n season one, Smallville introduced a new generation of fans to the Superman mythos by way of a teenage Clark Kent (Welling) and the other inhabitants of a small Kansas town plagued by the fallout of a mysterious meteor shower. While the first season established the characters and set up the world of Smallville, the second reveals more about Clark's powers and origins.
Clark's personal relationships become more complicated this season as well when he is forced to reveal his secret to his friend Pete (Sam Jones III), who proves to be both an ally and a liability later on. And as Clark grows closer to Lana (Kreuk), their budding romance jeopardizes their friendship with Chloe (Allison Mack), whose jealousy leads her into a dark alliance that could expose Clark's secret to the worst possible source. At home, Jonathan and Martha struggle to keep the farm and adjust to the surprising news that a new little Kent could be on the way.
Meanwhile, Lex (Rosenbaum) has his own new set of issues when his father Lionel (new cast regular Glover) is blinded in the season premiere and subsequently makes himself at home in the Smallville mansion. Unfortunately for Clark, it appears that Lex's fascination with his secrets runs in the family. The Luthors' constant game of one-upmanship inevitably spills over into the lives of the Kents, intertwining the fates of the two families. But how much does Lionel know, and what is he willing to do to uncover the rest?
When he's not investigating Clark, Lionel occupies himself by interfering with Lex's first serious romance of the series, with Dr. Helen Bryce (Emanuelle Vaugier). The elder Luthor makes every attempt to expose his son's eventual fiancee as a gold-digging fraud, but whether Lex's loyalties are dangerously misplaced becomes one of the unanswered questions at the end of the season.
The buildup reaches a climax in the devastating finale, in which alliances are betrayed, destinies are revealed, and tragedy touches the lives of everyone in Smallville.
A strong show gets even stronger
It's clear that the creators of Smallville learned much during the production of the first season on The WB and applied those lessons to the second. Gone are the superfluous characters, like Lana's Aunt Nell and the bland boyfriend (although Eric Johnson does make a notable return in "Visage"). And fewer are the repetitive "freak of the week" episodes that constituted the majority of the first season. Though the formula isn't abandoned entirely in episodes such as "Nocturne" and "Dichotic," the arc of the season is more focused on exploring the comic-book-based mythology and the bigger themes of discovery and evolution.
This is the season in which Clark gains the power of heat vision ("Heat"), discovers the personality-changing effects of red Kryptonite ("Red"), finds alien cave drawings prophesying his heroic future ("Skinwalkers") and, in an out-of-this-world casting coup, learns about his home planet from very-special-guest-star Christopher Reeve ("Rosetta"). Before the season is over, Clark will question his purpose on this planet and meet his real father, Jor-El (who, in another masterstroke of casting, is voiced by Terence Stamp, General Zod of the original Superman film franchise).
One of the best additions to the show is John Glover as a regular cast member. Though he appeared sporadically in the first season, the gifted Glover settles naturally into the role of the show's main archvillain, an archetype sorely missing from the series until now. His scenes with the equally capable Rosenbaum are some of the most enjoyable of the series. The only unfortunate casualty is the reduction in scenes between Rosenbaum and Welling. The epic connection between Clark and Lex is truly the heart of the show, but it seems the writers are running out of reasons for the two to share screen time. The first hint of distance between them comes halfway through the season, in "Insurgence," but it is indirectly fostered much earlier by their parallel but separate story arcs.
The producers have also applied the lessons they learned from the first-season DVD release. The episodes are available in widescreen, and the extras are more extensive this time around. Most entertaining are the cast commentaries on "Red" by Welling, Rosenbaum, Kreuk and co-executive producer Greg Beeman, and on "Rosetta" by all of the above plus director James Marshall. While the interface makes some of the commentaries difficult to find (they're hidden on the second page of the features menu), they are worth searching out. Although Kreuk has little insight to offer beyond the admission that she hates the color pink, Welling and Rosenbaum have fun playing off of each other like a seasoned comedic team. Beeman and Marshall chime in now and then with their own takes on the action and the occasional censored profanity (the "F-bomb," as Rosenbaum puts it). Both commentaries feel like a candid, uninhibited look behind the scenes and give the viewer an idealized sense of what it might be like to come to work on the set of Smallville with these people every day.
