Okay writing these tags I realised that in MY gender-bent Supernatural who stays their canon gender and who doesn’t is more complicated then just saying (pretty much) only Sam, Dean, and Cas are gender-bent… so I’m making a non-exhaustive list here so I can store it some place other than my brain:
Mary Winchester (née Campbell) is still Mary Winchester (née Campbell); Born to Deanna and Samuel Campbell, who still dies (for the first time) at the hands of a yellow-eyed demon (Azazel is still using male vessels, Fredric Lehne gives a great performance) on November 2 1983, kicking off the events of Supernatural.
John Winchester is still John Winchester, former marine and Vietnam War veteran, still pretty much a bastard and a part-time deadbeat since Mary’s death incoming rambling feel free to skip -> (there’s a lot of nuance in John’s character and people love to paint him as this flat evil character but I don’t think that’s true and that’s just not my view as someone who had a father VERY similar to him and has unpacked it in therapy after his death) (aka. Not a John shooter nor a John anti but a secret third thing: an objective outsider perspective capable of holding two conflicting truths; John loved his boys, John failed his boys. Also that John was a product of not just his time but also of his familial relationships (or lack thereof regarding Henry; who is still Henry in my GenBend AU but I’m going off on a tangent here), his formative experiences aka military training and service, his social and economic class, his lot in life aka his wife’s brutal murder at the hands of something supernatural and subsequent single fatherhood under unprecedented circumstances and what was probably unacknowledged and untreated depression and PTSD (and maybe bipolar disorder?), but at the end of the day he did not have the will?/desire?/resources? (Who’s to say?) to change and caused great harm to his children both physically and psychologically (and others, but mostly his children.) and as we all should know its impact over intent.)
Dean is Deanna Winchester (gender-bent, I have way too many thoughts and theories on how that would go in my gender-bent universe to list it here, i could write for hours on it I think, but in regards to how it’d affect whether other characters are gender-bent based on if Dean in canon had a romantic and/or sexual relationship with them, explicit or implied/queercoded, it’s safe to assume they will be gender-bent (with an exception of Jo, she stays female for plot and interpersonal dynamics reasons, I may explain more or save it for later) unless I say otherwise, because as with Dean, Deanna will also be a closeted/queercoded bisexual, but in MY universe she comes out and attempts to accept herself in order to be with Cas, and Deans more subtextual queer relations (Benny as Betty, Crowley aka Fergus Macleod as Crowley aka Fiona Macleod, Lee Webb as Leanne Webb who still goes by Lee, etc) are more explicitly said while still having Deanna hide the true nature of them from the people in her life)
Sam is Samantha Winchester (gender-bent, again way too many thoughts to list it here, one such thought is later in life Samantha discovers she’s a lesbian and enters into her first wlw relationship with Eileen Leahy (not gender-bent, I love Eileen and I love Shosanna Stern), every previous relationship/love interest was a man, including a gender-bent Jessica, Jayden Moore)
Castiel is Castiel (gender-bent); genderless by default like the rest of the angels, but like in canon through extended time spent in her vessel and her natural predisposition for deviating from angel programming she becomes attached/finds herself identifying as female (just as canon Castiel did as male). Castiel’s vessel is a woman named Jane Novak who is a gender-bent Jimmy, Jane’s husband is Anthony Novak, a gender-bent Amelia because as I said the Jesus freaks (Christian Fundamentalists) aren’t gonna abide a gay married couple, and her daughter is Claire Novak (not gender-bent for both I love Claire reasons and it results in interesting interpersonal relationships with Deanna and Cas and interesting plot potential reasons). As I said she looks like your quintessential 2000s Christian working mother, she dresses conservatively in a business casual ‘womanly’ way; white button down blouse, under the knee length black pencil skirt, pantyhose that match her skin tone, sensible kitten heels (‘she’s practical and pragmatic but she’s still a woman so it’s gotta have a bit of a heel duh’), a more tailored version of Trenchcoat 1.0 (keep all the length and general look of the Trenchcoat but cinch in the waist a little to highlight those womanly curves), that sort of thing. I picture her hair Mishas dark colour except it’s mid length and mostly done up in an unintentionally messy bun, the type of bun that you could tell was attempted to be neat and kempt but one way or another just ended up neither, it’s also crucial that she have the iconic Misha eyebags because they make sense, she’s a working mother and (traditional in the Christian sense) wife who most likely is quite harried.
Adam Milligan is still Adam Milligan; Born to Kate Milligan and John Winchester. I think the dynamics of how John treated Adam would be even more interesting if you add in the layer of ‘Only Son’ to the civilian/normal life/secret love child combo. And by interesting I mean it’d fuck with a female version of Dean and Sam’s head even more.
Bobby Singer is still Bobby Singer; even though I’d love to see Babs (Barbara) Singer have a pseudo-mother relationship with Deanna and Samantha, I think it’d heal too much of their Dead Mother Trauma too early on in a universe where Mary is still their mother and she still died in 1983, which would take away a lot of the emotional beats (existing in normal canon and potential in a gender-bent Deanna and Samantha universe, imagine the mummy issues a female Sam and Dean would have about their Dead Mother growing up and as adults) and lessen some of the motivation, for Deanna and Samantha at least, to go along with John’s all encompassing, all consuming avenge-your-mothers-memory plan to kill Yellow Eyes. Considering the surviving parent is John and he’s still their father with whom they have a pretty complicated and pretty shitty relationship, I think Bobby needs to be the healthy mirror for that and be the pseudo-father relationship, so he stays Bobby. Also as I said in the tags above it’s a delight imagining Deanna getting her first period when John dropped her and Samantha off with Bobby one time when they were kids and Bobby fumbling and bumbling in an earnest old man way trying to remember everything he learned about menstruation and period products from Karen when she was still alive (hint: it wasn’t much) to teach Deanna and support her in his gruff pat on the back way (And when Samantha gets her first period and goes to Deanna, Deanna jokes “well at least you didn’t have to tell Bobby you were riding the red river for the first time like I did”), and just the potential of that slightly awkward and bumbling but still gruff and earnest Bobby-like support in other circumstances where Deanna and Samantha are experiencing girlhood milestones. Crucially Bobby doesn’t fall into the gender stereotypes trap with them either, he encourages them to be who they wanna be and do what they wanna do not based on if it is a ‘girl’ thing or not, just based on if they wanna do it, like he still teaches Deanna all she wants to know about cars and lets her run wild fixing up the junkers in the scrapyard, and still lets Samantha run roughshod through his library and archives but he also brings them along on HIS manicures and pedicures and sits them down to watch Tori Spelling in 90210 and Tori & Dean (all things he does secretly in actual SPN, he’s just open about it and shares it with them in MY GenBend SPN), he just wants them to be happy and true to themselves.
ellievsbear
dailybridgerton
2087
tangentwithtanner
prguitarman
stormborns
