Jensen Ackles Officially Finds His Next Supernatural In Adaptation Of Bestselling Novels

✓ Correct! Eric Kripke. He’d originally pitched the show to Warner Bros. as a tabloid-reporter anthology titled “Tape” before reformulating it around two brothers. Kripke ran the show through Season 5 (the original planned ending), then handed off to Sera Gamble, Jeremy Carver, Andrew Dabb and Robert Singer over the next decade. The Boys (2019–) is essentially Kripke processing the same superhero/horror genre concerns at a much higher budget.

✗ Wrong showrunner. The answer is Eric Kripke. Greg Berlanti is the Arrowverse / DC superhero TV mogul (Arrow, The Flash). Joss Whedon was the Buffy the Vampire Slayer / Firefly creator whose work clearly influenced Supernatural but who has no credit on it. Bryan Fuller did Pushing Daisies and Hannibal. Kripke is the one who took the show from a Vancouver pilot to a fifteen-season behemoth.

✓ Correct! Jensen Ackles. He’d actually originally auditioned for Sam, the younger brother, before being moved to Dean opposite Jared Padalecki. Ackles directed six episodes of the series himself (his first was Season 6’s “Weekend at Bobby’s”). Post-Supernatural he reunited with Eric Kripke to play Soldier Boy in Season 3 of The Boys, and headlined the short-lived prequel The Winchesters (2022–23) as a narrating older Dean.

✗ Wrong Winchester. The answer is Jensen Ackles, who plays Dean. Jeffrey Dean Morgan is John Winchester — the brothers’ father, who originated the lead-by-a-grizzled-cowboy energy Negan would later inherit. Misha Collins is Castiel. Jared Padalecki is Sam, the younger, taller brother. Ackles plays Dean — the shorter, leather-jacketed, classic-rock-quoting older one.

✓ Correct! 1967 Chevrolet Impala — specifically the four-door Sport Sedan, originally chosen by Kripke because its trunk was big enough to hide a body. The production wore through more than two dozen Impalas across the run, since the car gets demolished, dunked, dropped from cliffs, and possessed regularly. Jensen Ackles bought the “hero” Impala used in the final season after the show wrapped in 2020.

✗ Wrong Chevy. The answer is the 1967 Impala, four-door Sport Sedan. The Camaro is too sporty — Kripke specifically wanted a body-in-the-trunk family sedan. The Chevelle SS is a muscle car, and the Bel Air is closer to ’50s-cool than ’60s-menace. The Impala is “Baby” — chosen because, in Kripke’s words, “it could fit four people and a body in the trunk.”

✓ Correct! Lawrence, Kansas. Kripke chose the town in part because of its Wizard of Oz adjacency and the “Bleeding Kansas” historical resonance — Lawrence was sacked in 1856 during the pre-Civil-War conflict over slavery, an act of evil literally seared into the local geography. Mary Winchester’s nursery fire on November 2, 1983 is the show’s foundational trauma; the date and the ceiling-fire image recur all the way to the finale.

✗ Wrong Midwestern town. The answer is Lawrence, Kansas. Sioux Falls, SD is Bobby Singer’s hometown and salvage yard. Pontiac, IL is where Dean digs himself out of his own grave at the start of Season 4. Lebanon, KS is where the Men of Letters Bunker is hidden — you may want to remember that one. Lawrence is the home of the fire — and the show’s foundational trauma.

✓ Correct! Castiel — named for Cassiel, the Jewish-mystical angel of solitude and tears. Misha Collins was originally signed for a six-episode arc; Castiel ended up in 145 episodes across twelve seasons, including the controversial Season 15 “Despair” love-confession episode. The trenchcoat (a Burberry knock-off) became so iconic that fans send Collins replicas at conventions, and his on-screen vessel Jimmy Novak became its own minor character.

✗ Wrong angel. The answer is Castiel. Gabriel turns up later as the Trickster (Richard Speight Jr.). Uriel is Cas’s Season 4 angel partner, who gets killed off as a Lucifer sympathiser. Balthazar (Sebastian Roché) is Cas’s snarky friend introduced in Season 6. Castiel is the trenchcoat-wearing tax-accountant-vessel angel who pulls Dean out of Hell — and the show’s third lead from Season 4 onward.

✓ Correct! “Carry On Wayward Son” by Kansas, off 1976’s Leftoverture. Eric Kripke chose it for the Season 1 finale and made it a tradition every finale thereafter. Kansas frontman Steve Walsh said in interviews that Supernatural’s use revived the song so completely it now makes more annual royalties from streaming than the band did from its 1976 release. The song also closes out the series finale “Carry On” (2020).

✗ Wrong classic-rock cue. The answer is “Carry On Wayward Son” by Kansas. Renegade, More Than a Feeling and Don’t Fear the Reaper are all Supernatural-vibe tracks from the same era and several appear in episodes — but the season-finale ritual is reserved for Kansas’s track. Wayward, Kansas, brothers… Kripke layered every available pun into the show’s signature musical cue.

✓ Correct! Bobby Singer, played by Jim Beaver. Eric Kripke literally named the character after his Supernatural co-executive-producer Robert Singer — in part as a gag, in part as a dare to write a self-aware character around the joke. Bobby dies at the end of Season 7’s “Death’s Door” (E10) but returns repeatedly in flashback, alternate universes, and in the show’s last few seasons as a parallel-Earth Bobby. Beaver’s Deadwood role is Ellsworth, who marries Alma and is shot dead by Hearst’s men.

✗ Wrong hunter. The answer is Bobby Singer. Rufus Turner (Steven Williams) is Bobby’s old-friend rival hunter. Garth Fitzgerald IV (DJ Qualls) is the goofier hunter who later turns out to be a werewolf. Jody Mills (Kim Rhodes) is the Sioux Falls sheriff who becomes a found-family figure. Bobby is the salvage-yard idjit-caller, named for Kripke’s own co-EP Robert Singer.

✓ Correct! Lebanon, Kansas. Population fluctuates around 218 and a stone marker near town claims it as the geographic centre of the contiguous 48 states — perfect for an organisation hiding from the supernatural. The Men of Letters Bunker becomes the closest thing to a home base the brothers have ever had: kitchen, library, dungeon, garage. The real Lebanon’s Main Street has become a Supernatural pilgrimage site since the show ended in 2020.

✗ Wrong Kansas town. The answer is Lebanon — population 218, near the geographic centre of the contiguous US, perfect for a hidden order’s bunker. Topeka is the state capital. Wichita is the largest city. Manhattan is home to Kansas State University. Lebanon, with its tiny Main Street and middle-of-nowhere geography, is where the Men of Letters Bunker hides — and where the brothers finally have a home.