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mittensmorgul · 4 years

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Welcome to today’s installment of The TNT Loop Is Specifically Attempting to Murder Mittens: an ongoing saga.

In today’s torment, we have 8.05, Blood Brother. I recently wrote something about Dean possibly considering his time in Purgatory during his current Identity Crisis in s15 as something he can feel was truly “pure,” as he’d said back in s8-- as a place where God wouldn’t have controlled their actions and choices, and yet he CHOSE to stay and try to save Cas, but also, Cas CHOSE to stay behind (because that was something Dean REALLY struggled with in early s8, the fact that Cas could just abandon him this way-- not only because Cas’s personal burden of guilt was so heavy he didn’t feel like he deserved to be saved from that place, and because he truly believed that Dean would be better off without him if he returned to Sam... and isn’t THAT all just the reflection of their current issues and suffering?).

But there’s a few specific lines/situations in this episode-- two episodes before Cas will be rescued from Purgatory and used against his will as a sort of brainwashed sleeper agent for Heaven. The horrifying themes of “what is real” and “what of all of this is my CHOICE versus what we are being manipulated into” seem INCREDIBLY relevant to the current canon situation in s15.

I’m incredibly tempted to suggest that everyone try to watch this episode before 15.04 airs this week, or at least take a gander at the transcript and refresh your memories about this particular bit of pain. Recall that

Sam was also suffering the loss of a woman he’d loved in this part of s8 (and he’s just lost Rowena in s15, when his relationship with Amelia was always hinted at with an element of ~unreality~ and Sam using her to run away from his own reality, while his relationship with Rowena has always been coded with him EMBRACING himself and his reality)

Kevin was out there doing ~mysterious prophety things~ attempting to decipher the tablet to close the gates of Hell (and in s15 Kevin’s soul is wandering the Earth while they’ve attempted to seal up the rift into Hell... what part will he again play by the end?)

Dean is absolutely CONVINCED of his grip on reality, believing his choices are his own and helps Benny come to terms with that... (despite us knowing that Benny never really does feel that he “fits” back on Earth and will eventually choose to stay in Purgatory by 8.19, and Dean is now on the other end of this conundrum in s15...)

Once Cas does return in 8.07, as he confirms in 8.08, he’s actively running from Heaven, from his own guilt, from his own fears (in 8.08 he will say he’s afraid to see what he’d made of Heaven, afraid he would kill himself if he had to face it... this... was not a happy time for Cas, and he was being ACtIVELY controlled by Heaven on top of all that. Like Dean feels he’s being controlled by Chuck now...)

Okay, with that baseline info, I’d like to point to a few specific things in 8.05 for current canon relevance.

First off, since Benny will figure into a lot of the things I’ll be discussing in this post, I need to establish what Benny tells Dean about what it’s like to be turned into a vampire, and the “loyalty” to one’s maker that is supposed to bring with it. Benny... never quite fit into his nest, which had always frustrated his maker (Benny refers to him as “A jealous god” among other things). Benny wasn’t an obedient son, and actually had the willpower to abandon his nest FOR LOVE. For a HUMAN. A woman who would (after Benny’s death) be claimed by that “jealous god” and turned into a vampire. Andrea didn’t have the will that Benny did, and becoming a vampire had destroyed the humanity that he’d loved her for in the first place. He’d gone to hunt his old nest to avenge Andrea’s murder, only to find her hopeful that Benny would kill their master and free her to become the new “god” of their nest. Meanwhile Benny clung to every shred of his own humanity that he could, in 8.09 even inserting himself into his great granddaughter’s life (family first, right?). By the time Dean calls Benny in 8.19, asking him for the ultimate favor to save Sam from Purgatory, Benny’s lost everything he’d thought he would have. Sure, he destroyed his old nest and all the vampires that had made him, but he’d also accepted that he truly didn’t fit into the world anymore. And that was something he was struggling with even back in 8.05. So with that in mind, let’s explore this episode a little deeper.

This exchange hit me in the face like a mallet:

BENNY: It's weird being back – in the world, I mean. Isn't it? DEAN: Sure as hell is. BENNY: I mean, what do you do with it all? All the – all the everything? Hell, I don't even know if this world is real, if I'm real. DEAN: Hey, listen to me. I’ve seen what happens down that rabbit hole, okay? We're real. Benny, this is real. It's the only way to play this game, you get me?

This is EXACTLY the conversation Dean was attempting to have with Cas in 15.02. Except Dean? He’s constructed his ENTIRE IDENTITY on this belief. This is is, to use his own words to Sam in 7.02, Dean’s “stone number one” that he built his entire identity on. This is his foundation, and in 14.20, Chuck shattered it.

Dean tells Benny he’s seen what happens down that rabbit hole, but Dean had never allowed himself to EXPERIENCE IT. He’s watched SAM go down that rabbit hole, he’d been that “stone one” for Sam. From 7.02:

Dean: I am your flesh-and-blood brother, okay? I'm the only one who can legitimately kick your ass in real time. You got away. We got you out, Sammy. Believe in that. Believe me, okay? You gotta believe me. You've gotta make it stone number one and build on it.

But Dean himself has never had his entire grip on reality shattered to the degree that 14.20 shattered him, and he has ZERO coping skills to apply to himself in this case. HE had always been his own Stone Number One, and Chuck took that from him. Chuck took CAS from him, too, because Chuck had given Cas to him in the first place. NOTHING is real to him right now. Just as nothing felt real to Benny after all his own ties to the world had been cut in s8.

For YEARS, Dean has been everyone else’s stone, but right now he’s a few handfuls of sand on the shore of a vast ocean determined to wash him away to nothingness. He’s failed in every respect, and there’s nothing to hold on to at all.

During the course of 8.05, Benny learns the truth of what happened versus what he’d always believed happened. Andrea hadn’t been killed by his nest, she’d been assimilated by them. His perceptions and understanding had been wrong, and the woman he’d pined for the entire time he’d been in Purgatory had been changed into something he didn’t even recognize anymore.

DEAN (on phone): I'm not alone, damn it. All right? I'm not alone. I've got backup – guy who's been tracking the nest for a while. SAM (on phone): What guy? Garth? DEAN (on phone): What? No. You don't know him. He's a friend. SAM (on phone): A friend? Dean, you don't have any – all your friends are dead. DEAN (on phone): That's not what I called to talk about!

LOL all Dean’s friends are dead... Like Benny, who’s a vampire, so... dead, technically...

BENNY: Andrea, what happened? The old man said he was gonna bleed you dry. ANDREA: I don't know. He changed his mind. I blacked out. When I woke up, I was drinking from his wrist. BENNY: I'm sorry. All this is because of me. I'm sorry. ANDREA: No. It's not your fault. You never hid anything from me, Benny. I chose you. BENNY: But why'd you stay... with them, with him? Why? ANDREA: You remember what it's like at first. First, everything resets. Life is blood. That's all. And whoever gives it to you – BENNY: I know. It's complicated. Every damn thing is complicated. ANDREA takes a large clasp knife from her waistband and holds it out to BENNY. ANDREA: It doesn't have to be. BENNY: Andrea. ANDREA: Benny, I can't kill him... [she tucks the knife into his jacket] ...none of us can. But you – you came back from the grave. You're proof that he's not all-powerful, that he's not God. He's scared of you, Benny – I know it.

What is choice, and what is about control, and circumstances beyond control. What power do we really have to choose for ourselves when circumstances affect us to this degree?

Meanwhile in Dean’s conversation with Sam, there’s so much hidden, so much each doesn’t understand about the other’s current situation partly because they’re both refusing to talk about these issues. Dean is refusing to talk about how painful the loss of Cas in his life is, or why he’s befriended a vampire (because Benny voluntarily saved Cas’s life in Purgatory despite his serious reservations about Dean’s attachment to Cas). Dean can’t talk about ANY of this because it’s just too painful to accept that Cas CHOSE to stay behind, without him).

and Meanwhile Meanwhile, with Sam, he’d spent the entire previous year living with the belief that Dean (and Cas) was already lost to him. Until Dean came back and dragged him out of his escapist fantasy life he’d built with Amelia. But that life had already shattered for Sam when Amelia’s husband was found alive, too. So... Sam knew even before Dean came back that Amelia wasn’t really his, and that Dean’s return wasn’t really the only thing standing between him and that “normal fantasy life.” But it will take a long time for them both to fully understand and accept the whole entire truth of everything. Just like it’s gonna be a long painful slog through s15 before Dean and Cas are able to face the whole entire truth of what the other’s experience and emotions are.

And another interesting comment from Benny’s “god” figure:

BENNY: Why didn't you let her die? She meant nothing to you. BENNY’S MAKER: But she meant everything to you. If that's all I could salvage from my wayward son – the woman he defied his maker for – I wanted someone to remember you by.

Chuck’s now out for “revenge” against his “wayward sons,” yes? Let’s see how that goes for him.

And in Purgatory, we have the scene that leads up to Benny’s CHOICE to save Cas, against his own better judgment:

BENNY: Look, all I'm saying is I started seeing something in humanity, okay? Something that shouldn't be taken. I drink blood. I don't drink people. DEAN: And why the hell should I believe you? BENNY: What does it matter what you believe? You got your head so far up your ass, Dean, you don't even realize we're already done for. The angel knows it. We are never gonna make it with him next to us glowing like a beacon. DEAN: Do I need to remind you of our deal? Of what you committed to? BENNY: He is gonna get us killed. CASTIEL: We may get to test that theory. DEAN: More monsters? CASTIEL: Leviathan. DEAN: Why don't you blip out of here? CASTIEL: They're too close. I can't. Run.

Dean CHOSE to keep Cas close, WANTED him close, despite the risk to both him and Benny (the one being in this land of abominations who holds the key to Dean’s escape). And Benny started seeing something in Humanity. Which has been Cas’s deal since... forever... right? He saw something worth saving in humanity (and in Dean), and staked his EVERYTHING on it. Like Benny does staking HIS everything on Dean and their agreement.

Which makes Dean’s shattering in s15, after Cas had made his relationship with Dean his PRIMARY FEAR, and also the thing he struggled the hardest to maintain, to secure his place in Dean’s “family.”

(I know who you love, what you fear)

And this is why Dean shattering in s15 has also shattered Cas.

BENNY: You just gonna sit there? BENNY’S MAKER: You're right. I've been here so, so long, Benny, seen all the outcomes, all the patterns a trillion times. It all means so little. This universe is a pyramid of despair, nothing else. BENNY: A little dark. BENNY’S MAKER: I am evil, after all. At least I've had that much to keep me cold at night. You never had that, did you? Everything had to be thought about, considered. BENNY: You know what Socrates said about a life unconsidered. BENNY’S MAKER: Yes. But what we have in us? Benny, that's not life. That's what you still don't get. That's why it's always been so hard for you, my poor Benjamin. [...] BENNY’S MAKER: This is the one last thing I can take from you. BENNY: No. You try, damn it. You try and kill me again. BENNY’S MAKER: This is my story, you gnat. BENNY: Get up! BENNY’S MAKER: It ends the way I choose, not you. [BENNY hauls BENNY’S MAKER to his feet.] BENNY: Well, at least I can finally show you something new, old man. A whole new... [he flips open the large clasp knife ANDREA gave him] ...world.

And Benny kills him. So whose story was this, really? Who was making the choices? What’s even real?

While I was typing this up, 8.06, and now 8.07 have also played in the background. 8.06 entirely about the things left unsaid turning toxic, like a literal specter that festers away and breaks down relationships. I’ll sum up the takeaway from this by first quoting Garth’s line to Dean at the end of the episode. Garth, who was unaffected by the specter who fueled itself on vengeance, who has become a symbol in canon of “letting baggage go” because of this:

Garth: Stop being a idjit! With Bobby dead, you and Sam are all each other has. And that's not so bad, man.

Yes, Dean thinks, and knows. Yes, it is bad. It wasn’t enough back then, and it’s absolutely not enough now. Which Sam proves to him in their very next non-conversation. Because Sam is so not telling the whole truth, even though he claims the moral high ground over Dean and his friendship with Benny. Sam is just... not affected by Cas’s loss the way Dean was. And is. And will be in the next run of s15. And Sam was not honest yet about his OWN loss of Amelia and everything she represented to him, which I hope will be different in s15 regarding his loss of Rowena. Because she, at least, was REAL to him. And Sam’s current issue isn’t a shattering of his entire sense of self, and his own attachment to reality as a concrete concept the way it is for Dean right now.

I’d continue yammering on about 8.07, and Dean’s reaction to getting Cas back (and his concern that Cas isn’t “all back,” and that something larger is at work here that he doesn’t yet understand), but this post is already way too long... >.>

#spn 8.05 #spn 14.20 #spn 15.03 #spn 15.02 #spn 7.02 #spn 8.06 #spn 8.07 #s15 meta rewatch #spiders georg of the tnt loop #it's spirals all the way down #if you say 'mysterious ways' so help me i will kick your ass #destiel #the scheherazade of supernatural #using your words #lies and damn lies

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