REB #22: “When baking, follow directions. When cooking, go by your own taste.”

– Laiko Bahrs

Well, I guess I didn’t follow Bahrs’ directions for baking, which are to…er…follow directions.

I was flipping through my copy of my grandma’s cookbook the other day and decided to try to make Chocolate Bittersweets. I think this recipe was actually my great grandmother’s, passed down to my grandmother at some point (and that’s not to say it was an original recipe of hers either, as many of the recipes in the book came from other family members, and a couple were even taken from the sides of boxes). I’ll preface this by saying these things are far from bitter, so the name doesn’t really reflect what they are. I’m also not sure what category they belong in. Cookie? Minicake? Something else entirely? Here they are.

In any case, I noticed that I had all of the ingredients to make the cookie/cake part and most of the ingredients for the icing, but I didn’t have the coconut or cream cheese for the filling. I’m not even sure how that works, by the way: how do you put filling and icing in/on a cookie or cake? Well, the problem was solved when I decided to go ahead and make them with just the icing. But I had to improvise on the icing because I didn’t have chocolate chips to make it. So I used…

And it worked wonderfully.

Does anyone else like to cook or bake? I’m certainly no expert, but I do enjoy it, especially when it’s a recipe from my grandma’s book. What problems do you run into? Do you like to improvise? Because I feel like I do it all the time, sometimes because I don’t like what’s included in the recipe (like the nuts in Chocolate Bittersweets) so I leave that particular item out, other times because I feel like I’d like the recipe better with something else added. In this case, I took a risk using Nutella instead of chocolate chips, because while Nutella is fantastic, it is very different from actual chocolate in terms of taste, and in this case, it is also a completely different consistency (a spread) than chocolate chips (which are hard). Luckily, the chocolate had to be melted anyway, so it worked out. In short: Nutella can be used to make a really great icing, if you’re a Nutella fan. You just have to be okay with a hazelnut taste in your chocolate.

*NOTE: This blog entry is syndicated from a blog I had to start for my Electronic Publishing class at U.B. this semester. I may or may not delete the extraneous blog when the class is over, but I thought I would at least give my readers the opportunity to read the contents of that blog indefinitely.

TwitTV: Smallville 10×03, “Supergirl”

I’ll start this off by admitting that I am a big fan of flashbacks and flashforwards, when they’re done correctly. That said, “Supergirl,” the third episode of Smallville‘s final season, begins with a fantastic reintroduction to Darkseid, the one we first see at the end of the tenth season premier. It’s a very simple “three weeks earlier” kind of flashback, and what really makes it simple is that it is so quick. All we see is Darkseid’s essence revealing itself, just like in the premier, and then its takeover of the radio D.J. Gordon Godfrey. At this point, I start to wonder if Godrey had been anti-hero before now or if it is only since Darkseid came to Earth. If that’s the case, he sure wrote that book fast, didn’t he? I guess you can get away with that when you’re an alien, bodiless menace.

In this episode, Godfrey/Darkseid is holding a rally against the heroes, at which he unveils a billboard designed for his cause. And of course, the billboard breaks and threatens to tumble down into the shocked and, frankly, deserving crowd of haters (okay, kidding), but at the last second, when Clark is trying to figure out how to save everyone, Kara makes her triumphant return. Actually, let’s make that Supergirl, because she’s fully dressed in her own iconic red, yellow, and blue. What really makes this moment for me is that Lois immediately recognizes Kara and says, “Isn’t that your cousin, Clark?” More on Lois later.

While the Supergirl photoshoot is amusing and yields such lines as “you’re the woman of tomorrow today” (photographer) and “you didn’t come to Earth to be the first super-powered pinup girl” (Clark), I’m not really sure why it’s here. I know Kara is trying to get her image and status as a superhero out there, but would this really happen? In any case, Kara tells Clark that his father has let him go and Clark is “no longer his son,” and this conversation is probably what Clark needs to jumpstart his superhero…ness. That should be a word. Anyway, Kara reveals that she has a mission to protect Earth and Clark is no longer involved. Clearly, this hurts Clark and, of course, makes him want to be a hero all the more. So he convinces Kara to teach him how to fly, which actually works for a few seconds. There are some beautiful closeups of a butterfly, and then Clark. But then Clark loses it and falls back to Earth. Maybe I was too optimistic to think that Clark would actually learn to fly, for real, in this episode, but at least he’s on his way. This episode is kind of huge, in that regard. Clark actually flies on purpose in this episode, and not as “evil” Kal-El, even if it’s only for a few seconds. Later, though, the awesomeness momentum is dropped a little when we get another one of those ridiculous computer scenes where something impossible happens to serve a plot point: Kara (who is suddenly a computer guru, it seems) sharpens a picture in about half a second and sees that the car driver is Lois. This is never going to happen, with today’s technology, not like that anyway. But that’s okay; Smallville isn’t exactly a show focused on computers, so I’ll allow a little misstep if it makes the episode work. Besides, they make up for it by having Clark realize, just by hearing the phrase “three weeks ago,” how Darkseid got to Earth and, later, who it most likely inhabited. This is the kind of logical thinking that will make Clark a great Superman.

Back to Lois, isn’t her return adorable and sweet? Clark’s smile as he turns around to hug her at the rally, and her smile for him, makes my heart melt. Erica Durance and Tom Welling sure do have chemistry (and I think we’ll really see that next week, but more on that at the end of this blog entry). When danger rears its ugly head, though, the tone changes, and we are launched into the meat of the episode, which has Lois pretending to be Godfrey’s/Darkseid’s driver, as well as a bondage-clad stripper/prostitute (?), in order to help take him down. When Darkseid realizes that it’s Lois, who has taken pictures in order to discredit Godrey/Darkseid and end his crusade against heroes, he tries to inhabit her but figures out that she is pure of heart, so he can’t. And of course she is pure of heart! She’s Lois! The reason she is here now, in fact, is that she believes the heroes are a force of intrinsic good that will keep the world safe, and what’s so wrong with that? But now she knows Clark’s secret, so she is also doing this to help the man she loves keep his cover and stay safe while also saving the world. While she’s doing it for herself, on some level, to keep her boyfriend safe, she is also doing it for the world because she believes in the heroes. In this sense, maybe Lois herself is a kind of hero, a non-caped crusader for justice and peace.

When Clark and Kara realize what’s going on, they come to save Lois and take out Darkseid. This will go down as one of the most important moments for Clark’s journey to becoming Superman, as his face-off with an empathic villain is particularly enlightening. The fears and hopes Clark has come bubbling to the surface, and perhaps now he understands Jor-El’s reasoning for sending Kara to Earth. Clark is not yet ready to be the world’s protector because he has some growing up to do, quickly. For him to be who his father wants him to be, he has to stop this cycle of trying and yet failing to live up to expectations. He has to stop complaining that he doesn’t know how to be a hero and just figure out a way to be a hero on his own terms. As Yoda would say, “there is no try.” Clark must do.

The final few moments of the episode revolve around Clark, Kara, Lois, and Oliver, and I for one am riveted at this point. Lois’ trying to figure out a name for Kara (“…Ubergirl. Powergirl? Megagirl!”) is hilarious, and then we shift gears a little when she tells Clark, “The Blur is different. He’s my hero.” Before this season, this would have seemed cheesy and trite because Lois would have been blissfully unaware of Clark’s status. Now, it is still cheesy and trite, but because Lois knows the truth and is obviously having a bit of fun with Clark, it is sweet. We know they are in love, but what we’ve seen since Lois figured out the truth has been something deeper. Lois not only loves Clark but also admires him, fully adores him with every fiber of her being, because of who he is as a person and who he will be to the world when he is ready. She loves him as Clark and The Blur/Superman – together now, not separately.

This scene comes just after Kara has a heart-to-heart with Lois, in which Kara admits that “even heroes need someone to come home to.” While Kara is too distant from real life (with no real friends to call her own, no lover, etc.), Clark is too attached to it. It is obvious that, somewhere between these two extremes, there is a happy medium for both Clark and Kara to find. I think this is when Lois realizes that it is okay for her to be with Clark because, even though he is a hero to the world, he is also the love of her life, and why shouldn’t they both get to be happy? A power couple.

The next time we see Kara, she is running into Clark on the Metropolis streets, in disguise (yes!), explaining that she still has work to do on Earth. The Darkness (A.K.A. Darkseid) is still lingering, and it is her job to catch it. Does this mean that Kara will be back before the show is over? Personally, I hope so, because I’ve always loved the character, and I like what Laura Vandervoort does with her on Smallville.

Finally, we end the episode on an exciting note, as Oliver comes out of the hero closet, a group of reporters surrounding him in his office: “There’s only one way for me to set the record straight. I am Green Arrow.” What does this mean for the future of heroes on Smallville? Will Supergirl eventually be able to discard the dark wig and glasses she now wears as “Linda” (or the Smallville equivalent name)? What will it mean for Clark? Will the age-old question of why hasn’t Clark been wearing glasses finally be answered? Will Smallville‘s version of Clark/Superman be unique in that Clark will be fully out to the public as Superman by the series’ end? Only time will tell. While that seems like a preposterous notion, I wouldn’t put it past the show’s crew to figure out some way to make it work.

Now for next week, it’s the momentous two hundredth episode on October 15th! Lois convinces Clark to go to back to Smallville High for homecoming and his five-year reunion, at which he meets up with Braniac 5 (that’s right: James Marsters returns to Smallville again) and begins a journey through time. We’ll see flashbacks to Lana and Chloe, to high school, but we’ll also see hints at the future. This may very well be the most important episode of the series, beyond the series premier and finale, so don’t miss it! As you’ll see in the TV Guide exclusive trailer below, the episode looks amazing, and Lois and Clark fans will be happy to see the chemistry explode when the couple finally says the three/four little words we’ve been waiting for (at least I don’t think they’ve said it yet).

TwitTV: Smallville, 10×02, “Shield”

In an effort to reduce the amount of time and editing that it takes to write these TwitTV reviews, I’m going to limit them somehow, starting with the second episode, “Shield.” I don’t know what to exclude, and maybe it will vary from episode to episode, but I expect it may just be a matter of not describing every little thing from opening shot to closing shot. For this one, I’m going to focus on certain areas like structure, particular characters/concepts, etc., rather than describing the episode in detail (because we’ve all seen it).

First of all, I really admire the structure of “Shield.” It’s very unSmallvilley, and I like that; it’s refreshing, for a change. By this, I mean that it is not necessarily one of the freak-of-the-week episodes we are accustomed to, in which Clark catches the bad guy by the fifty-minute mark and we are treated to five or ten minutes of denouement for the final act. In this episode, Clark does catch the bad guy (Deadshot, who is awesome, but more on that soon) very close to the fifty-minute mark, maybe a little past it, but it turns out that said bad guy is a member of the Suicide Squad, which comes to break him out of jail (or Belle Reeve or whatever that was). In short, they will be back.

Another thing about the structure that I really like is how the opening scene mirrors the closing scene. First, Clark is shopping online for a plane ticket to Egypt, so he can see Lois. Then, after catching Deadshot and realizing a thing or two for himself, he stands alone on the top of the Planet, wearing an awesome red jacket, and drops the ticket to the ground. Behind him, the U.S. flag waves, and it looks like very much like a cape. For a second, I actually think he is going to fly, that he is going to figure out how to use his flight power to go to Africa to see Lois. And then it dawns on me that Clark has realized he can’t go see her – that’s why he let go of the ticket – and just has to wait for her to come back to him. Maybe that’s the intention of the scene, and if so, it works perfectly. If not, well, it still works to that effect. What adds to this scene, though, is the text message Carter gets earlier in the episode, when he is with Lois in Africa: Clark has instructed Carter to watch out for Lois. And of course he has! That’s such a Clark thing to do. Always looking out for the ones he loves when he can’t be there.

Next, there are a lot of really great closeups in this episode, especially the ones with Oliver and Tess when they’re reading Chloe’s letter. I enjoyed Tess’ line “the only one who could erase Chloe is Chloe” – and then later, when she says, “Our kitten reporter is on the move,” referring to Cat Grant (more on her soon). Anyway, Oliver is piecing together what happened to Chloe, bit by bit, and it seems Tess knows more than she is letting on. She helped Chloe disappear. There are some great performances for these two in this scene, and I look forward to more interactions in future episodes. Oliver and Tess don’t get a lot of screen time together, but when they do, there’s always an interesting chemistry on set. And speaking of Chloe…hot picture! Sometimes, I don’t think I take her relationship with Oliver seriously because it came out of the blue, and don’t get me wrong, it’s nice, but she wasn’t very serious about it in the beginning. That’s why it’s so weird to think that she and Oliver are actually in love now. I can’t wait for her to come back to him now, especially knowing now that she faked her death for a few reasons: to free Green Arrow, to get some distance from the Green Arrow life, and, ironically, heartbreakingly, to save her beloved Oliver.

Now, as for Cat Grant, I’m so glad they got Keri Lynn Pratt to play her. The first time I ever saw her, it was as Martin’s aunt on 7th Heaven. The character was incredibly ridiculous, and I think that – coupled with the fact that most of the actors on 7th Heaven are pretty bad or just have bad material to work with – just made me think Pratt was a bad actor as well. But then I saw what she could do on Jack & Bobby and Veronica Mars, and I fell in love with her. As Cat Grant, she brings some of that ditzy blonde attitude that I know she can do, that I’ve seen in each of her characters (maybe that’s Pratt’s “thing”), but also manages to add a kind of dramatic quality that I haven’t seen in her until now. Her black wig is both hilarious and practical. I can tell she is scared of Deadshot, as well as the superheroes, and it’s interesting to see the Smallville Cat as a crusader against heroes because I know how much the Lois & Clark version admires Superman. What really sells me on Pratt as Cat Grant is the scene between her and Clark where Cat is talking about herself and Clark throws a curveball by saying, “Kind of like the vigilantes.” Pratt’s facial expression here is fantastic, as she has Cat come to terms with the fact that she is indeed very much like the vigilantes she despises. I do have a problem with Cat, though: she’s not actually Cat Grant! Yet again, the Smallville team provides us with a character from the Superman universe but chooses to make that person a phony. This time, we get Mary Louise Schroeder assuming the name Cat Grant, whereas before, Jimmy Olsen was the fake. This practice is sad, and I hope it’s the last time we see it. If I were to rate episodes in my reviews, I would certainly take points off for this.

Okay, back to Deadshot. I didn’t know who Deadshot was before this episode, but I love the way they introduce him. The gunslinger shot is absolutely beautiful, with the low angles and deep colors, and then there’s the shot itself and, later, Clark’s save (of Cat). That said, there are some wonderful effects in this episode, and I loved seeing Clark perform a classic Superman save. The skull effect on his shoulder is rather interesting, and since it comes so late in the episode, it makes me wonder how they can fit all this in before the end of the hour. I decide there’s no way they can, and I am right: this episode is merely setting up for something that will happen later. Considering it’s only the second episode of the season, I’m impressed. Usually, we get filler at this point, so I already love the structure that producers Souders and Peterson have set up for the season.

On that note, the scenes with Lois and Carter are filled with mythology and setup. He explains his romantic curse to Lois, gives her some advice about Clark, and sets up for the Isis episode all at the same time! Clark as Ra is a great metaphor, and I love that Lois is so enthusiastic about it. I also enjoy the part where Carter describes the “über mensch” and Lois gets to translate: “a super man.” As far as I know, Lana is the only one to say “super man/Superman” before this episode, when she asks Clark, “What are you, man or super man?” I’m not sure which episode this was; I wish I knew. But in any case, as Lois is uttering the iconic word/phrase, Clark is standing on top of the Planet, dropping his ticket, a “cape” waving behind him. I love this ending. And even though there are a few weak points in the episode (the Cat Grant fakery, the lack of screentime for Deadshot, e.g.), I quite enjoy it. Besides, I know both Cat and Deadshot will be back, even if Cat isn’t really Cat Grant.