"Requiem" rewatch
Nov. 7th, 2009 09:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
acampbellI thought I was doing okay. "Bulletproof": check. "Power": check. I was bookin' right along. I'd vowed to slug through this trio of FAIL that is the S8 Lana/Clana arc, one more time and survive!
But, ah, "Requiem"! this one was rough. *teeth gnashing*
There's so much so wrong with this ep that it's hard even to know where to begin. There were a couple of times while rewatching that I almost had to turn it off, it was so unbearably awful. Ascomplicat said recently, only much more eloquently, if we didn't know what losers TPTB, PSIII, and the writers, etc., are, it would be tempting to think the whole S8 Lana arc was a huge joke and an exercise in making fun of some of the worst aspects of SV.
"Requiem" has proven, in my first rewatch since it aired, as awful as I remember it, and then some.
From Super, bed-breaking sex,
to the Clana Power Couple
to Fake!Lex
whose mission in his twisted, sick, sad life is to break up Clana, to Clark wanting to off Lex and needing LANA to stop him, and finally, to Lana skipping because there's nothing in it for her any more--Fail All 'Round. The only thing that saves my heart from being entirely crushed is that it's so over the top as to be almost silly, and so improbable that it's relatively easy to forget. Unlike, for example, "Promise," way back in S6 when I still couldn't believe that TPTB were letting things get so awful! Now I believe it, and am resigned to their always picking the absolute worst scenario.
I love seeing the Luthorcorp board, a board that was apparently devoted to them. We saw so little of the Luthors' public faces, particularly in the later seasons, when Lex was little more than a pathetic loser that everyone hated. But in Offscreenville, they were successful businessmen that were generally admired and even revered.
I liked Toyman better in a Lana-less ep this last time around.
Oliver "hides under a table" and is miraculously all right.
The thumping, giggling, smashing was just gross. I didn't think SuperSex was appealing or funny the first time around and it's even less so now. But then, the Clana sex back in "Mortal"/"Hidden" grossed me out, too, so much that it cast a pall over S5 in its entirety. Well, that, and the Clexana...
Chloe. Where do I start? She lost me a long time ago, and why is she coaxing Clark to kill Lex and then ragging on Ollie for wanting/planning to do the same thing?
Even more disgusting than the Clana is Fake!Lex. Fake!voice, breathing like Darth Vader, and, yeah, this "Lex" is apparently so obsessed with Clana that he just has to destroy it. Does this jive with the Lex we saw at the end of "Arctic"? We don't even get a throwaway line of dialogue that says something like: the pain of his injuries/disabilities have maddened him to the point that he's bitterly focused on destroying those he loved before...nada. And did they have to beat him up so badly that he needs machines to function?
This plot, this character, is a disgrace to the series and a colossal insult to Michael Rosenbaum and all the fans who admired and loved Lex over the years. Make him one-dimensional evil and on top of that, make him sound like Vader, and maybe then the audience will buy that he's Really a Villain. The last in a long line of cheap tricks.
See Glorious!Heroic!Lana lifted high in the air as she performs the Ultimate, Selfless Sacrifice for her TWU WUV!!
And then Clark, after expounding all ep long about how it's wrong to kill, rushes off to kill Lex and LANA has to be the one to stop him!
Unfortunately, no one was focused on stopping Oliver.
Lana goes to cry on Chloe's shoulder again in one of the most one-sided friendships ever.
Join the club, Clark. She always makes us ill, too!
The Kryptonite Lana is almost comical. We've known for eons that Lana/Clana is poison, but now it's made Canon!
It's clear to me that she wanted the supersuit so she could have sex with Clark, and when that was no longer a possibility, bye-bye.
And if she's now out there "protecting" him, why doesn't she show up to help him once in a while.
His last words (and the last words of the ep)? "I...love...you." Even though, according to Chloe, he's wanted Lois since 1930.
Would I like to get my hands on the people responsible for this episode. Who in heaven could have deemed this an effective conclusion to the Clana relationship? It feels like something a tenyearold thought up.
As tariel22 said, we just have to accept that, years of Superman canon to the contrary, in the SV 'verse, Lana Lang is the Great Love of Clark's Life.
The absolute worst scene is the one with "Lex" & Clana. It reminds me of the scene in Lion in Winter where Eleanor insists on watching Henry kiss Alais. The whole thing is unbearably insulting: to Lex ("real" Lex), to the audience, to everyone and everything.
Even his EVOL methods and nature cannot vanquish the Power of the Love that is CLANA!!
The best thing about this ep? Clark's sadness at Lex's passing. I refuse to subscribe to what one person suggested: that he's thinking: "I wish Lex had died earlier before he could break up Lana and me."
It's more of a dog biscuit than a bone. Heck, it's a snausage or a Liv-a-Snap, but at least it's something.
Gah, the Lana-arc rewatch was survivable, at least. But thank God that's over!
Caps byacampbell. Feel free to use if you have the stomach for it, but please comment/credit.
But, ah, "Requiem"! this one was rough. *teeth gnashing*
There's so much so wrong with this ep that it's hard even to know where to begin. There were a couple of times while rewatching that I almost had to turn it off, it was so unbearably awful. As
complicat said recently, only much more eloquently, if we didn't know what losers TPTB, PSIII, and the writers, etc., are, it would be tempting to think the whole S8 Lana arc was a huge joke and an exercise in making fun of some of the worst aspects of SV."Requiem" has proven, in my first rewatch since it aired, as awful as I remember it, and then some.
From Super, bed-breaking sex,
to the Clana Power Couple
to Fake!Lex
whose mission in his twisted, sick, sad life is to break up Clana, to Clark wanting to off Lex and needing LANA to stop him, and finally, to Lana skipping because there's nothing in it for her any more--Fail All 'Round. The only thing that saves my heart from being entirely crushed is that it's so over the top as to be almost silly, and so improbable that it's relatively easy to forget. Unlike, for example, "Promise," way back in S6 when I still couldn't believe that TPTB were letting things get so awful! Now I believe it, and am resigned to their always picking the absolute worst scenario.
I love seeing the Luthorcorp board, a board that was apparently devoted to them. We saw so little of the Luthors' public faces, particularly in the later seasons, when Lex was little more than a pathetic loser that everyone hated. But in Offscreenville, they were successful businessmen that were generally admired and even revered.
I liked Toyman better in a Lana-less ep this last time around.
Oliver "hides under a table" and is miraculously all right.
The thumping, giggling, smashing was just gross. I didn't think SuperSex was appealing or funny the first time around and it's even less so now. But then, the Clana sex back in "Mortal"/"Hidden" grossed me out, too, so much that it cast a pall over S5 in its entirety. Well, that, and the Clexana...
Chloe. Where do I start? She lost me a long time ago, and why is she coaxing Clark to kill Lex and then ragging on Ollie for wanting/planning to do the same thing?
Even more disgusting than the Clana is Fake!Lex. Fake!voice, breathing like Darth Vader, and, yeah, this "Lex" is apparently so obsessed with Clana that he just has to destroy it. Does this jive with the Lex we saw at the end of "Arctic"? We don't even get a throwaway line of dialogue that says something like: the pain of his injuries/disabilities have maddened him to the point that he's bitterly focused on destroying those he loved before...nada. And did they have to beat him up so badly that he needs machines to function?
This plot, this character, is a disgrace to the series and a colossal insult to Michael Rosenbaum and all the fans who admired and loved Lex over the years. Make him one-dimensional evil and on top of that, make him sound like Vader, and maybe then the audience will buy that he's Really a Villain. The last in a long line of cheap tricks.
See Glorious!Heroic!Lana lifted high in the air as she performs the Ultimate, Selfless Sacrifice for her TWU WUV!!
And then Clark, after expounding all ep long about how it's wrong to kill, rushes off to kill Lex and LANA has to be the one to stop him!
Unfortunately, no one was focused on stopping Oliver.
Lana goes to cry on Chloe's shoulder again in one of the most one-sided friendships ever.
Join the club, Clark. She always makes us ill, too!
The Kryptonite Lana is almost comical. We've known for eons that Lana/Clana is poison, but now it's made Canon!
It's clear to me that she wanted the supersuit so she could have sex with Clark, and when that was no longer a possibility, bye-bye.
And if she's now out there "protecting" him, why doesn't she show up to help him once in a while.
His last words (and the last words of the ep)? "I...love...you." Even though, according to Chloe, he's wanted Lois since 1930.
Would I like to get my hands on the people responsible for this episode. Who in heaven could have deemed this an effective conclusion to the Clana relationship? It feels like something a tenyearold thought up.
As tariel22 said, we just have to accept that, years of Superman canon to the contrary, in the SV 'verse, Lana Lang is the Great Love of Clark's Life.
The absolute worst scene is the one with "Lex" & Clana. It reminds me of the scene in Lion in Winter where Eleanor insists on watching Henry kiss Alais. The whole thing is unbearably insulting: to Lex ("real" Lex), to the audience, to everyone and everything.
Even his EVOL methods and nature cannot vanquish the Power of the Love that is CLANA!!
The best thing about this ep? Clark's sadness at Lex's passing. I refuse to subscribe to what one person suggested: that he's thinking: "I wish Lex had died earlier before he could break up Lana and me."
It's more of a dog biscuit than a bone. Heck, it's a snausage or a Liv-a-Snap, but at least it's something.
Gah, the Lana-arc rewatch was survivable, at least. But thank God that's over!
Caps by
acampbell. Feel free to use if you have the stomach for it, but please comment/credit.
