The episode begins in 1989 when a meteor shower hits Smallville; at the same time a small spacecraft, containing an alien boy, crashes in front of Jonathan and Martha Kent's (played by John Schneider and Annette O'Toole) truck. They adopt the superhumanly powerful child and name him Clark. Gough and Millar use this opening scene to establish that the three lead characters of the series, Clark, Lana and Lex, share a common bond—they are all without one or both parents: Clark is the only survivor of his homeworld; Lana's parents are killed in the meteor shower; and Lex is alienated from his father, Lionel Luthor (John Glover), after being rendered bald by the meteor blast.