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Home , Castiel (Supernatural), Jared Padalecki, MegaCon, Misha Collins, Star Wars (radio series), Supernatural (season 1)

SQUISHY HUGS Why is , AB’97, the object of so much affection?

By Carrie Golus, AB’91, AM’93

Anonymous asked: how do you ask jensen and misha to give you one of those really tight hugs, do i just ask them for a ‘squishy’ hug, would they get what im talking about? lol (im so nervous)

Answer: Hi there Yep, they would understand what you mean if you asked them for that. Have fun!

—spncontips.tumblr.com

isha Collins, AB’97, calls himself tee-ELL, or Cass for short—on the television “a C-list celebrity.” He’s a C-list series . A bit like Collins, celebrity whose photo ops at fan Supernatural is the most successful show you conventions can include a hug, if might not have heard of: last season it averaged desired, but that’s it: “PLEASE DO 1.8 million viewers, compared with 22 million MNOT KISS THE GUESTS,” the guidelines state. for NFL Sunday Night Football and 18.9 million Who inspires fans to create art in any number for zombie drama The Walking Dead. of media, including sculpture, video, and melted Nonetheless, Supernatural is its 12th season crayon. Who, at this writing, has 2.6 million on the CW network, making it one of the followers known as “minions”—not to longest-running TV shows of all time. At press be confused with the especially ardent fans who time it had just been renewed for a 13th season. call themselves “Mishawives.” (Legally Collins Supernatural centers on two brothers,

Supernatural fan has just one wife, writer Victoria Vantoch, Sam and , who lead a lonely, Rachel Howard AB’97. They have been together since high peripatetic existence, hunting , , displays a crocheted school and have two young children.) and other supernatural phenomena. The show blanket featuring For the uninitiated, Collins plays the functions like a love letter to vintage cars, Collins’s face. See more of her fan art —pronounced with three syllables, Cass- cheap motel rooms, diners, guns, beer, whiskey, at crocheter-of-

Photography by Michael Vendiola by Photography faces.tumblr.com.

18 / The Core Winter 2017 / 19 n the 2013 essay “#Bowdown to Your If his tweets are New God: Misha Collins and Decentered I Authorship in the Digital Age,” Louisa Stein, to be believed, his a film scholar at Middlebury College, claims that Collins uses social media with “dadaist relationship with creativity” to create “a distinct star text.” As Collins tells the story, in 2009 the Queen Elizabeth II network asked him to answer fan questions on its Twitter account. He thought, “They’re going to be looking over my shoulder and I’m not is particularly going to be able to swear,” so he set up his own account instead. tumultuous. Rather than following the usual celebrity Twitter formula—sharing mundane details of ordinary life—he “created this slightly surreal He did love the radio though—National persona,” he says. “I was the self-important Public Radio in particular. “I guess I was pretty celebrity who was actually in incredibly fannish,” he admits. In the early 1990s he had important situations at all times.” He tweeted an internship at NPR, working alongside Susan about his (fictional) friendships with various Stamberg, , , Bob world leaders, who requested his advice or Edwards. “I got a rush from it,” he says, “but I sexual favors. If his tweets are to be believed, didn’t make paintings of them at night.” his relationship with Queen Elizabeth II At UChicago, Collins majored in sociology, is particularly tumultuous. Last June he participated in Scav, and performed in one play, characterized Brexit as their “conscious Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All for You, “in uncoupling.” The tweet included a Tom of a classroom with plenty of empty seats.” He Finland-style erotic painting of the pair. had considered going into politics. But after Stein sees something subversive in Collins’s an internship in the Clinton White House (his grandiose tweets, given that his role on time there did not coincide with a more famous Supernatural is “somewhere between marginal intern), he decided it was not right for him. and nonexistent.” He uses social media, she So he decided to try acting. “I went to claims, to play with his “marginal status as Hollywood with the intention of getting famous, renegade character actor.” with no intention of staying an actor, so I could “Marginal” is an overstatement, but classic rock, and small-town America, though But the fans adored Castiel. He was use that celebrity to have some sort of positive Stein is onto something: compared to how it’s actually shot in Canada. innocent, socially awkward, and nice to look at, impact on the world,” he says. “This sounds like frequently he appears on the show, Collins There’s a lot of stabbing with silver knives, despite his frumpy trench coat. the ravings of an arrogant crazy person.” plays a disproportionately important role shooting with salt bullets, spray painting of In an essay for the book Fan Phenomena: Collins played guest roles on TV shows such in Supernatural fandom. Sam and Dean are satanic-looking symbols, and Latin spells. A 2016 Supernatural (Intellect Ltd, 2014), Collins as 24, ER, and Nip/Tuck but was fairly unknown the stars. Castiel gets a bit of screen time in PR Newswire poll found that Republicans ranked it recalls the screening party for the first Castiel before Supernatural. During his first season on roughly one episode in three. their No. 1 show; for Democrats it was No. 3, behind episode. When his character appeared, writer- the show, he would lurk on the website Television Collins’s favorite Supernatural episode is Game of Thrones and The Haves and Have Nots. producer whispered to him, “Your Without Pity, a proto-social networking site for “The French Mistake,” one of the so-called Collins first appeared in 2008, at the life is about to change.” TV fans. Collins—who just wanted to know if fans meta episodes, of which there are many. beginning of season 4, playing the angel who Collins writes: “I thought, ‘That is a liked him so he could estimate how long his job This particular example is “the most violent rescues Dean from hell. His first line, delivered truly arrogant thing for a producer of a CW would last—found the discussions “baffling,” he shattering of a fourth wall I think in television in the monotone that would become Castiel’s television show to say. I’ve been on plenty says. “There was a fervor and a passion to this history,” he says. In the 2011 episode—the title signature: “I’m the one who gripped you tight of television shows. My life is going to stay discourse that really shocked me.” is a reference to the Mel Brooks movie Blazing Crocheted and raised you from perdition.” This unlikely exactly the same.’ … Well Sera, I think I owe you Castiel dolls are He was asked to do interviews, both with Saddles—Sam and Dean find themselves in phrase is now available on T-shirts. an apology for that thought.” an international journalists and onstage at Supernatural fan an alternative universe where Supernatural is Castiel was intended to have a three-show phenomenon. The conventions. At first he tried to cultivate a certain a television show. (Dean: “Why? Why would story arc. “As a guest star, your prospects of am not now, nor have I ever been, a member doll on the left was public persona, “the coolest, most composed, anybody want to watch our lives?” Sam: “Well, made by Aleksandra having a long run are very slim,” says Collins. of any fandom,” says Collins, born Dmitri Chiel in , the sexiest version of myself,” modeled after Marilyn I mean, according to that interviewer, not very “I was kind of just waiting to be killed.” Krushnic in in 1974. (Collins is an old doll on the right by Monroe and other stars of classic Hollywood. many people do.”) I Heather Wykoff of Supernatural fans tend to hate anyone who family name; he’s always been called Misha.) His But his early interviews went badly. So Collins The episode spoofs both Collins’s social takes screen time away from Sam and Dean— mother was “a hippie,” so the family didn’t have a Crafty Geek Girls in took a radically different, more playful approach: media presence and his attempts to fit in with . Both both complex, sympathetic characters played television. “I never really developed those neural are for sale on craft interviews could be “an opportunity to riff and the show’s stars. He plays a shallow, irritating

Photography by MIchael Vendiola by Photography by former models. networks that process pop culture very well.” site Etsy. improvise and to have fun.” A star text was born. version of himself, tweeting constantly at his

20 / The Core Winter 2017 / 21 Photo op costs

According to a 2016 Hollywood Reporter article, some stars make more money fans, whom he calls “mishamigos”—“‘Ever ollins is on Facebook too. He uses from convention get that feeling … someone’s in the backseat?’ it to live-stream interviews and appearances than Frowny face”—before he is abducted and announcements. Once he streamed from their movies C or TV shows. Here’s brutally murdered. Some of the tweets he taps footage of an actual mountain stream. He the going rate for out in the show appeared on his real Twitter also posts videos to YouTube, including eight fan favorites. account. (Apparently he didn’t have time to a spoof cooking show starring his son, post that last one.) Cooking Fast and Fresh with West. (See In an influential 1956Psychiatry article recipe on page 32.) Fan Expo on fan behavior, Donald Horton and R. But for the bulk of Supernatural fans, Canada 2016 Richard Wohl used the term “parasocial the preferred social media platform is interaction” to describe fans’ relationships Tumblr. It’s a treasure trove of fan art, () with celebrities. “I like that term,” says fiction, and community. $200/photo Collins. “It is kind of contrived.” Social Some fan artists are content to post media seems to collapse the distance photos of their creations on Tumblr. Comic-Con between celebrity and fan; you can strike Others bring their work to Supernatural New York 2017 up a conversation as if you’re friends. But a conventions. Depending on the medium, Matt Smith celebrity’s social media account remains “de they can have it signed by the celebrity or (Doctor Who) facto a one-way stream of communication,” pay to have a photo taken with the object $105/photo says Collins. “That hazy line is to me an and the celebrity—and then post that interesting thing to play with.” image on Tumblr. 50 Year Mission In one 2013 stunt, while Collins was Photo documentation can be an Tour 2016 answering fan questions on Twitter, he wrote, expensive hobby. Photos with Collins at “This typing is too tedious. I feel i could be the 2017 Chicago convention cost $90; a () much more efficient on the phone. Why don’t “sandwich photo” with the show’s stars, A fan at the 2016 $100/photo you call me with questions. (323) 790–4967.” and , is Chicago convention “People went bonkers, because it was so $329. “If you want a hug, go for a ‘hug dressed as Castiel and covered in completely out of the norm,” he says. “Our shot,’” the information page states. Fan Expo handmade bees, a Dallas 2016 understanding of what a phone number is— “Please do not ask for a hug before or reference to his it’s such an intensely intimate thing to own after the photo is taken as it takes up bee obsession in about a person.” In fact it was a Google voice someone else’s photo op time.” Admission season 7. (Spider-Man creator) number that he shut down soon afterward. to the convention costs extra—up to $100/autograph One fan who was lucky enough to get $1,600 for the gold weekend package with through asked him the meaning of life and was front-row seats. told, “Kale.” The Daily Dot’s headline about Some fans want to give their artwork why he decided to be so goofy online. Supernatural Con the incident: “Supernatural Star Posts Phone to the celebrity depicted. “I don’t know Rather than supplying celebrity bromides, Chicago 2017 Number, Politely Trolls Fans.” what to do with all of the paintings of my Collins wanted to reciprocate in kind: “to Misha Collins Collins ended up with 175,000 voice mails: face,” says Collins. “I think it would make engage and be playful with the fandom,” (Supernatural) “That must have cost Google something. people really uncomfortable to have them he says. “I saw that there was all of this $90/photo That’s quite a bit of data,” he says. He also all up on the wall.” For the moment he’s creative energy being expended on acts of received a cease-and-desist letter from a small storing them, with the idea of curating an fan devotion.” Megacon Orlando business with a similar phone number. Enough exhibition someday. Devotion is exactly what it is, says 2017 fans had misdialed to jam its phone lines. He lets his children play with the dolls UChicago historian Rachel Fulton Brown, Despite Collins’s tricks, the canyon between he receives. “They call them Minidad,” whose research encompasses both (Batman) celebrity and fan remains unbridged. “I just he says. “They’re slowly starting to illustrated medieval prayer books (“fan $65/photo had an interaction with a fan whom I’ve understand that I work on a TV show, fiction” for the Virgin Mary, she says) and met probably 10 times,” he says. “I couldn’t although they don’t quite understand what J. R. R. Tolkien. Wizard World Kelsie Seybert sells remember her name. My brain can’t handle a TV show is.” (Son West, 6, and daughter “They’re clearly responding to Portland 2017 made-to-order it, there’s too many.” (Counting just Twitter Maison, 4, are allowed to watch cartoons his beauty,” Fulton Brown says of the Erik Estrada watercolor paintings (CHiPs) of Castiel and Dean followers, that would be 2.6 million and nature documentaries when they’re artists who create likenesses of Castiel/ $45/photo at her Etsy store, names; for comparison, the English sick. They have never seen Supernatural.) Collins. “When you’re in the presence RedStarCrochet. language has 170,000 words in Certain fan creations require “a year of beauty, the desire to draw it is almost current use.) “You would expect, of work to produce. They are incredibly overwhelming. It’s an act of seeing, of 2017 having met somebody 10 times, time-consuming, incredibly hard to giving it back.” But given the religious Lou Ferrigno of course they’re going to know make,” Collins says. “People really pour context of the show, it’s not just about (The Incredible my name by now. So it puts a their hearts and souls into these works.” physical beauty: “You sense he also has Hulk)

Watercolor by Kelsie Seybert Kelsie by Watercolor strain on that dynamic.” Olivia Miller Joy by Photography The fans’ passion and creativity is partly contact with spiritual beauty.” $40/photo

22 / The Core Winter 2017 / 23 See more of Kai Grover’s fan art at cluelessakemi.tumblr.com. Some images reference traditional Christian iconography. Others are more playful, such as a drawing of Cass doing yoga with goats.

The choice of time-consuming media—crochet, oon after Collins began tweeting, he realized that needlepoint, Perler beads—is significant. (“The neck is “maybe there was something more that could be pretty boring,” says Rachel Howard, who crocheted the S mined” from his social media presence, “that isn’t blanket on page 18. “Then you get to the face. The best just in the realm of surreal play.” When an earthquake part is the eyes—you can really see it coming to life.”) hit Haiti in 2010, he asked his fans to donate to UNICEF. “As an artist, you “As an artist, you are gazing on the thing that gives you Within hours they raised $30,000. the most joy,” Fulton Brown says. “Of course they’re In 2011 he organized the Greatest International are gazing on the going to do something that takes an immense amount Scavenger Hunt the World Has Ever Seen of attention. That’s the only way you can actually be in (GISHWHES), a weeklong event modeled after thing that gives the presence of the beloved.” UChicago’s Scav. The money raised from registration fees helps support his charity, Random Acts, “aiming you the most s well as visual artwork, fans have created an to conquer the world, one random act of kindness at a untold amount of Supernatural fan fiction. A lot time.” Random Acts supports programs such as a high joy. ... Of course A of it is “slash,” sexually explicit stories, typically school in Nicaragua and a children’s center in Haiti, as written by women about two male characters. (The term well as the Annual Melee of Kindness (AMOK), a global derives from Kirk/Spock stories that first appeared day of kindness—meaning whatever participants want it you’re going to in the 1970s.) Many flavors ofSupernatural slash to mean. exist, pairing various characters at various degrees of GISHWHES now has more than 20,000 participants do something transgressiveness. Castiel is usually “shipped”—put in a from 100 countries and has earned several Guinness relationship—with Dean, whom he rescued from hell. It’s world records, including the longest safety pin chain that takes an called Destiel. and the largest online photo album of hugs. Collins first came across Destiel “The goal of the whole game,” according to a enormous amount accidentally in the early days of researching 2015 article in Vanity Fair, “lies somewhere the fandom. He remembers thinking, “Oh between ‘do good’ and ‘be funny.’” wow, this is cool, the fans have written Occasionally “be funny” wins out over of attention.” something”—until he got to the part where “do good.” During the 2013 hunt, “NASA —History professor Cass performs a certain carnal act upon did post an official tweet asking us to Dean. Collins was surprised, and a stop bothering the astronauts on the Rachel Fulton Brown little shocked. He has avoided slash International Space Station,” Collins ever since. told Larry King. “I don’t know why Collins told that anecdote during they made such a big deal out of it. his onstage appearance last fall at I mean, what are they doing up there Chicago’s Supernatural convention, that’s so important?” held in suburban Rosemont: “I know The 15-member winning team gets there’s a lot of stuff going on on an all-expenses-paid trip somewhere— Tumblr that I’m not supposed to see.” Costa Rica, Croatia, Scotland—with That got a laugh out of the audience—about Collins hosting. The 2016 winners, Team 1,700 fans, almost all women. RaisedFromPerdition, will travel to Iceland for “dog Chewing gum and wearing a gray blazer, Collins sledding on a glacier, partying inside a volcano, and gamely answered questions about his children, his thermal hot springs water fights.” favorite travel destinations (India and Tibet), and how Some past GISHWHES winners have been scavenger Castiel managed to get a job at the Gas-n-Sip with no hunt aficionados, “and not really known much or ID or last name. anything about me, which has been awesome,” Collins There happened to be a Star Trek convention in says. “Some have been really quite fannish.” Rosemont the same weekend. So earlier in the day, What’s it like to go on these trips with fans—spending Collins had put on a red shirt and Spock ears and lined entire days parasocializing, unmediated by technology? up to ask a question of William Shatner, a good friend, “I need a break after a few hours of that kind of intense during his onstage appearance. attention,” Collins says. Of course Collins streamed the whole thing on “I imagine that’s what it’s like to be a politician on Facebook. Someone who calls him “Mr. Collins” the campaign trail, where all eyes are on you and you bumps him to the front of the queue. His question: have to be on. I don’t personally have the capacity to What was the origin of the phrase “May the Force be do that for long stretches at a time.” When it gets to with you”? be too much, “I often sneak off on my own, go to my But Shatner didn’t recognize him, Collins told the room, read. fans back at the Supernatural convention: “I was just “I think I’m kind of an introvert,” he says. “So it’s a

Charcoal and pastel drawing by Kai Grover Kai by drawing and pastel Charcoal Michael Vendiola by (UK); Photography Ninni and Perkie by buttons Hand-drawn another asshole fan.” strange position for me to be in.” ❁

24 / The Core Winter 2017 / 25