[NAS] Top Copy

TV Programme: The New Adventures Of Superman
Season: 2
Episode: 14
Date I watched this episode: 31/07/2009
Time since I last watched this programme: 6 days.

The story of a journalist who finds out Clark's secret and threatens to expose it is not a new one. For example, Roger Nixon from Smallville, and I'm sure this has happened in the comics a few times. But this was different - she was also an undercover operative for Intergang, and things turned out in a rather unexpected way. It's good to see Intergang back again, with their rather cool networking technology. They previously appeared in "Church Of Metropolis" earlier this season, and I'm sure this won't be the last time we see them. The main thing though was that it gave us some really good villains, rather than the typical stupid scientists we saw mainly in the first third of the season. (Rolf was however a bit of a stupid character).

The incident caused several problems, which were resolved in unusual and rather unbelievable ways. First of all, Clark was poisoned by Diana. This was resolved by Clark walking into a nuclear reactor. Kind of silly - with real radiotherapy, they direct the radiation to specific cells in the body, and it's unlikely that Earth radiation could irradicate Kryptonite. The other thing was clearly Diana's revelation on television that Clark Kent is Superman. In truth this makes things a bit difficult for Clark as there will always be people who have conspiracy theories about this whole thing. But it was sorted out through this press conference - which was again a bit unbelievable. That Clark's mother could make a laser hologram so realistic and the sound directed so perfectly is a bit unlikely, especially as this programme is supposed to be set around the present day. But the whole idea of the press conference was original: usually with these sorts of things, the reporter in question happens to die before they can release the tape.

It was great to see that the "date" thing carried over into this episode. In fact, the storyline with this had a definite ring of the Clark/Lana relationship in Smallville. The relationship is strained because of Clark having to do things as Superman that he can't tell Lois about. I guess for this reason it can never really work; certainly it doesn't in the films or in the comics, before he tells her that is. Lois is typically sassy about the whole thing, I really like it when she says "A for effort, F for Fat Chance".

Clark is never going to call Mayson Drake and it's a bit unethical of him to lead her on like that. But obviously even worse was Lois's tactics of stealing Mayson's bleeper - and it was great how Clark and Lois realised this, realise they "stepped over a line" and apologised. This programme has a certain moral standard that's heartwarming (though sometimes a little bit unbelievable).

The interplay between Lois and Mayson was also interesting. In the end, Lois saved Mayson's life, and so I think they will become closer in future. But they had admitted they didn't like each other, and this scene was quite funny, as they both didn't want to admit that they had feelings for Clark.

Well once again this episode pleasantly surprised me by being quite good - it posed a serious threat to Clark, it had some actually good villains, and it had some storyline continuity. So maybe this season isn't going to turn out so bad after all.