I'm Tired of Angry Birds!

Even if I have to do everything under spoiler space, I'm tired of video games, and I'm going to start reading fanfic again and, as long as I'm in the forums, I'm going to write something about them. No one is under any obligation to read it and the Boss of Us can, of course, step in at any time.
Kate, I'll be happy to see you back when and if you feel comfortable.
Turning my sights on some stories.

vbE (in disguise)

I'll be happy to see you back!

Along with feedback on stories. I'm working my way through Jenni Debbage's Kent family series right now.

I'll be in later. m/oI need to finish apologizing first. When email is involved it must be done more than once. BTW, how are you keeping your dad out of it? LOL!

Kate

Thank you. I'm Beverly, never called anything but Bev, even in school.


Good. Glad to hear it. M/O Easily. My mom is a long time member of this MB and the other LnC board. She told me to come here back in 2010 when I was renewing my interest in the series. I see her screen name a lot in the older posts but she hasn't posted in a long time. If she wants to make herself known, that's up to her. Dad would never butt in because she'll know.)

I second the 'thank you,' said Kate.
(Did they call you Bev in school )because of Beverly Crusher?)



Yikes! I feel self conscious, but.....
I had the chance to watch Virtually Destroyed, too as well as read the fics you had listed.
Remember "The Purple Rose of Cairo?" Throughout the episode I kept thinking, "Come on cinema gods! Let this Clark step out of the screen and into the living room at any time. I'll be happy to have him." Clark/Dean looked so good, even in the totally unnecessary shoulder pads in the suit jacket.
I had been thinking about the way Clark was presented in "Heartache Tonight" and "Tryst" and those two Clarks can step off the page and out of the monitors at any time, too. I liked the worldly, slightly more sophisticated guy in HT. He's the "war veteran Luke" you mentioned earlier, the farm boy changed by his travels.

Kate

Got a few minutes here. Yes, it was one of the first adult movies I ever saw, that I got to watch with the adults.
Forget about those cinema gods-- they're useless. I live in the Denver area and Dean Cain has had a home in Aspen for years and he's shot a movie in state recently. Did the cinema gods conspire to get me near either place while he's there? No! Did they ever get me to the airport the same time he might be passing through? No! Did they ever guide me to make a mutual friend somewhere? No!
They're useless!
The Twilight Zone gods might be better. I've seen an episode of that about an older actress (Ida Lupino?) who watches her younger self on screen when she was a star and in the end she walks into the movie screen and becomes the part she played in her old movie.
You were saying you were fooled by Scardino even though you weren't a part of their universe! Maybe you can get revenge from the Twilight Zone.

Added:


I have only about 3000 stories to go so I hope I find more like this, where Clark is a little more worldly. It doesn't hurt the character as far as I'm concerned.

Yeah with my luck Scardino will walk out of the screen. "Hey, you used to like me.I'm still a nice charming guy! I lose, right? And never come back to make more trouble. What's not to like here?"
Kick! (three or four times)
Actually being less annoyed at Scardino than just a few weeks ago, I reread one of the stories where he is featured, but no. I simply don't like him anymore. There is no going back. It makes me kind of waffle back and forth on whether I want to read stories where he is working for B39 or a part of the government that is anti Superman.

Kate, plotting how to beat up a government agent if he ever did walk out of the TV screen

Just punch him in the nose! Jim Pirri does a bit part in an episode of "Without A Trace" that is shown frequently on ION. He's a guy who comes on too strong trying to flirt with a couple of teachers working out in a gym, and one gets angry and smacks him in the face and makes his nose bleed. Yeah, teachers rule!
Come to think of it Jimmy Olsen punched him in the face, too, didn't he? That's it by acclamation then, the popular way of dealing with his characters.
I don't remember any fics with this happening, though. If they are there, they are still hiding in the thousands of stories I have to read.

As I said I'm waffling on this guy in fanfic. I'm curious but unmotivated to read or even look for stories. The few I've read so far haven't changed my mind.
Boy, the perils of letting looks influence you sometimes, huh?


I looked for them wondering if it was the series with the ten or twelve kids, but this series is different.


Kate

He is a good looking guy, and so was Larry Poindexter I've only spotted him once on TV. I don't remember the show but it was about three years ago. He had very nice salt and pepper hair and I had to look twice to recognize him. His face is a little more full, too.
M/O

Quote:

but this series is different.

I want to make a joke about it, but it might be too soon?

LOL! I can guess what it is, but I'm working on it! Honest.

Kate

Nobody's perfect. Where would they go from there if they were? LOL!
Well, Superman the hero kind of is, but even he has his outs.

Certainly, because Clark the alter-ego isn't perfect. I wonder if we are going to see many examples of this in the new comics?
In fanfic he's pretty much been established in the way he's viewed and I hope it doesn't change to reflect the 'new' Clark.

Kate

I haven't read fanboy stories in a while. I got tired of Superman/Wonder Woman hook ups. I like Wonder Woman fine, and i would have watched the series that was killed before airing, but I'm not interested in Clark/Diana.

I've argued around and around with my dad on that. He is a fan of Lois but he also likes the idea of WW and Superman having 'more' of a past. I'm sure the PTB in the comics thought of it but had a reason for going in the direction they did. It's odd that Batman is so popular and even though there are B/WW stories, S/WW still seems to be the hook up the fanboys want to see. Especially my dad.

Kate

They can have it. That's my breaking point with the new comics. As long as there is the possibility of having to get through an S/WW story arc, no matter how long or short, I'm not going to read them. I'll hear about it in the RPG.
Last time I read WW fanfic most fans and writers were up in arms, too, about the very idea that WW needed a man who is an equal or stronger. Her fans don't like the idea either.

I've seen that. It's an understatement to say they don't like it.

Well, when you come right down to it, it depends on how long it lasts. You never know. If it sells comics it might be a very long arc. If not, fingers crossed, it will disappear quickly. Either way most of the ff will ignore it.

Thankfully. I have my favorite WW authors and it's been a while since I've read fanfic about her. I don't know where the talk about the whole situation is anymore. I've been exclusively into L&C since the last half of '11.

Kate

Same here. I listen to my dad and brothers talk and I see what the RPG guys say in the chat room but I'm not interested so far in getting into it. I actually don't read WW fic anymore (since the rumors started last year) just because my dad loves it so much! You have your oldest fanboy and I have mine.

Yes, we do. I did watch that episode of The Animated Series where Lois and Bruce meet and start a romance. I did a search for Bruce/Batman appearances in L&C but didn't find too many. None that dealt with a romance between them. There were some funny short
ones but Batman is not a favorite and I will stand up for Superman too.


Kate

I don't remember Batman being mentioned in TNAOS, just Wonder Woman and Gotham City. I'm not that interested in crossover stories but I have read some of the Batman and Wonder Woman stories in the archive. They come from the same universe so I don't see them as crossovers, really.

Haven't gone there yet but I will. I kind of like alternate meetings as long as they aren't too far different.


Kate

There is one that's pretty interesting where they are doctors when they meet and a few of the obstacles that were in their way in the series are in the story. It's called "Life" something. "Lifeflight?" Something to do with doctors. It's a good long read if you can find it. I read it about two years ago, and it's not that far different. I missed the fun of them going after a story, going about the city, meeting or encountering bad guys and sources, though, but I'd recommend it.

Got it. With the weekend coming up I have some reading to do. I see it's a long two parter.

Kate

That was a good story. Different twist but still good.

Looking forward to it now.

Kate

I have found one other where the alternate meeting is also an alternate lifestyle for both. In the other Lois is a police officer, and to me, that made her dating Lex Luthor even more hard to believe than reporter Lois dating him. She just won't believe anything bad about billionaires!

Depends on the rumors or talk I'd guess. We've agreed he was good at maintaining an image. Good enough that even Henderson couldn't get behind it. Unless there is someone like Clark to voice suspicion, Lex would have to do something to make her suspicious. Where she goes from there would indicate how much she wants to believe the image.

Kate

It was before she met Clark and then Lex did something really stupid! You have to read it to believe it. If you're interested, let me know when you're ready for it.

Ready. Lex did something stupid? Hmmm...

Kate

Another Alternate Meeting

Another Good Story.

Just Plain Fun

No kidding, just read it without looking for icebox moments. Lots of fun.

Lifeflight was a good story. It's the closest story yet to where Clark almost had friends. The one track obsession with Lois after meeting her isn't as intense as usual. He was almost friends with the guys he worked with, but Lois got in the way.
Have you read a story yet where he actually has friends? Someone to watch the weekend games with? Someone to grab a drink after work with? Someone to shoot hoops with after work or on weekends? He never does stuff like that. For someone who wants to be a normal guy, his behavior is pretty darn not normal.

Kate, iceboxing all over the place

No, I haven't. It's another of those 'it wasn't on the screen so it didn't happen,' even though he talks about going to sports games with Jimmy or Perry. He gets along with people so he must have friends to do things with. For a while he was a big brother to Jack so he probably had other friends, too. You play poker with people and you get to be friends with someone. He wouldn't have to go out every night, but you'd think he'd do something on weekends when he isn't working on a story or mooning over Lois.

He doesn't have to date either but doing something with the guys- whoever that might be- would probably get Lois out of the house too because she doesn't seem to have friends either. It would be interesting to see who thinks she would follow him and who thinks she would not. If she's interested she would!
It would make for some light moments in otherwise totally dramatic stories. It doesn't have to be comic relief just a light moment away from the job.

Kate

That would be a nice change! I can see something like that happening. I know Jimmy gets lunch for some of the staff but he and Clark or CK and someone else might go out for lunch now and then. I know a couple of teachers who jog during lunch when it isn't their turn to monitor the commons during lunch.
Some of us walk around the parking lot now and then.
Maybe that's too mundane for anyone to think of Superman doing even as Clark, but the man is leading most of his life as an ordinary guy, so why not?

The commons? Wha' tha'?
People socialize. They don't have to be elaborately written scenes, maybe just mentions? Then you can use your imagination to fill in the blanks. That's reading. Seeing the words and visualizing in your imagination. I've seen enough baseball and touch football games in the park to be able to see our boy Clark doing something like that. I mean look at one of the other forums where you see Dean Cain as busy as he is participating in sports!
(My son will be old enough for T ball this summer so we're about to become T ball fans.)

Kate

I don't know about all schools, but around here the cafeteria is called the commons, the library is now the Media Center and Home Ec is now called FACS-- Food and Consumer Services.
T ball, Little League-- oh, are you guys in for suburban life!

We can want it but I doubt if it will ever happen. If Hitchcock had icebox moments in his movies, fanfic will have them, too. I doubt we'll see anything that normal for Clark. Only in our dreams, but boy, I can dream.

I suppose. There's nothing wrong with imagination. I can think of a lot of ways to make Clark a little more normal in presentation. There are some short stories where the authors try but they end up with Clark doing something unusual because he's so obsessed with and distracted by Lois' presence. They come close to an ordinary guy though who can interact with other people. I just wish he didn't have to be so obsessed with Lois every minute of every story. Can't he be in love but still play a game of volleyball without messing it up? LOL!

Kate

I think I read that one. Company Picnic or something similar. Cute story but, yes, having him break the volleyball so he could go for a walk with Lois-- the walk could have happened a little later. You don't have to describe a volleyball game, just reactions of the crowd, who wins, who loses, everyone goes off to eat... ...or for a walk in the park.

I think that's it. It was a short one and Clark was almost an ordinary guy.

Kate

Hitting a volleyball and causing it to explode sort of was a big hint that he just might have been Superman, but no one was thinking that at that moment. Whew! Lucky him.

LOL! All the things he did and no one noticed! Some were kind of stretched, like going to a secluded spot in the newsroom to change into Superman and take off and still blow papers out of Jimmy's hands from thirty feet away and around a corner.

Kate

So it will be a stretch to present him as an ordinary guy. At least we know Phil Mickelson and Bo Jackson never told what they saw! Or they didn't believe it.

Yes, and once again Lois' back was turned when Mickelson taught Clark to hit the ball right.
Jack, Phil, Bo- EVERYBODY knew before Lois did! Lucky for him none of them tell, which is more then you can say for Lois. I've read the stories where she wins the Pulitzer for outing Clark as Superman.

Kate

Yep, but she's not the only one who does. There is at least one story where Jimmy gets fed up with being in the shadow of Lane and Kent and he furthers his career by 'outing' Clark. But, true, Lois does it the most. Sometimes Clark saves himself but most of the time he has to live with the consequences. Well, so does she but she still has a private life.
Incredibly, he forgives her. Going ballistic or outing him-- What a woman! he thinks. Boy, I want her despite it all!

Clark Kent the perfect man. He loves being treated like dirt.
Why are we sticking up for him again?
LOL!

Kate

Uhhhhhhh....?
He even lets his mom treat him badly! He needs us!

Jonathan and son are the victims of a domineering wife/mother! LOL!
Jonathan usually agrees with her, once in a while steps in, but rarely contradicts her. He likes meddling in his kid's life as much as Martha does, and he doesn't mind that she leads the meddling!
Oh well, they raised the man who became Superman...

Kate, whose finding fault crumbles in the face of that

LOL! Oh, I don't know. Martha is not that big a terror. She can be as one track minded as Clark can be about some things, so I wonder where he learned that? No wonder Jonathan either lets her do the talking or says very little. Clark is very much a part of Martha's upbringing but Jonathan knows better than to point it out!
Letting her go means any fallout is more heavily on her conscience.

I never thought of that. Martha is tenacious when she thinks she's right and she pushes Clark to her POV a lot! Both of the important women in his life need to control him their way. In a way Jonathan is a perfect man too. He rarely contradicts his wife and never sides with his son either.
Was he like this in the series too? Did he ever takes Clark's side in anything?

Kate

What was the episode where Jonathan and Martha visit and Jonathan turns all of Clark's shirts pink? "Neverending Battle?" It was men vs. women then. I guess it's another fanfic interpretation of Jonathan, or maybe our own!

Yes but I know Martha doesn't seem to sympathize when her son is hurting. Her solution to everything is make it right with Lois. No matter what. Her sympathy is usually, not always, with Lois. I know it's also a part of the series but not to the extent of fiction. In fiction it seems her first reaction is to jump to Lois' defense.

Kate

Well, we've already agreed that our poor Clark is never right about anything. We just didn't realize it all started with his mother! As the CDU we have our work cut out for us.Martha is even more formidable an opponent than Lois.
Must change strategy.

I was thinking about Martha and I remembered the time (BFTB?) when Clark was home for advice and Jonathan was trying to understand what happened by thinking aloud and Martha practically told him to just shut up! I missed comprehending a few things about her too! It isn't as bad as not seeing the car booger right in front of my eyes, but Martha is just such a mom as I know them that I still accept the way K Callen played her as natural. LOL! I'm still irritated by the booger but not the mom.

Kate

I remember that. He was getting straight in his mind how the electricity from the lightning worked and she snapped that it wasn't important! LOL!
I'm going to have to be a chicken here and not criticize Martha. LOL! She might get me!
Mothers can do that, you know. LOL!
Yes, I'm officially afraid of Martha.

Because she can boss around Superman and his dad? LOL! And make them both look contrite?
Well maybe she's the Martha who should have run for the State Senate. Would she be in driving distance of Topeka I wonder?

Kate

Depends on where the authors put Smallville. In some stories it's way out in the western part of the state (150 miles west of Wichita) or in the eastern part of the state, east of Wichita but close to Kansas City. From driving through the state a few times to go to Broncos games in KC I'd put it in the eastern part, too. The far west is too flat and dry but I've seen places in the east that look a lot like the Smallville scenes on TV.

Why does Hollywood think there are mountains in Kansas? LOL! I know from National Geographic there are the Flint Hills in Kansas but going by the pictures you can't mistake them for mountains no matter how skewed you try to see them.
Anyway I think Martha would have started out local- mayor of Smallville after the New K attack. She would understand how to come to terms with superpower destruction better than anyone if young Clark stories are to be believed. Someone would need to divert attention from "Hey, didn't something like that happen on your farm, Martha, back when...etc."
"Of course not. Nowadays they have a name for it. That kind of damage can happen from a microburst!"

Kate, thinking meteorology saved Clark Kent

LOL! Freak anabatic winds whenever Clark ran too fast (as opposed to a chinook or a foehn wind; )angular momentum anomalies in the clouds whenever Clark spin changes on the farm (in the city the tall buildings would neutralize the air waves. . .or whatever ) "You know how dust devils can spring up on a windy day, Wayne!" "But it was calm as anything that day, Martha. I remem-" "There was wind that day!" "Oh. . .so there was..."

Yes, the tall buildings and concrete theory that affects weather. All that hot air rising- of many kinds- and...doing something, whatever it does.

Poor Mr. Irig. He must have been thinking about that day back in early '93, just before Clark left for Metropolis. The calm before the storm.....

And Martha takes the first step in taking over Kansas. Already a distant memory, Bob Dole's accomplishments are similarly doomed to pale in comparison to Martha Kent's.

Kate, hoping there is a story about this?

Search for "President Kent." I did a search for Martha stories and got that. I haven't read them so I don't know what they are about exactly yet, but I'm looking forward to it. The author says they were written purely for fun-- or something like that.

Found them and I've got my week end reading planned.
Thank you.

Kate

You had the guys in the RPG laughing at this. One is from KS and another is from OK and they had a field day with this. M/O for the sensitive...(Making jokes about how he shut down the government and then ran for president, and probably still wonders why he lost.)I gave the chat room the links to the stories, but don't worry. They aren't members here so they can't comment in known space.
I can already see that Martha gets elected president though I haven't read the stories yet, so she's on her way! LOL!

P.S. : When my husband downloaded the update for Angry Birds to his iPad in December he was dismayed (to say the least!) that the update erases your progress and you have to start the games all over again from the beginning! He finally got 3 stars on all levels in parts one and two! So he's jumping up and down behind me! It's the only reason he lets me play the game-- to help him get back to where the update starts.
Whee.

So that's why you were tired of the game. LOL!!

I guess I have to agree with you. She's a necessary part of Superman. Her influence is needed there. Her meddling needs some work- like cut back on it a lot!- but her influence helps guide him. I hope my kids think that about us, their parents, someday.

Kate, forming a revised opinion of Martha Kent

Martha is a good character but I like her better with Jonathan alive. She's too alone in the movies. Having her stand in the crowd with all the strangers and fans of Superman in Superman Returns while he's inside unconscious was something I still don't like to see. Especially while Lois and her son are ushered right in.
I did read a fanfic where Superman is killed and his body is being taken by the government and Lois gets Jimmy and Jack to help her steal it so the Kents will be able to see if he's really dead. (Or if he just needs Miracle Max. )
Of course being alone on the farm is her choice and frankly, I'd stay in my home, too, no matter where it was. I just like it better to see both Kents together, both there to help Clark establish himself as Superman. The idea may have come from Lois in the series, but Superman is an all Kent creation.

That's what's nice about the Superman stories- we have it all ways! We can read the stories of our favorite 'way' and those we don't like so much and still find something to enjoy. I don't like SR but I'm reading the fanfic. I don't like the extremely self effacing Clark anymore but I read the stories. It's all Superman, no matter if both Kents are alive or not, if L&C are soul mates or not, if all the stories are more JLA than romance, more action than angst. Where else can we find such variety to suit our moods?

Kate m/o
It's been a while but I have read Superman/Wonder Woman but not a lot. It's very tiresome reading about them just being so perfect together. If some write Superman as the perfect man, some write WW as the perfect woman. Think about that. LOL! Mr. and Mrs. Perfect show up in a lot of fic with that pairing. I mean WW letting S name one of their daughters Lois?

If you doubt that Lex had Lois snowed under completely before their wedding consider VD and the fourth child's name-- which was 'Clark.' Do you really thing Lex Luthor would have allowed a child of his to be named Clark?! He was telling her what she wanted to hear!
As for Diana being so gracious-- I don't think so! Diana is a daughter of the gods but I don't think she would be that sweet and good! A child named after the love of her husband's life? Constantly reminding her that she-- Diana, isn't?
About as possible as Clark Luthor. M/O
click OR Clark letting Lois name their only daughter after Daniel Scardino???? LOL!!!! The Adventures of Danielle Kent.
I have to agree about the variety of Superman stories. I do like to read the guy action stories now and then as long as they aren't too juvenile. Also I've read of the SR stories since you mentioned them a while back. You're right about super senses not working right when a superpowered being is with his young child. Lois and Richard can commit loud, bloody murder in the next room and that superpowered being would never hear it!

LOL!! Clark Luthor! Danielle Kent!
Oh my!!
Lois can get Clark to do anything, I guess. She learned a lot from her engagement to Luthor. How to bend people to your will without them ever knowing it! m/o "We will name the baby Danielle if it's a girl, and Daniel if it's a boy," she whispered to Clark every night as he slept, "and you will never question this EVER." LOL! "Daniel or Danielle, Clark, or so help me, you'll never touch me again!" The newsroom snickers every time the Kents bring their daughter to work.
I have to read the story later. The opening line floored me and I just can't get past the name!

Kate

Yes, she can! We are talking fanfic Lois, after all. The woman who has the guts to tell Clark/Superman after the first time they have sex he was so inept a lover she knew he was a virgin. (Would you have dared say something like that to an ordinary guy in real life? LOL!) But, if that woman wants to name her kids after her ex-boyfriends, she's going to.
Our poor Clark! How do we defend him against this indignity?
M/O Sooner or later it's going to dawn on Clark that's what she was saying. After that the words "faking it" are going to have greater meaning in his life. LOL! Sadly, I have to predict CVWN/RG marriages are doomed. (correct virgin wedding night/relationship guesses)Come to think of it, incorrect virgin wedding night/relationship guess marriages won't last long either!

Actually the story of Danielle Kent was okay in that it made me curious about next gen stories. Can I guess that the firstborns are named for the Kents usually (and not the author's kids?) No Alexander, Alexandra, Paul, Paula/Pauline or Claude, Claudia/Claudine Kents? Although by rights the door has been opened for Lana, Antoinette or Mayson Kents! LOL!

As for poor Clark- there is nothing we can do if he is written as the ideal man. If he accepts this type of thing and doesn't let it bother him then he's an addict and we're lost. m/o If he can be happy with a wife and those annoying little thoughts about her he's just out and out perfect.
BUT it's unlikely he would commit suicide if Lois dies unexpectedly. It would be his chance to experience women or a woman who are/is less vocal in comparing him to their former lovers and announcing he came up short, so to speak.
Go for it Clark!

Kate, who does not have that kind of 'guts' in real life

Speaking of children, do you think Lex really wanted four more when he already had two sons he didn't want at all? Did he really want children with Lois or was that part of the snow job you mentioned? More bait to reel her in? He could be pretty darn sincere when he wanted to be especially if Lois still believed him in VD.
With Gretchen's help he was apparently planning to live forever as himself. Splitting his fortune and power with offspring was something he already wasn't the least bit interested in doing.

Kate, still puzzled as to why Lois was willing to have children with Lex but not Clark, why she was so relaxed and affectionate with Lex but not with Clark until she knew the secret

After the last time we talked about this I asked the RPG players, my dad and other Superman fans in my family if Clark really wanted to die after losing Lois, how could he do it without committing suicide? The best answer,or my favorite, was for him to leave Earth and get away from the yellow sun. He could volunteer to explore the planets up close as he leaves the solar system on a voyage to the nearest star. A scientific expedition wherein he could live a normal life and die of old age, doing something good for mankind, alone or with other volunteers.
Do you remember the story arc "Where is Thy Sting?" when Death comes and tries to make Superman die? I remembered it the other day. It's another story where Clark chooses to live even after Lois is dead, believing it would betray her memory and her spirit for living.
Anyway Death shows him a vision of him standing on a barren Earth as the sun is nearing it's own death but still Superman chooses to live.
It's a haunting vision,but really,if it looks like that will be his end- build that ship,leave Earth and die of old age away from the yellow sun. After the people have left there is no reason for him to stick around. He doesn't have to be immortal unless he wants to be and the same would go for his descendents.
He's always had a choice.

On the one hand,he's won the woman Superman wanted and getting her pregnant multiple times would really rub it in. LOL! On the other hand, I do agree he had children and neither of whom he wanted, but, he didn't necessarily have to have anything to do with Lois' children, either. When the fun of tormenting Superman wasn't the big high it once was, she'd be expendable, too. A divorcee,a cash settlement and four kids to raise on her own. Lex's fortune stays his own.


All I can think of is she almost married the most ruthless criminal on the face of the Earth and planned on having a family with him.
That's enough to shake anyone's confidence in themselves. Weak reasoning, but it's all I can think of.

As for the rest of it, beats me. Different writers maybe. that's the reason I stopped reading the Star Wars novels. The writers didn't communicate with one another so there was so much inconsistent writing it was frustrating. You'd read that something had been resolved between characters in one book only to have the situation in full swing in the next two books-- each of the three written by a different writer-- then in the fourth book the situation is long forgotten by everyone!. In the fifth book, the situation is back again.
I think that's what happened here. Inconsistent characterization. Old writers took their ideas with them, new writers didn't do their homework.

Why didn't I ever think of that? LOL! I wonder if he realized it as he fought Death?
I do remember "Where Is Thy Sting?" and Superman being on the brink of dying and refusing to stop fighting when Death gives him the out. His speech bubble being tiny and jagged to denote his weakened state.

Would Superman even live to the end of the life of the sun? Wouldn't the sun change its color? Doesn't it become a red giant and then a white dwarf? His powers would be long gone unless he goes to another yellow sun to remain super.

Kate, getting all scientific suddenly

Gross pun, LOL!
She would have walked right into it willingly too. Lex has his image and reputation to protect and they have to remain pristine, so the tormenting would have to be subtle. No! I don't even want to think how the tormenting would be carried out.

So......she no longer trusts she will be able to raise children when her own judgement is not what she thought it was?
I guess.
Okay. I can accept new writers in lieu of anything else.
I think you said once before Lois' life changed more than anyone else's did over the course of the series due in part to the changes occurring in the lives of the people closest to her. But I doubt any of that would make her suddenly begin to fear intimacy and children.
New writers, new ideas. It would explain it. Angst for the sake of angst.

Kate, reluctantly letting it go

Yeah, well. It's one of those things you can't resist no matter how many times it's done. So I guess I can't tell you under spoiler white out some of the ideas the guys in chat thought up for Lex to torment Superman? Oh, okay.....
LOL! Kidding aside, I wish I never heard some of them!
I think they like getting into Lex's head now and then and being nefarious in thought only.

Then I definitely don't want to know what they thought up!
But then I had fun coming up with Lex motivations too. I really do think our ideas about him and the women had gathered around him were entirely possible. I can watch 'Madame X' and imagine how she is messing up Lex's plans with every moment of jealousy she shows!

Kate

And that brings is back to the story WTFAF! We've meandered all over the place since then! We aren't even in the right thread anymore. Where are we? Are we lost?
LOL!

It's easy to get lost when you're running off at the mouth with no real idea where you're going. I forgot Ariana's unknown motives started everything. Well, obviously she is still out to discredit
Lois but I still can't imagine why.

Kate

Nor can I and it still bugs me. That's why i usually don't read anything until it is finished. I made an exception with 'Smallville' but not many others.
Such good writing, too.

And very first season, too, before her fears and anxieties took over. Ironically because of Lex as you suggested elsewhere.
Thinking it over though I'm glad I don't have to see the hits Clark has to take to get through to Lois in that story under the circumstances as they appear at the end. At least I won't have to see him too polite to fight back. Sometimes that's what you have to do to resolve a situation fast! Stand up and fight back. In a realistic situation anyway, but this is a story and he needs to be put in his place and run over by her before she gets to where she needs to be all on her own!

Kate

LOL! He's motivation, Kate. Lois doesn't need a man, remember? Until she's good and ready to admit, well, maybe she does after all-- but only because she doesn't want him ending up with a woman who would really appreciate him! Some bimbo who is attracted to him and knows exactly why like Mayson or Linda.
Lois would never let that happen even if she has to take him herself. She has his best interests at heart, you know. Hidden way deep down inside.

In a place only a fanfic mother can see! It's a good thing Clark came to Earth as a baby otherwise Lois would have put him off Earth women forever. He would have grabbed Zara so fast Ching's head would never stop spinning.

Poor Ching, he's Kryptonian so would he be crybaby Ching? LOL!

LOL! No because he wasn't raised human like Clark. The NKs are practically Vulcans in the way they suppress emotions. It would be funny though to read about him getting emotional especially when Nor was no good at anger management.
Does it come from Ching and Zara being so stoic about her pre-arranged marriage? They were hiding their feelings for one another so all Kryptonians hide their emotions?
Protocol of the nobility wouldn't apply to all Kryptonians.

Military protocol wouldn't either.
I don't know. I haven't watched the NK episodes in a long time so I don't remember if we saw people from the non-ruling classes and non-military. I remember a lot of arguing and, of course, concubines.
The NK arc brought that word into my vocabulary at 12!

LOL! I don't remember either. I guess it's one to rewatch sometime soon if only to see L&C raking leaves! As slavers the NKs had a lot to learn. What harsh rule. Make them clean up their town!
(Martha gets political ambitions....)

Kate

This is from a while back but this picture made me think of the useless cinema gods. I'm fooling around on my laptop during lunch and I found it and it, the captions, just made me laugh. I hope you can see it without having to join Webshots (though I can recommend it just to download their free desktop wallpaper rotator.)

It Was Like Finding A UFO!

The cinema gods were at work that day in 2005 at least! To bad it wasn't me.

Well, yeah! DC/Clark looks good in the baseball cap! I think I will rewatch just to see that, maybe this weekend. I'm not a big fan of NK so the fanfic for it is far down on my list of reading importance.

The captions are funny! Imagine having someone famous walk through the background of a picture you're taking! It must have been a surprise to see him there! LOL! Is it a music festival or something? Looks like a stage in the background. The next picture in the album is a concert pic.


Kate

Mr. Incognito. I've read two NK stories so far. One was a comedy about NK students or just youths coming to Earth on a sort of field trip to observe Lord Kal-El. The other had Zara and Ching showing up at the Lane/Luthor wedding but that was a while back. Before I started posting here.

Kate

It was probably the Aspen Jazz festival (Jazz Aspen Snowmass). They hold many art fests and summer workshops in Aspen. We went to see the Zac Brown Band last year and my parents went to see Lynyrd Skynyrd the year before that. No Dean Cain in the background of my pictures, though! LOL!
No UFOs either.

LOL! We can't all be that lucky. So close yet so far away. I can almost imagine that girl's surprise though. And isn't it interesting that to this young woman he was still a recognizable star to get excited over?
The man still has it.

Kate

Definitely. You got me curious about the NK students and I'm looking for NK stories and I think I found it.
NK Story
Is this the one?

Yes! I liked the multiple authors because you went to the next part not knowing what to expect. It was like 'Heartache Tonight' in that way. The thread of the story carried over but you couldn't predict how. Part 2 had a good laugh for me after talking about how dominating Martha and Lois are and then lord Kal-El being so harsh with Martha!

Kate, it's nice to see dramedy written for a dramedy now and then

Without going as far as he did, the man needs to stand up for himself once in a while. A decisive Clark is a good Clark. So what if he makes bad decisions-- the arctic isn't just for screaming really loud anymore-- at least he isn't following Lois and Mo-om around like a puppy.

LOL! He makes it hard to stick up for him sometimes! Being a CDU is a tough job. You have to really like it to do it. ;P
I mean the guy can be hypnotized, subliminally led around by a faulty artifact and adversely affected by toxic colored rocks.
What a road we've picked for ourselves!

Kate

But he's worth it. Superman prevails in the end. Clark may have all the faults but Superman is still the best. He's the one thing my whole family can agree on.

Actually in my family too. In Star Trek it comes down to Kirk vs. all the other captains, in Star Wars it's Han vs. Luke, OT vs PT.
Oh, we all agree the Harry Dresden novels were better than the TV series too. Even my mom reads those books.

Kate

My husband and I practically fight over the Dresden Files novels. We settled it that if you put the book down for any reason, the other can pick it up and start reading! It was the same for Harry Potter.
Unfortunately, there is no such fight over LnC stories. He rolls his eyes a lot when I suddenly start begging Clark to stop crying and do something back! Give as good as you get!

I'm amusing myself with coming up with ideas of what I wish Clark should be doing in the situations where his behavior is annoying. There is one where women think he's gay because he doesn't admire them as most men do. Why not? Being madly in love with a woman doesn't stop a man from being a man any more than it will stop you from noticing a great looking guy when you see one in a similar situation. Do you really think Superman has never noticed Wonder Woman's body just because he loves Lois? Even in that thousand year war he noticed her, he just stayed faithful to his wife.

LOL! Are you serious? Why didn't he notice them? Was he blindfolded? Reading a text message? LOL! He looked at the models who showed up at the newspaper in PML.
He was being the perfect man again. In some stories he has every fault in the book, in others he's the guy woman wish real guys could be.
Sorry, but that sounded so funny. He's just automatically assumed to be gay because he didn't ogle someone?

Several someones.
here
It's a comedy and I did read it all the way through.
To paraphrase you, the poor guy can't do anything right and Lois is awfully subject to suggestion.

Kate

There are quite a few such stories! I just did a search and the list repeats itself a lot according to the list of words I used for the search, but I counted quite a few stories. I'm saving the search list and adding the subject to my list of future reading.
When it comes to Superman or Clark all of her reporting talents go right out the window! Jumping to conclusions--it's what all good reporters do.

When it came to Lex too. After Clark challenges her to investigate Lex she goes straight to him and asks a few questions. She accepts his answers even as he infuses them with a meaning she can't comprehend or understand. He tells her the truth but omits the details she would ordinarily look for hidden behind the words.
Lois thinks of herself as a good judge of character but when it comes to the men she lets into her life, she is influenced by what others think of them. The five time man of the year is someone whose word she can accept without investigation, and Clark's sexuality is something she doesn't want to investigate herself so she accepts the word (suggestions) of others.

Kate

She can be one irritating woman sometimes!
But then reading wouldn't be as much fun if she couldn't be interpreted in so many ways. As long as the characterization is believable, and I know I'm repeating myself again, any story is worth the read.
Clark was the perfect man in that story. He and Lois had no relationship beyond partners at work and he was already being faithful to her as if she really could just say 'kryptonite' and have him groaning in agony.

But that's obsession before the fact. They barely know one another and he's living like her newlywed husband. He's already committed to her and she doesn't know him well enough to know he isn't gay. Crybaby Clark gets on your nerves and obsessed stalker Clark gets on mine.
DJL created him as an ordinary American boy not as American Psycho.


Kate

Yes, but unfortunately, DJL also had him following Lois on her first date with Lex and peeping in her windows, too, and that can be interpreted as stalking. You have to expect that kind of behavior in fic characterization. To me it means Clark is afraid Lois has put herself in danger unknowingly-- which, of course, she has. Clark has just discovered the most famous philanthropist in the country is a dangerous man. When he threatened him with the sword, he gave himself away. After that he knew to watch Lex closely and he, no doubt, discovered everything Luthor said at the space station presentation was a lie. For all he knew, Lex was inviting the most famous reporter in the city-- who just happened to be snooping around the penthouse with Clark-- to interview him so he could kill her or make her disappear. She was the immediate danger, Kent was the rookie who could be dealt with later.
To me he wasn't stalking as much as protecting because he doesn't do this on Lois' subsequent dates with Lex. He finds out soon enough that getting rid of Superman is a bigger concern to Luthor than getting rid of Lois Lane.

He can control Lois but he can't control Superman. He loses millions discovering this but he also discovers Lois is the closest thing to power over Superman there is.

That was the advantage of seeing the show as a child for the first time. I didn't automatically jump to the conclusion of jealousy either. I knew Clark liked Lois but I also knew Lex was a bad guy and Clark was protecting his friend. I didn't think jealousy until Lex and Lois kissed and Clark does his grownup version of 'ewww!'
Now I know the first date implications of this and her later refusal to give Clark the same...opportunity?


Kate

Well, as Lois tells Ariana, she was attracted to his power and humanitarian image and on the first date the image was untarnished. As she got to know him better even her best-est buddy Clark couldn't make a dent in it as far as she was concerned. Clark's fault was being happy with what he could get from her. He never showed her what she was missing-- not enough to really make her notice. With Linda King, she certainly noticed him and later with Mayson but he never took it far enough for her to really see what she was pushing away. He never tried to make her want more.

Oh, oh.
Did you by any chance read a best friend story that irritated you?
LOL!

What good would it have done? She told Perry she knew she would never lose his friendship. She was right. He stayed her 'bestest' pal no matter how she treated him.

Kate

The story didn't irritate me. It was fun, actually. I forgot the name and had to look for the story. when you see the name you're going to wonder how I forgot it!
If there were more pratfalls in the activity this would be a slapstick comedy. We don't get to see pratfalls until near the end but they're worth the wait.
Lois is great in it. LOL! And Martha is utterly true to fanfic form.
I was thinking "best-est" as in just so darn cute.
Here

Absolutely none! LOL! Sometimes I wish we had Harry Potter type floo powder for computers. Where you can toss it on your computer screen and reach in and throttle the heck out of fictional characters when they act stupid. Unfortunately I'm the only one who would use it for that and it would be pulled off the market immediately due to inappropriate hand use.

LOL! That would be so cool though. Having fan fic characters come to life on the monitor as you read the story. If I could reach inside I'd be smacking Batman around too much. There are some stories where I just want to whack him on the back of the head. Get up and do something! Quit over thinking it and just do something. In some fic he broods too much and in some when they describe his silhouette motionless on a rooftop somewhere I want to throw something and make him duck.
Also I'd be putting one hand over Lois' mouth and pushing Clark out the door with the other way too often.

Kate

Me, too!
She just called you the lowest life form on two planets and she never wants to see you again as long as she lives! Get out of here and give her what she wants! See how she really likes it if you go out to lunch with a woman from the want ads department or get coffee for someone else! And when she tries to talk to you, YOU be the one who pretends she's invisible and walk away! See how she likes being treated like dirt. And if you even think of walking around with your shoulders slumped and lower lip stuck out and quivering, these hands will be back!
LOL!!
When Martha sticks up for Lois-- well, let's just say she would find herself in the barn or in the middle of Schuster's field a lot, wondering how she got there.

I still can't get Mighty Mouse's theme out of my head!!

Forget Clark- what I wouldn't do to the car booger! Run for your life fanfic nice guy Scardino!

I read the story and couldn't believe it when Clark thought Lois was the queen! Alternate universe or not, come on Kent! She's not the queen of anything! Throttle that guy!
Both Clarks knew how to fight- which is a by product of growing up in the company of other boys, friends or relatives, kids you can roughhouse with and as he got older learn to pull his punches.
He wasn't a friendless lonely teenager afraid of his powers! Come on!
That darn Mighty Mouse theme is making me too aggressive. I'm getting off the computer!

Kate, suddenly wanting to go somewhere and box or something

LOL!
I was on my laptop on lunch break when I was listening to it. people were looking at me and I did not look back because I was too busy laughing and thinking of 'Little Lois' and how mean she and Little Nell can be to their superheroes.
Some people have all the luck and use it wrong!
I read a story a long time ago and I'll never remember the name, but Clark was comparing Lois to Princess Leia. he should call her Little Nell and make her wonder what it means!

Darn right! I can look at Clark and see a terrific guy worth making me argue harder with Perry to get out of surveillance so I can go to a concert with him instead!


Kate

Sooooo... what if this did happen? Say they're both giving each other the cold shoulder and one day Lois overhears Clark and another woman reporter talking about going to a Pearl Jam concert together? If the man guilty of being Superman and therefore not be trusted because he lied to protect his family and friends and the secret, was to ask another woman out for what is the almost first date? Aside from the jokes.

Kate

No jokes? No "Lois will kill them both!"? Well that takes all the fun out of it.
Seriously, she'd be ready to spit nails. Even if she was dating Dan at the time, she would still be very angry!

Okay, make it during that time. I'm trying to imagine a story where Clark does give her what she wants and decides he should have the same privilege. Would she think 'wait a minute! That's my date!' or what? Would it drive her farther away or would she see what she's missing?
Canon/ff Lois is so blind to the way she treats this man! Even Jimmy feels sorry for him and tries to help Clark! Would it have done any good at all to try to open eyes that are blind to her own actions to begin with? Is that why Clark never tried?

Kate

Why do you always ask such tough questions? LOL! I've been thinking about this and I still don't know what to say.
IMO they were both blinded by love in too many ways.

He's standing at the coffee machine, flipping in coins for extra sugar and cream and suddenly an angry voice hisses at him:

"What do you think you're doing? You're taking that...person with purple hair to a Pearl Jam concert?"
"Am I? Let's see. . .I bought the tickets, I asked her if she wanted to go with me, she said she'd love too, pick her up at six-- Yeah, you're right, looks like it."
"That was our date, Clark! The one we had to cancel!"
"Yeah,I know. I reserved tickets to their return date as soon as it was announced."
"You didn't tell me!"
"I forgot about it until the tickets arrived this morning."
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"This morning I asked if you had anything planned on Friday night. You said you were going to the museum opening with Oil Can Danny."
"With. . .who?!"
"Never mind. You have plans."
"Take Jimmy!"
"Jimmy? Are you out of your mind?"
" He had a good time at their last concert!"
"He went with a date!" Pause. "I am, too."
"She has purple hair!"
"She wasn't born with it."
"She's what? Fourteen?"
"No, Lois. She's twelve. Just tall for her age."


To be continued...

Will Kent win this argument?
Will Lane give up gracefully?
Join us for our next exciting episode of "Lane Vs. Kent, the Scardino Weeks"

How about "Lane vs. Kent, The Misadventures of Superman?"
LOL! Take Jimmy!
Oh Mighty Mouse and Oil Can Harry! I love starting the day with a laugh.
Yes,Clark- take Jimmy! LOL!
So she would see what she's missing but darned if she'll admit it?

Kate, who had bright pink streaks once upon a time and still thinks they looked good

I wrote the original post and sent it to the chat room in case anyone was there and the guy who plays Luke Skywalker wrote back, "Have Lois try to make him take Jimmy."
LOL! I wish I thought of it!


As we enter the newsroom we see people walking far around the coffee machine to get where they are going, yet casting sidelong glances at the two people standing before it. . .

"Clark you are not taking that purple nightmare to MY concert!"
"Jeez, lois. that's no way to talk about a nice young woman who has idolized you since high school."
Silence for a split second. "She has not!"
"You got your first Kerth nomination her junior year. Six years ago."
"I know when it was! That means she's just a kid! Let Jimmy take her, she's too young for you!"
"No! I'm not missing another concert. I like this band. And keep your voice down. The whole room is watching." Sips his coffee, likes it, buys a second one exactly the same.
"So what? If you take that- that- that kindergartener to my concert, so help me I'll never speak to you again!"
"I'd like to see you try! You can't even keep your voice down."
"I mean it, Clark! Don't you dare take that purple topped baby to our concert!"
"You have a date for Friday night. My tickets, my concert. I'm not wasting the other ticket."
"Jimmy will be happy to go with you!" Turns and yells, "JIMMY! GET OVER HERE? NOW!"
"You are crazy!" Takes his coffee cups and walks away.
"Get back here, I'm not finished with you!"
"Yes, you are. You're not talking to me, remember?"


Will Kent continue to defy Lane?
Will Lane carry out her threat to stop talking to him?
Don't bet on it.

Stay tuned for the next exciting episode of Lane vs. Kent, The Misadventures of Superman!

My hair is red anyway so there was no direction for me to go as far as color, so I cut it short and my younger brother said I looked like a pencil eraser. Yes, he is still alive. Barely.

Yes, brothers come in handy in a lot of ways even if you can't think of them right off hand. You can ask them questions about dealing with difficult women for one thing. Even barely alive ones will answer!

A reason to take Jimmy if I ever heard one! LOL!




Kate

She would probably start a rumor that Clark had concert tickets for sale! The poor purple haired girl would hear them and think the date is off and ask him. Louis would see them talking together and -- no jokes, right? Darn!
Let me think...like I'm great at this or something.

LOL! You're better than I am.
She would probably follow them to the concert, Dan waiting or not, and Clark being Martha's son would give Lois his ticket. Purple hair would get mad and leave and, what? Our gentleman would go after her.

Kate, admitting that took me a while

Leaving Lois and a puzzled but happy Dan with the two tickets to the concert! (Joke.)
He would take his date somewhere else,have a good time and save the night.
Of course,when Clark gets back to his apartment,Lois is waiting,angry and with two unused tickets in her pocket.
If he's lucky she will have fallen asleep on his couch so he can rest and start his Saturday being yelled at,accused of everything bad under the sun and forced to apologize for just doing what Lois herself is doing. He is always wrong.
Whew!
See what I mean? No beginning, no middle to speak of, all end.
M/O
P.S. Have you read anything on FF.n recently? There is a story dealing with Superman's blindness that has a review from someone who has the same idea about super blindness that my dad does! When TEHI aired he watched it with mom and me and sort of laughed and rolled his eyes through it, saying it was wrong. The reason why is the same one given by the reviewer at FF.n. Xray vision is a different form of energy and wouldn't be affected by Dr. Leit's instrument. The xray vision would still work because of Clark's brain's ability to interpret the xrays into images like normal sight. Superman would still be able to see but Clark would have to stage an accident to explain HIM being blind while Superman carried on as usual --since he usually uses his xray vision a lot anyway to see inside burning buildings, wrecked vehicles, cave-ins and what not. Using it to protect his identity wouldn't be unusual to him. The problem might be that maybe using it constantly uses too much energy or a similar problem, but he would still be able to see. As Clark he could deal with the regular sight blindness and have to find a remedy without Leit putting two and two together.
I wonder if that person talks to my dad or my brothers at DC? LOL! I mean he even mentions that Clark from Smallville can't do it and my dad's been of that opinion since the first time SV Clark used his xray vision and it was just xray images he could see.
Oh, it's called "Zenith."

Knowing nothing about x rays in real life I can buy that reason in the super hero universe since everything is different there. I know you mentioned it before without going into detail and I couldn't imagine what the reason could be and the review is right. Movie Superman can do it too. I wonder why Smallville chose to ignore the comics and limit Superman's vision?

Mr Good Guy to the end. But in this case he would be right. The car booger would probably be skulking out on the balcony listening and peeking in to watch everything. Clark would have to drag him inside and throw them both out.
If Lois wanted Clark she would have a huge fight ahead to do it. You didn't give him the metascripting knowledge he had in the original plot so it won't be as easy as showing up and announcing "you need me."

Kate, imagining Lois doing the romantic stuff this time around and she, Lois, would probably hate every minute of it too- the reluctant romantic!

What would she consider romantic? At that point in her life she's so self centered. How would she go about winning him back? She never let herself get to know him well enough to respond in kind. Would she even know how Clark liked his coffee? Or would she be guessing?
I love the idea of the reluctant romantic.
Maybe Lucy would take pity on her clueless sister and help her. LOL!

Oh that would be great. Lucy coming to the rescue and maybe feeling an attraction herself as she helps Lois get to know him. She is the sister who does date after all and has known men to compare him to. (I still say concluding dating makes her as cheap as she's been portrayed isn't a foregone conclusion.)
Maybe it could go either way and once she realizes it, Lois finally has to act on her own to remind Clark she is the one he wanted in the first place.

Kate

"My place tonight,Kent. We're having a romantic dinner and you're going to enjoy it!"
"We're going to a movie tonight, Clark. The Joy Luck Club at the dollar house across from Louie's pool hall. Don't complain, I don't want to hear it. I'm doing this for us!"
Sets a six shot drink carrier on Clark's desk. "I got you one of every sugar filled, cream saturated, flavored latte they had because I care."
"Clark, I don't care what the people around here say, I'm not frigid and Dan can prove it!" (Joke, joke, joke, joke...)

[quote(Joke, joke, joke, joke...) quote]
LOLOLOL! At least I know someone else doesn't like him anymore than I do even though, okay. The car booger is starting to be funny and not so annoying.
I guess there wasn't a strong women seminar anywhere in town to take him to? Or Lucy was quick to veto that idea this time around?
And after the movie Clark can insist on going to Louie's to do man things for a while.

Kate

Ah, yes. You've reached the acceptance stage. Can forgiveness be far behind? LOL!
Well she wanted to take him to a "Women in War Zones Reporting" speech by Christiane Amanpour but Lucy said, "Absolutely not! He might think you want him to go with you to Afghanistan or something! . . . you don't, do you?"
Then they argued over The Joy Luck Club at the dollar house or full box office admission to The Shawshank Redemption at the multiplex, which in 1994 would have been 5 or 6 theaters in the same building, not 15 or 20.

LOL! I'm going to stretch out acceptance as long as I can.

All I remember is the Lion King back then. We still argue over the admission prices!
I wish there were more Lois/Lucy stories with the kind of relationship they had in the first season.

Kate

Wishful thinking, but they go on my future reading list.
What have you read recently?
I got sidetracked by classroom reading. We're reading "Moon Over Manifest" in class, it's the 2011 Newberry Award winner and the kids like it. A girl is the main character of the story, but a boy in stories from the past is a likeable main character, too.

Annoying L&C
I read this recently after finding it with the random button but I don't think I'll be reading the rest of it. I liked some of the story (Bobby and Rose) but it just went where too many other stories have already gone. This seems to be a universal plot. Lois rejects love, Clark and everything they can have for no good reason. Clark accepts.

Kate

That's on my list of multi parters to read at some future date, and I'm going to read it soon just to find out who Bobby and Rose are! Bobby as in the snitch who suddenly makes house calls? M/O
Angstiness. That's the reason for universal plots, I can make it angstier than that! someone thought.

Yes, Bobby B. whose ethics apparently are picky, considering what he doesn't tell Rose but instead sells for food. And she doesn't mind!


Kate

It gets more intriguing!
I'll guess wife, girlfriend and possibly sister, but just an idea.
I hope that's a full series. I don't want to start reading and find out there is another part coming. The Eragon books destroyed my patience with series stories. We knew there would be seven Potter books, but the Inheritance Cycle was supposed to be a trilogy and just before the third book we heard there would be a fourth.
Don't play that anymore. ;p And, really, if your story has sixty eight chapters and then just ends with no resolution, ever! A reader has aright to complain after reading it and being left hanging!

Sixty eight chapters and no end?
Well, I'll be even more careful reading after this. It was good enough to stick with it all that way? Wow.
Cute Story
I read one that stays on my e-reader. Considering the subject it could have been just another take on it, but I liked the depictions of both L&C. It isn't often you see a revelation handled so well!

Kate, having a lazy Saturday

Good recommendation. The author even acknowledged Clark's background, traveling the world, going to dangerous places. Just a mention is enough for me, too many never make one, preferring the innocent farmboy fresh off the turnip truck.
In the middle of it all, the reporter is still there when Lois asks where does his suit go when he changes! (I have a preferred explanation but this Lois will get the best explanation, I think.)
She had two revelations on the series, she slapped him the first time, remember?
I'll never understand why a ballistic revelation is thought to be better than this. The undercurrent of fireworks to come is more fun to think about for me.
JMO.

Imagining what she's going to do? LOL!
I guess what I liked best is the reason for the revelation. And, yes, the discussion that will come. It'll be an ordeal but they're both prepared to face it as adults. I'd like to have tickets to that! Lois trying to sustain anger to stay on track, Clark being for all intents and purposes grilled by the best reporter of their generation!

Kate

Like a one act play? Like they do at conventions?
That would be interesting! The interview of Lois' life but she can't print it or even share it with anyone!
Who do I know who knows anything about plays? There must be someone. We have a ton of summer arts programs in these parts and I know people who volunteer to help out all the time.

Two characters: Lois Lane and Clark Kent, one set, topic of discussion: Superman's secret identity.

That could be done, don't you think?

Yes, I believe so and I would definitely buy tickets for that, too.
I don't know about conventions performances but I'd like to read a play on this subject especially if the characterizations are recognizable as the Lois and Clark from TNAOS.

Kate, trying to remember if I know anyone who knows about play writing

I saw Star Wars in 5 minutes, a one man show, I think it was 5 minutes- it was very fast anyway, at Celebration III when a lot of us from the RPG met up there. It was more fun than the light saber demonstrations! I don't remember if it was scheduled or the guy showed up and started performing it.

I've written some L&C lines like an RPG post but I want it to be serious and not Aarghed so I haven't shown it to the RPGers.
I just have to find someone serious to look at them.

Do an aarghed version too. Seriousness is overdone with these two. As we've said before this show started out as a dramedy but so few stories take advantage of this. It doesn't have to be riotously hilarious, just have some humor there.
It's nice to find a story where something, anything funny happens.

Kate

I haven't found one of those in a while. We're getting to the final Chapters of 'Moon Over Manifest' in class and having fun talking about it. I'm easily distracted by good books for kids, and especially this one which is so well written.
An Aargh play? I guess we can do that. I want to see if the idea flies first, though.

Well, I'm looking forward to finding out what you have. In the meantime:
Congo Disappearance Resolution
I wish there was more to this story. The stick to the facts style makes it succinct and quick to read, but there are too many loose ends, as we talked about elsewhere. Why was she imprisoned ? What was she writing? Lex won't give up!

Kate

The two men who were with her were in on it somehow. One took the bribe, the other didn't but his guilt can be assuaged by drinking. He's as deeply into it as the anchorman, or whatever he was.
M/O
This is very much like the Lois married Dan story I mentioned a long time ago. The premise was good, very promising, but not enough detail was included to explain thngs. The plot moved along but too many questions were raised by it that were never resolved.

Either way they're both dead men now. Luthor ALWAYS ties up his loose ends! Both will die in convenient accidents.
Are we making up a sequel? LOL! We'd better stop.

Kate

We're surmising. Sorry, one of the boys in my class just discovered that word and uses it a lot. It's catchy!

We're attempting to tie up loose ends. Suggesting what might have happened in the sequel. Or in the missing scenes, actually.
Anchorman will die spectacularly on the air, and alcoholic man will die spectacularly somewhere on the riverfront. Lex can watch the first one over and over on his news channel, and the second one will be private, taped only for his viewing pleasure.

He does have a thing for blowing up those who get in his way.
I can imagine Lex blowing up the tabloid where the alcoholic man works, high death toll, surveillance footage from other business showing many angles of the blast. Ahhh, the entertainment requirements of the criminally inclined.

Kate

LOL! I do wonder why Lois was held captive, though probably to write something or why give her a computer. She could see what was going on in the world but with her end blocked from sending out messages.
What could that be?

Too much is missing for me to even guess.
Lex was sure he would be able to wear her down anyway. And why couldn't she have escaped through the window? Superman flew her right out without stopping so it must have been open and unbarred.
As you said before she's good at escaping.


Kate

Weren't there bars on the door to the hallway of her quarters? She was in a basement room with a guard.
There is quite a bit of detail missing,so I guess we have to assume (surmise!),he broke her out.

Lois is guarded and she's barred inside the basement so I guess we have to assume that she's tried to escape before. Too much assuming but at least there is no obsessive behavior to sit through afterward. And very little at the beginning so I guess I shouldn't complain. Yeah, right!

Kate

I ASSUME you mean Clark and his obsessions.
I think that's a new ff staple to add to the list. Alt Clark's who are missing them must be obsessed with finding their Lois Lanes. There are no exceptions.

If we didn't have to obsess along with him it would be better but being inside his head with him is what gets to be too much. There must be other ways to depict his search for her without having to know his every thought. When he went out to interview the two men who were with her there could have been more to the conversations than quickly getting into their own attractions to Lois. Followed, of course, by Clark's possessiveness over a complete stranger to him. He really takes to heart that this woman is his even before they meet. She might be dead but by gosh she's his possibly dead woman.

Kate

LOL! At least he isn't crying in his cups. I know people cry, men and women, at traumatic events in their lives, at breakups with someone they loved, at happy events in their lives, but during and after each and every fight, disagreement or angry word? But enough of crybaby Clark. I don't want to get sidetracked.
I'm still looking for a story where she really is dead, but I haven't found one yet. I mean in Africa, not like in Kidnapped!
I wonder what happens then. Does he spend his life in misery, always thinking what might have been? Does he ask Wells for help? What would he do once he discovers she is truly out of his life forever?
Whoa! What was that? H.G. rushing to the rescue? "We cannot have that! Utopia, I shall save you!" he yells.

LOL! Yeah, well what kind of save does he have up his sleeve if Lois isn't immediately blinded by love and clearly sees the obsession this terribly powerful man has for her and it frightens her? In his own way alt Clark's desire for her is as unhealthy as Lex Luthor's. The difference is when Lex pursues her, he's a monster manipulating her, but with Clark it's romantic and he's just helping her to realize her feelings.
Our Clark might have let Lois get away with waaaaayyyy too much, but he was patient and endured what life had in store for them. She had free will.

Kate

I have to agree but it helps to know which is the bad guy and which is the good guy going in. Unhealthy obsession or not knowing that much colors our perceptions of their motives.
So far, the few Alt Clark stories I've read have happy endings: Lois turns out to be just what Clark was expecting, but canon pointed out that the alt world characters are not at all like the series universe characters. Lois made the mistake of assuming Alt Clark was just like her husband, buying all of Clark's favorite snacks to make alt him feel comfortable and Alt Clark didn't like any of it! Alt Lois is probably the same way. Different lives, different preferences.
Alt Clark didn't grow up with a mom cooking for him and withholding sweets, so he had no need to become a junk food junkie as soon as he was on his own.
What about Alt Lois? Maybe she's allergic to chocolate, maybe she can't have sugar, maybe she disappeared on purpose. I was reading about a woman who did that because she discovered she had cancer and didn't want to put her family through a prolonged illness and caring for her.
If she was a smoker like movie Lois, perhaps she went out of the country to find alternative cures or treaments for lung cancer. Maybe she fell in love with Africa and chose to stay.
After all that obsessing, they might not like one another!

Or she might fear Superman. Maybe she's a lot more like season 1 Sam Lane and her talent as a journalist comes from the emotional coldness that drove him.
Wow. I never considered the differences between the characters. Jimmy isn't the young guy looking for a father figure, Perry uses his ties to President Presley to further his own ambitions for political power, Clark was ready to spend his life on the sidelines, doing nothing with his abilities.
Maybe SHE stole the story from Claude and he's counting his blessings he wasn't the one following leads to Africa! LOL!
Alt Lois is a clean slate Lois, too!

Kate

We have no clue what was different about Lois, but it doesn't stand to reason that all the major characters are different in some way but she isn't. Maybe she wasn't as strong willed as series Lois and gave in to Luthor, or whoever, and discovered she's happy with all that money and power. Luthor seems to be the preferred person to have made her disappear over there.
Whatever happened, if Alt Clark finds her, she won't be exactly like series Lois. If they have soul mates hanging over them.... poor guy!

Well that was something to think about! Finding alt Lois isn't a guaranteed happy ending at all. The daughter of a doctor and a nurse, she might look down on an orphaned farmer's kid from her social standing. LOL! What possibilities!

Kate

Once again, it's only us. No one else takes this into account. LOL! We are so out of sync.

No! I prefer to think we go where no one has gone before!

Kate, claiming ship's counselor mainly because he/she sits beside the captain

Pioneers,huh? So much for pioneers getting the glory...
I read the story you mentioned a few days ago and you were right: Bobby and Rose were the best part of it, though a snitch and a cop are pretty unusual as a couple. They were believable characters, though. At least they know what being in love is-- compared to a certain other couple.

LOL! You mean Clark Kent and the Reluctant Romantic?
I guess background characters don't tolerate angst in their relationships. They accept what they have and go with it, diving right into the deep end.

Kate

LOL! Yes, background characters are just happy to be featured now and then, letting the reader see someone can do it right even if Bobby goes back to being single in the next story.

And Rose fades into obscurity...
It was hard to imagine a police officer married to a petty criminal and not having trouble with it. A regular job doesn't fit either for Bobby. He gets his information from hanging with the heavy criminals and I don't see how he did it if they knew his wife was a 'cop.' One or the other would be dead by now.
Still I liked the couple and wished they were featured a lot more.

Kate

See?! I told you so,I told you so!
I'm kidding. That's the reason I've read a lot of stories from beginning to end even though there was a crybaby Clark or whatever. I can put up with something I didn't particularly like if there is something else that grabs my attention.
That's also why I can say I've read WW/S and WW/B fics.

LOL! You hang around with kids too much. (J/K)
I've read them too but by the authors I know, not by the younger fans who only like writing the physical acrobatics and don't balance it out with an actual story.

Kate, no cracks about actual plots in shipping stories

Ha! I know what you mean-- I've also read Harry Potter where the descriptions can be very technical. I made a joke a while back about Clark using proper teminology while with Lois on their wedding night, and, well, I got that idea from HP fic. Some of the young writers used proper terms for what they wrote about - where Harry or Ron or the twins actually said things like that! M/O (Wizard teens, according to youthful writers, are fascinated with touching and kissing 'mammaries.') LOL! So when Clark kept displaying his lack of experience, I thought of Harry and friends being so technical!

LOL! I remember that and it was funny. It cemented my image as a nutcase who sits in her office and laughs to herself in the morning. You don't help matters writing funny stuff so much!


Well see, I wouldn't even bother to read a story like that all the way through. Unless it's a comedy and says so out front, I'm looking for a story.

Kate

This was back in the day, when I was a teen myself. If it wasn't for Trek, SW and E2 fanfic I would have bought it all! LOL! I had big brothers who knew where the good stuff was and left saved stories on their computers. Now, of course, it's funny but then it was something you didn't admit to liking or reading. Then shipping took off and I still blame it for killing "Enterprise." The fans wanted Trip/T'Pol and for some reason that's what they got.

Yes. During the run of ST-TNG when fans wanted a romance between the captain and the doctor, the late Michael Pillar flatly said no. Adding that if they gave in to everything the fans wanted the show would be s**t. Unfortunately the production team of Enterprise gave in. I remember the shippers getting together to email Paramount asking for the T/T ship on the show.
I wonder if any of those Yahoo groups are still around? Probably filled with spambot posts if they are.

Oh well.
What brought that on? LOL!
Anyway, going back to reading at random.

Kate

Interesting Lucy But Not Enough

Some sister interaction.

Post Metallo Lucy with pre-Metallo smarts. She apparently learned a lesson from the incident and she isn't angry or distrustful of all men because of it!
The rest of the story was fine. Lois can be adult if she's allowed to be.

Kate

I can see why you think Lucy's time spent with her mother has paid off. In any other show she would be the smarter than everyone else kid sister but, no, here she's a good counterpoint to Lois. They keep one another in the groove and they're both exercise nuts.

The online script by DJL says there is a five year age difference so Lucy would be 12 or 13 when Lois moved out. Entering her teen years with a recovering alcoholic mother, she saw a different woman. Lois saw the weaknesses that drove her to drink but Lucy saw the strengths that helped her kick the habit. She spent her teen years with a much better role model than her sister who only saw her parents during the strife between them. Lucy knew them during the healing. Or Ellen's healing anyway. Possibly Sam's too because something caused him to appreciate his daughters and affect him enough to refuse to let Lois compromise her principles for him.
That's what makes it so hard for me to see her as the sex crazy girl desperate for love in fan fic. It doesn't follow for me that the confidence she has in the first season totally disappears by the second and on into the expanded L&C universe.

Kate

Good point. I never thought of it that way.
Why did they have to go and make the Lanes into the comic relief family anyway? LOL! I just hate that they changed them so much from season one. Good thing they never brought Jack and his brother back. They probably would have been bumbling thieves.
I'd rather see Lucy as the international con woman thing she was on Smallville than the weak little girl from season 2.

What in the world was that? She was on Smallville? For how long?

Since they couldn't make Jack and Denny any younger, they would have made them older but still played by Chris Demetral and Brandon Bluhm in older make-up. Big mustaches and longer hair, since real age and Hollywood age have nothing to do with one another.

Kate

She was going to school in Europe and got in trouble, owed money to a loan shark and tried to blackmail Lex to get the money to payoff the loan shark. All I remember clearly is she stole Lex's car at the end and took off in it. It still makes me laugh when I think about it. She reappeared in the final season and I don't remember what happened but the whole thing ended happily.It was a let down. Her introduction was so fiery and then she turns out to be a daddy's girl. But that's still better than meek and weak and scared of Lois.

Elizabeth Barondes' portrayal looks better and better.

Now for something completely different:
Take a look at these!
Dean
Teri
These are a mixture of candids and professional shots of both so expect some bad ones. There are also a lot of shots of other unidentified people mixed in because they are all part of the same album uploads by the various photographers who are sharing the pictures. For the most part I've never seen 75% of the Dean and Teri pics before. They go back to '93 at least. (Get the guy wearing DC's Superman suit and the guys dressed like him and the ones who think they look like him!)

Kate, who found them after looking at my brother's pics of his baseball opener

Well, how cool is that, when you can influence men to dress like you, in costume and not, and they brag about it on the internet?
Flickr is the pic sharing choice for Star Wars fans.Some of my favorite Stormtrooper photo essays are there.
Stormtroopers
More
OK! All done being off topic. Stormtrooper fanfiction in pictures!

Come on, Bev, let's find some Superman, Clark and Lois action figures and do something like this with them!
"The 365 Adventures of Vintage Lois and Clark" by Bev and Kate!

OOOOOOHH!!! Interesting but most Lois figures aren't fully articulated. My dad has the sets from the animated series but he hasn't opened them. From what I can tell by looking at them, her hands are positioned to hold dainty things like a purse or a notebook and pen, not grenade launchers or assault rifles. The vintage figures would be even more like little statues.
I could maybe borrow his Superman and Batman figures and do those two.
I have the bland Lois Barbie issued for "Superman Returns." If I used her with Superman and Batman I'd have to use forced perspective to make them look the same size! LOL! That, in itself, just sounds funny!
I think there is a fanfic about a giant Lois but I'd have to get the author's permission to use her for that!
Seriously, I can get Supe and the Bat and take a few test pics with them.
Or how about LEGO Supe and Bat? I have them with WW. She has a lasso of truth that looks like a big gold tennis racquet.

LOL! A giant Lois story?!! You're kidding!

There has to be someway to do an action figure story like the troopers with Superman and Lois. We just have to think of it. My brother might have figures I can use. I know he has vintage Lois. are there Clarks or just Superman?
Superman and Batman will work too but we have to have Lois in it too.

Kate

I know this was discussed a while back but you're right about real age and Hollywood age being different. If Hollywood stuck to real age think of how different this show would be! Dean was the right age to play Clark but in real life Teri is two years older. Lois is a year younger than Clark so Teri would be three years older than Lois. If you stick to real age she would have been too old to play Lois! In this case Hollywood got it right.

I second the comment! There is a giant Lois story?

I have to agree with you there. They put together a good cast, the very best of which were K Callen and Eddie Jones. IMO
Jump in any time, Paula.

Yes there is.
You Asked For It
Actually it's kind of funny. It was one of the first ones I read and afterward I decided not to go by author anymore. If he had written anymore stories I wouldn't have read them afer reading this one!

I emailed Dad and bros to see what figures they have opened and sent them a link to the troopers for what we have in mind.
There are no Lois LEGOs and the only action figures are of her as Superwoman or someone in a green superhero outfit. The only one of her in a regular outfir is the one from the animated series.

I wonder where that giant Lois story came from? LOL! It makes me want to start singing "Galaxy Glue!"
Of course they have it on YouTube, I just wish they had cut the screaming.
What Would We Do Without Galaxy Glue?

Is that how you started? I used the random button and I still do unless you recommend something.

Me too. They couldn't have done a better job putting this cast together and for the most part the guest stars were good too.

Kate

We got HBO when I was 4 and this was one of the movies I remember wanting to watch over and over! After all these years I still remember the exact words to the jingle. One of the posts said the same thing!
The new remake can't possibly top a gimmick like that song.
The only other Lily Tomlin movie I like is "All of Me" with Steve Martin. He's hilarious but she gives a good performance too.
Anyway, we had a tiny Clark/Superman on the series so why not have a giant Lois now and then? Unlike poor little Superman, it wasn't real.

LOL! Now and then? Once is enough for both.
Is he the only author who has Clark swear? Lois says "Get your own damn coffee!" on the show, but I don't remember reading Clark saying anything like it in ff.

Kate

Darned if I know and if anyone else does, never mind. Truthfully, that's the first time [i[I've [/i]seen it in ff. I seem to remember Lois doing so now and then in ff but not too much. She usually stops just before saying anything out loud! Or on the page, as it were.
It's a first for me, let's put it that way.

I wish I could but I'm not quick enough. By the time I have something to say about a subject you've moved on!
I have a question. What do you think of kidnap stories? Where Lois and Clark are married and their child is kidnapped. I read one where the daughter returned as a teenager looking for Superman because she was in a foster care system and developing powers. It didn't seem right. Something was off about it.

Don't let that stop you! I waited over a year before someone decided to answer my posts and start a conversation. This is mostly newbie stuff we're doing and has already been hashed out by long time members ages ago, I guess.
As for your question:
You would think a successful kidnapping couldn't happen, wouldn't you? In my mind the thing preventing it would be the heart beat issue from canon. If Clark can hear Lois' heartbeat and discern it from all others, he would be able to recognize the heart beats of his children, right? The gestational period in the womb- who knows how long a human/K child needs to develop-- and however many months since birth, he would know the child's heart beat. With his speed he'd have to fly in ever increasing circles and find the heart beat that way. Unless the Flash does the kidnapping, I would think even a fast jet wouldn't get far enough away too fast for the heart beat to be detected.

Definitely don't let that stop you- especially if you've been through the Little League experience.
It would be nice to see another name here and another opinion. I don't mind going back over something to clarify or expand.

The heartbeat thing makes sense. A fast jet? Meaning Lex? LOL!
I wouldn't want to read a kidnap story, especially not one where Lex is the kidnapper. Anything he does or says to that child would be abuse. All the way back to COTOC I wondered why Leanne (?) lied to her son about Superman being his father. I knew how disappointed he would be when she told him it really wasn't true. How can she do that to her little boy? I don't remember if I ever asked that out loud but I thought it. Though it's become one of my favorite episodes, I still think that.

Kate, thinking canon has established hypnosis works on superheroes in L&C's universe so any of them is a possibility for this type of crime

Well, maybe not the Green Lantern. Clark and the others are not under the influence of an actual alien power source/artifact when they're being superheroes. Wouldn't GL's power source protect him from hypnosis, which is something that deals with a human, or human raised, mind?
Wonder Woman was raised among humans, and she doesn't have an alien source giving her the powers.
GL would be the one running around slapping them in the face and throwing water at them. "Just remember I'm doing this for your own good!"

Oh, and just the thought of Lex trying to raise a child of Lois and Clark is both hilarious and horrifying. When that kid says no, he/she will mean NO! I can see Lex being argued into a corner until he gets angry and ---- I don't even want to go there.

Okay, that's the out we need- Green Lantern is exempt. He's the go to guy when one of the others gets hypnotized. LOL!
"Wonder Woman, NO!" just before he dumps a cooler of ice water on her. Followed by "Wham!" and sincere apologies from WW as she helps him climb out of that crater on the moon.

Kate who thinks the less said about Lex as kidnapper the better

Lex just isn't meant to be around kids. He ignored his own and look what happened to them. They act as if he did raise them. Trying to actually raise one - no.

So. . .looks like we doomed GL to a life of keeping his fingers crossed that no one on the JLA gets hypnotized.

As long as he's not successful and the child is found quickly. He could be the most likely source of a Cade Skywalker Kent.

What could the Flash do to GL? Shake him until he turns to atoms? Spin him around until he's dizzy? I don't think he has a powerhouse hit like Superman and WW.

Kate

Beats me. I guess he could take him somewhere remote and strand him there, hiding the ring under a rock to see how long it takes for him to get over his spinning vertigo and find it.
Come to think of it, the Flash isn't that fun a character.

Have you ever read Flash fanfic? I haven't. Or GL. I suppose there are stories but I've never been curious. Not even now.

Kate

I looked a while back but it was mostly Teen Titans fic and I'm not interested in them.
I have read some Superman the Animated Series fiction but there is too much action and not enough attention paid to the characters.

I have a list of stories about L&C next gen but I haven't read any yet. I guess they would be the Kent Teen Titans. I'm apprehensive because my fanboys and I are of the school that Kryptonian physiology will react to yellow sunlight and manifest powers no matter what. m/o so if a child is born to L&C without powers- C is not that kid's father. Kryptonian physiology is there no matter which genes are dominant, dormant or dead.

Kate

Same here but I can understand people wanting to angst out the next generation. As I said before I like the theory proposed by the RPG chat room bunch that only evolution will stop the superpowers from manifesting in Kent descendents. I can understand that better than explnations involving genes. we aren't talking wbout real people after all, she said and paused to listen for the far off screams of authors telling her where to go. . . What's that? Where the sun doesn't what?

I'm sure they said where the sun never sets.
The North Pole, in other words.
I don't know about you but the action figures my brother loaned me to fool around with taking pics have been confiscated by my son and I don't think my brother is ever going to get them back. Superman, Batman and Darth Vader go with us everywhere now.
You were right, the Lois figures are either 50s prim and proper or super, or so cheaply made they don't move at all.

Kate, looking forward to the fight between uncle and nephew over rightful ownership

LOL!
I needed a laugh. The last day of school for teachers in our district is Thursday and I have to be moved out of my room by then so it can be cleaned - all four sixth grade rooms, not just mine - so someone else can start moving in. The new middle school where we are going is not ready yet - still needs carpets installed - so I can't move over there until later, but looking forward to it. The last three stragglers to write a haiku for extra credit finally turned something in two Fridays ago. They barely tried but at least they turned in something.
"Does it have to be about Superman?"
"No. Write about anything."
"Like what?"
"The weather, going to school,playing with your friends, anything."

The best?

"Thunderstorns are loud.
Lightning can be fast.
I like when it strikes."

Those three! They can do it. They just have to be difficult.

But I never get tired of watching these birds!
Eagle Watch

On the subject of school. We started watching this live event every day in class, from just after the eggs were discovered until the last day of school, and it was fascinating. Now that school is out I find myself turning it on every so often to see how the fledglings are doing. They should be taking flight any day now. They are certainly trying out their wings a lot.
Might as well get someone besides myself hooked on this.

We tuned in around 7:30 Wed evening and saw one of the parents visit the nest. The trio are as big as they are and just 2 months old? Will be interesting to see them get airborne! The YouTube video of them hatching are pretty cool.

Kate

P.S. m/o
I had this on Friday when one of the parents brought a squirrel to the nest! It all happened so fast I could hardly believe it! The receptionist rushed in when I kind of screamed and she watched it. She thought the squirrel was freshly killed by the parent because by the time the fledgling grabbed it the eyes were already missing! Yes, she was fascinated! She also said the fledgling immediately grabbed the squirrel's neck and held on so it must be an instinctive thing for predator birds to go for the throat of their prey.

JMO, I think it is because at my grandparents' place in the country-- it isn't a farm anymore-- I've seen hawks carry off M/Osnakes and small raccoons and chickens by grabbing them just behind the head or at the neck and along the body.

That's where I saw the word used that way! Right here in front of me? The RPGers said you said it first.

Lucy Strikes!
Kind of a fun story. More Lucy would have been better since I'm on a Lucy hunt for stories but I have to settle for Lucy mentions.
See? She isn't the least bit afraid of Lois. LOL!

That's great! Lois can be totally honest with Lucy, not to mention herself, if it's just between sisters. She can probably make Lois do anything!

Kate

Good point. She can admit she stole Clark's story and she's sorry about it, too, but just between sisters! I liked how Lucy never took her too seriously. She was probably the only person who knew Lois' limits. I wonder how it would have been if Lucy had been in place of the Star character? No psychic stuff, of course, but a sister's knowledge of Lois at that time in their lives? I mean a DJL Lucy, of course.
Just thinking.

Lots of 'borrowing' clothes, making Jimmy take her along to the JSN seminar, both of them would have been running in place for their lives, lots of teasing about finally admitting her feelings for Clark.

Kate

LOL! That would have been so funny! But Lucy can't know about the secret identity yet so probably not, though the talk between them would have been funny. LOL!

"Lois, I don't want to hear any argument. We're going to the gym from now on!"
"This doesn't happen every day."
"Do you mean ONCE wasn't enough?!"

Superman could have seen Lucy safely home and then come back to feel the wrath of Lois.

Kate

I would have liked that. Bringing Lucy back as a recurring character. She probably wouldn't have lasted just like Star but I would have liked it. She is a good counterpoint to Lois.

No way! Lucy would have never let Lois wear an aluminum foil beanie! She would have made sure it was a large hat.

LOL! See? It would have been so much better!
"You're in love with who? Clark? Oh my god! What a surprise!"
"Clark did what for your own good?! I'm going to get a couple of boxers from Dad's old club and we're going to beat the crap out of him!"

Kate

"I introduce you to a nice guy from work and you choose to go out with a guy who tried to sacrifice you to the gods. Has it ever occurred to you that you like the disasters waiting to happen better?"

"Let me get this straight. Clark admits he made a mistake and wants another chance but now you agree with why he broke up with you? Okay! I'm going to wait a respectable amount of time and then I'm going to call him. Throw that at me and I'll make the call now!"

"Olsen, If I knew you were going to drag me all the way up here to find your boss, make me climb a fence, and then admit you want my sister to make a man out of you, I'd have stayed home and - wait a minute! You've never...?" (Old joke, I know...!)

LOL! But still funny.
What do you suppose it is about Lois Lane that compels men to admit such intimate details to her?

"Perry, I'm going home! Ralph just turned beet red and told me he's never been with a woman before and he's tired of lying about it! I swear if one more man tries to confide in me, I'm going to kill Jimmy for starting it!"
"Ah, Lois honey, don't let it bother you. After all, every one of us has been inexperienced in that area. Why, even-"
"NO! Don't say it!"
"- Elvis was a virgin once. Oh, I'm sorry! Would you rather talk about me? It's interesting that this subject has come up because my personal story-"
"OHHHAAHHHH!"

Kate

LOL

Did he really give himself away or what? LOL!

Oh and I can see Perry laughing to himself as she turns and runs for the elevators! Chuckling to himself as he closes his door and goes back to his desk. LOL!

Kris

Lois Lane and the Virgin Diaries. It sure took Clark's thunder away, didn't it? She won't believe a word he says when he tries to bare his soul!

LOL! "Virgin? Are you kidding me? Been there, done that, Clark, with every man I know!"
Change one little thing and the entire season changes.

Kate

Hey soccer mom Kate, how are things going?
CO is having a bad year and I need a diversion.

Change one little thing and a whole new direction opens, too.
I've been doing work on the L&C Concordance and so far I've discovered that Lex's marriage to Ariana Carlin was very short lived. She tells Dr. Heller she hasn't been Mrs. Luthor for ten years. Then Jimmy finds the wedding announcement the DP ran ten years ago and the ship's captain who performed the wedding says it took place in October 1984. They were separated and divorced before the year was out, but he strung her along for the next decade.
Second, I finally know what Lois won her Kerth awards for! Yay!
This is probably old news to long time fans but I scoured the internet to see if this is mentioned anywhere by anyone and I found nothing.
1991- "Gulf War on the Front Lines"
1992- "Inside Bush Campaign Headquarters"
1993- "Sexual Harassment in the Military"

Forget the Congo. At some point in '91, Lois was in Kuwait. Of the two major wars in '91, the Kerth appears to refer to the Gulf War, not the Eastern European war that was just beginning.
Apparently President Garner also had an opponent named Bush in the presidential elections. I wonder what she uncovered there?
Her expose on the military won an award but didn't affect the problem one way or the other. It continues to this day in our universe, probably there, too.

Wow! Where did you find that information? I've looked for it too. Well Lois did say she'd seen it all including war. Did she see famine while in the Congo? Where is the Congo exactly, teach? Mrs. K? Is it a place like Borneo turned out to be not exactly a country?

So Arianna still fits with our little scheme involving Lex. I love when a scheme falls together! He had to deliberately marry her for the purpose of leaving her as his only heir should he die, with no intention of trying to have a life with her.
And she bought into it too!

Kate

I second that. I know something is written on the awards but I never could tell what they were.
How about her books? I could never see her book titles clearly either. LOL!

Thank goodness for large, hi-def computer monitors. I watched the WOS episode on a 30 inch monitor and full screen. All I could make out of the books were Millennium, Woman of Tomorrow, Plant Propagation, Elizabeth the Great and something about Michael Reagan(?)
The Congo is an area of western Africa around the Congo River called the Congo Basin and it extends through six countries: Cameroon, the Central African Republic, the Republic of Congo, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea and Gabon.

Mrs. K has spoken

Friday quiz time!
What are the three countries that are found on Borneo?

LOL!
Just kidding.

LOL! Malaysia, Indonesia and Brunei, Easy.

Kate

I finished the Madame Ex entry for the Concordance and paying such close attention to the details has made me think about how we all see the series.
I see it from growing up as a Superman fan and learning to like Lois Lane largely because of Teri Hatcher's portrayal of her. Watching this episode and knowing of her dislike for the way the show was going, I could just imagine the confusion and let down I might have felt if we had to accept both a new actor playing Jimmy and a new actress playing Lois. I'm so glad that never happened.
Don't read further if my opinions offend you-

Kate

m/o
It's also fascinating to see Lois and Clark as they were created to be. Lois is a very vulnerable and insecure young woman who is also intelligent, talented and bound and determined that no one ever know how easily she can be hurt and how much she wants to be loved. None of this shows up in fanfiction. All of Clark's similar faults are magnified and expounded upon, even though he is just as vulnerable and insecure as Lois is but in other ways. In the series they areon a level playing field, equals in every way.
In ff, the field is slanted to give Lois the edge. She's portrayed much differently. She loses her vulnerability and insecurities and becomes a super woman, a woman better than Clark/Superman; a woman so much stronger than he is that he cries whenever there is discord between them, he kills himself over loss of her love or presence, he all of a sudden can't live without her and even gives up using his powers to help others out of overwhelming loneliness.
Lois never feels those emotions, she's much too strong and capable and secure to be that weak. Clark dies- not one thought of suicide enters her mind, she moves on, even loves and marries and has children in some cases. Even when she's overwhelmed by loss she has the strength and fortitude to go on alone and manages to live one difficult day after another.
Bev, you said once that authors who identify with certain characters write stories about them that make them the way they believe they should be or want them to be - or words to that effect. That's never been more clear to me than after seeing how the series writers balanced Lois and Clark together and let us see that all of their faults and idiosyncrasies were being made to change and become less noticeable as they got to know each other and became closer as friends who are looking for more from one another - even if they won't admit it to themselves. Like it or not, love changes them both in positive ways - it doesn't make her stronger and him weaker. It turns them into real and equal partners.
Lois and Clark as recreated by DJL are wonderful rich characters. I wish we could see them more in fanfiction. I've got my fingers crossed that as I keep reading I'll find them somewhere in the huge volume of stories somewhere.
The End

Good night, I'm offended!
No, I'm not.
M/O
I agree with you in this regard. I am not a cry baby Clark fan- there, I've said it again. I'm not even going to guess if it has anything to do with whether the authors are men or women. I see it, too, and I'll repeat myself again, if the story is good I will read it to the end and if that happens I enjoyed it. I do get tired of Clark always being the weaker, always in the wrong, always wrong, half of the pair while Lois does everything well, does it all perfectly and with a modicum of emotion or just the right touch- but much of the stories are ten years old or more and most authors have forgetten the fandom and moved on. That's what we have and you choose to live with it or you don't.
I also like how the pair complement one another on the series. In just becoming partners and friends they influenced one another in ways neither even notice, but we as viewers do. Doing the concordance is eye opening in a lot of ways.
I can hardly wait to get to the Scardino episodes. I want to do at least one of them because we've had such fun with them. We've kicked them around, turned them inside out, broken them and put them back together wrong! Just had fun with them and the Scardino character. I'm looking forward to seeing how different authors came to have have such differing ways of writing him. Right now I've got three episodes almost ready to post and I'm having fun with The Prankster. I was a little girl when Bronson Pinchot was Balki and I still have fun watching Balki be so mean to Victor and Lois. No dance of joy here! LOL!
Just in case you've forgotten what that is:

Dance of Joy

Oh the dance of joy! My brother and I used to do it but not the jumping into his or my arms thing. That was just plain gross.
I haven't figured out how to do the hiding text thing so I guess no fancy stuff here.
Is there a difference between the way men write the characters in fan fiction and the way women do? Do we as women empower Lois because she is a woman when we think about her character? I know I have sometimes wished she was more confident and sure of herself. She is a likeable character as is though. Clark is too. I don't like dumbing him down to make Lois look better either.

Kate, the main thing I disagree with in your opinion is that you're addressing only one group of fanfic--the largest group, admittedly--as if it were the only kind written. There is a second, much smaller group that is slanted in Clark's favor, in which Lois is a helpless, dithering female. Generally, I dislike both approaches. However, it's a hard balance to maintain when writing--making them equally vulnerable and insecure and equally competent and intelligent. But not all of the stories fit into those two groups. A number of writers try very hard to show them as equals, even if they ocassionally tilt from one side to the other in the same story.

You and Bev mentioned liking humor sprinkled through your fanfic, so for a fun dramedy, try this. The matching story by the same author does a pretty good job of making L&C equals.

Sticking my 2 cents in here, it's true I've only started reading but I haven't seen any story yet where Lois is less than what she is in the series. I'm not eager to see one but stories with Clark being less than he is in the series pop up nearly every time I click the read one at random link. As far as I was concerned that was the way fan fic for this fandom is produced.
It's what struck a chord with me while reading through this and it's sister thread. I was seeing a lot of what Kate and Bev talk about myself and then going, Good! it isn't just me. I have nothing against strong Loises just weak Clarks. Being mild mannered as was once pointed out is part of his disguise but he is written as if he really is a "crybaby." I'd like to understand where this comes from someday.
If it wasn't for Bev and Kate pointing out stories that went against the prevailing grain I might have given up reading.
I speak as a Superman fan of long standing. I love the series and I want to love the fan fic so I'll be looking forward to seeing the stories where Lois and Clark are more like the series characters.

Hmm. Good example of how what you think you are writing on the page is not going to be what all readers will see. I WAS comparing the two types of depictions. My apologies for not making that clear.
I will definitely read the examples you've provided. I wish the list was longer.


I can't say I've seen a story either where Lois is the equivalent of Clark's depiction of being too mild mannered. I've seen characterizations that I thought were too different from series Lois but she was never presented as meek or the opposite of the TV version.

I agree. That says it all right there.

Kate

I agree, too. I like strong Loises, but I like them matched with strong Clarks. The difference in my perspective comes from the fact that of the 3600+ stories on the archive, I've read all but about a hundred of them. I've been with the fandom since February 1996, and there were only 300 stories on the archive at that time, so I read them one summer and then just read every new story that was posted after that.I can see where you would get that idea. It's like thinking that the only L&C stories are either revelation stories (someone learning Clark's secret) or L&C getting together. That isn't true, but if you were just reading stories at random, the chances are very high that you would hit one or the other because they seem to be the kind of stories that a lot of writers write. And that isn't surprising since romances are far and away the most popular kind of fiction published in the US.

Weak Loises are much less common, but I don't want to provide names or links because I don't want to hurt someone. On the other hand, if you want to read any of my stories, I wouldn't mind your telling me what did and didn't work in them.

Hi Shielah,
My apologies, but M/O
One of the reasons I don't put feedback in the story thread and one of the reasons I haven't tried to join the fanfic message board is because a friend of mine, who is a member of the other board, tested the water about a year or so ago. He sent a private email to an author with an opinion on one of her stories that wasn't all positive. He was of the opinion that Lois had been presented as too cruel in her behavior to Clark, even though he knew it was a comedy. This was private, just between him and the author. The author did not take it well. I read the emails. She sent his message to several other members of the board to read, too, and made certain he was included so he could read their replies. Several months before this he had made a joke about the character of Claude needing a last name and she pounced on that post and declared it was never going to happen!
ince then I've been wary about giving direct feedback to anyone.
I'll be happy to read your work and if you really want opinions that might not be "Good job! I can't wait for more." I'll try not tohurt your feelings.

Ouch!! Sympathy pains all over the place! I know what it's like to be put on notice, believe me. I also know what it's like to be asked to stop being so critical or I'll be booted out of the MB. m/o
He can never make another critical post, unless specifically asked to by the author, without anyone jumping to whichever author's defense and soothing his/her hurt feelings at his expense. Been there.
Darn Star Wars and Star Trek! When you've been writing fic since the 60s and 70s you've heard it all before. I got used to that. It isn't easy holding back.

Kate

I understand completely. m/o

However, I am well aware that I learn the most from my mistakes, not just from what I do right. I'm not only a writing instructor by profession, but I'm working toward becoming a professional writer. When I ask to hear what did and didn't work in my stories, I mean just that. I can promise that I won't share it around or complain to other FoLC if your response isn't all positive.

Frankly, I've found some of your insights into events on the show interesting, and I would like your opinion. Bear in mind that my works are some 12 to 16 years old, so I won't make any changes on them, no matter what you say, but I am revising one I did a few years back, and if your comments apply, I may adjust that particular story as a result.

Feel free to take this to private email, if you desire. My email is sharper93@msn.com

I just wanted to step in and say that I don't boot people for critical opinions of fanfic. I realize you're not referring to this message board, but I just wanted to clarify in case anyone thought you were, m/o!!

Zoom

Long time coming, but use the full reply screen or reply button at the bottom of the post you are answering. The third to last button at the top of that reply screen is a capital A with a little rainbow under it. After you write your reply highlight the part you think might offend someone and select white as the color of the text.
Or just use the Spoiler button, which is the capitol S with a forward slash through it.

We used to do this a lot on the Star Wars and Star Trek message boards to hide spoilers when the movies were in the theaters or the TV series were still on the air. We found out that no one could resist clicking the spoiler notice, but if they had to drag their mouse over the blanked out text they wouldn't do it! Dragging the mouse was too much work, I guess.

Is TFN and the other forums still around? I haven't read any Star Wars fic in a while. The writing is getting away from the original trilogy and more about the Clone Wars. We're enjoying that series but I haven't gotten into the fan fic for it.

Kate

These were interesting stories though I really didn't grasp why he was portrayed as afraid and downright cowardly all the time. It's just in my head and my heart that the Superman/Clark I have known all my life is not a quaking in his shoes, trembling hands, voice cracking coward.
Other than that, I liked the premise of the first story best. As a role player myself I laughed out loud a lot. I met up with some of my RPG friends at Celebration VI this past summer and though we look nothing like the Star Wars characters we play, we do joke with each other very like the players in the story did.
The second story was fine until the worldwide reveal and then the humiliation of Clark Kent just went a little too far, in my opinion and my opinion only.
I guess it must be fun to see the guy pay for keeping Lois in the dark for so long.
M/O My sympathies are with Clark. His children have no respect for him at all, and I do realize teenagers are like that, but their utter disregard for his feelings and their utter respect for their mother's was a deeper humiliation than anything the TV hosts and pundits did. Luckily he was written as clueless to this and completely unaware of how easily they and Lois manipulated him to their way of thinking.
(Lois did learn something from her year of dating Lex.)

The new season has started out with good episodes, but I don't read the ff either, It's Harry Potteresque in that the very young are writing it and while that worked for Potter stories somewhat, I don't see grown men, or grown clones, acting like teenagers and I'm not interested in reading it.

The part that had me laughing was the mention of the Scardino lookalikes! Too bad they couldn't interact more with them but since they had no idea who he was going to be it would have been pointless. LOL!
After the secret was out in the other story I kept thinking of what you said a while back. Despite traveling all over the world and as written in ff, after using his powers to help people, having to move on, no one stepped forward to offer him a safe haven anywhere? Hopefully his daughters are having a better success at making friends in their travels.

I noticed that too. I mean in some stories where he tells Lois that Clark Kent would do something super and have to move on in his travels. I don't see how it can be, though. If that's what happened then when Superman made his first appearance wouldn't the people whose lives he changed have all realized who Superman was and said something? Or is it just everyone can keep a secret but Americans? LOL!
For what it's worth I liked both of the stories, but yeah. If Clark wears the suit under his clothes he's sure going about changing the hard way. Why would he have to take ALL of his clothes off and then put the suit back on? (Not that the thought isn't attractive...)His boxers don't fit under the suit? They bunch up and chafe under the suit?
Why didn't he just blow a blast of cold air through the room surruptitiously and fog over the camera lenses and everything else glass and change then? Perry and Jimmy could have hidden him from view so he could use his breath without the cameras seeing it.
The Tempus one was my favorite. I guess I liked seeing Lois on the defensive though she could have shown a little more vulnerability.

Well, looks like Disney now owns Star Wars.When George Lucas said he was retiring earlier this year the RPGers were wondering who would buy the franchise if his kids weren't interested in running it. The guys thought Fox or Disney. I guess Disney's deeper pockets would outbid anyone.
I'm curious to find out what Episode 7 will be. Original or a story from the novels?
It's going to be like fanfiction in the movies. The ideas won't be coming from Lucas. There are those who will welcome this, of course. There are always those who think they can do better but so far JK Rowling is the only person who has been able to come up with a universe as vast and successful.

I never thought of that, but why not?! Of all the powers he has why does he always react with brute strength? LOL! Good question.
The suit change was one of the reasons I thought the humiliation went that much [ ...... } too far,
Another good point about the rest of the world. If he was using his powers to save people and having to move on- well, yes, someone somewhere would know to associate that American boy, Kent, with that new phenom Superman, in some way. Maybe not as being the same person but when Kent was here working for the local paper things happened that no one could explain- until after the first appearance of Superman.

Agreed! Good ideas. I guess that would mean he was doing super things but no one saw him and moving on was HIS choice to make. He didn't have to move on and he never really says how long after his use of powers he did. He would have been playing it safe rather than running.

I'm sure he put a lot of caveats into that sale to keep the stories close to his own vision.
It's interesting that not even his middle child was interested in trying to run LFL. She must be interested in the production side only. She did write some good stories for the Clone Wars series.
Gene Roddenberry, George Lucas, J.K. Rowling. What a circle to be a part of.

Absolutely. I will always prefer the ideas that de-emphasize running. M/O The Clark-fan-bitch is back.
He's been protecting himself and his loved ones for most of his life. He should know what he's doing by the time he goes to Metropolis. Falling in love and having a family shouldn't change that other than to reinforce his resolve.

LOL! Is this new fanfic technical term? m/o There was "canonite" and now there is "fanbitch?" LOL!

Kate, a Clark Kent fanbitch

That'll work. M/O We've been kicked in the rear by one author and told by another we wouldn't know an award winning story if it bit us- yes, ma'am! We're not nice.

LOL! Yes we are properly chastened. I am hiding my face as I write this.
Well you know I might be too much on Clark's side, but someone has to be. There are many times in ff when Martha always takes Lois's side against him. I look at my son and I don't think I could ever do that no matter what the subject.

Kate

Quickly! Tell Martha no offense. She might come after you!

LOL! I hope I can accomplish as much as she did by the time I'm her age. But then she lives under Hollywood time. There's no limit to what you can do in Hollywood time.

Kate

Or soap opera time where kids can grow to adulthood in a couple of years.

Or be 26/27 for around 80 years. Which works for me or I wouldn't have grown up a Clark fan.

Kate

This is way off topic but since Disney owns Star Wars now, the gang in the RPG think the licenses for the SW comic books and the novels will be taken over by Disney, too. They've been joking that the Disney version of them will "New 52" the expanded universe. Han and Leia will no longer be married, neither will Luke and Mara, and Han and Luke will be angry young men, brooding about Han's unrequited attraction to Leia, who is dating Prince Isolder and totally uninterested in him now that the Empire is gone. Luke still smarting over her turning out to be his sister, will be torn between feeling bad for Han and feeling overly protective of Leia.
LOL! Those guys can make up such funny stuff!

Back on topic: I just read a story called Angel Found where the solution to the adoption of Clark leaves too many unanswered questions.

That story might be part of a series because I remember the general from another story. There's nothing like having the military keeping a close eye on you. I would think it would be hard to plant bugs, though, with Clark's hearing, and even something made to look like an ordinary object would emit heat from it's power source. Encasing it in lead would decrease it's efficiency, wouldn't it? Not to mention all this lead showing up on the farm that wasn't there before... LOL!

Kate

Clark will kick it into outer space. "Lead? We don't need that around here!"

LOL!

I did a search for the general's name and he does show up in other stories. Got them marked for reading.

I found only one other. Maybe I ought to look by author, huh?

Yes, that's the last thing that comes to mind! It's happened to me too. I'm trying to do what Bev did. Starting with the oldest stories first and working forward but the temptation to go to the random button again is always there.

Kate

I use the random button now and then but I like to see how the ideas are picked up again and again by various authors. We were joking about the staples list but as I go on and the same situations happen over and over it seems as if we hit on something. Hate to say it but giant Lois seems to be a stand alone idea! An original for the L&C universe. Only one person has written that premise as far as I can tell. LOL!

That's good. I still have the mental picture of Lois crawling out through the doorway...

Kate

LOL! Wake up! It's all a dream!

Thank goodness for that.
I have started reading stories by year of submission and angry Lois is a characterization from the beginning with variations on the theme as the years go by, I guess. She can be incredibly cruel after finding out the secret to just unreasonable. Either way showing Clark was right to not trust her with it yet. If this is her reaction after admitting she loves him what makes her think she could have handled it as just friends or partners?

Kate

There are stories where Lois does not react so negatively but they're few. I can see where it might be more fun to write her going totally over the edge about it though. It's fun to read how horrible she can be but she's doing it to Clark and that's the part that takes the fun out of it.

On the extreme other hand I'm glad Clark is rarely the cruel one. I suppose it can be considered cruel enough to have and keep such a secret from Lois in the first place, but then in TOGOM stories he sometimes chooses to be cruel in order to protect his family and the secret. Of course, he has to be punished for it most of the time.

Kate

LOL! He never gets a break, poor guy. Lucky for series-him Superman was able to use the cloning technology to repair his body.

What?!

Here I go again. Why does he have to be punished? He didn't ask to be born, he didn't ask to be saved, he didn't ask to be granted super powers once he got to Earth. Would Lois punish a man with a handicap she didn't know about at first? Make him apologize or pay for having a handicap or a rare talent? It's similar isn't it?

I don't know. All I can say is I believe Clark/Superman has nothing to apologize for. He has a right to protect his loved ones and friends, most of whom are totally innocent in association with him. Only his parents (and possibly Jack, maybe Henderson, and ideally, Perry, because I think he's smart and observant and not hampered by emotions) know, no one else does. None of them have a reason to apologize either, IMO, for keeping the secret. None of them deserve to be punished for saying nothing.

I certainly hope she wouldn't. We know from the pilot episode that neither she nor Clark- as both Clark and Superman- are in any way uncomfortable with people with a handicap. Neither treats Amy Platt with fear or discomfort. They're friendly, not condescending or dismissive.

Kate

Unfortunately in some ff L&C have been written as having a blind or deaf or power-less child and Clark is the parent who can't handle it. For someone who doubted he'd be able to,and was told he would never father a child, it would seem he would treasure his child no matter what. They both would. They both had to face and accept the facts, whether true or not.
In light of canon being established favorably I'd say Lois wouldn't have a problem with a man with a handicap. With Clark, she seems to know from the beginning that actions and words will hurt him more than anything else. Those great instincts of hers. Luthor, Scardino, they always push her toward the human man, away from the alien.

And she has to learn to listen to her heart. I never thought of it that way but it could be she's so used to following her instincts she chooses them over emotions.

Kate

You remember Paula, PMC12? I talked to her once or twice through email. She read a story where Clark had a friend who died and left instructions that she wanted Clark to be the guardian of her young daughter. So he had this child living with him and whenever she called him "Daddy" his response was a quick "I'm not your father" to her every time.
It was one of the situations that got on PMC's nerves. How could this man who was raised by the most selfless and loving adoptive parents in all of fictional parenthood not have even a tiny place in his heart to let an little orphaned girl call him "Daddy" after she comes to live with him? Where is the compassion for humanity he has as Superman? Didn't quite develop it yet? LOL!
I hope she never read one of the stories you just mentioned!

Oh! You might be right.

It's no great insight of my own. We talked about it in the RPG chat room and the subject came up. Well, I brought it up because I'm the one who is so into this show and they humor me.

It's a possibility. There is an obscure theory, largely unproven but people bring it up anyway to excuse their fears, that the reason so many people are afraid of spiders is because they are not native to Earth but arrived in some ancient meteor shower (I guess.) The theory goes that we as humans instinctively understand this on some level and are afraid of them for that reason.
That would explain some of the stories where Lois has a voice in her head talking to her and warning her away from Clark!
(I'm your instincts, Lois! Listen to me! Listen to me!)

Kate

(Stop thinking how great the hack looks in that tux! You know where that will lead! Look around, find someone else. Just don't look at him!)
"Lex Luthor! Why haven't you returned my phone calls?"
(Yes, Lois! He's human not an unEarthly gorgeous thing! Way to go, girl, and stop thinking gorgeous!)

Less than a year after the wedding fiasco:

(Go, go! Don't wait for the alien! There's human man right in front of you who wants you! GO! Leave the alien guy!. . . . .Didn't I tell you this guy new what he wanted and how to get it? He dropped his gun, get it! Don't let him die, he's human!)
Draws a bead on on Mallory and cocks the trigger.
"Please...call him Daniel."
Smiles at the man on the ground.
(You got him, Lois. Stick with this one. He's here, he's interested and he's HUMAN.)

LOL but yuck.
That little voice can be annoying.

Kate

The little voice is better than trying to keep telepathic thoughts separate. There was one story where Clark had a twin and they communicated telepathically. I never finished it, never read very far because the twin constantly butting in with comments while something was happening was just too distracting! Clark would answer back telepathically so it was hard to remember which twin was talking which time AND to remember what was happening in the story events.

That sounds funny actually. Having a twin in your mind while you're sneaking around on an investigation, trying to concentrate.

Kate

I suppose it could be but it was hard distinguishing between Clark and his brother as they talked together in parentheses and Clark and Lois. Like reading two books at one time.

Interchangeable thoughts? LOL! Still sounds funny to me. I guess I'll look for Clark has a twin stories and see what you mean.

Kate

If you find it let me know. I'm looking but I guess I'm either not general enough or not specific enough for the search. I get the same hits over and over and none of them have telepathic twins.

If you find the one about twin daughters read it. Scardino and his two nephews are guest stars. There is a scene where the boys and girls go into his hotel room and find Lois is there having dinner with him. The funny thing is they say absolutely nothing about this.They just look, and leave after a few minutes as if this is something they have seen before. Mom visits other men in their bedrooms all the time.
LOL! Mom still has an eye for trying out those more exciting guys!

LOL! I'll send a link to it to PMC. I think I still have her email.

LOL! I've been collecting links to next gen stories and I might have that one.
Poor Clark. If the booger is STILL more exciting after all those years he must be still fumbling around in the dark like an amateur.

Lois: "Get on with it Clark! Jeez! You'd think you know what to do by now! You can't be a bumbling virgin forever!"

Kate, apologies to CK- I really am your defender but my head is suddenly filled with funny thoughts

Clark: "You mean we can stop playing deflower the virgin now? About time! (Mumbles) Thought I'd be doing that the rest of my-."
Lois (aghast): "Are you saying you didn't think that was fun?!"
Clark" "Oh boy...."

LOL! Go Clark! Fly away now!

LOL! Yeah, get out of there now farmboy. Run to Wonder Woman! (just kidding)

Kate

Diana will protect you! She's sweet, kind and wonderful. From her ff I know she doesn't have an annoying voice in her head. She'll let you name whatever kids you have anything you want and she'll never vocally compare your M/O performance in bed to Bruce Wayne and give you an F.

Can you imagine being with someone you never fight with? Bo-ring.

LOL! They (ff) write about Diana and Bruce more often. No one wants to see the immortals get together and frankly, neither do I, but it is fun to joke about.
If the professional writers can't or won't write decent stories for a married L&C what makes them think they can write decent romance between S&WW, the immortals? They're going to get tired of them as a couple too. Then what?

Kate

Another reboot, when Hawkman's wife leaves him for Superman and the story goes from there. Who knows.
Or Lori LeMaris shows up! Superman can follow the scent of orchids or something (what was it?) through the streets of Metropolis but he can't smell saltwater on a mermaid? LOL! We can see the memory blocker incident again.

The JLA would never stand for that. They'd kick him out as a homewrecker and he'll really be a loner.

LOL!

When he's in love I guess he's blind to everything.

P.S. I got the Temperance joke!

Tell me about it. No matter what Lois says or does or neglects to say or do he continues to love her. In the series he had to or there would be no series, but in ff he actually has a choice but he's never given the option to use it because then there would be no story or not the story the author wants to tell.

Kate

Wishing and hoping.....
That would mean Lois gets her feelings hurt and that can't happen! She's never wrong! She must never be put into a position to apologize. All must apologize to her.

I want a charmed life like that! LOL! I could be happy never being wrong.

Kate

Become a teacher, we're always right. (Joke)
But that makes her always the victim, doesn't it? That's why everyone has to apologize to her. They are all doing her wrong because they are never right. No matter how mean she is to other people they are never the victim in the situation, Lois is. Wait a minute! You might be on to something there. You'd get to treat the world as badly as you'd like and never have to make retribution because the world has to apologize to you for victimizing you in the first place.
Think of what you can get away with- and she does!

Naw, the down side is you have no friends. You don't trust anyone. They make all the mistakes and you don't. What's to trust? So you go home, crawl in bed and watch soap operas.

Kate

Devote yourself to your job, because being the best at what you do at least gets you the attention and praise missing from your nonexistent friends. It's better. It's coming from the people you outdo year after year.
Mad Dog isn't an insult, it's a sign they acknowledge your superiority.
No wonder it took so long for Clark to get through to her!

In Requiem Lois asks Clark if he's ever known anyone who is so wrapped up in their job they have no time for anybody or anything else, and he asks her if that's a trick question! Lois acknowledges the description fits herself to a degree, so she is aware of her own life. I suppose that goes back to Lucy keeping her grounded. She's a big influence in Lois' life before Clark comes along.

Kate

What a life. And she doesn't know if she wants to let it go??

LOL! That's the way it is. When I was little I didn't understand the concept of angst and I used to ask my mom "Why did she do that?" or "What's the matter with her?" Now I know why my mom would find it so hard to explain. LOL! She was feeling it but couldn't describe it in any way I would have understood.
So I just thought Lois was pretty stupid not to want Clark for a boyfriend, because I certainly liked him!

That's the problem right there. We were too young to be Lois fans. I loved Superman going in and came to love Clark just as much. I still don't love the Lois Lane character but thanks to Hatcher's professionalism and her resulting performance I understand the character better. My interpretation is different though.

Kate

How do you mean that? You just see her differently?

Yes. I don't see her as cruel. Thoughtless and selfish but not outright mean. Changing her personality that much turns her into a different person. IMO

Kate

For story telling purposes you have that option but a strong woman doesn't have to be mean spirited. In some cases, in real life no one would stand for being treated that harshly. She's so often presented as a bully who is verbally abusive. For the past two years the school district I work for has sent the staff to training classes to understand and learn to deal with bullying. There are a few stories where Lois would be a good example of the behavior described in the seminars. Thanks heavens, only a few.
My main objection is it makes Superman a victim.

You know what? I think that's it. Clark/Superman as a victim is what bothers me. It shouldn't be. I might start reading the comics instead! Even "poor me, I'm so different, why must I be?" is better than a victim of verbal/emotional abuse.

Those stories are a small fraction though and you can see it coming in time to stop reading further. By the time L&C enter their relationship and marry they are both close to 30 years old. In most cases the characters behave as they did on screen so immature behavior for their age and experience is easy to see.
No law says you must read to the end, just as no law says you must reread often. If it annoys you stop reading and if you do like it, save to reread as often as you wish.

Kate, who thinks the comics are going where I don't want to go

I guess. I've found more than a few but I suppose Lois with powers most humans don't have is the only way some can see her as Clark's equal.
I am confoozed!

Don't give up. It's worth it to keep reading. You'll be able to hone your speculation skills if nothing else.

I felt that way in the beginning too, but Bev is right.

Kate, who thinks recent stories are- no I won't say it

Well, you've got me intrigued. My stuff it to me.
I've been working on my concordance episodes today but I'm going to read some of Sheilah's stories tonight. As fun a s the concordance viewing is, I'm taking a break.

Oh good. I was just going to start PML but I could use a break too even though I like watching these early episodes so closely. DJL's versions of L&C are so much fun. I like how Clark kept teasing Lois about everything! The exasperated looks she gives him are just as funny. They played off each other as actors so well.

Kate, whose appreciation of Dean Cain in this role is increasing with each episode

That is so true. He might have been inexperienced as an actor but he understood the character and gave him a playfulness that I never noticed before in the early seasons. I noticed the teasing too in the episodes I did.

Just a normal guy.....with a big secret. And that was why no one saw the resemblance. CK was just so ordinary.

Kate

One more rehearsal and the sixth grade program is Friday night. I can't wait to get it over with! It gets more complicated every year. We have guitarists and a pianist this year! (Students)

CK, an ordinary guy who could play a baseball game by himself. Those little vignettes, I guess they can be called, they showed for a few weeks at the beginning of the episodes were funny. My friend Mr. Skywalker has some little stories of Clark and Bruce where CK is teaching him to loosen up and play some sports, and in one they have an argument over whether or not croquet is a sport. LOL! I hope he posts them on his web page. Very droll humor.

I hope so too. I liked the story you passed along to me about capes vs. no capes.

Kate, who still laughs occasionally trying to imagine Flashbum.com

LOL! I forgot about that! I wonder why no one has ever thought about that in real life, but I guess it takes weirdo role players to think of stuff like that.
And don't forget Flashbum has a sub-category for Green Lantern.

Too much scanning would be involved to make a real one. LOL!

Kate, who is afraid to see if there are any real life sites like that for real celebrities

Can I see the story?

I'm very close to talking the RPG gang into letting me post the story here. It's short and it was a story put together by the RPG members, not just my writer friend as I had thought. He just put the posts into story form, so I need permission from all of them.
Hang on.
I've been playing an extra part in the RPG lately as one of the members went on vacation over the holidays and just returned to the game.
Plus, a couple of new Star Wars novels have created a renewed interest in the original trilogy characters so the RPG has been hit with a burst of activity. If you've ever played in an active game you know how time consuming that can become when the game gets rolling.
Timothy Zahn's new books "Choices of One" and "Scoundrels" have brought some new players to the game and it's been great fun.
Both are set during the OT time period.

Is Choices new? I thought that was out a year ago.
Anyway nice to hear from you.

Kate

Yes but a lot of fans wait for the paperback before buying and a lot of people got the PB for Christmas, and I guess one of the book clubs sent out "Scoundrels" to their members a little before the book was available in stores.
Both are good. It's nice to see the young LL&H in action again and in charactertoo. With Chewbacca alive and well! Han, Lando and Chewie in "Scoundrels" bring back memories of ESB and why they became so popular as pals.
LOL! My spell check keeps trying to suggest Backache as an alternative to Chewbacca!
Learn, you stupid thing, learn Chewbacca! Add to dictionary!

LOL! I saw Choices at the library. I guess I'll check it out.

Kate

Ran across this while looking for new Superman stories from any universe.

A Pictorial History of Superman

Did you ever read the comic series "The Kents?" Isn't there an explanation in there of a 'healing blanket' with this logo on it as being an American Indian symbol? The five sides representing the five tribes of the Iroquios Confederacy and the S was a snake, or medicine creature?

and one for Batman.

Batman Evolution

And this is kind of neat. What if Batman was a spaghetti western? LOL!

Spaghetti Gotham (or the Bat With No Name)

My dad has the TPB of the Kents but I've never read it. I started to a long time ago but I couldn't get interested. At the time I wasn't interested in Civil War times or themes. I'm going to take a closer look at that story the next time I visit the folks.
The early symbols did look more like snakes than the later ones.
Wouldn't it be great if someone could tie the Lone Ranger to Bruce or Clark? Spaghetti Gotham came pretty close but the author probably doesn't know about the Lone Ranger.

Kate, assuming you didn't find any new stories in other S areas and wondering if this should be moved to Superman in other media (?)

I remember the Batman symbols with his face included. I wonder why they stopped doing that. The last one looks awful.
I like the more diamond shaped S symbols for Superman instead of the early triangles.

My father's collection of Batman comics isn't as extensive as his Superman collection and it's more early Batman than after they were given the rivalry.
FF seems to have happened in a big way after the rivalry so there aren't as many or any written about the times when the guys were friends.
In Love and Capes I'm wondering if the rivalry will start now that the Crusader is married and Darkblade is dating Amazonia.

Kate

No new stories for the movies. Not new to me anyway. I've been interested lately in looking for similarities between the Loises in movie stories and L&C stories. Cold, unemotional, unsure of her feelings for anybody, seem to be common to both. In the movies she's just with Richard because she thought he was Jason's father, no real feelings for Superman or for doofus Kent. She and Clark were never friends in the movies so he's nothing, but her vindictiveness toward Superman is huge. "Why The World Doesn't Need Superman" - because he disappeared without saying good-bye to me! That's why!
On L&C they were friends and that seems to be her main excuse to hold him off. He's not exciting enough for her but he needs her and that's why she ends up with him. It isn't until her experiences in virtual reality that she realizes, wait a minute, maybe he's exciting after all. No money, no power, no "date me I want you I'm a speedboat" personality but I felt something in there!
She was prepared to settle for being needed.

Oh god. I hate to think of it that way. So why did she say yes to Lex? I know Superman turned her down, but if all she wanted was to be with a man who loved her, why not Clark? Now you've got me questioning that!!
I really hate to think it was the attraction to Lex's power and humanitarianism as she told the ex-wife. Carlin.
What does Clark see in her that I used to but don't anymore?! LOL!

LOL! In some ff she is prepared to marry Lex and have a life with him, but then Clark will finally get through to her and convince her that Lex is a criminal. Clark will ask her to marry him instead and she will agree but only if they don't have a sexual relationship. Which she was willing to have with Lex. The unbelievable thing is Clark is such a perfect guy he'll agree to this.
I have to wonder why? Why would any man agree to such a thing? I'll marry you but I don't love you or want you so you can't touch me, but we can live in the same residence together.
Really? Yippee! Let's do it.
What he should do is tell her he hopes Luthor knows what a lucky man he is and he hopes he'll make her happy, and then he needs to walk straight out the door.
IMO it's an unbelievably personal insult. If it were the other way around, I can't see Lois agreeing to such a thing.
But that's just me sticking up for CK. And this is where "floo powder" for computers would come in really handy. If he doesn't walk out the door, I could reach in, grab him and force him out the door. LOL!

Yes, but the thing about those stories that save them for me is he is actually presented as smart enough to NOT tell her he's Superman. She puts that odd restriction on the marriage and he holds back his secret.
But it DOES seem to go back to the fact that she might be falling in love with Clark but the sexual tension doesn't start until long after she discovers he's Superman. I think you're right Bev. It doesn't seem to start until after Virtually Destroyed.
Poor Clark.
I'd love to see that scene.


Kate

Do you really think it's possible? This is a subject we talked about in the RPG chat room almost a year ago- back when we were first bashing Scardino here on this board. I never mentioned it before because I don't like it!
It was brought up, pointed out, suggested by the RPGers that Lois was giving up the two men she was sexually attracted to- Superman and Scardino- for Clark because he needed her and she was falling in love with him. Then, after finding he was Superman, too, even Superman lost his sex appeal to her. She doesn't feel a sexual attraction to either of them until after the make-out scene in virtual reality. All of a sudden, wow! I can't wait for the honeymoon!
There does seem to be a definite line there that she has finally crossed when it comes to Clark but what it is really?
I don't want the RPGers to be right! Just this once I'm on Lois' side!
I just hate to take this seriously even now, a year later!

Even at my worst I never thought that. To be honest I don't really hate Scardino either but it was a shock to see that he was originally written to be after something other than dating Lois and getting her away from Clark. She was actually supposed to dump Clark for him. That she was sexually attracted to him was clear in that scene where she picks up his gun and saves his life but it was played down after that. I can't deny she went back to Clark because he needed her. This is a dilemma alright, because before and after Lex Clark was her big brother. She was seeing him differently just as Scardino came along.
I can see where the RPG opinions come from but I haven't decided if it's a theory I can believe or not.
Was she not sexually attracted to him? I haven't decided.

Kate, who could say a lot about Lois but it wouldn't be within the context of the story, and it is very hard keeping them within the context of the story

She would never go for it. She would see it as the insult it is and Clark should, too. It really is unbelievable that he would agree to that arrangement.


So Scardino was supposed to steal her away from Clark and then what? Where was it supposed to go from there? I know you wrote some ideas of where the storyline might have gone somewhere around here but I can't find them.

Keeping your opinions within the context of the story? Tell me about it! The difference between the series and ff characters can be as different as DJL's first (and most of second) season characters and what they became after she left.


Oh, I can imagine a lot of ways it could have gone. I think we talked about another Lex-type of romance running through the third season. It's up in the air whether the new writers would have had her as blind to his faults as she was to Lex's with poor Clark knowing something and unable to tell her because he knows she'll refuse to believe him and his nasty jealous petty rejected motives.
It's fun to think about though! I could probably come up with a third season time line if I really thought about it.

Probably a fourth season too as they have to repair their friendship and grow close again. DJL said in her pilot commentary she was prepped to fight for them not to get together until the fifth season. Or words to that affect.
I can't see them working together with the car booger in the picture. I liked the idea of him transferring to another department of the paper that would have brought them together in unexpected ways. Perry still the editor for both and trying to get them together without them knowing he was setting them up. Jimmy trying to stay friends with both but maybe finding out something about Scardino but afraid to tell Lois. Without Clark's calming influence she could begin to turn back into Mad Dog.

Kate, just thinking

Or worse. Clark's ethics were a joke to Lois. Think of what a G man's disregard for local law enforcement would do for a woman who already thinks her job is to tell people what they have a right to know by any means, legal or not, necessary. Breaking, entering, stealing evidence, disturbing crime scenes before the police get there- that would be a sight to see!
But when you come right down to it, what else but information on Superman could Scardino be after? Lex wanted her first because he ordered her father to be killed but Sam saw this coming and went into hiding, and second because of her close links to Superman. The wedding helped him get his hands on Superman, but Sam was mortal and knew it and stayed away.
Superman was supposed to die thinking Lois' new life would be filled with physical and emotional abuse, but Sam was doomed to hiding while watching his daughter get slowly sucked into Luthor's world of deception and lies.
Nothing so grand for Scardino, but being used to get to Superman would be another Claude experience to put those walls and defenses back up around Lois. Even if he compromised himself by actually coming to care for her.
Can you think of a good way to bring Lucy into that line of events in the third season?

Lucy could be the one to find out something about Booger and knowing her sister's stubborn streak better than anyone, she takes it to Clark to be checked out. Or maybe to Perry, who calls in Clark to look into it. CK would be someone both he and Lucy would trust. He in turn would reluctantly help them.
Even if he goes to another department- and I like the international desk/beat idea- he would still be doing investigating and could do his digging without drawing attention as he would if he went to the travel/Sunday supplement division.
He could save the paper a lot of money by saying he's made a deal with Superman to pick him up and take him along if he responds to a disaster or other event around the country or the world.
Then Lois and Mr. Exciting keep seeing Clark and Lucy at meetings in out of the way places just moments after Perry leaves and Lois jumps to conclusions!
There are ways to keep the dramedy in the series without using tin foil.

Kate

LOL! Oh, come on. Kitchen wrap is fun! Remember Kathy Bates in Saran wrap in Fried Green Tomatoes? Or Mark Addy in cling film in The Full Monty? LOL! Lois in a tin foil hat isn't that bad. It's pretty close to character assassination though.
Okay...but first season Lucy. Second season Lucy looks enough like Dean Cain to be his sister, and if that was a good enough reason to get rid of Michael Landes it's good enough to recast Lucy too.
(Just kidding. None of this is ever going to happen.)
Superman could do the same with Jimmy- take him and Clark along when he's called to a disaster. That way Jimmy could figure out Clark is Superman LONG BEFORE Lois does and tick off more fans.
There would be an episode where Jimmy and Jack confront Clark and promise to never tell.

LOL! Tawanda, Gaz!
Lucy can figure it out too and amuse herself making cracks to Lois and the Car Booger, and after Lois accuses her of seeing Clark on the sly, she'll reveal it's actually Superman she's seeing and Clark is their go-between. Let's turn this into a night time soap!
But she'll leave Clark and Jimmy guessing whether she actually knows or not, so they won't be able to confront her about it. Like CK needs another Lane woman to try to figure out, but this time he'll have Jimmy's youthful insights to help!
Then we discover that Tempus Fugitive did a lot of damage to the time line- the Lane family changed 180 from DJL's vision to Tempus' vision! That's why everyone accepts that Lucy is now even younger than Lois and that Sam is now a womanizer and a new age chemist. It's all Tempus' fault!

Kate

Seriously, I guess it would be Superman the government is after in sending Scardino to get close to Lois. By then the information Lex had on kryptonite would probably be uncovered, decrypted, whatever. I wish we knew for sure where that original script was leading.

Kate

So do I. The cliffhanger that never was. Leave it to me to find it.

Yes, Tempus is as good a scapegoat as any! Mr I'm Smarter Than You Are actually influenced the time line detrimentally but, typically, not for the ones he was aiming at.
Duh! right back at him.

I want to know where that original script was supposed to go too! It's fun reading what you can come up with and this is why you have fans at Stumblupon. I wonder how close you are.

Really? One would think the actors and actresses would be more interesting to others than just talking about the characters.
I'd like to know where the story was supposed to go too but the people who know have probably long forgotten.
One of the faults that Tempus has is he doesn't care where the Butterfly Effect goes once he changes history. He keeps trying to change the L&C dynamic head on and it doesn't work. Clearly he's as bad at reasoning as he is at being a bad guy. He keeps butting up against Stephen King's JFK novel concept that time doesn't want to be changed and it will react to stop you.

Kate

Time in this case has Herb as the stumbling block. No matter what Tempus does, H.G. is there to stop it- all throughout his lifetime. Time can be subtle or it can be in your face. Tempus is getting close to that time, going by the King concept. If he succeeds in what he wants, M/O just like the novel, time will make him go back and fix it.
I doubt that will ever happen because Tempus seems to like dealing hands on with Lois and Clark themselves. Wells made it personal when he brought Clark in to help and Lois tagged along. Now Tempus makes it a point to involve them in their undoing. Of course, they're going to fight back. How can he win if he gives them a sporting chance?

LOL! I agree with that. He gets an A for effort in trying to be a bad guy.

Lane Davies portrayal makes him appealing. I wonder if the Duh! was his idea or if it was the writers. Either way I like the mockery in every word he speaks.
Sometimes in ff that mocking attitude comes across but sometimes it's also a little forced. I'd imagine he's a difficult character to capture just right.

How do you sustain the sarcasm? And still be funny?

Kate

It can't be easy because the stories I've read run out of steam after a while. When Tempus is just a presence at the beginning and at the end, the story is more successful or believable to me. JMHO

Do you just use the random choice for stories or are you reading by author? Last summer I started reading from the beginning. The earliest stories all have a brightness to them. Or an enthusiasm for the subject. They have a different tone than the stories written now.

Kate

They change with the times. The first ones written have the spirit of the series but as time goes on, the ideas keep coming but they are losing the connection to the TV characters they once had. The authors, the times around them are changing and you see it in their work.

I haven't read any of the older stories. If the random button gives me a good story I'll read others by the same author even though, as you've both pointed out, that is hit and miss. On the other hand if there is a good story and you want to read the author's other work, it's very disappointing to discover they've written only one!

Or they only wrote two. My son loves the first one and it is pretty funny imagining the guys in uniform like that. We both get a laugh from it.
Lois, of course, is full of herself as usual. After Dick apologizes for staring she says:..."I'm used to it..."
Unlikely Basketball Uniforms
Ah, That Perry White Is Full of Surprises


Kate

Absolutely! Another vote for Perry knowing for a long time but keeping the secret.
My one hit wonder - so far anyway - is:
Not The Three I Was Expecting
It's hard to say if the marriage actually took place because it isn't about that at all. I love that even if it did, and Lois is in mourning or tangled in the legal aftermath, Clark is still there, plugging away, getting on with life. He's not hiding out on the farm, crying into his pillow, or exiling himself in the jungle somewhere. He's taking it like a mature man (or woman) and still going forward.
BUT...yes, I have to complain, this is me, after all. Where is Jack? The one person in town who knows would be helping him. Jimmy and Perry, too, not knowing, but just because he's a friend.
As a character study, though, I like the friendship that forms and good ending.

I can't find the story I was thinking about! Searching my internet history frantically.

Isn't there another story about that woman looking for Clark? I remember another one about a support group?
Another One
Yes! Here it is. Smart Lois, panicky, doesn't know which way to turn Clark. For a man whose been hiding his powers for almost ten years he hasn't learned a single good trick or even how to handle it. Also how did that handprint NOT attract attention over the weeks, maybe months it was prominently on display? It would have a cult following by then!

There are inconsistencies in the story. Weeks? Yes. Months? Maybe? But in the story Lois is thinking it was years ago when the woman saw this event and, hmmm, is the hand print still there?
Oh, yes, even days later it would be a subject noticed and talked about by the bus riders. Somebody would have let the local news know about it. Mysterious hand print embedded in the metal front of a bus, would have been a story on all the local evening news shows.
This version of the woman had the proof something happened but never thought to mention the bus before? Not even to the group?
It's still there but who cared? LOL!
I guess that's why the superhero universe works.

So Clark must have thought to go back and erase the hand print before he called home on the show.
I like the idea of a support group though for those people and I liked that Clark thought to go see them as Superman one day soon when he found out about them.

Another thing was the man rescued in the manhole explosion knew who Lois Lane was but never thought to go to her after Superman appeared to tell her of the experience, even though she was writing the bulk of the stories about him.
The Superhero universe has a lot of different rules.

Kate

They were left dangling after the story turned into another revelation story. Did Clark visit them as Superman? Did Lois write the story? What happened to those people? After the interesting introductions, they're just forgotten.

You're right. After the reveal there is no follow up.
I learned something new. Look for a follow up.

Or a sequel to tie up the loose ends. The man in the alley who gets a five dollar bill from a man who flew away- certainly he must have been a part of the group.

Kate

There would be several too after he became Superman. Is there anyone else from before? Probably not in Metropolis, huh?

Just Uncle Mike who was saved by the mysterious police officer! He must have figured out he was Superman by now.
Clark's first hotel was in a seedy area. He might have helped out there now and then but it was never on screen or in stories.

I always thought the man in the alley was in that area. Clark was taking off from close to the hotel.
So he does have experience dealing with people seeing him. He didn't panic or get flustered or start trying to stutter an explanation when he realized the man was there. He pretended to walk over to him and let the guy see him fly away knowing whatever the man said would not be believed just because of where he lived. He knew what that five dollars was probably going to be used to buy but he gave it to him anyway.
He also knows how fast he can fly away without breaking the sound barrier, obviously.
I wonder if Clark being thought an angel had any positive affect on the man's life?

Kate

It probably did. It didn't mean he automatically knew or figured out that Superman is Clark Kent and gone looking for him, but he might have realized Superman, after his debut, could be any man on the street when he isn't in the suit. CK had taken his glasses off by then so the man didn't know the angel wore glasses.
Good candidate for the support group, where he would have found out about the glasses.

Yes. On the other hand he would make a good source if he checked on him as Superman later on. Or even as Clark, though he moved to an apartment elsewhere fairly quickly. It's more likely he would check on him as Superman and the angel designation would be dispelled.
Maybe the forces at work in the superhero universe would keep him away from the group.

Kate

Technically his life wasn't really saved so I guess he isn't a candidate for the group, so he wouldn't need to check it out if he heard of it.
It might have sent him in a more religious direction, but I like the idea that he became one of Superman's sources and by association Clark's.

If Clark was careful to be in casual clothes and wearing the glasses when visiting the man, he could keep him from associating his attire with the angel in the suit. CK is good at that.

Kate

So it really would be unlikely that the saved people would ever know the indigent man. They were saved in different ways. If Lois did write the article maybe the man would hear about it, but would he be motivated to contact them if his experience wasn't exactly the same?
I wonder if anyone has ever written about him?

I tyried to do a search but I had no luck. I didn't know how to describe him for the search. Homeless guy/man? Lots of them. Guy/man in the alley? Lots of them too. LOL!

It's another thing that doesn't transition to ff. Panicky, wild eyed, stuttering Clark running away in horror seems to be more the characterization people want to see than the man on screen who assessed the situation and handled the problem so quick-wittedly.

Kate

DE-fense! DE-fense! On the other hand it can be fun being a Clark defender. When the smart kids found out, did he panic? No. He tricked them into re-thinking it. In the end the kids still suspected but weren't sure so they teased him instead of threatening him. Like Jack.

Did Jack tease him? Or just keep the secret? I guess he kind of did in the juvenile facility when he asked if you know who might get him out of there, and Clark said no.

Again he didn't panic and run. He didn't exactly admit anything either but he accepted that Jack was never going to tell. Kids just trust Superman I guess.

Kate

There you go. Kids do trust adults they believe in. Our head custodian said after Christmas break, and all that happened around that time, the kids were coming up to him and saying, "You'll protect me from the bad people, won't you, Mr. H***?" It choked him up that they just knew he'd be able to.
Even if Clark wasn't Superman, the kids believed in him, and Lois, because they both helped them all they could.
The tease was between friends and I don't know if erasing the writing in the sand confirmed it for them or not.

P.S.- Disney is saying the new Star Wars movies will be about Boba Fett and young Han Solo. As long as they don't sing or start dancing, I guess I can live with those subjects, though I wonder how they're going to get a moral message across in a bounty hunter story?

Just saw this link from my little brother.
MOS News
Makes me wonder why they are putting him in the suit at all if all he wants to do is fit in, have a place in the world? What's wrong with being a good guy all of a sudden? If he gets laughed at on screen, like in E1V2, I'll get up and walk out.

"Boba Fett, the Musical"

Han Solo and his cute,loyal and smart little pet, something alien TBD,who saves his life by running for help when he crashes his first Corellian landspeeder while practicing to someday make the Kessel run. Chastened, little Han promises not to fly fast anymore, his fingers crossed behind his back. His adorable little pet gives him a knowing look, fade to black.

Sounds like they are bringing Superman and into our world of today and if Zod is supposed to be in the movie, then CK isn't the last survivor of Krypton. He's Kal-El, one of the survivors of Krypton and an alien menace. He won't be welcome here and treated as an outcast.
If we're afraid of humans from other cultures then.....Trask's dream come true. Go all out after that alien! This is not going to be a fun movie.

Kate, thinking they are going to try to angst us out right along with Superman

Boy, I hope not! No Clark Kent or back to goofy Clark Kent? A more human Superman instead of the larger than life one we've always known?
I'm not quite seeing it, but I agree. This is going to be a very different kind of Superman movie.

Boba Fett is a bounty hunter. How will they make him heroic? He never kills his bounties? The bounty hunter with a heart of gold?

LOL! I don't know. A Disney movie featuring murder isn't likely.

I keep thinking of those pictures of Cavill in the Superman in other media forum and wondering now about the transition from the broody bearded Clark and the smirky one walking between two men as if being arrested. Also Jonathan's comment that maybe Clark should have let people die seems more ominous.

Kate

Smirk! My latest most disliked word! LOL!

I'm not sure what I think of this movie's potential. (MOS)
I'd probably go to see a Han Solo movie just to see if anyoen can capture the same kind of magic that Harrison Ford did. He was a smarta** but not offensively so.

I'll see them too. I'm a fan and that's all there is! I have to take it even if I don't like it. I still get curious and look for new stories from SR and STM fandoms but I'll wait until I know more about Earth 1 before I look. I at least want to know what to expect from future volumes.

Kate, still not warm to a Batman-Superman

Kind of right up there with a Wonder Woman-Superman, isn't it? Who needs the darn thing?
I'd like the movie to be good but I keep thinking of what the guys in the RPG said last summer- that the comic story where Superman threatened to give up his citizenship was a test to see how far they could take the concept of a darker Superman. I think this MOS is going to be in a very dark situation.
I'll be happy to be wrong.

They're bringing him into our world.
I don't know what to make of that but it is new to treat it as a first contact. The way things are in 'our world' and how the filmmakers see us that is uncertain to me. Trask keeps going through my mind.

Kate, not a fan of Trask ff but going to read some to see if any of the ideas turn up in the movie

FF ideas are turning up everywhere else, why not there too. Being arrested has been done on TNAOS but MOS looks military.
Can't wait for the release to see how close or how far off the mark we are. I'd love to be wrong. There must be an original idea in there somewhere waiting to surprise us all.

Here's hoping. It's going to be hard to ignore the reviews beforehand on this one. For SR they complained Lois was played by an actress who looked too young for the part an they were right.

Kate

Maybe it will be like the comics. Superman and his girlfriend, Lois Lane. CK an insignificant background character.
I need watch a first season episode or two.....
Is it 4pm yet?

LOL! Sometimes I feel that way. Whichever way MOS goes it will be another choice available to the fans.

Kate

Maybe this will help. I don't know who compiled it but it's pretty good:

Cheer Up!

Lois is in trouble! Lois is in trouble!

Kate, of course the chicken costume is funny too

My mom always gets a kick out of Lois returning from the sewage reclamation plant. She always wonders how many people Mad Dog had to fight to get to the "spaceship." From the look of it, probably 6 or 8.

Yet not a hair out of place.
That martial arts stuff is magical.
Falling into the cake with Bonnie Parker was funny too! I forgot about that one.

Kate

I always thought it was funny that she got lost. I drive past a water reclamamtion plant everyday to and from work and it isn't that big and I live in a major city. Of course, I don't know what is underground but what I can see isn't too big.

With all the underground bunkers and liveable tunnels and sewers under Metropolis one can assume Lex isn't the only one who has thought of using them. Think of all the money the construction company saved pretending they built the entire underground complex of the plant!

Kate

It has to be big enough to do the great job it does to make the sewers livable! If it didn't the Luthor men, and Metropolis criminals in general, wouldn't have any place to hide.
Even the smart kids went underground without any "Ewwwwws!" or "Yuckies!"

You mean they would actually have to learn to rent?

Yes, and to pay for electricity instead of illegally tapping into power lines.
What will they do?

Kate

Well, they can't go straight. Superman will have to umpire little league baseball games or give Christmas sleigh rides if they did. On the other hand there will be a lot of thankful kiddos because he got their kittens out of trees or drains.

Yes, we've already seen what would happen if he has nothing to do so I guess it's a good thing Metropolis is such a hotbed for every concievable kind of crime there is.

Oh yes, the sewer Luthors. What more can be said?
Why were we talking about this again? LOL!

Believe it not that went back to the MOS movie and fan fiction ideas showing up in professionsally written material.

Oh yes. I remember a long time ago Lucasfilm sponsored a site where fans could create fan pages for Star Wars and one of the rules for use was that any original ideas or concepts the fans posted on their pages became the property of Lucasfilm. I guess they wouldn't be the only ones to think of this, All disclaimers aside, lifting an idea and changing the names, a few details, etc. wouldn't be any more than using an idea from a fan as the fan is using or 'borrowing' characters from them.
I could be wrong.

Homestead or aomething like that? I think I remember that. I know fan fiction writers were up in arms about it but what can you do really to protect your ideas when you are using their characters anyway?

Did the comic book give Larry Niven an acknowledgement for the Man of Steel, Woman of Tissue idea when they used it? If they didn't what would lifting fan fic ideas from nonprofessionals be to TPTB?

Kate

I think they did. I'll have to go look at my dad's copy again but I think it was starred or quoted in some way. Even if they didn't Larry Niven wrote it, as a joke he says, long enough ago that it might be in the public domain by now. I don't know what covers ff ideas or if anyone has the time and money to fight in court if an idea is used without acknowledgment.

No idea. I'm just writing this so I can have the 33333 time this thread was read.

LOL! It's yours!

LOL! Yes, what an honor it must be for you.
I think that qualifies you to become an official Clark Defender now. You just have to write an essay "Why Clark Is Not A Crybaby, IMO." Bev will grade it for you and we'll both complain about it.

Kate

Constructive criticism of your definition which you don't have to reveal. That way if we say anything you don't like, your definition supersedes the encyclopedia and dictionary ones.
CDU inductees get a break.

......off to design a membership card.......

CDU card



Print on card stock, looks OK.










Just cute as all get out.
And she chose Lex over this.

I'll take one! Good picture. The man did NOT need the shoulder pads IMO, he looked great already.
Spending her hard earned money on designer clothes to fit in on the society pages where her dates with Lex landed her........yes that can cloud a woman's perceptions.

Kate, looking at the pic and thinking 'not mine'

OMG, he is cute as a bunny, isn't he? To be honest one part of me would go for the money, too, but darn this guy would be hard to give up! LOL! A lot harder than for Miss No Clark, but send Superman to see me, will you?

Okay. You didn't say how long the essay had to be.

Clark Kent is no crybaby because he comes from the same part of the country that I did and we don't grow crybabies down on the farm. The man we saw on TV was exactly as his friends in Smallville saw him. He had a normal life and enhanced it by traveling around the world after finsihing his education. He must have seen a lot of things as he traveled, as many cultures in peacetime as cultures at war. He might not have won any awards for his writing but I'm sure he made friends with the people he wrote about and left them richer for his passing through. I never thught about it before but I do agree that he was not a panicky, deer in the headlights person, terrified that some one would see him being super and denounce him for it. In the TV show he was faced with his secret being suspected but he never ran. He never panicked. He never flew home to cry to his parents that his life was over, he can't be in Metropolis anymore. he faced every challenge as aman, with humor in most cases, with trust in others and he was rewarded with trust in return.
See how you've corrupted me?
Just months ago these thoughts never entered my head. I just started watching the reruns, loved them all over again and started looking for other fans who did. Now I'm a Clark Defender and I never even knew he would ever need defending.

(I'm good at parroting you guys, aren't I? LOL! My only excuse if that you make sense!)
(Most of the time.)

Break or not, I got my complaining in first.

And Scardino. She opened the door and yanked him inside too.
I'm beginning to rethink that no sexual attraction thing you mentioned. Maybe there is something to it.
I'll duck and run for cover.

Don't encourage the RPGers! Bat them down! They aren't fans of this show like I am. They have no business advancing theories that I wish I never heard. LOL!

Well, I have to deduct points for saying we only make sense most of the time. Capitalization needs work but by an large the representation of opinions was acceptable.
You can get the deducted points back by telling me the three countries on the island of Borneo.

Oh come on! No haiku???!! I was looking forward to some Superman haiku.

Kate, sympathizing with Clark and now knowing how it is to have my hopes dashed

But she tried to have both didn't she?
Please be happy for me and come to my wedding. I know you think you love me but watching me go off on my honeymoon with Lex, a man you hate for no reason at all, won't be so bad.

On the other hand, what if he did go? She's going down the aisle thinking of him with every step and all of a sudden there he is in the fifth row with Perry, both looking a little guilty because Henderson is on the way with arrest and search warrants. At that point in her life would it really make a difference? Or would she take it as a sign she was doing the right thing?

Kate

I've been thinking about that too but I've put off commenting on it because I have to rewatch most of the last half of season 2 and look for what might make a casual observer of the show think that. I don't want to get distracted from my concordance episodes, but I HAVE been thinking about it.

Kate

Are you kidding? The one that prints the Borneo Gazette and the two who don't.

Never heard of it.Really.

Hard to say but I'd like to think she would say no and run to Clark just as she did at the end of the original episode. It's more likely she would take it as a sign to go ahead. Then when Henderson and his men arrive, she'll get angry and take it out on Clark.

A sixth grader could answer that question and write haiku! LOL!

I can see the scene in my head. Henderson stops the wedding just as she is about to say "I do." Perry and Clark come forward as Lex floors the officer about to cuff him and runs from the room. She looks toward Clark and says, "You did this?"

Cliffhanger.

Yep. Turns her feelings to anger and makes things worse than they need to be. Since she is always right, as Lex's criminal activities are revealed, she'll move back toward Clark in friendship but he'll never hear an apology of any kind from her.
She's a strong woman but she's not strong enough to admit when she is wrong.

Kate, okay, okay, when she's kind of a teeny tiny microcosmic could be but might not be in the long run wrong

LOL! Sounds like a lot of the stuff I've read, but not all. There are a lot where she is definitely likeable, too.

I do know what haiku is but I've haven't tried to write any since my school days way back when. I don't think I ever knew Borneo had three countries. All I know is it has a Gazette and the stress free Yolngu Tribe or something.

LOL! Yes, let's live in the TNAOS Superman universe.

I could get both of you on spelling but I misspell all the time and have to correct myself. State assessments are coming up for the district and after that I'll have the kids write some haiku about Superman. Maybe we'll watch a little of all the different Superman universes on film and make a creative writing project of it.

I was surprised by how many teachers at my son's school are Star Wars fans who have Star Wars corners and libraries in their rooms. They do give the kids superhero awards though with the Bat symbol, Green Lantern's lantern and Superman's S for their accomplishments.
Kids know who the superheroes are as much as the SW characters.
Your kids should have fun with a project like that.

Kate, yay! Superman haiku

That sounds like fun. Nothing like making new fans whenever possible. Be sure you mention the New Adventures.

Showing TNAOS just these last few months renewed interest in the show and the actors.

Kate

Me, for instance. For good or bad my interest was rekindled. I don't like gossip that much and I'm interested in the show itself so I was glad someone was talking about it and not just what the actors are doing.

It has it's place but I'm a character person, too though I have a lot more respect for Hatcher as an actress than I used to have. I also respect how Cain has kept his career alive with raising a child hands-on at the same time.
Other than that I'd rather speculate about the characters they played and how their lives might have turned out - all multi thousand ways.

Kate, really off to our little parade now

We don't have a parade anymore around here.
I did watch the Prankster episodes again on Sunday. There is more of the slapstick in the second episode and we learn more about the Griffins and Victor in "Return of." I like that Lois still had a hand in capturing them, Victor anyway. I also laughed at her "Oh come on! He deserved that!" to Superman after she pantsed Kyle. LOL!

Clark and Superman each have their own way of teasing Lois. Kate mentioned in Requiem how he might have been just playing to the crowd when he was knocked down by Garrison and it's totally possible, IMO. Clark's sense of humor comes out in Superman a lot. Remember how he embarrassed Dr. Klein by pretending, as Superman, he didn't understand how to fill a specimen cup for his fertility test? LOL! That's Clark having some fun! Klein didn't see that expression on C/S's face as he walked away ahead of him. LOL!
I can imagine Lois ROTFL like crazy when he told her about that.

Boy is Klein going be apoplectic when or if he ever learns the truth! LOL! Didn't he have to postpone meeting his girlfriend somewhere exotic? I hope Superman gave him a lift later. LOL!
But yeah, he teases her in both personas. "Is that the rule?" Pretending to disapprove when she gets the chance to get a prank back on Griffin.
In RFAS it just seemed to be Clark getting back for the taunting from Garrison earlier.

Kate, who's never seen a story where Klein thinks back to this

Being good as gold and twice as moral as Superman must have made for a lot of fun times for Clark!
I've never seen a story about that either. Would Klein be the kind of guy to call him on it though? He'll have forgotten about it over time, I'd think, he's got so much going on in his brain.
I'll have to go back and rewatch the episodes but did he have time for a girlfriend before or after Superman showed an interest in having a romantic relationship? I don't know why I think he was an influence on Klein in some ways.

Being Superman's personal doctor can do that to you. Jack straightened up and even let his brother go to a good foster home after meeting Clark and after Fly Hard he stayed in that juvenile facility until his life was in danger and after finding Jimmy they both went straight to Clark/Superman.

That's right. Jack's goal before that was never being separated from his brother and doing what he could for them to stay together.
He learned to care for others more, didn't he? He found Jimmy down and out and took him along to Clark's. Too bad we never know what happened to him. Probably became a cop so he could help Superman in some way.

Kate

Yesterday evening I was doing a little work on my PML concordance page and it occurred to me that the episode gives an indication that Clark does date other women during this time when Lois is actively dating Lex.
When she comes to his desk after the pheromone takes affect, he isn't surprised by her behavior- he's SUSPICIOUS. She's up to something. When he finally says he get's it, he starts to list all the things he can think of that she might need, things she's asked for before. Research? VCR fixed? A ride to the airport? A blind date?
Why would he suggest a blind date unless she's set him up before? We know that after IGACOY that she doesn't exactly agree with what she thinks is his taste in women.
Though he is interested in Lois, she has a boyfriend per se. She's dating Lex and not interested in a relationship with Clark beyond their writing partnership. Doing her these favors would keep him in her good graces and give him something to do, a distraction, an evening or two with a personable woman who is interested in being with him and not the richest guy in town.
He DOES notice other women and they notice him. Elle Taylor did.
Cat might be a little too pushy for him and dating from time to time or letting Lois set him up, certainly seemed to deter her interest. She still likes to tease him but that may be more to get a rise out of Lois than anything.
At any rate, like it or not there isn't a single minded obsession with Lois here driving Clark- the single-minded obsession with her is driving Lex. Until this episode he wants her father dead, after it he wants Superman out of the way, too.
Of course the only thing canon tells us is that Clark has been on a blind date or two set up by Lois and it's one of the first things he thinks of when she's especially nice to him.

Kate, glad our boy had a better time during the first year than I thought

Thank you, DJL! LOL! I can count on you!
I've always thought what was the measuring stick against which Martha and Jonathan measured Clark's interest in Lois. They had to have something to go by to know this woman was special to him.
Roll your eyes all you want, gnash your teeth, whatever else shows your annoyance, but just as Lois needs more than one or two sexual experiences to know if Clark is a virgin or not the first time they have sex, the Kents needed a dating history of their son with many girls and women to know that something about this one has touched him in a way none of the others did.
Again, thank you DJL. I'm grabbing that nugget and holding it close. LOL! I'm glad there is at least a tiny hint that he did have a more normal life as Clark than other incarnations did and it includes dating or having friends among women. I know it can be interpreted differently, that she asks him to recommend a date for someone she knows, but that wouldn't explain the suspicion and 'oh, I get it." IMO.

Oh this fun! Who would she be setting him up with? I had to look upIGAxyz so I guess you mean her reaction to Clark kissing Tony Taylor that she wouldn't want him seeing attractive blondes. Relatives? Any mousy cousins she had on her mother's side? Her dentist's assistant? LOL!

Probably not someone at work unless from another department. Someone she can handle seeing Clark becoming friends with or going out with a few times. WE know Lois is interested in him herself but she doesn't. Remember she thinks something happened between him and Cat and setting him up with blind dates would certainly keep him away from her. It might explain why Cat tried to get at him the way she did in ASU. Lois's blocking is too good otherwise. LOL!

Kate

Yes, this is fun! Clark knows Perry is worried about him, too, especially where Cat is concerned. He took special care to warn him away from her. Going along on a blind date would make both Lois and Perry happy, and give him another thing to argue about with Lois if the date is a disaster, another way to tease her if it was nice and he asks the woman out on his own.

No wonder Lois treasured him as a friend. He'd be one of the good guys as an ordinary man. I can see now why she was unprepared for his confession in the park but it makes me sorry for her that she could deny her emotions to herself so completely. As you said Kate, WE know she's interested in Clark but SHE doesn't.

Yes, Clark was her safety blanket, it seems. He was what Molly probably would have been if she and Lois had stayed friends after college. He was supposed to be there for her if the marriage to Lex failed. He would help her get back on her feet, set her up with blind dates in his turn to help her move on after the divorce, be there with that pizza and a movie, listen to her problems. That's what best friends do.
Only she didn't know that wasn't how he saw things.

Kate

So taking back his confession was the best thing to do. CK let her mourn and adjust to what she was discovering about Lex without the pressure of having to suddenly be in love with someone else while the horror of the mistake she almost made kept getting worse. By the time of her talk with Dr. Carlin she was unsure of her feelings for Clark. Imagine how much worse it would have been if they'd been involved when she realized this.
She needed him as a best friend to get over Lex.
After that would come the realization he was more than just a friend.
I think I read a story kind of like this a long time ago. He understands she needs the time to mourn. No matter what a monster Lex turned out to be, he was her boyfriend for a year.

If you think of the name let me know. It sounds like a Clark I would like to read about.

Kate

So Clark was actually the safe one as far as the TV plot goes, right? There are a couple of stories I've read where she explains to Clark that she was going to marry Lex because he was safe, but he was actually the dangerous one. Whether she loved him or not if the marriage didn't last it would be for a reason that would probably hurt or humiliate her. Clark was where she would turn for help and comfort if it did. Wow. That's a new angle. I thought I understood her reasoning but this is new.

It's those darn blind dates! Of course, you can ignore the possibility of them if you want to and keep things the way they are, but it throws a different light on everything and that's what speculation does and why I like to do it. I like seeing new angles. Plus I like that the indication opens up a new way to look at Clark's life as a young man in this series.
It doesn't take away the fact that he was interested in Lois from the start, but she was dating someone, and I like the possibility that CK did too. He wasn't a loner. He didn't avoid women because he was obsessed with her. I like that it looks like he had a little fun too, and not just with Perry and Jimmy.
I can see Martha being exasperated by it too!

Yes. He didn't get serious until there was reason to. So no dating Mayson even though it must have been a great ego boost to know a woman could fall in love with him and let him know it without all the denial and off limits barriers of Lois. I'm thinking a moth to a flame here. In spite of the fact that Lois is finally opening up at long last, Mayson's interest is there for all to see. How do you not enjoy that a little bit when the alternative is doors slamming in your face? Or being told we're almost dating so it would make me uncomfortable to stay with you while my life is in danger. One wants to go away with Clark for the weekend, the other grabbed Superman and took him home and wouldn't let him go until she fixed him.

Kate, thinking you just have to laugh sometimes

Then she wants to know where Clark was if he wasn't with Mayson. As if the suit didn't have her full attention all weekend even with Jonathan and Martha there.

I see Bev is going to do that episode for the concordance so we'll see what she finds hidden away in that episode. I'm still waiting to know what's behind the dad brushing off the blindness thing.
There doesn't seem to have been much interest in this subject in the early days of people writing stories. I haven't seen any from the years I'm reading now. Later stories do no justice to Mayson. She written as the Lana character we saw briefly in the alt universe.

Kate

Much interest in the Mayson era? Or TEHI? I noticed that about Mayson. When she lives, she turns out to be possessive and clingy or combative in some way.
She wasn't a bad character. I felt sorry for her falling for Clark but I'm glad he got to know what it was like to be loved by a woman who isn't afraid to show it. By a woman who can actually say the words even if it was to his departing figure. I'm glad she knew his secret before she died. The main, or one of the important reasons why he had to hold back.
I think her interest in him would have waned if she discovered the truth while she was alive. I don't think she could have accepted the two as the same person.

The Mayson era. She certainly must have whetted Clark's appetite to maybe experience this with Lois someday. Considering all that was to come!
You may be right about her not accepting Clark as Superman but her objections to Superman made it sound like professional rivalry more than anything else. She wouldn't have gotten the chance to get to know him even if she had lived. She might have held a fascination for Clark but he wasn't interested in her beyond that.

Kate

When I did 'The Source' for the concordance I saw where I think my dad's theory came from. When Clark and Lois are searching the office at Viologic, Clark hears Thorpe and Wick talking in another room and he lowers his glasses and watches as well as listens to their conversation. Then Lois waves her hand in front of his face and it's skeletal. Everything beyond it and into Thorpe's office is still crystal clear.
We get to see what Clark sees: from the distant men, though walls, up close to Lois' skeletal hand.
He transitions from X ray to available light and what changes is Lois' hand and the walls are back to normal and he can't see the other men anymore.
It's right there on camera! He doesn't need available light to see when he uses his x ray vision because he could see what was in the hidden rooms that Miranda and Sam Lane had. He saw the artificial limbs before they went inside Sam's hidden lab and turned on the light.
In TEHI if he used his X rays, Lois standing in front of him would be skeletal but anything beyond her would be as clear as what he saw in the Source. It might take a little practice to get it right and it might drain his energy but he would be able to see, either as Clark or as Superman. And Lois left him alone enough that he could have done a Clark appearance or two with his parents' help. Get him some opaque contacts to look through.
I guess CK was so happy to have an excuse to not go with Mayson, in his relief he didn't think of it until too late.
Or the visual effects people liked to make the series' writers look silly.

Wow. I don't think like that. I'd have never noticed that on my own. He looks into rubble, he looks underground and sees things clearly. It's because using x rays is different from just looking at something.
Don't make me think like this. Next you'll be telling me Algebra really is important in my life!

Don't distract her! I'm waiting for Superman haiku.

Kate, suddenly watching the clock already so I can home and watch that episode

I rewatched it too. That's an interesting scene. How we see it from Clark's POV. It never occurred to me that it could be seen any other way. I buy into visual effects, special effects totally, I guess! It happened and I bought it without ever thionking what it meant as far as his powers were concerned.

You'd almost think it was movie publicity.

Another Game Reference

Algebra is important to your life! We are communicating right now thanks to algorithms brought about through mathematics of which, etc. etc. etc. Yes, I've seen the King and I recently.
Yeah, the visual effects department was full of over achievers who gave the director more than he asked for whenever they could.
I'm going to ask my dad if that was where he got his theory and if it is I'll get to hear how it took me almost twenty years to figure it out myself...oh well...

Can Boba Fett the Musical be far behind?
Darth Vader has been consistently voted the best or one of the top best villains ever created in the movies. Now you can buy his image with mouse ears.
I don't know about anyone else but I'm going directly to the random button on the archive.

Kate

The Disney/Star Wars thing has always been there, ever since the start of the springtime Star Wars weekends and Star Tours at Disney World and at Disneyland. There has been Jedi Mickey dolls on sale for years, but this is way off the scale. LOL!
Well, as long as DC never sells out to them! I'm used to the Disney/SW mix and the RPG has had a get together at the 2009 SW Weekends and I have one of those Mickey/Luke in the Rebel fighter but the R2D2 unit doesn't have mouse ears. I could probably take what comes as long as the new movies are Star Wars and not Disney. I do NOT want Boba Fett, the Musical. Tag line, "He's Not So Bad"
Boba singing,
"I don't wanna be bad,
but I know that I must!
It's all because of my dad.
I don't know who I can trust!"

Nooooo!!!!

Click on the link in Message #241387, Kris's post. There is another reference to our show in that word find game.

LOL! Well at least you write better than Victor and his ode to Lois's teeth!

Kate, who can't believe you're really all right with Camilla the chicken as a stormtrooper or an Emperor's Red Guard. LOL!

Camilla the Chicken is still around? Gonzo's girlfriend? My kids know who that is.

They seem to come up with a reference once a week. As soon as one can't be clicked anymore a new clue shows up.

So Kate, what did you read when you hit the random button?
I happened on a kind of April Fool thing.
An April 1st kind of thing
Well, I had to laugh! LOL!
Though it did kind of seem strange that we only hear how Clark feels and not how Lois feels. Again Clark is the giddy female.OOOOH. his little heart is racing he's enjoying himself so much. Lois agrees. Yeah. What you're feeling Clark. Same here. Is it such a travesty to let her feel emotions and acknowledge them too?
Still it did make me laugh.

Okay, I see what you mean, but I put that down to Clark being a virgin and the perception of virginity in most fiction is that of innocence and guilelessness. A fifteen year old in mind and body but an adult man or woman overnight as soon as you've had sex. Magic!
Clark is that perception of a virgin. The boy/man to Lois's normal woman. She has the experience and been there done that attitude. The boy/man is getting into unfamiliar territory here and so Clark is reacting as that young female governess in a gothic novel would.
In a way I guess you're right. In a lot of ff Lois is Rochester and Clark is Jane Eyre.

Kate, JMO

Yes. That's it. Role reversal of a kind. I guess it could be worse.

Probably, but how can it be worse than some of what is already out there? He leads such a limited life being so single-mindedly obsessed with Lois while she is free to consider other men. That's where I have to dismiss the soul mate concept. The writers of the show who introduced this to the mix ignored the fact that first and second season writers had already established both characters weren't bound by this. The way the characters bought into it and accepted it once it was revealed to them was too easy for two people who needed proof for everything else.
It is romantic to think such a thing is possible and across the universe they found one another but Lois wold have led a good life without him. She would have married, had kids, probably been divorced but her life would have gone on. I don't see why Clark couldn't have done the same.

Kate, who thinks she hears Tempus laughing somewhere

I don't like the soulmate concept period. Have I said that before? I can read a story where it is a fact of LnC's life and like the story but I don't like the soulmate concept. It's romantic and nice to think it happened for them but it's used to restrict their romantic lives too much. Clark's specifically. There are no stories of Lois committing suicide after losing Clark unexpectedly. She always goes on. None that I know of where she turns into an emotional wreck crying her life away. She keeps going.
The more I see of DJL's Clark the more I believe he would too.
As for Tempus I reference Katherine Paterson: "he could go to you know where and warm his toes." LOL!

P.S. Fun To Follow This is Debrah Farentino doing something that sounds like what Dean Cain did years ago. Maybe not, but fun to follow anyway. I can almost imagine Lois doing something like this for her first Kerth Award story. Of course, there would be oil rigs burning in the backgrounds instead of mountains but I can imagine this was something like the care she'd have gotten as she went into the country as a journalist. Then confounding everybody by sneaking off on her own somewhere because she thought she saw a man appear suddenly as if he'd just dropped from the sky...

Hi Bev! Nice idea about Lois. She wouldn't have had Twitter to communicate but exchanging email with Perry and Cat, perhaps. Then she comes back and puts together a story or a 3 or 4 article series based on the emails and the more gritty details in contrast. That's possible. I'd read it.
Maybe that's where she sees or experiences the first indications of sexual harassment and keeps digging into it off and on for her third Kerth winner.

Kate, wondering what an embedded journalist is as compared to a assigned journalist as Lois would have been- just looked it up and even on assignment Lois would have been called embedded if she was assigned to a military unit in a combat situation

Hi! The kids are taking tests and my room is very quiet.

Yes! Or someone she met over there comes back and looks her up and tells her nothing has changed since she was there and they work together to expose what goes on. Of course, later on when their universe's version of Tailhook happens, Lois, with Clark, will be on the case again
Maybe then Superman will be able to make a difference. "I'll be watching you..." That old song my mom liked is going through my head...

Well, it IS romantic and it IS something you'd like to think happens in real life for real people as well as fictional couples. You hear people talk about it as if it's a reality and you wonder. I do understand though what you mean by it being limiting but if the one you found turns out not to be THE one doesn't mean it can't be the next. Humans have a way of lying to ourselves. Fictional couples get it handed to them all nice and perfect. All that (Lana) Lex and Scardino business? Nothing! You're soulmates and always were!

Wow, the possibilities! I'd love to see that story.
Both stories. The sexual harassment in the military one also. Funny how pictures totally unrelated to Lois can light a fire! LOL!

Mmmmm! I remember the Police, too. Now known more as a stalker song than a romantic one. Can you believe that was once a romantic ballad?

LOL! YouTube comes in so handy.

It's the ignored era in a way. I never knew about so many things until now. If the concordance had been finished at the time it was originally begun all of this would have been there to have fun with from the beginning of ff.

Kate

Do you think it would have made a difference? I've watched the shows and I see what you mean by Clark being such a tease and he isn't afraid of Lois like he is in the stories. He doesn't blanche and cringe if she gets mad at him. He doesn't go slinking away stuttering and looking helpless if she argues with him. He argues back.
To be honest I wish I read the stories before I started reading you and Bev! No offense but I'm seeing things I might never have paid attention to otherwise! It would have been different anyway. I think I would have gotten tired of crying Clark on my own but everything else would have probably sailed right by me. I'm not sure if you've done me a favor or not. Or done myself a favor, I guess I should say. Too late now!

The internet is a dangerous place. We miscreants are everywhere just waiting to corrupt the innocent. Warn your friends and neighbors.
WE ARE OUT THERE!

I wanted blood to be dripping off those letters but I couldn't find a font like that which is free for MB use.
I'll search some more.

Hello. Just thought I'd give you a little support. I enjoy the ideas and interpretations you've been writing about. I follow your conversations faithfully and I like the different ways there are to look at the stories and at the TV show. I wish you would give Firefly and it's fan fiction the same critical interpretations! That is the only other TV series I follow and the ff is getting fewer and farther between of late. I like how Lois and Clark keeps going.
Don't stop speaking your minds. You're a greater influence on how people are looking at ff in other areas as well as here than you might know.
I'm a long time lurker and reader who finally had reason to join just to say that. I'm Bree but that name is already in use so I can't use it myself.

I was going to say 'Welcome to the boards' Bree, but since you've been lurking then I'll say "Welcome to posting.'

Well, the purpose isn't too influence anyone or change anything. It's to offer a new look at the subject from a different angle. It doesn't mean I'm/we're right. Just that we look at things from a different point of view. I know we're wrong about a lot of things but with no one willing to point it out, I don't have to acknowledge it until I want to. "Mine is an evil laugh!"
(One of the reasons I don't read a lot of Firefly ff is (FFff?) Wash was my favorite character! I only read the ff based on the series not the movie. BTW, Tim Minear had him play with action figures, too, but he did it a lot funnier than Bob Fences did.)

Dinosaurs are funnier.
Wash
Does Tim Minear play with toys? Just wondering.

Kate, handy, handy YouTube, just so handy

P.S. Bad quality sound but funny.
AlanTudyk Reads Wash's Eulogy

Back to the subject, and as I have and Bev has said before, I don't know where that comes from. The ff persona for Clark is the man/child is all I can figure out. That's the way boys are, or are perceived to be. Which is great incentive to teach my boy how not to be when he grows up.

Kate, and no, Martha, no matter how wrong he is I'm staying out of it and letting him lead his own life, and no, Martha no matter how wrong he is I will never vocally take sides against him- i might bleed from biting my lip too hard but I won't say it aloud

Everyone I know on Pinterest is telling me 'famous last words!" LOL!
Maybe.

Kate

Maybe someday I'll have to worry about that, but unfortunately it's canon that Martha takes Lois' side whether it hurts Clark's feelings or not. As in real life the important thing is being right.
I'm learning more respect for men's feelings than anything else from these discussions. Being a Superman fan is bad for me as a woman! LOL! I'm- gasp!- becoming considerate toward them!

Is that what I have to look forward to? Is it so bad?
Famous last words or not I want the same for my boys. I want to always be there for them and back them up no matter what even if it's difficult.
But Clark will learn from it and maybe give his son(s) more support than Jonathan did. It is more important to be right to Martha and Lois and it seems Jonathan realizes that.

Nothing wrong with that. My job would be a lot easier if more people did.

If Jonathan does know that, Kris, I hope he explained this to Clark at some point. Even a silent ally is better than none at all. His need for children doesn't seem to be as great as Martha's is. He's happy with what he's got but Martha wants a daughter too.

Kate, wondering if I should change my avatar

LOL! No, despite it all, Martha did give us Superman, not Kal-El, Master of the World. We all have faults. Hers are just more irritating than ours because she does them in front of the world! There is a scary series of panels in Earth One, Volume Two (page 3, column 4, line 5, word 6, letter 7, just kidding times 8) where Superman's help is rudely turned down by the despot in charge and Superman imagines laying waste to the city with fire from his eyes.
We could have had that. 9, 10 times worse.
(Sorry, I had to get to 11 )

LOL!
How do I follow that?

LOL! Happens to me all the time. Just jump in with any lame old thing. Isn't there a song called The 12th of Never? Then Friday the 13th, Saturday the 14th. Taxes get paid on the 15th. The Sweet 16 is over now. You leave Hogwarts at 17 and come of age in the Muggle world at 18.

Oh yeah, Martha is a good mom, probably the best or close to it in fiction. But you have to tweak her every now and then because she's been known to commit a felony for her boy every now and then.

Kate

What Clark doesn't know can't hurt him. Most of the time he's crying and wouldn't notice anyway but still. You're right. Sometimes you just have to laugh. He cries so much! How can I not defend him?

Keep her on the straight and narrow? LOL! She's the last person I would ever think needed it.

You'll be surprised what illegal things Martha will do for her son. How sneaky she can be to get him to do exactly what she wants him to do. You wonder why Jonathan looks the other way. On the show he has no problem speaking up if she's going too far.

Kate

I'm not even going there.
Jonathan is a diffuser like my mother. If something has gone on long enough she'll stop it. "That's all! Stop." "But Mom, it was just-" "That's it!" Grumble, mumble, growl..."I'll get you la-" "Don't make me put my hands on my hips!"

LOL! Yeah, that's when moms are really mad.

I can't see either one of them getting that mad at Clark, especially Martha but I know what you mean. Jonathan can be stern.

LOL!
I can't see that either. They seem to have been long on discipline but not too strict with young Clark. He reacted with just the right amount of chagrin in Season's Greedings when Martha did the all three names thing. It makes me laugh that it's a good thing the powers developed slowly or as a little boy he'd have given himself away a million times! It also seems he didn't fear his powers as they developed. He learned to control them but he also used them just as he does as an adult. A sneaky little 'broken' chain link here, a 'loose' board in a fence there. Getting even with Lana when she was being too bossy. Getting even with Lois in SG was a natural action. He just did it, and no one knew what he was doing but his parents.
Have you seen the movie "Breaking Away?" There is a scene where the boys are swimming and Dennis Quaid's character plays a trick on the others by holding his breath a long time under water and getting into an old refrigerator at the bottom of the swimming hole. He gives them a good scare but I think about that whenever Clark uses his powers as Clark so naturally.
He probably learned to fight when Pete Ross got mad at him for doing something like that.

Kate

That makes me feel sorry for Smallville Clark and I don't like that! Well, he did get his frustrations out so I don't feel THAT sorry for him. He used to drive fence posts straight into the ground without digging a hole. (Take that, Whitney!) Smallville used to experience mini temblors that no one ever figured out.

I agree at some point TNAOS Clark became comfortable with his powers. In some of the concordance entries I've done the list of powers used as Clark are longer than the list of powers used as Superman. He uses them all the time, alone and with others.

I can understand his feelings now about not being super for the time the kryptonite took his powers away.
He does use them a lot so I don't really understand why he has to turn into Superman every time there is a situation somewhere. He knows how to use his powers as Clark. He doesn't need the suit to be super and remedy an immediate crisis. There are a lot of things he can do before he is forced to give himself away.

He knows how to be discreet. He realized he could stop Lois' Jeep by dragging his foot because her attention was focused on her driving, and the people outside, around them, were watching the other vehicles crashing or already crashed. Just as Griffin knew would happen, allowing him and Victor to steal the chips from the truck without being seen.

It's funny the first thing Lois thought of was that he was going to drag his foot, and it never occurred to her he was opening the door to jump out before they crashed! She knows him better than even she seems to realize sometimes.

Kate

TNAOS Lois won't know the new Superman. In the effort to make him more human they seem to be taking away his vulnerability.
Vulnerability
Cavill's Superman is going to suffer physical hurt and he'll bleed. Does this mean he can't stop bullets anymore either?
All of a sudden I have a bad feeling about this. Superman leaving a fight with bruises? If he flies into space won't he burn on reentry unless he moves very slowly? Can he fly into space anymore at all? Or even to high altitudes? Oxygen deprivation? Will he get the bends if he goes too deep in the ocean?
Superman with less powers. I don't like this. In this case speculation is making me feel VERY bad.

Oh, I hope not! He's Superman because he can't be hurt. He can't bleed. I hope Cavill is right and it's emotional not physical. Of course he can be hurt emotionally but invulnerability makes him super.

Sounds like he'll be invulnerable but just not that invulnerable. They WANT him to be able to be hurt, to bleed, to be weak in some way. They've taken krytonite away so he has to be weak in another way, in a physical way.
It's got me talking in circles. I don't like the sound of it either. How can that guy think it's going to be awesome?

Kate, who just might dump my drink on anyone near me who cheers if he bleeds, LOL!

Or jam a popcorn box over their head.
Wasn't he hurt in SR? That was enough.
Kryptonite was the substance that coould kill him and without that he can't be killed or harmed so it stands to reason he has be made invulnerable in order to be hurt or killed like a human.
I hope that isn't going to happen. I'm writing that in a whiney way, BTW.

I'm at a low point again. Some days I'm looking forward to the darn thing, some days I just know it's going to be horrible. Laurence Fishburne, you'd better be the best Perry since Lane Smith. My enjoyment of the movie rests on you. LOL!

LOL! I feel like whining too but I hope those guys don't know what they're talking about. I like seeing Superman at an elevated level. He isn't meant to be on the same level as me.

Kate, who does notice we are talking about Superman and not Clark

Well, Krypton being destroyed by war instead of planetary instability is certainly different but why bring in the American obsession with royalty again? It was bad enough TNAOS made him Lord Kal-El, it looks like he's going to be an hereditary ruler again.

Okay, the RPG guys have got me looking forward to TMOS once again, but I don't know how long it will last, because, yes, we are talking about Superman and not Clark.
I suppose it would be better to expect nothing and be blown away than to be hugely disappointed.

Hopefully it will be good enough to make a sequel. They're going for young males here, the Batman audience it seems and I can watch if it's Superman. Lord, Prince, King Kal-El? That would be harder to get used to but it's probably to appeal to international audiences. IDK. I just want it to be Superman.

Kate, who is going to miss Clark

This is one topic where speculation is not fun at all.

LOL! So far anyway. We can't listen to fanboys anymore.
How about: Can you believe DC isn't going to include Lois Lane in a big way, or at all, for the 75th birthday of Superman? They are promoting the Superman/ Wonder Woman romance and it wouldn't be appropriate to have a Lois cover. They don't think it would sell anyway.

Kate, talk about fanboys

It's her anniversary too!!!! What kind of logic is that?

LOL! Apparently they're looking at only the profit to be made off this anniversary. It's a pity. I've read many blog posts and articles criticizing this decision and most are very well written but I don't know if anything said will make a difference. Here's hoping someone from DC is reading them too.

I'm going to try to spend the remaining time as spoiler free as possible. From now on I'm not listening to what anyone says. I'll like it or I won't but it will be my choice.
I have so many pluses and minuses in my head already!

Kate, plugging my ears and humming

That won't work. I've tried it and it just doesn't work. LOL! You HAVE to look at the spoilers! They all to you and no matter how hard you try...YOU GIVE IN!
LOL!

I gave up on everything a long time ago. My dad, my brothers, my role playing game- all people who have no problem with spoilers or rumors. They love to hear them, they love to talk about them, share them with everyone they know. I hear it all on every subject. These are people who can afford to go to conventions several times a year so they find out things that turn out to be on the money no matter what the subject. In other words, I know guys who know guys who know spoilers.
I WILL break you.
JK, of course.

LOL! I'm going to try. Even though Lois meeting Superman in captivity comes straight from fanfic, I'm hoping she has a lot to do with getting him accepted by the world.

Kate

Spoilers are okay with me. I'm not that into movies or TV shows that I can't stand to know something in advance. Most of what you hear turns out not to be true. How many people really expected Luke, Han and Leia to be in Star Wars VII? Remember back when it was confirmed Kenneth Branagh was cast for the Phantom Menace? And how about the movie version of The Friday Night Knitting Club? That's been "in development" for what? Five years now?
I liked the recent fanfic about Lois's uncle whose plot was practically lifted right out of that book because I don't think we're ever going to see a movie version.
Glitter Suit
Well, now we know the glitter craze among kids has reached major motion pictures. Can unicorns be far behind?

I once said it looked like it was made from seat cover material and it still does, sparkly or not. Jeez I hope it looks normal on screen. Ever heard of a movie called the Electric Horseman? LOL!

When did it start to sparkle? (Yes I looked at the link.) I hope that's a special effect for some good reason. He accidentally flew through a swarm of fireflies. He didn't mean to hurt them. It happened so fast.

Kate

LOL! Maybe he'll develop an allergy to phosphorus now. That will be his new weakness. Friends, family and phosphorus.
Dang that sounds good.

At least he's not going to be Elvis dazzly, just real shiny, but talk about averting attention away from the face.

Back to humming and this time I mean it.

Kate

Maybe it's a Firefly reference instead of an Elvis one. In Firefly "shiny" was a superlative. He's going to be a shiny superhero.

It was supposed to be subliminal and we ruined it! Darn us.

You mean "gorram us." Gorram it, us! The subliminality of it went right over our heads.

Kate, who thinks even without meaning to we have a need to misbehave

LOL! I have to admit you're right. I missed it completely. But figuring it out late is better than never as the saying goes. He's going to be a shiny superhero, gorram it!
(What other words did Firefly popularize? Mei-mei? Tetchy? Corpsified?)

He's gonna to be a shiny superhero, gorram it, but without the green glow-rock he ain't never goin' out the airlock to be corpsified!

NOT for Kate:
Wish I Wrote This
I like this article a lot because I agree with the views expressed. Big surprise, huh? LOL! Wimpy, crybaby Clarks are not how Superman needs to be seen. IMO plus this guy's. I also like the secrecy point, but when it comes to the capricious and fickle TNAOS Lois, the trust issue has merit. He was right to wait as long as he did.

For Kate:
Nothing About Superman Whatsoever
Same But With Music LOL!

LOL! Funny kitties not enough. I read the article. So much for my super willpower.
I liked the article too though I have to disagree with the Reeve portrayal assessment. His is THE Superman portrayal but his Clark is all the more annoying because he smiles behind people's backs and he CAN have a secret identity without going that route. As a kid I got the joke but as an adult and after TNAOS, it isn't what I can buy anymore.
I disagree with Zod too. He's been done. He's been defeated. Why bring him back? Just because bad guys are so much more cool than good guys and he deserves a chance to be bigger and badder?
The rest of the article I agree with.

Kate

Exactly. That's what we were thinking. Bad guys are the more popular and respected fiction characters in society today. The good guys are dull. Zod is being brought back just so the film makers can have him say, "Kneel before Zod!" again and this time kill in a gory way anyone who doesn't. That's probably the one thing most people remember and imitate from the Reeve movies more than anything else, I would be willing to bet. And also why the guy who wrote the article is waiting for the new Zod movie.

Hmmmm. Something tells me you don't like Zod.
Neither do I but we're in the minority, and when you come right down to it another Kryptonian affected by yellow sunlight is the one adversary on equal ground with Superman.

That's true. Another Kryptonian on Earth is the only enemy capable of hurting him, making him bleed as the fanboys said. Changing the fate of Krypton will give them a steady supply, if that's what the trailers are suggesting and, of course, that might not be the case.

Kate, going back into no spoiler mode again for who knows how long this time

I'd wish you good luck but your will power is almost as bad as mine! At least you're making an effort, though.

All right. No more fanboy news or rumors.

Well don't let me stop you! LOL!

Kate

I think she means we're going to help your willpower along.

Heck yes, considering she seems to have trouble doing it on her own. It won't be easy for me considering I'm surrounded by fanboys.

Normally I don't mind spoilers either but I want to like this movie, not laugh at it or anything because the rumors are coming true before my eyes. I'm the easily disappointed fan in my family.

Kate

Well, I want Clark to be more than just a little boy character, but I also don't want to see another bland Lois. They both should have some spirit.

So far I'm not feeling apprehensive and that's a good sign. I felt reluctant to go when SR came out and I ended up liking Richard White far better than the movie itself. Still do.

Kate

Hear, hear! Love the guy and he WAS the best thing about that movie. I was looking for the stories you mentioned before in these threads but haven't found any of them yet. Are there many with his character in them or are most of them Clark and Lois and Jason centric? Is Richard well represented by the authors or dismissed?

A lot of people liked him better than Clark, but he's Jason's father, biological or not, and he's part of the story. It's like the third season of TNAOS would have been if Lois and Scardino had gotten together as planned. They wouldn't have gotten married and had kids but he would have been a recurring character.
I'm not that interested in SR's characters so what I've read is few and far between. Every now and then I get curious and find something new in that fandom and read it.

I'd say he's well represented by the authors right up until he discovers Jason's parentage. After that it can go either way. There are few new stories lately so what is already there is probably all there will be.

Kate

Probably.
I did some work on TEHI for the concordance and I'm wondering what my dad found so good about it that he became a fan of the show, too. There are so many holes in the story I can't believe he could like it, but maybe that was because it is also a funny episode. I do like that Gerrit Graham's name was Munch! Since Richard Belzer took his cop characterization to other shows and has made a career out of playing the single character of John Munch, I like to think it was a reference to him. I also like how Lois has all that knowledge locked inside her head and now there is no way to initiate step 2 in the process and 'turn it on.' LOL! All of Faraday's genius right there in her head and no way to use it, except in occasional facts leaking out. Perry and Jimmy wonder if they'll get used to it and I guess they did because no one ever mentions it again.
It never bugged me before but as I was watching and taking notes I decided I don't like the way Lois lets the bad guys get away when both are caught in her apartment and unable to get away. She decks Munch and he falls to the floor.
Unable to see, Superman, who is holding Leit by the collar off the floor, calls her twice to ask if she's all right and she never answers. He tosses Leit to the floor and the doctor helps Munch get up and they run out the door as Superman calls Lois a third time. After they are safely gone and she is closing the door after them, she finally answers and tells Superman she is okay. She deliberately lets them get away! Of course, she angry as she admits moments later, but she lets the men who blinded Superman run off and get away!
We get to see Lois fall in love with Superman again, and I still think it's a pity we never get to see her fall in love with Clark. No wonder it took so long for them to get together.

When he talks about maybe having to be the best blind man he can be? I'd have fallen for him too if I hadn't already. Cain's performance is so good you know he has a real understanding of the character.
I agree the episode is funny, though droll too in some ways. One of my favorite gags is when Clark stumbles off the sidewalk and shoves a car away to crash somewhere off screen. And no one notices!
I have to watch again but I guess she does let them get away. Superman hears a body fall and she doesn't answer him. Is it deliberate though? Or just distracted by her anger at Clark?

Kate

Yes, it is funny when he hurls that car away by accident and then walks along wondering what happened.

And when he's making hot chocolate in Lois' apartment and pours the chocolate onto the stove then stirs the milk while he puts his other hand down on another lit burner. The chocolate starts to burn but he doesn't notice! He answers the door and the bad guys come in and while he's surreptitiously searching the apartment, Munch/'Gomez' finishes making the hot chocolate and drinks it.

IIRC Clark does ask what the other guy is doing and Dr. Leit makes an excuse. And where did he get his clothes to go streetside in? Lois just happens to have men's clothing on hand to give him?

Kate, feeling an explanation there but can't quite get to it

He probably has an entire wardrobe wherever his clothes go during a spin change. I don't recall seeing Lois wearing that nifty looking trench coat he wears so it must be his.

Yeah, her shoulders are close but not quite that broad.
I have to agree with my dad. After hearing Leit explain what his device did to affect Superman's vision, his x-ray vision would have still worked. X-rays are a different form of energy. Visible light was blocked but the return from the x-rays would have reached his brain as usual. As Clark, he would have still been able to see. The scene from 'The Source' shows us exactly what Clark/Superman sees when he uses his x-ray vision.
Either the writers didn't realize this or they ignored it.

It's hard to say which since they did this a few times before and after. Something would happen in one episode that would solve a problem in a later episode but the writers would ignore it and come up with something less useful as a solution. L&C/S overlook simple or known solutions in order to have another adventure. Since it happens in canon it happens in ff too as Kris pointed out a while back.

Kate

That would have been interesting! Clark constantly looking over his glasses. He'd be able to type but he wouldn't be able to see what's on the screen. So, as long as he was looking through something, anything? He would be able to get around okay but he would need to shift what he was looking through all the time, wouldn't he?

Unless resourceful Jonathan and Martha could come up with glasses lined with something he would have to look through. They raised the kid after all and solved a lot of emerging power problems with him. Can you imagine what a frantic three days that would have been trying to keep the two identities separate from LOIS LANE? LOL!

Kind of off topic but I will admit that I am a ION TV junkie. I love watching all those cop/law enforcement shows they rerun constantly on ION. I'm Watching "Flashpoint" now and had to laugh at two character names. Clark Lane is the teen son of one of the main characters and the son of another has the first name, Dean. Come to think of it one of the main characters is called Spike, too but I never made the LnC comparison until now. Angel and her brother Spike.

That alone would have been entertaining especially if using his vision for long periods affected him somehow, made him dizzy or something.

Wow! Can we sense, perhaps, a fan working on that show or a massive coincidence?

Kate

It could go either way but that is one heck of a coincidence if it isn't a Superman fan involved in the creation of the show.

What about Mayson Drake? She's expecting a weekend date and instead she has to work trying to help Superman- someone she has little liking for. She and Lois would have found out they don't like each other a lot earlier than they did!

LOL! Well, I think Clark was chasing a lead up in Gotham City for those three days and I'll bet Bruce Wayne will back him up. The tip didn't pan out, though. Just a rumor, but, jeez it could have been the biggest thing since Superman.

This seems to be the one area the Kents never planned for. Who knew? I love that Martha and Jonathan rushed to help though. As Martha said, they love him more than anything else on Earth. That is such a wonderful moment: as soon as the door closes Martha grabs her son with such intensity he's caught off guard.

Kate

(Double post that couldn't be deleted so I blanked it and chaged it completely! Evil laughter echoes through the forum. )

You pointed that out before. The elder Kents always rush to Clark's aid. I would have liked to see how they handled the dual identity if anyone had thought of it, too. It was an eventuality they never thought could happen.
PS- finally figured out how to make a title

Another favorite moment from that episode is when Martha is trying to pick the lock at Clark's apartment and Jimmy comes along and does it for her just before spilling the beans about Clark and Mayson. The looks they give him are so funny.

We just watched the episode again and we loved how disappointed Jimmy was after Mayson came to the newsroom and Clark stood her up! The poor kid! LOL!

The Perry-ism in the episode is one he or SOMEONE should have told to Lois, too. ""Women are people, too," he tells Clark, never thinking to tell her men are people too. (Or perhaps knowing she wouldn't hear him. ) She doesn't grow as a feminist or as a woman. Her personality changes instead. Even in much of the fanfiction she manipulates Clark and he's so much in love all he thinks about is how miserable he would be if he ever lost her.
He spent 26 years without her and he traveled the world and got to know people, cultures, languages, events and customs without her. He can do it again AND be richer for the experience of having known that kind of love.



10 more days

One would think. Series Clark would I'm sure but not ff Clark. He's been given too many reasons not to be able to continue. I think we said before that H.G.Wells has his work cut out for him in the ff universe. Correcting all of the missed Utopias.
"I'm sorry Miss Lane. It would be a waste of time to send you back again." Looks sorrowful. "This isn't the first time you've asked me to send you back. Time and time again I've given in and sent you back to that day." (Pauses.) "You ALWAYS choose to start dating Agent Scardino."

Kate

LOL! A choice destined to happen! What if she always chooses to marry Lex, too? She trusted him and believed in him so I think that would be a choice destined to happen, too. And letting him go without telling anyone when he returns in "The Phoenix."
There are some things that can't be changed.
I like the idea. I wish none of them happened at all but where would the angst have come from otherwise?

Like it or not, and I never will like it, soul mates are a part of canon. No matter the obstacles Clark and Lois are meant to end up together. Why would fate, kismet, God, time or whatever, go to the trouble of making them soul mates if one is destined to cheat or marry someone else and be happy? Can't happen so any obstacles will be overcome.
Then Tempus tosses in the honeymoon curse among soul mates, which goes to show what a dismal bad guy he is. Between soul mates and Wells on the opposing team, he's fighting a losing battle, and Mr. Duh! doesn't ever realize it.



9 more days

If you buy the idea of soulmates completely, you have to follow the rules. You can't change them to fit your idea because that breaks their destiny. They aren't soulmates in the universe you are creating. You've freed one or both of them if you have Lois marry Dan, Lex, alt-Clark or an original character. If she can have a lasting relationship with another person so can Clark. One can't be a soulmate without the other!
Like the first season, Clark can be attracted and interested in Lois but not obsessed. He can regret the lost opportunity but still be happy with someone else.
I read a story where Lois chose to live her life with alt-Clark so Clark could be happy with an alt-Lois and after a lifetime of the two couples together having and raising families, she decides to return to original Clark, and explain what happened to separate them. Not only does he and alt-Lois understand but they agree to the switch! Both Loises walk away from their grown children and return to their original Clarks to make things right. WHY??!! I still don't understand the purpose of that story.

Kate

Yes, he's one of my favorite bad guys of all time but I completely agree that he doean't know what he's doing! He's trying, though, I'll give him that. And with experience comes knowledge but he's too arrogant to know he needs it and probably wouldn't know real criminal knowledge when he thinks of it. LOL!

Do you mean that something would have alerted them to the curse if Wells hadn't showed up with the newspaper? That just making them soul mates means they will overcome anything? Hm. Interesting.
When you think about it, the curse was cast when no one knew about CPR or life support or advanced medicines. With each passing decade the liklihood of the curse working in the future would have weakened as the medical profession advanced. Mysterious deaths have a way of being identified and ways to prevent them are often found.

Yes, I like him as a villain, too, but he doesn't know how to be bad, bless him. He's from Utopia, where would he learn? From books? From exaggerated film depictions? He has a lot to learn but he doesn't get any smarter.

LOL! You're full of ideas! Wow! There you go. Clark would have had her at the hospital so fast the seven minute window would have barely begun.
I was thinking more along the line that even a curse can't stop a predestined outcome. Tempus tried to make it work, got in there and hands on tried to put the events in place but he couldn't.
I like Stephen King's idea. Time will fight back.



8 more days

Tempus is like Richard Attenborough in Jurassic Park. He's using someone else's hard work and knowledge without the experience of learning what to do himself. Or something like that. Jeff Goldblum explained it better. He's doomed to failure because he hasn't the experience to deal with everything that can go wrong.
I like that time idea too. Eventually time will fight back. Little things it will ignore, but major changes? No.

Kate

Wells is the instrument of time? He always stops Tempus and puts things right. LOL! He can win at being good because he is innately good by nature, but Tempus can't win at being bad because he really just doesn't know how? He's a wannabe bad guy. I guess you guys said that before but I think I can get it now. >>>Not really. LOL!
And the time dilation thingy would have let him get her to the hospital before she dies so he could go home and reexperience it again! LOL! Seriously, the time manipulation is a tool he has without Wells' help. He must be aware of it!
We're trying to figure out how that could have helped.>>> Another story I've read had T implanting infant Lois with kryptonite particles to make her poison to Clark. Poor little thing will be dead of cancer before she starts school. Radiation is radiation.

The time dilation 'thingy' just makes my head spin. Just the idea of hearing an explosion and getting there in time to save everyone before the explosion takes place is weird, but you're right. C/S has to be aware of it.

At some point in time Jonathan or Martha said, "Clark! How did you do that?! You were there and back before I finished setting down my cup of tea! You didn't steal that food, did you??!!"
"Of course not, Mom! Soos made this especially for me, just the way I like it."
"In a split second?!"
"No, in- Oh." Followed by as much experimentation as learning to control the powers needed.
m/o Yes, poor baby. Meteor rock kids are from Smallville not TNAOS. It will be like lead poisoning, won't it?

Kate

LOL! Have you read that hilarious story where Clark is learning to spin change? It's so funny but I doubt it could happen that way. For one thing, he speeds up but from his perspective he's moving normally. When he painted and repaired his new apartment we saw how he is able to move at super speed without making a mistake. It's natural to him. He can move as fast or as slow as he needs to. It's more fun when he makes mistakes though. LOL!
Taking a baby along and leaving it in vacuum or limbo or wherever the spin takes him is not so funny. That is endangering a child, killing it if it's in vacuum.

What is this? Stories about endangering babies are coming out? Or what? Kids are my profession! Don't mess with kids around me.
No, really. What are you talking about?

Years of practice just kills it, doesn't it? They could have had him redo the apartment several times until he got it right.
Makes things easier for Barry Allen too. No wonder he isn't tripping and falling and stumbling off balance as he runs around the world.
"Honest Dad I had nothing to do with that statue falling over. A blurry red thing kind of bumped into it and knocked it over and then disappeared that way!"

Kate, who knows nothing about endangering babies but is aware of the humorous story about Clark spinning his child and losing it/him/her and of course, Lois has to save the day

That's the one. He leaves the baby in the void and then can't find him! But is leaving a baby alone a joke? And Lois doesn't care if he does it, just that he couldn't find him. LOL! What?! Which is worse in her opinion again? How about both? Don't take the kid out of the house alone, period.

Do we need to have a Festivus Friday? LOL! Sounds like we do.
One Friday a month in my class we have a Festivus Friday- a time to air our grievances. No naming names, no replying to another student or interrupting them, and no getting mad if we recognize ourselves. Just think about it and how you can make things better.
We can change the rules.


5 more days

That sounds like fun! I'm trying to remember what grievances my kids had when they were younger. Nothing compared to mine but does that work for you? I imagine it does, getting things off their chests that might fester or something.

Actually it does. I forgot to add they're allowed to applaud if they agree with a grievance but that's all. And, also, they can address a grievance to me personally but I can't single anyone out. They've complained about not having enough basketballs, volleyballs, soccer balls, etc., in gym because so many are low on air. We discussed it and we decided to talk to the PE teacher and volunteer to help him air them up on Monday mornings. Volunteers have been doing that since around Thanksgiving.
They complained about kids cutting in line for the bus riders because their friends are letting them. Turns out kids from other classes and grades didn't like that either. It took a while but we got the principal to monitor the lines for a few days to see if she agreed it was a problem and she did. Now the monitors have pretty much curtailed that problem.
They complained about the healthy, sugarfree or no sugar snacks I bring them and we agreed that one week a month they get to choose the snacks. LOL!
They complained that there is only ONE Halloween song in the whole world that we can play during our Halloween parties and we all agreed we're getting pretty tired of "Monster Mash" year after year! There was no solution to that but I reminded them they probably weren't going to have many more Halloween parties as they get older so we decided we could live with it.
Mostly, however, it's just everyday problems - no one emptying the pencil sharpener when it's full, no one telling if the hand sanitizer is empty or broken and not working, or knocking things off desks and not picking them up, etc.

Festivus Fridays are working for us.

As I mentioned waaaaaaaaay back in March...

My idea for my kiddos became an end of year event for all the sixth grade classes. I reserved an activity center for three days, the kids told friends from other classes we were going to watch Superman and everyone wanted in.
Last Monday we watched Superman, the Movie; on Tuesday we saw the pilot episode for Lois and Clark, TNAOS; and Wednesday we watched the opener for Smallville.
Each class did different things in conjunction with each movie.
In my class, we discussed the movies and wrote what we liked best about them, and on Thursday and Friday we did our Superman specific creative writing: haiku, cinquains, two and three line rhymes, quatrains, etc. You can tell which Superman stories the writers are referring to, and as always, the kids amaze me. There is so much more going on in their minds than we know unless we give them the opportunity to tell us.
Some are hilarious and some are so spot on they make me laugh for their cleverness. My favorites:

The ground is far below
The air is cold and thin but
I shout, I can fly!


I think I can fly
if I really wanted to
Will I want to stop?


They found a spaceship
With a little boy inside
They made a hero.


One father is proud
One father said be careful
I liked that's my boy


One Clark is funny
I liked the one who worked hard
Lois Lane does too.


A man saw me float
I don't think he believed it
He went back to bed

(I went home)


I was on my bed
I went up to touch the lights
I stand on the walls


Why is he so scared?
He can do so many things
He hides in the barn.


Look up
you might see me
That streak of red and blue
before I vanish in the clouds I wave
Good-bye!


He broke open the door
They were tied up on the floor
He broke the chains and they were prisoners no more.


He runs really fast
but he stills gets there last
Behind everyone he went right past.


The farm
The Daily Planet
He can fly there and back
But the boy just has the barn loft
Too bad.


When the meteors fell
things were wrecked and people died.
Where they came from no one could tell.
Then we found the rock with the boy inside.


The boy is just a little thing
He doesn't fly, he has no wings.
The men have suits they use for flight.
When the boy grows up do you think he might?


When I knew I could fly
I went into the sky
I saw the world was round
from where thin air stopped the sounds.
So to be like my friends
I go to where the air ends.


The boy from the sky
is the man who can fly.
His mom made his suit
and she thought he looked cute.
He went into the city
where there was a girl who is pretty.
I think he will stay there
so the bad guy beware.


Note: They did not forget Lois!


Lois sneaked on board the ship
How did she give the guards the slip?


I like how she's bossy but she gets too mad.
If she counts to ten she won't be so sad.
Her sister is right and so is her dad.
She needs some friends, they aren't so bad.

Good! I've been waiting for this! LOL!
I love that advice to Lois. Count to ten and you won't be so sad. LOLOLOLOL!


LOLOL!!!
This one is my favorite though. The running I know refers to SV Clark but it could just as easily mean the other two- getting there first as Superman and then as Clark after it's all over with. I love it.
Your class did a good job. It was worth the wait.

Kate, who looks forward to the next time (hint, hint)

LOL! That's funny! I remember Monster Mash from Halloween at school! I remember them playing it four times in a row while we danced around the room when I was in fifth grade.
You're a brave woman to let the kids take you on personally.


Kate, who did the mash, who did the Monster Mash....

I like this one too as well as 'he runs fast' and the Lois advice. It's funny what they picked up on and remembered. They laughed when TNAOS Clark broke down the door and had to stop or give himself away.
They felt really sorry for young SV Clark but that was because they saw him in the later years as a man on TV and not the first years when they were toddlers. They thought he was such a scared boy.

Maybe I can make an appeal to songwriters out there. Write some more good, scary, child friendly songs about Halloween! PLEASE!!!
"Monster Mash" is all there is!

Your students would be about the same age as SV wouldn't they? And getting younger with each year. Did you notice a difference in how aware they are of Superman now, with a movie coming?


Kate

Oh wow! Those are really good. One Clark is funny and one worked hard. Those are movie version and our boy, I'll bet. Our boy works hard. He has to around that bossy and mad Lois. LOL!
That is very interesting what they chose to comment on. Mad, sad Lois, hardworking Clark, SV Clark and his FOS in the barn.
Now, how can I experiment with my kids that way.

Quite a few in all the classes remembered the last few years of Smallville, most remembered the movie and some of the sequels, and some remembered watching TNAOS episodes on the WB. But none had seen the Smallville opener. These kids were born in 2001. In two or three more years I'd bet most of my students then won't remember Smallville at all. Their Superman will probably be Cavill and whatever TMOS shows them is what they'll think the Superman story is.

Not to mention the comics. They're going to have a completely different Superman mythos than many generations of us before them did.
All of a sudden I'm p/o-ed that Lois Lane isn't going to be a part of it unless the new movie firmly establishes her as a part of Superman's life.
Did any of the children know of Superman Returns?

Some did. I didn't include it because I wanted to compare the story adaptations as well as write about them. We compared the first part of STM with SV, and the second part of STM with TNAOS. The scared boys, and the funny Clark and the one who worked hard, are the way they saw them. Despite the differences we decided they were all telling the same story.
I think if I do this again I'll also show either Strange Visitor, so they can hear how the Kents found Clark, or Tempus Fugitive so they can see baby Superman's rescue and subsequent discovery by the Kents.
Superman Returns doesn't fit anywhere unless I also show episodes of TNAOS season 4. That's way too much, too complicated a project.
Of course, by this time next year TMOS will likely be on DVD too and yet another retelling of the story will be available.
I'm not sure if I CAN do it again as the time needed to see them all will take so long.

Also I'm sure you want to encourage new fans instead of make them tired of seeing the same story told differently over and over. (Kind of like reading ff. Joking, joking.)
Of course, you can show only selected scenes to compare but that would complicate matters for you as you prepare, wouldn't it?
You reminded me of when I was in elementary school and we read "Bridge to Terabithia' and then watched the PBS production of the novel afterward on the VCR. We did a comparison then, too. Now, of course, there is a whole new movie version that just outshines the PBS version.

Kate

The movie better be fantastic. Anything it tells a new gen of fans will be better than having Superman remembered as a wife beater/killer. Very violent video games have a longer popularity curve than other kinds. Here's hoping the movie inspires a better video game.
BTW, do the kids know about Injustice? Do they know about S/WW at that age?

Kate

Foundling, too, has an important part of the Superman story. I guess that's the big difference with a series as opposed to a movie. Unless it's Harry Potter or Twilight, in a series you don't have to stuff two hours or so with as much detail as possible.
I suppose as Kate suggested you could just show the relevant scenes from Foundling.

It's an idea but this is an end of year treat as well as a writing project. If the movie is a blockbuster, I won't be able to get them to want to look at alternative interpretations. TMOS will BE their Superman.

Yes, they do know about the video game as many have older siblings who have played the game or know someone who has. Many are familiar with the comics, too. Again, through older siblings or parents.

Mortal Combat is the game I was trying to think of and from what I hear, Injustice is a MC type of game. The characters beating on each other and themselves. MC was around when I was a teen.
I would say try to find a way to do it again, even if you just show TMOS and TNAOS as a lesson on contrast and entertainment, if the movie is as big as or bigger than Star Trek. There has to be an effort to keep the past Superman mythos alive.
At least TMOS will feature Lois in a way the comics won't.

Kate

I hate the thought of my Superman story being put aside for whatever is in the movie combined with the comics.

BTW, on that fanfic for pay post would you give it a try if you could? Wite ff for that Kindle outfit?

There are alternate timelines in the Injustice game and the Superman who killed his wife is from another dimension. Some of the guys in the RPG play. The last I heard they were playing the finale. They said something about having Batman fighting other dimension Batman who wants a kryptonite weapon or something to take back and stop out of control Superman. Doomsday is supposed to appear in the finale.

If i could write, yes. I'd want to know if I could do it.
But how this will affect the fandoms they will accept stories for I don't know. I'm a reader not a writer.

I'm a reader, Jim! Not a writer!
I heard the final confrontation is Superman vs. Superman. And WW and her Amazons are good Superman's allies against the other dimension Aquaman.


Kate

So all they do is pound on each other for the whole game? Like Mortal Combat? Then what? LOL!
How far into the game do you go before you discover you're in another time or dimension?

I don't know. The last battle IS S vs. S. Afterward, Superman and Batman walk away and Batman tells Superman if that ever happens to him, he's coming after him. Superman tells him to get in line. Evil Superman is imprisoned but the last time the game shows him, his eyes glow red. Of course. Leaving the possibility open for another game.
You can probably guess the Lois sub-story. Why evil Kal comes to the other dimension and has to confront good Superman. Lois is still alive in other dimensions.

P.S. A new trailer is out

Okay, yes, I clicked the trailer link. Go on. Laugh all you want.
It's nothing new that the Kents teach Clark to be careful of letting people know of his powers, but there doesn't seem to be a "you were given the powers for a reason" speech to do good works with them. Young Clark seems to be the one who is thinking that on his own. This Jonathan seems even more afraid of Clark being found out than TNAOS JK.
Is there even going to be a Clark by the end of the movie.


Kate, here I go again but speculating is fun, I can't resist

LOL! I knew you'd click that link.
It better be good.

LOL! So much for the covering of ears and humming. Never worked for me. Covering the eyes, too, might have, though.
They seem to have borrowed a lot of imagery from the comics. An ice shelf where the FOS is at, Lois hugging Superman to her like when he died, people running through the streets and looking behind instead of watching where they're going, tall buildings crumbling, etc.
It has a comic book feel but no Superman really in action, just in reaction.

He's going to be a Jedi and frown and yell NOOO!!! a lot. NOOO!!! and millions die. NOOO!!! and cities fall.

NOOO!!! they reenact the second movie except Clark is not a reporter in the big city. Is he going to show up at the end of the movie, stumbling over debris, glasses askew, but in an impeccably clean blue suit?


Kate, who thinks she's better buy another set of TNAOS DVDs because she'll wear out what she has watching the only Clark worth the effort

LOL! Jeez I hope not. Maybe that's the reason for the smirk photo and the spit curl as the authorities seem to be leading him away. He's thinking he's got them just where he wants them...

I think you have the right idea, Kate. Clark is still going to be a comic character. I think Dean Cain's Clark will be the lone characterization of Clark as an identity as important as Superman.

It seems to be what people want. He has to be nerdy in some way to contrast with Superman, dumbed down in some way. All I can do is sigh and keep looking for those little gems as Bev calls them.


Kate

Where Clark is a man instead of a wuss? To repeat what I said before, why do writers do that? Why turn him into a nerd after claiming to be such fans of this show? What precludes what is seen on screen from making it into a story?
I don't think I'll ever get it.

As I've suggested for myself, buy another set of DVDs for when you wear out what you have or put the episodes on your mobile device as Bev is doing.
If after twenty years...don't hold your breath waiting for a closer characterization of ff to series. What there is has become ff canon or fanon if you prefer.

Kate, JMO