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Reviews
4:22 Commencement Review
By Zoomway
I'm starting this with continuity from the previous episode, which is more than the show ever did.
In the episode Forever, Genevieve said she was going to go take care of Lana. That same day Lex threatened Lionel that if anything happened to Lana, he'd pay the ultimate price (in so many words). But that day Lana was a prisoner of Brendan, the waxworks king, and so Genevieve wouldn't have been able to find her. Lana was rescued. Then night fell. Then the next day happened and our three happy teens left Smallville High for the last time.
Okay, Lex had a night and a day that Lana would have been available for a warning that Genevieve was after her. Genevieve had a night and a day to get at Lana. Neither happened. Instead, the finale opened with Lana entering her Talon apartment at night. What night? I don't know other than it was the night before graduation. At any rate, Genevieve was already there skulking in the apartment.
"I have to applaud you, Lana (don't we all)," Genevieve said as she stepped out of the shadows. "I raised my son to have a willpower that couldn't be broken by anything ... except his love for you, apparently." Naturally. Lana's love ruins plenty of good men.
"What do you want from me?" Lana asked after clomping halfway across the floor.
"The stone. The one Lionel gave you."
"Lionel? He never gave me any ..." Lana cut herself off when Genevieve pointed a pistol at her face.
Lana opened her purse, because we established last episode that she was lugging the stone around with her, and held it out to Genevieve, who took way too long staring at it. In fairness, though, it wasn't the stone Genevieve had expected to see. Then Lana kicked the gun out of Genevieve's hand and a brawl ensued.
Lana, being bested in the brawl by a woman old enough to be her grandmother, was suddenly possessed by Isobel, the witch who sublets Lana's body. That gave Lana the strength of ten grinches plus two! She summoned the stone and then stabbed Genevieve in the heart with it ... or thereabouts.
Having dispatched her ancestral enemy, Isobel dispossessed the premises, which left Lana with blood on her hands, but the tattoo finally vanished. And Lex, who had at least two days to get to Lana to protect her, finally showed up just in the nick of ... too late.
What a cheap cheesy resolution to the Isobel/tattoo arc. Not to mention a cheat. Isobel wanted those stones for herself. Killing off the Teagues was just a personal vendetta. She gets a stone in her hand, she kills Genevieve and then just leaves Lana, the stone and the plot line behind? It's clear in this finale that the show's producers just wanted an end to a myth-arc that wasn't working and completely rushed to a poor resolution.
The murder seemed to launch Clark into nightmare mode. He dreamed he awoke to flickering lights, the TV and radio randomly scanning through channels and the grandfather clock not only running backward, but making the sound of a cuckoo clock. Perhaps as a tribute to last week's mutant.
Shelby began whining and scratching at the kitchen door. When Clark opened the door, bright light, a la Close Encounters, came pouring in. Clark and the dog stepped outside and there was something of an aurora borealis in the sky. Then the dog started barking and bolted back for the house as the colors coalesced into a ball of fire headed right for the farmhouse.
Clark sat up on the sofa hyperventilating as the Kent?s ran to him. They said he was yelling "It's coming" over and over. No comment.
Then the action clipped to outer space where a big rock split open and turned into a lot of smaller rocks headed for Earth. Then a countdown time stamp appeared, kind of like the one in All Shook Up. However, this countdown actually ends up meaning nothing.
After the opening theme, there was a close-up of Lana washing her blood-soaked hands in a basin as Lex poured water over them. Why Lana was performing her blood ablutions in the Luthor library instead of a bathroom, is unknown. Though that does mean that Lana left her apartment, went down a flight of stairs into the Talon, crossed the Talon and entered Lex's car as her hands dripped blood the whole way.
Lana was understandably upset ... this time. Last year she kicked a man into a pitchfork that pierced his chest and killed him. She didn't seem to suffer any anguish over that bit of self defense at all. Oh, well, that was a whole year ago and she may have gotten a remorse gene for her birthday.
Lex made the proper promises of a top notch lawyer to fight Genevieve's husband, who we've never seen, but who is also a top notch lawyer. Lex gave Lana a hug and told her to stay put until the lawyer arrived and not to talk to anyone. Lana had felt she should tell Jason. She won't ask him to the prom, but she will offer to tell him she killed his mother. Lex nixed the idea, mainly because he thought Jason was dead and wouldn't be accepting calls.
Lana also felt she should tell the police, but despite that sounding like the right thing to do, she kept the murder weapon and ran off with it. When one of Lex's lackeys entered and said, "Mr. Luthor, we have a situation," Lana pulled the stone out of her purse as soon as Lex left. She managed to wash her hands, but not the stone, so it's amazing how the silk cloth she kept it wrapped in didn't stick to the blood.
Meanwhile, at the Kent farm, Clark said he couldn't help thinking the dream was a warning. I know how he feels. I had a dream that my sister threw away a dead armadillo that was wearing overalls and she told me, "This is what happens when you dress animals in clothes too young." I certainly heeded her warning. I won't put so much as a hat on an animal until it's two or three years old.
Martha comforted Clark telling him it was just a bad dream. Clark dismissed her assessment. "It felt so real. If this was a warning, I need to do something."
"What you need is to get some shuteye so you're not half asleep when they hand you that diploma tomorrow."
"Your dad's right. Don't let a nightmare spoil your high school graduation."
"Nightmare," Lois said as she came down the stairs in her pajamas and bunny slippers. The Kent?s clammed up. "So that's what all the commotion is about."
Years earlier another Lois Lane interrupted a Kent family meeting in the middle of the night. Clark, who had been exposed to kryptonite for the first time, was recovering in the kitchen as he and his parents speculated why the green crystal made him sick. But they all clammed up as soon as Lois entered the room. Of course in less than two years Lois herself would be part of the Kent family confabs, but that's a long way off for Smallville's Lois.
"I had a nightmare last week," Lois waffled on as she poured herself a glass of orange juice. "This guy in a red cape." Some of that subtle foreshadowing.
"That sounds horrible, Lois," Clark snarked.
Lois walked back to the table. "There's something I need to tell you guys, but didn't know when to, so I guess two in the morning is as good a time as any." If it's 2 AM at the Kent household, what the hell was Lana doing away from her apartment at that hour? She wasn't with Clark and there can't be many midnight hot spots in Smallville. Not to mention it was established that tomorrow was graduation day. I know I won't get an answer to this, but I had to ask.
"What, Lois?" Martha asked.
"The General has recruited me to track down my sister the grifter in Europe, so we're headed for Heidelberg tomorrow."
"Oh, I'm sorry to hear that," Martha said.
Lois then turned to Clark. "I know how devastated you must be, but if you could just keep your tears to a minimum, I'd appreciate it."
Clark was actually funny here as he nodded his head trying to look sincere. "I'll try."
Then Lois had to do something that's traditionally hard for Lois to do, she had to be open with her feelings with no jokes for protection. "Mr. and Mrs. Kent, I just wanted to say thanks for everything. You guys are like the Mom and Dad I've always wanted to have."
This actually worked better as foreshadowing because one day they will be Lois's in-laws.
Lex went to Lana's apartment only to find Genevieve's body gone and the blood cleaned up. Naturally Lionel was behind it. Apparently Lana's apartment is a great place for villains to skulk. This scene was a pretty typical scene of threat and counter-threat between Lex and his father, but Lionel did have a good line. "You know, for a woman without a heart, Genevieve Teague certainly had a lot of blood."
However, Lionel's most cogent line, not just for Lex, but for all of Lana's battlefield love victims was, "Your feelings for Miss Lang -- don't let them cripple your common sense, son."
Lionel left, but told Lex he expected to have the stone returned to him by noon tomorrow, or Genevieve's corpse would be delivered to the sheriff with Lana's DNA as postage. To quote Bogart from The Maltese Falcon, "the cheaper the crook, the gaudier the patter."
Then we clip to a satellite tracking station where the guy on duty is reading Adbusters, a Vancouver based magazine "concerned about the erosion of our physical and cultural environments by commercial forces." So there's some ironic humor that their magazine is in the episode as just one more product placement ad cluttering the TV landscape.
When an alarm went off, the guy bothered to do his job, which seemed to consist of calling some other guy in to look at the screen. "Hey, look, rocks are coming to Earth." Okay, that's not what he said, but it pretty much covers what he meant.
The noisy time stamp appeared again to inform us that there were about 9 hours left till the rocks hit the Earth. You don't really have to guess where on Earth they were headed, do you?
The next morning Clark was trying to tie his necktie with little success.
"I realize hand-eye coordination isn't one of your strong suits," Lois said as she entered the loft and took his tie. "Here, let me help you with that."
"Lois, I'm not sure what I'm going to do without you." I don't know if the line was supposed to be delivered in a snarky manner, but it didn't come across that way. He sounded somewhat sincere.
"Oh, come on, Clark, your future's laid out right in front of you. You'll go to community college, major in agriculture, probably minor in law enforcement and then you and Lana are going to have a nice little church wedding."
"Excuse me?"
"It's written in the stars and you know it. It's only a matter of time before you join the bowling league, take over the family farm and then, well, you and Lana can bring little Clark Jr. into the world."
"You're hallucinating," Clark said in a rather cranky tone.
"No," Lois countered as she slipped the tie around Clark's neck. "Hallucinating would be Clark Kent going off to the big city to make his mark on the world. I'm just being realistic." And so saying, she tightened the knot to a strangulation level.
There's something metaphoric about Lois forecasting a mundane future for Clark. The necktie suddenly became an inescapable noose representing everything that has kept Clark bogged down physically and emotionally for at least the last four years.
"Well, Lois, what are your big plans after Europe? You gonna go back to school? Actually stay a little while?"
"I have a feeling if I'm going to get an education, it's going to be in the real word," she said, and moved to Clark's sofa. "You know I took this career test in some magazine and it said my perfect job would be radio disk jockey."
"Makes sense," Clark said. "You talk enough. They wouldn't have to worry about dead air."
"You mock me now, Smallville, but you just wait and see."
"Journalism," Clark suggested. "Thought about that? You wrote some half decent articles at your short-lived career at the Torch."
"No, kill me first. Even if I could spell, the last thing I'd want to do is spend my time in a news room. With my luck, I'd probably end up sitting across from the most bumbling reporter on the masthead." More of that subtle ironic foreshadowing. Unfortunately it goes with the pre-Crisis notion of Clark Kent being a bumbling disguise for Superman.
"You know what?" Lois asked, and then her voice dropped to a softer tone. "You actually look handsome for a change."
Clark smiled. "I'll take that as a compliment."
The knot in Clark's tie was still askew so Lois decided to straighten it. "Look," she began, "I know we've had our disagreements in the past and I'll be the first to admit that I've made it my own little hobby to bust your chops."
"Gotten used to it. Besides, I know I haven't been the most gracious host."
Violin music began to play (honest). "I just want you to know, Clark, that when I'm sitting in the audience today at your graduation and you stand up on that stage in front of all those people, I'm going to be looking up at you and thinking one thing."
"What's that?"
"Please, God, don't let him trip," she answered and smacked him in the arm. "See ya."
Clark smiled and shook his head as she exited.
This, as I mentioned in another thread, is an ironic scene because exactly three years ago Clark was getting his tie straightened by someone else -- Lex Luthor. I found the imagery so disturbing that I posted a comparison.
I had written this 3 years ago:
Traditionally this type of scene is used to impart a kind of intimacy, whether tying, untying, or straightening a man's tie.
And though the Smallville couple might be light-years away from a romance, Lois's invasion of Clark's space was deliberate and was, if only technically, intimate.
Later that day the graduation ceremony got under way as scheduled, but without Lana. As Clark and Chloe marched towards the stage, Clark asked, "Seen Lana yet?"
"Not a sign. I'm starting to get worried," Chloe said. "Lana's never had so much as a tardy (of course not, she's the Chosen One). She's not going to miss her high school graduation."
"She'll be here," Clark assured her as he headed for the stage. As soon as Clark's name was called, Lois hopped up and whistled.
Then Lana's name was called and a siren went off. Clark should have seen that as an omen.
Various military vehicles pulled up to the graduation and all nonessential personnel were ordered to evacuate the city within a 50 mile radius. "In approximately three hours a meteor shower is predicted to hit Smallville."
"Oh, my God," Martha said. "Not again." I know how ya feel.
Chloe was completely jazzed about the idea. "Hey, Clark, can you believe it? Twice in sixteen years, this is crazy. Smallville's gotta have some extraterrestrial bull?s-eye on it." Chloe actually delivered this line with a big smile on her face.
"It's pretty weird, huh?"
"There's gotta be some kind of connection in the cosmos, I mean this is not just a coincidence," she nattered on happily.
"Yeah, I'm sure there's some sort of explanation."
"There's something in Smallville just screaming for celestial attention. I mean lightning does not strike twice in the same place without some kind of lightning rod, right? I just wonder what that is."
"Um, I'm not sure, but we don't have much time, we have to find Lana."
"Well, if anyone can find her with moments to spare, it's you, Clark."
Clark suddenly got defensive. "Why do you say that?"
"I don't know. Because you have a way of getting things done in half the time a normal person does."
Clark snapped around. "And I'm not normal?"
"No, of course you're normal, Clark. You're as normal as they come. Now let's hurry and find Lana."
Lois showed up. "Look, I'm sure she's already out of town. They've evacuated half the county. They probably saw her coming in late and told her to leave town."
"That's exactly what you two need to do right now," Clark told the cousins.
"Great tip," Lois said. "Listen to me, Smallville, if there's one thing the General has taught me is that you cannot panic in times of crisis. Do you hear me?" she asked, her voice getting shrill. "Okay, no matter what happens, you cannot panic!"
"Lois ..."
"Because if you lose your cool ..."
"Lois!"
"What?"
"You're panicking."
"Fine!"
This type of scene works better with more seasoned actors, but it was a true Lois and Clark moment.
Clark went home to find his parents packing a few things and said he felt responsible for the meteor shower and that there must have been something he could have done to prevent it. So he decides to gab with Jor-El.
Before he can do that, Lex showed up offering the LuthorCorp jet to evacuate his family and oh, by the way "my scientists have identified what seems to be an inner chamber inside the cave wall" and Clark, of course, pretended to know nothing about it. Same old same old. Though Lex did say the first meteor shower caused him irrevocable damage. Baldness?
Clark finally got the opportunity to chat with Jor-El. "You're my father," he said as he put the octagon disk in the slot. "Talk to me. Tell me what you've done!"
Then a jelly monster tube of light formed around Clark. "It is you who brought this upon yourself, Kal-El."
"What did I do?"
"I sent you here to unite the three elements."
Wasn't it nice in the old days when Jor-El had merely sent his son to Earth to save his life?
"The stones? They have nothing to do with me."
"But they do, Kal-El. For the knowledge of the universe is meant for you only (well, la dee da), yet you have chosen to ignore your destiny. Today you will witness the consequences."
Jor-El is right. Back in Sacred he told Clark "You must find the other two stones. The fate of the world lies in your hands, Kal-El" and "if a human unites them before you, they will not be able to withstand the temptation and will drive the world to famine, war and the Earth's ultimate destruction." What in all that did Clark not understand?
"Then you sent the meteor shower."
"I have done nothing, Kal-El. Human blood has stained one of the elements and awakened a great danger from the darkness of space."
"What can I do to stop it?"
"There is nothing you can do to stop what already is in motion, but the meteor shower is just the beginning, Kal-El. I warned you that the elements could not fall into the hands of a human. The three must become one. It is the only way to save Earth from total annihilation."
"I don't know where they are! I don't have time!" Well, you should have thought of that sooner, young man.
"If you don't find them at once, you, my son, will be seared by a fire from the sky even you can't survive. The future of mankind rests in your hands." We're doomed.
Naturally that was a cue for Lana to show up. "Lana, I thought you already evacuated. Are you okay?"
"I'm scared."
"Lana, I'm sure this meteor shower brings up painful memories for you, but this time it's different. We have warning and we'll be safe."
"I'm not so sure. Clark, I don't know what's going to happen to me, but I want you to have this," she said and whipped out the stone, still colored with Genevieve's blood.
"Where'd you get this?"
"In China. Whatever it is, whatever it means, I somehow know it's meant for you."
And how long have you known it was meant for Clark, Lana? I'm sure Lana will be given an easy out here, because it's one of the many things that keeps her from being a complex character, but it would be nice if just once she did something bad and got caught.
"Is this blood?" the dense alien asked.
"Remember all those times I asked you for an explanation, but you said you couldn't give me one? That I had to trust you? Well, this time I need you to trust me," she said, her eyes darting back and forth frantically.
What I'd like to know is when and where were "all those times" that Clark told her to trust him? This is not only blatant retro-continuity, but it was designed to justify Lana being a bigger liar and secret-keeper than Clark. She handed him a murder weapon for crying out loud. If the sheriff had stepped in at that moment, guess which of them would go to jail.
"Clark, I need you to know that no matter what happens, I will never forget you."
"Lana, you're talking like we're never going to see each other again." If only.
"I love you," she whimpered and then smooched him.
"I love you, too," Clark said, with hardly any emotion and certainly none showing in his face.
"Good-bye," she said and clomped out of the barn. She had loud shoes in this episode.
Lana got on the cell phone at Lex's mansion. "Chloe, even though you won't hear from me for a while, I wanted you to know I'm okay."
Lex grabbed the phone. "I thought we agreed you wouldn't talk to anyone."
"I just wanted to let my friends know that I'm all right." Because you couldn't trust Clark to tell them you're still alive?
Then Lex rambled on about trusting him and asked if the stone was still safe and offered to put it in the vault. She balked, not having the stone, but not admitting that to Lex. All your secrets and lies are stacking up, Lana.
Meanwhile, Martha and Jonathan were ready to drive away, but Jason, the undead, showed up. Coated in blood and staggering from a truck, he said, "I'm having what you'd call a rough day." Ah, Jason is still humorous even when he's a villain. He demanded to know where Clark was, but his parents didn't answer. Of course they didn't really know, either.
In the great Smallville evacuation traffic jam, Lois asked why Lana would be at Lex's mansion when everyone was ordered to evacuate.
"I don't know, but I could swear that was Lex's voice in the background. She sounds like she's in trouble, Lois. I can't abandon her. The mansion is just around that bend."
But when Chloe tried to round that bend, a soldier told her that emergency vehicles only were allowed past that point. Chloe turned to Lois. "We're way too close to turn away."
Lois exited the car. "Hey, soldier! Is this a roadblock or a lemonade stand?"
"Wait a second," the soldier said. "You're the ..."
"Daughter of General Lane."
The soldier snapped to attention just at the sound of the name.
While Lois kept the soldier distracted, Chloe bolted towards the mansion.
Clark sauntered, that's right, sauntered into the cave with the new stone. You'd never guess a meteor shower was coming by Clark's slow pace. This scene was intercut with Lex and Lionel playing cat and mouse for the millionth time.
Lionel continued to claim he didn't have the other stone, but when Clark finally put the murder weapon stone in the puzzle frame, it caused the stone in Lionel's pocket (no comment) to glow and knocked him to the ground. When Lex reached for it, it threw him across the room.
Lex got back up and looked at his father who was in a catatonic state with a vacant look in his eyes. Probably not unlike people who tuned in wanting to see the Batman Begins trailer and not having a clue what the hell was going on in this episode.
Lex then ordered a couple of lackeys to take Lionel upstairs. The stone, which had become dislodged from Lionel's pocket and was lying on the floor, began to glow and sent out its whining signal to Clark.
Clark whooshed to the mansion and pulled off the vault door (gee, Lex got that stone in there before Clark could whoosh there?), but Lex also had the kryptonite-eyed guardians of the stones in the vault. Why were the stones guarded by the one thing that would prevent a Kryptonian from getting them, but allow any human to go after them? Anyway, Clark grabbed the stone and then collapsed in the vault.
Then we clip to Jason threatening the Kents some more. His main function was to provide exposition ... "why was that symbol burned into your field ... when I ran into Clark in Shanghai ... he's more connected to those stones than anybody ... blah blah blah."
Jonathan said, "None of that matters right now, there's a meteor shower that's about to tear this town apart," or as a Klingon once said, "only a fool fights in a burning house."
"You need to get to your mother," Martha said. "Get her to safety."
"Don't you think I know that?" Jason said, his voice becoming hysterical. "I can't find her anywhere!" Kudos to the actor, he did a very good job in this scene.
Action shifted to Lana getting on the helicopter and Lex asking one last time for the stone. When she said she didn't have it, he took her purse and started pawing through it. "This was never about my safety," Lana huffed, always pissed when a guy loves one of those stones more than her.
Lex bracketed Lana's face with his hands. "Lana, your safety is more important than any of this. You mean a lot more to me than you know."
Meanwhile, Chloe finally made it to the mansion. She saw Clark unconscious in the vault, the stone in his hand and the kryptonite glowing. She grabbed his arm and pulled him away from the kryptonite the instant Lex walked back in.
"Lex, I was looking for Lana (whoosh in the background) ..."
"She already left," he said and noticed the vault door. "What happened?"
"I don't know, I just walked in."
"You know more than you're telling me, Chloe. Who did this?"
"Lex, honestly, I just came to find Lana."
"Your curiosity always has a way of landing you in precarious positions," Lex said, his anger mounting. He grabbed Chloe. "This time you're on a very narrow ledge with only one way back. Now who took the element?"
"Lex, I swear I don't know what you're talking about, but I think we need to get out of Smallville before the meteor shower hits."
"I'm going to find that stone, Chloe, even if that means dodging a few meteors in the process," he said and then tugged her towards the door. "You're coming with me."
Then the scene shifted to a brawl between Jason, Martha and Jonathan. Just as with Lana, an 18 year old who couldn't subdue a 50 something woman even though Lana had martial arts training, Jonathan and Martha couldn't subdue a guy who had a bullet in his chest and was dumped in a river. In both cases the "good guys" disarmed their opponent. Though it was funny that if Jason wanted to kill Martha, choking her with the shotgun was not the most efficient use of that particular weapon.
All hostilities ended when a loud rumbling was heard. It was The WB network complaining about low ratings ... er it was a huge fire ball headed straight for the Kent farmhouse. Kapow! A direct hit.
There was a montage of scenes of general and direct destruction. An 18 wheeler carrying a flammable payload caught fire and the driver jumped out of his moving truck, though I'm pretty sure the brakes would have worked. However, this scene wasn't used to full effect as it would have been in a disaster movie. The flaming truck, still moving, would have plowed into a gas station and sent up a huge mushroom shaped ball of fire and smoke. That, in turn, would have set off any number of cars nearby sending them into the air as unguided missiles and those could land on ... never mind, too expensive.
Then a meteor hit the Smallville High School sign, which is okay since they don't need it anymore. Then several hits on and near the highway, one sending a soldier flying. Lots of screaming, running and general mayhem. Then we have that kid. You know what one I mean. The one who is absolutely apathetic to the screaming of victims and ignores the pleas of parents while bent on a single-minded quest to retrieve a fallen toy.
On L&C it was a little girl who went running back for a toy, which just happened to be under a huge billboard dangling by one cable, or the kid running after a teddy bear with a horse-drawn wagon bearing down on her. In the movie The Crawling Eye, it was a kid about to be gobbled by the title character while retrieving a ball and on Smallville, it was a kid about to be crushed by a meteor because of a toy dump truck.
Clark whooshed in and saved the kid, who was less grateful than Evan. "You're not my daddy."
Then we get a long drawn out scene of Lana looking scared as her helicopter weaves through the meteors. It finally took a hit and crashed.
Then Clark, even more slowly than before, put the third and final stone in the frame. It turned into a solid, clear Superman emblem-shaped crystal. And, as Jor-El said, it did nothing to stop the meteor shower.
At that moment Chloe and Lex entered the cave from the other end. "Why do I get the feeling we're not in this cave for cover?"
"You know as well as I do," Lex said. "It's the epicenter."
"Of what?"
"Come on, Chloe! You're the town purveyor of all things unexplained. You know damn well about this cave and the stones."
"Lex, what's wrong with you?"
"If you didn't break into my library, then you know who did. Who are you trying to protect?"
"No one."
"Is it Clark?"
"Clark? What does Clark have to do with any of this?" Chloe is probably being sincere at this point. She knows Clark has super powers, but doesn't know he's an alien and knows nothing about the stones.
"You tell me. You've known Clark a lot longer than I have. In fact, you might know him better than anyone."
"You're right, Lex, I do and the Clark Kent I know is the last person who would go super thief on your library for some stupid piece of rock." Now here Chloe is definitely lying to cover for Clark because she found him at the vault with the stone in his hand.
The crystal began to float and threw off a bright light from the crevasse leading to the chamber. Lex turned around. "What is that?"
"Lex, be careful, it might be dangerous," Chloe warned and pushed Lex into the cave wall with sufficient force to stun him for a couple of moments.
Chloe continued on to the crevasse, but it's not clear exactly what she might have seen when she peeked in. Clark was standing there and the crystal was floating and Chloe was depicted as if watching it all. Then Clark stretched out his hand and grabbed the crystal and there was another blast of light.
Then the scene clipped to catatonic Lionel in bed with a close-up on his eye which showed Kryptonian symbols orbiting around. This is similar to a couple of years ago when Dr. Walden (remember him? nah) had put the octagon disk in the wall and got flooded with information that put him in a coma.
Action clipped back to the cave where Clark was still glowing and groaning. Lex got up and looked, but again, it's impossible to say exactly what he saw because a second later Clark vanished. It's also impossible to say what happened to Lex and Chloe because that's the last of them we see in this episode.
Clark, still caterwauling, appeared in an arctic wilderness.
Lois, driving Chloe's car on a narrow side road, stopped and looked up into the sky. The meteor shower seemed to be over. She exited the car and began running up a tall grassy hill. When she got to the top she fell to her hands and knees and her eyes started to fill with tears as she looked down on the smoking remains of Smallville.
Using Lois for this shot was a smart choice because it made it more powerful. We wouldn't have to guess whether Lana or Chloe would cry, that's a given, but with Lois moved to tears, it imparts more than sorrow, it conveys the feeling of a life altering moment frozen in time. Something Lois will never forget.
Come on, you knew the Chosen One would survive the helicopter crash. Lana, looking like she'd been attacked by rogue finger-painters, crawled from the wreckage. Noticing a raised mound of earth, Lana dragged herself towards it and then up to the ridge. Looking down into the smoking crater she saw ... Evan again ... noooooo! Uh, I mean she saw a large, dark spaceship.
A rectangle of light appeared on Lana's face as the ship apparently opened some portal while she gazed in.
And finally ...
We cut back to the arctic where Clark looks around and looks confused. He releases the crystal which begins to float. Clark loses his patience fast, grabs the crystal and pitches it.
THE END
Alrighty then, I guess all that's left is to make some predictions for next year.
First, I'd say it's a no-brainer bet that the crystal forms the Fortress of Solitude. I'm guessing that the yammering Jor-El will move his operations there and possibly the cave will be either reduced to rubble by the meteor shower, or that magical chamber will seal up and leave no trace that it was ever there.
If the cave caves in, then Chloe might die for real this time. She might even be killed by Lex, who would take advantage of the cave-in to cover her murder. I'm not suggesting they kill off Chloe, but next season starts a college era and allegedly Chloe is going to Met U while Clark is going to Central Kansas. I don't think the series will have 2 campus sets and unfortunately Chloe, not being part of the Superman myth, is seen as expendable by the producers.
There's also the fact that now that the show has introduced Lois Lane, her evolution has become important because traditionally she's already well established at the Daily Planet before Clark ever shows up to join the staff. The writers could use Lois's life altering moment seeing the destruction of Smallville to launch her towards journalism.
Lois could cover the devastation of Smallville almost like a war correspondent via cell phone to the Daily Planet. Maybe Lois phoned the Planet because she assumed Chloe would be there if she made it safely to Metropolis. The editor, finding out that Lois is phoning from the scene of the disaster, could ask her to give a first hand account. You'll notice I just said 'editor' and not Perry White. That's because the actor who played the role last year has been unavailable to reprise the role.
However, Lois probably wouldn't accept the plum job at the Daily Planet if Chloe were still alive because that's always been her cousin's dream job. Lois would sacrifice the job offer for Chloe's sake. That might be another indicator that Chloe might be killed off, but the big indicator would be Lana being told, or learning Clark's secret next season to further the Clark/Lana romance story line.
After Pete left, the producers had Chloe learn the secret from Alicia, who was also killed off. So the producers might not want more than one character knowing the secret. At least not characters who remain on the show. Unfortunately there seems to be several reasons for Chloe to kick the bucket. Her murder would be the most unforgivable thing Lex Luthor could do and the biggest neon sign that he has become irredeemably evil. It would allow Lois to move on to the Daily Planet and, of course, clear the path for Lana to learn the secret.
With Lois at the Daily Planet, there won't be the need to explain where Lois is when she's missing in some episodes that revolve around other characters and plot lines. Stick in a very young Jimmy Olsen. Give him a crush on Lois and let her befriend him and give them some adventures in Metropolis. It would serve as Lois Lane's ongoing evolution as the Planet's star reporter and give viewers who have no interest in the doomed Clark/Lana romance a respite from it.
There are other possibilities of course. The Kent?s, or perhaps just Jonathan, might be killed by the direct hit on the farmhouse. If so, it's doubtful that Clark would go to Central Kansas. He'd probably opt for Met U instead ... after a "3 months later" time stamp following Jonathan's funeral, of course. Lana, who always has to have a guy, will change her mind about staying in Smallville and go to Met U with Clark. That puts all the main characters in Metropolis because Lex will move there and change LuthorCorp to LexCorp and live in the penthouse of the building.
Whither Lionel? I guess there's a few possibilities. That jolt from the activated stone might turn him into some type of slave to whatever is in the dark ship and he will do its bidding, or he may help fight whatever is in the ship, or he could even evolve into Brainiac, a Superman villain who uses mind control and illusion as weapons.
In post-Crisis Brainiac did take over the mind of a human man, after all. This is what I wrote back in my review of Rosetta when Dr. Walden also suffered a Kryptonian overload:
Milton Fine, a sideshow mentalist, was taken over by Vril Dox, an evil alien from the planet Calu. His power surge left Milton in approximately the same shape as Walden. Milton gradually recovered, but then became one of Superman's big enemies -- Brainiac.
The Fortress of Solitude, evil Lex, Brainiac and Lois at the Daily Planet while Clark is in training to be Superman. It could work ... I guess.
As to what is in the dark ship, well, I doubt even the producers know yet. Somewhere between now and the premiere, they'll put something in it, but I don't think it will contain any type of recurring menace. They'll probably want to resolve that ship and its story line in the first two episodes. All we know, according to Jor-El, is that it is "a great danger from the darkness of space" and "you, my son, will be seared by a fire from the sky even you can't survive."
Well, that's vague enough that a fire-breathing giraffe from Venus could fit the bill. The problem is, Superman does not have a famous rogues gallery like Batman. Lex Luthor is about it as far as any villain that is recognizable outside of comic book fans. Names like Darkseid, Satanus, Killgrave, Lobo, etc. would only mean something to fanboys. Even the name Brainiac is only known outside the fandom in an ironic sense to describe someone who is not terribly bright.
In the end, it won't matter what or who is in that spaceship other than being an instrument to further Clark's future as Superman. If next season is the final season, and I suspect it is, they don't have time to waste on another pointless myth-arc. They need to get their ducklings in a row and have Clark working towards his future, Lois working towards hers and of course Lex moving irretrievably into the dark side.
Lastly, as a bonus, some fans compared Lois's last scene with the painting Christina's World by Andrew Wyeth.
Zoom (ready for the L&C DVDs)
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