The Daily Telegraph “Fact scarier than fiction”
(...) At the heart of the show are brothers Sam and Dean Winchester (Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles). When they were young their mother was killed by a demon. Now they're on a quest to hunt down such ghouls.
The brothers were named after the characters Sal and Dean, from the classic beat novel On The Road, by Jack Kerouac. Kripke didn't like the idea of having a lead named Sal, so he switched to Sam.
He says he was always fascinated by the fact that the story of the "heroes' quest" is one that has been told many times over.
"It just taps into something primal and universal in the human experience. When you break it down, The Matrix is the same as Star Wars, which is the same story as Lord Of The Rings, which is the same as Wizard Of Oz."
They may be similar in concept, but Kripke says that for the feel of the show he was more inspired by early '80s cult favourites such as Steven Spielberg's Poltergeist, An American Werewolf In London and Evil Dead 2.
The latter two, while incredibly scary, were also injected with a dose of comedy, which is the tone Kripke has tried to work into Supernatural.
As for Poltergeist, the reason why Kripke says it works is that horror is occurring in the suburban home, a familiar location, not a haunted home in the woods.
"It's the idea that horror can happen in your own backyard. How many viewers have to worry about the vampire in the gothic castle?"
After Sam and Dean, the third most-important character in the show is the black Chevy Impala the brothers ride about the country in.
When the car was smashed at the end of the first season, Kripke was hounded by people wanting to know if the car would come back. It has.
"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'." (...) [source]
