Warning: Spoilers for Superman & Lois season 2, episode 11
Superman & Lois has introduced a status quo change that also shows a big contrast for Emmanuelle Chriqui's Lana Lang from Smallville's version played by Kristin Kreuk. Superman & Lois on a brief hiatus before heading into the last episodes of season 2. With the show to return on May 31, Superman & Lois left viewers on quite a cliffhanger to pore over until then.
With Clark Kent (Tyler Hoechlin) back from the Bizarro world, he comes to the conclusion that he can no longer keep his secret from Lana Lang-Cushing after bumping into her on the street while in pursuit of the Bizarro Jonathan (Jordan Elsass). In the episode’s final scene, Clark removes his glasses and floats up into the air, revealing himself as Superman before his one-time girlfriend in adolescence. It’s Lana’s response to this reveal and her earlier meeting with Clark that show she’s different from Smallville’s Lana in one key way, namely her tolerance for Clark keeping secrets from her.
Despite how vexed she is and her observation that Clark has always had a side of himself he’s kept hidden from her, before Clark reveals his secret identity to Lana, she's much better adapted to him having one. On Smallville, Kristin Kreuk’s Lana was well aware that Tom Welling's young Clark Kent was hiding some kind of secret from her, frequently begging him to reveal it to her and greatly frustrated by his reluctance to do so. Lana eventually managed to see Clark using his powers without her knowledge in Smallville’s season 6 episode “Promise,” with Clark telling her of his alien origins by the season’s end. Once Kreuk’s Lana learned the full truth about Clark, she was far more understanding that the secrecy that he’d maintained for years was justified. However, that was only because she had the complete context of Clark’s Kryptonian origins. Without that knowledge, Lana could not shake the feeling that she was being deceived, and had to take it upon herself to learn the truth about him. While Kreuk’s Lana hated secrets being kept from her, Chriqui’s isn’t as uncompromising in this regard.
Superman & Lois creates a different dynamic between Clark and Lana, with Chriqui’s version more willing to accept that Clark will come clean with her when he’s ready to. The approach of Smallville and Superman & Lois with regard to Lana’s acceptance or lack thereof of Clark’s secrecy isn’t an inherently better version of her either way, but simply presents two different versions of Lana Lang. On Superman & Lois, the belief of Chriqui’s Lana that Clark would reveal his secret when he felt the time was right ultimately held true. On Smallville, Kreuk’s impatient Lana Lang, sometimes to the annoyance of viewers, had to know what Clark was hiding from her one way or another.
It's worth remembering, however, that Superman & Lois' version of Lana Lang is a much older, more mature, and wiser version than the Lana Lang of Smallville, who was just a teenager when the show began. Chriqui's Lana is a mother of a teenage daughter with a troubled marriage and has had enough experience to know that she can't push people to divulge things until they're ready. Kreuk's Lana is still young and figuring both herself and the world out. Even though she's pushy about learning Clark's secrets, her youth makes it somewhat more understandable.
Superman & Lois season 2 returns May 31 on the CW.