#dean i get. sam i cannot comprehend which is why he is so interesting

[diamond-rings-and-gutter-bones]

the thing about "saving people, hunting things" is that one of them thinks of the job as saving people. and the other thinks of it as hunting things. and which one is which, changes, but it's usually dean who saves people and sam who hunts things. which i found surprising when i realized it

[tinkdw]

I asked a bibro/anti if they could ever see destiel as canon. They said some interesting and definitive statements for someone who isn't a spn writer or production member. "Dean is not going to turn gay/bi." "Jensen hates destiel" "Dean is not going to mature into a non-codependent relationship with Sam partly because he has no desire to, partly because they’re actual literal soulmates, and partly because it would be boring TV."

I can see you really want an answer to this question as you asked me this twice so... 

I just can’t even, I’m facepalming so hard.

Look antis are just hateful. They hate nice things. Ignore them.

As for bibros, I’m sure there are nice bibros, however this is not my experience. I know one who is kind of ok but still resorts to online bullying and calling us delusional for things that have already been textualised as canon on the show so meh.

Dean is not going to TURN Bisexual if he is canon bisexual. IT HAS BEEN THERE ALL ALONG. That is why we have written REALMS of meta on it, SINCE SEASON 1. Just because they don’t like it and refuse to see it doesn’t mean it’s not THERE.

This is the same for the end of the toxic codependency. And Destiel. And everything.

They say “it can’t happen because it would be OOC” and yet they are yelling that everyone is OOC since season 12 because they just don’t see that this is them BEYOND THE FACADE, being the REAL them. Jeez. They really don’t have a leg to stand on I’m sorry. They’re just flat out wrong and yelling about it.

The toxic codependency LITERALLY ENDED IN 12x22!!!! I mean even if it rears it’s head here and there or IF it gets re-verted (which I doubt given how much emphasis they gave the scene and build up to it in 12x22) it’s still framed as BAD and if you watch Andrew Dabb’s own episodes he frames the toxic codependency as BAD BAD BAD and that it has to end. Then he’s showrunner and WAM BAM. End.

He’s the one who wrote 5x16, the episode that the bibros love because apparently it says they’re canonically soulmates. PFFFT THIS WAS NOT WHAT DABB WAS SAYING AT ALL!!!!!! A. No, just no. There is no reading for this that is concrete, it’s a vague concept that I can understand but overall makes no sense. So all you have to do is look at author INTENT. Watch the rest of Dabb’s episodes and you see that the “canon soulmates” reading is completely contradictory to the rest of his writing. What he was saying was that Dean’s toxic codependency on Sam was BAD and terrible for his own personal wellbeing and that Sam just wanted to escape because of the burden of it all. Literally all of this episode was showing that Sam DID NOT WANT the codependency. Then the next episodes show Dean’s spiral into feeling he should say yes to Michael as he feels unloved by Sam and unwanted, because his hold on the codependency is so strong. It’s BAD BAD BAD. SHEESH. (Also ironically or perhaps not it’s CAS who helps him break out of this mindset through something that he doesn’t want on the top level in this terrible moment of regression to his old ways but helps him in the long run. Meta much).

Then later Dabb episodes bring this up more and more as bad and to END, I mean Carver did too obviously, season 8 was all a huge exposition of how terrible the codependency was, culminating in them failing to save the world because of it in a direct subversion of season 5, they kind of become anti-heroe because of the codependency.

They become BAD because of it! It’s TERRIBLE for their individual characters and together and it’s due to the codependency!!

Anyway.... so after all this we are now seemingly heading to a positive endgame and the toxic codependency is GONE. Dusted. @elizabethrobertajones has been yelling at me about how they sat at the table in 13x02 and how this is really important to show the dynamics of the codependency, namely that yes it is now ended, just as we hoped/expected it would be after 12x22.

"Dean is not going to mature into a non-codependent relationship with Sam partly because he has no desire to, partly because they’re actual literal soulmates, and partly because it would be boring TV."

I JUST WHAT?!!?!! Dean has no desire to?! This has been his journey all along!! Yes he APPEARED to not want to because he was hanging onto it but all he wants is to be EMANCIPATED and be his own person!!!! Facepalm. Again this is seeing top level Dean and thinking this is who he ACTUALLY is. Freaking surface level reading much.

That’s what the whole point of the “young Dean” and “uninhibited Dean” episodes are for - to set up who he wants to be. OUTSIDE of the codependency and the responsibility of patenting Sam being thrown on him he is totally different! He is soft, there are parts of him that are totally still HIM, helping people, wanting to do the right thing, but the facade is GONE. This is the point of the “inhibitions reduced” episodes like 12x11 or when he’s drugged up etc - and lo and behold he starts flirting with guys, saying he loves stuff he usually wouldn’t (Disney, Taylor Swift) ETC ETC.

These people are literally looking at PERFORMANCE LEVEL DEAN and thinking this is all there is to him.

It’s infuriatingly insulting to the writers, also to Jensen, but Jensen himself sometimes falls into it so I can’t even have such a go when he himself forgets to mention Taylor Swift and obviously does sometimes see Dean as the performance. But literally THIS WEEK he went into a whole spiel about how Dean has layers bla bla bla he’s seeing this more clearly as it becomes more obvious and yes thank you Jensen.

I have a whole tag for the Jensen x destiel thing because he varies on this but ultimately whatever happens he and no-one is going to just flat out come out and say “yeah guys we’ve been building this for X years and aw well it was supposed to be a huge big socio-political reveal but I’ll say yes here at this random con”.

So whatever, I stick to what the story is telling us and right now Dabb era is VALIDATING ALL OUR META.

- end of the toxic codependency. check.

- dean has to face the pedestal view of his mother to start learning to accept himself as flawed but still good. check.

- dean has to be more emotionally honest. check.

- sam has to face his past and his guilt through something to allow him to move past it and forgive himself (Jack is perfect). check.

- dean has to face his issues with his father (FUCKING CHECK BIG TIME THIS WHOLE SEASON IS ABOUT FATHERS AND JOHN ALREADY HAD AN OUT OF NOWHERE MENTION IN A BUCKLEMMING EPISODE NO LESS TO HAMMER HOME THAT THIS IS GOING TO BE A HUGE FACTOR. IM LIVING).

- Destiel. Destiel is a huge part of Dabb’s own episodes writing. No wonder it’s so blatant in his showrunning and looking more and more like canon endgame.

So yeah, the bibros who kinda have a grasp on subtext are screaming that the characters are OOC and the writing is bad right now because they don’t like what they’re seeing. The ones who don’t grasp subtext think the show is great cos it’s just about the bros again and Cas is old news. They literally cannot see that Cas is ALL OVER 13x01/02 and I cannot even comprehend the stupid. They have even said it in all the interviews let alone in the actual show that he’s the undercurrent of Dean’s grief and he only get better when he’s back.

JEEZ.

So yeah. Sorry, this is such a rant because I am so done with this. I am so done with people thinking these hateful nasty people’s negative awful concepts of the show have any VALID meta reading.

They just don’t right now. Dabb is validating the positive meta that some have been writing for over a decade and I myself have only become a part of over the last year. To say it’s not true is not just infuriating but it’s insulting to the writers who put so much effort into doing it in the first place!!!

It’s snobby I know, but I do sometimes just sit back and think hey, the people I speak to regularly are all well educated people, most of them with with degrees, MAs, PHDs in literature, some actually work in writing/literature/cinema. We are not the idiots here. On top of that the fact that Dabb literally seems to have a checklist of our meta and is ticking it of.

Because it’s also HIS meta, it’s the way he wrote the show, it’s just validation that our readings were correct because that was the way they wrote it!

Yes things could flip if the showrunner or endgame for some reason changed but honestly I do not understand how that could happen now. It’s set up so strongly for the positive endgame we’ve been talking about for ages and now everything is setting up for it even more, we are like 85% of the way there, why would the final 15% change?

The antis/bibros just refuse to see the 85% of the story and are stuck on some warped view of what was set up as the BAD START as being the thing to strive for in the end. That’s not how story telling works. 

They set up the BAD START so that in the end it could be subverted (you can see a lot of it is in Swan Song for example but not all of it, so that they could continue the story, in fact the things that aren’t or the way it’s then immediately subverted is then set up as the NEXT bad thing to continue the story ie. Sam always had to redeem himself and die but then he comes back WRONG).

It’s standard storytelling! Set up the bad start so that the heroes subvert it and end up in the good ending! 

If at the start the hero is alone and alcoholic and clearly strives for a family but much of his blood family is negatively framed, doesn’t accept himself and hides parts of himself and “just wants someone to love him” (these are all things that are TEXTUALLY set up in season1 for Dean for example) then this is his endgame: a healthy life, found family around him and someone who loves him for exactly who he is warts and all.

This is blatantly what is happening (among others obviously but this is the easiest example as Dean pretty much carries the main emotional arc these days) and I’m so excited for it :)

[mittensmorgul]

8.12: Let me tell you what I understand! Some asshat pops out of my closet asking about my dad, smashes up my ride. So why am I not getting violent, again?

Sam, Dean. Meet your grandfather. And the Men of Letters.

Here’s a great little using your words scene. When Henry popped out of their closet asking for John Winchester, Sam and Dean were obviously wary of him and were’t about to start answering some stranger’s questions directly, but Henry assumed that his spell must have failed and that there’d been a mistake, He was the one intruding, yet offered no explanation to Sam and Dean, becoming hostile and assuming the worst of them:

HENRY: I'm quite certain this is all beyond your understanding, my alpha-male-monkey friend. And violence will not help you comprehend this any easier.

I mean, not exactly the best way to earn the trust of the people whose lives you’ve just invaded, right? But that superiority is pretty typical of the Men of Letters. Even the ones from back in Henry’s time.

Poor Henry learns that John is dead, just like Samuel once learned that Mary was dead. The interesting difference is in how they each reacted differently to learning those facts about their respective children far into the future.

Sam believes Henry’s story because he knows all the relevant facts about John’s early life (his birthday, where he was born), but Dean thinks all of that’s irrelevant because Henry abandoned John as a child. Sam wonders if he didn’t abandon John, but somehow came here to the future and was unable to return. Dean takes John’s side, because the story became the story, and that was the only story John really had about his real father:

DEAN : Yeah, well, either way, Dad hated the son of a bitch. SAM : And Dad made up for that how? By being father of the year?

Henry tries to introduce himself properly after his initial insulting non-introduction, but Dean’s not having it... yet. Henry quickly learns that Sam and Dean aren’t a couple of ignorant civilians, hence my favorite gif:

I know, Dean. You’re gonna go around it a few more... I hope you’re wearing comfy shoes.

SAM : Our father taught us how to be hunters. HENRY : [laughs] You're not. Are you? Hunters? Well, hunters are... Hunters are apes. You're supposed to – you're legacies.

And this is the early version of the modern mindset of the Men of Letters toward hunters ,and I think a LOT of the reason why they feel no qualms about just wiping all the American hunters off the board and starting over with their own brainwashed goons:

DEAN : Okay, enough with the decoder talk. How about you tell us what this whole “Men of Letters” business is, or you're on your own. HENRY : It's none of your concern. DEAN : Why, because we're hunters? What do you have against us? HENRY : Aside from the unthinking, unwashed, shoot-first-and-don't-bother-to-ask-questions-later part, not much, really. SAM : You know what? Wait a second. We're also John's children. HENRY : You're more than that, actually. My father and his father before him were both Men of Letters, as John and you two should have been. We're preceptors, beholders, chroniclers of all that which man does not understand. We share our findings with a few trusted hunters – the very elite. They do the rest.

Dean’s incensed that Henry was willing to travel through time to protect a mysterious object he knew nothing about without question.

It takes Henry noticing John’s journal, and seeing his own initials embossed in it, to realize that he never makes it back to his own time, and Dean tells him John always thought he just ran out on him. Dean gives a rather objective rundown of John’s life:

DEAN : The hard way. Surviving a lonely childhood, a stinking war... only to get married and have his wife taken by a demon... and later killed by one himself. That man got a bum rap around every turn. But you know what? He kept going. And in the end, he did a hell of a lot more good than he did bad. HENRY : I'm sorry. I wish I had been there for him. DEAN : Yeah, it's a little late for that now, don't you think? DEAN gets up and walks towards the door. HENRY : It's the price we pay for upholding great responsibility. We know that. DEAN : Your responsibility was to your family, not some glorified book club! HENRY : I was a legacy. I had no choice. DEAN : Yeah, you keep telling yourself that.

Henry reads John’s journal, waits until Sam and Dean are asleep, and then goes of to try and make things right, to return to the past. Dean tracks him to the nearest shop that trades with hunters, and stops him right before he goes through the portal. Meanwhile Sam goes to talk to Larry Ganem.

Larry Ganem was convinced that all the Men of Letters were wiped out, that he was the only survivor of the entire organization.

SAM : The box. Listen, Abaddon is here, and she wants this thing. So I need to know everything there is to know about it. LARRY: In the box is the key to every object, scroll, spell ever collected for thousands of years under one roof. It is the supernatural mother lode.

Meanwhile back with Henry and Dean:

HENRY : You cannot begin to understand how I felt after reading John's journal. DEAN : Oh, I think I can. See, I've read that thing more times than you can imagine, and it hurts every time.

(I wonder how Mary feels having read it also...)

HENRY : Maybe so, but you didn't let him down! I did! Just like you said! DEAN : Well, I was wrong. HENRY : No! No, you were right. And I'm going to go back and give him the life he deserves, not the one he was forced to live.

But it’s not really possible to change the past.

DEAN : Listen, I understand that this is not your idea of a happy ending, okay, and that – that you're disappointed that me and Sam are mouth-breathing hunters. But you know what? We stopped the Apocalypse. HENRY : If this works the way I planned, there will never be an Apocalypse to stop.

Oh, Henry. The machinations that brought on the apocalypse are so much larger than just you disappearing from John’s life...

Abaddon calls Dean offering to trade Henry and the key for Sam, or she kills him. Dean and Henry finally get to talk properly, and really begin to understand one another.

DEAN : Henry, you need to understand something. When my dad died, I couldn't save him... no matter how bad I wanted to. I never want that to happen to Sam... ever. If there's a chance that I can save him, I'm gonna do it. He's my brother. He's the only family I got.

They put on an act for Abaddon, because Henry taught Dean a few tricks-- like carving a devil’s trap into a bullet and shooting it into Abaddon’s head.

DEAN : A devil's trap carved into the bullet. DEAN puts the bullet into a gun and hands the gun to HENRY. DEAN : You're gonna have to get close. And "close" means it could get ugly. HENRY : I know. But you do that for blood.

And honestly, this sounds just like Castiel’s speech at the end of 12.09:

HENRY : [smiles] I'm sorry I judged you two so harshly for being hunters. I should have known better. SAM : About? HENRY: You're also Winchesters. As long as we're alive, there's always hope. I didn't know my son as a man, but having met you two, I know I would have been proud of him.

Over Henry’s grave, Sam mentions the Cupid who’d told them how Heaven worked to get their parents together, and how it makes sense now knowing their family legacy with the Men of Letters, and they wonder if it would’ve changed anything if Henry had survived and gone back to raise John. But they decide to take a chance on the Bunker still standing, because they’re legacies. It’s their responsibility now.

Because they can’t go back and change the past, but they sure can take what the past left for them-- their legacy-- and make something new, and something better, that brings their entire family’s legacy together.

Men of Letters AND Hunters.

Sam and Dean are both at the same time, 2 in 1 if you will... Balanced. 

[almaasi]

reaction post typed while watching SPN 12x20 ‘Twigs & Twine & Tasha Banes”

that Max & Dean parallel though!!!

07;30

idk what to expect but my sister says there was a cute text post she saw which she’ll show me later

i’m assuming it was destiel-related (spoilers: it wasn’t, it was dean-is-bi related)

here goes

i’m rooting for ya, steve yockey and richard speight jr

-

i have new headphones! but my shift key is still broken

-

07;31

recap OH MY GOD THEY WERE SO SMALL 12 YEARS AGO WHAT THE FUCK

remember when they were ADULTS to me

and now baby sam is three years younger than me

oh dear

they were definitely thrown into adulthood too soon, i’m still a smol human at age 23

-

FETUS SAM HAD A TEXAN DRAWL HOW DID I NOT NOTICE THAT

-

AAAAAH IT’S THESE TWO I LOVE THESE TWO

max ? and ... dammit i forgot her name? alissa????

-

i’m still sad about mick :c

also my brain always wants to call him mitch for some reason

-

07;36

that is a niiiiiice house. nice rainy weather too, kinda comforting

-

07:37

THIS WOMAN IS IMMEDIATELY THE MOST BEAUTIFUL WOMAN ON EARTH TO ME

-

07:38

“I COULD CLEANSE YOUR AURA IF YOU LIKE”

she’s a witch SHE JUST GOT 3000% MORE ATTRACTIVE

-

07;41

ANDY IS CUTE TOO

OH GOD STEVE YOCKEY I LOVE YOUR CHARACTERS SO MUCH

-

07:44

alicia!! i was close

-

07:46

????????? STABBED????

SHE’D BETTER SURVIVE

D:

...........what if steve yockey’s episodes are all “main character dies, inducing a story”

oh no

-

07:48

dean stroking his own hands nfhhggfhhghh that’s not meant to be sexy but it’s sexy anyway

he has such beautiful hands

i want all the gifs of this

-

07;50

dean being so in tune with cas he understands his motivation to do good regardless of whether the outcome reflects that!!!

dean knowing instinctively if cas is possessed!!!!!!!!!!

sam still wearing pink eyeshadow!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

-

07;53

THE FACT THEY’RE PARALLELING MAX & ALICIA WITH SAM & DEAN IN SEASON 1

AND THE RECAP INCLUDED A MENTION OF SAM’S SHINY HAIR

ALICIA HAS GREAT HAIR WITH PUPPYDOG EYES AND MAX IS QUEER AS FUCK AND FULL OF SARCASM AND SALT

I WONDER WHO IS THE PARALLEL FOR WHO

HMMMM 

/sarcasm dean is bisexual cough cough

-

07;57

i know it makes no sense and is Wrong but

does anyone else lowkey feel like “cass” seems way more ~~feminine~~ than “cas”?

(dean still spells cas with two Ss. will we ever know where the extra S comes from?)

-

08:00

whaaaaaaat

two marys

did i miss something

oh must be a shapeshifter

-

08;01

“mom plz call me back i’m having boyfriend trouble”

-

08;04

max; “i got the bartender’s phone number”

i’m so fucking enjoying this incredibly obvious season 1 dean parallel

i really wanna see some dean-is-straight-and-you-are-erasing-his-heterosexuality stan get this parallel waved in their face

-

08;06

GRENADE LAUNCHER

-

08;08

all right i want flower symbolism people on this, stat

looks like a a pink rose and a pink orchid

google says a light pink rose = “Light pink roses are associated with gentleness and admiration, and can also be used as an expression of sympathy.”

but it might also be lilac so = The lavender rose is often a sign of enchantment and love at first sight.

and the pink orchid = the pink Orchid has the honour of representing innocence, femininity, grace, joy and happiness.

basically i think it’s meant to represent andy’s character as a cinnamon roll

...in fact he’s so sweet and trustable that i’d go so far as to say it’s a) either a ruse and he’s the bad guy, or b) he and max are getting together later

obviously he’s giving off hella gay vibes but NOT TO STEREOTYPE or anything

....but actually i wanna cry of happiness i LOVE OBVIOUS SYMBOLISM SO MUCH

-

08;13

my theory; the tasha banes they’re seeing is a shifter and/or the other witch

-

08:15

what if......meat suit

oh dear

-

08;16

DEAN HOLDS A FUCKING WINE GLASS WITH A FULL FIST

-

08;19

what if......she did a spell to put herself back together but “twigs & twine” means she ain’t sticking around for long

-

08:20

tasha; “parents seem smart and strong and perfect, it’s only when you grow up that you realise they’re just people”

yeah

also important; doctors are also just people who studied some stuff once, and unless they continue studying, their knowledge could very likely be 10+ years out of date and therefore cause you more harm than good

every professional you meet and ask advice from is knowledgeable in that one subject but they don’t know everything, and they don’t know you. you know you better than anyone. feel free to distrust professional advice. if a professional tells you something, research it yourself before believing it.

seriously i’m not kidding. like, use your common sense, but trust that all people are often wrong. professionals will make up bullshit to seem better than you. even the world’s kindest people still have the right to put their own interests first, and they will. not saying everyone lies, but that people don’t realise they’re incorrect even if they’re experts on a subject. especially if they’re experts on the subject.

the best people admit they could be wrong even if they know their stuff inside out. because facts change, the world’s collective knowledge changes, and people’s opinions and understandings evolve over time.

also yeah. parents don’t know what the fuck they’re doing any better than you do. even if there was a “guidebook to life”, it’s not a one-size-fits all.

look idk what i’m saying here BUT THAT’S THE POINT

-

08;32

what if...... the other witch reanimated dead tasha for her own purposes

-

08;37

aw man andy’s dead too

-

08:39

;n; noo max

-

08:42

YYEAAH MARY PUNCH KETCH IN THE FACE

-

08:44

YES MARY MAKE HIM WHIMPER

-

08:49

MAX NO DON’T TAKE THE POWER

-

08;50

ALICIA NO

OH GOD WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS EPISODE

-

08;53

I 

don’t 

ev

what

how why 

what vthe FUCK.

i cannot fucking COMPREHEND

what the fuck

what the fuck

what the f u c k

-

06;55

oh no is he gonna make a demon deal or something

-

08;57

PART OF ME IS LIKE OH NO DON’T DO THE THING MAX

PART OF ME IS LIKE YES FUCKING DO IT MAX

?>???

-

09:01

??????? ketch is a SHAPESHIFTER

??

-

oh man

this episode!!!!!! WHAT A RIDE

10/10 honestly

even the things i didn’t like about it at the time (dead characters of colour) were kinda ~fixed~ by the end (mostly. rip tasha banes)

i mean it’s not one of my favourites because it was so very angsty and heartbreaking but IT WAS GOOD and WELL-CONSTRUCTED

i fucking miss cas though, this news to no-one

now i wanna see what my sister’s tumblr dash thought was so cute about this episode

i just went to ask her, and oh it was about the max/dean parallel pfff of course i noticed that it was blindingly obvious