“I swallowed a bug.” - River Tam

By TrinityVixen
Man, I hate being right.

Super Girl opens her mouth and confirms my worst my assumptions about the new, midriff-baring waif in that small Kansas town with so very many meteor-and-alien-related problems. Finally, our chance to meet a member of the house of El with actual working memory of Krypton-as-was, and the best she can muster is a super-hostile, “Don’t touch my stuff”?

She then goes and makes the bad worse by running all over manhandling children in her search for a little baby of near genetic descent: Kal-El. Sounds familiar, wish I could help her out, if only to be rid of her. And to save the children! Won’t somebody think of the children? It’s a deadly combination of bad acting and worse writing this week on Smallville. Pick your poison: there’s not a single thread of plot that doesn’t drive one to drink. And I should know; it took two JD and cokes for me even to be able to watch without cringing.

At this point, I’m convinced that the credits are entirely making fun of anyone still watching this show with anticipation of fifth-and-first-half-of-sixth season greatness. First, they tease you with the promise of John Glover as bastard incarnate Lionel Luthor and then he is still nowhere to be found. Conveniently, Lionel has provided his felonious, homicidal son an alibi for the one murder he did not commit. But this isn’t enough to grace us with his presence, no. Then there’s the heinous substitution of Aaron Ashmore’s cute, nerdly Jimmy Olsen for the near-doppelganger Michael Cassidy playing the toady, skeevy Grant Gabriel (who, like every other moron on this show except for the absent Jimmy, likes Lois better than Chloe; what a dicksmack). And I had to wait the entire episode to hear the melodious tones of Terence Stamp as Jor-El. Jor-El has been nothing but a serious downer and a jerk-off throughout the entire series, so when I’m spending an episode waiting on my chance to hear him speak again, you know it’s bad.

Plots. Right, there were some developments. Lex’s reformation of character lasts as long as it takes for him to accept a patsy to take the fall for Lana’s murder. Sure, Lex didn’t kill her, but exactly how does letting an innocent, dying cancer victim go to his death a murderer (albeit a murderer with some serious bank) help him with his karmic troubles? Two steps forward, two steps back, Lex. Offering to let Lana kill you hardly balances the cosmic books.

Oh, did I mention he found proof that Lana was alive? Yes. Apparently, instead of just leaving it be with there being no body in the car-bomb, there had to be some ret-conned clone of Lana whom she mercilessly exploded to make her escape. At this point, I’m willing to believe that the meteor shower caused everyone in Smallville to develop Memento-disease. Lana can’t seem to remember why she ran away from Lex (and murdered a helpless, innocent clone) in the first place, so she actually leads Lex to her in “China” so that she can kill him. Which she doesn’t do because by the time she gets her chance, she’s already forgotten why she brought him to her (to say nothing of how she’s forgotten the faked pregnancy, the threats that forced her to marry him, and the spousal abuse). I look forward to Lana returning to Smallville and everyone instantly forgiving her for pretending to be dead and putting them through hell. Oh wait. Not “look forward.” I mean, “I anticipate that next week I will double my alcohol intake to be able to stomach the reunions.”

Speaking of reunions: nothing sucks like meeting up with family. I can’t tell who has it worse off: Chloe or Clark. One the one hand, Chloe’s having her dream career diverted around her to the less worthy candidate of her cousin by a new editor with more interest in Lois’ ample (tits) vocabulary and her enthusiastic (rudeness) spunk than in Chloe’s hard work and dedication. It all boils down to which cousin is willing to write up her unconfirmed, unsubstantiated alien encounter for The Daily Planet. (Here’s a clue: it’s not the one who has years of experience dealing with at least one irrational alien.) That is how you get to be a serious writer. And this? This is how we get our Lois to become the one, the true Lois Lane? With one slimy editor possessed of zero journalistic integrity, who rewards hacks with glory jobs when they don’t even produce printable material? Right. And I thought it was ridiculous that there were so many Krypto-freaks concentrated in Kansas. Chloe must now contend with Lois being magically rewarded the future she more rightly deserves. That is crazy.

On the other hand, Clark’s not faring much better with his cousin. Kryptonian efficiency being what it is, someone had the thought to send Kal-El a babysitter but not to duplicate the indispensable (now lost) data of incredible import to them both. Democracy! What a wonderful thing! The loss of this data to the remarkably fictional Department of Domestic Security (itself the bastard, unloved cousin of the actual Department of Homeland Security) shouldn’t prove to be any real stumbling block for Kara. She’s already somewhat assimilated to our strange Earth ways except in anything that might make her at all sympathetic to humanity. So long as she can screw up her face and repeat Earthican euphemisms that she somehow absorbed during eighteen years of cold storage (while missing the slightly more personally relevant fact of her home planet’s explosion), she might just make it through! Zor-El, her daddy and Clark’s (supposedly) evil uncle, at least gave her a passably human name. I don’t see her running around with an “-El” addition that might draw attention. She does that enough with her intense allergic reactions to items of clothing that cover anything but the bare minimum of flesh currently outlawed on public television. And that flying thing. But she’s absolutely mastered the art of not looking at someone whilst holding a conversation of great personal import. It’s uncanny how human she seems for it. She’ll fit right in with the rest of the scenery: the fake sunsets, the imaginary distance between Metropolis and Smallville, Lois.

Next week, we have Lana’s triumphant return! I’ll be counting the hours until then. With the help of shot glasses, mostly.

About TrinityVixen: There’s an asterisk on TrinityVixen’s college transcript that assures anyone who reads it that, though there is no specific major, degree, or certificate for it, she did, in fact, complete some kind of creative writing program as an undergrad. Armed with that symbol of irrelevant experience, she has polluted the internet with her opinions and horrible fanworks ever since (and for quite a long while before). Living poor in New York until she finds a means to become independently wealthy, she must subsist on the juicy meat of fandom. Fandom and noodles. And instant soup.

Never miss an update. Subscribe to Pink Raygun by Email or subscribe via RSS

Technorati Tags: smallville, supergirl

Powered by ScribeFire.