Why I’d be more than happy to see shorter Supernatural seasons going forward

Jensen Ackles explained the shorter season order for Supernatural Season 14 is for the actors to spend more time with their family. I’d be happy to see event shorter Supernatural seasons going forward, and here’s why.

Supernatural Season 14 is getting 20 episodes. It turns out that Jensen Ackles and Jared Padalecki want the exact thing many of us do: more time with their family. Who can argue with that? Certainly not me, and I’d be happy to see them reduce the Supernatural seasons even more!

Filling out 22 to 23 episodes at a time is a lot of work. There’s a lot of planning that goes into stretching out a storyline without it being too stretched; without it losing its traction.

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Just look at how the showrunners struggled a little with Asmodeus. He was in a handful of episodes, initially as a major threat and then almost abandoned. This was supposed to be a Prince of Hell–and it took two seasons (and more years before that) to take down the first ever Prince of Hell the Winchesters came across.

Filling 20 episodes will be easier, but what would be even easier is filling 13-16 episodes. We just have to look at Supernatural Season 3 to see how more contained storylines were–there were some plotholes but that wasn’t their fault the writer’s strike affected production.

I would happily take much shorter Supernatural seasons in the future. I’m talking 16 episodes. We’d still get the odd filler episode, where the Winchesters were off on a case themselves that had nothing to do with the overall storyline, but most of the focus would be on the big bad. There would be fewer hours to fill up.

Shorter seasons would also mean the stars could go home more. Cutting out two episodes allows the actors about an extra month at home. Cutting from 23 to 16 would mean them getting about three and a half months extra with their families. That’s a huge amount of time.

With shorter Supernatural seasons, we could see more seasons overall. The actors would be much happier to remain on the set. There would also be more material to use for future seasons, instead of using up multiple ideas in one storyline to drag things out.

Next: 5 biggest takeaways from the Supernatural SDCC 2018 panel

What do you think about shorter Supernatural seasons? Would you take less per season for more Supernatural in the future? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

Supernatural Season 14 premieres on Oct. 11 at 8/7c on The CW.