Five episodes, four instances of Clark almost blowing his cover. At least I know it’s a pattern now!
1. Why not just buy them and smash them at home?
“The Mystery of the Broken Statues” begins with Lois discovering that there are folks going to all of Metropolis’s souvenir shops and buying up/smashing 50 cent porcelain animal statues. They are looking for contents inside, and leave all but the suspect items held in them, leaving the broken pieces all over the floor of the shops. Lois, always a detective trapped in a reporter’s body, starts to investigate.
Now, this is actually a reasonably clever plot, but it is bizarre to me that the crooks wouldn’t just buy the statues, bring them to their hideout, and smash them there? That draws zero attention, and seems eminently more logical than making a mess in a dozen shops. The shop owners seem happy that people are buying their trashy little statues, and I know that the value of four bits has gone up quite a bit, but isn’t the clean up more trouble than its worth? No owner thought to say “Hey, I’ll give you a bulk deal, just smash them on your own time.”
2. Superman does very little here
So in this episode, Superman does exactly two things: he flies across town so Clark can walk in a store faster, and he stops a plane taking off with Lois in it. That’s literally all. This show should be called Clark, Lois, and Jimmy Solve Crimes That Aren’t Any of Their Business.
The character of Clark Kent does a lot, but mainly just wears the most ill-fitting double breasted suit in television history. It looks like he found a dead man in an alley, thought “Woo hoo! Free suit!” and changed clothes with the poor corpse. Honestly, I know style has changed, but he practically has a fanny pack of extra suit material around his midsection.
So, remember all those items I mentioned earlier, hidden inside the statues? Well, Clark has figured out the code. In some Good Will Hunting shit, he uses all the symbols to make a pattern that no human or Krpytonian could ever assemble this easily. Maybe Clark is hiding the nine hours he was up in the middle of the night figuring this all out, but he essentially arranges all the items in a +/- order, so to eliminate certain letters and spell out a PO Box number.
I get why the show couldn’t do Brainaic, but can’t we at least get Superman doing something other than Brain Games?
3. Is Truman listed?
“The Monkey Mystery” begins with some depressing shit, as an old man tells his daughter to leave before the government kills him, and he gives her a formula that they are after. He tells her to go to the United States and give this formula to the President only. Don’t trust anyone else!
Now, I get what he is going for, but how is an Eastern European 20 year old supposed to get a sit down with the President? Even in the early 50s that seems like an untenable task, but bless her, she tries. Don’t get me wrong, she fails miserably, but at least she tries!
4. Organ grinding 101
I sort of respect the villains in this episode for having such an elaborate plan, involving an organ grinder and his money to relay messages back to the button men. This seems like a recipe for disaster, which it is, as the monkey, not a criminal mastermind, gives Lois the instructions meant for the gangsters, not a fortune.
Now, this monkey, dressed like Superman, is played for laughs, obviously, but I’m sort of surprised how little intelligence the show gives him. This isn’t a complaint, but can’t you imagine on I Love Lucy there being a monkey that can read or some shit? Once I saw the costume on the monkey, I was sure he’d be some sort of super monkey but, alas, he’s not.
5. What else is in that drawer?
So one of the crooks pulls a revolver from a desk drawer and is going to shoot the money with it, but then changes his mind, and pulls a banana out of that same drawer. Is that a drawer exclusively filled with phallic objects? Otherwise, that’s some really weird office organization.
