The Winchesters: Meg Donnelly Breaks Down the Supernatural Spinoff's Season 1 Finale (Exclusive)

By Nicole Drum

Supernatural prequel spinoff The Winchesters closed out its first season Tuesday night on The CW, delivering a final showdown with the Akrida as well as some other major surprises when it comes to telling the love story between John Winchester (Drake Rodger) and Mary Campbell (Meg Donnelly). Now, with Season 1 in the rearview, Donnelly sat down with ComicBook.com to talk about some of the surprising and satisfying moments in the finale, "Hey, That's No Way to Say Goodbye", as well as opened up about what she'd like to see should the fan favorite series get a Season 2.

Warning: spoilers for the Season 1 finale of The Winchesters beyond this point.

In the finale, The Monster Club realizes that the Mystery Man (who viewers realize is Dean Winchester, played by Jensen Ackles) is the key to stopping the Akrida. However, while looking for leads on this man, who they realize is not of this world, the find themselves dealing with the Akrida queen, Joan who it turns out was once a human and a hunter centuries ago but turned on her own kind and sided with the monsters. Joan reveals that she has destroyed the Mystery Man by sending him through a portal and gives Mary and John a chance to side with her. Obviously, that's not going to fly, and Carlos figures out that if they can somehow "rewind the tape" as it were and get the Mystery Man out of the portal, they can stop Joan. While John, Samuel, and Carlos fight Joan, Ada, Lata, and Mary perform a ritual to bring the Mystery Man back but only bring his car — Baby — back instead. Mary realizes that she can use the car as a weapon and does so, charging at Joan with it at top speed, driving both herself and the Akrida queen into the portal. A few moments later, the car returns, driven by Dean. Mary is in the car, too. The car protected her. Dean explains that he's not from this world and that he's been looking for a reality where his family had a chance at a happy ending. When he saw what the Akrida — who turns out were created by God as a failsafe should he fail and were now trying to wipe out everything — he intervened to ultimately save Sam in his own world. Now, this John and Mary have a chance to choose their own destiny as well. Dean leaves John with his hunter's journal, gives Mary some advice about the yellow-eyed demon, and tells them that he thinks he found the world where his family gets a happy ending before heading off. In the end. Mary decides to leave hunting and Lawrence, but John goes with her. He still plants to hunt, but they're taking on the open road together. 

Nicole Drum, ComicBook.com: I'm just going to jump to the one thing that I was most excited to see. Dude, you got to drive Baby.

Meg Donnelly: I know.

Talk to me about that because Baby is such a big part of the Supernatural universe and fandom. That car is iconic. 

Oh my God, yeah. I don't even know where to start. It was so mind-boggling. Also, for the record, I got my license maybe a month or so before Baby came, so I was freaking out because not only am I driving Baby — that's like a crazy responsibility right there. It's like Jensen's child. — And then also there were three other people in the car, and then we had to go 40 miles per hour. I had to turn all of these things. It was all rain on the ground and just driving really fast. So, I was freaking out the entire time because I was like, I have to be super aware, and I have to know what I'm doing. But also, the scene where I'm just by myself and I'm just racing down the road really fast, I had to be thinking about basically I'm sacrificing myself for everyone. So, I had to be thinking about that but also there were motorcycles on cameras going around the car and I was like "Ah!"

But it ended up going so well and it was so much fun. I had a blast. Also, funny story. The first piece of advice Jensen ever gave me about Baby was like, "First rule of advice. It's a lot lower than you think every time and the number of times I've hit my head on the side of this car is crazy. So just make sure you really duck under." And the first thing I did, I closed the door on my head, literally. My whole head just swelled up and Jensen was like, "What was the first rule that I gave you?"

One of the big questions I think a lot of fans have had about The Winchesters has been how is the show going to tell this story [about John and Mary] and still preserve the much beloved Supernatural canon. The entire season you guys have been saying, "trust us, we've got this" and now that we're here at the end, you definitely did. We find out that this is actually a different universe and a new, fresh opportunity. When in the process did you guys find out that you're the hopeful possibility universe for the Winchester family? 

We kind of had an idea since the pilot. There were so many different things where we could go and also depending on how many episodes we had, and a lot of it was up in the air. But it is really cool that Dean kind of came to this universe to try and give his parents a good chance and kind of set us up for success. But I don't know, I'm crossing my fingers for season two because I think it would be really cool.

Because Dean, even though he set up this great universe for us and kind of set us up for success, I feel like there's so much stuff that he kind of messed up. And I feel like it would be really cool to explore that. Or also, is there actually a possibility where the Winchesters have a good ending? Is it always just going to be the same? There's so many unanswered questions, so I feel like you can go in so many different directions. And that just excites me.

Like you said, you get the impression Dean also broke some stuff, but there's a lot of stuff that we get fixed, and I think in a lot of it, in a way is kind of Mary's journey. We open this episode and Mary's not going to college. She hasn't really figured out exactly what's going on, but the issue at hand is the issue at hand. Kind of talk to me about where Mary's at in this because she definitely knows what she doesn't want, but she also doesn't seem to know what she does want, even up until this finale. 

I think what she just wants is the freedom to be able to choose what she wants to do, whether that's going to college or getting a job or being in hunting, but for her own ... when it's her own choice. I think she just has never had a choice her whole life, and she really just wants to be able to choose her own future.

I think that's kind of the argument her and Sam have at the beginning because he's like, "You're not going to college. Why aren't you going and da da da?" And she's like, "Just leave me alone. I have bigger things to figure out." Because I think it's really just not having people dictate, aka Sam, kind of what she wants to do with her life because he's kind of decided what she was going to do at such a young age, at five, that she was going to be a soldier, a hunter.

So, I think that's her arc through this episode is just realizing, "I don't know what I'm doing or where I'm going. I just need to leave Lawrence because it reminds me of everything that I hate." But there's also so much that she loves there as well, of course. But it just reminds her of everything and she's like, "I just need to get out and find out what I want to do." And that's what she does. And obviously John still wants to hunt. So, I feel like that's also a really interesting thing that Mary's not hunting anymore, but John's hunting at night. That's just a recipe for disaster, I feel like. It'd be really cool to see what happens there.

I also thought it was really interesting there is they're not saying ... There's the no goodbyes thing. In the portal, she saw every possible version of herself, but she's not going to be any of them. She's going to be her own person. Almost in a way, that's the moment she finds herself is when she tells him that.

Yeah, she's going to choose her own path and her own destiny for the first time in her life.

But at the same time, she also kind of chooses her own path in a real way there when she does take Baby and decides to, "I'm going to run down this monster."

I mean, we've seen her make some big swings all throughout the season because Mary is nothing if not selfless in a way, but this is the biggest swing she's ever taken. Kind of walk me through the process that takes her to that moment because in the end, it's really only Mary that can do this. 

And that's kind of what John tells her. Because the fact that she's not going out there to fight, she was ready to fight John on it. And he's just like, "If something happens to us in fighting in battle with Joan, you're only but only one who can help everyone else back in Lawrence, and you're the only one who can defeat this thing. You need to stay back and figure it out because ... "

So, I think once Mary realizes that she's like, "Okay, I will stay back to figure this out." And then once she realizes that the card needs to go through the portal in order for everyone to succeed and for the world to be saved, it's not even a question. She's like, "I am sacrificing myself." She doesn't even question that. She's like, "If this is the only option to save everybody, I'm going with it." And she kicks everyone out of the car and she's like, "I'm going."

And so, I think she has no idea what is at the end of that portal. She has no idea if she's coming out, what will happen to her when she comes out of the portal. And so, I think she kind of assumed that it's the end, that this is her fate and she's going to die. So, as she's driving into the portal, she's just like, "Oh my God, this is it."

And so, I think that is just a huge part of who Mary is, and I think it's just The Winchesters in general, it's definitely an inherent trait, because John has it, Mary has it, and so does Sam and Dean. They will do anything. They are so selfless in the way that they will destroy anything or do anything for the people that they love if it means saving them.

This episode very much feels like not just a season finale, but a series finale as well. If things work out and we get more of this, where would you like to see this story go if you had your way? 

Man, I feel like it would be really cool to ... Because I feel like with John still hunting and everyone kind of going their own separate way, I also feel like Ada, now that she sold part of her soul and she got involved with Rowena a little bit, I feel like she kind of goes a little bit evil, I feel, in my opinion. So, I think it would be really cool for kind of Ada to be more bad. And somehow, I feel like we all kind of come back together, but I feel like maybe some time has passed and everyone has gone through a lot of their own stuff. And so, when they come back, it's like we kind of have to re-mend things. I think that would be really cool.

If this ends up being the end, what are you personally going to take away from this experience and what do you hope that fans of both just The Winchesters, but also the larger Supernatural universe take away from this?

Oh God. Well, I think on this project alone, not only was it a huge step for me career-wise, because I've never done something like this before, but also in life, because it was my first time living alone in New Orleans and kind of meeting new people in that way. And I feel like I just learned so much about myself during filming, and I'm so grateful for that. The Winchesters will always have a special place in my heart just because I feel like it was such a huge learning curve in my whole life. So, I'm really grateful for that.

And with the fans, man, I really hope that people just enjoyed watching the show. I mean, we put our blood, sweat and tears into it literally, because there's a lot of fight scenes, which is so much fun. And I just hope that even the Supernatural fans, it was just really cool. It's been a while since Supernatural has aired and it was just kind of comforting for them and definitely heartbreaking in some ways because I know there's so much foreshadowing and so much context. But I hope that it kind of healed their inner child, their inner supernatural fans. And also, that you can lose your own destiny. And even with all the cards that are stacked against you.

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I know that Supernatural boys didn't have the same kind of freedom, but it seems like with this show, it seems like they can kind of pick their own destiny. I think that's important for people to know. Because even through everything that you've been through, you can still choose good and still choose to do good.

What did you think of The Winchesters Season 1 finale? Let us know your thoughts in the comment section!

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