a little (long) post about TFW and its "Gaze"
That this post needs a disclaimer is probably not a good sign, but here it is, anyway: I love TFW. Like, very much. Okay? Okay.
BUT: one problem. Not how they love each other, not what they would or wouldn't do for each other, but how TPTB structures their team dynamic. I get that they love one another to an insane degree; this isn't about that. I want to talk about how they talk about one another. I want to talk about TFW's gaze. More specifically, I want to talk about how they talk about Dean. Or, rather, how they don't.
WARNING:
This is a core meltdown with some pie charts and flames on the side of my face.
See, I got curious about something and did a little research. I wanted to know how often members of TFW talked with other members of TFW about one of their own. Whatever the reason (betrayal, concern, support, etc.), I wanted to see how many times each member of TFW has been discussed by his teammates in his absence. You know, that "talking behind his back because we love him and need to help him because he won't help himself" kind of snuggly, sweet goodness that TFW is full of? Dean defending Cas to Sam/Bobby. Bobby advising Dean about Sam. And so forth. Good stuff. Character moments that make some of my favorite moments of the show. I wanted to see how it broke down, because it seemed to me that I could count on one hand the number of times TFW had discussed Dean in concern/anger/fear/etc., and couldn't keep track of how many times Sam had been. I wondered about Bobby and Cas. I wanted to see what was going on. So I looked.
Ever feel like the show spends an awful lot of screen time on what is wrong with Sam? Ever feel like Dean talks all the damn day long about how he feels about what is wrong with Sam? Ever feel like TFW spends an awful lot of time talking about their feelings about this or that member of TFW but never Dean? Ever feel like about half of those talks are somehow related to Sam? You're not imagining it.
The point was to see how and how often actual members of TFW discuss one another when either the person being discussed is unaware of the conversation (sick, locked up, dead, away, etc.) or the people discussing him are unaware that he is present (spy!Cas, ghost!Bobby, eavesdropping!Sam, etc.). In other words: how do the members of TFW drop what they are personally feeling/doing/thinking and gather together as a bonded unit to talk about whichever one of their own is on topic? When that person is out of sight (metaphorically) but is not out of mind. Does that happen? That's a valid question.
This is what I have found, looking at the four seasons since the birth of TFW.
Note: I have disregarded the following types of conversations:
= one-sided phone calls (eg., Dean: "Call me, Bobby. Sam needs our help!" or variations of the same. That wouldn't count for Bobby, and it wouldn't count for Sam.)
= one-sided comments that are not about the name dropped but about the information (eg., Sam: "Bobby's working on it." Dean: "You got nothing, and you know it.")
= one-sided comments that are topic-adjacent but aren't picked up by the other person/people in the conversation (eg., Dean: "We'll find him. Cas, too." Sam: "What made you change your mind?")
= any conversations with or even in the presence of non-TFW members (eg., Dean, Sam and Bobby discussing Cas with Crowley; Sam discussing Dean with Ruby; Dean discussing Bobby with Frank…)
= any conversations with or about fake!, possessed! or other!TFW members (eg., Dean discussing Sam with 2014!Dean doesn't count for Sam; Emmanuel/Cas discussing Cas and Sam with Dean counts for Sam because Sam isn't there but not for Cas because Cas is ~there; Lucifer!Sam discussing Sam with Dean doesn't count for Sam because Sam is ~there, Leviathan!Dean discussing Dean with Sam doesn't count for Dean because even though Dean is not ~there, L!Dean is not a TFW member; Sam and Dean talking about Bobby with Worm!Bobby doesn't count because Bobby is ~there; if this were S3, Sam's talk with Trickster!Bobby wouldn't count for Dean because Bobby is not ~there; and so forth…)
This is a look at only how the actual TFW discusses its own team members, about TFW's gaze on its own.
So. With that out of the way, here we go.
In four years, members of TFW have "discussed" (and I will explain the quotation marks in a minute) the following members the following number of times. ETA: I forgot that one from 5x20, AND I realized I wasn't counting two of those one-line "conversations" about Dean in S6, so I've added that in. Sorry! But look: double digits for all. \o/
51 = Sam
10 = Dean
35 = Cas
26 = Bobby
Here's a breakdown by percentage, including Winchester-specific, for reference.
If you want it by season, here are the numbers (not %) up through "Party On, Garth." S5 looks much better, now. \o/ Yay Season TFW.
But those are just numbers. What do they consist of, really? Let's break it down some more.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Sam as the sole topic of conversation in a scene that is, by default, about Sam: 23.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Dean as the sole topic of conversation of a scene that is, by default, about Dean: 0.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Castiel as the sole topic of conversation of a scene that is, by default, about Castiel: 10.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Bobby as the sole topic of conversation of a scene that is, by default, about Bobby: 7.
Whoa, that's a bit harsh on Dean. Let's loosen that up a bit.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Sam as at least the primary (3/4-ish) if not the sole topic of conversation of a scene that is, therefore, primarily if not solely about Sam: the above 23 + 8 more = 31.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Dean as at least the primary (3/4-ish) if not the sole topic of conversation of a scene that is, therefore, primarily if not solely about Dean: the above 0 + 0 more = 0.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Castiel as at least the primary (3/4-ish) if not the sole topic of conversation of a scene that is, therefore, primarily if not solely about Castiel: the above 10 + 5 more = 15.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Bobby as at least the primary (3/4-ish) if not the sole topic of conversation of a scene that is, therefore, primarily if not solely about Bobby: the above 7 + 5 more = 12.
Damn, Dean. I'm gonna loosen that up a bit more, okay? Hang on.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two of more members of TFW have discussed Sam for more than a single exchange of lines in a scene that is the topic is shared between Sam and someone/something else: the above 31 + 2 more = 33.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two of more members of TFW have discussed Dean for more than a single exchange of lines in a scene that is the topic is shared between Dean and someone/something else: the above 0 + 4 more = 4. (SUCCESS. \o/ AWW, BB, I KNEW IT COULD HAPPEN.)
In four seasons, here are the number of times two of more members of TFW have discussed Castiel for more than a single exchange of lines in a scene that is the topic is shared between Castiel and someone/something else: the above 15 + 3 more = 18.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two of more members of TFW have discussed Bobby for more than a single exchange of lines in a scene that is the topic is shared between Bobby and someone/something else: the above 12 + 5 more = 17.
That's better, but anything that excludes 5x18 is just wrong. I'll just go ahead and loosen it up as far as it will go.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Sam at all for at least a single name drop (other than the excluded "Sam said/told me___" and other assorted one-sided phone calls) or in some other let's say "adjacent" fashion in a scene that is about whatever the hell it may be about: 51.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Dean at all for at least a single name drop (other than the excluded "Dean said/told me___" and other assorted one-sided phone calls) or in some other let's say "adjacent" fashion in a scene that is about whatever the hell it may be about: 10. (DOUBLE DIGITS AT LAST, YAY. \O/)
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Castiel at all for at least a single name drop (other than the excluded "Castiel said/told me___" and other assorted one-sided phone calls) or in some other let's say "adjacent" fashion in a scene that is about whatever the hell it may be about: 35.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Bobby at all for at least a single name drop (other than the excluded "Bobby said/told me___" and other assorted one-sided phone calls) or in some other let's say "adjacent" fashion in a scene that is about whatever the hell it may be about: 26.
I've compiled and uploaded the entire extent of dialogue concerning one member of TFW by the others: Sam, Dean, Castiel, Bobby. I have them all available for you to read, but I am only going to post those that pertain to Dean. That's not very fair, I know, but it's a matter of brevity that sort of highlights the point and purpose of this post: Dean only has 10 "conversations" to cover, whereas the other members of TFW are comfortably into the double digits. I had to relax the standard of "conversation" to get Dean up to what could be counted as a double digit, but of course, that included more for the other guys, too. It's informative; in the pdfs, Sam has a 12-page block of text deal going on, while Dean has a 3-page-and that's stretching it-hodgepodge of snippets and Dean-adjacents. A less unexpected contrast is that conversations "about Dean" tend to be embedded in conversations about plot or about other characters (namely Sam), while conversations "about Sam" tend to be their own complete entities. In other words: they blend in and out of other topics talking about Dean, but they stay settled in on Sam. It's not just Sam, either; Bobby and Cas are devoted time and attention by the team as a team.
Let me show you what I mean. Here are the conversations in which Dean was-for whatever reason-not a part of the conversation. Same criteria applied as for the others. He's dead, he's gone, he's hurt, he's invisible, he's whatever. He's not a part of these conversations. These conversations consist of one unicorn sighting, one honorable mention, and the rest that are whatever they are.
SEASON 4
=There are two times: two conversations in two different episodes.
4x06, "Yellow Fever"
BOBBY: Where's Dean?
SAM: Home sick.
BOBBY: Have his hallucinations started yet?
SAM: Yeah, a few hours ago.
BOBBY: How are we doing on time?
SAM: We saw the coroner about 8:00 a.m. Monday morning, so, uh… just under two hours.
4x16, "On The Head of a Pin"
CASTIEL: Sam-
SAM: Get in there and heal him. Miracle. Now.
CASTIEL: I can't.
SAM: You and Uriel put him in there-
CASTIEL: No.
SAM: --because you can't keep a simple devil's trap together.
CASTIEL: I don't know how that happened. That trap… it shouldn't have broken. I am sorry.
SAM: This whole thing was pointless. You understand that? The demons aren't doing the hits. Something else is killing your soldiers.
CASTIEL: Perhaps Alastair was lying.
SAM: No. He wasn't.
SEASON 5
=There are three times: two "conversations" in a single episode, and one more that was Dean-adjacent. Well, calling these "conversations" might be stretching the definition, but he's mentioned and the scenes are (more or less) about him (and Adam/Sam/Cas). This is what I meant when I put the word "discussed" in quotations marks a little earlier. I had had totally forgotten to quote the last one for you, I suppose because I had brain-bleached the episode from memory. Sorry!
5x18, "Point of No Return"
BOBBY: How's he doing?
[SAM shrugs and scoffs.]
BOBBY: How're you doing?
[SAM nods slightly.]
:::
BOBBY: Where's Cas?
SAM: Blown to Oz. Look, I’ll get Dean. He couldn’t have gone too far. Just watch Adam.
…
SAM: What the hell happened to him?
CASTIEL: Me.
ETA:
5x20, "The Devil You Know"
SAM: And then Dean just walks right out the door with Crowley.
BOBBY: Well, look, Sam, I got no love for demons, and, yeah, this whole thing is crazy, but...I don't know. After a year of chasing up zilch, maybe it's time to go crazy.
SAM: Yeah, maybe. Hey, Bobby?
BOBBY: Yeah?
SAM: Uh...Remember that time you were possessed?
BOBBY: Yeah. Rings a bell.
SAM: When Meg told you to kill Dean, you didn't. You took your body back.
BOBBY: Just long enough to shank myself, yeah.
SAM: Well, how'd you do it? I mean, how'd you take back the wheel?
BOBBY: Why are you asking, Sam?
SAM: Say we can open the cage. Great. But then what? W-we just lead the devil to the edge and get him to jump in?
BOBBY: You got me.
SAM: What if you guys lead the devil to the edge and I jump in?
BOBBY: Sam.
SAM: It'd be just like when you turned the knife around on yourself. One action -- just one leap.
BOBBY: Are you idjits trying to kill me?!
SAM: Bobby --
BOBBY: We just got done talking your brother off the ledge, and now you're lining up to say "yes"?
SAM: It's not like that. I'm not gonna do it. Not unless we all agree. But I think we got to look at our options.
BOBBY: This isn't an option, Sam.
SAM: Why not?
BOBBY: You can't do it. What I did was a million-to-one, and that was some pissant demon I was brain-wrestling. You're talking about taking back control from Satan himself.
SAM: Yeah. Yeah, I am.
BOBBY: Kid...It's called "possession" for a reason. You, of all people, ought to know.
SAM: I'm strong enough.
BOBBY: You ain't. He's gonna find every chink in your armor, Sam, and use it against you --Your fear, your grief, your anger. And let's face it -- You're not exactly Mr. Anger management. How are you gonna control the devil when you can't control yourself?
SEASON 6
=There are four times: one conversation that is in the roughly in the ballpark of the general vicinity of Dean, while the other three are single line exchanges that I am calling "conversations" because they were all we got at all.
6x11, "Appointment in Samarra"
BOBBY: Don't say, "Here's Johnny."
SAM: I got to do this, Bobby. I'm sorry. You shouldn't have cornered yourself.
BOBBY: I didn't! Reinforced steel core, titanium kick plate. Get comfy. You want to explain what this is about?
SAM: I just… I have to do this, Bobby.
BOBBY: Says who?
SAM: If Dean shoves that soul back in me, think how bad that could really be. I can't let it happen, Bobby. I mean, it's not like I want to kill you. You've been nothing but good to me.
BOBBY: So… what, demon deal or something?
SAM: Spell.
BOBBY: You're making a mistake, Sam.
SAM: I'm trying to survive.
BOBBY: Dean's got a way to make it safe.
SAM: Oh, yeah, what, some wall inside my head that maybe stays up? Come on.
BOBBY: If it works-
SAM: Yeah, what if it doesn't? Dean doesn't care about me. He-he just cares about his little brother, Sammy, burning in hell. He'll kill me to get that other guy back.
BOBBY: Look, I know how scary it is. But you know what's scarier? You right now. You're not in your right head, Sam. You're not giving us much choice here. Sam? Balls!
ETA:
6x12, "Like a Virgin"
BOBBY: Sam. Where's Dean?
SAM: Hey, um... He went to go see your friend.
6x18, "Frontierland"
BOBBY: Where the hell's Dean?
SAM: Supply run, he said. I don't know.
6x21, "Let It Bleed"
BOBBY: How's Dean?
SAM: About how you'd expect.
SEASON 7
=There is one time. And it is a unicorn sighting. Sit down. Bask. It's over so very quickly.
7x09, "How To Win Friends And Influence Monsters"
SAM: How's he doing?
BOBBY: He's sleeping it off. Tryptophan coma.
SAM: So, you think he's okay?
BOBBY: Yeah, he's all right.
SAM: Good. So, you don't worry about him?
BOBBY: What do you mean? Before the Turducken?
SAM: Yeah. Yeah, I kind of mean more like… more like ever since my head broke, and we lost Cas. I mean, you ever feel like he's-he's going through the motions, but he's not the same Dean, you know?
BOBBY: How could he be?
SAM: Right, yeah, but what if-
BOBBY: What if what, Sam? You know, you worry about him. All he does is worry about you. Who's left to live their own life here? The two of you-aren't you full up just playing Snuffleupagus with the Devil all the live long?
SAM: I don't know, Bobby. Seeing Lucifer's fine with me.
BOBBY: Come again?
SAM: Look, I'm not saying it's fun. I mean, to be honest with you, I kind of see it as the best-case scenario. I mean, at least all of my crazy's under one umbrella, you know? I kind of know what I'm dealing with. A lot of people got it worse.
BOBBY: You always were one deep little son of a bitch.
I noticed in doing this that even the very rare scenes of Sam and Bobby talking with each other about Dean shift into--or begin as--or otherwise share focus with--either the plot or with Sam as the topic of conversation. This is what I mean when I say that there has never-ever-been a conversation among the members of TFW about Dean that begins, ends and remains only about Dean. All other members have had it: Sam, of course, but also Bobby and Castiel. Just… not Dean. That awesome moment in 4x16? Plot enters. This beautiful moment in 7x09? Sam enters. Dean is never the sole focus of a TFW conversation in which he is absent. Getting them to talk about how he feels, or how they feel about how he feels-which is all standard fare for TFW discussing any other member of TFW, as you will see if you look at the pdfs-is as rare as a unicorn.
Anyway, here comes my wall of text core meltdown...
I've heard this argument, that there's always something wrong with Sam, so of course they will be talking more about what's wrong with Sam instead of what's wrong with Dean. Well, my thought on that? The narrative structure of the show doesn't dictate the writing; the writing dictates the narrative structure. Dean has his walls up, so the show also has its walls up? No, that doesn't work for me for several reasons. The personality of the characters shouldn't dictate what the writers write; the writers dictate what situations those personalities are put into and how their friends/family respond. And if Dean is not ever placed in a season-long, enduring crisis that consumes the plot and character moments of his loved ones in the same way that Sam has several times now, and then Cas and now Bobby, and if the reason for this is because he's the "strong one" and the "big brother," then I would really like for the writers to read up on caregivers. The nurturers also need nurturing. Caregivers also need their family to take a moment once in a while to plan something nice for them, to talk about how they are doing, to try to help each other help them. I appreciate that it's realistic that the caring of caregivers doesn't always happen, but it's absurd to me that the show might suggest that because Dean isn't comfortable being the object of his family's caring attention and concern, that means that he actually doesn't need it. A person doesn't stop having their own needs because they endlessly care for others' needs. Isn't that something Sam has said to him several times? Bobby, too? Certainly Cas. A person doesn't stop needing to breathe because they're underwater all of the time. A person doesn't stop being human because being human is a boring, repetitive plot. Dean is generally either told this (as in, "Tell someone how bad it is," "Look after yourself," etc.), or he's told to soldier up. I really wish I felt that the show had a better appreciation for the impossible position they place him in by continuing to be told to relax and let his loved ones go even as he is being told to soldier up because everyone around him continues to be placed in a crisis that he is relied on to fix or to be that strong one who holds steady while all else goes to pot. Jensen's performance is where I find the center point for this exhaustion; it's not in the script. In any case, we have a lot of scenes of him being cared for by individual team members but not by the team. Which is the point of this ~study of mine.
Well, what about this: It's Sam, not Dean, that is always in crisis, so it's Sam, not Dean, that is always discussed? No, that doesn't work for me on this meta level either, because the characters don't write the show. The writers write the show. It's their sandbox. They've put Dean in danger in various episodes, and they put him in crisis in S3 (which is another analysis, and actually the memory was a little softer than the reality, but that's for another day, another post). So it's not as if Dean is incapable of being in crisis or being talked about because his walls are up, etc. I think the show don't talk about what's wrong with Dean, not because there isn't anything wrong with Dean, but because there isn't anything supernaturally wrong with Dean. There's only, what? Depression, alcoholism, grief, exhaustion, anger, betrayal. These basic human things that are wrong with him-and have been for long before TFW was born and have only gotten progressively worse as more and more crap piles on-are apparently not things that loved ones in SPN talk about--not because the characters don't care, but because those are not the things that TPTB is interested in writing about. That is, investing a season's main plot about.
That point is relevant, you see, and ironic: because if there's one character who gets crapped on for whining about his feelings all the damn time omg, it's Dean, and if there's one character who has to talk about his feelings because none of his loved ones talk about them on his behalf, it's Dean. They did it just once, in 7x09: a scene that arrived like a unicorn, sparkled and glowed out of its rainbow-flavored ass and then vanished into the night. Yeah, I tell you: I'm not feeling the love, folks. It's there, I know. Nothing is as big and blatant and amazingly all-consuming as TFW's love for one another. And that's the thing that drives me crazy trying to come to some satisfying analysis of this. All of the other TFW members love Dean best; they've all said as much except for Sam, for whom it goes without saying, I think. The love goes without saying. It's beautiful and ever-present; it can be breathtakingly sad and refreshingly joyful and sometimes hilarious. It doesn't need to be spelled out; it's the kind of subtext that is so omnipresent and vital that it is like the very air they breathe. Maybe you don't always see it, but it's there. They live on it.
Okay, so we don't have to talk about it. But why does that silence only apply to Dean? The love Dean feels for Sam goes with saying ad nauseam (no offense, Dean), the love each boy feels for Bobby goes with saying, the love Bobby feels for Sam goes with saying, the love Dean has for Cas goes with saying, and on and on and on, and isn't that the very reason that the angst on this show is off the charts? People talk about how they feel, omg, and how they feel about how this or that team member feels. Take a cursory glance at the pdfs for Sam, Bobby and Cas. It's not just Dean who's talking, you see, contrary to some popular belief. This great big team togetherness love is like the fifth character of TFW that is present in so many discussions that it keeps farting rainbows all over my analysis. They talk to one another about one another all the damn time. This only goes without saying when the object of that love is Dean.
But wait a minute! Cas damn sure gazes at Dean, and so does Sam. Bobby's eyes almost settle more on Dean than on Sam in their cozy family scenes. (Have you ever noticed that? It's true!) They all love him best. They all interact with him the most. They all have the most profound bond that they have with him, and they tell him about it, each and every one of them. So that can't be right. Dean damn sure isn't the only one gazing.
This is all true. But I'm talking about something else. I'm not talking about the individual relationships that Dean has with Sam, with Castiel and with Bobby. I'm talking about the TFW's relationship of togetherness for mutual loved ones. I'm talking about sharing when the person about whom they're talking out of sight but not out of mind. I'm talking about TFW bonding over a common concern for a mutual loved one. That doesn't happen when they're talking about this or that plot point, but when they take a moment to set the plot down and be people with one another for the sake of a mutual loved one. Part of the reason that Bobby and Dean seem so much closer than Bobby and Sam do is that the writers allow Bobby and Dean to take time (quite often) to be people with each other (about Sam primarily, but also Cas and John and certainly each other), whereas Bobby and Sam focus mostly on plot points and/or Sam's latest "wrongness" and what fucked-up thing he's about to do to Bobby because of it. Characters don't become closer when they do plot things together: hunting, fighting, planning, researching, etc. That is work, circumstances, necessity. That's not the basis for a bond, for that sense of another person in one's life as "home." Characters become closer when they are human beings with one another, sharing human feelings, and what makes those relationships the beating heart of TFW is that they gather together and don't leave one another hanging when one person is in crisis and another person is desperate to help them. So, if everyone's primary relationship is with Dean, then if you take Dean out, what are you left with? A collection of related parts that have no center, no core.
Think about TFW for a minute in terms of, say, Star Trek: The Original Series. Whether you see Dean as Spock (the walled-up one), McCoy (the emotional one) or Kirk (the "core" of the triangle), try to imagine that show without any of the dialogue about the guy you see as Dean between the other two guys. If he's Spock, that means that more than half of the dialogue between McCoy and Kirk in "Amok Time" will be cut out, for starters. If he's Kirk, we won't have moments like "He knows, Doctor," and we don't have episodes like that one where Kirk was a space oddity and Spock and McCoy fight with each other about him and their feeling/concern for him and had to bring him back to the right phase or something, I dunno--I forget the title. If he's McCoy… well, okay, you get the drift. Also, you can just forget a good 50% of episodes like "The Empath." This is my point: the team is not just a collection of related parts; it is a whole that turns its unified gaze onto its members. This is why it's a team and not a collection of related parts. Think about an orchestra, in which each instrument has its own relationship to the music but not merely a string of solos but as a harmony with the whole. Think of football, where each offensive player has his own relationship with the quarterback and not in isolation from the others, but working together to help their teammates get the down. Think of… well, there are so many "teams" analogies…
That is why TFW is Team Free Will, a single unit, not a series of adjacent entities that crossover once in a while… like Free Will: Cas! and Free Will: Sam! and its 4x16 lovechild, Free Will: Sassy! Or, hey, Free Will: Bobtiel! of 6x18. I'm just saying. It's not categorized like that. There are individual relationships that give the whole its foundation, but there is also the Team: how this relationship over there (say, Sassy) complements and enriches this one over here (say, Destiel), and vice versa. (I'm not talking slash right now. You know what I mean.) That is the most beautiful, you see, and my very favorite aspect of TFW: how the individual relationships--through good times and bad, hurtful feelings and comforting ones--feed into each other to bring out incredible texture and give enormous meaning to the singular unit of togetherness that Dean once named "Team Free Will."
So what does this even matter? I dunno; I was just curious. But here's the thing: if you're feeling like the show is oversaturated in Dean feelings and wish Dean would shut the hell up about his feelings for god's sake --OR-- if you're feeling as if Dean is the sympathetic human center of the show and is the actual main character in that he is perpetually the subject to Sam's perpetual object --OR-- if you're feeling as if Sam is the show's actual main character around whom all things revolve (all things including Dean the character, TFW as a unit and most of their conversations) --OR-- if you're feeling as if Sam's POV is neglected because the show spends so much damn time on how Dean feels for god's sake and can't we just stop talking about that before the angst kills us all? --OR-- if you're feeling as if nobody cares about Dean and how can they still expect us to care about Sam's ~wrongness this time? --OR-- if you're feeling as if Dean gets all the meaty relationship stuff while Sam gets scraps from his table… Well, if you've ever felt any of those things or anything similar, this might help to explain why. There is no balance. This is what I mean when I say that Dean is the designated gazer of TFW; he is hardly ever gazed at.
Ultimately, as it concerns Sam and Dean, which is the biggest gap of all (51/7)…? What this tells me is that one of the brothers barely has a point of view, and the other barely has a plot. There's no settling down in Sam's head if the plot revolves around the latest manifestation of whatever is or is not wrong or human about him, and there's no point in talking about Dean if the plot is off on the other side of the Impala revolving around Sam. But that's not default, you see? Ample opportunity for balance exists, but it's shuffled out of sight and taken nowhere. Why? I honestly don't know. It's inexplicable to me because it shortchanges both brothers. Why??? =Writers' sandbox.
So, when I wish in my heart for Dean to be the one in trouble, Dean to be the one cared for, Dean to be the main character plot of a season, Dean not to be told to soldier up and get his head in the game, but Dean to be gazed at for any damn substantial length of time and depth of focus in a concentrated group effort by the other members of TFW that lasts longer than an episode or, god forbid, a single scene or single line? When I want Dean to be in crisis and for that crisis to be the main plot which a season revolves and for TFW to talk about that main Dean plot and how they feel about that main Dean plot the way we have for Sam, for Cas and now for Bobby? This is why. It is something we actually never get in canon.
Let me show you something. This is the last thing. Here is a closing example of all that is beautiful and all that is flames-on-the-side-of-my-face-inducing about how TFW cares for one another. This is what I'm talking about.
In "Point of No Return," Dean was at rock bottom, yes? The team knew it. It was ~on topic. He was put in the panic room. He couldn’t be reasoned with. He was aggressive and angsty. The team was planning something else so that he didn't have to do what he felt he had to do to save the world. Their joint concern for him was the ~theme.
In "When The Levee Breaks," Sam was at rock bottom, yes? The team knew it. It was ~on topic. He was put in the panic room. He couldn’t be reasoned with. He was aggressive and angsty. The team was planning something else so that he didn't have to do what he felt he had to do to save the world. Their joint concern for him was the ~theme.
In "Point of No Return," here is how Sam and Bobby talked about Dean.
BOBBY: How's he doing?
[SAM shrugs and scoffs.]
BOBBY: How're you doing?
[SAM nods slightly.]
:::
BOBBY: Where's Cas?
SAM: Blown to Oz. Look, I’ll get Dean. He couldn’t have gone too far. Just watch Adam.
In "When The Levee Breaks," here is how Dean and Bobby talked about Sam.
DEAN: How long is this gonna go on?
BOBBY: Here, let me look it up in my demon-detox manual. Oh wait. No one ever wrote one. No telling how long it'll take. Hell, or if Sam will even live through it.
:::
BOBBY: I'm just wondering.
DEAN: What?
BOBBY: The apocalypse being nigh and all...is now really the best time to be having this little domestic drama of ours?
DEAN: What do you mean?
BOBBY: Well, I don't like this any more than you do, but Sam can kill demons. He's got a shot at stopping Armageddon.
DEAN: So what? Sacrifice Sam's life, his soul, for the greater good? Is that what you're saying? Times are bad, so let's use Sam as a nuclear warhead?
BOBBY: Look, I know you hate me for suggesting it. I hate me for suggesting it. I love that boy like a son. All I'm saying is maybe he's here right now instead of on the battlefield because we love him too much.
:::
DEAN: Because what other option do I have? It's either trust the angels or let Sammy trust a demon?
BOBBY: I see your point.
DEAN: You hear that?
BOBBY: Yeah, that's a little too much nothing.
DEAN: What if he's faking?
BOBBY: You really think he would?
DEAN: I think he'd do anything.
BOBBY: That ain't faking. We're gonna have to tie him down for his own safety. Dean? You with me? Dean! Before he has another fit.
DEAN: Yeah, yeah. Let's just get it over with.
:::
BOBBY: I'm gonna ask one more time. Are we absolutely sure we're doing the right thing?
DEAN: Bobby, you saw what was happening to him down there. The demon blood is killing him.
BOBBY: No, it isn't. We are.
DEAN: What?
BOBBY: I'm sorry. I can't bite my tongue any longer. We're killing him. Keeping him locked up down there. This cold-turkey thing isn't working. If-if he doesn't get what he needs, soon, Sam's not gonna last much longer.
DEAN: No. I'm not giving him demon blood. I won't do it.
BOBBY: And if he dies?
DEAN: Then at least he dies human!
…
DEAN: I would die for him in a second, but I won't let him do this to himself. I can't. I guess I found my line. I won't let my brother turn into a monster.
:::
DEAN: How the hell did he get out?
BOBBY: Maybe he had help. Room full of busted devil's traps.
DEAN: Demons? Ruby.
BOBBY: That'd be my guess.
DEAN: How did she even touch the door?
BOBBY: You think she's got the mojo?
DEAN: I didn't think so. I don't know, man.
BOBBY: What difference does it make? How he got gone ain't as important as where he got gone to.
DEAN: Well, I'll tell you one thing. At this point I hope he's with Ruby.
BOBBY: Why?
DEAN: 'Cause killing her's the next item on my to-do list.
BOBBY: I thought you were on call for angel duty.
DEAN: I am on call. In my car, on my way to murder the bitch.
BOBBY: One thing.
DEAN: What?
BOBBY: Sam don't wanna be found, which means he's gonna be damn near impossible to find.
DEAN: Yeah, we'll see.
:::
BOBBY: Police found my car. Abandoned in an alley in Jamestown, North Dakota.
DEAN: He's switching up. Any other cars stolen in Jamestown?
BOBBY: Two. 1999 Honda Civic, blue. Nice and anonymous, like Sam likes.
DEAN: What was the other one?
BOBBY: White oh-five Escalade with custom rims. It's a neon sign.
DEAN: You're right. He'd never take that. Which is exactly what he did.
BOBBY: You think?
DEAN: I know that kid. All right, I'll head in that direction. You stay here, ride the police databases. We gotta find him quick.
:::
BOBBY: Cops found the Escalade in a ditch outside Elk River.
DEAN: How far away am I?
BOBBY: A couple of hours. I pulled up a weather map, made some calls. There's a town not far from there, Cold Spring. Lighting up with demon sign.
DEAN: A good place to look.
BOBBY: Hey, listen.
DEAN: What?
BOBBY: Us finding Sam? It's gotta be about getting him back, not pushing him away.
DEAN: Right.
BOBBY: I know you're mad, Dean. I understand. You got a right to be, but I'm just saying. Be good to him anyway. You gotta get through to him.
So, you see. Even when in crisis. Even when at rock bottom. Even when needing help. Even when being the topic of conversation and the object of worry. Even when the plot of the moment and the myth of the moment happen to revolve around TFW in just the right way. Even when all of those stars align. Even then… there is no balance.
This is why 7x09 is a unicorn. TFW was talking about Dean. They were concerned with how he was doing emotionally. They were sharing with each other how they felt about how he was doing emotionally. They were talking about those goddamn boring and plot-irrelevant human emotions as if they were not goddamn boring or plot-irrelevant at all but actually important enough for them to drop everything else and invest enough time to settle down in and touch base with each other about what's wrong with Dean. This is why 4x16 is beautiful. TFW was talking about Dean. They were concerned with whether or not he was okay. They were confronting each other about what had happened to Dean. Everything else stopped for a moment because they couldn't stand that Dean was in that condition and that neither one of them could help him. Do you know how often that happens about Sam? Like pumpkins on Halloween. Do you know how often that happens about Dean? Unicorn.
So, there you have it. My core meltdown about this one fucked up detail about something otherwise so beautiful and satisfying that I love the hell out of it. If this is coming across like I'm a bitter Dean girl, well, I am. If I am, it's because writing choices on this show have given me more than ample reason to be.
This was cross-posted on tumblr. Transcripts are courtesy of the Supernatural Wiki.
BUT: one problem. Not how they love each other, not what they would or wouldn't do for each other, but how TPTB structures their team dynamic. I get that they love one another to an insane degree; this isn't about that. I want to talk about how they talk about one another. I want to talk about TFW's gaze. More specifically, I want to talk about how they talk about Dean. Or, rather, how they don't.
WARNING:
This is a core meltdown with some pie charts and flames on the side of my face.
See, I got curious about something and did a little research. I wanted to know how often members of TFW talked with other members of TFW about one of their own. Whatever the reason (betrayal, concern, support, etc.), I wanted to see how many times each member of TFW has been discussed by his teammates in his absence. You know, that "talking behind his back because we love him and need to help him because he won't help himself" kind of snuggly, sweet goodness that TFW is full of? Dean defending Cas to Sam/Bobby. Bobby advising Dean about Sam. And so forth. Good stuff. Character moments that make some of my favorite moments of the show. I wanted to see how it broke down, because it seemed to me that I could count on one hand the number of times TFW had discussed Dean in concern/anger/fear/etc., and couldn't keep track of how many times Sam had been. I wondered about Bobby and Cas. I wanted to see what was going on. So I looked.
Ever feel like the show spends an awful lot of screen time on what is wrong with Sam? Ever feel like Dean talks all the damn day long about how he feels about what is wrong with Sam? Ever feel like TFW spends an awful lot of time talking about their feelings about this or that member of TFW but never Dean? Ever feel like about half of those talks are somehow related to Sam? You're not imagining it.
The point was to see how and how often actual members of TFW discuss one another when either the person being discussed is unaware of the conversation (sick, locked up, dead, away, etc.) or the people discussing him are unaware that he is present (spy!Cas, ghost!Bobby, eavesdropping!Sam, etc.). In other words: how do the members of TFW drop what they are personally feeling/doing/thinking and gather together as a bonded unit to talk about whichever one of their own is on topic? When that person is out of sight (metaphorically) but is not out of mind. Does that happen? That's a valid question.
This is what I have found, looking at the four seasons since the birth of TFW.
Note: I have disregarded the following types of conversations:
= one-sided phone calls (eg., Dean: "Call me, Bobby. Sam needs our help!" or variations of the same. That wouldn't count for Bobby, and it wouldn't count for Sam.)
= one-sided comments that are not about the name dropped but about the information (eg., Sam: "Bobby's working on it." Dean: "You got nothing, and you know it.")
= one-sided comments that are topic-adjacent but aren't picked up by the other person/people in the conversation (eg., Dean: "We'll find him. Cas, too." Sam: "What made you change your mind?")
= any conversations with or even in the presence of non-TFW members (eg., Dean, Sam and Bobby discussing Cas with Crowley; Sam discussing Dean with Ruby; Dean discussing Bobby with Frank…)
= any conversations with or about fake!, possessed! or other!TFW members (eg., Dean discussing Sam with 2014!Dean doesn't count for Sam; Emmanuel/Cas discussing Cas and Sam with Dean counts for Sam because Sam isn't there but not for Cas because Cas is ~there; Lucifer!Sam discussing Sam with Dean doesn't count for Sam because Sam is ~there, Leviathan!Dean discussing Dean with Sam doesn't count for Dean because even though Dean is not ~there, L!Dean is not a TFW member; Sam and Dean talking about Bobby with Worm!Bobby doesn't count because Bobby is ~there; if this were S3, Sam's talk with Trickster!Bobby wouldn't count for Dean because Bobby is not ~there; and so forth…)
This is a look at only how the actual TFW discusses its own team members, about TFW's gaze on its own.
So. With that out of the way, here we go.
In four years, members of TFW have "discussed" (and I will explain the quotation marks in a minute) the following members the following number of times. ETA: I forgot that one from 5x20, AND I realized I wasn't counting two of those one-line "conversations" about Dean in S6, so I've added that in. Sorry! But look: double digits for all. \o/
51 = Sam
10 = Dean
35 = Cas
26 = Bobby
Here's a breakdown by percentage, including Winchester-specific, for reference.
If you want it by season, here are the numbers (not %) up through "Party On, Garth." S5 looks much better, now. \o/ Yay Season TFW.
But those are just numbers. What do they consist of, really? Let's break it down some more.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Sam as the sole topic of conversation in a scene that is, by default, about Sam: 23.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Dean as the sole topic of conversation of a scene that is, by default, about Dean: 0.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Castiel as the sole topic of conversation of a scene that is, by default, about Castiel: 10.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Bobby as the sole topic of conversation of a scene that is, by default, about Bobby: 7.
Whoa, that's a bit harsh on Dean. Let's loosen that up a bit.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Sam as at least the primary (3/4-ish) if not the sole topic of conversation of a scene that is, therefore, primarily if not solely about Sam: the above 23 + 8 more = 31.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Dean as at least the primary (3/4-ish) if not the sole topic of conversation of a scene that is, therefore, primarily if not solely about Dean: the above 0 + 0 more = 0.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Castiel as at least the primary (3/4-ish) if not the sole topic of conversation of a scene that is, therefore, primarily if not solely about Castiel: the above 10 + 5 more = 15.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Bobby as at least the primary (3/4-ish) if not the sole topic of conversation of a scene that is, therefore, primarily if not solely about Bobby: the above 7 + 5 more = 12.
Damn, Dean. I'm gonna loosen that up a bit more, okay? Hang on.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two of more members of TFW have discussed Sam for more than a single exchange of lines in a scene that is the topic is shared between Sam and someone/something else: the above 31 + 2 more = 33.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two of more members of TFW have discussed Dean for more than a single exchange of lines in a scene that is the topic is shared between Dean and someone/something else: the above 0 + 4 more = 4. (SUCCESS. \o/ AWW, BB, I KNEW IT COULD HAPPEN.)
In four seasons, here are the number of times two of more members of TFW have discussed Castiel for more than a single exchange of lines in a scene that is the topic is shared between Castiel and someone/something else: the above 15 + 3 more = 18.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two of more members of TFW have discussed Bobby for more than a single exchange of lines in a scene that is the topic is shared between Bobby and someone/something else: the above 12 + 5 more = 17.
That's better, but anything that excludes 5x18 is just wrong. I'll just go ahead and loosen it up as far as it will go.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Sam at all for at least a single name drop (other than the excluded "Sam said/told me___" and other assorted one-sided phone calls) or in some other let's say "adjacent" fashion in a scene that is about whatever the hell it may be about: 51.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Dean at all for at least a single name drop (other than the excluded "Dean said/told me___" and other assorted one-sided phone calls) or in some other let's say "adjacent" fashion in a scene that is about whatever the hell it may be about: 10. (DOUBLE DIGITS AT LAST, YAY. \O/)
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Castiel at all for at least a single name drop (other than the excluded "Castiel said/told me___" and other assorted one-sided phone calls) or in some other let's say "adjacent" fashion in a scene that is about whatever the hell it may be about: 35.
In four seasons, here are the number of times two or more members of TFW have discussed Bobby at all for at least a single name drop (other than the excluded "Bobby said/told me___" and other assorted one-sided phone calls) or in some other let's say "adjacent" fashion in a scene that is about whatever the hell it may be about: 26.
I've compiled and uploaded the entire extent of dialogue concerning one member of TFW by the others: Sam, Dean, Castiel, Bobby. I have them all available for you to read, but I am only going to post those that pertain to Dean. That's not very fair, I know, but it's a matter of brevity that sort of highlights the point and purpose of this post: Dean only has 10 "conversations" to cover, whereas the other members of TFW are comfortably into the double digits. I had to relax the standard of "conversation" to get Dean up to what could be counted as a double digit, but of course, that included more for the other guys, too. It's informative; in the pdfs, Sam has a 12-page block of text deal going on, while Dean has a 3-page-and that's stretching it-hodgepodge of snippets and Dean-adjacents. A less unexpected contrast is that conversations "about Dean" tend to be embedded in conversations about plot or about other characters (namely Sam), while conversations "about Sam" tend to be their own complete entities. In other words: they blend in and out of other topics talking about Dean, but they stay settled in on Sam. It's not just Sam, either; Bobby and Cas are devoted time and attention by the team as a team.
Let me show you what I mean. Here are the conversations in which Dean was-for whatever reason-not a part of the conversation. Same criteria applied as for the others. He's dead, he's gone, he's hurt, he's invisible, he's whatever. He's not a part of these conversations. These conversations consist of one unicorn sighting, one honorable mention, and the rest that are whatever they are.
SEASON 4
=There are two times: two conversations in two different episodes.
4x06, "Yellow Fever"
BOBBY: Where's Dean?
SAM: Home sick.
BOBBY: Have his hallucinations started yet?
SAM: Yeah, a few hours ago.
BOBBY: How are we doing on time?
SAM: We saw the coroner about 8:00 a.m. Monday morning, so, uh… just under two hours.
4x16, "On The Head of a Pin"
CASTIEL: Sam-
SAM: Get in there and heal him. Miracle. Now.
CASTIEL: I can't.
SAM: You and Uriel put him in there-
CASTIEL: No.
SAM: --because you can't keep a simple devil's trap together.
CASTIEL: I don't know how that happened. That trap… it shouldn't have broken. I am sorry.
SAM: This whole thing was pointless. You understand that? The demons aren't doing the hits. Something else is killing your soldiers.
CASTIEL: Perhaps Alastair was lying.
SAM: No. He wasn't.
SEASON 5
=There are three times: two "conversations" in a single episode, and one more that was Dean-adjacent. Well, calling these "conversations" might be stretching the definition, but he's mentioned and the scenes are (more or less) about him (and Adam/Sam/Cas). This is what I meant when I put the word "discussed" in quotations marks a little earlier. I had had totally forgotten to quote the last one for you, I suppose because I had brain-bleached the episode from memory. Sorry!
5x18, "Point of No Return"
BOBBY: How's he doing?
[SAM shrugs and scoffs.]
BOBBY: How're you doing?
[SAM nods slightly.]
:::
BOBBY: Where's Cas?
SAM: Blown to Oz. Look, I’ll get Dean. He couldn’t have gone too far. Just watch Adam.
…
SAM: What the hell happened to him?
CASTIEL: Me.
ETA:
5x20, "The Devil You Know"
SAM: And then Dean just walks right out the door with Crowley.
BOBBY: Well, look, Sam, I got no love for demons, and, yeah, this whole thing is crazy, but...I don't know. After a year of chasing up zilch, maybe it's time to go crazy.
SAM: Yeah, maybe. Hey, Bobby?
BOBBY: Yeah?
SAM: Uh...Remember that time you were possessed?
BOBBY: Yeah. Rings a bell.
SAM: When Meg told you to kill Dean, you didn't. You took your body back.
BOBBY: Just long enough to shank myself, yeah.
SAM: Well, how'd you do it? I mean, how'd you take back the wheel?
BOBBY: Why are you asking, Sam?
SAM: Say we can open the cage. Great. But then what? W-we just lead the devil to the edge and get him to jump in?
BOBBY: You got me.
SAM: What if you guys lead the devil to the edge and I jump in?
BOBBY: Sam.
SAM: It'd be just like when you turned the knife around on yourself. One action -- just one leap.
BOBBY: Are you idjits trying to kill me?!
SAM: Bobby --
BOBBY: We just got done talking your brother off the ledge, and now you're lining up to say "yes"?
SAM: It's not like that. I'm not gonna do it. Not unless we all agree. But I think we got to look at our options.
BOBBY: This isn't an option, Sam.
SAM: Why not?
BOBBY: You can't do it. What I did was a million-to-one, and that was some pissant demon I was brain-wrestling. You're talking about taking back control from Satan himself.
SAM: Yeah. Yeah, I am.
BOBBY: Kid...It's called "possession" for a reason. You, of all people, ought to know.
SAM: I'm strong enough.
BOBBY: You ain't. He's gonna find every chink in your armor, Sam, and use it against you --Your fear, your grief, your anger. And let's face it -- You're not exactly Mr. Anger management. How are you gonna control the devil when you can't control yourself?
SEASON 6
=There are four times: one conversation that is in the roughly in the ballpark of the general vicinity of Dean, while the other three are single line exchanges that I am calling "conversations" because they were all we got at all.
6x11, "Appointment in Samarra"
BOBBY: Don't say, "Here's Johnny."
SAM: I got to do this, Bobby. I'm sorry. You shouldn't have cornered yourself.
BOBBY: I didn't! Reinforced steel core, titanium kick plate. Get comfy. You want to explain what this is about?
SAM: I just… I have to do this, Bobby.
BOBBY: Says who?
SAM: If Dean shoves that soul back in me, think how bad that could really be. I can't let it happen, Bobby. I mean, it's not like I want to kill you. You've been nothing but good to me.
BOBBY: So… what, demon deal or something?
SAM: Spell.
BOBBY: You're making a mistake, Sam.
SAM: I'm trying to survive.
BOBBY: Dean's got a way to make it safe.
SAM: Oh, yeah, what, some wall inside my head that maybe stays up? Come on.
BOBBY: If it works-
SAM: Yeah, what if it doesn't? Dean doesn't care about me. He-he just cares about his little brother, Sammy, burning in hell. He'll kill me to get that other guy back.
BOBBY: Look, I know how scary it is. But you know what's scarier? You right now. You're not in your right head, Sam. You're not giving us much choice here. Sam? Balls!
ETA:
6x12, "Like a Virgin"
BOBBY: Sam. Where's Dean?
SAM: Hey, um... He went to go see your friend.
6x18, "Frontierland"
BOBBY: Where the hell's Dean?
SAM: Supply run, he said. I don't know.
6x21, "Let It Bleed"
BOBBY: How's Dean?
SAM: About how you'd expect.
SEASON 7
=There is one time. And it is a unicorn sighting. Sit down. Bask. It's over so very quickly.
7x09, "How To Win Friends And Influence Monsters"
SAM: How's he doing?
BOBBY: He's sleeping it off. Tryptophan coma.
SAM: So, you think he's okay?
BOBBY: Yeah, he's all right.
SAM: Good. So, you don't worry about him?
BOBBY: What do you mean? Before the Turducken?
SAM: Yeah. Yeah, I kind of mean more like… more like ever since my head broke, and we lost Cas. I mean, you ever feel like he's-he's going through the motions, but he's not the same Dean, you know?
BOBBY: How could he be?
SAM: Right, yeah, but what if-
BOBBY: What if what, Sam? You know, you worry about him. All he does is worry about you. Who's left to live their own life here? The two of you-aren't you full up just playing Snuffleupagus with the Devil all the live long?
SAM: I don't know, Bobby. Seeing Lucifer's fine with me.
BOBBY: Come again?
SAM: Look, I'm not saying it's fun. I mean, to be honest with you, I kind of see it as the best-case scenario. I mean, at least all of my crazy's under one umbrella, you know? I kind of know what I'm dealing with. A lot of people got it worse.
BOBBY: You always were one deep little son of a bitch.
I noticed in doing this that even the very rare scenes of Sam and Bobby talking with each other about Dean shift into--or begin as--or otherwise share focus with--either the plot or with Sam as the topic of conversation. This is what I mean when I say that there has never-ever-been a conversation among the members of TFW about Dean that begins, ends and remains only about Dean. All other members have had it: Sam, of course, but also Bobby and Castiel. Just… not Dean. That awesome moment in 4x16? Plot enters. This beautiful moment in 7x09? Sam enters. Dean is never the sole focus of a TFW conversation in which he is absent. Getting them to talk about how he feels, or how they feel about how he feels-which is all standard fare for TFW discussing any other member of TFW, as you will see if you look at the pdfs-is as rare as a unicorn.
Anyway, here comes my wall of text core meltdown...
I've heard this argument, that there's always something wrong with Sam, so of course they will be talking more about what's wrong with Sam instead of what's wrong with Dean. Well, my thought on that? The narrative structure of the show doesn't dictate the writing; the writing dictates the narrative structure. Dean has his walls up, so the show also has its walls up? No, that doesn't work for me for several reasons. The personality of the characters shouldn't dictate what the writers write; the writers dictate what situations those personalities are put into and how their friends/family respond. And if Dean is not ever placed in a season-long, enduring crisis that consumes the plot and character moments of his loved ones in the same way that Sam has several times now, and then Cas and now Bobby, and if the reason for this is because he's the "strong one" and the "big brother," then I would really like for the writers to read up on caregivers. The nurturers also need nurturing. Caregivers also need their family to take a moment once in a while to plan something nice for them, to talk about how they are doing, to try to help each other help them. I appreciate that it's realistic that the caring of caregivers doesn't always happen, but it's absurd to me that the show might suggest that because Dean isn't comfortable being the object of his family's caring attention and concern, that means that he actually doesn't need it. A person doesn't stop having their own needs because they endlessly care for others' needs. Isn't that something Sam has said to him several times? Bobby, too? Certainly Cas. A person doesn't stop needing to breathe because they're underwater all of the time. A person doesn't stop being human because being human is a boring, repetitive plot. Dean is generally either told this (as in, "Tell someone how bad it is," "Look after yourself," etc.), or he's told to soldier up. I really wish I felt that the show had a better appreciation for the impossible position they place him in by continuing to be told to relax and let his loved ones go even as he is being told to soldier up because everyone around him continues to be placed in a crisis that he is relied on to fix or to be that strong one who holds steady while all else goes to pot. Jensen's performance is where I find the center point for this exhaustion; it's not in the script. In any case, we have a lot of scenes of him being cared for by individual team members but not by the team. Which is the point of this ~study of mine.
Well, what about this: It's Sam, not Dean, that is always in crisis, so it's Sam, not Dean, that is always discussed? No, that doesn't work for me on this meta level either, because the characters don't write the show. The writers write the show. It's their sandbox. They've put Dean in danger in various episodes, and they put him in crisis in S3 (which is another analysis, and actually the memory was a little softer than the reality, but that's for another day, another post). So it's not as if Dean is incapable of being in crisis or being talked about because his walls are up, etc. I think the show don't talk about what's wrong with Dean, not because there isn't anything wrong with Dean, but because there isn't anything supernaturally wrong with Dean. There's only, what? Depression, alcoholism, grief, exhaustion, anger, betrayal. These basic human things that are wrong with him-and have been for long before TFW was born and have only gotten progressively worse as more and more crap piles on-are apparently not things that loved ones in SPN talk about--not because the characters don't care, but because those are not the things that TPTB is interested in writing about. That is, investing a season's main plot about.
That point is relevant, you see, and ironic: because if there's one character who gets crapped on for whining about his feelings all the damn time omg, it's Dean, and if there's one character who has to talk about his feelings because none of his loved ones talk about them on his behalf, it's Dean. They did it just once, in 7x09: a scene that arrived like a unicorn, sparkled and glowed out of its rainbow-flavored ass and then vanished into the night. Yeah, I tell you: I'm not feeling the love, folks. It's there, I know. Nothing is as big and blatant and amazingly all-consuming as TFW's love for one another. And that's the thing that drives me crazy trying to come to some satisfying analysis of this. All of the other TFW members love Dean best; they've all said as much except for Sam, for whom it goes without saying, I think. The love goes without saying. It's beautiful and ever-present; it can be breathtakingly sad and refreshingly joyful and sometimes hilarious. It doesn't need to be spelled out; it's the kind of subtext that is so omnipresent and vital that it is like the very air they breathe. Maybe you don't always see it, but it's there. They live on it.
Okay, so we don't have to talk about it. But why does that silence only apply to Dean? The love Dean feels for Sam goes with saying ad nauseam (no offense, Dean), the love each boy feels for Bobby goes with saying, the love Bobby feels for Sam goes with saying, the love Dean has for Cas goes with saying, and on and on and on, and isn't that the very reason that the angst on this show is off the charts? People talk about how they feel, omg, and how they feel about how this or that team member feels. Take a cursory glance at the pdfs for Sam, Bobby and Cas. It's not just Dean who's talking, you see, contrary to some popular belief. This great big team togetherness love is like the fifth character of TFW that is present in so many discussions that it keeps farting rainbows all over my analysis. They talk to one another about one another all the damn time. This only goes without saying when the object of that love is Dean.
But wait a minute! Cas damn sure gazes at Dean, and so does Sam. Bobby's eyes almost settle more on Dean than on Sam in their cozy family scenes. (Have you ever noticed that? It's true!) They all love him best. They all interact with him the most. They all have the most profound bond that they have with him, and they tell him about it, each and every one of them. So that can't be right. Dean damn sure isn't the only one gazing.
This is all true. But I'm talking about something else. I'm not talking about the individual relationships that Dean has with Sam, with Castiel and with Bobby. I'm talking about the TFW's relationship of togetherness for mutual loved ones. I'm talking about sharing when the person about whom they're talking out of sight but not out of mind. I'm talking about TFW bonding over a common concern for a mutual loved one. That doesn't happen when they're talking about this or that plot point, but when they take a moment to set the plot down and be people with one another for the sake of a mutual loved one. Part of the reason that Bobby and Dean seem so much closer than Bobby and Sam do is that the writers allow Bobby and Dean to take time (quite often) to be people with each other (about Sam primarily, but also Cas and John and certainly each other), whereas Bobby and Sam focus mostly on plot points and/or Sam's latest "wrongness" and what fucked-up thing he's about to do to Bobby because of it. Characters don't become closer when they do plot things together: hunting, fighting, planning, researching, etc. That is work, circumstances, necessity. That's not the basis for a bond, for that sense of another person in one's life as "home." Characters become closer when they are human beings with one another, sharing human feelings, and what makes those relationships the beating heart of TFW is that they gather together and don't leave one another hanging when one person is in crisis and another person is desperate to help them. So, if everyone's primary relationship is with Dean, then if you take Dean out, what are you left with? A collection of related parts that have no center, no core.
Think about TFW for a minute in terms of, say, Star Trek: The Original Series. Whether you see Dean as Spock (the walled-up one), McCoy (the emotional one) or Kirk (the "core" of the triangle), try to imagine that show without any of the dialogue about the guy you see as Dean between the other two guys. If he's Spock, that means that more than half of the dialogue between McCoy and Kirk in "Amok Time" will be cut out, for starters. If he's Kirk, we won't have moments like "He knows, Doctor," and we don't have episodes like that one where Kirk was a space oddity and Spock and McCoy fight with each other about him and their feeling/concern for him and had to bring him back to the right phase or something, I dunno--I forget the title. If he's McCoy… well, okay, you get the drift. Also, you can just forget a good 50% of episodes like "The Empath." This is my point: the team is not just a collection of related parts; it is a whole that turns its unified gaze onto its members. This is why it's a team and not a collection of related parts. Think about an orchestra, in which each instrument has its own relationship to the music but not merely a string of solos but as a harmony with the whole. Think of football, where each offensive player has his own relationship with the quarterback and not in isolation from the others, but working together to help their teammates get the down. Think of… well, there are so many "teams" analogies…
That is why TFW is Team Free Will, a single unit, not a series of adjacent entities that crossover once in a while… like Free Will: Cas! and Free Will: Sam! and its 4x16 lovechild, Free Will: Sassy! Or, hey, Free Will: Bobtiel! of 6x18. I'm just saying. It's not categorized like that. There are individual relationships that give the whole its foundation, but there is also the Team: how this relationship over there (say, Sassy) complements and enriches this one over here (say, Destiel), and vice versa. (I'm not talking slash right now. You know what I mean.) That is the most beautiful, you see, and my very favorite aspect of TFW: how the individual relationships--through good times and bad, hurtful feelings and comforting ones--feed into each other to bring out incredible texture and give enormous meaning to the singular unit of togetherness that Dean once named "Team Free Will."
So what does this even matter? I dunno; I was just curious. But here's the thing: if you're feeling like the show is oversaturated in Dean feelings and wish Dean would shut the hell up about his feelings for god's sake --OR-- if you're feeling as if Dean is the sympathetic human center of the show and is the actual main character in that he is perpetually the subject to Sam's perpetual object --OR-- if you're feeling as if Sam is the show's actual main character around whom all things revolve (all things including Dean the character, TFW as a unit and most of their conversations) --OR-- if you're feeling as if Sam's POV is neglected because the show spends so much damn time on how Dean feels for god's sake and can't we just stop talking about that before the angst kills us all? --OR-- if you're feeling as if nobody cares about Dean and how can they still expect us to care about Sam's ~wrongness this time? --OR-- if you're feeling as if Dean gets all the meaty relationship stuff while Sam gets scraps from his table… Well, if you've ever felt any of those things or anything similar, this might help to explain why. There is no balance. This is what I mean when I say that Dean is the designated gazer of TFW; he is hardly ever gazed at.
Ultimately, as it concerns Sam and Dean, which is the biggest gap of all (51/7)…? What this tells me is that one of the brothers barely has a point of view, and the other barely has a plot. There's no settling down in Sam's head if the plot revolves around the latest manifestation of whatever is or is not wrong or human about him, and there's no point in talking about Dean if the plot is off on the other side of the Impala revolving around Sam. But that's not default, you see? Ample opportunity for balance exists, but it's shuffled out of sight and taken nowhere. Why? I honestly don't know. It's inexplicable to me because it shortchanges both brothers. Why??? =Writers' sandbox.
So, when I wish in my heart for Dean to be the one in trouble, Dean to be the one cared for, Dean to be the main character plot of a season, Dean not to be told to soldier up and get his head in the game, but Dean to be gazed at for any damn substantial length of time and depth of focus in a concentrated group effort by the other members of TFW that lasts longer than an episode or, god forbid, a single scene or single line? When I want Dean to be in crisis and for that crisis to be the main plot which a season revolves and for TFW to talk about that main Dean plot and how they feel about that main Dean plot the way we have for Sam, for Cas and now for Bobby? This is why. It is something we actually never get in canon.
Let me show you something. This is the last thing. Here is a closing example of all that is beautiful and all that is flames-on-the-side-of-my-face-inducing about how TFW cares for one another. This is what I'm talking about.
In "Point of No Return," Dean was at rock bottom, yes? The team knew it. It was ~on topic. He was put in the panic room. He couldn’t be reasoned with. He was aggressive and angsty. The team was planning something else so that he didn't have to do what he felt he had to do to save the world. Their joint concern for him was the ~theme.
In "When The Levee Breaks," Sam was at rock bottom, yes? The team knew it. It was ~on topic. He was put in the panic room. He couldn’t be reasoned with. He was aggressive and angsty. The team was planning something else so that he didn't have to do what he felt he had to do to save the world. Their joint concern for him was the ~theme.
In "Point of No Return," here is how Sam and Bobby talked about Dean.
BOBBY: How's he doing?
[SAM shrugs and scoffs.]
BOBBY: How're you doing?
[SAM nods slightly.]
:::
BOBBY: Where's Cas?
SAM: Blown to Oz. Look, I’ll get Dean. He couldn’t have gone too far. Just watch Adam.
In "When The Levee Breaks," here is how Dean and Bobby talked about Sam.
DEAN: How long is this gonna go on?
BOBBY: Here, let me look it up in my demon-detox manual. Oh wait. No one ever wrote one. No telling how long it'll take. Hell, or if Sam will even live through it.
:::
BOBBY: I'm just wondering.
DEAN: What?
BOBBY: The apocalypse being nigh and all...is now really the best time to be having this little domestic drama of ours?
DEAN: What do you mean?
BOBBY: Well, I don't like this any more than you do, but Sam can kill demons. He's got a shot at stopping Armageddon.
DEAN: So what? Sacrifice Sam's life, his soul, for the greater good? Is that what you're saying? Times are bad, so let's use Sam as a nuclear warhead?
BOBBY: Look, I know you hate me for suggesting it. I hate me for suggesting it. I love that boy like a son. All I'm saying is maybe he's here right now instead of on the battlefield because we love him too much.
:::
DEAN: Because what other option do I have? It's either trust the angels or let Sammy trust a demon?
BOBBY: I see your point.
DEAN: You hear that?
BOBBY: Yeah, that's a little too much nothing.
DEAN: What if he's faking?
BOBBY: You really think he would?
DEAN: I think he'd do anything.
BOBBY: That ain't faking. We're gonna have to tie him down for his own safety. Dean? You with me? Dean! Before he has another fit.
DEAN: Yeah, yeah. Let's just get it over with.
:::
BOBBY: I'm gonna ask one more time. Are we absolutely sure we're doing the right thing?
DEAN: Bobby, you saw what was happening to him down there. The demon blood is killing him.
BOBBY: No, it isn't. We are.
DEAN: What?
BOBBY: I'm sorry. I can't bite my tongue any longer. We're killing him. Keeping him locked up down there. This cold-turkey thing isn't working. If-if he doesn't get what he needs, soon, Sam's not gonna last much longer.
DEAN: No. I'm not giving him demon blood. I won't do it.
BOBBY: And if he dies?
DEAN: Then at least he dies human!
…
DEAN: I would die for him in a second, but I won't let him do this to himself. I can't. I guess I found my line. I won't let my brother turn into a monster.
:::
DEAN: How the hell did he get out?
BOBBY: Maybe he had help. Room full of busted devil's traps.
DEAN: Demons? Ruby.
BOBBY: That'd be my guess.
DEAN: How did she even touch the door?
BOBBY: You think she's got the mojo?
DEAN: I didn't think so. I don't know, man.
BOBBY: What difference does it make? How he got gone ain't as important as where he got gone to.
DEAN: Well, I'll tell you one thing. At this point I hope he's with Ruby.
BOBBY: Why?
DEAN: 'Cause killing her's the next item on my to-do list.
BOBBY: I thought you were on call for angel duty.
DEAN: I am on call. In my car, on my way to murder the bitch.
BOBBY: One thing.
DEAN: What?
BOBBY: Sam don't wanna be found, which means he's gonna be damn near impossible to find.
DEAN: Yeah, we'll see.
:::
BOBBY: Police found my car. Abandoned in an alley in Jamestown, North Dakota.
DEAN: He's switching up. Any other cars stolen in Jamestown?
BOBBY: Two. 1999 Honda Civic, blue. Nice and anonymous, like Sam likes.
DEAN: What was the other one?
BOBBY: White oh-five Escalade with custom rims. It's a neon sign.
DEAN: You're right. He'd never take that. Which is exactly what he did.
BOBBY: You think?
DEAN: I know that kid. All right, I'll head in that direction. You stay here, ride the police databases. We gotta find him quick.
:::
BOBBY: Cops found the Escalade in a ditch outside Elk River.
DEAN: How far away am I?
BOBBY: A couple of hours. I pulled up a weather map, made some calls. There's a town not far from there, Cold Spring. Lighting up with demon sign.
DEAN: A good place to look.
BOBBY: Hey, listen.
DEAN: What?
BOBBY: Us finding Sam? It's gotta be about getting him back, not pushing him away.
DEAN: Right.
BOBBY: I know you're mad, Dean. I understand. You got a right to be, but I'm just saying. Be good to him anyway. You gotta get through to him.
So, you see. Even when in crisis. Even when at rock bottom. Even when needing help. Even when being the topic of conversation and the object of worry. Even when the plot of the moment and the myth of the moment happen to revolve around TFW in just the right way. Even when all of those stars align. Even then… there is no balance.
This is why 7x09 is a unicorn. TFW was talking about Dean. They were concerned with how he was doing emotionally. They were sharing with each other how they felt about how he was doing emotionally. They were talking about those goddamn boring and plot-irrelevant human emotions as if they were not goddamn boring or plot-irrelevant at all but actually important enough for them to drop everything else and invest enough time to settle down in and touch base with each other about what's wrong with Dean. This is why 4x16 is beautiful. TFW was talking about Dean. They were concerned with whether or not he was okay. They were confronting each other about what had happened to Dean. Everything else stopped for a moment because they couldn't stand that Dean was in that condition and that neither one of them could help him. Do you know how often that happens about Sam? Like pumpkins on Halloween. Do you know how often that happens about Dean? Unicorn.
So, there you have it. My core meltdown about this one fucked up detail about something otherwise so beautiful and satisfying that I love the hell out of it. If this is coming across like I'm a bitter Dean girl, well, I am. If I am, it's because writing choices on this show have given me more than ample reason to be.
This was cross-posted on tumblr. Transcripts are courtesy of the Supernatural Wiki.