Supernatural entered season 10 with Dean Winchester having become a demon, but while fans were excited, the resulting story was truly lackluster. In 2020, after an astounding 15 seasons produced, The CW's Supernatural rode off into the sunset to "Carry On My Wayward Son" for the final time. The show now stands as one of the longest-running TV dramas of its era, and joins a pantheon of other genre icons like The X-Files, The Walking Dead, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer in the hallowed halls of TV royalty.
However, that doesn't mean Supernatural was flawless by any means, and even many of its most diehard fans would admit that. Running for over 300 episodes, Supernatural produced a mountain of content, and as one might expect, some of that content was better than others. Thankfully, the show's cast and characters were capably entertaining enough to weather the worse creative storms, such as the woeful Leviathan arc during season 7 or the lame period where Lucifer wasn't played by Mark Pellegrino.
One of, if not the, biggest missteps made by Supernatural's writers and producers was the utter fumbling of season 10's "Dean-mon" arc, which ended up being so short that it barely qualifies as an arc. Here's why Dean, Jensen Ackles, Supernatural as a show, and its fans, all deserved better.
Why Demon Dean Was Supernatural's Biggest Missed Opportunity
All the marketing going into Supernatural's season 10 premiere was focused on Dean's new demonic identity. In the season 9 finale, Dean had been stabbed to death by Metatron, and thanks to the Mark of Cain on his arm, he later resurrected as a demon. Looking to guide Dean through his new infernal existence was sometimes friend, sometimes enemy Crowley, another tantalizing prospect, as actors Jensen Ackles and Mark Sheppard had electric chemistry. The stage was set for an epic story, but instead, what fans got was three episodes of Demon Dean, then back to Supernatural's status quo.
While the first three episodes of season 10 did start to fulfill some of the potential found in the Demon Dean plot, the whole arc was badly hurt by its brevity. Ackles looked to be having a ball playing a different version of Dean, the interplay between Dean and Crowley was indeed terrific, and the episodes did suitably shake up Supernatural's standard formula. Then Sam and Castiel cured Dean after three episodes, and everything went back to the same old, same old. That's not to say that the Supernatural formula is bad, as it obviously supported a 15-season run. But the Dean-mon arc could've easily been told over the first half of the season, or even the whole thing, instead of going the easy reset route.
Dean could've continued getting more evil, much to Crowley's delight, then perhaps ended up feuding with Crowley over control of Hell. Dean even could've reverted to the torturer Alastair molded him into during his stay in Hell back before season 4, for added continuity. Season 10 could've built to an epic showdown between Sam and Demon Dean, with Sam afraid he'd have to kill his brother. It could've been a story for the ages. While some of these elements did come into play, it's like they played out in fast forward, and were mostly unsatisfying as a result.