And just when I mentally say to myself that I’m not going to focus as much on SPN until my meta rewatch, that I’m going to hone in on Sherlock for a while, that all of my fandom energies will be based around that ‘verse for at least a week or so while I comb through and try to compile an actual, organized index of my feelings on at least one show—

suddenly, Dean and Cas. 

(Fuck you two and the crooked plots you rode in on. I would ask if you could just leave me alone for even a week, but I know the answer is a staunch no already, so I won’t bother. I wish I knew how to quit you guys.)

I feel awful, actually, that I’ve been sidestepping wank and— just about everything going on in fandom, right now. It’s not that I don’t have strong feelings about it, that’s not even remotely true— it’s that I don’t have the energy for the constant novel-length posts I used to make (especially when I get this riled up about it), that people still make, and I’m sort of more unattached than usual to the actual fandom community, for whatever reason.

(Sitting on the sidelines isn’t a great feeling. I’m thinking about trying harder to mend it, thinking about maybe remaking my blog or dusting off one of my side blogs, but I don’t know, yet.)

You know, though, I find it ridiculous at best that the very character arc they’re apparently so vehemently against would, if even executed half-decently, add an interesting and conflicting dimension to TFW’s interpersonal mappings that they haven’t actually had on the show in ages.

Not even coming from a shipper’s point of view, the very fact that it has been canonically baited so often hints at the fact that yeah— in that universe, it has points of interest to it, would add obvious development besides cheap jokes that have been shrugged off, and, I don’t know— take the show, the characters, the relationships a step further? 

Season seven was a clusterfuck. It was stagnant. It was the pinnacle of showing how much potential goes to waste in this show, and that’s saying something. Yes, it had its moments (which can I just venture to point out that MOST OF ITS SAVING MOMENTS e.g. in 7x01, 7x10, 7x17 WERE ENTIRELY OF SERA GAMBLE’S MAKING), but most of it? Fodder for a hell of a lot of subversion and fix-it fic. That’s about it. 

Season eight, while I’m nervous as all hell about it, has potential. The writing team is being reformatted (although I’m still worried about Carver and whether he will be able to refortify things or if almost strictly having men in charge will further some of the problems on the show, but at least they’re bringing in alumni from their better days).

The plot is as a pinnacle where, if they play their cards right, the tracks could really click back into gear with where they went askew. I’m even going so far as to be excited for S8, and purgatory, because apparently I’m still in deep enough denial of how badly the show has tanked that I can tell myself that it can change. 

That being said, though, it’s true that they don’t have much to work with right now, as we’ve been left at the end of S7.

The entire ordeal is very isolated, and part of me hopes that they’ve done that on purpose, to erase what happened over the last season as much as possible (though I highly doubt it, especially if they’re subscribing to the time-skip as rumoured. which pisses me off more than I care to get into right now). 

More or less, one of the still-functioning things they do have as of right now is the same bond that the remaining members TFW have had in past seasons. They still have Sam, and they still have Dean and Cas (and Jody and Meg because they’re TFW, too, if not the Earth-based segment as it stands now). 

One of the largest problems I think the show is suffering from right now is the fact that since the apocalypse happened, they’re trying and failing to top that action— trying to make the Big Bads bigger and, yes, badder— when that’s going to a) completely flounder, and b) poorly eclipse what the show needs to be properly about, which is these wonderful relationships, these families, these friendships, these alliances. 

A strong narrative, while it’s necessary to have a logical plot for foundation, needs to be focused around the living, breathing people you’ve put into it, not just the action— and really, after S5’s message, I think a much cleaner, better way of progressing up a step would have been honing in on conflicts in a more personal way, as opposed to trying to set the target for the world that much bigger. 

The apocalypse was such a great backdrop for everything that went on with personal growth in seasons 4-5— and I’m certainly not saying that they shouldn’t have progressed with similarly important frames of happenstance— but to put it like this; S1-5 was, a bit, like Part I of the show. It was planned, it was (mostly) cohesive, it was a fitting gradient up to the very end, and more or less, the finale of S5 capped it off somewhat cleanly. 

No matter that it was five seasons of change; it felt, especially in stark contrast to S6 and S7 so far, like a first installment. (I often profess that the most recent two seasons, despite the many things they’ve granted us for mostly interpretation material alone, is Supernatural: The Optional Canon. I wish that wasn’t true.)

Now, S1-5 exhausted a lot of canon, numerous arcs, etc etc, I’m not saying it didn’t— but the expanse of the material they can and should draw from is literally biblical, not to mention every other shade of folklore they could bend, not to mention the endless pools that are human psyches. 

In S6, S7, and to be, S8 at least, there’s been so much more to cover, and particularly with one of the most heavy-handed messages they explored — the power of love, and all of that— it should be catapulted into more of a personal story, especially if we’re able to delve deeper into the remaining, enigmatic facets of the ‘verse, which tend toward an emotional potential; the afterlife, the balances of morality, and how everything doubles forward to effect everyone involved. 

We’re all from fandoms. We know that while the first installment is often great in plot, in action, in development— the sequel usually takes it down to a more intimate level, because characters andpeople are bottomless wells of stories, and they’re the heart of a narrative. 

To get to the point— if they mirrored something along those lines in S8, if they try to correct their path, a way to do that? Is canonizing Dean/Cas, and delving into what that poses for everyone involved. 

Because, in short, do you know who falls in love, or has romantic feelings for someone? Even if they’ve known them for a long time? People. Sometimes, that happens. That’s all they are. Really. 

Do you know who falls in love, or has romantic feelings for someone of the same sex (or even presently presenting as the same sex, as in a wavelength of celestial intent)? Even if they’ve known them for a long time? People. Sometimes, that happens. 

You’re telling a story about people. 

The boys have had plenty of romantic interests. Half of them haven’t been as logical as this one. The next time someone backs up a claim with ‘it’s not that kind of show’, I’m throwing something into the sun. 

This has derailed, isn’t even following one point or another, and I haven’t had caffeine and I’m angry and I’m going to go angrily eat a piece of watermelon and try not to focus too much on everything that’s gotten even worse since this quote has come out, because I could more accurately put this in keysmash right now and I feel like I’m just vaguely restating some of fandom’s opinion anyway. Fuck this.