Sam-coded: Analyzing the parallels between Destiel and Sam's arcs with his love interests.
PART 1: JESSICA MOORE
FOREWORD & DISCLAIMER
With a fan community as enormous as Supernatural's, it is fair to assume that most, if not everything, stated here has already been pointed out or dissected multiple times before—especially considering the long span of time that the show has aired and the three years thereafter. The goal of this post is not to claim these ideas as my own but rather to compile and expand on them.
I also want to add that regarding Jessica, specifically, the canon facts about her are incredibly limited what with her only "real" appearance being at the Pilot episode (though she is referenced and alluded to in multiple episodes all throughout).
That said, she had a critical role in shaping Sam's goals, with emphasis on earlier seasons' Sam's development so it felt fitting to start this series off with her.
There are many instances that the fandom has pointed out cinematic parallels between Sam and Jessica & Dean and Castiel. In this post, I would be elaborating on all of the key points I have found, namely: 1. The scripted meeting, 2. Grieving a lover, and other random findings.
1. IN THE BEGINNING (WITH REGARDS TO GOD'S PLAN)
To start, both Sam/Jess and Dean/Cas were fated to meet to serve a higher narrative purpose.
Frankly, I think that is fucking beautiful, but not only that; it can be argued that, if we were to speculate that Sam met Jessica right after he ran away from Dean and John, then Jessica and Castiel did the same thing. They pulled their respective Winchester brother out of hell/a dark place. (That may just be me talking out of my ass, but it's such a poetic concept, isn't it?)
Most importantly though, both parties were doomed by the narrative, but in polar opposite ways.
(Screenshots taken from 5x20)
Sam was destined to love and then lose Jessica for two reasons: to start the story, and to make Sam go down the "dark" path i.e. adjacent to Lucifer, demon blood, evil. Their story was scripted from the get-go, even before Supernatural decided to go metatextual with God.
(Screenshots taken from 15x17)
On the other hand, Dean and Castiel were never meant to be anything more. God himself says that Castiel was supposed to continue obeying heaven, do what he was told, and it is one of (if not the one) that completely separated the Supernatural storyline from any of Chuck's other drafts.
(GIFs from 15x18 and 15x19)
Furthermore, Castiel's love for Dean and Dean's loss of him marks the end of the story and makes Dean defy the role that God made for him. Admittedly, it's a flawed parallel, as Dean has already moved on from being Michael's Sword and the Righteous Man. To that, I say it only further proves the point; their unscripted "profound bond" directly opposed God's word. It was what should have broken the cycle.
And still, both ended in tragedy. It's just that one was written to end that way and the other wrote itself.
2. THE WINCHESTER BROTHERS ON GRIEF
(GIFs are from 1x01 and 12x23)
This segment can't start any other way than with these iconic shots of the Winchesters holding their brother back from running towards the love of their life (as the lover, in question, dies/walks to their death). These shots are the very reason I started this whole analysis, and they speak for themselves.
Even their clothes are inverted here, because Sam and Dean are experiencing the exact same thing. The grief, pain, and helplessness that comes with losing a partner.
(While compiling these, I stumbled upon the eerie realization that the shots attached above and the ones below have swapped color palettes in a way? Granted, that may just be some editing thing. Technology and video quality aside though, you can't deny that the vibrance of the fire vs. the bleakness of Apocalypse World juxtapose aesthetically well with the shots below. Just another one of those, "is it intentional or did Supernatural just run out of options from the sheer breadth of it?")
(Screenshots taken from 1x05 and 8x07)
This parallel in particular is what makes me believe that Supernatural either has amazing writing or just a terrible retention for continuity and reflection. Because, again, Sam and Dean are going through the same damn thing here: guilt. Specifically, the guilt of their lover's death—how both had reasons to believe they could've prevented it.
Also, these are cinematically shot the same way: Jessica and Castiel by the road, a deadpan stare at the Impala as the brothers drive by, then disappearing from sight at a second glance. How else are we to take this other than Dean grieving a lover the same way Sam grieved for his girlfriend? Did they just forget this scene from 1x05 when they filmed 8x07? (Most likely, yeah, but that doesn't disprove its contribution to the narrative.)
The premise is also similar, damningly so, the only notable difference being the formatting, with season 1's monster-of-the-week almost-standalones and season 8's continuous, over-arcing conflict with hell and the tablets.
(Screenshots taken from 1x05 and 8x07)
At the very core, though, is Sam and Dean with their, "I could have—" statements. Sam had visions about Jessica dying, he could have warned her. Dean had Castiel right there at the portal to exit Purgatory, he could have pulled him out. It is that guilt they must carry around and that burden they must bear.
(Screenshots taken from 1x05 and 8x07)
They even give one another the same damn pep talk. Dean saw that Jessica's death was slowly killing Sam, the same way Sam saw that Dean's return from Purgatory without Castiel was tearing Dean apart.
(Screenshots taken from 1x05 and 8x07)
Lastly, here are the verbal acknowledgements of their grief. Because hey, who am I to try to explain subtext and nonverbatim connections.
2.1. TO BE JOHN WINCHESTER'S SON
In this segment, I would like to point out two of the instances that Sam and Dean accepted being compared to John Winchester, both in regards to losing Jessica and Castiel respectively.
(Screenshots taken from 1x20)
Again, this is what the story was all about. Sam and John could or at least find solidarity in this, as was intended for the plot. (They even mirror God and Lucifer here, which is an entirely different can of worms I am not opening today.)
Keep in mind, Sam's always hated how John raised them, but it is evident that he found some comfort with John given their undeniably specific situations.
(Screenshots taken from 13x04 I talked a little more about this arc here)
Sam openly calls Dean out on his John-esque behavior; an irony in itself given that the brothers have long since established that Sam was the one who resembled John the most whereas Dean was always, "yes, sir!" until the very end.
In this very same arc, there is a concerning increase Dean's alcohol consumption—and the use of alcohol as a coping mechanism in itself, rather than the leisurely treat it recurringly was in the show—which are telling signs for the headspace Dean was in.
They both lashed out in John Winchester ways they've internalized over the years growing up. Sam went down the path of self-destructive revenge-seeking, while Dean lashed out by rejecting being a father role to Jack, becoming the "drill sergeant," instead. These traits were what hurt them as children and were the crux of John's grief over Mary's murder. Round and round the cycle goes.
2.2. TO BE LUCIFER'S VICTIM
(GIFs from 5x03 (a) and (b))
Again, another iconic parallel considering Lucifer's go-to trick to getting what he wants was to pose as the person his victims want the most. Another example of this exact same scenario is when Lucifer appears to rock star Vince Vicente as his dead girlfriend (and Vince ended up saying yes.)
In the earlier seasons, the most obvious choice for Sam was of course Jessica, as Lucifer was desperate to get ahold of Sam as a vessel. That was narratively sound, right? Even though 5 seasons (so about 5 years in canon) have passed since Jessica died, Sam hadn't forgotten her and she remained his greatest weakness.
(GIFs from 15x19)
Then on the flip side, during a time the story's well past the Script and God's most definitely free-styling, Lucifer appears again—and it is on God's orders. The devil chose Dean's weakness (Castiel) to blindside him, so Dean ends up running on emotions instead of questioning it.
This happened right after the episode Castiel confessed, and before the episode that Should Not Be Named... That also speaks for itself, doesn't it? Insane, absolute insanity to me.
3. MISCELLANEOUS: SYMBOLISMS & OTHER COINCIDENCES
(Screenshots taken from 1x01 and 14x12)
This is where I might be reaching, but it's a small observation I noticed while bingeing the Pilot episode. Of course, at the time, production likely didn't even put much thought into Jessica's costume, but it's a funny thing to point out all the same. (I screamed a little about Cas' healer motifs here in comparison to Cesar/Jesse if you're interested.)
(Screenshots taken from 1x01 and 10x09)
They both have the same Look when their boyfriend is talking down on himself, I can't even make this shit up.
+ I'm so frickin' tired I cannot look for screenshots anymore but Jessica's cookies plus Castiel's "you don't understand, I need pie," moment in the convenience store resonate with me.
+ Might edit and add more to this later, for now I sleepge.
REFERENCES
1x01: Pilot
1x05: Bloody Mary
1x20: Dead Man's Blood
5x03: Free to be You and Me
5x20: The Devil You Know
8x07: A Little Slice of Kevin
10x09: The Things We Left Behind
12x23: All Along the Watchtower
13x04: The Big Empty
14x12: Prophet and Loss
15x17: Unity
15x18: Despair
15x19: Inherit the Earth
UP NEXT: SARAH BLAKE
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question for the supernatural analysis game!
we constantly see supernatural show parallels between relationships, so like cain and abel paralleled with dean and sam, and even dean and benny with sam and amelia, so this leads to my question;
is there a favourite parallel you have in the show? personally mine is how god and michael/lucifer parallels john and the winchester brothers
For the ⭐ spn analysis ask game ⭐
I think my favorite parallel was when they introduced Adam (a human) and Seraphina (an angel, whose name is the female version of seraph, the type of angel Cas is) the episode before Cas confessed his romantic love to Dean.
It was literally so clear. A beacon in everyone's face to remind the audience that love between angels and humans IS possible. To remind viewers that angels are capable of romantic and sexual love (as if we never had Gabriel in the show, btw), and to remind viewers that even an angel's immortality isn't a problem.
We literally could've had Dean and Cas live forever and happily in love, with Cas healing Dean to make him live as long as he wanted, and instead we got... yeah let's not talk about what we got 💀
Anyway I think it's remarkable the amount of effort the writers went into to try and give Dean and Cas a canonship status simply by paralleling them to other canon couples (that had the greenlight to be so). I'm thinking of the other blatant examples, like when they literally made up a wife for the biblical figure of Cain just so they could make a parallel with Cas:
Or when they mirrored the lines of that canon couple from the failed spinoff setup episode word for word:
Or when they did this:
Just... insane writers behavior that i absolutely love. But anyway, Adam and Seraphina is probably my favorite one, maybe because it's SO RANDOM (why would Adam, the first human ever, be in a relationship with an angel, generally named Seraphina) and placed in such proximity to the confession.
***
Thank you for the ask!! <3
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