Supernatural Minncon Friday and Saturday – Misha, SNS and More!

 

The Supernatural convention in Minneapolis is notable for a couple of things. First, it’s in the grandest theater on the whole tour – an actual slanted floor tilted and cushioned seated amphitheater style theater with two clamshell balconies that open up like magic on Sunday for J2 Day. The stage is so big that some of the guests aren’t quite sure what to do with it and it makes the Saturday Night Special seem like a rock show in a bona fide concert hall – and Louden Swain and guests know exactly what to do with that!

The convention center, and the city itself actually, is also notable for being connected by a series of hamster trail elevated tunnels that allow you to make your way from the hotels to the convention center without being pelted by the inevitable wind and rain. My hotel was also playing host to a furry convention, so we had furries and Supernatural tee-shirted fans sharing space and high fiving in the hallways. I was struggling to transport my hundreds of copies of Family Don’t End With Blood the mile and a half (okay okay, exaggeration, but it felt like that…) of hamster trails to the convention center when a very nice young man at the furry convention offered to help. He pushed the overloaded handcart the entire way to the convention center, while we chatted about what our two fandoms had in common and why nobody should be ashamed of what they’re passionate about.

I was in the vendor room throughout the con, and was so honored to meet many people who had read Family Don’t End With Blood and been inspired by what the actors and the fans shared in their personal essays. I also was thrilled to collaborate with Jodi from Eldwenne’s Fantasy – she created an original Women of SPN – FDEWB necklace that I adore, and was kind enough to give one to me. The necklace symbolizes that for the women of Supernatural, family means more than just blood – there’s a blue backdrop that matches the cover of the book, hugged tight by silver to symbolize the found family that surrounds the Winchesters, and black for Baby. And of course the drop of blood red. Gorgeous. Jodi is giving $5 off the necklace to anyone who purchases the book, or $10 at a con!

The con kicked off on Friday with Rob and Rich a bit overwhelmed by the amount of greenery onstage – not just the usual couple of dead trees, but a whole forest of them, along with some equally-dead potted plants.

Rob and Rich rearranged them, made a makeshift Supernatural Christmas tree, and generally had way too much fun with inanimate things. They even had a Christmas story, with Richard sitting crosslegged on the stage.

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Supernatural 12.22 – This Really Is “Who We Are”

I feel like I’ve been waiting all season to write a review like this one – one where I unequivocally enthusiastically at-the-top-of-my-lungs want to scream from the rooftops that THIS IS MY SHOW AND I EFFING LOVE IT! I’ve already regaled writer Robert Berens with all the reasons why he can never leave Supernatural, so he’s probably regretting writing this masterpiece, but honestly, I can’t help it. There were quite a few episodes this season that were disappointing, last week’s especially, so the reminder of why I fell for this Show and just how incredible it can be felt like the very best sort of relief. At least half my live tweets were in all caps, and that hasn’t happened since the last Robbie Thompson episode. I’m incredibly grateful to be able to return to that kind of enthusiasm for my favorite Show.

I’ve been watching Supernatural live since Season 2, so it’s been over a decade of season finale nights, but the mix of anticipation and dread that I feel leading up to every one has never diminished. All day, I kept an eye on the clock. I left work early, made sure I had all the necessary supplies – a little wine, some good take-out, a little pie for dessert. And of course, tissues. Lots of tissues. I tweeted Berens a few hours before the show aired, asking just how many boxes of tissues I would need, and he tweeted back that there were not enough tissues in the world.

Let’s just say that didn’t do anything to calm my nerves. There was mostly anticipation for 12.22, since Jensen had told me this was the episode I would love and I figure he pretty much knows what I love at this point. If he said I was going to be a happy fangirl, I was fairly certain I would be. Which also means tissues. At the same time, I had nothing but feelings of foreboding about 12.23, amped up by all the rumors about Mark Sheppard leaving the show and by Misha Collins’ tweet of an ominous (and emotional) video celebrating Castiel’s 100th episode.

Finale nights are full of lots of nail biting, but they’re also nights when the entire Supernatural fandom comes together. All over the world, thanks to streams and downloads as well as broadcasts, fans sit down “together” to watch, sharing our reactions and trying to support each other through the ups and downs of the episode. You can almost feel the tension across the globe as those final minutes tick by, as everyone waits to find out – literally – who will live and who will die. It’s been like that since the Kripke days, and this season was no exception.

And boy, were we right to be emotional – both the anticipation and the dread turned out to be well founded.

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