THE SMALLVILLE FILES SEASON 2
Score: 7.5 / 10 
14: When Good Petes Go Bad
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.
Well, thanks to the magic of Amazon.com selling me a copy of the Series 2 DVD set, I'm back and completely unreliant on the craven and soulless Channel Nine Australia.
So wassup?
Well, we're opening with a rave party. And just to test my memory for internal continuity, the rave party is being held in Alice's cave from Episode 10. Good Ol' Pete and TIAC have rocked up because Good Ol' Pete has heard that it's going to be 'slammin' and TIAC is worried that she's being written out of the show so her plan is to be in every single scene from now on.
So they're at the rave, DJ Olsen is hard at work and Good Ol' Pete has come over absurdly goody-goody, which doesn't blend well with his forced hip-hop slang.
"Hey, whodis," he says to a couple making out in front of one of the cave comics. "Don't be doin' the wild thing there against that wack wall."
They stare uncomprehendingly at him.
A young Bill Gates lookalike then comes up and pashes TIAC, before running off again. Ew, thinks TIAC, wiping her mouth off. Might be time to rethink that 'appear in every scene' plan. At least, until she checks out which extras are on set.
"Did he just kiss you?" asks Goody-Good Ol' Pete. "He must be totally sherm."
Sherm?? thinks TIAC. Sherm!??! Why must Goody-Good Ol' Pete always embarrass her so with his wanksta antics?
Young Bill Gates has, by this stage, climbed a convenient piece of cave-ladder. He hollers random slogans indicating that this is the kind of rush usually reserved for some form of sexual encounter (he assumes) or via a particularly expensive brand of running shoe.
And then he predictably jumps to his death, while Goody-Good Ol' Pete is jabbed in the back of the neck by some mysterious neck-jabbing implement.
Cue opening credits.
So it's the next day and Superlad is walking down the street, reading the local paper, completely oblivious to Good Ol' Pete riding his motorcycle like an out of work and out of control Evil Kneivel. Evil Ol' Pete jumps over a convenient ramp and slides to a halt in front of Superlad.
"Whatchu doing?" says Superlad. "Why are you riding without a helmet and without your learner plates clearly displayed?"
"For the rush!!" says Evil Ol' Pete. "You're never more alive than the moment before you die."
"Yes," agrees Superlad. "And you've never more dead than the moment after that. So you think about that, young Pete Ross." And he skulks off, disappointed that Evil Ol' Pete is not contributing his fair share of being a goody-two-shoes suck-up.
"Hey!!" says Evil Ol' Pete. "Speaking of dead people. Now that Whit's croaked it, why don't you make a super-move on Lana?"
"Hmmmmmmmmmmmm...." thinks Superlad. "Why don't I?"
And he abandons Evil Ol' Pete and his very overt set of emotional problems and heads into The Death Claw to ask Lana out.
"Yo, Lana," he says. "Wanna go out on a date?"
"Yep."
"Oh," says Superlad. "That was easy."
"Well, you wanted me to say 'yes', didn't you?" replies Lana, wary of some kind of patented Superlad trap.
"I just thought you might have still been coming to terms with, y'know, the brutal, senseless death of your boyfriend in Vietnam.
Lana shakes her head prettily. Well, okay then.
"They chat about the ... caves and how much cooler they are without used condoms and spliffs littering the place."
Superlad celebrates naturally enough by rushing over to clean up the caves. Sinead takes a break from his billionaire activities to help him out. They chat about the attraction of the caves and how much cooler they are without used condoms and spliffs littering the place.
"Ugh," says Superlad. "Litter."
"Yeah," says Sinead, rolling his eyes. He has no intention of soiling his hands by touching cave filth. He points to some stuff that Superlad has missed and, in general, adopts a supervisory role.
Meanwhile, back at The Death Claw, Lana has phoned up TIAC.
"Hey," she says, "I've got a great scene for you to be in!"
"Cool," says TIAC and rushes over. "What is it?" she asks.
"It's a scene where I brutally reveal to you that Superlad and I have a date tomorrow night and ask you whether you're okay with that and make you feel worthless and small and nowhere near as pretty as I am."
"Uh-huh," says TIAC. She has heard of better scenes but puts up with Lana's monstrous cruelty anyway.
By this stage, of course, Sinead has managed to locate an expert linguist to decode many of the comic books that have been scrawled on the cave walls. Unfortunately, Dr ExpertLinguist is about to fly out to Chile.
"I think you'll change your mind when you see this," says Sinead, handing him a cheque in an envelope.
"I don't succumb to bribery," says Dr ExpertLinguist, and tears the envelope up.
"Phew," thinks Sinead, remembering that it wasn't the cheque envelope at all, but rather a renewal to his Bald Gents' Quarterly subscription (who, it must be assumed, will be rather pleased with his million dollar contribution to their coffers).
But then he shows Dr ExpertLinguist some photographs of the comics from the caves and this convinces the good doctor to be hired. Because, cunningly, Sinead had shown him one with a cliffhanger for an ending. Sinead, always thinking ahead.
Meanwhile, Evil Ol' Pete, still searching for a fresh rush has jumped in front of a bus. Superlad saves him, ruining the moment completely. Evil Ol' Pete retaliates by yelling to the gathering crowd "he's an alien! he's an alien!!"
"Is he from Mexico?" asks a member of the crowd.
"No, he's an alien," says Evil Ol' Pete again.
"Like Chewy??" tries another one.
"He doesn't look like a Wookiee."
"He better not be that Jar-Jar Bloody Binks!"
"Maybe he's a Klingon!"
Evil Ol' Pete is far too frustrated with the stupidity of the crowd and runs away. Superlad slinks off slowly in the other direction.
Then, of course, Superlad and TIAC go to the caves and TIAC is infected too. Because she's careless. Then she accuses Dr ExpertLinguist (who is in the caves with Sinead - should have mentioned that) of being a "cunning linguist". Dirty wordplay from TIAC. No wonder Channel Nine abandoned the show when it did.
And also, to save time, Evil Ol' Pete shows up in the barn and infects Superlad with Kryptonite. Then pulls out some red K from Episode 4 and makes Superlad all full of mischief too.
Back at the caves and Dr CunningLinguist has told Sinead that the kids have been infected by evil space worms. Great Exposition, Dr CunningLinguist.
So Red K Superlad has broken his date with Lana and headed back to the barn with Evil Ol' Pete and Wack TIAC. Evil Ol' Pete smashes Superlad with a baseball bat and Superlad sets fire to a passing lantern, thereby letting Wack TIAC in on the secret.
"Cool," says Wack TIAC. "Can you fly??"
"... I have a variety of superpowers, Wack TIAC. I can't fly."
"Haha hahaha hahaha!!" laugh Evil Ol' Pete and Red K Superlad. "Yeah, right! I have a variety of superpowers, Wack TIAC. I can't fly." They laugh some more at TIAC's foolishness. Chicks! Where do they get these crazy ideas?
Then Sinead shows up at the barn and the others are mean and don't let him in on the secret. Wack TIAC even makes a scathing remark about his baldness. Ouch! Sinead skulks off, hairless and dejected.
So Red K Superlad and Wack TIAC go back to The Death Claw and make out right in front of Lana. Which is always good for a bit of a laugh. But then, embarrassingly, TIAC tears Red K Superlad's shirt off and the Red K falls too far away to cloud Superlad's mind any more. So he comes to his senses and pushes TIAC away. "Ewwwwwwwwwwww!!" he says.
"You don't have any real feelings for me at all, do you Superlad?" asks Wack TIAC.
"No," replies Superlad.
"You just use me and my collection of scripts to get all your answers in a given episode of your life. I'm like your own personal episode guide, aren't I?"
"Pretty much," agrees Superlad. So, even without the Red K, he can still be an insensitive cretin.
But, of course, without the Red K, he's much less likely to condone Wack TIAC and Evil Ol' Pete driving off a local chasm. So he tries to stop them, but Evil Ol' Pete smacks him in the mouth with a fist full of Kryptonite.
Lana throws some water on his crotch and wakes him back up, just in time for him to dash to the chasm and prevent Wack TIAC and Evil Ol' Pete from emulating many a Dukes of Hazzard episode and jumping an abandoned bridge. So many abandoned bridges.
And that is rather that.
TIAC wakes up in hospital.
"What, exactly, do you remember??!?" demands Superlad as his first question.
"I don't remember anything between the 13th and 55th minute of the episode," says TIAC. "Did I miss anything exciting?"
"You missed 80% of the episode!" says Superlad. "Of course you didn't miss anything exciting."
Then Lana shows up and stares with maximum ice at Superlad. She forgives TIAC, however.
"Why so mad at Superlad?" asks TIAC.
"He was making out with some other chick!" says Lana, choosing her words carefully.
"Which chick?" asks TIAC.
"Nobody I recognised," says Lana. Um, Lana, it was TIAC!! Don't you recognise your own roommate?? Boy, how self-absorbed can one get.
Good Ol' Pete comes over to the Kent household and apologises to the entire family. They accept the apology but not before Bo makes him refence the back fields. Then Superlad decides to apologise to Lana. She doesn't have any fields that need refencing, so continues to hate him.
Oh, and Dr CunningLinguist tells Sinead that the space worms that infected everybody weren't from Earth.
"Duh!" says Sinead. "They're space worms." And as punishment for his stupidity he makes Dr CunningLinguist promise to let Superlad run around the caves whenever he wants to do so.
A perfectly fine episode. Good Ol' Pete's cunning combined use of Green and Red Kryptonite make him a worthy foe indeed. Let's hope that he's not the one who grows up to be an arch-nemesis.
Next week: According to the DVD liner notes, Sinead's got a half-brother. Let's hope that he's bald and evil as well, huh?
Begone,
This here item has so far scored 7.5 / 10 on the patented Astonishing Tales Funny-o-meter.
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