“Writing is Hard” – God’s Words Couldn’t be More True
Okay, here it is.  I’ve copied our exact outline from our show notes on ‘The British Invasion’. Due to many fans being unhappy with this season’s story (or possibly lack of), we went into some of the possibilities as to why we are in the situation we currently find ourselves in. After wading through the facts and writing strategies, we can see a light at the end of the tunnel — and this leaves us all with one big question. Will this all amount to a strong 13th season?

Outline taken from our April 10th broadcast during the discussion on ‘The British Invasion’
Knowing “the why” can better help us understand the what. What will happen next?

Let’s take a look at these decisions —  

• Remembering that Ultimate goal #1 – refocus story –

***The ending of season 11 was much like the ending of season 5– where do you go from here?

• Writing decision 1 – remove God and Amara for obvious reasons
• Writing decision 2 – remove dead weight (yes Crowley and Castiel)
• Writing decision 3 – Keep fans happy while we reboot by giving them nostalgic elements of lore, characters and familiar motifs
• Writing decision 4 – Keep the enemy familiar (saves us time with character development) while we keep you distracted because we are rebooting.
• Writing decision 5 – BMOLs will be the placeholder to keep the arc of the season tied together with questions of morality and ethics (do we kick Kelly Kline in the stomach?)
• Writing decision 6 – take all of the above and use to stall for time because of reasons—
  • Newbs in the writing room
    • Welcome to Andrew Dabbs daycare

RELATED: Supernatural: The Crossroads – ‘The British Invasion’ – Episode Discussion

Because we don’t have 5 hours today we will focus our attention on Writing decision #2 — dead weight. Honestly – this has been a highlight this year. A smart and ballsy move by Dabb.

• To remove Castiel — Now he has been in close to the same amount of episodes as he was in last year but you really couldn’t tell because they have been nothing more than placeholder type episodes.
  • I.e. close-ended episodes
• This is common trick of the trade for television writing

To sideline or not to—

• Sidelining Castiel (and yes even Crowley)
  • These have been strong points and are tough decisions to make when you are a new showrunner like Andrew Dabb.

• Let’s forget about the fandom for a moment and look at it objectively from a writing standpoint alone.
  • How do you fix two characters that have become nothing more than “along for the ride” or fan service?
    • The easy and quick answer is – You remove them from the board
      • And that can be done in a multitude of ways.
        1. I.e. Have Castiel off doing who knows what and
        2. let Crowley stay busy with his “revenge” on Lucifer.

By removing them – it allows the writers to refocus the story and find important roles for them to play later –or even into season 13. You can see this with characters like the BMOLs, Lucifer, Nephilim — this season

Just with this analysis we can see what Dabb is doing– whether you agree with the methods doesn’t matter. This season is shaping up to be nothing more than a bridge season — let’s not forget the “cosmic consequences” 

This is a setup year. It’s not really what we are use to and the writers are all new — SO this is why we are where we are at. This will be our template for our critical analysis moving forward. If you haven’t, you can listen to our complete discussion on this week’s podcast. Be sure to subscribe on iTunes and Stitcher.

SUPERNATURAL: THE CROSSROADS PODCAST

• Supernatural: The Crossroads – ‘The British Invasion’ – Episode Discussion
• Supernatural: The Crossroads – ‘Ladies Drink Free’ – Episode Discussion
• Supernatural: The Crossroads – ‘Somewhere Between Heaven and Hell’ – Episode Discussion
• Supernatural: The Crossroads – ‘The Raid’ – Episode Discussion