The first thing we learn in this episode is that Lois Lane (Erica Durance) is a hard drinker on par with Marion Ravenwood. When the drinking game has a rough end, she finds herself arrested when one of the aggressive guys she was playing against ends up paralyzed. We know she’s not at fault, but how will he prove it?

Recruit debuted on 9 February, 2005 and was written by Todd Slavkin and Darren Swimmer.

Meanwhile, back in Smallville, Chloe (Allison Mack) is seeing Clark (Tom Welling) in a completely different way now that she knows his secret. I can’t wait to see how this plays out through the season (and series?). And Clark is being scouted by Met U for a football scholarship. Geoff Johns (Chris Carmack)is the team captain, and he’s involved in both storylines.

How much do you want to bet that he’s not only involved, but the villain of the piece?

Met U pulls out all the stops to impress Clark, and it seems to be working, which plays delightfully against Lois investigating the team and the relations around it. What will Lois and Clark figure out? And what is Geoff up to? And what abilities does he have?

Lex (Michael Rosenbaum) offers Jason (Jensen Ackles) a job, not to keep he and Lana (Kristin Kreuk) separate, which is what Jason initially thinks. Lex wants to keep an eye on Jason’s mother, Genevieve (Jane Seymour).

Lana is less than impressed with Lex’s interference. That is, until he shows her documentation that Jason may have known what has been going on with his mother, the spells, and more since the beginning.

The story makes Clark rethink football and his abilities, so he decides to not take the scholarship. And no matter what Clark chooses for his schooling, Jonathan (John Schneider) and Martha (Annette O’Toole) promise to be there and help make it happen for him.

The story ends with Lois getting kicked out of university (because of drinking and more) so she ends up at the Kent farmhouse… again.

Krypto waw written by Luke Schelhaas and debuted on 16 February, 2005. It introduces this universe’s varition on Superman’s famous dog.

It seems there’s a pair of dogs (Hercules and Einstein) with super abilities owned by a couple of criminal brothers who are using them for nefarious purposes, including robbing the Smallville Co-op.

When Lois acidentally hits Einstein, she brings him home to the Kent farm, where Clark soon discovers the dog’s abilities. The subdeermal microship suggests that he escaped from a LuthorCorp lab.

Oh, and Lois seems to be allergic to the good boy.

The pair of brothers plan to rob a LuthorCorp van of its payroll, and sadly for Clark, when they go to stop it, there’s kryptonite on board. Happily, the dog, not called Krypto yet (no one can decide on a name), is able to follow.

Following the events, Clark has decided on the name of Krypto, which is overruled to be Shelby, but is the dog going to be around now? Man, I hope so.

And Genevieve comes to see Lex and Jason, who confronts his mother about her plans about Isabelle and the spell book. Honestly, that storyline is a little silly. I know, I know, I’m getting upset about magic in a series about super-powers.

It’s not enough to make me give up on the show, because I love the cast, and I like how most of the series is handled. And I know magic shows up in the comic books as well, it just… I dunno.

Still, I do like seeing Clark becoming the hero we know he’ll be.