'Small' Wonder

Q In the premiere of ''Smallville,'' jocks attack a Kryptonite-addled Clark Kent (Tom Welling) and string him up in a cornfield. Is the WB concerned that this scenario -- and the show's ad campaign -- hews too closely to the 1998 gay-bashing murder of Matthew Shepard?

A The network insists it's only a super-powered coincidence. ''[The scene] was purely the product of the writers' imagination,'' says spokesman Paul McGuire. Despite angry Internet rumblings, even the ever-vigilant GLAAD and the Matthew Shepard Foundation (run by Shepard's mother, Judy) aren't planning to condemn the ads. Says GLAAD's Scott Seomin, ''There is enough ambiguity here for us not to come to any one conclusion.''

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