Episode 208 - 10x12 Collateral

Hi. My name is Tom Welling.

I played Clark Kent on Smallville and you are listening to Always hold On to Smallville.

Welcome to Always hold On to Smallville. In this podcast, we talk about each and every episode of the Young Superman show that we're from two thousand and one to twenty eleven on the WB and the I'm her host Sack Moore and joined by from Always hold On to d c's Legends of Tomorrow Tricia and as what's up Tricia Hayes act.

It's been a little while for.

Us, Huh, it has, it has, But you know, I know you're a big Black Canary fan. I am, so I definitely had to have you back for Black Canary's last appearance on Smallville.

Her last and just it was. It's just such a wonderful long appearance of a character. As we discussed in Siren, that is so accurate to the comics.

I look, when I was watching small Ville back in the day, there were a lot of I had a lot of blind spots when it came to DC Comics characters, and you know, all credit to the Arrow Verse. You're exposed to a lot of characters, you spend a lot of time with characters you're not familiar with before, right, Yeah, Now I knew like Black Canary, does she have like nightmares and stuff with birds of prey?

Black Canary?

Like, no, I knew. I knew about Black Canary more than that. I mean, but you know Smallville people, and they think it's small villain. In guest star heroes, you think of oh yeah, the Flash and Aquaman. You know, Hawkman was pretty cool, right and you know that you kind of go down. John Jones was around for a while, right, Yeah. I think people forget the Black Canary was ens noable, but that's totally understandable when you see what they did with her unfortunately.

Right, yeah, it makes a lot of sense. I feel like we have to have like a conversation at some point or maybe you've had this already and I just missed it about how why for some reason Black Canary and Green Arrow never end up getting together when they make like the TV adaptation, they end up doing her so dirty?

Yeah, I mean, and well, you know we'll get to it with this episode specifically, Like there's a scene where I'm like, oh, this is like brought into like a real life the Yeah, Green Arrow, Loven just stuff the fill in the blank show, and then of course Black Andary fighting over it.

And he ends up with the Oracle inserts.

It's just it is bizarre. I mean, if there was ever a Chloe Sullivan successor, it's Felicity Smoke and they both ended up with the Green Arrow. So they're doing

Are you telling me that you didn't read the Black Canary, Green Arrow spin off comic that came after the Darkest Night series?

You know, I can't say I have.

Oh no, before the Darkest Night series. Sorry, it ends with Darkest Night.

I can't say. I'm sorry. There's so much going on in season ten and I've found that it's to its detriment. Unfortunately, I feel like they're trying to do too many things. They're trying to bring back too many guest stars. They have too many subplots going on and look real talk

It is? It is on. There's no like time spent with this. It's not like there's multiple episodes where they're like living their lives inside this alternate reality and then you come to find out that it's an alternate reality, which I feel like some show dida now I can't remember which one.

Don't we watch so much genre TV?

Right? We watched so much And there's a lot of recycled storylines, which is very apt for.

At least the two parter, at least the two parter and the end of part one you realize, oh my god, there is.

No oh yeah, this is fake.

Right.

Yeah, It's like there's no like big return. It's more like we're just sort of in this and they're there for five seconds. Then we find out it's fake and Chloe's back and yeah.

And that's and then that's the thing. That's another thing about season ten. They're trying to do too much. Well, we got to resolve that, and then we got to bring back the suicide squad. Oh, Chloe needs to come back at some point. I guess we can do those things. It's a mess, and I don't really a mess. We're gonna talk through it. Maybe you can help me feel better about it. I'm just I'm not feeling great about about where we are right now in Season ten is

Low? It ranks low. I don't know exactly where it falls because like I'd have to go back and like really rewatch the series to remember, but.

Like who would do that? Am I right?

Right? And who would do that? Over the course of many years? I don't think season ten ranks very high. It's it's not that they're not doing interesting stuff. It's just like it there's you said, it's over stuffed, there's too much in it. They're trying to do like these really lofty ideas. But there as with this episode, which we'll get into, they're sort of like sandwiching these lofty ideas inside of like they're just taking movie plots and

From what I recall, Well, you know, season three, to my memory, is the biggest defender, although season three is my favorite seasons because there was such a stretch of like, okay, Fatal Attraction and Fast and the Furious, and you know, there seemed to be a string there in season three, but they really did revisit that and it came back with a vengeance in season ten, especially, just like.

There's like three episodes in a row that are like The Matrix, Date Night, and the Hangover, and it's like there are fun things happening or interesting things happening in these episodes, but the plot is not one of them.

Right, And I think when you're winding you shouldn't say winding down. You should be like barreling towards your finale. There's series you don't want plots like that, Like that's oh some random season two or three episode that's hilarious. How they did John Q? Hilarious and John Q was a terrible combination of words. I'm sorry, but you know my point, Like it's it's harmless.

That's Denzel Washington drama that is on Q.

Harmless was the h word I was looking for it, not hilarious. So that's where I am. Unfortunately. Yeah, Yeah, I don't know, Like there's some Apelus stuff in here. I love Homecoming, I love Luther, all of the Earth two stuff. I love the Clark and Lewis relationship. There's there's stuff here, but like it's just it's just over stuffed with too much going on. And I and I feel like I'm a I'm an active watcher. I'm sitting here,

No, no, it doesn't. And I think also season ten really suffers from coming after season nine, which.

Was so good. Yeah, thank you.

That like it's just anything other than that, which was so cool, cohesive and had a really great villain. You got season ten, which like isn't as cohesive. The villain's really like vague in so much as he doesn't even have a body.

It's interesting because season eight, you know, Davis was your like physical villain, but he was like a good guy and tormented, and then Tests was like your good or bad, and then but they were characters. They were like there, you know. And then Zod of course was he had his whole arc and he was there and he was fantastic. I think the season ten they're like, well, we want to bring back Lex, but we don't know if Michael's gonna come back, so we gotta like John Glover will

John McCain death stroke. I mean it is he's beyond death stroke.

I don't know, he's beyond death stroke. That is that line I talked about on the last the last podcast when you said that, but that is on the like the the top ten list of like quotable cringe and we had the same conversation last week about it. It's like when people think of these kinds of that kind of dialogue, it's like, I'm you just a little more bizarre. It's that same energy of absurd dialogue. Yep, although we're

No, they didn't. And I think the VR is like it's an existential villain, but it is still a villain, and like you can you could have made the whole season about like the hope that Superman inspires in heroes, right, Like you could have just made it that thing and they didn't Chloe.

That did you miss Chloe in season ten?

Yeah, but that's because, as freealsly stated, she's my favorite character in the show, and I was bombed that she was gone because like Test does not fill that role very well, so neither is she like trying to fill a role. But it's like it was fine. It gave us Mopey Green Arrow.

For a while. Yeah, they love Mopey green Arrow on the show.

They do. I mean, we can't have the non Batman character without the Mope. But I like, so I wasn't really down with all of the lack of Chloe, But I also like they did a good job with a lot of the episodes that followed, like you mentioned like

Well, And then you start to realize that there's only four main characters.

Yeah, like that's.

Like half the amount of characters to so I don't know, she had become so different than who we had come to know and love over the years, Right, So yeah, like you're right, tests, it's like, well you don't computers, you can do that, and that's that test that coming watch towers a side effect of like, well, these are our characters and cast members, like I guess we'll have Like I think they should have made doctor Hamilton a main character, given like the nine or thirteen episode contract

I mean, it's like they got rid of this character, but they still need an information broker. It's it's very much like I'm gonna keep going back into my Oracle spiel about how Chloe is basically Oracle without being Oracle, and this episode honestly has more of it, which is why I wanted to do this episode, even though it's

Gosh no, and you're right that there are a lot of reasons to have you on this particular episode. That's fine, Black Andary Oracle, birds of Prey.

Here we are Birds of Prey, bits of Birds of Prey episode.

It's basically a Birds of Prey episode. I'll have to say, let's get into it then. Collateral, Gord, tell me what you saw?

Goes in a lab, some of those performing experiments on me tubes everywhere.

They took away my powers laws.

And there was someone standing over me.

Who's Chloy?

Smallville All New episode this Friday at eight seventh Central.

Collateral is the twelfth episode of Smallville's tenth season. It aired on February fourth, twenty eleven. Was written by Jordan Hally and directed by Morgan Beggs. So, ratings, watch, what do you think this episode got on a Friday night in twenty eleven. Let me give you a little context. The previous episode December tenth, So we're like almost two months,

Got two point six.

All right? Saying it went.

Up very slightly because of the cliffhanger.

It went down two point three seven.

Oh, I was gonna say two point three five originally, and that I was like, no, he.

Oh, you would have been circles.

Yeah.

I mean people were like, oh, okay, I'm not gonna talk about the same mar because we're moving past this winter break. But the end of Luther, when Lionel was like when one of mishod All turns out, then he goes back into the crowd, like what a wait, that's how you should end your your You're half of your season, right, instead of like, oh no, the Justice League got knocked out somehow. Well not see what happens to most of these characters when we come back. If you're gonna do that,

Yeah, it also feels to me like we don't have the budget for that. No, not like they could have done so much more with the alternate reality, the virtual reality part of it, and they just they couldn't. Like they did like one thing where Chloe walks for a wall.

That's it that really that other than like falling or flying for a second. Yeah, that's that's a great point. This is wasted potential. So I just, yeah, I don't know, Like I know, I'm kind of out of the gate roof on this, but I'm like, what were you guys thinking? Like I don't understand, Like it's like I have watched this episode three times in my life. It has been when it aired, when I got the DVDs and watched this through the series and now covering it here.

Yeah, I mean I've probably watched it more than that, but it's only because I'm a completionist, so like I rewatch everything if I rewatch a series, and I rewatched this like a couple of times. So originally when I first watched it, I rewatched the series again afterwards because ten seasons is a long time to forget what happened in season one. So I've seen it a few times.

Was like, I love this. This is a fair enough, fair enough. So we start episode starts out there's a previously on Smallville. We get some context for like the engagement Clark and Lows are engaged. We get some v r A talk, you know, we get some death stroke Hawkman stuff. We get shots of Akaman and Marat blowing stuff up, and Sam.

Lane being upset about it. We get all of our being waterboarded like so, so we're covering a lot of ground.

Right, it's very previously.

Yeah, very fously. But then were throwing the suicide squad again, the big explosion where we see like the blur with the X through it that they're really proud of that shot, you know, prisoner exchanged and Chlodeon and Oliver. So there's a lot to catch up on really in this previously. Oh and then of course Chloe putting on the the Doctor Fate helmet as well, So yes, lots of stuff

Yeah, and she's like using their names, like she asked the VRA if they had like Clark Kent and Oliver Queen. I mean Oliver, whom we know is the green Arrow. But you're like literally asking the government do you have this person who you may or may not know who they are.

But hey, she's a general's daughter, right, so she has a general's daughter. She does two things. She says, I do happy and I do stop giving me the run around, bitch, or I will come for you, which is I don't know that's going to get you the customer service you're looking for, Lois, but I thought it wasn't easy.

Maybe from the government. I don't know.

That's right, but you know, in her right should go, you know, pick up the phone. Whenever she knocks over a glass and it shatters, So there's a lot of broken glass on the floor, which is check clas import Yes if you see broken glass on the floor, someone yes, So she starts cleaning up, but then someone comes to the door.

It's the angelically back lit silhouette of her fiance.

Now about the lighting, I feel like they there is an intention when you're in this spoilers, you're in the matrix, I'm gonna call, when you're in this virtual reality, they seem to be blowing out certain things.

Yeah, yeah, it's it's overblown, like there's the lighting is blown out and it's oversaturated. So like just colors are wrong basically. And I don't know if this happens, but I noticed it more later in the episode, So I don't know if it's like as characters or as Clarks start to believe in the fakeness, like the colors get worse. I don't I don't know if it's because I notice it. I don't know if it's just because they're in the Daily Planet bullpen and it's awful colors anyway, I don't know.

That's why I knows the most too.

And yeah it's in the bullpen.

But Clark's here and he's wearing like a T shirt and like some cargo pants or something's very I don't think Clark in this out before. He's got a gym bag with him.

Yeah, he's got like a rucksack or something.

But they released him a couple of days ago. They did because he probably had to walk and he tried. He tried to run away, and I guess, but uh, He's like, it was Lis was the VR. They're waiting for us at Cardinal's funeral. We'll get answers tomorrow. I'm just happy they let us all go, which which they let them all go if we're to believe this is reality.

Yeah, they took away his powers. They don't he hasn't know how this is. They're gonna they manipulated him somehow, and.

She's like, how could they?

I don't remember, there's no blue kryptonits.

Right, we don't know, like and and I realized I started to count stuff like amnesia or hospital. But but I can't because it's all didn't it's fake. It didn't happen, right, it's all fake. So I'm not gonna count. I'm not going to count than the out remembering stuff, and I'm not going to count people going to the hospital. But but he but but then like he has this like

It's Chloe.

It's Chloe.

We haven't seen her in a while.

No, I haven't seen her other than Oliver. Is just strange pictures that he has of her. Linger you're gonna see it get in a minute. By the way, this is the way. That's why I thought of.

That on his like BlackBerry, Yeah, that's amazing.

But Clark, yeah, he has it's basically a seizure. And was like, oh, come back back away, what happened? Did you see what you see? He's somebody was that's what's experimenting on us. Who was it? He says it was Chloe. Somebody's that. Oh my god, has Chloe turned villain in the last three episodes. We haven't seen her. What's going on? Oh my god? Yeah, I don't know.

At any point if you could remember when you first watched this many moons ago, at any point in the episode before she explains everything, did you think Chloe was a bad guy?

No? Right, I mean point no, not at all. Uh. The best attempt at Selly and I think is what Black Canary tells him, Like, hey, her already dancing with Doomsday almost destroyed the League. I was like, thank you. At least someone is mad about this. Still, I'm still mad about it myself. Characters are mad about it. But but no other than her, like, you know, poor choices of like trying to protect you stuff, like she's not gonna Yeah, Chloe kidnapped the Justice League and experimented on them.

That's what I'm right, Yeah, that's that's exactly what. Like, she's working with the government, she's working with the v R.

Yeah. But then we cut the open credits, we come back and then and then Oliver is in the same situation. He's got his cargo pants and his Duffel bag and his T shirt and he's going to his office and it's still like kind of the signs around it, but from the Battle of the destrope v hawkman up there. And he goes in there though, and pulls up his BlackBerry set sees that that that really strange picture that

Yeah, it does. If it was like a picture that he had, it would be less weird. But it's like it's like a horizontal photo, but it's on like the portrait episode. It's like all his letterboxing. It just looks funny.

But you know, he's forged himself a drink and he's he's looking at his lost love on his phone.

Teeny taddy picture on his phone.

This is twenty eleven cell phone here right, Yeah, and he he also gets triggered. He has a seizure of some kind and he shatters his glass table completely.

That you shouldn't have glass tables if you can shatter them. I just don't think that that is a gooseful, you know type. Heiece of furniture, it goes, it goes all over.

You know, I would question the reality of this, but I've seen those those glass tables of luther Mansion shattered all the time on some novel, so I don't think this is necessarily a matrix thing necessarily. But but he too has the visions of Chloe kind of experimenting on or. I mean, they's they're in a compromising place, they're being tube stuck up on them, and Chloe's hovering over them. So what I mean, what else would you assume?

Right jumping to that conclusion, I think totally makes sense, like she's experimenting on us because we're all plugged in with tubes and stuff and she's standing there. I get them coming to that conclusion.

Yeah, Then Clark goes to Watchdower, and so this is where I start to quit. I'm like, okay, wait a minute, wait, wait, wait wait a minute. Like tests in Doctor Hamilton, we're not at Carter's funeral, so they should still be around like unaffected. So where where are they? Oh, they're not here right this episode that makes it really easy. So the only person Clark finds a Watchdower is Dinah, and she is on her eighth hairstyle.

I've noticed, yeah, fourth or fifth. I don't know. What's interesting about what you mentioned, like tests and doctor Hamilton

Okay, See the AC mention really threw me off because I thought they were saying, oh, well, he's in a tube there hooked up two, but no, he's not like like.

Well, like he is, but like we don't see him.

But they release everybody.

Yeah, but it's like they like Chloe mentions that they're also on her list, so like a C is also on the list of people that you can see a get, but they don't show him at all. Because you don't see everybody get released.

You just we just see people that are there, Black Canary wake up and you under Stee.

Oliver and Canary. You don't see anybody else wake up.

Like it's just yeah, Like the problem is they should have had a room of like thirty tubes or I don't know what, twelve right, and then it's like, oh, well, they're all still in there.

Show me, like the boots of the hoodies are something.

Yeah, show me the costume, Like that's so simple. They have the kind of opaque you know tube. Yeah, just put the costumes in their mannequin and like, okay, because because they all got captured their costumes, right, yeah, so what the hell are they not in their costumes when they get out of these tubes.

I don't know they got changed.

I'm just so upset about this entire setup and pay off of this.

A lot of continuity is she's we're not in a continuity place.

Second, what happens in virtual reality stays of virtual reality. That's what I was told in this episode.

What happens in cyberspace stays in cyberspace.

The space cyber Night Easter.

In twenty twelve.

Oh so Clark runs into Black Canary and look, you know what, it's good to see more Black Canary because she's so underserved show like this other than her first episode sor, this is probably the most she's had to do in any appearance, right.

Yeah, it really is. Like in previous ones, she's like popped up on a screen and said some stuff and like she's she was kinden. Was she even really a big factor in like any other part of this season?

Oh this season? No? Season eight, Like her and Ac and all of her were looking for Clark and they all get captured. So like that's and odyssey but beyond that, like no, like doomsday. Yeah, well she was big help, but Doomsday big help.

Yeah, she's a huge help. She's really useful for something like that. But I mean, now there was anybody else on the.

Dues, No, that's that's no shade shade the Black Canary. There.

She is still a person who breaks. She has a little scar in her neck.

Look, I like that attention to detail. They took away my powers and like, oh okay, cool, so there's some physical manifestation of you not having your your your Canary crime, right Clark, He's just I don't know what happened to be.

And with Oliver, it's like they took his equilibrium or messed with his equilibrium, so he's like he's not core made it anymore.

Yeah, they took his.

His ability is balanced.

I gotta say this though, for a show with like they could not decide what Black Canary's hair could be. I like her hair in this episode, but it seems to imply that her blonde hair is her real hair.

Her blond hair is her real hair. Yeah, right, that they established that in the first one.

Well right, but like they established like she has really short dark Yeah, where's a well.

She wore a she wore a dark wig.

Oh yeah, I'm really confused about that. We've never seen her look like this before?

Is no, no, we have Okay, they let her grow her hair out because like, what can they do, Like they can't make her keep the short pix of cut. That's true, She's in like an episode every two years. Well, I thought that's.

Another thing, right. I look at her in the Elena Huffman and I think I said her name wrong pretty much every time she's been on the show. I apologizes. I think I kept calling her like Eleanna Huffman. So a lot of l's and i's and a's. I'm sorry about that anyway, And she was on like Stargate shows

Yeah, I still don't like the characterization. Like there's a lot of stuff and this episode brings it all back, like her weird pro cop they do.

I'm actually kind of shocked that even brought that back to the floor. I thought we had kind of forgotten that, right.

Right, We kind of left her like right wing radio host personality back there in that one episode, but like they brought it back, and like it's just such a weird characterization for her. It's not that she wouldn't be like at least somewhat pro cop because like even in the comics her dad was a police officer. It's not that she wouldn't like have certain like it's fine if she's like very like pro justice like must blah blah blah.

And had she been around, they could have fleshed out her character. The nuance you're looking forward to have been there.

Yeah, so nice.

I just I'm looking for other people. There's only four main characters this season.

Yeah, they're really like they could have done so much more with this character. But I don't know why they didn't want to have Black Canary on the show, like even as much as they had like Arthur Or bart Or Victor.

She's actually here. She's actually here more than some of them, just probably because maybe actor availability. I don't know, but she she she she appears more than Bart. Actually, oh really.

Some reason I felt like he was more like.

Just because she first he left the biggest impression. But literally Bart, he shows up, his pictures, shows up on a lot of screens. Okay, Kyle Gallener only in three episodes.

Oh see, I would have I could have sworn he was more than that.

Well, same thing, I mean, I would have sworn martial man Hunters Like, oh yeah, he's all over the place, like I mean, he's in more than most, but he's still not this huge presence. He's very spread out across the episode. So yeah, that's the thing. I was like, Oh, Alison's not gonna be here. Well what it's what's Selena doing? Can? I don't know?

Just what are we doing?

I had more characters, please, but.

Are we giving Oli her a different love interest? No, he's not a Pine for an entire season?

Okay, exactly, like have Chloe be gone and then him and Canary get together. Anyway, those emails to Canary were strictly batonic, but it turns out Dinah's also having these visions of Chloe experimenting on them, and that's what she's what she says, she did dirty dance of dooms danuely toward league part thank you, thank you.

Honestly, I think Chloe's husband getting murdered by Davis is hennance.

Enough, fair enough, fair enough. But Clark's like, no, no, she she learned her lesson. She wouldn't make that mistake again.

So she learned her lesson back then She's not gonna hang out with anymore villains.

But but then, this whole a lot of this episode hinches on Clark having faith in Chloe.

It does, which is the thing, right, So it's the thing they're trying to talk about, is like belief and faith and friendship and all that. But they're just like wrapping it in this very weird plot.

Yeah, because there is something you've been said for Clark's you know, best de facto best friend at this point, because she's been with them all ten seasons. They've both changed a lot, her more than him, but they both changed a lot. What does that mean for a friendship when people come in and out of your life and they do these right, So that's that's kind of what they're going for. Yeah, but this is not the way to address it.

I have the whole like guts of the episode is like Lois's little monologue to Clark in The Daily Planet, and they could have just done so much more or I think, but even with like the matrix part of it, Like if you had that two parter right and you spent this entire episode rather than just like twenty minutes of this episode trying to get him to believe her, there would have been just more nuance to it. Nuances. What I'm looking for is nuance.

It's the name of the game.

So ten seasons in.

Dinna gets a text message about Oliver. He's a met gin.

Yeah, who knows why.

It's not good. It's not good.

He's he's sitting in a corner observation room.

And I'm like, so clearly they don't have the sets that they had in the back in the name with Belle Reeve, with the padded cells of doctor Walden and Lax and Lionel, like that's the place you go. But Oliver's his head is up against the lens, I assume because his head's all distorted. I'm like, okay, very fishy, sure, but it's because the reality he's distorted it's ditch. I don't know.

He's gone crazy.

Now. I can't criticize any of this stuff because it's not real, right, but it's just.

Funny criticize it even though it's not real.

Well, I'm I'm claricizing her plenty, I think. But it's like, as far as this room goes like he's it's just this weird. It's like if there's a store in the mall that's not occupied, that's what he's in right now.

It's really big. You would expect to be he expect me to be brighter lit. I feel like because we're used to sort of that like sterile environment, which you don't get in this. It doesn't feel sterile at all. It feels like prison.

Don't worry, Oliver, We're gonna fight this. Clark is there to if taken my friends, strip me a onile my weapons, and mess with my equilibrium. Oliver says, to your point of that, that's how they affected him. They got me thinking, clois one this whole thing, I'm sor I'm sorry, Okay, she she was running experiment on me. And then I think Clark refuses to confirm that he also saw Chloy, which is interesting. Yeah, he doesn't want to, like he doesn't want everybody turning against Cloy.

Right, and which I think is interesting because the Oliver's tone when he he like delivers this news is like I can't believe it. They've got me thinking this totally crazy thing that wouldn't possibly happen.

And then Clark asked as suspicious as possible. Yeah, oh, I'm not ready to give up on her, and like, okay, Clark, sure, Yeah, he's gonna figure out what he's got, what's going on, and then he'll be back because everything's gonna be all right. And this scene really you start, I think you really start to see that the overblown like you know, edge lights and stuff, or it starts to show you what's

Not Clark's gone.

Clark's gone. But it's okay though, because not fifteen seconds later, the light starts sparking and the wall.

And then somebody comes out of the wall really twelve.

And it's it's Chloe. She came out of the brick, like a close shaped brick and this is in the this is in the this particular moment. The only reason I even remember it happening, it's gonna it's on the DVDs and like the like Donna, no no, no, like this is a real at the beginning of every DVD, which, Yeah, do you have the small of Blu rays?

By the way, I don't. I don't use physical media these days.

I gotta say, uh, the small Liville Blue rays are disappointing in their menu game, as most Blu rays are these days, because you put it in, it's complete silence. And then it's just like.

You don't get the music that you like wake up to when you fell asleep watching the shows on play all. I like two in the morning, I would wake up to the Gilmore girls like La Las constantly constantly in high school slash college.

It's part of it's it's the end of an era, you know, it's part of our generation. I guess the DVD and the music and it's lost on the kids today because yeah, it's just it's kind of it's it's so sad and empty to just have that screen on and there's no Remy zero, there's no montage there's there's there's no clever subtitles for every chapter of the d d oh god.

Yeah, the chapter subtitles were always really fun, but the version I have now, I actually bought the complete series on Apple TV when it was twenty bucks for all ten seasons.

I did that as well. I had a listener tell me about her, and I rebroadcasted on the social media because I have everybody.

Like, yeah, I think I bought it because you tweeted it.

You're welcome.

Thanks.

No, but it's it's a really convenient way to have I'm at the point now where I'm like, Okay, I'll get this something I love in multiple forms, just to have. Yeah, obviously some marble's gonna be one of those things for me. But uh, anyway, Yes, Chloe has come out of the brick wall.

Right back here. Chloe has appeared in her white suit.

Yes, what is what is this look about?

What's the It's this sterility like it's something that's like not quite real, Like I know people wear white suits, like I've seen Hillary Clinton, but it's and also Pitbull. It's it's there's something like different about the way that she looks.

Right.

Everything else is kind of like gray and browns and blues, and like it's this like sort of muddy there's something like computery about the blues, I feel like. But then like she comes out and she's like this crisp like white and also she's blonde. Like there's this crispness to the way that she looks that's like, oh, so this is reality. I think there's some interesting visual language happening there that just like gets lost in all of the

Yeah, that doesn't help.

No, he's in a straight jacket.

It's funny that they keep calling them flashbacks.

Yeah, you keeping them as flashbacks.

You should have been a flashbacks. I'm like, I don't think I've ever referred to something in my real life as a flashback. It's yeah, right, but it's it's just a TV they It.

Is like that's a narrative term, right, It's like, this is a flashback scene. But for me, if I was experiencing that, it would be like memory, You're appearing in my memory something.

Wow. So he's very skeptical, but of course he would be one that would believe Chloe more than maybe others because they're they're in love.

Yeah, they're sure. It's it's the way that you trust people, right, So, like he loves her, therefore he's willing to trust her, but I also think that they lose the idea that he's Also, he also feels like he's losing grip with reality right now. Like, so he's much more inclined to believe that this isn't real because the reality for him is so bad, right, Like it's that he has lost his grip on everything. He's lost everything he has, and now he's being told by the woman he loves, Oh,

I don't even want those. In fact, I might get rid of him one day anyway.

I'm just it's it's fine, it's no big deal, and it will save my life, you know. So there's that, So yeah, there's I just think that it's just easier for him to be the first one because he's already teetering on the edge, and so much easier for him to decide. Okay, sure, I'll jump.

Now. Twelve minutes in we get told what's going on. I'm like, come on, guys, that's that's pretty quick. That's pretty There's not a set up because like an episode, think an episode like Labyrinth. Right, yeah, we're like, you know, you know that Clark's not really his The whole series has not been his imagination.

Right, there's always one of those episodes, you know, right.

But it's it's intriguing. You're like, oh, what's going on? But this is like, oh hey, here's the deal, Like oh oh, we're all hooked into the the matrix. Okay, you, Clark and everyone else are lying como toast in lab beds. I'm like, oh, okay, your brains are all being wired into real life how which is how is a terrible comparison, but that's why they have the music from two thousand and one at the beginning.

That was how It wasn't virtual reality, how was artificial intelligence.

They're like, well, we don't want to say the matrix. What else can we say? Right anyway, But for those of you who don't understand, it's like you're playing a giant video game.

It's war games. It's fine.

Yeah, that it's being driven by you're subconscious, right, So that's that's that is her explanation, and she is an avatar of herself, Chloe in the sky with diamonds like I have not I have not missed. I have not missed your Your dialogue, You're.

Not gonna dialogue is so cheesy deliver. Most of it just fine, but like some of it's it's real rough.

Broke into a lab of lunacy and all this. It's like, okay, they're lost.

Every line, every single line. It's just some the canary in a cage or whatever.

It's just, oh, canary, I'm trying to get your of your digital cage.

Yeah, thank you. I did not write down all of the dialogue.

She explains that these the the flashbacks.

They're having these flashbacks.

Yeah, there from when she tried she showed up and she tried to pull them out, but when she couldn't because they tried to disc think from the main frame and their body is flat lined, so that's why they have that traumatic memory. And then by the time they got to like Lowist, they had figured out not to do that, right.

They took them three or four tries.

Right, so it was Oliver Clark and Black Canary. Yeah, and after that, no, there was.

No They're like, hang on, they're gonna die if we do. I'm sensing a pattern.

Okay, so if I'm to understand, I'm just trying to keep help me here. All the other Just League's members should still be hooked up in these tubes.

Right, And that's what it seems like.

Yes, okay, all right, they're just.

They're all still there. We just haven't encountered them because we haven't paid them for this episode.

I guess, not even body doubles or yeah, it's like, do we had body doubles at the funeral? Just getting them back? Right, Yeah, Chley has the whole There is no spoon moment, you like, the soon you believe you conmunpulate this reality, the soon you can break free of.

It, and then yeah, there is no spoon.

Suddenly he's uh, he's following her around. He's not straight jacket anymore. They're just walking through the hallways of the hospital. Oh there's eight agents can't say agents can't say that. Basically, agents from the Matrix are walking around and oh my god. And then he gets out of the straight jacket. She's like, come on, Hoodni, let's go. I'm like, enough, yeah, Chloe, okay, but.

No, And that's just the beginning. It's the first scene.

I understand she's been gone for abb We don't need to make up for lost time.

Need to quip, We need to constantly quip. How do we write Chloe if she's not quipping.

Quip quip the trap door for them all to extit the phone booth if you will. If you've seen the Matrix, how they get out of the Matrix.

It's much more dramatic than that.

Yes, eight hundred feet above.

Broadway, so naturally you have to jump off the roof.

I mean, if you want to hit the right angle, I guess.

I guess, Yeah, you have to get really far out.

But hey, she couldn't pick where that was going to be, so no, it disappeared. And hey, these guys they're not virtual cops. They're avatars, by the way, So they're not agents, they're not cops. They're avatars. It's just exposition, exposition, expedition. It's just like, well, you know. He's like, well, then I'm not worried about it if they shoot me and I'm not going to die, He's like, no, no, no. You know when the people who die when they jump

Is the heart attack you have when you know you're gonna die. I I don't know if that's true. I feel like blunt force is probably the thing that actually kills you. But also, this was a thing that I believed when I was a kid. Yeah, so to me, it feels like something that you just didn't google.

Well, you know what this reminded me of. You know Batman, the animated series. You know the episode where Bruce Wayne is in the much like this is in a reality where he's not Batman. He figures it out because he tries to read stuff and you can't read and at the end spoilers mad hatters behind it all. He tells the mad Hatter's like, you can't read it a dream, And from my whole life, I thought you can't read in dream like I don't you can.

I've never been able to read in a dream.

Well, I think it's a it's a they explained it, how like dreaming is like the left side, and writing and reading is the right side, and something is.

Just something like that is a different part of your brain.

Yeah, it's not as clearcut as Batman tried to tell me. It's my point.

No, but I I mean, you can't also unless you're a lucid dreamer, like you can't force yourself to try to read in your dream. But I can't remember. I mean I can't really remember my dreams nine times out of ten anyway. But I don't feel like I remember any dream in which I read something.

I'm not you know, I might put that that a test. I'm not gonna put the skydiving thing in the test.

No, you're not gonna jump out of a plane without a parachute and see what kills you.

No, but but that is to establish the stakes where if you die here, yes, if you die in the matrix, you die in real life. Yeah, we know, said we saw the movie. So Chloe's like, do you trust me? And he's like yeah. So she pulls out some guns and starts mowing down these mowing down these cops.

Yeah, just mowing them down with guns. I think that Chloe always has.

I one of the part of me is like the Dallas and Max say, if I come back, I'm gonna do some action stuff, Like I feel like this almost feels like an actor not she does.

She has a couple of episodes like that too, Like I don't know if it's the next one or if it's soon where they have it's the Date Night episode where she also does a lot of action stuff.

Yeah, I feel like that might have been like Okay, I wonder do you still that before, like some kong fu, some gun stuff, like I want to have some fun, I guess. I mean, if that's what you want to do. So that's going down. And then we go back to the Deli planet and Clark's looking through all the facilities that he might have been out, but he doesn't recognize

I mean, I this this episode feels not even this episode, like the whole Vra storyline in twenty twelve talking from the future, it feels like it was four years too early, like it fits so well into the reality we have since a certain era.

I hear what you're saying about it being too early. It's also too late, right, because it's like Patriocott act, right.

I mean, yeah, it's not that it feels too early necessarily. It's just like when you think of it in retrospect, it's it's like, oh, this would have not this wouldn't have been out of place. Right in a different year, they probably with what was actually going on in a different time period, they might have had like more to write about.

But here it's just really used for character drama. Yeah, Oh well, Lois trusts Chloe because she's her cousin, and Black Canary doesn't trust Chloy because, like you saw her experimenting on this in the government lab, and it's like, I don't know have but black Canary's making some good points.

Yeah, like for someone who didn't really work that closely with her, I guess like it, it makes sense.

Then they pull up the She's hoping Oliver admit Jin look and that you see Chloe and Oliver going through, and Dina just pulls up the all the security feed for met Jen. I guess you can do that from Lois's computer, the Daily Planet, and at least you're shooting these cops. And then and then even the the Chloe dialogue has infected Lois. Now she's like, I hate to crash a little cheap party, but my cousin is no Benedicte Arnold. I was like, is this all revolutionary war references?

Like it's the one turncoat we could think of.

But then Lois drops a hate not everybody switches sides as off of as you and you used to work for Lex and you were his his uh grinder organ grinder monkey, Like okay, yeah, over simplification, but fair enough.

She was a mercenary.

Yeah, but hey, you know what violent criminals deserved a fry. That's a black Canary thinks she.

Does, like right, like and that line, Like she says that line, and I'm like, that's not Black Canary. Like this Black Canary is a person who like in comics that I really enjoyed, like helped reform anti heroes, right.

Like, yeah, this is this is the case where they need a character to do certain things and they're not like concerned about the I didn't get that character.

No, then they never were really.

My gosh, like with Siren, and I think it might have behooved them to do Black Canary by yourself. I mean, you understand the why you would introduce her with Green Arrow in that season seven episode, because of course it's Green Arrow Black Canary. But then as we find out over the years, it's not TV so and that that kind of undercut whatever kind of identity relationships she could

And here we are, right, like we need someone to be a foil, but like not a really well thought out foil.

Yeah, we end up with the roof of the Daily Planet with theories end up on the roof, right. He runs up there to see Oliver and Chloe's like, oh, thank god, right, Like, oh, it's so good because Clark he hasn't seen Chloe since you know, yeah, the beginning of the size right, oh, because she texts him. And again, like I always take screenshots of these small villain not knowing how to visualize text messaging in the year of twenty eleven is still hilarious to me.

I'm like, yes, come on, like, we've been doing this for a while now.

I know the show started in two thousand and one. I'm not gonna hold that against you, but it's come on, everybody has a phone with text message now. But she gets a text some Chloye to meet her, meet her on the roof, right, and Aliver and Chloye up there, and they basically say, hey, this is all fake, jump off the roof with us and we're gonna escape, right yeap. It's got a little bit Inception in here too, which Inception came out in twenty ten. Yeah, so maybe they ripped some of that off too.

They probably did rip some of that of off, like the idea of like folding reality, but like they didn't really they didn't have the budget to do any of it, so it's much more matrix.

They had more steaks here about like scientists are trying to figure out your abilities and if they figure it out, we're gonna turn them off. I'm like, what is this now?

Yeah, it's the whole Like we've figured out a way to like psychosomatically turn off your abilities, and if it works in this virtual reality, it'll work in the real reality. But in the virtual reality, they've just convinced him that his powers don't work.

Yeah, they blocked his neuropaths.

And block them neuropaths.

This is they're trying to add more steaks, Yeah, when they don't need.

Like the reason why you have to get out, Yeah.

Well well that whether that you don't want to be trapped in the like I don't know, Like I feel like they didn't need to add that extra layer. They could have been like, yeah, the government has you all hooked in here and they're just studying how you behave in your world. Like that's there's one hundred things they could have said. They're like, we're gonna turn off your powers.

Right, you could have added like a ticking clock, like I've based on what I've seen in the system, like you have six hours to get out of here, or else you're trapped in here forever like or.

Or something they're gonna they're gonna do something like that. Vraa is gonna do something big in the real world and you guys gotta get out of here and stop it, right like.

Right, yeah, Like literally any kind of ticking clock I think would have been better than they're gonna learn how to turn off your powers in the real world, like.

Yeah, because I never really liked I mean it's visual shorthand now with any Marvel DC anywhere, Like, oh, I got a caller on and I can't use my powers, Like how would that even work? Like really, like, oh, the Flash can't run because he's got his power dampening necklace on, you know what I mean?

Like I never I mean, yeah, I don't. I don't love it. I think I like it when it's a very short like bit of something that's happening, so like the Collars and Earth X, but that works because it's a very short thing. It's just a reason why they can't use their powers, and a story they're not really trying to explain it. This tries to explain it and it but it's not like they've found they're trying to figure out how to use your block, your neuropathways to

Right, Like, I don't don't know, it's just they're overly complicating everything. Yeah, Oliver's abilities.

Come on, ye, give me a ticking clock. So what we have to like shrew up his hearing so that he's constantly got tonys and then he can't have his equilibrium and then he can't shoot straight, Like okay, you could also just kill him.

He's human, Like, so I mean maybe they did this on purpose, so so Clark wouldn't believe her because it does sound kind of it's like, okay, what do we what are we talking about? Right right? Why didn't Ulis knows well, we figured out, we figured out it was dangerous before her, Like okay, sure, but I don't mind Clark for not.

Oh no, I don't either. Like I said, it's really easy for all of her because he was already there and he loves her and like that's a good reason. And for Clark, he's like, where have you been?

Yeah, it's a very valadorous because I want to. Like the thing is, she's like, do you trust me? And he's like I want to.

He gives her the Aladin, she gives him the Aladdin.

You know. You know what the best Aladdin reference the show did was was is in Warrior back last season, like when Warrior Angel with the boy was the man he was, he was at the clothes like do you trust him? Like, oh man, I'm shipping these two too bad. He's an eight year old boy, but anyway bad he's a child.

Yeah, it's very big of them, I know, right, but you have to believe one hundred percent, and if you don't believe one hundred percent, you will not go through the portal.

You will die. And that's why Clark can't do it. So Oliver and Chloe jump off, of course like no, which shows you he didn't believe and then they yeah, they it is the visuals amusing. It's just kind of funny to see them just falling.

Yeah, in the different ways, like Chloe does like this graceful swan dive. Yeah, and Oliver's like.

Ah, the guy who jumps around rooftops all the time, Holy crap. And the girl in the chair, No, she knows exactly what they do to look cool.

She trusts it, undred percent trust it.

But you know what turns out Chloe was right, they were in a virtual reality. Oh how about that?

How about that?

Oliver is not wearing his green Arrow costume when he wakes up, He's wearing you know whatever, these government.

Fatigues, right, like the shirt and the cargo pants.

So they stripped all the heroes and redressed they did.

Yeah, do you imagine trying to do that to Superman? Like trying to redress Superman?

Oh my goodness. I mean did they scrub the makeup off Black Canary's face with the They must have made.

That grease paint man. But she gets it back, she puts it back on before she goes out.

I guess their costumes were nearby Storre. Yeah, but yeah, clothing and Oliver that they embraced and we did this might help you decide and she kisses.

I'm like, oh, you gotta do it, you gotta do it. I'm a giant shipper. I loved it. I'm just I'm a sap for that kind of crap.

Do you feel alive now? Do you so?

And then Rick Flag walks in and works it up.

What the hell are you doing here? She's like, stand down when they and Oliver's like, wait were they they?

I'll take care of these ladies.

Yeah, like oh yeah, tough guy all over here, right, But I'm like, what why are you here?

You know, just Edree, it's not necessary to bring the Suicide Squad back, like it literally could just be Chloe. They don't really do a lot of explaining of where she's been and how she's gotten here. But the thing that it does do, and this is the whole reason why I wanted to be on this episode.

Oh okay, here we are.

The thing that it does do is it completes my theory that Chloe is Oracle, because when Oracle was first introduced by Oustrander and Yale in she was introduced in Suicide Squad, so like she had been horribly mangled in the comic That Shall Not Be named. They had basically done away with her whatever we're done with this character, and they had asked to take her into suicide Squads. They just launched it in the same year. What they decided to do was put her in the wheelchair and

No, that's fantastic. I did not know about the history of Oracle in that way. Obviously, the whole Watchtower thing with her, we all kind of thought.

Right, it works. The whole set looks like.

Yeah, I mean she's surrounded by ice greens, you know that that kind of justified. And then her faking your own death, like I thought that was a bizarre thing they did in season ten with Chloe, like, well, she's yeah, not dead, we all know that, so right, Like referencing that in their own way perhaps makes that make.

In the In the Death of Oracle, which is the first arc of the second volume, which is right around the Brightest Day storyline, she does the whole thing where she fakes her death and then she gathers like a small group of her most close like confidants and tells them, I'm not really dead, but you can't tell anyone because everybody else has to believe the Oracle is gone. And then she comes back again like it It doesn't really pan out because they needed her to be around to do other things.

But there's a line in early season ten, I think not even Tests or Oliver, somebody they say the only person who could delete Chloe is Chloe.

Because she like deleted herself from the internet, right, like she did.

We had to explain why the lesion of the Superheroes never heard of her.

Yeah, exactly.

I think that's their weight around that because at the time it was like, oh, what does that mean you never feature? Does she become Loa's Lane or who knows? Right, I'm just saying as well, the fans are rattling off, that's that's a radical thing to say about this character who you invented. And then like the payoff is now she just deleted herself from the internet.

Like right, but then like but then she comes back and like she becomes a reporter again. So like, I don't know, is she using a pseudonym? She going by queen.

You know you mentioned the Suicide Squad? Uh, kind of being out of place and not doing anything after this. This is the last episode of the Suicide.

Squad, right, they don't matter.

No, Rick Flagg he was in four episodes this season, dead Shot was in two episodes, and then Plastique she was only in the one. And thankfully she is. I mean Jessica Parker Kennedy became actress then yeah, no, good, yes, and you've probably interviewed.

Her, right, I have interviewed her.

Yeah, so she became a much better actress between Smallville and the Yes, and we'll leave it at that. And I did not miss not seeing Plastick anymore with Suicide.

It's my very stupid thing about. The one time I interviewed her was during the press line for the Flash at New York No Saneo Comic Con a bunch of years ago, and she's very nice, but I was like, she's been in something else. Like the whole time I'm standing in this press line waiting for her to show up, and I'm like, she's been in something else. She was in Smallville? Who did she play in Smallville? And I realized it as I was talking to her nice and

A good question? And in multiplepisodes. I think she was in like three, maybe four, three or four.

Yeah, she was in a few because like she does that like version of the Suicide Squad that all has Amanda Waller.

Who also the Injustice League.

Yes, the Injustice Yeah.

That's the thing they do. The Injustice League in season eight, they do chick Me in season nine, and they do the Suicide Squad in season ten. I'm like, that's the thing. These look they should have stuck with Amanda Waller and Checkmate and then the Suicide Squad Like, oh no, we killed Amanda Waller.

Oops, doesn't Amanda Waller When she's introducing by the way, Pam greg graduates for Amanda.

Waller, but welcome to the suicide Squad, right, she.

Says, welcome to the suicide Squad and then like nothing comes of it until suddenly they show up.

Yeah. I love fanger Is.

She's great.

I've had a lot of great Amanda Wallers and she's one of them. She's definitely overlooked.

Yeah, we've got an off track though we have kind off.

Track, but you know what, there the suicide squads here in I'm gonna take some screenshots of this room by the way with the tubes, because I counted five tubes in this room and.

There are five characters that we actually know are in there, even though she does mention well it's Lois Clark, Black Canary Oliver, and she mentions.

Ac so you're thinking he's the fifth.

I think he's the fifth Yeah.

But who were the other Justice League members?

I don't know, maybe there's an another part that you're not seeing.

Okay, I'm just I'm sorry, I'm hung up on this because the cliffhanger was, there's the twelve Justice League members we knocked out, let's see what happens next. And they're like, I get it. Forget two thirds of them, right, So.

Why did I think there was a fifth one?

Like right out of the toime, Chloe would be the fifth one because.

She's Yeah, Chloe would be the fifth one.

There are names, but she's not in some of these too, Like what the name texts say Lois Lane the blur, Yeah, don't. I don't know if you see that fifth one out though, that's what the Blu rays were and pull that out of the HD.

But like, if you're watching, if you're like taking in data from all this, you know that, like you know their names, like their names are just known at this point.

Yeah, it is funny how they like, oh, we better label them so we don't get confused. I've seen this in you know, I gotta bring my Star Trek up that there was a the two part season three premiere of Star Treking Space nine spoilers. Uh, like, uh, the crew of the Defiant gets captured by the Dominion and very similarness. They're all hooked up to this thing and yeah, they have to do a whole thing and they're all

Right, it's just one episode wherecause we done with it in one episode. This is how we like reintroduce Chloe and make everybody trust her again. And that's it. That's all that happens.

So you know, blah blah blah, exposition exposition exposition. Uh, dead shots covering the perimeter whatever? This cowboy dead shot amuses me. Uh, they took too much inspiration from Jonah.

Hex Yeah, it was a lot of Jonah Heck's And.

I'm like, why are you a cowb Did you guys think that was gonna be a big hit that summer? Is that? Why? Like it it's like because I believe I believe twenty eleven was when jonah X came out, yeah, which which I used to say was the worst comic movie of all time. But I recently saw Venom the Last Dance, and I think that might be the worst one. Well, you know, to each their own.

But yeah, anyway, Catwoman's real Baday.

I saw that on a plane once and I haven't watched it since it is I mean, the basketball scene is immortalized, so U Anyway, look, had so many comic movies now it's we can't the best stuff worst stuff lists. They're all so subjective. But anyway, Chloe's doing her whole hacker thing, and we see Dana go up on the screen and she re.

Enters, but she doesn't like jack herself in the same way. So in my mind, she's like typing commands right, and like her avatar is doing things. So to me, did you ever play the game Hugo? Okay, so it was this. It was this instructional game, so like if you were a Homestar Runner fan at any point, like they had a version of they had a trog Door game that

That is crazy that you say that, because you're so right, because she doesn't go sit in a tube yeah and get hooked. And you're like, oh yeah, so when I got when I broke so and so when I broke ac out, I retroactively changed his tube and now I'm using it right. I mean, that's what you do, because that's insane because the next scene when she quote unquote Jack's back in, even though she's not jacking back in.

And she just can imagine Coly just type it away, like just typing out these commands.

What does she see? Can she read the maketrix code?

I mean, what's going on? She must be able to somehow, Like it's I don't know, I'm seeing it as like what was that game that was also entirely textpased, but it was entirely tex based. There was no visual version. It was like the first the first video game. It was like, it wasn't or Zork, it was Zork.

Okay, sorry but no, that's fine, looking up everybody, Yeah, Zork z O r K.

Z r K. Yeah, that was the Yeah. It was like one of the first text based adventure games and you were literally just typing commands in and then getting a response is like what's around you?

But imagine the pace at which you're receiving, Like he just threw a punch and a kick, and but hey, you know what, how did black Canary find Chloe? You go to an alley, You'll find a rat, Tricia.

Yes, you will that, and then it's just a quip off. It's there's a lot of equips and then fighting chill out.

Chloe says, but this is the show articulating. They're manifesting. Okay, Black Canary, he should be with Oliver versus Chloe, who.

Is Yeah, yeah, I mean it kind of makes sense in the context, like they're both very broken people when they get together.

I get it. I just I forgot that we had a Black Canary v.

Chloe fight, right, and that is the I like it that this is the way that Black Canary is like, oh so this is fake because there's no way.

No way a fight. But this is where she drops the line, I want my powers back, and so to Clark and ac Okay, what about Bart and Satanna and Cyborg? Cyborg? Hello, why is Cyborg not a part of this again? Act availability budget? You're in a VR you Yeah, you don't bring back Chloe? Cyborg is Chloe in this and solves all the man I don't have to rewrite every episode as he as I talk about it. But that he can plug into the computer and we don't have to worry about him typing in commands, you know.

Yeah, I mean jack out of the computer and you'll be just fine. I mean he was on a different show at this point, but yeah, yeah, he was on Rosolian Isles by this one.

Isles, that's right. What was on what was Terminator. Sarah Connor chronicles that was like a couple of seasons ago, because I know he was on that.

Guess yeah, it was a pre a few previous seasons ago.

Thompson Young So yeah, alright, r P. But then we have total matrix fight, like Chloe's doing backflips.

Yeah, this is the I know, kung fu moment.

Yeah, when she did that first move of our black Arab, be like, oh, okay, well clearly this is fake. But no, they fight some it's it's interesting, it's visually, it's the matrix is what it is, you know.

I mean, I think it's good. It's like most small boat fights. It's too slow, like we got so used to, like the really good fight Coreo on Arrow.

That's so the guys from Allest on Arrow. Whenever they're on here we talk about Oliver, they say, oh slow Arrow. I'm like, yeah, you're right. I can't argue with that, right. But the one thing, the one thing that really seals the deal is I really like a you know, there's this blade that pops out of BlackBerry's boot, which is pretty bad ass. She pulls out, catches it, throws it right at Chloe and then Chloe just stops it, just like Neo stops the bullets, because the episode takes it

Okay? But divorced from the other lines, I like the delivery of I told you Dorothy, this is all a dream. Like, I think it works. Yeah, if it was divorced from so many other quips that just happened.

Well, yeah, absolutely, that's the in isolation all these things. Yeah, did I get really mad about on Smallville? Like I'd be really chill about. But I don't need to hear seventeen bad Superman references in a row that like to the two good ones.

You know, there were so many, Like there's so many canary equips, like bird related.

Canary in your digital cage.

Yeah, Like we didn't need that taunting. We just needed the the Dorothy line.

Right, that's so we needed. But then you know, we cut back to the real world and Lieutenant Trotter was stroke. Lieutenant she is you know what, And she'd been in a couple episodes before this, which I'm like, okay, thank you, thank you for a recurring actress or recurring guest star, like it's not government person number seventeen of the week. She is dead set on getting these vigilanties. She's really,

They did have. They had her like grease paint with the multiple colors.

I thought, I spent a lot of time on this, more than anyone should, thinking about how how quickly you can maybe do just what if she has like a sponge that she could like of all of the paint ready where she could just put it on her face real quick.

It's kind of like a temporary tattoo. Yeah, you just sort of like stick it over and you just wet it and then you peel it off.

Right, that has to be it, otherwise it's.

An a right, that's so it's this. There's some really sharp edges in that makeup.

Yeah, that's right. That's man. That requires some some precision work.

It would take time.

It's like, hey, cloy sorry, She's like, it's okay. What happens in cyberspace, days and cyberspaces.

It happens in cyberspace days and cyberspace.

They have made up by the way, Bechdel test passed with that fight scene, right, yeah.

You goat there are just two people just fighting each other. It's just yes, it's there. It was a good fight kind of.

Yeah for small bull standards. So I guess Dina goes after she and her employee make up there. I guess she goes to change into her costume. Oliver employee talked about Clark didn't trust me. I can't believe it, and he's like, what's because you left us? You know, hich Is.

I'm sorry about that too.

Yeah. Actually I'm pretty upset about that as well. But if we don't get Clark out in seventeen minutes, and we might never get about because here come the government. So who finally we have this, Now we have our ticking clock. So then we we we we see the Blurs tube and Clark's in there, and we're on the streets and track lists and I really they really kind of you're maybe they racked up the I feel like.

They ratchet up the overexposed like stuff.

Yeah, because we really see it now on the street and the Daily Planet. So at some point Chloe talks to Lois.

Yeah, we just didn't see it, okay, because well it's like she talked to me. I talked to Chloe about it.

I know.

We need to make time for the ten minutes of like coda's in these episodes. Right, I'd forgotten how many codas there were.

This is the structure of Smallville. Like the episode ends at the end of Act four, Yeah, and then Act five is all just what do we learned today? Everyone?

Yeah?

Yeah, but again, like this episode, and that's that this is a this is a great like microcus on the problem this episode, like Clark, Chloe talked to me and told me everything. I'm like, show don't tell right, yeah, instead of like, oh yeah, the government kidnapped you all and hooked you up to machine. Can we see that?

Yeah? Like we almost I would almost prefer Clark to say what Chloe told him and for Lois to be like, Okay, why don't you believe her? Like what reason do you have not to believe her? Like, just show that she has the blind faith.

Instead of we had a very crucial conversation off screen that we didn't think was worth our time in hearing. Yeah, you and Chloe have battled luthers, you fought with demons from space and battled supernatural hexes together. Sex. Yes, you have. That's why you should That's that's why you should trust her.

Yeah, and that was honestly, that was a good like the Looser Luthors being season one through seven, and then the Hexes and the space demons being Slash nine and now that's it. That's how we summed up the whole series.

Right, But what's really going on? Clark and he's like, I don't know Chloe anymore, and I feel like, as the viewer, I don't know Chloe anymore either, so it is kind of meta.

Yeah.

Yeah, so it's it's interesting that they approached his head on. They try to make it part of the narrative. I guess I applaud them for that.

Yeah, but it boils down the whole episode into this one like five minute scene, rather than like teasing it out over the course of the episode or over the course of two episodes.

Ideally, you know, the uh again, the the continuity listing off here from the Torch to Summers at the Lake. Yeah, to the planet and watch time, Like Summers at the Lake. You talking about the episode of a Command, right, that.

One episode where we read the lake we went to the lake, remember in season four, like episode four he went to the lake that one time.

But this is having the opposite effect onund Clarke. He's like, yeah, you know, it's blinding me to the truth. Clolling on. You are on a different past. I don't know where she's headed right, And I mean she's made some crushable decisions the last couple of seasons, So you know, I get why he'd be on on not trusting her the way he should.

I get it. But also like this is his whole subburness streak, like his like suddenly he doesn't trust people or believe things when it's like what reason have they given you not to trust them or what? Like, there's just like the whole Davis Bloom situation. It's like I will not kill It's like we've ascousted all the other options.

Well, they kind of forget that Chloe, Like the reason she left was the prisoner exchange for all of her like they're act like, right, where did she go? Why didn't she tell it? Yeah, she faked her death or whatever, but like she's off the grid, like I don't know, it's it's it's they act like she just left one day and like there was no reason, so I don't know, like she.

Just disappeared and didn't tell like she literally traded her life for olivers.

Yeah, and then they do it a whole other gear where he's like, you know, I expect to Cloyd to trust me all these years and she didn't know my secret, and how do you trust me? And then that turns in their conversations later and I felt like it was a whole different gear they went into with that whole trust talk, but.

They had to get in there really fast. Yeah.

Yeah, it's and you said it earlier like that that seems to be the theme, Like what is this episode about? Really seems to be that, But it definitely gets lost in all this nonsense.

Definitely right, like they don't they don't spend enough time with it, and and that's a lot of like we have to do the plot contrivances to get us there, but like there's no other thing or it's like it's not that she constantly. She's not there constantly trying to convince Clark. It's like she tries. Once it doesn't work, Lois does it. Okay, it's fine, and now we have evil Chloe.

Yeah. Because so the the government, the VRA, whatever, they came, we got there, they got past. They knock out Chloe. And because it's not a Chloe hooked yourself up into the matrix and whatever, it's her typing in a team. You know, there is a microphone there. I'm gonna assume maybe she's telling her turn left, turn right.

Yeah, maybe she's maybe she's actually speaking the words into the computer place.

Let's hope. So, but Lieutenant Trotter and and everybody comes in and it gets one of her deck guys on the computer do whatever it takes to stop him. And then we see like not Chloe avatar.

You.

I mean they literally it's funny. They literally spell it out. They're like, you solds Avatar. I'm like, okay, well show Intel.

Right, like you're just we we got it, like we do know what's happening.

What's funny is we see the avatar like struggle with being taken over. Like I'm like what is strange, Like there's it would just be waiting more commands. Yeah, yeah, struggle to be taken over, Like, oh, we really need to make him clear to all the viewers at home. This is such a funny scene to me because Chloe and uh not. Chloe runs into Clark and Will's on the way up to the roof mm hmm, and they're like, oh, we're gonna go jump off the roof. She said, Clark,

You'll die.

It's a delusion. It's PTSD, Like I don't know.

Right, She like throws back the PTSD thing because he uses PTSD at one point.

Yeah, so it's actually pretty clever, like she's using his own earlier arguments against him. Yeah, and was like, wait, you're not Chloe.

Is this the point where she's like, if this isn't real that I can just like kicks her through a door.

Yes, she just slaps her like you know, through the through the bullpen and knocks her out.

So yeah, it's like, Okay, that worked.

Anything's possible. So if he knew that, I don't just imagine they're on the roof. Then all of a sudden, you know, like we better take the elevator up to the roof, right, We'll just.

Go through that door and I will be on the roof. But they're not that imaginative.

They're not I mean, I know Clark's not.

No, but you imagine, like you think of how like movie sets are built, right, your TV sets are built where like doors open into other sets. Yeah, you could use that, Like so you walk through the actual door in between these two sets and suddenly you're on the roof. That would have been cool. Yeah.

Yeah, we cut back to the real world, and and and the government's like, we got the blur right where we want him, don't let him out, Okay.

Got him right where you want him, right near the exit.

And this yeah, like I don't I don't know, but they've blind folded Chloe. They're taken her out to the street. But guess what, that's the cue for the Justice League and the Suicide Squad to save the day.

With projectile weapons.

Yeah, I mean, that's that's the lesson kids. Just as long as you have friends with guns, you know, you can say guns and Rick flag Man, I guess that's a bulletproof vest he's wearing. He's got the giant vests. We've always seen him, and he's just walking right in the line of fire, shooting people with pistols.

You know, he's just really true.

We see dead Shot has his heads up displaying his giant eye piece, and he sees Chloe, you know, dead to rights with two other people, and then he does a fancy bullet trick with his revolvers somehow.

Yeah. That that other movie with I don't know when it came out, with Angelina Jolie and Joe MCATs want it.

That wasn't that bad. That's a concept, is fun. And then another government person is gonna grab Chloe, but then an arrow comes out and stops him even though there's no When green arrow shows up, he has no bo he has the wrong angle. Yeah, that's and then okay Black Canary, yep, she just does cart Will after cart Will after I like it. Okay, it works all right, I thought you might.

It works for me. It's it's correct in the way that I envisioned Black Canary. When Black Canary is not talking, it's great. And then she says words.

But then she has she has her power landing, you know, her superhar landing with her landing and then she knocks out the trotter there with her canary cry, and all is well outside you know, Rick flag and dead shot. We all reconvene. Everything's great.

Everybody gets high fives.

Yeah, he gives it. Do you all give each other like the smile of a p Yeah. And then we cut back to the matrix and uh, evil Chloe is there waiting to stop them from jumping off the roof. And then and then she's like, start cycle analyzing Clark, like we've studied you, and you're never going to jump off this roof, right okay.

Which is weird because in reality he would just jump off the roof because he would be fine.

Now he is afraid of heights. I guess there is that, but like he's indestructible, so.

Right, like he knows he'll land.

Like they I don't know. The cycle analyzation is like you want to believe so bad everything you hear and see and feel. I was like, I guess, I don't know. I don't feel like that's really common so far. Yeah, Like I don't understand, but this is really like we know we were in the matrix right like as far as like we know, this episode has ripped off the

Yeah, I mean they're just sort of like finishing the Matrix parody, right, like or the homage.

In case you didn't get it before.

In case you didn't understand it before, they didn't, you know, use the words mister Anderson, but you know.

It is inevitable, mister can't.

Yeah.

So she's like, Lois is like, trust yourself. He trusted me when you told me your secret. So this is this is kind of I think this is their way of like Lois is the key to making him fly that kind of thing, which I agree with, which which saw a homecoming when you started to float, and I always kind of wish that would be the thing of the series, like oh no, she's up in their force one. You better go right now, instead of like, oh thanks Jarelle for showing me everything I did over the past

It doesn't come from necessity. It's just sort of like, yeah, you've earned it, yeah, which which which works, but it doesn't work, but it doesn't like continue sort of the themes were giving.

Yeah, yeah, because you know what for all matrix bs aside, it is nice to see Clark and Lowis flying around the Daily Planet. Yeah, the little did we know we were never going to see Superman and Lowe's fly around on this show.

The one time this was it.

I hope you enjoyed it.

This is all you got.

It looks good.

I think I agree. I think it looks pretty. I mean I enjoyed it the first time. I enjoyed it. Again it was it's nice, and I mean, it's unfortunate that it's the only time I get to see it.

But you know, but for them to have a nice moment together and they smiling at each other, like just taking it in, like slowing down and enjoying that like that, that's something the show doesn't often do. So I applied it for that, Like if there's something to take away positive from this episode.

It took a moment, it gave it a moment. It gave us some time, it gave us some breathing room. It's like the one thing that it gave that and it's it was a good thing to do.

Yeah, and then they just fly full speed down onto that portal and.

Boom, we're back, and we got the commercial that we're.

Back on the Kid Farm. I'm like, whoa wait a minute. I guess Clark woke up and like kicked that guy's ass off the computer. And yeah, and maybe he released the rest of the Justice League, if they were there or not. It's all very not clear.

It's all very unclear.

Yeah, all very unclear. But then we get to we get a scene with Chloe and Clark here and she's looking at Chloe's holding the season one candid photo of Chloe, Pete and Clark, and then also a production photo or screencap from Homecoming of Lolis and Clark as the home Coming King and Queen. It's funny nobody says the name Pete, but I'm glad we at least see his pictures and stuff around this season, so.

It's you know, it's the last season they knew it, you know, it's you gotta do the the look back, right.

Yeah, And then this is where they kind of have their discussion about, Hey, I didn't trust you because I missed you and you didn't talk to me and we've how did you trust me before? And I don't know, Like I guess I never felt like this is a conversation these characters needed to.

Have, right. I feel like they they sort of buried all of that after Chloe found out his secret and didn't say anything for like six months.

Yeah, I'm like, that's that's ancient buried drama, right. She also says I can't believe it's been five years already. I'm like five years since what, like you graduated high school? Like since season five? Like what do he like you should say? I can't believe we've been friends for eleven years now, Clark or something, And that would have been more right.

Yeah.

Yeah, But she's been the one living in her own virtual world, hasn't She can disconnect it from everyone the Arty, she broke everyone free from the matrix, But she's been in a matrix of her own design since she left.

So Okay, it's been trapped.

Half the credit goes to the doctor Fate helmet by the way, because it's it told her something bad.

It warned her of many things.

Yeah, Clark questions her using the suicide Squad. Yeah, and then every Frankenstein has a human heart. I guess they're they're all monsters. Is that your Is that her point about the suicide Squad?

I don't know, Like it's it's such a nonsensical point, like it's it doesn't make sense as a comment in my mind unless you think of like them being created out of blah blah blah, like like the the remnants of Checkmate they've risen from the Yeah, I don't know, I'm just reaching at this point.

But she she wrote a computer programming thing that turned off all of his whatever his terrorist activities were.

And she's killed my uncle.

Yeah. Well yeah, true right. She could either report them to the government or they could report to her. So do they still report to her? I mean, we never see them again.

We do not unclear unclear, unclear.

But then they transition to that trust conversation, and then you know, then they hey, everything's good.

We're cool, it's fine. We have a few more episodes with you. So it's cool. Also, we have an important question.

Yeah, exactly. So Lois shows up. Oh sorry, guys, I'm stuck in traffic now that I'm not in the matrix. Aha, But Chloe, you have an important question for you? Will you be made of honor? Was like, oh, yeah, you know now this You know on TV shows, when people get married, they got to have they've got to fill out their wedding party, got to have a best man of made on her. You look around whatever characters are around, right, and that's your that's your best.

Man, right, And sometimes it doesn't make sense.

In this case, it makes sense, all right, Yeah, because they've been their cousins, they've been friends for years, Oliver being Clark's best man. I think rewatching the show, I'm like, okay, that they've been through so much together, like yeah, profecially last three years. That that tracks so that that that is, that's that same energy of oh, who's the other guy on the show? Right?

Yeah, basically it's who's the other guy on the show? But but they have Yeah I buy it too. Yeah, we have two more codas to get through.

Yeah, but then uh, we cut to the watchtower and Oliver has a big bouquet and and Chloe. Were they meeting here for a date or something.

They must have been because she's dressed up.

Yeah, and they kind of resolve there whatever lingering problems. Yeah, so you ship them, huh?

I do? Honestly, I do. It works for me. I don't. I don't. I think it works for me in part because I didn't read the comments before I watched the show, so I had no reason to be annoyed at any part of it. But I do I ship them. I I don't know if I shipped them until the point where the show started shipping them and I was like, oh, this actually worked for me. I kind of like the two broken people finding each other thing they are bad

I mean, at the time, I was just happy that Chloe was gonna get a happy ending because they had teased death and insanity and all these horrible things for her. I'm like, Okay, well she ended up with Green Narrow and that's there's no Batman in this universe and he's a second mess hero and so great, that's good for you to get Superman much you got Batman equivalent.

They end up with some like domestic life, and then you get the comic books, which has more of their domestic life.

But Rewatching, I'm like, I don't like taller, more of a tests even like Colvere with blowests, like I don't. There's just something more there between those.

Yeah, there's there's definitely more there there with those those characters. They just spend more time I think establishing their relationship as like people who respect each other but also like quip off each other and like they have these little It's like the flirtation is different with Oliver and Chloe. It's a lot darker. Yeah, Like the flirtation is a lot darker, which isn't necessarily bad, but it's like I said, it's not necessarily healthy either. So it works for me.

No fair enough. So Oliver, He's like, hey, you coulda like called, And Chloe's like, oh, I wanted to be with the fate helmet. It told me to stay with that sounds like it will be a excuse. It really is, doctor fight helmet.

Doctor Faith's helmet just told me that I had to stay away. And also things were happening and all this other stuff and it didn't drive me nuts, which is really remarkable, and I was able to take it off.

Yeah, no, Oliver, I do like his responses. He's like, yeah, did it say anything about me? Like, shouldn't all be depressed? Look looking for your face on this way?

I'm like, oh, he kind of.

Yeah, No, I like that. In an episode where I was like cringing in a lot of the style, I like this. And Justine Hartley's pulling it off too. He is hoping I'd come across her smile but never find it. I'm like, okay, all right, that's nice.

Right, Oh they love each other, that's kinda they're gonna be okay, they're.

Gonna be fine, and other things will happen in between.

But and yeah, that's true. She you know, she'd reach out because she didn't think she could trust herself. Mm hm, that's that's cute. That's cute.

Right, it works. I don't know why it works, it just does.

So they reconcile, and then we cut back to the Kin Farm and Clark is going through Carter Hall's journal.

This is a new journal, and also Lois is planning the wedding in secret.

Well, I guess she wanted to pick up the dresses, the.

Bridesmaid dresses and the flowers. Which, sure, those can be like your decisions. But why is it like Clark means to be in the bar.

Why don't you come out there? I'm gonna write, Yeah, it's not like a wedding dress is being a secret or anything. It's like, yeah, you can be you should actually be part of those decisions, actually.

Right, Like the only thing you shouldn't be involved in is the dress, like the wedding dress.

Yeah, no, I agree. And by the way, Clark is wearing his red shirt with a blue jacket, and I've noticed that this costume has popped up a little bit. Still, I don't have a counter for that or anything, and I'm not going to have one, don't worry. But they've wisely one hundred percent phased out the blue shirt, red jacket.

Yeah, they're moving toward the Superman, right, but they're.

Like, well he can wear this quote unquote bizarre look at an outfit, right Still, So anyway, it's just fun to see him with that still. But yeah, this is a scene with Lewis and quite it's cute. She comes up behind him and covers his eyes up right, and he's been reading this Hawkman journal. He's like, yeah, I'm thinking a lot about him. I didn't know this was I was like, this is the Veritas Journal with their Hawkman stuff in there, but no, it's just another another journal.

The thing where he's like, I've been thinking a lot about him lately. I'm like, he just died. Yeah, like just died. I would I hope you're thinking a lot about him recently.

Yeah, I don't know why. I'm just really on the thoughts of my friend who I just saw murdered by death.

I'm just buried.

But you know, they you know, they talk about love and trust and all that, and how she inspired him to fly and she really enjoyed it, and she's like, well, who knows, maybe we'll get to fly in the real world one day. Maybe we won't see it.

We won't see it, but maybe one day they will.

And this doesn't bother me because like he knows, he should be able to fly. Yeah, so it's not that for a while, right, it's not some weird Superman reference thing that it would bother me because like Lois even says, I can't leap tall traffic in a single bound earlier, that kind of stuff infuriates me. Yeah, no one would say that because that phrase doesn't exist unless Warrior Ranger had a TV show and it said leaps all buildings in a single But that's what that's what it would

It more powerful than a locomotive.

Yeah yeah, maybe to step there. Yeah, but uh no, Clark and Close have a beautiful kiss, and she says, oh, speaking of the real world, I have a conference called Perry at seven. Keeping Perry White in the show.

And keeping Perry White in the show.

Love those references because surely they'll get him back for the series finale. I mean, he's married to an ed O'Toole. It would be silly.

If we didn't, surely they'll have him in the next episode that she's in.

Of course, why wouldn't you. It just makes sense. Yes, I'm very happy we got at least his voice cameo with the series finale.

Yeah, we tell you.

But when you cast an actor who's married to one of your main customers for years, who herself comes back for several episodes, not gonna lie kind of disappointed. He didn't come back at all in season ten. I mean he was in season nine, so thank you for that. But I'm like, two episodes and a voiceover is all we got.

Yeah, just say we get he's just too good for this, you know, small.

Little you know, it's really good about like finding the right beat to end an episode on you know, like either it's like this w B and a emotional with a song or like a X Files like mystery kind of thing, like a stre this episode just.

Ends, it does And it's like my one criticism. I have many Christians, but my one of my criticisms of the show one of the ones that always pops up and I'm rewatching something and I forget how many codas they have at the end of episodes. It's like they find the right thing to end it on, but they have to have like four endings first and then to find the right one.

Day and they shuffle them around, right, because yeah, Like, honestly, I would have maybe ended this and maybe they thought about this ending it with the all over Chloe scene, because if this is Chloe's comeback episode, Yeah, you have this nice wide shot of them kissing the watch tower, right, I'm like that, Yeah to me, that seems more like an ending shot than like Clark's sitting or at the bar and be like huh yeah, in the close up of him.

You could have sucked the two Smallville scenes together somehow and had like Chloe leave and then their Lois is like, so I finished these things.

Right, Yeah? Yeah, Well well that's only episode ends.

That's how the episode ends. You're an American hero.

You're my flesh and blood, my only son.

They struck me at my weapons, passed my equilivering there inside my head.

Now someone was performing experiments on me. They took away my powers.

Loss.

Smallville returns Friday, January twenty eight at eight seventh Central. In the year two thousand and one, the World's Greatest Hero took his first steps honored and.

Welcome home, my son. One joy, A new judge is about to begin.

In an epic television series that would be defined an American icon. Over ten years, he found a family.

Thanks for always believing in me.

You're welcome, sirn his first love.

I've waited for this for so long.

A way to fill in Lois.

You're looking at the newest recruits in the daily planet and a place where he belonged.

What are you trying to tell me that?

Then?

From another planet?

Suppose you stashed my spaceship in the attic.

Actually it's in the storm celling. Now he will defend the only home he's ever known.

Luther's building an army and starting a war.

You can't let that happen. And everything he's loved. Whatever you are watching, are you against the forces that destroyed his home world? These small you gotta have faith.

I do witness an event for ten years in the making. One man will become the hero.

I've come this far and I'm not looking back. He was meant to be small.

Season from Your Friday, September twenty fourth on the cw elnt.

What up.

A very street Inchanti boo? They said he wanted.

Very So what are you? Oh?

And what if my soulmate comes along and I'm too blind to see it?

Just follow your heart and you'll always do the right thing. Oh bad, past line?

What needs your quack?

What about what we need?

Man need?

Sad?

Sweet set?

Who are you?

Glois?

Lois Lie? Great? Piss?

Hello, It's just swim.

You're more than just a hero. You're a superhero.

Give me a nerd with glasses any day of the week.

Whatsome, Something dark is coming.

You're gonna be tested like you have never been tested before.

Street right, I know.

My destiny of Small fill season premiere of next Friday at eight seventh Central.

This is where it's all been leading you become. That's great to say it. More than two hours of special features. The final season of Small till.

On Blu Ray and DVD November twenty ninth, and on the Complete series collection on DVD.

Collateral got a seven point seven out of ten on IMDb, and Douglas Trumble from the Superman Homepage gave it a four out of five. Really yeah so on the letter grade scale, trisom, what would you give this episode? C?

Minus?

Okay? Good, It's not great good.

It's not great, there's some good moments. It brings Choe back, that's it.

I'm glad you said C minus because you clearly liked it more than me. Yes, so that makes me feel a lot more confident in saying D plus. Okay, is that harsh? I don't know. I don't think so. Since you gave it that score, I feel better about my score.

Even in the episodes of this season that are basically just ripped off of movies, this is the weakest one.

There's a way to do it, Okay, like the best one, Mercy in season five, they ripped off Saw, like that is Saw, but that's a great episode. It is, Yeah, like, there's a way to do it where it's not like, I.

Mean, even the Hangover episode is more fun, you know, yeah.

At least there's that, But this it's it's there's so much you know, technical babble, nonsense, and it's and honestly, it's the lack of paying off this this huge cliffhanger they gave us. Yeah, of like the Justice League is knocked out and they're like, I guess we're to assume they're all in other tubes and then they all got released, and I'm like, yeah, they didn't properly clean that up. Like, oh yeah, well, those VR people are gonna be in trouble.

It does not.

Oliver's hospital visit didn't count either. It doesn't happen. Didn't happen. So really, all we're left with is a movie plot as an episode that's a plus one, which, obviously, thank you, that's gonna bring us to twenty three. And that's the thing though, right, It's like there are like total recall. There's other movies where you're in something else, but like when the way this was presented, especially the yeah it's the matrix. It's the matrix.

So they they stop like trying to disguise it this season.

Oh yeah, yeah, there's no like, oh, what do we have like a whole whole bunch of Chloe surround him and he has to fly off. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's that's the matrix. Bechtel tests passed, though it does.

It does pass the Bechdel test barely, but it does.

Yeah. Well, you know black Canary and Chloe fighting for sure.

Yeah, there you have it.

That is collateral and that is small Villa Trigian, thank you so much for being on the episode.

Of course, happy too, even the bad ones. You know, I like the bad ones. They're fun.

I'm glad that you brought that that oracle Chloe theory to it.

That's what I needed to do.

I learned. I learned a lot about Commed. That's why I love having guests on that. No stuff I don't like. I learned a lot about that that oracle common becustory with the suicide Squad. To me, it makes more exciense on how why they conflated the suicide squad with Chloe, because I mean.

It's still it was still unnecessary, but like as a comic fan, I like that they did it.

Yeah, and we're we're never gonna see them again. They are the worst suicide Squad, right, they.

Are absolutely the worst suicide squad.

And I look, I think Suicide Squad the first one is an awful film, but those characters are better than these characters.

The character is better than and it like it gives you. It does it twice for no reason, but it gives you the actual like setup of what the suicide Squad is. Yeah, even if it's bad, like it's very very bad, but this version of the suicide Squad is much.

Worse, and it's just unfortunate. I'm tired of saying this is the worst version of this character. Here soon. I feel like I'm gonna do it a lot lately. But that's where we are. So but hey, always a pleasure talking small, always with you. If people don't find you in your work out there, where can they find you?

They can find me on most of the social Media's not so much on X these days, but certainly on Instagram, Blue Sky, those places at Trishanness everywhere you can find.

Me, and of course on always hold on to DC's Legends of Tomorrow.

The podcast with the shortest possible name, also known as ahat Theklat when we're having a good time. We've been on a little bit of a hiatus right now, lots of life stuff getting in the way, but we have a bunch of episodes. They're very fun. We jump around in time, as do the Legends, so we we have a good time with that.

Honestly, did you guys ever do a Matrix episode?

We did not do a Matrix episode, but we did do the the episode in which they're stuck in Ava's purgatory and it's very gay and I made my fiance beyond that, there you go.

I love the Star Trek episode or the TV episode as well.

Oh yeah, that that's one of Matt's favorites too, so we did that one, I think for one of his Bengos.

Yeah.

There are ways to do it, right, There are ways to do it.

There are If you want wacky, fun superhero, you go over TOC's legs tomorrow. Yeah alrighty well, that's gonna do it for our conversation this time, but we'll be back next time talking about Beacon. But until then, always hold

Hope to see you there, Always along too. Smallville's theme music is by Lance Laster and our podcast art is by Tom Gurky. You can follow us on Twitter at always Maulville with one S. You can find us on Facebook at always hold on to Smallville, and you can send us an email at always Maulville at gmail dot com. Once again with one S for listening