Smallville and the Downside of True Believers
Boy, everybody was having a rotten week on Smallville: Lex got attacked and carved up with Kryptonian symbols, Clark got ambushed by one of his self-appointed guardians, and Chloe had to try to keep her boyfriend from digging into all the Kryptonian secrets around town. In fact, Jimmy may be the only guy having fun -- at least he sold an article.
Let's start with Lex. He's trying to figure out what the little encryption doohickey he got from the bank in Switzerland does, but he's not having much luck. His luck gets even worse when the same guy who attacked him at the bank turns up again. This time, he beats Lex to a pulp and then carves Kryptonian symbols into his chest. Talk about adding insult to injury - the guy wasn't content with pain, he also had to turn Lex into a walking billboard!
When Chloe sees the symbols (courtesy of Jimmy), she tells Clark, and they set about deciphering. The symbols lead Clark to a church in Montreal, where he meets Edward Teague -- the sole surviving member of Veritas. Teague is happy to serve The Traveler until he finds out that Clark knew how bad Lex was, but didn't do anything to stop him. But you were supposed to be the savior of the world! How can you be our savior if you don't stop bad people from doing bad things! Dude, there are countless philosophy courses about that topic alone.
Teague decides that the best way to protect Clark is to save him from himself -- if you're dead, at least then no one can control you! Clark has issues with this plan, but Teague is packing Kryptonite, so he can't really argue. Teague chains Clark to a spiffy Kryptonite-channeled sacrifice table, carves him up a bit, then leaves him to die. Good thing Jimmy told Chloe about he human sacrifice angle -- she got there in time to free Clark.
Upstairs, Lex figures out that his encryption doohickey fits into a clock, and that clock contains the something that may lead him to what will control the Traveler. After a fight with Teague (Clark stops Lex from killing him), Lex gets his flunky to do some research. The doohickey was a music box that played a song about a Scottish island. There used to be a castle on St. Kilda, but some American billionaire bought it and shipped it over to the U.S. Hey, wait a minute -- that's the stately Luthor manor! Finally, we find out why Lex lives in a castle in the middle of Kansas!
Lex gets home and, after some deduction, figures out where the next doohickey must be hidden. He puts the clock doohickey and the fireplace doohickey together, and gets an image of the earth with a specific place marked out. Road trip!
What did you think? Did you buy Teague's actions? Will Lex control Clark? Should Clark kill Lex to keep that from happening? Talk about it in the comments!
Comments
The episode felt like Alias a bit. :)
Also - Superman doesn't kill.
So to have Teague and Chloe (!!) keep pushing Clark to play judge, jury and executioner and "take care" of those they think deserve it just goes to show how little they know him.
Luckily Clark seems to realize it would just turn him into those he's trying to stop. I was proud of him in this episode.
Posted by: Cris | May 12, 2008 6:54 AM
I still watch this show and everything but omg sometimes I want to throw something at the TV while watching it. No wonder people are leaving the show. It has gotten so stupid lately. Now they are getting religion involved and its just ugh. They over did this show to the extreme. In the beginning I was looking forward to a show that will lead up to the concept of Superman but at this point there is no way that they can even go that path.
Just end the show already and be done with it! I'm sick of how the direction of this show is going.
Posted by: Zury | May 10, 2008 11:50 AM