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2006 TV News Archives

January 28, 2006: Al Gough and John Schneider Talk Death on “Smallville”

KryptonSite caught up with Al Gough and Zap2It.com interviewed John Schneider to talk about the lead up and aftermath of the 100th episode of "Smallville". Be warned, there are HUGE spoilers if you haven't seen the episode. Here's part of what they had to say...

Q: Was it always part of the plan to kill Jonathan Kent in the 100th episode?

Al Gough: It's part of the mythology. We had talked about other characters, but it just seemed that as we were going into Season Five, this is the year the boy becomes the man, so at some point the mentor/father figure has to die, in order for Clark to ultimately step up and really embrace his destiny. Nobody can buffer or shield him anymore from these things. He's got to take it on for himself.

If there is anything about Smallville that Mr. Schneider would miss more than anything else, it would be his working relationship with Tom Welling. "I miss working with Tom. We have a really remarkable relationship with regard to the father and son bit. We're fun, and we're both big guys and all that sort of thing, but when you really get right down to it, the relationship you see on Smallville is very like the relationship we have. My son is 14, and I'll have that relationship in a couple of years. But I don't have that, really, yet," he said. Schneider's last scene filmed with Welling for "Reckoning" was holding Clark back after Lana's fatal crash. The words "there's nothing you could have done" are effective for not only that situation, but Jonathan's passing as well.

Read the Al Gough and John Schneider interviews at the respective sites.