Guys, I Think I've Figured It Out!
I have substantial reason to suspect now that the episode in the leaked photos from July is actually episode 10 of Season 7.
Recent spoilers and also the fact that somehow I'm finally able to read ALL of the pages (including the previously indecipherable Sam pages) have brought me to this conclusion, and now I will explain why, so that you may also see that.
Alright, so first things first, let me list to you all the official spoilers we know so far about the episode:
- It was originally called "Not Fade Away" and now it is (supposedly finalized as) "Death's Door"
- Bobby's (very much dead) wife and (also presumably dead) dad are in the episode
- Involves someone named "Reaper" who is apparently the grim reaper. Relation to other reapers not known, but possibly the "head" reaper one rank below Death
Now let me brief you about those photos since some people might not still know about them:
So, back in July, some photos were leaked of an unknown production script by someone unknown and posted on the UK spoiler TV image cache. I linked to them once before but apparently the image paths got changed, but they are very much still there. Most people thought it was a hoax. I on the other hand believe it's real. Supported by the fact that the time they were uploaded is right, it most likely is an early draft, and also apparently someone had contacted someone to try and confirm legitimacy and were told they "were aware of it". Last time I brought them up, I said I couldn't really read most of the pages, but I could read some things. The script has a loooooot of Destiel (including a love confession!) and also Ellen, Ash and Jo.
But now, for some reason, I seem to be able to read the pages fully, including the pages before that I couldn't read at all (which were the pages with Sam in them). Now that I can, a lot of things about this are piecing together.
Now to show you my findings and also my inferences from all combined knowledge and what little is able to be found in these photos:
- First of all, the title in this script is "Eternal Rest". Obviously, no episode we know the projected title for has this title. BUT, this is the first point. Look at this title. Now, compare it to the two known titles for 7.10. What do they ALL have in common? Death. Specifically, the afterlife AKA Heaven. "Eternal Rest" is obvious, "Not Fade Away" could refer to memories of the dead and "Death's Door" is, well, also obvious but refers to where people generally are when they are dying (ie: "Knocking on Death's door."). Now, we didn't learn about "Not Fade Away" until like....September, or something. Considering the photos are from July, it is very plausible to assume that "Eternal Rest" was the draft title of the episode before they started changing the title to better fit the ambiguity titles generally have in this series. The episode number, too, though it says "701" it may've been originally planned to be the first one shot, but again this is from July, before they even started filming Season 7, meaning episode numbers were likely being shuffled around in preparation for the schedule. This was also before Comic-Con, IIRC (the site says the photos were uploaded on July 1st), which means the numbers were changed before Jensen knew he would be directing the first episode shot which ended up being episode 3.
- According to one of those photos, Ben Edlund both wrote AND directed this episode. We know neither of this information for any episode, specifically 7.10. We know Edlund wrote 9, though, but he didn't direct it. Now, this information may've also been changed up between drafting and finalizing scripts, but for right now we have to assume that Ben is still both writing and directing an episode. I'm not sure if writers have had two episodes they wrote air side by side before, but I don't see why that couldn't happen. Especially if, as we've been led to believe, episodes 10-12 are important episodes.
Now then, onto the actual content of the photos. Previously, all I could really tell you was that there was a love confession and really beautiful Destiel moments in that script. Now that I can read all of the pages with Sam in them now, I can more properly infer things about that episode's plot based on what can be read from all the photographed pages (which obviously isn't the whole script):
- First of all, it seems that Sam (and most likely Dean as well) are dead and in Heaven again. If you'll remember with me, the last time we saw them go to Heaven was in 5.16. Additionally, in that episode, we learned that wasn't actually the first time they were in Heaven either. They'd been there multiple times before (they just excel at dying) and the only reason that they didn't remember all the other times was because Joshua erased their memories of Heaven. Except in 5.16, where he allowed them to remember. Now, in that episode as well, when they first woke up in Heaven, they weren't aware of it at all. Dean was not aware of it until Cas contacted him and made him remember, and then Sam wasn't aware until Dean made him remember. Given all that's happened between now and then, I doubt they'd actively remember Heaven, much less if they were to go to it a second time. AND, if they were to go to Heaven a 2nd time, they don't have a handy-dandy Cas to wake them up and remember themselves.
- We learned in 5.16 that people can share a Heaven and evidently Dean and Sam are such people, however this aspect was not obvious at first since Dean was separate from Sam at the start until he went to go find him. It is likely that this would be the case again were they to go to Heaven again.
- The pages with Sam reveal that he had been in a memory with Jess. However, a different page reveals that to not be true as he states here that he "just graduated from Stanford". We know this to not be true because that never happened, and Ash confirms as much. But wait, they clearly have to be in Heaven, because why are the Harvelles there? It's also revealed that to get him out of there, Jo had shot Jess. Sam also does not recognize them at all, or remember anything, as his remark about his actual life is sarcastic (suggesting that the Harvelles had tried to make him wake up while in the illusion and were met with resistance which is why they apparently kidnapped him and took him to the Roadhouse). So he wasn't in a memory at all, because you can't have memories of something that didn't happen. Which leads me to believe what he was actually in was a future that would've happened if his life had been normal (or aka, something that Dean always wanted for him).
At first I thought they were a hallucination or something, considering that's something Sam has to deal with now, but reading these pages, they're not acting like it. The Harvelles are trying really damn hard to make Sam remember (Jo goes as far as shooting him to prove that dead people can't die a 2nd time) and Ash even remarks that he's never had this much of a problem getting either of them to remember themselves. Then he mentions that that "'Someone' must really not want you to remember what happened."
And he's on to something, because clearly Sam's memory had to have been messed with if he was in something that never happened and he literally had no clue who the Harvelles were. Cue Dean and Castiel's pages!
- So last time I brought these photos up, I was under the impression that Cas wasn't really there and that it was Levi simply using the memories Cas has of Dean to essentially fuck with him. In light of new spoilers and also the fact I can read everything now, I no longer think this is true. In fact, I think it's safe to say that the Cas in the script photos is indeed the same Cas we all know and love dearly. I'll get to why in a moment.
SO, remember how, in an interview from sometime before the premiere, Sera was going on about how we'd "see Cas' Heaven in an episode"? I think, at this point, she meant we'd see his Heaven in the sense of seeing most people's Heavens, like how we saw Sam and Dean's in 5.16. The brief little shot we saw of Heaven in 7.02 does not count, because that is not Cas' Heaven. That was the eternal Tuesday afternoon that Cas favored, which is vastly different from HIS Heaven. In fact, there would be no point whatsoever in her even saying we'd be seeing his Heaven at all this season if they thought of that place as his Heaven because we already saw that place in 6.20.
Which would mean that Cas likely really is dead. Which will be interesting, because it will answer the old question of "Where do angels go when they die?" Personally and also based on that teaser pre-premiere, angels very much go to Heaven when they die. I don't know what exactly all entails an angel being dead (like if they have reduced powers or can't leave Heaven ever or something, idk), but either way him being there in Dean's Heaven the way he is in these script photos suggests he's dead. He's not part of whatever Dean is seeing because the interaction suggests he is a visitor from outside the illusion.
- If Cas was dead, let's assume that when angels die they keep most of their angelic powers. Let's say that to some degree they still have power over altering whatever they want, able to move about Heaven as they please, can sense other souls and can probably alter people's memories if they want to, but they are unable to leave Heaven like other angels. So let's say that Cas was in his own Heaven, whether he was conscious of it or not. He suddenly senses Dean's (and probably Sam's too) soul and he decides to go find it. Remember that this would be the same Cas who lied because he didn't want to burden Dean with his problems, Cas who did everything for Dean, Cas who up till the very, very end was still loyal to Dean, Cas who promised that he would redeem himself to Dean. This Cas is our Cas who is burdened by all the events that transpired between seasons 4 and 7. If he were to feel Dean's presence in Heaven, he would likely believe that they died because of him, because of what his foolishness unleashed on the world (and considering Boss!Levi is apparently also in 7.10, I don't think that would be far off).
And as I said in a previous entry, Cas and I keep our word when we make promises of the magnitude of the one he made to Dean. But he's dead! How could he possibly redeem himself to Dean when they're all dead thus making the whole point null and void? Solution: Give him a happiness that his natural memories in Heaven could not.
Cas knows Dean. He knows his life, his thoughts, his SOUL. He knows what Dean wants. Or rather, he believes he knows what Dean wants, and he would do everything within his power to give him that. And it is within his power, assuming he still has some of his angelic abilities. We learned in 5.16 that angels do indeed have the ability to warp a Heaven to their own devices. Zach did this to Dean and Sam and claimed he could taunt them in this manner for as long as he needed until Dean said "Yes". Zach, for all intents and purposes, was an ordinary angel just like Cas. His superior, yes, but there was never anything to suggest that he was a different kind of angel, so it can be assumed that he and Cas are the same kind of angel but with different ranks.
So he considers what he could do to follow through on that promise now that he's in some semblance of a position to do that. But what could he possibly do to make up for getting someone he loves killed? Warping said person's Heaven and memories to resemble lives in which they never knew the supernatural nor met him would work! So that's what he does. He reasons it with something like "All he's known has been pain and chaos. He deserves more than that and I...have no place in that." because you can't honestly look me in the eye and tell me Cas has any self-worth when it comes to what he thinks Dean thinks of him, especially after season 6.
Now, I honestly don't know what he made Dean's Heaven/future into. There are a variety of options he could've done and the script doesn't really give much hints at it. However, I think it's safe to say that no matter what he made for Dean, it most likely involved a future where Mary was still alive and where Dean never knew about hunting or anything like that. Maybe John was there too, IDK. And for good measure, he gave Sam his own version of a happy future based on what Dean wanted for Sam, because it was something Dean wanted as well. And Cas would sell his soul if he had one (more-or-less kind of did) to make Dean and everyone Dean loves happy. So he makes a future for Dean where his family is still alive and he has a basically normal life and where, most importantly, Dean doesn't know him. And he gives Sam a future where he has Jess and a lawyer life, because that's what Dean wanted for Sam.
- Now that I have that explanation/reasoning out of the way, I've arranged all the pages with Dean and Cas interaction in them to the best of my ability in supposed chronological order based on logic. Starting with this page, it is clear that evidently, in the script at this point, that Dean has become aware that he's in a lie. I don't know how, maybe for the same reason he was the one who became first aware of being dead in 5.16, IDK. Obviously, Dean is hostile in this interaction, most likely for multiple reasons, the most immediate reason being lied to in some form again. Since these are only small parts of the bigger script, we are missing a fuck ton of dialogue and information, but that doesn't mean we can't infer based on certain elements. So, taking the scenario I just outlined into account, Dean is clearly unhappy and Cas is very frustrated and confused by this (as usual). He doesn't understand why Dean can't be happy even after he literally gave him everything he could ever possibly want in an alternative life (even a Djinn knows that).
Some people may read that "I could have easily sent you to Hell." line as a Godstiel thing to say, and maybe a few months ago that would've been plausible, but I don't see that as Godstiel. I see it as a way for Cas to verbalize his hurt since he is unable to express it. It's a method we both use sometimes. He's thinking "Dean, why aren't you happy? Why are you yelling at me? Is this not what you wanted? Would you like something else? Would you prefer me to show you things that don't make you happy? Because I can show you Hell, if you would prefer seeing that to this manifestation of happiness I've given you." and he could, because he has the power to warp Dean's Heaven into whatever he wants, just like Zach chose to torment Dean with Mary degrading his value in 5.16. So he says that to convey in one small sentence that Dean's rejection of his attempt to redeem himself hurts him and that there were other options he could've taken but he chose the happiest one for him. But Dean, as always does not understand, so Cas tries to explain why this is a good thing for him. Because no one has seen Dean the way he has. He knows all about the guilt and pain that Dean has, and he doesn't understand why anyone would willingly choose to have that instead of happiness. And he reveals as much when he points out he did the same for Sam (which I had previously for some reason been thinking had been a "him") and that Sam was happy (evidently he doesn't know about the Harvelles ruining that) and asking for verification if that was what Dean wanted.
I should also note that in Dean's list of the things he actually wanted and didn't want, you can point out things from various seasons. Saving the world and keeping Sam safe were from seasons 4 and 5, saving people from all seasons, Cas becoming head of Heaven from season 6 and, based on what we learned in 7.06, not wanting to spend the rest of his life in prison would be something from this season, assuming that was not an attempt to tie back to the analogy he made a few lines previous on the page.
- Then we go to this page, which is presumably the one immediately following the first page. Now, unlike Sam's pages, the page with the beginning of this scene was not shown, so Dean and Cas could've been at this for a long while before the presumed first page in this order occurs. And in this second page, we see that Cas has had it. He's tried to understand Dean in all his humanity and he's given this human MUCH over the time they knew each other, and Dean never acknowledged it, and Cas had been fine with that because he figured that's just what Dean does and that maybe at some deep, nigh inaccessible level, Dean understood why Cas did everything he did. But we see here that he's starting to learn that isn't the case, so he's now hurt and confused and really, really agitated. And he begins to show this by pointing out things to Dean to contrast them to what he has done for and because of him. Because clearly even after three years, Dean is unable to see or understand the magnitude that is all Cas has ever done for Dean, so pulling up other people in contrast to him would better highlight all that and MAYBE, this time, Dean will finally see and understand.
But we all know Dean is one of the most hard-headed people ever (that or just really, really fucking awesome at denying anything and everything) and his snarky, kinda-almost sarcastic reply is not the answer that Cas was looking for. So Cas changes his approach. Rather than ask Dean questions and try to have him figure it out on his own, his only choice left is to spell it out for him in clear words and also actions (as you can see in this page, there's a bit of a physical scuffle between them starting). Because if there's one thing Cas has learned in his brief interactions with humanity/the Winchesters, it's that if you really want to get yourself heard, you are probably going to have to get physical. He did this once before, back in Season 5, when he was angry at Dean for even CONSIDERING saying "Yes" to Michael, after ALL he did for him. Which resulted in him basically beating the shit out of Dean in that alley, and guess what, it was actually basically the ONLY time Dean ever understood what the other felt/wanted when it came to his stupid self. So Cas figures since all other methods have failed, surely this time it will work.
So he begins by reiterating what he said to Dean at the beginning of Season 5, albeit much more fleshed out than back then, much more blunt and to-the-point. Yet Dean still insists on being an ass and once more replies with a snarky comment. But Cas is not to be deterred and, if anything, seems to become just a bit more desperate to make Dean see. So he does another physical act (pushing Dean further up the wall) and tries again with much, much more fleshed out thoughts and feelings. "See, Dean? Do you see? Even when you're mean to me, even when you hate me, all I ever think about is you! Why can't you see that, Dean? Why aren't you seeing that? I love you, it's all I've ever felt for you, why can't you see that? Why don't you love me?" is basically what he would be thinking when confessing all that he does in that second paragraph of dialogue.
And now, NOW Dean GETS IT. Or at least, is finally beginning to process it. I'd hazard a guess that part of him probably doesn't even believe it, based on the body language in that action immediately following Castiel spiel and followed up with his (most likely confused) "What?"
- Sadly after that all we have left are snippets from unknown pages, but like I said, I've put these in order based on the flow of conversation in the dialogue. Next we have this small snippet from what I can only assume is the page immediately following the previous page where Cas is now pulling away from Dean, based on the description you could almost say it's regretful. Can't really blame him, since he just spilled out everything, exhausted every method and yet, to Cas at least, Dean still isn't understanding.
Like I mentioned, these are snippets and we are missing huuuuuge chunks of important dialogue here. I can't definitively tell you what their conversation after that snippet is like, but I can infer that Cas most likely continues to explain himself, since he has Dean's attention now.
And then, we come to this snippet. It's a short, three small pieces of dialogue long, but assuming that it's the last page in this sequence we can infer lots of things from it and it ties back now to the main point of why they were even interacting.
Based on what Dean says, it can be inferred that Cas confided that he felt he had no place in any of Dean's futures. It can also be inferred that by this point in the conversation, Cas has been alerted to the disruption of Sam's fake future and is most likely livid about it because how dare they ruin the one thing he could do to redeem himself to Dean! But Dean is actually reassuring here, informing Cas of what his ACTUAL imagined futures involved. Of course Cas would think he was just saying that, because Dean does that a lot. He did it when Cas was Godstiel too. But Dean insists that it's genuine.
And that's basically all we have of that script. It wasn't much to go on in the first place, but now with new details about 7.10 and also what we've learned about the situation for the past 6 episodes, I think it's beginning to become clear that the episode in this script is in fact 7.10.
This is why: We don't know anything about Reaper apart from the fact he's "the grim reaper" since we already have reapers and Death in this series, his inclusion seems really random. But not really if you consider the Leviathans goals, among other things. Death (and his soldiers supposedly including Reaper) is unable to kill the Leviathans. He basically inferred/said as much in 7.01 before we even knew about them. Levi and his gang of lesser Leviathan are seemingly hell-bent on getting permanently rid of the Winchesters. I would imagine that this would coincide with a reaper's goals considering ALL of the times those boys have cheated death. IIRC, Death himself even expressed annoyance at this quality of theirs. And Reaper, though we don't know anything really about him, he could be one of those people who needs to have stuff working properly. And by all rights, Sam and Dean are meant to be dead anyway. So he, whether by his own volition or Levi recruiting him (I personally suspect this since Boss!Levi is back in this episode) goes and kills the Winchesters, perhaps doing something to make sure they actually stay dead this time (though we know they won't cuz when does that ever happen). It's then that we will see Cas again, in his Heaven, just like Gamble said we would and the events that appear to be happening in this leaked script will likely happen as well, because the inferences made above about the script coincide well with the few details we know. Also when I say Winchesters, they likely kill Bobby as well, which is why we see his dead wife and dad in this episode. I don't know how they would get back, but that's what I can infer of this episode.
Maybe the synopsis will prove me wrong, maybe it won't. Can't say. And again, these photos were from early, early July, before Comic-Con and also before they even started shooting. The chances of this being an early draft are 98% likely, thereabouts, so some or all of what we saw in the photos could very well no longer be there (I can only hope not because the Destiel is beautiful and I will scream if I do not see something like it happen). Won't know until a little over a month from now, but I know Cas is coming back, and for all intents and purposes, this is episode 10 for me.
Recent spoilers and also the fact that somehow I'm finally able to read ALL of the pages (including the previously indecipherable Sam pages) have brought me to this conclusion, and now I will explain why, so that you may also see that.
Alright, so first things first, let me list to you all the official spoilers we know so far about the episode:
- It was originally called "Not Fade Away" and now it is (supposedly finalized as) "Death's Door"
- Bobby's (very much dead) wife and (also presumably dead) dad are in the episode
- Involves someone named "Reaper" who is apparently the grim reaper. Relation to other reapers not known, but possibly the "head" reaper one rank below Death
Now let me brief you about those photos since some people might not still know about them:
So, back in July, some photos were leaked of an unknown production script by someone unknown and posted on the UK spoiler TV image cache. I linked to them once before but apparently the image paths got changed, but they are very much still there. Most people thought it was a hoax. I on the other hand believe it's real. Supported by the fact that the time they were uploaded is right, it most likely is an early draft, and also apparently someone had contacted someone to try and confirm legitimacy and were told they "were aware of it". Last time I brought them up, I said I couldn't really read most of the pages, but I could read some things. The script has a loooooot of Destiel (including a love confession!) and also Ellen, Ash and Jo.
But now, for some reason, I seem to be able to read the pages fully, including the pages before that I couldn't read at all (which were the pages with Sam in them). Now that I can, a lot of things about this are piecing together.
Now to show you my findings and also my inferences from all combined knowledge and what little is able to be found in these photos:
- First of all, the title in this script is "Eternal Rest". Obviously, no episode we know the projected title for has this title. BUT, this is the first point. Look at this title. Now, compare it to the two known titles for 7.10. What do they ALL have in common? Death. Specifically, the afterlife AKA Heaven. "Eternal Rest" is obvious, "Not Fade Away" could refer to memories of the dead and "Death's Door" is, well, also obvious but refers to where people generally are when they are dying (ie: "Knocking on Death's door."). Now, we didn't learn about "Not Fade Away" until like....September, or something. Considering the photos are from July, it is very plausible to assume that "Eternal Rest" was the draft title of the episode before they started changing the title to better fit the ambiguity titles generally have in this series. The episode number, too, though it says "701" it may've been originally planned to be the first one shot, but again this is from July, before they even started filming Season 7, meaning episode numbers were likely being shuffled around in preparation for the schedule. This was also before Comic-Con, IIRC (the site says the photos were uploaded on July 1st), which means the numbers were changed before Jensen knew he would be directing the first episode shot which ended up being episode 3.
- According to one of those photos, Ben Edlund both wrote AND directed this episode. We know neither of this information for any episode, specifically 7.10. We know Edlund wrote 9, though, but he didn't direct it. Now, this information may've also been changed up between drafting and finalizing scripts, but for right now we have to assume that Ben is still both writing and directing an episode. I'm not sure if writers have had two episodes they wrote air side by side before, but I don't see why that couldn't happen. Especially if, as we've been led to believe, episodes 10-12 are important episodes.
Now then, onto the actual content of the photos. Previously, all I could really tell you was that there was a love confession and really beautiful Destiel moments in that script. Now that I can read all of the pages with Sam in them now, I can more properly infer things about that episode's plot based on what can be read from all the photographed pages (which obviously isn't the whole script):
- First of all, it seems that Sam (and most likely Dean as well) are dead and in Heaven again. If you'll remember with me, the last time we saw them go to Heaven was in 5.16. Additionally, in that episode, we learned that wasn't actually the first time they were in Heaven either. They'd been there multiple times before (they just excel at dying) and the only reason that they didn't remember all the other times was because Joshua erased their memories of Heaven. Except in 5.16, where he allowed them to remember. Now, in that episode as well, when they first woke up in Heaven, they weren't aware of it at all. Dean was not aware of it until Cas contacted him and made him remember, and then Sam wasn't aware until Dean made him remember. Given all that's happened between now and then, I doubt they'd actively remember Heaven, much less if they were to go to it a second time. AND, if they were to go to Heaven a 2nd time, they don't have a handy-dandy Cas to wake them up and remember themselves.
- We learned in 5.16 that people can share a Heaven and evidently Dean and Sam are such people, however this aspect was not obvious at first since Dean was separate from Sam at the start until he went to go find him. It is likely that this would be the case again were they to go to Heaven again.
- The pages with Sam reveal that he had been in a memory with Jess. However, a different page reveals that to not be true as he states here that he "just graduated from Stanford". We know this to not be true because that never happened, and Ash confirms as much. But wait, they clearly have to be in Heaven, because why are the Harvelles there? It's also revealed that to get him out of there, Jo had shot Jess. Sam also does not recognize them at all, or remember anything, as his remark about his actual life is sarcastic (suggesting that the Harvelles had tried to make him wake up while in the illusion and were met with resistance which is why they apparently kidnapped him and took him to the Roadhouse). So he wasn't in a memory at all, because you can't have memories of something that didn't happen. Which leads me to believe what he was actually in was a future that would've happened if his life had been normal (or aka, something that Dean always wanted for him).
At first I thought they were a hallucination or something, considering that's something Sam has to deal with now, but reading these pages, they're not acting like it. The Harvelles are trying really damn hard to make Sam remember (Jo goes as far as shooting him to prove that dead people can't die a 2nd time) and Ash even remarks that he's never had this much of a problem getting either of them to remember themselves. Then he mentions that that "'Someone' must really not want you to remember what happened."
And he's on to something, because clearly Sam's memory had to have been messed with if he was in something that never happened and he literally had no clue who the Harvelles were. Cue Dean and Castiel's pages!
- So last time I brought these photos up, I was under the impression that Cas wasn't really there and that it was Levi simply using the memories Cas has of Dean to essentially fuck with him. In light of new spoilers and also the fact I can read everything now, I no longer think this is true. In fact, I think it's safe to say that the Cas in the script photos is indeed the same Cas we all know and love dearly. I'll get to why in a moment.
SO, remember how, in an interview from sometime before the premiere, Sera was going on about how we'd "see Cas' Heaven in an episode"? I think, at this point, she meant we'd see his Heaven in the sense of seeing most people's Heavens, like how we saw Sam and Dean's in 5.16. The brief little shot we saw of Heaven in 7.02 does not count, because that is not Cas' Heaven. That was the eternal Tuesday afternoon that Cas favored, which is vastly different from HIS Heaven. In fact, there would be no point whatsoever in her even saying we'd be seeing his Heaven at all this season if they thought of that place as his Heaven because we already saw that place in 6.20.
Which would mean that Cas likely really is dead. Which will be interesting, because it will answer the old question of "Where do angels go when they die?" Personally and also based on that teaser pre-premiere, angels very much go to Heaven when they die. I don't know what exactly all entails an angel being dead (like if they have reduced powers or can't leave Heaven ever or something, idk), but either way him being there in Dean's Heaven the way he is in these script photos suggests he's dead. He's not part of whatever Dean is seeing because the interaction suggests he is a visitor from outside the illusion.
- If Cas was dead, let's assume that when angels die they keep most of their angelic powers. Let's say that to some degree they still have power over altering whatever they want, able to move about Heaven as they please, can sense other souls and can probably alter people's memories if they want to, but they are unable to leave Heaven like other angels. So let's say that Cas was in his own Heaven, whether he was conscious of it or not. He suddenly senses Dean's (and probably Sam's too) soul and he decides to go find it. Remember that this would be the same Cas who lied because he didn't want to burden Dean with his problems, Cas who did everything for Dean, Cas who up till the very, very end was still loyal to Dean, Cas who promised that he would redeem himself to Dean. This Cas is our Cas who is burdened by all the events that transpired between seasons 4 and 7. If he were to feel Dean's presence in Heaven, he would likely believe that they died because of him, because of what his foolishness unleashed on the world (and considering Boss!Levi is apparently also in 7.10, I don't think that would be far off).
And as I said in a previous entry, Cas and I keep our word when we make promises of the magnitude of the one he made to Dean. But he's dead! How could he possibly redeem himself to Dean when they're all dead thus making the whole point null and void? Solution: Give him a happiness that his natural memories in Heaven could not.
Cas knows Dean. He knows his life, his thoughts, his SOUL. He knows what Dean wants. Or rather, he believes he knows what Dean wants, and he would do everything within his power to give him that. And it is within his power, assuming he still has some of his angelic abilities. We learned in 5.16 that angels do indeed have the ability to warp a Heaven to their own devices. Zach did this to Dean and Sam and claimed he could taunt them in this manner for as long as he needed until Dean said "Yes". Zach, for all intents and purposes, was an ordinary angel just like Cas. His superior, yes, but there was never anything to suggest that he was a different kind of angel, so it can be assumed that he and Cas are the same kind of angel but with different ranks.
So he considers what he could do to follow through on that promise now that he's in some semblance of a position to do that. But what could he possibly do to make up for getting someone he loves killed? Warping said person's Heaven and memories to resemble lives in which they never knew the supernatural nor met him would work! So that's what he does. He reasons it with something like "All he's known has been pain and chaos. He deserves more than that and I...have no place in that." because you can't honestly look me in the eye and tell me Cas has any self-worth when it comes to what he thinks Dean thinks of him, especially after season 6.
Now, I honestly don't know what he made Dean's Heaven/future into. There are a variety of options he could've done and the script doesn't really give much hints at it. However, I think it's safe to say that no matter what he made for Dean, it most likely involved a future where Mary was still alive and where Dean never knew about hunting or anything like that. Maybe John was there too, IDK. And for good measure, he gave Sam his own version of a happy future based on what Dean wanted for Sam, because it was something Dean wanted as well. And Cas would sell his soul if he had one (more-or-less kind of did) to make Dean and everyone Dean loves happy. So he makes a future for Dean where his family is still alive and he has a basically normal life and where, most importantly, Dean doesn't know him. And he gives Sam a future where he has Jess and a lawyer life, because that's what Dean wanted for Sam.
- Now that I have that explanation/reasoning out of the way, I've arranged all the pages with Dean and Cas interaction in them to the best of my ability in supposed chronological order based on logic. Starting with this page, it is clear that evidently, in the script at this point, that Dean has become aware that he's in a lie. I don't know how, maybe for the same reason he was the one who became first aware of being dead in 5.16, IDK. Obviously, Dean is hostile in this interaction, most likely for multiple reasons, the most immediate reason being lied to in some form again. Since these are only small parts of the bigger script, we are missing a fuck ton of dialogue and information, but that doesn't mean we can't infer based on certain elements. So, taking the scenario I just outlined into account, Dean is clearly unhappy and Cas is very frustrated and confused by this (as usual). He doesn't understand why Dean can't be happy even after he literally gave him everything he could ever possibly want in an alternative life (even a Djinn knows that).
Some people may read that "I could have easily sent you to Hell." line as a Godstiel thing to say, and maybe a few months ago that would've been plausible, but I don't see that as Godstiel. I see it as a way for Cas to verbalize his hurt since he is unable to express it. It's a method we both use sometimes. He's thinking "Dean, why aren't you happy? Why are you yelling at me? Is this not what you wanted? Would you like something else? Would you prefer me to show you things that don't make you happy? Because I can show you Hell, if you would prefer seeing that to this manifestation of happiness I've given you." and he could, because he has the power to warp Dean's Heaven into whatever he wants, just like Zach chose to torment Dean with Mary degrading his value in 5.16. So he says that to convey in one small sentence that Dean's rejection of his attempt to redeem himself hurts him and that there were other options he could've taken but he chose the happiest one for him. But Dean, as always does not understand, so Cas tries to explain why this is a good thing for him. Because no one has seen Dean the way he has. He knows all about the guilt and pain that Dean has, and he doesn't understand why anyone would willingly choose to have that instead of happiness. And he reveals as much when he points out he did the same for Sam (which I had previously for some reason been thinking had been a "him") and that Sam was happy (evidently he doesn't know about the Harvelles ruining that) and asking for verification if that was what Dean wanted.
I should also note that in Dean's list of the things he actually wanted and didn't want, you can point out things from various seasons. Saving the world and keeping Sam safe were from seasons 4 and 5, saving people from all seasons, Cas becoming head of Heaven from season 6 and, based on what we learned in 7.06, not wanting to spend the rest of his life in prison would be something from this season, assuming that was not an attempt to tie back to the analogy he made a few lines previous on the page.
- Then we go to this page, which is presumably the one immediately following the first page. Now, unlike Sam's pages, the page with the beginning of this scene was not shown, so Dean and Cas could've been at this for a long while before the presumed first page in this order occurs. And in this second page, we see that Cas has had it. He's tried to understand Dean in all his humanity and he's given this human MUCH over the time they knew each other, and Dean never acknowledged it, and Cas had been fine with that because he figured that's just what Dean does and that maybe at some deep, nigh inaccessible level, Dean understood why Cas did everything he did. But we see here that he's starting to learn that isn't the case, so he's now hurt and confused and really, really agitated. And he begins to show this by pointing out things to Dean to contrast them to what he has done for and because of him. Because clearly even after three years, Dean is unable to see or understand the magnitude that is all Cas has ever done for Dean, so pulling up other people in contrast to him would better highlight all that and MAYBE, this time, Dean will finally see and understand.
But we all know Dean is one of the most hard-headed people ever (that or just really, really fucking awesome at denying anything and everything) and his snarky, kinda-almost sarcastic reply is not the answer that Cas was looking for. So Cas changes his approach. Rather than ask Dean questions and try to have him figure it out on his own, his only choice left is to spell it out for him in clear words and also actions (as you can see in this page, there's a bit of a physical scuffle between them starting). Because if there's one thing Cas has learned in his brief interactions with humanity/the Winchesters, it's that if you really want to get yourself heard, you are probably going to have to get physical. He did this once before, back in Season 5, when he was angry at Dean for even CONSIDERING saying "Yes" to Michael, after ALL he did for him. Which resulted in him basically beating the shit out of Dean in that alley, and guess what, it was actually basically the ONLY time Dean ever understood what the other felt/wanted when it came to his stupid self. So Cas figures since all other methods have failed, surely this time it will work.
So he begins by reiterating what he said to Dean at the beginning of Season 5, albeit much more fleshed out than back then, much more blunt and to-the-point. Yet Dean still insists on being an ass and once more replies with a snarky comment. But Cas is not to be deterred and, if anything, seems to become just a bit more desperate to make Dean see. So he does another physical act (pushing Dean further up the wall) and tries again with much, much more fleshed out thoughts and feelings. "See, Dean? Do you see? Even when you're mean to me, even when you hate me, all I ever think about is you! Why can't you see that, Dean? Why aren't you seeing that? I love you, it's all I've ever felt for you, why can't you see that? Why don't you love me?" is basically what he would be thinking when confessing all that he does in that second paragraph of dialogue.
And now, NOW Dean GETS IT. Or at least, is finally beginning to process it. I'd hazard a guess that part of him probably doesn't even believe it, based on the body language in that action immediately following Castiel spiel and followed up with his (most likely confused) "What?"
- Sadly after that all we have left are snippets from unknown pages, but like I said, I've put these in order based on the flow of conversation in the dialogue. Next we have this small snippet from what I can only assume is the page immediately following the previous page where Cas is now pulling away from Dean, based on the description you could almost say it's regretful. Can't really blame him, since he just spilled out everything, exhausted every method and yet, to Cas at least, Dean still isn't understanding.
Like I mentioned, these are snippets and we are missing huuuuuge chunks of important dialogue here. I can't definitively tell you what their conversation after that snippet is like, but I can infer that Cas most likely continues to explain himself, since he has Dean's attention now.
And then, we come to this snippet. It's a short, three small pieces of dialogue long, but assuming that it's the last page in this sequence we can infer lots of things from it and it ties back now to the main point of why they were even interacting.
Based on what Dean says, it can be inferred that Cas confided that he felt he had no place in any of Dean's futures. It can also be inferred that by this point in the conversation, Cas has been alerted to the disruption of Sam's fake future and is most likely livid about it because how dare they ruin the one thing he could do to redeem himself to Dean! But Dean is actually reassuring here, informing Cas of what his ACTUAL imagined futures involved. Of course Cas would think he was just saying that, because Dean does that a lot. He did it when Cas was Godstiel too. But Dean insists that it's genuine.
And that's basically all we have of that script. It wasn't much to go on in the first place, but now with new details about 7.10 and also what we've learned about the situation for the past 6 episodes, I think it's beginning to become clear that the episode in this script is in fact 7.10.
This is why: We don't know anything about Reaper apart from the fact he's "the grim reaper" since we already have reapers and Death in this series, his inclusion seems really random. But not really if you consider the Leviathans goals, among other things. Death (and his soldiers supposedly including Reaper) is unable to kill the Leviathans. He basically inferred/said as much in 7.01 before we even knew about them. Levi and his gang of lesser Leviathan are seemingly hell-bent on getting permanently rid of the Winchesters. I would imagine that this would coincide with a reaper's goals considering ALL of the times those boys have cheated death. IIRC, Death himself even expressed annoyance at this quality of theirs. And Reaper, though we don't know anything really about him, he could be one of those people who needs to have stuff working properly. And by all rights, Sam and Dean are meant to be dead anyway. So he, whether by his own volition or Levi recruiting him (I personally suspect this since Boss!Levi is back in this episode) goes and kills the Winchesters, perhaps doing something to make sure they actually stay dead this time (though we know they won't cuz when does that ever happen). It's then that we will see Cas again, in his Heaven, just like Gamble said we would and the events that appear to be happening in this leaked script will likely happen as well, because the inferences made above about the script coincide well with the few details we know. Also when I say Winchesters, they likely kill Bobby as well, which is why we see his dead wife and dad in this episode. I don't know how they would get back, but that's what I can infer of this episode.
Maybe the synopsis will prove me wrong, maybe it won't. Can't say. And again, these photos were from early, early July, before Comic-Con and also before they even started shooting. The chances of this being an early draft are 98% likely, thereabouts, so some or all of what we saw in the photos could very well no longer be there (I can only hope not because the Destiel is beautiful and I will scream if I do not see something like it happen). Won't know until a little over a month from now, but I know Cas is coming back, and for all intents and purposes, this is episode 10 for me.