THE SMALLVILLE FILES SEASON 6
Score: 7.2 / 10 
2: Superlad Takes A Sick Day
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.
Since the premiere of Smallville, there have been two (2) elements for which all super-savvy viewers have been clamouring: the power of superbreath and a guest appearance from famous Superman friend and ally Green, uh, Arrow.
In one fell episode, the writers have delivered both. Kudos!
Let's see how they unveiled these twin triumphs, shall we?
Superlad has been racing around in Metropolis all night, secretly cleaning up the aftermath from the last couple of episodes. He is contractually obligated to do this after all season finales. But this year, all the cleanup has left him feeling a little rundown.
"Are you all right?" says Senator Boring Old Ma. "You look awful."
"'Awful'?" says a disbelieving Superlad, gesturing to the flawless face.
"Tired," corrects Senator Boring Old Ma. "Even you have your limits. Why don't you take a nap? The chores can wait."
"No they can't," says Superlad. Because who else is going to do them? Her? Porthos? The Ghost of Bo?
But then he has second thoughts and decides to instead kill some time with his third-favourite hobby - pushing giant nails into random planks of wood with his thumb. But even this proves tiresome for the bedraggled Superlad.
He looks up, exhausted and bored silly. So, for kicks, he sneezes the barn door, totally, off. It lands halfway (+/- 12%) across town, almost killing a scantily jogging Lois Lane.
All right. New third-favourite hobby.
Senator Boring Old Ma does not approve of Superlad's new hobby. "You've never been sick before," she says, in a tone that indicates she considers catching a cold on a par with smoking. "Why start now?"
"I just wanted to fit in," says Superlad.
"Speaking of fit," says Lois, wandering in through the door and helping herself to a boiled egg. "I was out jogging, looking awesome--" (she gestures to her bod. Superlad nods) "--when suddenly a barn door fell out of the sky and almost killed me. How does that happen?"
"Probably a plane," says Superlad.
"'Barn plane,' confirms Senator Boring Old Ma."
"Barn plane," confirms Senator Boring Old Ma.
This satisfies Lois.
Meanwhile, Lana's moving into the Luthor Mansion. She expresses surprise at the number of security guards there are.
"But everyone just wanders in here whenever we feel like it, without ever being stopped," she points out.
Sinead scowls. There are times when Lana can be such an insensitive cow.
Back at Daily Planet Rebel Headquarters, Superlad's filling in TIAC on the whole sneezing hobby.
"I sneezed!" he says, proud as punch.
"Stop the presses!" shouts TIAC. They do, for they pay no heed to sarcasm at the Daily Planet. TIAC sighs. "Okay. Good. Start 'em up again." And off they go.
Superlad sneezes and blows paper all over the damn place. Also, supersnot.
"Ew," says TIAC. "Use a tissue, dude."
But enough of the mucus storyline for now. Let's check in on Sinead and Porthos and one of their infamously multi-layered father-son chats.
"You following me?" says Sinead.
"Nuh-uh," says Porthos.
So they're barely even trying this week. Sinead tries to spice it up a little with some references to starting a blog and Elvis leaving the building, but Porthos has no idea what he's talking about. "What's an 'Elvis'?" he says. "No, never mind. I have a Senator to seduce. Why don't you get yourself kidnapped in an elevator on the way out?"
"I think not," says Sinead. But then does so, out of spite.
Back at the Kent farm, Superlad's making the most of his sick day. Senator Boring Old Ma comes in.
"I've rented some DVDs," she says. She hands him Cheaper By The Dozen and Cheaper By The Dozen 2. Y'know, just for a laugh.
"Gee, thanks," says Superlad, suddenly grateful they don't have a DVD player.
Porthos shows up to inform them about Sinead's abduction. "You need to rescue Sinead," he says to Superlad. "He claims to not remember what happened last episode, but what if somebody taped it? They'd know all about you and Zod. So off you scoot. I'll look after your Ma." He sways his hips seductively.
Sinead, meanwhile, is being interrogated by two random thugs. One is all for shooting Sinead. His reasoning is two-fold: firstly, Sinead proved himself to be invulnerable last episode and he really wants to see it in the flesh. Secondly, any given episode of Smallville requires Sinead to either lose his memory or be shot. He lost his memory last week. Ergo, this week he needs to be shot.
The Other Thug has twin counter-arguments. Firstly, Sinead doesn't have to lose his memory or be shot. He could have sex with a hot brunette. Secondly, he hates the bangy sound guns make. "Hurts my ears," he says.
The First Thug doesn't have time to find a hot brunette. Not at this hour. So he shoots Sinead in the shoulder. Sinead screams in gunshot agony.
"Hmmm, that's odd," says First Thug, as Sinead bleeds all over the place.
Elsewhere, Lois has had second thoughts about the Kent explanation for the barn door nearly falling on her killer body. She brings TIAC over to show her the door in question.
"Probably satellite debris," says TIAC.
"A wooden satellite?" says Lois.
"Could be Chinese."
Superlad has popped over to the mansion to see if he can find Sinead. Instead, Lana's there.
"What are you doing here?" says Superlad.
"Playing the piano really, really badly."
"No, I mean--"
"Oh. I live here now."
"Well, fine."
"Fine."
"Fine."
"I'm so pretty"
And so forth. Superlad runs off. Lana stays behind to watch some of Sinead's security camera footage of her undressing. "I'm so pretty," she says to herself. She tries to find some other footage of her physical perfection but succeeds only in finding evidence of where Sinead is being held.
She sighs. Heads off to investigate.
Superlad has joined forces with TIAC, who consults her script. "We need to go to Sinead's private investigator's office and look for more clues," she says. Off they go.
Scripts! Fah! Who needs them? That's Porthos's way of thinking. He's instead gone straight to the easily deduced source of Sinead's abduction - Oliver 'Green Arrow' Queen. GA went to boarding school with Sinead and also majored in Circuitous Multi-Layered Conversation.
So GA and Porthos proceed with the understated subtext. Which is to do with GA kidnapping Sinead and how he better not harm a hair on Sinead's head. They have a subtextual laugh about this.
By now, Superlad and TIAC have found their way into Sinead's PI's office. Superlad's found a secret room with the ol' X-Ray peepers, but is still feeling too run down to tear the door open with his bare hands.
"Oh, come on," says TIAC. "Without the superstrength, what good are you?" She sighs. "Why don't you blow the door open then?"
Before she can clarify that she's using some more of the sarcasm, Superlad's done it. Super breath, he thinks. Awesome. Now he truly is the most powerful being on Earth.
Lana has, of course, totally bollocksed up the rescue of Sinead. She's been captured and held hostage while Sinead is forced to have some fake super-serum (don't ask) injected into him.
As always, Sinead headbutts his way out of trouble. Lana joins in with some of her martial arts nonsense, until she somehow sets the building on fire. Sinead sighs and accepts his impending flamey death by banging a bucket into a fence.
The flames come ever closer. Oh no! What can possibly save them?
The flames all go out somehow and the episode moves into the endgame.
Sinead and Lana discuss the nude footage of her. "This is the way I live, Lana," says Sinead. "Take it or leave it." "But I want a mirror up there," whines Lana. "Fine," says Sinead. "I'll sort it out within the hour," he lies.
GA reprimands his henchmen for shooting Sinead in the shoulder. "I'm Green Arrow," he says. "Not Green Freaking Bullet. Dismissed."
TIAC shows up with a pentagonal kite, which she places in front of Superlad's chest for our amusement. Lois also shows up to reveal an article she's written on wooden Chinese satellite debris has been published in The New York Times. "That's great, Lois," says Superlad, not even paying attention. "Hey, why don't you come swimming with us down at the lake?" Lois tries to bring up the newspaper front page again, but Superlad maintains his focus. "Look, are you getting in the damn bikini or what?" Lois points out it's going to rain. Superlad subtly blows the much needed crop rains away. "Bikini. Now," he orders.
Fine stuff. Let's tick another superpower off the list. Next week: The much-misunderstood microscopic vision.
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