The episode went a little too far into mean-spiritedness for my taste, too, with Garth (the everyman hero of the episode instead of the Winchesters) even naming his twin boys Sam and Castiel instead of Sam and Dean when I don’t think Garth has ever even met Cas! The Winchesters, instead of being turned into “normal people”, were more like bumbling idiots who needed Garth to save them.
By the time we get to Dean’s motivational speech to Sam, they had been so ineffectual for the entire episode that his words didn’t even ring true.
Dean to Sam: Not everything we did was because of Chuck. It was us. The blood, the sweat, the tears, man. That’s us. We’ve been doing this our whole lives. We’re the best in the world. So I say we go out there and kick some ass!
Sam didn’t believe him, and sadly neither did I. And that’s not why I watch this Show!
In order to save my sanity, I came to my own interpretation of the episode so that I could continue to be madly in love with the show that only has ten episodes left: it was Chuck cursing them with unbelievably bad luck, not taking away some good luck he had bestowed way back when. What has always been inspiring about the Winchesters is that they are ordinary human beings who have managed to do incredible things because they’re well trained since childhood, extremely competent and skilled, and they always have each other’s backs. That’s the whole point of the show and why it has been so powerful for so many people. You can’t take that away and expect anyone to be inspired by the characters in the same way.
Hence my own interpretation. Sometimes you have to do what you have to do as a fan in order to keep from despair, what can I say?
Luckily, the next episode seemed to want to do the same thing. The show backed away from being all about the Winchesters never having been heroes on their own and instead showed that they always have been, even as they play pool with a goddess to try to win some good luck back.
In that episode, ‘The Gamblers’, Sam and Dean head to Alaska to a magic pool hall to try to get their mojo back (ie, that curse I’ve head canon-ed lifted). Written by two of my favorite writers, Meredith Glynn and Davy Perez, this episode had nothing but affection for the Winchesters even as it continued to portray them struggling with everyday problems. However, their inherent heroism is intact in this episode. The car keeps breaking down but Dean somehow gets her all the way to Alaska anyway. Dean can’t eat cheese now, but he’s discovered Lactaid. They’re coping, even with the shitty luck Chuck bestowed on them.
One of the wonderful things about this episode was that it gave us a glimpse of the “everyday life” of Sam and Dean, which is something that is all over fanfic but a rarity in the show itself. We know they’ve been playing pool all their lives, but how often have we seen it?
Dean insisting that he’s been playing pool since before Sam was born, and Sam’s priceless reaction, made me laugh out loud. (And the humor in this episode totally worked)