Supernatural: A Very Supernatural Christmas

The height of summer probably isn't the best time to watch a Christmas special, but this being Supernatural festive spirit was really just a cover for the usual bloodshed and mayhem.

Intercut with flashbacks to a particularly miserable Christmas for the young Winchester boys stuck in a motel - while their dad was out on a hunt - A Very Supernatural Christmas wasn't the laugh-riot that the title might suggest.

The story concerned an investigation into a series of brutal abductions where the victims were dragged up their chimneys.

At first Sam believes they are on the trail of the "Anti Claus", Santa's evil brother who punishes the wicked, but as their legwork continues, and the true origins of many Christmas traditions are traced back to a pre-Christian era, the brothers begin to realise they are actually hunting a Pagan god (as they did way back in Scarecrow).

The episode does a very good job of casually undermining pretty much all Christian claims to Christmas (besides the name), by pointing out that it was simply a Pagan festival hijacked by the early Church. And to balance things out, it also doesn't shy away from the human sacrifice aspects of some Pagan rituals. Who said TV wasn't educational?

There's definitely a heavy-undercurrent of The Mayor from Buffy The Vampire Slayer in the personalities of the Pagan Gods, portraying them as though they'd just walked off the set of a 1950's sitcom.

Mixing very dark humour with quite graphic violence (the nail-pulling torture scene was particularly wince-inducing), I'm not really sure if A Very Supernatural Christmas is going to go on anyone's list for traditional Christmas viewing (up there with A Charlie Brown Christmas), but it's a continuing return to form for Supernatural's third season.

And just when it looks like its bordering of schmaltz, when Grinch-like Sam throws a surprise Christmas for Dean, the brothers then unwrap their typical Supernatural gifts and you know that the show is still a very long way from jumping the shark.