Lower Decks

For the second straight week, I’m going to ask that you ignore a part of the plot of a Smallville episode because you will have to look passed it to see the good parts.  This week, instead of zombies, it will be Clark’s temporary power to read people’s thoughts.  It isn’t a Superman power, and you’re never going to hear from it again.  So put it out of your own mind, don’t worry about it, and try to focus on the rest of the episode.  Which, actually, isn’t that bad.

Because, when it comes down to it, the power that Jor-El gives Clark is pointless.  Clark is able to “hear” a few things from Lois that helps him get on her good side, but I don’t really see how it helped him defeat Toyman.  In fact, making it anything other than an attempt to get Lois and Clark closer is probably just a flat-out lie.

I actually liked the reasoning behind giving Clark the power, though.  Clark, as the Blur, is dealing with a bomber holding hostages, and he makes a mistake.  Jor-El tells him that his human side is overriding his Kryptonian intuition, and that he needs to be able to understand why humans do things so that he can save them better.

It makes sense, but Clark spends the majority of the episode trying to hook up with Lois.  Even when he uses the power to get clues about the bomber from witnesses, he’s doing it to impress his partner.  At the end of the day, it was a Lois & Clark power – not a Superman power.

So let’s forget about it and focus on Oliver.  We learn this week that Oliver has been beating him up about Lex.  One week it’s Jimmy, one week it’s his parents, and one week it’s Clark.  I realize Oliver is human, and he’s made a lot of mistakes since meeting Clark…but can we get back to the fun Oliver that everyone was excited to see?  The one who pulled off the badass move with the soda can back in season six.

But, alas, he’s still in his drunken funk.  The episode finds him in a Latin bar, drinking himself to death and looking for a fight.  Tess arrives before any fighting can happen, forcing Oliver to come with her to a shareholder’s meeting.  Apparently Queen Industries is floundering without any real leadership, and Oliver has become quite the joke in the business world.

And I couldn’t help but laugh at the idea that these two modern tycoons (Ollie and Tess) were shooting guns in some foreign cantina.  I realize that they’re both extraordinarily young to be in the positions they are, but don’t they need to act with a bit more discretion?  Imagine the same situation happening with Bill Gates and Warren Buffet, and I’m sure you’ll get a chuckle.

Everything in the episode, including the bomb sequence at the beginning, goes back to the Toyman.  He returns in the episode, trying to get Oliver to admit that he killed Lex (something Oliver pinned on Toyman).  It’s an interesting idea – the villain holds the hero hostage to prove that the villain is innocent.  Not only that, that the hero is guilty of murder.

I realize that Oliver isn’t really a hero right now, but all of that is true.  Oliver did kill Lex, and he got an innocent (although criminally insane) man blamed for it.  Pretty dark stuff if you ask me.

Toyman, holding the rest of the room hostage, gets Oliver to read a sort of confession, listing all the things he’s done wrong.  When it comes to the part about Lex’s murder, Oliver breaks down.  Once he’s sure everyone in the room is safe, Oliver steps off the pressure plate to kill himself.

And I’m hoping this is the bottom for Oliver.  Next week’s promo shows that he’ll be focused on heavily again, but it can’t get much worse than a suicide attempt, right?  He has to start finding himself again soon because the show simply can’t focus on Oliver too much.  And at the end of the day, Clark really isn’t doing a lot to help him.  In fact, I’d say he tried harder to save Davis and Lex than he’s done to help Oliver, and there’s a lot more potential in Oliver.

 And I’d like to say that I really like the use of Toyman.  I don’t know a terribly lot about the character, but he’s just an interesting guy to watch.  I’m sure it’d be hard to use him very often without getting corny, but I think he’s the kind of villain the show needs.  Particularly since he’s no physical match for Clark because the show seems insistent on not showing any actual fights.

Which brings me to the end, with Tess sending Toyman into solitary confinement so that he can work on Metallo’s kryptonite heart.  I’m not sure what Tess’ motivations are (does she know that the Kandorians built it?), but it’s certainly an intriguing move.  I hope we get to see Metallo again (with a real fight, please!), and it’d be interesting to see a team-up between the two villains.

So, all in all, not a terrible episode.  It brings us a little closer to the end of the “Oliver in the dumps” story, and it brought back an interesting villain.  Take out the ridiculous mind-reading power and the sappy Lois/Clark stuff (including some weird monster truck stuff that doesn’t make any sense either), and it works.

Next week, we get another DC character than I’m not very familiar with.  Hopefully we don’t have to ignore half the plot in that one.