In news that may divide Supernatural fandom, or at least the commenters on our recent roundtable with the drama's writers, The Live Feed reports Misha Collins will return as a series regular in the recently announced ninth season. He'll also direct one episode.

Collins was introduced as the angel Castiel in the Season 4 premiere, and proved so popular that he was promoted to series regular for the fifth and sixth seasons. For seasons 7 and 8, however, he became a special guest star; he was last seen on the Jan. 16 episode. Since 2008, Collins has appeared in 50 episodes of The CW drama.

Fans of Collins, and his character, launched a "Feathers for Castiel" campaign last month, sending feathers to the production offices of Supernatural in an effort to convince the producers to give the angel a larger role in the series. "I don't think the feathers to the offices campaign was what saved the angel, but it does look like I'm going to be a regular for Season 9," Collins wrote this afternoon on Twitter.

Supernatural airs Wednesdays at 9 p.m. ET/PT on The CW.