Constantine Season 1 Episode 4 Review: The Reason You Should Be Watching This Show

If NBC decides to cancel Constantine after only one 13-episode season, I will personally send them links to this episode review every day for a year, at least.  As much as I have enjoyed the series after three episodes, episode four, entitled “A Feast of Friends,” is the sort of episode that justifies a series’ existence.

Yeah – it’s that good.

Plot Summary:

Episode four opens with a very sweaty, nervous-looking man being held for questioning at an airport in Atlanta, Georgia.  As we soon find out, the man is an acquaintance of John Constantine’s named Gary Lester, and he is carrying an extremely power hunger demon that he has trapped in a vessel, a demon that is released after Lester’s vessel is broken by an unfortunate member of airport security.

In need of help, Lester seeks out Constantine.  As the two attempt to reconcile what went down in Newcastle, Constantine is forced to decide how far he will go to stop one of the most powerful demons he has ever faced.

Don’t worry mate; it’s not my first disco.

What I Liked:

This is the episode where all of the potential we have seen hovering over this show at various points – the writing, the acting, the touches of humor, the production values, and the ability to fully embrace the dark nature of its source material – come together.  When I said episode three, “The Devil’s Vinyl,” could stand alongside some of the better episodes in Supernatural, I was not lying – but this episode goes one step further, and could go toe-to-toe with the best that show on the CW has to offer.

The best part about this episode is the ending, which I will not spoil for you.  All I will say is it definitely established John Constantine as both a person who shouldn’t always be trusted, and a human being struggling with a role in the universe that he never asked for, and clearly doesn’t want.  It’s powerful stuff, and if it doesn’t make you a fan of the show, that I dare say nothing else will.