for anyone curious, the following meta and the elaboration below are in relation to this post.Ā i posted this to another blog of mine, but i felt i should share it on my personal as well.
okay, i actually genuinely donāt wanna shut up about the significance of miracle because itās possibly one of the mostĀ redeemable qualities of the spn finale. itās actually really important, even if you donāt like the circumstances surrounding it.
at first i just sort of went off about it in some tags:
#this is the only good thing about that entire finale #it is the one thing i actually loved from a meta perspective in terms of dean's archetype #so i gotta have the puppy snuggles on the blog i'm so sorry #other than that this is largely a finale free blog lmao #i actually have a Lot of feelings about dean being given a dog #and naming the dog miracle #am i gonna end up writing meta about a dog? possibly #in broad strokes: dean has always been the archetype of a soldier #but never once has he been allowed to be a veteran #the dog very much is representative of that #it's very commonplace for veterans to have emotional support animals #dogs in particular #the way miracle launches into dean's arms after dean's just woken up is indicative to me that it's commonplace #likely after nightmares #which means that (for me) dean's PTSD is being subtly addressed #which means when i retcon the disaster of a finale for my portrayal miracle is absolutely staying #spn 15.20
but thereās so much more to it than that.Ā
the thing about the dog, if weāre staying within the context of the canon, is that this is a dean who has lost everything (keep that wording in mind, because weāll be coming back to it). the war is won, and he's come home, but the cost was high. we also know that dean has canonically suffered from PTSD since the end of s3, though itās not always been explicitly addressed in the following seasons. regardless, it's an aspect of his character that is widely established and recognized.
much like in s4, and after the purgatory storyline in s8, deanās PTSD is shown to manifest itself largely through substance abuse, anger management struggles resulting in bouts of extreme violence, and nightmares. itās a thread throughout the narrative whether itās consistently addressed or not. more importantly in terms of the dog: dean is never allowed to heal, because the war wages on.
by the series finale, the war is won, but the cost is castielās life. what does the dog have to do with castiel, you ask? more than you might first think. i donāt want to get too deep in the paint, so iām going to focus primarily on 13.01, deanās grief arc in early s13 in general, and some key aspects of s15.
returning to the concept of being left with a dean who has lost everything, i want to point out a choice of dialogue in 13.01. the following is said during a scene of mourning, after theyāve lost castiel, and dean is left to wrap his body for burial.
dean [voice breaking]: weāve lost everything. and now youāre gonna bring him back. okay? youāre gonna bring back cas.
this scene is the beginning of a several episode long grief arc where dean is depicted classically as a mourning widower in terms of cinematography (viewed on bended knee from above, distant and distraught after the death scene itself at the end of s12), and is then shown to slip into apathetic suicidal tendencies. his substance abuse reaches such a low that he quite literally drinks himself to death, but death will not take him, despite his wishes. he rages at sam for being able to move on so easily, in 13.03, patience:
dean: and what about cas?
sam: what about cas?
dean: he manipulated him, he made him promises, said, āparadise on earthā and cas bought it. and you know what that got him? it got him dead! now you might be able to forget about that, but i canāt!
the grief arc firmly establishes castiel as being representative of dean winchesterās hope, and the will to live. this is reinforced throughout s13 ā s15, as it is further mirrored in later episodes, such as in act 3 of 15.09, the trap, in which sam is shown alternate futures. in every future where dean has lost castiel, he is shown to have lost his hope, and his will to continue on.
dean: no, sam. it doesn't matter.
sam: what are you saying?
dean: what i've been trying to say for months. it's time... time to stand down.
sam: you want to quit? what's happened to you, dean? ever sinceā
dean: ever since what? we lost pretty much everyone weāve ever cared about? ever since the mark made cas go crazy? ever since i had to bury him in a maālak box? ever since then?
these follow an old tradition within the writing of spn that can be pointed at as early as 5.04, the end (ācas, too?ā): castiel is always singled out apart from the rest. castiel, an angel, who saw worth in dean when dean couldnāt see it in himself. an angel who became his best friend, and loved him when dean couldnāt love himself. castiel, who saved him the moment they met, and saved him in death, as seen in 15.18, despair. given everything preceding this, itās evident that this is not a small loss for dean. when they lose cas, dean loses the will to go on.
in losing cas that final time, casā confession ā his assertion that dean is full of love, not anger ā finally seems to break through. when fighting the main antagonist of s15, he is called āthe ultimate killer.ā at one time, dean wouldāve agreed with this. but after casā confession, he denies it, and firmly says, āthat's not who i am.ā because thatās not who cas fell in love with. point being: castielās sacrifice affects dean enormously.
at the end of all things, when dean crosses the threshold from soldier to veteran because the war is won, he has a dog and he names him miracle; which harkens back to a scene when dean indirectly referred to cas as āhis miracle,ā because truly: whoās been performing miracles in deanās life over the past 11 seasons? the name holds a heavy weight and bears a large significance in the face of his loss.
by the end of s15, we now have a dean that is allowed to rest, and in resting, he is allowed to begin to heal. and the thing that is representative of this crossing of the threshold from soldier to veteran is giving the veteran an emotional support dog. that dean names miracle. something that is saving him, day by day, even in small ways. itās just not only important for dean's development and healing after finally making that transition, itās also the lasting influence castiel still has, even in death. itās absolutely heartbreaking, especially when one considers how many of deanās nightmares, stemming from his PTSD, canonically revolve around losing castiel ā as is shown in early s8 through the purgatory storyline; therefore it is not incongruous to assume similar nightmares would crop up after the events of 15.18. and weāre shown this.
the dog jumping into bed for cuddles after dean wakes up is just so telling. but the way dean wraps around the dog, clinging? itās the most telling.
granted, there is every possibility that i am giving the show too much credit (as itās been shown we, as fans, are wont to do). but the concept of death of the author was quite literally pushed into the narrative of s15, and i personally like to think that no matter what else happened in 15.20, certain things remain significant and have bearing on the story, even if unintentionally so. thatās sort of just always been spnās way of doing things.
