Meta: Things that might be true (10.02)
Things that I've noticed while re-watching Dean and Sam's reunion scene in Reichenbach... six things that may be true.
1. Demon!Dean's speech patterns and inflection are different from Dean's. The tilt of his head, the lilt of his voice, are very Not!Dean. Lighter. Maybe being Not!Dean is lighter than being Dean. All of the responsibility of being Dean Winchester, savior, protector, warrior, martyr; it's all gone. Maybe because he finally gets to do the one thing almost everyone else eventually gets to do, the one thing he hasn't been able to do since he was four years old - stop worrying about monsters - maybe the weight of that being lifted is enough to lighten his load. Or maybe it's something else. Maybe it's not the weight of the monsters he's been carrying, but the people. The people he loves - those who are still with him (temporarily; it's always temporary, he always loses them one way or another) and those he's already lost, who have all thrown themselves onto the hand grenade that is Dean's life, who all died because of something he did or something he didn't do; they're gone but that doesn't mean they weigh any less, but now that they're been excised from his heart, along with his guilt and worry and responsibility, maybe he's so much lighter that even his voice is lighter.
2. In my episode review, I wrote that Dean was drinking whiskey at the piano, but when he goes to refill his drink I can see now that it's tequila. I don't remember Dean having a taste for tequila. Maybe whiskey is Dean's drink, not Demon!Dean's drink. Maybe tequila goes better with the taste of sulphur. Maybe whiskey is something he's decided to leave behind. Maybe it reminds him of things he doesn't want to remember, feelings he doesn't want to feel any more, drinking partners he's trying to walk away from.
3. When Dean gets up from the piano, grasping the Blade, Sam thinks he's going to be attacked. And maybe Dean thinks the same thing for a second; we have no way of knowing. We do know that Sam is eventually attacked, not with the Blade but with words, and maybe the way Dean tries to chase Sam away instead of hurting him physically means there's enough Dean left to care. Or maybe it means something else entirely, because words in general, and Dean's words in particular, have always cut Sam deeper than any blade ever could, and maybe Dean knows that; maybe that's exactly what he wanted.
4. Sam believes in Dean's inherent goodness, believes in it so much, thinks all he has to do is convince Dean that a cure is possible and that he's worthy of it, and it hasn't even occurred to him that Dean wouldn't be interested. On the other hand, he's got the MoL cuffs, so I guess he's prepared after all. But he is unprepared for the way Dean has embraced being a demon. And why is that? Sam has watched Dean plunge wholeheartedly into every role, from FBI agent to movie production assistant to prisoner, and why would demon be any different? Why would Dean not enthusiastically embrace his role as a Knight of Hell the way he embraced his role as a hunter? He didn't ask for either one, never made an informed decision, never really had a choice, just followed the person who pointed him in that direction and accepted his fate, and maybe that's just how Dean is.
5. Sam knows what it feels like to rip someone's throat out with your teeth. Does Dean know he did that? After they left Famine, did they go back to the hotel and clean up the bodies, the empty husks Sam left behind? Was Dean repulsed by what his little brother was capable of? Dean, who was so dead inside that he didn't want anything? Could he ever understand? Does he now? Does he know what it's like, now, to crave something like that? Maybe. And maybe, come to think of it, maybe Dean knows what it feels like to rip someone's throat out with your teeth. Sam doesn't know for sure; there are things you don't talk about, even in the middle of the night when you both wake up sweaty and trembling, suffering from nightmares that have the same setting, the same verse, as it were, but with vastly different characters, different plots. Even when you're the only two humans (or once humans, once-and-future humans) on earth who have shared this experience, who have flipped to the end of that particular book, that doesn't mean you can talk about it with each other; even for these two; especially for these two. So maybe Dean is thinking of ripping his throat out, with his teeth, because he's done it before and is craving the sensation again (and for Sam it wasn't the sensation, it was the result, the destination being more important than the journey, the ends justifying the means, but he understands this isn't necessarily true for Dean). Maybe it came out of nowhere. Maybe it's been done to him and he wants to feel what it's like on the other side. But what Sam does know is that he would do it, if it would save Dean, would bare his throat and his heart and his fractured soul, lay himself bare to fangs and claws, a demon's teeth, his brother's teeth, and say here, take it, rip it to shreds, it's yours, if you need it, if it will help.
6. When Sam pulls out the MoL handcuffs, he is literally standing in front of a firing squad. He knows, as we know, that there's no way he's going to get those cuffs on Dean. And we know he's still going to try. And we don't know what makes him think he can do it, just as we don't know what made him think he could overcome the Devil himself, but we do know that Sam has done the impossible before, when Dean was standing in front of him, and maybe he can do it again. Maybe nothing is impossible after all.
1. Demon!Dean's speech patterns and inflection are different from Dean's. The tilt of his head, the lilt of his voice, are very Not!Dean. Lighter. Maybe being Not!Dean is lighter than being Dean. All of the responsibility of being Dean Winchester, savior, protector, warrior, martyr; it's all gone. Maybe because he finally gets to do the one thing almost everyone else eventually gets to do, the one thing he hasn't been able to do since he was four years old - stop worrying about monsters - maybe the weight of that being lifted is enough to lighten his load. Or maybe it's something else. Maybe it's not the weight of the monsters he's been carrying, but the people. The people he loves - those who are still with him (temporarily; it's always temporary, he always loses them one way or another) and those he's already lost, who have all thrown themselves onto the hand grenade that is Dean's life, who all died because of something he did or something he didn't do; they're gone but that doesn't mean they weigh any less, but now that they're been excised from his heart, along with his guilt and worry and responsibility, maybe he's so much lighter that even his voice is lighter.
2. In my episode review, I wrote that Dean was drinking whiskey at the piano, but when he goes to refill his drink I can see now that it's tequila. I don't remember Dean having a taste for tequila. Maybe whiskey is Dean's drink, not Demon!Dean's drink. Maybe tequila goes better with the taste of sulphur. Maybe whiskey is something he's decided to leave behind. Maybe it reminds him of things he doesn't want to remember, feelings he doesn't want to feel any more, drinking partners he's trying to walk away from.
3. When Dean gets up from the piano, grasping the Blade, Sam thinks he's going to be attacked. And maybe Dean thinks the same thing for a second; we have no way of knowing. We do know that Sam is eventually attacked, not with the Blade but with words, and maybe the way Dean tries to chase Sam away instead of hurting him physically means there's enough Dean left to care. Or maybe it means something else entirely, because words in general, and Dean's words in particular, have always cut Sam deeper than any blade ever could, and maybe Dean knows that; maybe that's exactly what he wanted.
4. Sam believes in Dean's inherent goodness, believes in it so much, thinks all he has to do is convince Dean that a cure is possible and that he's worthy of it, and it hasn't even occurred to him that Dean wouldn't be interested. On the other hand, he's got the MoL cuffs, so I guess he's prepared after all. But he is unprepared for the way Dean has embraced being a demon. And why is that? Sam has watched Dean plunge wholeheartedly into every role, from FBI agent to movie production assistant to prisoner, and why would demon be any different? Why would Dean not enthusiastically embrace his role as a Knight of Hell the way he embraced his role as a hunter? He didn't ask for either one, never made an informed decision, never really had a choice, just followed the person who pointed him in that direction and accepted his fate, and maybe that's just how Dean is.
5. Sam knows what it feels like to rip someone's throat out with your teeth. Does Dean know he did that? After they left Famine, did they go back to the hotel and clean up the bodies, the empty husks Sam left behind? Was Dean repulsed by what his little brother was capable of? Dean, who was so dead inside that he didn't want anything? Could he ever understand? Does he now? Does he know what it's like, now, to crave something like that? Maybe. And maybe, come to think of it, maybe Dean knows what it feels like to rip someone's throat out with your teeth. Sam doesn't know for sure; there are things you don't talk about, even in the middle of the night when you both wake up sweaty and trembling, suffering from nightmares that have the same setting, the same verse, as it were, but with vastly different characters, different plots. Even when you're the only two humans (or once humans, once-and-future humans) on earth who have shared this experience, who have flipped to the end of that particular book, that doesn't mean you can talk about it with each other; even for these two; especially for these two. So maybe Dean is thinking of ripping his throat out, with his teeth, because he's done it before and is craving the sensation again (and for Sam it wasn't the sensation, it was the result, the destination being more important than the journey, the ends justifying the means, but he understands this isn't necessarily true for Dean). Maybe it came out of nowhere. Maybe it's been done to him and he wants to feel what it's like on the other side. But what Sam does know is that he would do it, if it would save Dean, would bare his throat and his heart and his fractured soul, lay himself bare to fangs and claws, a demon's teeth, his brother's teeth, and say here, take it, rip it to shreds, it's yours, if you need it, if it will help.
6. When Sam pulls out the MoL handcuffs, he is literally standing in front of a firing squad. He knows, as we know, that there's no way he's going to get those cuffs on Dean. And we know he's still going to try. And we don't know what makes him think he can do it, just as we don't know what made him think he could overcome the Devil himself, but we do know that Sam has done the impossible before, when Dean was standing in front of him, and maybe he can do it again. Maybe nothing is impossible after all.