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fandomtrashhh · 1 year

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Updated for Episode 12

So I did a thing. I went back to every episode of The Winchesters and I wrote down everything that Dean has said so far, and I realized moreso than before how EVERYTHING he says not only is the lesson/theme of the episode, but it all also applies to himself. Also, I'm not sure if other people realize this because not everyone is into classic rock as I am, (many of the songs are rock songs) but all the songs also match what the episodes are about. Let's start with episode 1.

Sorry if I overlooked something or for any mistakes, I did not rewatch every episode to make this.

I also apologize for how long this is. If I knew how to add the "read more" on this post I totally would.

Major spoilers for all episodes of the Winchesters ahead!!!

Episode 1, "Pilot": March 3rd, 1972. The day Dad came home from the war, and the day he met Mom. Now I know this story might sound familiar, but I'm gonna put the pieces together in a way that just might surprise you. And in order to do that, I have to start all the way at the beginning.

Obviously, Dean is just starting the story. He tells us this is when John and Mary are going to meet, and he's also foreshadowing what's to come. This is why I have high hopes for this show, because Dean says so in the beginning that even though you think you might know everything, there's really more to the story.

Dean also narrated at the very end of the episode:

What they didn't know is that the Akrida weren't just a threat to Earth, but to all of existence. Now, like I told you, there's gonna be some surprises. Hell, I'm still trying to find all the puzzle pieces myself. But I'll explain everything. And until then, I'll keep picking the music.

Also something to note is that this is the only episode that has a non music related title. I'm 100% sure that if it did have a song related title, it would be "I'd Love to Change the World" by Ten Years After. The beginning, when Dean is first narrating and while John is holding the letter that Dean gave him and pretty much up to the point where John and Mary run into each other, that song is playing. Then at the very end of the episode, when we see Dean in the flesh, it's playing again. I find this VERY interesting, especially since the music applies to everything in this show. This leads me to believe that Dean really is trying to change something because the song literally says "I'd love to change the world, but I don't know what to do, so I'll leave it up to you." (The song also mentions bees, which I thought was interesting. That could be nothing, though.)

Episode 2 "Teach Your Children Well": The ties that bind a family together can be complicated. Parents raise you, teach you what's right and wrong, and in some instances, how to kill monsters. But no matter who you are, there comes a time when you have to break from them and make your own way. And if you're not careful, things can get pretty ugly.

“Teach Your Children Well” by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Let me show you some of the lyrics:

“You, who are on the road

Must have a code that you can live by

And so, become yourself

Because the past is just a goodbye

Teach your children well

Their father's hell did slowly go by

And feed them on your dreams

The one they pick's the one you'll know by

Don't you ever ask them, "Why?"

If they told you, you would cry

So just look at them and sigh

And know they love you”

A big theme in this episode is parents, the guy who goes missing at the beginning for one, but mostly about John’s parents. John and Millie argue over John hunting and all around the episode is about kids forging their own paths and how it can cause issues which I feel like can definitely apply to Dean and how he discovers his identity away from his father and how the things his father put them through were wrong and how that caused issues.

Episode 3 "You’re Lost Little Girl": There's no map to being a hunter. No playbook. You gotta follow your gut. But that can only take you so far. Truth is, you can't do it all on your own. You need other people to help guide the way-- your friends, your family. Otherwise you just end up lost.

“You’re Lost Little Girl” is by The Doors. Some lyrics:

“You're lost little girl

You're lost little girl

You're lost, tell me who

Are you?

Think that you know what to do

Impossible? Yes, but it's true

I think that you know what to do

Yeah

Sure that you know what to do”

In this episode, Mary gets taken by a monster and everyone is trying to find her. Mary thinks that she doesn’t need anyone to help her because she’s a good hunter, but she ends up needing them to save her. It’s the same with Dean, Dean is an amazing hunter, but he still needs his friends and his family.

Episode 4, "Masters of War": Fighting the battle between good and evil isn't easy, especially when the first monster you have to face is the one inside yourself.

“Masters of War” is by Bob Dylan.

The lyrics for this song are very meaningful and well done. To put it simply, it’s about war and criticism of war.

“You fasten all the triggers

For the others to fire

Then you sit back and watch

When the death count gets higher

You hide in your mansion

While the young people's blood

Flows out of their bodies

And is buried in the mud”

In this episode, John and Carlos talk about their trauma from the Vietnam War and we really get an insight to how much anger John has in him. John is Dean’s parallel in this episode because Dean has a lot of unresolved trauma and deep rooted anger that is mentioned in Supernatural and it also fits because Dean was used as a weapon in a war against the supernatural from a young age.

Episode 5, "Legacy of a Mind": Spending a lifetime of hunting monsters takes its toll. There comes a time when you gotta let out that pain inside you. If you don't, it'll eat you alive.

The song “Legacy of a Mind” is by The Moody Blues

“He'll fly his astral plane

Takes you trips around the bay

Brings you back the same day”

This can be applied to what happens in this episode where Mary is stuck in her own head and has to face her trauma, and this song pretty much talks about trippy things like the lyrics above.

This applies so well to the episode because this episode deals with the complicated relationship that Mary has with her parents and her dealing with the trauma she has with being trained to be a hunter from a very young age and how it was wrong of them to do that to her, but she still loves her parents. This also applies to Dean, since John taught him about hunting from a young age, the same way Samuel and Deanna did to Mary. Mary is once again the Dean parallel, like she often is in this show.

Episode 6 "Art of Dying": Hunting has a way of changing a person. After a while, right, wrong, good, evil, they all start to look the same. And then it makes you start to wonder, "Who's really the monster here -- them or me?"

This is the only other episode where Dean narrated at the end:

Hunting's not for everyone. You have to be strong, stay sharp, make tough decisions, and it's not easy, but then again, the righteous things never are.

The Art of Dying is by George Harrison:

"There'll come a time when all of us must leave here

Then nothing sister Mary can do

Will keep me here with you

As nothing in this life that I've been trying

Could equal or surpass the art of dying

Do you believe me?"

and then the end of the song goes:

"There'll come a time when most of us return here

Brought back by our desire to be

A perfect entity

Living through a million years of crying

Until you've realized the art of dying

Do you believe me?"

This episode the core four finds a case involving an older hunter buddy of Mary's and it turns out that the monster is the ghost of the hunter's friend who the hunter friend and her group killed because he went too dark in magic. That's how the episode applies to Dean's monologue, along with Lata's fear of turning into someone horrible and letting her anger control her. John also (kinda) confronts his anger in this episode. The monologue also talks about how being a hunter is hard, but doing the right thing never is, which also applies to the characters of this episode, especially Lata. This applies to Dean because he really dealt with feelings like that during SPN, and being angry all the time and feeling like he was a monster, and how he always chooses to do the right thing when it comes down to saving the world, even when it's near impossible to.

Episode 7 "Reflections": There comes a time in every hunt when the fightin' starts. And the difference between winning and losing isn't whether you have the holy water, the wooden stake, or the silver bullet. It's whether you've got the grit to get the job done.

Reflections is by the Supremes:

"Through the mirror of my mind

Through all these tears that I'm crying

Reflects a hurt I can't control

Although you're gone

I keep holding on

To those happy times

Oh, girl when you were mine

As I peer through the windows

Of lost time

Keeping looking over my yesterdays

And all the love I gave all in vain

(All the love) All the love

That I've wasted

(All the tears) All the tears

That I've tasted

All in vain

Through the hollow of my tears

I see a dream that's lost

From the hurt baby

That you have caused"

I think this one represents loss, especially the loss of Henry. Dean's monologue ties into this because in this episode there are multiple instances where the characters show real strength and bravery in order to come out the other side with a win. And this can obviously be applied to Dean and everything he has done and hunted and how brave he had to be to be able to actually get the job done.

Episode 8, "Hang on to Your Life”: Being a hunter, it means living a life of sacrifice-- not a lot of room for dreams. But if you open your heart and get a little lucky, you'll find you gain more than you lose.

Hang On To Your Life is by Guess Who:

“Thinking 'bout it's here and it's real

Wondering how I really should feel

Well you can sell your soul

But don't you sell it too cheap

Hang on to your life, oh life, oh life, oh life, oh life

Hang on to your life

Thinking 'bout betraying a friend

Thinking 'bout delaying the end

Well you can ride the wind

But don't you ride it too high”

This episode is about Carlos’ dream of being a musician and how he had to give that up when he became a hunter. The parts about selling his soul and betraying a friend applies to the band member that Carlos used to play with and how he accidentally made a deal and because he “betrayed” Carlos by selling him out to Loki.

Dean’s monologue applies to the theme of found family in this episode. Even though they’re all a part of this life and had to give up their dreams, there is good that came from it in the form of family and friends, the same way that Dean found himself a family in the midst of it all. This is also the episode where John and Mary decided to get together, again proving that they can find something worthwhile, right before they found the picture of Dean. (Insert Miranda Cosgrove meme)

Episode 9 "Cast Your Fate to the Wind": This isn't how I saw things going when I pushed over that first domino. Thing is, I've had more than a few dances with free will and fate, but as my dad used to say, "Fate is what you make it."

The song here is actually a song that I didn’t know. It’s a jazz song by Vince Guaraldi. Honestly, reading the lyrics to this song make me think SO MUCH of John and who he becomes, and I’m actually going to put in the entire lyrics because I can’t chose one section that I feel is most important:

“A month of nights, a year of days

Octobers drifting into Mays

I set my sail when the tide comes in

And I just cast my fate to the wind

I shift my course along the breeze

Won't sail up wind on memories

The empty sky is my best friend

And I just cast my fate to the wind

That time has a way of changing a man throughout the years

And now I’m rearranging my life through all my tears

Alone, alone, alone

There never was, there couldn't be

A place in time for men like me

Who'd drink the dark and laugh at day

And let their wildest dreams blow away

That time has a way of changing a man throughout the years

And now I’m rearranging my life through all my tears

Alone, alone, alone

So now I’m old, I’m wise, I’m smart

I’m just a man with half a heart

I wonder how it might have been

Had I not cast my fate to the wind

To the wind, to the wind”

Like, come on. This is so John coded in who he becomes and what happens to him. In terms of how this song applies to the episode though, it applies to the theme of fate throughout the episode, which ties in with what Dean says at the beginning. “Fate is what you make it.” This speaks true to John in this episode because he uses the knowledge of his death to his advantage and makes his own fate, which Millie uses the “fate is what you make it” line. I find this episode very interesting because they use the theme of fate in an episode that deals with vampires, and has a whole scene that parallels 15x18 AND Carlos gets to kiss his male love interest. Dean’s monologue at the beginning applies to himself because he’s dealt with fate and free will plenty of times in Supernatural.

I also find it interesting that Dean said that this isn't how he saw things going when he pushed over that first domino, which begs the question of what did he expect? What was his goal in doing all of this? It's also worth noting that immediately after he says that he says "fate is what you make it," saying the two apply to each other, go hand in hand. I don't think it's a stretch to say that whatever his intentions were, whatever he did, had to do with controlling his own fate.

So, just to recap: in an episode where the two main characters are dealing with being in a new relationship and whether or not they want to tell people, one of those main characters dies from a vampire in a direct parallel to the 15x18 confession, and two men have an on screen kiss for the first time, and the entire theme of the episode is fate. That's VERY interesting to me.

Episode 10 "Suspicious Minds": Hunting and happy endings don't usually mix, so when you get your chance, you got to ask yourself, "How far will I go to get it?"

This can be read as a direct tie in to his monologue in the last episode! It's along the same lines!!

Something I've noticed is that each episode I feel like the monologues get deeper and more meaningful, the farther we go the more is revealed.

This Dean monologue ends right as John and Mary get interrupted while they're kissing and Mary says "normal will have to wait another day" while there's a close up of Mary's college application as a mirror to SPN 15x20 with Dean's job application. Something I thought was interesting.

Suspicious Minds is an Elvis Presley song, which I know that the trend here is to include 60's and 70's songs, but knowing the intense meaning of Elvis in the Destiel fandom makes me feel a little unwell knowing Elvis actually gets incorporated into the text.

"Oh, let our love survive

I'll dry the tears from your eyes

Let's don't let a good thing die

When honey, you know I've never lied to you

Mmm, yeah, yeah

We're caught in a trap

I can't walk out

Because I love you too much, baby

Why can't you see

What you're doing to me

When you don't believe a word I say?"

So this is very much talking about one of the big plot points of this episode, a man who tries to bring his dead wife back to life in such desperation that he's willing to kill innocents to do it. Now the parallels drawn in this episode are very intentional to both John and Mary, even including the dialogue they speak after they kill said man and how John thinks that's love and Mary thinks it's horrible and she essentially makes him promise that that will never be them (clear foreshadowing) when in reality, even though it's showing that John already had the mindset of "doing it out of love" as he does in the future, they're both guilty of that. Mary brings John back to life when Azazel kills him, and as we all know, after Mary's death John goes on a revenge mission, wasting his life and putting his children through hell in the process. It's also just a running theme throughout SPN of toxic codependency and how almost every major character is also guilty of going to great lengths to bring the ones they love back. The song lyrics also apply to John and Mary as a romantic relationship as well and can show how their relationship is now and foreshadow what will happen in the future.

The thing that is different about this episode though, is that even though the parallels in this episode can apply to Dean, the actual Dean monologue doesn't, and this is what I find really weird and what I think is honestly one of the biggest indications that Jensen really is writing a fix it fanfiction:

This is the only episode where his monologue doesn't directly apply to himself. Every other episode ties in to his own experiences, except for this one. Dean doesn't go to great lengths to get himself a happy ending. Happy endings for other characters? Absolutely. But not for himself. Why would this be the only episode that doesn't directly relate to him? Well me and a lot of other people think because it really does apply to himself. But not as something he experienced in the past or has knowledge on, but as something he is doing right now. He is actively changing his future, possibly even a future with Cas (I do really think that there's a solid possibility that Destiel will become 100% canon in this show because of how everything is being set up, all of the parallels, and the fact that some of the cast, the social media team, and an executive producer has acknowledged some of these said parallels.) So in the end, how far will Dean go to get his happy ending?

Episode 11 "You've Got a Friend": Being a hunter means always being on the move. But no matter how hard you plan, no matter how hard you work, at a certain point, we all run out of road. It's what we do with those crossroads that define us.

"You've Got a Friend" is a song by Carole King from 1971:

"When you're down and troubled

And you need some lovin' care

And nothin', nothin' is goin' right

Close your eyes and think of me

And soon I will be there

To brighten up even your darkest night

You just call out my name

And you know, wherever I am

I'll come runnin'

To see you again

Winter, spring, summer or fall

All you have to do is call

And I'll be there

You've got a friend"

This represents Betty, and how in this episode she goes from being a potential source of trouble for the gang to becoming an ally, or a "friend" and an inside woman for them. This also can be applied to Carlos and Lata because Carlos was there for Lata and helped support her while Lata told Carlos about her childhood trauma.

In this episode, Dean's monologue is about the choices you make before you die. This can be seen in the choices made throughout this episode by multiple characters (Betty, Mary, John, etc) and this ties in with the song because no matter what choices you make, you'll have your friends by your side, which is true to Dean and just Supernatural as whole with their message of family and found family. Admittedly, I feel like the connection to Dean's voiceover and to the title of this episode aren't as strong as a lot of the previous episodes, but they're still there. (Betty, the "friend," makes a choice to work with the rest of the gang.) At the same time, I believe this can also be another instance of foreshadowing because Dean is dead, he's at that metaphorical cross road, and he's making a choice to go into the past.

As I said above, Lata faced her trauma. This is the 4th or 5th instance of someone on this show confronting their past. At this point, it's become a theme. Why would the show reiterate this point over and over? I think this will tie into Dean's reasons for why he's in the 70's. Not to mention this was yet ANOTHER episode where 2 characters are trapped in a room, and this time because of a shadow monster, and the only way to get out is if one confesses a deep secret. What the fuck.

Something to keep in mind is how much this episode emphasized secrets. This seems to foreshadow the fact that Dean is harboring some huge secrets that will soon be discovered. I think the real question now is how will these secrets be revealed to the audience and to our characters?

Episode 12 "The Tears of a Clown": Hunting is a dishonest business. You lie about who you are, and what you do. But the hardest lies aren't what you tell other people, but what you tell yourself."

The song "The Tears of a Clown" was released in 1967 by Smokey Robinson & The Miracles:

"Now if there's a smile on my face

It's only there trying to fool the public

But when it comes down to fooling you

Now honey that's quite a different subject

But don't let my glad expression

Give you the wrong impression

Really I'm sad, oh I'm sadder than sad

You're gone and I'm hurting so bad

Like a clown I appear to be glad (sad, sad, sad, sad)"

Okay, so this episode gave me a lot of brainrot. What the song is expressing is that even if you seem happy, that doesn't mean you are, and that was the big theme of this episode. Just because you seem okay or even think you're okay, that doesn't mean you are. With John, that applies to his anger issues and his unresolved issues with being charged for a murder he didn't commit. For Mary, it's the issues she already has, plus being unhappy in her relationship with John because she thinks he's using their relationship as an escape, and this also applies to her because even though she got accepted into college, she hadn't really taken any steps towards a normal life since then. In general, this episode was about a clown who lures emotionally vulnerable people into his circus tent so he can force them to be "happy" even though they aren't, like we saw with Roger.

This can very much apply to Dean's voice over, because the characters in this episode, including the clown, are actively lying to themselves.

The thing is, like a lot of Dean's voice overs, it's intentionally vague. He could be referring to literally anything. In the context of this episode, it makes the most sense that this is referring to Dean's anger issues and the fact that throughout the entirety of Supernatural, Dean oftentimes told himself and the people around him that he was okay, even though he wasn't. But at the same time, these voice overs and one like this in particular can be interpreted in different ways. What Dean says about facing the lies you tell yourself can apply to sexuality. Dean could be talking about not only his mental and emotional issues, but he could also be referencing being in love with Cas. At this point, Destiel happening feels like genuine build up. Now all we have to do is wait a couple more days to see if it all pays off.

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