti” faction followed the two younger brothers of the late Duke, armed rebels who were known as "the Princes.”

The civil warfare inside Savoy was often broken by long truces while the Madamisti and Principisti had to wait for more muskets, pikes, cannon and cash from their foreign backers. D’Agliè spent a lot of time handling the paperwork for this, and also running spy rings and writing to ambassadors.

The Savoyard factions soon realized they’d committed a dismal folly in inviting rapacious foreign troops into their Duchy. Occupation troops from France and Spain were seizing towns and castles all over Savoy. D’Agliè understood this major threat to the survival of his state. He was a pro-Madamisti extremist, since he was in bed with Cristina, but he was never pro-French. He was a Savoy nationalist.

D’Agliè soon understood that both the Spanish Hapsburgs and the French regarded the Savoyards like himself as expendable hillbillies. Both Civil War factions foolishly imagined that they had powerful foreign friends, but in reality, they were all prey. That was his nation’s tragedy: that was why Savoy bled.

D’Agliè resented this national humiliation. D’Agliè had made it his cause to demonstrate that magnificent Turin ranked with London, Paris, Madrid, Vienna, and Rome as a major center of culture and refinement. As a gallant knight, he didn’t care to be treated as a pawn, although events soon proved that he was one.

After years of fitful slaughter and negotiation, the Madamisti won the Piedmontese Civil War, for they were the better-organized faction. Madame Cristina’s partisans behaved like a French national administration, while the Princes’ faction resembled an old-fashioned Spanish court. The future of Europe was with Richelieu’s methods, and not with yesterday’s conquistadors.

Unfortunately for D’Agliè himself, Richelieu’s clever methods included strategic abductions. These were the period equivalent of covert drone strikes. Richelieu aimed to dominate Savoy as a French province, and D’Agliè stood in his way.

So at the end of the eventful, war-torn year 1640, D’Agliè was invited to a glittering New Year's victory celebration at the French embassy in Turin. Of course d’Agliè attended this important political event, kitted-up in his court finery, and French troops simply pounced on him, bundled him up and hauled him across the French border. They left him only enough time to pen one courtly letter to Cristina explaining that he hadn't been assassinated.

D’Agliè soon found himself confined as guest-hostage inside the French Castle of Vincennes. To judge by the poems he wrote within this fortress, you’d think that Vincennes was much worse than Hell. In fact, the castle of Vincennes was a posh, if heavily armed, royal French residence. Vincennes still stands centuries later, in pretty good shape, and tourists enjoy it.

D’Agliè was placed in a castle suite that had formerly belonged to a prominent mercenary general. He was assigned one servant for his meals and wardrobe, a personage who was, of course, a French police spy.

Despite his endless references to iron chains and cruel torments, there is no evidence that d’Agliè was physically maltreated at Vincennes. He was allowed to walk in the hunting woods, to ride a horse sometimes, and to play sports.

D’Agliè never names another human being in his prison poems, but there was a large French garrison busy inside Vincennes, and d’Agliè spoke and wrote excellent French. He was not the only prisoner in there, so he must have talked to somebody. Sometimes the Savoy ambassador was allowed to visit him at the fortress. On occasion, his nephew showed up, because his d’Agliè nephew was being educated to high standards in Paris, despite the fact that his uncle was a dismal French hostage.

With that much made clear, though, D’Agliè was in deadly trouble inside Vincennes. He was a kidnapped foreign hostage, a non-person, one of the disappeared. Having grabbed d’Agliè, the French had no particular motive to ever let him go. D’Agliè certainly knew that a predecessor of his, a fellow Savoy patriot named Pierre Monod, had died mad in endless French captivity.

Furthermore, the mighty Cardinal Richelieu was d’Agliè’s committed enemy. Richelieu had directly warned d’Agliè, face-to-face, not to cross him, and d’Agliè had defied him in support of Savoy independence, so a pardon was not in the cards there. Worse yet, even if Richelieu himself died, the next French government might be even more hostile to a stubborn Savoy patriot.

It's historic fact that Cardinal Richelieu, who was rather a theater and opera fan, once sprung D’Agliè from his captivity in Vincennes, and put him on display at a Paris court ballet. Some historians claim that Richelieu was politely entertaining d’Agliè by allowing him this artistic excursion. It seems more plausible to me that Richelieu was putting d’Agliè on public display as a warning to other insolent gigolos.

Since he was never a character in an Alexander Dumas novel, Filippo d’Agliè had no realistic chance to thrillingly escape from the prison-castle of Vincennes. He was dismally stuck in there. If the Duchess Cristina had decided to write off her handsome bodyguard in favor of some other handsome bodyguard, d’Agliè would likely have died in there.

However, even while imprisoned, d’Agliè still had political allies. His older brother, the head of the San Martino d’Agliè family, was an accomplished diplomat, and had been Ambassador in London, where Cristina's sister was the Queen of England. D’Agliè’s sister-in-law was the most glamorous lady-in-waiting to Cristina, a clever confidante that the Duchess trusted implicitly. And lastly, d'Agliè's other brother, the family's obligatory cleric, was a rising Churchman with a hotline to Mazarin, the Pope and other Catholic power-players. So the d’Agliè clan, who owed their rising good fortunes to his own, would never abandon him.

Also, none of the other Madamisti wanted to be kidnapped next, which rather steeled their resolve about the plight of the Turinese court’s most entertaining and glamorous figure. Cristina was surrounded by loyal Savoy retainers who were keen to remind her of Richelieu's insult.

So Duchess Cristina did not forget d'Agliè, although he was out of sight, and she commenced a long moral-support campaign for her imprisoned favorite. By hook and by crook — and the skills of the Duchess steadily increased there — she managed to get him musical instruments, proper cozy bedsheets, and even two tobacco pipes with symbolic messages.

These tobacco pipes meant so much to d'Agliè that he chose to be buried with them. This strange fact was not revealed until d’Agliè was accidentally disinterred in the late 1980s. Cristina's charities must have meant a lot to him in his dire straits.

Romance is attractive, so the personal relationship of the Count Filippo d’Agliè and his sovereign Cristina has attracted a lot of attention. I work in the attic of a structure, the so-called “Vineyard of the Royal Madame,” which was built by d’Agliè and Cristina as their love-nest. This building was also the subject of d’Agliè’s second and last book, a text chock-full of poetic license. There’s not one honest word in it about the function that the building actually served.

There are those who consider Filippo d’Agliè the brains of the Cristina government; they tend to write off Cristina as a ditzy fashion-plate obsessed with her clothes, jewelry and gardens. I don’t believe that was the truth of their situation, and my evidence is, that during d’Agliè’s absence in captivity, Cristina’s ability to govern visibly improved. Fillindo the Constant was not the only Piedmontese patriot. While d’Agliè was composing these poems in French captivity, Cristina came to rely on the services of Count Pianezza, an ugly, charmless, but strict and efficient administrator. With Pianezza as her Prime Minister, Cristina’s court was much less romantic, but rather better organized.

To his own credit, when d’Agliè finally returned to Savoy from his French captivity, he was cordial with Pianezza. He and Pianezza understood one another as patriots, staked out different areas of complementary operations, and got on with the pressing business of promoting, developing and defending their state. Also, the two ministers stayed out of war and Cristina reigned successfully until she died.

However, poetry offers its own rewards. Today, nobody has ever heard of the unromantic, strait-laced Count Pianezza. The Count Filippo d’Agliè still owns his secure position within the long legacy of Italian nationalists who spent hard time in foreign jails.

Why did d’Agliè write these poems? What was their purpose? What did he think he was doing?

Lacking documentary evidence, I will speculate. I know I shouldn’t do that. I love historians, I respect their discipline, I will follow them faithfully down to the last footnote. However, I’m a novelist, and my purpose in the essay here is to revive my dead landlord.

So what, literarily, seems to be going on, with these nine poems about nine towers in a prison? If you read them without context, they seem like overwrought screeds by a miserable, if highly erudite, captive who suffers nine different severe mood disorders.

But consider this: who is the intended audience? Who does d’Agliè think will read these poems? It’s not himself, or they would be his diary entries, as with Pepys or maybe Montaigne. It’s not the French (although the French thoughtfully kept his prison manuscript in one of their national archives until the present day). It’s Italian poetry, so the audience has to be Italians, but who are these mysterious readers?

They might be his erudite pals in the Academy of Soligno. But these men are soldiers, scholars, engineers, architects — warriors hardened by power-struggle, and this poetry is too inward-looking, contemplative, anguished and sobbing for them. This is not the poetry of a martial tough-guy in the slammer defying the screws. It’s a martyr crying out for tender sympathy.

So I think Fillindo's intended readership are the literate ladies of Cristina’s court. I surmise that d’Agliè’s poems were meant to be read aloud in female Madamista court circles, in the same way that Duchess Cristina's chosen ladies used to gather and recite the endless novel "Astrea" by Honoré d'Urfé. This work of fiction was composed in the court of Turin and was a huge international hit among the baroque ladies-of-sentiment.

Fillindo wants these court ladies -- led by his brother's wife -- to believe he’s the faithful one, the “constant” one. These women are the key demographic that he needs to convince of his sincerity. It’s the women around Cristina who will cherish these outpourings of his heart. If they believe him in his constancy, they’ll tell everybody else about him, including, of course, their sovereign the Duchess.

Although these d'Agliè poems were never popular, or ever meant to be popular, either, they probably hit the elite clique of readers they were aimed at. This must have been a long and much-considered publicity campaign. Today we have the text of the book, “The Prison of Fillindo the Constant,” but Filippo d’Agliè was never sitting down in his prison to write a book.

The book is the composition that d’Agliè edited and printed after he was well out of the prison. The book is therefore a souvenir relic of what must have been some different, larger, open-ended propaganda scheme.

He wrote the poems in order to get himself out of a jam, or at least to vindicate himself to posterity. In the long run, his poems achieved both those things.

I suspect that these nine poems about the nine towers were released one by one, secretly smuggled out of prison, as a kind of thriller-serial. They’re hand-written missives, likely direct from d’Agliè's own hand, that are circulated hand-to-hand, among the ladies of the court of Savoy. The prison poems have a semi-covert, samizdat-dissident air about them; they’re probably tear-stained.

If you imagine the nine poems circulated in this way, one after another, slowly, with the readers kept on tenterhooks as to whether the author has died a martyr’s death in his alien chains, you can see their emotional power.

Likely these poems went through many careful drafts, because prisoners have plenty of time on their hands. At first, d’Agliè is just wandering around the prison courtyard, maybe dancing and skipping a bit in metric rhythm, muttering his verses to himself — as a prisoner, he has no other resources left for entertainment, all he has left is words.

Then he hand-writes some draft version, thinks it over, destroys it. Then he writes a much better version, has it smuggled out from prison to the readership in distant Turin — but those fugitive texts are long lost.

Finally, after many vicissitudes, he’s back to his homeland, and restored to power. His sovereign is graciously allowing him to print his memento of patriotic devotion. So d’Agliè gathers up the verses and does his definitive edition, "The Prison of Fillindo the Constant" — probably cleans it up some, tidies the classical metaphors, maybe even gets a professional Savoy court-poet, such as his uncle, to help him polish it to a sheen.

That’s the book that we can read today. It’s not the original, wracked outpouring of prisoner Filippo weeping into his French wine-cup. No, it’s an aristocratic souvenir public-relations document, and even a kind of brag.

Imagine yourself as a Savoyard court woman reading the d’Agliè book. You know (because everybody who matters knows), that the author is the lover of the Duchess. Your ruler, Royal Madame Cristina, has won her civil war. She controls the state and the army and she dispenses all the favors. She has become Royal Madame Cristina "The Diamond," whose new motto as ruler of Savoy (quite likely invented by d’Agliè) is "More Solid than Splendid."

The victorious Cristina aka "The Diamond" is still glamorous and shiny just like her jewelry, but politically, she is solid as a rock. That's why she allows her minister to print this book about his former woes. She once lost her minister to foreign captivity — but she also redeemed him and she got him back. So Fillindo has outlasted his enemies, he's back in the marbled halls of power in Turin, and she's still kissing him and everybody knows that.

In addition to this titillating situation, you're supposed to admire Fillindo's devotion and fortitude as you page through his poems, and maybe even cry for him a little.

So it’s a nifty little book to possess. It makes you feel important, clued-in and very much in the know, palace-intrigue-wise. Even though the returned Fillindo is spending a ton of public money on horse-parades, street dancing and fireworks displays, as well as kissing the Duchess behind closed doors, you actually feel almost proud of him.

If he’s breaking the state budget building a romantic palace up in some vineyard across the river — if your husband complains about dear Fillindo, you will stoutly defend him. Because he’s one of ours and always will be, he's Fillindo the Constant! He spent such hard time in that prison, you just don’t understand how he suffered! Let Fillindo have the pretty palace! He deserves it.

The Nine Towers Where the miseries of prison dwell

The Tower of Solitude

So long without people, almost out of this world Behind horrid walls, in this profound abyss, I am solitary, obscure, and unknowable, In the desert of imprisonment.

These stone walls become my laws, And in the midst of this empty courtyard, My bound soul, following pathways Remote and little-known to mankind Wants to flee even from itself.

This is Solitude, and alas, even my soul, Who was the first-created, and friend to the gods, Is inside this gloomy marble urn with me, Wrapped in shadows among the phantoms, Under these sad bastion towers, A prisoner buried alive, victimized by injustice, Sacrificed to the Furies in this Temple of Pain, A hermetic soul with a derelict heart.

Every comfort is far above my reach, For my soul is low among the monsters, These cloisters, remote from my life, offer only death to me, And when Terror attacks me, I cry out in vain, without one human helpmeet, And with nowhere to flee.

Limp with anguish, all alone in here, I see that even Pity is in bondage, Pity long pre-occupied, and ungracious to me.

What has become of the prizes, the treasures of living? On some remote shore, gems and gold scatter free; Are they more pleasing when I can’t see them? Those pearls to me are bitter tears, Every palm a funereal cypress. Every delight is a bitterness, And here I am in this valley recess, In an arsenal of the rocky Alps, A covert prison full of weaponry.

Give life some ease, give wings to ingenuity; Put the brake to the course of the years, And in some kingdom of tranquillity, Open the fields of pleasure, and scatter the fears; I have this subterranean river of verse, Which has waves of weeping, waves of longing, And there is poetic peace in that river, For the turbulence of all these pains and tears, Flows toward a quiet sea, my martyrdom in chains.

It is vain to sweeten my raw torment With verses so suave and smooth, In this hard solitary confinement, I must sing my duet with lazy Sleep. I hear snores, and to my wavering soul, Every object seems obnoxious. Every living thing is my enemy. And to a heart so sensitized, Succumbing to sickness, yet more loathsome, Every new phantom brings some new pang.

Alas this is madness, and a faraway confidence, Has long since fled my ardent bosom, And while my eyes failed to see them, My emotions fluttered off on brooding wings. As I struggled to free myself, ever more urgently, My thoughts scattered like arrows, Wounding me right in my torso, Fixed there, like a puncture to evil, The portal for wandering Death.

Even the firefly at night carries her fire with her, But these are such dark woods, And such sloughs of despondency, That griefs attack me worse than wild beasts. These internal wounds can never be healed, By remembering my witch-lights of lost glories.

With this thorn lodged so deep in my being, My every breath can only be a sigh, And every desire a source of infection.

Tormented in this armed foreign camp, Fillindo of the Soligno Academy, Passes his unhappy days. I am bound here in exile, imprisoned by the avarice Of a country that feeds you and then abducts you. My thoughts of that faraway war Make my heart long to flee here to there; Let my heart be abandoned, I will still be the victor, If only through dying here alone.

Oh silent poem no one hears, and no one responds to, Carry your wail to the deserts, To those mute rocks and taciturn stones.

2 )

The Tower of Silence

The Memphis of Taccian, and Athens with her splendor, And Babel forever muted, would gaze in blind horror At this Tower of confusion, for whenever the stars rise, The Sun is forced to flee beneath the earth. The Night shelters me in eternal silence, Forever deaf to painful laments, founded in Hell.

Under Night’s dark veil shroud the tall obelisks, And in museums dim the fame of exhausted gods. Here where all is silent, see the Alps rise As the enemies of Heaven. In this bleak, uneasy peace, What peaks, what abysses, flee all sound Like hunted animals frightened by thunder And the music of the spheres.

From this dark center of a hidden world, Arises Weariness herself, And with Silence, they seize both my hands; This, this is the method That confounds me doubly in a double prison; When I listen to my own heart, I feel proven useless in warfare; These atrocious towers, Crush my heart as they silence my voice.

Among these walls Silence nestles, Here the soul is sepulchered; Oppression cannot speak, wail, or sigh For the torment is too stark: Stone walls lack senses, and never heed Complaints and lamentations. The stones respond only with echoes, Treacherous, unfeeling noises, That redouble the rattle of chains.

The sounds of Echo are flatteries, Deceitful phantoms, vain auras, Even worse with each repetition, As when a voice trapped in a cavern, Resounding among inhuman shadows, Has all its melodies truncated, Into howls, shrieks, a market crowd babbling, Like talking with the Wind With the voice of a monster, about fear.

The Hyrcanian Tiger cares not for harmonies; Tigers never break into song, The shore wave doesn’t hear whispers, If it happens to distinguish Some murmur from the sighs and weeping, It would tie up that tongue, With contempt for whines, that strict jailer, Clamps outrageous screams between iron jaws.

There are no jokes, no fooleries and chatter, In the Empire of silent Harpocrates, That winged god honored in Cilenio; Those in silent shadows cannot govern, The mute learns nothing in the groves, From he who teaches philosophy. He does not beseech love or speak sweetly, For he is doubly made the prey, With a blocked ear and a foot chained.

Slam shut those gates, but with that racket Clamor rises, armed pawn of an evil chorus; The watchman shouts his fierce alarm, And the welkin rings for no sane reason, His lantern wakes me from slumber And noisy harassment pains me. My fate is to harken, while speechless, To shadowy horrors, or die.

Noise alone is my only music, And when it dissolves away, Among my eloquent torments Is the pain of my silenced tongue; The orator hushed, with the heart of a favorite, But an afflicted mind; I languish in woe, My discourse is scattered by pain, Ever more broken and scattered, Worm-riddled with sharp regrets.

Inarticulate tones without resonance In this grotto of grave obscurity, The heart’s language, of the harp, of the trumpet, Cannot reveal its ardor, and is blocked In the locked closet of a secret night; The open mouth still breathes, But silently, in a graveyard coffin, Giving Silence the victory, For extinction always is voiceless.

All my senses are stifled within me, I must guard my worthless words, to fence them in; They might fly from my lips like arrows In a strident language of bitterness, But I’m tied by the foot in this cavern, To dwell here indefinitely, Where the asps are deaf, and know nothing.

In Thebes and Cimmeria, the Muses and Undines, Abandon their golden lyres, For stone has no pity or parlance.

The Tower of Suspicion

Here is the hostel of blind walls Where shadows ever more threatening Host in their shadowy darkness The Chimera of false Suspicion; Here in the cavern of black eclipses, Ingenious in his wickedness, He peers through horrid abysses. The Chimera, that fatal spirit, Born of a viper, fixed in the heart, Is the cruel son of self-awareness.

Alone here, I fight hard with foreboding, My mind is without friendly counsel, Forever sleepless, and worrisome, A pained, quiet warfare of wariness. Every tremor shakes me deeply, And every passing light or glimmer, Betrays my rationality; In this campaign of darkness, False light falls on fake wounds; Death awaits the soul everywhere.

Here a thousand noises and whirling lights, Blur the senses with veils; Every object becomes a mirage, I pretend, assume, believe anything; The aura of the Chimera Makes a passing breeze fearsome. Every image in the clouds is nauseous, A mere bee appears as a Dragon, Any shadow a wandering Ghost, Flowers are flames, and atoms are Giants.

With its narrow head, and face multicolored, Raucous and confusing, Divisive in its genius, Parting, returning, harassing me, Enclosed in monstrous variety, Lurching in motion, unstable in essence, Chimeric and always unknowable, Restless and disconcerting, One immense sea of distrust; Suspicion besets me, and I doubt my own senses.

A belt of sharp thorns wraps my head, A circle of deceits, and dreadful molestations, A mental labyrinth of errors, That forms Terror in my field of thought; Sphinxes, Monsters, Ghosts and Weapons, Teams of armed enemies, And in these atrocious spasms, Nothing but lies, delusions, stupidities, False depictions, faces distorted.

How many cliffs does the Earth have, Or whirlpools are in the sea, Or deadly machineries ready, Designed for my bitter ruin; How many flights had Icarus, Or Phaeton, chariots of the Sun? These dreads are mere vain imaginings, Yet they shake me in my misfortune; Whatever one dreads, one learns to see, And during life’s dark occasions, We build mirrors and clutch at them, Appearing there among reflections, Of madness, and death, and ourselves.

We peer through the mists of our own hearts, Self-tortured, to dodge our own arrows, And sick at heart, keen to defend ourselves, Against Terror, we brew our own poison. We load ourselves with iron chains, Chests aching from apparitions, Bedevilling ourselves with double punishments, Now the ice, now the fire of our Inferno.

Such are the reasonings, bitter and cruel, From Zeal that has lost all discretion; Suspicion, that treacherous counsellor, Shrouds the eyes of Love in his blindfold; And through deceptions, ever harsher, Delusions ever more rigorous, More malignant, more fiery and passionate, This Zeal that disrupts life and insight, Surrounds us with his mendacities, A ruinous friend who spies to bewilder us.

The human bosom is not made from jasper; It is much more frail and infirm, In vain it resists Suspicion, To screen, to defend a heart in misery. Yet Destiny reigns through disasters; Misfortune and Danger teach us Suspicion; Caution may be worldly wisdom, But to seek trouble is fertile with evil, For this world would surely have shipwrecks Even if it had no more seas.

Let me confront him, and duel with Suspicion, This enemy within my own thoughts; Although I am silent, and alone, I will treat Suspicion with his own suspicion; For the nodding Lion fears a rooster’s crow. I hate an insidious fraud, Worse than an enemy soldier.

Suspicion should never be pitiless, Ignoring the woes of the supplicant, Like Falarus, Minos and Rhadamanthus. This, this is what torments me, And I tire of this sordid misery, Which carries me so restlessly, Wounded and troubled in soul.

So I think of my Muse, where she rules in constancy, Calmly accustomed to the ruination, A Queen of unalterable virtue Also, she despises death; Through her, I take comfort in my perils, And among these Eurippeans, find a way out.

Let me abandon this Harpy, which devours my heart, Here among the vengeful Erinye, Where Cerberus lurks and the stones hear nothing.

The Tower of Melancholy

Among these stony Alpine peaks, Much-seen by me, but much better unknown, My tedious incarceration, My molestations painful and tormenting, Here among the crags, Here among the brambles, Have almost put me in the tomb of Fame. My ruin is displayed to others, And though my soul still lives, and I’m not dead yet, I have no life, for there’s nothing here but pain.

Suffering the anguish of a lover, More from my own soul, than from that oppressive Tower, With the weariness of Atlas, Supporting the weight of my own brooding, Sustaining that like a new Sisyphus, While every harassing object, Seems like my boulder of pain, So my heart knows no repose or peace, Like Enceladus dying under his volcano.

In this horrid shelter, Searching the Night with my gaze, Rising above misery, Into that tenebrous aspect Which shrouds all joy, and beautiful splendors, Night, which augurs enmity to the Sun itself, A darkness everlasting, Over this ancient fortress, Where solitary shadows flit to and fro, Obscuring the light, and destroying Happiness.

Here one broods, one weeps, and is famished. Every breath animates some new pain, Among deceptive laments, Contemplating martyrdom, Blinded by tears, alas, unable to see The sea of Desires that cause that misery, A sea rising, surrounding and drowning the spirit, So that grief is itself a grief, and a dark confusion.

Among the reeking junipers Of the Alps, lacerated and torn, He becomes his own worst enemy, Doubling his torments in a private war. Hope abandons him, enemies attack him, Memory; Thought; Misfortune; Fury; Contempt, and Rage; So he collapses and curses Heaven.

Then, with a strident howl, He begs the sweet remedy of Death, Praises his treacherous fate, And desires whatever seems worst for him; Scowling in face, cloaked for a funeral, He no longer loves glamour. He eagerly greets, with his whining, Anything that makes life seem worse for him, And weeps when Aurora smiles with the sunrise.

Belted with asps and serpents, Letting the snakes tear his bosom, Lurking among the brambles, He abhors the Sun, and every amenity. Inhumanly fleeing from goodness, He squanders his life. Then, drinking venom To repress his own courage, He feeds monsters with his blind emotions; Sphinxes and Larvae, Chimeras, Shadows and Suspicion.

The Erinye in the Inferno, Are less vile and furious than he is; Despair rules over him, And he makes his own heart his own Hell. As the subject of his own Empire, He punishes himself, severe and unrelenting; Ripping his own heart in malign delusion, In the fantastic shadows of his own unhappiness.

This, this is his torment, He is false friend to his contrary self. He follows his own damnation, Down the river of pain toward his death. Tormented, he became fatalistic. Virtue should be his strength, He should leave his tomb empty, To be born again in open meadows, With the Flower of Faith, which raises even the lowest.

Here among my inauspicious walls, Where the clear light of day seems buried with me, The blackest shadows perturb me, Malign influxes; greedy veils. When I ask myself to cure myself, Every remedy I have tastes bitter. There’s no mercy for me in the stones here, They only echo whatever seems worst, Redoubling my pain with my own voice.

So be silent now o Muse; It is vain to quarrel and complain. Her royal scepter does not rule here, In this armed host of inhumanity.

The Tower of Vain Hope

Among fears no longer, as light as the Peacock, And with the same inconsistency, Flapping over this Hemisphere, With a slight, rapid flight, here comes Hope. Alighting in return here, fluttering wings, Inside this locked prison, as packed full of evils As the box of the most cruel Pandora. Hope that binds me, hope that melts me, Hope that attracts and deceives me, Sweet tyrant, vain affection of my heart.

Dark lighthouse which signaled for goodness, The fervent desire to reach serene harbor, On some shore of the stream of the stars, With vain displays, among my torments Fallacious Hope confuses me, Sighs become fair winds, tears become waves Hope soars under rainbows and omens of peace; Then flies off in black clouds and the ship wrecks.

How vain the swiftness of thought is, When courage among the iron weapons Turns to heartache amid tranquil peace, That black Peacock, whirling and wheeling, Hope so appealing that I long to trust it Although it augurs my sepulcher; From its wings I take pain and a pen, So Hope can tear at my heart, That crooked harpy, that colorful fraud.

Surrounded by high apparitions, all in splendor, Gulled by my own temerities into a spiral of error, In uncertain light that beams among menaces. The prospects that are most false and harmful, Are the same ones that give me most joy; The most ruinous troubles seem clearest and fairest, The brightest stroke of lightning is the most lethal, A lighthouse for the abyss, or for Mongibel, the foul volcano.

Hope betrays my heart and deludes my soul With a thousand rash ideas and idolatries, That offer themselves in profusion to a fickle goddess; A sensual sacrifice of flames and vows, Revering the empty motions of inhuman delusions, With a great belief in the most vain phantoms That are hidden in the mystic veils of thought. The Oracle of Love is the Voice of Heaven.

Hope paints my endless desires for me, As I gaze among the gloomy clutter, Hope is an enchanted mirror Of murky desires and broken delights, Hope calls to my heart, in a busy ministry, Promising glory, fame, and every grand achievement, And here Hope calls me once again, Although each pledge is proven to be vain, Dishonorable, and truly dangerous.

But in this hostel, woe is me, Hope is my courage, That courtly flatterer who presents my life to me; Brilliant scenes in my theater of honor? I imagine they are shadows of grief.

But if my soul sees more, I can’t choose to fly With a foot that is manacled here; If the eye is struck by hope’s strange enchantment, The eye is where tears will soon appear; This flattering serpent weaves among strong chains, Breathing and lurking in the iron of the prison, Like a venomous flower that one longs to find.

Time tramples over these fickle notions And with the grinding of the years, All the incidents and painful insults, Life, which aspires to flee from here, Grows shorter, while Death draws nearer.

Hope is smoke, it is clouds, it is froth; Mere fog borne away with the wind, And every light hope, which melts in a moment, Leaves lasting pain after brief joy. The laughing and deformed Hyena, The Chimera that confuses, mutable, without form, That light-hearted liar in a flock of dark Sphinxes, Hope, purveying sweetness, brings disaster.

Put an end to this greed of the heart, ingenuity. Find some placid repose, Let self-command reign over affectation, Seize control over Hope and Desire, And make them both your prisoners; Let your soul be the rock that holds the anchor, Against deadly perils of the surrounding sea.

From the bribery of Hope, I turn away offended; An awakened prophet who feels a righteous injury; The weight drops from me, and if my thoughts fly, They fly toward the border of my country, And I choose to believe in freedom. Later, I may seem foolish, And my conceptions may well betray me, But if I have to choose between my life and my comforts, Every man, after death, sees no Hope in the shadowland.

So I close this poem with no sighs and weeping, And without any cruel Hope; Such are the waves of the sea that I have here, Such are the wind and the sails.

The Tower of Poverty

On a cold stone among the bare rocks, Lives a snake stripped of skin, an enemy viper, Miserable for her own sake, raw to others, Perishing like a mendicant nun. Alone, sad, frail in body, abject in heart, In a horrid crevice in the fatal Alps, Wavering between shame and anguished affliction, Bewildered with grief in the lurking shadows.

Time is devoured, and lightning strikes the earth, Casting the proud walls of a high Tower into ruin. The snake slithers amidst the huge heap of rubble, But this mayhem for others doesn’t improve her. No matter how often she’s wounded by fate, By thunderstorms, whirlpools, or shipwrecks, Vicissitudes, pangs, inconveniences, If she flees one torment, some new companion From the pestilential swarm comes to bite her.

Belted by Opprobrium, hunted by Misfortune, Even harmless plants aggravate her, Empowered by her lowliness, bloated with her hunger, Lurking at doors like a carved gargoyle, With the ugly faces of Bitterness, Wrath, Anger, Disrupting the peace and quiet, inspiring miseries, Proud of being voracious, ravenous with desire, She tears at herself, and it is wisdom that bleeds.

With a squalid expression, and skin torn, Inconstant, perplexing, obscure and cowardly, Friendless, neglected, among her anxieties, Contemplating new crimes, even if humble ones, Feigning confusion, limbless, busy with fraud in her rags, Writhing in knots, with no idea how to rise up; As needy as survival in the harshest warfare, Where the feet stumble, the belly rules and the soul falls in the dust.

She has no gentility of conscience left; Lacking in good impulse, she is rich only in destruction; Choosing to follow a goddess of wickedness, One without smoky altars, rites or a temple.

When the immortal gods are in nudity, They are inspiring, a fortunate sight to mortals, Benign and full of clemency, Their beauty of their visages explains their goodness, With as many virtues as the sky has stars.

But the soil here has no place to stand on. So one wearies of the noisome annoyance. To march into the sea gains one nothing And to search in the waves is just to lose repose, And this unending motion, among fatigue and torment, Is the labor of Tantalus in the Inferno.

His difficulties are perpetual, Poor Tantalus begging aid, always neglected, His oldest griefs just receive new indignities, His body enslaved, his destiny transfixed, Burned by the sunlight and frozen stiff by frost, Shamefully offended, and afflicted by contempt He blames his fate on Heaven and the injustice of the Gods.

But whoever rises up, can also be beaten down. Jupiter bears his lance among the thunderclouds, Probing and sorting inequalities, His spear can rain down gold or smite with lightning. Everyone thinks his own tears are the bitter ones, Tears never get pooled in common for everyone. Tears do not wet the forests, mountains and seas; The fields are dry of tears, and the rivers too.

Try chamomile, heart’s-ease, or even hemlock, To temper the extremes of your petty fevers; If Heaven is inclined to act with force against you, You can do nothing to change that. Jealous heaven takes your splendor, joy, or wealth.

From the coasts of triumph, we sink into the deeps, And other souls hold deeper griefs than ours; Some are proud, the rest of the world is impoverished, But gems come from the depths of the mines, And the lowest soil gives rise to rich treasures. Metals all rise up from raw veins of ore, But gold is proud, while iron is in service, Iron forged into manacles, and rattling chains. Where the diamond rules over horror, it has no splendor, Nor can shining gems bring hope to a nation made dark.

The Golden Fleece is forbidden, and defended, Behind fortress walls well-watched and guarded, In a nation of blindness.

With black sails, and graven metals, The hero Jason does not land here, In his generous laden ship, Conveying golden treasure, and the Fleece. Here, hard stone nurtures iron weapons, Defying the world to give rescue, No one rushes up Potosi River, to the peaks of Pindus, To gaze over fabulous wealth.

The vaunted waves of the world’s great rivers, The Euphrates, the Ganges, the Indus and the Po, Where rich riverbanks rustle with shining trees, Do not flow like this lava, this turbid torrent, From Vesuvius, descending all tortuous, Every wave in vivid flames, scattering shadows, The inferno of a prison-forged arsenal, Stamping out light and hammering chains.

But among all that, at the end, love survives here; Among weapons, virtue goes armored. The soul is oppressed yet the heart is not conquered; The angry monster wins only contempt; With loathsome serpentine coils Bringing her trouble to empires, Lurking in discord, coiling in ruins, Inventing new forms of constriction, Knots of cramp, as the dying continues.

Poverty cannot frighten, it’s not the worst that can happen; Virtue consoles, and who has the least, flies the fastest, Above the incarceration, reading the flights of the stars.

The Tower of Obscurity

Cimmeria of the coldest soil, Or the obscure cliffs Beneath the Arctic Pole, Or frozen Scythia, Land of the Arimaspes, Or imperial Thule, With nights that are half-years, Or damnable Tartary Where in the ice-caves Lie the world’s deepest prisons, Cannot chain up shadows like this place.

Search no more, with the pilgrim’s tread, For the very nest of the tenebrous. This, this is the shrine Of this unhappy Hemisphere, Where shady Erebus In weird landscapes, Under ashen skies And ferocious weather, Gathers up in dark forests, All the shining candors of the splendid world, Veiling all, blotting the sun, and nourishing horrors.

Here is the path to the abyss of Tartary, Where blind Fate attacks, With deadly eclipses, Amid the horrid Erinye, The sleepless immortals, Nourishing doom. Here the black fields, Beyond the reach of thunderbolts, With not one lamp of freedom, Where Destiny flings occult shrouds, And each man digs the grave of the other.

A country that gives birth to darkness, Amid horrid veils of confusion, Where they must grope and grab In eternal darkness Even when Heaven is clear; Here, where their Kingdom, Darkened by barricades, Veils the eyes and the wits, With ignorance harder than iron, Clutching the body, and cluttering intellect.

Clamped in the stocks of darkness, And chains of obscurantism, And unknown torments and horrors, Of subterranean cells, Where the splendor of souls are stifled, Stupefied by the cold. Hearts falter, movement is sluggish, The air itself has gone blind, And, dreading the congealing atmosphere, The Sun escapes to some better climate.

Here I live, lightless and languishing, Here where the Sun dropped dead; Forever deprived of clear daylight, I try to make the days shorter, Although that shortens my lifetime. So if I am pensive and silent, It’s because all I can see, teary-eyed, Are dreadful Specters and Chimeras, A host of Ghosts, wherever I turn.

Why risk shedding light on opacity? Inhuman enchantment, Seeing a heart that glows, Will dowse any flame of ardor, Intimidating affection; Swift-flying Love, Avoids stricken countries; Love takes his handsome face elsewhere; Love doesn’t take his pretty torch to light Hell.

Blame whoever gave as Mother to the Gods, Night herself, that blind goddess, Shadow abhors the Light, And each always struggles with the other, Once ice appears, fire does not glow; Once good fortune is spent, The ardor of life flees, And twilight sets in; And Love does not show his bright face In the dim light of stars of bad omen.

Here, Terror obliterate clarity. Whatever shines is a lie; It is the false light of deadwood That glimmers without heat and life; That cold phosphorescence, That sparkles when mariners strike it, Or the glows that cluster in branches, From the eyes of nocturnal owls.

No Moon, ray, or splendor to boast of, Among these dark caves, Among ghosts and enchanters, Every ray dissipates, In a fog dense as rock; Enveloping darkness, Among thoughts and troubles That frail light cannot dissolve, But a light here would only add bitterness, Since iron looks worse when seen more clearly.

But the rays of Heaven are glorious, Beaming in ardor, With a light that inspires Smiling happiness; And the fatal prison, Cannot contain the joy Of those martyrs, In hermetic recesses, Of immortal memory. Once they contemplate the holy Sun, Then their blinded gaze, Their wounded hearts, And all the horrors disappear, and become their splendors.

Muse of the Diamonds, be silent now, And take consolation, Even if life is a shadow, All shadows, good or evil, always fly away.

The Tower of Rigor

Frighten the soul, and horrify the heart; Stun the senses and stagger the feet, On this hard courtyard, where Rigor, Rules among his penalties and punishments. Faces go pale and hearts pound at the sight of him; His grim scowl and aspect of severity, He sits in pride among armed retainers, Emotionless except for his cruelty, With bitter laws, utterly pitiless, A bloody ruler over the dead.

Here they must dwell, those whom he threatens With flashes of horror And themes of fear, Better that lightning would strike this Tower, Amid seas of tears And sighing winds, And through those dark thresholds, Some are dragged, bound and complaining, To cells of inexorable pain. Where the stone resounds, Rigor gloats over misery, And weakening accents, And fading voices, and enfeebled laments.

Readied for martyrdom, While begging for mercy Thrown amid Panthers And Tigers born of women, With contempt and disdain, And barbarous anger, Burning in their armored chests; Red-faced and foul-mouthed, Soldiers breathing fury, With lamps of Tartary And eyes all aflame, With smoke in their noses, As in a choking battlefield, With ferocious gunfire in cruel warfare, Where Hope is killed and Faith is buried.

With eyes of stone, dry and pitiless, Disgusted by prayers, And offended by tears; Rigor throws lamps into rivers, And anger learns from the waves, And kindles in the midst of the waters Slander from treacherous faces, Disdainful effrontery, That awakens a fire, That consumes others, with cinders, and mockery Such a dreadful comet, That shines malignant rays repeatedly, Havoc, Shame, Pain and Outrage.

There are no veins of dark ore in the mountains, Whether iron, bronze or jasper, Forged into hard chains, That are hard as the heart of pitiless ignorance. There is no anvil, no stone so potent, As Rigor’s adamantine soul, Which he drags along burning boulders, With feral impetus, To the darkest crater of Etna, Among pitiless peaks and rivers of fire.

With a fiery tongue, and harsh vulgarities That imitate the lion’s roar, Sarcastic in words, Atrocious in deeds, Thrilled to hear high-pitched screams, He is happy about howls, and aims for more; More dolorous moans of monstrous suffering, But he himself doesn’t sigh, He himself doesn’t weep, He just wants to add more, Stained with blood — all from other people — He lacks only new art for inventing martyrs, He survives just to wickedly kill them.

Innocence makes him furious, He’s the Astrea of injustice, A traitor to every fairness; His only trophies are the ruins of others, He wins the palm for strangling the living, He even poisons the doors of the Church.

The Erinye, the Furies, in their Inferno, Crowned with serpents full of venom, In grief, and eternal damnation, Have happier souls than he does, This minister of hatred, This blood-soaked fanatic.

At his word, the torture machines get ready, Cranking out torments, and unthinkable miseries, Tragic misdeeds of funereal cruelty, Like Sisyphus, or Ission, with that stone, or that wheel; With vultures and Harpies flying all around, Competing with wild bulls and gryphons, All sojourning together with him in the abyss, With rivers of bitter tears, But no spring of Pity appears there; The Styx flows divinely, with the Acheron.

Here he gets crowned by Pluto himself, With French lilies in one hand, bloody roses in the other, Aconite, the poison flower of the Alps, Grows where Death keeps seven perils, Myrrh, yew, and funeral cypress, To scorch the eyes, And poison the lips. In this dark hell-hole, among the recesses, Of intricate tangled forests, And for every, root, branch, frond and leaf there, Some victim of his has some shackle or a chain.

With such artifice of inhuman genius, What’s one more dead man among a thousand? One more abyss in a black kingdom on fire? Or other snuffed-out lamps that once shone, Or spirits destroyed by brotherly gunpowder, Their bones buried in crude shallow graves, That should have obelisks of immortality? Up in the bold clouds, Those battalions of buried troops, Could join Mars and defeat the Spheres of heaven.

Such are the glories and merits of Rigor, His pomp, and his deadly victories. Here is his throne, here his art, here his opera, Where he gambled with Life and Fate, In the theater of horror, on the raw throne Set among ruinous graveyards, The prison, the tomb, the echoing cavern, Where, striding and bombastic He passes out guns, loose and reckless, To anyone who wants an armed vendetta.

But cease now, my Muse, for pity is flowing. In the confinements of Rigor, pity alights, it is ready. At the very extreme of Avernus, mercy has arrived.

The Tower of Memory

The passionate exemplar of this Tower, More than mere stone: carved into stone, Sweetly deceiving, imperious, tormenting, The dolorous Memory Of my past life. So pleasurable, yet so fleeting, A jumble of confusion, Raw and fallacious, Delightful, deceitful, Revealing the years to my afflicted mind: My goodness departed, and my evil present.

In this dreadful shelter, moody and brooding, Deprived of the good things rehearsed in my mind, I express — yes — that which still seems true to me, But from these self-deceits, While contemplating my life, Horrors and dark concepts radiate Through the happy sphere Of my former glories. I see myself as a wretch, Whose soul turned from sweetness, To grim years without joy, where sorrow flourished.

The Wheel of my misfortune seems immortal. It revolved from a Time of every joy, From the light into horror, a dead calm, Devoid of any wind. When I look back at my past, Feeling that, for all my good fortune, Something much worse happened to me, And yet greater evils await me, Then, in a cloudy mirror of weepy fatalism, I see myself drowned, extinguished by sorrow; It seems my life was one momentary yearning.

Spurred by these racing moods, Which are just as inconstant, and changeable, As my rapid, atrocious misfortunes, Moods that move so quickly That they change every time I breathe, I fix my mind’s eye on my good times, Not the times that chained my foot, For Destiny was my enemy, Glimpsed in my dreams, Wandering among the shadows, Among immobile phantasms. As my fate grew more obvious, I ignored it more.

What I sense here is not a simulacrum. It’s the truth, yes, far past pretense. While I write, I am plowing the sea, An immense sea, the color of death, Which intellect cannot touch; Events remote, and irrevocable, Can never return to us; The spirit wastes in vain, Meditating on days Of lost contentment, amid present misery; Memory advances to murder the heart.

This ray from Heaven, Memory, splendid within us, Lights the mind with sparkling desire, And strong affections, lofty and powerful, Clarifying, liquefying, Lifting the heart in impossible flight, Among the wandering Atoms, where it involves itself, Among sighs of nostalgia, Learning at last from meditation, While each passing thought feels bitter-sweet.

I was hard-proven in the midst of weapons, But alas, my life is passing in bondage; My beautiful past slid away from me. How stormy that stream, And how swift those regrets. Even ecstasy could not avert the flood. The Hour was fleeting, The Meridian long spent, Of my brief glory. And, although my Faith remains firm, My Desire is to follow Memory, Toward that which comes next: Oblivion.

Fixed in my past, In my present afflicted, Enveloped in shadows, Among boulders, oppressed, I live pierced by sharp brooding; The wanderer in chains, Impressed by clarity and insight, I follow the Sun though immersed in my sorrow. Darkened and yet serene, Here where my adverse fate, Replete with the tenebrous, Will forever flee from the light of my happiness. And yet: even if I am in irons, the Sun is constant.

But in this valley of blind Moles, And of Asps too deaf to hear me, Looking or listening, could they add to my evil? Should I leap into their abyss, Betraying my ingenuity, For that which never was, and never shall be? Should I wheel like the ill-turning stars, Bringing on yet more trouble, Like an extinguished spark, Showing all the good fortune I witnessed, Is woefully buried now, in eternal eclipse?

No. No, though I write in dust, And chisel it in my entrails. If the fading pleasures of Memory, Can no more kindle my heart, And my soul is slain by too short a sweetness, And a vulgar and horrible history, Builds prisons where there should be thrones, No, not even in these caverns, Where they print images of eternal night, Hiding in shadows the bitterness of fate, Where sad Memory can revive the dead.

Such is my heart, and my step, and my grieving eyes. Standing in fire, in bondage, in Avernus, If my mind cannot fly, my soul will rest. And with my friend Memory, In this punishing Inferno, I will always think of my country. That unhappy home, Imperilled by war, Threatened by treachery, Under vague, veiled skies forever changing, So near the Abyss, so far from Heaven.

So song, be silent now, With your voice that infiltrates stones; Cherish your woe, and arouse Memory.

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