Episode 4.5: Run

When Jonathan Kent is almost hit by a car, he is saved by the fastest man alive. No, not Clark, but Bart Allen. Bart is no meteor infected kid though. He's a metahuman. But when he's not saving people from oncoming traffic, he's boosting their wallets. Clark tracks him down to retrieve his dad's wallet, but when he exhibits similar powers to Barry, Barry comes to the Kent farm to make his aquaintance. Clark tries to teach him to do right by people, but Barry doesn't listen, instead stealing a newly acquired artefact from Lex. The artefact is also of importance to Clark as it appears to be a map that could be instructions from Jor-El. Can Clark get the map back? And can he put Bart onto the straight and narrow path? Meanwhile, Lana tells Jason the truth about her new tatoo.

Season 4 so far has a very different flavour to previous seasons. We've had no Lionel for the past three episodes and I kinda miss the evil bugger! It's also strange to have so many scenes involving Lana which have nothing to do with Clark. It's not a bad thing but it definitely makes the show feel different.

This is the best episode of the season so far. The introduction of Bart really opens doors to a much wider world of DC characters, which is a tantilizing prospect. It also takes us away from the meteor infected angle, which is always a good thing for the show. Bart is a pretty cool character as well. I like that he embraces the fun that one could have with such powers and seeing him hitting on Chloe with the best chat up line ever really made me chuckle.

I've said this before but I have to say it again. I feel like I can only blame Clark at this point for Lex getting closer to the darkside. His bareface lies are so evident that I kinda just want Lex to call him out on it. "Dude, why are you so clearly lying to me?!" Lex says things in such a way that he makes it known that he knows. It's like he's dangling a carrot, giving Clark the opportunity to come clean. But the more Clark turns away from that carrot the closer Lex is going to get to wacking him over the head with it in sheer frustration.

For now the whole story with Lana and her tattoo is actually not that bad. I like that she opens up to Jason at this point. The thing that kept her and Clark apart were secrets. At the start of this episode she looked like she was going to fall into the same pattern of behaviour as Clark, dodging questions for fear of speaking the truth. So it's nice to see that she does things differently by sharing the truth with Jason.

She gets a nice moment with Martha too, when she helps Martha to realize that she's been working all night at the Talon as a way of avoiding the fear she feels, when she's at home, that she might lose Jonathan.

This is a very good episode that mixes a sense of fun with some really good character moments.

10/10