spn 8.11
was enjoyable and cute. at times seemed to be trying way too hard, couldn't tell if that was a script thing or a direction thing? IDK enough about how to tell the difference. anyway, some parts of it seemed to be trying REALLY HARD TO BE CHARMING AND FUNNY instead of just being charming and funny. Other parts were genuinely so. This seems to be a common problem with SPN's lighter episodes in the past few years.
I did enormously enjoy Charlie and Dean being BFFs. Sam, your inability to relax and let go is so GPOY it's painful. (or should that be GPOM?). Dean, your ability to compartmentalize is also GPOM. I was tweeting about this, how this season is more than any other the season of OMG I IDENTIFY TOO MUCH WITH BOTH BROTHERS MAKE IT STOP. I think the season has been more consistent about Sam's characterization than Dean's overall but I can go with it because see: compartmentalization. It's just that they tease with these interesting bits of post-purgatory fallout like Dean in the interrogation room coming close to torturing a dude and I want some follow through; I know enough about how SPN paces characterization that they will probably get back to that at some point. Anyway! Ramble ramble. I just kinda miss the internal consistency in Dean's characterization on an episode-to-episode level that was one of my favorite parts of season 6, and it seemed to kind of get lost somewhere mid-season-7 and never quite recover, though I probably should actually rewatch season 7 and the first half of season 8 before I make blanket statements like that, because Dean being sort of all over the place this season makes some sense to me. I do think they're doing a super job on that front with Sam this season though.
Others have talked about how Dean made Sam leaving Amelia Dean's fault when he was talking to Charlie even though the text explicitly showed us how that's not true; which doesn't in the least bit mean that Dean's text message stunt wasn't still a hurtful dick move. But it is consistent with the theme that played out earlier with Cas & Purgatory. If Benny falls off the wagon, Dean will probably feel like that's his fault too. It's hard for him to separate out making a mistake or poor and/or hard choice or dick move under shitty circumstances (the cell phone trick, cutting Benny off) with choices other people make (Sam cutting Amelia out of his life, potentially Benny eating people).
He sees simple cause and effect where it's not simple at all. It's a very childlike way of looking at the world. I've seen people call this self-centered, and I think that's a choice of words that flattens what's going on even as it seems to get at it, but there doesn't seem to be a good English word for this concept that when some aspect of your development has been frozen at a point in childhood where you feel like everything that happens around you has to do with you because you don't really have a conception of other people as separate from yourself yet. So literally self-centered, but not in the same connotation as the term is often used. IDK if I'm even expressing this well. It's why kids think it's their fault if their parents fight. Dean had this reinforced over and over by his dad putting way too much responsibility on his shoulders way too young, so that if things went wrong (as in "Something Wicked") when he'd made a choice that a normal kid his age would make (getting bored and leaving his little brother alone) he perceives it all as his fault, not John's fault for leaving his pre-pubescent kids alone for days at a time in outright parental neglect. So he internalizes that when he makes a mistake (actual or perceived) everything that happens after that is due to that action and his fault.
In Purgatory, he perceives that his mistake was letting go of Cas as they went through the portal, so that Cas getting left behind after that is Dean's fault. Cas making the choice to let go and stay for his own reasons isn't something that is a possibility in Dean's understanding.
With Sam, he perceives that he did something really fucked up by sending that text to make Sam feel like Amelia was in danger. In this case, that's true -- it was fucked up and the wrong thing to do. However, Sam had already left Amelia once for his own reasons, and Sam making the choice to leave her again didn't have much to do with Dean's text message ruse. It was for Sam's own reasons. But Dean sees it as cause and effect (probably connected to his experience with Lisa, which I wish the show would be more explicit about, sigh) -- he made Sam think Amelia was in danger, Sam cut off Amelia.
With Benny, if Benny does give in to the (as the show has explained it, nearly overpowering) urge to eat some people, Dean will probably perceive that Benny called him in a moment of need and Dean chose to cut him off, therefore anyone who dies because of Benny is Dean's fault. He probably won't be able to see that Benny's choices are Benny's. It's complicated, because sometimes yes, being there for a friend in need can have the effect of stopping them from falling off the highwire. But it's also unfair to be put in the position to be the only person between someone and that plunge into the abyss. Which is a position both Sam and Dean have repeatedly put each other in over the years. It's interesting that in season 6 with Cas, Dean was able to actually make that separation and see Cas's choices as on Cas and not on Dean, even when Cas tried to toss things back at Dean ("I did it for you!"). But Cas dying in season 7 seems to have thrown Dean back into the mindset of "anything I can't stop from happening and/or had the slightest part in is entirely my fault."
As Sam came out and said, it's survivor's guilt. I wouldn't be shocked if Dean deep down thinks it's his fault that his mom burned on the ceiling, though this has only been implied in the show (see: Dark Side of the Moon and the scene with Zach and not!Mary); it's just a very 4-year-old thing to do.
OKAY WOW I think I have meta thoughts about this that aren't coming out in any coherent fashion at allll so I should probably stop while I'm ahead.
I did enormously enjoy Charlie and Dean being BFFs. Sam, your inability to relax and let go is so GPOY it's painful. (or should that be GPOM?). Dean, your ability to compartmentalize is also GPOM. I was tweeting about this, how this season is more than any other the season of OMG I IDENTIFY TOO MUCH WITH BOTH BROTHERS MAKE IT STOP. I think the season has been more consistent about Sam's characterization than Dean's overall but I can go with it because see: compartmentalization. It's just that they tease with these interesting bits of post-purgatory fallout like Dean in the interrogation room coming close to torturing a dude and I want some follow through; I know enough about how SPN paces characterization that they will probably get back to that at some point. Anyway! Ramble ramble. I just kinda miss the internal consistency in Dean's characterization on an episode-to-episode level that was one of my favorite parts of season 6, and it seemed to kind of get lost somewhere mid-season-7 and never quite recover, though I probably should actually rewatch season 7 and the first half of season 8 before I make blanket statements like that, because Dean being sort of all over the place this season makes some sense to me. I do think they're doing a super job on that front with Sam this season though.
Others have talked about how Dean made Sam leaving Amelia Dean's fault when he was talking to Charlie even though the text explicitly showed us how that's not true; which doesn't in the least bit mean that Dean's text message stunt wasn't still a hurtful dick move. But it is consistent with the theme that played out earlier with Cas & Purgatory. If Benny falls off the wagon, Dean will probably feel like that's his fault too. It's hard for him to separate out making a mistake or poor and/or hard choice or dick move under shitty circumstances (the cell phone trick, cutting Benny off) with choices other people make (Sam cutting Amelia out of his life, potentially Benny eating people).
He sees simple cause and effect where it's not simple at all. It's a very childlike way of looking at the world. I've seen people call this self-centered, and I think that's a choice of words that flattens what's going on even as it seems to get at it, but there doesn't seem to be a good English word for this concept that when some aspect of your development has been frozen at a point in childhood where you feel like everything that happens around you has to do with you because you don't really have a conception of other people as separate from yourself yet. So literally self-centered, but not in the same connotation as the term is often used. IDK if I'm even expressing this well. It's why kids think it's their fault if their parents fight. Dean had this reinforced over and over by his dad putting way too much responsibility on his shoulders way too young, so that if things went wrong (as in "Something Wicked") when he'd made a choice that a normal kid his age would make (getting bored and leaving his little brother alone) he perceives it all as his fault, not John's fault for leaving his pre-pubescent kids alone for days at a time in outright parental neglect. So he internalizes that when he makes a mistake (actual or perceived) everything that happens after that is due to that action and his fault.
In Purgatory, he perceives that his mistake was letting go of Cas as they went through the portal, so that Cas getting left behind after that is Dean's fault. Cas making the choice to let go and stay for his own reasons isn't something that is a possibility in Dean's understanding.
With Sam, he perceives that he did something really fucked up by sending that text to make Sam feel like Amelia was in danger. In this case, that's true -- it was fucked up and the wrong thing to do. However, Sam had already left Amelia once for his own reasons, and Sam making the choice to leave her again didn't have much to do with Dean's text message ruse. It was for Sam's own reasons. But Dean sees it as cause and effect (probably connected to his experience with Lisa, which I wish the show would be more explicit about, sigh) -- he made Sam think Amelia was in danger, Sam cut off Amelia.
With Benny, if Benny does give in to the (as the show has explained it, nearly overpowering) urge to eat some people, Dean will probably perceive that Benny called him in a moment of need and Dean chose to cut him off, therefore anyone who dies because of Benny is Dean's fault. He probably won't be able to see that Benny's choices are Benny's. It's complicated, because sometimes yes, being there for a friend in need can have the effect of stopping them from falling off the highwire. But it's also unfair to be put in the position to be the only person between someone and that plunge into the abyss. Which is a position both Sam and Dean have repeatedly put each other in over the years. It's interesting that in season 6 with Cas, Dean was able to actually make that separation and see Cas's choices as on Cas and not on Dean, even when Cas tried to toss things back at Dean ("I did it for you!"). But Cas dying in season 7 seems to have thrown Dean back into the mindset of "anything I can't stop from happening and/or had the slightest part in is entirely my fault."
As Sam came out and said, it's survivor's guilt. I wouldn't be shocked if Dean deep down thinks it's his fault that his mom burned on the ceiling, though this has only been implied in the show (see: Dark Side of the Moon and the scene with Zach and not!Mary); it's just a very 4-year-old thing to do.
OKAY WOW I think I have meta thoughts about this that aren't coming out in any coherent fashion at allll so I should probably stop while I'm ahead.