Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Lois & Clark Stop the Presses Episode Discussion Thread

This episode marks Lois and Clark's first fight as a married couple. I used to not really like this episode very much since Lois and Clark were fighting throughout the episode. It wasn't as fun to me as watching romantic, feel good episodes. Now, though, I realize that all couples in a healthy marriage fight from time to time, and I can appreciate this episode more. I think the writers did a good job at showing a realistic problem that might come up if a married person suddenly found his or her spouse as the boss.

As far as the argument goes, while I can understand Lois' point-of-view, I tend to take Clark's side. I think that Lois may have thought that not killing Clark's story would have looked like she was playing favorites, but I think she should have given him time to get the facts he needed to publish the story. I believe that that's the call Perry would have made.

One thing I have always liked about this episode is that Perry says that Lois and Clark were neck and neck to get the promotion. I've always liked that Dean Cain's Clark was portrayed as a good reporter in his own right rather than just Superman's disguise, and I just like hearing that Perry views them as equals.

This is another episode without very many fanfics associated with it. I can only find one fanfic in the Archive Database with a keyword of "Episode-Related" to this episode.

Crystal Wimmer wrote Choices: A Rewrite of Stop The Presses . "To me, Clark's jealousy and lack of support were entirely out of character. With that in mind, I decided to try this using the Clark I know and love, rather than the one imposed by this episode. So, if he were - if he made the choice to be supportive, rather than critical - how might the episode have been changed?"

My biggest gripe against this episode is that Superman manages to get light into the missile silo and stop his enemies before Lois crashes the car in there. I just would have liked it a lot better if Lois crashing the car into the silo had actually helped Superman. I always like it when Lois has an active role in defeating the bad guys.

That disappointed me, too. They really made her contribution pointless.

It's a difficult for me to watch this episode, let alone get the muses to agree to a plot-line for me to work off of. I do have a plot line in mind (where Lois does accept a co-editorship with Perry and L&C sit down and work out how they'll work in this new dynamic if after seeing how it caused problems last time) but I just can't get myself to sit down long enough to watch the episode to get a good handle on these two well enough to write them.

In an attempt to be more objective and to be able to participate in these discussions, I've been watching the episodes from the third and fourth seasons to see if they're as terrible as I initially thought they were (spoiler alert: Overall, they absolutely, totally are.). But I will confess that this episode wasn't quite as ugly as I thought. There were little glimmers of their original characterizations there that at least made it feel like I was watching the same show.

For example, when it's announced that either Lois or Clark are going to take over as editor-in-chief, we see Lois not-so-subtly want it badly and take it as personal vindication when she gets the job. Clark is fine with it, and even happy for her, until she starts gloating and then makes it worse when she goes on a power trip by killing his story. I can buy her reassigning him away from the hacker story. First/second season Lois probably unconsciously would have killed that story for several reasons, chief amongst them the fact that he'd be getting that great story without her and she'd have a need to assert her authority.

The thing that drove me crazy wasn't Clark getting upset -- it was that he ripped the door off the hinges. No way. Uh-uh. That was played for cheap laughs and it didn't amuse. Clark has a tendency for petulance, but I can't believe he'd lose all self-control in public, no matter how upset he was with Lois. If it had happened at their home, I might get on board, but Clark's had too much practice keeping his cool when an audience is around.

I also found it stretching the bounds of credulity that Clark (of all people!) was going to get impatient when Lois kept getting phone calls during dinner. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black. If anyone could relate and be supportive in that situation, it should have been him. That was another thing played for cheap laughs that only made me shake my head.

I love Martha and Jonathan! I love their understanding and patience as both Lois and Clark can't sit through a meal. I also adore them for digging in and not waiting.

I can't say I'd watch the episode again anytime soon, but time and distance have mellowed some of my antipathy for it.

I completely agree. If Clark getting upset would make him lose control like that, he would have a lot more mishaps and probably hurt people. Also, the door coming off looked completely fake. If he had grabbed the doorknob too hard, he would have broken the doorknob or pulled it off, not broken the hinges.

I always found it odd that the DP would let a person report directly to their spouse. Where I work the policy is that you can't manage or report to anyone in your immediate family or anyone you live with. The idea is to avoid nepotism and conflicts of interest. I can see why Perry would want Lois or Clark to take over for him, but that raises ethical questions with regard to their working relationship vs. their personal relationship.

I have to agree that Clark getting mad about Lois being interrupted from dinner by calls was not in character. He gets interrupted from all sorts of things by his Superman duties so it made no sense. Plus, Lois newly taking over the job really mad a mess.

There is also Female Hawk's "Treasure Chest", which is not on the archive yet as far as I can tell. It is actually set a lot later but it has Lois as the editor of the DP.