#7.19 “Quest” Review

WARNING: If you never read spoilers, come back after you’ve seen the episode. Otherwise, I will not be held accountable for spoiling you rotten.

Just so you know, here’s the definition of Retcon: A comic book term, it’s short for retroactive-continuity. It happens when a writer changes past established continuity to make present events possible.

I’ve used it before, so if you’ve read my previous reviews you might have heard it, but I’m telling you again because I’m going to use it again here. A lot.

I loved this episode, but it wasn’t perfect.

I guess my biggest problem with this was also the same thing I loved about it: the continuity. I loved how writer Holly Harold had worked in references to previous mythos elements that were on the show before and had been basically been dropped. The Kawatche Numan/Sageeth legends, the cave drawings foreshadowing Clark and Lex becoming enemies, the real reason why Lionel brought the castle over from Scotland, the communications Jor-El had sent to Earth prior to Clark’s arrival…

It’s wonderful that these things haven’t been forgotten. It proves that the show’s The-Powers-That-Be aren’t completely clueless when it comes to the series’ past, significant recurring characters getting killed off and never being mentioned again (Alicia Baker, Grant Gabriel), notwithstanding.

However, some of the explanations in “Quest” simply don’t make sense when you look at them from the perspective of what had had happened in the show before.

Yeah, it’s great that the real reason that Lionel brought that castle to Smallville was that he was looking for clues to find the way to control the Traveler. It ties into the Veritas story arc perfectly and makes sense given his character. Only Lionel would buy an entire castle and pay to have it moved to Smallville so he could explore it at his leisure. He is that obsessive.

But this is where all of that stops making sense.

If Lionel was that obsessive, why would he pay to move the castle from Scotland and then never step through its doors?

If you would recall, in the Pilot Lex had told Clark that Lionel had “never even stepped through the front door” of the mansion. Yet in “Onyx,” Lex had a long conversation with himself in the basement of the building describing how frightened the weaker half of him had been as a child back when “they” had gotten trapped in the wine cellar after his father had had told him to never play “down there.” It was like he’d been in the house when he’d said it, so I guess Holly was just depending on the earlier “Onyx” retcon to support this new plot point.

But I’m fuzzy on the Veritas timeline and this episode just further confused things. Just how long ago did Jor-El plan to send Clark to Earth? When had Jor-El started sending those communications? Milash, that antiquities expert, had said that the clock maker who had made the cryptograph, Dietrich Brauer, did his work before the Second World War.

Added to that, in previous episodes they had established that Jor-El had been a young man back in 1961 when Clark had learned his father had visited Earth before in the third season episode “Relic.” And it was in an episode earlier this season about Clark’s birth mother, “Lara,” where they’d established that Kara had visited Earth in 1986. And it turned out that Lara had been pregnant with Clark, or baby Kal-El, at the time.

So, how did Jor-El send information and stuff back forty or more years? Maybe this all ties into how Jor-El had managed to hide the stones back to Earth’s distant past which created the Fortress, but they’ve never really explained how he did that in the show.

With all of this, however, keep in mind that Jor-El was the same man that Raya had described in the season 5 episodes “Zod” and “Fallout” as good man; a man of science; a man of peace. Clark’s own birth-mother, or at least some sort of weird alien clone of her, had said pretty much the same thing just earlier this season in the abomination that was “Blue.” In that same episode, Zor-El had called Jor-El a “feeble minded pacifist.”

So why would Jor-El, a leader of his people, a man of peace, a recognized pacifist, feel it necessary to send weak-willed humanity a way to completely control his son? Is this a retcon? Is Jor-El no longer a peace-nick and is now a manipulative bastard willing to believe his son capable of atrocities and in need of someone else having absolute power over him?

Okay, the version of Jor-El that got turned into the AI is already a manipulative bastard, dishing up Kryptonian style tough-love to Clark nearly every week, but is the real Jor-El like that now too? Where’s the hope Clark had voiced on more than one occasion that his birth parents aren’t really monsters? In thinking about what we’ve heard before about Jor-El, it just doesn’t make sense. Why would Jor-El trust humans enough to send his son to them to raise even while providing a way for them to completely control him?

The retconning is running rampant on the show lately, so maybe this episode is no different, but I think some of this stuff is seriously straining credulity even on a science-fiction/fantasy drama….

Also, I had problems with how Chloe reacted to the whole situation. No way should she ever suggest to Clark that killing is the right thing to do. I would think she would share his outlook on the matter, even if she sees the need to kill someone for the greater good. I can sort of see why Holly had her do it. Chloe needed to voice the opposing view, be the devil’s advocate, for Clark. It gives him a reason to talk about how he feels about killing Lex, maybe becoming more like him if he kills just because he can, but couldn’t Chloe’s dialogue be worded differently so she doesn’t openly endorse murder? Yeah, Lex is a cold-hearted, evil man and the world would be a better place without him, but wouldn’t Chloe know that Clark would never take it upon himself to execute him for his crimes despite the potential threat he poses to Clark?

I don’t like how easily she bought into Edward Teague’s deification of Clark either. She’s his best friend, seeing Clark as God-like isn’t doing him any favors and she knows him personally and should know that he isn’t like that.

That, on top of all the religious undertones, I think was pouring it on too thick. Late film pioneer, Samuel Goldwyn, I think had said it best: “If you want to send a message, use Western Union.”

I agree with him. I don’t like messages mixed up with my entertainment anymore than he did and this one laid it on way too thick. Clark was sent to Earth to become the next Savior? He’d prayed his whole life that he could serve him? Teague was nuts, but come on… That is just too much.

I guess it was good that Edward Teague was nuts, it helped to justify his need to kill Clark. Lex Luthor controlling Superman is a frightening enough prospect that it made some sense to kill him to prevent it, but his torture of Clark was brutal.

I do like the Veritas Da Vinci Code-esque storyline that had escalated in this episode. It was reminiscent of the stones storyline in the 4th season, which I know a lot of people hated, but I loved. I like it when the season arc storylines give the characters clear goals that directly conflict. This was like that.

Lex and Clark are both looking for the same thing, but only one will get it. In the 4th season, Clark won and found all the stones that formed the Fortress of Solitude. This season, Lex has already won the race to find the device that will control the Traveler and Clark doesn’t realize it yet. I can’t wait to see how the events in the Veritas storyline will likely all come to a head in the next episode, the 7th season finale, “Arctic.”

I also liked the way that Clark and Lex ended up in the same place based on different clues. I loved that Clark seemed to again be using his brain. He figured out a lot of it based on clues others found. Hopefully the dumbing down of Clark just to give Chloe more things to do is over. I like it when they work together more like they did in this.

Despite some of my problems with the story details, the twists and turns in this episode kept me on the edge of my seat, almost literally. Holly Harold she penned an extremely suspenseful episode, even if not all of the details made sense.

Tom Welling again did an excellent job. He played Clark as determined to get to the bottom of what happened to Lex since the message seemed to be designed for him. He was angry that Edward Teague did what he did to Lex and then did to him, but even that wouldn’t make him just let Lex kill him. He saved Edward’s life, despite his anger and confusion and lingering danger the man might pose, and Tom played those mixed emotions perfectly.

I loved how resolved he played Clark in the scenes with Edward Teague and with Chloe. He was very Supermanly in this entire episode, even when Teague got the drop on Clark and he was helpless. Tom does pain so well. I think I’ve talked about this before, but doing pain well must be bizarre and surrealistic. I mean, it’s just a green light or some guy pretending to cut Clark’s chest up and Tom makes it look so agonizing. I don’t know how he does it and makes it look so real, but he’s just awesome at it.

I loved Michael Rosenbaum in this episode. Probably his best scene was with the old antiquities expert on the plane. I loved all the warring emotions that played across his face as he talked. In pain from the injuries he’d received earlier, Michael had Lex start on as completely over the old guy blathering on about things he already knew, like he didn’t like being lectured to, and then end on murderous resolve when he told Milash that he was going to find out the answers to all of his questions about why Lionel had been so obsessed.

Allison Mack was completely awesome in this episode. Although I wasn’t happy with some of the actions that they had Chloe do, I thought she delivered the sometimes out-of-character dialogue very well. I liked the ending scene with Clark in the barn a lot.

Aaron Ashmore again was cute as Jimmy. I like how clueless he can be even while thinking he knows everything. It’s funny how straight he plays that and it’s perfect for the part.

Rick Ravanello played Edward Teague in “Veritas,” and he was fine for that episode. However, I’m glad the part was recast with the far more capable Robert Picardo, best known for his portrayal of the Doctor on “Star Trek: Voyager.” He gave the part of Edward Teague much needed heft in the acting chops department that I’m not sure Rick would have delivered. He was particularly effective in the first scene with Clark in the Cathedral. He turned Edward on a dime, motivation-wise, and I completely bought the man turning from blind adoration to disgust and contempt.

Ken Biller returns to Smallville after having last worked on the show as a writer and director back in seasons 2 and 3. He turned in a very clean episode, convoluted expository dialogue aside, but I wasn’t wild about some of his shot choices especially in the first scene between Clark and Edward Teague. Too many long shots.

I LOVED the photography of this episode. Director of Photography Barry Donlevy did a beautiful job. I think my favorite part was the scene in the church when Lex was trying to figure out the clue. The way the patterned light fell on his face was terrific. All of the later scenes in the church were awesome, actually. Those scenes were very dark, yet there was no problem seeing what was going on and it was all so pretty to boot. That’s never a bad thing.

I liked the special effects make-up. They made the wounds to both Clark and Lex look realistically horrific and they blended in very well to the perfectly intact chests underneath… I had a hard time telling where latex skin stopped and the real skin started. That’s hard to do. I know because this kind of make-up usually looks completely fake, especially on TV, so kudos to the make-up people.

Even while the episode was enjoyable to view on the whole, and extremely suspenseful, there were some major WTF moments too so I will have to count down for that. I give this episode 4 overly convoluted expository blocks of dialogue out of a possible 5.

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