After moving out of the spotlight last week, this week's installment of Superman and Lois brought Superman back to the forefront, where his differences with General Lane come to a head. The episode was also filled with comic-book references, giving us big hints as to where the story might be heading going forward. Really exciting stuff, so time to dig in!
At the end of the episode, it's revealed that he has found a large source of Kryptonite under Smallville. We then get a hint that he's got a larger army of metahumans than we might have expected, as he mentions something about arming them with the Kryptonite. All intriguing stuff, and we're starting to see his villainy crossover into Superman's path more directly, which helps connect Clark and Lois' arcs better. He's shaping up to be a more formidable foe after each episode, proving there's more to him than a simple business tycoon.
On the Superman front, this episode puts the focus on Superman's struggle with juggling his multiple responsibilities. The writing was excellently done here and perfectly showcased an aspect that's so important to Superman's character. Sure, he can handle villains like Thaddeus Kilgrave (a cool comic deep cut!) with ease, but his real weakness is that with all his power, he still can't be in two places at once. Does he go help Lois stand up to Morgan Edge at the Town Hall or try to catch Kilgrave? Does he deal with Kilgrave and Intergang or help his sons deal with a teenage metahuman? This episode featured many instances where Clark was forced to make difficult choices, and it made for quite an incredible episode because of it.
During all of this chaos, Sam Lane continued to be a thorn in the side of both Clark and Lois. After finding out about Jordan's "abilities", he grows increasingly wary of Clark and basically demands that he put all his focus on being Superman. He also tells the boys to not "distract" their father. This leads to a few heated arguments between him, Clark, and Lois, which were all well-written and acted. While all of that was great, it's what happens at the episode's end that should have your theory wheels start to turn. Near the end of the episode, we see him make a mysterious call and initiate "Project 7734". This strongly suggests that Season 1 will be drawing from the New Krypton-arc from the comics, which also heavily involves Lex Luthor. If this is the case, let's just say we're in for a few big twists in the coming episodes.
As far as Jordan and Jonathan go, their storyline focused on fellow student Ted, who gained some sort of speed/glitch powers from Jordan's "incident". The biggest takeaway from this plotline was that Sam told the brothers that Ted was going to be sent to a school "for people like him", hinting at an X-Men-like Academy for powered kids. There was a recently introduced Teen Titans academy in the comics, so this could be hinting at that, but it more likely will be an invention for the show. Either way, it's an exciting development!
Overall, an excellent episode that gave us plenty of great character moments, action, and comic references, all while painting a better picture of where the overarching story is heading.
Rating: 8.5/10
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