Smallville #5 – Review

By: Bryan Q. Miller (story), Chriscross (pencils), Marc Deering (inks), Carrie Strachan (colors)

The Story: Just when you thought the teenage angst was gone, along comes a teen and angst.

The Review: Once you got used to the idea of seeing Superman on television (especially in the low-rent settings of a CW show—remember how often people would have to drive up to farm just to have a conversation?), the funnest part was the guest stars.  I’m not really talking about the actors so much as the parts they played.  For anyone longing for a live-action Justice League, seeing Aquaman or Cyborg or Lois Lane in an Amazon outfit was just irresistible.

The transfer from small screen to printed/digital page sucks a lot of the fun out of the experience, sadly.  For comic book fans, the appeal of guests and cameos on Smallville was seeing your favorite characters come to flesh-and-blood, grizzled and beautiful life.  It’s like how putting Clark in the cape and costume in a comic doesn’t really compare to putting Tom Welling as Clark in a genuinely stitched-and-sewn cape and costume on a high-def TV.