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Jensen Ackles explains ‘The Winchesters’ will tie into canon in a ‘wild Supernatural way’
Jensen Ackles says that the prequel show will reveal what really happened between Sam and Dean's parents.
The pilot for the Supernatural prequel, The Winchesters, is in production right now, and Dean Winchester himself, Jensen Ackles, is shedding some light on how the new show about his character’s parents will fit into the narrative established in Supernatural, which ended after 15 seasons last year.
For those who need a refresher, the original CW show established that the parents of Dean and Sam (Jared Padalecki) Winchester both had backgrounds that touched on hunting monsters. Their mom, Mary, came from a monster-hunting family, while their dad, John, had connections to the Men of Letters. The established canon, however, also had John in the dark about demons and such until after Mary died.
“Obviously, we’ve got a massive fix for that,” Ackles said in a recent interview with TVLine about John supposedly being clueless about monster hunting until later on. “But we get to that point, and we play the ‘Ooh, that’s why’ kind of a thing.”
Creating a story that meets the original show’s mythology in creative ways is also part of what Ackles said made the project an interesting one. “That’s kind of the exciting thing, in my opinion, is that the waypoints or the tentpoles that were established on the mothership, as we lovingly call it, those will get touched on,” Ackles explained. “We’ll get to those waypoints in a way that we probably didn’t expect. And that’s what we’re really having fun with is, like, the story is coming together. It’s not the washed version. It’s not the sugar-coated version of how mom and dad met. This is what really happened.”
Hopefully we’ll get to find out what really happened when the show airs on The CW. The series, which stars Meg Donnelly and Drake Rodger as Mary and John Winchester, currently only has a pilot order. Ackles — who will also narrate the show — is optimistic that it will be picked up for series, however, and that he might even direct an episode or two. “Obviously, I gotta get approved by the studio, but I think they know me, so I might have a good chance,” he said with a laugh.
While we wait to hear about the fate of The Winchesters, we can rewatch the original Supernatural series or check out similarly supernatural fare such as Surreal Estate on the SYFY app, or Supernatural Academy on Peacock.
