My fear was that I’d be the only one to remember this year. That this year, Supernatural Day would feel more sad than joyous, and I’d be sitting here recalling years past when we all took to social media with posts and tweets and photos celebrating the premiere day of the Little Show That Could, together.
I should have known better.
The fandom can feel like a fractured and contentious place sometimes, especially now a year after Supernatural ended, but I woke up today to find my timeline overflowing with beautiful memories and heartfelt sentiments about what the show has meant to people who are still grateful – and still missing it, like I am. One of the best things about fandom has always been that it feels like having a community of like-minded people around you, sharing the joy you find in something, and understanding just how passionate you are about that something. It’s validating, and it makes the experience of being a fan a million times more enjoyable. It’s why so many of us describe joining the fandom for the thing we love as ‘coming home’ or ‘finding my people’. Being able to wake up today and feel all those wonderful things all over again is such a gift.
So I’m joining the chorus (which is the best feeling ever – to raise your voice and express your emotions along with a whole bunch of other people doing the same).
Happy Supernatural Day!
We came a long long way over the fifteen years this show was on the air.
Thank you, Eric Kripke, for creating these characters and this story that has changed so many people’s lives.
Thank you, Jared Padalecki, Jensen Ackles, Misha Collins and so many more gifted actors for bringing these characters to life and making them so real – imperfect, complex, struggling, enduring loss and pain and confusion and despair just like the rest of us do.
But never giving up.
I am so grateful for the journey we got to take with Sam and Dean and Cas and all the other memorable characters who were a part of this fifteen year story. Grateful that the story itself was never simple, and rarely easy, just like real life. We watched the characters we loved go through unimaginable pain and loss; watched the actors portray their grief and rage and longing and love so vividly that we could feel it ourselves, in our own hearts.
Grateful that Supernatural was a show that made me laugh so hard tears were running down my cheeks – and made me sob so hard that the same thing happened. Grateful I had something I loved so much that it could make me furious and frustrated, and elated and overjoyed. That it was so well crafted by everyone involved – writers, actors, the most amazing crew ever – that it held my interest and inspired my passion for fifteen years. I doubt that will ever happen again, and I’m inexplicably thankful.
I’m so grateful that the actors who made Supernatural what it is have never stopped loving it either, commemorating its milestones right along with us and expressing their own genuine emotions about what the show and the fandom has brought to them too.
When I asked most of the actors if they wanted to write a chapter about their experiences on the show for a book, I was honestly shocked that almost all of them said yes – and then shocked again when they actually did it, and by how personal their chapters were.
The chapters in Family Don’t End With Blood and There’ll Be Peace When You Are Done make it very clear that the actors have been changed just as much by the show and the fandom as the fans have. And they weren’t afraid to share that, including the struggles that they went through to get there and how the fans helped, in order to inspire other people to ‘always keep fighting’ too.
They have celebrated right along with us every step of the way, and there has never been any doubt that they love this little show as much as we do.
While it was not always easy, with long nights of filming and time away from family and friends, it was also clear that what the cast and crew built together was as special as the show itself.
And I’m grateful to my fellow fans. To the ones who courageously shared their very personal stories in Family Don’t End With Blood and There’ll Be Peace When You Are Done, so that other fans could feel validated in their own challenges and perseverance. To the ones who’ve shared this wild and crazy adventure with me over all these years, whether that’s bantering on twitter or having deep discussions on this blog or hugging me in photo op lines or clambering over fences at midnight to try to find Supernatural locations.
I have so many memories, and have become friends with so many diverse and fascinating and wonderful people from all over the world. Supernatural has given me so much, and I’m grateful for each and every person I’ve had the pleasure of meeting – and everyone I’ll meet in the future!
So here we are once again, celebrating the day that the world changed forever with the premiere of a little show on the WB network. A show that struggled mightily to survive for many years, clinging to renewal with a small but passionate contingent of fans doing everything we could to keep it going.
A show that persevered just like its protagonists did, embodying the ‘always keep fighting’ mantra that became its unofficial slogan – because we’ve all got work to do.
A show whose cast and crew loved it and believed in it just as much as its fans, who fought for it year after year, working their asses off to make it something incredible.
Who celebrated its successes and grieved its ending, just as we all did.
A show that became something special, in so many ways, to so many people.
Happy Supernatural Day to the Little Show That Could – and did.
— Lynn
You can read the actors’ and fans’
personal memories of Supernatural
in Family Don’t End With Blood and
There’ll Be Peace When You Are Done,
links on the home page banner or at
