#tl;dr the author is dead so destiel is canon even if it's not

[fuckspn]

okay i know this has been said before but i really am losing it over how supernatural managed to queerbait so hard that they accidentally made it canon like

you’re a writer on the show supernatural, right? and you want to drive your shipper fangirls wild with a line that sounds absolutely laden with subtext that you know you’re never gonna follow through on, so you give dean the extremely bisexual-sounding line, “There’s things, people, feelings that I want to experience differently than I did before. Maybe even for the first time.”*

(*disclaimer 1: i don’t actually know who wrote that episode or what their intent was with that specific line. it’s just an illustration of the broader trend wherein supernatural leaned so hard into its ambiguous homoeroticism that it accidentally created genuine queer subtext.)

haha! oh, you know those shipper fangirls will go nuts for that! they’ll write so many tumblr posts about how this clearly refers to dean grappling with his bisexuality and his feelings for cas, and you’ll laugh all the way to the bank knowing that you didn’t really mean it!

except... that line’s still in the show. it doesn’t matter that you didn’t genuinely intend for it to be a hint that dean is coming to terms with his queerness and his feelings for another man (or male-presenting being), because that’s still what the line sounds like. the writers, regardless of whether or not they planned to follow through, intentionally inserted subtext implying that dean is bisexual. the queer interpretation of that line doesn’t go away just because the writers didn’t take it seriously.

and this has gone on and on for over a decade, until finally the writers go “fuck it! it’s the final season, let’s build up dean and cas’ relationship like never before, culminating in cas confessing his love in a scene that will draw back in old viewers for the final two episodes, only for us to once again fail to follow through!”*

(*disclaimer 2: this is assuming the worst case scenario: that the version of the last 3 episodes we saw is more or less what the writers had planned and that they never intended for “canon destiel” to be anything more than cas’ confession and death. i’m not getting into conspiracy theories or rogue translators in this post.)

but then they’ve written themselves into a corner, because they’ve leaned so hard into the gay subtext that there’s no logical narrative way forward except to openly and directly address the possibility of a romantic relationship between these two male main characters. and they don’t want to actually make the relationship canon but they don’t want to piss off the shipper fans by having dean outright reject cas, so they just drop the subplot entirely.

except by dropping it, they end up failing to address how dean feels about the confession at all. and thanks to the years of intentional subtext implying that dean and cas are in love—even though most of it was put there as a joke!—this ambiguity does not narratively read as “dean is straight because he’s never shown to return cas’ feelings,” but rather, “there is a very real chance dean does return cas’ feelings even if it’s not openly addressed.”

regardless of the writers’ intentions, dean winchester is textually implied to be in love with a male-presenting being who is also in love with him. end of story.

[destielfanfic]

Lost and Found, #2

Lost and Found, vol.2 (more about this new type of post see here) 

Here are some asks that we have already answered privately but we hope that our answers could be useful to other followers as well. Some asks may contain spoilers for the fic, proceed at your own risk!

When possible, fic links go to posts on our blog, if the fic is not featured on the blog, we link to the hosting site. If you think that some other fic is a better fit, let us know! Gif from the gorgeous gif set by @magnificent-winged-beast​ , original post here, SPN, 15x12. Used with a permission.

Lost and Found fic, #1 

I’m looking for an old epic Destiel fic (LJ era). Castiel was Dean’s guardian angel since he was a child. On one of the first scene Castiel was fascinated by Dean excitement for a storm. Castiel was very fascinated by Dean in general. Castiel was able to see souls. Sam and Dean had a very strong bond partly because Castiel had touched newborn Sam’s soul. When Dean was a teenager Castiel possessed Jimmy’s twin sister and went to a date with Dean to the cinema.

Our answer: The Soul Piece by cloudyjenn [M, 138,000 (abandoned? WIP), SU]

This fandom classic used to be hosted on all popular fic hosting platforms of the day - Live Journal, FanFic Net and Dreamwidth. Times have changed , the author has deleted their LJ and FF accounts, and the fic is now hosted only on AO3. See our PSA about cloudyjenn here.

Lost and Found fic, #2

I’m looking for a fic called “Return” but I cannot remember the author. It is a story about Dean being a space soldier and Cas is his husband back on earth with their son. Dean’s ship gets blown up but Cas can’t move on even when Sam tries to talk him into it for his own good. Turns out Dean is alive and enslaved. He is rescued 5 years after he is presumed KIA and returns to Cas and son. It also has two smaller fics in the verse “Meet” and “Ask”.

Our answer:  Return, Meet and Ask by cloudyjenn (unofficially recced on an ask about fics where Cas thinks that Dean is dead) [8,000 word count, 3 parts, AU]

Another fic by cloudyjenn, which is now hosted only on her Dreamwidth. On our blog this fic is recced on 2 asks, the second ask is about fics with soldier/civilian families; both asks are tagged with the #war tag. Since cloudyjenn deleted her LJ 3 years ago, many links to her fics on our blog were broken. Thanks to this ask, I had a chance to look them up and fix them. ;)

Lost and Found fic, #3

hey! what’s that fanfic where cas is a spanish professor and dean is an MA student doing spanish literature? thanks xxx 

Our answer: Inevitable Homoeroticism in Spanish Romantic Heroes by prosopopeya [NC-17, 41,700 word count, AU]

Gosh, this fic was the talk of the town when I joined fandom and started reading destiel fic 8 years ago.

Lost and Found fic, #4

hi! I've looked through your fantasy/demon dean tags and used the search engine, but I haven't found the fic i'm after. In the fic Dean was a demon/Cas was an angel, I think it worked out like angels and demons were different kingdoms? As far as I remember they had to work together, an arranged marriage may have been involved but I'm not sure. Demons had tails/wings, and angels had wings but i'm not sure about tails. There's a scene where Cas watched Dean train his demon team. 

Our answer: This is All Life Really Means by gedry [NC-17, 90,000 word count, AU]

Gedry is another popular author from the good old LJ times. The link on our review goes to their LJ where fic is marked as complete. Recently, gedry has started to repost their fic to AO3, so I added AO3 link to our review as well. It seems that some timestamps are still not transferred, and for this reason only the fic is marked as a WIP. Please be assured that the main destiel story is complete and you can enjoy the fic and give it more love on AO3. Btw, the fic is on our demon!dean tag which we use for both, AU and SU fics. 

Lost and Found fic, #5

[TL;DR lost fic: SU S10 (Post Demon!Dean), Dean PoV, hunting, angst, on Ao3, medium length] Newly-human Dean struggling to control the MoC and TFW hunting at a hotel. Demon!Dean told Sam & Cas that Dean was molested as a kid by a coach at his school (who paid for the brothers' hotel room). Monster looked like Cas, but didn't speak. Not written by kelpie, xylo, komodo, salty, peridium, or other usual suspects. 

Our answer:  Autrement, Danger - Or the Account of an Exceedingly Long Day by awed_frog [M, 30,600 word count, SU]

If awed_frog is not yet among your usual suspects when looking for a canon verse fic, she must be added to the list asap!

Other stuff to remember:

If we answered your lost fic ask and you never responded back, we are assuming that we have found your fic. If you have sent us an ask and never heard from us again, privately or via our Group Asks, don’t hesitate to send us another message!

Lost fic asks that we couldn’t answer privately, are added to our Group Ask for our followers to help!

We also answer more general questions about fics, fanfic tropes and suggest recs when necessary.

When looking for lost fic, check out our Tags Page! We have more than 300 tags to explore. Or use our Search engine from desktop to search for specific or unique terms.

If you enjoyed the fic, please drop by the archive (AO3) and let the author know with your comments and/or kudos! And if you found our recs useful, let us know by Liking and/or Reblogging our posts.