Smallville Rewatch Project: Episode 1.21 (Day Ten)
I actually watched this episode over a week ago. Which means I'm gonna have to watch, like, eight episodes at once to catch up. Chore.
Previous Season 1 Reviews
Episode 21 Tempest, original air date 5/21/2002, directed by Greg Beeman, written by Alfred Gough & Miles Millar
Lionel shuts down the Plant even though it was showing a profit. Continuity from Stray because he's doing it to spite the fact that Lex wouldn't come back to Metropolis. Lex, instead of towing the line, calls a meeting with the managers of the Plant to buy out Lionel. What Lionel doesn't find out until later is that Lex is using his mother's stock to fund the buyout (the stock that Lillian had given to Pamela, we can rightfully assume Pamela willed to Lex when she died). Ah, but this is where the tornado hits and Lex hesitates to save his father. We probably could've saved 6 more years of heartache if he'd let Lionel die there...but that's a horrible thing to say, Tasha! *bad Tasha*
Jonathan, issues with Lex's investigation aside, is wrong about Lex's intentions for the town.
Random Fact: Whitney's eyes are a gorgeous shade of blue.
Whitney, having no football scholarship, decides to join the Marines and make a difference in the world. He's doing it to insure that he and Lana have a future. So, I feel REALLY bad for Whitney because he has no idea that Lana is staying with him out of guilt and obligation. At this point of the series, and the fact that he's pretty much made a 180 from the beginning of the series, I like Whitney. He's not the cardboard cutout jock that he was portrayed as in the beginning and I like that he and Clark came to a mutual respect for each other.
Ok, so what's worse? Dropping a generator on a teenage boy (Phelan) or rigging a truck to explode on a teenage boy (Nixon)? Tie?
We learn that Clark is becoming more and more invulerable. He didn't feel the heat of the fire and the debris didn't leave bruises (re: bullets from Hug).
Nixon approaches Clark about the truck explosion, but Lex walks in and makes a silent threat for Nixon to leave Clark alone. Lex's threats are twofold because a) he genuinely wants to protect Clark, but also b) he's probably afraid that Nixon will tell Clark or the Kents about the extent of the investigation or think that Nixon's antics this go round will be blamed on Lex.
Clark tells his parents about Nixon, thereby not making the same mistake he did with Phelan, but Nixon has bugged the farm and hears about the spaceship. What's most interesting about this part of the story is that thanks to Nixon, Lex is back on the Clark trail that he stepped off of in Leech. But Lex tells him that he better find something interesting or else. Nixon finds the ship and puts the disk in. After Jonathan kicks his ass, he takes off into the storm with Jonathan following. Unfortunately, the activated ship also takes off.
What's also interesting is that Lex is the first one to expound that relationships built on lies and deceit are doomed to fail. A refrain that is later picked up by Lana. The show didn't do a very good job differentiating between Clark's respective relationships with Lex and Lana. Especially since Lexana ended up together due to the dissolution of their relationships with Clark (for the same reasons). It makes Lex's motives for persuing Lana even more dubious than they already are.
Random Fact: I think Chloe has been through as many cars as Lex.
Clark and Whitney have a nice talk. I like that Whitney got to genuinely apologize to Clark about what he did to him, and it says a lot about how Whitney views Clark now if he trusts Clark to watch out for Lana until Whitney gets back. I think he trusts Clark's integrity, and with good reason because Clark actually honored Whitney's wish until way after Visage (Red doesn't count because he was on RedK and was gonna do what he wanted anyway). I really like that Whitney got a chance to redeem himself over the course of the season because he could've remained the cliched jealous jock boyfriend, but he wound up having layers. And the fact that he mended fences with the main protagonist says a lot about him. Knowing what happens to him later (and that Clark paid homage by using his name in Bulletproof), I'm sad to see him go.
Random Fact: It was really incredibly remarkably cheesy to have Remy Zero play at the Spring Formal.
So yeah, Chloe asked Clark to not leave her at the formal, but it wasn't his fault. The kids in the school were safe, but Clark knew that Lana was right in the path of the tornadoes, so no matter how you feel about the girl, I'm not gonna tell my future Superman to not save someone just because some fans don't like her and want him to be with Chloe. Besides, in Clark's defense, he has also stood up Lana to save Chloe (Cool) and Pete (Craving), so all's fair.
Conclusions: So the season begins and ends with a natural disaster. I also want to point out that no matter how much I may...dislike the direction that Al and Miles went with Clark in later seasons, they have written some really good episodes.
Season 1 is probably my second favorite season of Smallville (after Season 9, of course) because both seasons we see the Hero come full circle in a way. In Season 1 Clark is just finding out that he's not even human, and in Season 9 Clark is learning to finally embrace both sides. In Season 1 Clark's main motive for helping people may be guilt in a sense, but he also has this sense of justice that has been ingrained in him by his parents. In Season 9, Clark has taken that guilt and instead makes his mission about duty, truth, and justice.
As I watched this first season, I began to think over the course of the series about how many things Smallville did get right, and some of them even better than comics mythos. For one thing, making the Kents a younger couple than previously portrayed helped to make the audience relate to them so much better and I think it helped to sell the relationship with their son so much better. The Kent family dynamic is the driving force of the first season. Without it, the show would've had no heart and would've just been Dawson's Creek with superpowers. I'm actually trying to figure out why more comics fans didn't watch the show because, while it had flaws, I can't think of how much more Superman this 15 year old high school student could have been at this stage in his life. He's just learning he's an alien, but he doesn't know about Krypton or his birth parents, so for all he knows he was abandoned. But look what he does with his abilities; he saves people, takes no credit for it, and of course he broods because HELLO he's a teenager, but he actually handles his situation with a lot more grace than I've seen him get credit for. We even have a mirror image by portraying what Clark COULD be like with powers in the body of his meteor infected opponents. Some use it to get revenge, or to get what they want (money, fame, or the girl/boy). I think watching this season I fell in love with Clark all over again.
Rant: Instead of going on yet another Chloe rant, I'm going to quote my friend Luke from DI.
"[Chloe] wants to be with [Clark] so she tells him she doesn't want to be with him, and then gets mad when he agrees... Clark doesn't get a mind-reading power until 9.4, and even then only for part of the ep, so what the hell is he supposed to do?
And then she's incredibly rude to him when he welcomes her back from summer in Heat, makes up a story about a guy. He goes to her and wants to clear the air, gives her chance numero dos to tell him the real deal and she again lies and says it's all perfectly fine... And then not only that, any time stuff regarding Desiree's case is brought up it's constant digs with, "Gee, apparently he's immune to some girls charms. You know like me, 'cause he doesn't wanna do me so he should go burn in hell, in spite of the fact I told him I didn't want to date him even after he gave me numerous attempts to nut up and tell him how I feel. But he should some how magically know so he's an ass-butt and I'll be a passive-aggressive little witch to him with my fake smile pretending I'm happy to be his friend."
This is pretty much how I felt about her for three whole seasons.