rather waste some time with you

dean's enormous crush on gordon walker is something that can be so personal.

i think the scene of dean talking to gordon about his emotions is really sweet; he doesn't get to open up that much.

DEAN: Yeah. Yeah, you know. He was just one of those guys. Took some terrible beatings, just kept coming. So you're always thinking to yourself, he's indestructible. He'll always be around, nothing can kill my dad. Then just like that he's gone. I can't talk about this to Sammy. You know, I gotta keep my game face on. But, uh, the truth is I'm not handling it very well. Feel like I have this...

it's interesting that later on sam interprets dean's like and trust of gordon as trying to replace john. i mean sam doesn't know this but dean is actively furious and heartbroken by john right now. and in fact, gordon's presence only reinforces that rift.

GORDON: Word travels fast. You know how hunters talk. DEAN: No, we don't, actually. GORDON: I guess there's a lot your dad never told you, huh?

i think the emotional journey between dean and gordon is really interesting in this episode. dean thinks gordon is cool, he opens up to him, wants to trust his instinct. but as gordon talks more about his hunting philosophy you can see the seeds of doubt in dean that end up turning him against gordon's desire to just kill lenore and the other vampires.

in fact though sam accuses dean of trying to replace john with gordon, it's the realization that gordon is similar to john in some ways that causes dean to pull back from him. gordon talks about hunting being black and white and easy. but that's exactly the thing in john's philosophy that dean is currently struggling with.

DEAN: What if we killed things that didn't deserve killing? You know? I mean, the way Dad raised us... SAM: Dean, after what happened to Mom, Dad did the best he could. DEAN: I know he did. But the man wasn't perfect. And the way he raised us, to hate those things; and man, I hate 'em. I do. When I killed that vampire at the mill I didn't even think about it; hell, I even enjoyed it.

something that always upsets me is the extreme violence of dean's fight with gordon at the end of the episode. i think it's pretty clear that gordon's characterization falls into a lot of racist tropes throughout the show. and certainly subjecting him to intense violence that is framed as almost comedic is definitely in line with that.

but i also do most of my analysis based on intra-textual information and there is something about the fight that just reads as dean acting out of an acute place of betrayal. and yeah, he opened up to gordon earlier and then gordon hurt sam. and yeah dean's really freaked out by how gordon treats lenore. but there is a level of the physicality in the fight that just makes me think.... they hooked up. like it reads to me as dean reacting in hurt and betrayal not just at someone who he opened up to emotionally but physically as well. anyway, take it or leave it but i watched it and i was like oh they fucked For Sure....

lastly, you know her, you love her, shot of all time.

sweetheart, this is dean studies!!!!

okay so i have three big takeaways from 2.06. 1. dean paying attention to how jo got all that money. 2. how and when dean articulates his feelings about john. 3. john's penchant for using people as bait.

2.05 makes clear (to the viewers but not sam and dean) that jo routinely hustles hunters out of money when they pass through the roadhouse. so it doesn't come as a surprise to us when she holds out a wad of cash to the landlord as a deposit on the apartment.

but for dean on the other hand....

this facial journey makes me think a lot of things. it makes me think about dean's money managing all throughout season 1. it makes me think about the clearly established money stress he dealt with as a child. and it makes me think about the questions about some of the things he might have had to do in order to get money.

throughout the rest of this episode, he struggles with the balance of being protective of jo and her inexperience in hunting while not trying to make her feel belittled. i think he sees a lot of himself in jo but also sees, as he says, she still has a way out. and he knows he can't take the way out. but he really, really wants her to.

so when jo pulls out that cash, i think all of the layers of how hunting can trap you, and harm you, and force you to do things you don't want to flashes in his mind.

so he keeps trying to talk her out of it.

JO: Now you sound like my mother. DEAN: Oh, and that's a bad thing? Because let me tell you... JO: What? DEAN: Forget it. JO: No, you started this. DEAN: Jo, you've got options. No one in their right mind chooses this life. My dad started me in this when I was so young... I wish I could do something else. JO: You love the job. DEAN: Yeah, but I'm a little twisted. JO: You don't think I'm a little twisted too? DEAN: Jo, you've got a mother that worries about you. Who wants something more for you. Those are good things. You don't throw things like that away. Might be hard to find later.

i have said before and i'll say again that dean tends to shape his stories about john to his audience. we'll see that with the deadbeat dad stuff in season 5. we'll see that with the CBGB story in season 10. so, sometimes, like later this episode, you get a story about which he's not being totally honest because he is trying to subtly connect with or give advice to someone else.

however, sometimes, the truth coincides smoothly with the point he's trying to make. we know dean wants to quit hunting, wants to "do something else." we know this because he says so in several upcoming episodes this season (2.09, 2.10, 2.18). and we know this because in every single dream world he's ever shown, he isn't hunting. he's free.

and we also know he's trapped. he's trapped because "It’s never gonna be over. There’s gonna be others. There’s always gonna be somethin’ to hunt." because he wants to save... everyone. and that's not something he can quit on with a good conscience. there's... no exit.

so he's telling jo the truth here. john started him hunting when he was really young. dean wishes he could do something else. and he can't. and having a parent who wants something better for you is something he didn't have and seems to wish he did.

it's important to me to note and understand exactly what dean's actual feelings about john are because he doesn't often get to process them aloud.

so let's take a later example in the episode that's a contrast.

jo shows dean that the knife she carries is her father's old hunting knife. and then she asks him

JO: What do you.. what do you remember about your dad? I mean, what's the first thing that pops into your head? (dean shakes his head) Come on, tell me. DEAN: (he looks away and around, bites his lip, thinking) I was six or seven, and uh, he took me shooting for the first time. You know, bottles on a fence, that kind of thing. I bulls-eyed every one of 'em. He gave me this smile, like... I don't know. JO: He must have been proud. DEAN: What about your dad?

this story has an entirely different format from the way dean talked above. first of all, when jo asks "what's the first thing that pops into your head," dean is clearly thinking about john asking him to maybe kill sam. and he can't say that. not only because he doesn't want sam to know but because jo is being emotionally vulnerable here. she wants to connect with dean about hunting, about missing their deceased fathers. this isn't' the time for him to dump some truly grim stuff at her feet. so he freezes, shakes his head.

and when she keeps pushing, he doesn't at all say the first thing he thinks of. he processes for a bit and shares a story about being a young kid with a hunter father. something jo will relate to since her dad died when she was still a young kid.

crucially, and sadly, dean fumbles toward the end of the story. i'm not gonna gif each little expression cause i think it makes more sense in context. but he starts out with a more upbeat tone but by the time he gets to "he gave me this smile," he's looking down and away. the more recent feelings about john having clearly soured the story he was trying to tell. jo says, "he must have been proud" and dean just can't keep the performance up. he literally can't even look at her until he shifts the conversation back to her.

dean cares for jo so much! which is why it's always so heart wrenching to see his terrified, desperate reaction to her getting taken by the ghost. which is why it's so heart wrenching to learn he accidentally repeated the hunting technique that john used which killed her dad. bait.

it makes me wonder about 1.21... does john only agree to go as bait with the fake colt because meg demanded it be him. it is very clear that john's MO is using people as bait while he waits in the shadows. from what we can gather, i think this is because there is no one john trusts to hunt better than himself. i think it probably killed him that he and sam couldn't go after the demon in salvation and just send dean with the fake gun off to meet up with meg. but i'm getting away from myself....

anyway. dean recognizes chloroform by smell.... which actually cannot mean nothing.

i had a very strange hallucination in which terrible things happened to Piers

and i know most of yous didnt know this and thats fine! no need to apologise im not trying to make u feel bad, im just trying to navigate fandom and this website without being constantly exposed to a really awful racist slur

if u have to use that specific term, at least keep the slashes between the letters. it still sucks to see tho ngl. even better! stick to omegaverse or instead use aob (alpha-omega-beta) (imo its also nicer to pronounce; ay-oh-bee. ayo-bee)

People SAY that your health 'suddenly' starts to decline in your 30s but that's not really a good way to put it A) bc that's not really accurate and B) bc it frames this decline as something inherent and unavoidable, which does nothing to convince you that you have some agency about this.

So I'm going to explain this in LOOSE NON-SCIENTIFIC language:

When you are an infant or child, you are actively growing. Nature is throwing tons of new cells into you bc your body needs to BUILD BUILD BUILD. What you're able to do, eat and heal from is all largely dictated by this-- for example little kids often LOVE sweet foods or dairy-like foods and are relatively less interested in anything else. This is bc their body is running on HIGH all the time since building body parts is very energetically intensive. They can eat a fistful of sugarcubes and burn them off in an hour. Ask me how I know.

When you are a YOUNG ADULT you are actually still developing to a secondary extent, but your bones and such are fused and now that development goes into solidifying the structure and also finetuning its reproductive capabilities and features-- these, too, are HIGHLY energy consumptive when they first come online. Nature is STILL, thus, throwing tons of energy and new cells your way hoping you'll do something cool with them. You regenerate very quickly, and recover from harm rapidly-- But please note: swift recovery from harm is not absence of harm. This most relates to the consumption of 'junk food' and alcohol-- many people say they could 'eat whatever they wanted and nothing would happen' when they're in their 20s or that they could go out drinking and 'not be affected'. You were affected. You didn't notice.

Once everything has come online you go into maintenance mode. Nature stops throwing excess cells and energy your way bc you don't need that-- your body is yours and you are now responsible for maintaining it...hopefully with what you learned by experience in your 20s. IF YOU WERE NOT PAYING ATTENTION, you did not learn this, and are in for a surprise in your 30s bc your 'free recovery' subscription has ended. Recovery and maintenance- processes that are constant in the human body- now cost MINERALS & ELECTRICITY. You can go into DEBT now, and that debt will come in the form of joints that pop, inability to recover well, lowered immune function, and feeling like shit.

This debt accrues interest RAPIDLY once you hit 36-- the age of around 36 to 46 or so is a kind of reckoning stage where Nature assesses how well you've managed your body and you will be SWIFTLY downgraded if the result is you were just winging it.

So how do you build this account? 2 main things ( LOOSELY SPEAKING this is so not 100% scientific but I have to be general here): MINERALS -- you get these from eating well, mostly. You might want to take supplements based on your unique needs. But you need Minerals & Vitamins (i'm lumping these two together) bc they are the chemical building blocks (currency) your body uses to rebuild and fix up cells. ELECTRICITY is- again loosely speaking- having the proper chemical voltage throughout your body. This 'voltage' drops when you don't move enough, or when you're dehydrated. The building and repairing process your body wants to do may have the materials (minerals and vitamins) but there's not enough power in the factory, or the AC isn't working and the workers are overheating and can't work well. To fix this, drink lots of water and MOVE AND STRETCH your body. The action within your muscles and bones GENERATES ENERGY and it keeps your cells happy.

So the thing is, it's not that you suddenly find yourself taking damage after 30+. You were taking damage the whole time. You're just kept from really feeling it bc you're young and full of extra juice and given time to figure things out.

But at some point Nature expects you to do that, and you will pay if you don't.

Best to start out giving a shit, even if none of your friends think you're cool, even if you get called a 'health nut' bc you will still be able to frolick at 45, 50, probably so on while everyone who said it was dumb to have 'balanced meals' shares memes about how they wake up feeling like shit every day.

the fact that she's still calling for ava to help her when she sees a submarine, says she's been looking for her for ages, is probably screaming and begging for rescue the entire time- but can't be understood unless you spend enough time in the blood ocean, unless you're just as doomed as her.

her mentioning that she heard the submarine get pulled up the first time, that surely there must be a way to leave, which means the first time she caught the sm-13 in her mouth she was only trying to get home, was desperately trying to hold onto the one chance she thought she had for rescue.

her quiet grief when she realizes that the convict inside has only one bar of air left, and the sorrow in her voice when she says he's not going to make it. trying to be gentle when she tells him to control his breathing, that it's not the worst fate down here.

her clear disgust at what the butcher did to the Filament station, her horror that an entire station is lost but still not being able to just swim away from the only human contact she's had in who knows how long.

elsie, the speaker, the research lead who has held onto her sanity despite everything, who knows the full scope of the blood ocean, the voice of reason- asking so fucking quietly if he'd give anything to survive. knowing what it's done to her, knowing that she'll condemn him to darkness forever. asking if he would like to live on and then sending him to the light to be mutated into something new and survive by leaving his humanity behind.

elle, the whisper, still aware of what's happening even as she goes insane, knowing that her mind has been burst by trying to comprehend the pinhole god. furious that the eye has chosen simon instead after all her suffering.

elsie who now remembers the full horror of it, who knows that if the humans left start making food from the blood, it will slowly warp them all into monsters like her, who knows that the information in the sm-8 cannot reach the surface- even if it means killing ava.

both of them screaming at simon to stop in the end, only trying to kill him because they're trying to save him from turning into them, because can he not see that the truth will drive what's left of humanity insane, can he not see that the pinhole god wants him to fuse with the tree so that he stays down there like them forever- swimming alone in the darkness of the blood ocean, terrified and in agony, with no hope of rescue.