TNMC

     For all of you people who begged for a more Pete-centric episode, you’re prayers have been answered. So have mine, because Smallville’s producers made it a hardy #$%@ YOU! to everyone and anyone who forced themselves to sit through it.

     Pete has always been a rather dichotomous character, which is in no way meant to be a reference to Jonathan Taylor Thomas or that visual abortion of an episode he guest starred in back in Season Two. It just refers to the fact that Pete is often starved for screen time, which often gives his character an illusion of depth. This depth is imagined by fans of the show in an attempt to compensate for poor or non-existent characterization. Pete is a cipher. Sure he has some personality, but that’s mostly due to the work of Sam Jones III, and not from any effort made by the writers. Despite three seasons, and the occasional episode, he’s still as hollow and empty as ever.

     This isn’t entirely the fault of the writers, however. Well, it’s mostly their fault, but to be honest Smallville’s Pete Ross is a completely different character from the comics. Unfortunately, that character was also two-dimensional and hollow. With a virtual blank slate to work with, I’d hoped they’d create a more rich and lively version for all to enjoy. Looking at their track record, though, anyone could tell that this isn’t going to happen. Look at what they’ve done with Lana Lang. They transformed her from a down to earth, stable, young woman into a needy, neurotic bitch. True, the Lana from the comics was actually pretty stale and boring, but she served as a ready example of the sort of life Clark Kent had become dissatisfied with. In Smallville, she has a completely different role. She’s the "unattainable goddess" that all young men manufacture in high school. During the first season the viewers saw her as Clark Kent saw her. She was nearly perfect in both appearance and demeanor, but as the show wore on we saw the flaws bubble to the surface in full force. She was a fully rendered human being at that point, and many people stopped liking her. It’s natural, given the rather poor job they’ve done of making her at all likeable, but at the very least I can say she’s more real than Pete.

     This is pretty wordy for one of my typical reviews, isn’t it? I haven’t even touched upon the episode’s plot yet. I suppose I’d better start. Though last week’s cliffhanger is touched upon with Jonathan Kent recovering in a hospital bed, the majority of the episode is spent on Pete and his brush with illegal street-racing. Up to this point Pete’s pretty much the only character on the show that’s ever really behaved like a normal teenager. He is the average guy, very much like Xander from Buffy in some ways. He’s human, with no special powers, has a good home life and a big family. Of course, when you spend your whole life living in Clark Kent’s shadow, you’re going to wind up feeling a little… small. Breaking the law and risking his life and the lives of others makes him feel big. When asked to take a dive for money, Pete refuses and pisses off his benefactor and mentor Dante. So, is Pete meant to be sympathetic during this episode? I certainly didn’t sympathize, so I guess he wasn’t.

     Pete places himself and everyone around him in danger because of his own choices and he begs Clark to bail him out. This doesn’t work. I don’t mean to say that Clark doesn’t bail Pete out, I mean that the entire plot is crap. During the past three seasons we’ve seen Pete behave in a questionable manner befitting a young man his age, but we’ve never been given any indication that he’s this idiotic. Clark’s no saint, nor is anyone else, but he’s usually aware that what he’s doing isn’t necessarily ethical, he’s just willing to make that choice and accepts the consequences most of the time. Pete isn’t even open to the idea that breaking the law and putting himself at risk is a bad idea. It makes him feel good and that’s all that matters to him. Clark’s been down this road, and despite his attempts to stop Pete from going too far, Pete won’t listen. This is one of many reasons Pete is an ineffective character. As a foil for Clark, he’s great on paper. He loves life and wants to enjoy himself. That’s something Clark never allows himself to do. Clark knows what happens when he cuts loose, and he doesn’t want to have to live with that anymore. Pete, though, isn’t so fettered.

     Lana, as a character, is limited and flawed. The writers may or may not be fully aware of this. The sort of plots she gets involved in are pretty much identical. Young man is interested in Lana, young man has serious social and/or physiological problems, young man tries to harm Lana, Clark saves Lana. It’s ridiculous. She is shallow, from a character standpoint, and difficult to like. It’s hard to see what Clark sees in her beyond her physical attractiveness. At the same time, it’s hard to figure out why Pete even hangs out with Clark and vice versa. There’s a great deal of talk about how close they are, but at the same time the distance is constantly being demonstrated for the audience. Clark is completely unaware of Pete’s illegal activities, but that’s only the most recent example. Clark has always been oblivious to the struggle Pete has to endure to keep Clark’s secret. Yet how is the audience supposed to buy that these two young men, who can’t even talk to each other about their feelings, are so damned close?

     For all his flaws and stupidity, I can identify with Clark. He doesn’t think of himself as special, as Pete does, just different. Feeling like an outsider is all too common among teenagers, and it’s easy to see a bit of myself in Clark. The same goes for Lex. He also feels like an outsider looking in. That’s probably why these two gravitate towards each other. That and the gay subtext, I guess. What really irks me about this whole thing is that Pete behaved in a completely unacceptable manner during the entire episode and expected everything to go back to normal at the end. That’s stepping into Clark territory, my friend. By the time the credits roll, Dante is dead, Pete’s safe, and Clark’s seriously pissed about the whole thing. It’s kinda good that Clark isn’t so quick to forgive, but it’s a bit out of character for him. He’s usually quick to forgive and forget when it comes to Chloe, Lana, and Lex at least.

     To save Pete and his family from certain death, Clark steals Lex’s Porsche to use as collateral for one final race between Pete and Dante. Before the race, Clark discovers there’s a bomb in Pete’s car set to go off when his speedometer hits 100 MPH. Before he can put a stop to things, Clark is rendered unconscious thanks to some handy Kryptonite the thugs were using to make the cars go faster. They chuck him into the trunk of Pete’s car probably hoping to be rid of him when the whole thing explodes. Exactly how liquid Kryptonite can make a car go faster is well beyond my scientific ken, but I can tell you it’s about as believable as anything else this show’s offered over the past three years. When Pete uses the fuel to take the lead against Dante, the Kryptonite storage tank is emptied and Clark’s strength is restored. He punches a hole in the gas tank, which slows Pete down, and simultaneously causes Dante’s car to lose control and crash, thus killing him.

     Clark is obviously unhappy about the outcome, but he knew what he was getting into when he decided to help Pete out. At this point, he doesn’t really have any right to lecture Pete about his choices. Sure the car is returned safe and sound, and Lex pretty much knows what Clark did. I only wish Clark hadn’t lied about it. Lex knows what happened. He’s not stupid. He can probably forgive Clark for abusing their friendship in exactly the same way Pete tried to do, but Clark can’t bring himself to do the same. When did these characters become so damned unlikable? When?

     As for Lana and Adam, that plot has gone somewhere, though nowhere particularly interesting to me. Lana has discovered that Adam died some time back of a rare liver disease and he’s since turned up perfectly alive with a new name and everything. When she confronts him, he threatens her and now he’s officially a villain. I liked this character when he said things to Lana that no other character would ever say. He called her on her bullshit and didn’t pull any punches while doing it. It was great. He was even sort of interesting in a mysterious kinda way, but now he’s a Freak, though meteors might not have anything to do with it. While following Lex’s subplot during the episode, we discover that Adam’s been injecting himself with blood platelets of "unknown origin". The doctor that gave the stuff to Adam is the very same woman who was seen testing Clark’s blood back in "Phoenix". I think it’s safe to assume that the platelets are Clark’s, or some cloned variant.

     It’s really sad, because this entire subplot has been worthless up till now. It took Lex and a mystery connection to Clark’s blood sample from earlier in the season to liven it up. Don’t get me wrong, it was entertaining while Adam was making fun of Smallville and openly challenging Lana’s attitude. I loved every second of that, but after a couple episodes even that grew stale and I just couldn’t bring myself to care anymore. Now things might be interesting again, but it’s hard to say. Next week look like it’s got some T&A in it, which I won’t say no to. I’ve read that it’s also a variation of the superpowered stalker concept, and we all know how great that one is. Don’t we? DON’T WE? I give "Velocity":

3 out of 10

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