Barnabas File

I sat down Friday night and watched the two-hour series finale of Smallville .   This concluded the program’s ten year run and perhaps the longest superhero origins story ever mounted.   I liked the series early on, but I have dropped in infrequently in recent years.   I stayed with it through the Kryptonite “freak of the week” period and the “superhero of the week” era, but lost interest six or seven years in.   For one thing, I think I missed Lex Luthor (Michael Rosenbaum) who was as complex a figure as Clark Kent/Kal-El (Tom Welling), the series’ protagonist. I also was tired of the “soap opera” dimension that was obviously provided for a younger demographic. When the program debuted, the producers promised “no flights, no tights.”   Although they did violate the first rule from time to time when Clark was not himself, the new producers did allow a memorable flight in the finale although we never really saw Welling in the complete red and blue costume....