Season 3, Episode 6: Relic

 

"Relic"

Episode 6

Air Date: November 5th, 2003

Well, one thing I am very impressed by this episode is this isn't just an excuse for Tom Welling and Kristin Kreuk being thrown into a period piece for the hell of it! "Relic" really is a stunning mystery that is slowly unraveled that builds on previous aspects of the Superman myth by giving them purpose and destiny to them. Now I'm sure it can be a bit irritating that Lana had a great aunt that looked just like her and had three. YES. THREE. men in love with her at the same time. But I'll take it do to the tremendous storytelling here despite the obsessive necessity of having every man or villain fall in love with Lana just to make her the constant center of attention of a series that suppose to be about Clark's journey so....  The 1961 setting is beyond authentic, really transporting us viewers to the time of jukeboxes, slow dances and that beautiful Flamigo's classic "I Only Have Eyes for You" playing beautifully in one of the background of the alluring, visually breathtaking flashbacks. The mystery centered around Louise' death is well written narrative across the episode that delivers some pretty astonishing revelations like a young Jor-El being on Earth during the 60s while the sheriff of Smallville at the time plotted on getting rid of the drifter passing through Smallville in an effort to kill him and frame Louise' husband at the time. Once again, it's nice that this wasn't a forced period piece to put Lana and Clark's teen angst in the middle of an early 60s murder mystery.  Both Tom Welling and Kristin Kreuk really sell their roles with Clark playing his young Kryptonian father, who apparently was sent to Earth by his father as a right of passage but ended up falling for Lana's great aunt.

They really did give performances that were distinct enough to make me believe this wasn't just the actors in vintage attire, but the actual old relatives of Clark and Lana who truly did fall in love.  It also is a great way to show Clark that Jor-El was in fact more human than he originally thought, given how harsh his A.I. has treated him so far.  Here we have a Jor-El who is young, naive but overwhelmed by his Kryptonian heritage and what it means for his future....exactly how Clark feels now about where his destiny and fate lies.  But my favorite part of the episode is when Clark has vision of his father ruining into Hiram Kent, Jonathan's father and finding out that he helped Jor-El to get through the town unseen to make it back to Krypton.  We have always known about the Kents' part in the legend of Superman, but one of the things that Smallville did so well with was building on those classic mythos by this episode establishing that because of Jor-El's time in Smallville and Hiram helping him, made the Kents chosen by him to send Clark there and be protected by them.  It's a excellent ending to be left on and is a wonderful conclusion to find out the Kents were meant to find Clark giving their beautiful, caring nature. WOW!!!

But it's not only the history of the Langs and Kents that is explored, but finding out more about the dark past of the Luthor family.  Turns out Lionel's father, Lachlan Luthor, was a petty criminal in Smallville that Lex never knew about.  Intrigued by Chloe's background info, we get a superb scene of Lex confronting his father about his family's history and finding out that Lionel rewrote it instead of revealing his parents were suicide slummers who killed in a tenement fire.  As tragic as it may seem, Lex's curiosity gets him an old detective who reveals that the fire that killed his grandparents wasn't an accident but a set up to kill them.  Even when Lex reveals this to Lionel and tells him they will find out who killed them, Lionel seems more nervous and apprehension of finding out the truth of the murderers....hmmmm.... Once again, terrific and natural building of this phenomenal arc with Lex and how Lionel will play a major part in his descent into madness down the line of this season.  It's also great that the writers continue to establish the necessity of the caves and how Jor-El used them to store his time on Smallville in a Kryptonian journal. Nice! All and All, "Relic" is a profound hour of mystery and mesmerizing flashbacks that tell an in-depth story of Clark, Lana and Lex's lineage that works so well being intertwined in the history of Smallville.  I especially love how Clark uses his father's memories as a way of getting justice for Lana's great uncle by pretending to be the ghost of the Drifter.  Really haunting and clever sequence to get the former sheriff turned Mayor of Smallville to confess to the murder.  Love it when our hero is so forward thinking and can use his powers as well as brains to save the day to make things right. :)  A series classic episode for sure! 

Final Kryptonite: A+