*sadface*

[ratherastory]

I sometimes wonder what show people are watching.

Clearly, it's not the same one I am.

If you need me, I will be over here in my happy bubble that is free of ship wars, character-bashing, and show-bashing in general.

Comments

[ratherastory.livejournal.com]

Oh, of course it's more complicated than what I said, but there's a reason I don't write meta: my days of elaborating complicated theses about character motivation. ;)

I am, as always, awed by your ability to put my emotional flailing into words. :D

[de-nugis.livejournal.com]

: )

I may be a crazy optimist, but I have hopes for Sam and Dean's relationship. For all it ended in disaster, I think the year with Lisa gave Dean some healing and perspective. And part of the reason I am so relieved that they are giving a supernatural explanation for Sam (apart from the fact that if he were just this way as character development it would be impossible to sympathize with him), is that for all Dean has maybe erred at times, like parts of s2, in thinking of Sam as needing saving rather than able to save himself, it might actually do Dean a world of good to be in a situation where something was wrong with Sam that Dean COULD fix and COULD save him from. Sam saved himself in s5 and it wasn't always perfectly depicted but he was awesome, and I have enormous respect for his s5 development, but Dean was so deep in his own depression that he was a bit marginal to Sam's journey. So now if Dean saves Sam I won't feel like Sam has been cheated out of saving himself, and I will feel that Dean is maybe getting something he needs. They could go on from there to work at a better, adult relationship, after a lot of hugging and crying.

[ratherastory.livejournal.com]

I really hope you're right, but I'd like, at the end, for Dean to come out of it thinking of Sam as, y'know, more than a burden that needs carrying, or someone who needs constant saving/protecting. It's that weird and slightly unhealthy relationship that's gotten them into trouble over and over again.

[de-nugis.livejournal.com]

Yes, I agree, but I think part of the reason they are caught in the cycle (and Sam needing to save Dean is part of it too, in s3 and in a twisted way in s4 and even in s5) is that it never works, it never completes. And Sam came closer to getting to save Dean in 5.18 than Dean to his knowledge has to getting to save Sam, because I'm sure Dean doesn't think that he was what made Sam able to beat Lucifer. Just now I feel like it's something they need to get out of their system before they can move on from it.

I think I want most of all for Dean to like Sam again. At the end of s5 I think he had come to trust him again (and now, dammit, that's totally shattered) and to respect him as a man capable of making his own choices, and he'd always loved him, but I still didn't feel a lot of warm affection, which Sam seemed to be reaching out for, in a very clumsy way, at times like 5.11 and 5.14. I don't think who saves whom would unbalance the relationship if there were more ballast of choosing each other's company and liking each other. But at the moment poor Sam can't enjoy anything, and he's not very likable.

[ratherastory.livejournal.com]

Yes, exactly!

I want Dean to like Sam again, the way he did right up until the end of Season 3. Dean has had so much shit rain down on him that I'm not sure he remembers how to do things like trust people, or like people. Love isn't an issue for Dean: he gives his love out like it's candy. He loves Lisa and Ben and Bobby, and God help him he loves Sam too because he can't not, but love in Dean is a sad, broken thing, like a wounded bird. It's fragile, and it's just something others use to hurt him.

I'd really like to see Dean come to terms with this, and maybe grow out of his conviction that he's basically worthless, or only worth as much as his ability as a hunter lets him be. His words this episode were telling: "I ain't a father, I'm a killer." It's not true, but it's true to him, and that's what breaks my heart and also makes me want to shake him until his teeth rattle in his head and he sees sense.