#spn final

[dimplecki]

fanart (2013) - canon (2020)

[lolaused2run]

Eric Kripke re. spn 15x20

(The lead-in banter is about how the original spn finale “was supposed to be WAYYY bigger” with Kansas, lots of people, etc.)

KRIPKE: It’s nice to have the two guys, and that’s great, but it would have been great to have the two guys AND this amazing– 'cuz that show is so much about family – (Rob: Yeah, it would have been epic, yeah) – that it’s sort of a bummer, it could have – I know how certain fans aren’t crazy about that finale and I think it would’ve had a much different reception, just simply, had we had ended it the way Andrew and Bob originally intended

(Rich and Kripke mention that the global pandemic put some decisions out of their hands)

Supernatural: Then and Now podcast, May 6th 2024

"The Curious Case of Dean Winchester" s05xe07

[shallowseeker]

I'm sorry to be dumb, but did I miss something? Who is Hokmah?

That was just a little detour Jack-rambling with a friend. :-)

For the little girl that appears in the Occultum garden in 15x13 Destiny's Child, I was trying to think of a cosmic force she could represent that isn't Eve, and I landed on a personification of Hokhmah/Hokmah/Chokmah, "Lady Wisdom."

You didn't miss anything. She's not called that in the show! @13x02 and I were just playing with the idea over here. :D

You'll get a decent condensed Western overview here on Cengage that I like pretty well, but "she's" a complicated theological point of interest if you wanna crawl through more academic scholarly sources.

I think you can shape her in a very positive way. Jack saw Wisdom! He regained his Soul!

////

But on a darker note, I think a negative view of Lady Wisdom has enormously evil implications for the destruction of the Cas-Dean-Jack family unit in the finale, leaving only Sam's "pure, idealized, almost Noah-esque" family in its wake.

In terms of poetry, Lady Wisdom can signify the idea of a perfect woman and ideal mate. As a point of contrast, the non-ideal mate is depicted as "the path of the Strange Woman," who carries you into Folly."

Both the wife and Wisdom protect their mates from the dangerous "strange woman," who lures the unsuspecting man into sexual misadventure (Prv. 5:20–23, 7:5–23, cf. 2:26–19). Social commentary regarding proper family bonds finds expression here...

I think that's echoed in 15x17 Unity's horrific depiction of Seraphina and Adam, who make out incessantly, are stoned out of their minds, and obsessed with Revenge and Fate. Adam even gives birth to an unnatural "revenge-baby" whose intent is Destruction. It's God who's supposed to yank out ribs and do Divine Fatherhood, not angels.

Now, in actuality, there's noting wrong with a little PDA or getting high, but Adam and Seraphina's sudden intrusion into the story combined with Chuck's apparent knowledge of the rib-bomb ("Have fun watching him [Jack] die.") seems ominous.

I think the grotesque caricatures of Seraphina-Adam reveal what Chuck truly thinks about the Dean-Cas partnership. (Of course, Chuck takes no responsibility for driving Seraphina and Adam to their desperation either...)

Anyway, Seraphina is Folly. So is Cas. It's true that Cas and Dean are in a pretty negative feedback loop at this point in the story, but Chuck, as usual, is painting it in rip-roarin' 2D. With a dash of disrespectful disdain.

Other poems use the female imagery to constitute competing superhuman forces. The path of the strange woman, who appears as personified Folly in the concluding poem of Proverbs 1–9, leads to death: "her guests are in the depths of Sheol" (Prv. 9:18, cf. 2:18–19, 5:5–6, 5:23, 7:27). Wisdom, in contrast, offers life, an offer whose credibility is enhanced by the remarkable poem in Proverbs 8. 

So, here is Chuck's judgment, perhaps. Cas is a rival superhuman force that is unnaturally taking Dean away from Him. (Early in season 15, Lilith tells us that Chuck has "a pervy obsession" with Dean, so it's a very unsettling tug-of-war here.) Cas might even be aware of it, as he uses the alias Clarence Worley in 15x06, post-Chuck confrontation (and Cas has become pretty pop-culture savvy).

It's a power struggle. Chuck paints his rival-God sons as the "Strange Women" to His Own Divine Ultimate Fatherhood, the same way he brands Michael as "cuck." Chuck does not tolerate individualism from his sons, and so uses emasculating language. Furthermore, he does not value feminine three-dimensionality, as shown by how he treats Amara’s wisdom. She too is painted “Strange,” because his perspective of individuals rings hollow. Amara does not fit Chuck’s restrictive, mental stereotype of Hokmah.

In the finale, Dean is "Chuck-downgraded" from the masculine Adam to the Woman in the Gray Robe, and then, her tongue gets cut out. (Chuck’s “mirrors” usually favor Dean as the masculine Marlboro man.) It's...hmmm. Quite sadistic, really, what happens to Dean. It shows how 2D and hierarchical Chuck treats gender. Also, Dean loved Cas. If Dean didn't love Cas back, this death would have been more heroic and less...maudlin and back-stabby, I think. (There’d have been no need for bury your gays.)

In terms of modern society, Cas is actually more strange than Seraphina. He's a superhuman force in the shape of a man. He's diametrically opposed to Chuck's idea of Hokhmah, which is in fact the Idea of Blurry Wife. Chuck wants traditional, picture-perfect wives: he wants Lisa and Amelia and fake!Mary and Blurry Wife. Not strange women like Rowena or Eileen or worse—ursurper figures like Lucifer, Michael, Castiel, or Jack.

I clumsily talk about this idea of the Nephilim family unit in the tablet meta as well as the idea of joining/sundering Heaven and Earth in this forbidden love meta, but I think what I want to say is that Cas represents both the poetic specter of Strange Path/Folly and the Corrupt Idea of the Unnatural, Enochian Sire of a Nephilim.

Some believe the fallen angels who sired the Nephilim were cast into Tartarus (2 Peter 2:4, Jude 1:6) (Greek Enoch 20:2), a place of "total darkness."

Sounds a lot like the Empty, huh?

///

Is Blurry Wife Chuck's approved idea of Hokmah? Perhaps. Seems like The Perfect Sam-Fam is network-approved!

It's a twisted idea, isn't it? That the "impure" Nephilim family was Washed Away leaving only this bizarrely cookie-cutter, picturesque one in its wake. Jack was born on Washaway beach, and Dean and Cas became increasingly paired with flood and water motifs as the relationship escalated.

So anyway, this negative view of Lady Wisdom can in fact carry us all the way through the finale and the destruction of the human-angel Nephilim family unit. Because of this, the finale echoes on a homophobic note that reverberates through most who see it, even when they can't put their finger on why it feels that way.

Cas, Jack, and Dean are buried.

Cas is thrown into the Empty/Darkness, like the legendary Fallen Sires of the Nephilim. (He even exits through a punishment symbol, a pair of handcuffs.) Jack becomes like the Nephilim before him, a cursed untethered spirit, barred from existing in an earthly body. Then, there's Dean, the human partner, who is stabbed in the back in a brutal Execution and cursed to wander in search of the connection he is disallowed from having (that's what The Winchesters feels like, no?).

It's wicked.

///

Further reading:

This has a nice chapter on Hokhman, which goes into some of the root words used in the poems themselves. (It's chapter 6.)

Above excerpt from "Ḥokhmah ." Encyclopedia of Religion.  Encyclopedia.com. 22 Aug. 2023 <https://www.encyclopedia.com>

[sui-sleepingcatk2y]

"When you mix the light with that much dark and you get that much contrast in one episode where Dean's in his happy place doing what he loves to do, hunting alongside his brother. And then he dies doing the thing that he loves. That's as contrasty as you can get, but I also think that's makes really good television"

Jensen Ackles

[blue-bird1967]

You're sacred and they're starved And there you are to tear apart

[stonelions]

dean would absolutely lose cas at grocery stores and go around asking people "hey have you seen a little guy in a trench coat? 'bout yea high? [hand at his shoulder] peach fuzz, devastatingly handsome? sensible shoes? just kind of a weird, dorky little guy?"

everybody is on the lookout for some short, questionably dressed mystery man and meanwhile cas, 6' tall, shaped not unlike a shot putter, is standing at the checkout scrutinizing the tabloids like "...i'm not sure there's any veracity to these claims" while the cashier's register throws a fatal error bc she accidentally lasered him with the barcode scanner and it saw infinity

[bisexualsdean]

You don't have to say it. I heard your prayer.

↳ dean + praying to/for cas

[gracerings]

we might not have got a destiel kiss but now every time a fictional guy that people gay-imprint on gets to gay kiss someone on tv, destiel and supernatural trend on tumblr in a tribute to those who paved the way. and so the cycle repeats and castiel’s final words live on.. maybe happiness isn’t in the having after all

[grave-robbedd]

Told yall I’ve been working on Sam stuff for a good second. Unsure of when I’ll finish the full piece. So have this for now!

[entropyofnuance]

Can’t believe those mfs promised “there’ll be peace when you are done” for fifteen goddamn years just to send Castiel to superhell and kill Dean Winchester

[snevinsspn]

don’t get me wrong i am a finale hater at my core but there’s something poetic about how it’s thoroughly established throughout the show that cas was the “malfunction” in the system that caused the story not to go the way chuck wanted it to by developing free will and rebelling from heaven and then the moment he dies the story ends with dean dying and sam living an “regular life” the way it would’ve if the series never happened at all

like the series spends a lot of time saying cas is NOT the way he’s supposed to be. he rebelled the moment he saved dean from hell. he turns the narrative on its head by developing free will and making his own decisions. chuck even tells him that this is the only universe in which cas “didn’t do as he was told”. he ruins chucks plan for the brothers at every turn by caring about them.

then moment cas was gone the story went back to the way it would’ve ended if the show never happened and he had never affected anything. like the “error” was deleted and it reverted to the way it “should be”. dean died tragically and stupidly on a hunt way too young doing a job for his father. sam got out and lived an “apple pie life” and died old. they went to heaven with their family and it’s all The Way It Should Be, not matching up with the message of found family the show developed and instead returning to the blood family vibe of the early seasons pre cas. like he died and the story stopped resisting chucks wishes. idk i’m just yapping but it feels like something

[dimplecki]

I'm feeling so emotional about spn final lately

I feel like I'm only now starting to grieve. I watched it, cried and repressed it completely

Mainly because I was waiting for it for so long and hating what the show has become. Couldn't really connect the final to the show I used to adore...

But now I'm rewatching the show and back here on tumblr (after many years) and it just hurts so much to know its ended and re-connecting with the fandom post final makes it even more real..

15 years of my life (on and off) I've been obsessed and invested with this show and Sam/Dean

I am now coming to terms with the ending and its so hard :( I'm so sad

[jediwizard]

seeing nov 5th trending five fucking days before the day itself is the pretty much the tumblr equivalent of hearing mariah carey's 'all I want for christmas' come on at the grocery store at exactly 12am on November 1st

[david-10ninch-blog]

If I don't watch the series finale of SPN it doesn't exist, right???

[mirroredmoons]

it has been said before but i feel the need to state again that the finale of supernatural is not only the most insane case of accidentally making a soul crushing psychological horror while trying to make a satisfying conclusion but the only case of that happening ever (at least to my knowledge.) i’ve seen bad tv endings, but never a tv ending that was trying to be comforting instead telling me that all of my worst nightmares are true and that me and the ones i hold close will never ever love openly without fear. again, so many before me have made this point but god. they killed him on rebar. he never got to be free

[captainchilly]

"Cas, I hope you can hear me." ↳ 15.09 - THE TRAP