#sam winchester analysis

[featheredmoonwings]

Here's a thought.

Sam has been irrevocably changed since his coming back from hell (and jumping in of course). So often I find myself looking at later season's Sam, a Sam who's not a firey rebel against what the world wants of him, a Sam who would fight for himself. This is a quietly submissive Sam who can't stand to disappoint Rock No.1. Someone who takes on pain again and again and again because he's so used to it.

Sam from the first seasons it's not the same Sam as the later. This is a broken, traumatized man who excels at being high functioning and I am SO sure of it.

He LOOKS resigned and tired a lot of the time. And it reminds me of hell!Sam begging himself not to remember. hell!Sam knew what he was talking about and what we're seeing in later seasons is his reflection.

And let me throw in a Silmarillion reference because why the heck not. Like the souls of elves go to Mando's halls, Sam's soul needed to go to heaven and heal from all the years of hell he suffered (earthly ones and hell ones). He was not ready to be reembodied in earth and now he's come wrong.

Like 5 different entities warned us about Sam's shredded to ribbons soul. To me, that doesn't sound like a soul that should've been put back in a body.

[inbredbrotherhood]

I’m glad we all agree that Sam Winchester is both predator and prey, but he’s also a secret third thing: a parasite.

He’s like a bad case of fading kitten syndrome, but it’s not his fault, he’s just hungry and eating until he’s full but sometimes ‘full’ for the host means ‘dead’, but he isn’t a killer on purpose and he wishes he could be better but this is just his nature. He latches onto the things he loves and drains the life from them and he can’t stop, won’t stop, even if it means he dies too. This is how he loves when he isn’t prey (the lamb on the altar, between the wolf’s teeth), this is how he submits when he isn’t the predator (the feral dog ripping apart everything in its path).

Being a parasite is hard for him in ways being a predator or prey is not — he is controlled by his hunger and he’s terrified of what it will make him do.

[notalawyerdude]

The concept that the style a person idolizes/is drawn to, is what they feel they are lacking in their own life

Dean is into westerns/Cowboys because it represents freedom

Sam is drawn towards academia because he craves structure and security

[fandomtrashhh]

Sam & Powers

I can never articulate how disappointing it was for Supernatural to focus so much of their time and effort on Sam’s powers and everything that comes with it in the first 2 seasons only to bring it back in season 4 and even season 5 even more in depth than before to then just drop it after that and only mention it once every 2 seasons. I feel like it was such a core theme in the beginning of the show that was used so well to tie up what they thought was going to be the season finale in season 5 that once they realized they were going to continue the show they decided it would become too boring or repetitive or something to use more when they were SO wrong. Sure if that’s ALL they focused on then that would make sense but what they did didn’t make any sense at all because how can you take something that was such a big part of one of the main characters and erase it all? One of the things that drew me to Sam’s character in the first place and that helped cement me as a Sam girl was the fascination with his powers that he was slowly coming to terms with. What made his powers different than a lot of other pieces of media that I’ve consumed is the concept that they were forced upon him by a DEMON through his BLOOD! How is that not compelling?? He literally states in the show that he has a sickness that is pumping through his veins that he can never get rid of so why shouldn’t he do good with them? Like !! There was so much potential here!! I’ve always felt when they said that Azazel’s death just...made Sam’s powers “go away” it was a flimsy excuse to get rid of them and only use that plot when they felt like it (i.e drinking demon blood) but if they never had Sam’s powers function like that they could have created a whole plot where Sam comes to terms with his powers and realizes they aren’t going away but they aren’t inherently bad, that he can choose what he wants to do with them, re cementing his autonomy that is so often lacking in the series!! He chooses to help people with these powers (without needing to drink demon blood) and explores them and accepts them!! The route that the show ended up taking never sat well with me because it felt like he just internalized his powers because of what other characters said about it and how people literally tried to kill him because of it and that just feels wrong. Like the show tried so hard to just magically turn him into this Normal Guy TM when Sam is Not Normal and that was the whole point!! He deserved to be as freaky and as comfortable with it as he wanted!! And then in season 15 I almost felt like they were going to do something freakish with his character again because of Rowena’s comment about him being the “closest to a witch” among the characters in the room and then she left her spells and potions and everything TO SAM and it would’ve been so cool to have him dabble in witchcraft and would make so much sense with his character yet he uses them once and then it’s never mentioned again. By the end of the show he’s living this normal life when after everything he went through and everything he discovered about himself throughout 15 YEARS, I don’t think that’s what he would’ve wanted anymore. Supernatural had so many brilliant ideas & concepts which is why I think I’ve continued to be so obsessed and intrigued by this goddamn show, but so so many shortcomings.  

[destiel-wings]

whats your opinion on the show (imo) making sam seem like he screws up a lot and that dean is the one cleaning up after him?

For the ⭐ spn analysis ask game ⭐

Oh, that's interesting to think about, thank you so much for asking!

Here's how i see it.

The whole base of the show is that Sam is the younger brother, and Dean needs to take care of him. That means protecting him, and in this life, cleaning up his messes, at all costs. Which is probably why they highlighted Sam's screwups, even making them more morale-challenging for Dean (I'm thinking of the whole demon blood storyline) just to show how far Dean would go for Sam. 

When the show starts, the Winchesters' worldview is black and white: demons bad, humans good (which makes particularly interesting and smart the fact that they included the episode "The Benders", that early on, that subverts this certainty). Anyway, the more the show progresses, the more Dean finds out about Sam's powers, putting him at supernatural-beings-level, and this is the first time in the show where, in the current events, Sam thinks he's letting Dean down. But nonetheless, Dean's first priority is to protect him and help him. 

And that's the base of their dynamics, that they were still carrying from their childhood: Sam, being the youngest, needs Dean to clean up his messes, taking care of him practically (even if he's perfectly capable of cleaning up after them himself most of he time), while Dean needs Sam emotionally, because he desperately needs love and the family that was taken away from him the moment his mother died and everything fell into pieces. I think that's a great part of the tension that charges the codependency between the brothers. 

That said, Sam didn't really need Dean to protect him at the beginning of the show, he was actually fine by himself, doing just fine away from home. The show starts when the supernatural comes into their lives (Sam's life, with Jess' death) again, and Dean steps in to do what he knows how to do, better than Sam. 

And the show plays on that for a long while, having Sam become "a problem" (his powers, the demon blood), so that Dean can be needed and attend to his caretaker job, getting to keep Sam around.

But here's the thing: where it gets even more interesting, in my opinion, is seeing how as the show progresses these roles begin to shift and reverse. 

At the beginning of the show Dean is supposedly the one who's most similar to John and who wants to fight for the "family business", and Sam doesn't need any of this, and he doesn't need Dean. But as the show develops it becomes clear that Sam is the one who's actually more similar to John (sorry Sammy), and as the brothers embrace the life and the seasons advance it becomes clearer that Sam enjoys this life way more than Dean.

After all the messes he's made in the first seasons of the show, Sam becomes more desperate to make amends towards Dean.

"It was how many times i let you down"

And it's not surprising that this shift in dynamics happens right in s8, after they have been apart for a whole year (while Dean was in Purgatory) and they spend the entire season trying to reconcile their relationship. Here we can finally see a Dean who needs Sam a little less, because he's lived without him for a year and he's found Benny, who plays the role of a possible replacement (narratively). For the first time we see a jealous Sam struggling to regain Dean's forgiveness and trust--more precisely, struggling to regain his first place as Dean's shotgun. Unsurprisingly, this shift happens as Cas becomes more important to Dean too.

Dean had always struggled to create real connections with people, but as the seasons go on, he learns to do that, they find a family, and so Sam isn't the only person to give and receive Dean's love and affection. But Sam is the younger sibling, so he always took Dean for granted (it's not his fault, it's what younger siblings generally do), which is why it was so refreshing to see him realize it wasn't that granted. And that's the moment where Sam actively begins to show how much he needs Dean's love as well. Because if you think about it, aside from the found family they share (like Bobby, Jody, Charlie, Garth etc) at some point Dean actually begins to have more people than Sam's (Cas, Benny, even Crowley, just to drop names).

And I love how this season is immediately followed by the mark of Cain storyline, where we finally have Sam trying to save Dean for a change.

I think that's a big step of growth for the character, where he gets to wear the older brother's shoes and get to be the caretaker for once, and really fight for Dean as he had been doing for him until that point.

I think Sam screwed up way less after that, and it checks out with the new dynamics of their relationship: Sam has grown up more, and he doesn't need Dean to save him all the time, he can save Dean too, he's more than capable of it, and more importantly, Dean sees it. As Dean gets to develop new important relationships of affection with other people (larger found family, and Cas), he needs Sam just a tiny little less. And so he starts to see him less as a job and accepts that he can take care of himself too, and basically that whole dynamic of Sam screwing up and Dean cleaning up after his messes becomes obsolete in the show, and is less evident. They both screw up. They both clean up after each other's messes.

And beware, I'm not saying that Dean loves Sam less, just that he needs him less. I'm talking about the toxic codependency, that was actually healing and transforming into a healthier relationship (until the finale did what it did).

In later seasons Sam is portrayed more like an adult, we see him leading a group of hunters, and we see Dean seeing him do that and letting him take the lead, we see him be a father to Jack (finally taking on a caretaker's role as Dean had done for him), we see him threaten and fight God himself, and we see him search for his own path, between the hunter's life that he actually loves (unlike Dean) and even Rowena's witchcraft, to some extent. And we finally see him having a meaningful love relationship again, with Eileen.

I am actually so proud of Sam and of how far he had come. Things could've been so great for him, if we hadn't had that horrible finale. We always say that Dean's ending was bad, and it is, but I honestly don't get people who say that Sam had it better, just because he survived. He's the one who got it worse actually. All of his development... gone. All of those promises of the happy life he could've gotten... gone.

He spent a whole life building a life that wasn't important (and i say that because that's how the episode framed it, and i could make a whole other post about this explaining why) just missing his brother after having lost everyone else he's ever loved. That's just horrible, especially when the show had made clear that the blurry wife life maybe wasn't what he really wanted after all.

***

Again, thanks for the ask, feel free to send more!

[wrenwinchester]

No because this. This is so important to me.

Like. We always see Sam preaching about doing the right thing. Like it’s something he knows should be true. And what should be done. And Dean looks to Sam as his moral compass. But the moment Sam is left alone, he is so quick to fall into temptation.

Like drinking Demon blood to strengthen himself after Dean’s death, and going psycho murderer when Dean went Demon. (There are other examples but I don’t have time for that.)

Like Sam finds it so easy to slip into doing the wrong thing. And yet. This is the same guy who prays everyday, who believes in the good in the world despite all the bad that happened to him. Because if he doesn’t believe it’s there, that means everything he does is truly evil.

I love him.

Sam who's canonically obsessed with purity is so sad to me. Theres something so bitterly contradictory in Sam being the one who believed, who prayed, who actively wanted to be good - being Lucifers vessel.

[wrenwinchester]

Don’t think about malnourished baby Sammy. Don’t think about little four year old Dean begging his Dad to buy formula instead of ammunition, of four year old Dean burning himself trying to warm up Sammy’s milk. Don’t think about Dean waking up every couple hours after crawling into Sammy’s crib to make sure he was still breathing. Don’t think of little four year old Dean who used to beg to feed his little brother his bottle, now not having another option. Don’t think about baby Sammy getting sick and Dean begging John to make him a doctors appointment to make sure he’s okay. Don’t think of baby Sammy learning to walk with his older brother holding his hands, of baby Sammy crying when he sees John because he doesn’t recognize his own dad. Don’t think of baby Sammy calling Dean dad, or the fact that Sam’s first steps were towards Dean. Don’t think about the fact that the doctors were worried about Sam’s weight at that doctors appointment, and ever since, Dean has made sure that Sammy always had enough to eat, even at the cost to his own health.

Don’t think about twelve year old Dean collapsing on the first night of a hunt because he hadn’t eaten in four or five days, because Sammy needed the food. Don’t think about John yelling at Dean asking what the hell is wrong with him etc. and Dean just shrugs it off. Because he’s fine. And he ignores it. He shoves the aching for food way down and ignores it. So, when they go back into town because they hit a dead end, and get food at a diner, Dean gorges on the food, and eats half of John’s too. Don’t think about John seeing this, having a flash of worry but ignoring it because “it’s Dean he’s always fine.” Don’t think about Dean worrying the first time Sammy called him Dad because “no, no, no, Sammy, I’m your big brother Dean.” Because he’s worried that his Dad is going to freak out if he hears Sammy calling Dean dad.

Don’t think about the fact that Sam probably didn’t learn the word Mom until he was at school because it wasn’t something his dad and Dean said. Don’t think about Sam driving alone for the first time and hitting a dear and calling Dean because he didn’t trust that his dad would answer. Don’t think about Dean, sitting in some motel at 23 years old after a fight with his dad who stormed off debating calling Sam because he’s the only one who would get it.

Don’t think about the Winchester brothers as little kids left alone in motel rooms for too long, underfed, and unsure of when their Dad was going to be back.

[creatorofarcadia]

It's been a while since I watched Supernatural, so don't take my opinions as gospel or anything. But I think Dean is self-hating to the point of narcissism in some ways. Don't get me wrong, I empathise with Dean and understand why fans largely do too. But his self-loathing warps his perception and becomes the centre of EVERYTHING and at times that really has ripple effects on those around him - particularly Sam.

Take their childhood, Sam has a right to mourn the fact that he didn't get a normal childhood. He's allowed to be angry that he didn't get a home, a present father, a stable community, and consistent education. But whenever Sam attempts to express his complicated feelings about his childhood, Dean immediately interprets it as ' oh I was supposed to look out for you. Are you saying I failed? Are you confirming I'm worthless?' which grinds the conversation to a complete halt. Because of Dean's intense self-criticism, Sam can never really be 100% honest with him or ask for support with his own issues, especially regarding their childhood. As anything outside of 100% gratitude just becomes another stick for Dean to beat himself with, and the conversation is immediately derailed.

Not only does Deans self-hatred mean that Sam's expression of his own experiences are pretty consistently shut down. In some ways, I think Dean strips Sam of his autonomy - he's so self-loathing, he sees every decision Sam makes as being about/a reaction to him. A good example of this is Stanford. Rather than understanding Stanford for what it was, an attempt by Sam to carve out a better life from himself and escape hunting. Dean views it as betrayal or abandonment, some re-affirmation of his own belief that he's not worth caring about. Rather than understanding it's a rejection of hunting, he sees it as Sam rejecting him. To Dean, Sam isn't attempting to find a better life, he's punishing the family.

Overall, it's interesting that people largely and rightfully sympathise with Dean due to his self-hatred. However, I don't see as much discussion about how his self-hatred doesn't just hurt him, it hurts those he's close to, as it colours his interpretation of their every action. Dean's self-loathing is always the biggest thing in the room and that has consequences.

[flowersintheimpala69]

Sam (trembling, bruised, avoiding eye contact, teary): dean..? Do you think maybe it’s time we start.. seeing other people?

Dean (white knuckling through life with one beer in hand and a shot of whisky in the other, gun rested menacingly on thigh, one incest situationship breakup away from genocide): if you leave me I will kill myself

Sam (sighing and sitting down next to dean, leaning into his brother’s side. he’s tired): okay.

[wrenwinchester]

I know that Sam would have and did study everything he could about everything supernatural related and random customs so he could make sure his dad and brother would be able to stay alive in the most obscure of instances.

Little 9 year old Sam sitting in the public library while Dean was off doing something, probably doing research for his Dad even though he hated it, so Sam picked up one of the books Dean had left and just started reading it cover to cover. It was about wraiths or something.

Twelve year old Sam, trying so hard to prove he was old enough to go on hunts with his dad and his brother, in the public library of whatever most recent town he was dumped in, long after the rest of the middle schoolers had left, long after he’d gotten the information John and Dean needed for their current case, looking into old time customs, small things that would just be considered cool trivia facts to most but could be life saving to Sam’s family.

15 year old Sam, spending more time researching for potential future cases than he spends on his homework because he’s retaking some classes because of the different curricula the schools he transferred between used, and he already knew the current content.

College Sam, taking hyper specific history/religion classes to finish his generals, because he always wanted to be ready to save his brother if necessary. Spending late nights in the library doing cultish research to make sure he was staying sharp and keeping up with whatever new things might be coming to light, just in case.

College Sam prepping for pre-law finals by studying obscure cases that went unsolved and seeing how many of them were done by monsters.

Sam after Jess’s death, diving headfirst into the hunt not just because he is grieving and it’s the only thing he knows, but because he may not have been physically active, or actively hunting, but he knows what’s been going on in the hunting community. He knows what new things are surfacing and he knows how to take care of them.

Sam and research. Because you can leave the hunting life, but the hunting life doesn’t leave you.

SUPERNATURAL — 2.16 Roadkill

[bitchface24-7]

I love the dichotomy between Sam and Dean where they see each other in opposite lights. (lowkey a character analysis below)

We’ve seen how Dean views himself. He thinks he’s worthless, weak, stupid, and unloveable. He “hates what he sees in the mirror.”

Sam thinks Dean is amazing. He’s a phenomenal hunter and an even better brother. He stepped up to take care of him when dad fucked off. Dean took care of Sammy in ways most people would never understand. Dean is strong, kind, funny, witty, and undeniably gorgeous. Sam loves Dean with all his heart. No one will ever replace him. No one. Sam cannot live without Dean. If Dean leaves him, he’ll just be surviving.

Sam on the other hand thinks he’s a weirdo, a freak, an abomination. Something to put out of its misery since how could something so disgusting be alive in this world?

Dean thinks Sammy is brilliant. A keen eye and a knack for researching into unknown lore the brothers didn’t even know existed. He’s snarky, snooty, sarcastic, and sweet. Sammy knows the power of both his bitch stare and puppy-dog eyes. Sammy must know he has Dean wrapped around his pinky finger? There isn’t a goddamn thing in this world that tops Sam in Dean’s eyes. Sam is perfect. He’s both beautiful on the inside and out. Sammy is Dean’s priority, his main focus, his baby brother. Eventually it just switches to “mine. mine. mine.” in Deans head. Dean cannot live without Sammy, he’ll k*ll himself before he lives in a world without his baby brother.

Like??? HELLO?!?! I love them so much it isn’t even funny

[luxurystark-jackson]

sam being constantly treated like a child even when he’s an adult and dean being constantly treated like an adult even while he was a child

and then dean who’s always treated like he’s too dumb to know anything and sam being treated like he can never be wrong about any of the lore

[samwinchestermydude]

I think we as Sam fans should be more annoying and loud about the fact that his crossroad demons were men twice.

(This is me being pissed off about how people will say dean is of course bi due to some dumb shit like the siren, which was his brother, and “bi lighting” or something, and then turn around and say Sam is the straightest character. Like what.)

[schizosamwincester]

Okay, but can we talk about the metaphorical layer of Sam not being able to make a deal after Dean dies?

In season 3, Sam outright says that he's trying to become more like Dean so that he can survive without him. So what's the first thing he does when Dean is gone? The exact same thing Dean did when their positions were reversed. But no matter how hard Sam tries, he can't be Dean. The powers that be, the universe itself, will not let him. He tries, and he is denied.

More importantly, look where this cycle actually begins, and who started it all: John. Dean can successfully emulate his father and make a deal, but Sam can't. No matter how hard he tries, Sam can't fill out the family legacy. And don't forget Mary, either. Sam is the only Winchester to not successfully make a demon deal.

No matter how hard Sam tries, he can't be John. He can't be Mary. He can't be Dean. He can only be himself, and that's a failure and a freak.

Like obviously the real reason they did that was because otherwise the plot wouldn't work, but I adore the symbolism that came as a result.

[destiel-wings]

Dean Winchester & hug dynamic analysis

I was thinking about how whenever Dean hugs someone he's almost always the one hugging the other and how this links to his psychological trauma of always being the caretaker of people, making himself bigger to protect them.

Because that's how Dean sees himself, as a shield for others, and then I thought about how Cas actually is the shield, and he's HIS SHIELD, specifically, the only one who's really there to protect HIM, which is why it hits so much when we see this:

The way Cas wraps his arms around him, trying to protect him with his whole body--that he'd use as a shield and give up in a second if he could spare him from any pain and save him.

(for context: Dean was about to go use the soul bomb on Amara there, it was a suicide mission)

Bobby is another one that hits, he hugs him as the big hugger because he's his father, he loves him and he's actually here to protect him (and Dean LETS him -barely, but he lets him *and Cas* - in a way that he doesn't let Sam)

I watched a compilation of Sam & Dean hugs to check if i was right about it, but it's almost always Dean the big hugger with Sam, except when he's about to die or Sam sees him alive again after losing him.

Even then, Dean mostly tries to hug Sam as the big hugger anyway, with at least one arm, like a way to comfort him, making him feel protected, like his body language is saying "I'm here, I'm okay, I'm still strong, i can still protect you" (because their real father failed and Dean thinks it's his job).

He rarely lets himself be the little one hugged with Sam, unless he's barely conscious. Which is why it kills me so much more now that in this moment (s14, when Dean was going to lock himself in the Ma'lak box cause he was possessed by Michael) and Sam has a desperate breakdown and punches him (to stop him) he forcefully hugs him as the little hugger, the way Dean always kept him, like a way of saying "I still need you to protect me, please don't do this to yourself".

In the scene below he gives Sam his blessing to do a dangerous (possibly suicidal) mission, and one of his arms is down, but the other one tries to stay up--he's forcing himself to do it and he struggles because he still wants to protect him, but (as the seasons progress) he slowly becomes more prone to let go.

So in this view the hug dynamic becomes an indicator of how Dean sees Sam (and himself) and his protector role, how adult and self sufficient he considers Sam, and how much he lets people around him take care of him, lowering his walls and letting himself be hugged.

This is also why i think hugs from characters like Garth or Charlie are so special, because they're just like us: they see Dean and they just know that he needs to be hugged a lot, and that he's not used to it, so they just go for it-- and it's so normal and kind and spontaneous that Dean's just not used to it-- he doesn't know how to respond (especially with Garth, at the beginning, but as the seasons progress, he learns to, and he even initiates the hug eventually).

I love the hugs where they're 50/50 (one arm up, one arm down both), feels like they're equals, both taking care of each other. I feel like with Sam and Dean, this indicates a healthier dynamic, because Dean lets go a little of the role that was imposed to him and manages to see Sam as the strong individual that he is. But the same applies to 50/50 hugs with other characters, like with Cas, where I feel like it testifies how equals they feel in terms of being fighters, there's a show of respect of each other's strength that transpires by the gesture (which is even more astounding considering that Cas is literally a powerful angel).

And just to end on a destiel note, I'd like to note the possessiveness and protectiveness of Dean (rightfully so) whenever he finds Cas after he thought he had lost him, and how that translates into his body/hug language:

[follows-the-bees]

Thinking about how Sam and Dean carved their initials into Baby cause it's their first home. Then the Bunker cause it's their second home. How they carved Cas', Jack's, and Mary's names at the Bunker because it was their home as well, they made that home/family together.

Also thinking about how they put Castiel. They hardly ever use his full name but from a story perspective it's sweet.

From a production side, they probably did it because of the great divide of how to spell Cas.

Thinking about the choice to put Jack and not Jack Kline. About Jack declaring he was a Winchester.

Jack was a product of all his parents, he was both a Kline and a Winchester. But ultimately he was exactly who he wanted to be. Just Jack.