(1) so... imma be honest here... i have been in this fandom for quite a while and have tried to avoid cockles stuff due to rpf and thinking it was all tinhat theories (im SORRY). But for some reason,, , i have seen more and more cockles on my dash and it got me going down the rabbit hole of theories and such. Now, there is still a part of me that is still pretty skeptical but im open minded. Before i make up my mind about something I would like to collect data and make conclusions for myself.
(2) SO with that being said, here are my questions: what was the thing that solidified cockles, in your mind, as real? What makes their relationship different from every other person on this show (like jared for example)? What pieces of evidence, in your mind, is indisputable (i.e something that i or anyone else cant convince you that cockles is Not real)?
(3) Do you have any doubts? Can you give me a timeline of cockles? All these years and no one has said anything? now, i know thats not unusual (im in a fandom where 2 guys have been in a relationship for 11 years and people (besides the core-fans) didnt know until last year), but has there been any slip-ups and/or instances where people went: 🤔👀?
(4 of 4... sorry for the spam lol) And if you can/want to add any more evidence, please do! And of course collaboration is not a requirement, but it would be greatly appreciated! I just love delving deep into these kinds of things 😁💕
a challenge. i accept.
i’ll address each question in turn, and this got l o n g and gif-heavy, so it’s going under a readmore.
1) what convinced you cockles is real?
the year was 2013, i was new to the spn fandom (and, quite frankly, to unlearning my homophobia, but working on it). i knew that jibcon was a thing and i knew some of the cockles stories from the last few years, but people joke and tinhat about celebrities who joke flirt all the time, right? then i saw this with my own eyes.
now, the grinding is a big part of this, because you just don’t casually do that in the course of trying to reclaim a piece of paper your friend is playing keep-away with. but jensen’s face. mr grumpy tough guy who play-acts all grouchy when jared so much as hugs him onstage. i can think of no other word for that facial expression except delighted. mr grumpy is surprised and thrilled about misha grinding up again his crotch in front of a crowd.
keep in mind that while jensen is a fantastic actor, when he’s not acting, he’s terrible at keeping his genuine emotions off his face. terrible. this is clearly spur of the moment and not an intentional bit.
a few more details: it’s subtle and debatable, but it really rather looks like jensen is very nearly rocking his hips into misha. regardless, he is definitely NOT backing away or trying to get out of the situation at all. next, you can see that misha straight up puts a hand on jensen’s ass, after grabbing onto his waist with a certain propriety and familiarity that reeks of intimacy. and lastly, you can see in the back that misha is making a 😬 face. he knows that he just fucked up.
so i stared at this for, i don’t know, an hour or so, and i could come to literally no other conclusion than that they have some kind of physical relationship. there’s too much familiarity on misha’s part and too much delight on jensen’s part for anything else.
2) what makes their relationship different than anyone else on the show?
you mention jared, and jared is the perfect example. it’s easy to say that misha is joke flirty with lots of people, not just jensen, but this post perfectly compares the difference between misha’s body language with jared and with jensen. it actually contrasts the above grinding incident with a similar incident where jared stole his microphone.
with jared, misha just stands up and walks around trying to get it back. but look at that body language with jensen.
that little way misha leans away is flirtatious, it just is. it’s giggling and inefficient in a way that shouts “keep chasing me.” then he giggles and grabs at jensen’s hands when jensen snatches the paper, gets a determined attitude to his posture, and goes in to try and get it back, which leads to the grinding. it’s so diffierent.
here’s another post that analyzes the difference between mishalecki and cockles, and this is the bottom line: every time jared and misha touch in a flirty way, it’s a bit. it’s a joke between buddies. “haha i’m pretending to put my hand on your leg in a sexy way.”
when jensen and misha touch, the touching isn’t for the bit, the bit is for the touching. they do bits to have an excuse to touch.
the hitch kiss is a perfect example, because that wasn’t even part of the scene they’re reenacting. jensen’s character is supposed to reluctantly lean in, barely make contact, and misha’s character jolts back. instead misha just goes for it, and jensen happily goes for it with him. (this is after jensen initially didn’t want to do the scene, before misha joined him on stage, and then after misha joined him, he went and picked the script up again and was like “ummm they want us to make out now haha.”)
they’re literally not even supposed to do this, it’s totally improvised, because they created a bit so they had an excuse to pretend kiss. okay, now hold that disguised-touching thought.
jensen’s body language between jared and misha at conventions is like night and day - not that it’s bad with jared, not at all, but they’re bros. they stand/sit shoulder to shoulder facing the crowd, they have a routine well worked out to provide entertainment, they play off each other like people who’ve been best friends for as long as they’ve been best friends. they’re like a steady team who has each other’s backs.
when jensen is on stage with misha? all he cares about is staring at misha, except for when he’s bragging on misha or encouraging misha to do things like strip or do one of his terrible accents because he has a kink. look at how he stares, he downright gazes. and he just does that... all the time, year after year.
he is enamored.
there’s also what we call the unicorn laugh, which is the most... exaggerated, ludicrous full-body SCREAMLAUGH that jensen only does for misha. and most of the time it’s because misha said something... not that particularly funny. maybe not even a joke at all. i get secondhand embarrassment just looking at it.
for comparison, jensen’s reaction to jared’s dumb joke vs misha’s dumb joke.
okay, now we’re going to go through some of the other truly transparent and embarrassing shit jensen does, because he is transparent and embarrassing.
whenever jensen does a cockles or j2m photo op, he performs the Mish Reach, an astonishing maneuver where his arm will stretch as long as is required to touch misha. he will touch misha, you cannot stop him. do not try.
speaking of, he has a Thing for calling misha “mish” and “dmitri” (misha’s legal name) as if he gets off on the intimacy of a nickname (or real name, as the case may be).
the green eyed monster. for someone so beautiful and you know, everything, jensen seems to get jealous for no good reason with incredibly little prompting. look at this body language. and here, misha and jared were simply chatting, and this baby actually pouts at them.
flirty faces totally count as pranking, right? jensen’s favorite way to make misha break on set was the hit him with this face + “hey big boy”, which is definitely what a prank is and not flirting.
being compelled to support/defend/include misha. this is one of my favorite tiny moments, it’s just adorable. misha is introduced on stage at comic con, jared does a playful “booo! *thumbs down*” and jensen visibly goes “hey, don’t do that! in this house we love and support misha!” to the extent that jared visibly goes “dude what’s your problem?”
once, a fan asked the j2 panel a question that included misha, and this boy said “thank you for your question. i like it when people include misha.” here, he handles a castiel standee so... tenderly. here, he talks misha up to convince him to improvise lyrics to a song. misha had to leave this comic con panel early, and despite him having just left and knowing that he’s driving, jensen tried to facetime misha and then looked so sad when he didn’t pick up. here he tells misha he looks “dapper as always” (he is in jeans, t-shirt, and blazer, c’mon bro). same panel, misha forgets his place in his story and jensen whispers the next part to help. also same panel, jared roasts misha, jensen just has to Be Supportive.
how he can’t help but talk about misha all the time. even when misha isn’t there or the topic has nothing to do with misha, jensen loves to talk about him. jensen often jokes about his terrible memory (like how he doesn’t remember which season dean went to hell), but he tells the story of how he met misha over and over, and the story of the first time they went to dinner together. and he gushes. here he gushes about how excited misha was about scoobynatural. another time, he lost it because he met someone with a dachsund named misha, and he HAD to wait and tell misha in person because he HAD to see his face, and despite misha just making a “ah, great” expression, jensen said it was so worth the wait. here he gushes about misha in some dvd extras. look at this smile and gulp.
okay, this post is already out of control and we’re not remotely done, but the only way out is through, so onward.
since we’re ostensibly on the topic of body language, we’re going to circle back and cover unnecessary touching, disguised touching, and blush-inducing intimate touching. consider this, the most tender but filthy hand fondling i’ve ever seen, disguised as both resting their hands on a fan’s shoulder. there is zero platonic explanation for this. this is hand lovemaking.
(similarly, this is eye lovemaking from across a stage.) here, early on, jensen tried to be slick and disguise his desire to kiss misha’s cheek by first kissing jim beaver’s cheek. we are not fooled. this is a long post about unnecessary touching, and includes a moment i love but you can’t clearly see what happens. felicia day is dancing at jibcon, and jensen steps up to misha, switches his microphone to his far hand, and wraps his arm around misha’s waist the way you do with your partner.
straight, platonic men do not touch each other like this, and it can’t be a bit, because it’s extremely difficult to even see from the audience. jensen touches misha with a casual, possessive intimacy without it being part of a joke, like the time he was determined to keep his hand on misha’s thigh and this comforting hug + cheek kiss (when misha was crying at a photoshoot celebrating spn’s last season).
he simply doesn’t touch jared like that, not ever. i could keep going, but we can end the answer to ‘how are they different together’ there.
3) what pieces of evidence do you consider indisputable?
the number one thing to me is the body language. i have an intuitive talent for reading body language and facial expressions, and the only word i can use to describe jensen and misha’s body language is intimate. these two people are physically and emotionally intimate. you don’t touch someone with this degree of familiarity and possession unless you’ve had sex. i don’t make the rules, that’s just how it is.
and we’ve seen now some of jensen’s intimate body language, but we have to talk about the way misha touches jensen’s back. i am asexual, and i would be straight-up uncomfortable if someone touched me like this, because it pings my radar as inherently sexual. this one and this one drive me utterly feral.
this is a compilation of how they stand so close to whisper. they also love to lean their heads on each other’s shoulders. this one in particular is incredible not just for jensen dropping his head, but the soft expression on misha’s face and how he tips his head to the side.
next: the boners. it’s weird to talk about a real person’s dick, but the fact remains that jensen has gotten hard-ons onstage because of misha at least 3 times: once when misha reenacted the fake orgasm scene from when harry met sally (which misha so did to turn him on intentionally), another time after that eye lovemaking already mentioned, but most notably after what we refer to as straddlegate, when jensen oh-so-helpfully volunteered to lie down for misha to straddle him (to reenact a scene) and then afterwards adjusted himself, pulled his shirt down, stuck his hand in his pocket, and awkwardly sat down. the man has a problem.
next: the shared/matching jewelry. years ago, misha wore a ring jensen gave him, and bracelets that weren’t identical but very similar, and misha’s had a pendant with an angel figure on one side and “always with you” on the other. photo op pictures caught them wearing the same bracelet that said “believe in you”. then in 2019 misha was seen wearing a ring on his right hand ring finger that jensen was seen wearing the previous year.
next: the anal sex fart joke. i do not actually relish discussing jensen ackles’ asshole, but the man said this and then literally approved it for release. the joke is that misha fucked his butt loose. i’ve had several people tell me that this is a common joke among gay/bi men, and even that yes, the sound jensen made is exactly what it really sounds like. so that happened.
next: the photos they post on twitter, which they obviously choose to share with us on purpose. there was the sunset photo, the family boat trip photo, the chest-to-chest selfie, but the king of them all is the anniversary photo. remember that story of their first dinner together? well, they took a picture that night, and ten years later they tracked down the same bar and the same table ten years later, recreated the photo and posted them for us to see.
now what i also find indisputable is a whole bunch of Suspicious Shit their friends (mostly jared) have said, but we’re gonna save that for another question.
4) do you have any doubts?
i used to, sometimes, but i don’t anymore. cause really, why is it so hard to believe that two people are queer and polyamorous? especially when one (misha) is openly poly and made very strong hints about being queer. i’m not accusing them of anything immoral or rare, i just think they’re queer and poly and in love. that happens.
5) can you give me a timeline of cockles?
i’m really not good at remember when things happen or in what order, so honestly i’m just not going to force myself to do this one, i’m sorry. but i can give you the “know your cockles history” section of my masterlist, and @destielintheimpala’s cocklesyears tag.
6) all these years and no one has said anything? have there been any slip-ups?
oh hon, please excuse me while i laugh.
listen, everyone knows. everyone makes jokes about it. do you remember in 10x05 when the two girls playing dean and cas were said to be “a couple in real life”? i have an entire That’s Suspicious section of my masterlist, mostly because jared thinks it’s hilarious and he can’t keep his damn mouth shut. this post is so gif-heavy already that i don’t dare go through each incident, so i’ll have to be very choosy.
one time jared was teasing jen by pretending to be jensen looking at a centerfold of misha, saying, “misha’s been working out!” and at first jensen pretended to look disgusted, but couldn’t help himself in saying, “he has though, hasn’t he?” and the look on jared’s face.
another time, a fan asks their favorite season, and jared says season 4, the year he met genevieve (the actress who played ruby), jensen says he also liked the season he met jared’s wife, and jared cheekily says “isn’t that the season you met misha?” another time, j2 were told that misha had started a fire in his meet and greet, jensen says “he is pretty hot” and jared just walks away.
check out these faces when fans asked about pictures of misha and videos of misha. tell me that isn’t sheer panic.
another time, jared put jensen’s arm around misha. memorably, there was the comic con where misha did a funny voice, jensen said “he sounds like that in the morning,” and jared swooped in to say, “how do YOU know?” and proceeded to take his mic out of its stand to drop it. everyone laughs, mark sheppard makes THAT face, jensen blushes, and they both giggle and look a little embarrassed, but like... if it wasn’t true, wouldn’t you be so uncomfortable that your friend just implied to a whole comic con hall that you’re fucking?
so when you ask “all this time and no one has said anything?” - people say things all the time. we all know. they don’t try to hide it. it’s just that heteronormativity is such a drug and straight goggles are so thick that most people can dismiss anything short of literally having sex as “just good friends.” sooo many people claim that it’s just jokes. they can do almost anything and fly under the heteronormative radar.
and since you mentioned slip ups, i have to mention two more things before i lay my weary head to rest. first, what i call the almost kiss, because i really think jensen forgot he was onstage and he tried to go in for a kiss.
and now, for my pièce de résistance... brace yourself.
a clever fan noticed that while multiple people were on stage, misha subtly lifted up his shirt tails to display his crotch and unzipped jeans.
and jensen not only sees it, he damn near swallows his tongue.
if you’re really gonna look at allll this and tell me that these dudes are not husbands... i can’t help you.
there’s more i could discuss, but i’m afraid of hitting link limit, so please go through my masterlist for more.
