Smallville broke Charmed's record for highest rated debut for The WB, with 8.4 million viewers tuning in for its pilot, while Charmed had 7.7 million viewers.

Viewers will often observe of dialogue, guest stars, character wardrobe, musical scores, and scenic design used as allusions to the Superman comic books and films.

Back in 1998, Warner Brothers Television began pre-production of a proposed television series about a teenaged Batman, tentatively titled simply Bruce Wayne Based on a pilot script, it focused on young Wayne, Vicki Vale, Selina Kyle, Harvey Dent, and Jim Gordon.Tim McCanlies, who wrote the film The Iron Giant, wrote the pilot script and series bible for Tollin-Robbins Productions. The project, however, never got off the ground and into production. Because Warner Bros. was working on rebooting the Batman film franchise, all production was stopped for the television series.

Eventually, in 2000, Tollin-Robbins chose to purchase the rights to do a series about the younger years of the Clark Kent character, and brought in creators Alfred Gough and Miles Millar, who were only interested in the concept if they could make him lose the suit and the majority of his powers. They created a "No Tights, No Flights" rule, vowing that Clark would not, at any point, fly or don the suit during the run of the show. Michael Rosenbaum, once a consideration for Harvey Dent in Bruce Wayne, was cast as Lex Luthor due to his quiet, secretive nature, Kristin Kreuk was cast as Lana, and a young construction-worker-turned-model-turned-actor named Tom Welling was cast as Clark Kent. Also cast were Allison Mack as Chloe Sullivan, Sam Jones III as Pete Ross, Cynthia Ettinger as Martha Kent and John Schneider (of The Dukes of Hazzard fame) as Jonathan Kent. After the pilot for the series had already been finished, due to unknown reasons, Cynthia Ettinger was replaced with Annette O'Toole (who played Lana Lang in 1983's Superman III), and Cynthia's parts were reshot with Annette O'Toole.

The concept of Smallville has been described by Warner Brothers as being a reinterpretation of the Superman mythology from its roots. Recently, since the November 2004 reacquisition of Superboy by the Siegels, there has arisen contention regarding a possible copyright infringement. The dispute is over the ownership of the fictional setting of Smallville, the title setting of the show, and a claimed similarity between Superboy's title character and Smallville's Clark Kent. The heirs of Jerry Siegel claim that "Smallville is part of the Superboy copyright", of which the Siegels own the rights.

The series follows the life of a teenage Clark Kent living in the town of Smallville, Kansas, that is set at the start of the 21st century. It shows Clark Kent coping with adolescence while he is developing superpowers (super vision, superhearing, etc.), exploring his extraterrestrial origins, and struggling to find his destiny in life.

The series often deals with the people in Clark Kent's life: the trials and tribulations of his adoptive human parents, Jonathan Kent and Martha Kent; friendship with his peers Chloe Sullivan and Pete Ross; his attempts at a relationship with his sometimes love interest Lana Lang; and especially his peculiar friendship with a young Lex Luthor.

The element of Kryptonite is used as a recurring plot device throughout the series. Kryptonite is shown to have bizarre and lingering effects on human physiology and the young superhero often encounters mutated villains who have developed bizarre powers, such as psychic abilities, shapeshifting, and other paranormal abilities (for this reason, the show is often criticized as being predominately a "villain of the week" series). Regarding Kryptonians like Clark, though, the Kryptonite has very different effects; the general premise is that Clark is virtually invincible except when around Kryptonite. Different colors affect Clark differently: Green Kryptonite physically weakens him and could possibly kill him if he is exposed to it for too long. Red Kryptonite causes him to set aside moral compunctions and act out on his impulses and dark desires. Black Kryptonite splits Clark into (and merges him back together from) two separate beings that exhibit two personalities (Clark Kent and the apathetic Kal-El). Silver Kryptonite causes hallucinations and paranoid delusions.

Summary Came from Superman Database