Lois & Clark:
The New Adventures of Superman

Season One

Lois & Clark (2-Hour Premiere)

Clark Kent gets a job with the Daily Planet just in time to cover industrial magnate Lex Luthor's plans for a space station. When Lois stows away on a shuttle launch bound for the newly opened US space station, Clark makes his first public appearance as Superman to save the sabotaged flight.

A textbook example of a good pilot. The direction is tight, the script an interesting spin on the Superman mythos. Introducing Clark as an adult in Metropolis and before he even considers a costumed identity is such a great idea. Its only failure is the bomb-swallowing at the end. GRADE: A-

Strange Visitor (From Another Planet)

The insane Colonel Trask, who heads a government bureau established to investigate alien life, believes Superman is a threat.

Colonel Trask makes an excellent villain, and one more compelling than Luthor, oddly enough. His xenophobia, contrasted with Luthor's casual irritation, makes him a more immediate threat anyway. In retrospect, it's a little unusual that TPTB did a "mythology" story this early in the game, but it works perfectly. GRADE: A

Neverending Battle

Lex Luthor puts Superman through a series of "tests" across the city in order to gauge his foe's powers.

Three winners in a row. The first episode that really establishes Superman as a force in his own right, and investigates Luthor as well. The bullet-catching scene is beautiful. GRADE: A-

I'm Looking Through You

A scientist's invisibility suit is stolen by criminals.

Superman confronts his first villains that could come from a comic book...and it's bloody Leslie Jordan. The script, while amusing, is derivative, and could play on any other hero show equally well. The shot of Superman smashing through the wall is very impressive, but it's offset by subpar invisibility effects throughout the rest of the story. GRADE: C-

Requiem for a Superhero

Lois learns that her physician father is working for a corrupt boxing ring and creating cyborgs.

This story sets a level of technology in Metropolis that is never seen again. The idea of cybernetically enhanced fighters is a good one, but it's odd that so much attention and importance is placed on how very dangerous they are, only to have Superman defeat them so very easily. It ends the show on a very weak note, since the hour builds up expectations to a huge, "Superman II"-styled fight and never delivers. It's nice to see Lois interact with her father. GRADE: C

I've Got a Crush on You

While arsonists are burning nightclubs, Lois and Clark go undercover as a torch singer and bartender, suspecting an insurance scam.

Lois and Clark go undercover in the first of Thania St. John's exquisite scripts. It borders on slapstick, and the gang of arsonists look like they've just come from a Pearl Jam concert, but it's hopelessly fun and Lois gets a deserved comeuppance or two. GRADE: B-

Smart Kids

Orphans who have been given doses of an experimental intelligence-enhancing drug kidnap Luthor and learn Clark's identity.

There's some interesting dialogue throughout the hour, John Shea gets the chance to steam like a volcano, and a little work was put into making the effects of Metamide 5 as realistic as possible, but this is a patently silly idea and many questions are left unanswered throughout. GRADE: C-

The Green, Green Glow of Home

On a trip to Smallville to investigate the government shutdown of a farm near the Kents', Lois again meets Colonel Trask and Clark learns the dangerous properties of kryptonite.

Utterly priceless, and one of the best hours of TV produced in the 1993-94 season. This almost totally Superman-free hour introduces kryptonite with a real bang. Lois bumbles her way through Smallville to hilarious effect and Colonel Trask is too evil for words. Still the high point of the series. GRADE: A+

The Man of Steel Bars

Luthor is engineering resultant rises in temperature whenever Superman appears in public, with the Man of Steel ordered to stop using super powers in Metropolis.

If you can get past the Sonny Bono puns, this is an intriguing hour, and one that effectively introduces the odd subplot of a population ready to turn on Superman at a moment's notice. It has to be said, though, that despite all the efforts to make it look scientifically solid, that Luthor's plan is awfully far-fetched. GRADE: B

Pheromone, My Lovely

A former, spurned flame of Luthor's resurfaces with a fragrance that causes its victims to let their passion control them...and that's only the 10% solution.

Perhaps the first real "gag" show, there's little in this episode you can take seriously. The jokes built around the pheromone are all wonderful, but it is with great sadness that I must report that, with his confession of love for Lois, Lex Luthor ceases to be an interesting character at all, and begins his long, downward slide into becoming Melrose Lex. GRADE: C+

Honeymoon in Metropolis

Lois and Clark hide out in a honeymoon suite to spy on government secrets being passed in the building next door.

A very well-written exploration into Lois and Clark's partnership. As a character study, it works like a charm, although the rest of the hour pales by comparison. GRADE: B+

All Shook Up

When Superman saves Earth from a meteor, he is thrown back to the planet with amnesia. A still-deadly fragment of the meteor continues towards Earth.

Zabel's weakest script for the show suffers because none of the cast effectively convey a sense of impending doom. Knowing that Clark will regain his memory and save the day, the cast just go through the paces. It does have a couple of excellent super power gags--the car and Clark failing to fly--that almost salvage the story on their own. GRADE: C-

Witness

Lois interviews a reclusive scientist who is gunned down while she is out of the room. As the only witness to the high-paid assassin's identity, she becomes his next target.

The only real loser in the first season, this instantly forgettable hour brings in Elliot Gould and then kills him off before he could get around to do some real acting. The rest of the hour plays like any given "woman in jep" TVM with Deidre Hall. GRADE: D-

Illusions of Grandeur

Superman finds himself matched by the power of suggestion when a corrupt stage sorceror uses her abilities to take over his mind.

Superman's vunerability to magic is introduced in a nifty hour with great performances from Penn Jilette and Ben Vereen. The power of hypnotism shown here is almost at metahuman levels, which somewhat undermines the episode's credibility, produced as it was long before any other superhuman characters were introduced. GRADE: B+

The Ides of Metropolis

A wrongly convicted scientist escapes and turns to Lois for help, not realizing that his own software is about to cause a virus that will shut the city down.

Computer virus stories weren't yet fodder for hacks when DJL penned this neat little script, which has a great guest turn from Melanie Mayron. GRADE: B

Foundling

Clark learns something of his origins when the globe he claimed from Trask's warehouse activates and begins playing holographic images of his life on Krypton. By chance, his apartment is robbed and the globe makes its way to Luthor.

The long-awaited look at Superman's origin rarely disappoints, and David Warner makes a far better Jor-El than Marlon Brando. Dean Cain acts his socks off in this hour, really conveying the happiness of a man learning who he is. Luthor's treasure trove of missing works of art is a smashing idea, although it has to be said that Superman's offscreen destruction of all of Luthor's security devices displays the lack of budget like a trophy. GRADE: A-

The Rival

Lois's college rival, now in the employ of the Metropolis Star, is scooping the Planet regularly, but only because her "Citizen Kane"-fixated boss is engineering the stories.

Blake and Jackson's first work for the show wraps some fabulous material about newspaper ethics around an interesting character played by Dean Stockwell. In a departure from the show, we learn very little about the head of the Metropolis Star, and are spared the usual scenes of "Bad Guy Discussing Evil Plan with Subordinate." Lois's rivalry with Nancy Everhardt is mighty petty, though. GRADE: B

Vatman

A lock of hair Superman donated to charity comes back to haunt him when a LexCorp scientist makes an immature and dying clone for Luthor's service.

Clone stories tend to always fail in US telefantasy. This is a wild exception, and the first great powered fight in the show. Cain again proves himself a great actor, with his fidgety, immature doppelganger instantly different from the real thing. The only letdown is the rather obvious Warner Bros. backlot, but television has admittedly been using that budget-lightener for years. GRADE: A-

Fly Hard

Luthor and the Planet staff are held hostage while criminals search for a gangster's lost treasure, buried in the building.

St. John's script is of her usual high standard, and the idea of Clark powerless to save anyone for fear of revealing his identity a great one. Unfortunately, the flashback scenes to Dragonetti's day are tedious, and the cast playing dual roles--and roles awfully similar to their regular ones at that--too obvious. Also obvious from the moment you knew who was behind things was Robert Beltran's treachery. GRADE: C-

Barbarians at the Planet (Part 1 of 2)

The House of Luthor (Part 2 of 2)

Lois accepts Luthor's proposal, the Planet folds, the building is wrecked by a bomb and Superman lies helpless in a kryptonite cage. The villain seems to have won...

PART ONE: A very compelling outing sees Luthor finally claiming victory. While I personally detest the whole "Lex in love with Lois" angle, it is played very well here, and, for one shining hour, Luthor is a great TV villain again. GRADE: A-

PART TWO: A lackluster follow-up to the previous hour sees the men of the Daily Planet (Cat Grant gone already and missed) working to topple Luthor. Phyllis Coates puts in a very welcome cameo as Lois's mom. Sadly, James Earl Jones never returned to prove he still owns the Planet, and Luthor's jump to his death too stupid for words. It's a nice Lazarus metaphor, but you'd think Luthor would fight rather than give in. The "Fugitive" parallel of the guilty man climbing to escape and falling to his death is also noted, but that was a little unbelievable, too. The "crossed fingers" reset of the end justifiably infuriated fans. GRADE: B-