Well, the amnesia AU I mentioned is following canon and it's based in canon, but it can't exactly return to canon because it's been following season 4 from the beginning- so there are things changing, even if the big stuff stays the same - Lilith, Ruby, the angels and the apocalypse - but the premise had to lead to changes. So it's the same, but different.
The premise-changing ones you mention are not the ones I like - simple reversals, or the slashy stuff, or 'raised evil' - because they don't make sense from the starting premise. The ones I like usually are more along the lines of .... it's a story that could have been told. The writers could have made those decisions. Shifts in the stories, but still true to the premise (and/or the characters). e.g, ratherastory's fic in which stanford!sam is in a very bad accident shortly before the "real" series began- it seems pretty natural for Dean to show up when he gets a phone call that his brother's in a coma (he gets better..ish), so any differences from canon from then on also seem natural (especially as the big things from canon are still lurking out there, and having an impact.)
Then there are those few cool stories where canon from various seasons crash together in cool ways (oh, canonical time travel. It's opened interesting possibilities). There were two big bangs like that this year that I read, and I really liked both.
no subject
The premise-changing ones you mention are not the ones I like - simple reversals, or the slashy stuff, or 'raised evil' - because they don't make sense from the starting premise. The ones I like usually are more along the lines of .... it's a story that could have been told. The writers could have made those decisions. Shifts in the stories, but still true to the premise (and/or the characters). e.g, ratherastory's fic in which stanford!sam is in a very bad accident shortly before the "real" series began- it seems pretty natural for Dean to show up when he gets a phone call that his brother's in a coma (he gets better..ish), so any differences from canon from then on also seem natural (especially as the big things from canon are still lurking out there, and having an impact.)
Then there are those few cool stories where canon from various seasons crash together in cool ways (oh, canonical time travel. It's opened interesting possibilities). There were two big bangs like that this year that I read, and I really liked both.