Supernatural series creator Eric Kripke shared the original pitch for the series on Twitter, and it’s fascinating.
In honor of the Supernatural season 11 mid-season finale, Kripke tweeted the first page of his original pitch to The WB, which has never been released before.
Read the pitch below:
#SPNArtifact. In honor of tonight, the first page from my #SPN pitch to the studio. Never before seen. pic.twitter.com/P8tT0SE26S
— Eric Kripke (@therealKripke) December 9, 2015
Kripke then humorously added:
P.S. My favorite line from the #SPN pitch: how I say the show isn't "Vancouver Rainy." Ha. Shows what I know!
— Eric Kripke (@therealKripke) December 9, 2015
The pitch first describes the series as X-Files meets Route 66. It then goes on to discuss some middle American folklore, like the legend of Robert Johnson selling his soul to become the world’s greatest guitarist (a story that inspired season 2’s “Crossroads Blues”) and the wendigo creature (which was the monster of the week in season 1’s “Wendigo” and has been mentioned numerous times since).
Kripke describes the series as being “irreverent” and about the “bloody, beating heart of America.” He also says he wants to make it “as scary as I possibly can, until you guys call and yell at me.”
His final description of the series is “Star Wars in truck stop America,” which seems quite fitting, especially for the early seasons of the series. The brothers have long been compared to Luke Skywalker (Sam) and Han Solo (Dean), after all.
Notably, the brothers’ car changed from a ’64 Mustang to a ’67 Impala, which is a fandom-famous story in itself. Kripke has said, “When I was originally writing the show I wanted to give the guys an American muscle car. My first choice was a ’65 Mustang. My neighbour said it has to be a ’67 Impala, because you can put a body in the trunk. He says, ‘You want a car that, when people stop next to it at the lights, they lock their doors.'”
Eleven seasons later, and we’ve gotten an entire episode from the car’s perspective, so its importance can’t be understated.
This pitch was from 2004, and the earliest draft of the pilot also featured the brothers not being raised as hunters and thinking their mother died in a car crash when they were 9 and 11 respectively. Eventually the series as we know it took shape, and Supernatural premiered on The WB on September 13, 2005.
Supernatural returns with new episodes on Wednesday, January 20 at 9:00 p.m. ET on The CW.