‘Supernatural’: Felicia Day Reflects on Charlie as a Role Model & Her Death (and Return)

Felicia Day‘s Charlie Bradbury appeared in only 11 episodes of Supernatural over a number of a years: seven in the show’s world as a quirky lesbian hacker genius and four as her Apocalypse World alter ego, an accomplished demon hunter, who also liked girls. Nonetheless, the sci fi/fantasy/web content creator stalwart was popular enough that many fans asked that Day become a cast regular. It helped that Charlie was almost considered a Winchester family member, and a particular favorite of Dean’s (Jensen Ackles) — in both universes.

Day was interviewed in May at a Creation Entertainment convention in New Jersey for TV Guide Magazine’s Supernatural Afterlife: 20th Anniversary Special celebrating the iconic sci-fi show, where she shared her thoughts about both her love of SPN conventions around the world and her role on the iconic show.

What draws you back to the many Supernatural conventions?

Felicia Day: I started my career as a potential slayer on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, so I was introduced to conventions and fan families very early. And the minute I did my first convention, sometime after Buffy, I knew that this is where I wanted to be. It feels like when your content means more to someone than just like passively entertaining them, it gives an extra level of fulfillment to an artist.

At the SPN conventions, what do your fans generally say to you?

I think what’s wonderful about my character Charlie it that inspired a lot of people to either go into tech, come out to their parents, and be more confident as sort of a weird woman. Those kind of roles don’t come along all the time. Charlie’s an out-sized character; in the genre universe, I don’t see a lot of characters like her even today on TV and I think that kind of resonates.

I’ve read on some fans sites that they really accepted Charlie, particularly because she wasn’t going to be romantically involved with either of the Winchesters, Sam (Jared Padalecki) or Dean, but more like family.

I hear it said a lot that she was an honorary Winchester. There was a line that Dean said: “Charlie is the little sister we never wanted.” And that’s really the dynamic that people really loved about Charlie and what I loved about it — because we were like a family on screen and also off screen.

The fans, especially those that come to the conventions, seem to be part of that extended family. Are the SPN conventions like family reunions for the cast?

They are! I love when I walk into the Green Room and I see my friends and we’re talking and chatting either in a panel or in front of the fans behind the scenes. We’re all just really happy to be together. I’ve been on a lot of TV shows where that’s not the case. And I think it really stems from the tone that the leads on the show set. Jared and Jensen have done a great, great job of treating everyone equally and having that family feel.

What are some of your favorite memories from these conventions?

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve heard, especially younger girls say, that “I’m confident in being who I am because of you.” I have an 8-year-old daughter and I’m seeing her kind of grow up being a little weirder than other people, too. We don’t have a lot of role models like Charlie out there. And so if that can impact somebody’s real life, the choices they make, the people they love, the confidence that they have being themselves, it’s a blessing.

How old will your daughter be when she’s allowed to watch her mom on Supernatural? 

I’ve actually been surveying fans whenever I see a teenager with them! I ask, “Hey, when did they start watching?” I think I’ve settled on 12. My kid is a real aficionado for spooky things, so she’d probably like it earlier, but no, she’s seeing it when she’s 12. [Laughs]

I briefly interviewed a father and his 13-year-old daughter on the convention floor. This was her second year at the convention with her dad.

Amazing, so he is a fan?

Yes, he was a weekly viewer and now, he said, he really enjoys binging the show with his kid.

There’s nothing better than seeing a parent and a kid come up to me at the cons. It tends to be daughters, so it’s mothers and daughters and fathers and daughters. There’s nothing better than seeing that because it means that we’re transcending generations. They don’t make shows like Supernatural or Buffy or those kind of genre shows that are 22 episodes anymore, where you just want to sit down in front of the TV and see a family go through some adventures. We don’t have that now. Everything’s spectacle. Everything’s eight episodes every three years, and it just doesn’t have the same feel.

If you were to write a letter to the fans, what would you say to them?

I’d say thanks for keeping the show alive in your hearts. It means the characters live on, so thanks for spreading the word. Because every year the fan base seems to grow, which is a real blessing for us as artists. I’d love to revisit my character one day, and they might make that possible because they still love the show.

What was your reaction when you learned Charlie would violently die? It was a final death, which wasn’t that common on Supernatural. How much time were you given to process that?

They told me, when they closed the deal, “You’re dying in this episode.” That’s what happened. I write a lot of my own stuff because I’ve been killed off many a TV show. [Laughs] At least I can control what I write, so I’ll never kill myself off. But yeah, it was really hard. Supernatural was at a time of my life that I really needed to be on that set to be accepted and feel like I was part of a family. And you get attached and you want to be there more, and then you’re told that you can’t be there. But I know that I’m not a regular and I’m there to serve the bigger story they need. So, personally, it sucked, but professionally, I understood and I was there for it 100%.

But after that sad death in which you died bleeding out in a bathtub, you were called back!

That’s the blessing of being in a genre show. I never want to be on just like a 9-1-1, because if I die, I can’t come back. They brought me back from the Apocalypse World and I got to do some really interesting stuff. And yeah, Charlie lives on in many different ways, and that is such a compliment.

What’s your all-time favorite episode?

Wow. Well, the Groundhog Day-like episode “Mystery Spot,” where Jensen dies in different ways during the same day, is one of my favorites as a viewer, but my favorite is the LARPing episode [“LARP and the Real Girl”] where Charlie got to fall in love and kiss a fairy. [Laughs] The set, the vibe, the costumes were just so fun. I tried to get the costume I wore from wardrobe, but they lost it. But when they were wrapping the show, they called and they were like, “Do you want any wardrobe? “And I said, “Great, I would love the LARPing outfit.” They couldn’t find it, but I did get the original Charlie lion cat shirt and the Princess Leia shirt. So I do have some of the original wardrobe. I also was given, by producer Jim Michaels, the oil painting that was in the LARPing episode. So I have an oil painting of myself dressed as a queen that I’m not hanging in my house, but I do have it, which is kind of a fun memento.

Where is it?

In my storage unit. I used to have a huge storage unit full of fan art of myself. I decided that I needed to downsize and not pay that much money to for a box with things with my face on it anymore.

You said that you’d like to come back on some kind of Supernatural project, if that were to happen. If so and Charlie was in it, what would you like her to be doing?

I would be thrilled to be in it. I think she’d probably be teaching at like a community college and being a mentor. It would be one of those jobs where she could take the summers off and travel and also on the side maybe do a little anarchist hacking. Yeah, it would be really fun to revisit Charlie as a character, either the Apocalypse version of her or the OG version. There’s a lot of story there that I would love to revisit.

Do you have a favorite on set memory?

There are so many wonderful moments. I can’t tell you again how wonderful Jared and Jensen are in that everybody was equal on the set and you’ve been on a bunch of TV sets, so you know that everyone doesn’t get treated equally a lot of the time. There’s usually a hierarchy, you know, this person shouldn’t talk to this person or this person has this job, so they’re not as important as this other job. That wasn’t the case on Supernatural. Everybody was doing a job together. That’s how it should be because everybody contributes equally. Jared and Jensen just kept their feet on the ground and treated everyone like real people. I really admire that, and it really set the bar for me for everything I experience on sets now.

Would you describe what Supernatural has done for you, professionally and/or personally?

Charlie is important to me because she’s important to the fans and we don’t always get that with every role that we have. But the gift of that is pretty special and it makes it easy to be a little more picky in what I choose to do. I consider, “Is the role going to take you away from the things that you love to do in your life? Is it going to be something that you want to live and will mean something to those who see the show?” I’m lucky, I’ve had a lot of roles and most were written for me.

Was Charlie written for you?

Charlie was written for a “Felicia Day type.” Then, the showrunner, Sera Gamble, thank God, said, “Let’s try to get her!” But it’s because of the work I’d done on the web and writing my own shows that showrunners like on Eureka and Supernatural wrote me parts.

Supernatural is obviously a cult show and you can expound on that a little, but one could say that you are also a cult figure in your own way, no?

Yeah. I’ll take that. I’ve been on a lot of cult shows. I’ve been in Buffy, Eureka, the web musical Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog [also Adventure Time and Mystery Science Theater 3000: The Return]. I also created my own [award-winning] web show, The Guild. So yes, I guess I’m one of those people. I just love creating things. I don’t want to not make things just because somebody told me I can’t make it. And again, it’s my work outside the system, just like representing who I am and trying to say it’s okay to be like this, that influenced people on Eureka, Supernatural, Buffy, and Dr. Horrible to an extent. All of those roles were created by creative people who liked what I did. I don’t get things through auditions very often. It’s just like other writers liking me,

Are you hoping you get a call for the Buffy sequel spinoff?

I can only cross my fingers. That would be a dream role because it’s so interesting that they’re doing this and passing Buffy on to new generations, some of whom already carry a torch for the original show. My dream is to be on a Star Trek or the new Buffy. But if I had to pick one show, it would be to bring Charlie back on Supernatural, because honestly, she’s just a really special character.

For a deep-dive into 20 years of Supernatural, from behind-the-scenes scoop to exclusive cast interviews, photos, and fan stories, pick up a copy of TV Guide Magazine’s Supernatural Afterlife: 20th Anniversary Special issue, available on newsstands and for order online at Supernatural.TVGM2025.com.