The series recounts the early adventures of Kryptonian Clark Kent as he adjusts to life in the fictional town of Smallville, Kansas, during the years before he becomes Superman.

Season three follows Clark's constant fight against the destiny that his biological father, Jor-El, has in-store for him, and his guilt over the price Jonathan paid to bring him back to Smallville.

Writers also brought in several DC Comics characters, Maggie Sawyer, Morgan Edge, and most notably Perry White, in special guests spots.

[3] Going into season three, the Smallville crew wanted to establish two main themes, which were the consequences of Clark running from his destiny, and Lex taking steps toward "the dark side".

[21] The episode "Forsaken" was designed to set up many of the plot points in the season finale, particularly those dealing with Clark's feeling of isolation, specifically that of Pete and Lana's departure from Smallville.

The episode "Whisper" not only introduced a new superpower for Clark, his super hearing, but allowed the writing staff the opportunity to provide a sort of "in-joke" to the audience.

In the episode, an accident with Clark's heat vision causes him to go blind; as his eyes heal, he is forced to wear a pair of prescription eyeglasses until he fully regains his sight.

When this happens, the staff is forced to change aspects of an episode in order to save time, better develop characters, or stay in line with the rest of the season.

As the episode progresses, elements of the story were changed and Garrett drifted from being sympathetic to being a darker character who was eventually killed by a police sniper.

[29] In the original draft of "Truth", Mrs. Taylor did not reveal that she had been part of an activist group that had done some illegal activity years earlier, but that she was having an affair with a student.

As Gough sees it, using the affair storyline would have created more scenes that would need to be shot in order to effectively tell that part of the episode, and using the concept that Mrs. Taylor had been on the run from the law worked easier for the crew.

[27] Although there were no real changes to "Talisman", Gough has stated that he wishes they could go back and redo aspects of the episode, because it failed to provide an "entry point".

He believes that if someone had not been watching the show previously, they would not have been able to follow the story; to the random observer the episode was simply about two men, Lionel Luthor and Joseph Willowbrook, searching for an ancient dagger.

In the scene, a camera pulls back from a flashback transition to reveal a young Lex sitting alone at a large table full of food and gifts.

This required Rosenbaum to rely more on Millar's direction, so that the emotional level was matched between himself and the young actor portraying Lex, Wayne Dalglish.

[15] As production commences, occasionally the filmmakers find that they have to make last minute changes to the episode in order to explain certain situations better, or because a better idea came along after they were finished.

Gough admits to needing some kind of device to cut back to while all of the other cliffhangers are occurring—Clark being taken away, the Kryptonian symbol burned into field on the Kent farm, and Lex being poisoned—and he felt that Glover's suggestion would help them pull off the effect they wanted.

[25] Rutger Hauer was supposed to reprise his role as Morgan Edge for the episode "Shattered", but he had a scheduling conflict that prevented him from returning.

Instead, the crew hired Patrick Bergin, and had to rewrite the episode to feature a Morgan Edge who had recently undergone plastic surgery to alter his appearance and voice.

For the scene where Clark buys a car with stolen money in "Exile", the production crew converted a local bank lobby into a dealership showroom.

[21] The interior scenes of Summerholt Institute were shot in a local train-car washing building, so that they had enough room to create and film the tank of kryptonite solution.

[15] The flashback sequences filmed in "Memoria", of a young Lex with his infant brother Julian, were shot underneath the St. George's Preparatory School, on a specially designed set by Rob Maier.

[16] For scenes in "Legacy" that involved Dr. Swann, the crew traveled with Christopher Reeve to the New York Public Library to film, which was easier for him to journey to.

Producer Bob Hargrove petitioned for the scene to be shot with real stuntmen, as opposed to using computer-generated effects, which was an idea that was being tossed around at the time of filming.

For instance, a matte painting is used to establish the Metropolis background, which is composed of buildings from several modern-day cities in addition to Vancouver; they include Singapore and Hong Kong among others.

[39] The refusal by the film department to allow Smallville to show Jor-El forced the special effects crew to come up with a creative way to display some sort of aid to help the audience visualize this disembodied voice that was supposed to be talking to Jonathan in "Exile".

To save money on this effect, the crew filmed John Schneider on a black backdrop, and Entity FX digitally added the force field around him.

The entire alley had to be tracked by the computer in order to make sure that the digital raindrops hit all the objects in the frame, including dumpsters that were visible.

In order to achieve the effect of time freezing around Lana just as she is about to get shot and fall to the ground, Kristin Kreuk had to lean against a structural support and hold her body still while filming.

[40] Additionally, the Smallville producers teamed up with Verizon to provide its registered users the chance to view plot updates—in the form of a press release from The Daily Planet—as well as quizzes and games related to the show.