Supernatural: What is causing Jack’s health to deteriorate?

This week’s Supernatural concluded with the reveal that Jack might be very ill. What’s going on with the young Nephilim and where will this take his story?

During Jack’s time on Supernatural, the character has gone through a rollercoaster of struggles and emotions. Season 13 focused on Jack’s attempt to control his angelic powers and be on the side of good rather than be manipulated by his father, Lucifer. Then season 14 takes a new turn as Jack begins the season drained of all his power, and has to come to terms with being human and finding a new purpose. Jack’s grace may never replenish, and now another twist from the most recent episode has shown that there might be even more challenges on the way. At the climax of episode 3 of the new season entitled “The Scar”, Jack is seen coughing up blood.

What is happening to Jack is still a mystery, which may stay that way for some time. In an attempt to continue being useful and training to become a better hunter, Jack may decide to hide his deterioration from Sam, Dean and Castiel, not wanting to worry them or to add to their plate of already existing problems. Whilst everyone is on their toes looking for the archangel Michael, their current biggest threat, Jack might end up sacrificing his own well-being, and maybe even his life, to ensure that the team stays on track and defeats Michael.

Jack’s coughing and blood probably indicate some kind of internal bleeding and that could be the result of many things. However it’s probably fair to narrow the cause down to two scenarios:

Jack’s grace is being regenerated

There is a chance that Jack’s powers will replenish and we don’t actually know what that would involve and what impact that would have. As Nephilim’s are rare on the show, our characters still don’t know much about their angelic powers and what impact regenerating grace will have on Jack. It could be that Jack’s body is being weakened by the return of an angelic presence within him. We know that the archangel Lucifer was Jack’s dad, and that archangels are exponentially more powerful than an average angel and can only possess specifically strong humans. Therefore, it could be that the grace replenishing inside Jack is breaking Jack’s human part because the human side of him is not strong enough to hold the angelic power.

Losing his grace has caused an impact on his mortal body

On the other hand, the second explanation for Jack’s sickness, which may be more likely, is that Jack is feeling the physical effects of losing his grace. As I’ve mentioned, we’ve never seen the outcomes of grace being extracted from a Nephilim before.

It could be that Jack’s body has become dependent on his angelic energy in order to stay alive, and now that that’s been taken away from him, his human body is falling apart. After all, Jack first appeared in the show as a fully-formed man, despite having only just been born, being omniscient enough to understand that he had to grow up fast in order to impact the world in a good way. His entire body and its structure was created by the angelic power he once possessed so it could be that the body is dying without the central support beams keeping him together.

As season 14 progresses, we are sure to find the answer behind Jack’s decline in health. It may be completely unrelated to Jack’s grace, although he would be a pretty unlucky character if that were true.

What do you think is causing Jack to bleed internally? Let us know your theories in the comments!