SPN: bad boys and heaven can't wait
Dec. 2nd, 2013 09:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
butterflyWhile I was watching “Bad Boys”, I kept connecting it back to “Heaven Can’t Wait”.
So, this is a bit of an analysis of each episode, a bit of compare/contrast, and also a bit of pulling together various threads of S9 so far.
The last time I had both time and energy to review even part of an episode was 9x02. At that time, I noted that the themes that seemed most apparent were knowledge (and lack thereof) and consent (and lack thereof)* and how these reflected the balance of power in relationships.
*There was also a heavy ‘identity’ theme that I didn’t get into in my 9x02 stuff because I only got ten minutes into rewatching the episode & it hadn’t really come up yet.
What choices are people given and are they given enough information to make those choices? If someone is tricked or forced into a decision, how much of a difference will that make when it comes to the consequences?
Once they’ve made a decision (informed or uninformed), how badly can that go? How far does it have to go before they realize what a terrible choice it was? Will they ever realize it? If they do realize it, what should they do about that?
The 'knowledge’ theme also ties into the 'identities’ theme, as the lack of knowledge is frequently a lack of knowing who the person you’re talking to really is. The person with knowledge trumps the person who is operating on a lack of knowledge or false knowledge.
Both of these tie into Dean tricking Sam into saying 'yes’ to Ezekiel, of course. That’s our overarcing thread of the season thus far – and, in true SPN-style, that means we get to see versions of that choice over and over again.
The identity theme has often been about hidden identities and about one identity being consumed by another. Again, this relates back into Sam and Dean – Zeke is hiding inside Sam and threatens to consume him; Dean’s ingrained identity of the one who 'watches out for Sammy’ was dormant much of S8, only to rise up in 8x23/9x01 and now threatens to consume him.
“Bad Boys” has a few elements that give away that it was originally intended to follow “Slumber Party”: Sam reading an Oz book (Charlie is still on his mind), Dean being aware that Sam/Zeke might need rest and Zeke’s apparent lack of active presence (as he heals himself after expending energy on his resurrection of Charlie), use of “D-dog” (originally meant to proceed and foreshadow “Dog Dean Afternoon”), but it works well enough in its current position & the swap even creates some interesting characterization*.
*Instead of implying that Dean’s decisions with Cas were partly inspired by his reunion with Robin, they’re entirely self-directed & we get a re-play of similar events, thus tying it into being a re-occurring characterization choice.
One of the interesting choices of “Bad Boys” was in how the episode used a bit of the template of S1’s “Route 666” but rearranged things – Dean is called in on a case by someone from his past who he told the truth to but didn’t believe him + Dean reconnects with an old love interest* who he left abruptly – but in “Route 666”, those are both the same person (Cassie) while in “Bad Boys”, those two functions are broken out into Sonny and Robin.
*While Lisa is also an 'old flame’ plotline & the case does end up related to her, it’s formatted completely differently from both R666 & BB - Dean’s time with Lisa prior to meeting her again was all about sex (she’s completely objectified in his description of her) rather than primarily about emotion like it was with Cassie and Robin.
Functionally, “Bad Boys” was both a recapitulation of what we’d previously known about Sam and Dean and also a textual confirmation of some things that had previously been more subtextual. It took the long history of the Sam'n'Dean show and compressed it all into forty minutes, all with a bit of an 'old school’ vibe to the case aspect. It’s a “this is how things were” episode. A few line tweaks (and some color correction) and this episode could have happened in S1.
“Heaven Can’t Wait”, otoh, was steeped in the 'now’ – the problem of the fallen angels, Cas-as-human, Crowley and Kevin and the tablet. It’s a “this is how things are” episode. This episode could not happen in any season except for S9.
But despite that difference, they’re both telling us a story about a person who feels valued only for what they do and not who they are, someone who is struggling to find definition as a person and not as a job description. In each of the episodes, that person is given a chance to experience a new beginning where they are judged on who they decide to be and not who they’ve been told to be but, ultimately, neither of them can escape their history.
The stories start differently, because the ways that Dean and Cas are damaged are very specific to them.
For Cas, we have a man on the verge of suicide and we have an angel trying to fulfill his Heaven-given purpose. For Dean, we have children witnessing a violent death.
Ephraim is a hammer. He knows only one way of doing things and, even though everything around him has changed, he cannot. He’s a hammer and so every problem – every pain – that he sees is a nail. The suicidal man didn’t want Ephraim’s kind of help but, drawn to his pain and feeling overwhelmed by the depth of it, Ephraim only knows one way to respond.
What is so worth saving? I see nothing but pain here. I see inside you. I see your guilt, your anger, confusion. In paradise, all is forgiven. You’ll be at peace. (Castiel; 4x22)
This is what Heaven taught angels to be: to choose peace over freedom. Teaching them any differently has been a very difficult task at times.
The suicidal man has had freedom, perhaps, but he has been lacking in peace. It’s painful to live in this world, especially alone. But even on the verge of suicide, he chose to reach out and call the suicide hotline. Even after he hung up on the hotline and was about to pull the trigger, he put the gun back down again. He wavered on the line between life or death and, hesitantly, chose life this time.
Of course, that’s when Ephraim shows up. Ephraim doesn’t care that the man has changed his mind about dying, that he’s decided to live, because Ephraim’s decided he gets to make the choice. This is also an inverted mirror of what Dean did to Sam in 9x01, when Dean overrode Sam’s decision to accept death and forced life into him instead.
Timmy’s mother isn’t quite a hammer, but she’s indiscriminate. She doesn’t have the ability to judge what a true threat is anymore and reacts to every possible danger with maximum overkill. She’s become something that scares her child even as he loves her. While many things about her are reminiscent of Mary Winchester, she also contains elements of John. More accurately, while the ghost of Timmy’s mother is a literal force of protection and danger, the ghost of Mary is a metaphorical one. Everything John Winchester did to his kids, the way he raised them, was in Mary’s name. Her ghost traveled with them, even as Mary’s actual spirit stayed trapped in the house in Lawrence.
The first killing in 9x07 happens because Jack, who works at the home for boys and who has a traumatic past, threatens to take off his belt and (implied) use it to hit the boys who are out after curfew. Timmy’s mother does not share Jack’s opinion of how to treat young boys and stabs him through the chest with the pointy end of a tractor. Much like Cassie in “Route 666”, Sonny will look at this death, deem it suspicious, and call in Dean to see if it’s supernatural.
After the teaser-deaths that set up the episodes’ cases, we check in on our main characters. For 9x06, we start with an extended focus on Cas doing his job while studying and then copying human behavior in order to better fit into his new life. We’re introduced to Nora – first by defining her as a mother, then by having her note how Cas isn’t like other employees she’s had. She uses ambiguously flirtatious language, which Cas doesn’t yet pick up on, as he’s too concerned that she’s noticed he isn’t human. Nora’s #1 priority is her daughter, just as Timmy’s mother’s priority is Timmy, and Dean’s priority is Sam. Dean also frequently uses ambiguously flirtatious language with people (of either gender), including with Cas himself.
When I was originally watching “Heaven Can’t Wait”, I briefly compared Nora to Dean (in terms of them both asking more of Cas than he was normally expected to give), but after watching “Bad Boys”, I realized that the comparison could be greatly expanded.
Both Nora and Dean are placed in a position to give Cas orders*, both ask more of Cas than just following his job description, both of them see him as special and different than the other workers/angels and, specifically, they both view him as uniquely trustworthy and thus are willing to place their 'child’ into his care**. Nora is a single mother, thus placed in the narrative position that Dean often occupies as Sam’s primary nurturer.
*As Cas mentions in 4x07.
**Dean’s prayer at the end of 8x16 explicitly does this, but he has shown his trust via actions at other times.
However, while Nora is responsive to her child’s needs, she does not give up the desire to satisfy her own emotional needs in the process. A more emotionally-healthy version of Dean, she is able to have her job, her child, and still look for that 'something more’.
Does this mean Robin is Cas? Actually, no, I don’t see her that way. While we get a mirror of the same situation between Dean & Robin that we saw between Dean & Cas earlier in the season, Robin herself is another reflection of Dean. She’s found peace in her life by integrating the legacy of her father (the diner) and her mother (guitar lessons).
The great divide of Dean Winchester has always been the struggle between 'ruthless hunter’ and 'selfless nurturer’*. Rather than these two ideas held up as something he could merge into a whole, they were kept at war with each other by the way he was raised.
*It is pertinent to note that this is an artificial divide based on Dean being raised in a world that was dominated not just by men, but by men who were like his father: men who had lost their own loved ones, frequently women who, like Mary was by John, were idealized post-death. Though there were also women in the hunting world, we have on-screen evidence that John tended to have the growing boys socialize with the men while keeping them away from the women especially motherly ones (ex: Ellen vs Bobby/Pastor Jim/Martin).
He was taught that he needed to be fully a parent to Sam while also never appearing less than the perfect image of a Manly Man ™. This idea was reinforced not just by his father, but by the community he grew up in as a whole. “Delicate features for a hunter,” Gwen Campbell said when she met Dean in S6. Too pretty, too emotional, too soft to be considered the kind of man his dad wanted him to be, so Dean created a mask and hid behind it*. In 9x07, we get to see the moment Dean realizes – decides – that the mask is never going to get to come off. His brother needs him and so Dean needs that mask in order to survive in the hunting world. This is when “no chick flick moments” Dean was truly born. Dean isn’t allowed to be fumbling and genuine** – he has to be smooth, practiced, and with as much of a protective shell against the world as he can manage to keep up.
*If we go by the fringe canon that is John’s journal, then we know that John’s reaction to Dean being empathetic and nurturing towards him was to immediately decide that this meant Dean was 'grown up enough’ to start learning how to kill.
**exceptions to be made only in cases of parenting Sam – and, in a loophole Dean figured out for himself, exceptions could also be made during sex. Dean’s displayed sexual behavior was promiscuously heterosexual and his external flirting behavior suitably aggressive, with any gentleness or experimentation away from rigid gender roles locked firmly inside the bedroom, where his father’s eyes wouldn’t reach.
In the time that the series has been running, that mask has slowly been flaking off – a process that accelerated in S8, when Dean openly started embracing parts of himself that he’d formerly pretended didn’t matter to him or didn’t exist. While the resurgence of the codependency has stifled much of Dean’s growth this season, 9x07 also serves as a reminder that Dean has been stifled before and then been able to begin to heal from that and begin to grow again. Taking a step backward doesn’t mean he can never go forward again.
Dean’s purpose – what he believes he exists for – is tangled up in a violent death that happened over thirty years ago. It was Mary’s death and the choices John made after her death that sculpted Dean into a parent at the age of four. 9x07 lets us see the moment when Dean embraces the role that John created for him.
We know from previous show canon that Dean killed a creature with silver at age 16 and this is the moment he committed himself to the hunt. He also claims, in this episode, that the bruises he received were from a werewolf. And, of course, werewolves are one of the creatures that is killed by silver. Here my personal headcanon that I get by adding 9x07 together with the S2 information along with what we know about the characters involved and their personalities:
Dean and John are hunting a werewolf. Dean almost gets himself badly hurt before the werewolf is killed by John*. John decides Dean needs to sit out the next hunt (the rugaru hunt?), gives him money, Dean loses the money, gets caught stealing, etc. The events of the episode happen.
*Potentially yanked out of the way by John, explaining how Dean could honestly say the wounds were caused by “a werewolf” and yet there are no scratches.
John is doing whatever he was doing while Dean was in the boys’ home. He learns that hearts are still getting ripped out and eaten back in the werewolf town & realizes there were multiple werewolves. Decides he needs Dean with him on this one – maybe with the idea of “get back on the horse” re: werewolf killing (similar to sending Dean & Sam to take care of the Striga in “Something Wicked”). Dean, having given up on the idea of a 'normal’ life, has the moment he described to Gordon in “Bloodlust” (and which obviously could not have happened prior to the flashbacks of 9x07):
Dean: “So. I pick up this crossbow. And I hit that ugly sucker with a silver-tipped arrow right in his heart. Sammy’s waiting in the car, and uh, me and my dad take the thing into the woods, burn it to a crisp. I’m sitting there and looking into the fire, and I’m thinking to myself, I’m sixteen years old. Most kids my age are worried about pimples, prom dates. I’m seeing things that they’ll never even know. Never even dream of. So right then, I just sort of-”
Gordon: “Embraced the life?”
Dean: “Yeah.”
John is super-pleased at Dean’s newfound passionate commitment to the hunt & their lifestyle and pats himself on the back for having left Dean alone for those two months, because the results prove it was completely the right choice. Ends justify the means and all that. This also would lend further justification to his (terrible) notion in S1 that it’s better for him to stay away from his kids sometimes, even if they believe he should be there with them. /headcanon
Ends justify the means. That’s how Dean is operating this season. The ends of keeping Sam alive (“Watch out for Sammy!”) justify the means – going against Sam’s wishes, kicking Dean’s best friend out of the bunker, lying to Sam and everyone else. The ends are just, so the means are justified. Dean can’t quite make himself believe it, but he also can’t not put Sam’s life above everything else. Keeping Sam breathing is how Dean justifies his own existence.
After the shot of the newspaper in 9x06, we go to the bunker, where Kevin has managed to translate the tablets into a completely different language that he doesn’t know how to translate into English. Much like Dean and Sam’s relationship, the translation is stalled out and stuck in place. More knowledge is required in order to jumpstart things again.
When Kevin mentions that he has succeeded in translating a single phrase – falling angels – Dean’s body language shuts down a bit and he glances at Sam/Zeke. He’s reminded of the fallen angel that is inside Sam at this very moment. Luckily, Dean then gets a phone call telling him about a case.
In 9x07, the case is also triggered by a phone call to Dean*. Both cases begin by someone reaching out to Dean, someone who has a strong emotional connection to him. Dean has successfully built connections with people outside the family unit – both Cas and Sonny trust Dean to be able to take care of something dangerous and have faith in his abilities.
*I believe 9x08 is as well, from what people have said.
One difference is that in 9x07, Sam is our initial focus character. This episode, more than any other in S9* up until now, shows us Sam’s PoV. And so, in 9x07, Sonny’s phone call to Dean is answered by Sam. This is another element that makes the episode feel like it could belong in the early seasons, because we often learned about Dean through Sam’s discoveries just this way (the most obvious analogue episode being S1’s “Something Wicked”).
*That I’ve seen, though from what I’ve read, this is true even if 9x03 & 9x05 are added to the mix. I hear that 9x08 is more of a Sam-focused episode, too, which is possibly another reason that “Bad Boys” may have been moved to be directly before it?
The beginning of this episode also gives us more insight into Sam’s headspace. He’s kinda relieved he’s the only one around because it means he can do some reading for fun. We rarely get to see what Sam indulges himself in. He picks out an Oz book, smiling a little – knowing that he knows the truth behind the books and almost certainly thinking of Charlie, a nice reminder that he cares about her, too. But before he gets a chance to begin reading, one of Dean’s phones vibrates.
Parallels: Sonny is an example of something that was kept from Sam in the past; Cas (his absence) is related to what Dean’s lying about right now. And just as Sonny & Robin are a divided version of the Cassie narrative from “Route 666”, the two parts are united in Cas for “Heaven Can’t Wait” – he’s the one that Dean abandoned, who is calling him in on a case because, despite feeling betrayed by Dean, he still trusts him when it comes to taking care of dangerous things. In some ways, “Bad Boys” can be viewed as a deconstructed version of the Cas/Cassie narrative. Dean’s relationships with both Sonny and Robin are more straightfoward than the tangled mess of his relationships with Cassie and Cas. Seeing the two halves separated can help us analyze them when they’re put back together.
In 9x07, though Dean takes the phone away from Sam, Sam is allowed to hear this phone call – it’s not inherently dangerous, the way that Sam hearing him talk to Cas might be. In 9x06, Dean leaves hearing range so that he can talk to Cas privately. Everything must be vetted before Sam finds out about it – an example of Dean treating Sam like a child (reminiscent of his words in 8x23: “Now, if anybody needs a chaperone while doing the heavy lifting, it’s Sam.”) even more now that Sam is essentially a hostage to Zeke’s good will.
Dean is so pleased to hear from Cas that even his moment of indignation over Cas not being as welcoming as normal (“Hello to you, too”) is brief. He gave up having his best friend around in order to protect Sam, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t miss said best friend (“No one wants Cas here more than I do.”) and wishes circumstances could be different. He’s likewise pleased to hear from Sonny. Both cases serve as excuses for Dean to go visit people that he likes. In Sonny’s case, there is no exceptional danger to Sam, so Dean doesn’t mask his intentions the way he does with Cas’s situation.
Cas is attempting to be cool with Dean – he’s hurt over being sent away. But Dean obviously affects him as, in contrast to the smooth efficiency that Nora had praised earlier in the scene, Cas makes a mess of his job while on the phone with Dean. This is only a phone call, but Dean’s presence is already disrupting the life that Cas is attempting to create.
Dean assumes that Cas means for them to work the case together but Cas can’t handle juggling his new humanity and talking to Dean anymore, and he hangs up on Dean to try to focus on the new life that he’s found in Dean’s absence. Dean then proceeds to tell a mixture of truth and lies to Sam – yes, there’s a case but it’s no big deal; yes, I heard about it from Cas, but I’m not even going to see him; you absolutely do not need to come. It is a story meant to downplay any serious concern, much like what John must have told to the questioning young!Sam in the scenes of 9x07 that we don’t get to see. 'Okay, you noticed Dean is gone, but it’s fine. He’s just off on a hunt. No, he didn’t get taken by a monster! Your brother just got a little lost on his hunt. I’m going to go out to find him. You just do what Bobby tells you and Dean will be back before you have time to miss him.’
However, notably, the story that John tells to Sam and that he has Dean reinforce makes Dean look incompetent and John look like a hero. Dean 'got lost’ on a hunt and John spent two months tirelessly searching for him. And then Dean had to lie about it, too. So, what we learn here is that the boys’ habit of lying to each other is also something that was supported and reinforced by their father, and is yet another piece of their childhood that they need to learn how to heal and grow past. Also, we get more evidence for the already-canon fact that John puts Dean down when John feels a lack of control in a situation*. Meanwhile, while Dean’s story does minimize Cas (and the fact that a large part of why Dean is going on the case is to see Cas) in order to protect Sam from Zeke, he does not paint Cas as a victim and himself as a hero.
*Such as when he verbally attacks Dean over the state of the Impala in “Dead Man’s Blood”, because he’s mad at Sam for challenging him.
At the age of 16, Dean was gambling for money and stealing food. Gambling and theft have remained large parts of Dean’s life as time has passed – both things that, if not encouraged by John, were discreetly ignored by him. John, after all, is the one who taught Dean how to run credit card scams. Dean has almost always lived on the margins of society, with the one exception being the year he spent with Lisa*, because that’s what John taught him hunters needed to do. While Dean had seen examples to the contrary – Bobby and Pastor Jim both appeared to have stable residences – his father remained his primary example of how to 'be a man’ while Dean was growing up and was the primary person that Dean deliberately modeled his persona on**. It’s also John’s example that set the foundation of Dean believing that 'people like us’ can’t have families or homes, though this was reinforced to him by his own life experiences.
*who was implied to be middle-class or upper middle-class by her residences and how easily she was able to buy/sell her way into new places & her general standard of living.
**this is pointed out explicitly in “Dream a Little Dream of Me”.
Brief visual note: Sam’s shirt in the opening scene of 9x07 has buttons arranged to look like a cross. It’s been glaringly obvious to me, so I figured I would inflict the thought on you. Every time I look at Sam’s chest, all I can see is “cross, cross, cross”.
When we return to Cas in 9x06, we find out that he doesn’t have a home and that he’s been sleeping at the store. When he tells Nora that he slept over to do inventory, she appears to buy it* and it boosts her already-high opinion of his responsibility and dedication.
*on rewatch, her face relaxes and she nods after he says that, so, yeah, I think she either genuinely believed it or decided to believe it.
Cas and Nora then proceed to have a conversation where they do not connect at all, but each mistakenly believes that the other person is connecting with them. Nora uses misleading language – potentially defaulting to unintentional flirtatiousness when nervous about asking for a big favor – and Cas doesn’t know enough about potentially romantic interaction to think to ask questions that might clear things up. The issue of false connection has been strong in Cas’s storyline so far – Hael, April, Nora. He thinks Hael wants a mentor/guidance; she wants his body as a vessel. He thinks April is a nice human lady who is genuinely trying to help him out; she is tricking him into lowering his guard so she can torture and kill him. He thinks Nora wants a date and that he’s successfully figuring this 'human’ thing out; she wants a babysitter.
Tying this into the Sam/Zeke/Dean storyline as a parallel, that indicates that while Dean thinks Zeke wants to heal in Sam’s body, Zeke actually wants something else entirely.
If this is also meant to tie back into the Cas & Dean storyline, it’s a nod to how Cas mistakenly believes that Dean only 'needed’ him for practical reasons and not emotional ones (whether those be romantic or platonic) and how Cas attributes Dean kicking him out the bunker to Cas being more trouble than he’s worth now that he’s human and doesn’t have any angelic attributes. The Cas & Dean situation is thus an inverse of the Cas’s other situations, a mirror image. Nora is also a softened mirror, compared to Hael and April – while both Hael and April wish to take things from Cas that are not replaceable, Nora merely needs his help. The other strong theme of Cas’s episodes so far is that humans have been helpful and supernatural beings have been dangerous. So, even when Cas makes a false connection with a human, it is not life-threatening in the way that it is when he makes one with a supernatural being.
The first investigative element of both 9x06 and 9x07 takes place in a home. In 9x06, Dean is alone and investigating the home of the victim who died in the teaser. In 9x07, Sam has come along with him and they pass a homemade sign that reads “Sonny’s Home For Boys”. Both houses are set back from the road, but while Sonny’s Home is brightly painted and the trees are lush with growth, the home of the suicidal man from 9x06 is dingy and grey, surrounded by weeds and dead trees. We can see that outside the yellow tape marking off the property, green growth exists, but the interior is half-wild and half-dead. By contrast, the outside of Sonny’s looks good, but then Sonny tells us that the place is near-collapse because redemption is no longer considered a worthy or possible goal by those in authority. It still looks good on the outside but it’s falling apart on the inside. Just because something looks to be in better repair doesn’t always mean that it truly is in good shape*.
*Ah, there’s a line about Sam in 9x08 about this, yes? Something about being held together with duct tape on the inside?
In his first conversation with the police officer in 9x06, Dean is handed the answer to the case, though he doesn’t know it yet. The first 'pair’ of victims is a twisted mirror of Jimmy and Amelia Novak. The man was full of faith and took an angel inside him, while the woman did not believe*. Both Castiel and Ephraim disregarded their vessel’s human connections in order to fulfill what they felt was their mission**. But all Dean knows at this point is that they were on the verge of divorce***.
*In Amelia’s case, this was specifically in angels talking to Jimmy, while the 9x06 woman was a non-believer in general.
**Castiel by walking away from Claire in order to go find Dean & Ephraim by killing his vessel’s wife.
***Just as Amelia speaks of leaving Jimmy if he continues to believe he’s been chosen by an angel.
The first investigative scene in 9x07 shows us the answer to the case as well – Timmy watches from the window as Dean and Sam talk below. Dean defends his father’s actions here by placing all of the blame on Dean himself. Dean learned from a very young age to prioritize his father’s perspective over his own, a habit that he’s never fully broken, though there have been various times in the show it’s worn more thin than others. Dean 'makes mistakes’ and deserves to be punished for them, but John only ever 'did the best he could’ and none of his mistakes are allowed to tarnish his legend.
When Dean and Sam open the door to the boys’ home, they are immediately confronted with another cross – Ruth, a woman who helps Sonny run the home, is wearing a very obvious necklace that shines in the light. Faith, prayer, and belief are strong elements of this season so far and it’s not always connected to the specific angel plotlines.
Ruth reveals to the audience (Dean already knew) that Sonny was in prison and has had enough 'prison buddies’ visit him that Ruth easily makes the assumption that’s where Dean and Sam know him from. Dean also continues to be associated with positive religious language – “there is a God” he says in 9x06 and “oh, and we’re such angels?” in 9x07. Both God and angels are treated as if they’re good things, in contrast to Dean’s bitterness in 9x01 that his brother’s life is in “God’s hands”. Currently, Sam is on angel life-support, so Dean has reason to need to believe in the goodness of angels (rather than solely in Cas) right now. Quite literally, his brother’s life depends on it. This is an obvious conflict with his normal “all angels but Cas are dicks” viewpoint, and we’ve seen that cognitive dissonance at work in Dean over the course of this season.
In the first 9x07 flashback, we get several key elements: Dean’s disrespect for cops is already firmly in place at age 16, John abandons Dean to the mercy of the system, and Sonny is practical but good-humored. He uses a paperclip to release Dean from his handcuffs, another element that harkens back to S1 Dean. The very first time Dean escaped from handcuffs on the show, he used a paperclip.
I mentioned up above my personal headcanon for Dean’s bruising, so I won’t get into it again. I do want to look again at the words Billy the cop attaches to John – “let him rot”. Some people dispute whether or not they sound like something John would say, which is more interpretative. What’s not arguable is that this is exactly what John did. He found out what had happened and then left Dean to take the entire brunt of the consequences. He left Dean there not just for the month before the arraignment but for an additional month afterwards. After he finally does pick up Dean, John allows a lie to fester in between Dean and Sam, one that portrays Dean as firmly the inferior partner to John. Lies like this would contribute to Sam’s surprise in “Woman in White” that Dean was considered competent to hunt on his own after Sam had left for college. After all, John was the general and Dean was the grunt. One of the strong themes of S1 is Sam realizing how good a hunter Dean is and how well he and Dean work as a team. This is not something that Sam was ever truly 'allowed’ to realize growing up because, when it came to hunting, Dean was always in John’s shadow.
This is also one of the places in my original watch of 9x07 where I connected it back to 9x06. Because this is, of course, essentially what Cas believes Dean has done, too, 'let him rot’ as a human. Cas was kicked out of the bunker and into the human 'system’ that was already a hard place for him to deal with. Both Cas and Dean were left with no support from the person they regarded as their primary support system and were cut off from their closest emotional connections. And what 9x06 makes clear is that Cas is absolutely justified in feeling angry at Dean. Yes, Dean has his reasons - which the audience knows but Cas does not – but that does not mean Cas isn’t allowed to feel hurt.
Likewise, John may have had complicated reasons of his own to leave Dean to the system in 9x07 but that doesn’t mean what it did to Dean is invalid. We had another example of this back in 9x02, when Tracy reminded Sam that what he did back in S4/5 had consequences that hurt people – she was angry and in pain, and those feelings are valid. Consequences result from choices. Sam’s choices in S4 created horrible consequences for Tracy, among other people. John’s choices while the boys were growing up had consequences for them. Dean choosing Sam’s life over everything – the world, Sam’s own free will, his own best friend – has consequences. And when those consequences hurt other people, those people have the right to be angry, regardless of the reasons behind the choices.
But making a choice doesn’t mean that you don’t regret the consequences. In 9x06, we see that while Dean is talking on the phone to Sam, he’s watching Cas. This is where the comparison to 6x20 comes in, as many gifsets have expressed very well – Dean watches Cas and, at the end of the episode, Dean leaves Cas to his 'retirement’ much as Cas decided to leave Dean to his. Dean has to go through the process of this episode to come to the conclusion that Cas does while just watching Dean – that the other person has given so much already and they deserve a little peace and distance from dangerous things. During Dean’s phone conversation, btw, we learn that a person who might have helped them with the translation is out of reach – the process continues to be stymied and stalled, much like Sam and Dean’s relationship and their individual character growth.
An interesting element of this scene is that Dean spends nearly the entire time he’s talking to Sam on the phone staring, but we don’t find out until the conversation ends that he’s spent that entire time staring at Cas. It’s not only something that Sam doesn’t know about, it’s also something that is constructed as a reveal to the audience. It’s a discovery rather than something that’s part of the scene from the beginning. We’re supposed to go, “Ooooh! He’s at the place Cas works!”
We have a similar moment of discovery happening around the same time in 9x07, though this one is for Sam as well as the audience. Dean and Sam have split up and Sam discovers the bed that Dean slept in while he was at Sonny’s. There’s some good meta out there about how Sam has to peel away the layers (the mask) before he reaches Dean’s name on the bed. There are parts of Dean that are hidden from Sam and there are parts of Dean that he flaunts in front of Sam. 9x07 and 9x06 both represent parts of Dean that either were (9x07) or are (9x06) hidden from Sam, while 9x08 sounds to be focused purely on the public, Sam-expected side of Dean (to an exaggerated amount?*). 9x08 is about the side of Dean that calls a woman 'gumby girl’ and expects her to be sexually available to him on a moment’s notice even if he hasn’t seen her in years**.
*I can’t say for certain, obviously, but that’s what I’ve picked up from reading other people’s meta and reactions to the episode.
**Again, from what I’ve heard of 9x08, to an even more exaggerated amount than we saw in S3, plus his behavior is superficially rewarded in 9x08. Which, much as I kinda frown at it, actually tracks with the comparison. With Dean selling his soul, he knew the downsides immediately. He only had a year to live, so he was going to live it up. With this situation, the downsides have been more sneaky and, superficially, it seems like Dean was able to make a deal to save Sam without damning himself in the process, but then the downsides crop up later.
In their separate searches for the answer to the 9x07 case, Dean and Sam each meet up with someone. Sam finds Ruth in the house – now, Ruth knows that the situation is bad, but she doesn’t have the tools to fix it. Dean finds Timmy in the barn*. Timmy has the tools to fix the situation but doesn’t have the knowledge to be able to use them.
*And we get yet another visual S1 reference in this scene by having Dean use his homemade EMF detector.
Dean gets on well with Timmy, as he usually does with children, and for the usual reason that he gets on with kids – because he takes Timmy seriously. He takes kids’ beliefs, concerns, and information as seriously as he takes an adult’s and he doesn’t dismiss their perspective as worth less because they’re young.
The information that Sam gets from Ruth leads him to an incorrect conclusion – that a man who had a grudge against Jack in life decided to take it out on him after death. Sam is not having good luck with getting the right information to form correct conclusions – the information he’s pieced together about himself so far this season is leading him to the conclusion that there is, once again, Something Wrong With Sam, just like there always is. But, this time, it’s not. This time, the thing that’s wrong with Sam is… Dean.
This continues into the scene where Dean and Sam are digging up Howard’s body to burn it – Dean deflects when asked about his time at Sonny’s and why John asked him to lie about it. He minimizes, just like he does in 9x06 when he talks about the case. This continues a pattern Dean has had in place for a long time – he’s hesitant to talk to Sam about Cassie. Once Lisa is more than a 'bendy weekend’, he becomes reluctant to talk about her. He doesn’t want to talk about his personal relationship with Cas. He doesn’t want to talk about his friendship with Benny. Basically, if it’s an emotional connection that isn’t already shared between him and Sam (like Charlie, who they met together), Dean’s first instinct is to shield that connection from Sam’s notice as much as possible.
There are many potential reasons for this, but the S8/S9 narrative has made it clear that a large reason is because part of Dean doesn’t believe his own emotional connections have validity when compared to his caretaking of Sam. He doesn’t believe he’s supposed to want anything for himself and wanting things for himself makes him feel incredibly guilty*. Wanting things for himself means he’s letting down John and, especially, Sam. He fought against this idea in S8 but the events of 8x23/9x01 caused him to backslide pretty hard.
*And, to tie back to 9x08, which maybe I should actually watch since I keep talking about it: sex is the one exception Dean has been able to carve out from this rule with any consistency. Sex is the one thing that Dean believes he can still have for himself even if all his emotional energy is supposed to be directed at taking care of Sam. So, yeah. There’s that. Sex is Dean’s loophole and his one surefire escape from the idea that everything must always be about Sam.
So, on that topic, let’s flip to a scene where Dean does something because he wants to do for himself and it has nothing to do with taking care of Sam. Let’s flip back to 9x06.
Because, honestly, Dean could have done what he told Sam he’d do. Worked the case and not tried to contact Cas. In fact, the episode could have happened that way, since the angel was gunning for Cas – they could have reunited briefly by accident rather than by Dean’s own choice. Cas is, however their relationship is ultimately defined by the show, someone that Dean has a strong connection to. Cas matters enough to Dean that he can even have broken Dean’s biggest rule – nothing hurts Sammy – and yet, ultimately, still be a desired presence.
Dean goes to see Cas in this episode simply because he wants to see Cas. He’s not aware yet that the case involves angels. Cas has no special powers. Cas doesn’t come with any kind of trump cards anymore. He’s just Cas – and being 'just Cas’ is enough for Dean. 'Dean wants to spend more time with Cas’ was a reoccurring drumbeat of characterization in S8; we saw it over and over that season, where it ultimately culminated in Dean and Cas spending eight hours hanging out together waiting for a cupid to show up. We find out here that it’s still true this season. Dean felt forced to kick Cas out of the bunker, but Dean’s personal desires* haven’t changed. He’s still eager to spend as much time with Cas as he can grab.
*The ones that 9x07 reminds us Dean isn’t allowed to place above taking care of Sam.
After we see Dean watching Cas through the window, we immediately go to a scene with the next victim. A girl has been dumped and says that she wishes she could die. Unlike the suicidal man from the teaser, she has no desire to die at all. She’s merely using an expression so that her friend, Jace, understands how much it hurts that she got broken up with. But, with Ephraim, all that matters is that she’s in pain, it’s his job to end pain, and her suffering – human suffering – is so powerful to him in comparison to what he’s felt from angels that he feels a mercy killing is the only answer. Again, we go back to Ephraim being a hammer and only seeing nails.
When we’re back at Dean and Cas, we put together the elements from before – Cas is trying to act human (and being occasionally clumsy and overbearing at it), and Dean is glad to see Cas, spirits only slightly dampened by the chill Cas is putting out. Cas does not come out specifically to blame Dean but it’s clear that he’s upset that – after asking him to come out to the bunker – Dean then tossed him out and left him to make his own way in the world. And now Dean comes along and judges Cas for where he’s ended up, says that Cas should have done better.
Cas tries to explain his perspective to Dean but Dean isn’t able to understand. He doesn’t see Cas as a failure, therefore Cas shouldn’t see himself as a failure. Just like he couldn’t understand why Cas felt like he deserved to stay in Purgatory, Dean can’t understand why Cas wants this new start as a 'normal’ human. But then Nora shows up and Dean latches onto something he can understand.
“That’s what this is about… the girl.” This is the same conclusion that Dean comes to about Sam in S8, too. These are the two extremes that Dean believes exist – there’s hunting or there’s 'the girl’*.
*He finds it hard to believe in S6 that he can possibly have both when Lisa suggests it and, ultimately, he decides that he can’t.
We see this belief of Dean’s in his head very clearly in S2’s “What Is And What Should Never Be” where 'the girl’ (Carmen, in this case) is a required part of a non-hunting life and yet he barely spends any time with her. 'The girl’ is an idea to Dean. It likely started with Robin. After he left her behind, he would turn the notion of her 'round and 'round in his head. What if he’d stayed? As time passed and Dean slept with more girls, she became a concept in his head. There were the actual real girls he slept with and then there was this idealized 'girl’, the person he would have been in a serious relationship with if it weren’t for hunting, the person who could be permanent. Again, this is something that Dean’s community reinforced for him – going back to how most hunters (including John) seem to have started hunting is because something supernatural killed their loved ones.
Which seems as good a time as any to talk about the reunion between Dean and Robin. Robin works in the service industry at “Cus’s Place”.
The actual reunion is bookmarked around our second flashback. In this flashback, we learn that Dean has been at Sonny’s for a month, his charges have been dropped, John is nowhere to be found, and Dean’s begun to flourish at the school he’s attending. Much like Cas is hesitantly trying to feel his way through a 'normal human’ life, the young!Dean was doing the same.
Getting good grades, getting on the wrestling team, these things wouldn’t have impressed John, just like Cas being trusted to do inventory and cook food doesn’t impress Dean. The difference is this: John was proud of Dean when Dean performed in ways that benefited John. Dean, at the end of this episode, is able to look past himself and his own expectations and give Cas the kind of validation that Sonny gave young!Dean in this scene. John Winchester was never able to, well, get over himself. Even in the rare cases we saw when he could admit to having made a mistake, he would proceed to make it all over again with the same justifications as the first time. Dean, by contrast, is capable of empathy and emotional growth. But he needs to be removed from John Winchester’s influence for those qualities to flourish. We saw that in S1, then more after John had died. He has, in so many ways, made a great deal of progress.
But there’s that one last great barrier, as mentioned above. After Dean’s progress in S8, it all came crashing down once Sam was dying. Sam was – had to be – the priority. No matter what the cost. And Dean went right back to his mindset in “All Hell Breaks Loose”. It’s a fire sale and everything must go. No price is too high, no sacrifice too great. Except that, this time, isn’t just Dean’s soul on the line. This time, in order to save Sam, Dean put a parasite inside his brother. He was betting – desperately hoping – that it was going to be a mutually beneficial arrangement. Symbiotic. But Zeke is looking more and more like a true parasite and Dean is the one who stuffed him inside Sam.
Sonny, in the flashback, compares Dean’s defensiveness over his family life to the way Sonny himself felt being in a gang. His loyalty to them did nothing but cost him years of his life. His loyalty imprisoned him. And Dean’s loyalty to Sam and to John does imprison Dean. He spends years and years not being his own man – he’s his father’s soldier, he’s his brother’s caretaker. He’s rarely allowed to simply be Dean. He grabs bits and pieces, tiny moments where he can express himself, but so much of Dean was on extreme lockdown. He had to be John&Sam’s Dean, not his own. Now, John&Sam’s Dean is a persona constructed out of parts of the inner Dean, so there is reality there, but only the parts of reality that would make up an acceptable mask. Anything else out of place, Dean slathered over with bits of his father’s persona until even Dean himself could barely see inside his own heart. Dean deflects, Dean projects onto other people, Dean represses like it’s an Olympic sport and he’s going for the gold.
The flashback ends when we meet Robin, and we join back up with the present. Dean is happy to see her and she’s not happy to see him. It’s when he mentions his name that she recognizes him, I think – her eyes widen – but she pretends she still hasn’t. Dean Winchester told her he’d stay and then he left. While, for Dean, Robin is a pleasant memory of a shining moment of “What Could Have Been” in his past, for Robin the memory is less pleasant. He’s the boy who up and vanished. We don’t know what Sonny told Robin but, whatever he said, it didn’t make her feel any better. Robin protects herself and she pretends her time with Dean didn’t mean anything.
It seems pretty obvious to me that we’re supposed to think of Cas during the Robin & Dean scenes*. Even apart from the fancy font choice, “Cus’s Place” is pretty close to “Cas”. Robin could have been working at literally any name in the world, but they went with “Cus’s Place”. Robin, like Cas, is working in the service industry. Both Robin and Cas were left behind by Dean because he chose caretaking Sam over being there for them and they both are standoffish with Dean in order to protect themselves from further hurt. Robin is the girl he hurt in the past because Sam must always come first. Cas is the person he is hurting in the present because Sam must always come first.
*or, rather, that we were supposed to think of Robin during the Cas/Dean reunion, in the original shooting order. We were supposed to compare a clear romantic relationship to the whatever-the-hell-it-is between Dean and Cas.
Once Dean believes that Robin doesn’t remember him, he wants to leave. The point of going to the restaurant was always to see Robin, just as the point of checking out the 9x06 case was to see Cas. In Robin’s case, Dean gives up after realizing she doesn’t treasure the memory of him the way he treasured the memory of her. With Cas, he’s a bit more persistent. He may believe now that Cas isn’t interested in helping because he’s got 'the girl’ but Dean still wants to be around Cas and spend time with him.
When Cas tries to explain that Dean’s got the wrong end of the stick – Nora’s nice, she asked him out, saying 'yes’ is part of Cas trying to feel his way through humanity rather than actively choosing Nora over Dean’s kind of life – Dean doesn’t take it fully seriously.
The discussion is interrupted when Dean gets the call that another death has happened and he immediately invites Cas to work with him on it. There are both progressive and regressive elements at work with Dean here – he easily lets Cas know that Cas’s lack of powers aren’t an issue, but he also isn’t taking Cas’s human responsibilities seriously, just as he frequently used to fail to take Cas’s angelic responsibilities seriously.
When they get to the crime scene, Cas immediately recognizes exactly caused this death and he has another powerful emotion – he’s scared. So much so that he has to go find something to lean on. Is it just a coincidence that what he picks is the Impala? More than Dean and Sam’s home when they were growing up, the Impala has often subbed in as an extension of Dean’s heart – when he was bitter and heartbroken and angry over John’s death and what his father had asked of him, he took those emotions out on the car. When he’s needed time to emotionally heal, those scenes have often been represented by showing him working on the Impala. When he was grief-stricken, alcoholic, and running on empty in S7, one of the major external signs was Dean needing to leave behind the Impala and use a host of inadequate replacements instead. If Cas does not feel like he’s in a place where he can or should lean on Dean himself – the Impala is not such a bad replacement.
Meanwhile, with Dean, we’re getting a crash-course in the spectrum of human emotion. Jace says her friend was 'kinda bummed’ and can place the emotion accurately by comparing it to other situations. Human emotions require perspective. Ephraim is not capable of doing this kind of emotional calculation. Here, Cas is able to offer Dean insight into what Cas himself is going through – human emotions are overwhelming to angels. For Ephraim, they are overwhelming for him to sense, but for Cas it’s even more acute because he’s living them. Here, Dean accepts again*, that Cas’s priorities do not need to match Dean’s for them to be valid. Cas is scared. Dean thinks of Cas’s feelings, he thinks of 'the girl’ and, possibly, he thinks of Sam. Because what Sam wanted was to feel safe, and Dean wasn’t ever able to give him that. But maybe he can give it to Cas.
*As he learned to do in S8.
The problem with this, of course, is the same problem that used to crop up whenever Sam tried to leave*. The life seeks him out. Sam was marked by demons as a child and, when he went to college, the demons followed. When he separated from Dean in S1, a demon found him. Etc. Similarly, Dean tries to keep Cas safe in 9x06, but the life is seeking Cas out. Ephraim is called to Cas’s pain. Right now, Cas can’t escape the life because it’s chasing him. He’s too much of a key piece on the board to be ignored, even if he is 'only human’ now. Ephraim says it – “you were a legend”. Cas matters as a symbol. That’s why Naomi hauled him out of Purgatory last season, too.
*Note: this does not happen in the break between S7 & S8. Sam was, to all appearances, genuinely safe and out of the supernatural fight.
Though 9x07 is, as mentioned, very much an old school episode, that doesn’t mean that it doesn’t reference the current season plot. Some elements that stand out – Dean’s comment about forced ejection for ghosts (might end up Zeke-relevant), and the fact that when Sam is allowed to see what Dean has seen, he finds the answer (Timmy’s drawings). Dean was in the right place but he didn’t see the truth. He was distracted by Timmy – he focused on the child so closely that he didn’t see the force around the child that was causing so much destruction. Sam needs to be allowed access to the same knowledge that Dean has, because the two brothers notice different things. Sam finding out Timmy’s secret was key to healing the broken bond between Timmy and his mother that was hurting so many people.
The scene after Sam finding out Timmy’s secret is the scene where Dean sees Robin on the couch and remembers learning guitar from her back when he was sixteen. Dean is resigned about the idea of continuing on with the family business. He also reveals a sadness in general about the idea of a responsibility that never lifts, never lightens. Two topics that Dean rarely ever allows himself to show reluctance over – hunting and caretaking Sam. But here, after over a month of no John, Dean lets himself dream a little. Robin kisses him and he isn’t suave or a ladies’ man. He’s genuine, a little awkward and nervous. Dean and Robin genuinely connected, as two kids who both wanted something other than what life seemed to already have mapped out for them.
In 9x06, Dean decides, at the last minute, that he’s going to help Cas out with Nora. He isn’t merely going to accept that Cas is choosing something else – he’s going to actively help try to make Cas happy doing what Cas wants. He is thinking about what’s best for Cas rather than what’s best for Dean. So, he gives Cas some quick advice, and he lingers and watches until he’s actively waved away by Cas. This scene has been extensively meta’d from every possible angle, so I won’t go into it much. Except maybe, again, to remark - Jensen Ackles, who gave you the right to have that face and make those faces with it? No one! No one did!
Once Cas is in the door with Nora, we get the reveal of the false connection. This time, it’s decidedly less dangerous than Hael hitting him over the head or April torturing and killing him. Still, it is a disappointment to Cas that he has, once again, misread the situation and someone’s intentions. He sympathizes with Baby Tanya, talking about his own feelings of abandonment, loneliness, misunderstanding, pain and fear.
Dean, of course, heads back to Nora’s house once he learns from the Sheriff that only the wife died in the first explosion and realizes that the truck parking outside Nora’s house belonged to the husband.
Ephraim isn’t trying to fool anyone. He is what he is and he does what he does. He has a duty that he performed in Heaven and, now that he’s been exiled to Earth, he plans to continue to perform that duty. As I mentioned way back at the beginning, what Ephraim and Timmy’s mom have in common is that they both lack a sense of perspective. To Ephraim, all human pain is overwhelming. To Timmy’s mom, all threats are deadly threats. So, they both go for overkill in response.
The key to stopping Timmy’s mom was realizing that the power was in Timmy. He had to make the choice. He had to let her know he would be okay without her, so that she could let go. Lots of meta written on this point re: Dean and Sam. It’s out there and it’s fabulous and I absolutely agree.
In both 9x06 and 9x07, Dean promises to eliminate the threat and keep people safe. In both cases, that is not in Dean’s power. But, in both cases, Dean is able to deliver the final set-up – he lets Timmy know he is the one with the power to release his mother and helps Timmy believe that it’s true; he tosses Cas the angel blade that Cas uses to kill Ephraim. He might not have the power to stop what’s happening, but he can help the person who does have the power.
In the end, both episodes show us Dean leaving behind something that made him happy, and doing that because Sam needs him. “There’s nothing I would put ahead of you, past or present,” Dean said in 8x23. This is the price of that – losing everything else, over and over.
And just as young!Dean stares out the window towards his father’s car and is reminded of his duty to Sam, Cas can’t let go of his either – we also get a shot of Cas (after hearing news about the 'meteor shower’) going to his window and looking out, thinking about what he should do.
Both Cas and Dean are struggling with figuring out who they are and whether they have more of a duty to others or to themselves. Dean made a decision years ago, ingrained it into his very heart, and it’s only been over the course of the series that he’s realized that there’s a possibility that he could make a different decision someday. That the choices he made at sixteen are not the choices he must continue to make forever. But it’s difficult because the reasons he made that choice still feel valid. Like Timmy’s mother, his child called out to him in pain and he answered and now he can’t let go again and he’s breaking so many other things in his desperation to keep Sammy alive. Not only does this keep Dean from growing, it keeps Sam from growing, too.
Cas feels rejected and like a failure. He’s trying to figure out what life he wants to lead, and he’s needing to do it without any training wheels or help from the people he knew before. It’s a rough gig. He feels isolated and confused. But Cas is capable of figuring things out on his own. Though having Dean around would have made things easier, Dean’s presence is not a necessity. Cas can still grow, on his own, without Dean. And he’s left to continue to do just that, as Dean heads back to the prison he’s built around himself and Sam.
Original Post: Bad Boys & Heaven Can't Wait