I had numerous friends that enjoyed and endured the show in varying measures over the years, but outside of catching a few random episodes in the early seasons, I never really watched the show. For many, Smallville was an inevitability no matter how long it aired or how off-the-rails it got, they would be tuning in.įor me, though, it was always a phenomenon viewed from the outside. The show’s theme song, “Somebody Save Me”, came to be an in-joke among fans, many of whom couldn’t find it in themselves to quit watching even as the show’s quality began to fluctuate wildly towards the end of its run. That lack of alternatives, perhaps, explains why so many fans stuck with the show. For a decade, the tale of a young Clark Kent’s journey to becoming Superman was the be-all and end-all of live-action superhero television, the only option for fans hoping to see classic characters, concepts, and storylines brought from page to screen.
So, with plenty of comic book and superhero fans that just wanted a show to call their own on a weekly basis, it’s almost no wonder that Smallville became appointment viewing for millions of fans. Before that, viewers were left relying on a string of one-season wonders and countless shows that were lucky to even film a pilot episode. Honestly, it wasn’t until the premiere of Arrow in 2012, a mere four years ago, that the current explosion of superhero shows really began. You’d have the occasional small-screen success like The Incredible Hulk or Lois & Clark, but these were rare exceptions.Īnd really, even as superheroes began their climb to cinematic dominance in the early 2000s, their representation on television remained limited. Granted, as a huge fan of superhero movies and television, I don’t really have a desire to revisit those dark days, but it’s important to remember how rare these types of projects were before the turn of the century. In an era when superhero shows seem like an inescapable part of our pop culture landscape, it can be hard to remember a time when live-action versions of such properties were few and far between.
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