Combat

DVD, Smallville S6 (Combat)

A swirling cacophony flows over the episode, mainly at the end, where strange emotions and events play together, uncertainty clouding much of it, but this cacophonic style is true of the whole episode - it's a load of bright lights, loud noise and unreality, so it's fitting that the subject was basically wrestling. Every sci-fi/fantasy series has to have a wrestling episode. I don't know why, but previous examples include the Rock appearing in 'Star Trek: Voyager,' Big Show in 'Star Trek: Enterprise' and now we have Kane in 'Smallville.' And Ashley, but I'd never heard of her. It makes sense for wrestlers to be in these things because they're acting all the time in their profession so as long as it's a macho story about fighting then they fit right in.

The title might better have served the content if it had been called 'Anger' as 'Combat' sounds too detached from the fiery rage Clark's gone through now that he's been forced to accept Lana and Lex are married. The story is really much more about this and his guilt for feeling that way, than fighting (and for killing Titan, the ex-Phantom Zoner played by Kane). I have no idea if Titan was an established character or one they created for the series, but in either case he wasn't a character, more of a catalyst for Clark to get over his frustration and move on to the next level, which is that it's occurred to him that Lana may have been coerced into making her decision. It's a bit of a leap, and a fanciful one at that, and I can already imagine the scepticism he'll be treated with whenever he airs this particular idea.

On Lana's side she also goes through a tough time of it, refusing to completely embrace her marriage with the excuse she hasn't caught up with it all yet, which then leads to her baby having complications. Is this something to do with Lex? In jealousy did he give her something that would induce early birth so they could get on with married life or was the baby fine and he just got that new doctor, Dr. Allbright, to remove it without Lana knowing and just say it went wrong? Why does he shed a tear when he throws the baby's picture into the fire (along with Lana's medical records from the other doctor, Dr. Langstrom whom he killed last episode and which he'd promised to get for her), is it because he genuinely lost a baby he wanted, is it because his experiment's gone wrong, or is it because he's sorry for Lana? Is the baby in fact alive and well and destined to grow up in secret? All these questionable outcomes could be true, it's difficult to tell.

Lois Lane makes it back to the series after a break and immediately gets into a cage fight, first with some female fighter (who was pretty useless it must be said), then against Clark. It's kind of embarrassing the way the writers use her sometimes and demeans the character, and also she's completely on the outside as usual. Unless she was actually conscious and witnessed some of Clark's fight with Kane, sorry, Titan… But that's not even hinted at. The underground fight club with its internet output gave the budget a bit of relief as it meant they didn't have the screaming crowd associated with wrestling. It was sickening to have this internet site where people could vote on whether Titan's 'krypto' opponent (as Chloe called them), would live or die.

The episode was loud, brash and full on visually, though not mentally, with only the talk between Clark and Martha at the end to breathe some goodness and worthiness into a basic thumping episode. Clark feels remorse over killing Titan and worries he'll have to kill all the other Zoners he thinks must be out there, his Mother reassuring him that the difference between them is that he feels sorry for what happened whereas Titan would have killed without thought. Then again he looked like he would do most things without thought. The Belle Reve angle didn't add much and the irritating cowboy host looked like he should have been one of the patients, not an employee. It's also terrible security that he could get patients out, have them killed and then get them back in their cells. Belle Reve should really be investigated, big time! There was a reminder of Green Arrow and the lads fighting against Lex' plans by infiltrating the various facilities which is good to know, but what Lex has in store remains to be seen. We were due a duff episode and this fitted the bill.

**