‘Supernatural’ Star Jensen Ackles Admires This Actor’s Transition From Sci-Fi Roles
Sci-fi and horror can have passionate fans. They can also typecast actors. Jensen Ackles spent 15 years on Supernatural, a job that is coming to an end with two final episodes to film in Vancouver. His next role will be on season 3 of Amazon’s series The Boys, from Supernatural creator Eric Kripke.
Ackles appeared on Michael Rosenbaum’s Inside of You podcast on Sept. 8. He discussed his transition from Supernatural and said there’s another popular actor who navigated it well. Supernatural returns Thursday, Oct. 8 with seven final episodes.
Jensen Ackles thought long and hard about his post-’Supernatural’ move
Ackles isn’t the only one involved with his career. He has agents and managers, plus his own ambitions.
I think there’s a lot of pressure on me. Maybe it’s from me and the people in my camp, of what that transition piece is going to be coming out of Supernatural. I do think that probably has a little bit more pressure on it than maybe what comes next down the line. So I do want to be thoughtful about my next move, just from a strategic standpoint. Because I want that to be able to set me up for something moving forward, whether it’s a movie or a short order streaming network thing or a guest arc on an existing program.
Jensen Ackles, Inside of You podcast, 9/8/2020
Jensen Ackles doesn’t want to stray too far from ‘Supernatural’
Some actors would want a change of pace after playing the same character for 15 years. Ackles is grateful audiences responded to Dean Winchester on Supernatural. The Boys is a little different. It’s superheroes, but it’s the same show runner who created Supernatural and similar sensibilities.
“I think it should be something that’s not too drastic,” Ackles said. “It’s not all of a sudden he’s in some crazy period piece and is in drag. By the way, that might be fun to do down the road, but I think it’s important to stay in the ballpark of where I’ve been really happy and successful for the past nearly two decades, and then transition in a good way so that the audience is like, ‘Oh yeah, that makes sense. I like that. I want to see him do that.’”
This actor is a good role model for Jensen Ackles
Rosenbaum brought up Nathan Fillion, whose big break was Joss Whedon’s sci-fi series Firefly. After that show, Fillion played a villain on Buffy, the Vampire Slayer and did the Firefly movie. To transition, he did an arc on Desperate Housewives, then found himself on the long-running hit Castle and now The Rookie.
“I know Filliion pretty well,” Ackles said. “I have asked him about that. He did navigate that very well. He’s certainly someone to emulate. Youve got to be smart and you’ve got to navigate all that. You’ve got to understand that at the end of the day you’ve got to do something that lights your fire.”
