Ouch... Why did I have to think of this?
Thinking on the association of “The Night We Met” by Lord Huron, Destiel/Deancas, and the final episodes.
The song, while I love it, had been an interesting choice, in my opinion, for the Destiel association. It’s about the singer wanting to go back and stop themselves from ever meeting a person - because the pain of losing that person is worse than the ide of not knowing them at all.
HOWEVER, with that said and with the finale in mind, a little thought trickled into my mind.
Warning: Thie is not a happy thought/theory/explanation. Sorry!
Trigger warnings are in the tags.
Dean in 15.20 is more of like the Dean we had seen in early seasons. There is barely a mention of Cas at all, and the ones we get don’t come from Dean.
The theory that I’ve started to form is that he had gone back and mentally "retconned"/blocked out a lot of his relationship with Cas it was so painful.
He’s gone through so many “widowed” moments in the past where he’s barely hung onto himself by a tread. We see that somewhat at the beginning of 15.19.
Some point after the prank call with Lucifer, though, there seemed to have been a switch in his head, because the later half of 15.19 and all of 15.20, Widow Dean doesn’t really make an appearance anymore. His response to Chuck’s taunts echoing Cas’ words and carving “Castiel” into the table may be the closest we see, but neither are his normal “widow” behavior. I doubt Dean had done a full retcon of Cas at that point, but he could have changed enough in his memories to make Cas’ death more palateable by then?
In the finale, he felt a little shadow-version of himelf. He was similar to the early days Dean, but not quiet that. A lot of Dean’s character development we the years has come from having Cas in his life. The idea that this change in character and the weird acceptance of death might make a bit more sense of he – consciously or unconsciously – started to represss his memories of and feelings for Castiel.
My guess it would have started after the phone call incident. Lucifer is known for bringing in the dead spouse. The could have been the final straw for Widow Dean to lose hope that Cas was still coming back somehow. So in an effort to protect himself from that pain again (or even worse pain this final time, he could have started to rewrite his past with Cas. – forgetting or misremembering moments with him and making Cas less important to Dean as a whole. He might not have even be aware of this change.
It takes place over some time and he still does know Cas, just not the way he did before. Not as a best friend or anything more. So, when we see him in 15.20, he seems like he’s not the Dean we’ve come to know over the years. He’s changed his memory of the night he and Cas met, along with the rest of their history to protect himself from the pain of Cas’ loss.
The theory is not fleshed out fully and so could be way off base, but it’s an interesting line of thought. I’ll be mulling it over for awhile, I think. Thoughts and opinions are always appreciated!
