Facade was written by Holly Harold and debuted on 6 October, 2004.

It’s his senior year, and Clark (Tom Welling) ignores Jonathan (John Schneider) and signs up for high school football, whose team has a new assistant coach, Jason (Jensen Ackles), Lana’s (Kristin Kreuk) new fella. That raises a number of ethical questions.

We also get a freak-of-the-week story when a student, Abigail (Brianna Brown), elects to have some experimental surgery to enhance her appearance. The side effect is that she affects those she kisses. Lois (Erica Durance) decides to do some digging and gets herself into some trouble. Whatever was done to Abigil was done by her mother, Dr. Elaine Fine (Julianne Christie), who is apparently consulting and working in Smallville – is she a dermatologist? She also investigates Lana’s back tattoo and explains it’s not ink, but almost a brand.

Oh and speaking of Lois, how are we keeping her around Smallville? Her father, General Lane (Michael Ironside) shows up to let her know that her university acceptance has been pulled, she’s short a few credits… so she’s off to Smallville High.

There’s a nice flashback scene that not only establishes Abigail’s character and her acne issues, but also gives us a glimpse of Whitney (Eric Johnson).

It’s a great character bit to see Clark longing to play football and just be a regular guy. And speaking of regular stuff, Martha (Annette O’Toole) and Jonathan (John Schneider) debate over her pursuing a new job. Unfortunately, it’s with LuthorCorp, but it will help with medical bills and keeping the farm afloat. She’ll be looking after the Talon.

The freak of the week story is pretty typical, but the character growth and beats are nice, including seeing Lois take care of herself, and Clark and Jonathan connecting despite their difference of opinion on his football signup. Oh, and Chloe (Allison Mack) realizes that she still can’t have Clark when she sees the way Lois and he interact.

Devoted was written by Luke Schelhaas, and it first aired on 13 October, 2004.

Now that Clark is on the football team, we would be remiss not to have an episode about the cheerleaders supporting the team. And they seem to have a pretty strong sway over a number of the players.

There’s Mandy (Amanda Walsh, man the crush I have on her), Rhonda (Chelan Simmons), Mary (Lisa Marie Caruk) and Mara (Moneca Delain). They’ve been doing a number of the players with kryptonite-laced ‘love potions,’

Problems ensue, however, when Chloe imbibes some and becomes completely devoted to Clark. And when Jason has some, he becomes insanely jealous of Clark’s friendship with Lana. Jason attacks him, which is brutal, because it hurts Clark, as he’s mistakenly had some of the kryptonite-laced drink as well.

Lois is still fighting to get readmitted into Metropolis U, to no avail. Lex (Michael Rosenbaum) is trying to rebuild his friendship with Clark. He buys the football team new jerseys, gives Clark all of his files on him, and has destroyed the car from their first meeting.

And speaking of Clark, not only is the team less than thrilled that he’s the starting quarterback after walking on to the field this year, but he may not have time to work for the school paper anymore. And Lois is definitely becoming more of an investigator, but thanks to some help from Clark and Lex, Lois is heading to university after all. But I bet she’ll be back soon.

The fourth season is growing up, and there are lots of new things going on with the characters and the way they’re evolving. It’s walking a line between fun and building its mythology.