The Life Of Whitney Fordman
By Craig Byrne (PlanetKrypton@aol.com)

The Smallville episode "Visage" marked the last appearance of Whitney Fordman among the living in the show. The character, who first appeared in the Smallville pilot, was killed somewhere in Indonesia.

Whitney was played by Canadian actor Eric Johnson, and was a regular for the show's first season. Very often Whitney served only as "the quarterback" who happened to get in the way of Clark and Lana ever getting together. Originally, in the early drafts of the pilot, the character was named Whitney Ellsworth, named after the legendary editor of Superboy comics who later became the producer of the 1950's Adventures of Superman TV series. There have been many suspicions of why the character's name was changed, one being that folks at DC Comics thought the Whitney character was "too mean" to share a name of such a beloved member of DC history.

Somewhere along the line, Whitney's last name changed to Redmond and then finally Fordman. (His father suffered an identity crisis on the series also -- first called George, and later, he had the name "Jack"). The character started to become a bit more sympathetic over time. After some episodes with little to no Whitney ("Hourglass" and "Rogue"), it was decided to do an episode that prominently featured the character, titled "Kinetic." Unfortunately, "Kinetic" was plagued by really bad direction and even worse guest actors, and it probably made fans care *less* about Whitney instead of more.

It was around this time that it was revealed that Whitney's father had an illness, and also around that time, the relationship between Lana and Whitney seemed to be fading a bit. By the first season episode "Crush," Whitney's father had died, bringing Whitney more responsibility. Whitney took that responsibility to a new level by following in his father's footsteps and joining the Marines. It seemed the character started to become someone that fans could identify with and sympathize with, but sadly, it seemed the fans never forgave poor Whitney for hanging Clark up like a scarecrow.

Whitney's fate, of course, was revealed in the episode "Visage." His "ghost," hopefully, won't linger along as long as Lana's parents did, but one thing is for sure -- Whitney Fordman will never be forgotten.

For more on Eric Johnson and Whitney, visit Eric Johnson Web.

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