#spn theme ideas

[shallowseeker]

Natural crisis points in The Winchesters character arcs and struggles

(Image from fangasm)

If it ever comes back for a short run or the characters appeared in later SPN incarnations, The Winchesters has a lot of built-in crisis points to power it forward.

I think overall, Robbie Thompson built them moderately well, because below are intrinsic qualities to each of them! He's good at building complex heroes, if he only has the time to follow through.

I. Fans as demonic forces

There are OG!fans actively rooting against it, which is VERY helpful for the writing team because such figures can immediately become an endless supply for bad-guy motives, villain monologues, demonic taunts, and dark mirrors.

Anyway, for characters, here's what I think:

///

MAIN SERIES THEMES

#1 BREAKING: Everyone has a breaking point, and when you do, you humans...your edges are sharp. You'll cut each other into ribbons. Familial counter: So, we'll break! But we'll be there to help pick each other up again. Even if it hurts. Even if we bleed. #2 DESTINED IDENTITY: You are who I say you are. Because I'm the only one who really knows you. You were written to be what I say you are. Familiar counter: I am my own person! No matter what you say. No matter how you wrote it before. #3 HUMAN-ING WRONG/FIXING OTHERS: You think you can fix them. Classic blunder. You can't. They're unfixable. Miswired. They were just born wrong, you know. Always running into danger. "John is a lost cause, he'll always devolve into abuser," etc etc. Familial counter: Maybe people don't need fixing. Maybe they just need to be accepted. Maybe, sometimes, they just need support!

#4 PEACE OR FREEDOM: Which would you rather have, peace or freedom? Familial counter: Both!

///

ALT MARY

Fear, powerlessness, destiny, entrapment, & the timeless Campbell classism of assumed stupidity

Go on, Mary. Trade your future for your blessed, blessed present.

No Mary Winchester in any timeline anywhere ever triumphed, because she is just too easy to trap. So are you.

You think you're a hunter? You're prey. Like an impala on the open savannah.

You're easily manipulated Mary, because you're just dumb, like all those backwoods Campbells.

We wanted the Winchesters for their brains, but we wanted you for your body. That's all you're good for. A weapon, a vessel.

("Stay present," was such an oft-repeated line for Alt!Mary. We could twist that into short-sightedness, I think.) ///

ALT JOHN

The worst version of yourself & the complicated gray of the Men of Letters; the arrogance of trying to be "the brains" and trying to be "lone wolf"

Become who you were meant to be.

I know who you really are, because I wrote you that way.

You're an abuser, a murderer, a bigot. It's your destiny.

You're just a soldier, a tool of war. A blunt hammer that hammers his own fuckin' thumb.

You're going to become the monster at the end of this book, John.

And the best part? You're going do it to yourself.

"I'm a John understander, you see."

So, go on.

Be all that you can be.

///

CARLOS

Doomed to be alone and fearful of reaching out; you become embittered by the constant pain of loss; you're so pathetically needy

You say you won't play my game, but you don't even see how you're already playing it.

You don't want to be alone, do you?

You actually want chaos to stay together. What if I told you that hunting could be forever? Would you choose it? I think you would, no matter who it hurt.

You're the weakest link because you're so desperate and needy.

When you have your own chance of happiness, you can't even be happy for yourself; you're fundamentally broken (re:Anthony)

You're too busy steeling yourself for the loss that you ruin everything, so why bother wanting?

Might as well cut it out now before the love gets its hooks in you too deeply.

It's your foolish, reckless altruism that winds up hurting everyone around you. Irony's a bitch, ain't it?

///

LATA

Violence is inevitable, even for you.

You're not a good person. That's just how you get through your day.

One thing writing taught me is that anyone can do anything if you know where to put the right amount of pressure.

And it's beautiful how desperately you want to be good, and yet every action you take always hurts someone.

Your hands aren't really clean. You like to watch, don't you? You're just a hypocrite.

You let innocents die, just because you wouldn't go against your principles.

Or, you know--your tragic cowardice.

Everyone around you succumbs to violence because you're poison.

So go ahead and have your cake and eat it, too, Lata.

I hope you choke on it.

///

MILLIE WINCHESTER

"Sooner or later, everyone is gonna leave you."

How can you turn your back on your dream to chase your husband's shadow?

It's gonna kill all three of you before the show's over, you know.

You warned John not to go down this path, and now you're the one lighting the way.

Doing this won't bring Henry back to you, you know.

You weren't there for him.

When he walked out that door, he said I love you.

You were silent.

///

ADA MONROE

Kill him. Kill your son.

I told you, Ada. Cute cuddly half-breed pups become the biggest, baddest wolves.

When push comes to shove, you know what's gonna happen.

You've always known that he'll turn.

He'll turn on you.

Would you rather your son die at the hands of a stranger?

If it has to be done, wouldn't you rather it be by your merciful, loving hands?

You can die with him if you like. An equalizer of sorts.

Or maybe...you think that if you become powerful, become successful enough, you'll have enough power to protect you and him. Control him if it comes down to it.

You can always try.

You'll never be powerless again, you say?

I'll take that bet. Don't say I didn't warn you.

[shallowstories]

SPNwin season 2 ideas today...

It's night.

The low-budget motel lighting bathes the parking lot in acid green, tinting the fog a putrid yellow. Deanna and Samuel Winchester are staring at one another, just outside the door. They say nothing, but the moment is tense.

Outside, a car pulls up. Gravel crunches beneath a set of trendy sneakers. We pan up--catch sight of a cute sweater pattern on someone's waist. They're holding a bag of takeout. (Burgers.)

The light in the parking lot flickers.

Samuel turns to see the hesitant, smiling face of Maggie Winchester.

He's devastated.

("Deanna, what have you done?")

///

Deanna is going to Hell.

///

Inspired by 2x22, ofc:

DEAN and BOBBY walking in the junkyard. Finally, BOBBY stops and turns to face DEAN. BOBBY: You stupid ass! What did you do? (DEAN looks away.) What did you do?! (He pushes DEAN.) You made a deal... For Sam, didn't you? How long did they give you? DEAN: Bobby. BOBBY: How long?! DEAN: One year.

[lambmotifz]

so obsessed with the idea of dean having cannibalistic urges towards sam and how perfectly that would fit with the concept of him feeling guilty for wanting to ravish his little brother. something something biting the forbidden fruit/wanting more/temptation…

[incesthemes]

i got curious about mary's role post-resurrection so i looked at a list of all her appearances in season 12 only to discover that she's only in about half of the episodes. which is surprising because like, where the fuck is she going? where is her character arc going to take her such that she's separated from her children for entire episodes, 33 years in the future with everyone else she's ever known or loved dead?

i'm just eternally fascinated that supernatural is a show about sam and dean, and literally no other character including their own mother is allowed to impede on that. every other character has to be removed at some point from the brotherly unit so as not to infringe on their domination of the narrative. every other character is expendable, unnecessary for the show to function continuously. every other character can go off on their own for several episodes at a time and live a life separate from them. there's no limit to this and no one is allowed to get close enough to sam and dean to negate this reality.

[aborddelimpala]

That's it guys for my #Whumptober contributions. 4 weeks ago I was looking up what "whump" meant and now, I've made 196 gifs of bloody, tied up, beaten up, choked, unconscious, crying, hurt Sam Winchester. Man, that was fun :)

You can find all my Whump Sam gifs HERE

You're welcome

xoxo - Nat

[shinelikethunder]

no particular conclusions on this, or even any definite takes on What They're Out To Do Here, but my slow/intermittent SPN groupwatch is just now heading into s9, and...... wow, the midseasons sure do have a preoccupation with "free will" as "congrats, you've recognized your One True authority figure as fallible, deceitful, and/or outright malicious and renounced your unquestioning deference to them! and now your job for the foreseeable future is to choose, over and over, between a whole-ass rogues' gallery of fallible malicious liars vying for a situational position of trust and leadership in your life. have fun figuring out which of these manipulative assholes to listen to this time!"

"--oh btw the exciting part about having to pick between shitty wannabe authority figures, rather than just obeying your single shitty authority, is that if you pick wrong the results are now fully your fault"

[wxywardsun]

◾️ The line between heaven and hell ◾️

[antigonewinchester]

15x20

And we come to it... The End of Supernatural.

But we’ve got a double feature this time: because I watched 1x20 too. With 15x20 calling back to that ep so specifically, I thought I’d see what the finale looked like in its context.

There’s a lot of talk of how the early vs. later seasons differ visually in terms of lighting, cinematography, etc., but I was also struck in their difference in tone. There’s a sincerity to 1x20, not just in what’s happening but in how the writing takes itself & the situation seriously, while 15x20 is much lighter and humorous, verging into bathos at points. It’s exactly the same as the contemporary MCU/Disney blockbuster humor: never letting the tension build for too long and breaking it was jokes. Maybe I’m just a bit too earnest but this kind of humor rings really hollow to me. It often feels self-defensive, like the writer(s) are hyper aware of their audience & its reaction and so they make fun of themselves before the audience can make fun of them.

I’d forgotten The Twilight Zone reference early in 1x20; love that. All of the John - Sam - Dean family drama is so compelling -- Sam still hotheaded & angry, John caring but not willing to give up his authority, Dean the peacemaker in the middle of it all. (The rest under a cut because it got long.)

DEAN: What happens if you die? Dad, what happens if you die, and we coulda done something about it? You know I been thinking. I ...think maybe Sammy's right about this one. We should do this together. [SAM nods.] DEAN: We're stronger as a family, Dad. We just are. You know it. JOHN: We're running out of time. You do your job and you get out of the area. That's an order.

Kripke’s idea of ‘family as everything’ is the foundation of this ep. It’s also obviously about healing the original family estrangement in Sam leaving and John rejecting him for it--John has to relearn how to “believe” in family again, which first starts to happen when Sam & Dean rush into save him, and then he saves Sam, using a bullet from the Colt to kill Luther holding Sam hostage, even though it means one less chance to get the YED. If, as SW analyzed, Dean takes on John’s narrative role in S4/5 with Sam, then Dean is in this narrative position thru the entire rest of the show. For ex, in Dabb’s seasons, so much of the writing focuses on Dean not “believing” in or resenting/rejecting family, which drives almost all the emotional conflict. And then cue Dean’s heartfelt deathbed speech in 15x20 about how much he loves Sam & thinks Sam is such an amazing guy, right? The ultimate “I believe in family & love you so much” speech. Dean’s speech even parallels what Sam’s son tell him as he’s dying, so framing Dean in a parental role to the end: (”SAM No. / DEAN (softly pleading): Look at me. Look at me. I need... I need... I need you to tell me that it's okay. I need you to tell me... Tell me it's okay. / SAM (through tears) Dean... it's okay. You can go now.” versus “DEAN II: Dad. It's okay. You can go now.”)

With the Colt, what stood out on this watch was how even though it’s a weapon that can “kill anything,” it’s not divine or blessed or anything like that; it was just a gun made by Samuel Colt for ordinary human hunters. Given how fantastical the show gets by the end, the Colt is grounded in a satisfying way. In order to fight creatures stronger than they are, people will make a tool that’ll allow them to overcome all that, just through sheer human ingenuity & stubbornness.

Jenny is the obvious throughline between these two eps, but there’s also John being integral to both (returning in 1x20, Sam & Dean figuring out the case thru his journal in 15x20) and both eps dealing with vampires. In 15x20, the situation is clearly meant to be a mirror reflection of Sam and Dean’s family tragedy: vampires invade a house, kill the father instead of the mother (but leaving her traumatized and unable to speak, literally & metaphorically) and steal the 2 kids away, but ending more happily with Sam & Dean saving the kids. There’s also again shades of sexual violence against children, in the vampires not just killing the kids but keeping them alive for years, both to feed and feed on them. If it’s more alluded to in 15x20, then it’s literal in 1x20, with vampires intertwined with sexual violence all over the ep: Kate & Luther making out / getting ready to have sex while Jenny watches, with Kate then turning Jenny by assaulting her with a kiss (complete w/ incestuous undertones in Luther then saying “Welcome home”); John looming over Kate and Luther like a creepy stalker when they all invade the vampires’s nest; Dean playing bait and drawing the vamps out, with Kate assaulting Dean very similarly to how she did Jenny. The ‘Dean playing bait’ scene was also interesting in that Dean is very much vulnerable (what if Kate had just gone for his neck?) while the masculine violence of the Winchesters is highlighted as well... John & Sam shooting Kate and the other vamp, John coming in with “sweetheart” to Kate when he confronts her, Dean taking Kate off in a bridal carry, a parody of the real thing. They’re both the hunted and hunters.

SAM (crying) Then don't leave me. Don't leave me. I can't do this alone. DEAN Yes, you can. SAM Well, I don't want to. DEAN Hey. I'm not leaving you. I'm gonna be with you... [DEAN is crying as he places his fist over SAM’S heart.] Right here... every day. ... DEAN Goodbye, Sam. Goodbye.

Telling that it was Jackles and Jarpad who added in those callbacks to Sam & Dean’s dialogue in the pilot, not Dabb. Good for them, tho.

I’m surprised I’ve never seen a comparison made between Dean’s death and Jack’s departure in 15x19! If Jack is a Christ figure, then Dean is a messiah figure, and those figures very often die; both Dean and Jack gave up a chance at a normal life to save the world & protect the people they love, Dean as a hunter & Jack as God; they both do the “I’ll still be with you, in your heart” gesture; it ends with both Jack and Dean saying goodbye, and they both then go onto to ascend to Heaven or a heavenly place. People talk about how Jack’s ending is messed up because he’s just a kid with too much responsibility put on his head, but the show idealizes / does the same thing with Dean, in how much it valorizes Dean’s protection of Sam. I think back to Jarpad’s quote talking about the finale that got people in a huff (“It was a success story — it was Dean’s success story,” Padalecki reflects on the “Supernatural” series finale. “This guy gave his life for years and years and years and ultimately gave his life to have his No. 1 on the planet live as normal a life as possible.”) but like? Doesn’t this attitude seem exactly how the show viewed Sam & Dean at this point?

I’ve also seen people talk pretty cynically about Dean’s death and as much as I’m not a fan of Dean dying I also just cannot read it as cynically as some people do. Dean didn’t die because he “couldn’t live a normal life,” he died because the show set up the “Dean = chooses the hunting life, Sam = wants a normal life” framing back in S12, Dabb’s first season, which culminates here in Dabb’s last, with Dean dying on a hunt after saving 2 kids from something horrible, and Sam going on to live without Dean and having a ‘normal’ life, wife, a son, even if he deep down he longs to be with Dean again. If Dean most represents “the family” in the narrative, then of course he couldn’t get a wife and kid like Sam could; that would be Dean choosing to have another family over Sam, and that wouldn’t work with Dean’s narrative role. In S15 too, Dean’s death also fits thematically with the emphasis within the last season on making sacrifices and dying for what you love and the people you saved living on after that sacrifice. Ketch, Rowena, Cas, Jack (sort of), Dean, to name some major ones. There’s also that Sam dying & Dean living on would be a repeat of Swan Song, so I can see why they would’ve wanted to avoid that plot beat because they’d already done it once. If anything, I’d say Dean’s death echoes his one in 3x16: telling Sam to carry on without him, Sam being unable to prevent his death, but this time instead of going to Hell, Dean ends up in Heaven. And Dean gets narratively rewarded with the perfect, best Heaven ever! The one that is stated he deserves!! I just don’t see how that translates into the writers seeing Dean as not normal or having something wrong with him?

OKAY last few things: I actually like the regular “Carry On Wayward Son” and then the cover version, what can I say. Despite ppl saying Dean spent however many odd decades in Heaven waiting for Sam, it’s clearly implied he only waited a short time in Bobby saying “Time up here, it's... it's different,” which is calling back to Hell’s time dilation, Dean’s 40′s years, and his now only spending a few minutes separate from Sam in comparison. And while I 100% understand not liking the finale, it’s kind of fascinating to me that the finale basically framed it as a final, fantastic Happy Ending for Sam & Dean, they are at peace for all eternity, isn’t that so nice, and parts of the fandom somehow read it as a tragic or unhappy ending. It’s just... so clearly not. It is if you wanted to the story to end another way, but c’mon, the story wasn’t going to end another way. It ended as it started, the Epic Love Story of Sam & Dean.

[mybrainproblems]

i just think that we should recognize that outside of the nepotism hires, pretty much every writer on spn was at worst competent and that occasionally some of them even reached for the transcendental. (and honestly even the nepotism hires had some flashes of brilliance tho mostly on a dialogue or scene basis rather than episode or plot basis.)

at least for me, the points where spn memorably has egg on its face and is at its worst is when it's being racist or sexist. like i can suspend disbelief on the occasional plot hole or jump, moments where characters are a bit ooc to move the plot along. but the unforgivable stuff to me are episodes like there will be blood or man's best friend with benefits or the bad place. the treatment of characters like bela and jo in early seasons, the way it waffles on monsters and whether they are universally evil. the way spn frames hunters positively in light of american exceptionalism and libertarianism.

like just. idk. saying spn is poorly written and only the fans get it just feels weird. i believe in death of the author, i believe in the power of transformative fiction... but whether you're writing meta or fic or shitposts, you're still playing in someone else's sandbox. and if it was a crappy sandbox, you wouldn't enjoy playing in it. (not to mention the lack of media literacy where ppl call every single callback just reusing plot lines rather than them being, yanno, narrative parallels.) there are absolutely points where they were reusing and retreading things and it tended to be with beloved characters like crowley where they kinda dead-ended but wanted to keep him around as a more central character without having much for him to do.

there are absolutely points where there is bad writing or they reach for something that is more complex than a cw show is really allowed to be without losing its core audience and then they can't follow through. but all in all? there's a hell of a lot more good than bad.

[fullmetal-angelgrace]

not to be that person (but this is the destiel website so who cares) "i like you older, older means we're still here." from hbo tlou episode 3 sounds like something cas says to dean in a fix it fic where they live happily ever after for decades instead of the shit that happened in the finale

[youngestdaughtersyndrome]

not to actively make you worse but! i want to know what characters you assigned to each preacher's daughter song ......

duplicated for sizing ....

[shallowseeker]

Jimmy Novak & the curse of mundanity

Sometimes, you really don't know what you have until it's gone

So an Interesting Thing about Depression I was thinking about is that there's not always some big, hidden secret to discover about yourself in order to Fix It.

///

Take Jimmy Novak. Sure, we can easily weave a narrative about his life paralleling conversion therapy OR modes of personal unfulfillment due to a lack of internal acceptance...

...but what if we consider something far more unsettling?

That mysterious "unexplainable" unfulfillment brought on by mundanity.

///

What if:

He's married to a woman he actually loves and find sexual fulfillment with?

He has a FABULOUS house and worked hard for it, and the day he bought it was one of his happiest ever. He loves this house.

His church is a healthy, positive thing for him. That is, he actually loves church and derives real enjoyment from it. It brings him festivities, friendships, singing, and extended family connections. He's actually not that 2D trope of a repressed "Ned Flanders.")

He's a great neighbor, and his neighbors are great. There's not even any adultery or infidelity involved. It's just comfortable.

The day his daughter was born was the best day of his life.

He might even want another baby.

Being a radio ad salesman is fast-paced and he loves it most of the time.

And yet...

Something wobbles.

Without a clear reason.

Without warning.

He wakes up one day and thinks, "This is it?"

He suddenly feels...ordinary. Unimportant.

He stays up watching TV at night.

Exhausted, unfulfilled.

The same things that used to bring him such joy...just suddenly...don't.

Depression sets in.

The thing about Jimmy's unfulfillment, and indeed about Depression as an entity, is that it doesn't require "extra" reasons.

Hell, Depression doesn't need secret shadows or hidden, unexpressed needs to just Be There.

It doesn't actually need an explanation to exist: not of being closeted or be uncomfortable with religion or being unfulfilled in marriage and family life.

It doesn't need to explain its presence.

It simply doesn't need extra.

Consider that genuinely Jimmy loved everything about his life.

That makes it all the more horrifying.

And so tragedy unfolds: He let a serpent (seraph) in, and his Paradise was lost.

[shallowstories]

It feels good. Being God, that is.

Or maybe it just feels good to feel nothing.

///

Jack is surprised when the powers of Chuck wash over him.

It's not painful or ugly or horrible. It just feels tingly.

Weird.

And suddenly all that pain and confusion he'd been feeling since he got his soul back?

It just vanishes.

It's a relief.

[aerospectrum]

a pretty dark thread idea I’d like to do

I want to do a darker maybe crossover type thread exploring Castiel being a test subject as a kid/fledgling angel. he grows up being experimented on in a specialized lab run by Naomi whose been experimenting on angels for years trying to make her own manufactured angels from the same grace angels have flowing in their veins. Sometimes she creates corrupted species of angels other times she’s just curious about their healing factors, resistance and strength and regenerative abilities, and what makes them tick. cas would be a young teen when he manages to escape her lab and years pass when he’s living with a friend or partner who always wants to know about his past that he keeps under strict lock and key. He’s a very happy, well adjusted goof who never seems to have a bad day or even able to hurt a fly. But he begins having nightmares; saying things that aren’t normal, aren’t human. Forcing him ultimately to reveal his true self or lose the ones he loves.

[crushedbyhyperbole]

Cherry Pie Kiss

Slice One

Pairing: Dean Winchester x fem!reader

Summary: The pie thief has struck again. You know who it is but how to prove it? The answer is on the tip of his tongue.

Words: ~900

A/N: So this is SPN fic number two. The idea of Dean being such a pie fiend that he would steal someone else's pie from the fridge and deny it afterwards, really amused me. I obviously didn't get the desire to kiss him out of my system after the first SPN fic I wrote so here's another one 😂 It's not smut but there is mild adult themes which is why I ask minors not to read or interact. Reader is as generic as I can make but I have referenced as female. I hope you enjoy, and as always, I value your feedback and comments 💖

Warnings: kissing, mild violence, bad language as standard. Dean is an asshole. Reader is a bit of an asshole too. They're probably made for each other.

*** Minors do not read or interact ***

Dean Winchester.  You hate him.  His arrogance, his smug superiority, the way he always acts like he’s untouchable… his goddamn pretty mouth.  Ugh!  Asshole!

You didn’t always hate him – you had known him for years, one hunter to another – but, since you had been forced to stay with both he and Sam in the bunker these last couple of months, he had really grated on your nerves. 

After your hunt of a large nest of vampires had gone wrong, you had become the hunted.  Your home decimated, your family too precious to put at risk by you staying with them; you had needed help.

Sam had insisted, so you agreed to stay with them until your vamp problem could be solved.  Only the nest turned out to be much bigger and far wider spread than you had first thought, and it was taking time for even the infamous Winchester brothers to put an end to.

The light in the refrigerator is stark as you stare inside.  It’s gone.  You slam the door, raging internally.  Why can you not have anything to yourself in this goddamn place?

“DEAN!”  You shout angrily at the top of your lungs, knowing he can hear you from his room down the hall, even with his music playing.

He won’t respond to you.  He never does.  Why should he?  You’re just some girl he’s got to put up with for a while.  Some girl he made a pass at that first week you were here, but you shut him down and he’s been an asshole to you ever since.

You storm up to his door and bray your fist against the wood as hard as you can.  “I know you’re in there!  Get your ass out here now!”  You shout and hammer your fist against the door until you hear him moving inside.

The door clunks as he unlocks it, and it swings open to reveal him stood in the doorway in a navy blue robe and slippers.  The light from his lamp is dim but warm, his music a moderate volume for the late hour.  He looks irritated that you’ve disturbed him, that quizzical frown and pout are a dead giveaway.  Good.

“What’s got your panties in a twist?”  He smirks at you.

“You!”  You push past him, and he doesn’t try to block you.

“What now?”

This isn’t the first time you’ve had this argument and it probably won’t be the last.  Whenever Sam isn’t around, Dean always does something to piss you off, like he’s trying to bait you.

“You ate my pie!  AGAIN!”

His expression is schooled into that self-righteous assuredness it always is when you confront him.  His hands go to his hips – which looks ridiculous because of the robe – and he shifts his weight onto his other foot.

“I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about.”  He says with a frown, and it’s entirely plausible that you’ve made a mistake, except it’s just the two of you here and you didn’t eat the damn pie.  “I haven’t seen any damn pie.”

“Oh yeah?!”  You square up to him, looking up into his eyes, unblinking, unphased.

“Yeah!”  He doubles down, firmly meeting your stare, leaning closer as if you would be intimidated by that.

It’s a short distance you need to cover and he is unprepared.  You expect him to push you away but he flounders, arms flailing and uncoordinated when you grip the lapels of his robe and pull him towards you.

When your lips meet he puckers up and blinks in shock, but you don’t give him time to realise what’s happening.  You wrap your arms around his neck and hold him tight as you slip your tongue between his lips, plundering his mouth.

It takes a beat, but he responds by gripping your hips and holding you against him, moaning into your mouth as he opens up to you.  The heat of his response takes you by surprise, but it shouldn’t have, really.  He’d wanted this since the first few days you were here.  Wanted you.

You ravage his mouth, your hands in his hair, making it messy as you practically melt into his arms.  His tongue plays perfectly with yours, his lips soft and yielding.  Dean Winchester is an exceptional kisser.  This fact makes you hate him even more.

As you pull back, breathless, Dean grins at you.  He looks happy and care-free, like the cat that got the cream.  Your face, however, holds a scowl.

“What’s wrong, darlin’?”  His expression changes to concern.

You lick your lips and it’s just as you thought, the sweet buttery goodness of pie crust and the pleasant tartness of sour cherry.  You slap him across the face – not hard but just enough to get his attention – and stride to the door leaving him confused.

“What the hell?!”  He rounds on you, his arousal tenting his robe.

“Don’t you dare eat my pie again.”

You leave your warning hanging in the air along with his frustration.  A smirk playing on your lips at the sight you had just left behind you; Dean Winchester with kiss-swollen lips and a hard-on for you.  It isn’t the worst thing you’ve seen but you still hate him, even if there’s now something else there along side it. 

[bizarrelittlemew]

I have a burning curiosity that can only be relieved by an OFMD author. Why is there so much AU fanfiction in this fandom?? 😆 My AO3 search results with every alternate universe tag I can think of blocked are coming up with almost every result on the page filtered out! 🤣 I have nothing against them existing and I'm all for everyone writing what makes them happy, I just wonder how this fandom ended up being so full of them. I used to think SPN was oversaturated with AU's, but it can't hold a candle to OFMD! 😅

okay i wanted to give this a proper answer and also asked a few other authors, so here are some of the reasons we came up with - i think it's a combination of all of these:

while the show takes place in a historical setting, it's not historically accurate or even trying to be. it uses anachronistic dialogue and gives piracy a vibe more like a modern workplace. the characters become timeless in the sense that they are already "modern" characters put into a historical setting, and therefore fit just as well into any kind of AU setting. the characters are what make up the show more than the historical setting

the themes that the show deals with - relationships, sexuality, gender, trauma, family, self-image, mental illness - can be explored in so many different ways given different settings. it's very interesting to examine how the characters would deal with them when thrown into different circumstances and time periods

canon is really good, so while there are gaps in the narrative that can be explored, a lot of people are drawn to putting the characters in entirely different situations and/or feel like canon ground was covered pretty quickly

the story itself translates to other universes very easily. people want to enjoy that story and/or their favorite plot points again and again, but just writing down the plot of the show in the canon setting wouldn't make much sense. by throwing the characters into a different universe, you can pull scenes and plot from canon without just repeating it, putting a different spin on it

very few shows have (canonically) older queer people, and people like the idea of how that translates to other universes

we have (relatively) little canon and had a lot of time between seasons. considering the size of the fandom, amount of canon, and time since canon, the proportion of AUs is not surprising

if we assume proper tagging, AUs make up around 27% of all ofmd fanfics by number of works, but probably much more by word count, since a lot of canon fics tend to be shorter. in comparison, that number is around 20% for SPN and 34% for Merlin 🤷

also i've seen a lot of people starting out by only wanting to read canonverse fics until they gave an AU a try and BAM they were hooked 😌

and last but not least:

Ed and Stede fall in love in every universe 💗