You almost had the perfect episode, Smallville. Really.

Right up until we hit the end? I really loved Abyss. The writers were doing everything right. They took Chloe and Clark, put their friendship and all the history of it into an episode, threw Jimmy and Davis in for flavor and even a cherry on top with the Fortress and the father-son chat.

It was a tour de force for everyone involved. They hit it out of the park. Tom and Allison working together is always magic, but for the first time since the Chloe/Jimmy storyline started? I genuinely felt a connection with the relationship. (Bit late to the party, all things considered, but yay!)

I was seriously walking on air. Which is probably why I hit so hard when I got to the end. See, the thing of it is, the conclusion of the episode. In fandom parlance, it was completely made of fail.

My problems with it are myriad, but not for what you'd think. Under the previous producers I would have had a very cynical thought and completely missed the rest. With Al and Miles, I would have rolled my eyes at another ham handed attempt at derailing the romantic competition. In fact, when I first heard the spoilers for this episode, that was exactly what I went into this expecting.

Truth is, I'm still am. I'm not sure the new producers can resist the temptation. It's just so easy. Why build a real relationship when you can just batter down all the others? They miss the obvious. That doing so creates the appearance that Clark didn't really choose the woman in question (previously Lana, now apparently Lois) he just settled because, well, all other women in the vicinity became otherwise engaged. Or dead. It depends really.

Since Chloe is the most frequent victim to the former with conveniently timed boyfriends and plot devices I have good reason to worry. See Jimmy and the lie detector of this season if you want prime examples. (And you have no idea how hard it is to restrain the lecture on how, really, lie detectors do not work like that. I seriously want to lecture people.) She only becomes attractive to the opposite sex when they're psychotic or when Clark needs sexual tension with someone who isn't her.

Though I will throw a fit so big Doomsday will look tame in comparison if they don't restore Chloe's memory for that (take away my Watchtower/Justice League potential? Yeah. Take away Chloe's coffee and see how she likes it) that isn't my real problem here. I wouldn't be happy if they hold off for any reason. The problem is a little more meta than that.

No. I'm more worried about the part where she had no say in it. While I could go on about how romanticClark's sacrifice is there's a teensy problem. It's only romantic if we look at it on the Stephanie Meyers scale of romance. Which, er all things considered, not such a good plan really.

And yes, I can hear you, Chloe would have said no and she wouldn't have let him do it. Which would have meant no big sacrifice. Tough. You can't force a story decision just because it's full of awwww potential. You do that, you run roughshod over the part where your characters are supposed to be real people. And the kicker?

Superman wouldn't do that.

I'm hoping like all get out that Clark will realize this. That he cannot go around overuling people's right to decide for themselves. It's the twenty-first century. You'd think, by now, we would know that a person's right to decide what happens to their own bodies (especially if that person happens to be female) is a sacred right. Whether it's the choice to eat bad sushi or retain key and vital memories - since, you know, memories happen to be who we are - we have the ultimate right to choose for ourselves. Unless we willingly surrender that choice to someone else, we call the shots.

It concerns me that Smallville might blithly blow right by that little factoid. While I love the part where Chloe seems to be getting all of the movie!Lois parallels (seriously, she's getting more Lois Lane action than Lois Lane is) this is one I would have been quite happy to see left on the cutting room floor.

I hated that part of Superman II. I really did. I didn't even know what feminism was in those days but I knew enough to know Superman didn't have the right to take Lois's memories away without her consent. That he could just force it on her because it was one of his powers? No. It was wrong then, it's wrong now.

We're talking one of the big aspects of Superman's story. The part that where Clark's soul tempers the powers of Kal-El. Yes, he has the powers of a god, but he isn't one and therefore can't make decisions like one. Which, makes me hope that's where we're going with this. Otherwise, it's a major league misstep.

While Clark might have acted out of a misguided sense of compassion and love, we need him to realize that.. We need him to acknowledge that he doesn't have the right to do this. For whatever reason.

I could go on about how Chloe needs her memory back because it's integeral to the storyline (it is), because the show will suffer without it (it could) and because if it's about making room for Lois that's pathetic (duh), but I don't have to.

We need her to get her memory back for one simple moment. The one when Clark looks into her eyes and understands just what kind of a mistake he actually made. Not just so he can slot in another key aspect of Superman, but because until we get that moment?

Nothing about this storyline is okay.