Smallville 9x05 Roulette
Well, 'Echo' just managed to bump off the 'Least Favorite favorite of the season thus far' tag. It now not so proudly goes to 'Roulette' instead. Atleast with the former ep there were some redeeming aspects, like lots of Clark, a couple of cute Clois moments, badass Tess, Toyman. But this one? Not so much.
For one, this felt like another ep with just, hardly any Clark in it. Secondly, too much Ollie. This was like S9' answer to S7' 'Sleeper.' That bad. And no-one and nothing else much worked for me either, so yeah. It was a long 40 or so minutes watching this one.
Speaking of, wasn't that the longest damn opening sequence ever? I literally kept glancing at my watch. I'm sure Oliver in the white suit emerging from the coffin was supposed to symbolize something. And I suppose if I cared enough I'd delve in deeper, but unfortunately my tolerance levels for Oliver' character are at an all time low. And that really remains my biggest problem with the ep. I think, this is it. This is the SV writers and producers end to Ollie' redemption arc. They have him rediscover the hero in him, have a scene or two with Chloe and Clark, and there you have it. All is forgiven and forgotten, conveniently rounded off with Clark continuing to not urge Oliver to seek actual redemption, such as, you know - turning himself in. There also continues to be a total lack of acknowledgment on Oliver' part as to his betrayal of Clark in 'Doomsday.' And I realize that we're probably never going to see any of this ever brought up again. And while by now I should condition myself to accept this and move on, I still find it difficult to. I eventually will, I suppose. But I'll always regret this path the writers chose for this storyline, most of all because of the negative impact I feel it's had on Clark' characterization.
The writing for that final Clark/Oliver scene wasn't bad. Not at all, actually. But I just couldn't enjoy it. And I used to enjoy Clark/Ollie scenes like this. Scenes where you could sense the level of friendship between them despite all the snark. I enjoyed Oliver telling the other JLers in 'Odyssey' how he'd never give up on Clark because Clark would never give up on them. I enjoyed Oliver still coming to Clark' aid in 'Identity' even with all his own shit going on. But now I just can't be bothered. Like I said, if Oliver is indeed to continue to be on the show, I will eventually learn to atleast be be OK with his character again. But it's going to take a helluva lot more scenes like this last one and a lot more acknowledgment than just "you've done a helluva job keeping the world safe, Clark. I'm here to help you now" to get me invested again.
I'm not aware if Chloe being behind the whole thing was revealed in spoilers or not but it came as a shock to me. Yes, Chloe had her genuinely chilling moments last season like threatening Dr Emil, her hand in killing Sebastian, and well, you know, generally being a but duplicitous wrt the whole Davis/'protecting Clark' thing, but her actions in this ep sort of took her to a whole other place, I think. I do believe she thinks her motives behind everything she orchestrated are coming from a well intentioned place. And they may very well be. In fact, I'd genuinely like to believe they are. But her means in getting there are so completely out of whack. It is a somewhat intriguing place for her character to be, but what I find to be the most interesting question is that is she deluding herself into believing that is all OK, or does she actually really believe it? Because it might not seem like much of a distinction, but IMO there is one, fine line as it may be.
Her scene with Oliver, while a little frustrating and annoying, yes, did bring to light that these two characters now definitely share a similar moral code. And that's both enlightening and a little scary, quite frankly.
In other Chloe news, her lying to Clark seemed to come a little too easily. And also, "at the risk of taking a bellyflop into an awkward pool" - um, what? I'd really like to ask the SV wtiters just once who they think actually talks like that.
Lois didn't fare much better either, this ep. In fact I'm beginning to think this writer can't write any decent female characterizations because Roulette kinda sucked too, come to think of it. All through Lois' talks of beer pong with Ollie on their birthdays, all I kept thinking was when did this happen? They went out for about what, six months? Then Oliver went away and we had no indication of any bonding between them last season, so when was this? It's such a coontrivance on the writers part. And then ofcourse came her next scene with Clark where she chastizes him for not telling her about Oliver. There's so much that's wrong with this scene like the suicide attempt immediately popping up on Oliver' computer and Lois immediately figuring out the context, but mostly it was just Lois coming off entitled. Now, I was expecting this scene from the spoilers, so the one, really, only redeeming aspect about actually watching it was that I felt the tone of the scene was much less harsher than I expected. But aside from this, Lois couldn't have come from a more a more illogical POV. "I'm not just anyone." But you are. You are Ollie' ex. When did you become his most trusted confidante? Moreover it was never Clark' secret to tell, so her telling Claek anything wrt it seemed so unnecessary and stupid. Especially considering that she never once stopped to think that if Oliver himself never deemed her fit enough to tell then why should Clark butt in and tell her?
Her scene with Oliver himself felt equally ridiculous to me. For starters I must be the only one who didn't much care for Lois/Olle back in the day, nor was I ever blown away by their chemistry like everyone else. Secondly, "it never felt that way when I was with you." Contrivance alert, because, if I recall, Oliver was more than OK relegating Lois to weekend-girlfriend status. I never, to be perfectly honest, got the indication back in S6 that Lois was all that important to Oliver, but like I said, I always used to feel in the minority opinion with this one. I appreciate that Lois wants to be there for Oliver as a friend, but maybe she ought to take a hint or two that he might still be interested in someting more. Also, a question that's been bugging the hell outta me - does Lois know about Oliver murdering Lex? I'd like to think not, but then, what does she think his whole downward spiral is all about?
The Clois scenes in this one didn't really work for me either. The movie night, as a concept was great, but executed poorly. The concept was supposed to really be about Clark needing to find the balance to multitask and it foreshadowing their later dynamic where Lois does eventually get used to it, but instead because of the whole Oliver angle it just felt really stilted and offkilter.
Finally, the Alia/Kandorian storyline inches forward. ::sighs::
And what can I say about Clark? I'd love to talk about him, but there's hardly anything to discuss. I did like him actively seeking out people to save I suppose.
I'm lookimg forward to 'Crossfire'. I'm mixed on my feelings for the spoilers for that one but I think there might be enough good stuff in there to wash the taste away from this ep.