Disciple

DVD, Smallville S9 (Disciple)

Once again, so much is crammed into so little space that could have expanded to fill an episode, and perhaps be more fulfilling. Because there's so much to like about this episode, but it's on the borderline of working quite well, I'm just not sure which way it balances in the end… Perhaps I can convince myself one way or the other. Firstly, it's a bit of a soppy one, with Clark and Lois all dating and cute stuff, only he's gone for a few seconds earlier than he would naturally have been and she gets shot by a Dark Archer. While it was a mystery that piqued the interest, I never had the slightest thought that this would be some kind of schizophrenic experience Oliver was going through and 'the darkness inside' was making him become some split personality who was taking out his mates. So that left an impersonator, and initially my thoughts flitted to Mia, Oliver's apprentice that we haven't seen since she joined his dojo, perhaps taking out Lois in jealousy since he keeps showing he wishes she was his girlfriend again. Lois' lack of dying was at first hard to believe - that an archer would be able to hit her, but fail to kill her when it looked like she'd been hit right in the middle, was too much, though later we learn that her attacker is just so good he can take people down minutely without killing or seriously injuring them. I did think Clark should have pursued the attacker when he enters the Watchtower after the attack on Chloe, as he was only seconds gone and Clark could easily have leapt up after him. But if he'd been caught there wouldn't have been much of an episode…

I'm guessing Vortigen is one more of those existing characters that I know nothing about, because he had the air of a real figure from the Green Arrow mythology rather than someone created for the series, and they mentioned 'The Dark Archer' a couple of times, so I'm guessing that's his monicker in the comics. Vortigen who's starting to lose the peak of his abilities (though he's still one of the top archers in the world, as Oliver says what he did, few would be capable of), so it would seem the height of arrogance and stupidity to want to throw his life away when he could have lived many happy years, not appearing to be that old - it was the beard that signified he was a 'wise old man,' though in reality he was maybe ten years older than his protege, Oliver. But cults don't generally breed the most sane of lifestyles, to be fair… His mission is to force Oliver to accept his 'destiny' as his own replacement, just like Chloe managed to force Oliver to return to his heroic persona when he was in the gutter, or Tess tried to force Clark to put saving the Earth at the top of his list instead of all that petty bickering or stopping purse-snatchers. One out of three of these examples ended positively, so forcing people into things probably isn't the best way to go about encouraging them down career paths they are unsure of!

It becomes an interesting quandary for Queen, as, coming face to face with his own mentor from this ancient Celtic cult he joined in earlier years, he's given a difficult choice to deal with: kill his mentor, as he commands, or be forced into seeing Mia killed which will unleash his 'darkness,' apparently, and in a rage he'll do what he couldn't do otherwise. Of course, as we hoped, he finds a third alternative, taking down his former mentor non-lethally in exactly the way he had been taught by him, with a little help from Clark, who does his trademark running in front of the projectiles to take the impact when Oliver pushes Mia away. It's not the most tense and exciting example of the Kent abilities in action, but I don't think we've seen it done for arrows as we have for bullets, so there was novelty value. I was wondering what had happened to Mia and Vortigen, and expected not to find out (I've watched a lot of old TV shows and they tend not to bother with details like that!), so I was pleased to learn that Vortigen is in prison, and will be until he's an old man (on what charge, pray tell? Shooting arrows at people?). There's also a nice scene where Mia shows up again, having previously been summarily dismissed by Oliver in the most tactless way imaginable as if she's not even the slightest bit important. He claims it was for her own safety, which is fair enough, but he could have been more diplomatic. But all is warmth and joy because he takes her back under his wing, and best of all, she now knows his masked persona, so he doesn't have to hide anything from her.

There's more warmth and joy all round, as Lois has forgiven Clark for leaving her at the mercy of an arrow-wielding nutcase, though that leads on to her mentioning the 'friend' of Clark's who visited her: Zod. I have to say, Clark isn't doing the best job of trying to win his former enemy over as a tactic to avoid the tower of doom that Zod built in the future - he threatens to destroy all Zod's people if they interfere with Lois! And he doesn't play the usual hero/villain game, calling Zod out on the fact that he's obviously got some secret agenda he's not letting Clark in on, and standing up to him in a most staunch fashion, leaving no doubt that he'll stand in the way if the General tries anything untoward! But I found it refreshing not to have some verbal dance around the issues, as if Clark really trusted the man, and Zod was really his best mate. Callum Blue wasn't bad in this one, it was a novelty to see him in the Kent kitchen (Mia also broke into Queen's dojo, so there was a lot of breaking and entering going on!), his creepy appearance in Lois' hospital ward worked, and although we do get some chat about Kryptonian religion and some 'Book of Rao' that will enable him to build the tower (more mythical technobabble that they love on this series), it was more about the tension between him and his people, and Kal-El. He does tend to over-emote, making his glassy eyes water up whenever he gets talking, but I suppose that's the price of being a leader like that: madness.

Someone else we're subtly being warned about, I feel, is Chloe's slow, but gradual descent into becoming a new Lex Luthor to rival Tess. We're reminded of all the spying and surveillance she's done recently, and when Clark urges her to get out from behind her monitors and cameras she bats away his concerns, absentmindedly telling him everything's under control. Control is the operative word, though, as she's dangerously close to wanting complete surveillance on everyone, all the time (shades of 'The Dark Knight' again?), and when prodded she hits back: Clark says he does what's right, she counters she does what's necessary. It's that kind of 'ends justify the means' attitude that could seal her fate, knowing that she's not in Season 10. I hadn't quite realised we were supposed to be seeing this decline in concern for privacy and lack of self-awareness that Chloe's going deeper and deeper into, as a threat, but the suggestion wasn't so subtle in this episode! But again, it all makes for some good drama, without degenerating into hateful soap-esque emotional trauma and whining as so often happened in the series' past. I have to say that I'm liking the direction this season has taken, with the Kandorians taking a backseat for much of it, some good character arcs that make sense for the context they're in. Could it be that 'Smallville' is finding some form? I think I talked myself into it: I liked it.

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