#dean/cas + reconciliation

[shallowseeker]

im sure you've already said this but "i put on you what i couldnt take" is such a marriage thing. like sharing a burden

Ahhhh yes. D: 15x09 scrriiiiiiiiiipt via @spnscripthunt-inactive

I would NEVER have cut it it was SOOOOOO important to acknowledge those dynamics!!!

[shallowrambles]

I'm going to break these up to respond @ilarual, because these are so good!

#this is very much Dean giving Cas the kind of compassion no one else in Cas's life ever has least of all Cas himself#it's not so much Dean forgiving Cas because he believes Cas has taken real accountability for what he did wrong#as it feels like it's Dean forgiving Cas because he looked at the ways Cas has hurt him and he looks at Cas's emotional needs#and decided that giving Cas grace and forgiving him was more important

Yes, exactly. It's grounded in compassion and understanding, because they do understand each other and what motivates the other. They're both "men of action," types in very big ways, and they both act as "family protectors." And strangely, even when things are going terribly, they wind up being huge sources of support for each other! They need each other's support now to heal and grieve, and they wind up prioritizing that, which is really how partnerships work. Cas knows what lies behind Dean's sometimes razor-sharp words, and Dean knows what lies behind Cas's sometimes inexplicable lone-hero actions. (Feature/bug dilemma, on both sides. Cas likes Dean's passion; Dean likes Cas's heroics.)

#which isn't necessarily sustainable long term but it's also a) something they can actually work on once all cards are on the table#and 2) not necessarily something that's anywhere near as likely to recur in a post-Chuck world where the crises aren't as apocalyptic#either way it's an expression of incredible compassion and love and I don't think Cas takes that for granted#anyway I thought too hard about The Trap prayer and went fully insane again oh my god#spn

Yeah, it would help not to have cosmic deals, cosmic consequences, and murderous grandfathers-out-for-their-grandson's blood breathing down their necks all the time. The most believable thing about season 15 is that when Dean's hero-magic goes away during The Hero's Journey/The Gamblers, he immediately shows signs of stress-exacerbated disorders, like IBS. Yeesh!

I agree that Cas doesn't take it for granted. I think Cas knows his own tendencies at this point, as evidenced by how he was able to verbalize it more successfully in Absence (if only he'd gotten back from Anael sooner!). He usually realizes that he needs help and should communicate better with his partner and family; he just has the horrible luck of doing it too late, too often. Poor Cas!

I think the thing with Jack was unique, because this time, he did the lone wolf thing during a critical risk period, and it was in relation to co-parenting rather than "Heaven business." (Jack was dangerous and volatile, even if it hurts to admit that. He could've hurt any one of them.)

Then, it all got so tragically fragmented.

It's fascinating to me how much I've changed my mind about Dean in The Trap. I'm waaaaay more sympathetic to the whole Cas-being-forgiven aspect of it, because yes, Cas apologized initially, but the root of the issue was Cas's painful withdrawal of his partnership and his withholding of critical information. Full stop. He and Dean are NOT equally culpable in this one.

It's not just about Mary and Jack, and yet Cas keeps pivoting to "Dean blaming him for Mary." Which oversimplifies the whole thing in a terrible way. Yes, they're all culpable, and yes they all saw that things were wrong with Jack, but next to Donatello, Cas is THE authority on souls and physically the strongest of TFW. To make matters worse, he all but demanded Dean to parent Jack and take care of Jack's emotions, even though Dean expressed discomfort over his memories of soulless Sam. Dean has repeatedly expressed how he wants Cas to be open and honest with him, especially now that they're co-parenting, and although Cas demanded Dean parent Jack, he then turned around and hid Big Parenting Stuff from him and went off to meet Anael.

Barring Cas's one feeble and poorly-timed, "I tried to fix it on my own because I was afraid of losing this family," he doesn't really spell out his part in the communication failures or apologize very well for withdrawing from Dean, specifically. He sorts of sulls up and say, "I already apologized and I'm not doing it again." Yet, Cas has a continued, longstanding pattern of withdrawal from the partnership. I'm floored that my Cas goggles kept me from seeing it before, and maybe I'm a little embarrassed, too. I mean, honestly, it's amazing that Dean takes him back at all. :/ Once you look past, "Oh no! Dean said mean things!" anyway.

I think by The Trap, Dean has given up trying to get Cas to change or hold him accountable for his lack of communication. Cas sort of gave Dean ultimatums over it, if you squint, and Dean rolled over. And Dean wants to get back together. He needs Cas's support and Cas need his. He looks at everything Cas is and decides that Cas's avoidance and want to protect the family is just woven into the fabric of him, and Dean decides to accept that. It's something he loves about him as much as he resents it. Cas's chivalry is a feature and a bug. Dean loves him for it. It makes his life a Hell sometimes.

Occasionally, I still see people harping on how horrible Dean was for "forgiving" Cas, like Cas doesn't need to be forgiven. And with some distance and clarity, I find that pretty baffling now, but I also remember feeling that way when I wasn't looking at their partnership equally and giving Cas too much leeway on his continued absence from the partnership. I almost...respected Cas more. That thought makes me wince. But his bad decisions I was way more likely to stamp as protective or tactically genius, at least compared to some of Dean's similar decisions. Dean's things I tended to group as "too angry/emotional/irrational." :(

I guess I've come a long way when it comes to holding Sam and Cas accountable for their actions, too. Much of the time, my issues with Dean devolved to unfortunate tone policing or not liking him to express his anger and be angry at his boundaries being breached over and over, even when he was taking his anger out on inanimate objects. I balked just because it made a loud sound that made Sam wince (oh noes, not the wincing).

///

On the other hand, I'm quite impressed that Dean and Cas were finding their way back to each other after the Death of a Child. That's about the hardest thing a marriage can go through, and they were getting back together and trying to heal even before Jack reappeared. Clearly, it's a stress-tested relationship. WAY more stress-tested than your everyday marriages; they've been through multiple apocalypses. On the whole, they often have good communication, even when they disagree, they knew where they stood (like with Donatello). It's just these huge, incredibly unusual horrible earth-shatteringly terrible things that throw them. Chuck's grooming is such a bitch.

[autisticandroids]

belated fic rec list, part three: *french mistake robert singer voice* season six

so! this is for day 1 of @spnficrecfest (you will notice that that was yesterday two days ago. uh huh). and i am compensating by creating FIVE SEPARATE ERA-SPECIFIC LISTS. this one is for season six fics, and a few from season seven. the season seven ones primarily deal with the aftermath of season six, is my justification. mainly destiel, with some other pairings or gen as well.

other lists: endverse // seasons four and five // season nine // dabb era

my fave s6 fics, in increasing order of length

he who has ears by catty_the_spy, .5k

godstiel finds a priestess. gen.

holy is the sound by anti_ela, 1k

daphne allen, after. daphne/emmanuel.

i can't remember to forget about the face of you by geckoholic, 1k

lisa in the aftermath of the mindwipe. deanlisa.

to be whole / to be holy by raelilac, 1k

meg character study during caged heat. she remembers her past. megstiel.

this is not a blessing by kijikun, 1k

studies on dean during the time of godstiel. destiel, mpreg.

through a mirror, dimly by electricskeptic, 1k, chose not to warn

gen. dean and meg in caged heat. thoughts about hell. where did that other dog come from. who is he.

deluge by electricskeptic, 1k

cas/rachel during the civil war. rachel explores free will.

walking on a string by swordfishtrombones, 2k

cas unwisely abandons the battlefield to be with dean for a day. he's losing anyway. destiel.

to lie with the devil by lowkey_existential_despair, 3k

crowley reflects on cas throughout their arrangement. crowstiel.

former things by aerilex, 3k

a cozy little destiel reconciliation, post-godstiel.

subvert by kayzo, 3k

a little study on godstiel. gen.

fractured link by trell, 5k

deancasmeg in the era of honey cas.

lifelines by thraced, 6k

the angel civil war, seen through the telephone. deancaslisa

a gift for the fallen by electricskeptic, 7k

dean and cas repairing their relationship during the angel civil war. destiel.

forks in the road by thraced, 7k, violence and mcd warnings

cas and dean walk through a nightmare together while cas is losing a war. destiel.

don't hang your head for me by sorrel, 8k

the braeden household between seasons five and six, narrated by lisa. gen.

all things by seraphwings, 8k

cas gets his own misery callously explained to him post-godstiel. destiel.

the starving faithfuls by planetarypluto, 9k

dean and godstiel meet in a church. destiel.

pretty big fish (orphaned fic), 11k

an unusually peaceful godstiel interlude. destiel.

if you ever get close to a human and human behavior (be ready to get confused) by bree_black, 25k

an extraordinarily charming aftermath of swan song, featuring human cas, ghost sam, and both of them orbiting around dean. destiel.

leaves of grass by trieduntrue, 43k, chose not to warn

a unique account of what it is like to be godstiel. destiel.

this nervous condition (anonymous fic), 44k, chose not to warn and dubcon

a bleak godstiel mpreg.

[angelinthefire]

season 7 sucks but it really is so essential to my understanding of dean/cas. Like the shock of Cas' "betrayal" and then death, Dean being so hurt by it, and continuing to be hurt by it all season. And like, he never *really* processes it. He never accepts what he's feeling, he never understands why he's not able to get over it. And he's so willing to forgive Cas, like I really think he just wanted things to go back to how they were before, like that's what he wanted more than anything. But they can't. Cas takes on Sam's trauma, and then he can't go back to how he was before, and Dean's guilty and angry over it. Like he went through months of being told suck it up and do his job, and Cas is back, and that should fix things, but it doesn't, and Cas seems like he doesn't want to fix things. But ultimately Dean decides that doesn't matter and takes the first step towards reconciliation. And then Purgatory.

I would not find deancas so interesting if it wasn't for s7. It's like, s4-6ish Dean and Cas were totally brothers-in-arms. But then Dean was wounded, and the wound was never allowed to heal, so it got worse, and he has this ugly bleeding sore in his heart, and that's Cas' place, and when Cas is gone it's all messy and gorey, and when Cas is there the space is filled but it still hasn't healed. And that's how Dean loves him.

[ananke-xiii]

Maybe they titled it “Tombstone” because that’s when s13 stopped making sense.

Or: how the ��Jack made Cas see Paradise” beat was dumped on Kelly and how Jack is very much like Fleabag because “No one’s asked me a question in 45 minutes”.

I wish I could share in the general excitement surrounding this episode but, to me, its “feel-good” energy is too much of a foreboding for the rest to come that I’m like, nooooo, I can’t take iiiiiittt. After this episode the season completely derails: Castiel’s character doesn’t make sense anymore, Sam and Dean go back and forth in a plot that’s a joke and Jack… where’s Jack? Do we still have a character named Jack? Ah, yes, here he is, maybe I see him.

In the second scene of the episode we have on one side of the room Jack and Dean, the two characters who are very much emotional because of Cas’ return.

Jack is super tender when he approaches Cas and tells him that he missed him. He’s also super zealous to show his father that he’s been learning to master his powers (he can move a pencil!) and that he has gathered enough knowledge about the family business to find a case, a hunter’s case. His purpose in this episode is to demonstrate to his father that he fits in, that he’s good. 

Dean’s also in high spirits and it’s because of Cas’ return as well but the reason is, of course, different. Clearly, he doesn’t have anything to prove to him but he’s euphoric about his “win”. He was literally dead not even 24h prior when he was desperate for an anchor that would reconnect him with meaning and reality. Well, not any anchor. He specifically needed Castiel because, unlike with his mother, Dean didn’t get to have any reconciliation with Cas in s12.

CASTIEL: I don't... What are you doing here? DEAN: Saving your ass. SAM: You and Kelly just taking off was a stupid move. But there's no way we're letting Lucifer get his hands on that kid. It ain't happening. DEAN: Look, Sam's right, okay? We'll work through our crap. We always do. But right now, we are here to get you, get Kelly, and get gone.

Narrator’s voice: they’ll never work through their “crap”. Sigh.

On the other side of the room we have Castiel, who’s fresh off the Empty and looks like he could use a day or two of rest, and Sam, who’s mentally trying to figure out if it was Jack who resurrected Castiel and how he can apply this knowledge to saving Mary. Both Cas and Sam are the ones who are, if not downright contrary, not particularly over the moon by the prospect of working a case.

The tragedy is that both Jack and Dean are so happy about it that it almost feels like they can all forget about the fact that they had to burn Cas but now he's here, that Dean had thoughtlessly run towards death 2 seconds before and that Jack very much doesn’t know yet how to control his powers. In other words, this scene forecasts disaster.

This episode also marks Cas’ first attempt at parenting Jack and it goes both well and disastrously bad for him. Now, parenting is a fucking hard job consisting of infinite responsibilities, one of which is saying no and setting boundaries. This is how Cas starts parenting Jack.

The good news for Cas is that he seems to instinctively predict Jack’s actions, thus knowing when it’s time to say “no”. The slightly bad news is that Jack doesn’t listen to him. And, I mean, this totally makes sense because 1. Jack’s all happy and energized about “his” case; 2. he’s very eager to show off what he has learnt; 3. this is his first chance with his father, it’s like a clean slate for him and he really wants to pass the exam with a “good” stamped on his forehead.

Three times Cas tells Jack “No” and three times Jack disobeys.

The first time is when Jack wants to wake up Dean to tell him about the police update and Cas tells him that he “wouldn’t do that”. Jack, however, would very much want to and so he finds himself face to face with Dean’s gun. Things will get very bad.

The second time Cas tells Jack “No” is when they’re outside the bank and Cas tells Jack to stay where he is but Jack tells him that he’s “got this”. Which he doesn’t because he accidentally kills the security guard.

The third and final time that Cas tells Jack “No” is before he disappears from the bunker. He does it anyway.

Now this might sound strange but, so far, Cas hasn’t done that bad. This is the super-secret that SPN doesn’t want you to know but disobeying the father is actually not that big of a deal, rather it’s quite healthy and it also makes sense for Jack because he’s known his chosen father for maybe less than two days. Their relationship has just started and they need to find their own balance. What’s more important here is the fact that Cas can foresee and understand Jack’s actions, which is a victory for everybody because so far in the season he’s the only one who’s been able to do that.

What he totally fails at is, unfortunately, trying to understand who Jack is. Sam, Dean and Cas have their own (different) opinion about who Jack is and they all hold tight to their beliefs. One thing that always struck me is that nobody asks Jack any question. For me this means that nobody is trying to understand him, they're not curious enough to want to get to know someone like Jack.

Jack is good or evil or special and that's it. And "that's it" because Sam, Dean and Cas see him that way but there isn’t much communication going on in that damn bunker. For instance, when Cas comes back he tells Jack that Sam and Dean have told him that he’s doing well. I don’t want to say it’s a lie but it’s a lie. Nobody is doing well since May 18th. Jack agrees but promptly changes the subject by showing him the pencil trick. This is deflection 101.

One thing that Sam and Cas have in common, though, is that their idea of Jack is strictly dependent on what they think about Kelly and I can’t help but grimace because of it.

Sam, for completely unknown reasons, thinks Kelly was a “good” person, therefore Jack must have a good, perhaps “stronger” side in him that can win over Lucifer’s evilness. Leaving aside for a moment that this a backward, problematic view of maternity, Sam can’t possibly know if Kelly was a good person or not because the two maybe talked to each other one or two times and both times weren’t particularly meaningful moments for either of them. Not saying Kelly wasn’t a good person, just underlining that Sam’s beliefs about Jack are based on his own assumptions bearing zero evidence of reality and founded on outdated notions about maternity.

Cas, on the other hand, thinks Kelly believed that Jack would change the world for the better and so he does too. The thing is, though, if we look back at s12 it’s not Kelly who thought that her son would change the world, it’s Castiel. Kelly thought that she was part of a plan, that she and Cas were destined for something great. She wasn’t the one who had the vision of the future, Castiel had. We have to consider two things here: what Kelly meant by “something great” and Cas’ utopic vision that we don’t see.

I’ve said it many times and I’ll say it again: not even one writer was interested in giving Kelly a little bit of backstory so that we could have an insight on how she is as, you know, a Real Character. As far as motherhood (the sole defining trait of her character) is concerned, we know she wanted to do the “baby thing” with the President and that she had always dreamt about being a mother.

What we do know for sure, however, is that she was a pregnant woman who: was sexually assaulted, abducted, forced to suddenly understand and comply with the supernatural world’s dynamics, abducted again, chained, had committed suicide, had been resurrected, was abducted again, was intimidated by two strangers to get into their car to go to an underground bunker so that they could perform whatever the hell Sam planned to do on her. So, I ask, maybe, just maybe, is it possible to view her behavior and her words in “The Future” as those of someone who probably had all the rights to be on the verge of a mental breakdown? They could’ve framed her “fanaticism” re: Jack's birth as, perhaps, a way to cope with the living hell she was subjected to during her pregnancy. To give meaning to what was happening to her. Regardless of the framing, the show makes a point to tell us that she first and then Cas, Kelly thought, were the ones destined for something great. The writers compared her to Rosemary (from the movie/book "Rosemary's Baby"), like, three times. I hoped that it was a way to signal the abuse she had to endure but I don't think it's the case, sadly.

This is a part of Kelly and Cas’ dialogue in “The Future” that I particularly hate:

Kelly: Maybe. Or maybe it was a miracle. Maybe – maybe everything that I've been through, everything that I still have to go through, is happening for a reason. Maybe it's part of some plan. Castiel: No, it isn't. I used to believe in a plan. I used to believe that I had some mission. But I have been through enough now to know that everyone is just winging it. Some of us quite badly. Lucifer, he's just breaking toys. He's sowing destruction and chaos, and there is no grand purpose at work. And there's no special role for you. When Lucifer took over Rooney's body, I'm sorry. You were just there.

While I understand that Castiel here is more speaking about himself than about Kelly and he, as well, is very well much on the verge of a menty b, I find it so utterly unfair to tell her that she was “just there”.

First of all, NO, if anything, Lucifer was “just there”, she was where she had her right to be, doing her job, sleeping with her partner, talking about her dreams, living her life. That was her life and it was destroyed in an instant, it was only human that she needed a way to make sense of what she was going through. Pregnancy is already a nightmare and, on top of that, she had to go through all that?

And second of all, she literally came back to life after suicide, how couldn’t she not start behaving weirdly? I know the writers were writing Supernatural were Death has only value for characters without any “special role” in the narrative, but come on, they literally just wrote a character telling another character that she has slit her wrists and this is the reply she gets: you’re not special, what happened to you was because you were just there. Brrrrrrrr.

But let’s move to my second point.

Let’s talk about Castiel’s vision. Because, you see, we think that Jack manipulated him but how do we really know it? Yes, there’s that cut scene but it was cut nevertheless and it’s crucial that we don’t see it because, by not seeing it, we can’t really know for sure if Jack had manipulated Cas for real.

Let’s compare it with what Kelly sees when Jack sends her “visions of the future” and what we see: Kelly sees what will happen next in the episode. Period. We see the same thing. Period. No mention of destiny, just the future in the very sense of “what’s going to happen in the next few hours”. She, like us, doesn’t know what Jack has supposedly made Cas see. We know she hasn’t seen anything because in “All Along the Watchtower” we have this little scene here:

KELLY: Tell me again. Tell me again what you saw. CASTIEL: Right, I saw– I saw... I saw the future. I saw a world without pain or hunger or want. I saw the world that this child... that your child... KELLY: Mm. CASTIEL: ...will create. KELLY: Mm. CASTIEL: And it is a world without fear and without suffering and without hate. KELLY: Mm. CASTIEL: I saw paradise.

So the one who was in love with the idea of Jack’s special destiny was not Kelly but Cas.

This is why this dialogue from “Tombstone” seems suspicious to me:

CASTIEL: Yeah, I know she is. Kelly was… She was a very brave woman. JACK: She left me a message. She said I had an angel watching over me. CASTIEL [sighs]: Jack, I'm so sorry. I-I should've been here for you. JACK: No. It's okay. It's just… I understand why she trusted you. Why I trusted you. CASTIEL: You remember that? JACK: I remember feeling… safe. CASTIEL: Jack, your mother, she believed that you would do amazing things. She said that you would change the world for the better. And now, looking at you, talking to you, I know that she was right, that we were right. Kelly would be so proud of you.

I think that the reason why we don’t see Cas’ vision in s12 is because the show wanted to do something with it in s13. It might be the case, what with all the talk about how “Paradise on earth” the Original World seems to be compared to Apocalypse World in s13. I mean, these are just my speculations but it could be. Because, as a matter of fact, Cas’ vision of Jack’s future is dropped in favor of Kelly’s vision of Jack’s future and this… actually never happens?

What we know , though, is that Kelly tells Jack the following in “Patience”:

Kelly: Jack, don’t let anyone tell you who you’re supposed to be. Because who you’re supposed to be isn’t fate, it isn’t me, it isn’t your father. You are who you choose to be. And I know you’re going to okay. You are going to be amazing. You have an angel watching over you.

She’s telling Jack that who he is isn’t fate, that he can choose who he wants to be. I mean, there’s definitely something off going on here.

Maybe they just dropped Cas’ “I saw the future” beat (that was presented as what convinced Cas to save Jack) on Kelly because, by the time the writers started planning s13, they decided that they weren’t gonna use it anymore? I don’t know, what I’m saying, though, is that Kelly was more focused on her kid being good rather than evil as everybody assumed, whereas it was Cas who “saw” Jack change the world for the better. But we don’t see what Cas sees so we have to take his and Dean’s word for it. And both words seem to be pretty biased. At any rate, something doesn’t add up in between s12 and s13.

So, to recap: what we have seen is that Kelly has never actually said that her son would do great things, but that she believed that her son would be good. It was Castiel who believed that Jack would create great things in the future because of a vision neither us nor Kelly have ever seen. Even if we consider the cut scene it still doesn’t account for the difference between Kelly’s and Cas’ visions and/or why Kelly didn’t see what Cas saw.

Another person that underlies the “to be vs to do” dilemma is Mia Vallens where in “The Big Empty” she shapeshifts into Kelly:

JACK: Sam thinks you were right, that—that I’m good. He wants me to believe it, and I wanna believe it, too. It’s just, I… I’ve hurt people. I didn’t mean to. It was an accident. And I know I should feel bad, and I say I feel bad, but most of the time, I mostly… I don’t feel anything. And that’s why I think maybe… Maybe I’m a monster. MIA/KELLY: Jack. It doesn’t matter what you are. It matters what you do. And even monsters can do good in this world. JACK: You really believe that? MIA/KELLY: I have to. I have to.

First of all, Mia is telling Jack that he’s a monster, lol. And she literally doesn’t know he’s a Nephilim so WTF? Anyway, the things are two: either the writers were drunk when they wrote this (Jack: “I’ve hurt people, I think I’m a monster” Mia: “It doesn’t matter what you are, only what you do”. MIA, ffs, THIS IS WHAT HE HAS JUST TOLD YOU, HELLO????? HELLO???? He’s just told you that he has done something that makes him think he’s a monster, how do you not see how your advice is shit?) or, more probably, they blatantly wanted to remind us that the person who’s speaking is not Kelly but a shapeshifter who tries to do good things to atone for her past crimes. She has to believe that because of her own past, not Jack, not Kelly, Mia.

What’s more, Jack saying he doesn’t feel anything… doesn’t really mean he doesn’t feel anything. Since he was born he’s been living with two men obsessing over “good and evil”, two concepts he still clearly and rightfully doesn’t understand because nobody is explaining him shit. How is he supposed to know? Of course he’s confused as to how or what he should feel.

For example, by the end of “Tombstone” Jack is evidently confused and ashamed. He feels shame because he has “failed” in front of his father, his “failure” resulted in the death of an innocent man and, what’s more, Sam, Cas and Dean are talking about him in the other room like he’s just proven that he’ll never be good. Excluding and talking about someone when this someone is feeling shame is, like, the worst response ever.

No wonder the episode ends like this:

SAM: Jack, look, this life, what we do, it's… it's not easy. And we've all done things we regret. JACK: Just don't. You're afraid of me. CASTIEL: Jack, no. JACK: No, maybe you're right. Maybe I'm just another monster. DEAN: No, you're not. I thought you were. I did. But… Like Sam said, we've all done bad. We all have blood on our hands. So if you're a monster, we're all monsters. JACK: No, you don't… Every time I try and do something good, people get hurt. I thought I was getting better. I'm not… I don't know what I am, but I know I can't make the world a better place, not like this. I can't even do one good thing. And I know that if I stay, I'm gonna hurt you. All of you. And… I can't. You're all I have.

My heart aches a little at the words “You’re all I have” because they have all failed him so much and he literally doesn’t have anyone else.

Also, Jack echoing of Cas’ words “She said that you would change the world for the better” resembles what Chuck told Sam and Dean in s11 and that Dean paraphrases in his prayer to him: “You said the earth would be fine because it had me… and it had Sam” discarding them as false (can’t shake the feeling that they wanted to go somewhere with that “Paradise on earth” crap).

All Jack has has unfortunately failed him: Sam has failed him with his training mentality that bore no fruit and made Jack think that he had value only if he succeeded; Dean has failed him because he both threatened to kill him and provided “shelter” for him putting Jack in the position of basically having to live with his possible executioner (we know Dean wouldn’t eventually do it but the point is that Jack doesn’t and Dean’s threats deeply, deeply affect him).

Cas was the only one who could have had a real shot with Jack but he arrived tooo lateeee! And he (understandably) came back with his own package of preconceived ideas, ideas that made it all worse because Cas didn't know that Jack was noooot doing well! I hate SPN, why would they do this to meeeee?

Of course Jack would eventually run away. Perhaps the major takeaway from all this is that he did way better on his own than with the three of them. And that says a lot.

[monstermoviedean]

i’ve got a list in my head of moments in spn where i think it would’ve been the perfect moment to bring in a secondary character, and there’s one in particular that i think is just. so, after the rupture, cas meets up with claire. she finds out about jack, she finds out about mary. and yeah idk i just think claire would have a really interesting perspective about it all. about dean. i don’t think she’d be completely on dean’s “side” (i don’t like calling them on diff sides but i think you get what i mean) and yell at cas or guilt him or whatever, nor would i want that(!), but… after all, claire knows what it’s like to care about, to love, people who have hurt her family. 😕

oh this one hurts. this one hurts. you're absolutely right though and my god is this a good fucking take. like. okay so first off this made me realize that jack and claire never met. and while i don't think claire would be like "you stole my dad" (because of course she wouldn't) i think there could be some really really interesting feelings to work through in term of cas having another kid who is dead now, and how hard he's taking it. i think claire would have to initiate this meetup, not cas, because cas is trying to isolate himself and would not want to look at another child he believes he failed.

absolutely 100% agree that there's not really "sides" but i also don't have a better term for it. i think claire would see cas' "side" and could give cas some real comfort, if he was open to it. she knows what it's like to lose people and to feel like you failed. she believes that cas is good, and trying to be better. and she's a living, breathing symbol that not everything he touches goes wrong. i think she could represent healing to cas, and just talking to her could nudge him towards reconciliation.

(side note: i would have liked to see their relationship develop further past season 10. i feel like it was a really promising start and then just. nothing. it felt like once she had jody they were like 'okay she's being parented cas doesn't need to do it anymore!')

i also think claire could easily see and sympathize with dean's "side." her dad abandoned her and her mom was absent from her life for a long time. her mom literally died in her arms. i could see why the pain of losing a parent would resonate with her. i can also see why, if she talked to dean, she would sympathize with feeling abandoned by cas (talking about seasons 4 through 10 here). and last but certainly not least, claire is going through a widow arc of her own. she's still reeling from having lost kaia. while she didn't see dean during his widower arc, jody did, and i'm sure jody mentioned that dean really wasn't doing well. and that might be on claire's mind too - that dean is in serious pain from losing a parent, a child, and a friend who could be something more.

like you said, i don't want claire to yell at or guilt either of them. i'm not sure she would, either. but i think she could sympathize with both of them in a way not many others in their lives could. and i would also like to see her again :)

[marvelfanfn2187a113]

What do you think is the cause of the separation between the brothers? I mean that Dean and Sam get together and get angry at Sister Winchester and that it's the kind of fight that she leaves the bunker and Dean is so angry that he yells "if you leave, don't come back" she looks for help looking at Sam, but he's also mad at her and she responds to Dean like "Why do I want to go back to a shitty life?"

Why would that fight be? And what would their reconciliation be like? Who would Sister Winchester go with if she left the bunker?

It might be because I’ve had Jack on the brain, but i imagine that it could be that the little sister was so intent on helping Jack/being on Jack’s side, that it starts to feel like she’s picking Jack over Sam and Dean—so much so that even Sam (who is pretty pro-Jack) is hurt and angry.

Even after he kills Mary, the little sister is against putting him in that Michael-coffin-box thing. They fight about it, and things get so heated that she decides to leave the bunker and warn Jack.

When Dean yells at her that she better not come back, she freezes. All she can think about is that time Sam left for Stanford and her dad yelled that—and the time when Sam left Dean and Dean yelled it.

She turns to Sam, thinking he would be on her side, because he knows what it feels like to be told that. But he’s too angry and hurt that she’d pick a nephilim over him to see it, and he says nothing.

So she snaps, says she wouldn’t want to come back anyway, and storms out.

I think she would go to find Jack first. I don’t remember if Cas is around during this arc, but if he is she’d take Jack and go straight to him. If not, she’s probably go to Jody. Jody would want to send her home, but after the little sister explains about Jack and Jody meets Jack, she sees how much the little sister needs a sanctuary, so she promises not to tell Sam and Dean…yet.

Reconciliation would probably take a while. Once Sam and Dean find a way to get Jack’s soul back, the little sister works with for Jack only. However, after they get a chance to apologize for what they did, she warms up to them a bit. As soon as Jack has his soul back, tensions ease up a little bit, so when Sam and Dean offer her her old room back, she says yes.

[one-more-offbeat-anthem]

weird age

(for dean’s 44th birthday celebration hosted by @chocolatecakecas !)

Twenty-four is a weird age.

Maybe, if Dean had friends, he would feel some kind of abject jealousy towards his peers, with degrees and families and jobs, but he doesn’t. In the past few months, he’s gotten really into a cheesy soap opera that seems to be on every crappy motel television in the Midwest at every hour of the day. It’s called Dr. Sexy, and Dad would hate it, but he and Dean are on the outs right now and Dean’s been hunting alone (and driving a 1984 slate grey Chevy truck that he didn’t not steal), so he can watch the show as much as he wants. 

On Dr. Sexy, the patients are all ages, but a lot of them are in their early twenties, and a lot of them are like him. Lonely. Estranged. Drinking too much. Arguing with their fathers. Dean doesn’t have any kids like some of the patients (as far as he’s aware), but he is driving to nowhere, like most of them are.

Today is his twenty-fourth birthday, and Dean spent the morning ganking a ghoul before grabbing a greasy diner burger and a gas station six-pack. Now he’s slouched on the latest springy motel mattress, beer in hand, Dr. Sexy on the television. No one has called--not Dad, not Sam, and Mom, well, Mom’s been dead for almost twenty years now.

On the television, the latest patient is a middle-aged woman who got in a serious car wreck, and while Dr. Sexy himself is talking about the prognosis with a nurse that he’s having a thinly veiled affair with, the patient’s son grasps his mother’s limp hand.

Dean drains the beer and switches off the television.

********

Forty-four is a weird age.

If he's being honest with himself, Dean didn’t expect to get here, let alone past his early twenties. If he had had dreams of middle age, he’s not sure he would have dreamed up watching his brother, his brother’s girlfriend, a toddler who looks like a teenager and was briefly God, and an angel attempt to make him a birthday cake in the kitchen of an underground bunker.

(He’s pretty sure the cake is supposed to be a surprise, but the bakers aren’t making any great effort to be secretive. Or quiet.)

The past twenty years have been full of the unexpected. Dean’s dad eventually bit it, and Dean died a time or two himself. He’s helped prevent a handful of apocalypses and been an archangel puppet. And he’s had his own soap opera-worthy love story with the aforementioned angel. It took over a decade of deaths and arguments and resurrections and reconciliation and rescue missions and half-baked confessions, but he and Cas finally figured it out. They’re settled.

They’re all settled.

Dean looks at his family, who have all remembered his birthday and are turning the kitchen into a bomb site as a result, and decides to let the cake stay, in their eyes, a surprise.

In the meantime, he’s going to go watch some Dr. Sexy and have a beer.

[jjs-other-other-blog]

Okay so I did it. I finally watched the rest of Supernatural which I hadn't seen yet and it was both better and worse than I thought. Let me explain:

Now that I've actually seen it I can say that a lot of season 13, 14 and 15 felt like the show was half dead already, like they just kept going through the motions. Stick to the basic formular and keep it running. Big bad evil. Somebody makes a deal and lies about it. One of them is about to go darkside and has to be reined in. Somebody tries to sacrifice themselves. The wheels on the bus go round and round. The villains, the heroes, their sacrifices - we've seen this film before.

The only new player on the board who at the same time really changes up some dynamics in these last few seasons is Jack. He's a bit cluesless and he likes nougat. Cute, but not that exciting to be honest. What really makes him interesting though is the effect he had on the people around him. Because both Sam and Cas form a sort of fatherly bond with Jack which drives a huge wedge between them and Dean who violently swings between wanting to kill Jack and taking him fishing. But even that knew clusterfuck of dynamics gets old and frankly unnerving rather quickly.

Because over the last couple of seasons we see Dean become less the macho stereotype he tried to be for his father, he becomes gentler, kinder. Except when it comes to Jack which makes zero sense in my opinion and also makes me hate Dean which makes watching this part super uncomfortable.

I mean, there has to be some sort of friction between the brothers, but Jack just becomes another loop on the carousel. Dean has forgiven worse before, but still hates Jack, then changes his mind about it a thousand times. He teaches him to drive (in the Impala no less), he wants to put Jack down like a rabid dog, he hugs him, he will never forgive him. Hamster in a wheel, round and round he goes for no tangible reason.

They should've played the "this is all Chuck, it feels weird and off because it's all Chuck and he's a terrible writer" card more - it could've been brilliant. Lean into the "this is a show written by the villain" narrative more. Use more technichal terms. Have Sam say out loud that he has plot armour and stuff like that. Have Jack explain that Cas isn't at the big show down because the boss doesn't like him and wants this to be about the two brothers. Say out loud that Dean's anger with Jack is misplaced because it's not his anger, Chuck put it there. It's vaguely there, sometimes you can see the implications shimmer through, but they should've gone for it 100%.

They were onto a so very interesting idea that was meta in a way I have never really seen before, but as usual they only scratched the surface. It's just so sad. Season 15 had some very emotional heavy hitters. The big fight and reconciliation bewteen Dean and Cas. Cas stepping into the role of Jack's father for real. The empty finally collecting its debt. And as I said, fighting the narrative is an amazing premise. Season 15 had everything it needed to be great and then they screwed up royally only a few steps before crossing the finish line.

TL;DR: As always, Supernatural had a great idea, but never fully explored it and instead repeated the same drama they recycle every season. I know it's really just terrible writing, but the Chuck won theory actually explains why they didn't dive further into this concept and why even in seaon 15 they all kept spinning that wheel instead of breaking it.

[humandisorderincarnatedean]

numbered list of things that cas canonically did to dean 1. beat him into the pavement because he was angry at him 2. hold dean responsible for his own decisions repeatedly 3. lie to him for an entire year and imply dean’s selfish for asking cas for help fixing a problem he created 4. leverage the kidnapping of two civilians dean cared about to get dean to stop opposing his purgatory plan 5. leave dean alone surrounded by a pack of gorilla wolves 6. tell dean he can’t trust him and leaving right after almost beating him to death again without supposedly ever clarifying that situation?? 7. steal from him repeatedly 8. leave with the explicit motive to try and force a reconciliation dean was not yet ready for 9. apologize for approximately 8% of all of this. but yeah sure dean’s the only one who ever treats another person badly

[shallowseeker]

always thinking about castiel cutting dean off in the trap bc they cant be together bc of the empty deal (even if that wasnt the intended read). devastating.

Oh me too bestie.

[bustyasianbeautiespod]

(non spn watcher here) when did destial become a canon love story with writer intent? like was there more destiel-ness in the season leading up to the nov 5th confession?

Okay *cracks knuckles*.

First and foremost, I'm gonna tell you about my SPN history. I started watching SPN and got caught up with the show while s10 was airing and was watching live until the end of s12. I gave up specifically because Castiel's s11 plot proved to be just on the side of too miserable for me, and s12 didn't really make it any better (Cas dies at the end of that season). During this time, and until Nov 5th 2020, I was solidly on camp "Dean and Cas are never going to be canon just because of what SPN is fundamentally as a show, and even if they did, I cannot imagine a situation where it would be a good thing for Cas given SPN's track record on how they treat the angel."

When Nov 5th happened I was sucked back into the show. In preparation for the finale I watched all of s13-15 in the two weeks between the confession episode and the finale. Again, my perspective going into this endeavour was still very doubtful and pessimistic, specifically on the Dean side of the equation.

The beginning of s13 was a bit of a shock to me, honestly. It starts with what the fandom calls 'The Widower's Arc'. I think this was the arc that most solidly cements the feelings from Dean's side. It was so vehement in pointing out that Dean feels for Cas in a way so distinguished from how Sam does. In the very first episode of the season (so the first episode I watched after going back into SPN), Dean quietly wraps Cas' body with a curtain all by himself in a sunlit room. And I go Oh. Okay.

This vibe does wane after Cas comes back and regular SPN hijinks ensues. S14 actually ends with Dean and Cas fighting and Dean doing his usual Dean-isms. 15.03 is when that fight culminates: they break up and spend a couple episodes apart from each other.

15.09 The Trap features Dean and Cas in purgatory, and this was Truly An Episode. They bicker through-out the entire thing and are pretty pissed at one another, but then Cas gets taken, and Dean desperately prays to him, confesses his anger issues, forgives Cas and asks for forgiveness back. Later, they reunite, and Cas acknowledges that he heard everything Dean said.

This episode is so interesting to me because it culminates the Dean and Cas fight-separation-reconciliation plot of s15, and in doing so confirms it to be as important as it is. I cannot point enough that the plot reasons for the stuff happening in 15.09 is so pointless. They go to purgatory for a fetch quest for an item that can be interchangeable with literally anything else, specifically to put Dean and Cas back in purgatory (a meaningful place for them), have them be separated, and have the prayer happen. The whole point of the Dean and Cas portion of the episode is to do character work. We don't even see the scene where Cas finally gets the thing they're here to acquire in the first place. That's literally not the point. The point is Cas and Dean's story. S15 is the last season of a show with so many big things to wrap up, and they make it a point to have Dean and Cas go through a half-season arc that DOES occupy so much of the season and brings a new openness, vulnerability, and room for development into their relationship.

So yeah, before 15.18 there WAS very visible marks of the fact that Something was gonna happen. Interestingly enough all those marks were pretty dean-centric. I would say s4-10 destiel is the audience being inundated that Cas loves Dean. S11-15, ESPECIALLY 13-15 is so very much making it known that Dean loves Cas too.

On a related note, on Nov 21, 2020, a post is made here on tumblr claiming that around Dec 2016 (S12 was airing at this point), Warner Bros. conducted a market research about Supernatural, and from this person's experience, specifically about Dean and Cas and Dean's sexuality (link to a post that confirms the information in the post to be true). This market research was during the time leading up to s13, which I think does mark a big change in how the love between Dean and Cas started being framed by the show as something Dean both feels and is also aware of.

So, to answer your questions.

Was there more destiel-ness in the season leading up to the nov 5th confession? Yes.

When did destiel become a canon love story with writer intent? It became a canon love story by S15, but the writer intent to make it canon goes way back to s13 but probably even s12.

- Grey :))

[i-aint-nothin-but-a-nasty-dog]

may i please hear about prengan (thank you for tagging me beloved <3)

Prengan 😭

So I have a doc w notes for a fic based on one of the posts that was floating around a few months back abt Dean and Cas having a nephilim baby right? It's basically: Cas gets rescued from the empty, reconciliation and get together yay, sexy times ensue, and either during or after said sexy times, I like the idea of cas's grace and deans soul interacting and the physical and emotional effects of that yk. The interaction between them creates a nephilim from that but it's more of a metaphysical change. Cas notices and oop now it's baby time. How do they bring the child into living? They gotta perform a spell and mold a form of clay and summon the nephilim into that, and then it becomes a kid fic from there on 🤷‍♂️ the idea of it is interesting to me but it starts to fall apart as soon as I think about it so rn it's going to stay a wip

Screenshot of the original notes page 😭

Kith kith ty for the ask! 😘

[ananke-xiii]

Forgiveness&Finding oneself in Purgatory Take II

While their first stint in Purgatory was all about Dean unable to let Cas go and Cas wanting to let go of Dean to stay there and do penance, things seem to be reversed in Purgatory Take II.

I've written about "The Trap" some time ago, trying to make sense of what Cas says there and what the hell is going on. I still think something's off in this episode, specifically I think Dean's prayer is redundant and it should've been Cas the one saying something, or at least there should've been a reply from his end.

Maybe, following my imaginal psychology-influenced interpreation of Cas and Dean in Purgatory, I can answer my own question. What I've found is quite interesting, I'll be honest.

So. I've previously interpreted Cas' and Dean's relationship as a marriage of sorts: their vows are based on betrayal and it's indeed the constant shadow of betrayal that keeps their weird marriage alive. It's time for a divorce.

Yeah, a divorce. What, wasn't "The Trap" the moment of reconciliation between the two after their "divorce arc"? Not according to this interpretation I'm attempting. Let's see what's going on.

Dean and Cas are back in Purgatory and they're looking for a flower. "You know, of all the time I've been in Purgatory, I've never seen a bloom of any kind" Cas tells Dean. Interesting. Nothing that Cas knows of has ever bloomed in Purgatory. He adds that they'll know when they'll find it because "it's likely to be the only flower here". If I remember correctly there was someone that Dean was looking for when he was in Purgatory the first time... he was also the only angel there... Oh, yeah. It was Cas. But now Cas is there with Dean so who does the flower stand for? Oh, it's still Cas. They're AGAIN looking for Castiel.

The parallel is reinforced by Dean mentioning Benny. If you think that Dean was mean to Cas in "The Rupture" don't read further cause this is worse.

Dean and Benny looking for Cas and Dean and Cas looking for a flower. Let's go there

Dean compares Benny, his previous fellow in Purgatory, to Cas, his partner now and it's not pretty. According to Dean, Benny was the best. Benny is King of Purgatory by now. Benny sacrificed himself for Dean to save Sam. Benny always picked up the goddamn phone when Dean called. Benny saved Cas and stayed with Dean when he was looking for the angel. Benny, Benny, Benny.

If Amelia was Sam's Magical Girlfriend, Benny is Dean's Magical Boyfriend. Unlike Amelia, Benny was written waaaay better so his function is a little less blatant but he's also written as a projection of all the things Dean looks for in a partner. Benny is an ideal. Cas is real ("We're real").

Comparing someone to an ideal somone else is petty and Dean does so because he wants to hurt Cas. But Cas can be as petty as hurting as his husband. He wants Dean to feel guilty:

CAS: Well, this place will bring that out in you. Guilt. It was my fault the Leviathan got out. It was my fault we were here the first time. I carry that guilt every day.

or: while EYE carry THAT GUILT EVERY DAY, YOU, on the other hand, DON'T, so now that we're back in this wretched place that brings out guilt YOU should feel it because EYE have already apologized while YOU refused to hear it.

Cas is also the worst. They belong together perfectly <3.

And this brings us here, to the words Cas utters and that I couldn't fully get:

CAS: You didn't give me a choice. You couldn't forgive me. And you couldn't move on. You were too angry. I left, but you didn't stop me.

If Cas and Dean are re-living Purgatory 2.0 then they are re-living what happened there the first time: Cas let go of Dean after Dean had spent one year looking for him.

So what Cas is saying here is (following what I've already talked about in the first link I've attached here): You asked of me a relationship based solely on your terms which I reject. You couldn't let go that image of me, that person who betrayed you, so much so you couldn't even leave Purgatory without THAT person (who I am not). You were too focused on your need to keep control and take responsibilities which I refuse to take. I left you as soon as I stepped into Purgatory and yet you couldn't stop chasing me.

Ouch. Cas wants a divorce, guys. But he doesn't want a divorce from Dean but from their distorted marriage founded on betrayal instead of openly expressed love. In other words, Cas wants Dean to let him express his love, he wants love back from Dean and he wants to do it openly. It's a good divorce, you see?

And Dean gives it to him. He kneels and prays and forgives Cas, he let go of that idea of Cas that he was holding on to.

DEAN: No, no, no. Cas? Cas, I hope you can hear me... that wherever you are, it's not too late. I should've stopped you. You're my best friend, but I just let you go. 'Cause it was easier than admitting I was wrong.

or: I should have stopped holding onto that image of you that I had, the one where you are my betrayer and I'm bound to you as your betrayed. You're my best friend first and foremost and I just let that first image of you go because it was easier than admitting my real feelings.

DEAN: And I – I forgive you. Of course I forgive you. I'm sorry it took me so long –I'm sorry it took me till now to say it.

or: I let you go. Of course I do, I've actually always done it in the secret of my heart and I'm sorry it took me this long to say it out loud to myself.

Wooooa. Now that's waaaay better. Dean agrees to Cas' divorce proposal. Consequently, Cas must give Dean something too because forgiveness, the resolution of the betrayal bond, cannot be simply given, there must be an exchange between betrayal and betrayed. The Power scale must result in a 0 on both plates or the experience of betrayal will repeat itself. In other words both parties must do an act of Love.

So what does Caa give to Dean? He gives him... himself. Wholly. A bit smudged, though.

See, while Dean was coming to terms with forgiveness, Cas was looking for himself (the flower/blossom). Instead of running away from the Leviathans aka The Monsters Inside Castiel, he let himself be taken. He accepts to go to their Queen (Cas and Queens... a love story. He's indeed The Man who Would Be King. Take that Dean, you and your King Benny, LOL. Cas becomes King by marriage like a true queen).

CAS: They were after me, not you. I figured it would be safest to give myself up.

In order to find himself Cas does The Surrender: he gave himself up to his literal and symbolical monsters. And in so doing something blooms: himself, new unabridged version. Again, a bit smudged because he's not the same powerful angel as he once was, his powers are failing but who cares? This is who he is and he offers himself to Dean, this is his act of love: take me as I am, smudged or not. I blossomed for you but I had to do it alone because certain things must be done alone but your forgiveness was what gave me the strength. Thanks for letting me go. I now come back to you free from our previous bond. This time our new bond is freely given by both.

In this light, Cas sort of silencing Dean was necessary and not because of his deal with the Shadow.

In between their Purgatory scenes we see what happens in an alternate timeline where Cas takes on the Mark of Cain, which is exactly why they're in Purgatory. The Mark is another bond. Cas accepted to take it because of Chuck.

If Dean took the further step he wanted to take, Cas had to turn him down: you either love freely and openly or you subject yourself to a Greater Power. You can only choose one bond.

If Dean had said what he wanted to say to Cas, they both couldn't accept the idea of Cas taking on the Mark: it's an idea incompatible with Love.

But now all the foundations are laid for Love to take center stage. Too bad that Dean didn't get his chance in "Despair" too. That was tragic and deeply unfair.

[bisexual-winchester]

If Purgatory isn’t where Dean and Cas realized they were in love THEN WHY WAS THEIR DIVORCE RECONCILIATION THERE???

[barbiegirldream]

SK anon hi

I feel like my best friend saved me from supernatural cause I was watching it all the way to the beginning of season 13 and then when me and my friend found out we were both watching it I decided to wait for them. But since we've been busy with school and still are we kind of just forgot about it. And knowing the general reaction to the ending I'm happy I didn't finish it.

Btw I don't know if this is like controversial or whatever but like looking at the destiel ship now and being older I feel like it's been a little bit overhyped, but that might be cause we now know we were queerbaited.

If you go back and rewatch season 4-15 I promise you it was not over hyped 😭😭Season 11 is especially crazy for Dean’s obsession with Cas. In season 13 Dean fucking kills himself with no intention of living and then after Cas is brought back to life he’s fine and pretends he likes that weird little devil kid he wanted to kill days prior. In season 15 they have a pointless falling out just so the writers could do a purgatory reconciliation thing. And Dean arguably in the end again fucking kills himself because basic first aid could have saved his life easily. Trust me Destiel was the peak of queerbait.