Jensen Ackles Trades Supernatural for Superheroics in The Boys' Third Season

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Ackles is hanging up the demon hunt for a supersuit.
Ackles is hanging up the demon hunt for a supersuit.
Image: The CW

Joke’s on you for waiting for season two. The Boys is already racing on to new ways for Eric Kripke to keep a Winchester brother gainfully employed.

Yes, Supernatural’s final end may have been delayed thanks to the novel coronavirus—it’s set to return with its final episodes later this year—but one half of its brotherly team of demon fighters is ready to move on to another Kripke production. Amazon has confirmed that Jensen Ackles will be joining The Boys’ third season, even before season two has gotten in the hands of fans.

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Ackles—who celebrated the news with an appropriately silly Instagram video of him reading the original Garth Ennis/Darick Robertson comic, which you can see below—will be playing the very first “public” superhero of the Boys universe, called Soldier Boy.

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Originally a soldier in the U.S. Army during World War II, Soldier Boy was one of the members of the superteam Payback—a prototype super team working with the military á la Marvel’s Invaders, except they all got brutally massacred, and rebuilt by Vought as the basis for modern supes teams. In the comics, it’s revealed that the name is actually a legacy title, and two previous Soldier Boys had existed before the current incarnation (it’s yet to be said just which Ackles is playing). Fans of the series will know that the present Soldier Boy has some...decidedly rough interactions with Billy Butcher and his crew, so it’s likely we’ll see the latest owner of the mantle rather than any flashbacks to the past.

The Boys’ third season has yet to begin production in earnest, but the second will start streaming on Amazon September 4.

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