hope | On the fickleness of canon

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On the fickleness of canon

I was just chatting with

lea_ndra on the contradictory readings of Supernatural canon when it comes to how long Sam's been at Stanford.

Four years:
- I believe at one point Sam talks about being gone for four years, yes?
- Which fits in with Stanford's program in which a bachelor degree can be obtained in four years.
- Which, ostensibly, means that Sam in November of 2005 is about to get in to the last semester, and is applying to move on to law school.

Two years:
- Dean says he hasn't spoken to Sam in 'almost two years'
- Not sure of the variations college-by-college and culture-by-culture - Sam could be halfway through his degree, shifting to focus his major on pre-law.
- Eric Kripke has admitted he made a 'mistake', that he meant two years when he scripted in Sam to say four.

So, which one is the 'right' one? Which one is 'canon'? Are these the questions we should be even asking?

My firmest belief of, and joy in, texts and fan/audience readings is that there is no one answer, and there is no one author. Texts take on lives of their own beyond the control of the creator, become fluid and organic.

So by Kripke allegedly slipping up and saying Sam has been at Stanford four years, he's adding an ingredient to the soup that changes the flavour of every spoonful you taste.

- Sam is 22. Four years means he left for college pretty much right after he finished high school.
- Dean hasn't spoken to him for 2 years. This means that Dean had contact with Sam at some time during his first two years of college.
- Four years of college means he's almost obtained a degree - is right no the cusp, nothing half-assed about it.

For me at least, suggesting that Sam has only been at college for two years throws askew a whole lot of elements that have become integral to Sam's characterisation (or at least, my understanding of it):

- Sam is 22. This means he would have left his family for college when he was 20.
- If he finished high school at age 18, this means there are two years there where he's still with his family and not yet at college. Why would Sam do this, especially scholarship-worthy as he is?
- What happens in those two years? Why does Sam decide not to go to college immediately after school? Why does he decide to go to college two years on?
- Sam is still Sammy, a child, when he leaves for college in the four-year slant. He comes back to John and Dean an adult. In the two-year slant, he leaves as an adult.

lea_ndra suggested that in her understanding, the two-year one, Sam's childhood meant he missed out on a lot of schooling and thus finished high school a little later than usual. With this slant, Sam can still move directly from high school to college, but still, Sam still being around with his family at age 20 (instead of age 17-18) is a somewhat different dynamic than teenage!Sammy running off to California. Was his resentment toward John stronger, their fights more bitter due to the fact that Sam wasn't finishing school at the same time 'normal' kids did? or that Sam felt John had even less of a right to treat him as he did given he was no longer a child?

Tiny, tiny things, maybe-mistakes, that make such a huge difference. Is canon something that's defined by what is aired, released into the ether, never to be withdrawn? *can* the creator of a text alter its canon post-release by saying things like "actually, I meant to say two years"?

These questions blur into the slightly problematic (or at least, complex and layered) issues of texts with multiple authors. Scripts have some direction, mainly dialogue; the way an actor performs a scene goes great lengths to establishing meaning and tone in a text, often far beyond what is written. And even what is directed. Eg. Kripke might say there's no sexual innuendo between Sam and Dean, but Jensen Ackles slapped Jared Padalecki's ass when they were filming a scene for 'Bugs' - the fact that Dean slapped Sam's ass is canon, now, it has been released into the ether and copies of the text have spread virus-like. Even if in the DVD Dean's slap had been digitally removed, the DVD would only be another *version* of the text - the 'original' would still exist, on my hard drive at least.

So which is the definitive 'canon'? The show as it was aired? the show as it was re-aired, with Dean calling "Jared!" taken out? The drafts of scripts, the final scripts, the remastered DVDs? the story as the creators tell it in interviews etc? Or is canon an overlap, layers, a veritable lasagne of all these tasty carbohydrate sheets of text? What happens, then, when they're contradictory?

How do you define what's canon when strictly, it's only what's given to you by the text itself? When Sam left for college, how old he was, etc - we can speculate, and make educated guesses, but essentially, whatever we come up with *isn't* going to be canon, because it is never mentioned in the text.

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mmm... lasagne.

it is interesting to me that you spell it with an -e at the end. is that the australian way? because it is more correct (in the original italian) than the american way of spelling it, with an -a at the end.

just passing through and stuff I also thought 'mmm, lasagne'.

But in my family at least (British) we spell it Lasagne. That is all.

Yah, that's the only way I've ever known to spell it :)

Maybe Sam's been gone for 4 years, but Dean saw him halfway through the BA course because he couldn't bear the separation any longer?

They could have had something as simple as a phone conversation rather than a meeting. It could have even been a handwritten letter or two. *g* Or email. They don't specify, so it could have been any type of contact.

Or! An alternate theory: Sam spends two years at a local college(s) and then transfers to Stanford, since the LSAT and interview talk clearly indicate that he's in his final year.

Oh, this is fun. There are so many interesting theories. *g*

I prefer this literalness of canon to Kripke's ret-conning, yes :)

I'd have to go back and look at the transcript, but I'm nearly positive that Kripke said that the mistake was the Sam being away for two years. It should have been four. My understanding was that they'd originally meant for Sam to be 20 and then they aged him up to 22.

That makes sense. I like what the mistake has done, though.

I always thought the 2 years was the mistake; that Dean was supposed to say 4 but they tripped it up.

Personally? As a comic fan I've learned to pick and choose my canon; fact that you see is a must, creator intent counts for something but is loose canon at best.

Crap. You know what? I'll respond better later when I'm not using a Pocket PC and a friggen stylus.

Yeah,

monkeycrackmary gave me a verbal comment on this post, which was essentially "all canon is subjective, some is more subjective than others".

And I agree. This post isn't about finding which answer is the 'right' one, it's about rolling about gleefully in all the variations and contradictions and winchesters.

Yeah, monkeycrackmary gave me a verbal comment on this post, which was essentially "all canon is subjective, some is more subjective than others".

Yeah, she's used to Comics Canon and Continuity. Sometimes you've got to learn where to draw the line, especially once your fandom gets on in time and starts to contradict itself (A new writer comes on and ignores/forgets/doesn't know of a previous bit of canon) and give multiple explinations for the same thing.

And I agree. This post isn't about finding which answer is the 'right' one, it's about rolling about gleefully in all the variations and contradictions and winchesters.

Personally? Here's my theory on the 4/2 thing. In my own little land of Pre-Show SPN Sam left for college four years ago. He and Dean kept a half-assed correspondence for two years, writing a post card here and there but mostly playing phone tag with an occasional drop-by at Stanford from Dean. I think maybe somewhere around Sophmore/Junior year Sam started getting "busy" with his College Life and started taking longer and longer to leave a responding tag on Dean's voicemail until he just stopped all together.

Oh, also? I saw elsewhere in this post (Though going over it again I'm thinking it might have been a different one actually...) that someone said something about Sam being a year older than the average college senior. My personal opinion on that? Is that either he spent a year in one major before switching to another and therefor adding more time on or that he was undeclared for that first year ot so.

Or the third option, which is that he's been gone just over three years *g*. I get that by assuming Sam's just gone into his fourth/final year, which would have started September-October 2005, and is applying to enter law school autumn of 2006 (approx; I don't have a very clear idea of how the US manages university schedules), and therefore left August-ish for an autumn 2003 start. Then perhaps Sam and Dean were in contact for his first year and had an argument of their own later (maybe because Dean realised Sam definitely had no intention of returning to the family even for summer holidays), and so they haven't been in touch for two years. Fan-wankage, yes, but avoids the problems you identify with Sam having been in college only two years.

Wrt to the larger issue, I'm inclined to believe that things can't be retconned. (Original) aired material is canon. I don't like taking super-texts (either creator/actor etc comments or stuff like the website material or tie-in books) as canon (though it may be canonical) because the ordinary viewer won't have access to it; to me canon is the understanding had by a viewer who watches every ep but has no interest in fandom or seeking out extra stuff.

Thank you! This is how I always thought it should be. If Sam left for college in September right after he finished high school (Stanford is on quarters - Fall quarter starts end of Sept), he'd have been there just over 3 years when Dean shows up (just starting his senior year).
However, according to canon, he's 22 and a half when the show starts, and that's typically about a year older than most college seniors. I always wanked it that because of all the moving around, he wound up repeating a year at some point early in his education.
The "four years" thing could just be Dean rounding up, since Sam had started his fourth year, and I second your thought that they had their own falling out after Sam started school and thus haven't seen each other in two years (rather than three or four or whatever).

Wankwankwankwank...

I'm not a fan of retconning myself, unless all versions are still made available! once you've released a text into the wild, it takes on a life of its own. It's not like you can wind your kids back to their childhoods and do things differently this time, you just have to make do with all the things that have happened to make them as they are, as independent individuals. or just have more kids.

er, that metaphor got a bit carried away there.

Four years. Episode 107 - Hook Man. Sam and Dean go to the library to look up arrest records; they have two dusty boxes set on the table in front of them and they have this exchange:
Dean: So this is how you spent four good years of your life, huh?
Sam: Welcome to higher education.

Good point. I missed that.

ahah! thank you. sometimes it's just all one big blur...

I just happened to have that ep on in the background not long after I read this. Total luck on my part.

- Sam is 22. Four years means he left for college pretty much right after he finished high school.
- Dean hasn't spoken to him for 2 years. This means that Dean had contact with Sam at some time during his first two years of college.
- Four years of college means he's almost obtained a degree - is right no the cusp, nothing half-assed about it.

That's what I think--both are true. *g* Sam was away four years, but Dean hadn't had contact for two years. I think this because Sam was interviewing for law school, so I assumed he was about done with his bachelor's degree. The other scenario works, too, though, but I like this one better. *g*

the show as it was re-aired, with Dean calling "Jared!" taken out?

In what episode was that? I only saw from Scarecrow to Devil's Trap as they aired. I'm catching up with re-runs and YouTube.

I believe it was Hell House that Dean yelled "Jared!" I never picked it up myself, but there was lots of talk of it when it happened. I think they fixed it up when they re-aired it.

Ooh, I saw that one as it originally aired, so I must have missed that. Too cool, though. *g*

Also, I love your icon! :-)

Someone - sheesh - up there ^^ got it right. The mistake was the two year thing, rather then the four, and he's been in school for four.

I just wish we knew how long he'd been with Jess. If he and Dean were in contact for the first couple of years, they were only together for two, since she didn't know Dean...

Which means Sam and Dean had a falling out...fuck, plot bunnies!!!
*whaps them*
:)

I just wish we knew how long he'd been with Jess.

I believe in Route 666 he says something about keeping the secret from her for 18 months.

Ooh, yeah? Cool. I'd forgotten. I really dislike that ep - have to find a transcript.
Thanks!

here (http://www.twiztv.com/cgi-bin/supernatural.cgi?episode=http://dmca.free.fr/scripts/supernatural/season1/supernatural-113.htm) is one, but beware - TwizTV transcripts I've read in other fandoms sometimes make me weep. They're full of Stargate 'exhibitions' instead of 'expeditions', and 'pedalstools' instead of 'pedestals', which makes relying on them for quotes a risky business. *g*

*headdesk* So, second time around, this time with added proofreading! :D

Heeeeeeeee.
*pet pet*

I don't need *too* much. Tanks for the link!
*smooooch*

or like, yaknow, you could try my website, where I've archived a variety of all kinds of scripts from SPN ;)

http://supernatural.oscillating.net

Oooooh, thank you!
:)

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On the fickleness of canon

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