I have been trying to wait a while before responding to comments in order to suppress my usual desire to do a DVD commentary for a story that should stand on its own, but you have lured me out, damn you!
There are two responses I'd like to make, with the usual disclaimers about authorial intent not amounting to much once the story's out there:
(1) I don't think demons are any more reliable narrators or objective observers than humans are, and in fact I kind of like the idea of demons being blinded by their own kinks: they see what they can use and don't see what they can't. (In terms of the SPN mytharc, as I've sort of speculated as an aside in another story, I think they see love as a tool to break people with; I don't think they see it as something that makes people stronger. And I think it's that kind of *humanity*, rather than any supernatural McGuffin, that's going to save the Winchesters in the end.) This isn't something the story addresses at all -- I could have put in ironic bits of the demon misunderstanding Dean, and I didn't, because I was thinking of it as a pretty dark story and I do think her understanding is correct as far as it goes -- but fanfiction exists in dialogue with the source, and I think it's reasonable to analyze the story in light of information and understandings unavailable to the POV character. So that's Out #1. :D
(2) Out #2 is more metatextual, and it's that I see this story getting farther away from canon as it goes on. That is, Part 1 does pretty accurately represent *my* take on Dean's state of mind immediately post-"Crossroad Blues," when I think he's a wreck, if not as much of a wreck as he is in "Everybody Loves a Clown," but he got darker and darker throughout the story when in canon I personally see him as on an upswing post-"Hunted." It seems clear to me that what was killing him was not just guilt at his father's death but guilt, terror, and loss at the idea of having to kill Sam and just the terrible burden of having to hide something from Sam; and that once he shared it with Sam, he was on the way to healing, and the events of "Hunted" and even of "Born Under A Bad Sign" solidified his determination to save Sam rather than kill him. This is morally questionable in some ways, but psychologically I see Dean as a lot more stable now than he's been for most of the season.
The story goes kind of AU for me, in that it shows Dean breaking down past the point where I think he started building himself back up. Although it went less AU than I expected when I finally figured out what was going on in 3, because as brutal and scary as 3 is, I find it perversely hopeful that he won't break down, he won't give up, down at the end he's still Dean. That wasn't the way that part went originally; I struggled a lot trying to figure out how to make him give in before realizing that the point was that he *wouldn't*, and that the section worked much better if I tied it closer to canon, if I made it a kind of reaction to "Hunted" and "Nightshifter" and even "Houses of the Holy," all of which stick Dean in positions in which he *can't* fight.
I guess the demented optimism of that is kind of lost in (a) the demon's POV and (b) the death wish section immediately following, but it still is ... less pessimistic, at least as a standalone section, than I'd originally intended. Yay for characters knowing themselves better than I do, I guess?
Okay, that went kind of DVD commentary. Feel free to disregard, since, you know, authorial intent + $2 will buy you a small coffee at Starbuck's.
no subject
There are two responses I'd like to make, with the usual disclaimers about authorial intent not amounting to much once the story's out there:
(1) I don't think demons are any more reliable narrators or objective observers than humans are, and in fact I kind of like the idea of demons being blinded by their own kinks: they see what they can use and don't see what they can't. (In terms of the SPN mytharc, as I've sort of speculated as an aside in another story, I think they see love as a tool to break people with; I don't think they see it as something that makes people stronger. And I think it's that kind of *humanity*, rather than any supernatural McGuffin, that's going to save the Winchesters in the end.) This isn't something the story addresses at all -- I could have put in ironic bits of the demon misunderstanding Dean, and I didn't, because I was thinking of it as a pretty dark story and I do think her understanding is correct as far as it goes -- but fanfiction exists in dialogue with the source, and I think it's reasonable to analyze the story in light of information and understandings unavailable to the POV character. So that's Out #1. :D
(2) Out #2 is more metatextual, and it's that I see this story getting farther away from canon as it goes on. That is, Part 1 does pretty accurately represent *my* take on Dean's state of mind immediately post-"Crossroad Blues," when I think he's a wreck, if not as much of a wreck as he is in "Everybody Loves a Clown," but he got darker and darker throughout the story when in canon I personally see him as on an upswing post-"Hunted." It seems clear to me that what was killing him was not just guilt at his father's death but guilt, terror, and loss at the idea of having to kill Sam and just the terrible burden of having to hide something from Sam; and that once he shared it with Sam, he was on the way to healing, and the events of "Hunted" and even of "Born Under A Bad Sign" solidified his determination to save Sam rather than kill him. This is morally questionable in some ways, but psychologically I see Dean as a lot more stable now than he's been for most of the season.
The story goes kind of AU for me, in that it shows Dean breaking down past the point where I think he started building himself back up. Although it went less AU than I expected when I finally figured out what was going on in 3, because as brutal and scary as 3 is, I find it perversely hopeful that he won't break down, he won't give up, down at the end he's still Dean. That wasn't the way that part went originally; I struggled a lot trying to figure out how to make him give in before realizing that the point was that he *wouldn't*, and that the section worked much better if I tied it closer to canon, if I made it a kind of reaction to "Hunted" and "Nightshifter" and even "Houses of the Holy," all of which stick Dean in positions in which he *can't* fight.
I guess the demented optimism of that is kind of lost in (a) the demon's POV and (b) the death wish section immediately following, but it still is ... less pessimistic, at least as a standalone section, than I'd originally intended. Yay for characters knowing themselves better than I do, I guess?
Okay, that went kind of DVD commentary. Feel free to disregard, since, you know, authorial intent + $2 will buy you a small coffee at Starbuck's.