neurotically and continually, about SPN, as one does... And it occurs to me that the uneasy outsider perspective on the SamDean relationship which we see from people like Lisa, with regard to how close Sam and Dean are and how far they'll go for each other's sake--well, we don't really get that from Sam-centric characters.
I just think that's interesting. Like. No one has ever told Sam the equivalent of what Lisa says ("I love my sister but I'd never bring her back from the dead"). In fact, more often you'll see characters like Bobby and Charlie telling Sam that his absolutely unhinged-level devotion to Dean is totes normal, and even that Sam trying to be healthy and let go is incorrect and/or a betrayal. Maybe this is part of why that old fandom lie is so durable, the one that says Sam isn't as insane about Dean as Dean is about him; we just don't get to see Sam through the eyes of other characters the way we get to see Dean.
Even when we get the whole Amelia storyline (don't get me started on all the wasted possibilities and missteps there...), there's never a point where Amelia is even aware enough of Sam's actual life to be able to confront him like that. Further, unlike with Lisa, who the show presents as a home/family for Dean and in fact a realistic alternative to life with Sam, Sam is with Amelia primarily because he is traumatized and running from the pain of losing Dean. When Sam comes back in season 6, Dean is going soft/domestic and actually initially decides he's going to stay with Lisa rather than get back together with Sam (until the djinn situation essentially forces him to do otherwise). Put that side by side with Samelia, where what you have is Dean returning from the dead (much like Sam did in s6), and Sam hauling ass across the country to meet up with (and be assaulted by) Dean.
I honestly think a big part of this is that Sam, more so than Dean, voluntarily kept that kind of romantic/family entanglement off the table as long as there was any prospect of Dean needing him. The show (and the fandom) makes a big deal out of how Sam always tried to be normal--and that's true, but only to a point. Dean drums it in Sam's ear since the Pilot, they're not normal, Sam isn't being honest with himself and Jessica, blah blah blah. Yet it's Dean who still keeps his own little fantasy about getting to have an "apple pie life" 🙄 for many seasons (despite still telling Sam it's not in the cards).
The main difference here is that Sam actually comes to terms with the fact that they can't really have normal lives--at least not without doing a f-ton of collateral damage to any potential loved ones; Dean, on the other hand, does not come to terms with this, despite spending a lot of hot air over the years telling Sam that "normal" is not allowed.
Once Sam realized that not only would he never be allowed to be normal (not by life, not by the supernatural, and not by Dean), but that anyone he let into his life would be dead meat in short order--Sam committed to the hunting life he hated. He knew he couldn't live without Dean, and he knew Dean was never going to stop hunting, so he didn't want to let him do that alone.
Going to tag this "Dean negative" or whatever, but this is primarily a reflection about Sam, who is master and commander of 99.999% of my SPN-related brainworms.
