Smallville 10x10 - If it's a mirror universe, shouldn't everyone make smart choices and funny quips?

[seriousfic]

So we start off with Tess still reeling from the Lionel Luthor news…



On the plus side, this means she doesn't have to throw out all the LL stationary. Suddenly, she gets a swank inheritance… a Kryptonian artifact! Okay, what's with all the Kryptonian shit that's been left on Earth? Is Sol some kind of intergalactic dumping ground? "Ms. Mercer, we found it beside an old mattress and a car up on cinderblocks." But that's on hold, because Clark needs to talk to Tess at Cadmus Labs. Dude, you have superspeed. Why don't you go to her place to talk it over? Save some gas?

Once there, Clark reveals that he's found out that one of the Luthor clones is still alive… you know, Tess's Mini-Me… and he's quickly able to find the one lead-lined room where… wait, wasn't Alexander staying with Tess? Wasn't there a whole big plotline about how she wanted him to stay with her? And now she just stuffed him in a fucking exploded building? Yeah, that'll stop him from growing up to be a supervillain.

Meanwhile, Clark keeps railing on how Luthors are dangerous from birth and their blood is a poison, sounding for all the world like the Grand Dragon in some personalized KKK. At first I thought this was a dream sequence of Tess's, showing Clark acting irrationally to highlight her fears, but no, Clark really is this much of a douche. I guess all the times he realized Lex was evil because he was fucking abused as a child just kinda wore off. Shit, has this guy never watched a movie or a cop show where the criminal is evil because he had a shitty childhood? Or does he watch Criminal Minds and think "man, awful lot of folks born evil in New York City!" (or wherever, I just assume all these police procedurals are episodes of Law & Order where Lenny is sick).

Even if Lex were born evil, how do you explain Lionel? He did some good in his time. Hell, didn't you spend the entire last season trying to redeem Zod? Why are you giving fucking Zod more credit than your best friend?

Fuckhead.

Anyway, Clark finds his room, but Alexander has already escaped… and left a message for Tess. Busted! Clark goes off on Tess instead of listening to her protestations… like how Alexander was a little kid and perhaps sending him to jail for being the clone of a bad guy would be a little harsh, and during shouty-time he finds the Kryptonian artifact. Picking it up he… get this… ACTIVATES IT. He doesn't think to check for a mention of it in any of his Kryptonian texts, he doesn't ask Jor-El about it, he just turns it on! What if it's a Kryptonian suitcase nuke, or a Kryptonian date-rape drug? As is, he just gets zapped into an alternate universe, but still… Clark, just because it's shiny doesn't mean you should play with it. Fuckhead.



Anyway, in this alternate universe, Clark is in bed with two ladies… best Kryptonian artifact ever… although, wait, isn't it canon that Clark is only able to have sex with women because of advanced Jor-El training that was probably awkward as fuck? (Yes, folks, Smallville made "Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex" canon. You can see how it's become so beloved) So how is this universe's Clark, who said "nuts to Jor-El!", able to do it?

But I digress! Lionel wakes Clark up and man, good to see you, John Glover! On behalf of America, I apologize for not having a better show for you to star on. I mean, a guest spot on Heroes? I could not be more sorry. Really, if it were up to me, you'd still be on Brimstone.

Anyway, you know the deal… historical quotes, creepiness, dueling… with blue-Kryptonite-tipped swords so Lionel can cut Clark, which seems needlessly sadistic, even for Lionel. In this universe, Clark Luthor is Ultraman, a nod to a comic book storyline that is vastly superior to this one, needless to say. He's, I guess, working a public relations angle by playing superhero, yet he kills anyone who sees him, which doesn't strike me as very good PR. I guess all the Luthoring in the world can't teach Clark to wear a fucking mask.

Clark, who by now should really be up to speed on parallel realities, speeds over to the Clark barn and starts crying for "Mom! Dad!" Alternate universes in which long-dead characters reappear to the delight of the fans? What do you think this is, Clark, Lost? You'll take your one guest star and you'll like it!

Instead of his mommy, Clark meets his sugar mommy (I apologize, it's just this fucking show), Tess, complete with the requisite AU gangsta swaggah. She and Clark Luthor are having sexy, sexy fauxcest, although she takes care to remind those watching at home that Clark's adopted, so it's acceptably perverted perversion. Clark naturally turns her down, because he gave up good taste in women back when Allison Mack was on the show. Tess sees that Clark doesn't have his scar – a goofy-looking L sigil carved into his arm by Lex Luthor, aka Sir-Not-Appearing-In-This-Episode. Slashers, go nuts—and realizes that Clark activated the dimensional switcheroo.

"What dire hellhole must your Earth be like for you to take a chance on a random alternate universe?" she does not ask.

"Ummm…" Clark does not reply.

Some more bullshit about the AU you don't care about… Lois and Ollie are getting it on here. What a wild and crazy thing you would only see in a parallel universe, or in a rerun. They're also basically the same as their 616 counterparts, which isn't boring at all in the land of anti-sarcasm. C'mon, evil sexy Lois and Ollie, they were black leather and make homoerotic remarks. Not that hard.

And pardon me for asking, but what happened to Doomsday on this AU? Or Chloe? Just wondering. I'm going to assume those crazy kids worked things out and Chloe is keeping the Beast at bay with regular doses of Vitamin C-cup. Also, Henry James Olsen died from stepping on a rusty nail.

Meanwhile, back on Earth Nice (you can tell because they took the filter off the camera), Douchebag Clark… that is, Extra Douchebag Clark… tries to get his Tess on, thinking she's the one who switcheroo'd them. Thankfully, Tess doesn't have to pay The Ultimate Price to allay his suspicions, but unfortunately, she doesn't pull an Emma Frost and sleep with him just cuz. (Also, when Clark kisses her, Tess struggles at first, then starts ~giving in to her raging desires~. That's real nice, show.)

Once she's alone, Tess tries to call Lois to warn her, but Lois blows her off because she's a moron it's her day off. So Tess kills Lois's credit card and calls her again on someone else's cell phone. Okay, that was fun. Tess, I have a feeling you and Babs would be good friends, even without the total L Wordness of the two of you.

Lois goes to the Watchtower where Tess starts to explain the situation, but ED!Clark barges in through the skylight; yes, even Clark in other dimensions can fly, what the fuck, CK? Do you like running everywhere? And, this being an evil Clark Kent, he does things the real Clark Kent would never do, like hitting women, yelling at them, and threatening to kill Tess… wait… okay, things the real Clark Kent would never do unless he were mad. Or drunk.

And, get this, our cliffhanger is SuperDouche asking Tess for the dimensional switcheroo machine so he can destroy it, her asking what he'll do if she doesn't tell him where it is, and him saying he'll kill her. Duh, Tess, the evil Clark Kent has not sworn a vow of pacifism.

Anyway, wondering how our intrepid heroes get out of this one? Too bad! We never find out. I'm not kidding, that entire subplot just gets left hanging. What do we get instead? Lots of anvil dropping, only instead of being about the comics ("Lois, I accidentally put my underwear on the outside… I think it looks kinda good!"), it's about the show we've been watching for ten years, like how Lois would only leave Ollie if she met someone better, only there isn't someone better because that universe's Clark is a douche (super douche, I mean), so IRONY.

Meanwhile, in one of the only points to this episode, Alt!Tess and Alt!Lionel have a scene together where Lionel tells Tess that he loves Alt!Clark more than her, that she's not special, and that Santa Claus isn't real. Thank you, show, I do appreciate it when interesting, well-acted characters interact. Perhaps more of that?

Clark goes to the Alt!Fortress, but Lionel has already taken it over and, judging by the lighting scheme, turned it into a disco. Clark finds out from him that Ollie has the dimension thingey… fine, they call it a mirror box, even though it isn’t a box and has no mirrors… so he kidnaps Lois from her wedding reception and phones Ollie to bring him the mirror box. Then he explains himself to Lois in classic "how could I know this stuff about you if we weren't in love?" fashion, like how she sees through his every lie. Uhh, Clark, you fooled her into thinking you were human for half a decade. She's not exactly Stansfield from The Professional.

Then Clark speeds off to the Alt!Watchtower, where he chats with Ollie. Ollie doesn't have the mirror box, but he does have an unpleasant death. Kryptonite! Ollie has been buying up Smallville and digging up Kryptonite to build death traps for Ultraman in every city. So he's basically Lex Luthor?

"You're not a killer!" Clark pleads to Ollie. Lex Luthor says bullshit.

Clark babbles about how it wasn't him, it was the one-armed Clark Kent, instead of just showing his lack of scar, but Ollie isn't having it. He is, however, having a concussion courtesy of Lionel Luthor… who isn't too pleased with Alt!Clark's plan to kill him and go to a parallel universe. Okay, that plan is at least one step too complicated. Again, instead of volunteering that Lionel's got the wrong Clark, CK takes a beating, at one point even getting whipped by Lionel's belt. Okay, slashers, go nuts.

But Ollie turns the Kryptonite off and Clark is able to throw Lionel twenty feet through the air. Ah, just like old times! Clark prepares to go home, but tells Ollie to activate the Kryptonite as soon as he leaves to take care of Alt!Clark. And away we go. Clark shows up at a battle-damaged Watchtower, where Tess, Ollie, and Lois are all pointing Kryptonite weaponry at him. An evil Clark Kent going on a rampage through Metropolis? Glad we didn't get to see that!

Clark and Lois have a bullshit confab about their relationship, then Clark visits Tess to reveal he's figured out that she's a Luthor. Awkward! He apologizes and says that DNA doesn't abuse people, people abuse people. Wow, such insight after only ten seasons of character development! What's next, will you learn playing football with your powers isn't such a good idea? That you shouldn't mope around so much? That you shouldn't eat yellow snow?

Fuckhead.

Tess tells Clark that she kept Alexander a secret because she thought he was the only family she had… and because she wanted to murder him, but she's either not mentioning that to Clark or the writers forgot about it… your call, folks.

Meanwhile, Lionel got sucked through the portal with Clark, so Big Daddy Luthor is back! Point for you, show! That puts you at point one.

So, as someone who's written a Clark Luthor AU… this definitely could use more Chloe/Davis doggy-style. That's an expert opinion there.

Comments

[geonncannon.livejournal.com]

It pains me that this show is going to surpass Stargate SG-1 as the longest running American fantasy show. I really do think they only gave it a tenth season just for that reason. :P

[paraxdisepink.livejournal.com]

Well SG-1 had ten seasons plus the two tie-in movies, so maybe that helps. Heh

[morwen_peredhil]

I keep hoping that you have to be fucking kidding about eighty-five percent of what you describe happening on SV these days, and then I remember that, just like Twilight, Smallville means never having to say you were kidding.

[paraxdisepink.livejournal.com]

isn't it canon that Clark is only able to have sex with women because of advanced Jor-El training that was probably awkward as fuck?

My only reaction to this is an urgent and prevailing desire to beat my head against a wall until I forget that I ever read it.

yet he kills anyone who sees him,

As opposed to the good old days when he used to just condemn them to a horrid fate in Belle Reve.

And didn't they already do the clone a Luthor sibling plotline in s7 with Julian?

THis show is a crime against my sanity. I choose to remember Lionel as the magnificent bastard who wanted to give Lex a good spanking.

[tgirl78.livejournal.com]

Okay, I totally agree with your synopsis here, but I still quite liked this episode. lol! Tess is also growing on me. :) As with Clark turning the artificat- I SO agree with you. I was thinking- "How the fuck are you going to know what that does once you turn it!? Aren't you smarter than that!?" Silly Clark.