today I am thinking about the way Amara imposes her love onto Dean, saying that it’s inevitable, assuming that his being drawn to her is him taking a romantic interest because why wouldn’t he want her? How could he not? Isn’t it obvious? The way that Amara is associated with giving up, giving in, allowing the world to end and relinquishing hope for a future, and especially being tempted towards “evil.”
I’m thinking about that, and then the way that Dean apologizes to Cas at the end of the season — while they’re on their way to buy drinks, when Dean has totally accepted defeat and is content to merely wait for the world to end — for making him feel so unvalued that he went to Lucifer. and then immediately following it up with, “you’re our brother.” How this, for Dean, is not only a moment of surrender/accepting defeat (to Amara) — but also accepting that Cas will never have romantic feelings for him. This is Dean (who not only relates to Amara, but has also been told by GOD that he is like her, and has ALSO been told repeatedly for years that his desire to have others close to him is selfish) releasing Cas from any obligation to return his affection.
Dean is apologizing for not being focused enough on him to keep him from being seduced by Lucifer, and yet at the same time accepting that he is not deserving of the kind of relationship he wants — saying “this is the closest I’m ever gonna get, and that’s fine.” Dean sees himself as responsible for Cas’s fall from grace by being a temptation, imposing himself on him, assuming that Cas must feel or will eventually feel the same way.
Edit bc I can’t stop thinking about this:
Because despite it being his way of letting Cas go — he’s still doing exactly what Amara does to people when she consumes their souls (she describes it as preserving them, keeping them from being harmed). Dean is keeping Cas stuck in the same emotional in between phase that they’ve been in for years — like purgatory. Treating Cas like both a lover and a family member, and preventing either of them from moving forward in any direction — not closer to each other, but not further away either. And that is exactly what Amara’s version of the apocalypse is — she’s saving God’s creatures from suffering by keeping their souls perfectly preserved inside her. Protecting people from harm by making sure that nothing will ever be done to them ever again.
tangentwithtanner
stormborns
