castiel-knight-of-hell:

elizabethrobertajones:

rosewhipped22:

@anti-anti-destiel  Loved your well-worded addition to this post!  And it inspired me to make a gifset.               

You’re in a safe space, Dean.  Feel free to be yourself.    

The thing that gets me the most (after reading some of the wanky replies on the other post) is that all this is doing and all we’re saying is that Dean sometimes changes his mind about ridiculous pretensions, usually to do with nonsense macho notions of how to be a man, that he has, or admits or shows through later actions that the way he presented himself in the past was a facade. 

This happens ALL the time, often with Sam as the “straight guy” (in the comedic sense of just taking whatever seriously and not turning it into a joke with HIS actions) who will drink the vegetable water and not think it’s weird because he has nothing to prove while Dean is making a goddamn drama out of a water cooler and some cucumber slices… 

ALL this does is show that “surface level Dean” is not the whole story of Dean… And it’s so utterly terrifying for some people, that the show over and over and over offers us windows to look inside Dean ANY time he breaks expectations in ANY way and see that “surface level Dean” is NOT Dean at all; he’s a character DEAN plays. If you can admit that much, you’re suddenly in the fucking void left behind of “WHO ACTUALLY IS DEAN” and answering that question honestly by looking at what the show tells us about Dean and understanding EVERY part of Dean’s “mr macho straight guy with the car and the guns and the beer” as a surface layer, that 99% of it is subverted openly and textually all the time (the 1% being the car thing because Dean x Baby is… like… untouchable, okay :P), well, it means you have to accept the “straight guy” part of it is as surface layer as the rest, BECAUSE THAT’S HOW DEAN PLAYS IT.

I don’t even know how you can LIKE Surface Dean. I think the general line is because he subverts masculinity by crying sometimes. A+ character depth.

Dean x Baby also has a surface layer and deeper meaning. His love for the car will never be challenged but his reasons behind that love were first assumed to be because he was a car guy and later revealed to be much deeper.

The macho car thing is usually about status. Male characters pick a cool car that they’ll look good in and also use their advanced car knowledge to either bond with or feel superior to other male characters. Dean’s referred to how cool the Impala is and used car knowledge to bond with other people, in the early seasons he seemed to be an average gearhead character who loved his car because it looked good and had impressive stats. 

Once we got below the surface we saw that Dean does have a general appreciation of cars but his love for Baby has little do with that. He fell in love with her as his home, a physical reminder of his family, and as an extension of himself. Dean’s put Baby in storage twice, while living with Lisa and for most of season 7. Car guys tend to be picky about what they’ll drive but during those times he didn’t care much about the looks or specs of the cars, he drove what was available and practical. Dean’s surface is that he’s a car guy but really he’s a one car guy who formed a deep, emotional connection to the Impala.