Ten Ways To Survive The Hellatus
With the hellatus in full swing, you may find yourself already counting down the days until Friday, September 23rd. I know I am. So in order to help ease the pain of a world where Friday nights don’t mean new episodes, I came up with a list of ten ways to survive the hellatus. Hope you enjoy! Feel free to add any other suggestions. I’m sure we could all use them!
1. Re-watch all the episodes with commentary. It’s really fun to hear stories from behind the scenes and learn about how they achieved certain camera angles and effects. Plus, who doesn’t like to hear Jared and Jensen’s pretty voices?
2. Read Pilot as it was originally scripted here. Sam and Dean Harrison? It’s a really fun read, in fact I’ve read it more than once and always enjoy it.
3. Read ‘In The Hunt’, a collection of unauthorized essays about Supernatural. It’s a bit dated at this point and only makes references through season three, but it’s an interesting read nonetheless! With essays like Dean Winchester: Bad-Ass…or Soccer Mom?, Good and Evil in the World of Supernatural and Back in Black, there’s a little something for everyone. Plus, it’s really fun to see how the characters have developed since the book was written and how the essay authors predicted future events correctly and incorrectly. (Check out Alice”s review of the book too,, posted when it came out).
4. Check out some Supernatural fan fiction. There are tons of ways to get it. Whether you’re a fan of wincest or not, there’s definitely something for everyone. There is a whole database of Supernatural fanfic at http://www.fanfiction.net in fact, last I checked there were 49,923 entries. That should be enough to last the hellatus! Suggestions are welcome, that’s a lot of entries to sift through!
There are also plenty of Supernatural novels out there to fill that summertime void.
5. You can check out the graphic novel prequel ‘Supernatural: Origins’ written by Peter Johnson, series Executive Producer, Geoff Johns and Matthew Dow Smith (ISBN 140121701X).
‘The Unholy Cause’ is another Supernatural novel written by By Joe Schreiber and Eric Kripke (ISBN 1848565283)
Keith R. A. DeCandido has also written a series of Supernatural novels including ‘Nevermore’ (ISBN 0061370908), ‘Bone Key’ (ISBN0061435031) and ‘Heart of the Dragon’ (ISBN184856600X). There’s also Jeff Mariotte’s ‘Witch’s Canyon’ (ISBN0061370916). Here’s Sablegreens’ review of Nevermore and Witch’s Canyon.)
I haven’t read any of these books so I don’t know how good they are. Has anyone else read them? I’d be interested to hear what you thought. Did they stay true to the characters and overall mythology of the show?
6. Sometimes when I’m having a bad day I really love to watch the bloopers from season one all the way through season five. Sure it only takes 45 minutes, but it’s 45 minutes of bliss. I love a good blooper reel, and one with Jared, Jensen and Misha is even better.
7. Check out past articles on The Winchester Family Business. The site is updated constantly and there are so many talented writers, not to mention the insightful comment section! Since I just found the site this past year I’ve had a great time catching up on back articles.
8. There are also tons of games on the Winchester Family Business like Supernatural Bingo, word searches and scrambler games. Why not throw a Supernatural themed party? Just don’t forget to invite me!
9. On July 26th you can own Supernatural: The Anime Series. The series will make history as the “first-ever live-action series to be re-imagined in Japanese anime style”. With a whopping 22 episodes, it’s sure to help you fill the Supernatural-sized hole in your heart. Check out Yirabah’s recap on the first episode of the Animation series.
10. If you’ve already completed the first nine time-killers, desperation may begin to set in. So you may need to resort to things like photoshopping your head on to the Winchester’s various love interests, memorizing episodes word for word and reciting them for your friends, staring at Alice’s countdown clock watching the seconds go by. I didn’t say these were healthy ways to pass the time…
So how are you getting through Hellatus?
I just finished reading Rebecca Dessertine’s new book “Supernatural:One Year Gone”. I thought it was pretty good and filled in a few gaps in the past season. Now, there are some editing issues and I did catch that Sam’s birth date was incorrect in my copy. I believe that was a Titan book’s mistake and not hers since she works for Kripke and knows this information. Other than that the pace is good and I finished it in a day.
Thanks for the suggestion, I hadn’t even heard about that book. Does it focus on season 5 or 6?
The plot takes place in between seasons 5 & 6. Now, Lisa and Ben are in it, but it helps to fill in the gaps that the show doesn’t. I liked that part. It made their relationship more realistic.
The majority of the book takes place in Salem, Mass. So, that means witches! That’s all I’ll say about the plot except for one thing. After reading this, I would advise no one to go on vacation with Dean except Sam and maybe Bobby! They won’t be able to handle it. Dean has trouble seek him out like bees to honey! 😀
That sounds great! I’ll definitely be checking that out this summer. I’m one of the few Supernatural fans who actually liked the Lisa and Ben plot. I just wish there would have been a way to develop it more. It sounds like this book fills in those gaps nicely. Thanks for the suggestion!
I read it and really liked it. I noticed that Sam’s birthday was wrong as well! Haha I was like that’s not right. I already have the next 2 books pre-ordered. I’m just waiting for the dates to roll around so I can read them!
Me, too! I’ve got them pre-ordered and just waiting on the release dates! 😀
I’ve already rewatched all seasons, but that’s okay, I’ll just start over again! But I’m willing to try a few of your other suggestions, except for the fanfic, I’m not quite interested in that one. But some of the books look to be interesting, every time I go on Amazon, I almost buy…but not quite. I’ll be spending some of my summer Hellatus drawing Jensen’s beautiful face…maybe more than once, and then if I still have time, I’ll focus on Jared. These guys have such beautiful bone structure, it’s just too tempting.
Thanks for the suggestions.
Great suggestions, this are really great ideas!!!
By the way, I’m really interested on reading “Supernatural:One Year Gone”, but I live in Venezuela and I can’t get the book here, is there any other way for me to read it??. If there is, please tell me, it would really help me to survive the Hellatus.
Thanks!!!! 😆
You can order it from Amazon.com, I just checked and they have copies available.
Thanks for the information :-), but in my country is almost impossible to buy things online from other countries, because the government doesn’t give you the dollars you need to do it and it regulates what you buy online (It’s a really crappy government 🙁 )
So what I really need it’s a web page where I can download the book, is there any?
Thanks 🙂
I’m consoling myself during this Hellatus with my convention.
I’m also doing some of my own writing (fiction and meta both).
Is it Friday yet? I wanna be on vacation.
Sofia, now you tell me that watching the countdown clock is not healthy. I have been staring at that thing since Alice set it up, hoping that my mind powers would make it move faster. 😆
Finished reading ‘One year gone’, I think it is the best SPN novel so far. It has a lot of characters that are no longer an issue, as we await season seven (Gramps, Soulless Sam, Lisa and Ben).
You can also find SPN fanfic at archiveofourown.com. If you like wincest you can find some at community.livejournal.com/wincest/, there is also a link from supernaturalwiki.com (also a fun place to spend the hellatus).
Thanks for the link, Nancy! I’ll have to check that out!
I hope your mind powers work to speed up the time!
I’ve read One Year Gone and The Unholy Cause and I quite liked them.
You should check out http://www.bookdepository.co.uk/
The prices are really good and there is free delivery. I’ve bought lots of books from there and haven’t had any problems.
Sofia,
Thanks for the great ideas to get us through the hellatus.I am a huge bookaholic. ( I put myself through WSU working at the library, was a children’s librarian for ten years, and have been teaching mostly reading to 7th and 8th graders ever since). I, too, recommend In the Hunt; like Alice, I enjoyed “Dean Winchester: Bad Ass or Soccer Mom”. I also enjoyed the articles, “Blue Collar Ghost Hunters” and “The Burden of Being Sammy”.
My two favorites of the novels are Nevermore and One Year Gone. Nevermore, as Sablegreen noted in her review has great dialogue between the boys and references Poe as well. My only quibble with One Year Gone, was it showed Ben as being well-versed in using a shotgun. We know from (2 1/2 Men?) that Dean let Ben nowhere near a gun. However, there was no way Dessertine could have known that was the way Dean was heading as far as fathering Ben when she wrote it. I really enjoyed the three-part story: Dean, Lisa and Ben;Sam and Samuel, And Campbells hunting witches in 1692 Salem.
Coming out soon:
Novels:
Coyote’s Kiss by by Christa Faust July 12
Night Terror by John Passarella Sept. 13
Nonfiction:
TV Goes to Hell: An Unofficial Road Map of Supernatural by Stacey Abbott and David Lavery Oct. 5
The Mythology of Supernatural: The Signs and Symbols Behind the Popular TV Show by Nathan Robert Brown Aug.2
Other Supernatural books:
The Supernatural book of Monsters, Spirits, Demon’s and Ghouls “written” by Sam and Dean and Supernatural: John Winchester’s Journal written by “John”.
Actual author for both is Alex Irvine and intersperses lore with personal anecdotes.
The Supernatural Companion Books by Nicholas Knight; there is one for each season. They combine episode information with interviews, behind the scenes, and lore.
And if you have some free time, like I have now that Summer School is over, there are a ton of great supernatural (genre, not show) and dystopian (think S5
The End) young adult books out there. If anyone is interested I’ll be glad to give you some titles and authors. These books are very well-written; great for adults as well as teens.
Again, thanks for the article and the links.
Marilyn,
These are great suggestions! No reason to be bored in the off season!
Thanks!
I had a double whammy lost my job and hellatus started in the same week.
Between sending out resumes I watch a season on SPN. i m up to season 5 ( my absolute favorite) and I m surprised how many episodes I can recite lines From. My daughter walks thru the livingroom and just shakes her head.
I must say the Winchester’s are about the only thing keeping me sane at this point.
Happy New Year to everyone wishing you a year full of health, wealth and most of all happiness.