MEAWW.COM / ENTERTAINMENT / TV

'Supernatural' Season 15 Episode 18: 'Despair' episode angers Destiel shippers and non-shippers alike

With this episode, 'Supernatural' just killed something besides Castiel; the writers shut the door on depicting two men handling a close friendship, or romantic love, or even deal with a one-sided attraction in a mature way

By making Castiel confess his love to Dean, minutes before he got sucked into the Empty and basically died, the show has managed to piss off Destiel shippers and non-shippers alike. After the episode 'broke' the Internet, the 'Supernatural' fandom converged on Twitter. Some had grown up with the show and had stopped watching around Season 8 or 10. Some were new fans but thanks to the longevity of tumblr and fanfiction.net posts knew exactly what a big thing Destiel was, back in the day.

While Destiel has always been a 'thing', a majority of the fandom liked the Dean and Cas pairing because it showed a deep and abiding friendship and brotherhood between two men. This section of the fandom has always found Destiel irritating because it assumed that two men can't have a deep bond without a romantic or sexual interest in each other. It was why the phenomenon of that cringey term 'bromance' became so big as popular culture became more comfortable with two grown men showing platonic but deep affection for each other publicly. Raise your hands if you have seen Jude Law and Robert Downey Jr. cavort on Graham Norton's show's couch multiple times with joy because men were finally enjoying same-sex friendships as openly as women are able to.  

But within patriarchy, demonstrated affection by men has always been suspect. So much so that generations of boys grew into men without their gruff fathers ever telling them they "loved" them or receiving any visible signs of explicit love. 'Supernatural' was one of the first shows that delved into the emotional lives of men. For that reason alone, it will always be a pioneering show. It showed how deeply men can feel towards the other men in their lives -- be it fathers, brothers or friends.

Castiel and Dean became best friends over seasons. Dean considers him as the third 'unofficial' Winchester -- he is family born out of friendship and shared tough times. Castiel has won Dean's skittish trust by being there for him over and over again, right in the trenches with them. It is the sort of brotherhood and emotionality that emerges when boys go off to war together and come back as men. Whether you believe in Destiel -- a romance born out of true friendship -- or see them as brother-in-arms, their bond was and has been undeniable. 

But in the past few years, Castiel has become a reliable but mostly absent friend. 'Despair', the latest episode of 'Supernatural' was for shippers and non-shippers alike, the final nail in the coffin. For Destiel shippers, it was 'burying the gay' trope come to life in fast forward.

For non-shippers, Castiel suddenly 'confessing' his love for Dean was a weird and forced moment -- especially after the show has spent seasons convincing everybody that Castiel's affection for Dean was familial and brotherly and vice versa. Then there was the dynamics of the acting in the scene itself, with Misha Collins making it sound like it was a romantic confession while Jensen Ackles looked a little annoyed about having to deal with it.

Reactions from both sides of the fandom flooded Twitter after the episode aired. One fan said: "#Supernatural is the longest hate crime and we're out here accepting the queer baiting" with multiple screenshots of agonized posts by Destiel shippers, while another fan tweeted: "Im not happy at all. its queerbaiting wrapped in a one sided love confession and dunked in an obsene amount of bury your gays, to create the ultimate homophobic plot device ever seen. The f**king memes are hilarious though and they hit my stressed out election brain JUST RIGHT."  

Fans also circulated memes that have cropped up since the episode aired to show just how awkward the scene was on-screen. For instance, a meme was created around the hilarious moment from 'The Office' when Michael Scott kisses Oscar to show that he is not homophobic. Fans were comparing Oscar's reaction to how Dean reacted to Castiel's confession. Others complained about how weird it was to suddenly after so many seasons revive Destiel just to generate a buzz. "You guys are really excited over Dean and Cas? Like that sh*t makes no sense. How are you going to make best friend/brotherly love.. into actually love and then destroy a second later?? Make it make sense," tweeted one fan. Another user reiterated that: "I have never seen Cas and Dean in a romantic light. Two men loving each other doesn’t have to be romantic. That is what makes this show so different, because it’s a bunch of men who know how to show their feels. Brothers, best friends, family. #Supernatural". 

In the past five seasons or so, Cas and Dean's bond has slowly been whittled away in front of our eyes by giving Castiel less and less screen time or having Castiel pair up with anyone except Dean. If they hadn't killed Castiel two seconds after his confession, we would at the very least have a very real-life situation of a gay man falling in love with a straight man or closeted bisexual man, depending on how you see Dean, and dealing with that situation in a very real way. But no. With this episode, 'Supernatural' just killed something besides Castiel; the writers shut the door on depicting two men handling a close friendship, or romantic love, or even deal with a one-sided attraction in a mature way. And that's a pity. 

'Supernatural' airs on Thursdays at 8/7c on The CW.