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I've been watching Smallville Season One while exercising. It's built on a great premise -- the Man of Steel before he grew into full superness -- but the show is extremely flawed. It does have some good parts: the character of Clark, his friendship with Lex Luthor, premonitions of Lex's future menace, and the sweetness of the Clark/Lana relationship. But some parts of this show are just too stupid for words. Let's start with the writing. The dialog is so cliched that you can predict it, word for word, at least 30 seconds before it's spoken. And the plots are just insipid and embarrassingly similar from show to show: pick a random Smallville-ite and give him/her a kryptonite-fueled power that just happens to be an ironic twist on their personality. The guy who gets angry easily? Give him fire. The bug-lover? Turn him into a bug. And wait... we had a fire guy, so how about a cold guy next? And then a bee girl! It's a rogues' gallery of the pathetic, going beyond "comic-booky" (which could be fun) into plain stupid.

Now let's talk about characters. Chloe is the worst, a limp attempt at a "Willow" character from "Buffy the Vampire Slayer". No matter what the situation is, no matter how little evidence is around, Chloe instantly leaps to the correct, implausible solution ("Hmm, that girl MUST be controlling the killer bees by emitting a queen bee scent.") It's as if she has a direct mental channel to the script. Then there's Pete, a character so insubstantial that I couldn't even remember his name after a dozen episodes. Continuing the "Buffy" analogy, he's the Xander character, but Xander was actually witty and charming. Pete is barely noticeable: we're supposed to believe he's "Clark's best friend" but he doesn't actually do anything remotely interesting. The rest of the characters (Ma & Pa Kent, Lionel Luthor) are played like stereotypes: not bad, just unoriginal and predictable.

But perhaps the worst aspect of the show is its complete lack of suspense. In every episode, you always know who the bad guy is from the very beginning. Given that Clark is invulnerable and the main characters aren't likely to die, you know how every show is going to unfold and end. Add in the cliched dialog, and the plot just evaporates. To compare with another "super-teen" show, "Buffy" succeeded in this domain because the characters were strong, the dialog was clever, and the plots had surprising twists, even when the vampire parts got dumb.

There is the occasional flash of brilliance, like the episode with the rogue cop who blackmails Clark (thankfully, no kryptonite-poisoning in sight) and when Cassandra takes Lex's hand to see his future. Other than these rarities, the show is barely watchable, even painfully bad sometimes. I give it 3 stars for being just enough to take my mind off the treadmill. (I stick with it because I'm curious to watch Clark & Lex mature.)

I am finally seeing what the fuss was about. This is an interesting take on the whole Superman legacy, with Tom Welling playing the young Clark Kent as a teen in a little town in Kansas, but in modern times. He has abilities that his adoptive parents want to hide, he yearns for a lovely girl named Lana, and at this time he is great friends with the conflicted Lex Luthor, a billionaire's son who is torn between what his father wants for him and what he wants to do on his own.

John Schneider also does a nice job as Jonathan Kent, while the other cast members, pretty much unknown before this series, are solid. It's interesting to watch Clark hone his skills in his slow rise to Superman, while we all know that one day, Lex will give in to the dark side and become his enemy.

it was a good buy, everything worked, and was clean, the reason this did not receive 5 stars is because when i received it, the discs were loose, and were not securely in the box set. This could have been caused from shipping. But just in case, i gave it 4 stars.

My fiance and I went thru this season in 2 weeks! We hurried to watch the second season and have just ordered the 3rd,...... it's addicting!

This was a great season and I'm glad I could find it somewhere for so cheap. The shipping was extremely reasonable and I enjoy my product very much. Thank you!