The mystery role that Jeffrey Dean Morgan will play in the upcoming fourth season of the popular Prime Video series, The Boys, is hinted to by showrunner Eric Kripke.

In the impending fourth season of the Amazon Video superhero series, Eric Kripke, the showrunner of The Boys, keeps hinting at the identity of Jeffrey Dean Morgan’s mysterious character. Kripke revealed in a recent interview that the character is personally connected to Billy Butcher played by Karl Urban.

Speaking with Entertainment Weekly, Kripke revealed that Morgan will be playing “an old colleague of Butcher’s.” While he didn’t share which character the Supernatural and The Walking Dead alum would be embodying, the showrunner teased that he does share “a lot of Butcher’s concern and hatred of superheroes. It really came from the notion of everyone else in The Boys is always trying to pull Butcher back. So what would happen if he started working with someone who wants to push him forward?”

In the same interview, Morgan shared that he had wanted to join the cast of The Boys since the first season premiered back in July 2019. “When I first saw it, I just knew immediately, ‘I gotta be on the show,'” he recalled. Despite repeated attempts by Kripke to get Morgan on the show, the actor’s schedule was always booked until Season 4, when Kripke held Morgan’s scenes fo the end of production. “I’m incredibly lucky that Eric and the crew allowed that to happen because it’s a pain in the ass,” Morgan said. “You can’t lock a picture, you can’t finish anything. They’re just waiting for Jeff to f—ing show up to shoot a few scenes.”

Jeffrey Dean Morgan Almost Played a Different Character

While Morgan shared that there were other characters he was being considered for, Kripke noted that “[o]nce the character that he plays came up, we said, ‘Oh! That would be perfect for Jeff.’ He was always going to play that character if he was able to swing it.” Morgan added that he enjoyed acting opposite Urban, saying, “I knew who my scenes would be with, whom I f—ing love. Karl is a better looking, better acting version of me, but we’re the same f—ing motherf—er. To work with that is so much fun.”

In The Boys Season 4, “the world is on the brink,” reads the official synopsis. “Victoria Neuman is closer than ever to the Oval Office and under the muscly thumb of Homelander, who is consolidating his power. Butcher, with only months to live, has lost Becca’s son and his job as The Boys’ leader. The rest of the team are fed up with his lies. With the stakes higher than ever, they have to find a way to work together and save the world before it’s too late.”

The Boys Renewed for Fifth Season

Ahead of its Season 4 premiere, The Boys was renewed by Prime Video for a fifth season. Despite The Boys Season 5 being only in the writing stage, Kripke recently shared that there are a lot of crazy ideas being thrown around in the writers’ room. I mean, we’re about a month into the writers’ room right now, so we have some pretty cool notions,” he teased. “It’s a very raw lava-esque deal right now. It hasn’t hardened into anything, but I’m excited. I think there’s some crazy sh-t’s been talked about, that’s for sure.”

The first three seasons of The Boys, as well as Gen V Season 1 of The Boys Presents: Diabolical, are available to stream on Prime Video. The Boys Season 4 premieres on June 13, 2024.