The S files: Superman's high school years

Fighting for truth, justice and the American way? No way. In Smallville, the new Dawson's Creek take on the comic-book hero's high-school years, Clark Kent's biggest task is fine-tuning his X-ray vision.

"For a teenage boy it's great — he can see through people's clothes," says co-creator Miles Millar, "but you don't always want to be able to see through things."

Yes, the about-to-be-Superman is going through all those changes that lads face when they're growing up — learning to cope with shaving, voice-dropping, super-strength, X-ray vision.

"It's puberty with superpowers," says fellow creator Alfred Gough. "Clark's parents do raise questions. Can he ever have a normal life, and can he have sex? That clearly has never been explored before."

John Schneider, the former Dukes Of Hazzard star who plays Kent's father, grins: "I think it's clear in the pilot that we're not dealing with Superman as a teenager. We are really in effect dealing with a special-needs child."

Set in the present day, Smallville follows the adventures of Clark Kent during his small town, high-school days in Kansas, before he learned to fly, before he mastered all his other powers, before he relocated to Metropolis and the Daily Planet.

He lives with his loving and protective adoptive parents, Jonathan (Schneider) and Martha Kent (Annette O'Toole, who played Clarke's teen dream Lana Lang opposite Christopher Reeve's Clark Kent/Superman in Superman III).

He hangs out with pals Pete Ross (Sam Jones III, CSI) and Chloe Sullivan (Allison Mack, Honey, We Shrunk Ourselves), befriends Lex Luthor (Michael Rosenbaum, Urban Legend) and pines for the beautiful Lana (Kristin Kreuk).

He will find out that years before becoming Superman's arch-enemy, Lex was sent to Smallville by his wealthy and domineering father — LexCorp, the family's empire, has roots there.

The lads become friends when Clark saves Lex's life but it's just as well that Lex
doesn't know that the radiation exposure that left him bald resulted from Clark's arrival in a meteor storm.

Lana's parents died during that storm, in 1989, but she doesn't realise that Clark crashlanded on Earth on the same day, same place. Clark, of course, knows all this and lives with the guilt.

Oooh boy, staring down kryptonite and teen angst at once. No surprise that the idea for updating the 63-year-old DC Comics' myth was born in the teen-oriented WB network just as execs were coming to terms with the loss of Buffy, The Vampire Slayer.

They called in the makers of the chop-socky hit Shanghai Noon, Gough and Millar, and asked them to work up the show. The moviemakers set the ground rules. "You should know off the bat that this is what we're not going to do: no suit, no glasses, no flying," Gough told the network. "Otherwise it would feel passe."

Gleeful execs didn't need to wait for the numbers to come in after the first few episodes to realise that they had a hit that would go into a second series (at least). They knew as soon as giant billboards of a stripped-down Welling stopped traffic on Sunset Boulevard.

Reviews like this from Entertainment Weekly's Ken Tucker didn't hurt, either. "Although he demonstrates super strength and super speed, Welling's Clark Kent won't don the famous cape and body-sock to do the 'it's-a-bird-it's-a-plane thing' because it's a worn-out gesture after all those Superman movies and TV shows, or because it'd super inflate the show's budget ...

"Over the years, DC Comics has told and retold the Superboy tale in a number of different 'origin stories', and comic-book aficionados will have their quibbles about this new version. For the general viewer, though, Smallville is smart, tart, and tidy.

Noting that Smallville "plays up adolescent loneliness and cruelty", Tucker voted it an intriguing mix of teen angst and bright adventure.

Welling, a 24-year-old whose only previous experience is a recurring role in Judging Amy, says he didn't research the role too much but is happy with the present-day setting. "It will bring a lot more viewers than had it been set back in the 30s. It brings the issues we'll deal with up to speed."

He admits there's pressure in trying to live up to the Superman legend, but is happy the series is being shot in Vancouver, far from the Hollywood media hordes.

Schneider, who knows a thing or two about being a teen idol, had a father-son chat with Welling. He gave him some advice he got from his old Dukes pal, Denver Pyle: "Take the money from the first 13 episodes and forget you made it. Put it away."

It was good advice, says Schneider, who wishes now that he listened.

"I knew about Superman," says costar Kreuk, a 20-year-old from Vancouver, alumnus of several Canadian teen series. "I knew about Clark Kent. I knew about the basics. I'd seen a couple of episodes of Lois & Clark [the 90s TV incarnation] and one of the Superman movies when I was younger.

"I don't think my character has been explored too much. I'm not sure, but from what I've heard I don't think she has. So I think it's good that I haven't explored it too in-depth. Warner Bros did give me this big textbook, basically, on Superman, from the beginning. I skimmed through that, so I know more than I used to know.

"I think Smallville is about a bunch of people growing up and learning who they are and coming to be — in Clark's case, Superman, or in Lex Luthor's case, this great villain.

"They're these people coming to love or loathe themselves and learning their morals and their beliefs, all the things that will make them who they are as adults.

"I think it's also a human story with superhero elements to it. There's so much humanity in it that it's a really great show for everyone. There's lots of action, but it comes second to the growth of the characters and development of who they are ..."

Which still doesn't tell Clark's parents what they really want to know.

An animated history

1938

Superman debuts as a comic-book character able to leap tall buildings in a single bound. Two years later he gets a radio series in the US, voiced by Bud Collyer.

1941-43

Our hero makes the leap to the screen in 17 animated features voiced by Collyer, in which he battles mad scientists and giant robots.

1948-50

Kirk Alyn, a former Broadway dancer, pulls on the red and blue tights as the first human Superman in three serials shown in cinemas before the main feature. He was billed only as "Clark Kent".

1952-57

Square-jawed and — ahem — stocky by Les Mills standards, George Reeves brought the "strange visitor from another planet" into Earth's living-rooms. The grainy black and white TV series didn't look much different from the original comics.

1966-70

Animation again in a kiddies' TV series, The New Adventures of Superman. The Man of Steel had occasional help from Batman.

1973-85

Hanna-Barbera, the people who brought you The Flintstones and Top Cat, collected the DC Comics' heroes into an evil, empire-busting franchise, Super Friends.

1978

The blockbuster: Christopher Reeve (above) pulled us into cinemas faster than a speeding bullet. Sounds strange in the Peter Jackson/Shrek era, but the moviemakers' biggest boast was that they made it look as if the big guy could really fly. Three sequels (1980, 1983, 1987) got progressively worse.

1988-92

Superboy got his first series, with John Haymes Newton and later Gerard Christopher under the cape.

1993-97

Dean Cain and Teri Hatcher teased audiences with four years of Lois & Clark, a will-they, won't-they TV series that was strong on romance and weak on baddies. (Eventually, they did and married in the 96 season).

1996-2000

Cartoon Network revived the animated character, using the voice of Tim Daly (Wings).