‘Walker’ Casts Genevieve Padalecki as Jared Padalecki’s Wife

Real-life spouses Jared Padalecki and Genevieve Padalecki will be acting opposite one another again.

Genevieve has joined the cast of Walker, starring her husband, as his character’s late wife, Emily, in a “heavily recurring role,” Deadline reports. But don’t expect to suddenly see Emily in the afterlife or brought back from the dead. (This isn’t Supernatural, on which the two met, after all.) She’ll be in flashbacks. The character is described as “strong, capable and generous,” as well as “brave and focused on helping the disenfranchised” and “a grounded and authentic hero in the Walker family.”

Jared Padalecki and Genevieve Padalecki on Supernatural (Jack Rowand/The CW)

Jared spoke a bit about his new series on Michael Rosenbaum’s “Inside of You” podcast posted Tuesday (but recorded while he was still filming Supernatural). “I’m thrilled” about Walker, he said, adding that production, in Austin, Texas, is slated to begin in October. Originally, he was going to go almost straight from Supernatural to Walker — before and after the pandemic, with the new filming dates — but that changed “because we need more time to build” for the new series.

As for an episode count, Jared noted that he thinks they originally got picked up for 13 episodes, but he isn’t sure if that’s changed due to the pandemic’s effects on production. Since shows usually shoot from July to April, filming the same number of episodes on the current time table would take them into July or August 2021 — which could then affect a potential second season.

He hasn’t spoken to Chuck Norris, who was the lead of Walker, Texas Ranger, the series on which Walker is based, but said, “he had to give his blessing because he still co-owned the rights to the story.”

Walker is a reimagining of the action crime drama that aired from 1993 to 2001. In this new version, Jared plays widower and father of two Cordell Walker, who has “his own moral code.” After two years undercover, he returns home to Austin, where “he’ll attempt to reconnect with his creative and thoughtful son (Kale Culley) and his headstrong, somewhat rebellious teenaged daughter (Violet Brinson) and navigate clashes with his family — an ADA brother (Keegan Allen) who stepped in during Walker’s absence, his perceptive mother (Molly Hagen) and his traditional rancher father (Mitch Pileggi),” the logline reads.

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“Walker’s former colleague is now his Ranger Captain, (Coby Bell),” it continues. “Walker finds unexpected common ground with his new partner (one of the first women in Texas Rangers’ history) played by Lindsey Morgan, while growing increasingly suspicious about the circumstances surrounding his wife’s death.”

Walker, 2021, The CW