First off, the latest episode of Smallville was interesting. The emphasis of the episode was that Clark needs to prove himself, or something like that, and that only Kara, his cousin is capable of doing so, so she reveals herself as Supergirl (not the name she uses) and pretty much has herself targeted instead of the future Superman.
Some immediate comments: It was great seeing the actress who plays Kara back again. It’s also kind of cool that they touched on the fact that Clark still can’t fly, and for a second he did…right before crashing down and burning. Oh well. Baby steps.
The problem with the episode is more in what they were trying to do than it what they did. There’s always been a freakish element to the show that I think is inherent in the people who develop the show. A couple of times they’ve gone with the whole leather aspect of the superhero costumed characters just cause it was kind of hot and innovative. Not to mention that all of the actors/actresses are hot as well, so it makes sense that they take advantage of their best attributes.
Last season, they went the fetish route with an attempt to create a false superhero identity for Lois Lane, in that her character was named Stilleto, and she dressed in black leather, in a sort of catwomanish costume with black stilletos. It was pretty obvious that they were going the full nines in attempting to make her fetishy hot. And they succeeded. They even threw in a few S&M jokes as well to even out the look.
This episode they went the full monty, so to speak. The main villain for the episode was followed to an S&M bar by Lois, who then dresses up as a dominatrix so she can get into a scene with the guy and then blackmail him into giving up his vendetta for the Blur (Superman/Clark). There was the obligatory scene where Lois walks through the dungeon atmosphere and people are doing all sorts of freakish things while pounding music is playing in the background. Then she puts the guy in handcuffs, pours hot wax on his chest and then elicits two hot women who help her take photos of the guy in bondage. Then she uses the photos to ruin the guy’s credibility.
Okay, here’s the complaint I have. First off, if they’re interested in appealing to the fetish crowd, which is the only reason you do in your face bondage sorts of scenes in a network television show, well, you’re going to get that crowd interested in your show. You’re not going to get the Bible thumping crowd, so you have already decided on your audience appeal. Well, then your next move should not be to try to discredit that same crowd by showing that once you reveal the photos, you’ve discredited your character. In other words, you can’t show the scenes, expect to excite your audience and then turn around and tell your audience that it’s not acceptable behavior. If you do, you’ve basically pissed off every potential audience member you could ever hope to attract. The Bible thumpers are going to hate you for going all fetishy, and the fetish crowd is going to hate you for going all moralistic and anti-fetish. Basically, you lose on all counts.
The whole CW thing lately has been to be as innovative, fetishy and sexually-aware as possible, and that’s great. But if you’re going to do it, go all the way. I don’t mean show nudity or go nuts with the sexual content, but at least show that if your emphasis is to show it, don’t ridicule it as well.
Having hung with that crowd for some time now, I find the ridicule from mainstream television to be really counter-productive because it’s been no secret that a lot of creative types are into all sorts of interesting persuasions (or lifestyles). As such, they find themselves having to sneak it into mainstream material and then pretending that it’s just innovative but vanilla at the same time. Well, it’s not. And unfortunately, they’re never going to convince the mainstream people who hate them that they should embrace them, so either go all the way with it and be proud, or don’t do it. Save it for people and innovators who are willing to take a risk and a chance with the idea. Otherwise, you force it right back into the closet again, because if the people who really believe in it aren’t willing to back it up, then who will?
One of the interesting things about Buffy when it was on the air was that it was never scared to just “go there”. It never apologized for it, and it went on with life like everything was normal when they did go there, and they did go there enough times to cause people in those communities to really appreciate it. I think that’s what the CW wants to do, but they’re too frightened to do so. Instead, they keep sniping from the shadows, hidden in closets and hoping that people will think they’re innovative so that they can sneak out and wave their pistachio banners for everyone to see. But that’s never going to happen as long as they keep hiding in shadows.
Not the greatest episode, but there’s a lot of promise there for the future. Here’s hoping they continue to try to innovate without hiding behind their intentions.