Supernatural: S08E11 - LARP and the Real Girl.

This one is late largely because I have a degree to be doing. Enjoy!

So the plot to LARP and the Real Girl basically involves a LARP game getting out of hand when real magic and a fairy get involved. Yeah, that is kinda it...

8x11(because I'm not writing that full title over and over) was awkwardly paced and predictable, happy to lean back on the novelty of a Felicia Day lesbian scene and Dean in chainmail rather than do any actual work. Although I suppose Day needs a medal for getting a second episode of Supernatural and still walking out of it alive, this show doesn't take to kindly to female characters. That isn't to say the episode wasn't fun in places, Sam's general WTF expression throughout the episode had me chuckling a few times and the character of the sheriff was probably the best guest character in the whole episode but we've seen in the past how much fun these kind of Supernatural episodes can be and this one just felt half arsed. Admittedly I was impressed that 8x11 managed to be even more violent and gory than Supernatural is normally, how they manage to get this aired is beyond me.


There are some continuity issues too, I can't say what it is like to have a vampire bust me out of purgatory, but Dean seemingly dropped Benny and he is fine, I kinda thought they'd have a tighter bond? Especially after all the shit Dean has been bending over to do for Benny. What I do know is what a breakup feels like and I've seen some critics talking about Sam's 'brilliant portrayal of mourning his lost relationship'...what? If you really love a girl, breakups suck, breakups feel like an end of the world scenario even if you know deep down that it isn't. Sam is still Sam, he just seems to be trying a little harder to look like Grumpy Cat. And despite one out of context, offhand comment about Dean sending that text, you could quite easily watch this episode out of context and not feel confused which as said is a problem because I though Supernatural was finally making some progression.

Honestly though, I think a big problem I had with this episode is more the fault of the season as a whole. Namely that we're half way through the season now and the actual story has barely even started, which is season 8 in a nutshell. Whereas previous seasons got way too big for their boots, cramming in so much stuff it literally couldn't contain it all, Season 8 seems fine to sit back, recline and bumble from one story point to another. A good 70% of the season aired so far has made little progression to either the characters or the story as a whole and honestly, I'd rather have too much story and little filler, because season 8 has basically the same bloated feel, only rather than being bloated with story it's now just bloated with filler. When the of the week episodes are good like Bitten and Heartache, my favourite episodes of the season so far or just downright hilarious like Hunter Heoici, then it's easy to ignore that what you are watching is basically filler but with the combination of such a half baked episode and just last episode marking that Supernatural was supposed to be finally moving forward, all this episode left me was disappointed and made me realise that for all of the faults of the last couple of seasons, at least none of them were this boring.

I had other, more personal problems as well. I got the idea behind the episode, like these LARPers want to escape to a world where magic and monsters are real, while not knowing that they actually are real but with Supernatural's muted visual palette, this didn't really seem as clever or as funny as it probably could have been. The monster of the week was just a hot chick in a white dress, who had a fancy transition when she left. This could have been played to much more amusing levels if Supernatural featured monsters of the week more in the fashion of shows like Reaper, I'd love to see these LARPers bump into someone like Barney The Butcher, now that would have been hilarious.

So overall 8x11 has to be one of the worst episodes of the season, a season which has so far had pretty strong of the week episodes because that has largely been what the season has been made up of. Maybe in the last couple of seasons an episode like this would have been a nice break, but here it just feels like time wasting.

Pros;

• Who knew that Sam could be the most amusing thing in an episode? 
• Some impressive kill scenes.
• I liked the sheriff.

Cons;

• Awkwardly paced. 
• Bland. 
• Underwritten. 
• Predictable. 
• Assumes it can be carried by novelties and novelties alone. 
• Just get on with the fucking story already, Jesus Christ!

Think About It!

-Locke

What would you rate 'LARP and the Real Girl'?