Review tonight's Smallville and win $100

This week's episode of Smallville was one of the best written that I've seen. I thought once I started watching the show, it would get old and boring, but I'm surprised every week by the ingeniuty of the writers. It's like I can't wait for the following week to see what's coming up. The "Onyx" show with the split screen effects was one of the best written. I wish they would develop Clark's abilities more to coincide with the Superman storyline. I know they're trying to spread it out, but it's frustrating knowing he can fly and doesn't in the Smallville story. The previews for the finale look awesome. So happy that Lana (goodie goodie) is taking a turn for the better -- her character was starting to make me throw up! But in recent shows I got into the whole Isis Princess thing. I'm sure the writers will be putting Tom Welding and Michael Rosenbaum hotties will come up with an interesting cliff hanger that I can't wait to see, especially the 8 minutes preview of Batman.

I was extremely impressed with Michael Rosenblum's performance in this episode. Excellent. The script was interesting and I love the part with the iron mask. Your writers are intelligent and know what we fans want. Thoroughly enjoyed the episode. Encor.

"I want you to remember this day, Clark. I want you to remember that despite all your amazing powers, there was one man who beat you." Alexander, "Onyx" "Onyx" is an episode so well-written and executed that it surprises and exhilarates. An episode to save Season Four. When it ended with that slightest of smiles from Lex, I finally breathed. The writers had pulled it off. Details were thought out. Dialogue was spot on. History was given its due and a nod was given to Destiny. Stand-alone episodes have become more frequent than not this season, and so to have one that threads the Superman-Lex Luthor mythos and furthers the story of not only Lex, but all the main characters of the show, is both impressive and special. What we saw was the result of thoughtful storytelling for a much beloved character. The setup? When a secret experiment goes wrong, Lex is caught in a black-kryptonite beam that divides him into two individuals. One retains the goodness of the Lex we have come to know and love, and the other possesses the darkness that we shine to whenever it glimmers. After "Alexander" imprisons Lex in the mansion cellar, he sets out to 1) get what he wants and 2) make sure that he is the one that the world will know. Clark, Lana, Lionel, Chloe, and the Kents all encounter Alexander and are stunned by his ferocity, his arrogance, and his methods of bending the world to his will. Though "Smallville" has done a fair share of dual-personality/possession episodes that exonerate characters of wrongdoing because "they weren't themselves", "Onyx" is different in that the "new" Lex came from the old. It wasn't so easy to dismiss the actions of Alexander as being out of Lex's control, even though he was imprisoned in an iron mask with no one within earshot to hear him. Now in its fourth season, it was time for the show to illustrate what exists within Lex, to remind us again of what he faces each day. While the show has always embraced Lex's destiny as a super-villain, it has also been consistently dedicated to writing him as a multidimensional character, one that is complicated and that more often than not, has reasons to do what he does. And so, while the show was about the future Lex Luthor, it was perhaps more about the current one. Our Lex a man who has done his best to deny his "true nature." It showed us how he must struggle each day with what he wants versus what he believes to be right and good. How many times has he wanted to tell Jonathan off? How many times has he wanted to show his father his own coldness? How many times has he wanted to tell Lana how he feels? How many times has he wanted to call Clark out on his half-truths, his inexplicable timeliness, and his secrecy? "Onyx" punctuated the belief that Lex Luthor is misunderstood by those around him and judged before knowing. Imagine the self-control he must exhaust to fight this "true nature" within. At the end of the episode, Lex pondered whether the experiment created an evil Lex of if Alexander is what's really inside of him. Watching, we know the answer already, and one cannot help but feel compassion for a man who so obviously fears himself and wants so desperately to not become what we know is his destiny. In the end, the events of "Onyx" will have repercussions for a good long while: for the characters, the relationships, the show. Given the care with which the Lex Luthor character has been written over the years, it is not surprising that this season's stand-out episode would be written for him and that the most-outstanding Michael Rosenbaum would rise to the challenge, embrace it, and make it work on every level. As it was for Lex, this episode was a reminder and a promise: a reminder of what the show could be and perhaps a promise of what it will be once more.

Finally after many weeks of waiting for Smallville to return it does, and with quite a return. This weeks episode was titled "Onyx", somewhat referring to the Black Kryptonite in the episode, the second time its appeared. The episode starts out with Lex and a Professor working on an experiment with kryptonite (when will they ever learn). The experiment requires the kryptonite to be heated up a significantly high temperature. The kryptonite became unstable and shot a beam at Lex forcing him to shake and skip frames. The kryptonite turned black and shattered, and Lex fell to the ground. The professor was ok but hit his head on a steel beam as Lex pushed him to safety. Lex then rushed the professor out of the lab to the hospital. The camera panned back and another Lex appeared from the shadows. The Lex that brought the professor to the hospital was the pure Lex the one you could say untouched by the Luthor gene of evil. The other half was the full unrestricted by the good side Lex. The good Lex is a cotton ball, plain and simple. The other Lex is the complete and exact opposite. The good Lex is so nice that he allows his philanthropist father to have a dinner with a bunch of deep pockets as him and Lex joke, at the top floor of Luthor Corp. Plaza. Lurking in the shadows is none other than the evil Lex, with a gun. Evil Lex takes the good Lex down to the dungeon after knocking him out afraid that killing him might make him disappear as well. The good Lex wakes up and is confronted by the evil Lex (talk about facing your devils). The evil Lex introduces himself as the one who makes the good half of Lex do all the right decisions, like play in the dungeon as a little kid when his father told him not to. The bad Lex then took an iron helmet to good Lexes head a metaphor to how a King treated his brother before he died. The evil Lex is bad, taking advantage of Lana when she refuses to like him, of course the only thing he could possibly do is evict Lana from the apartment and oh, close the Talon. Evil Lex killed the professor to close any chance that he and the good half be reunited. He also followed Clark and the good Lex to the lab earlier in the episode, and saw how Clark got "sick" as soon as he went near the meteor rocks. Evil Lex uses this as a weakness to Clark to beat the crap out of him, which I think was just a little too convenient for evil Lex to have a ring of kryptonite. Clark powerless is thrown from his loft. He knew about the two Clarks earlier in the episode when Chloe hacked into the hospital surveillance cameras and told Clark about the two cameras, two Lexes, one timestamp. Evil Lex brought Chloe and Clark to the wrecked lab and let them wander about, then dropped a concrete ceiling on both of them. Clark tossed it back like paper as usual. From then the episode is basically clockwork, evil Lex wont stop monologging about his evil plan to take over the planet and how Clark will help him. Clark saves the day once again. How did he take down evil Lex with kryptonite? I'll give you a hint: Heat Vision. At the end of the episode Lex is forced to look at himself, unknowing of all the horrible things he did to everyone. Lionel wakes out of his niceness coma, with the help of evil Lex. Lionel talks to Lex at the end sealing the fate of Lex. I would say this was not a filler episode but a foreshadow of things to come. I would say this will be a memorable episode, of how evil Lex CAN be. I look forward to the season finale, its going to be a big one.

uhhhh.... why don't you guys just download the show off bit torrent.... just type the name of the show and file type: bittorrent on google.

Brian - same issue where I was, too. Every other channel down the dial worked just fine, sans WB. Not that I usually care or anything, but in this case it was funny.

Latest smallville episode Onyx was all about people having split personalities. For me it didnt stop there though, for when I was watching it, I myself felt split in two. One part of me was extremely glad that the hiatus is finally over, and rejoiced in seeing the familiar characters brought back to life in their signature ways. But my alter ego wasnt so pleased. We will tell you why. Lex Luthor almost found a way to end famine. And hunger. Hee. Unfortunately he gets split in two instead, and we are to believe that his inner structure has always been made up of two voices: the nice savvy Lex we know and love, and the evil one who wants to rule the world. When first these two are introduced, we are made to believe that they have both had a more or less equal part in Lex actions. But at the end of the episode, Lex only remembers what his good half went through, because it has suppressed his other half, and with it the memory of Clarks identity. The two visions of Lex mental structure dont really mix, but Id be willing to forgive the writers this if they will give me one thing in return. If according to them, this is the way the Luthorian psyche works, then Lionel Luthor should now remember all about Clarks secret. Lex and Lionel are Luthors. They are Luthors, and no matter how deep they stack away their evil sides and their memories, they will find their way back to the surface. Do I however really expect the writers to be true to their own statement and have Lionel be aware of Clarks true nature from now on? Of course not, because lasting amnesia is too much of a popular plot device. Now Lionels career in the charity business seems over, and I wonder what its use has been for the story. Besides reading up about storylines that make sense, the writers should read a book about creating storylines that pay off sometime, instead of storylines for the sake of the storylines. Shining example of that in this episode the mere presence of Lana. Her plotline was completely unnecessary for the story, and to have Lex proclaim his love for her was a crime against his character that I plan to forget about. After this Lana goes to Clark, who decides not to let her in on whats going on, because this way she can have her repeat to Clark how sometimes you think you know someone Because we lose three scenes worth of broadcasting space to this, the big climax of the story felt extremely rushed. Lex finds out about Clark, and within five minutes he has confronted Clark and the Kents about it, slipped on the kryptonite ring and shot poor Mr. Kent in the leg. Personally Id rather have had Lex not find out at all. I know the writers are panicking about the bad ratings this season, but forcing very large chunks of story though very tiny holes isnt the way to win anyone back over. Another misconception they seem to have is that people will rather watch the show, if they simplify the story. Black kryptonite itself is the evidence of this. Did Clark claim at the beginning of season three that Kal was an integral part of him that would always be there, at the beginning of this season they were suddenly two different people who shared nothing but the same body. This is in a way exactly what they have done to Lex, and Lionel to a degree, in this episode. They dumb down the characters. Wether this is because they think it will be better for the show, or because somewhere along the line, they have become scared of the rockhard, interesting characters they created in the first three seasons, is anyones guess. All the bad things they did to the story in this episode were done in the least painful way possible. Every scene was written as awesomely as its content would permit, and all the actors did a very good job in this episode; particularly Michael Rosenbaum of course, who was so obviously thrilled with all the cool things he got to say and do that he was an enormous pleasure to watch. Still, the content of this episode has done so much damage to the overall story that no matter how much I want to, I dont believe it can ever really be fixed. During the first three seasons of smallville, I was always in excited anticipation of the way in which Lex Luthor would grow into his evil ways. Now however all I feel is disappointment in its writers, who have backed down from the challenge.

When we fired up TiVo Wednesday night, our recording of Smallville was an hour-long DirecTV "We are experiencing technical difficulties" message in both English and Spanish. After it failed to record Smallville, it switched channels and had no trouble picking up Alias...

Has somebody been watching old Superman Films? Particularly Superman III, Superman Vs Superman? Remember that film all the way from 1983? Well give it a twist, replace superman with Lex Luther and voila you have your plot for episode Onyx. A tale of good vs. evil ego In a quick outline of the plot, Lex Luther is experimenting with meteor stones (again) in a novel yet slightly perverse idea to create irradiated fruit (hey forget about genetically modified crop, let irradiate them instead!), something goes wrong, big explosion, Lex is separated into a good Lex and an Evil Lex, awkward circumstances, bla bla bla, fight for control, two Lexs rejoined, Clark saves the day (Naturally). Oh and of course Lex doesnt remember anything. (Ive got to admit that man has more black outs than the electric company.) Credit is due to Michael Rosenbaum (Lex). His dual personality performance was excellent, very dramatic, and very robust. I believe the screenwriters are trying to set the stage for something more sinister in later episodes. With one swift they showed the true extent of Lexs evil nature, they brought back into play Lionel (Im presuming they are going to give him a more active role in the search for the crystals, or perhaps to push Lex further into the dark side), they are promoting stronger the idea of Chloe becoming a confidant for Clark (especial since Samuel L. Jones Pete is out of season) and they created tension between Lana and Lex (ahh spring is in the air). Not one of the best episodes for Smallville but I do feel it lays down foundations for future plot twists. It does make you wonder what they are preparing next for everybodys favourite farm boy (aka Clark Kent, aka Kal-El of Krypton, aka Superman)

Smallville - Double Your Pleasure You know that I love Michael Rosenbaum. I love him the way Boston Rob loves Ambah, the way that Ryan loves Anwar. So you can imagine how giddy I was watching "Onyx", this week's "Smallville" ep. You get not one, but two Lexes; more than doubling your pleasure, as our Bald Wunderkind is in almost every scene. When a LuthorCorp experiment goes horribly wrong, Lex Luthor is injured by (you guessed it) Meteor Rock. The explosive fracas splits him in two, and the results are alternately dreary and spectacular: Whitebread Lex - a weepy, charitable doormat - and the Lex we all really want to see: A ruthless, Kent-Shooting charmer, who figures out Clarks secret in about 10 minutes. Evil Lex even has the brains and the sack to fashion a Kryptonite ring. Although, if youre familiar with the comics, you know exactly how well that turns out for him. He completely fools everyone for most of the episode, of course, because no-one in Smallville has ever encountered anything even remotely out of the ordinary. Dullards! Eventually, Clark and Chloe cotton on to Lexs evil doins, and move to thwart his nefarious intent. (Did that sound like a line from Deadwood?) Lex responds by dropping a concrete floor on them, and hi-larious hijinks ensue. In the end, somebody - let's say Spock - recomboobulates the two Lexes, and everything is back to normal. Sigh. All-in-all an exciting, action packed episode with just the right amount of homoerotic inuendo. Though, was it really necessary to lift the entire plot from a 40 year old Star Trek episode? I distinctly recall Kirk getting split into his good and evil half in a transporter accident. It made little-to-no sense then, so why do Millar and Gough think that modem viewers are any less discerning. Does anyone actually believe that somebody can be split down the middle into their positive and negative attributes? Are we no more complex than a Rorschach diagram? Heres the thing, though, Onyx makes it tough to tell which one is truly the bad Lex. Sure, the supposedly Evil Lex killed a couple of people, attempted to crush Clark and Chloe, went all date-rape on Lana, and shot Papa Kent. But who hasnt done that while coming down from a four day mescaline binge? However, then Good Lex hands off this rotten, irradiated Apple and lets Clark eat it. That aint right. Those arent the actions of a brotha. Maybe he deserved to be locked up in that convenient, metal metaphor. One thing that did peel my banana, however: the ep had a touch of season ones profound homoerotic splendor. Any time Clark and Lex have one of their man-on-man scenes there is this unspoken electricity pouring off their sweaty selves. The lingering glances, the half spoken truths, the quick over-the-sweater action while they think no-ones looking. Admittedly, theyve toned it down from the earlier episodes, but its still there in the background of every shared scene. Sweet Statutory, thats just wrong. Overall, I can't help but think that they missed a prime opportunity to bring Lexs character closer to the comic-book villan we all know and love. Smallville Lex is such a pushover. How do you go from a Nietzsche quoting corporate bad-boy, busy seducing high-school quarterbacks to Supermans arch-nemesis? Here was an easy out that provided a much more plausible explanation than Oh, he just turns into a Jerk over time. Hopefully, this is something that "Smallville" will revisit as Lex continues down his dark path.