He's got the laser eyes!
OMG a post! About a season finale! That has only kind of recently finished airing, no less! Wonders: they never cease.
Although I'm afraid it's mostly going to be a rambling collection of thoughts about the broader arc and show and whatnot. My reaction to the finale upon its end was pretty much literally: LOL ILU SHOW :D:D. So there's that covered ( Read more... )
Although I'm afraid it's mostly going to be a rambling collection of thoughts about the broader arc and show and whatnot. My reaction to the finale upon its end was pretty much literally: LOL ILU SHOW :D:D. So there's that covered ( Read more... )
... Huh. Is this really how fandom is reading it? Someone else was talking like this was the established understanding, although apart from that I have had about zero contact with fandom so I didn't know quite how widespread it was. I mean, the themes are the same, but at this point, I'm mostly expecting his black eyes to signify demonic influence/power working through him - to about the same extent that it did for Sam when his eyes went black when he killed Lilith. Not that he's full-blown "demon". I mean, I'm not expecting him to get the insta-cleanse Sam did, I agree he's likely going to have a long hard climb ahead of him, but for fandom to take it as signifying something as total as "Dean's a demon!" is a bit ... simple? Very black and white, anyway, especially for this show, which spends so much time exploring the wide swathes of grey between those poles. Although not surprising, really, because *fandom*. And I'm sure it's the kind of tizzy the writers were trying to create, hah, those devious wonderful bastards.
I guess differences of interpretation is at work, really, because I also never read him as coming back from Hell as fully-fledged torturer/demon, just that he had broken - ie, started irrevocably down the path, with no ability in himself in those circumstances to turn back, before Cas intervened. I mean, the pain, fear, remorse, guilt, etc - the feeling he wished he was no longer capable of - he showed in the way he regarded it signalled to me that he still had plenty of humanity left that Hell had yet to strip him of over hundreds more years before he would become an actual demon. I do agree about his recklessness having some basis on his experiences of survival over the last decade or so. Either way, he doesn't dwell in the "what ifs".
You're welcome for the cite, it's a fascinating area of thought that I really enjoy, and highly applicable to show! I just find I don't have the stomach to try to discuss it online very much, it's got too much identity politics attached to do so productively, unfortunately.
The pov character question is an interesting one! I personally think it's as simple as Sam being the "normal life" pov character and Dean being "the hunt" pov character, both bringing their valid pov to bear on The Fight. Which is why they can clash so deeply on worldview and values, and still both be (incompletely) in the right in the points they're making? It's probably also why Sam is seen as representing the average "normal life" viewer, bringing with him the civilian understanding into the alien war-motifed environment of the hunt, while Dean attracts the viewers who have internalised disenfranchisment from the normal. That their arcs completely unmoor them and force them to come to terms with the values of their worldviews is part of their coming-of-age journeys.
Anyway. Thanks for discussing! :)
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