Supernatural

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For the literary and media genre, see Supernatural (genre).
Fandom
Name: Supernatural
Abbreviation(s): SPN, occasionally SN
Creator: Eric Kripke, Robert Singer, Sera Gamble
Date(s): 2005 - 2020
Medium: Television
Country of Origin: USA
External Links: Supernatural on imdb
Click here for related articles on Fanlore.

Supernatural is an American television drama that follows the nomadic lives of brothers Sam and Dean Winchester as they travel around the United States in their black 1967 Chevy Impala. They hunt down and vanquish supernatural foes like ghosts, demons, and other mythical creatures. The series ran for 15 seasons from 2005 to 2020, and in 2022 the spin-off series The Winchesters began airing.

Canon

Supernatural was created by Eric Kripke, who wanted to cross American Folk Tales with traditional horror.[1] It focuses on the Winchesters, Sam and Dean, who were raised in the hunting lifestyle by their father, John, who spent years seeking revenge against the demon responsible for his wife's death in 1983. Each episode of Supernatural has a monster of the week theme with a self-contained plot, as well as a season-long narrative arc that deals with the repercussions of the Winchesters' hunting lifestyle. In later seasons (4-15) the seasons evolved to be more about greater supernatural threats like high-level demons, archangels, and God, rather than the classic horror creatures first featured in the early seasons, although, werewolves, vampires, ghosts, etc, would still show up occasionally in individual episodes.

The show is known for its tendency to break the fourth wall and include tongue-in-cheek references to its production and nods to its fandom in various episodes.[2] Examples include:

  • Having Sam and Dean solve a case on the set of a B-movie, 2x18 "Hollywood Babylon"
  • The show acknowledging fanfic writers and the existence of Wincest and Destiel, 5x01 "Sympathy for the Devil" and 10x05 "Fan Fiction"
  • Featuring LARPing, 5x09 "The Real Ghostbusters" and 8x11 "LARP and the Real Girl"
  • A Supernatural convention, 5x09 "The Real Ghostbusters"
  • Having Sam and Dean get stuck inside TV land versions of their own and other shows, 5x08 "Changing Channels", 13x16 "Scoobynatural" (Scooby-Doo crossover)
  • The brothers being temporarily transported to an alternate reality where people think they are actors named Jensen Ackles and Jared Padalecki who star on a television show named 'Supernatural', 6x15 "The French Mistake"

The Supernatural Fandom

See also Timeline of Supernatural Fandom
Cover of the gen zine A Hunting We Will Go (2008), artwork by Suzan Lovett. Supernatural is an online fandom that in some ways is still deeply rooted in the traditions of what came before. As typical with Lovett's art, the background details contain a hidden narrative - each image square references a key scene from episodes during the first season. The t-shirt Sam is wearing reads: "Sometimes he *is* heavy" referring to lyrics from a 1960s song "He ain't heavy, he's my brother." In the case of Supernatural the sibling obligation between Sam and Dean results in much angst. To see the details click for a larger version.

Because of the length of the show and the large fandom, that ebbed and flowed over time, fan activity shifted over many platforms, from individual archives and mailing lists, to LiveJournal, to Tumblr, and then Twitter. The nature of these platforms sometimes dictated the types of fandom discussions and fanworks being shared.

On LiveJournal

The Supernatural fandom had a huge presence on LiveJournal, including a daily newsletter [3] and many communities [4] dedicated to discussing the show or celebrating certain characters, pairings, or other aspects. A newbie guide, created in February 2006, gives you an idea of the depth of the fandom's presence on LiveJournal even within just the first season. While there were very active discussion groups at TWOP and thousands of stories archived off LJ (with a particularly large number at fanfiction.net), Livejournal was always the major hub of fanworks-focused fandom for Supernatural. Fanworks challenges like the various big bangs had hundreds of stories a year, and looking at bookmarking sites like Delicious would return thousands of hits, mostly all on LJ. The fandom also hosted multiple separate LiveJournal kink memes, examples being, the monthly Supernatural Kink Community (spnkink-meme), the twice-a-year Supernatural Anonymous Kink Meme (Blindfold SPN), spn-hardcore, and knotting-focused take-the-knot. Unlike other fandoms, many SPN challenges still use LiveJournal as their main hosting site, but they are also much more likely to have secondary sites, on tumblr, twitter, etc. to promote and provide information about the challenges.

When fandom began splintering away from LJ as clone sites were built and things like Strikethrough made many fans nervous, Supernatural fandom stayed unmoved for the most part. Strikethrough had very little effect on the fandom, and Supernatural remains notable for having a culture of not flocking the sort of content that often is in other fandoms (SPN mainstays like incest, kink, and RPS). In the early years of the SPN J2 Big Bang, nearly every story was hosted on Livejournal exclusively. The fandom migration to Dreamwidth was very small given the relative size of the fandom, and the communities there got very little traffic.

Movement to AO3

The Archive of Our Own had just over 2,000 Supernatural fanworks on March 2010. By August 2011, the AO3 had over 10,000 works in the Supernatural category[5]. By December 2012, the AO3 had over 27,500 works in the Supernatural category[6]. As of February 2014 Archive Of Our Own had over 60,000 Supernatural fanworks; and a year later in January 2015, it had over 92,000 Supernatural fanworks.

The evolution began in 2011. Partly due to the The Great LJ DDOS of 2011, the second of which occurred during the posting period for the 2011 edition of the SPN J2 Big Bang and a round of Blindfold SPN, and partly due to a few BNFs putting their back catalogue of fic on the AO3, the willingness to move fic out of the LJ bubble grew very quickly. In April 2011, during the first DDoS attack on LJ, killabeez wrote If you love us, you'll archive your fic., a plea to the fandom to backup their fic somewhere off LJ.

During the first half of 2011, leonidaslion, a popular and prolific author, moved all her stories to the AO3 and deleted her Livejournals. candle_beck cross-posted all of her work there as well, and other authors followed. Interest among readers in using the archive soared during the summer of 2011 as fans in many fandoms were discovering the pleasures of reading big bang-length fic on e-readers and using the AO3 feature that allows downloads in multiple formats to get them in a couple of clicks.

On Tumblr

There are large Wincest and Destiel shipping communities on tumblr, producing fic, meta, gifs and fanart. While some shippers coexist peacefully, the tumblr community is notorious for ship wars and fan-on-fan hate. In addition to the main ships, quite a few unusual and uncommon pairings were able to find better representation on tumblr, mostly likely because of the tagging system. The tagging system can sometimes result in getting more hate, but for fans of rarer SPN ships it helped them more easily find each other's fanworks.

Supernatural also gained popularity on Tumblr due to the fandom's enormous range of gifs, often tacked on to both fandom-related and non-fandom-related posts as reactions. The fandom's gifs have became so well known that actor Misha Collins referenced them at 2014 DC Con, saying "We have a gif for that", and it became universally known outside the fandom that SPN has a gif for everything.[7]

Every year from 2013-2020, Supernatural ranked within the Top 20 "most reblogged" live-action television show on Tumblr, coming in first place between 2013-2016.

On Reddit

The two primary subreddits (communities) for Supernatural are /r/Supernatural, the main subreddit with 118k subscribers and a general or mainstream appeal re: desired submitted content, and /r/fandomnatural, the second most active subreddit with 8k subscribers that places equal focus upon Supernatural fanworks, shipping, fandom meta, etc. There are many more subreddits dedicated to Supernatural, its ships, and/or its stars: /r/FunnySupernatural, /r/Supernaturalgifs, /r/Destiel, /r/Sastiel, /r/MoreThanBrothers, Cockles, /r/jensenackles, /r/jaredpadalecki, /r/mishacollins. Further related subreddits include /r/GISHWHES and /r/WaywardSisters.

On Fanfiction.net

Supernatural also has an active presence on fanfiction.net, with a large number of stories archived as well as many story community listings for organizing and reccing stories, and SPN discussion forums.[8]

Mailing Lists

A few Supernatural mailing lists offered episode discussion. While fan fiction was discussed, and on occasion even offered, it usually was gen and het.

Supernatural Wiki

Many members of fandom contribute to the comprehensive Supernatural Wiki.

Shipping

See also: List of Supernatural Relationship Names

Three slash ships have dominated Supernatural fandom: Sam/Dean, Dean/Castiel, and Jared/Jensen. However, Supernatural fans have shipped a wide variety of ships over the course of the show's run, and the show also has a large gen fandom.

Slash, RPF, "Destiel", and "Wincest"

Due in part to the show's tight focus on the Winchester brothers, the fandom's initial main pairing was the brothers themselves. This incestuous pairing is commonly known as Wincest, and has occasioned some controversy both within and without the fandom. Some stories and writers portray the relationship dynamic as fundamentally unhealthy and explore the dysfunctional aspects, while others portray their relationship as a more traditional romance, or as some combination of the two.

The actors who play Sam and Dean are also the fandom's main RPF pairing. The ship is called J2 and less commonly Padackles (the smooshname for Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles). As one fan put it: Supernatural: the fandom where RPS *is* the moral high ground."[9] CWRPS featured actors from Supernatural interacting with those from other CW Network shows such as Smallville, One Tree Hill and Veronica Mars.

The focus on Wincest and J2 as almost the only slash pairings shifted during the run of the fourth season (2008-2009); the introduction of the angel Castiel (played by Misha Collins) led to the meteoric rise of Destiel aka Dean/Castiel. Ship wars and other wank over Castiel's popularity ensued (see Wincest vs Destiel). Many Destiel fans were adamant that Destiel would become canon (and it did partially, when Castiel confessed his love for Dean in season 15). Meanwhile, RPS fans started writing stories about Jared/Misha (Mishalecki), Jensen/Misha (Cockles) and "J2M" threesome fics.

Although Destiel and Wincest are the fandom's most predominant pairings, smaller slash pairings have also generated a fair amount of fanworks, including Gabriel/Sam, Castiel/Sam, Lucifer/Sam, as well as the poly pairing of Castiel/Dean/Sam. There are also, a fair amount of rare slash pairings in SPN, that may or may not include Sam, Dean, or Cas, some examples being Michael/Lucifer (Micifer), Adam/Samandriel (Adamandriel), Sam/Kevin (Sevin), Crowley/Bobby (Crobby), Dean/Crowley (Drowley), and Michael/Adam (Midam), among many others.

Het and femslash pairings

There is also a medium sized het community, focusing mainly on canon pairings, OFCs, and crossover pairings. Het pairings seen in fanworks include Dean/Jo (semi-canon), John/Mary (canon), Sam/Jess (canon), Sam/Ruby (canon), Dean/Lisa (canon), Sam/Eileen (canon) and Castiel/Meg (semi-canon). Briefer canon relationships, such as Sam/Madison, Sam/Sarah, Sam/Amelia, Dean/Cassie and Dean/Anna also appear in some fics, as do rarer non-canon pairings such as Sam/Rowena, Dean/Donna and Ellen/Bobby. Sam/Jess/Dean, although rare, may be the most popular FPF M/F/M threesome pairing.

Fanworks focusing on femslash pairings are much more rare than slash, gen, and even het fanworks, but they do exist and thrive in a small subset of the fandom. Popular pairings include Anna/Ruby, Charlie/Gilda, Charlie/Jo, Charlie/Dorothy, Anna/Jo, Meg/Abaddon, Jody/Donna and Claire/Kaia, as well as polyamory ships. The femslash community on tumblr organizes periodic fanwork projects like exchanges and bangs, with considerable crossover to feminist projects and campaigns, like those by women4spn. [10]

Gen fandom

Perhaps because initially there were comparatively few other pairings to choose from and the choice between a main pairing based on incest or RPF is one that many people prefer not to make, Supernatural has a large gen community (see Sam & Dean). A lot of the gen fic (or sometimes Bob fic, stories with a background pairing where the relationship isn't foregrounded) is casefic. Some writers who often write shipfic may also write gen fics.

An average of about 40% of the fanfiction listed in the spnnewsletter every day is gen[11], and in the 2011 SPN J2 Big Bang, 21% of the stories were gen, down from the peak of 33% in 2009.[10]

Challenges

For a full listing of Fanlore articles on Supernatural challenges see Category:Supernatural Challenges

From the beginning Supernatural fandom has had a strong tradition of moderated fanworks challenges, with a great emphasis on big bangs. Some examples being:

There were also other challenges such as gift exchanges, fanweeks, fests and kink memes. For perspective on the depth of past, and current, challenges see the List of Supernatural Challenges.

Conventions

The popularity of Supernatural resulted in several fan run conventions specifically devoted to the show. For more, see Supernatural Conventions

Controversies

Misogyny

There is a large amount of controversy in the Supernatural fandom. Alleged sexism and racism in the source material and the fandom have inspired several imbroglios, especially during Season 3. At the start of season three, some fans felt that the show's tone had shifted, becoming disconcertingly misogynistic; the season-by-season Bitch Watch[12] was an attempt to document this assertion by citing the sudden prevalence of sexist slurs in the source.

Treatment of Actors

Supernatural fans have also been known to fight over whether the actors on the show are stupid, cocaine-addicted, would look better with a few additional pounds, or are paragons of virtue, often resulting in wank, such as the aftermath of Jensenvention and PETJA.

A vid about Supernatural fandom, its joys and controversies, was made by counteragent in 2008: Still Alive.

Jibcon Incident

In 2013, an incident occurred at a Jibcon panel in which a female fan appeared to be directly asking Jensen Ackles about the possibility of Dean being bisexual. (In fact, she was simply intending to ask him to lend support for the It Gets Better project.) The crowd started booing her before Ackles allegedly cut her off, telling her not to "ruin it" for everyone and to keep the panel "fun and light." The fan apparently left crying, sparking outrage and intensifying fan accusations of queerbaiting by the writers and cast. [13] [14] [15] The YA book Ship It is based directly on the incident. [16] Eventually, the fan in question made a Tumblr post explaining what had really happened, expressing irritation at how the fandom had blown it all out of porportion. [17]

Bury Your Gays

The LGBT Fans Deserve Better movement was highly critical of the show for its treatment of queer female characters, writing in June 2016:

The CW features not one but two shows that have managed to kill off all of the queer women ever introduced: The Vampire Diaries and Supernatural. We have dubbed this "The Julie Plec" phenomenon, reserved for shows and writers so unaware of the "bury your gays" trope that they manage kill 100% of the characters they introduce.[18]

This was after the death of Charlie, a recurring character, who was a lesbian, and much loved by the fans. Who's death many felt was unnecessary, and used to create blatant manpain for Dean, with one fan saying:

The only reason they killed Charlie was for manpain, if you ask me. As though Dean really needed a reason to go berserk at that point in the season. I mean, they could've run out of beer in the bunker and it probably would've of sent Dean over the edge at that point. The whole thing was just so forced and stupid, IMO[19]

Destielgate

In 2020 there was a lot of controversy over how the show handled Castiel's love confession to Dean, and the subsequent finale, for more information please see Destielgate.

Supernatural Fanfiction/Fanzines

For a full listing of Supernatural fanfiction on Fanlore, see Category:Supernatural Fanfiction

A large portion of early Supernatural fan fiction was posted on FanFiction.net and on Livejournal. The spnnewsletter maintained a set of delicious links or tags. In Jan 2011, almost 40,000 stories had been tagged. Like many fandoms there has also been a great deal of cross-posting and migration to Archive of Our Own, as of January 2020 there were over 220,000 works tagged as Supernatural.

Tropes/Trends

Popular tropes in the fandom include:

  • Pre-series: stories set during Sam's years at Stanford before Sam and Dean's reunion in the pilot episode, or when Sam and Dean were kids. Some pre-series stories focus on the lives of John Winchester and/or Mary Campbell-Winchester before the boys were born.
  • Genderswap: fics in which Sam or Dean (or both, or later, especially in human AUs, Castiel) has always been a girl or is temporarily turned into one.
  • Fuck or die: usually caused by a cursed object or a spell.
  • Raised Apart: where Sam or Dean (or both) wasn't raised by John Winchester in the hunting life, they meet as teens or adults without realizing they're brothers, and genetic sexual attraction usually takes care of the rest of the plot.
  • Amnesia: usually a curse or spell causes the brothers to forget that they're brothers, but they decide (usually based on evidence of their constant proximity and remaining feelings of affection) that they must be involved and act on it, angst follows.
  • Curtainfic: Sam and Dean, or Dean and Castiel, or all of them, retire from hunting/stopping apocalypses, temporarily or permanently, and set up house together.
  • Evil!Sam: usually focused on Sam's demon-given superpowers (prophetic visions, telekinesis, seen in seasons 1 and 2) corrupting him, on antichrist!Sam or Boy King (of Hell) Sam from references during seasons 2 and 3, on (canonically) demon-fucking and blood-drinking Sam from season 4, on Lucifer!Sam (Sam said "yes" to being Lucifer's vessel) from season 5, or on soulless Sam (a.k.a. Robo!Sam) from season 6.
  • Evil!Dean or Demon!Dean: usually based on becoming evil!Sam's (corrupted) Hellish consort, or focused on Dean's time in Hell (where he became a torturer) between season 3 and 4 and Dean not coming back quite "right" from Hell, or focused on the period at the end of season 9/beginning of season 10 when Demon canonically became a demon for a short while.
  • Ghostfic: where during one of their brushes with death (usually in the early seasons) Dean or Sam doesn't remain alive or come back from the dead like in canon, but continues hunting with the remaining brother as a ghostly sidekick.
  • Wingfic: popular even before the arrival of angels on the show.
  • Angel slash: the arrival of the angel Castiel (and his relatives) in season 4 led to a second major FPF pairing for the fandom, Dean/Castiel. Sam also gets paired with angels (Sam/Gabriel, Sam/Castiel, more rarely Dean/Castiel/Sam, Sam/Lucifer all have adherents). Angel-on-angel slash such as Michael/Lucifer, Castiel/Gabriel, and Castiel/Balthazar is another subgenre, known as Angelcest.
  • Angels as a Family: given the fact that in canon the angels refer to each other as brother and sister, it is not unusual to find them characterized as a family in fanworks, especially in AUs where they are often part of one large extended dysfunctional family
  • Soulbonds: a canon reference to Sam and Dean being soul mates, who share the same heaven[20] and Castiel's statement that he shares a "profound bond" with Dean[21] only fueled the already existing fire for soulbonding fic.
  • Hunting or Casefic: focusing on the monster hunts the Winchesters go on, can be seen as a type of casefic because they often have to solve a mystery to discern which type of monster is involved. Fans can expand upon canon monsters, bring in monsters from other universes, or create their own. Fic of this type may be more prevalent in gen stories.
  • Alpha/Beta/Omega: originating in Supernatural fandom, and still found quite frequently in fics, it went on to become a multifandom phenomenon and an established trope
  • Everybody Lives or Resurrection: a lot of characters die on the show, and fans often ignore these deaths in fanworks, or will find ways around them, such as resurrection, which is possible canonically. Some of the more popular characters for fans to resurrect include, Bobby, Gabriel, Charlie and Crowley. After season 15, Dean and Castiel could also be added to the list.
  • Time Travel: time travel exists canonically, and fans use this as a tool to explore the past of the Winchesters and other characters, or as a fix-it, often to prevent the death of beloved characters
  • Outsider POV: perspectives from non-canon, or minor, characters on the Winchesters and the supernatural, and how the relationships between Sam and Dean and Cas are reflected to outsiders
  • Crossovers: crossover fanworks are quite common, especially with other fantasy/sci-fi fandoms. Some of the more popular crossover fandoms included, Teen Wolf, known as SuperWolf, where Dean and Sam usually take the roles of hunters against the werewolves, and some combination of Doctor Who, Sherlock, or Doctor Who and Sherlock, known as Superwho, SuperLock, and SuperWhoLock respectively, usually with the boys meeting The Doctor or Sherlock and John Watson.
  • In-Canon Alternative Universes/Altered Realities:
    • Djinnverse or Wishverse: an alternative reality Dean is forced into by a Djinn in episode 2x20, fanworks are often focused on Dean's mundane dream universe, and Sam's outside attempts to save him
    • It's a Terrible Life: an alternative reality created by the angel Zachariah, this universe can be attractive to fans because in it the Winchesters are not brothers
    • Endverse: shown in episode 5x04, a universe where Sam accepted Lucifer, a non-angel Castiel, and Dean being part of a resistance movement. Fan creators like to explore the vastly different characterization of Cas from the one in the canon timeline, and Lucifer!Sam, as well as what life may have been like for characters not shown in the episode
    • Changing Channels: an alternative reality created by the archangel Gabriel where the Winchesters are stuck in "TV Land", fans will use this setting to put the boys in various other television shows, as well as adding other characters to the mix, like Castiel, or the spell somehow backfiring on Gabriel and him being stuck within the universe of his own creation
    • The French Mistake: episode 6x15 where Sam and Dean visit "our world". It has great potential for crossovers between canon and Supernatural RPF, fanworks set during this universe are often humorous
    • Apocalypse World: shown from the end of season 12 and throughout season 13. Fanworks often expand on what was shown in canon, with a focus on Jack and his time there, and sometimes changing events so that Sam, Dean or Castiel spend a longer period of time in the alternative universe
    • The Bad Place: the dark universe, and home to Dark Kaia, the Wayward Sisters often feature heavily in these stories
    • Oz: the land featured in the Wizard of Oz exists in Supernatural canon. This universe doesn't feature much in fanworks, in those that do they often focus on Charlie and her time there, or the aftermath of her Oz visit
    • Chuck's Endings and HunterCorp: in season 15 it was revealed that Chuck had created several other universes, most of which contain their own Sam and Dean, these include Earth 2 and the HunterCorp Universe, who's Sam and Dean are pulled into the main universe. Fans like to explore these possibilities, and expand the characterization of the alternative Sams and Deans. It is also not uncommon in fics for characters from the main universe to be pulled into one of these other universes
  • Fanon Alternative Universes:
    • Canon Divergence AU: are extremely prominent, although there is no popular consensus on at which points to diverge, although after the ends of certain seasons, like season 5, or after prominent episodes, like 15x18, are common
    • Apocafic: these may be canon-divergent fanworks where the show's apocalypse is not stopped, or they might be completely different fan created apocalyptic scenarios, like a zombie apocalypse for example
    • Highschool AU: taking place when some or many of the main characters are still young and partaking in high school. Used often to explore budding romances or to exploit the vulnerability of young minds to create scenes or situations regarding raw emotion
    • All Human AU: stories where there are no supernatural elements, and characters like Cas have always been human
    • Fantasy AU: these types of stories vary, from urban fantasy AUs that are very similar to the show but include greater fantastical elements, to high-fantasy AUs, where Sam, Dean, or Cas are heroes or knights, or mythical creatures themselves, like elves, dragons, selkies, etc. Similarly there are also quite a few Fairy Tale AUs, which can also have fantastical elements, but these fics guarantee the requisite happy ending.
    • Western AU: usually taking place in the American wild west, sometimes these are traditional western stories, but some fics incorporate hunting, monsters, or other supernatural elements

Fanzines

See also Category:Supernatural Zines

Most Supernatural fan fiction is online. However, a small quantity of fanzines continue to be produced, mainly of the gen variety. In addition to traditional fanzines, Supernatural has also created a thriving amount of doujinshi 'fan produced comics' in both English and Japanese. The bulk of these fanworks contain Wincest with a small smattering of J2 (or RPS). A complete list of Supernatural fanzines and doujinshi can be found at Supernatural/Fanzines.

Example Fanzines

Awards

Rec and Discussion Sites

Art

See also: Category:Supernatural Art

There is a wide range of artistic styles in the fandom, ranging from hyper-realism to photo-manips and from chibi art to anime/manga styles. LiveJournal communities for art include supernaturalart and spn_fanart. On Tumblr, theroadsofararchive has collected over 30,000 pieces of fanart.

Notable Fanart

Example Art Gallery

  • Supernatural: The Board Game (2010), a fan created SPN version of Monopoly

    Supernatural: The Board Game (2010), a fan created SPN version of Monopoly

  • Art created by petite_madame for the fic Last Day On Earth (2009), with a tight focus on the Winchester brothers and the Impala in the background

    Art created by petite_madame for the fic Last Day On Earth (2009), with a tight focus on the Winchester brothers and the Impala in the background

  • Chibi art by Olga (2006)

    Chibi art by Olga (2006)

  • Cover art by West Gate for the Doujinshi Gemeinschaft (2009)

    Cover art by West Gate for the Doujinshi Gemeinschaft (2009)

  • illustration of a sitting naked Sam with blue-green wings

    Crucify by digitalwave (2007), an example of the popular trope in fanart to give Sam or Dean wings

  • Art by badbastion for the story Beneath Every Layer of Skin (2012), created for the Wincestiel Big Bang. The configuration of the figures is similar to Pietà, a subject found in traditional Christian art.

    Art by badbastion for the story Beneath Every Layer of Skin (2012), created for the Wincestiel Big Bang. The configuration of the figures is similar to Pietà, a subject found in traditional Christian art.

  • wayward sons by itsvondell (2013), showing Dean, Sam and Cas relaxing on the Impala, the wings behind the sun indicate Castiel is an angel, but also, depending on when exactly the image was created in 2013, may be inspired by the Season 9 title card for the series

    wayward sons by itsvondell (2013), showing Dean, Sam and Cas relaxing on the Impala, the wings behind the sun indicate Castiel is an angel, but also, depending on when exactly the image was created in 2013, may be inspired by the Season 9 title card for the series

Vids

See also: Category:Supernatural Vids

Vidding is very popular in Supernatural fandom. Many vids focus on the relationship between the two brothers and more often than not angst is a major element. Although, over time the focus has expanded to other characters.

SPN was a big vidding fandom from the first. Within a few weeks of the pilot airing, a LiveJournal community dedicated to Supernatural vids was created, and two vidding archives were online by the end of season two. There were four Supernatural vids, all made by major vidders, in the 2006 premieres show at Vividcon:

Unfortunately, because there was limited footage at that time, these vids featured many of the same shots: a woman on fire on the ceiling, a car with one broken headlight, a woman in a nurse's outfit, etc. The nuances of these excellent vids were therefore missed by the baffled moderators of that year's Vid Review, Luminosity and Speranza, neither of whom had seen the show at that point and who consequently gave them short shrift. (Luminosity later went on to make some of the most famous vids in the fandom.)

Some of the more popular vids are known for their creative approach to visualize certain themes and ideas. For example, Luminosity's The Fifth Circle merges SPN with non-SPN footage to give a better impression of hell and the use of effects is quite stunning.

Other vids are meta commentary on the canon, fanon or fandom of the show. The vid Women's Work drew attention to the simultaneous sexualization of, and aggression towards, women in the source text while Still Alive by counteragent uses images of women from the show to represent fandom/fen and attempts to provide an overview of Supernatural fandom with a focus on Season Three.

With the fandom revival predicated by Destielgate sparking renewed interest in vidding the show, kbsd created spnamvs in April 2021 to archive and organize Supernatural vids on Tumblr.[22]

Examples vids

Supernatural Vidding Communities

Podfic

See also: Category:Supernatural Podfics

Supernatural is one of the most popular fandoms for making podfic. On the Audiofic Archive, which started in 2006, Supernatural was consistently the top fandom by number of podfics through the 2016 amplificathon challenge.[23] On AO3 it is the fourth largest fandom for podfics as of 2019 (third if you don't count Avengers separately from MCU).[24]

Several podfic-specific SPN-related communities were created on LiveJournal and Dreamwidth:

Meta/Further Reading

See also: Category:Supernatural Meta

Fanfiction Archives

Active
Inactive/Offline

A list of additional archives is being maintained by indie-archives here.

References

  1. ^ On the road trip from hell, Melbourne: The Age, 5 January 2006. (Accessed 31 March 2011)
  2. ^ Meta Episodes page at Supernatural Wiki (Accessed 31 March 2011)
  3. ^ SPNNewsletter[1]
  4. ^ SPN Directory[2]
  5. ^ Fandom page shows 10,978 on August 30, 2011. facetofcathy
  6. ^ Fandom page shows 27,527 on December 12, 2012. on_verra
  7. ^ ‘Supernatural’: They really do have a GIF for everything
  8. ^ As of 23 July 2010, ff.net has Over 32,000 SPN stories, 201 SPN ff.net story communities, and 112 Discussion Forums.
  9. ^ quote is attributed to gothphyle and first heard at the last Zebracon in 2007. Source: stormheller Never say never - The Link Well, Archived version dated September 17, 2005.
  10. ^ a b See Big Bang: stats and graphs post of 2 Sep 2011 by missyjack about the SPN J2 Big Bang. (Accessed 1 Jan 2012)
  11. ^ Supernatural Fic Link Archive page, showcasing black_samvara's fic tagging project.
  12. ^ Compiled by Trollprincess on May 19-19, 2008, in three posts: Season 1, Season 2, Season 3
  13. ^ How 1 question triggered a "Supernatural" fandom meltdown
  14. ^ Supernatural and Queer Love
  15. ^ An open letter to Jensen Ackles, by a Queer Teenage Girl
  16. ^ How Fanfiction Has Made TV More Diverse
  17. ^ Direct from the mystery girl
  18. ^ The CW Breakdown 2015-2016 on LGBTFansDeserveBetter.com.
  19. ^ "Fan, DittyDotDot commenting on a forum post, S10.E22: The Prisoner, at primetimer.com". Archived from the original on 2021-10-13.
  20. ^ From Episode 5.16, The Dark Side of the Moon (accessed 1 Jan 2012)
  21. ^ From Episode 6.03, The Third Man (accessed 1 Jan 2012)
  22. ^ Hello, Supernatural fans! Have you ever been unable to track down a particular AMV? Wondered if there’s a video set to your favorite Destiel song? Been in the mood for exclusively widower arc videos? The SPN AMV Archive can help you with all those things, and more!
  23. ^ Amplificathon 2016 Points Page, Archived version, accessed 15 April 2019.
  24. ^ In the Podfic tag, the top fandoms as of 15 April 2019 are Marvel Cinematic Universe with 2076 podfics (parent tag of Avengers), Sherlock with 1083 podfics, Avengers with 1062 podfics, Supernatural with 1006 podfics, and Teen Wolf with 985 podfics. Podfic - Works, Archived version
  25. ^ [WebCite of the front page.
  26. ^ WebCite for the splash page; WebCite for the main page.
  27. ^ WebCite for the main page.
  28. ^ WebCite for the main page.


Related Links
People Jared Padalecki • Jensen Ackles • Misha Collins • Jeffrey Dean Morgan • Richard Speight Jr. • Amanda Tapping • Eric Kripke • Kim Manners • Robert Singer
characters: Sam Winchester • Dean Winchester • Castiel • Crowley • Bobby Singer • John Winchester • Mary Winchester • Meg Masters • Rowena MacLeod • Charlie Bradbury • Gabriel • Lucifer • Benny Lafitte • Jody Mills • Donna Hanscum • Adam Milligan
Places Metallicar
Things Wayward Sisters
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