Relic

DVD, Smallville S3 (Relic)

"Doesn't make sense," says old man Dexter near the end, and that describes the episode as a whole rather well! It's in turns convoluted and tenuous, but we should be used to stories that are a bit unbelievable, yet all this stuff magically appearing and slotting into place is a lot to accept at once. I don't know the story of Superman and the various origins and history of characters, but I wonder if they're making larger leaps away from the traditional mythos than seems right, when the final intimation is that Clark was sent to the Kents, because Jor-El knew what a jolly good chap Hiram was. It certainly throws up all kinds of possibilities, but is a bit hard to take.

The visions of the past are fun, and a mainstay of sci-fi. It's a surprise it's taken them so long to do something like this. The scenes in the past were well shot in age-o-vision, but the most interesting part of that story was the various ancestors showing their faces: Hiram Kent, Lachlan Luthor and Lana's Aunt, as well as later-to-be-crooked-Mayor Tate (seems more likely he'd be suspicious of Clark since he looked so much like Jor-El, and would be a danger now, so I'm guessing Clark didn't run this scheme past his parents!).

A lot was happening, but it no longer had the fast-paced stylishness and sheen of invention (the only bits you could tag with that were the cave icon opening up (another gripe: I thought the caves were hidden, so how did Jor-El and Hiram get in there?), and Clark's Matrix bullet-dodge) that used to be common on the series. In one sense it's great that they should slow down and fill out some history, though the heavy-handed parallel to the way Clark and Lana are behaving around each other at the moment makes you want to shout out that they should just be friends and get on with the series!

It seems incredible that Lionel Luthor's Dad happened to be a crook, met up with Clark's Dad, Jor-El, who was just visiting Earth, while Lana's aunt fell in love with the guy... Other dissatisfaction I felt was in Chloe and Pete yet again being present only to provide a sounding board for Clark. And the whole other storyline opened up about Lionel's parents being murdered - don't believe a word of it - he's such a lying toad, he's putting the grief on. Seems likely he had something to do with it, and maybe Lex suspects that too? Somehow, most of the episodes of this season so far have left me unsatisfied - either there's action without good story, or story without the blend that we came to expect in S1 and 2. I'm sure it will improve...

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