Review

A pretty creepy family portrait is causing havoc to whoever buys it, assuming you count slit throats as havoc, of course. Seems the painting, or rather the entity associated with it, has been claiming victims since 1910, with John Winchester being the only one noting the similar deaths due to the long time gap between incidents. The Winchester boys are quickly onto the case, and have to contend with rich snobs, revenants being a tad feisty, and of course, Sarah. A pretty gripping, tension-filled episode ensues, with Sam back on the dating calendar. Ready to go read up on the history of the painting?

If last week’s episode was all about Dean facing his personal past, this week’s episode is about Sam facing the future, and in particular his love life. We’re all for that if it’ll involve some T&A, which is sadly missing from this otherwise excellent series. Seems Sam has some deep-seated anxieties about people he becomes close to kicking the bucket in pretty messy ways, his mom and Jessica being the reason. Dean is keen on Sam getting some, and I’m just pleased that I could write this paragraph to appease our female demographic. Okay, enough with the emoting stuff, on with the review.

The episode opens with a well-constructed scene that had me sitting up and taking notice. A couple return home from a charity auction with a family portrait. Before you can say “Hey, it’s slightly down on the left”, we notice that the dad in the painting changes the direction he is looking in. Since this is Supernatural, this for sure can’t be a healthy development for our couple. And it’s not, as both fall victim to an unseen assailant in pretty bloody fashion. Yeap, the gore’s being ramped up again.

Great stuff, and a locked-room mystery for the Winchesters to unravel. Without giving too much away spoiler-wise, it’s all about the painting and Sam getting the provenance to the painting in order to unlock that mystery. Too cool for school, and there’s a real nice twist coming at you by episode end that had me applauding.

Director Sgriccia is pretty much spot-on with Provenance, keeps the episode running along on all cylinders, and maintains the Supernatural mythos throughout. At one stage I kind of thought he had blown things mythos-wise, but it turns out that was a twist which I should have seen coming.

Revenants never get boring with this franchise's ability to give new spins on the revenge fueled spirits

There are a couple of money shots in this episode that should have your average horror fan baying at the moon for more Sgriccia involvement in the series. Firstly, the reflection of the straight razor in the reading glasses, a nice touch that wasn’t overused and hence was more effective than it sounds here. Go catch the episode to dig that funky chicken.

The second one for mine was the Winchester Bros raiding the auction house to get the painting, then burning it in a field and no doubt feeling that the job was well done. We then flash back to the picture frame where the painting is re-materializing. Now how cool is that? Sam’s reaction the next day on seeing the painting all hearty and well was pure class, and well up on the hoot factor. Gosh, that painting does have its surprises, and they keep coming at us from go to whoa in Provenance.

Naturally, this being Supernatural, we do end up seeing the entity that’s causing all the mayhem but Sgriccia holds off the reveal till very late in the episode, sort of like what Hideo Nakata did with Ring. And like Nakata, Sgriccia nails the reveal and really makes it work for him. That’s one freaky deaky revenant, perhaps the best of the season so far, and the use of time lapse really turned the heat up on a creepy scene. Wonderful stuff from a Director sure to have a huge future in the genre.

We don’t normally bother mentioning the incidental characters, unless they look likely to have a repeat outing sometime during the season. However, we simply have to mention Taylor Cole’s (Sarah) performance in this episode that helped round things out to a high level. She’s a hottie, and by heavens can act as well. There were some sparks between Cole and Padalecki, and here’s hoping Cole will appear again this season – unlikely – or next season. Besides which, my Boys were all impressed with the Cole rack, which deserves a mention in its own right.

Speaking of music, which we weren’t but whatever, the episode throws up Grand Funk Railroad’s “Bad Time”, and “Night Life” by The Steve Carlson Band. Neither track has been on my play list before, but I was grooving along to the beat without any issues.

Wow, still have some room in this review but am out of things to comment on for Provenance, which means you are going to have to bear with me for a couple of minutes here. During the episode we learn that Dean likes mini-quiches, so yes, real men do eat them, which is just as well cause I love that eggy goodness. Sarah also likes a beer, so the team are pretty much agreeing with Dean: “Dude, marry that girl!”

Provenance was an episode that kept me interested from the prologue scene to the closing credits. Plenty of twists, lots of great looking scenes, and maybe an indication that Sam is going to be more than a big girls’ blouse in the future. Can’t ask for much more would be my call. Quality TV of the highest order.

Starting to see some light at the end of the tunnel with this, the nineteenth episode. Only three more to go and we can sit back and wait for season 2 to arrive Downunder. Still not entirely sure how they are going to tie up the plot arcs and finish the season with a cliff-hanger, but we’ll just have to wait and see, I guess.

High recommendation on Provenance; there’s something for everyone in the episode, and you will enjoy. Dial on in for some good times, and you won’t be disappointed.