Review–Supernatural’s official season seven companion

Review by C.J. Bunce

This week Titan Books published Volume 7 of its Supernatural: The Official Companion series, documenting season by season both CW Network’s episodes but also providing behind the scenes information fans of the series should love.  Writer Nicholas Knight uses a nice mix of what you’d find in a standard series guide plus some nice extras, and he writes in a manner that will directly appeal to “Supernaturalinos”.  It’s a format that should be emulated by other publishing houses, and we hope to see other series like CW Network’s Arrow and Beauty and the Beast work with a publisher to release similar books for those series next year.

With guest stars in the seventh season like Faran Tahir (Star Trek 2009), James Marsters and Charisma Carpenter (Buffy the Vampire Slayer), Felicia Day (The Guild), and more of Mark Sheppard (Doctor Who, Warehouse 13, Leverage) as recurring character Crowley, this is probably not the episode guide for fans of the Winchester brothers to miss.

Supernatural: The Official Companion: Season 7 follows the exploits of Sam and Dean through all 23 episodes.  Highlights of the volume include a section of full-color glossy photos of the cast, detailed props, make-up and set design signage.  Each episode is discussed with summaries, interviews with series creators, and all with details diehard series fans will appreciate.

Each of the key villains of the season are highlighted in their own pages throughout the book, and interesting trivia can be found on every other page in sidebar sections.  The publication quality is to-notch–the black and white photos throughout the volume are crisp and detailed, and the book is arranged with Supernatural design components.

As for the format, we wouldn’t be surprised if the publisher releases all the volumes in one compilation after the series wraps, a format usually found for series with enough viewers to demand an episode guide.  Supernatural’s large fan base and devoted following is just right for this type of work–a series by series release vs final wrap-up book, and fans of other series with similar fan bases, like the Star Trek series Enterprise, which has never published any series compilation or episode guide, would be lucky to have similar works produced.

Supernatural: The Official Companion: Season 7 is available from bookstores and at a discount from Amazon.com.