#1x12gif

[dustydreamsanddirtyscars]

1x12 “Faith” // 3x10 “Dream A Little Dream of Me” // 8x01 “We Need to Talk about Kevin”

“If the Tin Man Misses His Heart, So Does an Entire Show“ - On 14x01 “Stranger in a Strange Land” and the Thing about Hearts, Love and Faith

“That's one deep, dark nothing you got there, Dean. Can't fill it, can you? Not with food or drink. Not even with sex. [...] Oh, you can smirk and joke and lie to your brother, lie to yourself, but not to me! I can see inside you, Dean. I can see how broken you are, how defeated. You can't win, and you know it. But you just keep fighting. Just... keep going through the motions. You're not hungry, Dean, because inside, you're already...dead.”

- Famine to Dean in 5x14 “My Bloody Valentine”

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I admit, it is rather weird to write a piece of meta on an episode underneath a gifset that doesn’t feature a single scene from said episode. It doesn’t for good reason though and that being the fact that iTunes doesn’t have the episode available here in Germany yet, so I couldn’t download it to make gifs, therefore this will have to do. I think though that these scenes above will illustrate well enough why I chose to use them in context to the S14 premiere. It’s plain and simple: To me they capture the essence of what this episode was about and to a huge extent in my personal opinion this episode was about one thing: Faith. Whether it was from Maggie mentioning a rawhead (the monster Dean killed in 1x12 “Faith” and almost killing himself in the process as well) the first man we saw Michael visit who started his day with praying to Mary trying to “keep the faith” that they’ll find Dean to Castiel expressing faith in Jack, who has lost it and the believe in himself to Sister Jo who seems to continue to work as a “faith healer” and saving people.

Faith, the very concept of it has always been something Dean as a character was shown to struggle with on Supernatural. Early on, from the very first season onward and especially set up with the episode 1x12 “Faith” that sees Dean close to dying with a damaged heart after having been electrocuted his’s faith or lack thereof has been an integral part of his journey as a character. In fact it has become a red line running throughout the seasons shining a light on Dean’s state of mind as well as perception of self.

Given all that the opening episode of S14 felt very interesting, because imo it called back to its roots and the episode 1x12 “Faith” as that episode not only truly established the heart symbolism surrounding Dean that has been focal point time and again over the course of 13 years, but also marked Dean’s special place within the grand scheme of things which has always lead all the way to Michael, who of course at present is calling the shots.

And here is where these aspects intertwine rather well, because imo the heavy focus on the heart in 14x01 with Kip for example talking about “eating Sam’s heart out” feels especially striking because Dean is absent. Dean, the tin man, lost his heart, his agency, has become a mere puppet to Michael’s will. And along with Dean essentially losing himself to me the show has lost it’s core, his heart too and that was strikingly showcased this episode.

Now, I know many people are going to hate me for saying this, but to me this set up makes one thing perfectly clear: Supernatural cannot work without Dean (which is why Dean is never allowed to not be around for longer periods at a time), because it lacks its heart, the PoV character, the narrator, the one who is holding everything together - and with that also has become the one who has steadily fallen apart due to the weight he carries on his shoulders, because he never once has put himself first or believed he mattered (and frankly ever since that god awful scene at the end of S12 with Dean trying to save Mary by going inside her mind also was plain shown that he indeed doesn’t seem to matter as a person in his own right, but only in extension to someone else) and with that thought he deserved to be saved.

To me this first episode spelt out perfectly the only way Dean should be able to “beat” Michael in the long run (I assume that even though Dean may appear “saved” but really won’t be - I guess they will play up some parallels between Nick and his possession and the aftermath for him with Dean, though frankly this whole thing was the most stupid move, because the vessel Lucifer inhabited was artificially made by Crowley and had nothing to do with Nick anymore, so... duuuhhh + if they needed this for dramataic purposes, Dean sharing with Sam those experiences would have made more sense and would be much more meaningful, but anyway...) lies in the small but important fact of Dean finding self worth and love for himself. The episode has shown one thing clearly and that is that Michael is completely unable to grasp the concept of what love means, it escapes him or at the very least annoys and bewilders him. Just like Lucifer never knew what Baby could trigger for Sam in 5x2 “Swan Song” neither understands Michael the meaning of love. And especially so if it is love for someone else. The only thing he knows about that is how he can use it to manipulate people and that’s how he was able to get Dean too after all.

And here is where I found Michael’s question to his counterparts interesting (though I quite frankly had to roll my eyes at Dabb here too, because really? Now even so obviously reference/steal from Lucifer from “Lucifer” and his “what do you desire?”-style), because every single time, every single answer featured love for someone else and belonging in some fashion, things Michael obviously seems to despise and count as a weakness (he is very Voldemort in that regard actually...) unless it is directed at oneself.

What do I mean with that? Obviously, Michael had asked Kip the question of “what he wants” as well and after some thinking he had come to the conclusion, a very selfish one: Everything. Well, as one says that’s how the mighty fall, but what I felt important in this context is how Kip managed to “survive” Michael and how Michael befriends a vampire at the end of the episode (for its “pure” reasons - lots of callbacks and parallels to purgatory with Dean and Dean and famine here, which I can’t possible work into this text right now, but there are a few fitting things in these storylines relevant to the current set up). They both think of themselves, put themselves first, “love” themselves if you will and THAT is something very strikingly different to Dean, because Dean doesn’t care about himself, doesn’t put himself first and truly has no love for himself. That is exactly why imo Michael has such a strong hold over him, why Michael could overpower Dean. It’s based in Dean’s lack of self worth and that aspect to is directly connected to faith - faith as such as well as the episode from S1.

More than once on the show it was addressed that Dean doesn’t think he deserves to be saved. Be it due to what he did in Hell or plain and simple due to the fact he thinks no one could or should ever love him. I truly think that is why Dean is so vulnerable to be overpowered by Michael, because in opposition to Dean Michael has all the love for himself but none for anybody else. He is self confident to the point of arrogance and being a complete megalomaniac, but point is, he feels worthy. That’s where he draws strength from. Dean on the other hand feels the opposite, has never learnt to form a healthy image of self. That is where to me the aspects of purity and hunger come into play here and especially so Famine’s words to Dean, because even though it is 9 years later, Dean doesn’t feel any different really, he never healed but only accumulated more scars, more trauma, more reasons to hate himself. He has been deeply depressed for a long time and shown to be tired and at the end of his rope, ready to lay his head to rest. Amara to echoed these sentiments previously said by Famine, that Dean feels empty. And well, doesn’t someone who feels empty and despises himself allow all the more room as a literal vessel for someone to inhabit?

So what does it all come down to? My personal takeaway from this episode was that there is only one way to “save” Dean and that is by Dean saving himself. And that may be the hardest part, because as all of the gifs capture above Dean struggles to see himself as worthy to be saved, as important and lovable, because he simply doesn’t feel any of those things for himself. But if I was part of the writing team, this aspect would be the vital aspect for Sam, Jack and Co. to get Dean back, getting Dean to build up his own self worth, loving himself and with that becoming strong enough to fight Michael off who really doesn’t know humanity at all. Dean’s love for his loved ones has proven to “move mountains”, who knows what he could move if he had found just a shred of that immens capacity to love for himself...