Smallville will begin its eighth, and hopefully last season, on September 18 and there will be some noticeable changes. I say ‘hopefully’ because in seasons past the show’s momentum would bog down and sometimes even regress when the producers were guaranteed another year.
In the new season some cast members will be returning, some will be missing and still others will merely make guest appearances to tie up dangling plot lines from last year. There will also be new cast members, if only temporarily, and a few of them will have familiar names, at least for comic book fans.
With a new team of show-runners replacing the departed Gough and Millar, there is an opportunity to resuscitate the ailing series and give it an epic sendoff. This doesn’t mean the previous show-runners wouldn’t have given it an equally grand departure, but they had such an entrenched view of their endgame that many plot lines just puttered around aimlessly waiting for the payoff.
SPOILERS
Maybe the most long awaited change will be Clark Kent finally becoming a reporter at the Daily Planet. Yeah, okay, there have been changes more eagerly anticipated like Clark conquering the power of flight, or donning the famous costume, but no one is expecting miracles. However, at the very least, Clark becoming a reporter working with Lois Lane at the great metropolitan newspaper gives Smallville a recognizable mythic credential.
Also Clark, according to spoilers, will give some serious consideration to creating a secret identity, but again the idea that we’ll actually see the Superman costume is unlikely. He will also develop more than friendly feelings for Lois, but that will happen just in time for Lana to come back to town. You’ll recall Lana left town after leaving Clark a Dear John DVD.
It would be great to see Clark finally over his Lana obsession, but old plot lines die hard on this show. This could actually be an intriguing story arc. Lana suddenly returns and Clark, who thought he was completely over her, isn’t so sure when they meet up again, but over the course of the arc he could remember that, for the most part, their relationship was filled with too much angst and not nearly enough happiness.
It’s time for Clark to move on emotionally and it’s important that it be his choice to move on from Lana rather than implying Lois Lane is merely a silver medal runner up in the love Olympics. Viewers need to see Clark realize how bad things had been between himself and Lana and that it’s not what he wants out of life and love in his future.
Speaking of Clark’s future love, Lois Lane will also undergo some changes and soul searching, like her feelings for Oliver Queen. Although one obvious change is purely physical, she’ll have brunette hair rather than the blonde-do she sported in the previous seasons. Not only is it more in keeping with most versions of Lois Lane, the coloring is more appealing on the actress.
No doubt the biggest change for Lois will be dealing with Clark Kent as a co-worker and possible reporting partner. Starting out their legendary pairing at such an early point presents some challenges, not the least of which being how will this Lois Lane ever be fooled by a pair of glasses?
At some point in the new season they should introduce Perry White as the editor even if they have to use a different actor than they had used several years ago in the episode Perry. With Lois and Clark in their iconic places at the Daily Planet, the paper itself needs to have an editorial identity. Of course in the early going a Lex Luthor minion named Tess Mercer will be tending to the running of the grand old paper while tossing passes at Clark Kent. However, eventually like all villains, she will be overthrown and it would be the perfect opportunity to reintroduce Perry White.
Returning, Visiting and Vanishing
Indefatigable sidekick Chloe Sullivan will be back along with her boyfriend Jimmy Olsen. You’ll recall the previous season ended with Jimmy asking Chloe to marry him. You may also remember that something in Chloe’s powers weakened Brainiac. It turns out that Chloe’s powers will have further development in season 8 and she will take an active interest in running Isis, the foundation for the meteor infected that Lana had created as a front for her spying activities on ex-husband Lex Luthor.
As to the fate of the bald billionaire, Lex will not be returning. His absence will be filled by a variety of villain types including the previously referenced minion Tess, as well as a man named Davis who will somehow become Doomsday, and then there’s Maxima, the intergalactic babe who always wants to mate with Superman to produce a super race of warriors. Lastly, Clark’s cousin Kara will be returning, but only for an episode or two and Lana, as mentioned, will return for five episodes.
A few of the growing crew of lifesize action figures will be returning, although the nascent Justice League will be missing Impulse and Cyborg due to previous commitments by the actors who play those characters.
There will also be a glimpse of the Legion of Super Heroes in an episode where Superman from the future sends the Legionnaires back in time to Smallville for an unknown mission. Lightning Lad or Live Wire? Time will tell.
Probably the best news on the superhero front is that Clark will actually get off the bench. It’s not that Clark hasn’t performed his share of rescues in the past, but if given the choice to have or not have super powers, he opted for the latter.
This upcoming season, however, Clark will take a proactive stand. Not only that, but allegedly Green Arrow will suffer a crisis of faith in the cause and it’s Clark Kent, of all people, who has to get him back in the game. The nagging question will be, of course, is this all too little too late?
Smallville has steadily lost its audience as Clark pined for Lana seven long years, shrugged off the idea of being a hero, allowed his sidekick Chloe Sullivan to do all his research and thinking for him while he generally stood on the sidelines watching the world in trouble, but not feeling quite bad enough about Earth’s plight to put out more than a minimal localized effort.
For the new season to not only maintain its fading audience, but lure the disenchanted back, it will require a herculean effort on the part of the writing staff and the CW network, which has often done a poor job of promoting older shows in favor of the next new shiny thing.
Another problem is that the new show-runners want to keep pimping the idea that there could be a ninth season even before the eighth is launched. If, however, they stated emphatically that season eight was going to be the last season, they could use the tried and true “countdown” type of advertising technique, i.e., “Only 6 episodes left of Smallville.” It’s amazing how many people will return to a show they had abandoned years ago when they feel it is finally going to end.
On the other hand, if season eight were to do well even without an ‘end of series’ advertising strategy, there could be a ninth season, but that requires contract renewals and as of yet there has been no news that Welling (Clark Kent) would sign for another year. Realistically all television series end. They can drag on after their expiration date, which some critics say is already true of Smallville, or they can end definitively with a feeling their goals have been met. In the case of Smallville that would mean having things end in a manner that makes it clear that Clark will be Superman and happily so, rather than being bullied into it by Jor-El, or guilted into it by Green Arrow, lectured into it by Chloe, or driven by revenge by Lex Luthor.
This might be the season worth a second look from those who dumped Smallville years ago, or gave it a cursory try and found it not to their liking, or even for those who had hoped Clark would start drifting away from Lana as soon as Lois Lane showed up only to be disappointed year after year. The new show-runners have made a lot of promises and hopefully they can keep most of them.
you suck
I love Smallville! Love Superman, etc. As for the shows plots and such. Here’s my 2 cents:
I agree that Clark really needs to step up his Super Hero status but he can’t hide behind the classic horn rimmed glasses as Lois would have to suffer a stroke to not recognize him. What was campy in the older Superman tv series of eons past changes in phone booths etc can’t happen now.
Unless the writers have some episodes go thru a dream scene, where he and Lois never meet as teens, how can Clark have a disguise? Hey, that’s a good idea. It would satisfy our need for Clark to have the dual identity and costume and keep it from Lois’ ever inquisitive eye!
Well, hope that was clearer than mud.
I’m going to try to comment intelligently and dispassionately on Smallville and the proposed changes for the new season in particular.
I grew up on L&C and got used to the dynamic, falling in love with the characterizations of the leads. Among the supporting cast, I really enjoyed Lane Smith’s Perry White and K Callan’s Martha Kent. As such, when Smallville premiered in 2001, I was intrigued as a Superman fan and ecstatic when I heard that Annette O’Toole was going to play Martha Kent because I’d seen her on, among other things, Nash Bridges, and really liked her style. At the time, I didn’t know how rare a strong Martha was.
I came for the story and stayed for the new creation of Chloe Sullivan and the Luthors.
I’ve been a fan ever since, though my commitment to the show has waned in recent years because of the toxic treatment of the Clark/Lana relationship that has dominated season after season of the show.
I like the idea of Clark moving forward into the Daily Planet, and considering the need for a secret identity and specs. The introduction of the nascent Justice League was the highlight of the previous season. However, the handling the relationship between Clark and Lois has been sloppy and, two episodes into the new year, continues on the same track.
One of the lingering problems that hampers this show is the original handling of Lana Lang. When the Gough and Millar decided to split Lana into two entities to cover both dominant Lana Lang backstories, they shot themselves in the foot. They created Chloe Sullivan, a sort of proto-Lois Lane who was well realized by Allison Mack in spite of the spotty writing, and they were left with a dilemma. A great character, a new creation, was taking the focus both the present and future female romantic leads in the Superman story (first Lana and then Lois).
Things might have improved if they had taken the time to cast and write for a show-stopping Lois Lane who was not only easy on the eyes, but also strong, smart, wise, and committed. However, instead of one-upping Chloe Sullivan, their cosmic accident of a character, the writers decided to go for the inside joke with Lois. Oh, isn’t that interesting how she doesn’t give Clark the time of day, how she isn’t interested in reporting, how she’s worse than raw when she steps into a newsroom. Who’d guess that she’d be an award-winning journalist and the love of Clark’s life? Ha, ha, isn’t that clever? Such an approach might have worked if Chloe didn’t exist, but with Ms. Sullivan present as the dispossessed and doomed cousin who embodied all the attributes the fanbase is used to seeing on Lois Lane (aside from hair color), it became like comparing gold to dross. Chloe was the gold, and Lois the dross. That’s not the development needed if Lois is supposed to pull the focus away from the trainwreck that is the Lana/Clark relationship.
They’ve done their best to both provide Chloe with an important role outside the newsroom and to marginalize her. They gave her her own meteor-power (healing) and a Brainiac enhancement. However, they’ve also done their best to push her to the side so Lois can take center stage. Part of that program is Chloe’s romance with Jimmy Olsen. Providing Chloe with a boyfriend to help her forget her crush on Clark would seem like a good idea. Furthermore, tying her to the future of the Superman continuum would serve to carve her a fairly innocuous niche. So, the producers searched for a talented actor to play Jimmy Olsen and settled on Aaron Ashmore who has given quality performances elsewhere. However, aside from slight touches of the tech savant, they’ve had Ashmore play Jimmy by the numbers. A nice, caring, funny guy with a camera in his hand who would ultimately be forgettable if he weren’t a friend and coworker of Los & Clark.
Pairing Jimmy with Chloe while forcing Ashmore to play it straight like that results in a misfit romance that might best be termed “Wonder Woman and the Supermarket Bagboy.”
Additionally, they haven’t settled on a believable new career for Chloe because there’s no believable source of funding for the Isis foundation, and no salary attached to runining it. It IS credible that Chloe would get involved in meteor outreach given her personal history and personality, but she has no way to support herself while she’s doing it. In addition, she continues to call upon her reporter’s instincts and research techniques, serving to highlight Lois’ shortcomings at a time when they hurt the series most. Also, they have chosen to have the future reporting duo sit across from one another in the newsroom and receive the same take-home pay while Lois writes front-page stories, and Clark writes three and four paragraphs for the odd obituary or two. This strains the typical suspension of disbelief.
All in all, there is considerable potential for revitalizaiton in the new season, but it’ll be a long, hard road back.
Supermark —
Thanks for your comments. Ironically on Thursday’s episode Plastique, Clark did indeed change in a phone booth. However I understand what you’re driving at, but I have a feeling the issue will be addressed in a way sci-fi, fantasy and especially comic books are famous for. I’m not saying it will be an ideal solution to Lois, Lex and Jimmy Olsen’s foreknowledge of what Clark Kent looks like prior to him wearing glasses, but I’m sure a solution will be found.
Jordan —
I appreciate Chloe Sullivan, but as Chloe Sullivan. I’ve always liked Chloe more than Lana, but not because Chloe hit the Lois Lane mark for me, but simply because Chloe was a more engaging character. Lana was set up to be worshiped and stuck in that rut she had very little opportunity to develop much character. Men fought over her, including Clark and Lex, yet the audience was left scratching its collective head as to why.
I never saw Lois Lane’s skills as inferior to Chloe’s, just different. She is much more hands-on leaping into the fray in a typically reckless Lois Lane fashion, whereas Chloe is much more calculated and careful in her approach. Lois goes undercover and Chloe goes to her computer. It’s very easy for me to see which of the two is Lois Lane and I don’t lose sight of the fact that Erica Durance is playing Lois Lane during the years most of us never see her, the pre-Superman years.
I don’t think Chloe has been marginalized outside the newsroom because she was scarcely a reporter even when in the newsroom. For about 3 years now Chloe’s main function has been the girl with all the answers to Clark’s problems and dilemmas. After a while it gets stale and so I’m glad Chloe has a function that makes sense for her and makes her important on her own terms. Allison Mack seemed happy at the prospect of Chloe cutting her apron strings from Clark.
As for Jimmy Olsen, I think they did a good job casting and writing him. He is being typical Jimmy Olsen full of ambition and enthusiasm, but lacking experience and life skills. You shouldn’t worry about the relationship because Chloe and Jimmy don’t end up together since Jimmy exists in the future in the Superman myth and Chloe does not. That means she moves on from him in some fashion or other.
And I must admit I don’t worry about the characters’ finances on the show. Chloe and her father were both unemployed at one point and yet she had a car and enough gas money to make the 6 hour roundtrip commute to Metropolis and back again and did so often. That lengthy time consuming commute was always more unbelievable than even Clark wearing the same outfit every single day and no one noticing
Lastly, to “D”, tsk tsk, I thought people in Akron, Ohio were more polite
well the way you insult the show isn’t very polite either. and p.s. i don’t live in Akron,Ohio. D.
Is there a place on this website where you can chat with other people?
Prey really showed the potential Smallville still has. It’s almost as if the wrtiers got together and posted a message to the fans. “We interrupt the show you’ve been dutifully watching for five years (or more) to bring you an episode of the series we SHOULD have been broadcasting for you all that time.” Unfortunately, they backtracked some of their character development, but it’s nice to see assertive roles for everyone.
On a side note–by far my favorite feature on this site (that I’ve been browsing since ‘03) is your “History of Lois & Clark’s relationship.” Unfortunately, it seems that when the last of the seasons was converted to DVD, you discontinued the feature. I love the DVDs as much as the next fan, but I have to say that I loved your summary and commentary–they’ve even provided valuable insights that I hadn’t considered or had completely missed even after watching the show faithfully and repeatedly. I know you’re busy, but I hope you can find the time to continue the “History.”
Is it worth it this year?
I just pick the latest 8 season of smallville.
I like the latest season,.. its really great