#complex dean

[shallowseeker]

im just so tired of people bringing up the "jack's not family" line, like yes that was an awful thing for him to say but he literally expects jack to come back with him and sam to the bunker at the end of inherit the earth it's very clear he was just lying to himself, imo. like yes he did that but that wasn't the last thing he said to jack ever and he even tries to help jack the very next episode when jack is exploding and he comes to his senses.

Right, so this one is tricky. And heartbreaking.

Because the case for this "not being enough" is well-argued and complicated.

After TFW comes to their respective senses in Unity/Despair (Sam breaks out of analysis-paralysis, Dean throws away revenge and takes on death directly, Cas verbalizes that Jack isn't part of some grand plan), it's true that they hastily try to make amends.

BUT.

But they're out of time. They're all out of time.

We see Sam, the idea-guy, completely give up hope. And though Dean is dazed, he is trying to be "back to normal re: supporting Jack," more like what we see from him during LAST HOLIDAY.

///

Some snippets:

Dean feels responsible for what happened to Cas. He knows he's not enough:

Dean feels responsible for the disappearance of the world's future. Jack's future:

//

And Dean himself is DAZED

//

Dean is trying to pull himself together for JACK, specifically: "Dean rises...gives Jack a warm little nod."

//

Dean is dazed throughout, really. We see that he stayed up REFRESHING the newscast feed, hoping this was a nightmare he could wake up from

//

And here, Dean is commiserating with Jack and they're clinging together more than Jack is with Sam.

We can see the dynamic at play. That this time, Dean and Jack have been the ones forced to huddle together for support in the face of Sam's overwhelming despair and fatalism.

Jack enters the library. Jack: Guys, I'm... feeling something weird. Dean: Yeah, me, too, pal. We need aspirin.

&

When Dean grabs Miracle, he is likely anticipating the excitement of showing him to Jack, trying again, to let his gentleness and love fly free:

//

Further proof that the dynamic has shifted to a Dean-and-Jack having the strength dynamic. We see this after Sam verbalizes his despair again...and Dean tries to rally.

//

With Michael, we again see that the unit naturally flows into a cluster of Dean-Jack-Michael while Sam tries to muster up more lore, trying to be "the idea guy" while the others eat and converse:

&

///

So then we come to the end. The above rushes by quickly and we get:

&

Dean gets Miracle back, and he's already anticipating going home (with Jack). Dean got his faith back in s12 after Cas returned.

This time, Dean is trying to generate that faith all on his own.

In s12, when Dean got his faith back, he got up the strength to rescue Mary and tackle Jack's new powers and the continued string of wound-be kidnappers.

Perhaps here in s15, Dean is thinking about the same thing. They'll go home to recover and then get back to work. Dean is anticipating working with Jack and showing love to a new family member, a dog...

...and he's already dreaming of getting Cas back.

///

Dean has hope. And so much of it. It even comes off a little showmanship-ey.

Of Jack, he's like, "This is still Jack! We're back online! Only way onward from here is up!"

&

And Dean invokes the Dean Cave. But here's the thing.

In effect, the beats of the actions come off as, “Jack saves the world,” and “Dean offers to reward him... with a TV.”

The optics are a little bit “Quid pro quo.” And it's okay to point that out. Tragic, even.

It's because we know Dean that we know that isn't how he wants it to come off. That he's overcorrecting in the context of all the heartache they've been through.

///

And just like he's masking all this regret with over-the-top cheeriness, he starts to mask his sudden heartbreak, “masking emotion with irritation.”

Suddenly, Dean's dreams start to crumble. Jack's not coming home? He's bailing? What about them? What about (Cas)?

You've got a lot of people counting on you, he says. And by people, he means their own family.

///

When he realizes it's too late, that he's not getting what he wants, Dean is so overwhelmed that he can't even speak.

The fact is: Dean's attempts were too little, too late. (Though very complex and human and sympathetic!)

And Dean knows it. We went from zero to trying to generate his own faith and overcorrecting with Jack all episode, followed by being over the moon at getting his family back.

Then he lost it again.

Dean tries to crest on victory and be happy that the world is restored and they're free of Chuck. (They rescued Jody, Claire, Garth, and others!)

He clings to the concept of freedom, of HOPE IN THE FUTURE.

That he can make use of the gifts he's been given.

To live (maybe even get a real job, as we will see from his employment application later).

Dean's still trying to generate his own hope going forward, but as we see from the state of his room in the finale six months later... he's failing at that.

Sigh. :(

///////////////

This theme of Jack's “vanishing” and Dean's “death via prolonged heart SQUEEZE” (followed by being stabbed through the heart)

are further underlined in the SPNwin companion episode to the finale, The Winchesters episode 12: Tears of a Clown.

It's a reference to that sometimes people are TRYING to be strong and putting on a smile, when they're really not doing well at all.

CLARENCE: I didn't know what to do...how to help him through his grief, you know? So instead, a day after the funeral, I took him to the carnival to try and cheer him up. It only made things worse. ..

That's when I heard of the Legend of Limbo. If only I'd helped him through his grief instead of taking him to that damn carnival, he'd be here right now. ... MARY: Clarence used the carnival as an escape, so his brother wouldn't have to face his problems.

[shallowrambles]

ANNEMARIE: Yeah. I thought so, too. Seeing you take on Matt, I was like, “wow”" no one's ever done that for me before. But then you kept going and going, and I realized whatever is going on with you has nothing to do with my “honor” at all.

(10x01)

The name means, "favored grace, rebellious lover." Annemarie is a window into Dean wanting to (yet again) run away from everything, from Sam, from Crowley, from work. From his chronic feelings of rejection. From feeling things, from living in the real world with obligations and responsibilities.

Annemarie calls Dean on beating the person who was wronging her (Matt), a la how Dean called Cas out re:taking on Raphael. Because, like Godstiel, Demon Dean kept going beyond defending honor, beyond protectorship.

Demon Dean is a treatise to the loss of free will through disinhibition, yes, but it's also Dean acting out everything that was ever done to him. There's pent-up rage and rejection tied up with all of it.

It's the specter of "I did all of it for you!" which only sounds romantic, only sounds honorable...but Cas kept going, slaughtered the angels en masse. Because it was really about Cas's beef with his brother Raphael and his family and his issues. Just like in SPNWIN Mary called out John on using Mary as an excuse for her issues.

Anyhoo, we stan Annemarie. She is "human Dean."

She walked out of there thinking she deserved that.

[microwavebeeep]

I know, what I'm doing

[secretsoftheuniverse1987]

I see a lot of references to the scene in Goodbye Stranger where Dean, on his knees, begs Cas to come back to himself (and to Dean), and I see a lot of reference to Dean referring to praying as begging, but not a lot about how these scenes are literally in back to back episodes? Dean Winchester really said I don't pray because it feels like begging, but I'll pray to you, and then in the literal next episode said fuck it, let's drop the pretense, I am begging. I need you.

[anassemblageofpassions]

The thing abt john winchester is that he is too complex for the majority of the spn fandom and for a good portion of the writers on the show too.

Because at his core john is about love over everything else. When he looks up at his sons (yes, up, the fact that they’re both taller than him>>>>>), there is love seeping achingly from every single pore of his being even as he abuses them, as he destroys their souls beyond belief. He does it all entirely out of love. And he is so, so wrong for it. A part of him knows it. But he wants to keep dean alive, and he wants to keep Sam pure. And he loves them so much. And he damages them so horribly. John Winchester is the foundation upon which they are both built, they only become more of what he made them as the series goes on. Sam stops fighting it, Dean continues to mold into his image no matter how hard he tries to fight it.

Hell puts them both on steroids, but their individual trauma responses that influence this are the foundations that John built into them. No wonder azazel wanted sam to win so badly. John Winchester crafted his sons into alastair and Lucifer’s ideal victims, respectively, and dean was a better (worse) john than John ever was. John held out in hell. Dean acquiesced to his abuser despite all of his efforts to fight him, and he’s never been the same since.

Sam fought like hell, and he fought destiny, but at his core, he did what John always wanted him to by doing what dean wanted him to do, and then he stops fighting at all, loses the fire he showed john in adolescence that john immediately notices when he returns in s14.

And the sad thing is. They filled their roles so well that John is saddened by what they’ve become. He didn’t want dean to break. He didn’t want Sam to be dimmed. He’s sad to see what Sam is like in s14. In the process of recovering his wife, he ensured he would mold his sons into what he wanted them to be, and when he got what he wanted, he was devastated.

John Winchester is so driven by love and grief and he’s so filled to the brim with both that it’s painful to watch him on screen because he destroyed his family because of it. And he wanted this all along but he didn’t realize what he’d have to give up to get it.

[dark-dragon-8]

So I just watched "Sex and Violence" (Supernatural) and, man, I'm never questioning Wincest again.

Like, the siren was supposed to become whatever Dean wanted most and the guy literally turned into a "better" version of Sam/a little brother.

The way Sam looked at Dean when he was about to kill him and the way Dean always had a second/little moment of hesitation whenever he was about to hurt Sam and the siren had to convince/talk him into/actually tell him to do it (unlike the others who pretty much did everything on their own after the siren gave them the offer).

Like, damn, I don't care what you say these are not normal siblings. Normal siblings wouldn't think of the other as their greatest desire/the thing they want most, they just won't. Normal siblings (speaking from experience) would look at the other and, at most, will either wish to get along with them or for them to stop stealing their food, no in between. No, they're not normal siblings, hell they're barely even normal-weird/just weird siblings at this point, they're straight up obsessed with each other.

[lilacpaperbird]

and if I say that the whole "sam thinks he's better than dean because he went to college and thinks he's sooo smart" criticism is 0% based on canon material and instead it's 60% based on fanfics and tumblr posts relying purely on headcanons, and 40% a projection of their own academic inferiority complexes... then what?

[thedeadedhooman]

get me on the call with eric kripke because I need to know his version of the supernatural finale. I just know it would've been a banger. it would've been the darkest of shit and horrifyingly gory and too tragic to even rewatch but it would give you a fetish so bad you'd find yourself going back and watching it while you gag and jack off at the same time. it would've been wacky enough to even have him cancelled by a section of the fandom.

[5sospenguinqueen]

Castiel: You don't want Dean to die.

Castiel: And I don't want Dean to die.

Castiel: So, now we just have to make sure Dean doesn't want Dean to die.

Y/N: Fantastic plan, but have you met Dean?

[opheliasam]

god he (dean) used to be so different my chest hurts

[toydrill]

i missed drawing venture siblings so bad

[shallowseeker]

Thinkin about Dean's complicated desires to protect and be protected; the competing desire to be trusted with and shielded from

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One of the first scenes that epitomized Dean's warring needs re: Cas was in 5x18.

CASTIEL: Because there are at least five angels in there. DEAN: So? You’re fast. CASTIEL: They’re faster. CASTIEL takes off his tie and wraps it around his palm. CASTIEL: I’ll clear them out. You two grab the boy. This is our only chance. DEAN: Whoa, wait. You’re gonna take on five angels?

///

There are many ways to deal with this deranged, contradictory emotion. To (A) goad him into being faster, harder, stronger or (B) call him a baby and a whiner and hope that he steps up or (C) take him out of the fight all together "Just stay here and get better!"

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SNIPPET from this conversation:

(In season 14)

...there's the irrational desire of Dean's that Cas would just fix it all and shield Dean from all of it. This is something that Dean's scripted irrationality in Game 14x18 Absence accomplishes so, so well:

CAS: "Are you mad because I didn't tell you-- or that I'm telling you at all?" DEAN: "BOTH!"

It's both!!!!!

He craves Cas's protection. But he resents it, too. It's what he loves about him. It's what he hates about him. It's the power dynamic that brings him simultaneous comfort and pain.

The sad thing is, if Cas had solved Jack's soul problem on his own, Dean would have probably been elated and relieved. Just like how he was in total awe when Cas got the Leviathan blossom on his own. Dean was weak in the knees for it-- ready to tell Cas something big for it. It's so messy and dualistic and complicated.

///

Anyway, that protectorship of it all is complicated. That's what this spooky line is about in 15x02. Everyone everywhere is reminding Cas of his failed familial obligations. Here are the civilians in the gym, getting frustrated with Cas:

ANDY: First Nan went missing. Now Dave and Sheri. CASTIEL: We are looking for them everywhere. ANDY:You said you'd keep us safe. [Cas has no better answers for him. He pauses, closes his eyes for a moment, and then walks away]

Cas is the failed protector, the absent soldier who's trying his best to be on ALL impossible fronts: battlefield, home, marriage, work.

It's the same raw frustration we see out of a distraught Dean in 3x10:

DEAN: He's the one who couldn't protect his family. He- (DEAN steps back and swings the weapon again, hitting DREAM DEAN twice.) He's the one who let Mom die.

Cas was supposed to succeed where John failed! But it's too much weight. No one can be that strong. Not even Cas.

[shallowrambles]

My spiciest take is I do think you could take Demon Dean’s comments about running away, liking the disease, you humans actually much worse/evil than me morally, you’re nearly killing me to bring back my human weakness and stamping out my unfeeling “strength,” imprisonment, etc and shove it into the mouth of vintage Sammy and a whole lot of it would mostly work.

Dean took on the mark to be stronger, and he liked being without pain and weakness. Dean’s early “moral code” was prone to moral rigidity (especially when stressed out) and black-and-white rules (parallels Cas).

Early Sam took in demon blood to be stronger. He was was objectively “more moral” re: saving human vessels than human hunters often were. Vintage Sam was prone to spiraling about moral relativism to the point of neuroses.

I think there is a tendency to minimize what Bobby and Dean did to Sam because it’s uncomfortable. But it’s as real and true to me as Sam not taking responsibility for his own behavior sometimes. And I think their problem-solving behavior affected his later problem-solving behavior. (He mimicked it to the point of extremes.)

They have different psychological signatures and motivations. But the parallels are there.

Both brothers go full corrupt with good intentions, and in both cases the trap of heroism terminates in the loss of self and inhibitions. (MOC Dean was ready to die and Sam was ready to die re: Lucifer and Hell trials.) I think addiction and disinhibition is the stronger analogy in both cases. The self-medication is a trap. Neither "addiction" represents a true self in my book so much as it represents "checking out" of humanity.

In a very real sense, MOC is like alcohol, blackout drinking, rages, and loss of memory. “Comfortable numbing.” (An early-days John-coded secondary psychopathy.)

For Sam, his drug reminds me of super-soldier type drugs, and his method of saving of ppl analogous in my head to him overpowering them without weapons/guns in a combat zone. It’s an unsustainable, dangerous approach with more personal risk. (In particular, his soulless stent makes me think of Pervitin, which can cause heart failure in the end.)

[merrymorningofmay]

the funny-sad thing is that there IS a conflict going on right now that IS ethically clear-cut, comic book tier good vs. evil where the us/europe have a big role to play and you Could throw all your energy into canceling the bad guys (who, for once, are not and have never been a historically oppressed group) and anyone who affiliates with them and pressure your officials into taking proper action and get your quick moral superiority dopamine all you want, but that likely won't annoy your parents, so

[ghostl-yy]

Little Sam lusting over his big brother Dean is great and all but theres something so fucking raw about Dean being the one who has the hots for his little brother, his baby Sammy. The guilt eating him up, knowing that it's wrong, thinking hes sick but not being able to help it, trying so fucking hard to swallow it down and pretend it doesnt exist but never quite managing it. Trying to be quiet about how desperately he wants his little brother - spending his teens feeling disgusted with himself for even thinking about ruining his sweet, pure Sammy.

[pratchettquotes]

"He's started catching fish," said the Senior Wrangler. "That means he'll come over all smug and start asking what plans we've got for making a boat at any minute, you know what he's like."

The Dean looked at some sketches he'd made on a rock.

"How hard can it be to build a boat?" he said. "People with bones in their noses build boats. And we are the end product of thousands of years of enlightenment. Building a boat is not beyond men like us, Senior Wrangler."

"Quite, Dean."

"All we have to do is search this island until we find a book with a title like Practical Boat-Building for Beginners."

"Exactly. It'll be plain sailing after that, Dean. Ahaha."

Terry Pratchett, The Last Continent