We got VERY lucky. I think we were the only table that got ten minutes with Jensen, which was twice as much as everyone else. What a huge treat for he’s the nicest guy to talk to not to mention just like his co-star he’s great on the eyes. He was the only person in the press room to almost make my heart stop with his big piece of news. Most details on that below. So here it is, the full transcript my roundtable interview with Jensen Ackles at Comic Con.
Oh yeah, MAJOR SPOILER ALERT!!!!!!!!!!
(Jensen starts first, asking us a question) Have y'all been here for all five days? Are you burned out? You’re like “Oh my gosh, somebody end the misery. Well, we’re almost there. ” (We all nodded in enthusiastic agreement, although we were more than willing to let this gorgeous guy keep talking.)
Give us a tease…
Give us a tease (laughs). If I had a nickel… As you’ve probably heard since I’m now batting clean up, we’re getting back to bit of a season one formula in a sense that we’re putting reset on the whole show. I’m anticipating this season more than any other simply the fact that we set out to tell a five year story and we told it. So I’m like “Now what? Now what are we going to do?” Luckily we have very, very creative and intelligent people writing the show and I know they’ve got a lot of ideas up their sleeves so I’m kind of anticipating…I don’t know what to anticipate. I’m just excited about seeing what’s coming down the pipe. I’m watering at the mouth as everyone else is.
You’ve only had four episodes.
We’re shooting our third one right now.
What do you see (for the season)?
Well like I said we’re kind of getting back to the same formula as season one where it’s that monster of the week type of deal. There will be a mythology common denominator throughout the episodes like you saw in season one and two. What that is hasn’t been completely laid out yet, for me anyway. I’m sure they have some idea of what’s going to happen. Knowing what we know about the characters for the past five years and then having them put in positions where they are now…I’m mean Dean is a domesticated individual he’s got a normal job and a girl and basically a kid. Of course he still has a shotgun underneath his bed, still got the rock salt in his trunk and all that kind of stuff. He doesn’t drive the Impala anymore he drives a pickup truck. Not to say that the Impala’s gone because it’s under a tarp in the garage.
(Note, its right around this time I go into convulsions over this reveal. Jensen notices and is very amused. Once I notice he’s seeing my fan girl reaction – the only one at the table – I tell him, “That’s a tragedy!” He smiles more and replies, “I know, I know, it is!”)
It’s like he’s hung it up, he’s hung up his boots. But that only lasts for a very short while. Like anybody who has the kind of hunting in his blood he gets kind of drawn back. He’s like the mob, you’re never really out of it.
We heard about the brothers and the dynamic change.
There is. It’s a bit of a flip in motivation again like I said. Dean is domesticated now and he’s trying his best to lead a normal now. Sam is now back but is really on board with the whole hunting thing. Now it’s a job to him. It’s what he does, it’s his skill and he’s using it. He’s trying to leave Dean alone because he wants Dean to have a normal life. So there’s that kind of push and pull of he wants his brother to work with but he also wants his brother to live this normal life so it’s left him alone for the better part of a year, which is where we pick up the story in season six. And then the past catches up to Dean and Sam can’t stay away and he has to go get him and that’s where we kind of pick it up. It’s the struggle of Dean not wanting to get pulled back in but not really having a choice and then trying to figure out how he’s going to deal with the family because he knows that he can’t bring them into it. It’s kind of too late because he already has and now he’s got to distance himself from it, the one thing he didn’t want to do.
How’s he adjusting to the family life outside of his brother?
It’s cool. We just did this whole montage that we shot for episode one of Dean living this normal life. Going to bed next to a pretty girl, and going to barbeque with the neighbors, driving his truck to work, working on the construction site. It’s kind of cool because it’s completely out of what we’re normally seeing him do. It was kind of nice to play that different level of just being a normal guy. It’ll be interesting to see how he gets pulled back into it. Even though he doesn’t want to it’s kind of fun to have.
(My question.) What was it like directing? How much fun was that?
It was a lot more work than just acting (laughs). In that I’ve been acting for thirteen years so I know how to do it. Directing I’ve never done it and I didn’t want to fail so I prepped like no tomorrow. I was pouring through scripts every night, I was doing shot lists and revising them constantly. I kind of always fell back on what Kim Manners told me about directing. He was, “It’s all about the homework. You do your homework, you show up, you’ll have fun. You don’t do your homework you’re going to show up and shoot yourself in the foot.” So I knew that if I fail, it’s not going to be because I didn’t do my homework. So I did. I did a ton of it. I showed up day one with eight days of shot lists. I don’t know how it turned out yet, we haven’t seen the cut. I know the crew respected it, they had confidence in me. For a first timer, I was glad to have those guys watching my back.
Would you do it again?
If you asked me the day after I finished I would have said not a chance in hell but now the dust is settled yeah, I would.
Dean and Castiel have a certain relationship. Will that play again next season?
I hope so. Misha hasn’t been in the first three episodes so we’re still waiting for Castiel to show back up. But he does in the, well it would be in the third episode (since episode 4 was shot first). I believe he’s back. I don’t know, I haven’t read anything as far as what the relationship’s going to be like. Now that he’s the head cheese in Heaven I’m not quite sure how that’s going to alter his character. That and now Dean’s different, I don’t know, I don’t have an answer for that. I’m interested to see myself.
Congratulations on your wedding.
Thank you.
Has that changed things much now that you’re both married men on the set?
Not really. It’s just like, official now. It’s good.
Total coincidence that you guys did it after the season five finale.
Yes, total coincidence.
Was it like someone stole the other’s thunder, so close to each other.
Yes and no. I would say that if we weren’t as good friends as we were it probably would have been like, “What are you doing?” But it was all done very innocently and honestly. I was happy for him, he was happy for me. We’ve been working together this long, no wonder. I think that we’re on the same cycles now.
What kind of creatures are going to be around for the first three episodes?
I know we’ve got a Djinn, which was in “What Is and What Should Never Be.” That was the end of season two. Kripke actually directed that one. We get a revisit from those characters. It’s kind of gone since the end of season five the world as far as the evil and the monsters and demons is in an upturn. There’s monsters that’s showing up that shouldn’t be in areas that we’re finding them, are acting out of character. There’s vampires that are walking around during the day. Everything’s turned upside down. For the first few episodes it’s going to be trying to make sense of what’s going on. But we’re going to get back to those old characters which will be nice because I like season one.
