Smallville's back to form. Not a great show by any stretch, but thoroughly enjoyable as schlock. The first ep was pretty much the writers scrambling to resolve a cliffhanger ending with the sudden loss of the guy who had second billing in the credits.
Since then it's typical formula stuff -- meteor freak, pilot for a spinoff, alien, psycho who kidnaps and tortures people -- but fun to watch with a beer in hand.
Good points: Mercy's turning out to be a decent enough villain, and her sexual chemistry with Ollie is almost as entertaining as the absolutely atrocious dialogue they keep spouting. And speaking of villains, the show's actually managed to make Doomsday, the most boring character ever, somewhat compelling (though he's only been in two episodes and may get boring once his story's actually explained). And finally, it took them FIVE EPISODES before they resorted to Kryptonite (although Clark was depowered in the first one, so maybe that counts too). And it's great when they just go deliberately schlocky -- I'm surprised it took them this long to get to the Maxima story as it's a perfect fit for Smallville.
Bad points: Chloe's now as bad a deus ex machina as Clark. And all the usual stuff that's bad about Smallville.
