#well...... after 10 years i'm back to the spn fandom

[jenesenackles]

SUPERNATURAL cr. Eric Kripke › 1.01 Pilot (2005)

[the-east-art]

Easts Supernatural Rant

Just been thinking a lot about how bad Supernatural is lately because I've been going through the weeds reading old fics I've bookmarked and there's some good SPN ones. Background info: I watched SPN nonstop in middle school (roughly ten years ago) and if you go back in time you'll see that it was the fandom I was in way back when I first made my tumblr. I watched until about... season 10? When I realized it was never going to actually get good. So I was really obsessed with it for a good while but also it has been quite a while since I actually watched it.

rant under the cut o7

Okay so anyone who has watched Supernatural knows that it didn't start out actually so... bad. Supernatural starts out decent and builds up momentum fine in my memory clear through the final of season 5. I feel like among the fandom most people know that this should have been the ending of the series. For those reading who don't know, Swan Song ends with a really beautiful monologue about endings and in a tragedy with just enough of a glimmer of hope. Like it's a good ending. And then the series just kept going. do not get me wrong - there's a lot of fun episodes and concepts explored in the *checks notes* holy shit 10 FUTURE SEASONS, but it's also where a lot of the cracks really get bad.

However, in my opinion the biggest issue with Supernatural as the seasons progress is how whittled down the cast becomes. In the first few seasons there are a lot of supporting cast that you really get attached to - there's a bar for hunters, Bobby's place, a whole network of people connected to the principle cast.

While naturally the core of the series is Dean and Sam (and eventually Castiel) almost all of the supporting cast dies. And while I think the death is good in several ways, it really pushes the stakes of the series, especially in the earlier seasons where death truly was final and wasn't a joke. However you can only kill the supporting cast for so long until the show becomes... lonely. Messy. You start to not want to get attached to new characters because of how you know they'll probably die and then not get mentioned again. Many characters after their death just kind of... fade into the background never to be seen. While I don't believe that characters need to be mourned forever, you can't help but to feel that they are dropped for convenience of the show.

This has been on my mind because, as I've been poking around the annals of ao3 looking for diamonds in the rough, I've realized that really any fics that take place in any of the later seasons (let's say 8-15) to me might as well be a different show. It's a show heralded by characters I either don't know (Griffin Mcelroy meme of 'I don't know who Jack Kline is and at this point I'm too afraid to ask) or are character so completely reshaped by the narrative that I no longer recognize them (Castiel the character that just kind of does whatever will make the story interesting I'm looking at you).

What previously is a respectable narrative becomes blown out of proportion. I was reading a fic that dealt a lot with the themes of 'free will' and what that means and how do we try and exercise it, and I realize that I forgotten that, at one point, free will had been the theme of the series. The principle trio in the fandom is called Team Free Will because of that, but pretty much after season 5 all of that is thrown out the window. The first third of the series the boys are fighting against fate, and prophecy, and roles that they have been assigned to. But in the latter part of the series, as the narrative web spins further out of control, you lose that theming.

I mostly talk about this because I kind of find it interesting to look at. About what is engaging to me as a person, and what is a red flag. What I like in a story and what I don't. And I am chiefly reminded of moments where the series drops plot point, or muddies messaging (I have been reminded what The Voicemail is and how it is never addressed). And It's sad. Because I really REALLY loved the show once, and cared for the characters. And now I take refuge in fanfiction, because a lot of the aspects of the story and settings and characters hold SO MUCH potential, that is ruined in the source material.

Uhhhh yeah. Let me know what you think and let me know if have any questions about my opinions on stuff cuz I LOVE talking about art and narrative and stories. Or let me know if you want Fanfic recs because hell yeah I do.

[zepskies]

Hey Lovely! For the ask game, I'm requesting #4, #7, and #24.

Thanks!! ❤️

Well hello there, friend! 🥰

Oh my, good questions...

Hahaa oh lord. I mean, how much time do you have? 🤣 I have entire files worth of ideas from different fandoms that I've even gone so far as to outline, but have never gotten around to writing.

I think the first ones that come to my head are two series ideas in the Smallville fandom:

Hanging By a Moment - Clark Kent x OC

Summary: The path of Clark Kent’s life changed drastically after he turned sixteen. It was choice, it was happenstance, it was destiny—all in one. He didn’t know it yet, but it was always going to be her.

(Yes, title is based on the song by Lifehouse. 😂)

Keep Holding On - Jason Teague x OC

Summary: Try as Jason might, he just couldn’t compare to Clark Kent. Not in Lana’s eyes at least. Elena is the casualty of war, caught in between.

Both sound very melodramatic now that I read the summaries next to one another. 😂 The main reason why I haven't written these, I guess, is because I feel like the Smallville fandom has mostly died out. Tumblr especially doesn't really support OCs as much as reader inserts, and these stories both needed to be OCs to give me the freedom to create as much backstory and character as I wanted to.

Oh a DEEP CUT you say? 🤣 Oh God, I've been writing since I was about 10 or 11 years old (and let me tell you, it was heinous).

I think my very first fanfic was for an anime called Rurouni Kenshin. It was an AU set in present time. It was that cliché thing where the heroine is sitting at a bar and is getting hit on, but she doesn't give the guy the time of day until her boyfriend (the main male lead of the show) shows up.

That character was known for being a spitfire, so she was good at putting people in their place lol. Her boyfriend is the more mild-mannered of the two, but still very protective, so I guess that's where the idea came from in my kid brain. I've long ago deleted that story off FF.net because it was so damn bad.

My first SPN fanfic, however, can be found here on Ao3. It's also pretty rough because I wrote it back in high school when I was first watching the show, first on FF.net, then transferred it over later to Ao3.

Another interesting question... 🤔

It can take me a bit to get myself into that creative headspace, but when I'm working on a one-shot, I tend to power through the draft until I finish it in a day, maybe two if it's long (5,000+ words let's say).

If we're talking about a series, I try to knock out at least a chapter at a time in one writing session, which could take me a couple hours or several more, depending on length and how detailed my outline is, if I need to do additional research, etc.

If I really have a good flow going, sometimes I can knock out 2-3 chapters in a day. I'll have a solid 1-3 hour writing session towards the beginning of the day, take a break for a few hours, run some errands, go on a walk, have a meal, and come back to it later. I tend to do the bulk of my writing in the afternoon and throughout the night.

Thanks again for asking these questions, lovely!! 😘💜 Always happy to answer.

[hornystiel]

tagged by @thisisapaige thank youu 💙

20 Questions for Writers

1. How many works do you have on AO3? 6 (i'm new to posting my stuff there)

2. What's your total AO3 word count? 33,807

3. What fandoms do you write for? Spn, tho back in the day i wrote weird ass crossover things for some games + comics + films and manga lmao. and none of those were in english

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

dressing down, shotgunning gone right, a couple of firsts, dancing moves, chipped coin

5. Do you respond to comments? i try to respond to all of them, even if with just a thank you, and i cherish them all very much

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? umm for now it's dancing moves i guess? because it's very open and they're nowhere near done resolving their issues

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? a couple of firsts. they will be fine and they will have a lot of sex :3

8. Do you get hate on fics? not that i know of? i mean in the comments everybody is very nice :')

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind? WELL. the thing is. i only read and write fics with smut because yolo carpe diem and i love smut and i think when it's well written it adds A LOT to the characters. or i just want to read steamy stuff for my own benefit hehe. anyway yes i write it and it can be anything really, but usually it's on the verge of desperate and they're very obsessed with each other. i'm also a monsterfucker and love wing kink so that too. aaand i like writing d/s dynamics <3

10. Do you write crossovers? in my earlier days - yes, i've written a couple but it's just some bits somewhere in my folders and only one person besides me saw them. in spn fandom i'm not really interested in it

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen? not that i know of and i don't think i'm that popular lmao

12. Have you ever had a fic translated? as of now - nope

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before? no and i honestly don't think i'll be able to because i'm too protective and too 'it should be my way and style and nothing else' person so i'd be a nightmare to co-write with

14. What’s your all time favorite ship? destiel (duh) and mckirk (so many years have passed and yet they still hold a place in my heart)

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will? idk i have hope that i will be able to finish them all eventually. but probably the 'Skating Gays' fic because i can't focus enough to do a proper research on all figure skating shit and i don't want to write it half blindly and also in my head it's like at least 40k long and it intimidates me because i usually write much shorter stuff

16. What are your writing strengths? dialogues and smut (or i hope so at least)

17. What are your writing weaknesses? can't stay motivated and focused to write Big Works and probs the whole 'what's around the characters' descriptions

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic? i'm bilingual myself with knowledge of bits and pieces in other languages and it doesn't bother me even if it's in a language i don't know, it can even be left without any footnotes if the meaning of this bit is for the audience/another character to fail to understand the character speaking. other than that i can read the translated text and be okay

19. First fandom you wrote for? hmm. hard to remember but if we're digging deep enough it was probably tsubasa reservoir chronicle

20. Favorite fic you’ve written? i love all of them? i put my whole pussy in all of them and i enjoy them after. but IF i have to choose...dancing moves and dressing down probably. still. HARD

tagging @jactingjoices @hauntedpearl @angelcasendgame 💜

[keithal]

Do you have any supernatural fic recs?

ANON. i have been waiting since 2019 for someone to ask me this. prepare to regret this decision (FYI: i'm taking all these recs & following notes from my public bookmarks on ao3, which you can find here. i'm cutting the notes short, so if u don't mind spoiler-y drawn-out comments, check that out too if u want!)

deancas focused:

A Reasonable Amount of Trouble by xylodemon -> an spn au where dean is a p.i. and a hunter on the side, cas is still an angel, and they get caught up in a plot that's a mix of seasons 4, 6, 8, and 9. this was my introduction to spn and deancas. the characterization is flawless and the prose is beautiful (very cs pacat-esque). the plot is crafted with close attention to detail and the pacing is perfect

the point of our being by noviembre -> a post-s15 fix-it that takes place immediately after the penultimate episode. noviembre is undoubtedly my favorite spn writer of all time. one of the best dean voices i've ever come across. this ties up the narrative threads into a beautiful, sound, satisfying ending, and both destiel & saileen survive. despite the odds, they're happy.

i projected onto dean winchester when i was twelve years old and now im making it your problem by alittleduck (amidsizedfrog) -> another post-finale fix it. and, to date, the funniest thing i've ever read. every fic in this series has a good balance between scenes that make u laugh so hard u hurt ur throat and Scenes That Make You Want To Gurgle Cement.

So Says The Sword by komodobits -> a s4 au and a fandom classic for a reason. if u haven't read this, i'm of the firm belief it's best to go in as blind as possible. but definitely keep this verse in the back of ur mind while reading: "Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father" (matthew 10:29)

sir this is a wendy's by noviembre -> yall remember when misha collins said that a modern au deancas would be like if a wendy's janitor and the president of the usa fell in love? well noviembre took that seriously and now we're here. and u should all be thankful bc it's somehow the single funniest and most romantic thing i've ever read

the pie isn’t a metaphor (it’s just pie) by noviembre -> post-finale s15 domestic deancas fic that's the emotional equivalent of drinking tea and lying under a warm weighted blanket. it makes me so happy and i think abt it every time i eat a pastry. i just sit there chewing like “dean and cas are eating fresh pie in their kitchen” and it puts a smile on my face.

Muscle Memory by komodobits -> a "50 first dates" au that i think abt every single day. i'm not joking. it's so sad and touching and sweet and unexpectedly funny, and no one writes deancas like komodobits. it just FEELS so them and i'm obsessed w it.

Strandlines by aeli_kindara -> au where s4 cas meets stanford-era dean. dean's voice and characterization is incredibly in-character with the early seasons and his voice doesn't falter once. and of course castiel! robotic s4 cas with this tremendous power and this fierce yet wavering loyalty to heaven that eventually focuses solely on dean! likewise, his character is spot-on and i enjoyed reading from his pov immensely.

[podfic] right hand on his rife, swore it on the bible by be_brave13 for quensty, floorsirens -> u can't possibly expect me NOT to include this. YES my friend and i wrote the fic but be_brave13's love and appreciation for it makes it feel like a completely separate work. my favorite podfic (and gift) of all time so i implore u to give it a listen.

something suddenly everywhere by noviembre -> the finest post-s15 fix-it of all time. cas is in the empty, they've defeated god, jack is gone, and all that's left is sam, eileen, dean, a bunker, and trying to move on. i know i already said that but this is the same author so it still counts! i cried, i laughed, i grieved, i jumped from excitement. it's a rollercoaster of emotions. it should be put behind a velvet rope at a museum so we can all gather around and clap.

To Boldly Go by 8daysuntiltheapocalypseiguess -> au where dean writes star trek fanfiction. it follows him from the beginning of the show to the older seasons and is told entirely thru his fic summaries, reader commentary, and livejournal dms. warning that it is unfinished, but it's a masterpiece

saileen focused:

Loveletter (Dear Eileen) by voynichs (Xenerik) -> a short and beautiful meditation about love and eileen from sam's pov. it's only 300 words but it feels like 15k. definitely at the top of my fave saileen fics of all time. when i first read it i stayed up until 2 am crying abt it

Livin' on a Prayer by Dredfulhapiness -> EILEEN MEETING EARLY SEASONS DEAN AND SAM I'M SCREAMING. do u understand how this could've changed the timeline but, more importantly, me as a person. eileen there when dean and sam were trying to find a way out of the deal, there when everything happened with ruby, there for dean's resurrection, there before they met cas, there after sam dies and dean retires and cas goes m.i.a. and DEALING with the aftermath of a foiled apocolypse. everyone hates the winchesters but the winchesters are gone and all that's left is eileen to deal with the brunt of it.

With Hands Clasped by Xenerik -> a handful of snippets from the eileen wedding that explores gender and religion and love so beautifully. i haven't been able to read it completely yet, but i can tell this is going to be another saileen fave.

other pairings/no pairings

The Love Story of the Runner Up by Margo_Kim -> told from the perspective of a guy cas had a brief affair with as a semi-drunken story he tells a friend in a bar. it's technically deancas but since cas's relationship with another man takes main focus, i elected to put it here.

Ten Years by Margo_Kim -> a bela talbot character study and the best i've been able to find, no contest. *rowena voice* good girls are pathetic here's to evil skanks <3

The Archangel Gabriel Is Dead by seizethefire -> fics that have half a million kudos in my mind. it's about how and why rafael comes to think that god is dead. it expertly explores the familial relationship between gabriel, lucifer, michael, and rafael. it's devastating and beautiful in equal measure. definitely a personal favorite and one i think everyone should read

put them in a box somewhere by amidsizedfrog -> a mary & dean fic told from mary's pov from before she died. a gut-wrenching story about performative/toxic masculinity and internalized homophobia and mothers.

lastly, if ur interested, i also write spn fic >:) which u can find by clicking here. happy reading!

[prosopopeya]

Twenty Questions for Fic Writers!

Tagged by @binickandros!!!!!

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

26 apparently

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

460,406

3. What fandoms do you write for?

supernatural now mainly, though i've written for house md, spring awakening, and bare: a pop opera

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

these are all dean/cas fics:

inevitable homoeroticism in spanish romantic heroes (spanish grad school au)

like real people do (my return from the spn grave, basically a reaction fic to The Confession Scene)

command me to be well (angsty post-canon dean gets cas back; sort of a love letter/spiritual sequel to my first spn fic, which is also on this list)

flying in circles inside a jar (a classic s5 era fic with some deeply awkward dialogue that i don't like now but i mean this was written over 10 years ago)

some boys are sleeping alone (my first spn fic and basically my thesis on dean's bisexuality that would feed....just about every fic to come after)

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

i try, though inevitably i get overwhelmed (even by like, one comment) and then time passes and then it's just overwhelming and awkward. but i try! it's hard especially when i just am rephrasing "thanks, i'm glad you liked it!"

6. What is a fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

100% something from the house or spring awakening era. (does anyone else remember when apocalypse aus were all the rage for house or was that just me and my friend angie.) a lot of those aren't on ao3 though, so probably the saddest ending over there is hm... "some boys are sleeping alone." or, shout out to my bare: a pop opera fic, still going strong over there: all the stars bend over sideways.

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

there are a lot of happy endings to be found now but maybe for the sheer weight of the force behind everything building up to its ending, let me come home. that one or "command me to be well," which i swear i remember someone somewhere saying that it doesn't just relieve the angst at the end, but it luxuriates in the happy ending.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

not really, no, at least not to my face. i've seen some commentary somewhere about people not being into post-canon fic that doesn't involve jack, but i still have barely seen the jack seasons......... oops

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

yes, usually i throw something in there. inevitably it winds up dom/sub-y in some way. my favorite manifestation of this was the slow evolution of dom-y cas in "let me come home," especially when writing from his headspace bc that's not the usual for me. but other than that, my favorite is cowboy's sweetheart

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

ohhhhh boy. back in the day i loved a challenge for the wildest mashups people could think of. freddie from chess/donuts was the quintessential example of this, written in the wake of strikethrough on lj. one of the few that i still allow to see the light of day: thank you for being a friend, a my little pony/supernatural crossover.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

not that i'm aware of though someone did put "inevitable homoeroticism" and "command me to be well" on goodreads.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

i've had someone podfic one of my fics! though the recording isn't up anymore i don't think

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

YESSS @marbleflan and i had a great time with:

r/relationships: inspired by an r/relationships post where a guy is sleeping with a woman only for her...husband to walk in on them, oops, and oh no surprise also, he's really hot??????? wait is this gay????? (it is)

perfect match: inspired by the season 8 of are you the one? an mtv reality dating show. the typical premise of this show is to put pairs of people in a house and tell them that they have to find their scientifically, dr. love approved perfect match out of all the people in the house, and if you all guess wrong, you lose money; if you all guess right, then you win money. but in season 8....everybody was bi/pan/queer, so anyone could be your match. it was supremely messy and also great. many key moments were lifted from that season including i think the drunken orgy, the theme dance night, and the intervention. i have a lot of memories of furiously writing/editing my portions of this to and from my in-laws' for thanksgiving while my husband wanted me to, like, participate in conversation in the car.

14. What's your all-time favorite ship?

i mean.................... guess.

15. What's a wip you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

man i started this really great one about dean and cas accidentally arguing about not having sex when they both actually wanted to have sex and i really want to finish it but idk! i refuse to put the dean watches heartstopper fic on here bc i WILL finish that.

16. What are your writing strengths?

i think character voice, through dialogue and narration. i like situating myself in a character's head and feeling things out through their perspective.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

repetition, and like.... plots.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

been there, done that. wordreference carried me.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

lizzie mcguire, i think, and labyrinth. also if i recall, buffy, and star trek: voyager.

20. Favorite fic you've written?

"let me come home." i think it has to be. it has just about everything in it, every thought or feeling i've ever had about supernatural. i'm really super proud of it, and unlike inevitable homoeroticism, i'm never going to feel like enough people have read that fic. like i just want more people to read it. usually i'm pretty good about just going with the flow, the whims of ao3 and what people seem to respond to, and not really being bothered by how popular a fic is or isn't. but man i want it to crack that top 5 list so badly. (it can replace flying in circles. the others can stay.)

if you write fic, you are tagged, but i scrolled through some pages of my followers to look for mutuals in the fic writing game; if i missed you i was just reading too quickly!!!! you are tagged!!!!: @ltleflrt, @blanketforcas, @hauntedpearl, @goldenraeofsun, @jewishdeanwinchester, @bbcphile, @wanderingcas

[wastemanjohn]

fic quiz

tagged by the wonderful @nameslikeguns, thank you!

1. How many works do you have on ao3? 38! Got two WIPs cooking so hopefully I'll hit 40 by the new year :)

2. What's your total ao3 word count?

226,530

3. What fandoms do you write for? Literally just SPN these days. I do tend to just write for one fandom for years at a time though!

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

when i'm down on my knees you're how i pray

someone forever warm

when i hear your lips make a sound

and if you crave it then you know that you are injured

i don't mean to suggest that i loved you the best

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not? Yes - eventually. I am always so happy and grateful for comments, they fuel me, but I'm bad at replying to them bc as @nameslikeguns said I can find it difficult to respond bc I find kind words hard to know how to respond to. IRL if someone compliments me I tend to just squirm lmao so my responses to comments are the online equivalent of that I guess! I tend to just scattergun reply to my whole inbox all at once when I feel brave enough.

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Oh gosh; as someone who mostly writes angst this is really difficult to say! Most of my endings are *~angsty~*. but I guess the first that came to mind is i don't mean to suggest that i loved you the best.

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? That's easy lmao. so many moving parts or maybe some unholy war, which is a fic I forget about because i wrote it so early on... but it has a happyish ending!

8. Do you get hate on fics? i don't know about hate but i've had the odd pass agg anon here and there who wanted to tell me my edgelording triggered their IBS or about how much they hate john. Just makes me lol tbh.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind? Is the pope Catholic... :) Yeah my fics are predominantly smutty but I don't write a lot of straightforward porn these days (I want to but the muse doesn't take me there). Wanky as this is going to sound I usually build the story around the smut so I can get horny and Make A Point at the same time. Works pretty well for me!

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

I used to write a ton of bandslash back in thr day and that quite often involved crossovers from different, er, bands. I'm not going to talk anymore about that though lmao.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen? Not fully stolen to my knowledge but there was a fic going around tumblr recently that had quite clearly borrowed heavily and too specifically from this fic to be a coincidence. The person in question when my friend investigated was actually a minor so... it felt really difficult to do anything about it lol, I'm not about to go after a child on the internet. So I just made a pass agg reblog of the original fic instead like "Hey recognise this?" like the mature and sensible adult I am. But BELIEVE the bee in my bonnet is still buzzing about that.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated? Yes in my previous fandom I had a few translated into Chinese and Russian! That was really cool.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before? Yes several back in my bandslash days... I wish I could refind my Franz Ferdinand girlies from LJ and confess that I was one of the people behind "the dark!fic" lmao. (Or maybe not bc I was like 14 and had no business being in that community or posting what I was posting).

14. What’s your all time favorite ship? John/the world. I want that old man to fuck everyone. Or possibly get fucked by everyone depending on where the mood is taking me.

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will? Serial killer John may be one of my roman empires and yet it lies in googledocs gathering dust. One of my resolutions for 2024 is to finish it.

16. What are your writing strengths? Ugh these questions make me feel so awkward lmao. I mean... I think I have quite a good range? Which is feedback I get quite a lot so hopefully there's some truth in it! And I think I'm quite good at imagery and emotional pacing ig? I'm not sure what else to call it. Also in the vein of common feedback anyway.

17. What are your writing weaknesses? SELF DOUBT. Honestly mate if I wasn't bogged down with that shit so much I'd be dangerous 🤪 It does make me write slowly and abandon a lot of stuff I start but I'm working on it. From a technical standpoint though I do struggle with plot. I think I'm more of a vibes/moment in time writer than an epic plot writer which does gall me lol. But yeah - I definitely struggle with longer works because I struggle with keeping things cohesive and overwriting/explaining then just overwhelming myself. Again, a resolution to work on for 2024. I also feel like I struggle with dialogue sometimes; if it doesnt magically come to me fully formed which is rare I'll really have to work at it. Trust me if you've ever written a dialogue heavy fic from me then just know that chances are said dialogue will have chopped and changed and been edited within an inch of its life.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic? I can only speak English sadly and have ultimate respect for people who write in a language that is not their first. That's just so amazing to me.

19. First fandom you wrote for? The White Stripes. Lmao. There were quite a lot of us back in the day.

20. Favorite fic you’ve written? Hands down i heard love is blind. sharp teeth dry heat and when the stiff wind blows are close seconds because i lived my goddamn truth with both of those fics ��� And I have a somewhat complicated relationship with what it is but I'm happy that it exists and i'm happy that it still does the rounds occasionally!

tagging @amiwritesthings @castratedsamwinchester @spnyuri @lovetranasction @beautyandthebeastiality @babybrothershaped and whoever else wants to do this idk who is and isn't writing atm lol

[zmediaoutlet]

I just got back into spn/wincest stuff after learning about it 10 years ago when i was 13. and i stumbled on your fics and they are all so amazing!!! you’re incredibly talented and i feel like you understand the characters really well!!! and they actually help me getting around to watch the series a bit haha. i was so glad to discover that you’re still active in the fandom. just wanted to say thank you for the great stuff you put out!!!and really looking forward to more!!!!

I'm so happy you're on board and partying with us again, o 23-year-old anon! And it's so cool to hear that the fics helped prod you back to the series, haha. I hope you have fun with it! It's a really remarkable 11 years (and then four additional years which are variably remarkable).

Hope I can get the gumption together to finish the current fic -- at the moment I'm playing a lot of Horizon Zero Dawn instead of writing, which is not Productive but hopefully is refilling my creative tanks -- but messages like this really make it seem like it's worth sticking around in the spn/wincest grotto. Thanks, bud. <3

[catsconflictscopicsandchamomile]

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

Here's the setup:

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

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

-Chuck Won. duh???

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

Here's the timeline:

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

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

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

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

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

-Here's the setup for the continuation:

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

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

Destiel is canon.

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

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

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

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

-human!impala as main character

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

-collective fandom catharsis at Blurrywife's bitch ass

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

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

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

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

[sortasirius]

what makes you think the writers want deancas? not trying to be an asshole, i'm just genuinely curious as to why you think that. i know berens' episodes are pretty heavy with subtext so i can see why you'd say that he wants it, but i'm not so sure about the rest of the writers/dabb. it seems like meghan isn't a huge fan either, given her "they twisted it so fast" tweet :/ of course she's a very new writer (think she's only writing one ep this season?) but still

OKAY this is a great question, welcome to my dissertation.

I’m going to address the end of your question first. Meghan is actually DeanCas positive, she has been for quite a long time. She actually, a few years back, posted a picture of her reading a literal book about Destiel and captioned it “writing reading” or something like that.

This whole thing just comes out of a boiling over of tensions because of how nasty fandom twitter can be. Like I said here, I think this has just gotten blown out of proportion, they shouldn’t have posted all this randomly disparaging stuff, but also like...can you blame them? The fandom is a lot, we always have been, and they’re probably also under a gag order not to talk about the finale, and are annoyed that people keep asking.

So nah, Meg is not anti Destiel.

To the first part!! So let’s take a look at the show runners since Cas has been around.

Seasons 4 and 5: Kripke

Seasons 6 and 7: Gamble

Seasons 8-11ish: Carver

Seasons 11ish-15: Dabb

So starting with Kripke. Okay, yes, I will be the first to admit that we have some pretty incredible Destiel moments in these seasons, but it’s less directly written into the plot and much more from Misha and Jensen’s uhhhh ~chemistry~. The only times it was directly written into the script was when the episode was handled by someone like Edlund (“On The Head Of A Pin,” “The End,” “My Bloody Valentine”). And you have to remember, if in season 5, there are moments here and there where you’re like huh that’s suspiciously romantic dialogue, remember that Cas took Anna’s place. Anna was supposed to be endgame for Dean, but due to a myriad of issues and Misha’s general greatness, Anna was replaced with Cas.

Onto 6 and 7. Hmmm. Gamble. 6 and 7 are my two least favorite seasons and that’s no secret, and that’s not only due to the plain old weird shit in the overall storyline, but also that homegirl killed off Cas in s7 and then Bobby like four episodes later. (Also it ALWAYS rubbed me the wrong way they couldn’t have Baby in that season lol). We still had some great DeanCas moments, but again, it wasn’t really written into the overall arc (until they had to change the end of season 7 because of tanking ratings and bring Misha back lol, anyone remember the fact that Dean kept Cas’ jacket and would randomly dream of him? Yeah.). But we still had those moments, those distinctly romantic moments, probably the best example in these two seasons is from Edlund again, specifically “The Man Who Would be King,” I wrote a little about that here.

We move onto Carver, who gave us, at this point, the most overt DeanCas season with season 8 (season gr8 is a better name imo), and this is the first time Dean and Cas’ relationship is directly written as an arc of the season.  I mean, you have everything in Purgatory, Dean “seeing” Cas everywhere, the fact that he felt so guilty that Cas stayed in Purgatory that he manipulated his own memories to think that he was the one that failed Cas, because he couldn’t comprehend that Cas would want to leave him, and let’s not forget Dean snapping Cas out of Naomi’s hold on him in “Goodbye Stranger.”  It was a very obvious shift, not enough to alert the general audience, but more than enough for most of us in fandom.

It’s also important to note that this is when Andrew stopped co writing with Loflin and started writing his own episodes (”Hunter Heroici” anyone?)  I like Loflin fine, but Dabb was able to stretch his legs a little bit more once he stopped co-writing, and we also began to see some DeanCas themes in his solo episodes.

In any case, them and their issues being a big part of the seasons continued with Carver, and Berens entered the scene, his first episode (”Heaven Can’t Wait”) is one of my favorites, with human Cas and the fanfiction gap and Dean and Cas just generally being awkward and funny and sweet.  This is Bobo’s FIRST episode, remember that.  He comes right out of the gate with it.

Also in Season 9, this is when Dean takes the Mark of Cain, and the Cas/Colette mirror is born, so obviously, Dean and Cas are the fabric of the season once again.  This is also the season where Metatron says Cas is “in love with humanity,” and then immediately refers to Dean as Humanity so uhhhh yeah.

Onto season 10, Dabb and Berens continue with their greatness (I could write pages on the DeanCas date in “The Things We Left Behind” alone).  And then we have one of the best scenes in the entire show in “The Prisoner” where the Cas/Colette mirror continues and Dean, driven by grief and pain and rage and the Mark, still doesn’t kill Cas.  He still can’t kill Cas.

Season 11 is important because it takes choice away from both Cas and Dean, and shows us, as the audience, how much losing each other takes out of them. We saw in season 10 how much losing Dean takes from Cas, but what about Cas losing Dean?  Dean loses his choice with his connection to Amara this season, and loses even more when Lucifer reveals he’s been possessing Cas, and plays on Dean’s connection to Cas like a mockery.  It’s also worth noting that, similarly to season 8, Dean breaks out of the connection with Amara when he’s worried about Cas, and that’s something that even SHE is surprised by.

But then season 12, the beginning to the Renaissance.  This is when we get the writer’s that become important for what Dean and Cas are today, and, truly, why I believe they want canon Destiel as much as we do.

This is the first season with Dabb’s writers: Davy Perez, Meredith Glynn, Steve Yockey, and of course Bobo all come in with their incredible talents and gave us episode after episode of good content.  “Lily Sunder Has Some Regrets” is probably my favorite, probably the best example of what I’m saying.  An episode where Dean is called out by an enemy directly, told to “roll the dice” on Cas’ life.  And Dean won’t, it’s not even really a hesitation.  And this comes from a character that has known Dean for ten seconds.  I also wrote more in depth about this episode here.  There are also some.....distinctly domestic details we get this season, specifically in “The Future” (written by Berens and Glynn) with the mixtape.  The most tropey of tropes mixtape.  Yeah, I’ll just leave that one here.

And then season 12 ends with Cas’ death, but also with the parallel between Sam and Dean with Jess and Cas.  Sam literally has to drag Dean away from Cas, just like Dean had to drag Sam out of his burning apartment in the pilot.  The episode drives it home in every way that it can: Dean is the one left kneeling by Cas’ body, while Sam goes to find out what is upstairs.  Dean is the one who stares at the sky, finally broken.  This isn’t a random thing, this is Dean’s whole arc, it’s the entirety of the beginning of 13.  Dean’s pain, his anguish, his anger.

Season 13 starts with them burning Cas, with Dean, who has begged God to bring him back, who has split his knuckles punching a door, standing, staring at Cas’ pyre with brokenness on his face.

I mean.....

Anyway, season 13 is where it gets interesting (well, I think all of this is interesting but I’m a writer nerd so).  So Cas comes back from the Empty in “Advanced Thanatology” written by Steve Yockey, and then a wombo combo of “Tombstone” by Davy Perez next (”Brokebacknatural” as the PR said at the time).  Listen.  This is the part that SPN crossed a line that they couldn’t come back from.  With Cas being Dean’s “big win,” the fact that Dean and Cas watch movies together, “I told you, he’s an angry sleeper.  Like a bear.” Talked about it here.

This is where, in my opinion, the network stepped in, but the damage was already done.  They had already established that Cas was Dean’s big win, that Dean’s poor coping was not due to Mary’s disappearance, but solely due to Cas, and that Dean and Cas have more married energy than anyone else.  The network had nixed blatant canon at this point, and they writing room had been pushing the boundaries of what the network would allow. 

After these episodes, we see a marked drop off of DeanCas heavy scenes.  They’re still there, still a part of the fabric of the season, but not as...obvious as it had been in early season 13.

And this continued through season 14, we’re back to scraps of Destiel scenes here and there, but to me it always felt like there was something bubbling under the surface, something distinctly unsaid in the themes of the season, even after the walk back of obvious “Dean and Cas are in love” scenes.

And then we get to season 15, which, y’all know I talk about all the time.  What’s important here is that Bobo and Glynn are both executive producers, calling more of the shots than ever before.  Additionally, it’s important to note that, though they only co write occasionally, Glynn and Berens refer to each other as “work husband” and “work wife.”  Each episode has just turned up the volume, and, not for the first time, but certainly the most obvious, Dean and Cas ARE the season.  Sure, they’re trying to beat God, they’re trying to finally find peace, defeat the final big bad, but really?  This season has been about Dean, and Dean’s relationship to Cas.

And not only do we have obvious and clear Destiel in nearly every episode, but we have episodes like “Last Call” which canonize bi!Dean (wrote about that here).

And, maybe most importantly so far, we have “The Rupture,” the breakup, and “The Trap,” Dean’s confession (both written by Berens).  And here’s the thing.  These episodes feel connected, but also feel like they’re missing something.  Beren’s last episode is 15x18, “The Truth.”  We’ve all spec’ed about what could happen in this episode, and I think *I* know what it’s leading to.  But for it to be leading to that, it means that the network has to have approved what we’ve all been waiting for years for.

Who got this change to happen?  Who got the network to change their minds?  It wasn’t us.  It was them.  I am fully convinced that Dabb and Berens quite literally put their careers on the line for Dean and Cas.  They believe in them, they’ve shown that from the beginning, but the only thing standing in the way was the network, never allowing them to take the final step. 

So, to answer your question: I think the writers want canon DeanCas because they’ve already shown us that they do.  Take a look at their episodes, at Dabb’s, at Beren’s, at Glynn’s, at Perez’s, at Yockey’s.  They’ve been telling us what’s going on with Dean and Cas for years.

Sure, I’m not in their heads, I guess I don’t know for *sure* that this has been their thought process, but if we put it all together, from the marked shift when Dabb fully took over in s12, to the change right after “Tombstone,” to the new shift, the blatantly romantic shift in season 15, what else is there?

I’ve said for a long time that we, the SPN fandom, are beyond lucky to have the writer’s that we do.  They’re all going to go on to have prolific careers and we were lucky to get them at the end of our little show.  I give them a lot of credit for what we have in the show today.

Just remember, they’ve been telling us in all of s15 who Chuck is.  He says he’s the writer, right?  But a writer who doesn’t have control of his characters?  A writer who wants to do the same ending over and over because it “works”?  That doesn’t sound like a writer, it sounds like a network exec.

They’ve been showing us what they want for years, and the way s15 is going?  I think they may have convinced the network to let us have it.

[littlewetbeast]

so this is coming from your tags on a post about s8 and 9. as someone who only joined the fandom after nov 5, I'm always curious about what the fandom was like when the show was airing. can you talk about that a little bit more? maybe elaborate on your tags? thanks a lot <3

i can only really tell you what it was like from my perspective back in the day, and what i can say is that there was SO. MUCH. HYPE. when season 8 was coming out. people were pointing to the source material and going, wait! that shit isn’t just a gay sex joke, that shit is like - textual romance! and that’s what made people begin to argue that this time, it wasn’t bait, but a narrative that they surely wouldn’t drop the ball on. of course, now, in hindsight, we all know spn is the baitiest of bait and supreme trashfire, but at the time it truly did seem like things were headed in a new direction - and we had the textual evidence to back us up on that. i mean, i was there watching it all live throughout season 6, 7 and 8 - most of my close friends watched it, and the destiel tumblr community was on fire by the time season 8 rolled around. i wish i could find some of the old meta posts, but essentially, season 8 truly got so many people thinking that this time, the tides were changing. charlie and kevin were now part of the main cast, and there was undoubtable intent in season 8, not just from cas' side, but from dean's as well. people went bonkers over the aaron scene. this was a time where queerbaiting was at a an all-time high amongst so many popular tv shows, but there was simply no one that went the length that supernatural did. and it wasn’t just the undoubtably gay shit - it was the introduction of kevin and charlie, that incremental effort to include more characters outside of a white, male cast, which bolstered the argument that spn was finally headed in a new direction. i mean, they’d done the same shit over and over for years, surely this was a sign that they knew they had to switch things up. i remember being so genuinely hyped, along with my other queer friends, because we started to believe that perhaps spn truly was going to follow through on this. it was literally all there, in the text! one of dean’s closest friends was a lesbian. dean was in a love triangle with two men. dean got romantically flustered when a gay guy hit on him. dean hallucinated cas and altered his memory to cope with him leaving. dean was on his knees telling cas he needed him, and it broke the connection. there was just so much. anyway. having had that experience, the unfolding of spn’s ending and cas’ confession literally felt like a ‘classic spn’ moment for so many of us. we’d already been burned before by having the naïve expectation that spn could... you know, actually be normal about queer people, and write fulfilling narratives for them. throughout season 9 through 10, a huge amount of things that season 8 set up were undone - kevin was killed, charlie was killed, cas and dean were separated and no homo-ed repeatedly. there wasn’t an outrage that i could see on my dash, but myself and all my close friends just... stopped watching. there were crickets on my dash, maybe a few gifs here and there. the interest completely plummeted. there was a silent deflation and quiet acceptance from those of us that had actually gotten our hopes up that spn really was that show. when i discovered they’d killed off both kevin and charlie, that cemented the knowledge that supernatural was never going to give us what we wanted. i can’t even fully describe how fundamentally that experience changed me, but my attitude towards media and queer representation was completely altered as a result. spn has refused to move with the times, but they had already demonstrated before that they were never going to make that leap. they were in the stranglehold of the network, and the desire to retain their conservative viewership overrode every attempt to move beyond the gun-slinging sam-and-dean bro show.  so yeah, in the end, i have such sympathy for newer fans that got burned so badly by the finale, but as an older fan, i looked at it as it was all unfolding and just went - yup, been there, done that. it’s a classic spn move. i stopped giving credit to those who were throwing out crumbs of representation, when what we actually deserve is to feast. anyway, in summary, spn has expertly burned its queer fanbase for almost a decade. in response, i reject many parts of the canon and simply enjoy the fanon content, because it’s stupid and i do what i want. 

[deanwasalwaysbi]

Thinking About How This Wasn't Actually a Denial

But was it self preservation?

The year was 2013 and rather than a denial, Jensen said "Don't ruin it for everybody now."

What was the fan 'ruining' for everybody? The Con? or something else? So if I was a tinhatter - and sometimes I am - I might think about other tv shows from the past that were covertly queer and how they handled the question, were TV shows 'out'?

Mainstream shows like Bewitched, you know, shows that are so clearly straight, you can tell because... well. ... they never technically used the word 'gay'. ... witches honor

SPN Film Studies is Back in Session! Join Under the Cut for more on supernatural & the story about how Bewitched! came out of the Broom Closet

Bewitched aired from 1964-72, it's so old the first season was in B&W. The show starred Elizabeth Montgomery as Samantha, the strange housewife with a stranger secret. Her husband, Darrin, unwittingly married into the whole witchy family, from the now drag icon Agnes Moorehead's Endora with her open marriage, to the unmarried and batty Aunt Clara (Marion Lorne who played the mother in Hitchcock's heavily gay coded 'Strangers on a Train'), to the extremely coded Uncle Arthur (gay actor Paul Lynde). (We can't know for sure, but it seems at least 4 members of the cast were gay themselves.) The core premise of the show involves Samantha balancing who she really is with repressing that self for the safety and comfort of her family.

Samantha and her husband keep her [ahem] 'queer' nature a secret which gets harder on Samantha when she has to tell her daughter to live the same way, “I know what fun it is to be a part of the magical life ... to have so much at your fingertips. But we’re living in a world that’s just not ready for people like us, and I’m afraid they may never be. So you’re going to have to learn when you can use your witchcraft and when you can’t.”

There are plenty of generic 60s wacky hijinks but there are also whole episodes metaphorically about repression being harmful, episodes where characters asked if another was a 'thespian', episodes where Darrin was queercoded while under a spell, episodes about representation & bad stereotyping in media, and even two episodes where witches discussed whether it was time for witches to come out to the mortals, (whether mortals could accept that they were just nice normal people trying to live their lives like everybody else - or not - and would just freak out and kill them again).

When it came time to recast Dick York's Darrin with a new 2nd lead, Elizabeth and her husband, William Asher, knowingly cast the gay Dick Sergeant. (Although he wasn't out publicly at the time.) Then, when Sergeant came out in '91, Montgomery supported him and the two served together as the grand marshals of the Hollywood pride parade.

Dick Sargent expressed in the 90s what he would want in a Bewitched reunion episode: for Darrin to meet another like couple, a witch and a mortal who are married, and another, and another, and end up forming a whole community and support group, finding out that it was never so uncommon after all, that it was actually "about 10% of the population." The two would march in the first mortals and witches pride parade, saying they should have come out years ago.

In '94, Montgomery had this to say about the queer themes of the show, “Don't think that didn't enter our minds at the time. We talked about it on the set, that this was about people not being allowed to be what they really are. If you think about it, Bewitched is about repression in general and all the frustration and trouble it can cause. It was a neat message to get across to people at that time in a subtle way.” (x)

Interviewer: Are you concerned that your involvement in the gay-pride parade will lead people to believe you're a lesbian?

"[Laughing] I'm really not worried about that. There are bigger things to worry about. Like the presidential election and finding a cure for AIDS. I did the parade in support of Dick. I mean, in the end, didn't we all?" (x) (Montgomery was also one of the first celebrity allies to fight for LGBTQ rights and support HIV/AIDS-related fundraisers.)

So did they talk about it at the time? No. You can bet they didn't speak about it publicly. What would have happened if a fan, publicly, had asked Elizabeth, William, or Dick about the show's queer allegory content? This was a time when being gay was a literal felony. They would have had to have lied or risked losing the show, their careers, and possibly subjecting themselves to violence.

Now. back to Jensen and the Schrodinger's long con:

This was in 2013 - The same year that the Supreme Court of the United States struck down a federal ban on gay marriage. You certainly couldn't call homosexuality illegal in the US at that time. It's the same year that Dabb and Sgriccia spoke about the Aaron moment on the DVD and whether there's 'this potential for love in all places' for Dean. Of course Jensen said this about the very same scene: "But it was - you know - it was comedy. It was a comedic moment in the show and fortunately Dean gets a lot of the comedic moments in the show and it was just, you know, Ben was poking fun at the fact that - you know, how can we make this very kind of manly, heterosexual guy uncomfortable - uh -you know, or  or have him back on his heels and throw him off his game a little bit.”

I'm reminded of 2012 when Ben Edlund stepped in about a Destiel question at comic con, pretending it was some freaky thing that fans had made up even though he'd already written and directed TMWWBK, which had already aired.

Jensen: “What’s Destiel?” Ben Edlund: That’s some weird shit. Jensen: Is this something that you created, Ben? Ben: You don’t want any part of that.

Or the next year for season 9 when Jensen said “I think the whole Cas and Dean thing has gotten out of hand”  “I don’t think there’s anything secret to their relationship even though a lot of people wish there was” EVEN THOUGH- that season we got the nightstands acknowledgement and Misha (or both of them?) was told to “play him like a jilted lover”

Or Jensen's knowing bromance smile in 2015

I think recent events (cough spn gate) have made clear that the network and many viewers were still uncomfortable with CAS being gay in 2020, deleting even familial mentions of Cas from the finale episodes once he was revealed to be not only gay but also in love with Dean. (x) (x) (x) Can you imagine then what Warner Brothers would have said to an acknowledge bisexual Dean Winchester in 2013? Granted, there was no Trump election, but legitimate, could that have been the end of the show? Or the Russian and Conservative US viewership? Is it possible that Jensen would have feared so?

Is it possible that Jensen had a more personal reason for a knee jerk defensive response?

So was Jensen covering in 2013? Well. This happened 5 years later in 2018:

That hostile "? No." came even though Misha confirmed that he and Jensen had discussed Destiel by that point. Granted, discussing Destiel as a concept and accepting Dean being inherently bisexual are two very different things - Cas is GN after all - still, less than encouraging.

I may never get over the jumps back and forth that Jensen did. At this point I think there's no denying that a lot of SPN's queer content was on purpose, even as writers and actors were telling fans and network execs otherwise. Yet when each person involved was brought in? that question haunts me at night. I have gone off before about the timeline in my pursuit of whether Jensen was Ben Hur'd (x) and, if so, for how long. I'm sure many in this fandom have so much to add.

In the meantime we'll just have to cherish this moment from 2019:

Interviewer: 'So, tell us just a little bit about what you’re most excited to tackle with your character this final season.’ Jensen: “Cas. Just like a full football form tackle.”

Bewitched references in SPN:

2.05 - Dean: Well, it looks like he can't work his mojo just by twitching his nose, he's gotta use verbal commands.

2.20 - Dean says Barbara Eden was hotter than Elizabeth Montgomery - sigh - Dean.

7.05 - Dean thinks a husband has no idea his wife is a witch, and refers to him as Darrin. Dean also indicates he likes the first Darrin better. - (I guess I can't make a comment about how much TV Dean watched as a kid if I get all of his references and also haven't saved the world.)

14.03 - Jules refers to the witch as 'Brunhilde' - this is a minor character in bewitched but more so from mythology and likely referred to the cartoon witch from WB cartoons - the stereotypical witch that faced bugs bunny with the green skin and straw hair.

let me know if you have any to add. Stay Witchy ✌

[iwishtoreportaburglary]

Hello!! I hope I’m not intruding by barging in here but like. You showed up in my notifs on twitter and now here too and I was PRETTY sure you were the same person from like, way back in the spn days…and I was so excited to see you around! Honestly I’m usually too shy to say anything but it just makes me really happy to see people I was friends with pop back up and I can’t NOT say hi.

We’ve kinda gone on to different things and are in different places in life from back then but I’ve thought of you and wondered how you were doing, I’m happy you’re back! Something I know for sure after this long is that like, fandoms or whatever don’t matter, I have always just remembered the people I care about and definitely took it for granted when it was easier to stay in touch. This site feels a bit lonely these days, I truly love when I can talk to people I know here again. Hope things are going well for you!!

Hi! I've been meaning to like drop into y'all's dms with a "hey lewis" pic but I just kept forgetting and then I got shy so I just stuck to liking things on here and twitter. Things like fandom really don't matter, I'm just happy to see friends enjoying things!

Things are kinda *wobbly hand gesture* right now, 10 years later and I'm still in school x~x. But! I know what I would like to do now, so that counts for something I think. I just need to finish my paper for my project and I'll have my masters degree. I hope things have been going well for you guys 🧡.

When you guys watched sk8 did you do dub, subs, or both? I did both and like the og voice work is great of course, but the dubs had me howling ajsgfdas ainosuke's VA stole the show

[livebloggingmydescentintomadness]

Ashley, I want your blessing to leave the supered-natural tumblr. I've been here for a few years but every time I remember how we're so ridiculed by the network and Co I cringe so badly and feel awful. But on the other hand, I love you guys with all my heart. But then I remember the network, and the leaked scripts, deleted scenes, etc and my heart aches x1000. But I also love you guys so much. I've been going through this cycle since the finale and idk what to do. I'm shackled to this bad TV show and idk if I should leave or if it's worth it to stay :'D

hey there darling, i totally understand how you feel. i’ve come close to leaving the fandom a couple times over the years because of how the show treated us, but never quite followed through because i enjoyed the online experience and the characters too much.

so here’s what i want you to do. i want you to take a break from the show and fandom for a decent but not too long chunk of time - let’s say 3 to 4 weeks, depending on how it goes. i want you to make a list of all the spn-posting blogs that you follow so you can remember them, and then unfollow all of them - or if they only post spn sometimes and you don’t want to unfollow, block all relevant tags so their spn posts won’t appear on your dash.

don’t worry about unfollowing us, hon, we all understand. you’re not going to hurt anyone’s feelings. we get it.

so for 3-4 weeks, don’t watch the show, don’t read any fic, don’t watch any fan videos, maybe even avoid the songs that most strongly make you think of the show. you can still talk to your fandom friends of course, but try to not talk about spn related topics. do a trial run of erasing the show from your life. 

while you’re doing that, experiment with new fandoms and new interests. read some new books, watch some new movies and shows, follow some new blogs in new fandoms, pursue some new hobbies even, like baking or knitting. something that makes you feel good. do something fun and indulgent, like dying your hair or taking regular luxurious baths.

if you find that you really miss the fandom after 3 weeks, go ahead and proceed to the next part, or wait a whole month just to really get the experience of a spn-free life that’s filled with other things. 

next, go back to your list of spn blogs and re-follow 2 or 3 of your most favorite. don’t worry about catching up with the latest drama or memes, it doesn’t really matter; just see how you feel about being exposed to spn content again. does it make you feel happy, like reconnecting with an old friend? or is it so contaminated with pain and sadness that you notice it immediately dragging your mood and mental health down? do you find that following a couple spn blogs is just-enough-but-not-too-much content, or do you want to go back to following more and fully rejoin the fandom? 

so in a nutshell, i want you to take leaving the fandom for a test drive. you don’t have to commit to it and making it a forever thing right off the bat, so toss out that anxiety. just start with trying it out. put everything spn-related in a box and start deliberately filling your life with new, positive things so you don’t sit around obsessing with what you miss about spn.

once you’ve had some good time getting used to the absence of spn and the presence of other things, come back and look at the fandom with a fresh perspective. observe how it makes you feel, and observe how much of it you can be exposed to before it starts negatively affecting you. maybe you can happily go back to the previous amount, maybe 50% of it, maybe 10% of it, or maybe you need to commit to leaving the fandom completely at that point. 

the important thing is figuring out what’s best for your well-being, and i think this plan will help you work it out. you have my full blessing to do what’s best for you, dear, whatever that ends up being.

[slaygentford]

god. my physical health sharply declined like two weeks after nov 5th 2020 which has sucked very hard and left me unable to do a lot of stuff i used to love (the nerves and muscles in my hands are fucked up rn so i cant rlly write or play games/instruments or draw (VERY DISTRESSING for an idiot who got a university degree in drawing things)) BUT. as a terminal deanstan ive been feasting on fic basically every day. like i dropped out of spn fandom circa 2010 but now that im back in i cant quit bc im not used to winning like this in terms of amnt/quality of content

the health stuff is slowly getting figured out/diagnosed but i have the deangirls 2 thank for getting me thru this year without completely going off the deep end (also like. lamictal and ativan and therapy. whatever!!)

for a second I thought you were calling bipolar 2 "deangirls 2" and I was like well I'm not gonna fight you on that point. SOLID fucking 10/10 for calling this a win -- never have a group of people won but also lost at the same time like this. schrodinger HATES them

[silverskyy]

Here are some questions for the spn ask thing: 9, 14, 32, 59, 64!

9. What was your favourite Destiel moment?

(Disclaimer that I didn't actually watch the confession scene live and don't count it as an option here because it's so tied up in the rest of the Nov 5th hysteria for me). I had to think about this a bit and I reserve the right to change my mind tomorrow, but I think the start of the widower arc--the finale of season 12/premiere of season 13. I'd been fairly burnt out by season 12, so seeing Dean need to be pulled away from Cas facing off against Lucifer in Apocalypse world and his reaction to Cas getting stabbed was incredible to my angst loving heart. And then after a whole hiatus of speculating, Dean's sheer grief over Cas's body was even better than I'd honestly expected! I know lots of folks prefer the fluffier dynamic, but I feel like the times we see the Destiel dynamic at its strongest in canon are when their love shines through their grief or anger.

14. What is your opinion on Saileen?

I love it! I remember the fandom reaction when Eileen was introduced, at least in the parts I occupied, was pretty fully onboard with Saileen immediately; I think their chemistry was easy to latch onto. They were really cute before she was fridged died in season 12 and it was lovely to see them become explicitly romantic after she came back. I'd never been particularly drawn to any Sam ships before, Gabriel/Ruby/Jess/whatever, but now it's Saileen (or a little bit of Sam/Rowena) all the way. My first Supernatural fic after a 4 year hiatus was an exploration of Eileen's disability that touched on her relationship with Sam as well, check it out if you want!

32. At what point during the show did you start shipping Destiel?

Technically I didn't start shipping Destiel due to watching the show. I binged the first 4 or 5 seasons of Supernatural when I was 14, completely unaware of fandom as a concept, and didn't ship them because I didn't ship anything non-canon/didn't particularly know queer people were a thing. A short while later I discovered the existence of fanfic and eventually stumbled upon Destiel fic. Imagine my surprise! When a friend got me back into actually watching the show during season 8, I caught up without heteronormativity goggles on and realized this ship had real legs. Looking back I think it's The Man Who Would Be King that took the dynamic from a fun subtext story to something in which I was actively invested. I don't know how you can watch that episode and not be drawn in (maybe I should change my favorite Destiel moment to Dean turning back to look at Cas in the holy fire lol).

59. If you could have a spinoff about any characters other than the leads of Supernatural and Wayward Sisters, who would they be?

Hmmmm, I think I'm going to go with a show about the angels and Heaven. Back in seasons 9/10 I was very invested in the angel politics and the metaphysical elements of what Heaven actually is, but ofc Supernatural never bothered to follow up on the interesting Heaven tidbits they dropped or let any angel besides Cas have a character arc that didn't end in perma-death. That means there's a lot of room for a secret good spinoff! Hannah my beloved would ofc be an important character who totally didn't die, but maybe bringing in dead humans like Ash could provide character contrast? I'm also thinking about how the later seasons portrayal of Heaven as a bunch of minimalist corporate hallways and boardrooms sucked ass, so it would need to very much lean into the non-physicality or at least seasons 4/5 gaudiness of the space. No idea what sort of tangible plot this sort of show would have, but I'd definitely check it out!

64. Do you like any characters that most of the fandom hates?

Most of the characters that are hated in the fandom spaces I'm in rn I also agree are terrible, so this is a toughie. I'd say I'm a fan of Meg, mainly Meg 2.0, who I hear tell of people hating even if I don't see it happen myself. I also did a big 180 on Amara at the end of Season 11 when she expressed her anger at God and became the complicated figure I'd been hoping for all season, so I like her a lot now! But also don't know how many folks actually hate her either. Oh, maybe Metatron! I know back when he was still alive folks tended to disparage him, but I found his annoying elements mitigated by the fact that his appearances tended to herald great Cas moments, which I ofc hold dear. And he was funny which counts for a lot.

if y'all wanna get more supernatural rambling the ask game is here