The answer, in this geeks opinion is both. I think that Smallville started out as a quirky teen drama with the super hero twist. The story mostly centered around Clark’s obssessive love of Lana, which really got annoying, and Cloe’s secret love of Clark, equally annoying.

The show turned around when Cloe found out Clark’s secret, and they got rid of Pete. No offense to Sam Jones, who I think is a great actor, but his character was weak and doomed for removal. The show got even better when they stopped focusing on Lana, and brought Oliver and the other Justice League Characters. I really wish they would either start focusing on those characters a bit more, or do a spin-off series with those characters. They are AWESOME!
Last week Thursday we saw the season finale of season 7, entitled “Arctic”. Lex goes to the Fortress to fulfill his destiny, while Lana awakens from her coma and Chloe is arrested by the government.
Best part of the episode … Lana wakes up, and says a digital goodbye. Again no offense to Kristen Kreuk who is both a gorgeous woman and a fantastic actress, but the writers just completely destroyed this character, and made the whole Clark and Lana story line contrived and aggravating. It became painful watch, and Lana’s dialog made me want to puke most of the time.
The season finale was a little dissapointing to me though. While there was a bit of action, and the destruction of brainiac was cool, the story was suppose to wrap up the story arcs with Lex , Lana, and Clark, and all of that was basically an after thought of the episode. I mean, Lex FINALLY finds out that Clark is the Traveler, and that is done in the last five minutes of the episode, and Lex is kind of, “Oh OK.. we could have done great things together, but now I am going to kill you.”
I just thought there should have been more time with that. Lana too. While I ended up hating the character, I really thought that her “ending” on the show was horrible. It was disrespectful to the character, the actress, and to us the viewers who have had to sit through seven ears of build up with that character. I really thought that the wrap up of Lex and Lana’s stories should have had an episode each dedicated to it.
My biggest concern is that since Clark and Lana didn’t really have closure, and so he will continue to obsess about her and she will continue to be a focal point in the show, which will suck.
Anyway, Cloe seems to get screwed in every season finale, Lois seems to be getting set up to be Clark’s new obsession, Clark and Lex buried in the rubble of the fortress and Michael Rosenblum not coming back next season, Brainiac getting blasted into oblivion, and Kara stuck in the phantom zone, we are left to wonder who will actually be the villains in the next season.
In the end, Smallville seems to be casting off it’s teen 90210′esq drama and embracing it’s geeky superhero self, and I, for one, welcome the change.