first off?
I would bet GOOD money that was unscripted
unrehearsed
ad done in ON TAKE
the fact these 2 haven't WON an Emmy? Proves what bullsh*t award shows are.
and damn it they MUST be Supernatural in real life
cause those two SOBs aint aged a day!
TV Discussion: SUPERNATURAL ...the last ride
- Thread starter playahaitian
- Start date
-
- Tags
- supernatural
first off?
I would bet GOOD money that was unscripted
unrehearsed
ad done in ON TAKE
the fact these 2 haven't WON an Emmy? Proves what bullsh*t award shows are.
and damn it they MUST be Supernatural in real life
cause those two SOBs aint aged a day!
Supernatural's, Sam and Dean Winchester are back in action, like never before, in The Hillywood Show®’s SUPERNATURAL PARODY 2! Armed with weaponized Proton Packs and plenty of salt, the Winchester brothers are just a call away. Ghost problems? Demon problems? If the answer is yes, don’t wait another minute! Pick up your phone now! The brothers are on call, 24 hours, to serve all of your supernatural elimination needs! Who ya gonna call? WINCHESTERS! Strap in SPN Family and prepare yourself for The Hillywood Show®’s biggest production yet! Filled with fan favorite moments from CW’s Supernatural and a star studded line up including Jensen Ackles, Jared Padalecki, Misha Collins and more, this production is a #Supernatural spectacular!
Supernatural: Jeffrey Dean Morgan Returning For 300th Episode
for the series’ 300th episode. As milestones go, it’s a feat for any series to hit the century mark, but when one proves popular enough to do it three times, well, that’s cause for celebration, and it looks as though The CW has plans to make it a special one for Sam and Dean Winchester. The network will do so by reuniting them with their dear departed father, John, who was last seen helping his sons do away with the yellow-eyed demon at the end of season 2.
It seems like every year Morgan has to field a question or two about his willingness to return to the long-running series. It’s been over a decade since he last appeared and since then he’s seen his star rise, appearing in the likes of Zack Snyder’s Watchmen, as well as Losers, Batman V. Superman: Dawn of Justice, this year’s video game adaptation, Rampage, opposite Dwayne Johnson,and more. But while his filmography continues to grow, Morgan’s role as Negan on The Walking Dead is perhaps the character that's become synonymous with the actor. That is unless you ask Supernatural fans.
MORE: THE GIFTED FALL FINALE REVIEW: THE SERIES DELIVERS A BIG WIN FOR MUTANKIND
As reported by EW, those fans are in for a treat in 2019, as Morgan is confirmed to be returning to play the elder Winchester in the episode titled ‘Lebanon.’ That may seem like a strange title for such a landmark achievement for the seemingly immortal series, and, like everything else about the episode, it’s a question waiting to be answered. Though he wasn’t exactly forthcoming in regard to plot details, showrunner Andrew Dabb did have this to say about Morgan’s return:
[img class=" lazyloaded" alt="Jared Padalecki Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Jensen Ackels in Supernatural" >
“We’re incredibly excited to have Jeffrey back for this milestone episode, and think fans will love what we have planned for his character… and a few other surprise guest stars.”
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- BY KEVIN YEOMAN
- – ON DEC 12, 2018
- IN TV NEWS
for the series’ 300th episode. As milestones go, it’s a feat for any series to hit the century mark, but when one proves popular enough to do it three times, well, that’s cause for celebration, and it looks as though The CW has plans to make it a special one for Sam and Dean Winchester. The network will do so by reuniting them with their dear departed father, John, who was last seen helping his sons do away with the yellow-eyed demon at the end of season 2.
It seems like every year Morgan has to field a question or two about his willingness to return to the long-running series. It’s been over a decade since he last appeared and since then he’s seen his star rise, appearing in the likes of Zack Snyder’s Watchmen, as well as Losers, Batman V. Superman: Dawn of Justice, this year’s video game adaptation, Rampage, opposite Dwayne Johnson,and more. But while his filmography continues to grow, Morgan’s role as Negan on The Walking Dead is perhaps the character that's become synonymous with the actor. That is unless you ask Supernatural fans.
MORE: THE GIFTED FALL FINALE REVIEW: THE SERIES DELIVERS A BIG WIN FOR MUTANKIND
As reported by EW, those fans are in for a treat in 2019, as Morgan is confirmed to be returning to play the elder Winchester in the episode titled ‘Lebanon.’ That may seem like a strange title for such a landmark achievement for the seemingly immortal series, and, like everything else about the episode, it’s a question waiting to be answered. Though he wasn’t exactly forthcoming in regard to plot details, showrunner Andrew Dabb did have this to say about Morgan’s return:
[img class=" lazyloaded" alt="Jared Padalecki Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Jensen Ackels in Supernatural" >
“We’re incredibly excited to have Jeffrey back for this milestone episode, and think fans will love what we have planned for his character… and a few other surprise guest stars.”
ADVERTISING
Jeffrey Dean Morgan on returning to his Supernatural family after more than a decade away
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MISHA COLLINS DISHES ON CASTIEL'S WARDROBE CHANGE IN 'SUPERNATURAL' 300TH EPISODE
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Supernatural
Show Details
TYPE
TV Show
GENRE
Fantasy ,
Drama
NETWORK
The CW
SAMANTHA HIGHFILL
January 16, 2019 at 02:00 PM EST
“Car coming through!” It’s a rainy December day in Vancouver as Supernatural’s crew members clear out of the way of an incoming vehicle. Despite the dreary weather, excitement fills the air, because everyone knows who’s inside the car. They just haven’t seen him yet.
Seconds later, out steps a scruffy Jeffrey Dean Morgan, the man who brought John Winchester to life all those years ago. He’s got a cigarette in his hand and John’s boots on his feet as he’s ushered through the rain and mud to the reunion he’s been waiting for: He’s about to see his Baby.
“Driving from set to where the Impala was, I was getting excited,” Morgan tells EW. “I was like, ‘oh god, I get to get in the Impala!”
And get in he does, sitting in the driver’s seat of the 1967 Impala and preparing to say his first line as John Winchester in more than a decade. Morgan’s reunion with Baby is the first of many as he returns to the show after 12 years away. And in the middle of it all, EW sat down with Morgan on the Supernatural set to discuss his big (though temporary) comeback.
Eric Ogden for EW
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Fans have asked you about returning many times over the years, and you’ve always said…
JEFFREY DEAN MORGAN: “Every time a fan asked, I always said the same thing: ‘I’m totally open to returning. It’s about the story.’ Because I’m very good friends with Jensen [Ackles] and Jared [Padalecki], and we’ve talked about it and it was always, ‘Before the show goes off the air, I hope to get on.’ Jensen called and said, ‘Hey would you be interested in doing our 300th?’ I wasn’t going to be working at this time so absolutely, sure.
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inRead invented by Teads
So I got on the phone with [co-showrunner] Andrew [Dabb] and I said, ‘It’s about story.’ It’s kind of important if you’re going to bring this guy back, there’s gotta be an endgame. The relationships between these three men were so open, so if I was going to come back, it would be nice to have some closure, especially with Sammy. So it went from there, and we worked it out to where we think it’s a good story and a really good way for John to come back into the fold.”
What was it like returning to a character you haven’t played in more than a decade?
“To step into it again, it’s like wearing an old pair of boots. I’m friends with these guys so it’s a joy to come in. Today was my first day and you just kind of sit down and do it. It’s fun and it’s easy. I remember very well what I did then. I remember the story and I remember playing with these guys. If I hadn’t been seeing and talking to these guys the last 10 years maybe it would’ve been a little bit more of a nervous situation, but I’ve been doing this a long time. I feel like I’ve been doing it forever and I really haven’t stopped working since I was last on this set. Like a father would be, I’m very proud of the guys.
They are two of the best guys. They’re as genuine and as cool as they get and I’m sitting here doing the scene with them and it makes me get choked up because they’ve done so well here. Episode 300? That’s unheard of. That’s a hard thing to do, so huge props to not just these two but the whole crew. It’s funny walking back into the stage today and all the crew guys are coming up to me that were here on day one. Same guys! It’s amazing. The turnover on the shows that I’m normally a part of, they’re there maybe a week or two and then they’re like, ‘I’m done.’ [Laughs] But this show, there’s something special about it obviously. It keeps people wanting to be here.”
Eric Ogden for EW
What does it mean for John to get to see his boys and his wife again?
“I think it means the world to John certainly. And also for me, the actor that plays John, I think it means almost equally as much. There’s always been a need for closure with these characters and their father, especially with Jared’s character. Kid’s a disaster because of his father apparently. [Laughs] My thing was always, if I come back, I gotta fix that. There’s gotta be an opportunity to mend that relationship and I think that that’s hopefully what the audience is anticipating.
But it always bugged me that the John that I played is different than the John that has been portrayed since I haven’t been around. I really wanted the opportunity to be able to come back and make amends in a way and try to fix the sullied name of this character. But more than that, it’s three friends, life lived. It feels like we’ve been friends for a lifetime now, getting to reunite in a place that we love and that we met and do what we do and I think that is super cool. So not only does John win in getting to come back and see his boys and Mary again and hopefully make some amends, it’s just as cool for me, the actor, to be able to come back and see everybody.”
This show is hitting 300 episodes for a number of reasons, but as someone who’s worked on many different shows and sets, what makes this set different?
“That’s the easiest question. It’s because of those two dudes. It begins and ends with Jensen and Jared. I’ve never seen guys that are here every day — there are not scenes in this show without them, they don’t get time off, they’re here every day, and they have families just like I do. I know how hard it is to be away from my family and I know how grumpy that makes me. They show up every day, they’re not grumpy, they know their sh-t, they’re pros.
And they’re not only all that, but they’re also genuinely nice. Because of that, these crew members that could have gone on to do whatever they want, they stay here for those two guys. They’ve got two great leads that set an example for everyone else and it’s how it should be done. They’re just good guys and I love ’em. That’s the simple answer: It’s because of those two. There’s a couple more [people] that have been here just as long and they’re also equally as great but it really starts with number one and two on the call sheet. They set an example for cast and crew.”
Supernatural airs its 300th episode on Thursday, Feb. 7 at 8 p.m. ET on The CW.
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MISHA COLLINS DISHES ON CASTIEL'S WARDROBE CHANGE IN 'SUPERNATURAL' 300TH EPISODE
×
Supernatural
Show Details
TYPE
TV Show
GENRE
Fantasy ,
Drama
NETWORK
The CW
SAMANTHA HIGHFILL
January 16, 2019 at 02:00 PM EST
“Car coming through!” It’s a rainy December day in Vancouver as Supernatural’s crew members clear out of the way of an incoming vehicle. Despite the dreary weather, excitement fills the air, because everyone knows who’s inside the car. They just haven’t seen him yet.
Seconds later, out steps a scruffy Jeffrey Dean Morgan, the man who brought John Winchester to life all those years ago. He’s got a cigarette in his hand and John’s boots on his feet as he’s ushered through the rain and mud to the reunion he’s been waiting for: He’s about to see his Baby.
“Driving from set to where the Impala was, I was getting excited,” Morgan tells EW. “I was like, ‘oh god, I get to get in the Impala!”
And get in he does, sitting in the driver’s seat of the 1967 Impala and preparing to say his first line as John Winchester in more than a decade. Morgan’s reunion with Baby is the first of many as he returns to the show after 12 years away. And in the middle of it all, EW sat down with Morgan on the Supernatural set to discuss his big (though temporary) comeback.
Eric Ogden for EW
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: Fans have asked you about returning many times over the years, and you’ve always said…
JEFFREY DEAN MORGAN: “Every time a fan asked, I always said the same thing: ‘I’m totally open to returning. It’s about the story.’ Because I’m very good friends with Jensen [Ackles] and Jared [Padalecki], and we’ve talked about it and it was always, ‘Before the show goes off the air, I hope to get on.’ Jensen called and said, ‘Hey would you be interested in doing our 300th?’ I wasn’t going to be working at this time so absolutely, sure.
ADVERTISING
inRead invented by Teads
So I got on the phone with [co-showrunner] Andrew [Dabb] and I said, ‘It’s about story.’ It’s kind of important if you’re going to bring this guy back, there’s gotta be an endgame. The relationships between these three men were so open, so if I was going to come back, it would be nice to have some closure, especially with Sammy. So it went from there, and we worked it out to where we think it’s a good story and a really good way for John to come back into the fold.”
What was it like returning to a character you haven’t played in more than a decade?
“To step into it again, it’s like wearing an old pair of boots. I’m friends with these guys so it’s a joy to come in. Today was my first day and you just kind of sit down and do it. It’s fun and it’s easy. I remember very well what I did then. I remember the story and I remember playing with these guys. If I hadn’t been seeing and talking to these guys the last 10 years maybe it would’ve been a little bit more of a nervous situation, but I’ve been doing this a long time. I feel like I’ve been doing it forever and I really haven’t stopped working since I was last on this set. Like a father would be, I’m very proud of the guys.
They are two of the best guys. They’re as genuine and as cool as they get and I’m sitting here doing the scene with them and it makes me get choked up because they’ve done so well here. Episode 300? That’s unheard of. That’s a hard thing to do, so huge props to not just these two but the whole crew. It’s funny walking back into the stage today and all the crew guys are coming up to me that were here on day one. Same guys! It’s amazing. The turnover on the shows that I’m normally a part of, they’re there maybe a week or two and then they’re like, ‘I’m done.’ [Laughs] But this show, there’s something special about it obviously. It keeps people wanting to be here.”
Eric Ogden for EW
What does it mean for John to get to see his boys and his wife again?
“I think it means the world to John certainly. And also for me, the actor that plays John, I think it means almost equally as much. There’s always been a need for closure with these characters and their father, especially with Jared’s character. Kid’s a disaster because of his father apparently. [Laughs] My thing was always, if I come back, I gotta fix that. There’s gotta be an opportunity to mend that relationship and I think that that’s hopefully what the audience is anticipating.
But it always bugged me that the John that I played is different than the John that has been portrayed since I haven’t been around. I really wanted the opportunity to be able to come back and make amends in a way and try to fix the sullied name of this character. But more than that, it’s three friends, life lived. It feels like we’ve been friends for a lifetime now, getting to reunite in a place that we love and that we met and do what we do and I think that is super cool. So not only does John win in getting to come back and see his boys and Mary again and hopefully make some amends, it’s just as cool for me, the actor, to be able to come back and see everybody.”
This show is hitting 300 episodes for a number of reasons, but as someone who’s worked on many different shows and sets, what makes this set different?
“That’s the easiest question. It’s because of those two dudes. It begins and ends with Jensen and Jared. I’ve never seen guys that are here every day — there are not scenes in this show without them, they don’t get time off, they’re here every day, and they have families just like I do. I know how hard it is to be away from my family and I know how grumpy that makes me. They show up every day, they’re not grumpy, they know their sh-t, they’re pros.
And they’re not only all that, but they’re also genuinely nice. Because of that, these crew members that could have gone on to do whatever they want, they stay here for those two guys. They’ve got two great leads that set an example for everyone else and it’s how it should be done. They’re just good guys and I love ’em. That’s the simple answer: It’s because of those two. There’s a couple more [people] that have been here just as long and they’re also equally as great but it really starts with number one and two on the call sheet. They set an example for cast and crew.”
Supernatural airs its 300th episode on Thursday, Feb. 7 at 8 p.m. ET on The CW.
Supernatural stars cover EW to celebrate 300 episodes (and an epic reunion)
Samantha Highfill
January 16, 2019 at 12:00 PM EST
“REUNION TIME!”
Jared Padalecki is making an announcement. It’s early December, and he and his Supernatural costar Jensen Ackles are preparing for their final two days of filming the 300th episode (Feb. 7) as demon-hunting brothers Sam and Dean Winchester, respectively. As they walk onto the Men of Letters set on a rainy Thursday, they come face-to-face with Jeffrey Dean Morgan, a personal friend and the man who brought Papa John Winchester to life in the show’s pilot (and left the show after season 2). “It’s the culmination of 300 episodes,” Padalecki says of Morgan’s return. After all, John’s disappearance kick-started the brothers’ road trip.
Eric Ogden for EW
“DAD’S ON A HUNTING TRIP, AND HE HASN’T BEEN HOME IN A FEW DAYS.”
Standing in his little brother’s college apartment, Dean Winchester first uttered those words in the pilot, and in doing so, launched Supernatural’s — and the brothers’ — first big mystery. “I had a good feeling about the show just reading the pilot,” Ackles says. “It had grit, the characters were well-written, and the story had miles to go.” Although he couldn’t quite predict how many miles the journey would be.
Supernatural premiered on The WB in 2005 and has since become the longest-running show in The CW’s history. The idea was simple: two brothers hunting monsters from urban legends, the kinds of things you’d hear about while sitting around a campfire. Bloody Mary? They killed her. Hook Man? Yep, him too. But it didn’t take long for the writers to understand that they might have to broaden the scope of the show if they wanted to get 20-plus episodes (much less 300). “We quickly realized that [conceit] would run out in a hurry, so even early on we expanded our horizons of what the show could be,” executive producer/co-showrunner Robert Singer says. But just how far could they stretch? And would they even get the chance?
Despite surviving the 2006 WB–UPN merger that created The CW, it took years forSupernatural to land on solid ground. “Bob Singer and I were fighting for the show’s survival at the ends of the first three seasons,” says creator Eric Kripke. “We’d have a meeting with the network that we informally called the ‘explain-why-we-should-give-you-another-season’ meeting.” And yet there was something about those conditions that felt right for a show about two humans trying to save the world from superhuman forces. As Dean recently said in a season 14 episode, “Impossible odds—feels like home.” But the land of impossible odds isn’t simply where the show (and the Winchesters) lived in those early years. It’s where they thrived. “In the beginning we almost mischievously wanted to see what we could get away with,” Kripke says. “There weren’t a lot of genre shows on The CW. It was mostly Gossip Girl and 90210. We were always like the goth kid at the back of the class that no one really wanted to pay attention to. So on this little weird horror show, we really got to push some boundaries that hadn’t been attempted in TV. There was no one saying, ‘That’s too crazy.’” So they took risks. They wrote a Groundhog Day-style episode called “Mystery Spot” that saw Dean die more than 100 times in one hour. They created “Hollywood Babylon,” an episode where Sam and Dean investigated a haunted horror-movie set. They produced “Ghostfacers,” an episode shot to look like a reality show about ghost hunting. “We always felt like we were on tenterhooks a little, but it helped us in a way,” Singer says. “We said, ‘If they don’t like us, let’s be bold.’ ” And in season 4, they made perhaps their biggest, boldest decision yet: They introduced angels (and therefore a much more religious story line) into the fold, which Singer identifies as the show’s biggest turning point. “I was concerned that would be a bridge too far,” Padalecki says of the angelic decision. “I wondered, ‘Are we going to turn o a lot of the people that came here to watch a scary movie?’” Kripke himself had fought the idea for years, until a pre–season 4 epiphany came to him while he was washing his face, of all things. “I realized the supernatural world was unbalanced,” Kripke says. “There was only evil. So I walked in the writers’ room on day one of season 4 and said, ‘Okay, there’s going to be angels…but they’re dicks!’”
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'BIG BANG THEORY' CAST SAYS GOODBYE TO THEIR CHARACTERS
Thus began what Kripke, who’s since created Revolution and co-created Timeless, still believes is one of the best hours of television he’s ever written: the season 4 premiere. “Lazarus Rising” introduced Castiel, the show’s first and longest-lasting angel. “Right before my scene, [then writer] Sera [Gamble] said, ‘Your life is about to change,’” remembers Misha Collins, who plays Castiel. He adds with a laugh, “I was like, ‘You’re so full of yourself.’” But Collins’ life did just that when he shifted from being a guest star to a series regular as his character survived multiple deaths — and even a brief stint as God — to become someone Sam and Dean consider family. “Angels completed the mythology,” Kripke says, and with them, the show was able to build to what writer-turned-showrunner Gamble refers to as the “regularly scheduled apocalypse” at the end of season 5. It was good versus evil. Michael versus Lucifer. Dean versus Sam. And for a while, everyone believed it was the end of the show. But when the network gave them a renewal for season 6, the writers were left to figure out what the heck comes after an apocalypse. The answer? Anything they wanted.
“A benefit of genre is we have such a huge runway in terms of ‘anything can happen,’” then writer and current co-showrunner Andrew Dabb says. “A medical show is limited in the scope of what they can do. We’re not.” So the next few seasons saw Supernaturalpush even more boundaries, with alternate realities, meta episodes (“The French Mistake,” anyone?), and new villains. That’s not to say everything worked, but that’s the beauty of a long-running show with a devoted audience — everything doesn’t have to work. “Fans would forgive sins of certain episodes because they love watching Sam and Dean,” Singer says. Because saying Supernatural fans like Supernatural is like saying Dean likes pie. It’s not about liking it. It’s about loving it. “I don’t think we have casual fans,” Singer says. “They live and breathe this show.” The #SPNFamily gathers all around the country (and globe) for multiple conventions each year, and every July they ll the largest venue, Hall H, at San Diego Comic-Con. It’s those fans who are devoted to Sam and Dean, even when their Impala might take a wrong turn. “The show’s ability to evolve and adapt is what’s led to it lasting 14 years,” Dabb says, adding, “Theoretically there are still a bunch of Leviathan out there running around that we never dealt with, but we don’t talk about that.”
Limitless options and viewer forgiveness aside, there is one rule the show has to follow — outside of standards and practices, that is. “I credit Bob Singer for instilling from very early on the idea that the show can go anywhere as long as the characters stay true to themselves,” former showrunner Jeremy Carver says. “The core of the show is the bond between the brothers.” With Sam and Dean as its foundation, the show can make episodes like season 11’s “Baby,” which was shot entirely from the perspective of the Impala, or season 13’s “Scoobynatural,” an animated crossover with Scooby-Doo and the gang. “One of the fun takeaways of watching Supernatural is that if you can imagine it, there’s probably a little town somewhere in America where it’s happening,” Gamble says. “It’s unlike any other show, really, in the history of American television.” And 14 seasons in, it’s still finding ways to surprise fans by, say, bringing John Winchester back.
Eric Ogden for EW
“DAD?”
Standing next to his little brother in the Men of Letters bunker, Dean can’t believe what he’s seeing. This time he’s not enlisting his brother to find Dad, because Dad has come to them. And he hasn’t changed much. His beard has more gray in it and his face is thinner, but it will surprise no one that John comes back with a rifle in his hand. (Sorry, Walking Dead fans; the rifle came before Lucille.) But John isn’t the only one who’s changed. Standing across from him, Sam and Dean are no longer the kids who crammed toy army men into the ashtray of the Impala, or even the young men who went looking for him in the pilot. They’ve grown up. Their lives, quite simply, have changed. The same can be said of the actors themselves. In fact, Ackles is currently two years older than Morgan was when he filmed the pilot. “That’s how full circle it all is,” Morgan says. “Like a father would be, I’m very proud of the guys. It makes me get choked up because they’ve done so well here. Episode 300? That’s unheard of.”
As for how John comes back, let’s just say things get weird — don’t they always? — and there’s an altered reality at play. “Our guys are put in a position where they essentially can have a wish granted,” Dabb says. “They’re actually expecting something else, but [John’s return] comes from a place of want by Dean. The need for closure is really what brings John back into their lives.” But John isn’t the only person who comes back into their lives. As with any altered reality, not everything changes for the good. Without getting too specific, whatever brings John back also causes the return of Zachariah (Kurt Fuller), the no-BS angel who saw Sam and Dean as nothing more than thorns in his side. (Like Kripke said, angels are dicks!) Speaking of angels, this reality also affects Castiel in… certain ways. This time the boys are dealing with a different (though not entirely unfamiliar) version of their friend.
Eric Ogden for EW
But for Morgan, who’s been asked for years about returning, it has always been about bringing John back in the right way. “The relationships between these three men were so open, so if I was going to come back, it would be nice to have some closure, especially with Sammy,” Morgan says. And before the hour’s over, both boys will get a moment alone with Dad. “This episode gives Sam a chance to forgive,” Padalecki says. Ackles adds, “For Dean, the whole episode is a dream that he doesn’t want to wake up from. But he knows he has to.”
Back in the bunker’s kitchen where Padalecki declared “reunion time” just hours ago, Sam and Dean are sitting around a table sharing a bottle of whiskey with their father and catching him up on everything he’s missed. Yes, they’ve saved the world (more than once). Yes, Lucifer has a son. But most important, John’s late wife, Mary — the woman he spent his life trying to avenge — is alive. Right then Mary rounds the corner for the moment she never saw coming, but in a strange way has always been waiting for. “Everything’s right in the world in this bubble of time,” Samantha Smith, who plays Mary, says of the couple’s reunion. “It’s very romantic.”
But as the Winchesters know a bit too well, all good things must come to an end. And when this is said and done, Sam and Dean will return to their life, driving down crazy street next to each other. Because despite the show hitting 300 episodes, nobody’s ready to call it quits just yet. “I don’t think we’re ready to throw in the towel,” Ackles says. “We’ve still got a little gas in the tank.” Put another way, Sam and Dean still got work to do.
Eric Ogden for EW
Samantha Highfill
January 16, 2019 at 12:00 PM EST
“REUNION TIME!”
Jared Padalecki is making an announcement. It’s early December, and he and his Supernatural costar Jensen Ackles are preparing for their final two days of filming the 300th episode (Feb. 7) as demon-hunting brothers Sam and Dean Winchester, respectively. As they walk onto the Men of Letters set on a rainy Thursday, they come face-to-face with Jeffrey Dean Morgan, a personal friend and the man who brought Papa John Winchester to life in the show’s pilot (and left the show after season 2). “It’s the culmination of 300 episodes,” Padalecki says of Morgan’s return. After all, John’s disappearance kick-started the brothers’ road trip.
Eric Ogden for EW
“DAD’S ON A HUNTING TRIP, AND HE HASN’T BEEN HOME IN A FEW DAYS.”
Standing in his little brother’s college apartment, Dean Winchester first uttered those words in the pilot, and in doing so, launched Supernatural’s — and the brothers’ — first big mystery. “I had a good feeling about the show just reading the pilot,” Ackles says. “It had grit, the characters were well-written, and the story had miles to go.” Although he couldn’t quite predict how many miles the journey would be.
Supernatural premiered on The WB in 2005 and has since become the longest-running show in The CW’s history. The idea was simple: two brothers hunting monsters from urban legends, the kinds of things you’d hear about while sitting around a campfire. Bloody Mary? They killed her. Hook Man? Yep, him too. But it didn’t take long for the writers to understand that they might have to broaden the scope of the show if they wanted to get 20-plus episodes (much less 300). “We quickly realized that [conceit] would run out in a hurry, so even early on we expanded our horizons of what the show could be,” executive producer/co-showrunner Robert Singer says. But just how far could they stretch? And would they even get the chance?
Despite surviving the 2006 WB–UPN merger that created The CW, it took years forSupernatural to land on solid ground. “Bob Singer and I were fighting for the show’s survival at the ends of the first three seasons,” says creator Eric Kripke. “We’d have a meeting with the network that we informally called the ‘explain-why-we-should-give-you-another-season’ meeting.” And yet there was something about those conditions that felt right for a show about two humans trying to save the world from superhuman forces. As Dean recently said in a season 14 episode, “Impossible odds—feels like home.” But the land of impossible odds isn’t simply where the show (and the Winchesters) lived in those early years. It’s where they thrived. “In the beginning we almost mischievously wanted to see what we could get away with,” Kripke says. “There weren’t a lot of genre shows on The CW. It was mostly Gossip Girl and 90210. We were always like the goth kid at the back of the class that no one really wanted to pay attention to. So on this little weird horror show, we really got to push some boundaries that hadn’t been attempted in TV. There was no one saying, ‘That’s too crazy.’” So they took risks. They wrote a Groundhog Day-style episode called “Mystery Spot” that saw Dean die more than 100 times in one hour. They created “Hollywood Babylon,” an episode where Sam and Dean investigated a haunted horror-movie set. They produced “Ghostfacers,” an episode shot to look like a reality show about ghost hunting. “We always felt like we were on tenterhooks a little, but it helped us in a way,” Singer says. “We said, ‘If they don’t like us, let’s be bold.’ ” And in season 4, they made perhaps their biggest, boldest decision yet: They introduced angels (and therefore a much more religious story line) into the fold, which Singer identifies as the show’s biggest turning point. “I was concerned that would be a bridge too far,” Padalecki says of the angelic decision. “I wondered, ‘Are we going to turn o a lot of the people that came here to watch a scary movie?’” Kripke himself had fought the idea for years, until a pre–season 4 epiphany came to him while he was washing his face, of all things. “I realized the supernatural world was unbalanced,” Kripke says. “There was only evil. So I walked in the writers’ room on day one of season 4 and said, ‘Okay, there’s going to be angels…but they’re dicks!’”
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Thus began what Kripke, who’s since created Revolution and co-created Timeless, still believes is one of the best hours of television he’s ever written: the season 4 premiere. “Lazarus Rising” introduced Castiel, the show’s first and longest-lasting angel. “Right before my scene, [then writer] Sera [Gamble] said, ‘Your life is about to change,’” remembers Misha Collins, who plays Castiel. He adds with a laugh, “I was like, ‘You’re so full of yourself.’” But Collins’ life did just that when he shifted from being a guest star to a series regular as his character survived multiple deaths — and even a brief stint as God — to become someone Sam and Dean consider family. “Angels completed the mythology,” Kripke says, and with them, the show was able to build to what writer-turned-showrunner Gamble refers to as the “regularly scheduled apocalypse” at the end of season 5. It was good versus evil. Michael versus Lucifer. Dean versus Sam. And for a while, everyone believed it was the end of the show. But when the network gave them a renewal for season 6, the writers were left to figure out what the heck comes after an apocalypse. The answer? Anything they wanted.
“A benefit of genre is we have such a huge runway in terms of ‘anything can happen,’” then writer and current co-showrunner Andrew Dabb says. “A medical show is limited in the scope of what they can do. We’re not.” So the next few seasons saw Supernaturalpush even more boundaries, with alternate realities, meta episodes (“The French Mistake,” anyone?), and new villains. That’s not to say everything worked, but that’s the beauty of a long-running show with a devoted audience — everything doesn’t have to work. “Fans would forgive sins of certain episodes because they love watching Sam and Dean,” Singer says. Because saying Supernatural fans like Supernatural is like saying Dean likes pie. It’s not about liking it. It’s about loving it. “I don’t think we have casual fans,” Singer says. “They live and breathe this show.” The #SPNFamily gathers all around the country (and globe) for multiple conventions each year, and every July they ll the largest venue, Hall H, at San Diego Comic-Con. It’s those fans who are devoted to Sam and Dean, even when their Impala might take a wrong turn. “The show’s ability to evolve and adapt is what’s led to it lasting 14 years,” Dabb says, adding, “Theoretically there are still a bunch of Leviathan out there running around that we never dealt with, but we don’t talk about that.”
Limitless options and viewer forgiveness aside, there is one rule the show has to follow — outside of standards and practices, that is. “I credit Bob Singer for instilling from very early on the idea that the show can go anywhere as long as the characters stay true to themselves,” former showrunner Jeremy Carver says. “The core of the show is the bond between the brothers.” With Sam and Dean as its foundation, the show can make episodes like season 11’s “Baby,” which was shot entirely from the perspective of the Impala, or season 13’s “Scoobynatural,” an animated crossover with Scooby-Doo and the gang. “One of the fun takeaways of watching Supernatural is that if you can imagine it, there’s probably a little town somewhere in America where it’s happening,” Gamble says. “It’s unlike any other show, really, in the history of American television.” And 14 seasons in, it’s still finding ways to surprise fans by, say, bringing John Winchester back.
Eric Ogden for EW
“DAD?”
Standing next to his little brother in the Men of Letters bunker, Dean can’t believe what he’s seeing. This time he’s not enlisting his brother to find Dad, because Dad has come to them. And he hasn’t changed much. His beard has more gray in it and his face is thinner, but it will surprise no one that John comes back with a rifle in his hand. (Sorry, Walking Dead fans; the rifle came before Lucille.) But John isn’t the only one who’s changed. Standing across from him, Sam and Dean are no longer the kids who crammed toy army men into the ashtray of the Impala, or even the young men who went looking for him in the pilot. They’ve grown up. Their lives, quite simply, have changed. The same can be said of the actors themselves. In fact, Ackles is currently two years older than Morgan was when he filmed the pilot. “That’s how full circle it all is,” Morgan says. “Like a father would be, I’m very proud of the guys. It makes me get choked up because they’ve done so well here. Episode 300? That’s unheard of.”
As for how John comes back, let’s just say things get weird — don’t they always? — and there’s an altered reality at play. “Our guys are put in a position where they essentially can have a wish granted,” Dabb says. “They’re actually expecting something else, but [John’s return] comes from a place of want by Dean. The need for closure is really what brings John back into their lives.” But John isn’t the only person who comes back into their lives. As with any altered reality, not everything changes for the good. Without getting too specific, whatever brings John back also causes the return of Zachariah (Kurt Fuller), the no-BS angel who saw Sam and Dean as nothing more than thorns in his side. (Like Kripke said, angels are dicks!) Speaking of angels, this reality also affects Castiel in… certain ways. This time the boys are dealing with a different (though not entirely unfamiliar) version of their friend.
Eric Ogden for EW
But for Morgan, who’s been asked for years about returning, it has always been about bringing John back in the right way. “The relationships between these three men were so open, so if I was going to come back, it would be nice to have some closure, especially with Sammy,” Morgan says. And before the hour’s over, both boys will get a moment alone with Dad. “This episode gives Sam a chance to forgive,” Padalecki says. Ackles adds, “For Dean, the whole episode is a dream that he doesn’t want to wake up from. But he knows he has to.”
Back in the bunker’s kitchen where Padalecki declared “reunion time” just hours ago, Sam and Dean are sitting around a table sharing a bottle of whiskey with their father and catching him up on everything he’s missed. Yes, they’ve saved the world (more than once). Yes, Lucifer has a son. But most important, John’s late wife, Mary — the woman he spent his life trying to avenge — is alive. Right then Mary rounds the corner for the moment she never saw coming, but in a strange way has always been waiting for. “Everything’s right in the world in this bubble of time,” Samantha Smith, who plays Mary, says of the couple’s reunion. “It’s very romantic.”
But as the Winchesters know a bit too well, all good things must come to an end. And when this is said and done, Sam and Dean will return to their life, driving down crazy street next to each other. Because despite the show hitting 300 episodes, nobody’s ready to call it quits just yet. “I don’t think we’re ready to throw in the towel,” Ackles says. “We’ve still got a little gas in the tank.” Put another way, Sam and Dean still got work to do.
Eric Ogden for EW
Jeffrey Dean Morgan defendsSupernatural dad: He 'shows love in different ways'
John Winchester didn’t have an easy life. When Yellow Eyes killed the woman he loved in the pilot of Supernatural, he made a choice: He would get revenge on that demon no matter what it took. But that meant that he would have to juggle raising Sam and Dean with a life of hunting, and the brothers have spent a lot of time figuring out how they feel about that decision and the way it affected their lives. But for Jeffrey Dean Morgan, who returns as John in the 300th episode, John, at his core, wasn’t too difficult to figure out.
“I don’t think he’s as screwed-up as other people do,” Morgan tells EW. “I think he is a guy who’s got a tremendous amount of love for his family. He was willing to die for his sons, willing to put himself in a place to where he could lose his life for revenge on what killed his wife. So as much has been said about John or that I’ve heard about John, I think what is missing is that he shows love in different ways. Maybe he wasn’t a big hugger and he didn’t say the right things when he should’ve — and there’s a bigger picture about getting your kids into hunting ghosts that I should acknowledge — but I think at his core he really loved his family and was willing to sacrifice everything. So I never looked or played John in a way that there was any malice toward his sons.”
Of course, Morgan’s journey with the character might’ve ended in season 2, but the show has continued to reference John, often sharing new stories about the character or even having Matt Cohen on to play a younger version of Sam and Dean’s dad. “I used to go to conventions and people would be furious with me, and I didn’t know what they were mad about,” Morgan says. “But the John that I played certainly wasn’t this a—hole of a man.”
And when John returns in the upcoming 300th episode, he’ll get a chance to really think about the choices he made, particularly as a father to Sam (Jared Padalecki) and Dean (Jensen Ackles). “As a parent, he could’ve done things better certainly, and I think whenever we get a chance to look back at our lives, we all think we could’ve done things better,” Morgan says. “In this episode he sees what he has done and what he has created with his sons, and there’s going to be moments where we get to address those with each son separately and as a unit, and that’s what makes this episode special.”
John Winchester didn’t have an easy life. When Yellow Eyes killed the woman he loved in the pilot of Supernatural, he made a choice: He would get revenge on that demon no matter what it took. But that meant that he would have to juggle raising Sam and Dean with a life of hunting, and the brothers have spent a lot of time figuring out how they feel about that decision and the way it affected their lives. But for Jeffrey Dean Morgan, who returns as John in the 300th episode, John, at his core, wasn’t too difficult to figure out.
“I don’t think he’s as screwed-up as other people do,” Morgan tells EW. “I think he is a guy who’s got a tremendous amount of love for his family. He was willing to die for his sons, willing to put himself in a place to where he could lose his life for revenge on what killed his wife. So as much has been said about John or that I’ve heard about John, I think what is missing is that he shows love in different ways. Maybe he wasn’t a big hugger and he didn’t say the right things when he should’ve — and there’s a bigger picture about getting your kids into hunting ghosts that I should acknowledge — but I think at his core he really loved his family and was willing to sacrifice everything. So I never looked or played John in a way that there was any malice toward his sons.”
Of course, Morgan’s journey with the character might’ve ended in season 2, but the show has continued to reference John, often sharing new stories about the character or even having Matt Cohen on to play a younger version of Sam and Dean’s dad. “I used to go to conventions and people would be furious with me, and I didn’t know what they were mad about,” Morgan says. “But the John that I played certainly wasn’t this a—hole of a man.”
And when John returns in the upcoming 300th episode, he’ll get a chance to really think about the choices he made, particularly as a father to Sam (Jared Padalecki) and Dean (Jensen Ackles). “As a parent, he could’ve done things better certainly, and I think whenever we get a chance to look back at our lives, we all think we could’ve done things better,” Morgan says. “In this episode he sees what he has done and what he has created with his sons, and there’s going to be moments where we get to address those with each son separately and as a unit, and that’s what makes this episode special.”
tight episode last night
this whole Nick arc is just ....
WOW
this whole Nick arc is just ....
WOW
https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/0...e-spoilers-john-remember-dream-mary-season-15
WHY SUPERNATURAL'S 300TH EPISODE IS A 'STARTING POINT,' NOT AN ENDING
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The Winchesters still have miles to go before they sleep.
BY LAURA PRUDOM This interview contains spoilers for Supernatural's 300th episode, "Lebanon."
Supernatural celebrated its 300th episode with a powerful installment that celebrated the strength of the Winchester family, bringing back Jeffrey Dean Morgan for the first time since Season 2.
With 300 episodes under their belts, you'd be forgiven for thinking that Sam (Jared Padalecki), Dean (Jensen Ackles), and Baby (their beloved Impala) might be running out of gas, but according to showrunner Andrew Dabb, the 300th episode is designed "to bring them to, not an endpoint necessarily, but a starting point." Below, Dabb discusses the impact that John's return will have on Sam, Dean, and Mary moving forward, and what we can expect from the show's newly-announced Season 15.
At what point in the writing or plot-breaking process did you know you were getting Jeffrey Dean Morgan back?
Not actually until a little later in the process. Obviously, the 300th episode was something we discussed right when we came back for the new season. So right in that first week, it was like, 'what are we doing here?' We didn’t have a full idea necessarily at that point, but we had an idea of, like, 'we need to pay attention, this is a very special thing.' So we were thinking about it for quite a long time, and when the time came to actually write it - basically within two weeks from we were gonna write it, which was in the fall, around September - we had had this idea for Jeffrey Dean Morgan. And the idea to bring him back had kind of floated around for a long time on Supernatural. And because it was the 300th, we’re just like, 'let’s just see if it’s even feasible.' He’s a very busy guy, a lot of stuff on his plate, and thankfully he was available to us and agreed to do it. And so, it wasn’t last minute, like, the script was written and we tore up the script and rewrote a script for him, but it was certainly, for us in the way we approached this episode, working pretty far out, it was a little bit later in the process.
Supernatural: "Lebanon" Photos
10+ IMAGES
Unlike the 200th episode, which was packed with Easter eggs and references, "Lebanon" really deals with the show’s emotional legacy. Why was it so important to you to ground it that way, and make it different than what you’ve done before?
Well, some of it is, like you just said, to make it different from what’s come before. We go back to the meta well fairly often on this show, but it is something that can get a little tiring at some point. And the great thing about Supernatural is, we have all this history. And some of that history is meta and references and things like that, and we do that all the time, in big and little ways. But the other thing, and the thing that I think fans are here for, is the emotional growth these characters have had, and this emotional journey they’ve been on. And to put John back into the story at this point really allowed us to galvanize some things that have been going on with Sam and Dean, I would argue for the last three years, and bring them to, not an endpoint necessarily, but a starting point. And so it allowed us to have the episode mean something both in the grand scheme of the show, but also in our ongoing narrative. What we didn’t want was for it to feel like an endpoint, or a looking back and patting ourselves on the back sort of thing. It had to have forward momentum, even if it was grounded in the past. And so in that way I think it was a good mix.
We were happy to explore the town of Lebanon a little bit more. And that’s something that will be coming back for us later this season. We get to place some of the characters we’ll see again. So it’s about, yes, having some old things in there, but continuing [to do] new things, because we’ve got another whole season of the show to do. So we can’t just rest on our laurels at this point.
Since the show was just renewed for Season 15, how are you building towards that in the upcoming episodes, and what might make it different from what's come before?
Oh, wow, it’s a little early for that. [Laughs.] will say that, true to Supernatural form, Season 14 does not end on [an] 'everybody is super happy and hugging' note, necessarily. Bad things are coming, as they always are, for the Winchesters. But I do think that, moving into 15 … I think that people will be surprised, and will be happy in terms of where we’re going, not only in terms of the plotline, but also in terms of our guys and their ongoing growth as people.
What are the emotional ramifications of John's visit for Dean and Sam, and for Mary, moving forward this season?
I think, for Sam and Dean, I don’t think anything they say to John are new thoughts that they’re having. I think they’re things they’ve thought for a long time, but they’re articulating in this episode. I think both of them have a weight lifted off their shoulders, but I don’t know that it changes a lot for them, because they’ve been on this journey for so long. I think for Mary, there’s a little bit more weight to it, because I think it forces her to confront some things about Sam and Dean and how they grew up, and parenting styles, and her own parenting style, that I think she spent a lot of time avoiding. And she’s someone who came back and has sort of been a part of their lives for the past three years, but not really. Sometimes circumstance, getting zapped into an alternate universe. Sometimes fully. But I think it makes her reevaluate some of that stuff. And so I think, you know, ultimately, him being there brings those three members of the family even closer together.
Samantha Smith as Mary and Jeffrey Dean Morgan as John.
Are there any other consequences of this episode beyond giving some closure to those old wounds? The boys figured John wouldn’t remember anything, but in the final shot, obviously, he remembers at least part of it as a dream.
Yes, I mean, we can’t change our own past on the show, by our rules and also because it would invalidate a lot of what we’ve done. But I would like to think, at least for a while after that "dream" John had, his stance towards... maybe there’s a little softening towards Sam, and towards Dean as well. So I think there’s that. And in terms of going forward, we would love to have Jeffrey back on the show again, but again, he’s a very busy guy.
Why did you decide to bring back a John from 2003 rather than a John who was already dead?
We wanted a John who had a lot of more raw emotions with Sam and Dean. By the time he passed away, he gained a level of composure, at least with Dean, that he had not really had previously. And certainly, once he came back, and he knows they killed Yellow Eyes and all that kind of stuff - it’s not that they wouldn’t have had great conversations, because they would have. But they would’ve been very different conversations. And they would’ve been about, "wow, that was great that we did that," versus about the more raw issues, all of which culminated with this John that we chose to bring back, who was the John that existed right after Sam left, and that period before the show started. And I think that allowed him to have a little bit of distance, and also, that allowed them to have some conversations that hearkened back to the first days of our show or before, actually. The first conversations that hearkened back to Season 2, where already, their relationship had started to change.
The past couple of seasons have had a few notable instances of Sam and Dean reminiscing about their childhood and digging into whether John was a good father or not, which I’ve really appreciated just to give us more context into their childhood - why has that been important to you?
I think some of it is that, when you get older … Sam and Dean are in this position, I think Jared and Jensen are in the position, I think it’s a position we all go through from being even a very old kid, like in our early thirties, into being an actual adult, where you look back and you kind of reevaluate... especially your parents. I’m not saying you look back at them with rose-colored glasses, because sometimes you look and you’re like, "oh my God, my father was a very immature person." You understand what that means. And so, for Sam and Dean as they move forward, and especially having this surrogate son of their own, I think it’s forced them to ask questions about their father.
I don’t think either one of them would say John was a great father, certainly, but I don’t also think that either one of them would say that John was the worst father in the world. I think they now, more so than any other time in their lives, understand how complex and stressful and crippling his life was at that point. And I’m not saying they give him a pass, because even Dean in the previous episode said, this is what they talked about, some mistakes John had made and knew they were mistakes and knew they were wrong things to do, but I think they had some understanding there. It was really important to us that the conversations Sam and Dean had with John in this episode are not the same conversations they would have had with him fifteen years ago. Because they have grown as men, and over the course of many, many apocalypses, and you want that reflected in the conversation.
On a similar note, are you interested in revisiting any cases or flashbacks to their past in upcoming episodes? Episodes like "Something Wicked" and "A Very Supernatural Christmas" were always so effective for adding context to that period in their lives.
Yeah. I mean, I always love those episodes as well, flashback episodes and things like that. Those are things that, to be frank, this season fell a little bit by the wayside, largely because of our reduced episode count, which took away some options in terms of standalone stories. But I’m always on the lookout for a good story in that area, so I would love to find more.
We've seen a number of past characters return this season, including Pamela Barnes - was there anyone else you wanted to bring back for the 300th that you couldn't get? And any other returning favorites coming up this season?
In terms of this episode, no. We got everybody back we wanted to get back, and we’re incredibly happy about it, we couldn’t have asked for anything more. In terms of going forward, in episode 20, I will say that we get visited by an old favorite.
Supernatural airs Thursdays at 8 p.m. on The CW.
WHY SUPERNATURAL'S 300TH EPISODE IS A 'STARTING POINT,' NOT AN ENDING
Share.
The Winchesters still have miles to go before they sleep.
BY LAURA PRUDOM This interview contains spoilers for Supernatural's 300th episode, "Lebanon."
Supernatural celebrated its 300th episode with a powerful installment that celebrated the strength of the Winchester family, bringing back Jeffrey Dean Morgan for the first time since Season 2.
With 300 episodes under their belts, you'd be forgiven for thinking that Sam (Jared Padalecki), Dean (Jensen Ackles), and Baby (their beloved Impala) might be running out of gas, but according to showrunner Andrew Dabb, the 300th episode is designed "to bring them to, not an endpoint necessarily, but a starting point." Below, Dabb discusses the impact that John's return will have on Sam, Dean, and Mary moving forward, and what we can expect from the show's newly-announced Season 15.
At what point in the writing or plot-breaking process did you know you were getting Jeffrey Dean Morgan back?
Not actually until a little later in the process. Obviously, the 300th episode was something we discussed right when we came back for the new season. So right in that first week, it was like, 'what are we doing here?' We didn’t have a full idea necessarily at that point, but we had an idea of, like, 'we need to pay attention, this is a very special thing.' So we were thinking about it for quite a long time, and when the time came to actually write it - basically within two weeks from we were gonna write it, which was in the fall, around September - we had had this idea for Jeffrey Dean Morgan. And the idea to bring him back had kind of floated around for a long time on Supernatural. And because it was the 300th, we’re just like, 'let’s just see if it’s even feasible.' He’s a very busy guy, a lot of stuff on his plate, and thankfully he was available to us and agreed to do it. And so, it wasn’t last minute, like, the script was written and we tore up the script and rewrote a script for him, but it was certainly, for us in the way we approached this episode, working pretty far out, it was a little bit later in the process.
Supernatural: "Lebanon" Photos
10+ IMAGES
Unlike the 200th episode, which was packed with Easter eggs and references, "Lebanon" really deals with the show’s emotional legacy. Why was it so important to you to ground it that way, and make it different than what you’ve done before?
Well, some of it is, like you just said, to make it different from what’s come before. We go back to the meta well fairly often on this show, but it is something that can get a little tiring at some point. And the great thing about Supernatural is, we have all this history. And some of that history is meta and references and things like that, and we do that all the time, in big and little ways. But the other thing, and the thing that I think fans are here for, is the emotional growth these characters have had, and this emotional journey they’ve been on. And to put John back into the story at this point really allowed us to galvanize some things that have been going on with Sam and Dean, I would argue for the last three years, and bring them to, not an endpoint necessarily, but a starting point. And so it allowed us to have the episode mean something both in the grand scheme of the show, but also in our ongoing narrative. What we didn’t want was for it to feel like an endpoint, or a looking back and patting ourselves on the back sort of thing. It had to have forward momentum, even if it was grounded in the past. And so in that way I think it was a good mix.
We were happy to explore the town of Lebanon a little bit more. And that’s something that will be coming back for us later this season. We get to place some of the characters we’ll see again. So it’s about, yes, having some old things in there, but continuing [to do] new things, because we’ve got another whole season of the show to do. So we can’t just rest on our laurels at this point.
Since the show was just renewed for Season 15, how are you building towards that in the upcoming episodes, and what might make it different from what's come before?
Oh, wow, it’s a little early for that. [Laughs.] will say that, true to Supernatural form, Season 14 does not end on [an] 'everybody is super happy and hugging' note, necessarily. Bad things are coming, as they always are, for the Winchesters. But I do think that, moving into 15 … I think that people will be surprised, and will be happy in terms of where we’re going, not only in terms of the plotline, but also in terms of our guys and their ongoing growth as people.
What are the emotional ramifications of John's visit for Dean and Sam, and for Mary, moving forward this season?
I think, for Sam and Dean, I don’t think anything they say to John are new thoughts that they’re having. I think they’re things they’ve thought for a long time, but they’re articulating in this episode. I think both of them have a weight lifted off their shoulders, but I don’t know that it changes a lot for them, because they’ve been on this journey for so long. I think for Mary, there’s a little bit more weight to it, because I think it forces her to confront some things about Sam and Dean and how they grew up, and parenting styles, and her own parenting style, that I think she spent a lot of time avoiding. And she’s someone who came back and has sort of been a part of their lives for the past three years, but not really. Sometimes circumstance, getting zapped into an alternate universe. Sometimes fully. But I think it makes her reevaluate some of that stuff. And so I think, you know, ultimately, him being there brings those three members of the family even closer together.
Samantha Smith as Mary and Jeffrey Dean Morgan as John.
Are there any other consequences of this episode beyond giving some closure to those old wounds? The boys figured John wouldn’t remember anything, but in the final shot, obviously, he remembers at least part of it as a dream.
Yes, I mean, we can’t change our own past on the show, by our rules and also because it would invalidate a lot of what we’ve done. But I would like to think, at least for a while after that "dream" John had, his stance towards... maybe there’s a little softening towards Sam, and towards Dean as well. So I think there’s that. And in terms of going forward, we would love to have Jeffrey back on the show again, but again, he’s a very busy guy.
Why did you decide to bring back a John from 2003 rather than a John who was already dead?
We wanted a John who had a lot of more raw emotions with Sam and Dean. By the time he passed away, he gained a level of composure, at least with Dean, that he had not really had previously. And certainly, once he came back, and he knows they killed Yellow Eyes and all that kind of stuff - it’s not that they wouldn’t have had great conversations, because they would have. But they would’ve been very different conversations. And they would’ve been about, "wow, that was great that we did that," versus about the more raw issues, all of which culminated with this John that we chose to bring back, who was the John that existed right after Sam left, and that period before the show started. And I think that allowed him to have a little bit of distance, and also, that allowed them to have some conversations that hearkened back to the first days of our show or before, actually. The first conversations that hearkened back to Season 2, where already, their relationship had started to change.
The past couple of seasons have had a few notable instances of Sam and Dean reminiscing about their childhood and digging into whether John was a good father or not, which I’ve really appreciated just to give us more context into their childhood - why has that been important to you?
I think some of it is that, when you get older … Sam and Dean are in this position, I think Jared and Jensen are in the position, I think it’s a position we all go through from being even a very old kid, like in our early thirties, into being an actual adult, where you look back and you kind of reevaluate... especially your parents. I’m not saying you look back at them with rose-colored glasses, because sometimes you look and you’re like, "oh my God, my father was a very immature person." You understand what that means. And so, for Sam and Dean as they move forward, and especially having this surrogate son of their own, I think it’s forced them to ask questions about their father.
I don’t think either one of them would say John was a great father, certainly, but I don’t also think that either one of them would say that John was the worst father in the world. I think they now, more so than any other time in their lives, understand how complex and stressful and crippling his life was at that point. And I’m not saying they give him a pass, because even Dean in the previous episode said, this is what they talked about, some mistakes John had made and knew they were mistakes and knew they were wrong things to do, but I think they had some understanding there. It was really important to us that the conversations Sam and Dean had with John in this episode are not the same conversations they would have had with him fifteen years ago. Because they have grown as men, and over the course of many, many apocalypses, and you want that reflected in the conversation.
On a similar note, are you interested in revisiting any cases or flashbacks to their past in upcoming episodes? Episodes like "Something Wicked" and "A Very Supernatural Christmas" were always so effective for adding context to that period in their lives.
Yeah. I mean, I always love those episodes as well, flashback episodes and things like that. Those are things that, to be frank, this season fell a little bit by the wayside, largely because of our reduced episode count, which took away some options in terms of standalone stories. But I’m always on the lookout for a good story in that area, so I would love to find more.
We've seen a number of past characters return this season, including Pamela Barnes - was there anyone else you wanted to bring back for the 300th that you couldn't get? And any other returning favorites coming up this season?
In terms of this episode, no. We got everybody back we wanted to get back, and we’re incredibly happy about it, we couldn’t have asked for anything more. In terms of going forward, in episode 20, I will say that we get visited by an old favorite.
Supernatural airs Thursdays at 8 p.m. on The CW.
That damn slow piano music gets me every time
damn it...
they ALMOST got me...ALMOST!!!
I didn't even know about the 300th episode until yesterday when I saw the pictures on Facebook. Fans have been wanting John Winchester back on the show for years and that episode was one of their best. Jeffery Dean Morgan can still play that character. To see the whole family back together one last time was great. I hope the bring John back but I think this was just a one time thing since Jeffery Dean Morgan is in the ATL filming the Walking Dead and that a long flight to Vancouver. At least bring him back if Mary dies or for the final episode. I would love to see Sam and Dean do an episode of the Walking Dead if not just a cameo.
That’d be dope! I like how they had Lucille in one episode! So the John they showers at the end was just a younger version? I hope they can find a way to bring them back when and if the show ends to wrap it all up nice!! IDK if anyone watched Angel but they all went out on some kamikaze shit the last episode!
This show has no right to be THIS good for THIS long...
Wow.
Wow.
WOW........ They are going to do it.... and I'm not ready.
@playahaitian thoughts?
Supernatural Will End After Season 15
Earlier this year The CW announced that the long-running Supernatural would return in the Fall 2019 season for its 15th season, and now the cast and crew of the series have announced that the series will conclude once that batch of episodes wrap up.
Though we’re very, very excited about moving into our 15th season, it will be our last,”Ackles said. “Fifteen years of a show that has certainly changed my life, I know it’s changed these two guys’ life. We wanted you to hear it from us. Though we’re excited abotu next year, it will bet he finale, the big grand finale of an institution.”
Collins added, “We love you guys and this family is not going anywhere even though the show will come to an end.”
Ackles concluded the video saying: “I will say this, a little word from Eric Kripke, the creator of this world and these characters, in a show about family it is amazing and it is the pride of his life that it became family.”
In a statement, co-showrunners and executive producersAndrew Dabb and Robert Singer saod: “Firstly, we would like to thank all the people who have been involved with the show both in front of and behind the camera. For us it has been an experience of a lifetime. The support we have had from both Warner Bros Television and The CW has been incredible. We’d like to give special thanks to Jensen, Jared and Misha for making this journey so special. It is now most important to us to give these characters that we love the send off they deserve.”
The CW has confirmed that with the 20 episodes set for the show’s fifteenth season, Supernatural will conclude with 327 episodes across its 15 season run when it ends in 2020.
https://www.comingsoon.net/tv/news/1052715-supernatural-will-end-after-season-15
I'm not ready
@playahaitian thoughts?
Supernatural Will End After Season 15
Earlier this year The CW announced that the long-running Supernatural would return in the Fall 2019 season for its 15th season, and now the cast and crew of the series have announced that the series will conclude once that batch of episodes wrap up.
Though we’re very, very excited about moving into our 15th season, it will be our last,”Ackles said. “Fifteen years of a show that has certainly changed my life, I know it’s changed these two guys’ life. We wanted you to hear it from us. Though we’re excited abotu next year, it will bet he finale, the big grand finale of an institution.”
Collins added, “We love you guys and this family is not going anywhere even though the show will come to an end.”
Ackles concluded the video saying: “I will say this, a little word from Eric Kripke, the creator of this world and these characters, in a show about family it is amazing and it is the pride of his life that it became family.”
In a statement, co-showrunners and executive producersAndrew Dabb and Robert Singer saod: “Firstly, we would like to thank all the people who have been involved with the show both in front of and behind the camera. For us it has been an experience of a lifetime. The support we have had from both Warner Bros Television and The CW has been incredible. We’d like to give special thanks to Jensen, Jared and Misha for making this journey so special. It is now most important to us to give these characters that we love the send off they deserve.”
The CW has confirmed that with the 20 episodes set for the show’s fifteenth season, Supernatural will conclude with 327 episodes across its 15 season run when it ends in 2020.
https://www.comingsoon.net/tv/news/1052715-supernatural-will-end-after-season-15
I'm not ready