#like the post 15x20 theories

[clairenatural]

Jack was like hey I have to go pick up Dean from the 1970s because he's meddling in the timeline do you want to come. And Cas thought about having to face the consequences of his actions and said how about I'll just see you when you get back :)

[garashir]

baby jack pulled cas from the empty with the power of his mind just calling out to him. in 15x19 jack has absorbed the power of chuck, chuck who had just brought lucifer back from the empty THAT EPISODE, and you expect me to believe jack couldn’t or wouldn’t bring cas back? in this essay…

[seenthisepisode]

hi! I saw your post about the why episode title change why 11 scenes cut why lamp etc etc and I know some of it but not all, and I was hoping you could elaborate on spngate— if it’s not too much trouble— or point me in a direction where I can join you in the spn gate?

I feel ashamed for HOW LONG i let this ask just rot in my askbox (it's from january, apparently, now it's april. i thought maybe two weeks passed but NO. it was months. ANON I AM SO SO SO SO SORRY. I LOVE YOU WITH ALL MY HEART) but now with the power of this url and the wine i am currently sipping, let me give you the best, most thought-out answer that i possibly can.

I don't know how long you've been following/watching spn, so I won't get into real deep iceberg theories that go back to season 8 and jeremy carver, for the purpose of this essay answer I'll just stick to the year anno domini 2020, and will try to do my best to tell you what happened.

Okay, maybe 2019. So, in june 2019, when the first scripts and drafts for s15 are presented, these things happen: 1. apparently, according to Berens, the confession scene is the first thing that was written for season 15. 2. Jensen Ackles is sat down and asked if he would be okay with this. (question is asked: why would they ask jensen if all he does in this scene is look at cas, he doesn't say anything, he does not confess, it changes nothing about his character, etc.; if you put the real tjlc tinfoil hat on you'd ask hey , maybe they asked him if precisely that is okay, if he is okay with the fact dean is practically silenced here but that's Deep) 3. Jensen apparently is okay with that, because it happens.

also this thing happens around the same time: 1. they write the ending for the brothers, and no matter what version of the finale we're talking about, Dean dies 2. Jensen Ackles is Not Okay with this. he calls Kripke who then, in a call and/or email assures him it's a good ending (Jensen says that) and also very quickly after that Jensen is announced to play Soldier Boy in Kripke's The Boys. make of that what you want

They film, blah blah, march 2020, covid happens, they stop production right after they film the confession. Last episode to air is 15x13, last episode they film is 15x18, they almost have a plane crush when flying to vegas con, and then, a loooong break until august 2020. Now, from what we know, there were two versions of the finale - the pre-covid finale they were supposed to film if the filming schedule wasn't interrupted, and the finale that happened.

What was supposed to be in the Original Finale/Pre-Covid Finale, we still don't know exactly, but from what the cast said, there was supposed to be a big cast reunion, Harvelle's Roadhouse in Heaven, Kansas Band (why are they dead?) playing there after Dean gets there and so on.

Anyway. July 2020. Misha does a livestream with Michael Sheen (the SuperGood campaign) where he says he is going back to filming the last two episodes in a few weeks. he said it LIVE. it's on youtube. people analyze the background from Misha's livestreams and photos and conclude he is in Vacouver, where spn is filmed. He also says that he is going back filming in a few interviews. Also here.

August 2020. They go back to filming in august 2020 to film 15x19 and 15x20.

August 20th, 2020, Misha's birthday.

I wasn't on set TODAY. so casual. of all days i wasn't there today.

August 24th, 2020, day 6/8 of filming 15x19, Angel with a Shotgun is hash tag Song of The Day while filming scenes of 15x19 (scene 28, 31).

September 4th, 2020. ALL THEY FILM, for the whole DAY, is one scene. They usually film a few. They film one. Song of the day? The Night We Met.

Somewhere before the episodes starts to air again, Dabb says only 30% of the audience will like the finale. Anyway, everyone concludes, Misha is filming, destiel is more or less going canon, but everyone including bibros is sure Misha is filming and will be there for the finale.

Originally, "Despair" was called "The Truth".

Finale airs.

It feels shorter (apparently it's not) but it does have an additional ad break. For Walker. But it feels shorter because of the "carry on my wayward son" cover montage that lasts too long and later it's discovered thanks to scripts that dropped that there are ELEVEN scenes that were filmed,, but didn't make it to the episode. The script that drops is also very telling, where scenes are just [OMMITTED]. It was explained that they wanted to have actor there but they didn't want actors to quarantine for two weeks to film one or two scenes BUT then that's exactly what they did with Jim Beaver lmao.

So yeah. I also remember Misha at a con (DarkLight?) where, after asked about the original ending, he answers that the original ending was something that would be better explored in fanfiction anyway. Theory rises he filmed and was cut off the episode without his or Jensen's knowledge because Misha sat down his kids to watch the spn finale (which was the first episode they were supposed to watch ever, why would he do that if he's not there?) and then, CW SPN twitter posts a goodbye video that has everyone from the cast and their mother BUT MISHA AND JENSEN ARE NOT THERE. Jensens sexy silence starts.

THEN THE WILDEST THING HAPPENS.

November 25th, the Spanish Dub. 15x18 drops in Brazil and Dean says "and i you" to Cas, after he confesses. No "don't do this cas" but "and i you". Tumblr stops working for two hours, people on discords are screaming, no one knows whats happening, someone claims Jensen was called in September 2020 to record some adlibs? To record the muffled sobs Dean does while on the floor. Theory is supported by the fact that in the Bazil version? When Dean sits on the floor? The sound that plays are birds. Chirping birds. Sounds don't match, what was Dean saying while crying on the floor, question arises.

Everyone decides there was a Rogue Translator who managed to hide from The CW Sniper (who is the reason actors just dont tell us everything) and translated some kind of Original Script. Voice Actors are invited to a podcast where they debunk this saying that it was added because the translator felt this was the right response or something like that. Anyway they debunk the fact that there existed, at any time, a version of a script, that maybe was send to them, where Dean says I love you too. This was a wild night, no one slept.

And like. I could make this post longer, but I am planning to, one day, make a huge masterpost with real sources about that because honestly you could write a book about it.

But tl;dr spngate is a theory that misha did film for the last 2 episodes and the changes they made were truly last minute (september 2020), they were going for a canon destiel, possibly human!cas engame, dabb was always on our side, and it's based on stuff like jensen actively hating the ending to the point he made his prequel after 2 years of radio silence, 11 scenes just cut from the finale, misha saying he is going back filming, and people like mark pellegrino saying the last scene he filmed was with alex and misha. also the onion field. why lamp is the theory that cas is represented and symbolized by lamps throughout the show and when dean dances with a Lamp in a drug induced dream instead of, say, some kind of a lady he is actually thinking about cas.

also there are little things like when jensen at an online con before the finale says that oh yes i am wearing a grey flannel but tomorrow? who know it could be blue and green. and we all collectively lost our shit. like when he said he is most excited to "tackle" with cas in season 15. or that "dean has no taste, clearly". WHY WAS YOUR PERMISSION NEEDED JENSEN

there are a lot of things i didn't mention here because i simply can't unflod this whole thing just like that but

but if you understand this picture you might be entitled to financial compensation

[angelsdean]

like, i get that some people are upset that dean is still in heaven but, it wasn't really a shock to me at all ?? sure i clowned a bit w/ the 'time traveling aliveboy dean' stuff but they literally said before the show even started that dean was on a "hiatus" from heaven and that was always in the back of my mind thru out my clowning. and it really was a hiatus from heaven ! it all took place in the heaven drive time gap as like a finale coda (and what a huge time gap that is to fill. there's still so much they can do w/ that bit of time alone imo). we also don't know how much jensen + robbie were allowed to change, there may have been stipulations w/ spnwin to not change the heaven finale, something that might have to wait for a reboot / continuation of spn prime.

but regardless, crucially ??? what spnwin did is it completely recontexualized dean's ending. i said this in the tags of this post but i'll say it again: the spn finale said. ok dean's dead. he waits for sam. and that's it. spnwin said. no actually !!! he's not accepting that peace !! he's not waiting around for sam !! and giving dean back that agency is important to me. giving dean back the ability to make his own choices and want things for himself is important to me.

and i know some people are doubtful that we'll get a s2 of spnwin, meaning dean's story would end here, on him being unhappy in heaven. but personally, i don't think it matters if we get a s2. i think jensen is Not done with dean or the spn prime story. he's said before that spnwin is only one of many stories he wants to explore in the spn universe. also, after that answer he gave recently at jibcon re: a destiel reunion, i think he def wants more spn ("hopefully we get to see that at some point / i'm sure it would go how we all think it would go" and dean wanting to talk abt the confession)

i think even if we don't get a s2, everything that spnwin established re: dean's story will be the foundation for that reboot / mini series they're always talking about. personally, i Don't think we'll see dean again if there is a s2. (tho we may hear him in voiceovers as they read his journal and use it as a guide. and we may learn more abt dean and his journey this way). overall, i think dean helped establish this story and these characters, but moving forward it will be focused on them and not dean (tho we will see familiar spn faces, and maybe they will get involved in the multiverse too and visit the main spn universe, who knows?)

i think we needed what spnwin gave us re: dean's story not being over, dean unhappy in heaven, dean still searching more, (hints about jack possibly being "off" too / chuck won theory...) as a foundation for future stories in the main spn universe post-15x20. we want to see dean bust out of heaven and find happiness right? well, the seeds for that have been planted. and i knowww that's asking for optimism and faith that we WILL see a continuation in the future, and i get that some people are just doubtful and hopeless, but i really think we will see a continuation in the (maybe not so distant) future. and imo having this foundation to work off w/ dean's recontextualized time in heaven is important for all the things we want to see in a continuation.

and like, even tho i'm annoyed that ppl think his 'ending' now is worse than it was in 15x20, i don't think it's wrong to feel upset, because if that really were where it ended for dean i wouldn't be happy either. but for me the thing is i really really do Not think this is it for dean. i don't think jensen will be satisfied w/ dean staying dead in heaven forever. it completely goes against the thesis of the show, and dean's personal desire for freedom over peace in 'paradise.' and after everything jensen said abt dean + cas reuniting, i think there's a lot of unresolved things in spn that he wants to address, and he'll keep trying to make more spn until we get a better ending for all these characters (bc lbr, sam's ending also sucked. we never saw cas again and all he got was a throwaway line in the finale. jack deserves better too. they all do).

[deanstudies101]

3x15, Time Is On My Side

Critical theory: Ethics. What makes a monster. Happy endings, and what we deserve. 

Discussion question(s): What is the difference between Sam and Dean’s approach to doctor Benton, and why do we think that is? (How do we feel about the idea of Dean being killed over and over and having his organs replaced?) How do we feel about Rufus’ conversation with Dean, knowing what we know about the finale? 

Key quotes: Rufus, “Folks like us...there ain't no happy ending. We all got it coming.”

Discussion: 

[Bela deserved better and they did her dirty.] We find out she was abused by her father and that she’s going to hell and then she just. Gets torn apart by hellhounds. 

Sam vs. Dean’s approach. Sam has always done quite dodgy stuff to keep Dean alive (Faith), but Dean is very aware of how what he does affects other people. He doesn’t want people to die for him. Benton has been killing people to take their organs, and Sam doesn’t seem to understand why Dean wouldn't be happy about that. 

Convo with Rufus. [Because. Rufus is right.] It’s annoying. Sam is also a hunter, and he gets a happy ending. If they both died it would be a classic tragedy (ie. it was always going to end like this). Dean wants Sam to be happy, John wants Dean to protect Sam, and Sam wants to live a normal life. It was always going to end like that. We’re just barely seeing Dean standing up for himself to himself, he still revolves a lot around Sam. You can see how Rufus got where he is, because that’s what happens to hunters who survive. But why does Sam get the happy ending? [I discussed the meta answer, ie. that post. (spoilers for 15x20) Dean dies because there is something wrong with him. (@autisticandroids)]

[catsconflictscopicsandchamomile]

ok so here's why throwing Fae Lore into spn makes a revival/continuation possible

Here's the setup:

-"Blurrywife" is a Faerie, specifically a malevolent/vampiric one, definitely a Succubus type. The mimes are her human thralls, hence why they don't act like normal vampires.

-Baby, yes the car, is ALSO a Faerie, specifically a kind of shapeshifter called a Pooka. John captured her in the early 80s, and, being John Winchester, never told his kids about this.

-Chuck Won. duh???

-Jack is, and was always destined to be, the next Jack O' The Lantern, and after Chuck threw his flaming corpse out Heaven, he's been ruling his own spoopy little candy-coated afterlife. pumpkin boi

Here's the timeline:

-Blurrywife & Mime Crew are kidnapping kids, likely for The Fae's 7-year tithe of souls to Hell (a thing that exists in the lore), when the Winchesters show up. Sam & Dean, as usual, have NO idea how to identify or fight Fae, and get their asses handed to them, with Dean falling to some weird Gaelic cold-iron magic fuckery (points to Blurrywife & crew for figuring out how to fight with iron despite being unable to touch it. 10/10 fuck these guys tho fr)

-Sam, alone and grieving, is an easy target and she picks him off before he even gets to the car, taking (something close to) Eileen's form and trapping him in a dreamscape, similar to how Djinn attack in spn.

-Sam, Dean AND Baby (there's def some Fae Drama going on there, yikes) have been stuck the Fae Realms for THREE YEARS as of Nov 2023.

-Dean and Baby escaped at some point, staying with Jack for a bit before running off to the 1970s like a dumbass and getting EVERYONE, including Jack and Bobby (why is Bobby even here??? HOW DID BOBBY'S GHOST GET STUCK IN THE FAE REALMS WHAT DID HE *DO*) recaptured.

-Sam has had it much worse, being drained to a white-haired husk of his former self and left for dead within a few days/months. DJ is half-faerie, raised in the fae realms, and could be 3 years old or 50, who knows. I don't like thinking abt how he happened.

-Here's the setup for the continuation:

Dean (fairly intact besides the cursed stab wound in his back) escapes with Sam (nearly dead, white-haired, displaying more or less the typical signs of someone who was taken & drained of life by The Fae) and stumbles into Charlie's safehouse. the Fae Arc can continue from this point, w Baby's true nature being revealed, Blurrywife as a major antagonist/BBEG, DJ going from possible threat -> clearly a well-meaning and very brave kid -> newest Winchester family member who Sam fully accepts as his son (plus s4-cas-esque moments as DJ tries to adapt to living on Earth. DJ ilysm but most cars aren't sentient and you can't bring your longbow to community college)

also Cas is still in The Empty, and Jack & Bobby are still captured, so that's some major plot points right there

Destiel is canon.

...anyway, this is all still pretty convoluted, but it allows for:

-15x20 to have been "not real" without being retconned

-DJ to exist without either setting the continuation ~30 yrs in the future (how would that work), or repeating spnwin's time-travel-kid-ex-machina (that's just not good writing I'm sry)

-spn finally doing something w The Fae (& related lore) besides one-off eps

-human!impala as main character

-explanations of weird shit in the finale (rebar, vamp-mimes, etc)

-collective fandom catharsis at Blurrywife's bitch ass

-the full horror potential of a faceless woman in a long dress standing ominously in the corner while time blurs forward around you and you age to death in five minutes

-some VERY fun metacommentary & crossover easter eggs if you use certain bits of Fae lore

-still works w my other big finale theory/revival idea/if-they-dont-do-this-i-will-be-so-pissed, which is the whole Deanmon 2.0 thing. but that's a post unto itself.

(also yes. making Blurrywife a djinn IS simpler and requires 0 new lore and makes perfect sense in canon. however, I hate how djinn are portrayed in spn. it feels vaguely racist and makes me uncomfy to write/read. so um that's why I didn't do that)

[hettolandija]

Misha wasn't in Vancouver when they were filming the SPN finale. When production resumed in August 2020 he was in Northern California filming his part in the movie 'Encounter'. He didn't quarantine for two weeks with the other actors in Canada. On the final day of SPN's filming (Sept 10th 2020), Misha was at home in Bellingham. He did a livestream that day from his living room and said how weird it felt to not be on set on the final day of shooting. He sounded sad. I know there is a conspiracy that he was in Vancouver and filmed scenes for the finale and for some reason they cut him out, but it is simply not true.

Anon, first of all you must know that after seeing this message something possessed me and I ended up on 15th page of google search at 4 am trying to find out what exactly happened in 2020. The craziness followed me onto the next, uh… almost two weeks now. My sleep schedule is completely destroyed. I watched all pictures and videos that Misha posted in 2020 on his numerous social media. And googled for virtual cons, podcasts and more. I was so busy in searching of truth that I forgot to open AO3 and I forgot to delete spam from my email, and on some days I even forgot to open tumblr.

I became this picture (but on Google Earth and word document + several pages of physical notes):

Now I'm able to not only distinguish the interiors of his Bellingham and Los Angeles houses, but also easily locate his Bellingham house on google street view (and the one on Hollywood hills too). I can draw a floor plan of his Bellingham house from memory by now. I never wanted to know any of this.

But back to your message, I think that YOU ARE RIGHT about Misha not being in Vancouver filming for 15x20 (but I still think that in pre covid-script Cas was supposed to be here, but that is a different can of worms). The conspiracy theory was based on a very incomplete data, so now I'm working on a detailed 2020 timeline with pictures and links to everything, and I need your help because:

everywhere where I look it says that 'Encounter' was filmed in October 2020. Do you have a source of any other information?

I wasn't able to locate any livestream from Sept 10th 2020. Only some fragments of M&G videos, but I don't know whether they were live or pre-recorded messages. Are we both talking about a video where he looked like this?

I also found fragments of a livestream that he did with Alex Calvert, but this time he was sitting in his white van. Maybe this was the same day, maybe it was only the same shirt.

[mybrainproblems]

#idk this is all conjecture. but it’s interesting to think about#don’t take my word as gospel truth 🤷🏻#also. full disclosure. I have not yet watched the finale#I’m still in s14 on my first layer seasons watch!!

okay, so i've watched 15x20 nine ten times now and this is really a good summary for exactly why these rumors persist about the "extra" ad break and the episode being "short" (hell, i was even ready to throw in on the extra ad break rumor)

people have either never watched it bc they heard it was bad, or they haven't watched it in three years bc yes, the episode is just not up to par with other spn episodes, nvm finales. and since it's more fun repeat a fun conspiracy than fact check, it keeps going around. (which i also parroted! until i decided to get out a stopwatch and check for myself in dec 2022!) it was also a rumor that got a lot of play by a couple of popular blogs in late 2020/early 2021 and it gained a lot of traction then.

so yeah. it's worth investigating! which i did and have been digging into for a year now. i had hit the dead end of not being able to find a version of 15x20 where the ad breaks were intact. which brings me to...

an extremely lovely person reached out to me last night to let me know that they had 15x20 on their DVR with ad breaks intact and pulled the rough timing marks for me without me even asking bc they are an absolute angel!!!

transcription of the timing marks in the second image:

1. mins 10-13 after boys catch vamp mime (yep 10 whole minutes!) 2. mins 17-22 (incl cw promo) after kids run out/vamp lineup enters 3. mins 32-35 after dean's death 4. mins 40-45 (incl jared walker promo) after sam walks out of bunker 5. mins 57-60 after bridge waving :\

which means i was extremely wrong in my first reblog guessing where most of the ad breaks were as someone who hadn't watched live and... there are no extra ad breaks from what I can tell? (as someone who actually works on this, please chime in if these look off! i would love to hear from someone who actually knows!) at least to me, it looks like they're at about the time slots i would expect for a normal TV episode? breaks 1&2 feel like they're close but idk. my knowledge is mostly in TV market research, not ad sales/buying (side bar: i adore being proven wrong with Facts, if i am wrong pls tell me!!)

what i think makes it feel like the episode is under 42min or that there might have been extra ad breaks (which i would totally have believed) is that not even midway through the 60min time block it runs into narrative concrete with dean's impalement. and then you have an entire second half of the ep where nothing happens and it is So. Slow. it's basically a single scene (dean's death) and then dean and bobby's short convo, followed by a couple of aimless montages with OG carry on and a cover of carry on back-to-back.

it is a WEIRD fucking episode. especially from a writer who is, at worst, competent. (i say this as a dabbfan & with love in my heart)

i have a post i just made with a list of major timing marks if anyone wants to take a look. (once i knew where to look they were SO obvious)

also bc it might contextualize my pov: i'm in the camp of "no major changes that weren't related to covid regulations were made between shutdown and starting filming again." i genuinely believe that the finale was screwed long before the reaction to 15x18. walker was the CW's follow-on show and they were looking for general audiences for that show, not destiel shippers. it's a really boring explanation, but i think it's the most likely. at a guess, last minute cuts were smaller adjustments and (my unprovable theory) waiting to see if they could get another song licensed for the montage.

ok so like. thinking about the fact that there was an extra commercial break in the finale

In 2021 I used to work for [major US cable company] on a team that manually scheduled all of the ads that aired on their network every single day. While the exact shit that airs gets put in there the day before by a team of approx 10 human beings (insane), the tv show schedule & the breaks themselves are SET IN STONE. It takes a really specific, heavy-hitting request from a network and a LOT of people & moving parts to make an extra commercial break happen. That shit is built into the system way in advance!!!!!

I wish I had thought to ask my coworkers if they remembered anything happening then. Things were ofc moving around a lot because of the election coverage, BUT that was in the news networks, not on the fucking CW. Do we think that request was made last minute??? how long did they plan to have that extra break in there?????? were they cutting that episode up until the last minute after the networks saw the reaction to 15x18??????? we will probably never know but it is gonna bug me forever

[bisaster-energy]

literally the only way the finale could be considered "good" is through the Chuck Won lens (which is the right and true interpretation god bless)

[youchangedmedean]

Dean’s Outfit in The Winchesters Trailer

Here I am, back on my obsession with Dean’s clothing and able to put it to good use.

We see Dean in the trailer not looking exactly like we know him. However, we know his outfit.

He is wearing his black denim jacket, light denim shirt and mid blue jeans. I am guessing this is heaven by the license plate but it is not his heaven outfit from 15x20. Dean has had the jacket since s11 and wore it in s15 for 

15x04 Atomic Monsters 

15x08 Our Father Who Aren’t in Heaven 

15x09 The Trap

The shirt was new for s15 and worn in :

15x04 Atomic Monsters 

15x08 Our Father Who Aren’t in Heaven 

15x09 The Trap 

15x14 The Last Holiday

15x15 Gimme Shelter 

15x20 Carry On

While they were both in Atomic Monsters (directed by Jackles himself) they were not worn together. They were worn together in 15x08 and 15x09. Yes, this outfit travels to both hell and purgatory.

And Jensen finds it so significant that he decided Dean would wear it the first time we see him in The Winchesters. I also want to note that it was worn in 15x04 to kill a vampire. And Dean died on a Vampire Hunt. In this case the parents were getting him human blood. They said Sam and Dean couldn’t understand because they are not parents. “We just wanted him to have a normal life”. Can’t help but think this could take on new meaning with the prequel.

It was also interspersed with Chuck and Becky with this memorable scene

BECKY: Okay. If I had to give one note… the jeopardy, Chuck. It’s feeling a little… thin? Low stakes? It’s fun to hear the boys’ voices, but a story is only as good as its villain, and these villains are just not feeling very… dangerous? Not to mention, there’s no classic rock. No one even mentions Cas. The climax is a little stale. Boys tied up again while we get the villain’s monologue, which, frankly, isn’t one of your best. A little originality wouldn’t… hurt.

I don’t think I need to remind everyone about all the Atomic Monsters theories. “It’s awful! Horrible. It’s hopeless.” They’re not dead. They’re just away”.

The shirt I believe to be the one Dean died in. He changed into it and his death jacket for his final hunt. 

I think I might have an idea now for something I had no clue about before. I noted before on my post about Dean’s Cursed Heaven Outfit that on the video Jensen posted as he was dressing up as Dean for the last time “at least for now” he was not wearing the jacket Dean wore in Heaven. He was wearing Dean’s black denim jacket, not the heaven one.

These are NOT the same jackets. The sleeves sit different, pockets are different shapes, there is not the same seams on the heaven one etc.

I could never figure out why Jensen would be dressing as Dean in a near identical outfit that we never see. Now I wonder if Dean coded Jensen managed to film something way back in September 2020 for the prequel? The scenes filmed on that final day were the roadhouse, driving and the bridge. I think it might be possible he switched jackets at some point. And maybe this was when Jensen stole it from set! Seeing this trailer I am more convinced than ever that the prequel is somehow going to lead to a continuation.

[swordofsun]

Okay, @wigglebox wanted me to post this over here and they would follow up with their bonkers dutch angles stuff.

This is a "what the fuck is Dean doing in The Winchesters" theory. It takes Chuck Won as a given and is based on how insanely meta s15 was on top of the show being meta a fuck + the SPNWIN preview and the couple of scenes of tv static + Cas literally being narrative breaking + general vibes.

At some point after the end of 15x18 and the beginning of 15x20 Dean literally stepped out of the narrative. What we're seeing is Chuck's POV. This is the ending he wanted, the ending we never really got to see but that Becky hated so damn much. (Becky the audience insert that is given an absolutely lovely life to show how much the show cares for it's audience.) The Dean we see is a Chuck puppet or illusion of some sort.

Chuck may not have realized Dean stepped out of the narrative.

The real Dean, The True Dean, is off to the side. Just out of sight of the camera, watching it all go down. He can't effect anything because Sam and other Dean (if there even is an Other Dean) just go through the motions. Even more disturbing if it's like in Heaven when someone steps out of the memory and everyone else just continues on like they're there. There's no pie, no one on the piece of rebar, just Sam reacting as if there was. No one driving the Impala, just Chuck controlling everything.

Cas was literally narrative breaking. He didn't do what Chuck wanted and, through the power of love (an actual thing in SPN), Dean is able to make that step too. Just off camera where we can't see him watching.

So the Dean that we see in the SPNWIN preview is searching for the point where the narrative started. He's going back over his parent's story to figure out just when Chuck started actively taking an meddling role. With the end result a Cas rescue from the Empty and actually defeating Chuck.

(And possible AU where we get to see Mary and John without heaven's influence?)

[vampireinterview]

the way the lack of destiel was in retrospect only like, number 7, on the finale’s list of problems is so funny that we didn’t even take it into consideration when theory posting pre-15x20. it was like, destiel either will or won’t be acknowledged but surely they won’t do THAT

[diminuel]

The Winchesters 1x01

I’ve rewatched the The Winchesters pilot episode and here is a more structured reaction/ discussion. (You can read my summarized live watching reaction here.)

This ended up being very long (over 3000 words), but if you’re in the mood to read a lengthy discussion you can find it under the cut! It will of course contain spoilers.

Initial thoughts

I enjoyed it! I had some issues with the pacing at times and some character interactions felt a bit underdeveloped, but all in all, a very good start.

The most comforting aspect of the pilot, which I was expecting, is that this episode felt familiar. It’s another episode of Supernatural to me, far more than it is an independent series. Part of that is due to the fact that it’s clearly embedded into SPN by various anchor points: familiar characters, familiar setting (hunting, dads’ missing), familiar music, familiar “heart” (it’s about family) and, most importantly, the frame story with Dean narrating. We don’t know from what point he’s narrating – is this filling a gap in one of the later seasons (post return of the Samulet), is this one of Chuck’s other universes before it was destroyed, is this set in 15x20 before Sam, or is this set after 15x20.

Picking the music – the frame story

And this is topic is where I must start. First, an attempted transcription of Dean’s narration:

“March 23rd, 1972. The day dad came home from the war. And the day he met mom.

And I know this story might sound familiar but I’m gonna put the pieces together in a way that might just surprise you. And in order to do that I need to start all the way at the beginning.”

Followed by his closing statement:

“What they didn’t know was that the akrida weren’t just a threat to earth, but all of existence.

Now, like I told you, there’s gonna be some surprises. Hell, I’m still trying to find all the puzzle pieces myself. But I’ll explain everything. And until then? I’ll keep picking the music.”

We don’t know who Dean’s addressing (see the use of “you”). We see him writing, so rather than him sitting somewhere and telling two storylines (a) what happened to mom and dad and b) what he was doing to find all the puzzle pieces) I assume what we’re hearing is what he’s writing down. Following up on that it’s possible that he has an intended reader, possibly Sam due to his absence from the passenger seat and familiarity with the story. I’m making an assumption that Dean’s been way more interested in learning every detail he could of his parents. He has the journal as a connection to his dad and he has what his dad told him about Mary. We see Dean is using the story of John and Mary’s first meeting to connect to Mary when she is returned, so it stands to reason that he has been using the retelling of this story as a way to feel closer to her.

My guess for the time being is that we’ll figure out who the intended audience is at a later date, as this is just the pilot the possibilities of our theories seem endless! It’ll eventually narrow down though I’m enjoying having such free range at the moment.

I also can’t avoid making a comment on how relevant it is that DEAN gets to tell the story. Dean’s been at the mercy of someone else telling his story (and in the end, despite defeating the author figure, he still fell victim to an outdated “story” of how his life must end. Never mind that they “tore up the ending” and how big a point it was that neither them nor god could read his death book. The ending was blank, maybe not unwritten but unseen to them. And yet Dean died by the ending he’d been writing for himself since it was the only ending a hunter could have? A “truth” that was undermined by the fact that Sam did not die too? But I digress. I’ll be digging into that some more in my spite fueled PhD project.) Dean is telling the story, he is picking the music, he is behind the wheel. The journal possibly containing his parents’ story is riding shotgun.

It is of course possible that he isn’t just telling a story, but also actively participating in it.

He calls the Akrida creatures that threaten all of creation; maybe he is working a case, trying to defend against this – to us – unknown threat and uncovering the truth about his parents gives him the tools to stop the threat happening in his timeline, to his world. More on this below.

Dad hasn’t been home in a few days/ 15 years

The very first meeting of John and Mary seems perfectly normal, the kind of story you can tell your kids so that Dean can then retell it to Mary once she’s resurrected. But this is where we are clearly going “off script” from both the story that Dean retold Mary and the story we got from cupid (of two people hating each other and only heaven’s interference made them a perfect match).

John and Mary seem to have been brought together because they followed trails of their fathers that led them to the Lawrence Men of Letters chapterhouse at Cornelia 29.

Mary is there because Samuel called her from the road, telling her that Ada gave him this address for documents he needed. Just like Sam and Dean, Mary is therefore picking up her father’s case after he has gone missing. (We don’t know why she doesn’t involve her mother Deanna if this family doesn’t keep secrets and does all the hunting together.)

John is brought to this location by the promise of answers. John tells of an unfamiliar man, who gave him a letter allegedly written by Henry and who then vanished into thin air.

And the third person who found their way to the alley at Cornelia 29 is an unnamed demon. We don’t know why he was there or why the demons are looking for the same things, but he clearly wanted into that crypt as well and he knew that John had the key.

Both Samuel’s disappearance and the letter from Henry come with a host of questions, some that get a partial answer in the episode, but most are given into the fans’ care to theorize about.

Samuel’s case and knowledge about the MoL

In the opening, we see Samuel in the MoL “crypt,” opening a door to the catacombs that hold the little mystery box. He doesn’t make it down there, because a creature attacks him. It doesn’t look like anything we know, though I’m not sure I would speculate on it being an Akrida already. In any case, Samuel runs from the crypt, gets chased and possibly even captured. He called Mary from Lubbock, Texas, so most likely before he went to the crypt.

The person who gave him the lead and the address to the chapterhouse in Lawrence was Ada, who apparently has dealt MoL (including Henry) before. When we see Ada’s book store, where Samuel was working on his case, we can spot a couple of other MoL files on the desk. For some reason Ada (or Samuel) got access to these files, on top of that Ada knew that the file that Samuel was looking for was in a cabinet in the Lawrence chapterhouse. It seems slightly suspicious to me that Ada has access to these documents and information but doesn’t know what happened to the MoL. Also, they were looking into all MoL chapterhouse locations (I wonder if they found the location of the Bunker too) so how did they know where to look for the correct files?

That aside, we do know that the MoL shared their secrets with select hunters. It is possible that the Campbells knew, but now here’s an interesting fact: when asked about the MoL by John, Mary says she doesn’t know them. However, the Mary who returns in S12 and is taken to the Bunker by Dean has heard of them, though she calls them “a myth. An old Hunter's story.” This might be another, potentially relevant, deviation from what we think we know.

The chase for Henry and the mysterious letter:

The most striking deviation from what we thought was the truth, is that John learns of the MoL and hunting.

What stays the same is the story of him coming back from war (and still being sweet). One thing that has puzzled me was why John has joined the war in order to chase after his father. “I went halfway around the world to figure him out; why he left and what he did.” What answers do war promise? Has Millie, who definitely had knowledge of the MoL (the sign can be spotted at the Winchester garage), told him a story that involved Henry being a soldier? If this is the same timeline as in 8x12 Henry told John that he would be leaving for work. So he might have some idea that John did work so important, that it made him abandon his family. John might have projected “important work” onto the war?

And now that John is back, clearly suffering from PTSD and with some rather radical ways of solving problems (like trying to buy Mary time to escape from a Loup-garou by using the fragments of a silver cross that got embedded in his arm when his friend exploded on a landmine… Typical Winchester stuff.)

Interestingly, an outside force in the form of a mysterious letter, gets him to the right location to find out about Henry. Since the stranger who gave John the letter vanished into thin air, he either is a supernatural creature or have help from one/ be able to use magic. It’s clearly someone who had access to Men of Letters objects (the key, the letter paper with the emblem), knew when/ where exactly John returned from war and knew Henry to either pass on a letter for him or forge the letter. Even though we hear Henry narrating the letter once Millie reads it, she doesn’t comment that it’s Henry’s handwriting (which Mary does about her dad’s twice), this might simply serve to throw us off track. Of course, it would be possible that every MoL has such letters prepared in case of tragedy, but why wait so long to deliver it? And it’s unlikely they’d be able to vanish as they please.

It’s possible that Henry wrote a letter once he knew he wasn’t going to go back to his own time, but a) John was already dead by then, b) then the letter would be with Sam and Dean in 2013 and c) Henry had no access to that key in 2013.

Depending on when it’s set Dean and Sam (potentially Cas, but probably not Jack because I think John might call Jack a “guy” or something of that sort and not a man.) are in the bunker, they have access to the locations of the chapter houses and potentially also the key.

But of course, it could be anyone else who knows John, knows Henry, has access to MoL info, has access to the key and can vanish and either has an interest in putting John on the path towards becoming a MoL or in Mary’s path.

Who hits all these criteria? We don’t know.

The Box and the Big Bad

As we learn from Ada, the box traps demons and kills them. Samuel wants it, the demons want it. Ada says Samuel wants it because it is the only thing that can kill the Akrida. For seasoned viewers “monsters out of this world” aren’t a novelty – it could refer to monsters from Purgatory, monsters from AUs or monsters on the level of cosmic entities such as Chuck, Amara or the Empty.

But they’re interesting because “out of world” monsters who are a continuous threat could mean that they’re still a threat to our timeline. Of course, they could be a big enough threat that angels intervened too, since it would be a shame if the battle ground was destroyed before the prophesized battle between Lucifer and Michael happened.

In any case, Ada says that the MoL always stopped the Akrida and ominiously remarks that they’re gone now, which implies that the danger the Akrida present is catastrophic, but that’s not true. As far as we know Abaddon didn’t bother to leave the US on her killing MoL tour; non-US American MoL are still around. If the MoL are the only ones who have knowledge about stopping this invading monster force, then surely this knowledge was shared among the MoL on all continents. The MoL would have contingency plans for when something bad happened – either there is more than one such box to kill the Akrida or other MoL would come fetch it to continue the fight against this perpetually returning foe. Since we know the British MoL exist, I doubt the story tellers expect us to forget about them, so this puts Ada’s comments into question.

I have already seen some speculation that Dean might want the box, not to fight the Akrida but because it might give him an access point to the place killed demons go. Not that he’d need one; they technically know how to access the Empty. There’s a spell and the Empty can be called once they go to Death’s library (to which they have a key). So time travelling to get his hands on a box just for the sake of a portal to the Empty might be too complicated considering they have other methods. (But they did also time travel back to get a hand of god off a submarine so what do I know about Winchester plans.)

However, I can imagine that he wants it. It’s likely they came across records of the box when going through the Bunker’s files. And maybe Dean went on his journey of putting puzzle pieces together because when he (and Sam) checked out the MoL crypt in New Orleans the box was no longer there. That would mean he’d have to trace who took it.

The only thing worse than how it starts for a hunter is how it ends

I can imagine that Carlos’ line hit those of us who are still trying to cope with the ending very hard. It’s a line that we hear a lot in the show and one that gets reaffirmed time and time again and then one final time with Dean.

We learn that Carlos’ family was killed by ghouls and that got him into hunting. Of Latika we only know that Samuel saved her (we don’t know yet from what, potentially there’s a link to the vampires who killed Maggie) and that she feels compelled to remain in that world, possible as a sort of debt to repay.

We already know that Mary wants out of the family business thanks to Dean and Sam’s trips to the past. We also learn that she feels resentment for her parents for burdening her with this life from so early on. The death of her cousin Maggie seems to have given her conviction to leave another push. Like for Sam, finding dad is one more case, though she probably won’t be able to let go. Because there’s always another case, more people to save, more things to hunt. (Hopefully another season to film.) And in our timeline Mary doesn’t get out until her parents’ deaths (and even then she still left to solve cases when she was a mom).

It'll be interesting to see how John’s dive into hunting conflicts with Mary’s desire to get out.

Additional thoughts and observations:

1972 is also when Azazel is finally able to speak to Lucifer and learns that to free him he has to break 66 seals and find a special child. Coincidence? Doubtable. Already in 1973 we see him setting his plans for this special child into motion.

Azazel is around and angels aren’t far either. Whether it was true that Heaven interfered with John and Mary’s love story (we already see that it’s not true that they can’t stand each other), angels are aware of what is happening. Because when Cas sends Dean back to 1973 he says that Dean had to know what they already knew. They were definitely watching the parents of the true vessels. After all, from the start, angels knew God’s story: that it was going to end with Sam and Dean. So this time must have been very exciting for angels.

Apropos angels: Of course I want to see Cas again (whether in his Jimmy Novak vessel, in a vessel that looks the same as Jimmy Novak for a reason I don’t need explained to me, or in a different – potentially also female – vessel), but maybe this would be a good chance to also see Anna again? At this point she’s still Cas’ boss.

In our timeline she was killed by Michael in the 70s after being brain washed, so it might be interesting if her involvement in fighting the Akrida with John and Mary leads her to choose humanity. She must have been on earth somewhere before 83 when she was reborn as a human to make her want to fall. I guess the 70s might be a good enough time frame for her to learn of the joys of sex which was one of the reasons she fell. ;3

In SPN we learn that when Henry disappears the location marker was “Normal, Illinois”. It is not hard to imagine that Millie and John moved and built up the Winchester garage afterwards. However, why does Henry have his locker in the Lawrence chapterhouse then? This seems to firmly locate him in Lawrence. Of course, it could be that he is from Lawrence, moved to Illinois and one he disappeared, Millie moved away from Normal to where her husband was from. (It’s unlikely that Henry did the commute from Normal to Lawrence since that is a 6+ hour drive today according to google maps, probably even longer back in the 50s.)

We learn that Henry’s middle name is Eric. According to the Superwiki John’s middle name is also Eric. Is Dean’s middle name also Eric? (If he has one. This messes with my Michael headcanon.)

And that’s it. Congratulations, you’ve made it through this massive post.

I would love to hear if you have any thoughts!

[estrel]

How Did The Car Get Here?

or: why the impala being in dean's heaven means it isn't really heaven

[content warnings: mention of the finale (15x20), though no screenshots are included because i can’t force myself to rewatch it]

okay so i'm finally cracking my knuckles and getting into a meta post after the finale, and it started because marlo and i watched scoobynatural the other month and of course that means some new revelations about the finale came to light, right? right (this is the grain of salt i'm throwing at you <3 it's gonna read like the fan fiction meta. that’s a warning)

you might be thinking, "ely, what the hell does scoobynatural have anything to do with the finale." and to that i say, surprisingly quite a lot

the basic premise of this episode is that sam, dean and cas are whisked away to a tv world (scooby doo) and have to save the people (characters—HEROES, hint hint) in it from a real-world ghost. it's revealed later that the ghost has been tied to a pocket knife that a real estate developer has been putting everywhere in order to scare shop owners into giving their stores to him. (wiki description that might’ve put it better than i could)

when sam and dean first arrive, almost immediately sam says, "how did the car get here?" but more importantly i’d like to ask: why is the car here?

so, let’s get into it.

[ID: A screenshot from “Scoobynatural” of the Impala at night. Sam and Dean stand to the left of the frame. It is captioned with Sam saying “How did the car get here?” / End ID.] 

it feels like many of us, including dean himself in the finale, were surprised (read: offended) to see the Impala in heaven. what's the purpose? it's obviously inanimate, and though dean gives her a gender and a name, it doesn't make her "real," nor does it give her a soul, which seems like a heavenly prerequisite. so how—or why is the car there at all? 

in scoobynatural, Baby is used simply as a means to get from one place to another (as vehicles do) UNTIL it becomes apparent that the ghost they're hunting is actually a ghost. then, the real purpose baby serves is to provide weapons and hunting materials in order to take down the big bad.

[ID: Two screenshots from “Scoobynatural.” In the first one, Velma is speaking and fixing her glasses, surrounded by the Scooby Gang. Scooby and Shaggy are on the left side of the frame, and Daphne and Fred are on the right. It’s night time. The caption reads, “We don’t have the proper tools or weapons.” The second screenshot depicts a cartoon version of Sam, with the caption, “That’s okay. We do.” / End ID.]

mind you, sam and (especially) dean weren't aware of why they'd been whisked into the tv in the first place, or that there was any "real" danger at all. dean was actually enjoying it a LOT, stuffing his face with much-too-tall sandwiches, hitting on daphne, and gaping at the mystery machine in awe. the Impala being there with them seemed insignificant (dean even says so)... until it isn’t, and her true purpose is revealed—

[ID: Two screenshots from “Scoobynatural.” The first one shows a shot from the perspective of inside the Impala’s trunk. Sam and Dean are surrounded by the Scooby Gang on either side of them, with Scooby, Shaggy, and Cas on the right side of the frame, and Velma, Daphne and Fred on the left. The caption describes the trunk unlocking. The second screenshot is of the contents in the trunk: several weapons like a wooden stake, various guns, an axe, a knife, and an arrow. / End ID.]

so, with the Impala appearing in the Scooby universe with all the equipment they could ever want...or need or...dream, doesn’t that remind you of what bobby says in 15x20? let’s see...

[ID: A screenshot of the 15x20 transcript. It’s a snippet from Bobby’s line, which reads, “You got everything you could ever want...or need or...dream. So, I guess the question is...what are you gonna do now, Dean?” / End ID.]

best of all, right after Bobby says this, Dean spots the Impala and decides to go for a drive:

[ID: A screenshot of the 15x20 transcript. It reads, “(Dean looks away from Bobby and sees the Impala, with the original KAZ 2Y5 license plate, parked on the road).” / End ID.]

let me rewind a bit to something i said earlier. “sam and (especially) dean weren't aware of why they'd been whisked into the tv in the first place, or that there was any "real" danger at all.” in my theory for 15x20, I think it’s actually quite a similar situation, in that they are fooled into thinking there is no real danger and that heaven is just...heaven. bobby is there, along with some (crappy) beer and dean’s parents are there, and— wait, doesn’t bobby hate john? and hang on...you’re telling me the beer in heaven is crappy? and hey, wasn’t jack acting a bit strange after becoming god? what was up with that?

a lot of things about the finale just...don’t add up. and the impala is there, even though Baby doesn’t have a soul and therefore could not be/manifest itself in heaven (just as she couldn’t actually be in scoobynatural because she wasn’t there when sam and dean got sucked into the tv). so we’re back to asking: why is the car here? 

i’m going to just take a shot in the dark here and say that maybe it’s for the same reason that she was there in scoobynatural. to serve a purpose��when they realize that there’s actually a big bad to be fought—that things aren’t exactly as they seem. 

as to who the big bad is, take your pick!! it could be chuck!jack, or the Empty (it is still loud in there after all), it could even be a djinn dream. but throwing Baby into heaven for seemingly no reason other than to have dean drive her for like fifty years just seems ridiculous to me. she’s got weapons in her trunk, weapons that the heroes (good place to remind you that there is LITERALLY a s15 ep called The Heroes’ Journey) can use to their advantage. 

there’s a lot that points to something being off about the finale. but personally, i think Baby might be our biggest clue. 

kirk out.

[wigglebox]

So you never want to see Cas back? Not in a revival or anything set in present time? That’s pretty cruel and I don’t think many people are going to get behind that (except incesties of course).

Whoa hey nonnie, those are some intense words you're trying to put in my mouth!

I never said that. I am not even sure what post you're referring to?

If you're talking about me not wanting Cas in heaven — it's because I'm of the belief there will be a continuation that will properly address The Empty situation. My flavor of Chuck Won theory depends on a continuation and so long as jackles is out there continuing to talk about it, along with others, I'm going to keep that hope high. It's why I don't get sad thinking about Dean being alone in 'heaven', because I don't think he's in heaven, and I no longer view 15x20 as the finale.

If you're talking about my specific parameters for wanting to see Cas on the prequel, same kinda thing. I don't want him with Dean if Dean's being screwed around with by Chuck, because I don't want Dean to ever look at Cas and wonder if he's real or not. I need Cas to always be real. And, I don't mind him showing up in the 70s but there's a short window where that's possible, and it'd be early seasons Cas more likely than not. Which is why I'm okay with him popping up in a Trickster episode because, selfishly, I don't want my Chuck Won theory coping mechanism disrupted lol.

But also really, I'm a go-with-the-flow kinda person.

And for real, don't put words in people's mouths and then assign them motives.

That's not a cool thing to do!

[googledocsdyke]

thinking incredibly earnestly about like why i unironically love bite me (a google slides social media au) as much as i do and why it’s so fucking funny and i think a huge part of it is that it lays bare the process of total decontextualisation that generally is at work within the self-contained world of like, fic in general. like, in many ways most fic is the same fic. i think we can generally agree on this. obviously there are like fics that transform the way you view the source text, or fics that generate their own world and fandom (down to agincourt), or fics with profound complex thematic engagement (so says the sword) or fics that have their own specific cult status (my immortal, twist and shout). but like the reason the fic ecosystem chugs along, the reason bajillions of fics are posted to ao3 every day, is because of the kind of fic that is so clearly based off other fic, maybe just shifted 2 degrees to the left.

like fanfiction IS by and large a repetitive medium that is often primarily interested in working off and re-articulating very widely accepted tropes. think of all the largely identical 15x20 fix-it codas you may have read. or this harry potter au i wrote when i was fourteen years old that could not have ANYTHING less to do with the actual characters dean, cas, or charlie as written in-show, or even like, anything to do with hogwarts as a setting. there was NO reason it needed to be a harry potter au. why the hell were the x-men there? there was no characterisation. the presence of potions homework, and gryffindor dean, and “charlie ships it,” were all just empty signifiers towards a narrative that i knew better from reading other fics than from watching the show itself. actually, i think at this point i hadn’t even watched any charlie episodes, but you wouldn’t be able to tell! because i lifted my concept of charlie wholesale from other fics that asserted that this was her “characterisation” and her place in the story. like it Was a 1600-word exercise in copy-paste, which is what large amounts of fanfiction are and historically have been. and is so fundamental to why we keep coming back to them

and i’m not saying this as like. a normative or “judgmental” statement in any way! i think there’s no point in insisting that all fic be like. deeply grounded in discrete characterisation or a sincere engagement with the complex themes of the original text, or whatever. firstly because a) most people writing fic ARE young teens/young adults who do so as a kind of participatory gesture, a low-effort way to signal their earnest investment in a particular ship or imagined narrative, and b) decontextualisation is like… at the beating heart of what fanfiction is. like most fanfiction is not “literary” (in huge skeptical quotes bc of how contested that very term even is) but it also feels like it’s a mistake to… ask it to be? i’m thinking along the lines of this post, where gothhabiba asks that we “articulate an actual theory of how and why fanfiction is created, its relationship to other kinds of media and writing, and what it does for the people who write and read it,” rather than “arguing about whether or not it’s ‘good’” . because that is truly a moot point!

i think as most of us return for the renaissance, some 6-7 years older, we’re now at the point where we’re able to engage (more) critically with the substantive text of the show, the actual themes it engages and (mis)handles, the cultural context in which it was produced, the texts it builds off of, intentionally or unintentionally, and the critical frameworks we can apply to it. and all of that is like overall a very good and interesting thing!! but it’s also so interesting when paired alongside the decontextualising impulse that drives a LOT of fandom engagement

ANYWAYS. all this to say that like 95% percent of the joy of bite me is how unapologetically ooc it is. like this is the continuous thing i’ve been talking about other people with. you could copy-paste any characters from any broadly popular media into this situation and the characterisation/speech would be no more or less jarring; it would still make the same amount of “sense” from an in-universe perspective. nothing about this au is really about dean and cas so much as it’s about decontextualised figures LABELLED dean and cas (and again, this is not some literary condemnation or smth, the majority of fic does this in some way! i’m just using bite me as an example). we are told to believe that sam winchester, a grown white man & published author, says “yall wildin” unprompted and that kaia nieves tweets things like “oomf famoose” and it’s fucking hilarious. it’s so good. because intentionally or not, it DOES reveal how much of fic, as a genre, is utterly separated from the characters they propose to be telling a story about.

i said earlier today that bite me is a social media au written in a riverdalian fashion, and i don’t just mean that in a general “it’s bad but good but outrageous” way, but more specifically that both bite me and riverdale decide on something objectively absurd and instead of shying away from it or trying to cover up the writer’s lack of knowledge, it faces it head on. like we ARE told unapologetically and continuously that actors live in their trailers when they’re filming a movie, that a hashtag trending for one day is enough to get a magazine writer that hasn’t been accused of sexual misconduct fired, that dean and cas are starring in a gay romantic comedy called fucking trainspotting. and the writer doesn’t/won’t/shouldn’t apologise for a word of that. in the same way that riverdale will look you dead in the eye and say “archie is going to war and world war ii-era combat aesthetics never ended even though it’s 2020” or “jughead got into the iowa writer’s workshop despite never having been an undergrad” and like what are you supposed to do? make fun of it?? the text doesn’t CARE if you make fun of it! it’s light years ahead of you! it’s so totally unconcerned with this “realism” you’re supposedly chasing that the joke doubles back on you.

so like tldr: bite me is emblematic of the decontextualising urge at the heart of your average fanfiction, lays bare its own ridiculousness, and raises genuinely fascinating questions abt what fanfiction as a text is meant to be or do. also kaia and claire fall in love on stan twt. UNPARALLELED media experience