"Doomsday" or a New Beginning? Smallville, Part Two

Continuing a discussion of "Odyssey," Smallville's Season 8 opener from September, 2008, a mid-episode cliffhanger shows a non-Super-powered Clark Kent close to a "mortal" death, when watchful guardian J'onn J'onzz appears and lifts him off into the sky. A quick final shot shows them speeding up out of the Earth, into space and towards the camera, finally surrounded by white/yellow heat (we come to find out that they are speeding towards the sun).

A commercial break holds the tension, and we arrive back at the Kent farm, introduced by a signature shot that still appears in one form or another in every single episode of Smallville, even though the majority of events on the show now take place in the city of Metropolis.


Clark awakes in the barn, the scene of so many iconic moments throughout the show's history, and as he sits up and is able to crush a football, he realizes his superhuman abilities have returned. He and J'onn have a discussion about power and destiny, during which Clark begins to ponder a dual identity, and J'onn reveals the tragic consequences of his heroism.

J'onn: How does it feel to be whole again?

Clark: I was dying -- you saved me! You brought me to some white light...

J'onn: The healing effect of the sun...brought you back from death. I promised Jor-El that I would only be a watchful guardian -- but I could not stand by and let you die.

Clark: You shouldn't have had to...

J'onn: Jor-El knew he was sending you on an impossible odyssey -- to be given the power of a God, yet exist among humans.

Clark: Sometimes I feel like I need to be two separate people... Either way, I can't keep expecting you to save me.

J'onn: That was the last time. The burning sun may strengthen you, but it has the opposite effect on me. It stripped me of my powers... We both know that yours' is a greater destiny -- but with the Fortress destroyed, you'll have to do it without Jor-El's guidance.

Clark: ...Or anyone else's.


During the last couple of seasons, Smallville had gradually begun to dramatize the idea that exposure to the Earth's sun can restore Clark's extraordinary abilities in moments of weakness. The basic notion that Superman's powers are gained from our yellow sun has existed in his comics for many decades, but it became a primary factor in the character's re-emergence following the 1992 "Death of Superman" storyline. It was explained that Superman's body stored solar energy, and though seemingly appearing "dead" after an epic struggle with the monster Doomsday, he was in fact only in a coma-like state, recharging his body's resources. That Smallville is now directly incorporating the sun's importance in Clark's life energy on Earth, coupled with the introduction of the Doomsday character throughout this season, hints at where the show may be heading for Season 8's finale.

Continuing their conversation, Clark describes his life flashing back before his eyes while he was dying, seeing his father, mother and Lana. "I've written eulogies. I've seen people walk away from me. But I've never really said goodbye -- I've been holding onto a life on this farm that hasn't existed for years," again here echoing what many longtime viewers of the show have been feeling for the past few seasons. J'onn asks Clark what he is going to do. Clark turns around with conviction, and replies, "Let it go." J'onn smiles, and picks up Clark's signature red jacket. He throws it to Clark, who, accompanied by familiar Smallville musical themes, puts it on dramatically, as if he were donning the iconic red cape of his future heroic persona. Clark nods confidently.


Clark's new proactive nature affects the way he acts both with the yet-to-be Justice League, and with Lois Lane herself. At the conclusion of the episode, Clark meets up with Oliver, A.C. (Aquaman), and Dinah (Black Canary), and Clark's more positive attitude prompts Oliver to tell him: "Pretty soon, you'll be sporting a homemade costume and leading a double identity, just like the rest of us." When Clark then goes to meet up with Lois at The Daily Planet, he surprises her with news that not only has he secured a job at the revered metropolitan newspaper, but also that he will be sitting right across from her.


Clark's beaming smile as he walks towards camera and out of the office, satisfied that he has suitably outwitted the intrepid reporter, displays a kind of boyish, optimistic expressiveness that actor Tom Welling hasn't shown in the role in years.

After Clark leaves, Lois discovers that "Smallville" wasn't lying.

One of the few dramatic faults of Clark's storyline here is that, despite making a life-changing decision to pursue a "day job" so that he can be "closer to the action" in the city, it is never actually explained precisely how he scored such a plum spot working right across, and seemingly at equal rank, with the already-employed Lois Lane. Viewers are also left to wonder just how the producers might decide to develop and make plausible Clark's "disguise," as in Smallville's continuity, Lois has now known Clark for nearly five years, and there are no eyeglasses in sight (though the show has displayed Clark flirting with a pair or two before). The producers and writers are way ahead of us, though, as they continue to blatantly and wittily acknowledge how Smallville's own success has forced them to slow Clark's growth into the hero we know: In an episode entitled "Legion," three superheroes from the future visit Clark to help him stop Brainiac, but to their surprise, they also find a superhero that isn't yet fully formed: "No glasses, no tights, no flights? So far, he's nothing like the Man of Steel!"

Smallville's take on the The Daily Planet newspaper building.

As the season presses on, Clark starts dressing in business attire for work at The Daily Planet, and (secretly) begins taking a more direct, active role in the emergencies in Metropolis. On his first day of work, Clark comes in ill-attired, and in a lighthearted moment, Lois borrows a co-worker's extra dress shirt and forces Clark into an indoor phone booth to man-up (Later in the season, Clark will use this same phone booth as he perfects his iconic "quick-change" into familiar red and blue colors).

Clark with a new, but familiar, shade of blue.

In the second episode of the season, Smallville again surprisingly touches on the sobering realities of terrorism, as the episode opens with a bus explosion which affects many bystanders.


While Smallville's narrative choices here clearly don't constitute an embrace of the deep complications of, and meditations on, the "war on terror" that have been prevalent in many other contemporary television series, there is still a noticeable shift in dramatic tension in Clark's world, which subtly reflects everyday problems with a more astute and pointed sensibility than in the show's previous seasons.

A promo shot for Season 8: a much more adult Clark dressed for work...can you spot the eyeglasses?

As time progresses, it becomes much harder for Clark to keep his "Good Samaritan" deeds under-wraps, even with the powerless J'onn J'onzz covering for him (as local detective "John Jones"), and Oliver Queen donning a second costume (with red & blue themes) in order to keep Jimmy Olsen from linking the mysterious "red & blue blur" to Clark's use of the red jacket and blue jeans. J'onn strongly urges Clark to find a way to keep his true identity a secret: "You are not in Smallville anymore, Clark. Metropolis has millions of people walking the streets -- every one of them watching for a miracle, to change their lives, to give them hope. You are that miracle -- and it's just a matter of time before someone discovers that."

Though Smallville's characters continue to mention many pivotal events from previous years of the show, there is one notable exception: the treatment of Kara, Clark's cousin, who was introduced by Gough and Millar in the beginning of Season 7 with the intention of spawning a spin-off show. Gough and Millar had attempted this before: after a Season 5 episode featuring Aquaman drew very high ratings, they produced an Aquaman pilot with a different actor, but when it failed to spawn a series, the actor joined Smallville to play Oliver Queen/Green Arrow -- who has also apparently also been considered for a spin-off numerous times. Kara arrived in Smallville with a bang, but soon landed in limbo creatively and narratively. Her character arc topped off midway through the season; she disappeared, showed up with amnesia, and then was sent to the Phantom Zone (a virtual wasteland created by Jor-El to house intergalactic criminals). Kara is interestingly not mentioned once throughout the first seven episodes of Season 8, and is brought back only for a one-off return appearance in the eighth episode, wherein Clark and Lois get trapped in the Phantom Zone. The show's ability to have fun with its own mythology knows no bounds: Oliver, upon learning of the existence of the intergalactic prison from Chloe, chides, "Phantom Zone, huh? Seriously, who names these things?" But Clark clearly takes his mythology seriously, as he tells a distraught Lois in the Zone that "No one's going to mess with Lois & Clark."

Kara lends a hand (on the familiar "House of El" crest) to help Lois and Clark escape from The Phantom Zone.

Despite a few powerful scenes between Clark and Kara, one gets the painfully obvious feeling that this episode is merely meant as "closure" for a character that perhaps never should have been written into Smallville in the first place -- and it is knowingly related in the show's dialogue itself. In a touching conversation at the Kent farm at the conclusion of the show, Kara tells Clark, "I don't fit in here -- my journey is somewhere else." Even in essentially admitting that the introduction of Kara into Smallville's universe was a mistake, the final scenes between Clark and Kara evoke a bittersweet sadness that is more affecting than any of Kara's prior appearances in Season 7.

Davis Bloome is a paramedic by day...reverse his last and first name, and it may sound familiar...

This year's creative direction has also been greatly enhanced by the introduction and development of a character named Davis Bloome, a paramedic who spends his days saving lives, but who has secretly been developing destructive tendencies in his unconscious at night. Gradually, he begins to discover that he may not be who he thinks he is -- but in fact something much more disturbing. This is the producers' new vision of Doomsday, the supremely powerful Kryptonian monster (in)famous in the DC comic universe for being the only character to essentially "kill" Superman. Producers tapped Battlestar Galactica vet Sam Witwer to play Bloome, and the actor's previous attachment to the critically-acclaimed sci-fi show has helped bring additional critical and cultural credibility to Smallville this year. The show's take on Doomsday smartly ties multiple Superman mythologies together: in the eighth episode, it is revealed that the Kryptonian villain General Zod and his wife, Faora, genetically engineered Doomsday because they could not have a child of their own, and they attached his DNA matter onto Clark/Kal-El's ship so that he would arrive on Earth to destroy the "Last Son of Krypton" (one of the later episodes of Season 8 will showcase flashbacks to Davis Bloome's early years on Earth).

Doomsday makes his first appearance in Smallville, in an episode tellingly-titled "Bride."

Bloome's tragic evolution into the creature who will eventually "kill" Superman, a narrative created by the show's producers, is dark and disturbing, and has added another interesting thread to an already rich tapestry of contemporary superheroic mythology that keeps Smallville alive (This year's season finale is, not surprisingly, entitled "Doomsday"). At the beginning of the season, producers hinted that recreating the iconic comic book death scene would be "quite an exciting cinematic moment;" fan buzz seems to agree that such an event may be the focus of this year's finale. Television critics have hinted that the "Doomsday" carnage may cause other significant character deaths as well -- permanent ones (In "Legion," the heroes from the future tell Clark rather ominously: "We've heard of Lois Lane, Lana Lang, even Jimmy Olsen -- but we've never heard a thing about any Chloe Sullivan."). This is where we can see that "Odyssey" was indeed framed as an introduction and preparation for such an event: Clark's near-death in the season opener could mirror his "death" in the finale -- except this time, J'onn J'onzz can't save him. In the comics version of the story, Superman is memorialized, buried, and disappears for a year, while four potential replacements show up, all claiming to be him. What will Smallville's take on this story be in Season 9?


While the season so far has included a couple of "filler" episodes with "magic time reversals," and a few tragically off-putting plot lurches (a brief return for Lana that took the season on a backwards-left turn into oddsville), the missteps and discrepancies have been surprisingly few. Ultimately, once gets the sense that the overall creative direction behind the new season is more cool, calculated and logically plotted than in years past; in fact there is an overriding feeling that a much clearer plan has surrounded all of the major production decisions, which has arguably given Smallville new life, a rebirth in a television market that is increasingly fragmented by changing network viewing habits and cable television's continuously strong competition in ratings. As the show's actors and characters have "grown up" throughout the past eight years, so also has the global television market matured into something very different, and much more complicated, than it was in 2001. In this sense, Smallville, Clark, and the hero he will eventually become (but in most ways, truly already is) are interesting metaphors for the transforming television industry, just as the show continues to convey Superman's core values, and his longevity, strength, and lasting sense of purpose throughout history. As the world changes, it seems Superman will always be there for us in one incarnation or another, but Smallville has successfully endured trials equal to those of its central hero, and like him, the show continues to surprise its observers with its consistently creative combination of classic mythology and contemporary narrative storytelling.