Coming off a fourth season in which the show had lost its way a bit, Smallville needed a reset. Right from the jump of season five, that was immediately apparent-and wildly successful. But after a 12-episode run that was clearly the most inspired in the show's canon to this point, the back half of episodes drops off precipitously.
Simply put, the first 12 episodes of S5 are exactly what Smallville needed. They included such threads as...
-Clark's (Tom Welling) de-powering for a time, allowing for a legitimate relationship with Lana (Kristin Kreuk) without all the "will they, won't they" drama.
-The Jonathan Kent (John Schneider) state Senator run, which put he and Martha (Annette O'Toole)-two character highlights--on center stage again.
-Chloe (Allison Mack) obtaining a Daily Planet post-exactly what was needed to refresh her character.
-A pivot towards the Kryptonian angle with the introduction of new character Milton Fine (James Marsters).
-Perhaps the single greatest holiday-themed episode ("Lexmas") in the history of dramatic television, exquisitely showcasing Lex (Michael Rosenbaum) and his continuing dark-side turn.
Sure, there was the "Lana turns into a sorority vampire" clunker and the gratuitous Lois (Erica Durance) sex-appeal spectacular "Exposed", but overall this was leaps-and-bounds the best stretch of episodes in show history to date. It all culminates in "Reckoning", the show's 100th episode and an absolute treatise in plot/character arc summation. The show's shining moment, to be sure.
If I were able to stop my S5 review after those 12 eps, it would be a solid 9/10 stars. Sadly, the season ran 22 episodes-and most of those remaining were absolute clunkers.
From episodes 13-20, my star ranking on each did not exceed 6/10. There are multiple reasons for this (such as, say, a strange turn for Lionel (John Glover)), but the biggest culprit was the usual bugaboo for this show: falling back into the Clark/Lana angst. This ground has been covered so many times that it is patently ridiculous for it to be even a fraction of Smallville's emotional arc-yet that is exactly what transpires. The only good thing it accomplishes is setting up a Lex/Lana pairing that crackles because of the chemistry between the actors. But in large part, the re-focus on Clark and Lana dancing around each other is so wearisome as to be sickening.
Fortunately, the final two episodes of S5 are quite strong and let things play out on a high note-including a cliffhanger ending that will leave Superman film canon fan with jaws agape. Because of that, I'm able to give this overall season an 8/10 score and declare it the best of Smallville's campaigns so far. It certainly recovered nicely from the high school fatigue of S4 and charted a new course in terms of sets and character arcs. Yet, the much-too-easy fallback position of "Clark/Lana drama" was severely disappointing and curbed an experience that could have very easily ranked in the upper echelon of my favorite TV seasons ever.