Season 1, Episode 6: "Broken Trust" (SPOILERS)

[LL2K2]

(This episode was originally titled "Smells Like Teen Spirit," but I have a feeling the songwriter's estate told them, 'uh-uh.')

SUPERMAN & LOIS RETURNS TONIGHT WITH NEW EPISODES – Clark (Tyler Hoechlin) reconsiders his decision to let Jordan (Alex Garfin) play football. Meanwhile, Lois’ (Elizabeth Tulloch) continued investigation of Morgan Edge (Adam Rayner) requires her to trust an unexpected ally. Emmanuelle Chriqui, Dylan Walsh, Erik Valdez, Inde Navarrette and Wole Parks also star. (#106). The episode was directed by Sudz Sutherland and written by Katie Aldrin. Original airdate 5/18/2021.

 

[Dr.]

(This episode was originally titled "Smells Like Teen Spirit," but I have a feeling the songwriter's estate told them, 'uh-uh.')

Just as an aside…

I’m not sure that song, book or movie titles are copyright-able. A quick glance at Supergirl episodes (for instance) reveals “The Body Guard,” “All About Eve,” “Suspicious Minds,” “City of Lost Children,” “The Martian Chronicles” and (just recently) “Prom Night.” Then there are cutesy variations like “Immortal Kombat” and “Phantom Menaces.”

However, certain unique words and phrases may be trademark-able. And “smells like teen spirit” is somewhat unique. Maybe CW legal decided it wasn’t worth the risk.

 

[Dark Raven]

Just as an aside…

I’m not sure that song, book or movie titles are copyright-able. A quick glance at Supergirl episodes (for instance) reveals “The Body Guard,” “All About Eve,” “Suspicious Minds,” “City of Lost Children,” “The Martian Chronicles” and (just recently) “Prom Night.” Then there are cutesy variations like “Immortal Kombat” and “Phantom Menaces.”

However, certain unique words and phrases may be trademark-able. And “smells like teen spirit” is somewhat unique. Maybe CW legal decided it wasn’t worth the risk.

If they had used a paragram and slightly changed the phrase though to something similar like "smells like team spirit" or whatever, it would probably fall under parody/ satire and be protected. They used the very distinctive and unique title "The Perks of Being a Wallflower" and changed it to "The Perks of Not Being a Wallflower." But even that I don't see really as either trademarkable, as with "smells like teen spirit." The "smells like teen spirit" would have to be within the same trademark category as the original (song), and not used in a different context like an episode title.

EDIT: I saw that the Vampire Diaries on the CW already had an episode in their third season called "Smells like teen spirit", so I don't think not using it on Superman and Clark has anything to do with any legal issues.

 

[herolee10]

 

[herolee10]

 

[The Caped Knight]

That was a Superheroic rescue by Superman!

 

[flickchick85]

That was a Superheroic rescue by Superman!

My feed cut off right in the middle of it, so I'll have to catch that on my Amazon version later tonight. I don't get why my CW feed never has any issues during The Flash, and then as soon as S&L starts, it gets all glitchy.

 

[The Caped Knight]

So Jordan is discovering super hearing ability.

 

[Primal Slayer]

So CW should've tacked on a "Previously On" montage. You put the show off for over a month and then we jump right back to where we left off lol.

I laughed that Disney+ is the sponsor for this episode.

 

[The Caped Knight]

The strength training with Jordan, Clark and Jonathan was nice. Jonathan definitely goes out of his way to be supportive of his brother. I really hope when he gets his powers it will be the same treatment

 

[The Caped Knight]

Wow that was unexpected. Glad to see Jonathan get a chance to play in the rival football game between Metropolis and Smallville. As for Jordan's uncontrollable heat vision blast, nice save Clark.

 

[flickchick85]

Ok so normally I'm a Jordan defender, but his inability to grasp the seriousness of the dangers these powers pose is really frustrating me this episode.

 

[flickchick85]

Lois: "Leslie Larr was there. Turns out SHE has powers too!"

Clark: *headdesk*

 

[The Caped Knight]

Man the drama and tension is just perfect. Jonathan definitely has Clark's character of being a boyscout, while Jordan is brash and impulsive like Lois

 

[The Caped Knight]

Wait a minute I think the x-kryptonite is what's accelerated the Dormant Kryptonian abilities within Jordan and perhaps the key to Jonathan getting his powers.

 

[Orb]

Tyler nailed that Trust speech

 

[Primal Slayer]

Show comes back where we left off and remains enjoyable as ever!

A little unsure how Kryptonite bullets didn't do much to Clark and how he was able to almost shrug them off so I wish that had more of an impact.

The Lois/Luthor team up was fun, Lois looked great in her black turtleneck, it just screamed Lois to me.

 

[vantheman77]

Love seeing the tension amongst the characters after coming back from the hiatus.

 

[The Caped Knight]

Show comes back where we left off and remains enjoyable as ever!

A little unsure how Kryptonite bullets didn't do much to Clark and how he was able to almost shrug them off so I wish that had more of an impact.

The Lois/Luthor team up was fun, Lois looked great in her black turtleneck, it just screamed Lois to me.

Well it's been 20 years, perhaps Superman has built up a tolerance to Kryptonite that he's able to fight through the pain. Also it's possible his suit has a Kryptonian durability nanotechnology resistance.

I think Captain Luthor or Alexander Luthor is probably caught off guard with how different this Lois is to his counterpart. She has similarities of been headstrong and direct

 

[vantheman77]

I guess Captain Luthor will learn that just because he had Lois in his world doesn't mean the Lois of a parallel world will be the same.

 

[flickchick85]

So CW should've tacked on a "Previously On" montage.

They did have one on my feed.

Anyway, so great to have this show back!

My frustrations with Jordan aside, I thought this was a really good ep. I saw the Lois/Lana team-up coming a mile away, as soon as Edge took special interest in her, but it was still nice to see. Looking forward to more of that. Also glad we finally got a Lois/Jordan scene. Until now, it seemed like the parenting was divided up between the Supers (Clark/Jordan) and the non-Supers (Lois/Jon), so it's good to switch that up every now and then. Lois catching on quickly to the "Marcus" charade (even before they were attacked and he busted out his mysterious tech) was a pleasant surprise too.

Clark's speeches in this episode (there were a few) were all really good, and SO perfectly Superman, imo. We even got a "you're stronger than you think you are," though in radically different context from All-Star, of course. But my nerdy side is just glad to be able to read that panel and hear it in Tyler's voice.

A minor detail I liked, was how Clark altered his voice when telling those soldiers to stand down. Something that's there in the comics but rarely addressed in most media is that Clark should have that "Super vocal cords" ability that the Flash does on his show and almost never uses it, so it was cool to see some hint of that here.

Considering his suit instantly started repairing itself when he pulled out that Kryptonite he was stabbed with in the pilot, I think it's fair to assume that suit is some form of "armor" and offers him a bit of Kryptonite resistance.

Next week looks awesome.

 

[vantheman77]

These episodes are like comic book issues!!

 

[flickchick85]

I just realized I haven't been adding polls to the episode threads here, and that's entirely because I forgot about them, so I'll start doing that now.

 

[KaijuDude1992]

Hoechlin was just all kinds of awesome throughout this whole episode IMO and yeah I kind of enjoyed seeing Jordan getting chewed out at the end there by Clark and Johnathan because honestly he deserved it.

Love the family tension in this show though and even seeing Captain Luthor and Lois team up for a bit was more interesting and enjoyable than I thought it would be.

This was a great episode to start off the season again and probably one of my favortie episodes to come out of this show in a while or atleast since the earlier episodes of this season.

 

[The Caped Knight]

Yep the suit definitely has natotech it repaired itself as soon as Clark pulled out the Kryptonite bullets. Which means that Clark probably reinforced his suit after the early years of wearing Ma Kent's homemade suit.