The CW’s Supernatural came to a close in 2020 after a whopping fifteen-season run. For many fans, the final few episodes did not provide a satisfying conclusion to the story of the Winchester brothers.
The finale, Carry On, was filmed during COVID. As such the cast list was cut down heavily from the original plan according to Entertainment Weekly. This (along with episode 18, Despair) also came under heavy criticism due to how the final moments of major characters played out.
Since then, discussions of a revival have been rife among the Supernatural cast and fandom. But will a sixteenth season (or movie spin-off) come to pass? Here’s everything we know about a Supernatural revival.
Is Supernatural coming back?
Warner Bros. Discovery has not yet confirmed any plans for a Supernatural revival. However, there are indications that something could be in the pipeline.
The most recent rumours come from a 20th anniversary interview with actors Jensen Ackles, Jared Padalecki and Misha Collins.
The three were asked about what they’d want to see from a revival. After joking about puppets and anime, Padalecki responded with the following: “We’re all a lot older than we were 20 years ago. I don’t know if I have 22 episodes of Supernatural in me. I think a limited series would be great.”
The trio were then asked whether they’d want the tone to be grittier, or kept the same, and Ackles responded with this:
“I’ve thought about this because we’ve been asked what would the show have looked like had it been on a streamer. And it would’ve been different. It would’ve been a little more R-rated. But part of me feels like, because of what we did for so long and what the tone is, I feel like changing that now might be doing it a disservice. I could see the benefit in keeping it like a broadcast show.”
The possibility of a revival has been brought up by the actors on multiple occasions on the convention circuit. The most prominent rumours started during the Creation Honolulu convention back in November 2023, according to Collider.
Padalecki said: “I have some ideas, and I hope that now that the writers are back, and the actors are back, that we all get together”. Ackles then followed this up with “Stay tuned on that… there are some conversations regarding that conversation that are being had.”
On 2 April 2024, Jared told Collider the following: “If and when Supernatural comes back, it’s going to be a labor of love, and we’re gonna put every hour in to make sure that it’s as true to the canon and to the fandom and to the story and to the characters as possible.
“So, my short answer is it’s not a consideration, the answer is yes. I just don’t know when I’m available. I don’t know when he’s [Jensen] available. But again, my answer is yes.”
At the end of February, Creation Entertainment, the company behind many fan conventions, including a whole bunch dedicated entirely to Supernatural.
On its Instagram page, it announced a collector coin for fans to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the show, as Supernatural started in 2005.
However, the dates on the item caught the attention of fans, as it says ‘2005 – ?‘, rather than ‘2020’, which is when the series finished.
Of course, this could just be a metaphor that the Supernatural fandom is forever… or it could be a tease that the show may return one day. When that will be is another matter.
You can view the post below – the dates mentioned are on the second image:
Fans of the three core cast members will be pleased to hear that they’re all getting back together on screen… though it’s not for Supernatural. Instead, the trio will star in season 5 of The Boys. You can see the video confirming their involvement below (with a special appearance from Baby):
Jared and Misha have filmed their scenes now, and showrunner Eric Kripke has given the following quote:
“I will confirm that Jared, Jensen, and Misha are all in the same frame together, and in the same storyline, and interacting with each other”.
It may not be a full Dean, Sam and Cas reunion… but it’s close.
However, the trio won’t be sharing the screen immediately. According to Padalecki (via Collider), his scenes will take place in the fifth episode of the series, which will air after a break between the first four episodes. Bleeding Cool also reported that Collins stated he’ll be in episode 5 as well.
Jensen has had behind-the-scenes involvement with another project related to Supernatural – a prequel called The Winchesters, which aired in 2022. This was created by Chaos Machine Productions, which he is a creator of, together with his wife Danneel Ackles (who had a guest stint as the angel Anael on Supernatural).
The CW/Warner Bros. Discovery
Sadly, The Winchesters was cancelled after just a single season. However, the fact that Jensen has been actively continuing stories in the Supernatural universe could indicate that more shows are being explored, including a revival.
In fact, Chaos Machine Productions sold two TV shows in 2024.
The key thing standing in the way of a reunion is managing to work around the schedules of the team.
Ackles’ work is the trickiest to navigate. He will be reprising his role as Soldier Boy on The Boys and will be leading a spin-off series with Aya Cash called Vought Rising.
He has also been involved in the CBS series Tracker with Justin Hartley. According to US Weekly, he even managed to get in a few Supernatural easter eggs. Jensen is also currently starring in the Amazon Prime Video series, Countdown.
Ackles discussed his busy schedule with Amazon during an interview with Collider, stating the following:
“…it’s not something that’s in the wings waiting right now, but I feel like it’s floating out there for somebody to grab at some point. So, maybe sometime in the future, it would be fun to put those boots back on and get back in that car. But like you said, right now, Amazon’s keeping me pretty busy. It’s a good problem to have.”
That does seem to dash hopes of any announcement of season 16 of Supernatural this year, but you never know.
For Padalecki, Walker season 4 has now aired its final episode and was sadly not renewed for season 5. Padalecki has since starred in Fire Country and has been teased for a role in the last season of The Boys.
In June 2024, Padalecki again discussed a reboot on Tommy DiDario’s podcast I’ve Never Said This Before, saying “I am dying to do a reboot of Supernatural akin to the Gilmore Girls reboot… Like, here are four one-and-a-half hour episodes, we’ll shoot it in three months.”
For Collins, Gotham Knights was yet another CW project that has not been renewed. Instead, he’s been focusing on ambassador work in Ukraine, and his charity Random Acts.
Whether the stars align for all three major actors to have time in their busy schedules for a revival remains to be seen.
Collins briefly sent fans into a panic when he announced a ‘revival’ on his social channels in which Castiel was not involved, but it turned out to be a classic April Fools’ prank (the author being ‘Becky Rosen’ is a major clue).
When will Supernatural return?
An interview with Jared Padalecki could imply that the cast is trying to get a Supernatural reunion announced for this year, 2025.
The actor said the following on Tommy DiDario’s podcast: “I think Jensen and I both said in 2020 we’d love to revisit these characters, this world, give us five years – which is next year”.
That would make sense, considering that this year we’ve heard more speculation than ever before about a revival.
However, as we’ve noted above, Jensen Ackles has numerous other projects he’s currently working on this year, and his most recent comments seem to imply that we won’t hear anything anytime soon.
Misha Collins also cast further doubt on a revival happening soon at Heroes Comic-Con in October 2024. He said the following: “I think we would all love to do some sort of a reboot, or movie or something at some point, but there is no plan for that right now.”
A release date is also dependent on the revival finding a network/streaming home. 2025 isn’t entirely impossible, but based on all the information we know, we’d anticipate that the project would only be in the very beginning stages if it was announced this year, which would imply a 2026 release at the earliest.
Should we hear more, we’ll update this article.
Would this be Supernatural season 16, or a Supernatural reboot?
No confirmation has been given by the cast or creators of whether this would be an official ‘season 16’, or a fresh reboot. It probably depends on if the original actors are returning, or if Warner wishes to do something different.
Ackles told TV Insider in 2022 that he liked the idea of a shorter final season: “I have this lofty dream of when, after things have settled, we’ll tackle one more case as Sam and Dean… [Maybe] a nice 10-episode short-order for HBO Max — I’m just saying. Like a whole True Detective meets Supernatural. It’s right there.”
Having a shorter run would be a break from Supernatural’s traditional 20-odd episode season, but would give time to focus on a strong, shorter story. In that case, this may be considered a spin-off miniseries.
Who could return for Supernatural season 16?
As we’ve already explored, we’d expect Jared Padalecki (Sam Winchester), Jensen Ackles (Dean Winchester) and Misha Collins (Castiel) to be involved in a revival, if it comes to pass.
Ackles originally had plans to bring back old faces in future seasons of The Winchesters before its cancellation. As he told Entertainment Weekly, “We were talking not only about story and where we wanted to take our cast, we were talking about who we were going to bring back from the mothership”.
As the final episodes heavily featured Nephilim Jack Kline (Alexander Calvert), then he could also return. Other likely candidates to be back on the show could include Rowena (Ruth Connell), Bobby Singer (Jim Beaver), Crowley (Mark Sheppherd), Jody Mills (Kim Rhodes), Donna Hanscum (Brianna Buckmaster), Gabriel (Richard Speight) and many more.
If the reboot incorporates some of the cast from The Winchesters, then we could see the return of young John (Drake Rodger) and Mary (Meg Donnelly), or even their older counterparts (Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Samantha Smith).
The CW/Warner Bros. Discovery
We don’t yet know who could be involved behind the camera. The Winchesters recruited former writer Robbie Thompson, but previous Supernatural writers and directors include Andrew Dabb, Robert Singer, Sera Gamble, and of course, the creator himself, Eric Kripke.
What could the plot of Supernatural season 16 be about?
Major spoilers for the ending of Supernatural and The Winchesters below
By the time season 15 of Supernatural rolled around, the stakes were higher than ever – pitting the brothers against God himself, AKA Chuck Shurley (Rob Benedict). Chuck had long been writing the story of the brothers, pulling the strings and controlling their lives.
After finally defeating him with the help of Jack, the Winchesters went back into their usual monster-hunting business. As such, they weren’t being kept ‘safe’ by higher powers anymore. Therefore, Dean ended up meeting his demise by being impaled on a rusty nail during an average case against vampires.
Dean has overcome many adversaries across his lifetime, so this ending felt extremely flat and anticlimactic for many fans. After his death, he met his old friend Bobby in Heaven, and drove the Impala on an endless road, before finally meeting up with his brother who died of old age.
Whilst Sam got to live a long and happy life, the audience only saw this through a series of flashforwards, and never actually got to know who his mysterious partner was – prompting fans to call her ‘Sam’s blurry wife’. Many suspected that the woman was Eileen (Shoshannah Stern), a fellow hunter and love interest for the younger brother. However, we never knew for sure.
Therefore, a new season could either explore a threat to Heaven, where the brothers take on one final case that addresses some of the loose plot threads left behind in season 15. Or it could take place in the time between Dean and Sam’s deaths. This would align with events that took place in Supernatural’s prequel, The Winchesters.
In the finale of this show, a young John and Mary Winchester met a mysterious stranger who appeared ‘Back to the Future’ style in a Chevy Impala. The audience naturally knew him as Dean Winchester.
The show reveals that these versions of John and Mary aren’t technically Dean’s parents. He has come to another world, back in time, to create an alternate happy ending for his parents. He gives them a letter from his grandfather, Henry (Gil McKinney), in the hope that John will understand more about The Men of Letters and hunting and become a more caring parent for the brothers in the future.
Dean also passes on his hunter’s journal to John and Mary, along with the Colt, a gun that can kill nearly every being in the universe. This is so they both stand a chance at living against their future enemies, such as Azazel.
Therefore, Supernatural season 16 could explore either a multiverse or another branch of time. Perhaps Dean goes back to an earlier point in the show to change the course of history, or we discover how events would unfold with The Winchester’s timeline and how this could have altered the lives of the brothers and their family, which famously “don’t end with blood”.
Ackles shared hopes to revisit these characters in some capacity after The Winchesters was cancelled:
Another huge unresolved plot line comes from the eighteenth episode of season 15. Dean and Cas were being hunted by Billie (AKA Death) and ended up trapped in The Bunker with no way out.
To save Dean, Castiel summoned The Empty, a void entity that the angel had made a deal with a few years back. He did this by doing the thing that made him the happiest, which was confessing his love for Dean.
The romantic declaration (according to Misha Collins via Pride) allowed The Empty to take both Cas and Billie, leaving Dean alone, and not giving him a chance to talk about this revelation from his best friend or explore whether he could feel the same way.
Much of the Supernatural fandom has long been invested in the complicated relationship between Dean and Cas (AKA Destiel), and many critics argued that Cas’s statement moments before death was a huge disservice as it played into the ‘bury your gays’ troupe seen in many TV series and films before.
There’s hope from many fans that Dean could reunite with Cas in a revival, and perhaps finally have a nuanced discussion about that confession.
At Heroes Comic-Con, Collins said “I think it would be tragic to not address it directly and have a conversation about it. I would love to know what Dean says because he kind of left me hanging, you know?”
He also expressed an interest in revisiting what happened to his character, telling con-goes in Stockholm that he’d like to see a storyline in which Cas is rescued from The Empty.
At the same event, Collins admitted that he was asked to make a cameo in The Winchesters as Castiel, but he declined as it didn’t answer any of the canonical questions about what happened to his character. Ackles was also in agreement with Collins.
It’s worth noting that Cas was briefly mentioned by Bobby in the final episode, implying that the Angel did get out of the Empty and helped rebuild Heaven. Of course, Supernatural has been known to retcon things before.
The CW / Warner Bros.
Possible antagonists for the revival could include previous characters such as The Empty, Chuck and Lucifer (Mark Pellegrino). Alternatively, we could visit an entirely new fantasy being – perhaps one that is involved with the multiverse or time-travel, if that’s the route that the show ends up going down.
What network could Supernatural 16 air on?
This is where things get a bit tricky. The CW is now under the ownership of Nexstar, which is changing its focus to linear broadcast content and sports programming from 2024 onwards. Current TV series on the channel, such as All American: Homecoming and Superman & Lois, will continue for now.
Traditional CW staples such as Supernatural don’t align with this strategy. Plus, Padalecki recently gave some scathing comments about the channel to Variety after the network cancelled Walker, so it would be surprising if he and the cast were to work with the channel again.
The major alternative is the streaming service HBO Max – a platform Ackles has previously expressed interest in.
It’d be surprising if the revival aired on another channel or platform that’s not part of Warner Bros. Discovery, considering that the original show was under this company. Then again, previous seasons have been syndicated on major streaming platforms, so it isn’t entirely impossible.
Dominik Tomaszewski / Foundry
How to watch Supernatural seasons 1 to 15 in the UK and US
If you want to relive the adventures of The Winchester family in the UK, then you can catch seasons 1 through 15 on Amazon Prime Video. Subscriptions for this start from £5.99 per month for video streaming only, or £8.99 per month for a full Prime subscription. Note that you’ll have to pay extra if you want to go ad-free.
US readers can catch Supernatural on Spectrum.
You can also read up on everything we know about Vought Rising, and the new animated adaption of Midnight Sun.
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