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Smallville: CURE
This actually may be my all-time favorite episode of Smallville.
Of the so-awesome-the-awesomeness-cannot-be- textually- rendered:
The girls and the boys have switched places!! OMG! I think I screamed out loud when it turned out that Lana is watching Lex just like he watched her (complete with a secret chamber!!! Yay for Luthorian secret chambers!) And not only has Lana become Lex, but Chloe has become Clark, really really wanting to make things all right with Jimmy but completely incapable of sharing her secret.
*Insert lots of lots of flaily noise, because I flailed for a LONG time after those two scenes*
And ahem, if Lana is Lex and Chloe is Clark, the Chlana can't be far behind. Really. And no, I'm never going to stop futilely hoping for this pairing, so just be warned.
Of the really awesome.
Dean Cain!!! Ok, I watched all three seasons of Lois and Clark completely for Dean Cain's hottitude, so I cannot help but approve that they got him on the show. And I love that he got to be an evil immortal trying, Frankenstein-like, to make himself a bride. (I did think making him Jack the Ripper was a little over the top, though). Also, his encounters with Lex were terrific.
Cain and Abel-El! I love that storyline, brother El against brother El. And I love that the two aliens Clark trusts, Kara and MM, are in opposition to each other; that's going to make his relationship with both of them interestingly complicated. And it definitely makes the search for that Kryptonian MacGuffin Kara lost more meaningful.
Jimmy/Kara. I hate to say it, because I always thought Chloe and Jimmy were cute, and their breakup scene did hurt my heart, but "James" and Kara have mega-chemistry in a way that Chloe and Jimmy never had. Even though Kara is kind of deftly exploiting him, she really does like him--and Jimmy can't help but bask in her praise and admiration. Plus the chopsticks thing and the mutual bonding over their interest in extraterrestrial life was really cute. "Everyone knows Martians use infrared." Hee!!!
Lana, who completely rocked the house. I love that she started the day all domestic, making blueberry pancakes for Clark, and ended the day in her secret lair, spying on Lex. And in the middle she had that extremely cute reaction to Jonn Jonzz (I take it he's a Kryptonian too?) and handled the Martian revelation with great aplomb. And masterminded a plot to help the victims of 33.1. Oh, and deftly handled the ten million dollar accusation from Lex: misdirecting Clark in a very effective way by pointing out Lex's motive for lying (even though he was actually being truthful) and lying herself. Damn. You are more a Luthor now than ever, Lana, and damn if that doesn't make you fun to watch.
James Olson, who really is an amazing boyfriend. That box of momentoes made me cry, dammit. He's also an adorable geek and really talented at his job, as Kara recognized. I actually think I'm sadder for him than I am for Chloe, and normally my sympathies would be for Chloe.
Clark and Lex. My god, two scenes together--that's the most since Nemesis, isn't it? And really good scenes together, too. Clark knows perfectly well Lex is covering up for 33.1; Lex knows Lana is feeding Clark information, and drops revelations about Lana and money in a way that manages to sow doubt without sounding like he's deliberately attacking her. Damn. It's so much fun to watch them really go up against each other even as they (kind of) end up working together.
The whole A plot. I really love that they're addressing the issue of mutants--how Lex is looking for a cure, but one that erases their memories of captivity. SMART, albeit pretty damn creepy. And it's really interesting to watch Chloe struggling with her own mutation. I like that she is trying to get Jimmy to stop saying "meteor freaks," but clearly she does still think of them as freaks--that's what she labels herself when she visits Dr. Knox, and her reaction to Sasha being out of Belle Reve clearly indicates she thinks the meteor-infected are dangerous. And the fact that she's willing to potentially give up her past to preserve her future clearly shows how scared she is.
I've been looking forward to Chloe's storyline because the re-evaluation of the meteor infected is something the show has toyed with since season 4, but never really explored in depth. What I didn't realize until the closing scenes of this ep, though, was how Chloe coming to grips with her own mutation would parallel Clark's coming to terms with his alienness. That makes me really excited for this season.
ETA
I forgot one other thing that was really significant about this episode: Lex deliberately killed someone. Well, he would have if Knox wasn't immortal. True, he killed someone who he found hauling a dead body around, but still. This seems like a big step to me, putting six rounds into someone's chest.
Of the WTF:
Does the entire population of extraterrestrials know that Lana knows Clark's secrets? Because otherwise, they're being very cavalier about revealing things.
Of the so-awesome-the-awesomeness-cannot-be- textually- rendered:
The girls and the boys have switched places!! OMG! I think I screamed out loud when it turned out that Lana is watching Lex just like he watched her (complete with a secret chamber!!! Yay for Luthorian secret chambers!) And not only has Lana become Lex, but Chloe has become Clark, really really wanting to make things all right with Jimmy but completely incapable of sharing her secret.
*Insert lots of lots of flaily noise, because I flailed for a LONG time after those two scenes*
And ahem, if Lana is Lex and Chloe is Clark, the Chlana can't be far behind. Really. And no, I'm never going to stop futilely hoping for this pairing, so just be warned.
Of the really awesome.
Dean Cain!!! Ok, I watched all three seasons of Lois and Clark completely for Dean Cain's hottitude, so I cannot help but approve that they got him on the show. And I love that he got to be an evil immortal trying, Frankenstein-like, to make himself a bride. (I did think making him Jack the Ripper was a little over the top, though). Also, his encounters with Lex were terrific.
Cain and Abel-El! I love that storyline, brother El against brother El. And I love that the two aliens Clark trusts, Kara and MM, are in opposition to each other; that's going to make his relationship with both of them interestingly complicated. And it definitely makes the search for that Kryptonian MacGuffin Kara lost more meaningful.
Jimmy/Kara. I hate to say it, because I always thought Chloe and Jimmy were cute, and their breakup scene did hurt my heart, but "James" and Kara have mega-chemistry in a way that Chloe and Jimmy never had. Even though Kara is kind of deftly exploiting him, she really does like him--and Jimmy can't help but bask in her praise and admiration. Plus the chopsticks thing and the mutual bonding over their interest in extraterrestrial life was really cute. "Everyone knows Martians use infrared." Hee!!!
Lana, who completely rocked the house. I love that she started the day all domestic, making blueberry pancakes for Clark, and ended the day in her secret lair, spying on Lex. And in the middle she had that extremely cute reaction to Jonn Jonzz (I take it he's a Kryptonian too?) and handled the Martian revelation with great aplomb. And masterminded a plot to help the victims of 33.1. Oh, and deftly handled the ten million dollar accusation from Lex: misdirecting Clark in a very effective way by pointing out Lex's motive for lying (even though he was actually being truthful) and lying herself. Damn. You are more a Luthor now than ever, Lana, and damn if that doesn't make you fun to watch.
James Olson, who really is an amazing boyfriend. That box of momentoes made me cry, dammit. He's also an adorable geek and really talented at his job, as Kara recognized. I actually think I'm sadder for him than I am for Chloe, and normally my sympathies would be for Chloe.
Clark and Lex. My god, two scenes together--that's the most since Nemesis, isn't it? And really good scenes together, too. Clark knows perfectly well Lex is covering up for 33.1; Lex knows Lana is feeding Clark information, and drops revelations about Lana and money in a way that manages to sow doubt without sounding like he's deliberately attacking her. Damn. It's so much fun to watch them really go up against each other even as they (kind of) end up working together.
The whole A plot. I really love that they're addressing the issue of mutants--how Lex is looking for a cure, but one that erases their memories of captivity. SMART, albeit pretty damn creepy. And it's really interesting to watch Chloe struggling with her own mutation. I like that she is trying to get Jimmy to stop saying "meteor freaks," but clearly she does still think of them as freaks--that's what she labels herself when she visits Dr. Knox, and her reaction to Sasha being out of Belle Reve clearly indicates she thinks the meteor-infected are dangerous. And the fact that she's willing to potentially give up her past to preserve her future clearly shows how scared she is.
I've been looking forward to Chloe's storyline because the re-evaluation of the meteor infected is something the show has toyed with since season 4, but never really explored in depth. What I didn't realize until the closing scenes of this ep, though, was how Chloe coming to grips with her own mutation would parallel Clark's coming to terms with his alienness. That makes me really excited for this season.
ETA
I forgot one other thing that was really significant about this episode: Lex deliberately killed someone. Well, he would have if Knox wasn't immortal. True, he killed someone who he found hauling a dead body around, but still. This seems like a big step to me, putting six rounds into someone's chest.
Of the WTF:
Does the entire population of extraterrestrials know that Lana knows Clark's secrets? Because otherwise, they're being very cavalier about revealing things.
Re: part II
But yeah, I agree that they're moving Lex along the continuum toward first-degree murder, even if he isn't there yet.
Re: part II
Oh, I definitely think that's what we're generally supposed to think; that's why Clark's line was so stupid, from both a meta-textual and intra-textual perspective. Meta-textually because the series' writers should know they've established as part of the show's ethos that Clark's signature move isn't deadly. They shouldn't have written him fretting about killing someone with it if they wanted to be consistent with the other nine million times he's done it. Raise the spectre that he could have killed Knox with it and you necessarily raise the spectre that it's been deadly other times he's done it -- and I would think they'd take better care not to raise that possibility, you know? Intra-textually, it was dopey because Clark's got a bunch of other powers in his arsenal. If he can't get creative enough with them that he's not tossing people into shit that can electrocute them, that's nobody's fault but Clark's.
p.s.