#and mirrors

Somehow, by the end, even with a mouth full of ouchie new dental work, Dean is smiling ... because he’s got his hope back, because Cas heard him, and it doesn’t even matter if Cas isn’t there for right now, because Dean can still think about it and have trippy daydreams where he can let himself go and he’s somehow still weirdly not the least bit freaked out about it or what it might mean?  By the time Dean’s out of the chair, he is a touch “is this real life?” but that wears off after a little bit.  And by the time the episode’s over, he’s maybe a bit achier than he was the day before, but he’s smiling.  Because I think for maybe the first time, Dean is starting to think and maybe even start to believe that he could have a little something like Mr. and Mrs. Garth have. Because, truthfully, Dean’s right - they don’t do ‘normal’ people things, they aren’t ‘normal’ the way civilians are normal.  So they don’t have the same kinds of problems, the degree of severity of the problems is HUGELY overblown (seriously - how many apocalypses have they averted now?  like 4?) and the stakes are always the highest possible (destruction of the world, their lives, their loved ones lives).  BUT -- just because they spend their lives fighting monsters doesn’t mean they have to completely give up the possibility of happiness and fulfillment in ways that work for them.  This is exactly what I’ve been hollering about for ages.  It can be a hybrid of apple pie AND monster town.  The wholesome day-to-day-ness of laundry and making burgers and movie nights AND the challenge of saving people and working on their own issues and going through some ugly shit sometimes, because the hunting life (and life in general) just suck that way sometimes.  But... what that also means, then, is if Dean and Sam don’t live the same way every other Joe out there does, that means they don’t love the same way, either.  Cue Dean dancing with his friend, Cyd Cherise the floor lamp. Even though Cas wasn’t in the episode, he was all over the place in it, he was everywhere you looked.  But for a lovely change, instead of it being an absence marked by the lack of something (ie. Cas being gone and Dean feeling bereft), the empty spots were filled with Cas in mirrors supplied by Garth.  Love reflecting love back at him.

As far as the actual dance sequence?  It was just gobsmacking.  I’m still like - I’ve watched it about 5 times and I still can’t believe Jensen did that.  He did that!  Singing in the Rain is one of my favorite movies of all times (along with tons of others from that same era) and Gene Kelly was such a hero, to me, growing up.  So charming and debonair and smooth without being insincere - I could see a lot of Gene’s moves in Jensen’s number tonight  (along with even a touch of Gene Wilder from Young Frankenstein in the opening bit with Garth, lbrh) and I was so thrilled at how it turned out.  Seriously - it feels like Jensen’s going for a record for the number of awesome things he does this season.  First the prayer and now THIS?!  Keep it up, boo!  We stan an overachieving legend! But the other thing that really stood out to me was that overarching message - ‘let’s misbehave’ - which, I just love the notion of.  Because like, the setting for the dance sequence is the library, you guys - they literally cleared out the entire library set just so they could shoot this sequence!  So this is Dean’s mind, with all the books and lore and hunter-related rubbish cleared out of the way.  This is just... Dean.  This is Dean’s brain post-Purgatory 2.0, the prayer, and also a bit of nitrous oxide.  This is ... not what I expected to see.