“Smallville” Season 1 (2001-02, WB), episodes 1-3 — The most blatant example of trying to steal an audience comes from the WB’s “Smallville.” Last season, the WB canceled the Fox-produced “Roswell,” which deals with aliens with superpowers who are trying to hide their identities, and brought in a new show with the same story. But the WB’s most perplexing decision was scheduling “Smallville” at the same time as “Roswell” (8 p.m. Tuesdays), a move that is guaranteed to limit their audience.
The “Smallville” pilot shows a spaceship crashing to Earth near a small town. A naked alien kid, who looks like a 6-year old human, emerges and is adopted by a couple who’s always wanted kids. Later on, Clark Kent (Tom Welling) becomes obsessed with a cute human girl, but he can’t get too close to her for fear that his secret will get out. This was all covered two years ago on “Roswell.”
Granted, the show is based on the Superman mythos, which was established well before “Roswell” started. And it even has a few slices of originality: unlike on “Roswell,” Clark’s parents know he’s an alien, and the whole show has a breezy vibe that contrasts from the seriousness of “Roswell.” But those are pretty much the only things that distinguish the show, unless you count the juvenile villains-of-the-week and the bland characters.
— John Hansen, “Is this the season of the rip-off?,” NDSU Spectrum, Nov. 2, 2001
“Smallville” Season (2001-02, WB), episodes 1-10 — An attempt to make Superman cool for the new millennium (as if Supes was ever uncool), “Smallville” (8 p.m. Tuesday, WB), is like a good cover band — technically competent yet lacking originality. Viewers will recognize such classic tunes as “Alien kid crashes in small town and falls in love” (made popular by “Roswell” in 1999) and “Otherworldly energy source draws evildoers to annoy hero every week” (a hit during early seasons of “Buffy”).
The best character is adorable newspaper reporter Chloe (Alison Mack), but she hasn’t been featured much. Clark Kent (Tom Welling) and Lex Luthor (Michael Rosenbaum) are likable enough, but love interest Lana Lang (Kristen Kruek) is inexcusably boring. A romance between Clark and Chloe would be much more interesting.
“Smallville” has established a formula of having Clark defeat a new Kryptonite-mutated villain every week — geek wants to be popular so he turns into a bug, fat girl wants to be thin so she starts eating everybody … that sort of thing. There’s no overarching mythology yet, but one assumes we’ll eventually see Lex turn evil, Clark and Lana get together and then break up, and Clark leave for Metropolis to become Superman. Because it’s a prequel to a story we already know, a viewer watches for the “how” and “why” rather than the “what.” Another hook is Remy Zero’s “Save Me,” possibly the best theme song on TV. B-
— John Hansen, “Alien TV: ‘Smallville’ not as super as ‘Roswell,’ ” NDSU Spectrum, Feb. 1, 2002