Re: Smallville going down hill?
I have to agree and here are my main complaints:
#1 -- It's becoming the Lana Lang show... Lana's in trouble; Lana dates a loser; Lana misses her dead parents... etc. The writers of this show must have a love affair with Kristen Kruek, because they invent ways to make her the center of every freakin' story even when the story isn't about her. The sad thing is that she obviously doesn't have the acting chops to be the focus of the series, yet no one seems to mind.
#2 -- There are just too few stories focusing on Clark's "alieness." A high school kid finds out that he's really an alien and his biggest problem is how to ask out Lana on a date? There should be episodes where Clark believes he is nothing but an inhuman freak sent to Earth to rule. He should be doubting his every instinct, but he comes off like any other teenager with a secret. "Dating girls" should be further down the list of things to worry about than "Am I a monster?" and it just doesn't feel that way. The guy should be a psychological wreck, not to mention the whole sex thing. The guy should be scared to death of actually being intimate with a chick, because he might accidentally maim her -- lose concentration for a second and Lana's head might go through the headboard.
#3 -- The series does a poor job when it comes to explaining Clark's other powers. He masters heat vision in one episode and super hearing in another. These should have been continuing things for him to deal with. I'm not even sure how his super hearing even works ... is he always hearing everything at once or does he turn it off and on at will? Another thing that I haven't seen is evidence of Clark's intelligence. Even if you don't buy that Kryptonian genetics would naturally make him a genius compared to humans, the guy's mind obviously works faster than ours ... I don't see any evidence that he's any smarter than Chloe. He should be able to beat most of these freaks-of-the week with his head. The thing that makes Superman what he is isn't just his strength and invulnerability, it's also his brains ... which is how he's able to beat most of his magic-based enemies like Mr. Mytzoplik (sp).
#4 -- Why the hell aren't Johnathan, Martha and Peter (and pretty much everyone else in town) getting rid of all the damn Kryptonite in Smallville? Let me get this straight, there's this substance where I live that can kill my friend or my son and I don't do a damn thing to get rid of it? A couple of organized searches every weekend or so might go a long way. But even putting Clark aside for the moment, it should be pretty obvious to the simple townsfolk by now that these green rocks that fell down from outer space are freakin' dangerous. Hell, I doubt that any of them have even called the EPA for God's sakes. And where is the government in all this? You're telling me that Uncle Sam is gonna turn a blind eye to a town where superpowered mutants turn up on a regular basis? The same town that had a meteor shower ten years earlier?
#5 -- It's simply too hard for me to believe that Lex won't be able to put two and two together once Superman makes his debut in Metropolis. Hell, I'm having trouble believing that he can't make the connection now with eveything he knows. I think they should go ahead and let Lex figure it out... let it coincide with his descent into the dark side. The fact that Clark kept such a secret from him might even explain his move to evil ... if, as I suspect, Clark is the only person he was able to trust, then this would come as the ultimate betrayl. I can even understand why Lex wouldn't reveal Superman's secret identity in the future... it's better to have a part-time Superman with a secret identity than a full-time Superman with no secret identity.
#6 -- Why hasn't Clark kept in contact with Dr. Swann? You don't need Christopher Reeve to actually be in an episode to have Dr. Swann send a letter, an e-mail or make a phone call. Since Jor-El only seems to talk during season enders, it only makes since that Clark would want to talk with the only person that has some knowledge of Krypton. Hell, Dr. Swann might be able to reveal a lot simply by taking a look at the spaceship or those freaky caves.
It's like... "Yeah, seen the someone-is-threatening-to-do-something episode before".
