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Lois & Clark:
The New Adventures of Superman
Season 2, Episode 8
208-boltblue
Air date November 20, 1994
Written by Kathy McCormick
Directed by Philip Sgriccia
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When Superman saves a man from committing suicide, lightning strikes the two of them and gives the man powers equal to Superman's. Calling himself "Resplendent Man", the new superhero saves people - for a price. Dr. Gretchen Kelly, still conspiring to resurrect Lex Luthor, realizes the incident which transferred Superman's powers can easily be replicated.

Plot[]

Lois gets a tip from the still incarcerated Mrs. Cox (from the episodes "Barbarians at the Planet" and "The House of Luthor") that she can find out what happened to her late boss Lex Luthor's body at the Perpetual Pines Cemetery. While checking it out, Clark is separated from Lois and overhears a man named William Wallace Webster Waldecker talking to his dead mother, confessing that he feels worthless since he cannot financially support his institutionalized sister. He points a gun at his head. Clark changes to Superman and grabs Wallace's arm, and the two of them are struck by lightning. Superman tries to talk him out of committing suicide, but as Wallace proves long-winded in discussing his problems and Lois is calling for Clark, he refers Wallace to the counselors at Metropolis General Hospital, bends his gun, and takes off. Frustrated at this, Wallace kicks the disabled gun and it flies into the stratosphere, revealing that the lightning transferred Superman's powers to him. Lois and Clark are caught by a cemetery guard and kicked out.

The next day Lois is rescued from a speeding car by Wallace, now bedecked in tights, domino mask, and cape. Her gratitude and intrigue is replace by outrage when he sends a bill for the rescue in the sum of $35.50. Superman confronts the new anonymous superhero and recognizes Wallace. He tells him it is wrong to charge for saving lives, but Wallace sees no moral problem; charging for services is standard practice, and Superman can't rescue everyone by himself. Clark is additionally worried about the press race to find out who the new superhero is and where he came from; if word gets out that Superman's powers are transferable, he won't be able to appear in public without being mobbed by people wanting superpowers.

Having spotted a tattoo on Wallace's left hand, Lois checks out tattoo parlors in the area and learns his tattoo was done by an artist named Allegra Venom. Wallace shows up at Lois's apartment to hit on her. She asks how he got his powers, but he says he is negotiating for the rights to his story.

Lois and Clark see Ms. Venom and give her a description of Wallace. Clark uses Heat Vision to burn out her hard drive so she cannot look up Wallace's name, but Ms. Venom remembers it anyway.

Wallace visits his sister Wandamae, who believes herself to be Mary Todd Lincoln and Wallace to be Tad Lincoln, and tells her he now has Superman's powers. At her suggestion, he adopts the nom de plume Resplendent Man. Dr. Gretchen Kelly approaches him, having witnessed him getting his superpowers at the cemetery, and tries to seduce him into helping transfer the powers to her. However, Wallace senses she is not trustworthy and refuses her.

With Lois increasingly anxious to ask Superman how Resplendent Man got his powers, Clark relents and meets with her as Superman. However, he dodges her questions about Resplendent Man. Lois and Clark next interview Wandamae. Dr. Kelly, posing as a nurse, attempts to take Wandamae away. Angered by her bullying treatment of Wandamae, Clark surreptitiously uses heat vision to give Dr. Kelly a hot foot. Wandamae catches him doing this and realizes Clark is Superman, but keeps his secret. However, she tells Lois that Wallace got his powers from Superman. Lois is upset that Superman hid this from her, so Clark excuses himself and confronts her as Superman. He warns her of the dangers if people knew about the power transference and implores her to think it over. As Lois leaves the institution, she spots Dr. Kelly ushering Wandamae into a car and tails them back to Dr. Kelly's underground laboratory in Perpetual Pines Cemetery.

Superman continues to rebuke Resplendent Man as he takes out advertisements for his services, uses X-Ray Vision to spy on a girls' locker room, and negotiates with a man whose car was stuck on a train track. Weary of this, Resplendent Man picks a fight with Superman. The two superheroes battle to a standstill.

Dr. Kelly catches Lois and puts her with Wandamae in a cage rigged to explode if anyone tampers with it. With Wandamae as leverage, she brings Wallace to her hideout and after several experimental runs, successfully uses electrical charges to transfer Wallace's powers to herself. Superman arrives in search of the missing Lois and is pummeled by Dr. Kelly. The awful circumstances have driven Wallace to have a change of heart, and he punches Dr. Kelly, knocking her into Lex Luthor's life support systems. As Dr. Kelly screams in despair at Luthor's flatlining electrocardiogram, Wallace drags her onto the transference equipment, and Superman transfers both Wallace and Dr. Kelly's powers back to himself. In retaliation, Dr. Kelly remotely activates a countdown for the explosives on Lisa and Wandamae's cage. She gloats, "Say goodbye to the would-be Mrs. Luthor," which inspires Lois to try her wedding date as the combination for the cage's lock. They are free, but Dr. Kelly has fled.

Wallace is happily resigned to being without superpowers, and says the whole experience has taught him that life is worth living for its utter unpredictability. Lois and Clark report the story but omit all mention of how Resplendent Man got his powers and how he lost them. The police deliver Luthor's corpse to the coroner's office, but Dr. Kelly poses as the delivery woman, taking his body back into her possession.

Cast[]

Main cast[]

Recurring role[]

Guest starring[]

  • Cindy Williams as Wandamae Winfield Waldecker
  • DeLauné Michel as Ms. Venom
  • Leslie Jordan as William Wallace Webster Waldecker/Resplendant Man

Trivia[]

After frying Ms. Venom's hard drive, Clark briefly whistles the Lois & Clark theme song.

Dr. Kelly tells Lois that there are over one million possible combinations to the lock on her cage. In actuality, since the code is six digits long (count the beeps on each attempt at entering the combination), there are exactly one million possible combinations.

The National Whisperer seen 42 1/2 minutes in includes the headline "Elvis Rolls Over as Daughter Weds!", a reference to Lisa Marie Presley's then-recent marriage to Michael Jackson.

Quotes[]

Lois: "Well, are you from Krypton too?"
Wallace: "Oh no, ma'am, I'm from Tennessee."


Superman: "If more people pondered the consequences of their actions, this planet wouldn't be in the state it's in."

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