#azazel stuff

[shallowseeker]

I should not be Lebanon-posting on main again, but something something about both Jack AND Dean trying to be the reverse-Azazel.

Bringing the dead parent back to life, for the sake of the lonely, suffering parent left behind.

(13x03)

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(13x05)

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Dean gets it now. Or at least, for two whole weeks, he learned to empathize with the SHAPE of that wound.

(12x03 &14x11)

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The moment, before Dean touched the pearl, Sam invokes Mary, and Dean's words about it are so interesting. "Why get their hopes up?"

Y'see, he has spent a great deal of time reacting to Mary's heartbreak re: his suicidal plan. (When she chews him out over his plan, he smiles a little, happy to be cared about, but so torn about being the cause of her unhappiness.)

and her happiness was perhaps already on his mind. (-> "Maybe if dad were here, she wouldn't be so disappointed in life, out shooting pumpkins. Maybe her having dad back is even more important than my safety.")

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(14x13)

Even when Dean's own life is in danger, he is still prioritizing the comfort of others. (Fr, Jack is a bit of this mode in Byzantium, too. -> "Don't be sad.")

Lebanon is the ONE episode where Dean chooses his own selfish happiness over the happiness of others.

And in the next episode after that, Ouroboros, Dean LOSES that for similar reasons, his son (Jack) sacrifice himself so his parents can be all right (-> poisoned Cas, bludgeoned Dean, and possessed Rowena).

EDIT: I suppose Amara is a reverse Azazel too, of sorts, bringing back the parent when Azazel refused. And Chuck becomes more in line with Azazel when he coos at Dean that he’ll bring Mary back if he kills Jack. A rotten deal.

[shallowseeker]

could you expand on your thoughts about samuel and azazel from your tags? i think i get mostly what you’re saying, but i also feel like i’m missing a little smth, so i’d really like to hear more :))

Oh, shoot. I actually can answer this one now, kinda.

I think THIS ask gets a lot of what I was saying -> -> ->

This is a symbol of the mirrored, sometimes less obviously "weighty" topic of Azazel's exploitation of John's reproductive capacity btw

You know, I could be wrong but....I think the fandom doesn't have the time to talk about how John's violating experience of being possessed

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Besides, that I guess I didn't have a major point. I think the "real readings," are very fun sometimes, i.e. "This bad thing on screen is ACK-SHU-ALLY throwing a sheet over 'REAL LIFE' SHADOW CRIMES of <insert preferred terrible thing here>"

But if I wanted that I'd just read... true crime.

The appeal of a fantasy genre like Supernatural for me, is that until some of the later seasons, it never quite descends into the gobbly gook of "it was all a dream," or "Sam was schizophrenic all along" or "John was the real killer all along" or "Dean is murdering innocents in his delusional state (which eps like Damaged Goods ABSOLUTELY toes the lie dangerously close to) or whatever psy-pop is popularly this week, which can wind up undercutting the story.

(i.e. TLDR version is this -> Everyone watching a story knows it's a story. You don't have to finger wag them about it. This is closely related to one of my other pet peeves: explaining to a queer audience specifically how life can be disappointing sometimes *looking at Stranger Things for this one* as IF they're the section of the audience who doesn't KNOW that better than anyone else.)

I digress.

l'll also tack on this Campbell meta, which resurfaced the other day! It's mostly about how Henry's suspicions and prejudices about hunters are received in a VERY different way than Samuel's insularity.

And yeah, i’ll just say it; there’s a reason that the campbells are viewed with suspicion, especially around their subsequent honor names an