'Supernatural' ends 15-season run with series finale on The CW

By Jay Bobbin

Gracenote

Even if "Supernatural" had its last story long planned, it wasn't expected to go out quite this way.

The CW's longest-running series, after starting on the now-defunct WB Network, was scheduled to conclude its 15-season run in May ... but when the coronavirus situation shut down many shows, the closing episode hadn't been filmed yet. Now, the end of the saga of demon-hunting siblings Sam and Dean Winchester (played by Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles) is in immediate sight: The series finale airs Thursday, Nov. 19, preceded by the retrospective special "Supernatural: The Long Road Home." (Also that day, TNT will present a marathon of encore episodes leading up to the finale.)

"I think if we allow ourselves the weight of what this season is to kind of creep into our daily work schedule, those days are going to get really long," Ackles - who also has directed several episodes - said of making the final "Supernatural" round while it was in production. "We're not trying to reinvent the wheel in the 15th season. We do what we know. And then, who knows what's going to happen? It's going to be a big shift in a lot of our lives."

Padalecki adds, "It's such a bizarre thing to be able to be on a TV show that films a full pilot, not a pilot presentation, and then gets to have that air and to have more episodes purchased and bought and paid for. One of the wonderful things about my experience with the show is that I was sort of in the same position that Sam was: I didn't know how it was going to end. I guess I wondered, but I never asked the question."

The CW's chairman and CEO, Mark Pedowitz, has stated how much "Supernatural" has meant as one of the network's most reliable performers, over a very long stretch - and also has noted how welcome its stars will continue to be there. Indeed, Padalecki has been cast in a CW reboot of the Chuck Norris action series "Walker, Texas Ranger," while Ackles has been signed to join Season 3 of Amazon Prime Video's superhero show "The Boys" (developed by Eric Kripke, who also created "Supernatural").

Padalecki notes that on the personal front, "Supernatural" has given him one of his very greatest gifts: "I met my wife, the mother of my children (actress Genevieve Cortese, who first guest-starred during the fourth season and also will appear on 'Walker')." Evidently, Padalecki has taken several other things from the show with him, too. "I am not guaranteeing this," he muses, "but there may be a few things in my house that might have already been on 'Supernatural.'"

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"Supernatural"

A retrospective and season finale air at 7 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 19, on The CW