Well, I'll go first this week, although it doesn't mean that I liked this episode I'm afraid.
First off, the title. I suppose Eternal can be justified by the fact that Davis/Doomsday is now apparently immortal, but Rewrite, Retcon, Insanity and Uneccessary would have been equally suitable. Now, before I comment on the plot itself, can I just note that Tess appears to have moved on from ruthless villain/businesswoman to Certifiably Bonkers Member Of A Pseudo-relegious Cult. At some points, I half expected Panorama reporter John Sweeney to burst in screaming "YOU WERE NOT THERE! YOU CANNOT ASSERT THAT!!!" - especially when she started coming up with her interpretation of what the Kawatche legends meant. Unfortunately, being Certifiably Bonkers made Tess a much less interesting character - less of a would-be Lex Luthor and more of a female Edward Teague. However, there is always a faint possibility that the producers might use her new-found insanity as an excuse to do a tribute to one of Red Dwarf's most famous episodes. Picture Tess in a gingham dress, pigtails, army boots and, on her right hand, her new friend, a penguin glove puppet called Mr Flibble:
"What's that, Mr Flibble? You don't think he was telling us the truth? Oh, you shouldn't have done that, Clark. You shouldn't have lied to us. Mr Flibble doesn't like people who lie to us..."
So, apart from Tess booking a one-way ticket to a padded cell, what did we get? Well, for some reason, Doomsday had to be retconned into the Veritas storyline and the Naman/Sageeth legend by having Davis found by Lionel Luthor's men and spending some time playing with Lex. Now, I can understand that the producers want to bring the purple orb thingy back into play, but why have a connection to the Luthors? Lionel's dead and Lex is currently presumed to be, so why the dull and somewhat awkward retcon, rather than show that Davis was following his own path, one of which the main players were completely unaware? Similarly, making Davis Sageeth rather than Lex invalidates parts of the legend (that Sageeth was Naman's friend, and like a brother to him), for no great dramatic gain. Actually, an attempt to justify the change - Clark telling Davis that they should have been brothers - shows how poor an idea it is: it rings hollow, because Doomsday is not a Kryptonian, but a chimera created using genetic material from various creatures that lived on Krypton. Worse still, Clark speaks of childhood nightmares in which he wasn't found by the Kents, but he never knew that he was an alien until he started high school. As with Tess' "Davis is Judas" thesis, this episode seemed to be a clumsy attempt to justify a story that simply did not fit established facts, rather than create a viable backstory for Doomsday.
Apart from the dumb plot, other stupidities abounded. Allison Mack got this week's really dud line: "That's a pretty big coincidence pill to swallow" (why not "that's some coincidence" or "quite a coincidence" - you know, phrases people actually say?). Clark and Chloe discover just how many people Davis has killed, but by the climax, they appear to have forgotten - viewing execution as morally wrong is fine, but acting as if Davis is the only victim...not so good. As for the Kryptonite "gunge tank" - what is this, a revival of Noel's House Party? And why on Earth should Clark think that Davis killing/becoming Doomsday is his fault because he wound up with good parents and Davis didn't? Apart from making Clark look like a complete moron, it showed the idiocy of the introducing those five days in the Luthor Mansion into Davis' backstory. He isn't who he is because of the Luthors - or any other bad childrens'/foster homes, but because he is genetically programmed to be that way. It would have made more sense to have had flashbacks showing him at a succession of perfectly decent foster homes, but forced to leave each time following an "incident".
All in all, this wasn't quite as bad as Turbulence: the dialogue wasn't guite as flat, and there were some decent performances (Saw Witwer, in particular, giving Davis some dignity as he makes it clear that he knows he must die for what he has done), despite the ludicrous nature of a lot of the script. However, it wasn't particularly entertaining, didn't advance the Doomsday plot in a good manner and left several characters looking very stupid indeed, so it gets added to this season's list of duds.
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Quick note: if a mod can correct the title, since I clearly can't spell "opinions", I would be grateful.
First off, the title. I suppose Eternal can be justified by the fact that Davis/Doomsday is now apparently immortal, but Rewrite, Retcon, Insanity and Uneccessary would have been equally suitable. Now, before I comment on the plot itself, can I just note that Tess appears to have moved on from ruthless villain/businesswoman to Certifiably Bonkers Member Of A Pseudo-relegious Cult. At some points, I half expected Panorama reporter John Sweeney to burst in screaming "YOU WERE NOT THERE! YOU CANNOT ASSERT THAT!!!" - especially when she started coming up with her interpretation of what the Kawatche legends meant. Unfortunately, being Certifiably Bonkers made Tess a much less interesting character - less of a would-be Lex Luthor and more of a female Edward Teague. However, there is always a faint possibility that the producers might use her new-found insanity as an excuse to do a tribute to one of Red Dwarf's most famous episodes. Picture Tess in a gingham dress, pigtails, army boots and, on her right hand, her new friend, a penguin glove puppet called Mr Flibble:
"What's that, Mr Flibble? You don't think he was telling us the truth? Oh, you shouldn't have done that, Clark. You shouldn't have lied to us. Mr Flibble doesn't like people who lie to us..."
So, apart from Tess booking a one-way ticket to a padded cell, what did we get? Well, for some reason, Doomsday had to be retconned into the Veritas storyline and the Naman/Sageeth legend by having Davis found by Lionel Luthor's men and spending some time playing with Lex. Now, I can understand that the producers want to bring the purple orb thingy back into play, but why have a connection to the Luthors? Lionel's dead and Lex is currently presumed to be, so why the dull and somewhat awkward retcon, rather than show that Davis was following his own path, one of which the main players were completely unaware? Similarly, making Davis Sageeth rather than Lex invalidates parts of the legend (that Sageeth was Naman's friend, and like a brother to him), for no great dramatic gain. Actually, an attempt to justify the change - Clark telling Davis that they should have been brothers - shows how poor an idea it is: it rings hollow, because Doomsday is not a Kryptonian, but a chimera created using genetic material from various creatures that lived on Krypton. Worse still, Clark speaks of childhood nightmares in which he wasn't found by the Kents, but he never knew that he was an alien until he started high school. As with Tess' "Davis is Judas" thesis, this episode seemed to be a clumsy attempt to justify a story that simply did not fit established facts, rather than create a viable backstory for Doomsday.
Apart from the dumb plot, other stupidities abounded. Allison Mack got this week's really dud line: "That's a pretty big coincidence pill to swallow" (why not "that's some coincidence" or "quite a coincidence" - you know, phrases people actually say?). Clark and Chloe discover just how many people Davis has killed, but by the climax, they appear to have forgotten - viewing execution as morally wrong is fine, but acting as if Davis is the only victim...not so good. As for the Kryptonite "gunge tank" - what is this, a revival of Noel's House Party? And why on Earth should Clark think that Davis killing/becoming Doomsday is his fault because he wound up with good parents and Davis didn't? Apart from making Clark look like a complete moron, it showed the idiocy of the introducing those five days in the Luthor Mansion into Davis' backstory. He isn't who he is because of the Luthors - or any other bad childrens'/foster homes, but because he is genetically programmed to be that way. It would have made more sense to have had flashbacks showing him at a succession of perfectly decent foster homes, but forced to leave each time following an "incident".
All in all, this wasn't quite as bad as Turbulence: the dialogue wasn't guite as flat, and there were some decent performances (Saw Witwer, in particular, giving Davis some dignity as he makes it clear that he knows he must die for what he has done), despite the ludicrous nature of a lot of the script. However, it wasn't particularly entertaining, didn't advance the Doomsday plot in a good manner and left several characters looking very stupid indeed, so it gets added to this season's list of duds.
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Quick note: if a mod can correct the title, since I clearly can't spell "opinions", I would be grateful.
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