Sera Gamble arrived, our table being the last group to talk to before going to the panel. The room was pretty noisy and crazy by now, for everyone was prepping for the press room/ballroom switch between “Supernatural” and “Smallville.” Still, she gave us her undivided attention and even complimented me on the “Ghostfacers” t-shirt I was wearing. She was the only one that noticed! A big thanks to Patrick Doody, the Producer of “Ghostfacers” for the shirt.
Please note that by this time the noise was so bad that hearing most of the questions word for word were impossible on my recording. The questions are shown here mostly in context but not how they were asked word for word. I also had a hard time with a few Sera’s answers too, but managed to get most of it except for a few words here and there that had no effect on the overall answer. Also, the last two questions were very rushed because we were out of time.
Now everybody say it together…SPOILER ALERT!!!!!!!!
Now that there’s been much talk of there being a five year plan for the show and this is TV and things get extended and people still very much love the show when did you start thinking about when you might get another season and what would you like to do with it?
We started talking in earnest about season six very early in season five, but this is a very classy problem to have. Saying that you have a mythology that you want to climax with the apocalypse, and first of all getting to the climax of any mythology story line on television is rare. And then getting to go past it into the next one is even rarer and it’s not a problem it’s completely an opportunity. Very early in the process, maybe the first or second week of talking about it, I was talking about it with Ben Edlund and he’s like “Since we’re talking about this how could we not do this?” Because the post apocalypse is super fun. We’ve just been having a very good time. If anything we have to pick a structure and pick a way to tell the story because we have so many elements we wanted to touch on. You know, whether or not it resonates with the fans I just leave it up to you guys. You’ll tell us if you like it, you’ll tell us if it sucks.
What is the post apocalypse overall then in the story, saying it’s fun to play with, what will it be in the show?
When we pick up Sam and Dean, Dean has been out of the business for a year, mourning the death of his brother, living with a woman and her child, and Sam mysteriously reappears, he’s pulled back into hunting. He has monsters acting very mysteriously, and it’s not the first time that monsters are integral to our mythology. We get to have these straight up just monster of the week episodes that anyone can tune in. You can call your friends to have them watch Supernatural and just watch it and be like “it has nothing to do with anything” but for a long time viewer you are getting a taste of mythology as well. Sometimes for Sam and Dean it’s like, that is not how vampires act, that’s not how shapeshifters act. Cause we’re just horror movie fans, it’s a vampire, that you have to shoot the meat or chop the head off or whatever.
So Dean is not married?
He’s living with her.
How old is the daughter?
Son. He’s 12.
Will they be a part of the show?
They are part of the show after the first episode.
About this strange behavior, one of the things we heard earlier about vampires walking during the day, give us some more pieces about what those strange things are?
Shapeshifters have traditionally been extremely loner type creatures. We have the movie of the week one, I don’t know if you remember in the black and white episode, they have traditionally been very socially maladjusted lone gunmen types, and we a completely different kind of shapeshifter. We have this whole episode about vampires, in which they act massively more intelligently than they have before and then we also manage to wink on the current obsession with really nice, sweet vampires that want to date you, because that has nothing to do with vampires on our show but we find it kind of fascinating. We also introduce creatures that you haven’t seen before. Creatures that hunters believe have been extinct for a long time are suddenly reappearing. Sure that they are starting to put together sort of post apocalyptic landscape, which, you know, shit’s gone wrong basically.
What I like about the show is that it manages to have episodes with humor. Are we going to see more of that? Are you going to return more to the humor of the earlier show or will there be a return to the dark place that we saw in the end?
I think what our show got its dark and its funny, sort of gallows humor to it. We try to do both. Like I said this vampire show is quite meta, not meta in the way of “The Real Ghostbusters” episode where they actually went to a Supernatural convention. It’s meta in the way it’s actually called “Live Free or Twi Hard” because it’s sort of winking at “Twilight” and “Vampire Diaries” and “Tru Blood.”
So the episode title is “Live Free or Twi Hard?”
Yes it is, unless somebody comes to me and tells me that standards and practices won’t let me do that. For now that’s the working title. Yeah, but Dean is still Dean. He’s like the biggest wise ass on the planet, and Sam is still Sam. You know they’re completely hilarious and Jared is a massively, fantastic physical comedian and then Misha, of course. He comes back as an angel, a full powered angel, but his puzzlement over stuff that we take for granted, I mean we can’t resist writing that into the script. So long story short, the humor is still there.
(my question) What about Mary’s family?
Yeah, the Campbell family are a part of the season. We’ve been fascinated with the idea that there’s this long line of hunters that are part of Sam and Dean’s past. And not all hunters become hunters because of the tragedy in their recent history that their mom was killed or that their sister was killed right in front of them.
(The question is very muddled, but the gist is will the Twi hard episode be the only fun one)
No, no, that’s not even. Ben popped his head into my office last week and said “What do you think of leprechauns?” so I think there’s going to an episode with (?) or aliens, or fairies or leprechauns or something coming up pretty soon.
After that the “Supernatural” folks cleared out in a hurry for their big panel in Ballroom 20 while the “Smallville” cast and producers shuffled in. I’ll have more details in another article or articles soon on what was said in the “Smallville” press room, but most of their talk was about the wish list of things they need to address in finishing up the story, a story that we have always known how it ends.
Alice Jester is the founder, editor-in-chief, head writer, programmer, web designer, site administrator, marketer, and moderator for The Winchester Family Business. She is a 30 year IT applications and database expert with a penchant for creative and freelance writing in her spare (ha!!) time. That’s on top of being a wife, mother of two active kids, and four loving (aka needy) pets.
I hope Ben manages to give us a few of his fun episodes. I love the fun ones like “Hell House”, “Bad Day”, “Changing Channels” etc.
Glad to hear Dean is still a wiseass. Hope he is still a badass too!
Thanks Alice for all these transcriptions as I have a very hard time understanding videos with all the background noise.
Thanks for all the info for Season 6. I can’t wait to see what Sera and the gang come up with. 😀
Can’t wait for the new season. I was trying to avoid spoilers, but that only lasted about 30 seconds!
I agree with Cassi that it is mystery how they will manage to fit everything in…. any talk about the possibility of a season 7, or more?
I have confidence in Sera. She knows the characters so well and writes all different kinds of episodes for them so I’m not concerned. She has quite the propensity for killing characters but perhaps that will be sated by the whole ‘ we want to shoot monsters in the face’ aspect to the season. 🙂
I’m looking forward to grieving Dean, smarta@@ Dean, remorseless Sam, funny Sam, brotherly conflicts, brotherly love and all that is in store for us. It’ll be a bumpy ride to be sure but it’s Supernatural…what else do we expect.
oh my god i think i love ben edlund …
yes this season is going to be different from the ones before but weren’t all of them i can’t wait to see what happens!
Love these interviews Alice. I am so psyched for Season 6, I can hardly stand it. 8-1/2 weeks left. So excited.
I’m one of the few people that love the Lisa/Dean pairing. Anymore info about them? A question that keeps running in my head is that after Dean leaves his family and goes back on the road with Sam, will Dean return to his womanizing ways, or has he totally become the ‘family man’ and that that experience will affect him throughout the season. Any ideas, thoughts?