The Sam & Dean effect

As Supernatural returns with a new season, lead actors Jensen and Jared talk about the cult show and its fandom

Take two good looking men. Give them company: monsters, demons, angels, vampires. Make them travel: to heaven, hell, purgatory. Ensure that their lives are riddled with deep angst, intense emotions and visceral violence.

That’s the cult TV show Supernatural, and it’s back with a brand new season (nine). For those who came in late, this is a, well, supernatural-themed drama series that first premiered in September 2005. It features two brothers, Dean and Sam Winchester, who have a rather unusual job: hunting down and exterminating evil supernatural beings. Over the years, the show has created a vast, intricate universe peopled by the Winchesters’ family and friends, bitter other-world enemies, and recurring motifs (such as the 1967 Chevrolet Impala in which the brothers cruise the American Midwest looking for monsters). Supernatural has acquired a committed global fan base that can sometimes border on the crazy. India has not been immune to the Winchesters’ charm. The show has been a superhit for AXN, the channel on which it airs.

Smoking hot: Sam, played by Jared Padalecki (left) and Dean (Jensen Ackles) are the tough monster-hunting brother)