We’ve all seen the headlines.  

A white person commits a crime, and its media coverage includes an excuse as to what happened—they were triggered; they snapped; they’ve always been kind and quiet; they were on Ambien—accompanied by a wholesome picture instead of a mugshot. 

White people are often afforded this disturbing benefit of the doubt, this belief that losing a job or being stressed means that you can mistakenly attack or steal or even worse, kill someone.  It’s the judge hugging a murderer and giving her a Bible after her sentencing.  It’s insurrectionists, actual traitors against the very fabric of American democracy, being given lighter sentences or even bail.  It’s a juror stating she doesn’t want to send Elizabeth Holmes, the Theranos CEO and scammer who bilked corporations out of billions and may have endangered the lives of thousands by deploying a blood-testing device that never worked, to prison because “she’s so young.”  Elizabeth Holmes is 37-years-old.  

Black people are never offered a modicum of the same understanding and humanity.  And honestly, no one should when it comes down to committing horrible crimes.  But even in the wake of facing the worst evils of oppression, Black people are supposed to ask for grace and tamp down their anger and humiliation and preserve civility.

Simply put, our humanity, our right to be fallible, to be vulnerable, to make mistakes, is often denied.  

By now everyone has seen Will Smith slap host Chris Rock at the recent Academy Awards ceremony over comments he made about wife Jada Pinkett-Smith's shorn hair. If you’re a pop culture love like me, you’ve already heard every take, from the scaldingly hot to coldly racist (Fuck off, Judd Apatow) to the maddeningly hypocritical (Alec Baldwin punched a man over a parking spot and years before he killed cinematographer Haylna Hutchins in a horrific onset accident) to the outright insane (white women claiming they claiming couldn't sleep after the incident).

I have a lot of feelings about the situation (especially confronted with Chris Rock’s Piers Morgan-esque obsession with Jada and his apparent disdain for Black women), but I’m not sure you need another one.  And frankly, there are some people who have stated it in far better and more eloquent ways than I ever could.   

But there’s one thing I haven’t heard from many people during this firestorm of memes and backlash and craziness.  

So I’m going to say it with my whole chest and my entire heart:  

Congratulations, Will Smith, on your Oscar win.

Willard Carroll Smith Jr. is only the fifth Black actor to win a Best Actor award in the Academy’s 94 year history.  

He joins an elite and sadly small club of Black actors: Sidney Poitier. Denzel Washington. Jamie Foxx. and Forest Whitaker.

He has created a career that has delighted, entertained, and enthralled entire generations, from The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air to Bad Boys and beyond.  

He has played Muhammad Ali, a secret alien FBI agent, a lovelorn superhero, a charismatic cop, and most recently Richard Williams, the mad genius father of Venus and Serena in his now Oscar-winning role in King Richard.

He has created a loving blended family that is always there to support him.  He has spent his career spreading joy and positivity that will not be erased by one terrible and insanely public mistake for which he is already making amends.

Regardless of what happens in the future, how Hollywood will inevitably overcorrect and ignore Smith’s decades of box office smashes, good deeds, and squeaky cleanness, no one or nothing will be able to take that away from him.  

It’s been months since Supernatural stars Jared Padalecki, Jensen Ackles and Misha Collins announced that the upcoming 15th season of Supernatural would be its last.  After more than 300 episodes, hundreds of thousands raised for charity, and creating one of the most rabid and connected fandoms in history, it feels selfish to feel anything other intensely proud of my boys and my show, and the rock-salt studded legacy they are leaving behind. There’s no crying in the family business.

However, after last week’s emotional at San Diego Comic-Con, the finality is creeping in with sadness hot on its heels, especially when you try to watch Padalecki  and Ackles try and fail not to hold back the tears. 
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But it’s easy to forget that there are still nine months of production and an entire season of thrills, chills and Impala gas tank refills ahead! I’m harassing my favorite TV genie for more wishes for my favorite TV show. One last time. 

Here are my wishes for Supernatural’s final season...

Brotherhood to the Nth Degree.  The heart of Supernatural has always been the relationship between brothers Sam and Dean. So the final season needs to pack in as many chick-flick broments as possible.  The past few seasons have made use of recurring characters, with season 14 splitting the brothers up more than ever, which is about as acceptable as watching the Impala with rocks.  I wish the final season will focus primarily on the epic bromance, even if that means seeing less of side players, Cas and Jack.  Sorry not sorry.  I’ll even up the ante by specifically wishing for another bottle episode ala season 11’s “Baby” that focuses entirely on Sam and Dean, preferable trapped in a precarious place.  With monsters.

The Ghosts of Sam’s Past.  There are several pivotal moments in Supernatural’s mythology: the devastating fight in which Sam’s father disowned him, his years at Stanford, and his relationship with Jessica Moore.  I hope that the show dedicates at least one episode to the game-changing times in Sam’s life that they have yet to explore, especially if that means bringing back young Sam Winchester’s doppleganger and talented actor, Colin Ford.  If this could come in the form of a Sam-only episode, that would be even better.

Bring Back Ben Edlund.  During Comic-Con, showrunners shared that fan favorites, like Jake Abel’s Adam, would be returning, which is great.  I’d also love for Supernatural to bring some of its best writers, like Ben Edlund or Sera Gamble.  Edlund has written some of the best and most twisted episodes, including the brilliant “Wishful Thinking,” “Monster Movie,” and “Repo Men.”  The writing in the last few seasons has been lackluster due to dull, meandering plotlines, missing references, and the butchering its own canon.  What better way to remedy that than to have the writers who shaped Supernatural from the beginning return to ensure it has a fitting end?

Hunters Assemble. The Winchesters have faced their fair share of betrayal from people they love, and even the hunting community at large.  They are long overdue from a show of respect and a helping hand from the hunting community, and not the creepy “you had the devil in you!” worship from a guest at a hunter’s funeral in season 12’s “Celebrating The Life of Asa Fox.”  In the final season, I wish to see the hunters come to Sam and Dean’s aid much like in the last chill-inducingly iconic end of Avengers: Endgame.  Considering Sam is worthy of the powers of Thor, he’s long overdue from some badass hunter back-up.

Monster Mania.  In the beginning, Supernatural focused on ganking monsters from classic American folklore.  The show lost track of that somewhere between God’s little sister and alternate universes.  For season 15, I hope would return to its horror roots.  There are still plenty of mythical creatures Sam and Dean have yet to kill or encounter, including hodags, banshees, mermaids, elves and even Bigfoot. With Chuck determined on ending the world as bloodily as possible, he could throw all at Sam and Dean at once, and this fan would be tickled pink.

Up The F#cking Ante.  Some of the best episodes of Supernatural contained an deft combination of fantastic acting (season 4’s “In The Beginning”), amazing action (season’s “First Blood”) or black humor (season 6’ “Clap Your Hands If You Believe”). My final wish is that Supernatural would crank up the volume on all three, more gripping, emotional scenes, more BAMFy fighting, more “should I laugh at this?” humor.  The show can start by opening season 15 seconds after season 14 ended with an injured Sam, Dean and Cas being attacked by a pack of monsters in the cemetery. 

What are your wishes for the final season of Supernatural?  Share your thoughts below.

​You know you’re watching a fantastic episode of The CW’s Supernatural when the end credits appear, and you are damp with tears, overwhelmed with irrational anger, and exhausted from the merciless beating your feels just endured.  

Last week, the long-running sci-fi drama celebrated its milestone 300th episode by baptizing it in Jared Padalecki’s tears and Winchester feels.  The much-hyped episode somehow outlived the monstrous hype by taking everything we love about Supernatural--the monster hunts, the broments, campy fight scenes--and masterfully mashing them into an hour of television that was both a love letter to the 299 episodes before it and legacy created by characters Sam and Dean Winchester and stars Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles.  

​Like Supernatural did in 2005, “Lebanon” starts with a quest for revenge: a local dealer of occult goods apparently murdered a friend of Sam and Dean’s.  They arrive to avenge their friend and collect his ill-gotten wares.  When Sam is nerdily talking about an exciting night of cataloguing, he realizes that the dealer possesses an enchanted pearl that “grants your heart’s desire.”  

Thinking this could be the cure to ridding Dean of Michael who is imprisoned in his brain, Dean tries it.  Since this is Supernatural and Dean Winchester has a reckless streak deeper than the Impala's hidden trunk compartment, and since he’s just a damaged little boy, his heart’s desire isn’t to be rid of of the hitchhiker in his noggin, but to see his parents reunited.  Sidenote: I wondered what Sam would wish for, and could only come up with Michael safely out of Dean's head and dead, because Sam always does the righteous and selfeless thing, especially if Dean is involved.  What do you think?
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In a haze of red strobing light and shadows, an attacker descends on the bunker, easily mollywhopping a distracted Sam and Dean.  The lights switch back on, revealing the whole and very much alive John Winchester (Jeffrey Dean Morgan).  

“What happened to you?” John Winchester says to his boys, 16 years older than he remembers with gray hair, and ever more impossibly, laughlines.

It is one of the most loaded questions in television history. 

This version of John is far softer, gooier and more open-minded than the gruff, hard-assed original John Winchester, who unspeakably punished Dean for “letting” Sam run away from his monster training as children and disowned his son for getting a full scholarship to one of the most prestigious schools in the country despite being dragged across it to Castiel knows how many schools in how many cities in how many states.  Is it possible that Mary Winchester is the answer?  Whatever the reason, I am lapping it up, because it's what Dean, and especially Sam, deserve.  

Time is precious, and John wastes none of it apologizing to Sam.  The scene in which Sam and John smooth over their tumultuous relationship is one of  the hardest and proudest moments of the entire series.  I discovered Supernatural more than 10 years ago when Jared Padalecki was still rocking awkward haircuts and still growing into that massive body, and it suddenly hits me how many decades Sam has struggled with his problematic relationsip with John and the devastating knowledge that he’d ordered Dean to kill him if he turned evil moments before he died.  For series star Jared Padalecki, he began the show as a single 23-year-old.  Now he’s married (to Supernatural star Geneiveve Padalecki) with three children, and he’s grown more as an actor than I could ever imagine.  He was truly the scene-stealer of the entire night.  Sam has been hovering hotly on the outskirts of major storylines for the last three seasons, and it almost felt like Padalecki was auditioning to reclaim his place as co-lead.

As Sam, Jared shakes and dimples and clenches his jaw to hold back to the emotion as he admits that it's been a lifetime since John died. “When I think about you--and I think about you a lot--I don’t think about our fights.  I think about you on the floor of that hospital, and I think about how I never got to say goodbye,” Sam tearfully admits.  “You did your best, dad.  You fought for us, and you loved us.  That’s enough.”  At this point, I just have to turtle in my shirt, because this moment is beyond tears and is scorching every feels sensor I have in the best, most cathartic way possible.

If this feels too good to be true, then you're not surprised when crazy descends upon the town of Lebanon in the form of a freshly unkilled Zachariah (Kurt Fuller) and a rebooted, ruthless “I Gripped You Tight And Raised You From Perdition” Castiel.  They come to right all of the wrongs the Winchesters have done to the timeline, and will smite anyone who gets in their way.  It's a thrilling throwback to see Misha Collins' Castiel in his original trenchcoat and badassery, though I'll never get over angels fist-fighting.

Apparently, John Winchester wasn’t resurrected.  A very much alive version from 2003 was pulled into 2019, and as a consequence, the history is rewriting itself.  “Temporal Paradox,” Sam calls it like it makes sense.  Five seasons of The Flash has taught me that timeline math hurts my brain and it’s better to just go with it, and accept the flimsy notion that if John disappears from 2003, Dean never pulls Sam from Stanford and continues to hunt alone; Jessica never dies; Sam becomes a kale-obsessed lawyer-douche who doesn’t have time for family (Is that a worse ending that ya know, going to hell with the Devil and the brother he hates?  Or killing your monster niece?  Or being tortured countless times by supernatural forces?); and some other family is cursed to save the world.

But of course, being the masochists they are and since Jeffrey Dean Morgan is due back another movie set in a day or two, they agree to continue to be the guys that saved the world to send John back but not until they finally have that family dinner. This is the first time in series history that the current Winchesters have shared a screen together, and the chemistry between them all is incendiary.  The dinner scene is perfectly Winchester, a family cobbled together by bad food, alcohol and a visceral, pitbullish love that transcends time, death, heaven and hell.

The final goodbyes are some of the most gut-wrenchingly and exquisitely acted moments of the series.   
Despite his gruffness, Morgan can swell the smallest of hearts with just a reverently uttered, “My girl.” Sam, who is rightfully destroyed, is crying so hard that we may have to start a Go Fund Me for a new tearducts.

Jensen Ackles, who is famous for his ability to send one perfect tear dribbling down those sculpted cheeks, his covered his tears as well.  One of the cruelest call backs in an episode full of them, is Dean flinching at the sound of Sam smashing the pearl just as he did when Sam shot Madison in season 2's "Heart." 

It’s darkly funny that the show that declared “no chick-flick moments” created a 300th episode containing almost nothing but.  

“Lebanon” proves all of the things I’ve been saying the past few years as I’ve grown frustrated with the dwindling quality of the show: after 14 years, Supernatural can still be excellent.  It skillfully weaves together the SPN staples: scares, balanced broments, humor, and action.  It’s easily one of the best episodes last three seasons, and the shot of adrenaline the long-running series needs after recently being renewed for a 15th.  As the old dog in The CW's yard, Supernatural doesn’t need to learn new tricks, it just needs to utilize the ones it does best.

What did you think of the 300th episode?  Hit up the comments section below.

If you feel a chill and smell pumpkin spice in the air, it can only mean one thing: Fall TV is here!  And if you're anything like Small Screen Girl, you spent the summer lamenting about the surprise pregnancies, weddings, break-ups, potential murders, angelic possessions and more.  Finales put our favorite characters through the ringer, and premieres aren't that much kinder either.  

Here are 8 characters who deserve better in the 2018-2019 season.  

Raj Koothrappali, The Big Bang Theory 
Whether you love or hate The Big Bang Theory, I think everyone can say no one expected the show to last for 12 seasons.  This fall marks the last trip around the sun for the nerdiest sitcom on TV.  I'm not necessarily sad to see it go, but I am bummed about the overall trajectory of Raj's character (Kunal Nayyar).  After spending 6 seasons being unable to talk to women, he's spent the next 5 bumbling through relationships and whining about being alone while enduring racist jokes from his friends.  Even worse, while everyone else generated massive leaps in their careers, Raj's has remained mostly stagnant.  No one deserves a come up, both personally and professionally, more than Rajesh.  By season's end, I'd love see to him engaged to an adorkable divorcee with an obsession with rom-coms and a couple of kids, a massive discovery of his own, and maybe a spin-off of his own.  The final season starts on September 24 at 8/7c on CBS.

Olivia Benson, Law & Order: SVU
It's remarkable that Law & Order: SVU  will be celebrating its 20th season when it debuts on September 27.  While Stabler fled for the luxury and sanity of private security years ago, Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay) is still deeply entrenched in the grim and traumatizing world of special victims.  Now a Captain of her squad, she's endured more than a lifetime of hazards that extend far beyond beyond the professional.  Manhattan might be safer with Olivia still brandishing the badge, but she has definitely earn the right to snatch some of the security that Stabler did back in 2013. 

Everyone, Station 19
Shondaland's Station 19 premiered to lukewarm following, yet its one of my favorite new shows.  During last season's searingly suspenseful finale, almost every main character from Andy's dad to Travis to Jack all found themselves in life-ending peril, thanks to cancer and that horrific office building fire.  I'm NEED everyone, especially my precious cinnamon roll Travis, to not only make it out of that season premiere safely but to be able to save lives another day.  Too bad we'll have to wait until October 4 to find out the fates of the hottest firefights on TV.

Ian Gallagher, Shameless
It can be painfully frustrating to watch The Gallaghers try to dig their way out of poverty and/or mental illness only to be kicked back down by the snowballing tragedy that is being poor.  This is especially true for my favorite Gallagher, Ian (Cameron Monhagan).  After he managed to recover from a terrifying episode stemming form his bipolar disorder, secure a job as a paramedic and find a relatively cool boyfriend.  Then his meds became unbalanced.  Now he's a viral activist called Gay Jesus who started out protecting gay kids from religious persecution only for the movement to spiral into something violent and dangerous.   

This season has seen Ian actually fight to STAY in prison and now he's searching for messages from God.  It seems like just yesterday, he was dating a hot black fireman or sneaking off for a tryst with his star-crossed lover, Mickey.  If anyone deserves one of those fantastic, hard-fought Gallagher victories, it's Ian.  I'd love to see him have a somewhat peaceful ending to the Gay Jesus drama, a way for Ian to keep his paramedic job, and another rendezvous with Mickey.  Shameless is currently airing on Showtime at 9/8c every Sunday.

Sam Winchester, Supernatural
This is the second time that Supernatural's Sam Winchester (Jared Padalecki) has been included in this somewhat annual article (though I think about making it a weekly series for him).  Season 13 found Sam Winchester desperately searching for his mother, deal with Lucifer being sprung from the Apocalypse-verse and dying horribly (again) only to lose Dean when his body was hijacked by the evil archangel Michael.  Now he will be tasked with saving his brother from a twisted and massively powerful angel while doing to his day job of saving the world. 

Sadly, I don't have much confidence that the writers will give Sam a decent, full-fledged arc that encompasses both the grief of losing his brother to what is literally his worst nightmare, the fight to save him, and Sam forming any kind of bond with his newly-rescued mother, especially since the writers have already expressed the "challenges" of writing the show without Dean.  After several seasons in which it seems that Supernatural was zombie-staggering through the motions, I'm running out of hope that they can conjure up a compelling and scarily emotional arc for our Sammy. Thank god for crossroads demons, amirite?  Supernatural premieres on October 11 on The CW.

Today marks SSG's third birthday!  Like most three year olds, I spent more time running around in circles being dazzled by shiny things than actually accomplishing things.  But I'm also super-excited for the upcoming television season.  Check back for more very soon, and have some cake in honor of SSG!