#9.20 “Hostage” Review

NOTE: I’m going to spoil you on the ID of the Red Queen in the first paragraph, so literally: read no further if you wish to remain unspoiled. You have been warned.

One thing I really hated going into this episode was because of the trailer shown at the end of ‘Sacrifice’ I knew exactly who the Red Queen was. I supposed they never came out and said ‘Hey, heads up: Martha Kent is the Red Queen,’ but the trailer had a voiceover spoken by Annette that played over different images of the Red Queen. If that wasn’t bad enough, then they showed Martha dressed in red telling someone (it turned out it was Tess) that she didn’t comprehend how to truly protect someone that she loves. In that promo it was clear that Martha was the Red Queen.

Yet, all during the episode until the reveal in the Luthor mansion wine cellar, her identity was apparently a mystery to everyone else. Then they had Maxwell Lord trying to get Tess to admit she was the Red Queen, even though he would have known she wasn’t. Was that a red herring for Tess’ benefit or ours? In either case, I’m not sure it makes sense. For the former, I’m not sure Tess had heard of the Red Queen before this. Why tease her like that? As for the latter, if it was for our benefit, it doesn’t really work. Maxwell Lord knows who The Red Queen is, we saw him meet her (or get kidnapped by her) at the end of ‘Charade.’ So, that was weird…

And, as I guessed it would be given the way they’d been teasing how mysterious the Red Queen was, her real identity seemed to have been intended as a surprise until Martha was actually revealed in that scene with Tess. Every scene the Red Queen had been in up until that point had her face obscured in some way and she never spoke.

Any time we saw the Red Queen’s hands, they were gloved, and we never got a good look at her body. If she was walking away, she was either obscured either by distance or shadow or we only saw her feet or hands (obscured by gloves). Everything everyone did during the episode had obscured her ID up until that reveal in the wine cellar. Everyone was on the same page: acting, writing, directing, the Director of Photography, even the costume designer had worked to help hide her ID with those red leather gloves and those awesome red shoes.

Yet The CW marketing department apparently hadn’t gotten the memo about the Red Queen’s identity being a surprise. They’d done this kind of thing before which is the entire reason I don’t read the Official Episode Descriptions anymore. They always spoil things that are meant to be surprise reveals in the episode. I stopped reading them after the ‘Traveler’ description had revealed that Lionel kidnaps Clark. However, the way that episode had played out, it was clear that Lionel having been responsible for Clark’s capture was supposed to have been a surprise.

Now, they spoil important plot surprises in the trailers? I admit, Martha wearing all red maybe wasn’t completely like what they did with ‘Traveler,’ that Official Description actually had ‘Lionel kidnaps Clark’ as the title, but still… Martha wearing red at the end of a montage of images of the Red Queen was still a huge giveaway for me.
I guess I won’t be watching the trailers anymore, but I’ll never know for sure how I would have felt differently had I not known the Red Queen’s identity ahead of time.

Yet, the foreknowledge oddly didn’t really seem to hurt the episode that much for me. I’m not sure what’s to thank for that. Maybe it’s a testament to the way the show was written or, more likely, it’s because I just adored having Annette O’Toole back on the show. Martha made me forgive many of this episode’s sins, even though it really didn’t have any serious ones to begin with.

I adored that the episode’s writers, Jordan Hawley & Anne Cofell Saunders, brought Martha back for such an important episode. The fact that Annette O’Toole brought her real-life husband Michael McKean along as Perry White was just icing. They have a great chemistry together and the way it was written worked well for both characters. It also made for good drama.

Probably part of the reason it took me so long to finish this review was that I watched this episode about five times more than normal and then I went and dug out my Season 3 DVD set. Man, the show has changed a LOT since ‘Perry’, but it was good to see that episode again to remind me what Perry White had been like six years ago.
I’d like to think the writers also dug out that episode to see what had made it so charming and popular. There was a lot less menace and tons more humor in the earlier episode, Clark accidentally tossing that tractor and it landing right in front of Perry always makes me laugh. That was funny. I’m not sure the humor here was quite as funny, but Perry was brought forward in a very nice way. I could see the changes that time and six years of sobriety had wrought in him as a character. The writers did a good job with that aspect of the episode.

Martha had also been brought forward in a very believable way. I loved that Martha wasn’t really quite ready to move on, which also explained why we haven’t seen her much since she left at the end of season 6. That was a great way to cover that up in terms of the show’s continuity. It was terrific that it made Martha having been so scarce for the past three years actually be in character for her and it gave Annette some great moments to play.

It was touching to see how affected Martha was by seeing Jonathan’s gloves on the tool box. There were some very nice scenes between Martha and Clark surrounding that too. She clearly misses Jonathan still, as would be expected, so I’m glad they didn’t throw her at Perry completely. As she said, it is probably too soon. Her profound reaction to seeing Perry wearing Jonathan’s old jacket was proof of that. That was another heartbreaking scene.

I also liked what they’d done that echoed the previous episode with Perry White. The save that Lois performed off the roof of that building was similar in a lot of ways to the save in ‘Perry’ that Lana and Pete had performed back six seasons ago. No, there was no superheroing from Clark, just an all-human-powered save by Lana and Pete. And the ‘rope’ this time was an orange power cable, though last time it had been an orange climbing rope. What Pete was doing with a rope like that when he and Clark had been going camping, I have no idea, but I loved how this episode seemed to have echoed that one.

Although, as much as I really enjoyed this episode I guess one problem I had with it was Martha being the Red Queen. It’s an interesting twist and I suppose it works on one level: she is far younger than the traditional elderly Martha in the comics, so maybe it isn’t that far of a stretch. She’s also a very strong-willed character, so of course she’s going to do what she can to protect Clark. Yet, I’m not sure I buy Martha going covert. Her resolve to protect Clark would likely make her a formidable person to deal with, but would she have the wherewithal?

I mean, doing what she did would take a lot of money and the last time I checked US Senators don’t make all that much. Not that I keep track of this sort of thing, but I believe they make less than a couple of hundred thousand a year. That’s not much, in the grand scheme of things. I don’t know, maybe what she’d done hadn’t cost that much, but still… How many people did she really have looking for the Book of Rao and maybe doing stuff for her in Nairobi? It strains credulity, but probably not enough for me to count down too much for it.

I absolutely adored that Clark figured it out though. He’s a smart guy and doesn’t need things to be spelled out to him like a child, and neither do the viewers, even though the writers sometimes seem to forget that. I’m glad that sort of plot point has become far less common.

Another problem I had with the episode was that Clark’s and Lois’ breakup initially seemed contrived and out of character. However, with subsequent viewings that didn’t bother me as much. I suppose tension was needed to lead up to the season finale episode, and this break up (or ‘break-up’) seriously complicated the situation with Martha being there, but really? Do they really have to go there?

Unfortunately, this just seems more like the Clark & Lana will-they-or-won’t-they-get-together (and will-Clark-or-won’t-Clark-disclose-his-secret-to-her) merry-go-round. I hope they don’t drag this on too long into the start of next season, but I suppose there is no drama without conflict so relationship friction for Clark is probably unavoidable. I just hope they can make it believable and well-motivated.

Yet, all that drama had terrific consequences for both Clark and Lois. She learned more about herself this episode and had a wonderful character arc. I liked what Clark took away from it too; he saw that unless he changes his normal MO the secrets he’s been keeping are going to jeopardize his relationship with Lois. We’ll have to see how that works out later, but it should build into interesting things next season if they stick with that. We really don’t need more of Clark lying to his girlfriend. He’s done that way too much.

I liked how they used Oliver Queen and Maxwell Lord in this episode. Maxwell Lord has some serious mind control powers in the comics, I’m glad we saw more of that for his return. Although, I hope he wasn’t killed by that weird tone over the phone. I hope he can come back in some way, I like him as a character and I’d like to see him more.

As character cameos go, Oliver Queen only showing up in some weird dreamscape of Tess’ thanks to Maxwell Lord’s manipulations was a doozy. I had a feeling something was off about how he was acting right from the start, but it was an interesting twist that I didn’t really see coming. That was very well done.

The second-to-last episode of the season usually is in the unenviable position of setting up stuff for the major complications of the season finale. What normally ends up happening is they deliver what fans scornfully refer to as ‘filler episodes’ at this point in the season, where nothing of note really happens and the overall story doesn’t show any real progression because they’re throwing too much stuff into the episode. This hour of course didn’t side-step that completely, so much of this helped to transition into the season ender, but I think what they did do with that had set up things well for that while still giving us compelling drama in this episode.

As for the lack of consequence: I’m not sure “Smallville” ever really has episodes that are completely without consequence, but the problem with events not having serious repercussions used to be worse in earlier seasons. Important things used to happen all the time that left no serious lasting affects. Think back to Season 5 and Alicia’s return for two episodes: Clark was seriously involved with her, they had even gotten married (although that didn’t stick since they were both underage) and yet after she had died in the next episode it was like nothing had ever happened. I don’t think her name was ever even mentioned again and her loss never affected Clark in any real way in the long term. In later seasons, the show has better dealt with things like that.

This episode actually is proof of that: yeah, Martha is almost inexplicably absent from the show because Annette has moved on in her career, yet this episode proved that her moving away has had serious consequences for her character. Those are not seen on the show since she’s not on it anymore, but Martha suffering for her choice to stay away makes sense for the character. In fact, it’s awesome.

Of course she would suffer. She’s moved away from the only family she has left. She loves Clark, but the given reason of why she left not only makes sense (it’s too painful to try and deal with the memories associated with the farm), it’s also the best possible explanation for her being gone. This was a great way to handle that: they made off-camera real-life stuff work for the show.

I can tell that is working far better than how they’ve tried to keep Lex involved in the show after Michael Rosenbaum left, or even how they’ve barely mentioned Lana aside from some off-the-cuff comments from Clark. It might surprise some people for me to say that about Lana, but that’s a shame.

You’d think she would have come in handy against several dozen Kryptonians: she’d be a living kryptonite weapon. She’s only been only obliquely referred to since she left, but an actual mention every now and then might be nice. As much as I hated her storyline last season, she was very important to Clark and should still be.

She should keep in touch with Chloe even if she’s not calling Clark. I would think Chloe, with her superhero-sidekick gig becoming a full-time job, would appreciate updates from her former best-friend on any crime-fighting she’s doing. She might even be able to help Lana with information. Lana doesn’t even have to show up since I know Kristin is off doing other things, but a mention of her would be nice now and then.

I’m glad they clarified that the castle that had figured so prominently in previous episodes was actually in Colorado. I think that hard to believe, why would anything that the government is involved with be that elaborate? However, I guess it’s better that than Clark saving Chloe from a complex in Europe. (Which is where Checkmate was located in the comics.)

I am a bit confused how this ‘Kryptonian bible’ that the Book of Rao is supposed to be is actually something that will exile all Kryptonians from earth, including Clark, or even how on earth Martha had figured all that out. Is it the Kryptonian bible or a device or somehow both? I guess I’m not going to sweat the details too much. The reveal of that fact made for one hell of a cliff-hanger ending that tied in perfectly to the season finale.

Despite the few problems I had with it, overall this was an excellent episode. It had terrific act breaks, had an exciting storyline and the ending was quite a cliff-hanger.

The story had also brought back Perry White and Martha in a terrific way, and even though the Tess/Maxwell/Oliver tangle seemed a bit out of place at first, I thought it had worked out well in the end. The writers did a good job bringing all that together.. I also like the continuity used in the episode, Perry coming back just in time to save Clark’s and Lois’ jobs was great. He was able to keep his promise to Clark made back in Season 3’s ‘Perry’ to get Clark work. Maybe it was bad that it took six seasons for us to get that pay off, but it was still nice to see. Jordan and Anne did a terrific job with this episode.

Tom Welling was fantastic as Clark. He played Clark as so earnest and strong willed, yet my favorite parts were the scenes Clark had with Martha. Tom has such good chemistry with all the women in the show, albeit in different ways, but he had really shone in Clark’s scenes with his mother. It seems that there is true affection between the two actors, they seemed so comfortable with each other and seemed to have easily slipped back into their old roles. It was different, Martha and Clark are different now than they were the last time Tom had played a scene with Annette, but still the ease they seemed to have had with each other really added to the scenes they shared. I especially liked the final scene with Martha, when Clark confronted her about being the Red Queen.

Allison Mack was awesome. Probably my favorite scene with her was when Chloe was talking to Clark about how she’d been having so many problems and decided to pull back. It was touching to see Chloe so affected by what had been going on and Allison had played that scene perfectly.

Erica Durance was wonderful. She was adorable in Lois’ scenes with Perry and I liked her a lot with Martha and Clark as well.

Cassidy Freeman was fantastic as Tess Mercer. The first scenes with Maxwell Lord were disjointed and Cassidy did an extremely effective job portraying Tess’ confusion and fear.

Justin Hartley had the nearly thankless task of having Oliver Queen only being in Tess’ dreamscape, but he did a terrific job. He played Oliver as basically the same, but there was an edge there that seemed different. So in looking at the episode several times, it almost like he was letting Gil Bellows’ portrayal of Maxwell Lord color the way he played Oliver in Tess’ dream. I thought it was very well done.

Annette O’Toole was outstanding as Martha Kent. It’s been so long since she’d last been on the show. The last time we’d seen her in the show (aside from a few still photos in the Kent farmhouse) had been in the season 6 finale, ‘Phantom.’ (Although I hope her line about coming back soon wasn’t just a line and that it means she will try to come back next season.) I had especially liked the scenes Martha had with Clark, especially the last one when she told Clark about what the Book of Rao does. It was heart wrenching.

Michael McKean was terrific as Perry White. It’s been so long since he’d last been on, ‘Perry’ had been on back in the fall of 2003, I wasn’t sure how well this would work out. Yet, he did a wonderful job. I think he was handled the changes that had happened to Perry very well.

Gil Bellows didn’t have much screen time, but I really like him as Maxwell Lord. I hope that Maxwell collapsing on the floor after that phone call to Martha doesn’t mean the end for him. I’d like to see him again.

Glen Winter did an excellent job as director. I was initially a bit weirded-out about how the Tess’ scenes with Maxwell Lord were handled, they were just so different than how the show usually looks, but given the fact that it was an induced dream (and not Tess really getting locked up in the Luthor mansion) it made sense. The unreality of those scenes was reinforced with jerky hand-held camera work which must have given the camera operator a real work-out. The scenes in Tess’ nightmares were disjointed and had a skewed POV: there were a lot of extreme close-ups, low angle shots, a lot of little jump cuts that only had minor changes from shot to shot and rough hand-held shots. They all contributed to the feeling that something was off. Even before Oliver stood up on a leg that couldn’t have held his weight because it had just been shot, I knew something was up. I didn’t know what, but when it was revealed to have been a dream, it made perfect sense. I really liked how all of those scenes were staged.

Glen also got solid performances from everyone. It was a terrifically acted outing and I have to think that Glen had something to do with that. It was another solid directorial effort from him.

Greg Middleton (previously credited as ‘Gregory Middleton’) has worked in other TV shows and feature films (most notably as the Second-Unit Cinematographer on “The Butterfly Affect”), but has also shot for Smallville before. It was quite some time ago, but he was the Director of Photography for Glen Winter’s directorial debut on the show, ‘Cyborg.’ That was a beautiful piece of photography, as was this.

Although I felt the dreamscape sequences in Tess’ head were initially jarring, upon subsequent views I thought those scenes were wonderful. The harsh, high contrast lighting with the de-saturated colors and abrupt changes in setups, along with the jump cuts from Editor Vikash Patel, were perfect for those scenes. It contrasted nicely at times with the far more colorful and sentimental scenes that had long, leisurely tracking shots, that took place with Martha back at the farm. It was a beautifully shot episode.

While it might not seem to be a perfect episode, for me it was pretty close. Yeah, this episode had some flaws, but ultimately for me they were minor and it didn’t affect the episode in any major way. I enjoyed this episode each and every time I viewed it. 5 golden Books of Rao 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.