The thing with Dean and the Mark is that he can both be in a surprisingly healthy place emotionally while also still being more and more susceptible to the Mark. They don’t contradict each other – that Dean is able to realize that he is loved and he loves other people, and he wants to live, doesn’t change that he has something inside him that may prevent that from happening. He’s trying to fight it off, but he knows from experience that he is fighting a losing battle. He can’t win this by sheer willpower and he’s not willing to win it in a way that hurts other people (*cough* apart from, you know, the monsters that he would have killed anyway).
Dramatic irony has struck him, in that this is exactly the situation that Sam was in during 9x01 – not able to will himself healed but not wanting to be saved by mystical means because he knew that always led to other people getting killed (and it did when Dean saved him in 9x01 and then later Gadreel used his body to kill Kevin). And now that the shoe genuinely is on the other foot, Sam has come to a place where he’s willing to rack up that same kind of collateral damage. Susie has already died because of it and the final price is bound to be even higher.
Both Sam and Dean talked in the recent episode about how the reason you should be a hunter is to help other people (as opposed to, you know, the reason most hunters they know actually got into the gig – which is to say, revenge). But when it comes to saving each other, they’re willing to let innocent people die. At what point in this process do they themselves become the monsters that they hunt? It’s the kind of question any show that deals with issues like this has to deal with (I’ve been supremely frustrated by the fact that Agents of SHIELD spent most of S2 dancing around this question and not dealing with it, though in these last couple of episodes, it looks like they’re finally done delaying. Maybe.) – the classic, ‘when fighting monsters, take care not to become a monster yourself’.
At the point when Dean agreed to take on the Mark, he no longer cared about not being a monster, because he already felt like one on the inside. And by the time he cared again, it was too late to undo the damage he’d caused himself and others. What we’ve been seeing this season has been implying that Sam will make the same choice – rush himself into becoming monstrous to save his brother, heedless of the damage it may cause. That’s the Winchester/Campbell family cycle – that in an attempt to save your family, you damn yourself. Mary damned herself to save John. John damned himself to save Dean. Dean damned himself to save Sam. Sam tried to damn himself to save Dean and only failed because he had no takers, so he had to take the long way ‘round. And Josie damned herself to save Henry, too. Going back and back and back to Cain damning himself to save Abel. It’s the family curse.
We’ve seen in some characters – like Charlie or Kate – that it
is possible to break this cycle. But somewhere along the line, someone has to learn how to let go.
Original Post:
dean and the mark
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