#I barely crack the surface of this meta-laden ep with this post jeez

[naruhearts]

*takes a break from yelling over this episode* 

In 14x14, queer Gorgon MotW Noah Ophis is fond of flowers -- you can observe the plentiful flower bouquets decorating his home:

(screengrabs: @coinofstone)

What caught my eye is this — an orchid centerpiece, complementing the pretty damn romantic ambience and soft hues evoking intimacy in Noah’s dining room (murder aside). The visual framing/alignment of Dean with the orchid could be symbolically significant, and you’ll see why.

As someone with a family of garden-lovers/gardeners, I immediately recognized the orchid on Noah’s dining table.

A quick search on orchids yields: “The most highly coveted of ornamental plants, the delicate, exotic and graceful orchid represents love, luxury, beauty and strength. In ancient Greece, orchids were associated with virility.” 

Noting the cannibalistic ingestion in 14x14, the following passage is interesting: “In fact, Greek women believed that if the father of their unborn child ate large, new orchid tubers, the baby would be a boy. If the mother ate small orchid tubers, she would give birth to a girl.”

Now, the primary aspect of the orchid metaphor I’d like to highlight --> the orchid’s genus name comes from the Ancient Greek ὄρχις (órkhis), “literally meaning "testicle", because of the shape of the twin tubers in some species of Orchis” x 

Additional research generally associates the orchid to sexuality and fertility. 

The orchid is phallic, especially if viewers take the vast queer subtext underpinning Noah and 14x14 (that then becomes TEXT) (I’m writing a separate post on 14x14′s queer subtext) into consideration.

We know that Noah’s name -- Noah Ophis -- is Greek ofiß for serpent (playing into the main meta-tastic Ouroboros themes of 14x14), but Ophis could also be not quite an anagram but an iteration/analog of the orchid: órkhis. Yockey takes GREAT care in characterizing Noah as a sexual villain (the first textually queer MotW if memory serves me right); he’s charming and upfront, preying on male victims onscreen through the power of seduction/sexual manipulation. Noah rides the line between the gender binary, appearing neither super masculine or super feminine: instead he may be seen as twink-y androgynous.

Am I supposed to be surprised? 

Remember that EVERYTHING MEANS SOMETHING.

Noah is a potential textually queer Dean mirror, not to mention that he poisons those he seduces, presenting a narrative reminder of Dean’s low self-worth; his low self-worth subsequently enables him to believe that he’s poison. Dean thinks he poisons the people he loves -- puts them in harm’s way *insert Dean’s previous romances + Destiel meta here* -- and perceives himself as undeserving of love in return, not worthy to be saved.

*resumes yelling* *all this meta in meta in meta is giving me the best kind of headache* *again I need to do AT LEAST 3 rewatches before I can properly absorb 14x14* *more posts to come, hopefully*

Also, semi-flamboyant Noah kinda reminded me of this guy:

Wanek, you genius.