How Many Admirers Can One Girl Have?

Sometimes, I have DVD's sitting around for ages and ages and always put off on watching them, usually because I have other TV shows to watch that won't take as long (I usually like to marathon a show when I have the entire run) or some other such reason. Smallville, for example, I've had the first nine seasons since... December last year, and Season 10 since April. So now, with my to-watch pile getting ever shorter, it's time to go through it all.

So, I'm going to do a blog for every season, giving my thoughts on things like character development, the story arc (should one be present) and probably a small list of my pick for best episodes of the season. As for themes, well, I don't know if I'm smart enough to go into great detail, but we'll see.

For those unaware of what I'm talking about, Smallville is based on the Superman mythology, focusing on Clark's teenage years in the titular town, as he learns the truth about who he is and where he comes from, while keeping his friends and family out of harm's way.

The show ran for 10 seasons, but continues in comic book form, under the same name, effectively functioning as Season 11.

Now, with the intro out of the way, let's look at our cast of characters:

• Clark Kent (Tom Welling), a polite and helpful young man. Almost always willing to give the benefit of the doubt to anyone needing aid, he races into any situation with the smallest provocation, which is promising for the man who will be Superman. As young people do, he constantly struggles with issues like his romantic feelings for a friend (a friend dating some jerk, no less) and of finding out how he fits into this world (though with Clark being adopted, it goes a bit deeper for him).
  On the subject of his adoption, his desire to find out about his origins isn't so prominent here, though the discovery of a spaceship just trigger questions for him.
  Power-wise, he starts off with super strength, super speed (primarily how he gets to all disaster scenes, since his flight hasn't developed yet, due to the rule the producers had of “No flights, no tights”), invulnerability and in the fourth episode, X-Ray, he gains... well, X-ray powers. It was a wise move on the part of the creative team not to start him off with a platter of powers, not just because it would mean every episode was easily resolved, but also due to the metaphor of puberty and the growing changes within a young man (though that aspect isn't really explored in great detail. Next season, however, they bring it up)
• Pete Ross (Sam Jones III) is Clark's best friend and while he doesn't get a whole lot of development, he's already got dimension to him, and is a nice, funny guy. Much like Clark, he'll defend someone getting picked on without hesitation and is always eager to help.
• Lana Lang (Kristin Kreuk) is Clark's love interest and... well, to put it lightly, is often considered the most useless character in the show. And, well, there's good reason for that: in my opinion, she's basically a living prop. She has no real purpose beyond being a love interest. And not just for Clark, or her boyfriend Whitney (who I won't be doing a paragraph on, so here's the abridged version: writers couldn't decide if he was a jerk or a decent guy. He was written out after this season so he's really irrelevant in most matters), but for some of the villains too.
  And that's one of the biggest problems of the show: so many people are attracted to Lana, but beyond being nice and non-threatening, why are they attracted to her above all others? What makes her so special? I can't say she's a creator's pet since she was in the comics, but I suppose being a different version, she kind of is. There's really not much else to say about her.
  Well... there is one comment I need to make: in the pilot, we see a young Lana Lang, as she watches her parents get killed by part of a meteor (which is hilarious in itself, they just freakin' stand there as it hurtles towards them! It's like “Oh hai, meteor, how's your-” *BOOM!*). The young Lana looks more grumpy than upset. And let me tell you, emoting incorrectly or not at all is not something she grew out of.
• Chloe Sullivan (Allison Mack), on the other hand, is one of my favourite characters in the show. She's quirky, snarky and HAS an actual use, being... well, for lack of a better analogy, this show's version of Oracle, in the sense that she's Clark's information broker and computer expert. She's extremely supportive of Clark, and wishes he would share the same feelings she has for him. Her pining for Clark reminds me of Willow's desire for Xander in the early seasons of Buffy... come to think of it, there's a few Buffy comparisons. More on those later
• Martha and Jonathan Kent (Anette O'Toole and John Schneider) are Clark's adoptive parents and are incredibly supportive when it comes to Clark and his powers. Jonathan can come close to menacing at times, but it's not like he's going to hit Clark (what's the point if Clark can't feel it?), but both he and Martha always take Clark at his word when something strange happens and he couldn't really ask for better parents.
• Lastly, there's Lex Luthor (Michael Rosenbaum). He's my other favourite. His scenes with Clark tend to be the best aspects of the show so far, with Lex taking all the weirdness in stride and trusting Clark with his life. He's smart, sincere and is quick to step in when a friend needs him. It's kind of sad when you know that he and Clark will become each other's archnemesis in years to come, but for now, we have two friends who stick their necks out for each other without hesitation (I must admit, I did laugh at this line: “It's a foil, Clark. Every hero should have one”. Yeah, it's a fencing term but that was well played).

Rather than start off with an arc, or even a series of arcs, the first season is purely made up of “freaks of the week”, which basically means one-shot villains on an episodic basis. On the one hand, you can't have a status quo from the get-go, so maybe it is a good idea to not try and shake things up before you've had a chance to establish yourself. New shows need to find their feet, and taking on too much too soon might scare people off.

On the other, this season has twenty-one episodes and repetition does set in quickly. This does lead to the question “How many bloody rocks are in Smallville?!”, since almost every villain Clark faces gains their powers from the meteorite that brought him to Smallville in the first place, which I don't think gets referred to as Kryptonite until the next season.

They're almost all high school students, too, so that doesn't help shake off the Buffy comparisons.

I should probably go into that now. I kept thinking of Buffy while I was watching the first season, mainly due to the following:

• The main character has super powers and has to keep them a secret (Buffy's difference being her parents had no idea as opposed to Clark's, but her friends all knew. Clark's are kept in the dark).
• The series begins in high school and the gang normally meets in one room to discuss the current situation (difference being Smallville lacks a Giles).
• Two of the main characters dance around their feelings for each other, even though it's obvious to others how they feel (Buffy/Angel, Clark/Lana)
• The main character has a friend who wants to tell them how they feel but just can't (Xander to Buffy, and Willow to Xander, and for Smallville, Chloe to Clark)

And there's probably more than that but those are the biggest.

Aside from Lana and the repetition, I have one other problem with the first season: the high school setting is pretty much just a back-drop. The gang rarely goes to class, we don't see the principal all that often, it really just seems like a way for Clark to find out who his next opponent will be, like he's Scott Pilgrim minus the fighting-for-the-woman-he-loves part. Sure, Buffy didn't have all that many scenes in class, but I do remember some of them, and at least by meeting in the library, it was justified.

Despite all that, it is a good start for the show, and things can only get better from here. There is a little set-up towards the end for the next season, with the spaceship, something we'll explore next time.

My top episodes: Nicodemus, Stray, Reaper, Craving and Leech.

Least favourite: Drone, Zero, Kinetic, Shimmer and Hourglass.

Next post: the second season, and the first real arc's seeds are planted.