User:Peregrine Fisher/Workspace/Pilot

Pilot is the first episode of the first season of the WB original series, Smallville. The episode was written by Alfred Gough and Miles Millar and was directed by David Nutter. It originally aired on October 16, 2001.

Plot
The pilot episode opens in the year 1989 in the town of Smallville, Kansas. A small alien spacecraft approaches Earth followed by a number of large meteors. Some of the main characters are shown going about their lives, unaware of the approaching meteor shower.

Businessman Lionel Luthor (owner of LuthorCorp) and his nine-year-old son, Lex (with a full head of bright red hair), arrive in Smallville in a helicopter. Lionel is in Smallville regarding a business deal with the Ross Creamed Corn factory, owned by Pete Ross' grandfather.

We are then introduced to Clark's future adoptive parents, Jonathan and Martha Kent, as they go about their daily business. We are also introduced to a three-year-old Lana Lang and her Aunt Nell. We learn that it is the Kents' wish to one day have a child of their own.

When the meteor strike begins, the young Lana and her aunt watch as Lana's parents are killed by a meteor. Also, as the Kents drive home, a meteor lands nearby, causing Jonathan to swerve off the road. Lex, having wandered away from his father into a nearby corn field after hearing a cry for help, finds a teenage boy strung to a wooden post in a bizarre 'scarecrow'-like fashion with a crude red 'S' painted on his chest - and is then caught up in the debris from the meteor storm himself. Lionel later finds Lex in the cornfield quivering on the ground. As a strange side-effect of the meteor shower, Lex is now completely bald.

Meanwhile, having climbed out of the wreckage of their truck, the Kents find a young naked boy who has undoubtedly come from a scorched spaceship lying nearby. Martha holds the boy in a blanket, and while Jonathan is ambivalent about what to do with this strange child, Martha smiles and says, "We didn't find him. He found us."

Trivia
Originally Cynthia Ettinger was cast as Martha Kent but she was replaced by Annette O'Toole, requiring re-editing.

Quotes
"We didn't find him. He found us." - Martha Kent

Guest roles

 * Young Clark - Malkolm Alburquenque

Featured music

 * "The Way It is" by Bruce Hornsby
 * "Long Way Around" by Eagle-Eye Cherry
 * "Eight Half Letters" by Stereoblis
 * "Unstoppable" by The Calling
 * "Wonder" by Embrace
 * "Inside the Memories" by Fear the Clown
 * "Let's Go" by Capitol Eye
 * "Maybe" by Stereophonics
 * "Everything I Own" by Jude
 * "Everything" by Lifehouse