Provenance - Update

I know it looks like I just stalled on this project, but I've got pages upon pages of this story written up in my notebook, and it's just the task of transcribing, building upon what I've done before and making it sharper. It's the boring part of the job, so I'm avoiding it until my notebook is full and brimming. So yeah. Update.

Provenance, Pt. 2

And so he worked. Through the night, and the day, and the night after that, until his fingers burned and his eyes dimmed. He slept sparsely, catching an hour's sleep here and there, but for the most part the days and nights moved like a witching haze, the air around twisting like ivy around him, the world spinning without him anchored to the floor.

The stranger had the most majestic of plans, ornate in craft and conceived brilliantly on the scrap of yellowing paper he had handed to Mueller. "But friend, why do you need this?" He had asked, pouring over the specifications with the eye of an enthralled student, rather than the master the stranger claimed he was. "What purpose does it serve?"

The stranger smiled at the question with his thin lips, twisting at the corners like a cat in the night. "Because it is required in the world. A doorway. But the door itself will come later. I have plans for the door, don't you worry."

"I do worry. Constantly. A character flaw, I'm afraid, one I work to remove from my repertoire but consistenty fail at. But if you have plans, who am I to question them?"

"Precisely," the stranger had replied, and it did not make Mueller feel comfortable. Not one bit.

A month went by. And by the end of the month, with the wood carved to perfection, the only tarnish the blood Mueller had spilt in it's creation, the doorway was complete. Mueller couldn't help but impressed by his work. The way the frame twisted and wrended around itself was astonishing-- Mueller would not have believed himself capable of the work if he had not carved it with his own two hands. The ornate carvings he had been directed to introduce folded in on themselves, and if Mueller had an eye for ancient languages he would have read the true reason the frame was built. But he did not, and his ignorance, whilst blissful, did not last long.

"It is beautiful," said the stranger, when he arrived holding a small basket, a chequered blanket obscuring the contents. "Truly, a work of a master."

"So you say. When will the door be introduced? I would wish to be present, to make sure everything fits."

"It will fit. The dimensions of the door itself are..." The stranger considered the words, and then smiled as he settled. "Fluid."

"And what do you mean by that?" asked Mueller, tentatively.

"Ah, to tell, but to show..." said the stranger, slowly peeling off the blanket on top of his basket. "Close your eyes."

Provenance Pt. 1

The Red Door was a thing that should never have been opened.

It was a built to specification by the master carpenter Klaus Mueller, after twelve bottles of dark rum shared with the stranger that visited him every Sabbath. He did not know the name of the man, just that the stranger bought word of the outside world to the small town that Mueller had lived in all his life, and that was enough for Klaus.

"Klaus, you are the greatest carpenter in all of the world, but you have never truly crafted something that changed anything, have you?" said the stranger, his thin black lips slowly moving across his harrowed, pale face. "Masters must be exhibited, masters must share their work, but you sir are content to build whatever is required, not what is... 'needed'. Needed to be shared, needed to be seen."

Klaus smiled at the compliment-- this man was of the world, was he not? Though with words so golden and a tongue so silver, surely they were lies, but the conviction...

The majority of the stranger's features were obscured by the burgundy cloak he wore, draped over his shoulders and drifting behind him as he moved amongst the chairs and tables of Klaus Mueller's workshop. He arrived before dark and left in the night between the clink of glasses, leaving Mueller with nothing but a scant knowledge of the outside world and a hangover that would kill a lesser man.

The two men were sat around an oak table that Mueller had been working on for the past week, their glasses caked to the surface because of the alcohol spilt during their toasts. It was a long silence between the two before Klaus replied, a hanging moment of thought put into the mysterious man's words.

"What do you suggest then, friend?" said Klaus. "I could, perhaps, build a monument to my supposed genius, to draw the crowds to this little hamlet of a town I call home."

"Or..." said the stranger, considering the words as they left his mouth, "I could make use of your talent for a project I've had in mind for some time now..."

"Is this what this has always been about?" said Klaus, "your visits here to my workshop, leading to this moment?"

The stranger shrugged nonchalantly, and his smile twisted for a moment. "Perhaps, but I know talent when I skill it, and I have need of your ability."

"What is it then?" said Klaus, "what would you have me do?"

"A door. Built to my exactest specification."

"A door?" repeated Klaus, incredulously. "Is that all?"

"Not even that... the door itself... the door shall present itself soon enough. But the frame, the framing for the door, and the hinges on which it will turn... that would be your challenge."

"Challenge?"

The stranger grinned. "Did you think it would be easy?"

Supernatural S1E2 - "Wendigo"

"Wendigo" was quite a good episode, more of a re-pilot just in case you missed the first episode-- you can tell, either way. The exposition is all there again, and the threat clearly outlined after a certain point. And it's scary. It is. You get the creep factor even as you don't see the monster-- and as I pointed out last time around, the fact that you don't see the Wendigo itself (hell, you don't even see it until the last fifteen minutes).

In fact the episode sets itself up early on with the dream sequence that has a major shock that you don't see coming, because it just makes sense that Sam would be there in the cemetery. That shock came from nowhere and I loved it, because it's just... it sets up shop, I think. Supernatural is, as Eric Kripke intended, a horror film week to week, and the structure, the context I guess, is the underlying Winchester subplot. These guys tell great stories, and the characters are really well defined, that you don't care.

So the story mirrors the Winchester's situation perfectly-- a sibling is missing, and needs to be found. Dean seems to notice this, and needs to solve it, but Sam doesn't care. Sam, to be fair, is a complete bastard in this episode, not wanting to babysit, but it's understandable because he's just lost Jess and now their father is leading them on a wild goose chase. That would make me angry, I'm sure.

I like how in the earlier seasons the show really knew its demographic. The young folk always, eventually, believe Sam and Dean, but the old guard, the older generation, they always view them with disdain, and of course, again, rightly so. These guys are running around with fake IDs and causing trouble, people seem to be dying as soon as they arrive. I like that. Sure, as the series as a whole progresses that eschews, but right now it's fitting, and you can't help but enjoy it. It gets more obvious next episode, with "Dead In The Water" and the Sheriff a) being the cause of the ghostly lake and b) trying to protect his family and c) trying to get the Winchesters to leave.

Again, characters are well-defined by their actions-- Sam is angsty still, he takes... well, he's never unangsty, and Dean is a cocky sonofabitch, the fact that he's wearing biker boots to hike into Blackwater Ridge, he's eating M&Ms as supplies, his bravado in the face of the guide, Roy. In the earlier episodes, in fact, it feels like Sam is shortchanged in the character building department, because he's so well defined by his loss of Jessica and his need to find John. That's it. Dean, meanwhile, is fun, he's bouncy, and he's not buried under the broodingness that later becomes him. He's the comic relief to an extent, and with the overarching plot being so damn depressing, it's required.

I don't think it's the best episode, not as good as the first, and not as good as, say, "Scarecrow" or "Provenance", two episode I do quite like, but it does continue to establish the mythology. Watching from the beginning gives you a better sense of things, where the show is coming from, but that's something I'll discuss when I hit "Phantom Traveler".

6/10