"Cool" is the fifth episode in the first season of Smallville, and fifth episode overall. It aired on November 13, 2001.
Summary[]
Sean Kelvin falls into an icy, meteor rock-filled Crater Lake. Suffering from permanent hypothermia, he is desperate to get warm. He tries fire and electricity, but the best fix seems to be body heat. When he attacks Chloe Sullivan, Clark has to break his date with Lana Lang in order to be with Chloe in time to save her. Clark throws Sean in a pond, which freezes and entombs him. Meanwhile, Jonathan Kent refuses to accept Lex as an investor in the family farm.
Recap[]
→ see also Category:Screencaps from episode 1x05
Sean sinks into the meteor rock laden ice.
Chloe Sullivan and Clark Kent arrive at a party full of high school students at Crater Lake which is laced with green meteor rock fragments. Lana Lang is there with Whitney Fordman. Sean Kelvin approaches Chloe and asks her out. Chloe doesn't seem impressed, but she does give him her number. Clark gives her a hard time, so she says she gave him her number just to get rid of him. Sean is throwing the football with Whitney. Sean claims he is interested in Chloe only as another conquest. When Whitney overthrows the football, Sean walks out on the ice to retrieve it and falls through the ice. The water re-freezes, trapping and drowning him.
Sean breaks through the ice.
The next morning, Sean breaks through the ice and approaches a campfire. His skin and hands are blue, but as he warms his hands by the fire they return to a normal color. He inhales warm air coming off the fire and the color of his face is also restored, but when he walks away from the fire we see that it has turned to ice.
Martha Kent is balancing the farm's books and the news is not good. Clark displays an uncanny ability for arithmetic and jokes that he could quit high school, play a professional sport and make a ton of money with endorsements. Walking to school, Chloe tells Clark and Pete Ross that Sean didn't call that morning as he promised. Sean complains to the school nurse that although he felt fine this morning, now he can't seem to get warm. He has a temperature of 38 degrees. When the nurse places her hand on his forehead, Sean grabs her hand. His color improves, but the nurse complains that now she has the chills.
Lex Luthor visits the Kent farm to buy some artichokes. He tells Martha he is hosting a dinner tomorrow night for the farming community. He wants to invest in some farms, modernize them, and make them competitive again. He is very interested in having Jonathan Kent attend the dinner. Martha and Jonathan argue about attending Lex's dinner. Eventually, Martha convinces Jonathan to go, but when they arrive at the Luthor Mansion, they find that they were the only ones to have been invited.
Clark approaches Lana at the Beanery.
At the Beanery, Lex Luthor tells Lana Lang (again) that he thinks she is with the wrong guy just as Whitney arrives and breaks a date. Lex runs into Clark outside the restaurant and tells him that Lana is free tomorrow night. Lex gives him tickets and promises a limo ride if Clark gets in there and asks her in the next 60 seconds. This appears to be just the encouragement he needs, and he makes the date with Lana Lang.
Clark tells Chloe and Pete about his date with Lana, just as Sean arrives hunched over with cold and rubbing his hands. Chloe can't go with him right now, so he runs over to make a date with Jenna Barnum. It's such a cold move; Chloe can't help but feel slighted. Clark is not happy with Sean either.
Sean kills his girlfriend.
At her house, Jenna invites Sean to join her in the shower, but Sean is in bad shape by now. His skin is blue and his hair is full of frost. He grabs the shower head, and the water starts coming out as hail. Jenna is terrified. Sean apologizes, but his desire for warmth overwhelms him. He embraces Jenna and kisses her. It works. Sean is restored, but Jenna is frozen solid. When Sean releases her, she shatters. Sean is sitting in front of a cold fireplace, wrapped in a blanket, shivering with cold. He is calling another girl, Bella, but she doesn't want to see him. He tries to light a match, and the flame freezes in his hand. Then he notices that he still has Chloe's number.
Chloe is trying to help Clark choose something to wear for his big date with Lana when she gets a call from Sean. She makes a date with him for coffee at the office of the Smallville Torch. Clark and Lana talk in the limo about how they retreat from the world with a good book or a telescope. The television in the limo reports that police are seeking Sean in connection with Jenna's death. Clark drops Lana off at the Beanery, and then heads for the school.
At the Torch, Chloe finds a trail of flower petals leading to the pool. Sean apologizes again and explains that he can't get warm, sitting by the fire only gives him a quick fix, body heat lasts longer. As he approaches Chloe, she falls into the water. She swims away, but Sean sucks all the heat out of the pool and it freezes just as she's climbing out. Clark arrives to free Chloe and knocks Sean across the room. Clark sends Chloe away, and turns to face Sean, but he's gone.
Back at the Torch, Chloe's research turns up a similar condition in which the thermosensitive cells in the brain are damaged. Pete arrives at the Beanery with a date and sees Lana. Whitney arrives, and Lana gives Pete the limo and asks Whitney to take her home. At an electrical substation, Sean tries to use electricity to warm himself. He tries to flag down Whitney and Lana on their way home but they crash. Sean heads for the Luthor Mansion.
Sean attacks Clark.
Clark arrives at the crash site, and Sean attacks him. He is able to steal enough body heat from Clark to warm himself properly and leaves Clark frozen on the ground, but by the time he gets to the mansion, he's blue again and pulls the heat from the generator. Clark recovers just as Martha Kent leaves the mansion to check on the generator. Clark approaches Sean as he tries to attack Martha. As they battle, Sean steals enough heat from Clark to get warm again. Clark throws Sean into a nearby pond, which freezes and traps Sean in the ice.
Sean trapped in the frozen pond.
Back at the Kent Farm, Jonathan is working on his motorcycle as Lex arrives to express his disappointment to have learned that Jonathan took out a loan to keep the farm going. Jonathan says he just doesn't know if he can trust Lex. Lex promises that if Jonathan ever changes his mind, the offer still stands.
Chloe adds a candle to the memorial for Jenna at school. Clark apologizes to Lana and tries to ask her out again. Lana explains that Whitney is now sufficiently jealous not to leave her any free weekends. Clark boldly asks Lana why she goes out with Whitney. Lana confides that he makes her feel safe. Whenever she needs him, he's there.
Cast[]
Starring[]
- Tom Welling as Clark Kent
- Kristin Kreuk as Lana Lang
- Michael Rosenbaum as Lex Luthor
- Eric Johnson as Whitney Fordman
- Sam Jones III as Pete Ross
- Allison Mack as Chloe Sullivan
- Annette O'Toole as Martha Kent
- John Schneider as Jonathan Kent
Guest Starring[]
Co-Starring[]
Uncredited[]
- Uncredited actress as Pete's Date
Featured Music[]
| Song | Artist/Band | Scene |
|---|---|---|
| "Rescue" | Eve 6 | Played at the beginning, when Clark, Pete and Chloe arrive at the party by the lake. |
| "21 Girls" | Steve Ancliffe | Played at the party, when Clark warns Chloe not to trust Sean and when Sean and Whitney play catch just before Sean falls through the ice. |
| "Let Your Shoulder Fall" | Matthew Jay | Played In the Beanery, when Lex tells Lana he thinks she's with the wrong guy. |
| "Dreams" | Maec Ferrari | Played at the Beanery, when Clark asks Lana to the Radiohead concert. |
| "We're At the Top of the World" | The Juliana Theory | Played when Sean attacks Jenna in the shower. |
| "Every Word" | Bosshouse | Played when Clark drops Lana off at the Beanery so he can go save Chloe from Sean. |
| "On Your Side" | Pete Yorn | Played when Pete shows up at the Beanery with his date. |
| "Just Gotta Know" | Bosshouse | Played when Clark returns to the Beanery to find Lana gone. |
| "So We'll Drive" | Matt Beckler | Played in the school hallway, when Chloe pays a visit to Jenna's memorial wall. |
| "Standing Still" | Jewel | Played at the end, when Lana walks away from Clark in the school hallway. |
Title[]
- "Cool" means a very low temperature; it can also mean popular.
- Sean Kelvin had the power to freeze people and suck their heat. Sean was also considered popular around the school.
Featured Super beings[]
Notes[]
- Antagonist: Sean Kelvin
- Clark uses the following abilities in this episode: super strength, super speed, and X-ray vision.
- Clark holds enough heat energy to power Sean for a prolonged period of time. This hints that Clark can absorb huge amounts of solar energy.
- When looking for clothes to wear on his "date" with Lana, Chloe notes that blue is a good color on Clark, alluding to the Superman suit, which in comprised of mostly blue.
- Sean's last name is Kelvin. Kelvin is a temperature scale along with the Celsius and Fahrenheit scales. The null point, zero Kelvin, is absolute zero, the ground state of matter in quantum-mechanical description. The Kelvin scale is primarily used in science.
- Chloe asks Clark if he comes from an ice planet (an obvious allusion to the planet Krypton, which has crystallic, icy-like terrain).
- Chloe's phone number, as written on Sean's hand, is 555-0164.
- This is the very first episode in the series to have no recurring characters in it.
- The original title for this episode was "Freeze".
Spoilers[]
- It is later revealed in the Smallville Comic issue #8 that a frozen Sean Kelvin, Greg Arkin and Tina Greer had been collected by Dr. Donovan Jamison, who along with Dr. Steven Hamilton and Dr. Arthur Walsh had been studying the effects of meteor rocks on humans and how mutation could be reversed or altogether prevented in a secret underground facility known as "The Dungeon" located beneath the woods outside Smallville.
- We later find out the bank's reaction to the Kents attempting to get another loan. According to Nicodemus, the bank refuses to loan them the money, probably because of how deep the Kents are in debt.
- In this episode, Clark abandons his date with Lana in order to save Chloe, the first of what will be many times in the series where he must sacrifice his relationship with Lana in order to use his powers to save someone.
Locations[]
- Other
Quotes[]
- Clark: Did you just write your phone number down on Sean Kelvin's hand?
- Chloe: Don't sound so shocked, Clark. Guys do find me attractive even though I don't have raven hair and the initials "L.L."
- Chloe: Ok, wait. I'm not a crash test dummy you can use to try out your dating skills. You, if you like Lana so much, just ask her out. And you, stop acting like a Vegas bookie picks your dates. And both of you, treat me better.
- Jonathan: Hey, son. I'm sorry, we didn't mean for you to hear all that.
- Clark: You don't have to protect me. Is it that bad?
- Martha: Yeah, it's pretty bad and we might have to take out a bank loan.
- Clark: Another one? The interest alone would put us up to like...
- Martha: Clark, don't.
- Clark: Maybe I can help.
- Jonathan: You already have. Last season you saved us four part time hands.
- Clark: I'm thinking bigger picture. You know, forget about this whole high school thing and try out for pro-sports team. I could make a ton of money in endorsements... Just trying to lighten up the mood.
- Martha: As much as we'd love to see your face on a cereal box, we'd settle for you getting to school on time.
- Clark: Right. (superspeeds away, and then returns having forgotten the pop tart) Forgot. (looks at the calculations Martha is doing) That's $65,200...
- Martha: Go!
- Clark: ... and one.
- Clark: (cheerily) Hello citizens.
- Martha: I am not familiar with this child. Where's the moody one, lives upstairs, runs real fast?
- Clark: Oh, he's going on a date tonight. But not a date-date, a concert.
- Jonathan: And who would this "not a date-date" be with?
- Clark: Lana Lang.
- Martha: It's bad enough you ride that motorcycle, by why do you have to repair it in the house?
- Jonathan: Because if I didn't, you'd never have any reason to be angry with me.
- Martha: I'll trade you. Do all the engine work you want, but come with me to Lex's.
- Jonathan: We've already talked about that.
- Martha: I talked. You grunted.
- Jonathan: I thought I was rather articulate. Sweetheart, the Luthors have sold out anyone who's ever trusted them. They don't know what it means to keep their word.
- Clark: I thought you came over for fashion advice? (holds up plaid shirt)
- Chloe: Burn that. What else do you got?
- Clark: (sighs) I'll check the laundry basket.
- Chloe: He may be a little intellectually challenged, but he's really hot. Besides, he begged to get together tonight just to talk, so I told him he could bring me a coffee at the Torch.
- Clark: Sounds like a date.
- Chloe: It's not a date. It's a fact-finding mission to see if he deserves a date.
- Chloe: Well, I finally find a guy I like, and he turns out to be homicidal.
- Clark: You deserved a lot better than Sean even before he tried to kill you.
- Sean: If you'd like, I could rub [your hands] for you. Nothing heats up a body like friction.
- Chloe: Wow. I can't believe you just delivered that line with a straight face.
- Lex: (puts his hands up) I come in peace!
- Chloe: Your online horoscope suggests that you try not to flaunt you excitement which I know will be hard since you've been waiting for this date since your first growth spurt.
- Clark: I'll say this one more time and then I'll print bumper-stickers, this isn't a date.
- Chloe: All right. Just check Lana's outfit. If a girl wears something new to hang out with you, at least she thinks it's a date.
See also[]
Promotion[]
Smallville "Cool" Trailer-0
External links[]
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