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Tom Welling Reflects On Smallville, Looks To Section 13

BuzzFeed caught up with Tom Welling to talk about his past and what might be coming in his future.

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As Tom Welling’s new movie The Choice is coming out very soon, BuzzFeed caught up with the actor for an extensive interview where Welling looks back on his time as Clark Kent on Smallville (2001-2011), his brief hiatus and the movies that followed, all leading to what will hopefully be a new show on CBS called Section 13.

You can read the entire interview here.

"Abyss" -- Tom Welling as Clark Kent in SMALLVILLE, on The CW Network.  Photo: /The CW  ©2008 The CW Network, LLC. All Rights Reserved.During that conversation, Welling talked a bit about his time on Smallville.

“There was a lot of growing up I needed to do on that show. Fortunately, Clark had no idea what the hell he was doing and I had no idea what the hell I was doing,” Welling said to BuzzFeed with a laugh. “We kind of grew up together.”

In the piece, Tom talked about the humanity of the character — which one might take as an explanation for why we didn’t really see him in the costume “This needed to be a show about Clark Kent, not about Superman,” Tom said. “That was always the rule: No flights, no tights. When we got into Season 5, they started to say, ‘Well… maybe…’ But I always maintained that’s not the show. Thank god Peter Roth [chief executive of Warner Bros. Television, which produced Smallville] knew that and always championed in our favor. … It was an incredibly unique experience.”

And what does Tom think of all of the current crop of superhero TV? “It’s a compliment,” Welling answered. “I’m very proud of shows like Arrow [and] The Flash.… They’re able to ground these characters so that the viewer can relate on a human level to people who used to be only in two dimensions.”

wellingchoiceAfter Smallville, Tom had two goals: “I wanted to play a human and I wanted to be a part of a film whose theme was bigger than whatever character I was playing,” he said to BuzzFeed. “By being on Smallville for 10 years, I was able to make some really fantastic choices with that character, but now I’m drawn to real people trying to live real lives.” In doing so, he’s done some movies including The Choice, and now he’s creating, executive producing, and hopefully starring in a new project, Section 13, for CBS.

“Emotionally, I can’t even think about what I’m going to do if Section 13 doesn’t go, but I also can’t even think about what I’m going to do if it goes. There’s just so many unknowns,” he said. You can read more about the Section 13 concept here.

At the end of the day, Tom sees his notoriety as the proto-Man of Steel “a big compliment.”

“It means people like what I did. … I guess the joke is when people say, ‘Hey, Superman,’ I have a tendency to reply, ‘Well, I’ve been called worse.’”

You can read the entire BuzzFeed interview here.

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6 Comments

6 Comments

  1. Tim Wolfe

    January 26, 2016 at 8:37 pm

    There should of been more then 10 seasons of Smallville look at Supernatural

    • Craig Byrne

      January 26, 2016 at 8:57 pm

      Not really. Smallville, as loved as it was and as much as I loved it too, went on probably 3 seasons too long as it was. Prolonging it even farther would have meant extending the story in an even worse way. We’d keep waiting for him to become Superman and it’d never happen, because Tom doesn’t want to wear the suit.

      I think the time also comes when you can’t expect these people to do the same thing for so long. The BuzzFeed article talks a little bit about the toll that doing Smallville put on Tom’s life, and the long hours… sometimes you’ve got to think they want to do something different. That’s a lot of investment to expect from just one person. It works for Jensen and Jared at Supernatural, but that’s also not a show with a set ending. Smallville’s ending, we always knew would be him becoming Superman. Would we have really wanted to watch 15 years and him still not doing it?

      This article made me respect Tom and his wishes a whole lot more. I hope others follow suit.

      • Sarah

        January 26, 2016 at 10:02 pm

        I am super happy for His return to TV in Section 13! Tom Welling as well as being a beautiful man is above all a wonderful and great man, I hope Tom That Will Be Able to Achieve all its desires

      • Bob Marshall

        February 7, 2016 at 2:25 pm

        Although it probably went on a little to long I’m glad it did. Season 9 was THE best season of the show IMO. Infact that season is probably my favourite season of TV ever.

        • Craig Byrne

          February 15, 2016 at 1:58 pm

          You’re definitely entitled to your opinion, but I thought a lot of Season 9 was a mess. Didn’t care about the New Kryptonians at all after the premiere, and making Clark so far from being the “Last Son of Krypton” really hurt what makes him special, in my opinion.

  2. Cheryl Meadows

    January 27, 2016 at 3:38 pm

    Regardless of whether or not Smallville could have been longer or shorter is not as relevent as the influence this show has had over the past decade and beyond. From the technology to the concepts to the underlying themes, Smallville, which also was influenced by Lois and Clark, has set the bar for innovation, idealogy, philosophy and cannon. It’s good that Tom Welling is moving on to other things, but for years to come, this maybe considered he best body of work. He is certainly gifted and charismatic. It also doesn’t hurt that he was a fellow Michigander. with natural hidden talent. Much success to he and the other cast members future. Smaillville live1

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Smallville

Justin Hartley Would “Love” To Play Green Arrow Again

When asked if he’d play a superhero, Justin Hartley says he would love to play the Green Arrow again.

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Justin Hartley

Appearing yesterday on The Jennifer Hudson Show to promote his show Tracker, Justin Hartley was asked by Hudson if he’d ever like to play a superhero again… and his response might be surprising and of course welcomed by the Smallville fandom.

“I would love to play a superhero again,” he told her, continuing on to say which superhero he’d like to play.

“You know, there are so many interesting ones that have been portrayed and there are so many that haven’t yet been portrayed… what I think would be really cool, though, now that I’m older [and] I have different life experiences, I would approach it differently and it would be a different story… I’d like to jump back into that Green Arrow suit, honestly.”

He did have one caveat: “Maybe not that exact suit, but something a bit hipper.”

“I think you’d find him in a different place, and you could tell different stories,” Hartley said about Green Arrow and his alter ego. “He’s been through stuff, and I think it would be interesting. I would love that.”

Years before Stephen Amell donned the green tights, Justin Hartley played Oliver Queen, the Green Arrow in five seasons of Smallville. Of course, if he were to ever return, we assume his character would be a widower. Al & Miles, are you listening?

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Smallville’s Kristin Kreuk Makes Comics Writing Debut With Black Star

Kristin Kreuk is co-writing a new comic book called Black Star for Titan Comics.

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Kristin Kreuk (Smallville’s Lana Lang) is writing an upcoming comic book!

Kristin is a writer and co-creator on Black Star, a new Titan Comics series that she is writing with collaborators Peter Mooney and Eric Putzer. It’s described as “a Northern Gothic noir steeped in horror and dark humor.” The series will be illustrated by artist Joe Bocardo.

Below, you can find the press release with more details; additionally, we have some preview imagery courtesy of Titan Comics! The images can be found first, and underneath, the release with more details about the comic, which will hit stores and digital devices on July 29. Be sure to get your copies and support Kristin’s latest venture — it’s a great way to say “thank you” for 25 years of Smallville enjoyment! (Fun fact: Titan published the Smallville: The Official Companion books through Season 7, with four of those books written by the author of this article! If only they’d still do 8-10…)

BlackStar_01_11_CLR_preview

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March 9, 2026 – Globally renowned publisher Titan Comics are thrilled to be publishing Black Star (in stores and digital devices July 29, 2026) a debut comic series by acclaimed actress Kristin Kreuk (Smallville, Reacher, Murder in a Small Town). Co-written with Peter Mooney (Rookie Blue, Mistletoe Murders) and screenwriter Eric Putzer, and illustrated by artist Joe Bocardo (Nightwalkers, The Hexiles), this five-issue series is a Northern Gothic noir steeped in horror and dark humour.

Amidst skirmishes between two warring factions in the early nineteenth-century fur trade, Dashiell Carlyle discovers he has magical abilities… and that he’s not alone. Thrust into a secret order with designs to use their magic to build a new and better world, Dashiell discovers that their utopia may come at a horrific cost.

It’s a violent world: gritty, bloody, and dark. But that’s balanced with a sense of discovery and awe. The storytelling’s propulsive, and the morality grey. It’s The Revenant meets Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1. It’s a love letter to a frozen corner of the world that few know. It’s weird. And wonderful. And something wholly its own.

Black Star was born while Peter, Eric, and I were filming “Burden of Truth” in Winnipeg.” said Kristin Kreuk. “We were inspired by the city’s lore and, because we worked so well together, began spending our spare time on set (and then, for years afterwards) developing our own take on the history and magic we imagined pulsing beneath its surface, shaping the rhythms of the city and the battles raging just beyond our view.” 

“Sometimes people come to my hometown and they can’t see past its rough edges or inhospitable weather. But it was clear Kristin and Eric could see right into the strangeness that makes Winnipeg so unique,” said co-writer Peter Mooney. “This isn’t so much an alternative history, but an omitted chapter that’s been lost to time. It’s bizarre and fantastical and entirely imagined — but it goes a long way towards explaining why the city is how it is today.” 

“There’s an intimacy to comics that no other form quite achieves; the reader controls the rhythm, the breath, the revelation,” said co-writer Eric Putzer. “In a story about power and human nature, we felt that intimacy necessary to make the reader an active part of the exchange.” – 

“For a comic book artist, working on a series as ambitious and well-written as Black Star is a gift,” said artist Joe Bocardo. “But if you also work on it with a talented and friendly team that gives you creative freedom, then it’s not a gift; it’s a privilege.”

“Set in the eerie, snow-blanketed wasteland of early 19th Century Winnipeg, this is magic as you’ve never seen it before,” said Titan Comics editor, Jake Devine. “Hopeful yet bleak, miraculous yet insidious, and only time will tell if the prize is worth the cost. Readers are going to be swept away by Joe Bocardo’s mesmerising artwork as it envelops them in a story filled with awe and tragedy.” 

Titan’s Black Star comics is set to launch with Issue #1 in stores and on digital devices July 29, 2026. 

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Smallville Makes The Netflix Global TV Top Ten

Smallville is doing so well on Netflix that it is trending on the Netflix Global TV Top 10.

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Wednesday isn’t the only Alfred Gough and Miles Millar hit on Netflix these days: Weeks after being made available internationally on Netflix (where, sadly, it is not available in the United States — we have to watch on Hulu), Smallville is trending globally as one of the top ten series available on Netflix. Considering the show premiered nearly 25 years ago, this is quite the accomplishment!

To those who have been reading KryptonSite for the past, well, 25 years, it should be no surprise. Superman remains popular and the story of a young Clark Kent before he ever becomes Superman (as played by Tom Welling) is the kind of story anyone can identify with if they ever felt alienated. If it wasn’t Clark they could identify with, there was a character for everyone to latch on to and love. It’s why we used to fight so much on the forums (which are now back, by the way – come post!) — Smallville was a show you could invest in, and with 218 episodes to binge, there’s a lot of Smallville to pick from on Netflix. Sure, fans can fight over who their preferred Superman is — Henry Cavill as presented by Zack Snyder, or David Corenswet as directed by James Gunn — but, why not go toward the guy who has over 200 hours of material to watch, most of which is pretty good? [Except “Ageless.” Skip “Ageless.”]

Even without this global reach, Smallville has been going through a bit of a renaissance in the past few years. There’s the annual Salute to Smallville convention, this year happening in Nashville in November, where we’ll be celebrating the 25th anniversary. There’s TalkVille and other fantastic podcasts about the show. And of course KryptonSite still exists!

Now let’s get to #1, international fans? We’re counting on you. And for those of you who have just discovered the show and came across this website, welcome! In any event, leave some comments below and tell us how you came to find Smallville.

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