10.09, Patriot (spoilers)

Discuss the episode

Well tonight was episode 9 of season ten. It was entitled "Patriot". Written by John Chisolm and directed by Tom Welling. Tonight we saw the return of aquaman, the introductions of mera his wife, slade wilson/deathroke. Plus continuing the darkseid/anti hero movement storyline. IT was an overall pretty good episode tonight.

John wrote a pretty good episode tonight. Tying darkseid to the sucide squad and the anti hero movement. I liked how he did it. Also bringing back aquaman and his introduction to his wife. They had a pretty good plot. I liked that Arthur has grown alot since we last saw him. Also great his true name and origins got a mention. I was wondering if that was ever going to happen.

Also the plot of lois trying to help out was great. She was ace reporter lois here tonight. I liked her scenes with slade and then all the heroes. It was cool to see how she worked with mera, finding out about watchtower, and now knowing tess knows all.

The special effects were pretty great tonight. All the powers used were good. Also the effects shots for all the world locations we saw. Which i thought was a pretty neat thing getting around the world. We dont get that to often in the show. Also the action scenes were pretty cool.

Clark was a very good leader in the episode tonight. He stood his ground and kept his morals. Wanting to save everyone including slade. This is truly him becoming a good superman. Also we got to see him in action with the new blur jacket too. His lines to slade were good.

Tom's direction was pretty great tonight. He has grow alot through the yrs on his episodes. I think he did another great episode tonight. The camera angles, blocking, and all the other little technical things were good. He got good preformances out of the regulars and guest cast tonight.

Acting as i mentioned was pretty good tonight too. Tom was great as clark. He was bold, strong, confident and very supermanly tonight. Erica was great as lois. She is really growing well as lois. I like she knows all about the jl and watchtower too. She had good scenes with ollie/mera and clark tonight. Cassidy as tess was pretty good too in her scenes with lois and the jl.

Alan and mera actress were pretty good tonight too. Alan it was nice to see him in a different character take on aquaman and less surfer dude and more like king of the seas take. Though they did add some humor in there too which wasnt bad. As for mera i thought she did well tonight. Her acting was alright and nothing bad i can really think of.

Hogan as slade wilson was pretty good. He was a well rounded and written character. Hogan also played him pretty good. He knows his military stuff from those yrs on bsg. I thought he did great as slade. I ont know much on the character. But sv take seems to be going in a good direction.

All an all a great episode tonight. Lots of stuff to like. Didnt see any big faults at all. Love how they did tie in the whole darkseid storyline to sucide squad and the vra plot. Really cant wait to see how it plays out the reminder of the season. Also the preview for episode ten in two weeks was pretty cool. Really cant wait to see that alternate world episode.

Another day, another dollar, another episode.

Honestly, I don't see as all that much was resolved or even advanced here. It seemed this episode was more designed to exposit (re-exposit, really) the dangers the characters are facing. Sensible enough too since there's probably going to be an "event" episode before the show goes on hiatus. Stands to reason that something related to the Darkseid plot will get built up.

One thing that honestly hadn't occurred to me with the Vigilante Registration Act subplot is how the heroes generally (and, I guess, Superman ultimately) turning back Darkseid and his minions will ultimately sway public opinion toward superheroes. The government? Obviously they'll never be fully secure with the existence of metas but the public would have a reason to believe in heroes after something like that. So it works.

Even so, the political subtext here seems a little forced. Religion and politics, right? But no matter how you view present and past administrations responding to terrorism, it just doesn't feel like an apples to apples model when you apply those issues to underground superheroes. And there's only so much that can be excused by Darkseid's influence. Yeah, sure, Godfrey, Slade Wilson and others are operating either under Darkseid's influence or else directly under his auspices... but there have gotta be at least few links in that food chain who truly believe in the VRA. Anyway. Just uncomfortable, that's all I'm saying.

I guess I buy into the Clark/Lois conflict here. Clark isn't working with her, which focuses and personalizes the embryonic JLA's fractures and divisions. I get that. Even so, Clark has seen the future and he knows how crucial a role Lois is going to play in his decision-making processes so it strikes me as a little hard to believe that he hasn't already begun building those bridges with her. I mean, (A) the guy's getting ready to propose so he should be thinking in those terms and (B) he's been through a lot of this with Lana in the past so this isn't new ground, visions of the future or no. But I guess you could argue that he's ultimately used to playing it close to the vest and going it alone. Eye of the beholder.

One thing the Apologist nitwits on the Younis page whined about was Clark's confrontation with Arthur at Sea World. Their basic issue is that Clark and AC have already been in conflict with each other over "terrorism" so retreading that ground here seems redundant. Well, no. Not really. The junior JLA is basically smithereens right now thanks to the VRA. Therefore, all Clark knows is that Arthur is accused of blowing up an oil rig... which, on review, wouldn't exactly be a new thing for him to do. If Clark erred at all, it was in taking it at face value instead of concluding that Arthur wouldn't jeopardize the environment just to advance a personal agenda. So if Arthur did it, he would've had his reasons. The error here is in Clark not really giving Arthur the benefit of the doubt. But even there, Clark only went to Florida to get the issue straightened out. He didn't exactly throw any accusations around.

So once again, swing and a miss for the Apologists and haters. Par for the course with those idiots.

Speaking of which, a relatively new SV reviewer that's popped up over on the Younis page. Julian Fenn. Because, y'know, it's not like Neal Bailey has ever reviewed episodes under an alias before, no no. He's a hack who thinks he's a writer but can't get anywhere with his "gifts". Wow, that sure sounds familiar! And. Julian Fenn? That just sounds made up. But even if Fenn and Bailey aren't the same guy, all that would really tell us is that Younis needs to do a little something-something about his recruiting policies.

But whatever. Through out the episode, nothing struck me as particularly bad though. That's happened a lot this season. I may not be bowled over by every single episode but it's rare that I can point to something and say "THAT was freaking ANNOYING" so far this season. There's a LOT of good this year, some mediocre stuff but nothing particularly bad. In general, this is shaping up to the strongest season of the series in years.

So on balance, good episode I suppose, but it feels like exposition for an episode in the near future. On that basis, it succeeds. But in terms of being an entertaining episode that I'll revisit again and again in the future... I just don't see that happening.

3/5

Nice views on the episode colors, for me i thought it was a good episode. But i do agree nothing really major i didnt like in any episodes this season. As i said in my review i do like how the anti hero movement/sucide squad and now darkseid stuff are being tied together.

Patriot ratings are up:
www.twitter.com/mattmitovich

#SMALLVILLE 'Patriot' draws 2.6 million total viewers, #2 in demos (tied)
less than 10 seconds ago via web

thec0l0rsblend wrote:Speaking of which, a relatively new SV reviewer that's popped up over on the Younis page. Julian Fenn. Because, y'know, it's not like Neal Bailey has ever reviewed episodes under an alias before, no no. He's a hack who thinks he's a writer but can't get anywhere with his "gifts". Wow, that sure sounds familiar! And. Julian Fenn? That just sounds made up. But even if Fenn and Bailey aren't the same guy, all that would really tell us is that Younis needs to do a little something-something about his recruiting policies.

Good review.

I'm guessing that because Mrs Aquaman was so good looking Bailey would've be fuming anyway. One thing's for sure, he needs Smallville.

Can't Eunuch get anyone with a modicum of credibility? Forget it....stupid question....