Just a few thoughts that keep rumbling around my mine about the show.
Spoilers ahead.
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It becomes apparent in the later seasons, that the brothers are honest to Gods heroes. To paraphrase the Slayer's epitaph, they saved the world a lot. In Se1 though, they seem more like ordinary folk, not heroes so much, as two guys just doing a job.
I like that they aren't ever superheroes, they don't get magic powers (nothing long lasting anyway), they don't get power rings, they aren't superhuman, they aren't bathed in space beams, they can't do more than normal people can.
They have been brought up to shoot guns, hunt demons, do research, learn theological sigils and basic magic. But they are ordinary people in ordinary bodies. For the record, I don't think Sam's pshychic powers count as a superpower.
When they stumble along the riches in the Bunker they don't suddenly know everything, they still have to research, they've just got a comfortable base to do so from. To be honest, they deserve a nice home, though the lack of natural sunlight would irk me. I bet it pisses Sam off too. And Dean, though he might not ever admit it.
The brothers don't expect to live a long life. They do what they do out of a sense of duty and responsibility, and because it's the right thing to do*. They are intensely moral (until it comes to saving the other one from death or torture, then, ignoring those few episodes after the Trials, the rest of the world can go swivel). To hazard a guess, they expect to die in their 30s or 40s. Most hunters get killed by something awful before they get old.
The thing about the brothers though, is that the older they get the harder they are to kill, because older hunters have got to be older hunters because they are very good at not dying*. Or not staying dead in these two's case. So in all likelihood they are going to get older and better and will die at a ripe old age of something boring. Hopefully in each other's arms.
To get back to the original point, these are ordinary folks, like you and me, with specific training to be sure, but really just like you and me. We could do what they do, if we tried hard enough and gave up enough. That's an attractive quality in a protagonist. It's more believable than Batman.
* Spot the Discworld references here.
Spoilers ahead.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
It becomes apparent in the later seasons, that the brothers are honest to Gods heroes. To paraphrase the Slayer's epitaph, they saved the world a lot. In Se1 though, they seem more like ordinary folk, not heroes so much, as two guys just doing a job.
I like that they aren't ever superheroes, they don't get magic powers (nothing long lasting anyway), they don't get power rings, they aren't superhuman, they aren't bathed in space beams, they can't do more than normal people can.
They have been brought up to shoot guns, hunt demons, do research, learn theological sigils and basic magic. But they are ordinary people in ordinary bodies. For the record, I don't think Sam's pshychic powers count as a superpower.
When they stumble along the riches in the Bunker they don't suddenly know everything, they still have to research, they've just got a comfortable base to do so from. To be honest, they deserve a nice home, though the lack of natural sunlight would irk me. I bet it pisses Sam off too. And Dean, though he might not ever admit it.
The brothers don't expect to live a long life. They do what they do out of a sense of duty and responsibility, and because it's the right thing to do*. They are intensely moral (until it comes to saving the other one from death or torture, then, ignoring those few episodes after the Trials, the rest of the world can go swivel). To hazard a guess, they expect to die in their 30s or 40s. Most hunters get killed by something awful before they get old.
The thing about the brothers though, is that the older they get the harder they are to kill, because older hunters have got to be older hunters because they are very good at not dying*. Or not staying dead in these two's case. So in all likelihood they are going to get older and better and will die at a ripe old age of something boring. Hopefully in each other's arms.
To get back to the original point, these are ordinary folks, like you and me, with specific training to be sure, but really just like you and me. We could do what they do, if we tried hard enough and gave up enough. That's an attractive quality in a protagonist. It's more believable than Batman.
* Spot the Discworld references here.
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