Spoilers "Superman & Lois": The Fourth and Final Season

[Christopher]

Clark tend to wind up as collateral damage when Supes dies or goes missing. Then pops up okay when Supes returns.

I know how it's been done in the past. That's exactly my point -- other, similar stories have usually addressed the question, so it seems like an oversight that this story's writers didn't consider it a relevant question to acknowledge. They showed Lois writing a story about the death of Superman, but they didn't show her wrestling with the question of what to do about Clark's absence. It would've been interesting to see her having that conversation with the boys, talking about whether to reveal that Clark was Superman (probably a bad idea since the boys would be outed too) or whether to come up with some other explanation. The fact that the writers didn't even touch on the question seems like a missed storytelling opportunity. It might have been a more nuanced way to explore the characters than the forced, contrived conflict with Jordan over the Luthor phone message.

 

[The Realist]

Jordan's reaction to Lois's phone selection doesn't exist in isolation, though. It's one of several punishing blows he's grappling with in very quick succession, on top of his existing mental health challenges. I think it works as part of a deepening spiral he's currently suffering.

 

[Christopher]

Jordan's reaction to Lois's phone selection doesn't exist in isolation, though. It's one of several punishing blows he's grappling with in very quick succession, on top of his existing mental health challenges. I think it works as part of a deepening spiral he's currently suffering.

It just feels to me like they're artificially regressing him for the sake of manufactured conflict. Before, the show usually handled his mental health issues with nuance and sensitivity. Now, they've just turned him into a brainless hothead, and it feels like cruder writing and a more negative, stereotyped portrayal of mental health issues.

It doesn't help that Luthor artificially manufactured the situation to create a conflict in-story, which just underlines how artificially the writers manufactured it.

 

[Nerys Myk]

I was afraid we might see a Superboy vs Superboy fight, with Jordan under the sway of Luthor. I suppose we still could.

 

[Commander Troi]

Man, I hope not.

 

[David cgc]

I wonder if they're going to do anything with hologram-Clark, of if that was just a vestige of an earlier plan for the season.

 

[Nerys Myk]

I wonder if they're going to do anything with hologram-Clark, of if that was just a vestige of an earlier plan for the season.

Just away to keep Tyler in the episodes, just like the flashbacks. Which was probably the plan no matter what.

 

[David cgc]

Just away to keep Tyler in the episodes, just like the flashbacks. Which was probably the plan no matter what.

Well, yeah, but they introduced him last week, they didn't use him in this episode, and next week we're probably getting the real thing.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Well, yeah, but they introduced him last week, they didn't use him in this episode, and next week we're probably getting the real thing.

Maybe a one off. No biggie.

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

Superman and Lois - the final season
Episode 3 - "Always My Hero"

GOOD, WITH SOME EXCEPTIONS: Sam's flashback detailing the arc of his relationship to Lois and Clark was well written, but the second the flashbacks rolled, I knew Sam was one of the characters who would die. It was all so telegraphed that the moment of the character's actual death lacked the impact the writers believed they were going for.

Jon finally developing powers was an expected turn of events, and I did find the sibling conflict for a parent's favoritism raw and interesting, leaving Jordan forced to swallow a number of facts about himself (e.g., self-obsession, gullibility, etc.), and Luthor always several steps above his enemies, with his total lack of fear being a greater weapon than his creature.

While the Family Irons upgraded to official government hero status was interesting, I believe its too little, too late for the impact of the job to be fully explored, considering the few episodes left in the series. I would've loved to see father and daughter already making their mark in the world early in the previous season., but...

Oh, well.

Cudlitz's Luthor boils with obsession, but its not leading him to put blinders on to all but one threat.So much has been made about the loss he feels over a daughter who is avoiding him, yet I have the suspicion that she will play some direct part in his undoing, saving any of the Kent family from taking what would be be justified revenge against Luthor.

BAD: The entire Manheim / Superman serum having any effect on the aged human heart of Sam, then being sufficient enough to use as a donor heart for an alien. This sub-plot reminds me of the wacky organ transplant "explanations" given in many a 1950s D-level horror or sci-fi movie movie. Yes, its going to work, but this transplant would only be acceptable if SM's body ultimately rejects the organ, or somehow (according to wacky 50's-style medicine introduced to Superman and Lois) presents another kind of problem that threatens his happy return, or rip off the personality change from another filmed Superman plot.

I hope Jordan does not live up to my prediction from a couple of seasons ago--that his desperation for approval--does not lead to his own end. Eh., despite Tulloch talking about the flowing tears this last season caused, I have no reason to believe either son will be a victim in the Luthor conflict.

GRADE: B+.

 

[Tosk]

This show breaks me a lot. Many "story problems" just bounce off me like so many bullets. I don't even care that I find myself being uncritical much of the time.

I loved Jonathan's blow-up performance just before his powers kicked in. I loved that Michele Scarabelli got to come back for just a little bit. And I love that I remain emotionally compromised by this show.

 

[The Realist]

Agreed 100 percent. "Story problems" or "plot holes" are often overemphasized by fans, IMO. Nitpicking is kind of baked into geek culture, but I'm much more interested in whether the characters engage me and whether the story affects me emotionally, than by the "plausibility" of whether a human heart can be transplanted into a Kryptonian or whatever.

 

[Christopher]

Agreed 100 percent. "Story problems" or "plot holes" are often overemphasized by fans, IMO. Nitpicking is kind of baked into geek culture, but I'm much more interested in whether the characters engage me and whether the story affects me emotionally, than by the "plausibility" of whether a human heart can be transplanted into a Kryptonian or whatever.

As my first editor Stanley Schmidt once argued in an Analog editorial column, that's a false dichotomy, because the setting is a character too, in its way. It interacts with the other characters and affects their choices and reactions, so its plausibility has an impact on the believability of the characters' stories and their reactions to things, just as much as the characters' own believability. You can't isolate the effect of different story elements from one another, because they all interact with another like the ingredients in a recipe.

For instance, I couldn't believe Jordan's and the other Kent-Lanes' reactions to "Superman's" heart being smashed, because every one of those characters should know that Superman's heart would be just as invulnerable as the rest of him, and thus it should've been immediately obvious to them that it wasn't really his heart Luthor destroyed. Alternatively, if the writers' intent was that it actually was his heart, and that it was somehow inexplicably vulnerable when removed from Superman, then the unbelievability of that plot point makes their use of it to extract an emotional reaction from us unconvincing. (Not just in terms of DC continuity, but in terms of the story's own internal logic, since it would make no sense for Lex to build a whole fancy gizmo to preserve the heart if he was just going to smash it slightly later. Which is why I'm confident he smashed a fake heart, and the characters should've known it too.) The physical nature of the object, the believability of the worldbuilding, is inseparable from the believability of how the characters react emotionally to it. And if you can't believe the characters would react that way, there's no emotional engagement.

 

[The Realist]

Except Tosk and I just talked about how deeply emotionally engaged we are, so ....

It's apparent you have a lot of ironclad rules in your mind about storytelling, the nature of adaptations, etc. But the fact is that different people have different priorities, perspectives, and preferences for these things, and you can't dictate to them what they should want as audience members.

 

[Christopher]

It's apparent you have a lot of ironclad rules in your mind about storytelling, the nature of adaptations, etc.

Please stop assuming you have any right to tell me who I am and what I think. You don't know me at all. The rule on a BBS should be to comment on the post, not the poster. Making personal judgments about other people should be off-limits.

 

[matthunter]

Please stop assuming you have any right to tell me who I am and what I think. You don't know me at all. The rule on a BBS should be to comment on the post, not the poster. Making personal judgments about other people should be off-limits.

I mean, you have literally been here for decades and you're STILL trying to argue this shit?

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

Agreed 100 percent. "Story problems" or "plot holes" are often overemphasized by fans, IMO. Nitpicking is kind of baked into geek culture, but I'm much more interested in whether the characters engage me and whether the story affects me emotionally, than by the "plausibility" of whether a human heart can be transplanted into a Kryptonian or whatever.

It is not "overemphasizing" when a significant plot point for the rest of the series (Superman's revival) is founded on an idea that sounds as believable as the procedure used by aliens to resurrect the dead / turn them into controlled killers from Plan 9 from Outer Space. For as advanced Kryptonian technology is supposed to be based on everything ever seen in Superman and Lois, one would find it easier to believe artificial organs would be a thing they mastered centuries ago. Instead, the series needed to play the "raising the stakes through tragedy" card by having the martyred Sam being the only way Superman will be saved.

 

[Tuskin38]

Next week’s episode is directed by Elizabeth Henstridge

Apparently it’s the third time she’s directed in this series huh I didn’t know she was on before

 

[Nerys Myk]

Apparently it’s the third rates directed in this series huh I sight know she was on before

Whut?

 

[The Realist]

Whut?

Not sure you're the drunk one.