Review for 7x04 'Defending Your Life'

[galathea]

The current season seems to be on a roll. ♥ Defending Your Life by Adam Glass is a character drama that mainly focuses on Dean’s repressed guilt and self-worth issues, but it also uses Dean’s story to highlight Sam’s current state of mind. The episode does have its flaws – the execution of the excellent premise is not always as deep or extensive as I would have liked – but overall my excitement about the fact that Dean is finally forced to confront his issues outweighs my few points of critique for the episode by far. If S7 manages to keep this kind of quality up for the rest of the season, it could turn out to be one of my favourite seasons of the show.



You know what I love most about the season so far? That it feels so very personal and intimate. The stories are all character driven and the case files mainly serve to mirror aspects of the characters, which has always been the strength of Supernatural’s better monster of the week episodes. I especially welcome the intense focus on the psychological damage Sam and Dean suffered these past couple of years, and I hope that the writers see this storyline through, actually moving the characters forward this time. Now, while I feel that Sam’s character growth has been pretty consistent and continuous from the second half of S5 onwards – soulless shenanigans notwithstanding – and seems now at a stage where he is largely at peace, Dean has been stuck in a vicious circle of depression and self-destruction for years now. And in order for his character to grow he needs to be allowed to work his way out of his misery. Dean’s repress-and-soldier-on tactics have been increasingly less successful and it is time for him to confront the multitude of issues he carries around and deal with them, or he will stagnate as a person. So, the fact that the writers actually make room this season to explicitly address Dean’s problems excites me and makes me hopeful for his development.

In any case, throughout the episode it is obvious that Sam and Dean are in very different places at the moment. Sam is energetic and completely focused on the case. He acts quick-witted, competent and enthusiastic, eager to get back into the game. While Sam’s zeal feels genuine – it’s not like he is using work to run away from his problems – I think that keeping his mind focused on the job helps him to stay in the here and now. He still automatically uses pressure on his wounded hand when his grip on reality is slipping, but I think that the cuts in his hand should be mostly healed by now, so either Sam kept them open by worrying them constantly or touching the palm of his hand has become more of a reflex, and it doesn’t need the actual pain anymore to ground him. Now, Dean, on the other hand, is visibly tired and exhausted. He doesn’t even have the energy to do a simple salt and burn, and he seems barely able to get up from the bed when Sam brings the next case to his attention. The fact that Dean quickly loses focus while on the job is even more worrisome though. For example, when he visits a bar to follow up on a lead, he almost immediately hits the hard liquor instead of actually working the case, and I think it is the first time that we see Dean getting drunk on the job. Remember, back in Playthings Dean had been outraged when Sam drowned his sorrows in alcohol while they were working a case, and now Dean himself is unable to even make it through the day without a steady liquid diet. Dean’s drinking problem has become more and more pronounced over the years, and I am happy that the writers seem intent on addressing it more explicitly this season.

Osiris: "I don’t decide Dean’s guilt. I just weigh the guilt that’s already there. This is solely about how Dean feels. Way down deep. Them’s the breaks."
Sam: "Wait. So if Dean believes he’s innocent, then he is?"
Osiris: "If, a big if. Why do I bring up the past? People want to be judged. They really do. When your heart is heavy, let me tell you, real punishment is a mercy."

I admit, I have been ridiculously excited for Defending Your Life, ever since I read its episode description a couple of weeks back. After all, there is an enormous potential in the premise of lawyer Sam defending Dean against his own guilty conscience, not only for the individual growth of the characters, but also for the development of the brotherly relationship. In the end, Dean’s trial does not quite go where I thought it would, but it still offers some lovely brotherly moments. For example, I love the way Sam just insinuates himself in Osiris’ trial against Dean, unwilling to let his brother go through it alone and even offering himself up for a trial instead. I also think that it does Dean a world of good to see that Sam speaks up for him without hesitation, not only as his defender, but also when he is called in as a witness against him. I mean, Sam saying out loud that he does not blame Dean for anything may not change Dean's feelings of guilt right now, but maybe one day Dean will be able to think back to this moment and take comfort from it. Anyway, I think it is clear even before Osiris explains his modus operandi to Sam that he does not actually objectively judge the guilt of a person. Instead he simply assesses how the accused judge themselves. The alcoholic who killed a girl in a car accident, the guy who ran a dog fighting ring and the robber who killed a shop owner and his wife, they all deeply regretted what they had done and paid their dues to society, but they still never forgave themselves for their crimes. So, obviously Dean, who tends to carry the weight of the world on his shoulders, fits Osiris’ criteria perfectly. Osiris’ choice of witnesses, i.e. those Dean himself feels most guilty about, makes sense as well – Amy (probably because she is at the forefront of Dean’s mind at the moment), Sam and Jo.

I think it is telling that of all the reasons Dean could (wrongly) conjure up for feeling guilty where Jo is concerned – e.g. Meg almost killed Jo because she wanted to hurt Dean; Jo would not have fought Lucifer in the first place, if Dean had not broken the first seal; she sacrificed herself for Dean and he failed to make her sacrifice count – he chooses to condemn himself for the least likely one, namely for pulling Jo into the life of a hunter. Now, back in No Exit Dean did indulge Jo and allowed her to assist on his hunt instead of sending her back to Ellen right away, and the exhilaration of that first hunt undoubtedly reinforced Jo’s desire to become a hunter. However, Dean also strongly discouraged her from taking up hunting as a profession, until Jo explained to him that hunting is her way of feeling close to her beloved father. Jo wanted to follow in her father's footsteps long before Dean entered her life, and he knows that. I think Dean shows classic signs of cognitive dissonance and a corrective selective memory here. Dean’s self-image posits that he is a failure and that he pulls everyone down with him, so he selectively remembers only those details of his past that maintain said self-image, with the result that he subconsciously sabotages any impulse towards a positive change. Moreover, he also feels guilty for other people’s choices and actions. There is no doubt that Jo would have taken up hunting, no matter if Dean had indulged her or not, but instead of accepting that it was Jo’s choice to make, her tragic death pushes Dean to retroactively link all of her decisions to his own self-perceived weakness.

The same is true for Dean’s misplaced guilt of pulling Sam back into the life. It may be true that he approached Sam at Stanford because he didn’t want to hunt alone – by the way, nice reference to that crucial brotherly moment in the Pilot – and maybe he even used John’s disappearance as an excuse to see his little brother, but after their weekend together, Sam turned Dean down when he suggested that Sam could join him on the road more permanently. And when Jessica was killed, Sam had any number of options to choose from; he could simply have picked up his life and tried even harder to achieve his dreams, but it was his choice to go after Jessica’s killer instead. Dean didn’t even need to suggest it to him. So, just like in Jo’s case, Dean is hung up on one moment of weakness/indulgence on his part and believes that everything that came after is directly his responsibility, regardless of the fact that said 'moments of weakness' are not at all related to the choices Sam or Jo made. That’s also the reason why Sam’s reasonable defence arguments – i.e. that that Dean could not have known that Jessica would die and that he did not, in fact, kill Jo – have no effect on Dean; the real root of Dean’s guilt lies somewhere else entirely. Overall, there are plenty of things Dean could rightly feel guilty about, but the massive weight that crushes him is a consequence of Dean excessively taking on guilt that is not his to carry in the first place.

Dean’s guilt where Amy is concerned falls into a completely different category, however. Dean admits earlier in his conversation with Mia, the bartender, that he felt he had to kill Amy, that it was a compulsion Dean simply could not suppress even for his brother’s sake, and I think that further confirms that Dean’s actions had little to do with Sam himself and everything with where Dean’s head is at the moment. I am not under the impression that Dean feels guilty for killing Amy. He feels guilty because he betrayed Sam’s trust and openly lied to his brother’s face ever since, and the fact that Sam so earnestly thanked him for letting Amy go only serves to compound Dean’s feelings of guilt. Rightly so, I might add. Now, Dean has always chastised himself for letting the people he loves down, and I have no doubt that he feels he did just that when he went to kill Amy behind Sam’s back. The fact that Dean rather accepts Osiris’ death sentence than allowing him to call Amy to the stand suggests to me that he is unable to face Sam’s inevitable disappointment with him. Not to mention that I don’t think he is ready yet to explain himself to his brother.

That all being said, overall I think that Dean’s trial is not quite as effective and profound as I hoped it would be, and I think that is mostly a result of pacing problems. I mean, as much as I enjoy the case file of Defending Your Life, I think it takes up way too much time of the episode, time that should have been devoted to Dean’s trial in my opinion. There are parts of the trial that feel incredibly rushed to me, most notably the scene where Dean himself is called to the stand. Sam has barely any time to actually work on convincing Dean of his innocence and after his initial apt arguments about the deaths of Jessica and Jo, he is forced to more or less tell Dean how he should feel, rather than let him get there himself, which obviously defeats the whole purpose of the defence. If the writers had given Dean’s trial more room in the episode, they could not only have explored Dean’s psychological damage more deeply – to only bring up Dean’s guilt regarding Jo and Sam seems a bit simplistic given Dean’s complex past – but they could also have given Sam the time to actually address some of the unnecessary guilt issues between them, specifically. It could have made for a very emotional moment between the brothers, had things become more personal at some point. But well, overall the episode hits a lot of the right notes for me, so I am in a rather forgiving mood.

Dean: "You should be able to see that I am 90% crap. I get rid of that, what then?"
Jo: "You really want to die not knowing, Dean?"

While Dean’s trial gives us some interesting angles on his well-known guilt issues, I think it is actually Dean’s subsequent conversation with Jo’s ghost that offers a deeper insight into his mind. Two of Dean’s statements strike me as particularly meaningful. Firstly, there is Dean’s admission that the pain, the guilt and the self-loathing have been a part of who he is for so long now that he has no idea who he is without those feelings – and I think that scares the crap out of him. I mean, it is obvious that the excessive guilt Dean carries slowly destroys him from the inside out, and yet he clings to it because letting it go would strip him off a main part of his identity. I think this ties back nicely to Swan Song, where Dean conceded that he needs to grow up and find new ways to define himself, but there has been little actual progress since then, and I now think that Dean is not only clueless about how to establish a new self-identity, he is also afraid of the change. Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t and all that. Dean’s resigned reaction to Jo’s question if he really wants to die not knowing who he is, who he could be without all that unnecessary ballast, is as heartbreaking as it is frustrating. I have no doubt that Dean believes that the effort is not worth it, that he can never be anything but a failure, but I would really like to see him fighting for himself for once.

Secondly, there is Dean’s statement that Sam and Jo have only been kids, whom he failed to protect from losing their innocence. This resonates with Dean’s misplaced feelings of guilt for pulling his brother and Jo into the hunter’s life because he had a moment of weakness. I mean, the fact that Dean believes that he 'tainted' Sam and Jo by simple association because he, as a hunter, has never really been innocent in the first place, further explains why Dean is so hung up on that particular issue. However, neither Sam nor Jo have actually been innocent at the time - at least not in Dean's sense of the word - and I think that, in fact, said innocence is simply projected onto them by Dean. Of course this applies especially to Sam, not least because Dean has been Sam’s primary caretaker ever since he was a child. In a way, he took Sam’s innocence when he told Sam that monsters are real in A Very Supernatural Christmas and he knows that, despite his efforts to protect his little brother, Sam has never felt safe again, until he left for Stanford – and then Dean came to get him from there as well. I also love how this ties back to Something Wicked, where Dean mourned Sam’s loss of innocence as well, but never wished it back for himself, and to know that he believes that there is nothing for him to have back in the first place makes that moment even more poignant.

Dean: "You really feel like your slate’s wiped?"
Sam: "No. Nothing ever gets wiped, you know. Sometimes I see freaking Lucifer when I brush my teeth. But, I don’t know, I guess I just finally feel like my past is my past and I can move on with my life. You know, hopefully."
Dean: "Easier said than done."

The final conversation between Sam and Dean is my favourite scene of the episode, no surprise there, I guess. I love that Dean asks Sam why Osiris did not put him on trial as well, but then does not show any signs of resentment or anger when Sam tells him that, since he paid his dues for his sins, he does not feel guilty anymore. I think Sam's mindset here is a wonderful illustration of Osiris’ earlier statement that when someone’s heart is heavy, punishment can be a mercy. In a way, Sam's time in the cage has been both a curse and a blessing for him. Lucifer’s torment almost destroyed him in mind and soul, but it also granted him atonement for his personal failures and thus allowed him to make peace with his past - a peace Dean has yet to find for himself, unsurprisingly so. After all, the brothers’ hell experiences have been nothing alike. I mean, Sam was a victim in hell. He willingly accepted the cage as a punishment for his wrong choices, and in turn he was purged of the guilt he felt for playing his part in the apocalypse. Sam paid his debt and, unless they find a way to fix his mental problems, he probably will for the rest of his life. Dean, on the other hand, became a torturer in hell. He was a perpetrator, at least in his own mind, and I have no doubt that from Dean’s perspective those ten years of torturing souls wiped out the thirty years of suffering he endured before. It is of no consequence for Dean that breaking in hell was a result of him being victimised, he blames himself nonetheless. Essentially, Dean took on a whole new mountain of guilt when he was in hell and, consequentially, his issues have only been cemented by the experience.

So, where will Dean go from here? In the end, it doesn’t seem as if the open confrontation with his guilt and self-worth issues allowed Dean to make any real progress where overcoming his psychological problems is concerned, and I find that disheartening. Now, it is not exactly a surprise that Jo’s absolution or Sam’s defence of his choices do not change how Dean feels about himself. Dean has never been able to accept praise or forgiveness in the past either, so why would he accept it now, when the guilt he accumulated is even worse? Dean’s psychological damage is so deeply seated and reaches so far back into his childhood that it seems almost impossible for him to heal from it, and I wonder what could possibly trigger a change at this point. I guess it is fair to say that the change has to come from within Dean, he needs to want to let go of his guilt. I still hope that it will be Sam who gives Dean the motivation to move on, not only because Sam can lead Dean by example, but also because having Sam at his side, solid and steady, will give Dean something to build on. I mean, in the last three episodes it has been Dean’s greatest fear that, one way or another, he will lose Sam again, and maybe just having his fears proven wrong will allow him to at least have hope again. I think that, this time, Dean truly believes Sam when he says that he feels good, and that is a first step in the right direction. In any case, I really hope that the events in Defending Your Life will provide some momentum for Dean’s arc this season, and I nurture the hope that maybe the Amy reveal will be cathartic for Dean instead of the time bomb everyone believes it to be.

What else is noteworthy:

(1) I wonder how Bobby managed to build a new base of operation so quickly. The episode suggests that not a lot of time has passed between The Girl Next Door and Defending Your Life, but Bobby seems to have organised moderate accommodations at least and obviously retrieved his spare book collection. Although, considering that the man built the panic room when he had a weekend off, fitting out a temporary home base might not have posed that much of a challenge. I am curious as to where he is staying though. One of Rufus’ old places? A storage unit, like the one John kept? Inquiring minds want to know! Also, I love that Bobby immediately knows that Dean is in danger when he identifies Osiris as the likely culprit behind the deaths, and that he puts Dean’s well-being ahead of solving the case – and saving other people’s lives – without hesitation. The way Bobby and Dean’s affectionate father-and-son relationship has consistently been highlighted these last four episodes is just one more reason to love S7 so far.

(2) I love the little moment in front of the bar, where a nervous Dean tries to talk himself into hooking up with Mia, and I assume that this is actually the first time Dean tries to hook up ever since his relationship with Lisa ended. I think it is very telling that he doesn’t feel entirely comfortable with it, and I don’t think that’s just owed to the fact that it has been a while since he put himself out there or that he isn’t at his best at the moment. I mean, back in Exile On Main Street Dean easily turned the advances of an attractive bartender down, and his tender dream about Lisa in The Third Man effectively conveyed that he enjoyed the level of intimacy he had with Lisa first and foremost. To go back to meaningless one-night stands after experiencing a steady and loving relationship is bound to feel hollow for Dean – especially since it was not the lack of affection that destroyed his relationship with Lisa in the first place. I love that Dean is unable to just go back to his old ways, and it fits well with his current depression, too.

In conclusion: I said it before, but I think it bears repeating: These first four episodes of the season remind me a lot of the four episode mini-arc at the beginning of S2, which concisely dealt with John’s death and Sam and Dean’s psychological issues in the aftermath, and anyone who knows me is probably aware that I have no higher praise to give to the writers. I expect the show to focus more on case files and leviathan shenanigans for the next couple of episodes, only to return to Sam and Dean’s issues around mid-season, probably when the truth about Amy comes to light. And I am quite okay with that.