Fall TV: Smallville Off to a Strong Seventh Season

The seventh season of WB's "Smallville" debuted with a rousing, epic battle between Clark (Tom Welling) and his evil twin from the Phantom Zone. All kinds of tantalizing plot twists are popping, but after the better part of a decade on the air, how much juice does this "Superman" prequel have left?

Don't get me wrong. As a "Smallville" fan, I hope the show goes on forever. The acting is terrific, and with few exceptions, the engaging plots move at super speed. But as Michael Rosenbabaum, who plays Lex, said in a recent interview, "all good things must come to an end." Rosenbaum's contract expires after this year, and he has not committed to an eighth season. For the past six years, Lex has been an excellent foil for Clark, and it is unclear whether new characters, and evolving old ones, could take up the slack following a Rosenbaum departure.

And let's be realistic: the cast is getting older. Rosenbaum and Welling are in their 30s. Ms. Kreuk is in her mid-20s. They're not the high school kids they started off portraying.

Season 7 began with a recycled scene from Season 1. Lex again goes off a bridge, but this time he's rescued, not by Clark, but by a mysterious blonde beauty with Kryptonian powers. The increasingly evil Lex's reaction is deliciously ironic: he mistakes her for an angel.

The inside dope is that in future episodes, this young lady will turn out to be Clark's cousin Kara (Laura Vandervoort), the future Supergirl. This is the second Kryptonian female friend Clark has encountered (the first was killed off fighting a Phantom Zone criminal last season), and she should inject some new blood into this long-running saga. I suspect Kara will be a souped up version of Lois (Erica Durance), an annoying thorn in Clark's side whom he gradually comes to love. But unlike his romantic feelings toward Lois, Clark's love for Kara will, of course, be familial.

That's too bad. I was always hoping that Clark would make out with a Kryptonian. The chemistry would be, well, super.

Like the 2006 Brandon Routh flick "Superman Returns", the seventh season of "Smallville" began with strong religious and moral undertones. Chloe (Allison Mack) continues to explore her new meteor-induced powers of Christ-like healing. She brings back a fatally stabbed Lois from the dead, dies herself, and then revives in the morgue. When Clark has it out with his dark double, he discovers the source of their respective strengths and weaknesses. The double is empowered by Kryptonite and weakened by the sun. With Clark, it's just the reverse, and he uses this knowledge to defeat the phantom. This theme of light versus darkness is likely to be further explored throughout the season.

Meanwhile, Lex's Machiavellian father, Lionel (John Glover), has mysteriously disappeared. So has Lana, but, after faking her death to escape hubby Lex, she surfaces in Hong Kong. The whole Clark-Lana unrequited love thing has gotten so jaded that I just wish she'd go away, but given the O'Henry-like ending of this season's first episode, she'll probably be around for awhile.

Lionel is definitely on his way out, and I predict that he will either die in some weird accident or be killed by Lex, who has harbored a steady animus towards him throughout the series. I'll be sorry to see Lionel go because he's been such an interesting grey character, alternately acting as villain and aide to Clark. In the past, Lionel, to Clark's exasperation, has been a budding suitor for Mrs. Kent (Annette O'Toole), which could provide additional fodder for Smallville 7.

Last season or not, this year's "Smallville" will be a winner, and there should be some fascinating developments as surviving characters reach full maturity.