Supernatural S04E14 - Sex and Violence (2009)

Review

In Bedford, Iowa husbands are for no reason killing their wives brutally. The Winchester Bros naturally head to Bedford as there is no doubt a supernatural reason for the slayings. While there the Boys, masquerading as FBI agents, discover there is a hormone loose in the blood of the murders, oh and Sam gets intimate with Doctor Cara Roberts. All the perpetrators apparently picked up strippers at the local Honey Wagon nightspot and believed the ladies were the love of their lives. Dean is more than pleased to visit a strip joint and hunt for clues, while Sam contacts Bobby Singer who thinks they may be dealing with a Siren.

Complicating matters another FBI Agent Nick Munroe arrives with his own evidence and suspicions. Dean ends up heading back to the night club while Sam revisits Dr. Cara to get samples of the perpetrators blood. The blood is missing but Sam and Cara do find something else to occupy their time, so that wasn't a waste. Meanwhile Dean and Nick are at the strip club where Nick tells Dean that at each of the crime scenes petals from the Mediterranean plant hyacinth were discovered. Dean puts two and two together, as Dr. Cara had a hyacinth in her office and fears Sam may have come under the influence of the Siren. A twist and a surprise ending are coming at you; can Dean and Sam defeat the Siren before they become two more victims in Bedford?

The episode kicks off with one of the great prologue pieces you are ever likely to run across in a television series. Adam Benson arrives home late from work to find his wife Vicki preparing dinner, which looked pretty appetising by the way. They have a few words, Vicki is not happy he is working long hours, and things come to a head when Vicki tells Adam that she has promised they'll go over a next door neighbour's place Saturday night. Adam is not best pleased and lays into Vicki with a meat tenderiser, that we had previously seen Vicki using on the dinner steaks. We're talking blood, we're talking blow after blow, we're talking a scene that has you saying "holy flock". Director Charles Beeson gets his Hitchcock on in dramatic style, you see Adam throwing the blows, you see Vicki recoiling from the blows, but you don't see the blows land, you just think that you do. Excellent stuff and for sure the episode was rocking from the get go.

Seems we are digging into the core of the dysfunctional relationship between Sam and Dean, which is given full warp drive through the course of Sex and Violence. Right from the start we know Dean is aware that Sam is hiding something, early morning phone calls taken in the bathroom would tend to give that secret up pretty quickly. Sam forgets his phone, a blackberry for god's sake, and Dean hits redial to discover Ruby and Sam have been making a lot of calls to each other. On the reverse side of the skinning knife Sam feels he can no longer trust Dean and that Dean is somehow holding him back from tackling the big bads, which would appear to be Lilith this season. Strangely never brother seems remotely concerned by the whole Lucifer and breaking of seals thing currently going down, maybe Castiel needs to have a word. Clearly things are going to have to come to a head this season, both brothers put their outbursts down to Monster influence here, as we really are dialling into "chick moment" in a freaking big way.

Perhaps too much time is being taken up with Sam and Dean's relationship, get on with the major plot arc!

I was actually quite pleased nevertheless with our "monster of the week", Supernatural like Doctor Who continues to introduce new foes each season, and sure dug the Classic references to Sirens from Greek myth. So in the Supernatural universe Sirens can change their appearance to be your heart's desire while influencing you via a hormone to go murder your nearest and dearest. In this episode that would be predominately wives though one mum did get the raw end of a fire poker. Now okay I'm cool with this but what exactly is the Siren getting out of the situation? It didn't seem to feed on anything ergo it's like pure evil or something. The jury is out on this one but I figure if the monster does get a repeat performance in a later episode more will be explained.

Is it just me or do the Bros seem less effective this season? Once again it's up to someone else to pull their iron out of the fire as the episode winds down as neither Brother is able to get on top of the situation. Either the implications are that team Winchester is faltering due to internal strife or the various Writers this season are missing a salient point, Sam and Dean sort out the supernatural shenanigans, that's like cannon law in this franchise!

It's not often that I get around to mentioning one of the support characters and the development of that character, nothing should remain static in Supernatural, which of course is a good thing. At the end of the episode Bobby offers the boys drinks and Dean remarks that Bobby is handing out sodas rather than the expected beers. Seems Bobby has given away the booze he was knocking back heavily at the beginning of Season Four. Nice to see attention being given to the detail and it certainly underlines the growing importance of Bobby as a replacement for John Winchester.

I should also mention T&A gets a run with plenty of lingerie on display, actually that's about it, knock yourself out.

On the mullet rock front we get White Zombie's "Thunder Kiss '65", first WZ song to feature on Supernatural from memory and Brian Tichy Steal The World. That's pretty solid, no complaints this week on the music front.

Another decent episode that doesn't bother with the season plot arc, beyond Sam's growing dependence on advice from Ruby. We get a decent enough foe for the Boys to face and one of the best ever opening scenes yet in the franchise. The twist toward the end of the episode certainly caught me out, the Director masked that one to perfection, and everything hung together like a well oiled gate. While the episode probably won't make anyone's top ten Supernatural episode lists it still managed to keep me entertained from whoa to go, recommended folks.