#6.19 “Nemesis” Review

NOTE: I discuss major plot points in this review so if you try hard to avoid that sort of thing you should know better than reading one of my reviews. Be warned, read any further at your own risk.

Wow.

Just. Wow.

Just when I thought this awesome season couldn’t get any better, they deliver this terrific episode. It’s probably one of the stronger episodes of the season, if not the series. Despite one or two things, like getting Lex kidnapped again and a couple of other picayunish contrivances, this was about as close to perfect that an episode can get.

One thing I was worried about when I heard about this episode was that how were they going to keep up the suspense with two men trapped in a collapsed tunnel. I mean, there’s only so much that can happen, right? Well, I shouldn’t have worried. Caroline has done so well in her previous efforts for Smallville, “Oracle” and “Cyborg.” (I’ll conveniently ignore the fact she wrote “Subterranean” for the sake of this argument. Although that wasn’t a horrible episode, it just wasn’t that great either.) Anyway, I shouldn’t have fretted. I mean, just the idea sounded great.

Clark injured, weakened by kryptonite, and trapped with Lex and no way to get out? All the while, Clark is still jealous and hurt about Lex’s apparent manipulation of Lana to force her to the altar and Lex is rightly convinced his wife still loves his ex-best friend more than him… There was zero chance the two former friends wouldn’t have a serious confrontation.

It’s such a wonderful gold-mine of potential for drama even lousy writer probably could have made the script passable. How could anyone except a complete hack even screw that up? Fanboy contentions to the contrary, I don’t believe any writer on the staff could be described as that despite the occasional dud. So I shouldn’t have worried.

Aside from a couple of things, which I’ll get to later, the episode didn’t disappoint. It was everything I had expected and more. The script was tight and had some great act break cliffhangers and got several storylines moved along in major ways. For Caroline, the dialogue was especially awesome.

At several times, Caroline had written words that meant more than one thing depending on what you knew. I love when writers in any fiction form (whether it be film, tv or in novels) do that. She’d put layers of meaning into many parts of the episode’s dialogue and it made for a much more fulfilling experience, even with multiple viewings.

Although there were many examples of this during the episode, Caroline had done particularly well with the layers of meaning when, at the end of the episode, Lana asked Lex what she’d done to deserve him loving her. It twisted the knife into Lex more deeply; I think he finally realized how profoundly he’d manipulated the love of his life, and just how agonizing losing the “baby” had been for her. The whole exchange with Lex was also painful for Lana. Her knowing what he did to her, even though he misunderstood the real meaning behind the question, it was still a good question to ask. What had she ever done to deserve his way of showing her love? It was a painfully poignant moment.

The scenes between Lex and Clark in the tunnels were outstanding. Clark was at times angry and resentful but finally, when Lex came back, regretful he’d thought that he’d leave him there to die.

The dialogue was excellent, but the character development was better. Lana has moved into a whole new world. Forget being scorned, hell hath no fury like a woman who had been tricked by her boyfriend into thinking she had been pregnant so she’d marry him and then made to think she’d lost the baby only once they were safely wedded.

When Lana found the blueprints to the tunnels, she took absolutely no action in order to get revenge on Lex. That was pretty cold. She was going to let him die and I wouldn’t have blamed her one bit if she had. What he did to her was so wrong Lex had finally, irrevocably, turned into evil. She was right to turn a little bit evil to protect herself and those she loves.

However, I suspect not all of her rookie attempts at Luthor style machinations were expert enough to fool Lex for long. Shooting what looked to be Lex’s prize, silver plated gun without cleaning it and replacing the spent bullets may not have been a very good idea. One look at that gun and Lex will know she was the one that shot the locks off that case, not the police. Not exactly a smart move on her part.

However, her two interactions with Lionel were classic Luthor and very well played. She pressured her father-in-law in very smart ways and I was glad she did. I had mentioned before in my review for Promise that what Lionel had done in threatening to kill Clark was inexplicable. He had seemed at points to be a nicer guy, more on Clark’s side…. Thanks to Lana’s nascent evil-doing, he finally made his real motivations clear. However, he’d only somewhat explained himself since what little he had said left open many more questions than the ones he had answered.

What exactly is Lionel protecting Clark from? How does making Lana marry Lex keep Clark safe? What is it that Lex would do to Clark if Lana weren’t in the picture? Does the danger to Clark have to do with the little 33.1 project that Lex is working, “Ares?”

Ares, by the way, is the name of the ancient Greek God of War. He was the son of Hera and Zeus and, in ancient Greek, his name literally means “injurer” or “destroyer.” (Okay, I looked that up. I’m not that smart.)

Anyway, with Lex knowing at least one of Clark’s abilities for sure, he had said that hitting Clark with that chisel was like hitting stone, would Clark have been destined to be added to that project? Is marrying Lana enough of a distraction for Lex so that is what makes Clark safe? Or he is safe because of Lana’s affection for her ex? If that’s the case, why wasn’t Chloe (Lana’s dearest friend) safe? Once Lex finds out that Lana knows what he did to her, and maybe headed to talk things over with a good divorce attorney, will Clark suddenly be back in Lex’s crosshairs? Will Lionel still be able to help Clark then? What does the phantom that Lana saw in that video have to do with the Ares Project? Has Lex figured out the phantoms are more aliens, like Titan from the fight club in “Combat?” Is Lionel truly good now? Or is the Magnificent Bastard back and only protecting Clark for his own very selfish reasons?

The questions Lionel opened up with his “explanation” are seemingly endless…

The plot thickens with only a few more episodes to go before the season finale. I can’t wait to see where they’re going with all of these intersecting storylines…

I loved that Caroline managed to put in major mythic canon that hadn’t really been addressed by Smallville much before. I’m specifically referring to the connection between Clark’s powers and Earth’s yellow sun. I think the only time in the series Clark’s powers being derived from the sun had ever really been a plot point was back in Season 3’s “Perry,” when unusually intense sunspot activity adversely affected Clark’s powers. Clark should feel rejuvenated in sunlight, it’s fairly common occurrence in the comics and in previous incarnations on TV, and in this episode we finally got to see it.

Probably the main problem I had with the script itself revolved around that pesky Kryptonite. How exactly did it find its way down into the walls of a tunnel complex that had looked like it was from the Cold War era? And how can Clark remain conscious with that much Kryptonite around?
That said, I can see the reason why it happened the way it did. As a writer, you are given the job to get Lex and Clark in an enclosed space with Clark weakened, while away from rejuvenating sunlight, and to up the stakes by putting their lives into danger. So why not put them into a partially collapsed underground complex with no way out as time-bombs are about to go off? Sounds good, right? Yeah, pretty good until you decide to have Clark weakened by kryptonite in the walls of a tunnel system that had been abandoned decades before the first meteor shower brought all that radioactive rock to Smallville….

Oops.

Well, logic problems abound in this episode if you look closely enough but I will freely admit that I didn’t really care. There was so much else to love about this episode for me to be bothered too much about that.

Anyway, the acting was terrific again this episode. Tom Welling was simply awesome. Clark was put into a very difficult situation. He went down to save Lex and he was the one who ended up needing saving. Tom played Clark as heroic, risking his life to save Lex’s simply because it was the right thing to do. His dilemma was believable because he was obviously torn. Once Clark was down in the tunnels, he was frustrated by being weakened and unable to finish the job, not that he ever stopped trying, and Tom played his anger, frustration, weariness, and surprise at Lex’s rescue of him, perfectly. I’m glad when Clark is passionate. Clark’s usually so closed off emotionally, it’s nice to see Tom to be able to let loose. Besides, he does “angry” better than almost anyone. At the end, when Clark realized that maybe he was at least partly to blame for who Lex had become because he’d given up on him, the epiphany was heart breaking. Although, personally I don’t think Clark is at all to blame but in a literary sense he has to be. There is no evil without good to fight against it. The guys who were black hats always have to fight the ones wearing white ones, or they don’t look as evil.

Michael was as good as he’s ever been. The range of emotions Lex went through, were amazing to watch. Again, the scenes between Clark and Lex were wonderful. Lex blames Clark for a lot of their problems, but the way Michael played Lex’s reactions to Clark’s anger was fantastic. He’d made it clear that Lex knows he wasn’t totally blameless in their growing animosity toward each other. It was fine line to tread and he played it so well. Also, later in the episode during Lana’s speech about how much it would hurt to have someone lie about something profound, Lex almost seemed to crumble under the unspoken accusation. The looks that passed across Michael’s face were so well done I could almost tell what Lex was thinking from moment to moment. He was truly at the top of his game in this episode.

I’d also like to add that it was wonderful to have the two men play so many scenes together in this episode. They haven’t actually been together a lot lately and, as both rivals and friends, they have wonderful chemistry together. It was an added treat for them to be in the same scenes for most of the episode, whether they were working against each other or for each other.

Kristin Kreuk was awesome in this episode and it was probably the best acting she’s ever done. I loved to see her holding her own with John Glover’s Lionel and being decisive in shooting off the locks to see what her dear hubby was up to. But Kristin especially shone in Lana’s final scene with Lex, where’s she’s lying to him about what happened on their wedding day. Lana went through a wide range of emotions in that scene and the devastation of knowing what Lex had done to her was touching and painful to watch.

The production design was terrific. The tunnels Production Designer James Philpot created looked old and distressed and they were gloomily filmed by Director of Photography, Glen Winter. I loved the high contrast ratio (the ratio of difference between the brightest lights and the darkest shadows) at several spots throughout the episode, but especially in the tunnel scenes. I adored the lightest whites being so bright they were actually overexposed. It looked much better as it was aired than it had in the “director’s cut” on the CWTV.com video site. The only problem I think I had with the photography was when Clark was asking Lex about how he’d forced Lana to marry him, Clark’s face was too dark. I would have liked to have seen the look on his face in that moment more clearly.

As good as the action can get on Smallville, sometimes they simply fail. The scuffle between Lex and Jodi over the gun was over too quickly with a totally expected result. It’s the worst kind of trite move, attempting to inject a bit of suspense, to have the gun go off in between two people and force the audience to guess who got shot. I suppose I should let them slide on that, had it been anyone else other than Lex, it would have been less suspenseful. He’s been shot so many times, maybe he might have gotten shot one more time, but it was Jodi who’d gotten shot. She was doomed to die so she couldn’t disarm the bombs and remove the threat to Lex and Clark.

That moment was about as contrived, and as anti-climactic, as it comes. I think I would have preferred Lex shooting her in cold blood as she turned the switch to kill him in return.

Despite the contrivances and inconsistencies, this episode actually improved on each viewing and that almost always gets a high score from me. The fact that the acting and writing were so far above the average, and I don’t score in quarters, almost dictated that I grade this episode on a bit of a curve. I give it 5 gloomy, abandoned tunnel complexes out of a possible 5.

Note: The views of Triplet don’t necessarily represent the thoughts and feelings of everyone at KryptonSite. Send her feedback.