THE SMALLVILLE FILES SEASON 2
Score: 7.9 / 10 
1: The Revenge of Richard Nixon
Starring Clark Kent (Tom Welling) as Superlad, Lex Luthor (Michael Rosenbaum) as Sinead, Chloe Sullivan (Allison Mack) as TIAC, Jonathan Kent (John Schneider) as Bo, Martha Kent (Annette O'Toole) as Boring Old Ma, Lionel Luthor (John Glover) as Porthos, Kara Kent (Laura Vandervoort) as SBH and Lana Lang (Kristin Kreuk) as herself. For more information on these people and more, consult the scorecard.
And after far too long a delay we're back with the second series of Smallville.
For those of you who are too addled to recall what happened in last year's cliffhanger or for some mad reason didn't even see last season's cliffhanger, you should go here and catch up. Don't worry... we'll all wait for you.
Allrightey, now that we've rid ourselves of those click-happy amnesiacs, let's get on with this.
We open precisely where we left off last season with Lana getting caught up in the twister and being twisted away. As she floats away in her car, who should pop up outside the window but young Superlad. As the sound effects get more and more whooshy, Superlad simply moseys over to the car, tears off a door and drags Lana's unconscious bod to safety.
Meanwhile, over at Castle Luthor, Porthos remains pinned by the giant piece of pinning column. He pleads for help and Sinead, recalling fondly the swordplay of his youth, drags the old man to safety. Y'know, except for the crippledness and blindness which Porthos now suffers from. Still, even that's not all bad. Some may say there's no fun in fencing with a blind, crippled old man. Sinead would beg to differ. For one thing, you'll almost certainly win. For another, even if you don't, he probably won't know.
Finally in the woods, Bo continues to chase the evil reporter Richard Nixon who has footage of Superlad not exploding. Bo remains furious with him. He can't abide it when Superlad doesn't explode and people capture it on film.
So they have a bit of a fist fight, which is going along nicely, until the first entrance of vehicular damage for the season kicks off with a bang - with a giant campervan thing falling from the sky right on top of their heads. Ouch!
Superlad has, by now, dropped Lana off at the hospital and dashed back to the barn where he finds Boring Old Ma having a nap in the corner. He wakes her up and she tells him about Bo chasing the bad reporter into the woods. Superlad also points out that the spaceship has gone missing.
"Really," yawns Boring Old Ma. "That's nice, honey." And goes back to sleep.
Back in the woods, the blow from the campervan has knocked Bo and Nixon into an old abandoned underground mansion - much like Bag End in Hobbiton. Richard Nixon is pinned by yet another of those pinning columns, so Bo takes the opportunity to pick up a crowbar.
"Please," cries Richard Nixon. "Please don't kill me!"
Bo ignores him and uses the crowbar to free him from the pinning column.
"I was going to kill you, but you asked me not to with such manners. Do you see now where being a good boy can get you?"
By this time, Sinead has dropped Porthos off at hospital and flown in leading surgeons from Metropolis to make fun of him. He then runs into the woods to help Superlad look for Bo.
And, of course, it's an immense help, because Superlad who was covering between 10 and 12 hectares a minute in his search now has to walk along with Sinead and look under rocks one at a time.
On the plus side, they get a chance to have a bit of a chinwag.
"So," says Sinead. "My father's in hospital, crippled and blind."
"Bogus," says Superlad.
"Indeed. Also, he's gonna be mad at me because I hesitated when he asked me to rescue him."
"Yep," agrees Superlad. "That'll do it all right."
Then Sinead sees Nixon's car in a tree, smiles at the thought of such vehicular mayhem, and calls Richard Nixon to say 'hey, how's it going?'.
Nixon answers but before he can give rescuin' details, Bo grabs the phone and smashes it to a million pieces.
"You damn fool, Bo!" says Nixon.
"It's that ringtone," explains Bo. "I just can't stand it!"
"'You don't like 'La Cucaracha'??' says Nixon"
"You don't like 'La Cucaracha'??" says Nixon, shaking his head at Bo's madness.
Superlad has overheard Sinead's side of the conversation and gets cross with him, because he's heard bad things about Richard Nixon. Sinead tries to offer a reasonable explanation, but then realises he doesn't have one, so Superlad storms away.
Back at hospital, Lana has checked herself out. And yep, she thinks to herself, I still look damn fine. Then she checks herself out of hospital.
TIAC shows up and makes Wizard of Oz references, which Lana doesn't really get. Which is a shame, because TIAC had gone to the effort to genetically engineer a winged monkey as a 'Get Well' present.
They discuss the fact that Superlad just abandoned TIAC at the prom to go rescue Lana. Both of them try and engineer some kind of spin which doesn't mean that TIAC is a total back-up option for Lana's form.
Obviously, they both fail. "Ah well," says Lana, shrugging and sauntering sexily away.
She meets up with Superlad in the coffee shop.
"Now, Superlad," she says, "I could have sworn that at one point, while flying through the sky in my twister-car, I saw you fly up and rescue me."
"Hahaha!" says Superlad. "Hey, look over there!"
"No, seriously," says Lana. "Did you fly up to rescue me?"
"Um... um... oh, isn't it a beautiful day? Y'know, apart from the twisters and everything."
Then Ma wanders up.
"I have nothing new to tell you," she says, boringly.
Superlad takes the opportunity to dash off and join TIAC and Good Ol' Pete in the ongoing search for Bo.
Ma takes Lana away and bores her to tears with some story about Lana's dead parents and how it inspired her to wish that she could have a super-powered boy fall from the sky from an exploding planet... or some damn thing. Kinda blanked out during that bit.
Bo and Nixon meanwhile have spent most of the show having a lengthy philosophical debate about how one should best raise a teenage superhuman.
Nixon offers the theory that such a super-powered creature should be made known to the world where he can right wrongs and help humanity in its darkest hour.
Bo maintains that he should do his chores first.
Bo then tells Nixon that if he (Nixon) gives him the footage of Superlad not exploding, he (Bo) will tell him (Nixon) how to escape from the hobbit death tomb they now inhabit.
Nixon hesitates.
"It's your footage or your life," says Bo. "Make your choice. I know I have."
And Nixon falls for the bluff. Bo destroys the film and then instructs Nixon that they're to dig for China!
Superlad and TIAC and Good Ol' Pete have found the campervan which covers the hobbit hole, but Superlad has used the old super-peepers to have a look for them. Thanks to a pesky supply of lead in the hole, he can't see them and they decide to focus their efforts elsewhere.
TIAC takes the opportunity to have a chat to Superlad.
"Gee," says Superlad, "I'm sorry I abandoned you at the prom last night."
"No worries," says TIAC. "Hey, why don't we just be good friends, rather than, y'know... anything more, which would be just too weird."
"Yep, I think that's best," says Superlad, calling her bluff. He rubs his hands together in glee.
"Oh," says TIAC. And heads off to cry a bit.
"'Can we still sleep together from time to time?' shouts Superlad."
"Can we still sleep together from time to time?" shouts Superlad. "No emotional commitment, just sex?"
TIAC ignores him.
Superlad shakes his head. Chicks!
Finally, the show's almost over, so Superlad works out where Bo is and he runs over to the campervan, flips it over and rescues Bo and Nixon. Of course, there's kryptonite in the hobbit-hole. The Bagginses love their kryptonite, so Superlad falls over.
Nixon takes the opportunity to pile the K into Superlad's jacket and drag him away, cackling evilly the whole time.
Bo gets up off the ground and has another fight with Nixon but loses. Nixon picks up the crowbar.
"You may not be willing to murder people for your son," says Nixon. "But I sure as heck am."
But before he can bring the crowbar down on Bo's mushy head, Sinead shoots Nixon in the back.
"Oh, hello Sinead," says Superlad.
"Hey," says Sinead. "Whassup?"
And that's about it. Sinead convinces the lazy Smallville cops that this was some kind of hunting accident while Bo and Superlad have a chat.
"I was worried that in your righteous fury you might have killed Nixon," says Superlad.
"I was tempted. But then I thought to myself - if I kill him, then he's already won. I am not a cold-blooded murderer."
"It's a damn good thing Sinead is, though!" says Superlad.
"It sure is, son, it sure is," says Bo.
"Hahahahaha!"
"Hey," says Superlad, when they've finished laughing. "Did I mention that when I was sucked up in the twister to save Lana, I kind of flew!"
"Oh, you nutty Kryptonian super-kids!" says Bo, and ruffles his hair.
Meanwhile, back at the hospital, Porthos has woken up and is talking to Sinead.
"Thanks for having them operate on me, Sinead," says Porthos. "I love you like... well, in many ways like a son. And if I've been tough on you and stabbed you with swords and burnt you with cigarette butts it's only because... well, because I know that your enemies would do just the same. And by 'enemies' I mean, of course, people like me. But now that I'm blind and crippled, I'd just like to say that you should have left me to die. Because this sucks big time. Thanks for nothin'!"
Good ol' Porthos. Always full of funny things to say.
Finally, Lana rocks up to the barn and asks Superlad again about, y'know, how he always manages to rescue her and stuff and whether he's got any secrets he might want to tell her.
"Um... nope!" says Superlad.
"Fine! Be a horrid person!!" says Lana. And storms off.
Oh, and we close with the spaceship just sitting in the crops for everybody to see. Let's hope somebody remembers it soon, huh?
And that's it. Brilliant stuff. 10 out of 11. Welcome back, gang.
Next Week: A babelicious new teacher rocks into town (apparently from Season 1 of Dawson's Creek) and immediately threatens to seduce Superlad. Which is kinda cool, because she's also Sinead's fiancee.
Begone,
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