Lex Luthor (Smallville)



Lex Luthor is one of the main characters in the TV show; Smallville. Unlike most adaptation where he and Superman are enemies from the start, Luthor starts off as one of the main protagonist, and even a close friend to Clark Kent. But as the series progressed, the friendship between Luthor and Clark began to dwindle, to the point where they became bitter enemies. This also resulted in Luthor's tragic past catching up to him, and terrible parenting. Luthor was also involved in various plans including the creation of various clones of himself. He also ended up making enemies with other heroes including Green Arrow, Aquaman, Cyborg, and Impulse (AKA Kid Flash).

Luthor was played by Michael Rosenbaum.

Childhood
Lex Luthor is the son of Lionel Luthor, and the late Lillian Luthor, and brother of Julian Luthor.

When Lex was about nine years old, he and his father were in a helicopter going by Smallville, Kansas. At the same time, a meteor shower occurred. The meteors also contained both Kryptonite fragments and a baby Kal-El. One of the meteors flew dangerously close to Lex. Fortunately, Lex managed to survive. The radiation inside the meteor gave Luthor a heighten immune system, but resulted in him lost his hair, and couldn't grow any since then.

Smallville
Years later, Lex Luthor met Clark after he was saved from the farm boy from a car crash. The two eventually became close friends, despite the fact that Clark's parents hated the Luthor family. He started off as a good person, fighting against his father Lionel Luthor, but due to a harsh childhood, and bad parenting, he envied Clark, and often tried to find out his secret. Their relationship crumbled, and Lex was set on the road to evil. He would use and abuse people with meteor powers, just as his dad would do, until one day he decided to murder his father. Lex eventually found out about Clark's secret. While he and Clark were confronting each other inside the Fortress of Solitude, Luthor was presumably killed when the Fortress exploded.

It was eventually revealed that Luthor was alive but severely injured. He had to rely on life support through tubes and breathing machines and his face was partially scarred and wore a kryptonite ring with an L insignia. He used Winslow Schott to assist him in his revenge. Wanting revenge, Lex killed all of his previous staff when he attempted to murder Oliver. Watching a view screen connected from Schott's puppet eye, he monitored Schott's setup of a meteor-rock bomb on the roof of the Daily Planet. Knowing Lana had stolen his Prometheus suit, he set Clark and Lana up so that she would have to absorb the meteor rock to diffuse the bomb, and as a result, never be able to go near Clark again. Just when Clark was about to confront Lex, a toy bomb of Schott's that Oliver put there caused a nasty truck explosion with Lex inside, killing him. Lex's remains from the charred truck were later scattered by Clark.

Lex was mentioned by Doctor Fate as Clark's ultimate opponent in the future, but assured him that he would one day finally triumph over Lex. Clark questioned this, believing Lex had been killed to which Doctor Fate did not respond. While in a spiritual cornfield, Lex was seen amongst the stalks of corn by Clark. He then disappeared while Clark returned to life. Afterwards, it was discovered Lex used Cadmus Labs to create many clones of himself with the intent to use the clones' body parts to heal his own injuries. Unknown to anyone for some time, Lex took his failed clones' best pieces to create a perfected, composite clone LX-Ø. Unfortunately, he was unable to successfully duplicate a heart at the time. After Lex's “masterwork” is discovered by a Lionel Luthor from an alternate reality, Lionel's biomedical research company tried to locate Conner Kent for a heart to give LX-Ø but Tess's efforts to hide Conner forced Lionel decide to use Tess as a last resort.

While Apokolips was approaching the Earth and after Tess escaped and shot Lionel for planning on using her heart to revitalize Lex, Lionel desperately crawled toward Lex to which Lionel and Darkseid made an exchange: Darkseid would give Lionel's heart to Lex while Lionel surrendered his own soul to Darkseid in the process. Completely restored, Lex noticed the alternate-Lionel's change of heart and met with Clark at the Luthor Mansion's remains. Lex told Clark that he embraced his destiny as Clark's nemesis. He was then able to encourage Clark to go fight Darkseid, saying that Clark couldn't defeat Darkseid but they both knew who could. Lex later arrived at LuthorCorp and confronted Tess, revealing he knew that she was his sister all along and the fact that she shot the alternate-Lionel (who only wanted Lex back). He told her he loved her and the two siblings embraced. Subsequently, Lex stabbed Tess with a long blade. As Tess died, Lex said he was saving her from becoming him, to which she said Clark already has. Tess then rubbed Summerholt's neurotoxin on his face, which interfered with his memory. Before she died, Tess told Lex he had 30 seconds until his memories about Smallville were completely wiped out. As Tess succumbed to her wounds, Lex forgot everything that happened throughout his life in Smallville.

Lex looked out of the office window at the coming Apokolips while its chaotic damage “destroyed” LuthorCorp, leaving behind LexCorp in its place. After Superman saved the world from Darkseid, Lex decided to run for President. It's unknown if he eventually won the campaign.

Powers
Lex possess an heighten intellect. After being exposed to meteor rock encased in green kryptonite when he was young, Lex also has a heighten immune system as he hasn't been sick since that day. It was also revealed that he has an abnormal amount of white blood cells in his body, which allows him to survive serious injures. He's also skilled on various forms of hand-to-hand combat including; judo, taekwondo, boxing, swordplay and gun handling.