['Supernatural' - 'Frontierland']

Well, even if you're not a devotee of Westerns or an obsessive Clint Eastwood fan, I'm betting you found something to like in Friday's episode of 'Supernatural.'

First and foremost, the show's crew and production team should be praised for doing a bang-up job of putting the Winchesters in a Western. From the opening credits to the costumes to the sets and the sepia-toned colors that suffused the brothers trip to the Old West, 'Frontierland' was a lot of fun to watch.

Also fun: Dean's palpable enjoyment at being transported to Eastwood territory. For once, he wasn't using a rock star's moniker as a fake name -- he used the name of his cinematic hero (while Sam was "Walker, a Texas Ranger." Heh!) Maybe Dean went a little too far with the serape, though.

But his realization his duds were a bit much provided one of the funnier moments in the episode, when he finally threw the "blanket" on the ground in disgust after the brothers' arrival in Sunrise. I guess I wouldn't put 'Frontierland' in the comedy or meta category when it comes to classifying 'Supernatural' episodes. Still, the episode was a diverting change of pace that allowed the Winchesters a much-needed break in a world that wasn't totally removed from their own but somehow wasn't quite as grim.

I loved meeting the famous Samuel Colt, and I hope he's able to return to the show someday. Getting his perspective on hunting was interesting, though perhaps it wasn't surprising that it's always been a rough, dangerous, lonely job. We know, thanks to Campbell family lore, that hunters have roamed across America throughout its history, but given how isolated each hunter or group of hunters must have been, thanks to limited communications and transportation, the job had to had to have been even more difficult and isolating. We see every week how hard it is on Bobby, Sam and Dean, and they've at least got each other and, to a very limited degree, a network of other hunters to rely on.

I'd love to know how Colt came up with the idea for a gun that could kill supernatural creatures, and how he actually made the thing. Beyond that, however, I simply enjoyed Sam Hennings' performance as Colt, though, given the problems that time-travel present, I bet we're unlikely to see the gunmaker again. But it was nice of him to eventually do the right thing and send the boys the phoenix ash and Sam's "magic brick."

Speaking of the ash the brothers need to hurt the Mother of All, that's I guess where the episode fell down a little for me. Then again, it wasn't this episode's fault that the season lacks momentum right about now. Normally 'Supernatural' seasons start to kick into high gear at about this stage. With the endgame in sight, the stakes usually get higher and higher for the Winchesters. So far, though, the Mother is a dramatic misfire. I respect the idea that this season of 'Supernatural' took a different approach, and I should re-state that I agree with the idea that the show doesn't always necessarily have to have a Big Bad looming over most or all of a season.

But right now, the Mother appears to be just another garden-variety psycho-villain borrowed from the Whedonverse. "All humans must die," yada yada -- that's her familiar schtick -- but we've spent so little time on the Mother that it's hard to take her seriously as a threat. I'm not exactly sure how she'll get any more interesting in the next few weeks; it just doesn't appear that there's enough time to make her into a realistically compelling foe. Right now, any and all talk of the Mother just kind of lands with a thud for me.

Perhaps the Mother isn't really meant to be the threat, however. We still don't know exactly what Castiel is up to, but it appears to be very bad. Here's my theory: Castiel is somehow using human souls to power his war machine, just as he used Bobby's soul to get the brothers back. He used Bobby's soul with his permission, of course, but I'm betting what Cas is doing with the other souls is being done in secret because it's most likely a sin.

That's just a theory, but Misha Collins did a good job of selling the idea that Castiel is, on some level, ashamed of his actions, whatever they are. We saw last week that he lied to the Winchesters about the Titanic, and he lied to Bobby this week about Rachel's death. Whatever's going on, I'd bet it'll come out in the upcoming episode written and directed by Ben Edlund, which is Castiel-centric.

One note about Rachel -- well, there goes another missed opportunity. I would have liked to know more about Cas' lieutenant, but she set a land-speed record in the category of "potentially interesting female characters killed off by the show." I suppose there may not have been sufficient time to develop her as a character, what with all the other story lines that have to be addressed before season 6 is over, but it would have been nice to spend a little more time with her.

In any event, as regards this hour of television, the Rachel and Mother things are just minor gripes. I enjoyed 'Frontierland' quite a bit, and unless I'm very much mistaken, Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles had fun making it. It was a well-structured episode, with Castiel's doing his damnedest not to kill Bobby just as the final showdown took place on Sunrise's Main Street. Never mind that I didn't really think Dean or Bobby were going to die; the hour that preceded that moment was so solid that the ending worked just fine.

And maybe the episode, which was directed with flair by Guy Norman Bee, gave the brothers a chance to reflect on the idea that life in their own era isn't quite so bad. Girls in bars in the 21st Century tend not to be quite so "germy," and the liquor won't rot your insides quite as quickly. Maybe the romance of the old West is really just a gloss we put on an era that was just as tough to live through as our own -- if not significantly tougher.

Still, the side trip to 'Frontierland' was a fun interlude, the calm before the storm, perhaps. Many things need to be resolved before the season ends: The souls, the Alphas, the Mother, Sam's wall, Castiel's war. Speaking of that war, by the way, we still know too little about it. I'm coming around to the view that we just haven't seen enough of the war this season. The season is almost over, and the occasional bulletins from Castiel haven't been enough to make it all that interesting as of yet. Ah well. Perhaps that will come to the fore in an interesting way in the next few weeks.

Until then, all I have to say about 'Frontierland' is 'Yee haw!"

A hail of Colt-made bullets before I sign off:

• My favorite line of the episode was Bobby's response to Dean's 'Star Trek 4' reference. "I only watched 'Deep Space Nine." Ha! Love it. I'm a huge 'Star Trek: Deep Space Nine' fan.

• "Even the monkey movie?"

• "I'm looking for a man." "I bet you are."

• The only thing the Sunrise saloon was missing was a piano player, but I can see why they didn't have that. We really needed to hear all the dialogue in the saloon, so a guy tinkling the ivories in the background would have been not only distracting but another expense for the production. I did enjoy the sight of the bearded fellow who remained passed out on his table for the duration of the episode.

• Nice shot of Sam, on horseback, silhouetted against the sky.

• I could have done with the "posse" joke being cut entirely or simply reduced to the first "posse" line that Dean said, but even so, I couldn't resist the silly smile that Dean had as he tried to stop himself from giggling at his pun. It seemed to me that might have been a case of Jensen Ackles almost breaking character, and something about that grin was just entertaining on a purely goofy level.

• "It's so much more germier than I pictured."

• This season, I've been hard on many of the show's monsters of the week, but I thought we got enough information about the phoenix to be interested in his plight. I did feel a bit bad for the guy -- all he wanted was vengeance for his wife's rape, and for his trouble, he had to die? Not such a nice end, but then the old West wasn't exactly a forgiving place.

• All that being said, all the phoenix talk made me think of 'Harry Potter.'

• "So you're a hunter?" "Hunter slash sheriff!"

• "'Gank'? What's 'gank'?

• I had to laugh at the idea of Sam as a "giant from the future" with a "magic brick."

• "We can't just strand those idjits in Deadwood, can we?" Ha! Jim Beaver, as I'm betting most of you know, appeared in the HBO show 'Deadwood.'

• In case you missed it, here's my recent interview with Padalecki and Ackles.

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'Supernatural' airs 9PM ET Fridays on the CW.


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