From a developing plotline point-of-view, I really liked this episode and thought it was a good start off for the new season.

From a Dean-Sam point-of-view, however, I was less than thrilled.

First of all, let me preface the rest of this post by saying that the last few weeks, I've changed my reading focus from Dean/Castiel slash back to Wincest. I like Castiel. I've always liked Dean (of course it helps that Jensen Ackles is damned attractive). And the whole idea of an amour fou between an angel and a human - and this particular human! - was like candy-cane, rainbows and unicorns for my poor little slash-infested brain.

It actually was the fandom, the writers in it, and the attitudes prevalent in it that managed to turn me off the idea of Dean/Cas after I'd read enough fic. Almost all stories featured broken!lickable!Dean with a hole were the umbilical cord connecting him to Sam used to be, savior!comforting!Castiel and thoughtless!undeserving-of-love!Sam. The writers managed to ignore Dean's love for Sam (despite their differences) that used to be big enough for Dean to sell his soul to get him back! and thought, hey, Misha Collins is so pretty and his character is sooo cool - let's just diss and character-bash Sam, because he is, after all, canonically designed to become be EVIL. It got so bad that in more than 80 % of the Dean/Cas fic I read, Sam either didn't show up but in a half-sentence, Dean had disparaging thoughts about him, or, if Sam did show up in the story, it was to showcase his evilness (or at least his lack of care for Dean's emotional state) - of course in glaring contrast to perfect!supportive-boyfriend!Cas.

I always thought Supernatural was the story of two brothers out saving people, hunting things.

In the fannish collective mind, it seems to have become the story of saintly!Dean who can do no wrong and his millstone-around-Dean's-neck!incompetent!evil!brother.

Excuse me while I go throw up a little.

Give me a good, long story in which Dean and Sam's love for each other (fraternal or slashy, I don't care) remains the driving force behind Dean's actions, and his falling in love with Castiel is an addition that enriches his life, but doesn't change its direction entirely, removing Sam from his focus and replacing him with his own private angel. I can only recall one existing story... that's set pretty early in season 4, I think. One.

I also always thought that the Sam!girls and the Dean!girls had the fandom divided up equally between their camps. Now, though, about 49 % of the Sam!girls seem to have either fled their base in order to sew and hold up Castiel's banner, or else defected to the Dean!girls' camp.

Again, I have to say that I like Castiel; as a character, a plot device, an idea, as something good for Dean to have. But not at the exclusion of his pre-existent relationship with Sam. Dean loves Sam. He raised Sam. He died for him. Selling him for a consolation price in form of someone who's late to the game (who didn't learn about hunting at John's knee, who didn't grow up in motel rooms, who didn't move town every couple of months, who didn't provide backup in cemeteries, abandoned warehouses, or the woods at night, who didn't stand by his side facing off against unimaginable horrors with nothing but a shotgun loaded with salt shells, a couple of musty old books and an iron dagger), who doesn't know his family's history but in the abstract, sounds like a bad bargain. Dean and Sam are co-dependent fuck-ups (in that regard, their FBI profile's right). Making the conscious choice to either abandon Sam or even kill him would kill Dean. Literally.

Where was I? Oh, less with the ranting, more with the overall view.

So, in short, my enjoyment of Dean/Cas slash shriveled up and died, and I began searching out Sam/Dean fic again. Preferably stories in which they were both equal partners - both during their hunts as well as in bed.

Episode 4x22 ended on such a positive note (no, I don't mean Lucifer rising, but the brothers being reunited and, hell, hanging onto each other while the devil broke free.

Now, in episode 5x01, we have Dean not offering a single word in Sam's defense when possessed!Bobby practically announces that Sam should have been put down years ago because John was right, little Sammy's become evil (ah, no. Misguided, prideful, stupid - check. Evil? Not so much.), and then pulling a self-righteous!John Sheppard, basically telling Sam that what he's done (not the Apocalypse; the brother!betrayal) can never be forgiven.

Are we viewers supposed to fill in the holes in this logic in private?
What about Dean breaking the first seal? Dean channeling John and kicking Sam out of his life? Dean being self-righteous and basically telling Sam that the angels (who - and it was already pretty obvious at that point - were dicks and had their own agenda) were right and he had to follow their orders like a good little soldier despite never being offered a single explanation why using his powers to kill demons was actually a bad thing (and by that I mean more than ominous fortune cookie vagueness à la 'they're of demonic origin, therefore by definition they're bad, bad, bad'!)?
Ruby playing Sam well enough that even a big part of fandom thought she was actually on their side?
The angels facilitating - no, engineering - the whole thing for their own benefit, no matter how much of humanity perished in the execution of their own neat little plan of finally icing Lucifer?
And Cas. Yes, Castiel. The oh-so-perfect one who freed Sam from Bobby's panic room so he could free Lucifer. Castiel had a change of mind at the 11^th hour. Nice for him. But until then, he'd actually been stupid enough to be convinced that Dean would thank him for wiping out part (or all) of Earth's population, preventing countless children from being born, preventing countless sinners from repenting (and therefore from changing their final destination from 'downstairs' to 'upstairs'), and, oh, yeah, causing his beloved brother to go to hell for eternity for bringing on the Apocalyse since it seemed very likely that Sam would die before he could repent and attempt to make up for his actions. I hardly think that Dean going to heaven afterward would make him okay with that.

So all in all? The Apocalyse was caused by a multitude of factors; Sam's hand in it (killing Lilith) was just the most obvious one. Sam's actions would have only been evil if he'd actually known what Lilith's death would set in motion and did it anyway. He didn't. He couldn't know. There were no obvious hints. Hell, even Dean and Castiel didn't know until it was too late. In law, guilt is determined by not only the crime committed, but also by knowledge and intent. Sam killed Lilith. He didn't know she was the final seal. He didn't want to break the final seal.

Zachariah and cohorts, though? They knew, and they wanted. They're guilty of instigating the whole thing. Castiel's guilty of not taking action (in time!) to prevent it.

Ever since the pilot, I've liked Dean and Sam in equal measure. Despite certain of my friends' fangirlgasms of Jensen!glee. While I visually find Dean more appealing, I identify with Sam. In all of season 4, Sam's been getting the short end of the stick.

If Supernatural intends to continue being the Amazing Dean Winchester Show^TM with one of its hero's albatrosses being the responsibility of cleaning up after his incompetent kid brother, then I'll watch the show until its painful end and then deny that anything post-season 3 ever happened. So there. Denial is one of a fangirl's greatest strengths, after all.

The SPN fandom, though? Is NUTS. Too bad its loud collective voice has the power to influence the events on the show.

esorlehcar said it all with less asides and ranty babbleness here. Just: WORD.