Superman: All 10 Clark Kent actors ranked from worst to best

2. Tom Welling

Appeared in: Smallville, Crisis On Infinite Earths (cameo)

If an actor spends a long amount of time in a role, there’s a pretty high chance they’ll get to know their character better than anyone else. That’s certainly the case with Tom Welling, because no actor spent more time with Clark Kent than he did.

Welling portrayed the role across all ten seasons of Smallville, showcasing how he evolved from a young teenager with inexplicable durability and superpowers to a respected hero who inspired people with hope. The latter is Superman in a nutshell, but the thing that differentiates Welling from every other actor to play the role is that he wasn’t primarily playing Superman; he was playing Clark Kent.

Smallville is all about Clark’s journey. That’s why it starts with him as a teenager at Smallville High, which is an aspect of the character that Welling excelled at right from the beginning. From his natural ability to highlight Clark’s endearing nerdiness to the way in which he became a mumbling mess around Lana Lang, he brought about those renowned Clark Kent qualities pretty quickly but in a completely different environment. It went a long way in showing that the Clark Kent persona wasn’t really a persona, but an extension of who he really was. And who he really was happened to be a thoughtful young man full of good.

By the time the show ended, Welling was a master at playing the traditional Clark Kent. It was the perfect ending to the story, but it was even more fulfilling watching how he got there in the first place and his growth along the way. What a journey.