norwich36 | SV "What If" Game

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?

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What's your goal?

To remove Lex from the sphere of Lionel's influence.

How would you achieve it?

With my special KryptoNorwich powers, I would kill Lionel in the first meteor shower. The Rosses could find wee!Lex in their cornfield and return him, somehow, to Lillian.

What do you think the effect of your change will be?

With Lionel dead, Lillian is the primary influence on Lex's life until her death, at which time Pamela takes over. With Lionel dead, Lillian never has Julian, so there's not the twin spiral into despair occasioned by her illness coupled with post-partum psychosis/depression. So while she'd still be dying, she wouldn't have necessarily become unstable; she could have been the steadying influence to Non-Sociopathy that Lex needed. Lex could still end up ruling the world -- Lillian did give him that Napoleon-coin watch, so she's not entirely without her own empire-building impulses -- but he'd be a genuinely benevolent dictator under her/Pamela's influence.

What might be the unintended consequences?

The biggest might be that Lex never meets Clark, but I see no reason why Lillian couldn't still send him to Smallville to run the factory (which she bought from the Rosses on a whim as the means of thanking them for returning her son to her and then turned into a business memorial to Lionel). Lex's interest in Clark might not have taken a turn into destructive obsessiveness, since I imagine Lillian could/would have instilled in him the idea that just because you want something/want to know it, doesn't mean you automatically have a right to it no matter what. Without Lex's outsized sense of entitlement to Clark's Secret(s), the dynamic of their relationship would have been different enough that eventually Clark might have seriously contemplated entrusting Lex with the information (I'm still not sure he'd actually do it, but I think he'd be more likely to contemplate the possibility that doing so would not automatically equal disaster, whereas canon!Clark has always seemed terrified to do so, with the exception of Asylum).

The senior Kents might have been forced to mend fences with Grandpa Clark a lot sooner since they would have needed his help to adopt Clark. Having a pragmatic granddad who nevertheless took pleasure in spoiling him might have been good for Clark.

Pete wouldn't have hated Lex, since Lillian would have paid the Rosses the fair market value for their property. So the dynamic between Clark and Pete over Lex would have been different and Lex and Pete might have forged a friendship with each that made it possible for fans to actually envision them as the iconic presidential running mates they're allegedly destined to be.

Since Lex's upbringing would likely have been more loving and emotionally normative without Lionel's presence, so he'd likely be less obsessively envious of Clark's life and thus, we'd never get that horrible moment from Vessel where he's all "Only friends with you so I could be in UR life, stealin' UR girlz!"

Adam would have stayed dead and Emily would never have been cloned, but those are small prices to pay for a Lex who doesn't end up with a black hole where his soul should be.

Ok, given that we basically have the same goal, your method is much more efficient than mine. And more likely to work, too.

The Rosses could find wee!Lex in their cornfield and return him, somehow, to Lillian.

You know, I was just thinking about this the other day. What the hell happened to the Rosses? There they were, negotiating with Lionel, and suddenly they were gone, and Lionel's standing alone on a flattened field. Did they just drive away and leave him there when the meteors started falling?

ith Lionel dead, Lillian never has Julian, so there's not the twin spiral into despair occasioned by her illness coupled with post-partum psychosis/depression. So while she'd still be dying, she wouldn't have necessarily become unstable; she could have been the steadying influence to Non-Sociopathy that Lex needed. Lex could still end up ruling the world -- Lillian did give him that Napoleon-coin watch, so she's not entirely without her own empire-building impulses -- but he'd be a genuinely benevolent dictator under her/Pamela's influence.

Yes, that makes a lot of sense to me. (I hope Lillian *does* have empire-building skills, actually--at least enough to keep the empire going long enough so there's money left for Pamela to raise Lex).

The senior Kents might have been forced to mend fences with Grandpa Clark a lot sooner since they would have needed his help to adopt Clark. Having a pragmatic granddad who nevertheless took pleasure in spoiling him might have been good for Clark.

I really like this part of your scenario. I was just talking to

huzzlewhat about how one of the things I hold against Jonathan Kent is the way he estranged Martha from her family. To be sure, she must have been complicit in this, but I really like the idea of Jonathan and Grandpa Clark having to make up--if nothing else, it sets a better example for Clark.

Pete wouldn't have hated Lex, since Lillian would have paid the Rosses the fair market value for their property. So the dynamic between Clark and Pete over Lex would have been different and Lex and Pete might have forged a friendship with each that made it possible for fans to actually envision them as the iconic presidential running mates they're allegedly destined to be.

I would love it if Pete and Lex were friends--in fact, it would be interesting if Lex were Pete's friend first , before he was Clark's, because of the family connection. That would put an interesting spin on the dynamic.

However, I do have to say that the idea of Pete and Lex being enemies and running mates is not really much of a stretch in politics. I mean, I know it's comics canon that Lex runs as an independent, but that's really just because the comics don't want to get to involved in politics. Realistically, if Lex was running for either of the major parties, his running mate is likely to be the opponent from the primaries who got the most support--so that really seems like a plausible scenario for Pete and Lex to be running together even though they hate each other.

Adam would have stayed dead and Emily would never have been cloned, but those are small prices to pay for a Lex who doesn't end up with a black hole where his soul should be.

Especially since Adam just died anyway and Emily was being raised like a pet.

What the hell happened to the Rosses? There they were, negotiating with Lionel, and suddenly they were gone, and Lionel's standing alone on a flattened field. Did they just drive away and leave him there when the meteors started falling?

Yes, it's ... odd that they apparently aren't helping Lionel look for wee!Lex although I suppose we could fanwank it that they went in a different direction from him to look. Alternatively, it was such a sudden yet clearly catastrophic event that Lionel may very well have told them to go ensure their own family was safe. Lionel is not entirely without actual human impulses and given his own frantic searching, he probably would have understood the Ross men wanting to make sure their loved ones were safe.

You know the other way the Rosses kill me? The whole "he cheated us out of our creamed corn factory" business. Because I've never been able to understand how they didn't know the worth of their own business. Particularly not if they'd undertaken the task of trying to sell it. Wouldn't ascertaining its actual worth be one of the things you'd do initially in that situation? And I have trouble with the idea that the contract was somehow over their heads since there was, canonically, a lawyer in the family (there may even be two; we know that Pete's mom is a licensed attorney because she couldn't be a judge without being a licensed attorney first; in Rogue it's "Bill Ross" that Jonathan calls when he gets into trouble for allegedly killing someone). Seriously, if Mrs. Ross is on the District/Circuit Court as of S3's Whisper, then she was a practicing attorney at the time of the meteor shower. Even if she was a litigator and somehow didn't feel qualified to review it herself, I refuse to believe she didn't have at least one professional colleague familiar with contract law who could have looked that thing over to ascertain whether it was hinky. So I've really never undersood the Rosses' claim that Lionel "cheated" them out of their factory. If they (a) didn't know how much their own property/business was worth and (b) didn't have the sense to avail themselves of the services of the lawyer(s) in the family to review the mechanism of the sale, that's hardly Lionel's fault (and you know I never willingly say that!). I always rolled my eyes when Pete - or Jonathan -- brought it up.

Wow. Twice in one comment you have said nice things about Lionel. I have to pause a bit to mark this moment in the historical record.

:D

I was going to say that I think it was just Pete who said that the Rosses were cheated by the Luthors, and that could just be a bit of family prejudice/lore he picked up without really knowing any specifics. But of course it's a pivotal plot point in "Lineage" that Jonathan betrayed his friends by convincing them to sell to Lionel, presumably for under market value, isn't it. Hmm. It does seem odd that people in a family full of lawyers would take the advice of their friend the failing farmer over that of their relatives.

Or is Jonathan's attempt to convince the Rosses to sell supposed to be evil just because it gave Lionel a foothold in Smallville?

Wow. Twice in one comment you have said nice things about Lionel. I have to pause a bit to mark this moment in the historical record.

There was a time, waaaaaaay back in the day, when I was sympathetic to and even liked Lionel. Sometimes, those memories bleed through. ;-)

But of course it's a pivotal plot point in "Lineage" that Jonathan betrayed his friends by convincing them to sell to Lionel, presumably for under market value, isn't it.

*nod* And like I said to Pep, I think "cheating" does strongly imply that's what happened -- he bought it for less than it was really worth, but that just brings me back to "The Rosses should have known what their own property/business was worth."

Or is Jonathan's attempt to convince the Rosses to sell supposed to be evil just because it gave Lionel a foothold in Smallville?

I think that's really what it is, but maybe back then the creative team felt like that was too subtle a point, so it had to be couched in terms of something Lionel himself actively did? In other words, just saying "Lionel got a foothold in Smallville and that's been bad," is a hard point to make when your own internal storytelling suggests that his business is the single largest employer in the town. But if you combine it with the suggestion that Lionel got that foothold through unethical or dubious means, the assertion gets stronger.

Oh, season 1 and early season 2 Lionel, back before you were a confirmed sociopath! I miss you!

Meanwhile, I suppose the charitable thing to think about the Rosses is not that they were total morons, but that Jonathan felt guilty for giving Lionel a foothold in Smallville, and when Lionel's crap factory became successful Pete's uncles bitched about it and it became this huge overblown thing in Pete's mind when it wasn't, really.

The thinking behind the whole Ross's ordeal was just ridiculous. As you said, there were lawyers in the family, and if they didn't understand the contract, why in hell didn't they either have someone look it over or simply not sign at all?

Right. Without more than "Lionel Luthor cheated us[/them] out of the creamed corn factory," it's hard to know what he actually did. Like I said to Nora, if it was buying it for less than it was actually worth (and that's certainly what I think the term "cheating" implies to most people), then it's not Lionel's fault that the Rosses didn't bother to get an accounting of what the business was worth before they undertook selling it¹. If there was some kind of double- or triple-speak in the contract, well, they had at least one and possibly two family members who could have reviewed it if the two gentlemen we saw in the pilot didn't understand everything they were reading.

I have no trouble with the idea that Lionel's general business practices weren't always ethical or above-board. But since there's never been any actual explanation of exactly what he did to the Rosses that was so wrong or unfair, I've always had a hard time understanding Pete and Jon's anger about it. All the ways I can think of Lionel "cheating" depend on the Rosses being kind of ... willfully ignorant, and that makes it hard for me to blame Lionel for how it went down.

1. I'm certain businessman!Lionel's never bought anything without having it examined/appraised, so yeah, I can believe that he had his accountants look into the factory and possibly learned that it was worth more/generated more profit than was reflected in the Rosses' asking price. And while yeah, the most honorable thing to do in that situation would be to tell them, "Huh, my people say it's worth more than you're asking for it," it's not necessarily dishonorable that he failed to do this. At the end of the day, the onus is on the seller to set the initial price, so that means it was the Rosses' responsibility to know exactly how much they should have asked.

Here's a what-if: What if the repeated references to Lionel "cheating" the Rosses out of their creamed corn factory has nothing to do with what he paid for it, but rather with the fact that he bought it at all, and then leveled it and turned it into a fertilizer plant?

In the deleted scene from the pilot, the Rosses really didn't seem happy about the prospect of selling to Lionel. Maybe they were considering it (because he wanted property in the area), just didn't like the man and decided they didn't want him to have their factory, and then Jonathan Kent persuaded them that Lionel really wasn't so bad? And maybe Lionel assured them that he would carry on in the fine Ross tradition, but kept the language of the contract vague with regard to how he would dispose of the factory once it was his -- and then, as soon as he took possession, he fired their workers and bulldozed the place and built a plant that's been leaking pollution into the Smallville groundwater ever since.

I realize this is a whole lotta fanwank, but it might be a way to reconcile canon with itself.

You know the other way the Rosses kill me? [snip] I always rolled my eyes when Pete - or Jonathan -- brought it up.

Oh, amen to all of this! :flails:

Love your idea, but I feel compelled to quibble with your apparent interpretation of that moment in "Vessel." It seemed clear to me that Lex -- still secretly obsessed with and in love with Clark -- was desperate to know whether Clark really did hate and/or fear him enough to be willing to kill him. So he was deliberately pushing all Clark's buttons by saying everything he could think of, true or not, to infuriate Clark to the breaking point and beyond, just to see for himself what Clark would do. Hence the obvious lie about only being friends with Clark because he wanted what Clark had.

It seemed clear to me that Lex -- still secretly obsessed with and in love with Clark -- was desperate to know whether Clark really did hate and/or fear him enough to be willing to kill him. So he was deliberately pushing all Clark's buttons by saying everything he could think of, true or not, to infuriate Clark to the breaking point and beyond, just to see for himself what Clark would do.

Sorry, but my reading of Lex at that point isn't as, um, charitable. I think he really is angry at Clark, I think he's partly calling Clark out as a hypocrite and I think he really was jealous of Clark's life -- Lexmas strongly suggests as much. My big issue with what Lex says in that scene is that it sounds like he was only ever friends because he was jealous of Clark's life. I don't believe that that's true or borne out by the canon of S1 through S3. Lex crawled through his own blood in an attempt to get to Clark in Asylum; that's just not something you do for someone with whom you're only pretending to be friends because you're envious of them. So. That's the extent to which I don't like what Lex says in Vessel. But I don't read that moment, at all, as desperate-and-in-love!Lex just trying to push Clark's buttons to see how far he'll go. I read it as a very pissed off Lex who's largely disappointed in Clark and is pushing Clark's buttons because he can and it makes him (Lex) feel better.

Oh, I admit that Lex is also angry with Clark in that scene, and with good reason: Clark has, at that point, been an absolute bastard to Lex for quite some time. And, yes, Lex has envied some aspects of Clark's life, as I think he's previously admitted. But the "Vessel" scene in question -- as you've said above -- implies that Lex only ever pretended to be Clark's friend because he envied Clark's life, and that is clearly and laughably untrue. So I guess, in a sense, we agree...if only to a certain point.

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SV "What If" Game

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