clarkkent

Smallville's Clark Kent isn't the only one getting a visit from DC Comics' Justice Society in 2010. A month before the classic crime fighters show up for Smallville's "Absolute Justice" event, airing Feb. 5, they'll drop by the Batcave for an episode of Batman: The Brave and the Bold.

An animated version of the 1940s superhero team will make its debut January 15 on Cartoon Network's great and goofy Batman show. We'll get to see how The Flash (the original one with the silly hat), Hourman, Hawkman, Dr. Mid-Nite and Wildcat influenced Batman's bad guy-beating skills. We'll also see them in action against a villain named Per Degaton. The ep, titled "The Golden Age of Justice," will also feature Bats teaming up with Green Arrow's main squeeze, Black Canary.

Michael Ausiello has posted on EW.com some first pictures of the Justice Society appearance in Smallville. A photo of Hawkman had already been released which admittedly I thought was a gag. Now we have another photo of Hawkman laying the smack down on Green Arrow and a picture of Doctor Fate and Stargirl to boot.

Once again Geoff Johns shows his subject matter expertise. In the comics, Hawkman had conservative tendencies while Green Arrow had liberal ones, so they tended to not get along unless a supervillain showed up when they would team up to stop him or her.

These sort of costumes are a step away from the "no tights no flights" rule that was there since the beginning of Smallville. Perhaps their appearance is marking a policy change for the show. Of course, once Clark puts on the cape and takes flight, the show is pretty much done.

(S09E08) The whole alternate timeline or alternate future concept has been around sci fi for ... well, I don't know how long. The most famous example I can think of is the classic Star Trek episode "Mirror, Mirror," though I'm sure there are many more. We've already had alternate timeline stories in Smallville (such as Lana's "death" in the 100th episode), and now we have an alternate future story.

Although it used an old television and sci fi concept, this particular story served a dual purpose: it let the viewer know what happened to Lois between the 8th and 9th seasons and also let us know the stakes of a potential Zod victory (although we probably could have figured that one out on our own).

(S09E08) Wonder Twin Powers, Activate! Okay, so it wasn't so much the Wonder Twins as an homage to the Wonder Twins. Or Wonder Twins: The Next Generation. You get the idea. The blingy Gleek cell phone was a nice touch. Hell, the ringtone even sounded like an alien monkey.

Of course, the Wonder Twins were just gravy for the actual purpose of the episode: to further the legend of the Blur and heighten the Lois/Clark relationship. Like her predecessor in the 1990's Lois & Clark series, Lois is a smart cookie but really blind when it comes to secret identities. Speaking of cell phones, her ringtone for the Blur was very cute indeed.

(S09E07) If Smallville continues to produce episodes of good quality like tonight's, I may have to take back some of the things I've been saying about it. Seriously.

Tonight we got a lot of backstory and explanation about some of the stranger aspects of the Smallville universe. Why is Earth such a magnet for Kryptonians, dead or otherwise? Because Krypton has been observing Earth for a long, long time and designated the planet as a bolt-hole. We also learned more about that Kryptonian artifact that has been a mystery in Smallville for a few seasons now.

All this and no Lois, too.

(S09E06) Tonight's episode had everything but the metaphorical kitchen sink. There was a lot going on. We had the rather amusing attempt by Lois to score a morning show job, the start of Green Arrow finding his sidekick Speedy and a little more Tess/Zod action.

In all the years I've watched or read Superman in various forms, I've never seen him go on an online date. I would have enjoyed watching more of that, particularly with Lois whispering in his ear. Isn't it illegal to tape someone without their permission (unless you're the government)? What would Clark write on his profile anyway? " Can lift cars, run real fast and shoot lasers out of my eyes. No Kryptonite, please. Must love farm animals."

(S09E05) Tonight we get an Oliver-centric episode that finally resolves his issues. Good! Now we can get to the more interesting dramas of the series such as that with Major Zod and his time-traveling Kryptonian army.

I had a myriad of questions about certain inconsistencies of the episode. No matter how wrecked Oliver was, how did he get so stupid as to swallow a pill given to him by a stranger in a casino? How did he get a flashlight while in the coffin? What casino takes car keys as collateral? Fortunately, they wrapped it up all neatly at the end by blaming Chloe for all his troubles during the episode.

(S09E04) It's when the writers give Clark abilities he's not supposed to have that I begin to worry, like his "reconstruct the Great Wall of China" vision from Superman IV. Thankfully, in this instance it was yet another of Jor-El's senseless tests and only temporary.

Admittedly, I don't get the title "Echo" for this episode. Is it that Oliver is an echo of his former self? Is it that he's turning the path back to heroism? It certainly seems that way.

Since Clark has switched to the black outfit, I hope people (including Lois) stop calling him the "red-blue blur". Now he's just the Blur. Or maybe the Black Blur, but that could be construed as slightly racist.

(S09E03) Who knew the Smallville zombie episode would turn out to be such a bummer? Our heroes did nothing but whine, brood, and talk about their lonely lives while the almost undead were chompin' on people's limbs.

Where were the fun Grindhouse-style action sequences with the good guys firing sawed-off shotguns and revving up chainsaws? Where were the decapitations? And where were the jokes? You'd think a show about Superman fighting zombies would have plenty of jokes.

I understand that every piece of zombie art can't be as fun and clever as Zombieland, or as gloriously gory as 28 Days Later, but I was hoping for something a little more off the wall here.

(S09E02) And just like that, Clark Kent returned from the dead. And all it took was the impossibly astute observation of a homicidal cyborg.

It's a shame that Brian Austin Green's John Corben, aka Metallo, was relegated to freak of the week status. Seeing him stick around to possibly become Clark's rival at the Planet and on the mean streets of Metropolis would have been fun.

As he proved during his stint on TSCC, Green's a talented guy who feels right at home kicking ass on a sci-fi show. He did a fine job here, even if the material he was given would make a Saturday morning cartoon script read like high art. But sadly, this ep was less about Metallo and more about Clark learning that dumping his friends and skulking on rooftops probably won't make him a better hero. (More on that in a sec.)

(S09E01) Welcome back to another year of "the show that wouldn't die". This year, we've been given a target in the first episode that in one year, Clark will somehow destroy the world. However, this was told to him by a Kryptonian ninja woman who is apparently from the past and working for this year's big bad, so her word may not exactly be trustworthy.

The writers have turned Chloe into the new Lana. My sympathies to Allison Mack for being given that tragic role. The special effects of the derailed train in the beginning were pretty cool. I hope they didn't blow the entire season's budget on it.

Clark's Kryptonian father Jor-El will be appearing on Smallville in Season 9, and he'll be played by Julian Sands. It'll be a flashback or time-travel plot device (much like his last appearance in season three when he was played by Tom Welling), so it's not as if the character is coming back from the dead or anything. This isn't Buffy.

The character has been voiced by Terrance Stamp practically since the beginning of the series and has only appeared once as Tom Welling, although his American accent at the time was never explained. Sands plays a younger version, as well, but at least the accent is correct. I wonder if Sands will be trying a Terrance Stamp impersonation the same way that Ewan McGregor copied Alec Guinness' accent for the Star Wars prequels. That would be kind of cool.

Sands is a good actor and I'm sure he'll do the part proud. I do wonder how this series will be affected by the shake-up at DC Comics. Time will tell.

In anticipation of the season premiere on Friday September 25th (and nothing says 'the last season" like a move to Friday nights), a new promotional trailer for Smallville Season 9 has been released (it's on the EW.com site and is sadly not embeddable). The good news is that the trailer gives a pretty clear view of Clark's new costume.

It's somewhat different than the leaked Comic-Con trailer, and that's a good thing. As for the outfit itself: others have said it reminds them of Neo's outfit from The Matrix. While there are similarities to that, it reminds me more of the outfits worn by the Phantom Zone villains in a recent Superman comic co-written by Richard Donner and Geoff Johns. Given this season's big bad, the costume design was likely done that way to evoke Clark's Kryptonian heritage.

So what do you think of the trailer? Does it make you want to stay in Friday nights and not miss an episode?

The cast and crew of Smallville showed up in San Diego at Comic-Con to talk about the upcoming 27th season of Smallville on The CW. Highlights included a new costume for the will-be Superman, but not the underwear-on-the-outside one we're waiting for. In keeping with the tradition of shiny leather and jackets, Clark's new look is black with a silver logo and a black cape trenchcoat. But it does sport the Superman logo (in silver), so that's progress.

Laura Vandervoort (Supergirl) is out, but Erica Durance (Lois Lane) is in 18 episodes, and we can look for that relationship to start a slow burn. Honestly, though, isn't everything on this show slow by now. Hell, Clark's going to be 40 before he starts flying around regularly.

For those of you who weren't paying attention during the last ten seconds of Smallville's eighth season finale, the "big bad" of the ninth season is going to be the Kryptonian Phantom Zone villain, General Zod. Now it's been announced that Callum Blue of The Tudors and The Secret Diary of a Call Girl will be playing the character.

I was secretly hoping for Terrance Stamp, a.k.a. the voice of Jor-El, for the role but this will do. At least they stuck with a Brit. It would seem like heresy at this stage to have Zod played by someone with an American accent.

Considering that Zod has been a presence on the show for several of its seasons, it makes sense that they wrap up the whole series with a final confrontation between Clark and Zod. Now if they can only give Clark the tights and let him fly, the fans of the series can walk away happy.