Destiel relationship development is shown each time Cas dies. #1 he explodes and dean is bummed. #2 the leviathan drag him into the water. Dean takes the coat with him and has a quivering lip bobby-“you just lost the best friend you ever had” #3 dean fights like hell to find him in purgatory and cant contain his joy when he’s alive #4 died in s12 Dean couldn’t even function Had no faith, wanted to die. Destiel is a fricken slow burn but its sure as hell burning! We’re on the right track!!!
OOH. But I have some addenda to this:
1. He explodes (in 4.22), Dean is bummed in 5.01, but also angry and inspired to fight in Cas’s name (*blasts Zachariah with a banishing sigil* Learned that from my friend Cas, you son of a bitch.)
2. He explodes again (in 5.22), and Dean is distraught, but his problems are only escalating. Lucifer/Sam kills Bobby a moment later, and Dean’s still gotta stand up to FUCKING LUCIFER so this is no time to break down and cry, you know? And by the time Sam takes back control and flings himself into Hell, Dean’s got... nothing, and then Cas comes back, heals him and Bobby, and then flaps off again. But Dean’s made a “dying wish” type promise to Sam to get out of the life, to get out of hunting, and live normal... so he lets Cas go... (WORST. PROMISE. EVER. oh my god, I’m still bitter over that.)
3. in 7.01, it looks like Cas is dead for a hot minute right after he returns the souls to Purgatory. Dean looks like he’s gonna cry, and then miraculously, Cas resurrects (again!) This is about the most painful thing in the world, because he gets to be alive for like... three whole minutes before...
4. in 7.02 the Leviathans walk him into that lake and explode him... This is the first time Dean wonders if Cas really isn’t gonna come back, you know? He had THREE TIMES before this, but as the days turn to weeks and Cas isn’t back, he’s got to be wondering. Except... through that whole time, through that long string of stolen cars, during a year when Dean had just about everything (including his own identity) stripped from him HE STILL CARRIES CAS’S COAT WITH HIM. *cries forever about a desperately-in-need-of-laundering overcoat* (come on, you know that thing was drenched in Dean’s tears, okay? he cried A LOT in s7))
5. Purgatory. and then everything AFTER Purgatory, through brainwashing (a kind of death of personhood) right up through 8.23 and “So, what, ET goes home?” and just *rips out own heart because it hurts less*
6. Not really a death, but in 11.01/11.02/11.03 when-- despite the terrifying and unknown threat of the Darkness-- he’s still primarily driven by worry/fear over Cas. He knows Cas is in trouble, and in 11.01 his primary reason for wanting to kill the “zompires” and escape the hospital is so they can find and help Cas. This only gets more intense as...
7. Post 11.14, when he learns that Cas has been possessed by Lucifer. Finding and Saving Cas becomes Dean’s ONLY mission for most of the rest of s11. Sure, Cas isn’t dead, but HECK, you know?
8. 12.19/12.20, Dean’s terror that Jack has “done something” to Cas, and rendered Cas unable to assert his own will, brings back horrors of s8 when Cas was being controlled by Naomi. Leading us up to the horrific angst of...
9. 12.23. This was the first time that Dean had seen Cas die by angel blade. This was the first time he’d seen Cas with the full burnt-out wingprints. Somewhere deep down, Dean knew this was different. This wasn’t something Cas would just miraculously pop back from. God wasn’t answering the phone anymore, and Dean had no hope that Cas could come back from this. He burnt him.
This was the first time he’d had a body to burn. The first time he’d had to wrap Cas and build a pyre and watch him burn. “What’s burned stays dead.” (which is such a disturbing thing when we’re talking about the slowest of slow burns here)
Until it doesn’t.
But yeah, Dean was ready to die in relatively short order when he thought Cas was gonna be gone for good. But then he came back... and not everything is all just hunky-dory, but heck... at least he’s back.
And now it’s Dean who needs saving from Michael, very much like Cas needed saving from Lucifer in s11. It’s time to see this situation reversed.