Smallville : Season 8

By Clint Morris

Like a cancerous raccoon that proceeds to dig its caked claws into your concaved caravan roof every night – you just can’t kill “Smallville”. It’s the “Simpsons” of not-that-exiting teeny dramas. Hey, I still watch the show – haven’t missed an episode, but at the same time I can also genuinely say I don’t know if I’ve actually enjoyed an episode since, well, the fab John Schneider was on it. And that was a few seasons ago now. When Pa Kent died, Lex Luthor left town, and the whole Clark/Lana on-again off-again on-again storyline was finally put to rest… so should’ve been “Smallville”.

I’m all for keeping the Welling family clothed and fed, and accept that The CW doesn’t really have anything suitable to fill the void if they did suddenly decide they didn’t want young Supernut anymore, but really, enough is enough – either put Clark in the cape, or support Euthanasia. The show is in misery. It’ll need to eat through a straw soon. If Michael Rosenbaum (‘Lex Luthor’), the actor who starred in such injudicious ventures as “Sorority Boys” and “Kickin’ it Old Skool”, had the smarts to leave the show, I’d say it’s fairly clear it’s past it’s use-by date. And to Rosenbaum’s credit, the show has been lacking even more so since his departure. Sure, they’ve introduced a foxy red-head relation to run the Luthor mansion and challenge Clark’s intellect but Cassidy Freeman was always going to have her work cut out for her – Rosennabum was, quite frankly, the bomb as Luthor. His character had nothing left in him by Season 5 – and yet Rosenbaum keep on giving it his all. Power to the bald son-of-a-bitch. He was the skid mark that held the bloomers to the jeans.

This season (the eighth!) sees Clark (Tom Welling) finding an enemy in schizophrenic ambulance driver Davis Bloome/Doomsday (Sam Witwer) – but the Superman and the Jekyll’s fracas is constantly delayed because of Chloe’s (Allison Mack) ‘connection’ to the ‘innocent’ Bloome. As Bloome tells Chloe, he senses something is wrong with him (“I’ve always felt like… kind of like there was this darkness inside me… just fighting to get out.”) but like a horny virgin, is trying his best to keep it concealed.

There’s enough to keep you watching this season, but it’s clear, what with the show making a sudden transform into “Lois & Clark” by the middle of the season (!), that the show runner’s are becoming pretty desperate now. It all plays granny-in-front-of-a-gas-heater tired. Oh, and don’t get me started on what they did to Jimmy Olsen! Is that even allowed!?

Hopefully Clark gets the ‘outfit’ next season and gives us a reason to watch… again.

Extras

Two featurettes (one on Doomsday, one of Allison Mack’s directorial debut), two audio commentaries, and deleted scenes.