#truly love rowena i have much thoughts

[shallowseeker]

Rambling about the Macleods and Castiel friendship today:

I looooove how Rowena and Crowley will go out of their way to annoy everyone:

Rowena (11x03)

Rowena: You wouldn't think a road trip with two such strapping lads could be this tedious. Shall we have a wee sing-song? Sam and Dean (in unison): No!

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Crowley in early 12x03: YAY ROAD TRIP!

Unlike in the past, Crowley is making himself as ADORABLE AS POSSIBLE THIS SEASON, ESPECIALLY TO CAS. Hilarious change of tactics. Truly. Crowley and Rowena both want friends so badly!

Crowley singing!

12x03

&

Crowley singing again!

12x15

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Crowley is ALSO blowing a lot of hot air this season. Which continues into the next episodes.

12x03

Cas, as usual, not reacting much to Crowley's attempts to wound. (This is partially why Crowley goads him; the game is in getting Cas to react, which... he almost never does.)

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But it's is soooooo funny, though. Crowley calls himself a "Jay-Z" and a POWERFUL demon and keeps trying to make digs at Cas as only "kinda powerful"...

...and yet insisting Cas go ahead of him, BWAHAHA. I love Crowley so much. I never thought about how Metatron-coded hs is a lot of the time, and it's... hilarious. (I'm a huge Metatron girl, so.)

"You first, Cas, go go!"

//

Also, I'm 99% sure this is the era where Rowena notoriously flipped on Cas, deciding he was super desirable, and I'm 99% sure this drove Crowley insane.

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Rowena is in her dating-any-men-possible era, and she instantly starts velcro-ing herself to Cas. Later we'll see her go, "Ooooh, is the handsome angel there. Hi, tweetie pie!"

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But yeah. Metatron, Crowley, and Rowena want to be popular kids and have friends soooooooooooo bad and I love them all.

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Literally, all Crowley wants from life is to steal Sam and Dean's (and Cas's) roles. As we saw in s10, he HATES work. He wants his life to be one long fun road trip, filled with booze and bar-hopping.

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Also LOL at Sam assuming Rowena got some licks in and did some damage. I love that he has this wonderful assumption of Rowena's strength:

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Crowley tries much harder than usual to muster up (transparent) bluster. He's feeling insecure, lost. He wants friends, family, security. I think he's partially throwing his weight around because Lucifer represents his deepest insecurity: his job.

Beating Lucifer is the last peak, and maybe if he climbs it, he thinks, his life will finally even out.

&

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AHAHA. Crowley loves being annoying, and he loves trying to break Cas's poker face.

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And speaking of uncool, Sam and Dean are pretty "uncool" this episode too, LOL!

&

VERSUS

Despite the others nagging him, it's CAS who establishes a rapport and gets the "in" this episode.

Cas does this being being unashamedly uncool, not being a yapping Hell-king, or trying to appear "hip" like Sam and Dean do.

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And Cas's stoic heroism seems to rub off on him. Crowley, not willing to fight Lucifer for Rowena in 12x02:

Crowley, who deep down wants to be more heroic like Cas, Like "Superman"...

...Is now trying his best to be a little more of a hero, following Cas's lead (he says it's because he hates Lucifer, but we'll do Crowley take up for friends and even the rescued-girl-of-the-week in later eps: Stuck in the Middle (with you) AND Somewhere in Between Heaven and Hell.

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A hero's entrance:

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And again, I had a meta about this before, but it's sooooo interesting that Lucifer is using Cas as a Chuck-stand-in: "Took you long enough," like he's been waiting for Cas, specifically. Like he wants a reaction out of Cas specifically.

//

And you know what else is fun? Lucifer attacks Crowley brutally with a guitar

And two seconds later Cas doles out the same thing to Lucifer.

ANYWAY.

This is the era when Rowena starting referring to Cas as "the handsome angel," and he actually gets fidgety and shy about it, and Crowley is probably losing his mind over Rowena's developing crush on him, especially since Cas, by all appearances, treats Rowena so nicies in comparision to Crowley.

BUT! In the next episode, Cas is a little nicer to Crowley, playing along by calling him Agent Zappa. Seems like they're KINDA friends now.

[maxinemartinsdrill]

spn women I have strong feelings about:

1. ROWENA ROWENA ROWENA. Rowena will get CRAZYYYYY interesting backstory dropped in various episodes and ppl just ignore it. like she grew up poor and when she had Crowley she was miserable and alone and she despised him for it because she needed to be strong and he felt like a weakness to her. and then she spends years fleeing witch hunts running around Europe and she finally grasps some level of power to find security because magic is her way out magic is her strength etc etc. and we first see her killing pimps and then helping those girls and then punishing them for lacking the strength she wants to see in them. like is she a nice person? absolutely not. but the reasons for her desperation to hold onto power are SO SOS SO COMPELLING. ppl would be allllllll over her if she were a man I mean that so sincerely.

AND THEN. She meets the Winchesters and they keep kidnapping her and she gets thrown into all this shit with Lucifer and she's not as strong as she thought she was. she's not strong enough to be safe. but the she gets to know Sam better and she finally gains the levels of power she's sought of angling for as well as some of the emotional security because he's vulnerable with her and he gets it a little bit. and she can let herself be bit more vulnerable and she can open herself up to feeling more than just scared or vengeful. the fact that when she's safe she will let herself love people??? excellent. like her becoming less evil to me is wayyyyy more interesting than the way spn does this a lot of the time and it feels rly fucking authentic.

AND EVERYTHING AFTER THA IS GREAT AS WELL. her trying to decide where she stands morally, admitting she did awful things to herself and getting on with it, only being able to love her son after he's dead, bequeathing Sam everything she had after she died. LIKE THERES SO MUCH THERE. and obligatory Lucifer trauma mention because samwena Lucifer trauma bonding was what got me back into spn and into Sam in the first place.

2. BILLIE. singing oh death in the hospital. holding Rowena while she completely loses itm she is THEE benevolent death to me. I love the fact shs one of the only characters who banters with Dean on his level of strange anachronisms. Love how when she was reaping him she was debating whether to tell him sam was still alive. possibly I am just obsessed with her because for once they gave a woman interiority in a way that wasn't inherently evil (like she wasn't portrayed as a saint for it but it was like just business) and then s15... At least 75% of my hatred of the cas confession comes from the fact they made Billie 'evil' in order to set it up.

3. Mary.... ohhhhhh mary. More about the implication than anything else - 'they couldn't stand each other at first but by the time we were done with them...' truly awful. the way she tries her whole life to get away from hunting and runs right back into it. and she comes back to deeply troubled children who she is expected to parent without having any idea of how to do this because she does not know them. and she's a mother to them not mary.

4. bela talbot :(( you're dying. And utterly alone. and you died to free yourself and you've been running and running your entire life but you can't run any longer. and there's someone on the phone, maybe the only person who can understand you. you're similar and he may as well be the only person left in the world. and then he calls you a bitch and says you deserve to die. and you get ripped apart by dogs and tortured for the rest of eternity.

5. KELLY KLINE!!!!!!!!! craziest mf on the show istg. again do I think the writers were trying to do anything serious with her? No. BUT THE IMPLICATIONS. like as I have rambled about before she is insanely republican and Christian pregnant with the antichrist AND on the run with a queer fallen angel who went on a blasphemous murdering homophobes and republicans spree a couple of years back. she is overwhelmingly positive despite this possibly because she is completely divorced from reality due to her bizarre politics (how to have an affair with the president in a god honouring way is it morally wrong to get an abortion if the fetus is the devil etc). and for some reason she is convinced that jack will save the world which is so fun!!!! I also really enjoy the fact that most of her bizarreness was left to be implied because it allows us to see her as a normal person doing her best in an awful situation and empathise with her. Despite the fact that they could have easily made her a full blown lady Jessica type (i don't know enough about dune to say if this is right) with the whole magical pregnancy manipulative religious delusions/cult type thing going. which would have still been interesting but also lacked depth in places. here they just tell you shes absolutely ridiculous and then have her interact completely normally despite the abnormal circumstances. which (accidentally???) gives her a lot going on. also the bit where she meets jack in heaven and realises he's dead the 'cas said he would look out for you' one of if not the most devastating line in late seasons spn not even joking.

honorary mentions:

Amara :))) literally 90% if when she is on screen I am unconvinced however gimme shelter was sooooooo good. SHES A FEMINIST!!! OBLIGATORY SHOUT OUT TO THE WIRE MOTHER CLOTH MKTHER DEAN AMARA POST

[adidegmez]

spn s14 spoilers

s14 ep1(stranger in a strange land)

i want to watch spn but at the same time i dont. last 2 seasons. i dont want to say goodbye. but i need to kearn how their stories end. i must say dean looks amazing. they'll find dean, sam and cas theyre trying so hard.

s14 ep2(gods and monsters)

poor nick, lucifer used him. i love bobby. when he came back i didnt think we would see him this much. its nice to see him he is like our bobby but he is not him. i wish he could come back. cas' speech was beautiful, he changed so much. i love him. jack is right and i dont like that. dean would agree with jack. but dean cant die theyll find another way. and theyll save dean. why didnt cas go with nick? dean isnt dean its Michael right? that was the plan. i hope he is dean but i dont think so.

s14 ep3(the scar)

dean is back. the beard, really dean. I thought Kaia's story would be left unfinished. im glad theyre telling it. Jack is still young and has been through so much already. jack saved the girl. and now he is sick. i love dad cas, when he is talking to jack he is awesome. dean said yes and saved his brother and son. yes michaelhurt people but dean did what he had to do.

s14 ep4(mint condition)

dean wanted a friend like stuart. when he was mad at his dad he could just go and hang out with his friend. he now has cas but it wouldve been nice for him when he was young. i love fanboy dean. his love for movies is beautiful. i hope they can have a nice halloween next year. i would like to see the cosplay.

s14 ep5(nightmare logic)

jack and cas finally went to hunt. i wish we could see that. i love bobby but he needs to be more chill. he is bobby but not our bobby. our bobby's relationship with the boys was different, it was beautiful. i missed him. i didnt think bobby would live this long. i thought they would kill him. im glad he is alive. i am not sure about bobby and mary tho.

s14 ep6(optimism)

i missed Charlie. They had planned everything but the "old man" destroyed Dean. He never expected this. he is offended. jackrealy played his role. i like both of them. they are amazing. i like how both of them thinks Michael is their fault and not the other ones. i love how jack is trying to convince dean to forgive himself. i liked how sam convinced Charlie to stay. i missed our Charlie and bobby. jack is truly a winchester. he is not okay.

s14 ep7(unhuman nature)

hi cas! nick learned some stuff from luci, like torturing:(. dean let jack drove the baby:'). and what is wrong with dean? jack is their son dean'S cas' and sam's. and they love him so much. i mostl forget jack is just a baby. at least rowena helped, it was nice of her. nick is a psychopath. he lost his mind. if he doesnt want to feel those feelings he shouldve asked for help from the boys or he couldve killed himself but he chose lucifer. when lucifer comes back there will be chaos. hell cause so much pain but nick doesnt even care. i thnik luci will save jack probably not willingly but i think jack will live because of him. maybe hell get his grace back.

s14 ep8(byzantium)

no no no no. this cant be happenning jack cant die. dean and cas werent with him. even if they were he cant die. theyll bring him back. im glad kelly got the chance to see her boy. the winchesters and cas, they raised jack well. he is amazing. empty is ruthless. im glad it didnt take cas now but it will take him when he is finally happy. i hope it cant but this story will end, cas' story will end. and i guess thats how it will end. this is bad but for now both cas and jack are safe. im happy for lily she saved jack and she got her reward in the end. the winchesters are back together again. i wish Chuck would come. he couldve beaten Michael easily. and the boys wouldnt have to fight with him. but Chuck is with his sister idek what theyre doing but it wouldnt take long to kill Michael. boys are great dads. they have their son back, they really love their son. i love seeing team free will 2.0. they are all amazing.

s14 ep9(the spear)

no garth wouldnt do that. i think he is working with the winchesters. i love garth. i think i love ketch too. he did some(a lot maybe) bad things but he is trying to do the right thing. i dont like the fact that dean lied to kaia. yes they need the spear, hopefully theyll keep their end of the deal and return her to her home. why did Michael let sam live? what did he do to him? no! Michael took dean, again. dean isnt gone hell beat Michael. dean will win.

s14 ep10(nihilism)

hi pamela. dean's dream, its beautiful. but where is jack in that dream? i cant ake Michael serious. he has dean's face. btw ill always choose dean againts anyone and anything. because hell always win he is always on the right side. jack shouldnt believe what Michael says. im the cage?! dean is so powerfull. hell keep him there for a while. at least billie helped them. 1>14,000,605. dean will save the World, again.

s14 ep11(damaged goods)

Dean says goodbye to everyone. thats not good, hes going to do something. well, what deans doing is not the perfect solution but it can provide more time for others to find a good way to get out of this situation. dean didnt say goodbye to cas and jack?

s14 ep12(prophet and loss)

i thought nicks story ended. dean you did everything you could do for sammy and you are still apologizing. sam, did it. he conviced dean.

s14 ep13(lebanon)

No one can steal the baby. i hate that girl. omg! he wanted his dad. john is back. winchesters are back together. cant they be happy just for once. constantine:) . im glad they all got to spend time together but i hoped john could stay and they could be happy. but this is supernatural and they dont get happy endings most of the time.

s14 ep14(ouroboros)

jack is using his soul more:(. i love rowena more now. rowena cares about them. she cares about jack. i dont want jack to be soulless. yes jack is a winchester and i think cas is a winchester too. if Michael is really dead and jack got his power back then whats gonna happen rest of the season?

s14 ep15(peace of mind)

jack doesnt have a soul, great! well, at least he is trying to do good things.

s14 ep16(don't go in the woods)

i dont like those kids. i hope we'll never see them again.

s14 ep17(game night)

nick became lucifer. i couldnt tell the differance. he was a monster. jack didnt do wrong, if he didnt kill nick he would try to do the same thing again. yes something is wrong with jack but he will get better. Mary pushed Jack too hard, maybe if she left him alone for a few minutes he would be able to pull himself together.

s14 ep18(absence)

No, Jack couldn't have killed Mary. dean and sam theyll be devastated. dean dont be mad at cas. he was just trying to do what he thought was right. The flashback scenes are killing me. I get sadder with each scene. There is 1 season left, I have been watching their stories for 3 months. I don't know how to say goodbye to them. rowena changed so much, i like the winchester affect. she cares about jack and the others. i didnt think mary would die. but she did.

s14 ep19(jack in the box)

hi bobby! i hate dumah now, i didnt like her before and now she is worse. Jack is very open to manipulation. cas did a good thing. dumah doesnt deserve that kinda power. They should have known that box couldn't hold Jack. Dean can be so cruel sometimes, he lied to Jack so easily. and sam he wasnt okay with it he struggelled while lying to jack. i hope they can figure this out. and thing could be way it was. lucifer always makes everything worse.

s14 ep20(moriah)

Chuck!! if jack was sam den would do anyhing to save sam. jack could be saved. jack will return only he can beat Chuck. and he will beat Chuck, he has to. Chuck is a monster. jack is just trying to be good. im glad dean didnt kill jack. he saw jack was struggling and he was trying to do te right thing so he didnt kill him. 1 last season

[xx-blueboy-xx]

To celebrate trickster Tuesday! I am going to ramble about Mystery Spot, the episode ever. Don't take any of this super seriously I am by no means a "meta analysis" this is just me foaming at the mouth. + the spiral of thoughts it sent me on.

Anyways. If you wanna read it! It's below the cut! Because it got (long).

First off, Mystery Spot represents the literal cycle Sam (and also the entire Winchester family) find themselves caught in, over and over and over again: due to their inherent savior & martyr complexes. Which are not a great blend. Imagine having to save everyone you care about, but, always being willing to simply - die for them. More than willing. Happy to. Feel like you have to, in order to be worth anything to anyone or them. In order to atone.

Now, we saw in S1-S2 how much Dean is willing to give up for family, for Sam. It's the entire reason S3 is happening - he sold his own soul to a demon, something he hated John for, to save Sam. To bring him back to life. Something we learn that his own mother did all those years ago: just not at the price of her soul, but, essentially - her first born child (so Rumplstilskin of Azazel for real). The Winchester need to save each other, that toxic codependency on family, that "family is all you got at the end of the day" mentality is what started it all.

We have only seen in S1-S2 breif glimpses that Sam also shows these signs. The same codependency as Dean, and that savior complex. However - it never becomes truly and completely apparent until S3. Where he is willing to steal human livers, find anyway - anything to save Dean from his deal. It isn't until Jessica, John and everyone else he has known is gone, that Sam begins to fall completely into the codependency that Dean unfortunately, feeds into. (With all of his "You ran away from the family" talk and such)

In Mystery Spot: we see the first true depths of how far Sam is willing to go to keep Dean alive. How far he has fallen from that rebelliousness he had before John died. Starting to agree with Dean that he "tried his best". And things like that. In Mystery Spot we see that Sam rather relive the same day over and over and over again, than let Dean die. We never see him accept it. Not once. Sure, it's a time-loop, but we know Gabriel was trying to teach Sam to let go.

Teach him to break the fucking cycle. But he doesn't. He contuines to give into it, over and over. Until Gabriel reveals himself, thinking maybe he can still change it. Change Sam. Get through to him. That'd when we get those 6 months of pure obessesion.

And at the end of it? We see the Sam that suggested to Dean they use the evil-immortal doctors alchemy to keep him alive, perfectly willing to steal human livers and such for it: come out full force. He is completely willing to sacrifice a stranger to save Dean. Rather than being hellhent on killing the Trickster, on revenge, he wants him back. At any cost. Even an innocent human life.

This is the Sam we see, after years and years of Dean encouraging this behavior - seasons later, bring an entire apyclopse down on the world to get rid of the Mark of Cain. Force a man to sell his soul. Have Rowena kill the inky person she had ever allowed herself to love - someone she considered her son. To utterly get rid of another person's autonomy (keeping her locked up ect.) to get it.

Note: it is NOT Dean's fault, that Sam broke Amara out, I simply am stating that his "we die for family sammy" and "we do everything for family sammy" throughout the years helped Sam make the decision. But at the end of the day, Sam choose to get rid of the Mark. All of the death that happened because of her is pretty directly on his hands, and he knows this.

I also believe that, while Sam feels massive amounts of sympathy, I believe he struggles a (lot) with empathy (autism + protecting himself/trauma response). He can easily replicate empathy, and act as if he cares but we see his hypocritical behavior consistently come into play and make us think: huh. I don't think he actually understands how Dean, Castiel ect. feels. That is why he comes off as spoiled and ungrateful to Dean in early seasons, and in later seasons does things that are completely amoral and deranged. Simply for those he loves.

Because he struggles to wrap his head around *why* Dean can save him, kill people for him, force an angel on him - but when he releases an apyclopse, him saying "I would do it all again." Is somehow wrong. He doesn't see his own hypocrisy at times and struggles especially to see others.

Anyways.

I support Sammy war crimes.

[vaicomcas]

I think a story where Jack brings back att the angels and most demons, and Empty let's them go cause they want to sleep, but takes Castiel's memories because they are still angry at Jack and Cas would be amazing.

Like Cas has memories somewhere before pulling Dean out of hell but everyone else around him remembers all that happened.

I wrote a really long ost about this fic idea byt tumblr ate it, so I am going to try again, I am sorry if I miss any details this time around.

There is an old post, about Naomi and Cas, I don't I will be able to find, but one person in the tags said, (paraphrasing) 'It would be intresting and kind of hillarious if only Castiel was mindwiped after his rebellions or disobidience and others rememberd.'

Cas loosing his memories after his lastest visit of the Empty would be as you said very messy.

Imagin, Jack goes to empty, after getting Chuck's powers, and Cas is not happy with the situtation but he also know they don't have much time, the Shadow is angry about everything. So Castiel helps Jack make a deal with the Shadow, to get most of the angels and hamdfull of Demons, who would actually help rather than messing them up evern more (Like Crowely, Rowena, Meg, etc), they deal with the rest and seasl the void so that the shadow is never disturbed again.

But before the leave, The Shadow takes Castiel's memories, or something happens, but Castiel does forget everything that happened.

So, as he comes back the last thing he remembers is planning a seige to hell, to pull out Dean.

And everything is a mess, right?

Hell is cahos, Deamons don't know who to obey, Rowena and Crowely are at eachothers throats.

Heaven is worse, Angels are hostile towards Jack, he is Lucifer's nephilim, raised by the Winchesters, he took Godhood from their father. They don't know if they want should trust him. Even Cas himself.

It doesn't long for everyone to realise something is very wrong with Cas, either. Like Cas then thought Balthzar is dead, and now when Cas doesn't remember, Batlh who is still angry doesn't know how to tell his brother, who is so happy to see him, he was the one to kill Balth. Similar interactions goes for Anna, for Samandrieal, for Racheal, and others.

Like all the angels are angry at Cas, but blowing up gets only confussion from him. And like he doesn't want to belive what they are telling him, because its too much and its disarterous for him.

Jack comes to realise, he doesnt know shit about Castiel or the angels or heaven and hell. He has no idea what to do and how to help

Like Cas is the one being who could have conneted all the frayed edges of Heaven and Hell, but he can't do that.

Its immposible to write this concept in way that would do justice to everyone, but it has a lot that can be explored

Wow, that really is a spectacular mess, isn't it? (in a good way) It is super interesting, but I can't even get started on how one would try to resolve it to satisfaction.

So then I started to blow it up even more:

In Hell, not only Rowena and Crowley would have unresolved issues, but Meg and Crowley too. And Crowley surely had issues with all the remaining demons, who first of all chose Lucifer over him, then also became loyal to his abusive mother while they were never truly loyal to him. I have no choice but to conclude that he would become an outcast of Hell in this situation (unlike almost everybody except one, I don't buy "redemption" of Rowena for suddenly become a loving mother after Crowley died).

Now onto Cas. I really hope that when Cas was in the Empty making the deal with Shadow he didn't let Naomi out, or the archangels. Because that would make Heaven as fucked up as before.

But do the angels who get out remember all of that past oppression? Do they, now free of Chuck's (the show's) narrative and Naomi's mind control, begin to think for themselves? Do they put the blame in the right places, and not just make Castiel the scapegoat of their enormous misfortune like the show made them do?

Assuming (probably too optimistically, but I can't bear the alternative) that this is the case, Castiel would still be under so much distress, as you described, hearing all the horrors, not wanting to believe, not remembering any of it, yet couldn't not believe.

Then I really don't want him to recover his memory; because it would just be so devastating, especially, also, if he remembered Jack, and realized that his son had learned about all of his "crimes", and understandably became disturbed, if not traumatized by that knowledge.

Whew, knives in the heart at every turn in this story, isn't it?

So then I can only come to one conclusion. Castiel, heartbroken, not knowing who he was anymore, banishes himself from heaven, meeting Crowley who was on the run as an outcast from Hell. Castiel may initially distrust a demon, but he thought himself in no position to judge anyone anymore; while Crowley remembered his fondness for his old friend, and welcomed the clean-slate they were given. Castiel and Crowley found the only source of solace in each other in this new world that was no longer theirs.

What happened to Jack through all this? I have no idea LOL.

Thanks for elaborating on this idea! You blew something up and I followed the ejecta in one direction, but there are a lot more ways to go.

[samsrowena]

moogs!!! I saw in your poll that you had ~unpopular~ thoughts about Rowena’s ending being becoming the queen of hell and I would be really interested to hear them if you wanted to elaborate!!! <333 if you’ve already talked about it somewhere then ignore me, I must’ve missed it, just link me to that maybe? love hearing your thoughts bestie - jo

HIII i'd be happy to!!! apologies in advance if this gets kind of rambly or incoherent lol

but okay so my main problem with it is that it just feels really reductive (which is on par with everyone else's ending but i digress). in theory i guess i get how it could feel like a full circle moment; she was introduced wanting the throne for selfish, evil purposes and then her story ends with her having the throne and using it for good. but in execution, i was not a fan. to start with, in 15x08 she seemed to revert to season ten rowena (but this is buckleming writing her so i shouldn't be surprised), bragging about everyone being afraid of her and then saying she wished she died a long time ago, as if all of her character development up until that point meant nothing

because i honestly just don't see any scenario in which she'd ever even want to become ruler of hell after season thirteen. she didn't care about power anymore. she'd been completely broken by lucifer and all she wanted was redemption. and i really despise the idea that sacrificing herself to save the world but then still being condemned to hell anyway was her being redeemed (of course she's not the only character they do this with; the message that you have to die for redemption/forgiveness runs rampant in the show and it sucks)

then there's the whole destiny thing. which is just like. i'm sorry but why in the hell would a group of people who literally call themselves "team free will" just accept that someone they care about is destined to die??? the only time they even allude at attempting to change her fate is at the end of funeralia but then they never even try. and in a season where their whole goal is to free themselves from thee biblical god's control, you would think they'd push back on the idea that her fate is set in stone a whole lot harder than they did (which is basically not at all). i just know in my heart that is so so so unlike them, especially sam after finding out he was the one who would kill her. this is the same guy who spent a whole season trying to save dean from certain doom (not to mention the countless other examples of him obsessing over saving people he cares about), so there is NO doubt in my mind he would've did the same for rowena

but i don't know, i mean i definitely understand the appeal of her becoming queen and maybe i'd be more open to it if they ended up doing more with it (and to their credit they apparently planned to, ruthie said at a con she was signed on for more episodes but covid ruined that) but at the end of day i just truly think she deserved so much more than being relegated to an eternity of doing a job that even her own son despised at the end

[w3bheadz]

first lines of 2024

share the first thing you have written in the new year once you get there<3 (however long it takes & however brief!)

This is a future chapter for Fishhooks <3

My mouth was full of blood, truly suffocating, really. They didn’t like what I had to say, so they stopped at the source. They could have killed me, but it would have been less fun in their eyes. If only I had kept my mouth shut, right? 

What a shame, yet another performer’s voice silenced because they had something to say. All because Snow couldn’t handle anything mentioned about Lucy Gray. If I were honest, I would have thought he was in love. But it wasn’t love, was it? It was an obsession.

 It was like Lucy Gray had been a drug he couldn’t resist, and maybe they had a fallout? Was that why she went missing? Why had her memory been erased from all of the records of the games?

I may not have been able to speak, but I refused to be silenced. Peacekeepers surrounded me in the train car, not trusting me to be alone just because of some worthless title that had ruined my life. Victor. If I hadn’t been reaped, I’d still have my little siblings, I’d still have my mother and my father. The train doors finally opened, my home offering the welcoming sea breeze as I took a deep breath.

I was escorted to Victors Village where Rowena looked to have been coming back from the ocean. She had her spear in one hand, a net of the catch in the other. She was walking up to the door as we entered the arches to the little village with a total of two buildings. I didn’t think someone could drop a net as fast as Roe had when she saw us coming. The look on her face told me she knew. She knew something was wrong. With her spear in hand, Roe started walking towards us.

 “Mags, you alright?” She asked me, cradling my face with her free hand, eyes on the four peacekeepers walking a few feet behind me. When I couldn’t answer, I shook my head, tapping my chin. Roe’s eyes flickered between the peacekeepers and I, though her voice lowered “Who did this to you.. The capitol? That’s it..” 

She dropped her hand from my face, walking past me. “So this is how your home treats the victors, huh?! Taking away their ability to speak? Haven’t you taken enough you sick fucks?!” Roe threw her spear. It went through the visor of one of the peacekeepers. Her mouth twisted into a small grin, ripping her spear out of the peacekeeper's face.

 “Who’s next, huh?! You treat one of the people you sent to their death like a PRISONER.” I saw the spear thrown again, taking someone out by the chest before the other two started to run. They weren’t allowed to shoot victors. It could have caused a revolt. Roe was sort of a hot commodity in the capitol. She was called to the capitol a lot, but she had never told me why. I had my suspicions, but I kept them to myself.

As the peacekeepers  ran, Roe walked back to me, dropping her spear and leading me into the house. Her face was now void of emotion. I simply slipped my hand into hers, squeezing gently. Roe had so much rage built up in her mind, and sometimes rather than talking through it, she held it all back. I saw the silent few tears run down her face before she looked away from me. I wish I knew what happened in that head of hers, just so I could help. So I could understand.

It wasn’t until that night as Roe held me close to her chest, that I made a realization. Roe was just as scared as I was. She might not have shown it, but she was utterly terrified. I could hear it in the quick beats of her heart, and I could feel it in how tight she was holding me. I could feel her breathing grow shaky, a small tear running down her face and landing on the back of my neck. I just pressed a soft kiss to her collarbone, hoping it conveyed the message that I had wanted it to.

“I’m so sorry, mi amor.. You didn’t deserve this” Roe said quietly. Her voice was thick with tears that she refused to let fall. She knew that I knew they were there, but she hated crying. The only times I had seen her cry were when she was so angry that she couldn’t contain them. Like when she had gotten onto the train to go to the capitol, just after her brother was killed. And when she came out of the arena.

Tagging @kat-xox @autistpride @marzst4rz @rinney4ever and whoever wants to <3

[ourgalaxiescollide]

𝕰𝖈𝖍𝖔𝖊𝖘 𝕱𝖗𝖔𝖒 𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝖁𝖔𝖎𝖉 𝖁𝖔𝖑. 𝟐

A list of random quotes that have echoed throughout the in-between. It’s not sure if there words were truly spoken, or if they were just the strange doings of the colliding magics ANGST ADDITION!

Jaz + Astrin (Troubled Lovers)

Jaz: N-No… no, no, wait, I didn’t mean to- Astrin: It doesn’t matter if you meant to. It’s done. Now, come on. We have work to do.

~ Jaz: No, I love you— Astrin: I don’t know! You’ve put so much doubt in my mind and maybe— Jaz: Don’t say it, please don’t. Astrin: Maybe I didn’t— don’t love you the way I thought I did.

~ Astrin: I can’t live without you. Jaz: You’ll have to learn to.

Callahan + Riake (The Bard and The Rogue)

Callahan: You're too good for me. Riake: I'm not good enough for you.

~

Riake: You LIED! You’re a goddamn liar! I trusted you! I told you EVERYTHING and all my words did was from the knife you stabbed me with. Callahan: Don’t say that, you’ll break my heart. Riake: I hate you. Callahan: No, you don’t. ~ Callahan: Please, my muse-- Riake: thi-this was a waste of time. you were a waste of time (Random assortment)  Cyrus: We were supposed to be together forever. don't I deserve my happy ever after too? Mossie: You do, just not with me. ~ Elina: I want to get better, I just don't know how... Rowena: That's bullshit. ~ Callahan: Why do you cry so often? Mossie: I'm sad often. Callahan: You seem so happy. Mossie: Yeah. I do. ~ Isabelle: I can’t stand it here! I don’t know why I chose to stay around. Riake: At least you had choice. I never did.

[sarah-dipitous]

Hellsite Nostalgia Tour 2023 Day 263

Rock Never Dies/Hell Bent

“Rock Never Dies”

Plot Description: Castiel and Crowley close in on Lucifer as the fallen angel realizes his new rock-star vessel allows him to get fans to do whatever he wants

This is such a huge “ask and you shall receive,” but as I thought harder on it last night, didn’t Rowena banish Lucifer to the bottom of the ocean after decaying his body a whole bunch?? How is he back already??

Would I Survive the First Five Minutes??: I would not try to summon Lucifer, I’m good

I was promised Castiel, why are we getting Dean playing Words With Friends??

The boys really do stick to small towns and whatnot. It’s gonna be weird seeing them in LA

It’s bad that you have to lie to Dean saying you’re listening to a podcast on the Protestant reformation just so you can MAYBE listen to your hair metal band (that Dean hates) in peace

You leave Castiel and his one outfit alone, Dean. You have, like, 10 and they ALL make you look like a lumberjack. Hashtag team cas

Poor Castiellllll, he’s so over working with Crowley

Oh, Cas…can’t tell the difference between the aftermath of a fight and the aftermath of a rockstar ~spending time~ with a groupie

Apparently, sometimes it does pay to have Crowley on your team. You get perspectives you never thought you would that way

How did Castiel get in with Vince/Lucifer’s band mates? The Winchesters are posing as a band themselves to Vince’s PR person, Crowley has a deal with a guy in the music industry….but Cas??

(There was a lot of just trying to get to the concert that happened that wasn’t too interesting)

I don’t wanna watch Lucifer beat the shit out of Cas and Crowley…

Ok but Sam being the one thing standing between the crowd getting out and Lucifer locking them in the venue with him??? And then Lucifer locking Sam in the venue with him???????

I AM here for Castiel beating the shit out of Lucifer and getting to repeat his “Hey, assbutt!” line

Sometimes you pause at the exact right time

Well, that didn’t last long

Ok but like…………sympathy for the devil has gone way up again “he finally apologizes for abandoning me, and what’s the very next thing he dies? Ditches me” luciiiiiiii, babyyyyyyyy. He’s really having an existential crisis and spiraling into a very “nothing fucking matters” mindset

Did Horikoshi watch supernatural when coming up with Dabi? Lucifer is really breaking down all while saying that his whole plan is to just keep breaking everything his dad created

Jesus, Crowley, you look terrible

“Hell Bent”

Plot Description: the Doctor faces the Time Lords in a struggle that will take him to the end of time

I don’t know why we’re starting in this sort of random and almost certainly fake scene between the Doctor and Clara in a 50s style diner (or not really Clara)

I know he’s on Gallifrey now but I truly do t know what’s going on

This poor Gallifrean woman who keeps getting hassled by the military and high council all while the Doctor refuses to see them…til the high council’s leader comes calling

Oooooo!!!! The Doctor telling the Gallifrean president “get off my planet.”

Ok, so not Clara and the Doctor is happening in some sort of real time and everything on Gallifrey is in the recent-ish past

Ok…I’m probably gonna Gonzo and Rizzo when the ghost of Christmas yet to come showed up, but more out of confusion than fear

Well cuz now I’m wondering if the Hybrid IS the Doctor. I know he said he was, but what about Clara? Clara who we met as Oswin in the Dalek asylum, who kept so much of her humanity while being a Dalek…whose very continued existence as the Doctor tries to save her even know could fracture all of time

We already knew I love the Daleks but hearing this one yelling out “exterminate me” is heartbreaking

Did Clara ever come up against the angels? Why would she know what to do in their presence??

I’m not ready to hear the Doctor’s answer to how long it’s been since he last saw Clara.

I’m shattered at the Doctor not telling her, Clara had to ask someone else…and it was 4.5 billion years. 4.5 BILLION. YEARS. of running and solving the puzzle and dying and reincarnating, trying to claw his way out of the confessional dial just for the chance to maybe save his best friend’s life. I am a wreck

Ohhhhhh, Doctor, you really shouldn’t have been alone so long. This is just like at the end of Ten’s time. He really believes he is the end all be all of time and existence, that he answers to no one because we’re at the last dying embers of the universe.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME WITH FOUR KNOCKS????

Not Arya is also here at the end of time.

What?? I’m ngl I’m getting a little lost in all the “who/what is the Hybrid?” theories they’re tossing around

I hate watching them say goodbye AGAIN.

Why does the Doctor and a companion who was his BEST FRIEND always have to end in a memory wipe for one of them???? There’s an emptiness and yet i can’t stop crying

Wait… is this the diner from the impossible astronaut? Is he remembering incorrectly? I knew it looked familiar

Oh, she returned his TARDIS to himmmm

I’d love to have a mini series of Clara and Not Arya’s adventures on their way to Gallifrey…

Oh thank god he has a sonic screwdriver again

[shallowseeker]

Friendly Friday ask: Jack did some things while in the womb (like learning from Kelly, giving Cas the vision of the future); were those conscious choices, automatic/subconscious responses, result of his godly powers later on, or...? [Or for an easier question: if Jack went on a date, who would be the best/worst at giving him advice?]

Happy Saturday!

Jack + from the womb

Jack's subconscious: I think the fandom-preferred/simplest explanation is that Jack's choices were subconscious, and Dagon certainly hint at that that with:

Dagon: You really thought that was gonna work? You get the chance to be Mary of Nazareth, Part 2, Evil Jesus Edition. Kelly: He's not. Dagon: Excuse me? Kelly: He's not. My baby's not evil. He saved me. Dagon: That's what you think happened? (Laughs) Uh, he saved himself. He doesn't care about you. Nothing's changed. He's born, you die. But don't worry. I'll be there, right by his side, to nurture him, love him, to help him to kill everything.

On the other hand, you could certainly argue the same thing about all human children. Does it truly love its parent in the beginning, or is simply looking to survive? For a mother to nourish it & a father to protect it from threats?

///

Jack's powers? I looove the take that his God-like powers did in fact reach into the future, as the episode is named.

But I like to think, like with Missouri Moseley and Tess Turner in 13x03, "the future isn't set in stone," and it can be misinterpreted or misunderstood, especially through your own personal lenses, hopes, and dreams.

I have some additional, thoughts about that here:

-> -> -> The events of the future kinda happened, just not for Cas

I also love to play with the thought that his powers were at work in other ways:

-> -> -> Kelly + Jack + water + taking control of the narrative

///

Jack + the classic date scenario

Your second ask is too fun! If Jack went on a date, there is not a single person in that household who wouldn't make it actively worse.

Sam has a stilted checklist of normalcy but has flashes of freakiness that would definitely not work in real life

Dean lurches into cartoonishly macho date advice that fails authenticity (his advice on love on the other hand? fantastic!)

Cas's advice veers between saccharine (a single rose! poetry!) and too much chivalry. He's also way too blunt.

And we saw what Rowena's dating life was like: "Don't be yourself. Lie."

I think...Mary gives the best advice, but that advice is simply, "Under no circumstances should you listen to Sam, Dean, or Cas on this."

[theshotsheardacrossworlds]

Smaller

Set post-5.1. Agi is asked to go undercover for the Scions while they are short staffed, which means the return of...Lala Agi. SFW.

“So, what you’re both saying is because Thancred isn’t available, Riol is overworked, and the others are spread too thin…I need to do crystal reconnaissance?” Agnes asked, dreading the answer. I hate recon. I truly hate it. I’m not good at it, and I stand out like a sore—oh no. She inwardly groaned remembering the last time she did crystal reconnaissance. Thancred’s temporary fantasia made me a lalafell. Oh dear.

“That would be correct!” Krile exclaimed. “We’ve had the same temporary fantasia made for you again—"

“Lala Agi makes a return.” Agnes sighed. Well, it won’t be too long. I hope. “La Noscea I’m guessing?”

“And the Black Shroud.” Tataru added, handing over a report to Agnes. “I have clothes for you as well as a special saddle for Horace.”

Great. “Tataru, before I take this, I want a staff that’s meant for a lalafell with my abilities, because…erm…”

Tataru’s eyes widened. “Oh Agnes, of course! I’ll have one made right away!” Tataru hurried outside of the Rising Stones, presumably to pay Rowena an exorbitant sum for a lalafell white mage staff.

Agnes and Krile shared a look and giggled. I suppose it could be worse—at least now I know I’ll be a lalafell and not taken by surprise, THANCRED.

***

To Agnes’s delight, the reconnaissance only took a few days, and Agnes even assisted the Malestrom with dealing with the smugglers.

There was just one problem.

The “temporary” fantasia would last at least another week.

Agnes wrote to Krile and Tataru that she would staying at her Mum’s until the fantasia wore off, to which they both happily agreed was a good idea. “Rest, Agi!” Tataru scribbled at the bottom of the parchment. Luci, after hugging and kissing her “little baby”, decided to leave to see her cousins in Ul’dah so Agnes could invite Estinien to spend time with her.

It would be wonderful to see him. We haven’t seen each other for over a moon. I miss him so much.

And so Agnes did just that.

Hello love,

Long story short, but I’m a lalafell again—this time for longer. I’ll be at the cottage to lay low. If you’re not busy (and you might be doing something important), you could come stay with me. If you can’t, then I completely understand, love.

Agi

***

Within a half day of her letter being sent, Agnes heard a knock on the door as she read in Luci’s chair.

“Coming!” She waddled to the door and opened it to find a long pair of legs in front of her. However, she barely had a moment to greet Estinien before he lifted her and gave her a big kiss. Oh! Agnes caressed his unshaven cheek with my very small hands.

“Hello, love.” She whispered, giving another short kiss.

Estinien’s nose rubbed against hers. “Well, well I see my lady has become a small lady. How are you, sweet girl?”

“Fairly good. Was just reading when you knocked.”

“Reading what, pray tell?” He now had her in one arm and closed the door behind him.

“Oh, just a silly little romance novel Mum left for me. She thought I might enjoy it. How are you, love?”

“Good. Been keeping myself busy with jobs and such. Aymeric also sorted out my pension, so that’s another source of income.” He placed her on the counter and opened a cabinet to remove a glass. “As a former, living Azure Dragoon I’m entitled to more than a little gil every moon. Since I know not where I’ll be, I already asked your mother if she’d hold onto it for me.”

Agnes raised an eyebrow. Does he come here that often? “Oh?”

Estinien smiled softly. “Aye, I trust Luci. Besides, stopping here means no one will know my true whereabouts.” OH REALLY?! “Not you! Not you, Agi. I swore to you that you’d always know where I am. I mean…others.” He turned up his nose. “That Baldesion woman and your coinkeeper.”

His lady bit back a laugh. “Krile and Tataru are amazingly smart and resourceful women, and I count myself lucky to be their friend.” Never get on Tataru’s bad side though. I’m sure she has bodies hidden somewhere. “Tataru even got me a smaller staff and glasses to use, while Krile gave me some clothes to wear.”

“Hmph.” Estinien huffed before sipping some water he had just poured. “They’re menaces. How did they find me in Kugane?”

Trust me, you don’t want to know. She reached for his arm and pat him. “Doesn’t matter, love. What would you like to do?”

“This may be surprising, but I’d love to go fishing. Haven’t with you in…what? Well over a year?” Putting his glass down, he then placed one large hand on either side of her and leaned to kiss her forehead. I always melt when he does that. Melt into a giant Agi-sized puddle of goo. “How does that sound? We can even pick up whatever we want to eat, lady’s choice.”

Agnes’s chocolate-brown eyes widened. “A giant platter of fried seafood?”

Estinien grinned, kissing her forehead again. “Whatever the lady desires. Assuming there’ll be enough for me in this platter?”

“Or on the platter. OOPS!” Agnes covered her mouth with one of her extremely tiny hands. Estinien barked a laugh and kissed her lips this time.

“My sweet Agi is always so funny. Tis one of the many things I love about you.” Estinien sighed, brushing his nose against hers. “I have one request.”

Just one? Agnes raised an eyebrow.

“I should like to carry you while I’m here. You’re my lady---small lady, for the moment---and I know the last time you got pissed at me for even suggesting it…” I did. I yelled at him. Not my best moment. “But you may get tired trying to keep up with me, or worse, something may attack you—”

Agnes snorted and crossed her arms over her chest. “Love, I’m the Warrior of Light, not some bloody little ragdoll!”

“I-I know. I just wish to keep you safe. That’s all.” He looks upset. No, love. Please. “Agi, I don’t think you’re helpless. I want to care for you as I always have done. But especially now because you’re very…small.” He looks like he’s almost pleading with me. Pleading me to understand. Oh, love. I do.

“Who am I to deny such a heartfelt plea? You may carry me around as you wish, love.” Agnes said with a smile. Estinien grinned and lifting her into his arms, kissing her.

“I’ll have you on my shoulder. That way you can have a nice view.”

I normally do have a nice view! Because I’m tall!

“Shall we go fishing and get your ‘giant platter of fried seafood’?”

Agnes clapped happily. “Yes! It’ll be so nice to have this time together. I’ve felt awful because I’m being pulled in so many directions—”

Estinien laughed, lifting her to hold onto one arm. “Oh Agi, you needn’t ever apologize to me. The time we share, no matter how little, is dear to me. Now, shall we go?”

Nuzzling against his cheek and holding on for dear life, Agnes nodded.

***

“Would you still love me if I looked like this all the time?” Agnes asked as she dipped a piece of fried shrimp in a spicy red sauce. The damndest things pop into my head sometimes and then I just blurt them out.

Estinien raised an eyebrow, his mouth full of calamari. “Wot?”

“If I was a lalafell…suppose the fantasia didn’t wear off and I look like this now…would you still love me?” I think I know what the answer is, but I want to hear it from him.

He swallowed and still eyed her warily. “What brought this on? You were talking about Alphinaud’s efforts in Eulmore a few minutes ago.”

She sighed dramatically. “It’s another one of those ‘strange thoughts Agi gets and can’t let it go’ things. So, please answer.” Agnes pouted, doing her best pretty please with sugar on top face.

“Fury take me,” he groaned, his face going into his hands. “First of all, you’re bloody mad sometimes.” Accurate! “Second, of course I would! I’d love you if you were a godsdamned slug! What on earth brought this on?”

Agnes threw her hands in the air. “It just popped into my head! Like, what if when G’raha summoned me to the First I somehow became a lalafell and it was permanent?! How would you feel? How would you react?!?!?!” Oh gods, now I do sound positively mad. SHUT UP, AGI.

“Woman, you drive me mad sometimes.” He rolled his eyes, groaning. “I would feel relieved because you’re alive and safe! If you were somehow made to be a lalafell for the rest of your days, then I’d love you as I do now. I’d still want to be with you. I’d still want to have children with you. I’d still long to spend every moment with you. You’ll always be my sweetheart…for as long as you’ll have me.” He smiled ruefully, taking one of her small hands in hers.

Don’t start bawling. Don’t do it. Don’t you dare, AGI!!!! With her free hand, she wiped a few tears from her eyes. “Oh gods, I mean I knew you’d feel that way, but…” her lower lip quivered. “You love me just as much as I love you.” She hopped down from her seat and ran to Estinien, who picked her up and sat her in his lap. “Gods, I love you so fucking much.” She hugged him and could hear his heartbeat. Normal and steady. So strong. And yet beneath the strength is kindness and gentleness.

Estinien rocked them slowly, an arm firmly around Agnes’s waist. “As I ever love you,” he chuckled as he ran his other hand through her hair. “Though I would absolutely insist on carrying you everywhere if you were a lalafell.”

Laughing, Agnes lightly smacked his chest. “Naughty man, you can’t possibly do that!”

He pretended to think for a moment, making her giggle. “Alright, I’ll only carry you to bed every night.”

Oh that sounds lovely!!!! She sighed happily, nuzzling his chest.

“And to the beach. And mayhap on my shoulders when out and about in Kugane. And—” He began tickling her sides.

Naughty man is teasing me! “You! You! No! No! NO! Only to bed! And if there’s bad weather! That’s it!”

He barked a laugh. “O-ho does my little lady not want to walk in the mud or snow?”

“No, thank you!” She looked up and stuck her tongue out at him, causing him to laugh heartily. After a few moments of laughter, he kissed her on the head. “But really though, I’m happy to hear that…even though I knew it. I love you.”

Estinien kissed her on the head again. “I love you too. Hey, do you mind if we go fishing tomorrow?”

“Fine with me, love.” Honestly, with how much I’ve eaten and how much I still want to eat, maybe fishing isn’t a good idea. I kind of just want to—

“I was thinking we could head back to the cottage and have a cuddle.”

YOU READ MY MIND!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! She clapped and cheered.

He began to laugh again, still keeping a firm grip on her waist. “Woman, if you wanted a damn cuddle then just tell me!” Tickling her sides, he laughed. “I’ll always cuddle you! Always!”

Always. Even when I’m very, very small.

[velvethopewrites]

This week’s fic is one of my absolute favorites. I meant to feature it last week, but I had just done the whole ‘grief’ thing previously, so I waited a bit. Sometimes I find myself reading things that have a similar theme. And sometimes a fic finds you exactly when you need it to.

Adventures in Love & Grieving by Followyourenergy (@followyourenergy)

I read this fic for the first time last year and it has stayed with me since - making me think about it on a weekly basis. And it has everything you expect to find in a @followyourenergy fic - brilliant writing, brilliant characterization, gut-wrenching emotions and humor, oh my god, so much joy about life. Once you start reading, you will not be able to stop.

You have Dean, a recent widow - barely coping and barely existing. Your heart will break for him. Dragged to a ‘group meeting’ from a flier his brother found, he is what you would expect - bitter, standoffish, annoyed (at everything) and yet still, drawn to helping people.

Enter Cas. Castiel is the leader of the group - a group for people who have lost someone - and here we meet Jody, Charlie, Cesar, Max, Rowena and Donna, and Linda. And Cas himself, although he stays out of the focus for a short while. The start of this fic is about grief - how people who haven’t lost someone just don’t get it (no matter how well meaning they are) - and about how grief basically walks into your house, messes it up and sits down to stay for awhile, sometimes forever. It’s a beautiful, thoughtful, well-written dive into the bare emotions of grief and loss.

Dean and Cas are eventually, of course, drawn to one another, and the friendship that grows between them is, quite frankly, awesome. Both men have lost and both men are incredibly lonely. They find something in each other that is truly beautiful to witness. You watch Dean, finally start to feel alive again after losing his wife - you see Castiel fight with his demons, sometimes losing, sometimes winning. The Cas in this fic is truly one of my favorites - I hold a tiny piece of him in my heart, I think, wishing I could be like him. It may sound silly to get this attached to a fictional character, but honestly this fic is just that fucking good.

The beauty of this fic, to me, is how both men eventually fall in love with each other - how neither of them even considered it possible because neither of them think they’re into men. What the author does is show you how crazy love is and how incredibly lucky we are to find it, even if it is in the place (or person) we least expect.

I honestly cannot praise this fic enough - it will take you on an incredible journey - not just with Dean and Cas, but with all the characters. You watch how they each pay tribute to their loved ones and learn to let go of their pain in different ways. You watch Sam and Jess deal with their own grief and fall apart because of it. You feel the pain of each loss as though it were your own and if you are not crying during at least half of this fic, then I suggest you get your heart checked, because it’s clearly missing. Because this fic is about more than Dean and Cas, and everyone else - this fic is about love and how it feels to lose it, but also, thank God, about how it feels to find it again.

The beauty of the words and this universe will amaze you and leave you breathless. And @followyourenergy makes it looks oh, so easy when I know it probably really wasn’t. The best writing is the writing that flows - the best writing is the writing that hides our truths, while blatantly putting them out there for the world to see. The grace at which the author handles everything astounds me every time I read this fic and by the end of it you will feel changed - grief, losing love, finding love, hell, just struggling to get out of bed sometimes, is what makes us all human. And it is a journey we all must take at some point in our lives, because we will all lose people close to us no matter how much we lie to ourselves. Surprisingly, for a story about loss, in the end this fic makes me laugh and feel human and hopeful and full of so much…love. It’s amazing. Five out Five Bees: 🐝🐝🐝🐝🐝 to one of my favorite authors.

omg it’s FAN FICTION FRIDAY

Reblog and promote a fic of yours <3

[roublardise]

hii bestie, for the characters ask: share your thoughts on rowena 👀

thank u omg yes

How I feel about this character

I can’t believe she’s from spn bc hello?????? How is she so great. I think I went off about her once about how basically I kept expecting spn to undermine her powers with new characters showing up etc. But they didn’t and she’s like.... she’s the most powerful witch. She survived Lucifer twice. She brought HERSELF back from the dead. She’s QUEEN of Hell.

She’s so bitchy and even when she’s TFW’s friend she doesn’t suddenly become super soft or anything.

She’s introduced by drinking tea with dead people stuck on her ceiling. I am in love with her. I want her to be my mom.

All the people I ship romantically with this character

I don’t think I ship her romantically with anyone tbh?? None of the people she’s been set up with in canon bc she’s arospec lesbian actually. Oscar was mistaking being grateful with romantic love ; Lucifer was worshipping power and rebellion ; Gabriel was about sex ; Ketch was being bored by the end of the world. I’ve heard some people ship Rowena with Sam but Sam is her apprentice I can’t see it at all. 

BUT I’ve been introduced to Rowena/Mary and honestly I’m listening very closely!!! I love the potential of it. It’s not smth I ship like... strongly. But it’s the ship with Rowena that I enjoy the best, and tbh the only ship with Rowena I enjoy actually! Rowena is girlboss4girlboss!!

My non-romantic OTP for this character

I’m gonna say Rowena & Jack’s dynamic. She sees him and goes “ok you are my nephew now” and she IS. She’s his aunt!!!!

I loved what they did with Sam getting into magic and the Lucifer thing. And I love Rowena & Dean dynamic bc she is the mother of his ex and it’s funny. And I love Rowenna & Cas dynamic I want more of that!!

But what makes me feel the most was truly the way Rowena handled Jack after his meltdown. No shade to Mary but she truly handled the autistic kid very very badly. Whereas Rowena respected his space, heard him out, stayed calm, all while slowly pushing him into talking to TFW bc that was the thing to do in this situation. And ig a lot of it was intended as like... Rowena realizing Jack’s power and not wanting to risk dying?

But I truly see it as Rowena caring for Jack bc she can see he’s just a boy, and being able to... see that forcing his hand won’t work at all with Jack. Like she sees the kid, but she sees the person, and each person has their own way to react to things. She’s not infantillizing him in the “I know best listen to me” way.

And maybe it reminds her of Fergus and how bad a mother she was, and here it’s a way for her to.. not to make it up, but to do better. I think Rowena would be a good mother actually - if she had a kid because she wanted to, and now that she’s learned love isn’t weakness.

My unpopular opinion about this character

I have no idea what would be unpopular lmao. I haven’t seen Rowena posts which pissed me off (yet?). I just think she’s perfect and never did anything wrong and the Rowena & Crowley dynamic is truly one family dynamic spn nailed. When she appeared I was like “omg boring the evil mother another redhead blablabla” but joke’s on me!!!!!!

Her makeups & outfits are always so epic honestly Rowena....... I wanna be your apprentice teach me the girlboss ways. If I was a demon in Hell and Rowena was queen? I’d prob have a fling with her and she’d break my heart and I’d thank her.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon.

I don’t have specific things bc honestly the fact she survived all the show is already like.... everything I could have asked for. Especially with her queen of Hell ending.

However what I want is: a girlboss evil team spin off. Rowena & Ruby & Meg & Bela (as a demon by now).

It’s wayward sisters but with these extremelly morally grey characters. They kill abusers but not only. They’re manipulating people to get what they want. They mostly just wanna survive ; it’s fight or flight, not revenge. They drink wine and paint each other nails and gossip about hunters. It’s not a “life was a bitch with me so I’m gonna be a bitch”. It’s more a “idc about anything but helping myself bc you only have yourself in this life”. But then they have each other <3 And idk there’s some plot about Hell or hunters or whatever and they see Mary often I think Mary would join the team eventually.

Belphegor is a regular side character bc I love him and I also think Rowena would make him her nephew in 0.2sec. Some others can also appear from time to time but it’s not their show it’s about evil-ish sapphics.

[aoitrinity]

Why Do I Have to Feel Like a Fucking Conspiracy Theorist -- OR -- How I Find a Semblance of Peace on Sunday Night

I’m also going to start this out with a GIANT DISCLAIMER.

I am about to theorize about what may have happened to the SPN finale. I have absolutely no insider knowledge. I am merely speculating here based on the panels and a bunch of Twitter and Tumblr posts that I have been reading over the last few days. If you are not in a good place to read such things, TURN BACK PLEASE. Go take care of yourself and your mental health. You and your feelings are valid and deserve to be handled gently right now.

Additionally, if you are here to give me shit for being unhappy with the ending, please walk away as well. I am here to reach out and share my feelings with people who might be struggling to make sense of something that upset some of us in very deep-seated ways. I am not here to bother you or critique you or tell you that you’re lesser because you liked the ending. If you felt it was good, then go enjoy it.

Long-ass post beneath the cut, everyone.

Alrighty folks...I debated whether or not to do this because I have been spiraling down the hell that is the SPN finale since Thursday. The travesty of what happened to our show--to this beloved show that seemed to have been so perfectly and precisely written for at least four years that it had basically already paved its own tarmac on which to land its plane and we all thought we knew exactly what we were going to get. And then we didn’t. We had a nigh Cas-less and entirely Eileen-less ending. We had no goodbye between Cas and Jack. We had Dean dying young after finally finding his freedom, only to ascend to heaven with no one but Bobby. We had the weird, weird, weird incest-y death scene. We had the bridge crane shot thing because...sure. You do you, Robert Singer.

It was so terrible, so truly awful, and I couldn’t seem to square any of it with anything we had known going in. I tossed and turned and cried and didn’t eat or sleep all weekend. I spent hours just reloading tumblr and twitter, going to the Misha panel, reading and reading and listening and trying to figure out what the fucking hell is going on because I needed to know exactly where to direct my anger. And after a fuckton of talking with @winchester-reload, I think we have at least a very plausible theory about what happened here--I’m laying it out below as much for my own peace of mind as anything else, because otherwise all of these thoughts are going to continue to spin around in my head for weeks and I won’t be able to do jack shit.

Now to start off, unfortunately I do think Dean was slated to die from the beginning of this season. I don’t know WHY they thought that was the best way to go, and I wish they had listened to Jensen on this one. Part of me wonders if it was an order from on high based on the discussion between Becky and Chuck earlier this season--the writers knew it wasn’t a great choice, but they were trying to signal to us that we should feel free to write our own endings to the story because they’d be better (I can wax poetic on the signs of why many of the writers probably wanted Dean to live, but that’s another post). I’m not defending that choice by any means, just laying it out there that I think they didn’t necessarily all want to kill Dean like they did.

However, what I THINK I can explain now is what happened with Misha and why we got so jerked around with Cas’s story. Consider what we know (I can’t immediately source all of it, but I did my best):

At the end of episode 15x19, Lucifer has been returned to the Empty after being killed AGAIN. He talks with Cas. Maybe harasses him a bit about Dean, idk. But then...Jack shows up. New God Jack. And he picks up Cas and pulls him out of the Empty, leaving Lucifer behind, because seriously. Fuck that guy (also leaving behind his abusive father is character growth for Jack, so yay for that).

-Misha was contracted to film 15 episodes this season. He was only in 14.

-Misha told Michael Sheen he had to go back to film 1.5 episodes after the shutdown in March. (Starts at 6:13)

-Misha was in Vancouver during filming of the finale.

-Mark P said at Darklight Con that the last scene he filmed was with Alex and Misha (and Mark P was only in episode 19).

-Misha implied that he was present for various filming moments, including Dean’s death (start at 35:15), and said that it felt like a “mini-reunion.”

-Various sources have mentioned that Jimmy Novak was supposed to be in the finale.

-After episode 18, Stands tweeted a fan who was angered and hurt by Cas's death that they could talk about the “bury the gays” issue after the finale aired.

-In episode 19 we know there were takes of the parking lot scene where the only thing fans observing could hear was Dean yelling “CAS” at Chuck (fuck I can’t find this one right now, but it’s definitely out there)

-Also in episode 19, we had a very strange, awkward montage at the end of the episode.

-In episode 20, we know there were a FUCKTON of missing scenes

-We also had no opening montage, but three other separate montages.

-Carry on My Wayward Son was played TWICE, back-to-back at the end of the episode.

-Episode 20 was shorter than normal and had surprisingly little dialogue. The pacing was VERY strange.

-The cast and crew has been almost completely silent about the finale since it came out. When they have spoken, it has been with an awkward excuse of “Uh...COVID?”

-Samantha Ferris has specifically noted that, despite the Harvelle’s being back in play and a big heaven reunion having been planned pre-COVID, neither she nor Chad Lindberg received any such invitation to return.

-Cas and Dean POP Funko figures were pictured together in a replica of Harvelle’s in 15x04.

NOW with all of this in mind (and I’m probably missing some stuff too because there is so much--feel free to add on to that list), please bear with me because here is what I think we were SUPPOSED to get POST-COVID (after it was determined that the reunion couldn’t happen because of the virus):

In episode 20, we start with our NORMAL OPENING MONTAGE, like always. It traces everything that happened during the season. We are reminded of Cas. The confession. Rowena. Eileen. Jack. Billie, God, the Empty, all of it. 

Things then follow along in the episode where they did up until Dean dies and wakes up in heaven. After his conversation with Bobby, he drives off to find Cas (who, in the script, was listed as “Jimmy Novak” in order to protect against script leaks--who wouldn’t want to do their best to avoid spoilers about the finale with the wrapping of a fifteen-year show?). He does indeed find Cas. We get Dean’s end of the confession. Hell, maybe we even get a kiss. And then Dean sets up his new heaven home in the recreated Harvelle’s. Maybe Cas even fucking moves in. 

Years pass. We get Sam having his life on Earth (still can’t explain why they cut Eileen and couldn’t even have Sam signing vaguely to the blurry brunette in the background; if anyone wants to take that on, go for it). Eventually, Cas tells Dean that it’s almost Sam’s time. Dean takes Baby and goes to meet Sam at the bridge. The cover of Carry on My Wayward Son plays during this much shorter sequence. End of episode.

But that’s not what we got. Instead, much of what I just wrote about was excised from the episode. The remnants were stitched together after shooting had been wrapped. Filler was added in the form of montages and long, unnecessary extra shots to get the episode to something approaching a reasonable length. 

But why? Why would they spend all that time and money and quarantining on Misha, only to almost completely cut him out of the finale? I struggled with why the fuck the CW would want this mammoth show to go down as the greatest queerbait in TV history when they had the chance to do something truly beautiful and monumental with it? It couldn’t just be sheer homophobia, right? Well, I think that factored into it, my friends, but here is where my head is at right now.

It was about cold, hard cash.

Now I could be wrong, but this is what I’m thinking at the moment: Supernatural is going off of the air. Supernatural, the CW’s cash cow for fifteen years. Sure there is still money to be made on blu-rays and merchandise and cons...but they need people watching their shows. They need that sweet advertising revenue. And you know what show they have about to premiere? A show that could, potentially, bring with it a chunk of that SPN revenue?

Walker.

And if any of you know anything about the original Walker Texas Ranger, you know that the show was predominantly a show about a very heterosexual white man being very excessively heterosexual. And for SOME REASON over the years, many of the execs at the CW still seem to think that this show, Supernatural, is really attractive to a lot of middle-American white men...whom they desperately want to watch this new show with this guy from Supernatural that they already know.

Now here’s where COVID fucked us. I think Destiel was greenlit by TPTB, at least in SOME form, before COVID. But then the pandemic happened, and they panicked. They got the cut of the last two episodes and watched them in their original, probably queer form. And then, the execs at CW looked at the economy. They looked at their cash cow, about to make its journey to the great beyond. And they looked at this new little calf Walker that they were so desperately worried about. And they made a choice.

They decided that it would be too risky to take the step with Destiel. They were worried about frightening off their ever-so-valuable hetero male demographic with the possibility that a traditionally masculine man in his 40s could be in love with another man in an overt way. It was homophobia mixed with greed, spun up by fear for their revenues because of COVID.

So they called in Singer, possibly Dabb, although I wouldn’t be surprised if they went straight to Singer. They told them that Destiel had to go: executive orders. And the only way to make it go in a way that removed any trace of what had been there was to rewrite what happened to Cas and cut him out from the last two episodes entirely. It was too late to reshoot anything. They had to just cut and stitch and fill with bullshit montages. 

They removed the scene at the end of 19, probably because Cas and Lucifer discussed Dean. All that was left of Misha there was his voice on that fake phone call. They may have cut other things too, but I would bet my life that they cut a scene from the end of the episode and replaced it with that very strange montage. Then they moved onto 20. They cut out every scene with Cas. And left in only two platonic mentions of him, neither made by Dean. They tried to imply that Cas might show up in Dean’s heaven at some point, but that was as far as the editors could go in the time they had. They filled in with montages, awkwardly long shots, anything they could do to fill all of those missing scenes.

And they even had to take the opening montage, because literally everything in it pointed to Cas being there at the end of it all. They wouldn’t be able to leave out his scenes, they were too critical to the season. They couldn’t cut his confession without raising eyebrows. So they cut the whole thing and moved “Carry On My Wayward Son” to one of the newly-added driving montages at the end. Which is why we awkwardly had both songs play back-to-back--again, such a strange choice unless they were out of options and couldn’t exactly buy rights to a new track or compose anything else.

And so we were left with the shadow of the finale that we deserved, that Cas and Dean deserved. We were left without resolution or happiness or words. Bobo told us the most important thing about happiness is just “saying it” and our characters were silenced without anyone ever knowing the truth.

I think the writers might have known and been given the new party line that “Misha never filmed, he couldn’t, sorry, it was COVID, no one’s fault!” But I don’t think most of the cast even knew it had happened until they watched the finale on Thursday with us (though they might have been confused why the bit from 15x19 was sliced, they could reasonably have assumed it was a time thing and also BL episodes don’t make sense anyway). Why do I say that?

Well, first of all, Misha started sending out a bunch of excited texts to fans with some old BTS pictures about an hour before the show started airing on EST. He also wanted his children to see the episode, his YOUNG children. Why would he show them such a traumatic episode if their Dad wasn’t in it? What if it was because he wanted them to witness what was going to be a monumental moment in queer television history that their DAD got to be a part of? And then that was all dashed.

Which is why I think the cast and crew went almost completely radio silent the next day. I don’t think they knew. And based on how they have been acting on social media since then, I think many of them are absolutely furious, but they have been silenced because of NDAs, because they want to find work again in a cutthroat industry, because they don’t want to bring down the hellfire of Warner Brothers Entertainment upon themselves. So the most we have gotten is a little acknowledgement from the MERCHANDISING COMPANY trying to validate our pain (god bless Shirts, she is a LIFESAVER) and a response to my salty tweet about keeping good stuff in the closet from Adam Williams (the VFX coordinator) that seemed to acknowledge the validity of my complaint.

Then there was a scramble behind the scenes, I would bet my life. Talking points were fed to the boys who had panels today, to CE, to all the cast and crew:

Toe the party line. Misha never filmed. This was always about COVID. Do not mention Destiel. Do not mention Dean’s feelings for Cas. Do not promote the Castiel Project or anything that validates the idea that this was anything less than a superb ending.

And that is why we have heard so little from the cast on this front, and what we have heard has been muddled and contradictory. That is why the writers are saying nothing. That is why we have been left adrift.

Now before I close this out, I do want to say that I really, genuinely do not think this was on the writers at all. I feel like they tried to give us the best ending that they could, in a writers room that we know is notorious for splitting along party lines about the overall story (BL and Singer, who have always been about the brothers and their man-pain vs. Dabb and the rest who always seemed to want more for them and for Cas). I think they did everything in their power to at least end with Dean and Cas happy together. If they could give us nothing else, they wanted to give us that. And then the network took it from them. From us. From everyone.

For the sake of fucking money. 

And the WORST PART OF IT ALL, for me, is that in the wake of this disaster, the fans have been left to try and figure out what happened. We have had to wade through a mire of conflicting information in the midst of all of our collective anger and grief over this garbage ending of a show many of us have loved and even relied on for YEARS, all the while wondering if we’re just fucking crazy, if we have all fallen collectively into the hole of conspiracy theories. That hurts ESPECIALLY badly because we have taken so many hits over the years from other groups on social media saying we were crazy for seeing things that weren’t there (especially Destiel), for writing meta and analyzing tropes and believing the evidence of our eyes and ears. The network has made us relive that entire nightmare WHILE processing our grief for a show we wanted so badly to celebrate and which instead we now have to mourn.

So again guys, I cannot prove that this is exactly what happened at all; this is simply my idea of what may have happened. But right now, it’s the most sense I can make from this mess, and to be honest, the act of typing it out has helped me enormously in my processing of it all. I feel like I can see more clearly, like I know where to target my outrage and where to direct empathy. I feel like just fucking maybe, I might be able to do my job tomorrow without bursting into tears at random moments. 

I really hope that this post has helped some of you to, in some small way, process this too. We get through this the way that Misha told us at his panel this morning, the way the writers have told us to do all season long...we throw out the story God gave us and we make it better. We write our characters the happy endings they deserve. 

We save them.

One last thing--if you have not already, please consider channeling your rage into a donation to one of the five causes our fandom has put together to pay tribute to our beloved show and to mourn the ending it should have had:

-The Castiel Project

-Dean Winchester is Love

-Sam Winchester Project

-The National Association of the Deaf

-The Jack Kline Project

[wcrriorhearts]

Even though Aemma had never met her mother, she was said to be a lot like her. Less easy to frighten and smarter, as Daemon liked to point out, because he had heard stories of her mother’s slow wits, yet she possessed the same gentle nature of the princess and had often felt utterly misplaced at the Eyrie, where everyone was cold, rough edges and blunt humor. She had stood out like a sore thumb, with her silver hair, pale complexion and lavender hues. Yet - it was home and the Keep had never felt like it so far. Aemma loved her cousins, her grandmother and many of the people who served her, but she still got homesick, even after four years here. It hurt her to know that she was forcing Rowena to stay here, who did not fit in at the Keep and was a child of the Vale through and through. Less rough in her presence, but strong, resilient, independent and stubborn. A perfect match for her brother with equal character, who had never been quite interested in his youngest sister. Aemma blamed it on the age gap she had to most of her siblings and was grateful that Darnold allowed Rowena to stay so far from home. Not that he thought he truly had a say in the matter. Her friend could be rather headstrong.

“And what information would that provide them with, my dearest Rowena? That I love you like a sister? They already know that, it is not a secret”, Aemma replied and smiled over at the other, reaching out to place a bit of foam on the older woman’s nose in jest. She knew the walls had ears here, but it mattered not to the girl if anyone knew she refrained from using titles within the walls of her own chambers. It was silly to her to cling on to something that essentially meant nothing. They were just empty words that some people pretended were a birthright and made them better than others, but Aemma believed that actions alone should be responsible for how highly one was regarded. So she thought little of titles and was not willing to let anyone she considered a close friend use them in private moments, because she was just like them. Just a girl, who happened to have been the daughter of a princess, nothing more. She would much rather be regarded as a good person, than royalty.

The idea of being examined by a midwife was utterly dreadful, but probably long overdue. Aemma didn’t like to be fussed over, and liked it even less when unfamiliar hands touched her, so she had warded off any attempts of the Grand Maester to ensure her health, by merely proclaiming that she was well and needed no medical attention. Grandmother Alysanne had laughed at it more than once and let the girl be. She had not suffered greatly in the first moon cycles of her pregnancy and was only just now beginning to feel unwell, with all the aches and pains keeping her up at night. And with it came the looming darkness of fear that she might suffer her mother’s fate and die in a few short weeks, or even days. No one could quite predict when the babe would come. Sighing, she leaned her head back, but nodded. “If it calms your mind, my darling. I shall be seen by the midwife. Hopefully she’ll tell me that it is over soon. I am growing quite weary of being in pain every day and waddling about the Keep like a tortoise.” Her hand reached out to find Rowena’s and she squeezed it gently. “I am sure you will be with child soon, my dear. But for that I must send you back home, mustn’t I? Babe’s unfortunately only come into existence with the help of men, who are utterly useless at everything else, but find their true calling in the marriage bed. Luckily Viserys doesn’t even dream of touching me these days. It is not one of my more favored past times. The only good part about it is that it’s most often over quickly and I can go about the rest of my night.” She laughed and sat up in the tub, before standing slowly, so that she could get out of the water and start the day.

The Vale suited Rowena in a way that King’s Landing never did. She was better with the open sky above her; it softened the severe lines of her features and lightened her heart so she was less quick with her barbs, more patient with the faults of others. Her husband Darnold did not love her with passion, but they respected one another, and he gave her the run of the household, which functioned as smoothly as any barracks with her hand on the helm. If it was not for Aemma Rowena would never have left her mountain holdfast; she had never been the sort of woman who longed for travel, and the Vale was adventure enough for her. The Old King had called, however, for his niece, and had arranged her wedding, so Rowena had little choice - nor, of course, did Aemma.

It was not that Rowena was a stranger to marriages arranged in that way; her own father, Lord Corbray, cared little for the prospects of his daughter, but her mother was ambitious and had long been close to Lord Rodrik’s first wife; the two women had decided that their children would wed when they were both still being coddled by their wetnurses. She had been raised to become Lady Arryn, and had never expected to be swept off her feet. In fact, she would have mistrusted any man who tried. But she had been seventeen when she was wed, and a tall, well-built girl of seventeen, with a confident demeanor and a no-nonsense attitude that rapidly established her position in her husband’s life. Aemma was not weak - never weak, and Rowena would shout down anyone who suggested she was - but she took after her mother Daella, who had been a slender, pretty, frightened thing, so terrified of the winds in the rafters of the Eyrie that she had wept piteously on her first ascent. Rowena felt a surge of protectiveness whenever she thought of Aemma’s condition, and this morning was no different.

Rowena echoed her charge’s smile, pleased despite herself to see Aemma so full of life. “The gardens are lovely today,” she confirmed as she directed the maids and then shooed them from the room. “Darnold writes that the Stone Crows have been making braver sorties close to the Gates of the Moon, but he does not sound too concerned.” She would like the chance to talk to Aemma alone before the duties of the Court claimed her. She dampened the soft cloth in the warm bath water and began to gently wash Aemma’s back, her head tilted to one side in concentration, and smiled gently at her. “You know that I am your sister. But it is good to maintain our courtesies, even when we think we are alone. You never know who is listening and storing up information, especially in the Red Keep.” Luckily they were close to the warm fire, and the gentle sloshing of the water would drown out any sound. Rowena sighed and sat back on her heels, allowing Aemma to simply soak for a few moments if she so desired. She dried her hands on the blue velvet of her gown, for a moment looking younger than her usual stiff demeanor allowed. “A walk in the gardens may ease the ache in your back,” she said. “But then I must insist you allow the midwife to check you over, my love. You know that I have not had children," not yet, she told herself, trying to repress the small flush in her cheeks, as my mother constantly reminds me, "and I may miss certain signs…I would not want you to become unwell under my watch.” At least Rowena had found a woman who seemed trustworthy, a clean and kind older lady from near Rosby. Much better than the leering Maesters the Old King kept about him.

[castielmacleod]

I was reading that post about the 12x23 Crowley conundrum and. It’s not that I necessarily disagree with the actor man on his own character but……. lol I kind of do actually. I feel a bit insane over how he doesn’t seem aware of how. Soft? He actually played Crowley sometimes. I mean Crowley definitely likes winning, but idk you can’t convince me that it’s ALL he cared about, especially toward the end. And I think that the growth of the character from just wanting to win, along with the instances where he actually does care about other things are actually very important?

Like I actually do genuinely believe he cared about Rowena. Not on a personal level, maybe, but on a deep traumatised level where he is still desperate for her affection and approval despite everything. I do think that he felt so incredibly, painfully lonely and unloved that he formed a genuine romantic attachment to Dean that haunted him right up to his suicide. I don’t think he ever actually hated Cas at any point, and past season 8 he is actually an surprisingly reliable ally to Cas whenever Cas needs his help. And I truly believe that Crowley actually did on some level want to better himself, to be different. In 10x23 he says he thought that by doing better and making changes to himself then maybe he’d feel something again. He doses himself with human blood throughout season 9, also presumably to feel something—feel things more deeply, at least, than he’s able to as a demon. And of course 8x23 is where we learn that underpinning all of Crowley’s actions is actually an overwhelming desire to be loved. It’s actually kind of notable that it ISN’T the desire to win that comes up in that scene, because he could have had the same break down, cried about how he deserves to win, he just wants to win. It still would have been kind of sad, at least to me. But instead that scene was about love and it instantly added so much more dimension to him. And I think “ultimately just wants to be loved” is a way more deep and compelling thesis for Crowley than “literally does not care and only wants to win” could ever be.

Mark seems to have a very divided view of where Fergus ends and Crowley begins, and in some ways I agree—Fergus is not Crowley. But I think Crowley is Fergus. To me Crowley is, when it comes down to it, still the 8 year old boy who was abandoned by his mother all those centuries ago. You can literally see that little boy on his face when Rowena is talking to him sometimes. That’s why it’s like… even if Crowley thinks he doesn’t care about Rowena, even if he tries to compartmentalise her as Fergus’ mother, not his—he very much actually does care. Visibly. It’s weird to me that of all the people to not really recognise that, it’s the guy actually standing in front of the camera making it so that Crowley visibly cares. Not just about Rowena, but about Cas, and Dean. All people he can’t get over.

And I mean Crowley’s plotlines definitely started getting worse in his last few seasons. By which I mean just fucking awful and unbelievably stupid. They really did strip him completely of his cleverness and charisma and temper and it is a brutal defanging honestly. It’s hard to believe smug permasmile unblinking sits-in-chairs-backwards blatantly gay “under a frigging spotlight” clean-shaven Crowley is even the same physical person as later seasons Crowley and I don’t mean that in a “wow character development” way but in a “oh they literally just stopped writing him” way. And like I’m a very melancholy person so I actually don’t even hate the whole depressive spiral Crowley ends up in, it breaks my heart in just the right way and it’s part of the reason I am so especially attached to Crowley as it is (like I always loved him but as soon as they started making me THAT fucking sad about him. Whew.) I think his depression is something that could have been meaningful to his character development and actually done well if 1. it hadn’t come at the cost of at LEAST his smarts (and I know very well how depression can wipe the floor with you and hollow you out into a shell of your former self, but they literally could have at least let him keep his bloody wits about him if nothing else) and 2. it had actually been acknowledged by the show that yes, he is depressed, and 3. it had led into a real proper resolution to the redemption arc they literally put him on instead of letting it putter out into nothing by making the Winchesters continuously refuse to give him the time of day despite everything he kept doing and giving up for them. If the writers had kept ACTUALLY writing him then the depression would have felt purposeful and not this anticlimatic wasting away until Crowley just kills himself.

(Furthermore not a single one of his interactions with Lucifer should have happened and I mean not a SINGLE one. Just throw all of that out. At a minimum though if Lucifer were to end up in Crowley’s captivity then he would have hacked the bloody hell out of him like he did to Samandriel and Gadreel and that’s that.)

And…. please forgive me for saying this but I actually. God I’m sorry. I actually agree with removing the “even when I lose I win” line in the canon context of Crowley’s death. If Crowley had been better written in s12 I would have no issues but I cannot stress enough that there was literally no winning for him at any point in that season, and ESPECIALLY in his death. I very strongly read his suicide as due to him being miserable and repeatedly rejected by the people he cares about and I think that spell was a convenient excuse for him to get it over with. If that’s just my take then okay, but that is really how it comes off to me. And I mean the spell doesn’t even work right away—Lucifer still has time to come out through the portal and murder Cas before Mary pushes him back in but he literally could have escaped! (And later does escape, when the Winchesters reopen🫣 the portal 🫣🫣🫣 to rescue Mary). And ultimately it all makes Crowley’s entire sacrifice kind of pointless. I’m sorry to say that when he lost he lost. And I will never not be bitter about it