I actually found S4 Sam pretty relatable, but I'm also the weird, rare person who spent the entirety of S4 saying, 'guys, I think maybe Sam has a point . . .'.
I distinguish Sam using his powers/demon blood from his interpersonal behavior with Dean. I don't think that Sam was self-evidently wrong in deciding to use his powers, or even in deciding to drink demon blood. If there's even the remotest chance that drinking demon blood will save the world--and I don't think it's irrational for Sam to believe there is--then arguably you absolutely should do that, even if it damns you as an individual. And especially if you believe that you're inherently doomed, as I think Sam did at that point. If you can't save yourself, you might as well save everyone else. As much as I love S4, I think the the two big mistakes of that season were waiting until 4.16 to reveal what Sam was up to, and casting Genevieve Cortese as Ruby. The former made it hard for the audience to identify with Sam, and the latter made Sam look stupid because Gen just wasn't very good at playing a master manipulator, and that made it hard to understand why Sam got sucked in. Picture, say, Six from Battlestar Galactica or Alice from Luther (assuming you've seen either of those shows), and Sam's arc gets more sympathetic.
Sam's behavior toward Dean in S4 was pretty inexcusable, but I think it came from pre-established character traits. He'd spent his whole life being the little brother that Dean took care of, and he obviously resented that in many ways, but it was also a huge part of his identity. So when Dean comes back and is broken, Sam wants to be mature and understanding, but nothing in his life has really equipped him to do that. He talks a good game about how he wants to be there for Dean, but when Dean actually does spill his guts about what happened in Hell, I think Sam is totally emotionally paralyzed, and just kind of panics. The mixture of pity, impatience, and contempt that Sam drops on Dean in the second half of the season is awful--and doubly so because Dean's worst fear has always been that if he's vulnerable he'll be rejected--but I don't think it's genuine indifference. Sam cares way too much and doesn't know what to do about it, so he distances himself. Which is bad, but not evil. Long story short, there's really nothing Sam does in S4 that I can't picture myself doing.
Re: Kill the monster because it's a monster
Yeah, I think that in itself is pretty common. But my sense is that scifi/fantasy, at least on television, tends to break down into two categories: mindless, 'America, fuck yeah!' monster killing (not a criticism: Aliens is one of my favorite movies), or else the liberal-ass, 'we're all the same under the skin' storytelling you get from Joss Whedon or Battlestar Galactica (not a criticism: I adore Joss and Battlestar). The aggressively pessimistic worldview of Supernatural seems fairly unique to me. It acknowledges that there's moral complexity, and that the world is fucked up, but then concludes that mostly you're just going to have to live with it.
Which ties into the show's weirdly wonderful antitheism. Every god on SPN feeds on their human worshippers. The pagan gods in "Hammer of the Gods" literally eating human flesh is the most extreme example, but the same basic thing goes on with the Judeo-Islamo-Christian God. Angels need to inhabit human vessels, and when they do they burn out the minds of the human they've possessed. And Cas's quest for souls in S6 makes it clear that angels feed on soul energy in some way. The closest equivalent I can think of to that is Babylon 5, but there the humans ultimately sent away their gods and demons. Nothing that final ever happens on SPN. Even after the Apocalypse, the world is still controlled by powers beyond human understanding. Guys like Ken Lay go to Heaven, guys like Bobby go to Hell, and there's nothing anyone can do about it.
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I distinguish Sam using his powers/demon blood from his interpersonal behavior with Dean. I don't think that Sam was self-evidently wrong in deciding to use his powers, or even in deciding to drink demon blood. If there's even the remotest chance that drinking demon blood will save the world--and I don't think it's irrational for Sam to believe there is--then arguably you absolutely should do that, even if it damns you as an individual. And especially if you believe that you're inherently doomed, as I think Sam did at that point. If you can't save yourself, you might as well save everyone else. As much as I love S4, I think the the two big mistakes of that season were waiting until 4.16 to reveal what Sam was up to, and casting Genevieve Cortese as Ruby. The former made it hard for the audience to identify with Sam, and the latter made Sam look stupid because Gen just wasn't very good at playing a master manipulator, and that made it hard to understand why Sam got sucked in. Picture, say, Six from Battlestar Galactica or Alice from Luther (assuming you've seen either of those shows), and Sam's arc gets more sympathetic.
Sam's behavior toward Dean in S4 was pretty inexcusable, but I think it came from pre-established character traits. He'd spent his whole life being the little brother that Dean took care of, and he obviously resented that in many ways, but it was also a huge part of his identity. So when Dean comes back and is broken, Sam wants to be mature and understanding, but nothing in his life has really equipped him to do that. He talks a good game about how he wants to be there for Dean, but when Dean actually does spill his guts about what happened in Hell, I think Sam is totally emotionally paralyzed, and just kind of panics. The mixture of pity, impatience, and contempt that Sam drops on Dean in the second half of the season is awful--and doubly so because Dean's worst fear has always been that if he's vulnerable he'll be rejected--but I don't think it's genuine indifference. Sam cares way too much and doesn't know what to do about it, so he distances himself. Which is bad, but not evil. Long story short, there's really nothing Sam does in S4 that I can't picture myself doing.
Re: Kill the monster because it's a monster
Yeah, I think that in itself is pretty common. But my sense is that scifi/fantasy, at least on television, tends to break down into two categories: mindless, 'America, fuck yeah!' monster killing (not a criticism: Aliens is one of my favorite movies), or else the liberal-ass, 'we're all the same under the skin' storytelling you get from Joss Whedon or Battlestar Galactica (not a criticism: I adore Joss and Battlestar). The aggressively pessimistic worldview of Supernatural seems fairly unique to me. It acknowledges that there's moral complexity, and that the world is fucked up, but then concludes that mostly you're just going to have to live with it.
Which ties into the show's weirdly wonderful antitheism. Every god on SPN feeds on their human worshippers. The pagan gods in "Hammer of the Gods" literally eating human flesh is the most extreme example, but the same basic thing goes on with the Judeo-Islamo-Christian God. Angels need to inhabit human vessels, and when they do they burn out the minds of the human they've possessed. And Cas's quest for souls in S6 makes it clear that angels feed on soul energy in some way. The closest equivalent I can think of to that is Babylon 5, but there the humans ultimately sent away their gods and demons. Nothing that final ever happens on SPN. Even after the Apocalypse, the world is still controlled by powers beyond human understanding. Guys like Ken Lay go to Heaven, guys like Bobby go to Hell, and there's nothing anyone can do about it.