TV episode review
US airdate 29 October 2010; 5 November 2010; 12 November 2010; 19 November 2010 (The CW)

Lois has a visit from her father (and her dead mother), while Clark also faces parental issues. Meanwhile, the anti-superhero brigade are gathering…

A so far very middling final season of Smallville has taken something of a downturn. Admittedly, all these episodes raise interesting issues about superheroes and vigilantism, but the surrounding melodrama and soap-operatics is very off-putting in what should be — even more than ever before — a superhero show.

The sub-Wicker Man antics of ‘Harvest’ would embarrass any show, while the ‘overbearing father visits for Thanksgiving’ nonsense of ‘Ambush’ was almost unwatchable, the only things saving it being Michael Ironside and Lucy Lane’s (FlashForward’s Peyton List) legs! Why does every flashback-suffering kid on telly have a Sugar Plum Fairy music box?

‘Abandoned’ featured more emotional porn as Tess returns to her past to confront an old witch who is creating a team of hot amazon warriors for the coming super-war. The whole thing’s just an excuse to get Tom Welling’s shirt off. Even the spectral appearances of Julian Sands, Helen Slater (as holograms), and Teri Hatcher (as Lois’s dead mother on video) can’t save things, and neither can the revelation of Tess’s parentage (surprise: she’s a Luthor!).

Finally, ‘Patriot’ is a heavy-handed take on the US war on terror, issues of terrorism, detainees and torture as Aquaman, his new wife and Green Arrow are all subject to Government ‘oversight’. Clark may finally be clambering off the fence, while Michael Hogan’s final scene reveal suggests the Darkseid arc might finally be kicking into high gear — and not a moment too soon! Brian J. Robb

VERDICT
Episode 6: Harvest: 5/10
Episode 7: Ambush: 5/10
Episode 8: Abandoned: 6/10
Episode 9: Patriot: 6/10