“Smallville,” launching Oct. 16, is of course the WB’s cape-free “Buffification” of Clark Kent’s teen years.
Coax has learned that this Buffification appears to extend to the monster-of-the-week premise which categorized the slayer’s first season. Here’s the rundown of trouble young Clark will run into during his first few episodes:
* Jason Creek, a high-school nerd tortured and virtually crucified by football players around the time baby Clark’s spaceship crashed, returns 12 years later with strange electrical powers that allows him to seek shocky vengeance.
* Greg Arkin, a high-school nerd with a thing for both insects and Lana Lang, crashes his VW bug and emerges a superstrong Brundlefly-esque bug-dude capable cocooning virtually anything.
* Earl Jenkins, an old friend of the Kents and a former janitor for LuthorCorp, gets the shakes so bad he can vibrate doors off their hinges and kill anyone he touches, British-nanny style. Jenkins believes his trouble began when he took a job cleaning the hush-hush “level three” of the Smallville LuthorCorp plant. (Trouble is, Lex’s dad keeps insisting there is no level three.)
* Mean old Coach Walt, who has overseen Smallville High’s football program for a quarter century, discovers he’s a pyrokinetic, capable even of incinerating the principal who wants to pull academic underachievers off the winning squad.
What do all these supervillians have in common? All of them seem to have gotten their superpowers from the Kryptonite that fell to Smallville the same day Clark’s spaceship did in October 1989.
Not that all the Kryptonite necessarily landed in Smallville. The first time we see the teen version of Clark in the pilot, he’s reading on the Internet about youngsters in other parts of the world who seem to be discovering superpowers. “Record Breaking Teen Becomes Fastest Man Alive” reads one headline (freeze-frame inspection reveals the teen is named Higgens, rather than Garrick, Allen or West). “Six-Year-Old Korean Boy Lifts Car Off Of Injured Father,” reads another.
And -- though 21-yaer-old Lex Luthor, Superman’s traditional archnemesis, has been assigned to look after LuthorCorp interests in Smallville, Lex doesn’t seem to have anything to do with the local wackiness. (In fact, “Smallville’s” Lex turns out to be a quite amusing individual who’s too busy harboring resentment for his father to even contemplate causing more trouble for the townfolk.)
Still to be determined is be how continuity-heavy the series will is. We do know that the second episode (with bug-boy) takes place only hours after the pilot.
* Jason Creek, a high-school nerd tortured and virtually crucified by football players around the time baby Clark’s spaceship crashed, returns 12 years later with strange electrical powers that allows him to seek shocky vengeance.
* Greg Arkin, a high-school nerd with a thing for both insects and Lana Lang, crashes his VW bug and emerges a superstrong Brundlefly-esque bug-dude capable cocooning virtually anything.
* Earl Jenkins, an old friend of the Kents and a former janitor for LuthorCorp, gets the shakes so bad he can vibrate doors off their hinges and kill anyone he touches, British-nanny style. Jenkins believes his trouble began when he took a job cleaning the hush-hush “level three” of the Smallville LuthorCorp plant. (Trouble is, Lex’s dad keeps insisting there is no level three.)
* Mean old Coach Walt, who has overseen Smallville High’s football program for a quarter century, discovers he’s a pyrokinetic, capable even of incinerating the principal who wants to pull academic underachievers off the winning squad.
What do all these supervillians have in common? All of them seem to have gotten their superpowers from the Kryptonite that fell to Smallville the same day Clark’s spaceship did in October 1989.
Not that all the Kryptonite necessarily landed in Smallville. The first time we see the teen version of Clark in the pilot, he’s reading on the Internet about youngsters in other parts of the world who seem to be discovering superpowers. “Record Breaking Teen Becomes Fastest Man Alive” reads one headline (freeze-frame inspection reveals the teen is named Higgens, rather than Garrick, Allen or West). “Six-Year-Old Korean Boy Lifts Car Off Of Injured Father,” reads another.
And -- though 21-yaer-old Lex Luthor, Superman’s traditional archnemesis, has been assigned to look after LuthorCorp interests in Smallville, Lex doesn’t seem to have anything to do with the local wackiness. (In fact, “Smallville’s” Lex turns out to be a quite amusing individual who’s too busy harboring resentment for his father to even contemplate causing more trouble for the townfolk.)
Still to be determined is be how continuity-heavy the series will is. We do know that the second episode (with bug-boy) takes place only hours after the pilot.
* Earl Jenkins, an old friend of the Kents and a former janitor for LuthorCorp, gets the shakes so bad he can vibrate doors off their hinges and kill anyone he touches, British-nanny style. Jenkins believes his trouble began when he took a job cleaning the hush-hush “level three” of the Smallville LuthorCorp plant. (Trouble is, Lex’s dad keeps insisting there is no level three.)
* Mean old Coach Walt, who has overseen Smallville High’s football program for a quarter century, discovers he’s a pyrokinetic, capable even of incinerating the principal who wants to pull academic underachievers off the winning squad.
What do all these supervillians have in common? All of them seem to have gotten their superpowers from the Kryptonite that fell to Smallville the same day Clark’s spaceship did in October 1989.
Not that all the Kryptonite necessarily landed in Smallville. The first time we see the teen version of Clark in the pilot, he’s reading on the Internet about youngsters in other parts of the world who seem to be discovering superpowers. “Record Breaking Teen Becomes Fastest Man Alive” reads one headline (freeze-frame inspection reveals the teen is named Higgens, rather than Garrick, Allen or West). “Six-Year-Old Korean Boy Lifts Car Off Of Injured Father,” reads another.
And -- though 21-yaer-old Lex Luthor, Superman’s traditional archnemesis, has been assigned to look after LuthorCorp interests in Smallville, Lex doesn’t seem to have anything to do with the local wackiness. (In fact, “Smallville’s” Lex turns out to be a quite amusing individual who’s too busy harboring resentment for his father to even contemplate causing more trouble for the townfolk.)
Still to be determined is be how continuity-heavy the series will is. We do know that the second episode (with bug-boy) takes place only hours after the pilot.
What do all these supervillians have in common? All of them seem to have gotten their superpowers from the Kryptonite that fell to Smallville the same day Clark’s spaceship did in October 1989.
Not that all the Kryptonite necessarily landed in Smallville. The first time we see the teen version of Clark in the pilot, he’s reading on the Internet about youngsters in other parts of the world who seem to be discovering superpowers. “Record Breaking Teen Becomes Fastest Man Alive” reads one headline (freeze-frame inspection reveals the teen is named Higgens, rather than Garrick, Allen or West). “Six-Year-Old Korean Boy Lifts Car Off Of Injured Father,” reads another.
And -- though 21-yaer-old Lex Luthor, Superman’s traditional archnemesis, has been assigned to look after LuthorCorp interests in Smallville, Lex doesn’t seem to have anything to do with the local wackiness. (In fact, “Smallville’s” Lex turns out to be a quite amusing individual who’s too busy harboring resentment for his father to even contemplate causing more trouble for the townfolk.)
Still to be determined is be how continuity-heavy the series will is. We do know that the second episode (with bug-boy) takes place only hours after the pilot.
And -- though 21-yaer-old Lex Luthor, Superman’s traditional archnemesis, has been assigned to look after LuthorCorp interests in Smallville, Lex doesn’t seem to have anything to do with the local wackiness. (In fact, “Smallville’s” Lex turns out to be a quite amusing individual who’s too busy harboring resentment for his father to even contemplate causing more trouble for the townfolk.)
Still to be determined is be how continuity-heavy the series will is. We do know that the second episode (with bug-boy) takes place only hours after the pilot.
