But wearing the clothes and aping the speech patterns of the deceased isn't healthy, uh, self-actualised behaviour. If Sam or Dean did that, we'd think it way strange, no?

Isn't that what Dean does? Wear the clothes, drive the car, and listen to the music his Dad did?

I know that point was made by Sam (under the influence of a ghost or somesuch) at some point, but I think that after a few years, once that's fully adopted, it becomes irrelevant. At this point in time, if that was ever true, Dean has fully assimilated whatever John-attributes he was assimilating. And from over a lot longer period of time. Probably from the age of 4.

And don't kids do that? Learn from their parents?

My older brother and dad fight like cats and dogs, and they're the most the same, even down to their engineering-type OCD. I think my older brother fought hard to be not like dad, and yet he is, except with drugs.

I'd say if it's your parent whose shoes you're trying to fill, a bit of mimicry is more understandable.

Isn't that what Dean does? Wear the clothes, drive the car, and listen to the music his Dad did?

You mean reflect a lot of the traits, values, and habits that were displayed during the formative years of his upbringing, especially an upbringing with few other constant influences? Yes.

Do you think that's what Garth is doing? Is his bond to Bobby comparable to Dean's with John? By length of time? Intensity of exposure? Do you think the narrative would support a non-Winchester (or Milligan) telling Dean to snap out of it and stop feeling like he had any more claim to his father's memory than anyone else?

By which I mean to say that I see a HUGE difference between incorporating a lifetime of leadership, parenthood, and hero-worship into your character, and living a life, meeting a dude, and incorporating what characteristics you glean into your own already-formed personality (blank as it may seem to be).

Or, you know, what ita ! said.

To be fair, I think people are harshing on Garth a bit. He obviously knew Bobby, he'd worked with him in the past, we don't know how extensively, it may have been more than a few times, maybe not, but it was definitely enough that he reconized Bobby's speech patterns. Enough times to know about the multiple phones and the role that Bobby played in the community. And somehow he came into possession of at least some of Bobby's invaluable books. Yes, the Winchesters will always and forever be Bobby's boys, but that does not mean that Bobby didn't have other people in his life (Rufus, for example) who were also important to him.

People harshing on Garth may be a bit unfair, but so far in this thread the harshing seems warranted and taken with a grain of salt.

I dig the "he was a bit creepy and needed a bit of a smackdown from Dean" and I dig Dean getting schooled on not owning Bobby's memory (and I love the look of respect/acknowledgment he gives Garth at that point).

But, yeah, there's filling a role (the phones/backup/knowledge-base) and then there's, as has been said, aping him. Which is insulting to Bobby as well as those surviving him.

But my takeaway from the ep was good vibes for Garth, and I loved that he got BALLS right in the end.

Garth is repeatedly portrayed as a guy who doesn't get the subtleties of...interaction. And not in the way Dean fails (or used to fail--it's been hammered out of him along with his sense of fun...much rarer a deal), for me, just fail fail.

I have a chronic impatience with those behaviours--in fiction and in real life. So far in this thread it's basically me harshing on him--everyone else has been pretty pleased with him and how he's written.

There's always been something about the simpleton-sees-through-all-isn't-simple-at-all trope that bothers me, and although Sam has had a lot of space during the past year to process his feelings on a whole lot, Dean's probably emotionally at a standstill for luxurious things like closure. Plus, he started out with a hell of a handicap--he's not Mr. Letting Go at the best of times.

There's no way Garth knows the whole deal of what's been up with him, and possibly also not the depth of the Singer-Winchester connection--however important Bobby clearly was to the community, he was an ersatz (ugh, maybe that shorts John too much) parental figure for Dean who needed as much parenting as he could get, and it was a mutual thing, given Bobby's death episode.

I felt like the narrative was telling Dean to hush up and get over it, and I say--fuck it and wallow, Dean. Apart from everything else, Garth is actually being ridiculous as well as fulfilling an important role in the community.

And if I were in the story, I'd be yelling at Garth telling him that he can be the phone bank and knowledge dispenser, but he has a grip he needs to get too.

Unrelatedly, Supernatural fandom--we don't have a cute name, do we? Like X-Philes, or anything? Why not? I feel we deserve it--something nice, I mean.

All the good names involving "Super" are taken by the Superman, Superboy, Supergirl and Superdog fans?