Smallville: Lois and Clark Take the Next Step

As Smallvillejourneys through its tenth and final season, the Lois (Erica Durance) and Clark (Tom Welling) dynamic has begun to shape into the iconic one we know from the Superman mythos. The pair will now dive headfirst into what it means to be Lois and Clark.

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"It's like a sigh of relief," Durance tells TVGuide.com of finally getting to play out the legendary romance. "I think it should've taken as long as it took."

From the once-combative relationship of their early years to the pair swapping 'I love you's' in the 200th episode, Lois and Clark have already seen great growth and equal amounts of sacrifice this season. The latest evidence? Lois discovering and keeping his big secret. "What I like about the fact that Lois knows is that you see this other side of her and how much she really does love Clark. She's just as accepting that he's not ready to tell her yet," Durance says. "She has had a little bit of a power shift, but she's been very adult about it."

Clark already came face-to-face with his future self — one who has freely let Lois in on his secret, and, we imagine, has even taken her on a special flight through the night sky. Now present-day Clark wants to figure out when and how to divulge his extracurricular activities to her.

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"It's always interesting to test the bounds of any relationship," Welling says. "It's interesting to see how they will become who they will be in the future."

The glimpse into the future not only showed a strong personal connection between Lois and Clark, but a professional one as well. (They certainly moved up from the basement of The Daily Planet!) "We'll [continue to] see a healthy balance of both," Durance says. "The writers have done a really great job in creating that arc to build up to the end of the season."

Clark will have a third role to balance in becoming Superman. "Clark's going to have a pretty big impact on not only Metropolis, but worldwide," executive producer Kelly Souders says. "He'll finally step into those shoes of being the icon that everybody needs in their life."

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For her part, Durance hopes to fulfill the audience's expectations of the beloved character. "I want to do justice to what people feel about Lois Lane," she says. "I hope by the end I'm able to do that."

How do you feel about Lois and Clark's path to becoming the iconic twosome we know and love?

Smallville airs Fridays at 8/7c on the CW.