It’s Nice to Be Back Behind the Wheel, or How in 11x04 Everyone Who Drives Baby Represents an Aspect of Dean
Sleek, shiny, and sexy as Hell, Dean Winchester’s 1967 Chevrolet Impala is indeed, as Erik Kripke once put it, as pivotal a character on the show as any. Over the course of 10 seasons she has become inextricably linked to her owner’s identity and state of being. Bashed up when John ordered Dean to kill Sam if all else failed, abandoned and overgrown in Endverse as 2014!Dean had become a shell of his former self, trash-filled and mud-covered while demon!Dean gave up on the world; whenever Dean goes through great emotional turmoil, Baby is a painful mirror of his emotions.
As we flash across the iconic features that make Baby the Winchesters’ home -the tiny soldiers symbolising their lives, the Lego blocks that still rattle when the ventilator is on, the initials DW and SW scratched into her in as much a claim of family as anything- the beginning of the episode reveals she has been wrecked, shattered, and is covered in blood. The relative innocence of Sam and Dean’s childhood is intercut with the brutal reality of their adult lives.
Season 11 started with the Darkness having snatched Dean from his trusted place behind the wheel of the Impala. Without either control or memory, apart from a vision, it is the opening shot across the bow that regaining control of his life after having had limited say in it for …well…ever will likely be an important story-arc for Dean. The cold open of episode 11x04 Baby starts with that same empty seat. Not only that, we find Dean chained up in cuffs in the back seat, completely out of control in his beloved Impala.
In fact, the episode started with a deceptively calm pan down the eponymous car’s driver’s seat from the audience’s perspective. It is a wonderful shot, which makes me want to grab the wheel and drive off. And that is the frame of the episode. It’s amazing the number of people who actually drive Dean’s beloved girl over the course of 45 minutes. And each of them represents an aspect of Dean himself, all of them aspects that might prove vital in defeating the Darkness.
First there is not-John Winchester. Appearing in Sam’s dream in Dean’s customary seat, one way to read it is to see him as an allusion to Dean’s role as a father-figure to Sam; the bond that lies at the heart of the shit-storm the Winchesters currently find themselves in. But rather than appearing as the John Sam knew, he appears as young John Winchester, whom we last saw not as John, but as Vessel to Michael. So, the first person to drive Baby besides Dean is one who not only represents Dean’s role in raising Sam, but also reminds us of Dean’s formerly destined role as True Vessel to Michael.
While gut-instinct tells me who we are really looking at here is Lucifer (or maybe, maybe Gabriel) given the uncertainty which of the three beings trapped in The Cage it was that screamed, this only goes to feed my conviction we will see Michael again and perhaps also that Dean will once more be faced with the choice of whether or not to become an angel condom.
To further cement the connection between not-John and Dean, immediately after Sam wakes up, Dean shares his dream of being in the driver’s seat with John next to him, leading a civilian life. While I am not a dream analyst, it sure feels like a wish for control. Control over the way he leads his life, control over the influence his father still has over him. Simply a dream to be in control of his life.
Moreover, Dean finishes his story with a description of how proud John was of him for driving well dream!John says
a reference to flying that should ring alarm bells all over, both because of Dean’s fear of flying, but also because of Michael being an angel. (for a much more elaborate analysis of this scene, check out @dustydreamsanddirtyscars ‘s awesome meta)
Next we have Jessie. While driving up to Aunt Mel’s and seeing that there’s valet parking Sam notes
when seeing Dean’s agitation. And sure enough, Dean puts control of Baby in her hands and off she is to live a little. I love her words to her friend here a lot. “Spider’s caught a fly” is a very predatory description that evokes a sense of cunning that comes with waiting long and patiently, kinda like the Darkness. Not for nothing I did a double take when she first got in the car thinking she might be Amara further grown up.
Set to M.I.A,’s Bad Girls, the lyrics
live fast, die young, bad girls do it well
I can’t help but imagine Dean taking Sam on a joyride in Baby at 16, doing wheelies and being shit-scared thinking about John catching them. In fact, when Dean calls Jessie to get the car back, she responds with a “ Yes, sir.” which is exactly the way Dean would have addressed John, once again alluding to that part of Dean.
It is the symbolism in doing wheelies that really makes the scene a perfect symbol for the Winchesters. It’s fun, but they are for ever going around in circles and while eventually have to come out of it; exactly what was stated by Sam in Out of the Darkness Into the Fire.
Mrs Markham - Your family. You do anything for them, don’t you?
Dean- Absolutely. But not if it costs too much
Mrs Markham - No. You’d do anything for them. Everything else is meaningless. But I did it wrong. now I’ve ruined everything.
The parallel here is so clear and so heart-breaking. Having killed her romantic love for the sake of family, Mrs Markham represents the monster/human struggle we have seen time and again on SPN. Grabbing the wheel and chanting over and over again
I can makes this right. I can make this right.
in trying to fix the consequences of what she considers her irresponsible behaviour, she is perhaps the most obvious representation of Dean in the entire episode. What is even more intriguing is her question
what did you do with the Maker’s body?
While she is referring here to pack alpha Deputy Dumbass, once again we a potential allusion to Dean “I kill Gods” Winchester’s ultimate objective.
And it is Mrs Markham’s help that gets us to the last driver.
The pack alpha reveals himself to be a military leader creating an Army to fight the Darkness, to fight a battle Dean was earlier this episode told by Sam only they could fight. And most likely, it is what will need to happen over the course of the season. But an important aspect of what Dean needs to do is foreshadowed here. The fight with the deputy reveals that Dean will be required to forego the usual hunter approach of machetes, hacking, and bloodshed. The alpha is slain because Dean reaches into a pink Hello Kitty bag, by thinking before acting, by being in the backseat rather than the front of the charge. This again could foreshadow Michael’s involvement, but like with much of the exposition this season, I love it could go many ways.
To conclude, over the course of Baby Dean goes from being chained up in the backseat to finding the solution to killing the Monster of the Week there. By symbolically breaking the chains of his father’s teachings, in all the different ways it is presented to us this episode, he ends up saving his own life and the lives of the humans in this episode. Expand that to a seasonal narrative, and truly, those who help themselves by letting go of the ties that restrain them, might receive help from God, whose voice, after all, introduced the episode.
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