TVLine’s Michael Ausiello and Matt Webb Mitovich have the exclusive on two items concerning Smallville, as it prepares to fly off into the sunset in its final season. One is confirmation (finally) of what fans of the show have been hoping for, and the other is a spoilery development of another character (unless you’ve seen the end of last week’s episode). First, Michael Rosenbaum has finally been confirmed to return in the series finale as Lex Luthor. “I’m delighted to return for the series finale,” Rosenbaum tells TVLine exclusively. “I’m simply doing it for all of the fans out there who made Smallville the great success it is. I appreciate all of their passion, their relentlessness, and even their threats. Ha ha.” The actor continues, “I can’t wait to hug the old crew back in Vancouver one last time and see all of my old friends once again. Oh, and for Lex to become the bad-ass he’s destined to be.”
Indeed, Rosenbaum’s failure to return would have left a hole in the show as it rounds out a ridiculous ten seasons. Fans have been clamoring for it since Rosenbaum left after the season 7 finale, where Lex disappeared in the Fortress of Solitude after it was brought down by a Kryptonian artifact…the same one that ushered in the clones of Zod and all the other Kryptonians in Season 8. A severely injured “Lex” was later killed in an explosion engineered by Green Arrow later that season, although it was just a body double in a Darth Vader-style breathing mask and not Rosenbaum. In the Season 10 premiere, it was revealed that there was a cloning experiment undertaken to return Lex from the dead. One of the clones returned to cause Clark some trouble, and one, Alexander, has been a loose end since he started to age with all of Lex’s memories and grudges. The second item concerns that clone. If you’re familiar with the Superman mythos, it won’t be that big a strain to guess who that clone turns out to be. You can catch a very spoilery glimpse of him here.
That’s all well and good, but um, where the hell has Darkseid been this entire friggin’ season?