Superman on Television

Superboy: Episode Reviews

Season 1 - Episode 25: "Succubus"

"Life is a wonderful gift, respect it, cherish it, and devour it!" - Pamela Dare

Synopsis:

The 'beautiful' author Pamela Dare turns up in town as part of her book tour and we quickly find out that there is more to her than just a simple author. As she arrives, a male fan is looking for an autograph and she asks him to follow her to a quiet part of the hotel that they are in. After giving him the autograph, she says she needs a favor and proceeds to drain all the life from his body, making him an old man!

Lana and TJ are getting ready to interview Pamela and when she turns up, she and TJ take a shine to each other. TJ leaves with Pamela to continue the photo shoot at what she calls her 'family' home; they share a kiss and she tells TJ that she needs him to prove that he knows Superboy.

Superboy is playing a charity baseball game against himself at all 9 positions! Pamela and TJ watch from the stands and Pamela seems mesmerized.

Pamela is doing a talk about her book that Lana and Clark are attending. TJ introduces her to them and she takes an instant shine to Clark, leading him away from the group and upsetting TJ. Clark later tells Lana that Pamela wanted him to go home with her.

Pamela stands in the hallway of Clark and TJ's dorm in a red dress with a mystical white light shining from behind her. She walks to Clark's door and TJ sees her walk straight through the door into Clark's room; TJ hides outside the room watching the door. Pamela begins to try and put some kind of spell on Clark while he's sleeping, but it doesn't seem to be working: "It doesn't work if you're not afraid", she exclaims and then disappears.

TJ is in the press room and he seems very angry as he approaches Clark; Clark gets up and turns around, at which point TJ punches him. Meanwhile, Lana heads to Pamela's house to confront her about what she's doing to Clark and TJ; Pamela grabs her by the hair and takes her into another room, while at the same time TJ is picked up by Pamela's driver and taken to her.

Pamela tells her driver that if she can have Superboy's power then she will never have to feed again; Suddenly she grabs her driver and drains the life from him, once again turning him into an old man. She sends him to find Clark to tell him what's happening and where to find TJ and Lana.

Superboy arrives at Pamela's house. She explains to him that she is centuries old, but must feed off the life-force of others to stay alive and that with his life-force she will never need to feed again and can live forever. However, she can only take his power if he's afraid and so she shows him Lana and TJ in death-traps and kisses him. Superboy manages to pull away and save TJ and Lana, while Pamela is reeling from the power she took from Superboy; she gets younger and younger, but the problem is she's not stopping as the power was to much! Pamela gets younger until she's a small baby and then turns into a crystalline type entity.

Superboy leaves and Clark turns up while the police are taking away the crystals, which suddenly start to glow. Could Pamela return?

Rating - 2 (out of 5): This episode was pretty bad if I'm honest. It really felt like a filler episode just trying to bulk out the series and it really doesn't age well. It's a very rushed episode in general and they try to put too much into it; unfortunately you can't create that much of a mood in 20 minutes. The premise is great, a being that consumes life wants Superboy's life-force to live forever, and could've been quite creepy done the right way... But it's all too TJ heavy.

Pamela Dare (Sybil Danning) is so very 1980s, with her big hair and even bigger shoulder pads, that you just don't buy her as a centuries old mystical being. The weird dance that she does by Clark's bed is just uncomfortable and, in addition, it's never explained why or how Pamela knows that Clark is Superboy and that he's susceptible to magic. These are quite big plot holes that are just ignored. As the audience are we supposed to just know that Superboy can be affected by magic? And that there are some people that just know Superboy's secret?

The other problem I had with this episode is that there's just not enough Clark/Superboy in it. The baseball game is good fun, but not long enough, and the end is all a bit rushed. You don't quite know how Superboy gets away form Pamela, or how he saves both Lana and TJ and then just leaves.

Ultimately I think this episode could have been far better. They could have really brought the whole magic scenario up a notch and made it all about Superboy and Pamela from start to finish. I guess they needed to show that this is what she's done for hundreds of years and I suppose it was all just a little disappointing for me. I love it when they bring Superman lore into things, but I just want them to give it the justice it deserves.

Join me for what I hope will be the next thrilling episode: 'Luthor Unleashed'.

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