Who are Pete Ross and Lana Lang to you?

[DochaDocha]

Smallville has forever soured me on the idea of Clark and Lana ever being a romantically involved. The best Lana Lang, imo, was the one on Superman: TAS. Distinct from Lois, likeable but clearly over Clark as a potential love interest.

I don't think Lana started off that way on STAS. I believe she was still into Clark, but he had to turn her down gently. Unfortunately, that show also had her dating Lex Luthor...

[Agent Z]

I don't think Lana started off that way on STAS. I believe she was still into Clark, but he had to turn her down gently. Unfortunately, that show also had her dating Lex Luthor...

She kisses Superman when he first rescues her and later reveals she knows he's Clark. She wasn't over him at all.

[John Venus]

I don't think Lana started off that way on STAS. I believe she was still into Clark, but he had to turn her down gently. Unfortunately, that show also had her dating Lex Luthor...

I should have clarified. I meant by the end of the episode, Clark turns her down and she clearly stops pining over him.

[Thor2014]

I'll always have a soft spot for the early-80s Lana where she was an anchorperson at WGBS. I would bring her back as a TV reporter (maybe TMZ style) to contrast with the traditional journalistic values of Lois and the planet.

[the illustrious mr. kenway]

Clark's old friends from Smallville. Honestly just do them like what Superman and Lois did with Lana and Kyle Cushing. Pete would work in a similar role as Kyle- a small town working class dude who is disgruntled about his life because of XYZ.....

I don't think Pete and Jimmy overlap that much beyond being Clark's best friend. So you could use them as foils for another. They could even teamup from time to time- unlikely friends etc. If Jimmy gets another solo, Pete could guest star.

Lana is in the same boat with Lois. Being friends with your husband's childhood sweetheart could be considered weird but it is a fun dynamic to play with in a lois lane solo series.

[Digifiend]

Since we're talking about Lana, I thought I'd repost what I said in another thread about how she came to Metropolis (multiple times) and got a job:

The first time we see Lana Lang as a grown up woman is in SUPERMAN 78 (September-October 1952)--3rd story, "The Girls in Superman's Life." Lana leaves Smallville for Metropolis, in hopes of becoming a reporter just like Clark. She convinces Perry White to gives her a chance. Lois and Lana meet for the first time and Lois invites her to be her roommate. Lana proposes to write a series for the Planet called "I Remember Superboy." However, she's later hired away from the Planet as a writer for the Federal Syndicate.

Next, Lana shows up in SHOWCASE 9 (July-August 1957)--the first try-out issue for Lois Lane's own comic--in the first story of that issue, "The Girl in Superman's Past." Lana Lang arrives in Metropolis again and meets Lois Lane for the first time--Clark Kent introduces them to each other. Miss Lane proposes that Miss Lang move in with her and she helps the red-head get a job doing T.V. commercials for station WXR.

That contradiction regarding two first meetings is easily explained. The 1952 story is Earth-Two, and the 1957 story is Earth-One, because that was five issues after Barry Allen's debut, which started the silver age and the Earth-One continuity.

[witchboy]

That contradiction regarding two first meetings is easily explained. The 1952 story is Earth-Two, and the 1957 story is Earth-One, because that was five issues after Barry Allen's debut, which started the silver age and the Earth-One continuity.

The Mr and Mrs Superman stories from the Superman Family series establishes that Lana doesn't meet Lois and Clark until after they're married. The Earth 2 Lana left Smallville as a small child and didn't know Clark until then. https://dc.fandom.com/wiki/Lana_Lang_(Earth-Two)

[Jim Kelly]

That contradiction regarding two first meetings is easily explained. The 1952 story is Earth-Two, and the 1957 story is Earth-One, because that was five issues after Barry Allen's debut, which started the silver age and the Earth-One continuity.

There's also a story in ADVENTURE COMICS 261 (June 1959)--"Superboy Meets Lois Lane"--where both Lois and Lana go away to summer camp, at Camp Hiawatha, and meet each other for the first time.

These "first time" meetings really can't be explained away by alternate Earths, because they happen so often. Like with all the times that Superman and Batman met for the first time. Granted, the editors rightly assumed that most readers would not have read the previous stories--comic books being disposable.

[Bored at 3:00AM]

That contradiction regarding two first meetings is easily explained. The 1952 story is Earth-Two, and the 1957 story is Earth-One, because that was five issues after Barry Allen's debut, which started the silver age and the Earth-One continuity.

Not to pile on, but this also wouldn't work because the Earth-2 Superman was never Superboy. While Barry Allen is the one who started the Silver Age, Earth-1 stories essentially began with Superboy's first appearance in 1945, whose existence wasn't acknowledged by the Superman comics until the mid-50s if I'm remembering right.

[Jim Kelly]

Not to pile on, but this also wouldn't work because the Earth-2 Superman was never Superboy. While Barry Allen is the one who started the Silver Age, Earth-1 stories essentially began with Superboy's first appearance in 1945, whose existence wasn't acknowledged by the Superman comics until the mid-50s if I'm remembering right.

That's the weakness of the Earth-Two concept. It's very picky about what it chooses to include and what it leaves out. I guess these in-between stories happened on Earth-E--that Earth that is not quite Two and not quite One--named for E. Nelson Bridwell.

[DABellWrites]

Just two characters from Superman childhood. Of the two, Lana always seemed to be more a fan favorite than. Pete Ross always been the odd man out.

[DABellWrites]

Not to pile on, but this also wouldn't work because the Earth-2 Superman was never Superboy. While Barry Allen is the one who started the Silver Age, Earth-1 stories essentially began with Superboy's first appearance in 1945, whose existence wasn't acknowledged by the Superman comics until the mid-50s if I'm remembering right.

Earth-1 began in 1961 with Flash #123. Trying guesstimate when Earth-2 ended and Earth-1 began before 1961 is just anyone's guess. It's better to treat those years as a series of continuity errors that somehow allowed DC to create two different Earths.

[Jim Kelly]

I've started re-reading THE NEW ADVENTURES OF SUPERBOY and in the second issue there's an interesting text piece, "When Superman Was Superboy." It's uncredited but a good guess is E. Nelson Bridwell wrote the piece. It discusses how the time frame of the Superboy stories kept changing. At first, the stories were set at the same time as the Superman stories which makes no sense. Then in the 1960s, Mort Weisinger decided that all the stories had to happen before 1938, because that's when Superman shows up. But this then means that all the Superman cast hardly ever age after 1938--otherwise Lois, Lana and Clark would all be in their forties or older by the 1960s. Then in 1970, Julie Schwartz and Murray Boltinoff decided that Superman is 29 (forever) and that means the Superboy stories can only be about 15 years behind the current time period.

At first, this set the Superboy stories in the 1950s. But, as the text writer suggests, once that idea took hold the Superboy stories didn't progress but remained stuck in the 1950s. You see the same thing happen in the Donner SUPERMAN, where teen Clark is living in the 1950s--but twenty years must pass between that and the events in 1978. So when THE NEW ADVENTURES OF SUPERBOY began its run in 1980, they deliberately set out to make the stories adhere to the rule that the stories follow Superman's progress through time. The first issue shows Clark celebrating his 16th birthday and if Superman is 29, according to Julie's Rule, then Clark's 16th birthday must be 13 years prior in 1967.

It's interesting to read this text because it gets away from the internal continuity and explains why the reality in the comics kept changing according to changes in editorial policy.

This got me thinking about how certain time periods appear more timeless to us than others. I'd say the 1930s are a timeless period, which is why they worked for Superboy stories. We know vaguely that there was progress in the 1930s, but generally it all seems to be one period without change and fits with the idea of Smallville. In the 1940s, with the war and all, too much changes to fit with a sleepy small town frozen in time. However, the 1950s seem like a timeless period, a period of little change, and maybe that's why it was hard to break away from that time period for Smallville once established. But the 1960s were notable for changes in culture and politics and memorable events. The 1960s don't feel right for Smallville. Nor do the 1970s, because more changes continued to happen. But I would say that the 1980s are a timeless period, when few changes seemed to happen and it was all one big Reagan era--so a Smallville set in that time period can also work. But at the end of the 1980s, all these big new changes started to happen, so the 1990s seem too fast paced for a timeless Smallville.

Given Smallville's setting keeps changing, the continuity can't be nailed down.

[Jon Clark]

I've started re-reading THE NEW ADVENTURES OF SUPERBOY and in the second issue there's an interesting text piece, "When Superman Was Superboy." It's uncredited but a good guess is E. Nelson Bridwell wrote the piece. It discusses how the time frame of the Superboy stories kept changing. At first, the stories were set at the same time as the Superman stories which makes no sense. Then in the 1960s, Mort Weisinger decided that all the stories had to happen before 1938, because that's when Superman shows up. But this then means that all the Superman cast hardly ever age after 1938--otherwise Lois, Lana and Clark would all be in their forties or older by the 1960s. Then in 1970, Julie Schwartz and Murray Boltinoff decided that Superman is 29 (forever) and that means the Superboy stories can only be about 15 years behind the current time period.

At first, this set the Superboy stories in the 1950s. But, as the text writer suggests, once that idea took hold the Superboy stories didn't progress but remained stuck in the 1950s. You see the same thing happen in the Donner SUPERMAN, where teen Clark is living in the 1950s--but twenty years must pass between that and the events in 1978. So when THE NEW ADVENTURES OF SUPERBOY began its run in 1980, they deliberately set out to make the stories adhere to the rule that the stories follow Superman's progress through time. The first issue shows Clark celebrating his 16th birthday and if Superman is 29, according to Julie's Rule, then Clark's 16th birthday must be 13 years prior in 1967.

It's interesting to read this text because it gets away from the internal continuity and explains why the reality in the comics kept changing according to changes in editorial policy.

This got me thinking about how certain time periods appear more timeless to us than others. I'd say the 1930s are a timeless period, which is why they worked for Superboy stories. We know vaguely that there was progress in the 1930s, but generally it all seems to be one period without change and fits with the idea of Smallville. In the 1940s, with the war and all, too much changes to fit with a sleepy small town frozen in time. However, the 1950s seem like a timeless period, a period of little change, and maybe that's why it was hard to break away from that time period for Smallville once established. But the 1960s were notable for changes in culture and politics and memorable events. The 1960s don't feel right for Smallville. Nor do the 1970s, because more changes continued to happen. But I would say that the 1980s are a timeless period, when few changes seemed to happen and it was all one big Reagan era--so a Smallville set in that time period can also work. But at the end of the 1980s, all these big new changes started to happen, so the 1990s seem too fast paced for a timeless Smallville.

Given Smallville's setting keeps changing, the continuity can't be nailed down.

Over on a fan fiction site there is a guy bashing Superboy for his treatment of Lana Lang in some of those Silver Age tales. And it got me thinking about how the decades changed characters like Lana (and her adult version Lois).

Lois was originally a 1930's "modern woman". She could handle herself as well as most men, even if they didn't always agree. Sure, she played "damsel in distress" a lot but to be fair in a lot of the stories where this happened Lois was not being some dainty lil thing but simply had gotten herself into a situation where most people outside of action heroes would be at a disadvantage. Being outnumbered by muscle bound thugs or guys with guns would have left your average grocer, pastor or mailman in the same predicament Lois was in. Lois might have been a bit overconfident of her ability to handle danger or maybe a bit nieve sometimes about how dangerous her actions were, but she wasn't shown as being weepy and prone to hysterics. She wasn't passing out from fright in situations where jimmy or Perry wouldn't.

Then by the late 1940's when the servicemen were coming home and all the "Rosie the Rivoter" imagery was turning into June Cleaver, Lois became more sitcom character than dashing reporter. She was Lucy Ricardo to Superman's Ricky. Her role was to get up to wacky hi-jinks to complicate Clark/Superman's life. And as the comics code had reduced comics from "Pulp movie seriels" where menacing criminals performed gory crimes, no one really complained about Lois no longer being gutsy since there were no serious criminal threats left for Lois to need saving from. So if Lois was now "menaced" by a villain out of a bad episode of Scooby-doo no one blinked because Superman wasn't exactly dealing with wife-beaters, mass murderers, or gangland violence anymore either. It was a world where Myxyzpltk pulled zany practical jokes, Lex Luthor was more interested in robbing Ft Knox than fomenting wars for profit, and exposing Clark's identity was a bigger threat than most villains posed.

And into this world was introduced a junior Lois Lane whose job was to have zany adventures with Superman a few decades before the ones he had as an adult with Lois. And unlike Lois, Lana had never existed as a "modern woman". Lana was a sitcom character from day one. She was the zany girl who'd do whatever a plot required. She'd drink any chemical concoction she found thinking it would magically make her life perfect. She and everyone else in Smallville lived in a world where every week some outlandish incident occurred but then life just went back to normal. Superboy was public enemy #1 this week, a robot the week before, and walking around with an anthead the week after.

And Lana, like 1950's Lois, seemed to go through the same adventures every week.
1)Suspect Clark is Superboy.
2)Devise "foolproof" plan to prove Clark is Superboy.
3)Have plan backfire.
4) Repeat first 3 steps and expect different result.

And prior to the Women's Movement of the late 60's and early 70's no one raised an eyebrow at Lois or Lana being these shallow stereotypes. Lois got back her edge slowly from 1970 on. And with every attempt to redfine her Lana has remianed a flawed person.
The 70's had adult Lana as a TV reporter working next to Clark. But she came off as having adopted a fake sophisticated "European" persona and was more insecure than Lois. Teen Lana devolved into just a female supporting cast member for Superboy with even less of a role once the stories dropped the "snoopy girl who tries to trick Clark into revealing his dual ID" based stories.
Post Byrne she was the girl who got left behind in Smallville when Clark outgrew his life there.
By Flashpoint she had undergone radical shifts being Mrs. Pete Ross, tempoary head of Lex-Corp (while Lex was a public criminal), Supergirl's foster-aunt...
And Post-52 she has continued to morph into a new character everytime someone uses her (Adventure girl, Superwoman, Steel's love interest ....)

[SecretWarrior]

Pete is kind of a nonentity to me at this point. Even during the Triangle era he was always just kind of there. The most interesting thing he had going for him was when he might have been Ruin, but even then he got passed over.

Sounds like the Winter Soldier storyline.