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SV "What If" Game
Edited to rename my game now that it is famous all over teh internets, since "an SV Game/Poll Thingy" doesn't scan quite as well.
I have one of those extremely tedious projects at work that require, for sanity, an lj break every half hour or so, so it seems like a good time to play a game.
So here's the premise: the SV fairy has appeared to you and offered you the opportunity to travel to the SV-verse, temporarily, to improve Smallville and/or the lives of the characters in any way you see fit. There are rules, however. You can either (1)have one conversation with one character (and only one character), time length up to one hour, at any point in the timeline OR (2) you can change one event, but not speak to anyone.
--If you choose the conversation, you can talk to anyone at any point in their timeline, but you have to be yourself (mysterious stranger); you can't, for example, be Clark to talk to Lex. You can, however, be a mysterious stranger who knows the future; you just can't hang around more than an hour to show that your predictions were accurate.
--If you choose changing an event, you have a fair amount of power--let's say the limit of your power is that of a meteor mutant--but you can only change one event, and you can't speak to anyone. So, for example, if your goal was to prevent Jodi from becoming a fat-sucker in "Craving," you could either magically prevent her father's greenhouse from being salted with kryptonite OR you could have a conversation warning her, but you couldn't do both. If you wanted to save Jonathan's life in "Reckoning," you could have a conversation with Clark or you could blow up the Fortress of Solitude (if you think that would help) OR you could puncture Jonathan's tires so he never has the encounter with Lionel, but you could only do ONE of those things, not all of them. If you want to redirect the meteors in the first meteor shower to squash Lana, you can do that, but you can't then talk to Clark to get him to wait on Loeb bridge so he saves Lex's life even though he no longer has Lana to moon over and so he may not end up there on his own.
SO:
What is your goal?
What are you going to do to accomplish it, given the constraints on your powers?
What do you think the effect of your change will be?
What might be the unintended consequences?
For example, here's mine.
What is your goal?
I want Lex NOT to become an evil monster whose sociopathy exceeds Lionel's. It turns out I want that even more than I want Clark and Lex to get together.
What are you going to do to accomplish it, given the constraints on your powers?
After much thought about this, I think what I would do is appear to Lillian a couple days before she kills Julian and HEAL HER with my magical kryptomutant powers.
What do you think the effect of your change will be?
Even though I don't get to talk to her, my hope is that healing her would cover both her post-partum psychosis (to which I am attributing her desire to kill Julian) AND her heart condition, so she would live and continue to be a countering influence on Lex. I think by the time Lex gets to Smallville it's really too late for him to really change; he's too fucked up already. My hope is that if Lillian is not sucked down into despair because of her mortal illness, she would actually be able to support Lex in not becoming like his dad. And Lex would still have a little brother, who he clearly loved a lot, so that would give him motivation to try to be a good person and set a good example.
What might be the unintended consequences?
Well, Lillian might already be so damaged that she would still kill Julian, and maybe this time Lionel would catch her and she'd go to prison or be locked in an asylum, which probably would NOT make things better for Lex. Or maybe she wouldn't be caught, but she'd live, and instead of being Lex's dead model of goodness, she'd be the psycho-mom he was protecting, and that could get ugly and he might go evil earlier. Or maybe none of that would happen but instead Lionel would succeed in molding Julian to be the heir he wanted Lex to be, and instead of Lex being the evil genius he'd be locked in an eternal struggle with his brother the evil genius.
So, does anyone else want to play, or did I make the rules too complicated?
I have one of those extremely tedious projects at work that require, for sanity, an lj break every half hour or so, so it seems like a good time to play a game.
So here's the premise: the SV fairy has appeared to you and offered you the opportunity to travel to the SV-verse, temporarily, to improve Smallville and/or the lives of the characters in any way you see fit. There are rules, however. You can either (1)have one conversation with one character (and only one character), time length up to one hour, at any point in the timeline OR (2) you can change one event, but not speak to anyone.
--If you choose the conversation, you can talk to anyone at any point in their timeline, but you have to be yourself (mysterious stranger); you can't, for example, be Clark to talk to Lex. You can, however, be a mysterious stranger who knows the future; you just can't hang around more than an hour to show that your predictions were accurate.
--If you choose changing an event, you have a fair amount of power--let's say the limit of your power is that of a meteor mutant--but you can only change one event, and you can't speak to anyone. So, for example, if your goal was to prevent Jodi from becoming a fat-sucker in "Craving," you could either magically prevent her father's greenhouse from being salted with kryptonite OR you could have a conversation warning her, but you couldn't do both. If you wanted to save Jonathan's life in "Reckoning," you could have a conversation with Clark or you could blow up the Fortress of Solitude (if you think that would help) OR you could puncture Jonathan's tires so he never has the encounter with Lionel, but you could only do ONE of those things, not all of them. If you want to redirect the meteors in the first meteor shower to squash Lana, you can do that, but you can't then talk to Clark to get him to wait on Loeb bridge so he saves Lex's life even though he no longer has Lana to moon over and so he may not end up there on his own.
SO:
What is your goal?
What are you going to do to accomplish it, given the constraints on your powers?
What do you think the effect of your change will be?
What might be the unintended consequences?
For example, here's mine.
What is your goal?
I want Lex NOT to become an evil monster whose sociopathy exceeds Lionel's. It turns out I want that even more than I want Clark and Lex to get together.
What are you going to do to accomplish it, given the constraints on your powers?
After much thought about this, I think what I would do is appear to Lillian a couple days before she kills Julian and HEAL HER with my magical kryptomutant powers.
What do you think the effect of your change will be?
Even though I don't get to talk to her, my hope is that healing her would cover both her post-partum psychosis (to which I am attributing her desire to kill Julian) AND her heart condition, so she would live and continue to be a countering influence on Lex. I think by the time Lex gets to Smallville it's really too late for him to really change; he's too fucked up already. My hope is that if Lillian is not sucked down into despair because of her mortal illness, she would actually be able to support Lex in not becoming like his dad. And Lex would still have a little brother, who he clearly loved a lot, so that would give him motivation to try to be a good person and set a good example.
What might be the unintended consequences?
Well, Lillian might already be so damaged that she would still kill Julian, and maybe this time Lionel would catch her and she'd go to prison or be locked in an asylum, which probably would NOT make things better for Lex. Or maybe she wouldn't be caught, but she'd live, and instead of being Lex's dead model of goodness, she'd be the psycho-mom he was protecting, and that could get ugly and he might go evil earlier. Or maybe none of that would happen but instead Lionel would succeed in molding Julian to be the heir he wanted Lex to be, and instead of Lex being the evil genius he'd be locked in an eternal struggle with his brother the evil genius.
So, does anyone else want to play, or did I make the rules too complicated?
no subject
And as long as you're being "evil girl from the future," you could always make Lionel conceal the fact that he was responsible for Jonathan's death, but since he's already "helped" Martha once, he could show up and offer to help her out, strictly on a friendly basis, but in a way that would definitely lead to Mionel.
However, as I said to
Why, exactly, do you think it would have been a good thing for Clark not to be influenced by Jonathan? I'm not sure I've ever heard your opinions on that.
no subject
Oh, I agree, but I don't think it matters. I think the fact that she's not a moral paragon would allow Clark to develop his own morality earlier, and I think Clark's craving for a father would take care of her resistance to Jor-El. We saw him seek out contact with Jor-El despite her feelings in Season 2--I think that urge in him was very very strong. I don't think it would be the easiest family dynamic in the world. But I think it would ultimately teach Clark more and make him more of an independent adult at a younger age.
Why, exactly, do you think it would have been a good thing for Clark not to be influenced by Jonathan? I'm not sure I've ever heard your opinions on that.
1. Anger management: Clark's anger mirrors J's so perfectly I can't help but feel that he imprinted on this behaviour pattern at an early age. He's reckless, he flies into rages without thinking things through, and he sees violence as a solution--all VERY unhealthy things for a future Superman to learn.
2. Prejudice: Jonathan accepts the surface as truth--we see this most clearly with the Luthors. He has one fixed idea of them and he denies any complexity in the picture, even when there is some. This is still Clark's failing today. Clark doesn't uncover the real truths of Lex's evilness because he's been too busy throwing accusations that aren't completely accurate. The Luthors are not black and white--they justify what they do, they act out of multiple motives, sometimes it would pay to work with them. But thanks to Jonathan, Clark's forever stuck in open adversary mode. He'll have to rely on others to sneak under Lex's radar and find out the real truth.
3. False moral superiority and self-righteousness: Again, learnt from Jonathan. Apart from the obvious limitations of these attributes, I think there's a subtler issue for Clark: he finds it very hard to accept personal failure. Jonathan did nothing to teach his son that failure is part of life, that sometimes you can't control fate. He was so smug and felt so entitled to being viewed as a good man, that he made Clark fear admitting you're not, admitting you make mistakes.
4. Football. Partly Clark's drive for it came from his ridiculous idealisation of his father as high school football hero.
That enough? ;-)
no subject
I'm a little waffly on #2, though. Jonathan had very good reason to suspect Luthors bearing gifts, and much as I love Lex, most of his interactions with the Kents in season 1 (when he was the least shady) were still pretty weighted with ulterior motives. I do agree that Clark and Jonathan both need to learn shades of gray, however.
no subject
Oh, I totally agree, but I don't think Martha would have welcomed them all with open arms either. I don't think removing Jonathan from the picture would have meant that Martha didn't bring Clark up to be cautious, and I think he would have learnt that Luthors may have ulterior motives for himself by seeing that with his Dad. But I don't think he would have judged the son by the father. I don't think there was anything innate in Clark (or Martha) that would do that. They would be wary but not ridiculously suspicious--a far healthier attitude towards Lex at that time. I think Martha would be necessary as a guide for Clark in navigating that friendship while he was still so young, and I think she'd be good at letting Lex close but not toooo close, until Clark was ready.
no subject
Ooh! Can I put in my $0.02 on this?
no subject
no subject
In retrospect, I think that Bo's narrow-mindedness and, well, stinginess of spirit is keeping Clark from his iconic place in this universe. Clark should be the first and the best. He should *not* be getting trained by
Bruce WayneOllie Queen.Are you spoiled for upcoming eps?
no subject
I don't really see him as being trained by Ollie, though--rather the reverse.
After all, he's the one teaching Ollie that killing is wrong, mkay, and that using drugs is wrong and that vigilantism is not always right. Sure, Ollie is one person encouraging him to take responsibility beyond his immediate circle, but it's not like that's what's pushing Clark out into the world--he was already moving in that direction as a result of his sense of responsibility for Black Thursday and releasing all those Phantom Zone inmates.
Really, the only thing keeping Clark from his iconic place in the universe is the fact that there's probably going to be a season 7, and they have to leave some plot developments for then. :D But I think he's been coming along by leaps and bounds this season.