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Underground > Film, TV & Theatre >

Smallville: "Justice"

17:41 / 11.01.07

I'm going to say that I do not watch this show. I used to watch it but it lost me early on and now I only catch it when people tell me to keep on the look out for a particularly good episode... But this has me genuinely excited!

The only thing that bugs me is the absence of super-estrogen… Would it have been all that difficult to introduce Wonder Girl or (Wonder Woman if the rights permit) into this little boy’s club?

20:36 / 11.01.07

No pic or link there -- but yes, I've heard about this and it should be fun. I have to check on when exactly the episode is airing - is it tonite?

21:12 / 11.01.07

Ah, they took out the pic. It was a shot of Impulse, Green Arrow, Clark, Aquaman, and Cyborg walking away from an explosion.

23:26 / 11.01.07

Wow, those costumes are just awful.

23:28 / 11.01.07

seconded.

Keith, like a scientist

14:49 / 12.01.07

yeah, i dunno if this is gonna work or not. this show has really gone down hill since the one bright point last season: the Clark tells Lana, time travels and Pa Kent Dies episode. Ever since then it's been varying degrees of ok, but this season has been really bizarre.

The direction is horrible, the acting insanely exaggerated or the exact opposite of that: wooden and practically narcoleptic. on top of this, they have some nut doing the sound effects and sound design that doesn't understand what the hell he/she is doing. the oddest sounds in the most inappropriate scenes.

22:59 / 12.01.07

I checked out last night's ep. in case it was the Justice episode (that's next Thurs. night); I haven't watched the show in many, many months. Turns out it was mostly lackluster with a few interesting/fun tidibts:

1) After Lois suspects that Ollie is the mysterious Green Arrow (whose hood conceals his face), Clark dresses up as Arrow, saving Lois and some other people, with Ollie standing there, to throw suspicion off Ollie. Lois kisses Clark-as-Ollie (she's been dating Oliver Queen for a while in the show) and says "Ollie" is an amazing kisser. So there's the first kiss between Clark and Lois, but Lois thinks she's kissing Ollie. (sure, the hood wouldn't hide someone's face THAT much, but it's just a TV show) Fun riff on the "one heroes dresses up as another hero to throw secret ID suspicion off" concept.

Also, Clark does some super-speed & super-strength things while dressed up as Green Arrow, so Lois thinks that Green Arrow must have super powers also. Hee hee.

2) Lana has been dating Lex, and the one and only interesting thing here is that Lana's suspicions about Clark having some weird secret are being fueled by Lex, and Lana's getting a bit darker/more pushy. The real interesting thing here (for me, anyway) is seeing the normally wooden Kristin Kreuk start to actually act like Michael Rosenbaum -- it's like after she's been dating Lex and hanging around him so much, she's starting to develop his suspicious stare, his creepy, insistent tone of voice, his deliberate calculating ways, and his speech rhythms. That was kinda cool to see.

I don't expect the "Justice" ep. to be all that great, but I will most likely tune in just to check it out, for fun.

13:53 / 18.01.07

This is on tonight - a reminder for anyone who's interested.

Elijah, Freelance Rabbi

17:00 / 18.01.07

Is it just me or are they all wearing custom sleeveless hoodies?

18:28 / 18.01.07

Not you. *lol* They're all taking their design cues off the lines of Ollie's Green Arrow costume; presumably since he's the one with lots of money, he designed them for the other guys.

They're certainly not great costumes by any means. Cyborg's looks especially weird and oversized on his frame.

19:23 / 18.01.07

It hasn't been getting great reviews but I'm interested to see what happens. It is written by an ex-Buffy/Angel writer.

00:31 / 19.01.07

Wow, that was pretty bad. Every scene was just predictable as hell, Arthur Curry and Victor Stone kinda sucked (actors and portayal of the characters), the soap opera ending between Ollie and Lois was just awful.... talking about 'the name of our team should have 'Justice' in it since Luthor's gonna get a big heaping load of it!' Whoooo boy, this really stunk. One fun idea (only vaguely suggested by the writers) is that the Smallville version of Ollie has gathered a super-team of 'Robin Hood's Merry Men.'

Chloe-as-Oracle heading up the 'watchtower' guiding the heroes through their mission was mildly interesting. But not nearly enough to save this episode. As Entertainment Weekly wrote in their review of the ep., "If Smallville wants to get its thunder back from Heroes, it's gotta work a lot harder."

Man, they need some new writers on this show. (I know this writer was a former Buffy/Angel staffer, but clearly this writer wasn't doing anything too spectacular on there...either that or the producers dumbed the script down.) I remember when this show has really strong writing (around season 3-4 it seemed, if memory serves), where each scene was not a cliche soap operafest (or obvious WB characters-with-powers scene), and they were really having fun playing with new spins on the characters we know so well. The writing lately has been as if the target audience is 11-year olds - and they're not 'talking up' to that audience.

Next week's ep. has the famous 'episode where the lead character thinks he's crazy/in an insane asylum but it's really an evil plot so he must reject this reality' plot, although J'Onn J'Onzz is guest-starring to telepathically guide Clark out of this sinister delusion. Yawn.

Elijah, Freelance Rabbi

02:52 / 19.01.07

Next week's ep. has the famous 'episode where the lead character thinks he's crazy/in an insane asylum but it's really an evil plot so he must reject this reality'

I wonder if that one is also written by an ex Buffy staffer.

I agree with everything Finder said. There were small moments that made me smile throughout, but for the most part I spent the episode waiting for it to be good.

Did Clark lose his X-Ray vision somewhere while I haven't been watching him, or did he forget he had it while stumbling around the base looking for Impulse? The Lois/Ollie thing is utter crap. Clark still being mad when people fuck with Lex is totally bonkers. Cyborg's eye effect was pretty sweet, once. WHY do they need Aquaman? This version doesn't even seem to talk to fish.

It seems really obvious to me that a few seasons ago when Adam Knight was introduced they wanted to make him Bruce and do the Justice story. When the Batman thing got scrapped the put the idea on the back burner and we got Lana The Witch and when that sucked decided to try for the Justice thing with Green Arrow. I mean, come on, the handshake at the end of the episode was pure Bruce/Clark.

14:52 / 19.01.07

Yeah, this episode was pretty bad. Cloe (as always) is the best part of the show, which I why I watch Veronica Mars. I liked her as Oracle and would've really liked if that would've been her code name.

I liked Bart/Impulse a lot, but his character is pretty hard to get wrong. The CW should really consider giving him his own show after Smallville ends.

Aquaman and Cyborg were completely useless and the show would've improved dramatically if they were allowed to use Batman instead of Green Arrow.

The episode was crap, but think shows like Heroes and the Justice League cartoon have really spoiled me.

Keith, like a scientist

17:52 / 20.01.07

Did Clark lose his X-Ray vision somewhere while I haven't been watching him, or did he forget he had it while stumbling around the base looking for Impulse?

I think there was a lot of lead shielding throughout the facility.

My expectations were pretty low, so I was mildly surprised when it wasn't the utter horribleness I imagined. I vaguely liked it, but I'm probably used to the "Smallville lens" that coats everything. Chole as Oracle was somewhat neat, in that it kind of paid off her character's purpose throughout the show in a DC way. She's always kind of done that stuff for Clark, but now she's in front of big honkin' clocktowers, which they oh-so-cutely called "Watchtower."

Martian Manhunter is really in the next episode? I missed that preview.

18:23 / 21.01.07

They don't say specifically he's Martian Manhunter in the preview, but I've read online that the guy telling Clark to break through somehow will be J'Onn (he's always showed up in a cameo in a previous episode as a shadowy figure with red eyes who leaves Oreos everywhere).

02:44 / 22.01.07

This episode was horrid.
They should end the show and start a new one called Metropolis. Clark can start to experiment with the real live superhero idea, Lex can pull the gloves off and be as deceiving and coniving and evil as he wants, but on a bigger scale. And Lois can be replaced with someone who can act.

and we can bring in those damn Wonder Twins.

18:24 / 24.01.07

he's always showed up in a cameo in a previous episode as a shadowy figure with red eyes who leaves Oreos everywhere

Im ny turf, that episode - in which Kal-el get his butt handed to him by the marrow-eating version of The Rock - just aired yesterday and the Oreos were a dead give-away (for those who actually read DC), IMHO. A "Justice League" episode without J'onn J'onz? Big mistake

01:56 / 25.01.07

man.
that was terrible.
i havent been watching smallville since i last watched it and realised it was absol;utely fucking terrible, but hey. i'm a sucker. i went back one more time, hoping beyond hope, throwing good hope after bad, that it wouldnt suck the proverbial donkey's ass.

queen was totally shit, completely unlike any of the olli queen's i have ever known, and his green arrow was pathetic.
impulse was okay-ish in comparison to the rest of the badly scripted tripe, but they really need to give that kid both a hearty facial slap and several issues of the comic books his character is taken from. sure, he looks good when he's running. because he isnt acting when he's running - he's a special effect. on which, i thought the sound effect for his super speed was far too loud and bassy. a sonic boom? every time he moves? maybe, but they sure as shit didnt sell it.

clark was as shit as ever, but hey. i hate the actor, and i think his character is as badly written as any in the show.

cyborg has never been a character i've known outside of teen titans, so i guiess he could have been perfect. maybe he's meant to be shallow as fuck.
aquaman... i don't even want to talk about aquaman.

none of the soap elements seemed to ring true, and i didnt belive in lois lane for one second. the way she cut off clark with "...buy more bikinis!" made me want to stab my eyes out with a biro.

and yeah. is it just me, or do most of the characters seem to be drawing from the same personality pool half the time?

the fact that it is being compared to heroes unfavourably shoudl seal the deal for anyone wondering if this is a terrible show.
heroes is barely pasable trash that i only watch because i am a sucker who believes it might improve . the plot moves at a snail's pace(we're up to episode twelve, and we havent even completed a story arc! is this the legacy of lost?), and i don't think i'll be all that bothered if it gets cancelled before it resolves.

what gives?
why can't we get a good live action superhero show?

17:55 / 13.02.07

Kinda fun...E! Online's Kristin Veitch just broke the story that Lynda Carter will be appearing as Chloe's long-lost mother. They did once have a headline shown in the show about an Themysciran Princess, but Carter will not be Wonder Woman:

---------------
Have you ever heard a piece of scoop so good, it made you whip out your Wonder Woman Underoos and dance? Well, that's exactly what I'm doing (perhaps figuratively, perhaps not) upon hearing that Lynda Carter is going to be guest starring on Smallville this season.

According to sources connected to Smallville, Carter isn't necessarily playing a superhero but in fact will be the mother of someone we already know and love: Chloe! How great is that? She'll make her appearance Apr. 12.

I'm also told that the reason Mama Sullivan comes back into Chloe's life after all these years will be made apparent in this Thursday's episode (in the last 10 minutes—so keep your eyes peeled).
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The show still sucks, though, sadly. It seems to have hit its high mark a long time ago...