First and foremost, one of the few things this show has ever *consistently gotten right* about Lana across all the seasons is that she actually is pretty damned good about laying out the boundaries of what she will and won't put up with in a relationship, what she expects from it.
While agree with this as a general rule wrt Lana, I think despite the fact that she talks a good game in each relationship, her *actions* (more specifically what she puts up with regardless of what she says) ultimately show that she holds Not Being Alone/Abandoned paramount even over those demands; I think she's been regressive in each passing relationship if we look at them more closely. She had the *most* spine with Whitney, but with Jason, Clark, and now Lex the regression has been worse with each time-- resorting to subterfuge (hiding the stone from Jason, working with Lex behind Clark's back, now sneaking behind Lex's back), putting up with things she swore she would not (Clark obviously lying through most of last year-- until *he* broke it off, not Lana), and now this behavior with Lex. Actually I think in the last two episodes she's shown a lot of spine, but was smacked down. Every time she's made one of her ultimatums? Smacked down. Well, they were interrupted the very last time, but still she got the picture-- Lex's ambitions come first. That unsettled her; it used to work in every other relationship to spout her demands, it doesn't work with Lex. (Also I feel like Lex is pulling a subtle "this is my stuff" card and she's reminded of her place in the relationship, the unequal standing.) While she's used to *attempting* to set boundaries and making ultimatums, time after time the ineffecacy of this wrt *Lex* is thrown in her face...she looked pretty broken up about it by the fire in the last episode, and just walked off speechless in this one. Her old tactics are just not working.
Lately I get the very real feeling that the only reason Lana is sticking this out (before learning she was pregnant that is) is because he's all she's really got now- and Not Being Alone is her *foremost* priority, even before setting boundaries. It's not like she's not trying to be stubborn- she has, even to the point of silliness (the cameras). But she's behaving like someone with no options (or more accurately, can't conceive of any herself). She looked like she wanted to talk to Clark about this for a minute there in that Clana scene, but she can't even use him as the trusty back up anymore so she cut herself off. What I mean is, even though *we* think of all these options for her? She doesn't, wanting to hang on to Lex is clouding everything else. This is a classic Lana mindset, even when things were going well in Lexana, she pushed aside those icky thoughts and "duh" questions about Lex doing shady as hell things to forge a relationship with him.
The space thing...while it bugged me that Lana had the audacity to order Lex about his cameras, I think the space issue it's a problem not specific to Lana, the show as a whole has issues with delegating space and dealing with the space issue...why the heck would Lois and Chloe, and two reporters to boot, be paying rent to Lex? I honestly think that while your objection has merit, tptb haven't even considered this. They have this odd thing about putting everyone into these nice, neat boxes space-wise in such a way that they have easy access to the people they need to keep interacting with regardless of whether it makes sense. Which is weird because...they made Metropolis like 5 minutes away by car so I don't see the need for it. But yeah, I don't think they've given this any consideration and it's a show-wide problem,.
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While agree with this as a general rule wrt Lana, I think despite the fact that she talks a good game in each relationship, her *actions* (more specifically what she puts up with regardless of what she says) ultimately show that she holds Not Being Alone/Abandoned paramount even over those demands; I think she's been regressive in each passing relationship if we look at them more closely. She had the *most* spine with Whitney, but with Jason, Clark, and now Lex the regression has been worse with each time-- resorting to subterfuge (hiding the stone from Jason, working with Lex behind Clark's back, now sneaking behind Lex's back), putting up with things she swore she would not (Clark obviously lying through most of last year-- until *he* broke it off, not Lana), and now this behavior with Lex. Actually I think in the last two episodes she's shown a lot of spine, but was smacked down. Every time she's made one of her ultimatums? Smacked down. Well, they were interrupted the very last time, but still she got the picture-- Lex's ambitions come first. That unsettled her; it used to work in every other relationship to spout her demands, it doesn't work with Lex. (Also I feel like Lex is pulling a subtle "this is my stuff" card and she's reminded of her place in the relationship, the unequal standing.) While she's used to *attempting* to set boundaries and making ultimatums, time after time the ineffecacy of this wrt *Lex* is thrown in her face...she looked pretty broken up about it by the fire in the last episode, and just walked off speechless in this one. Her old tactics are just not working.
Lately I get the very real feeling that the only reason Lana is sticking this out (before learning she was pregnant that is) is because he's all she's really got now- and Not Being Alone is her *foremost* priority, even before setting boundaries. It's not like she's not trying to be stubborn- she has, even to the point of silliness (the cameras). But she's behaving like someone with no options (or more accurately, can't conceive of any herself). She looked like she wanted to talk to Clark about this for a minute there in that Clana scene, but she can't even use him as the trusty back up anymore so she cut herself off. What I mean is, even though *we* think of all these options for her? She doesn't, wanting to hang on to Lex is clouding everything else. This is a classic Lana mindset, even when things were going well in Lexana, she pushed aside those icky thoughts and "duh" questions about Lex doing shady as hell things to forge a relationship with him.
The space thing...while it bugged me that Lana had the audacity to order Lex about his cameras, I think the space issue it's a problem not specific to Lana, the show as a whole has issues with delegating space and dealing with the space issue...why the heck would Lois and Chloe, and two reporters to boot, be paying rent to Lex? I honestly think that while your objection has merit, tptb haven't even considered this. They have this odd thing about putting everyone into these nice, neat boxes space-wise in such a way that they have easy access to the people they need to keep interacting with regardless of whether it makes sense. Which is weird because...they made Metropolis like 5 minutes away by car so I don't see the need for it. But yeah, I don't think they've given this any consideration and it's a show-wide problem,.