Previously on Smallville:
Jonathan and Martha Kent raised a cute little boy who came from outer space in a firestorm of meteors. That boy grew up to be Clark Kent, who was even mopier than the average teen. It was one day as he was moping on a bridge that sexy bald Lex Luthor hit him with his sporty Porsche. Lana Lang asked a befuddled young Clark "So what are you, man or Superman?" in one of the show's very first cheese bludgeonings. Clark inadvertently floated over his bed one morning, then spent the ten years not flying. A computer version of his birth father told him he was the Last Son of Krypton (except for all the other Kryptonian dudes we met over the years). Jonathan Kent died. Six years ago, Clark met a Lois Lane who oddly looked ten years older than she does in the present day. Clark got a job at the Daily Planet during their "hire a nobody off the street and let them be a journalist" career fair. Clark's friend Chloe called him a superhero. Lex proclaimed himself the villain of the story. Lex made a bunch of mostly icky clones of himself just before he died in a fiery explosion. Lionel Luthor came from a parallel universe and taunted his daughter Tess Mercer and wreaked general havoc. Clark sent Zod and the Kandorians through a portal to another world and inadvertently allowed a gaseous Darkseid passage to Earth. Darkseid infected a bunch of people with "darkness" that mostly didn't change them in any perceptible way. Oliver was one of those infected but he only started acting hinky last week, thanks to Granny Goodness's control. Oliver "hypothetically" asked Clark what he would do if one of the team were infected and Clark did not respond in a particularly reassuring way. Under Granny's command, Oliver dug up some gold kryptonite that would remove Clark's powers permanently. Clark's various fathers gave him advice. Clark got tired of this and deactivated Jor-El.
Now forget almost everything you ever knew about this show because very little of it is going to make any difference at the end.
And now, the series finale of Smallville:
The episode opens with Chloe reading a bedtime story to a little blond boy. It's not Goodnight, Moon or The Velveteen Rabbit but a Smallville comic book. On the cover is an illustration of young Clark standing on the bridge, moping into the water below him, moments before he meets Lex Luthor for the first time. "This is the story of an amazing boy who grew up in the fields of Kansas in a little town called Smallville," she reads. The boy snuggles against her and gives her a big smile. His room is decorated with a solar system mobile and a bow and arrows. Chloe reads on. Clark (although he's not named in the comic as such) turned his back on his past so that he could embrace his destiny. He was such an idiot that he didn't see the darkness that was coming. (The comic book is nicer than that, but it's true.) There's an illustration of Lana and Chloe in high school, both of them more shapely than they were in real life, as well as Clark and Pete, all palling around by their lockers. It's all very cute, but wouldn't the writer, artist and publisher have to know Clark's whole story to put this together? How can he have a secret identity when anyone he went to school with is going to know it's him? How many other plaid-wearing, Lana-loving, gigantic supermodels went to Smallville High? "He was about to face his greatest challenge," Chloe reads. The boy glances up at the solar system dangling above his bed.
A model of Saturn turns into the real thing as we flash back to seven years earlier. For us, that's the present. A behemoth planet of flaming rock flies by, bigger even than Saturn, smashing through the outermost rings. Saturn's moonlets scatter. The flaming planet streaks toward Earth. Somebody save us all! Except we know everything will be OK because we just saw seven years into the future, so whatever.
It's dawn and Lois is already starting her workday at the DP. She's waiting at the elevator when Clark walks up beside her. "Some people take time off when it's their wedding day," he passive-aggressives. Lois tries to get away by getting onto the elevator but he sticks to her like super glue. She insists there won't be a wedding. They have the first of many, many discussions about their relationship. He pouts that she hasn't called him in eight hours. "Usually you figure things out when I give you some space," he says. Eight hours isn't space, dude. It's beauty sleep. They get off on Lois's floor. Through Lois's rambles about how busy she is with work, we find out the President is in town for a fundraiser and other stuff that doesn't matter. Lois says she also has to call all their guests to let them know the wedding is off. Clark responds by super-zipping over to snatch the contact sheet out of her hands. Lois tries not to let this ruffle her and turns to her phone as a backup. Clark snatches that out of her hand, too. Is he twelve? No, because not even a tween is this immature. Lois tells him to go out and save some people, but Clark is still quite insistent that they're going to get married. You know, Lois's reasons for calling off the wedding weren't entirely logical, but he's really being a patronizing jerk here. Lois gives him much the same speech she gave him in the last episode. He eventually leaves, but not before letting her know he'll be waiting for her at the altar. I'd dump him all over again just for being so damned pushy and presumptuous.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
Chapel. Chloe and Oliver are decorating the place and doing kind of a sad job of it. All these months of planning and Lois kind of turning into Bridezilla and it comes down to Chloe and Oliver tying a few flowers to the pews. Oliver snarks about how much work weddings are. Yeah, that trip through Hobby Lobby's floral department was such a chore. He's glad he and Chloe were magically drunk for their own nuptials. They have an awkward moment of talking over each other before Chloe finally manages to ask Oliver if he would have married her without Zatanna's spell. Of course he would. "It's the best decision I don't remember making." That earns him a megawatt smile from his wife. She says she would do the same. They kiss and smile some more. Oliver hands her a bouquet of flowers and they walk down the aisle together, arms around each other. A stand-in for the wedding they missed? Perhaps. The discussion turns to Lois and Clark. Chloe hasn't been able to get in touch with Lois. Oliver doesn't seem especially worried. He shows Chloe the plain gold wedding bands he picked up for Lois and Clark. She's touched by how "simple and classic" they are but I bet she's glad to be married to a billionaire. As they walk by the water bowl at the chapel's entrance, the water turns from clear to black with rainbow sprinkles.
Luthor Mansion. Tess walks inside, all smiles and confidence, and lays out a set of blueprints. As she studies them, a shadow moves over her. "You're living up to your Luthor name," Granny Goodness says from the landing above. She calls Tess "the last heir to the dark dynasty." Yeah, those evil Luthors and their rampant blueprint ogling! When will the evil end? Tess insists she's rebuilding the place as a symbol of hope or something. Sadly, none of this will matter. Granny walks down the steps toward Tess. She talks about wanting to be a mother to Tess, how special Tess was. "Every soul on Earth charts its own destiny," Granny says, "tipping it toward the light or toward the darkness." She says she could always tell what side of the balance someone would fall to, but not with Tess. "Born to darkness but drawn to the light," Granny says. "Being a Luthor doesn't determine my fate," Tess grits out. Yeah, try to remember that for your last scene. Tess starts to leave in a huff but Granny pleads with her. She says she wants to save Tess's soul. She calls her Lutessa, earning my ire. Tess stops long enough to find out that Granny's trying to save her from Darkseid's Apokolips. (I always think that looks like a gloss shade from Urban Decay or something.) Granny goes on about some quasi-religious thing about destruction and Lucifer and souls and evil, but Tess is like, "Uh, you're not making your side sound super appealing," so Granny bids her farewell. Tess calls her back: "When is this hell coming?" "It's not coming, Lutessa," Granny says, "it's upon us."
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
Apokolips, formerly known as the giant flaming planet, is advancing ever closer to Earth. It passes over the moon, missing it by mere miles. Does this result in any sort of lunar disturbance? No, it does not. Somehow, all the sucking in this episode counteracts the intense gravitational pull that would otherwise decimate our little moon.
Kent Farm. Martha has returned home for the wedding and found the place all packed up. She reaches into a box and pulls out a framed photo of her and Jonathan. For a second, she sees his reflection in the glass, smiling up at her. Behind her, Clark walks through the door. She doesn't turn to look at him at first. Quite a stunning look of disgust or something like it flits across her face. Clark is surprised to see her. "I thought you were staying at the bed and breakfast," he says. "And I thought I was returning to a home you and Lois were building together," Martha says. Turns out Martha had given them the farm so that they could live there. Well, maybe you should have sent a little note with the deed, lady. Never assume that Clark is going to make the right decision without explicit instructions! They argue about whether moving forward means leaving the past behind. Clark thinks this is about Jonathan for some reason. Martha thinks that Clark has turned his back on Jonathan. He says he thought he saw Jonathan last year but then realized it was just the LSD talking. Martha says she's proud of her boy. "Why bring up Dad today of all days?" he asks her. Well, first, it's your wedding day -- of course your dead father's going to come up! Second, you're the one who brought him up, doofus! Martha is nearly as flabbergasted by his question as I am, although she doesn't call him names like I do. She's upset because it seems like he's cutting himself off from his past. A look of doubt flickers across Clark's face, but he quickly returns to "patronizing ass" mode. "I love you, Mom, but you have to find a way to put this all behind you just like I did." As Clark walks away, the ghost/hallucination of Jonathan Kent appears and gives a big sigh of disappointment. Martha cries because she realizes she has raised an asshole.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
Lair of the Prophets. I don't know what it's actually called. It's lair-like and Darkseid's prophets are there. Oliver kneels before DeSaad, Granny and Godfrey. "I've done what you asked," he says. "They won't know Apokolips is coming." Because everyone is too busy navel-gazing to look up at the damned sky! Granny is positively giddy. They have just one last mission for him. DeSaad gives him a ring made from gold kryptonite and says it will "disarm the bringer of light who threatens to vanquish the darkness." Remember this for later because it won't be important at all.
Cemetery. Clark visits Jonathan's grave. "I never wanted to say goodbye," Clark says. "Then don't," says dead, hallucinatory Jonathan behind him. Clark is suddenly filled with doubt. It's a serious scene, and not badly done, but Clark saying he's buried his insecurities is unintentionally humorous, given how much stroking his ego needs every week. "I'm so close," he says earnestly. "I know who I'll become -- I've seen it." He talks about Lois wanting him to let her go and Martha wanting him to hold onto the past. Jonathan offers him a platitude from beyond the grave (two feet beyond, to be precise) but since Clark can't actually hear him, it doesn't do much good. Clark is still insistent that he needs to stand on his own. He touches Jonathan's headstone. "I miss you so much." Jonathan lays his hand on top of Clark's. "Then let me be there for you." Clark doesn't feel it, which is just as well, because he'd probably super-poop himself in shock. He says neither of his daddies can help him anymore. "As much as I value everything you've given me, I need to go where neither of you can guide me in order to become the hero the world needs me to be." Notice how he's always talking about what the world needs? He makes being a hero sound like a burden, a task placed on his shoulders. He doesn't make it sound like something he actually wants. Superman is such a downer in this story. Clark looks up and sees Oliver walking toward him. Ghost Dad is gone. Oliver and Clark talk about all the crap everybody's already talked about. Letting go, not letting go. The past, the future. Clark wonders if Lois is part of the past he needs to leave behind. "What if heroes aren't destined to love?" he asks the happily married hero in front of him. Oliver gives Clark a pep talk about how Clark helped him to become a hero. "No one can push me or lead me anywhere," Clark says. Remember this for later because it's totally not true. He moans and groans about not fitting in anywhere and somehow comes to the conclusion that maybe he needs to let go of Lois.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
Metropolis. Clark tries to open the door to the apartment, but Lois blocks him from the other side. She's wearing a white satin dress and tells him he can't see her before the wedding. Clark gets whiplash so bad, his head ends up backwards. She confesses she read his vows and they changed her mind. She slides a copy of her own vows under the door for him to read. Before he does that, though, there's more talk of doubts and angst and blah. Even after Lois gives Clark a nice pep talk about how they make each other better people, Clark is still just the blackest little cloud you ever saw. "What if you were right?" he asks. "With your family not being here, and the doubts you had yesterday, maybe the stars aren't aligned." Lois exposits that her father is in a meeting with the White House Chief of Staff, but she's not going to let that stop her. On opposite sides of the door, they talk about their families for a very long time. Finally, Clark starts reading Lois's vows. We hear the whole thing, in her voice, about having each other's backs and being there for each other and so on. Finally, after several long, teary pauses, Clark tells her he'll see her at the chapel. Providing they don't each change their minds another dozen times on the way.
Meanwhile, Tess is driving along an abandoned back road near the monorail. She's been trying to reach someone, anyone, but can't because of atmospheric interference. Also because there is a gigantic goddamn planet in the sky. She starts to leave a message on someone's voicemail, not sure it's even getting through, when she notices a black SUV bearing down on her from behind. It swerves in front of her and slams on the brakes. A man gets out and points a gun at her. She tries to reverse but another car pulls up behind her, blocking her way. A second man shatters her window.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
Chapel. The guests have assembled. Chloe and Oliver apparently hung up more greenery. A string quartet plays Pachelbel's Canon. Ugh, this music. Kill them all, Apokolips! Kill them now! A cute usher walks Martha to her seat. Oliver and Chloe walk down the aisle, arm in arm, beaming at each other. Chloe's dress is a flattering shade of teal. Finally Lois makes her entrance, wearing a totally different dress than before. She pauses for a moment, looks scared as she looks out over all the expectant guests. Everything goes dead quiet. Clark appears beside her and takes her hand. They smile at each other and walk to the altar together. Guests start snapping pictures of the happy couple. Clark, of course, is not wearing his glasses. You know what? I bet everybody ends up instantly recognizing that Superman is Clark and they just don't have the heart to tell him his intermittent disguise is terrible. Everybody is just going to humor the poor oaf. Anyway, they take ages to walk down the aisle in slow motion. Ghost Dad is standing beside Martha, beaming with pride. He's even put on a clean suit for the occasion. Nice to know the afterlife has a Men's Warehouse.
We hear them read the vows we heard them reading earlier, all over again, word for word. At the end, Oliver steps forward to hold the groom's ring out to Lois. Chloe frowns, no doubt puzzled as to why the ring suddenly looks like butterscotch candy instead of gold. Discordant music plays. As Lois moves to put the ring on Clark's finger, the band suddenly lights up. Chloe: "Nooo!" She whacks Lois's hand, sending the ring flying. Oliver glares at everybody with black eyes. "Get everybody out of here!" Clark shouts. Their guests scatter. "Surrender to the darkness," Oliver says in a deep voice. Clark refuses, so Oliver punches him through a stained glass window. Wouldn't it have been easier to just shoot Clark with some gold kryptonite from a distance? Preferably before the ceremony so we wouldn't have to sit through the vows for a second time?
Lois runs up to Oliver, although what she thinks she's going to do is a mystery, and he tosses her across the room. Clark zips in, catches her in midair, then whooshes her to safety. A moment later, he whooshes back. "Oliver, this isn't you," he says. "Don't let it take you over." Oliver moves to attack him. Clark rolls him down the aisle like a particularly attractive bowling ball. That bowl of black water is bubbling away. How did no one notice this as they were walking into the church? Clark tells him to fight it off. Oliver fights Clark instead. At one point, they crash into the bowl of gross water. Clark slides and nearly face-plants into the butterscotch ring. Oliver grabs it. He and Clark circle around each other. "I'm not giving up on you, Oliver," Clark says. "You have a good heart; let it guide you. You and I, we have to save the world together. I need you to be a hero." Clark spreads his arms, tells Oliver it's his choice. "I believe in you," Clark says. Oliver stares hard at the ring, then crushes it in his fist. He drops to his knees as angelic music plays. The Omega flashes on his forehead, then vaporizes. Black ooze oozes out of Oliver's eyes. Clark smiles and helps him up. "Everything's OK now." "No, it's not," Oliver says. They look out the window and see Apokolips beginning to eclipse the sun.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
Kent Farm. The house has turned into a hub of activity. Lois plays back Tess's garbled voicemail. Clark uses his super-hearing to pick out the words: "I was trying to warn you. Watchtower... is compromised. [Something unintelligible.] According to the journals, Apokolips is an actual planet and it's coming." What journals? The journals they've had for years and have supposedly pored over repeatedly? Bah! Clark figures that's why Darkseid wanted Oliver to put the ring on him. That or Darkseid is a slash fan and wanted to see them married. Martha's just gotten off the phone with the General, who's not a big fount of information. Martha says she'll call in "every available agent" to help. Is she still the Red Queen? Because she's been slacking lately. Chloe decides to go back to Star City so she can access her database. Before she leaves, she gives Clark an emotional hug that for some reason surprises him. He exchanges weird looks with Oliver. "See ya in the funny pages," Chloe says. Oliver walks out with Chloe. He wants to go with her, but she tells him to stay behind and be a hero. If not for the episode opening seven years in the future, Chloe would have seemed like a goner for sure at this point. They have an epic-looking kiss as lightning flashes and the sky grows dark.
Clark, Lois and Martha fret at the window. Clark sees Ghost Dad standing on the front stoop and follows him out to the barn. "Dad?" Clark asks in awe. "I knew you'd see me again when you were ready," Jonathan says. He's changed out of his wedding attire and back into his work clothes. Does he have a closet somewhere for all his ghost clothes? Clark takes several ragged breaths and admits he made a mistake in leaving his father behind. "It's you and Mom and everyone I care about that makes this world worth saving," Clark says. The other 6.7 billion people not so much. Clark is scared to face Darkseid again. Jonathan tells him that he needs to turn to Jor-El. Martha joins them. "Don't doubt yourself, Clark; this has been coming for a long time." Ten long, long years. They have a group hug as a firestorm rages outside. Finally, Jonathan tells him it's time. Or well past time. Clark smiles at his parents and whooshes away.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
Lab. Tess comes to under the harsh glare of an overhead light. Lionel's face looms into view. "It's good to have you back," he says. He pets her hair. She tries to sit up, but he puts his hand right between her boobs. He moves on to holding her face, touching her lower lip. Bad touch! VERY BAD TOUCH! She heaves herself up off the autopsy table on which she'd been lying. Tess wants badly to get to Clark but Lionel says Clark doesn't need her. "Time to embrace your lineage," he tells her. "Time to become the Luthor you were destined to be." He starts waxing loony about all the different Lex clones and how Lex managed to put the best pieces of them together. Here he goes over to a wall of specimen jars filled with various fleshy blobs and goos. The only piece that Frankenstein's monster needs now is a heart, which is where Tess comes in. Tess tries to get away, but a guard stands in her way. Lionel rubs her shoulders and chest from behind. "Before the day is done, I will see the Luthor name resurrected, more powerful than ever." He kisses Tess's hair and looks again at the wall of specimen jars. The camera pushes through, allowing us a look at patchwork Lex. He's hooked up to all manner of tubes and a mask. Ragged scars show where all the bits went into making up the whole. Everything looks pretty good except for the right hand, which appears to be made of overcooked pizza rolls.
Clark zips over to the road where Tess was abducted. With a bit of X-ray vision, he finds her phone tucked under the seat of her car.
Back to the lab. Lionel's minions slam Tess onto the table. The guard straps down her hands while two men in surgical scrubs tie her feet. Lionel gets handsy with her tummy as he explains he would have preferred to use Conner's heart, but Tess hid the kid all too well. Or maybe Lionel just didn't look that hard. Oh, now he's getting familiar with her chest again. He leans forward to press a kiss to her cheek. He then makes the mistake of walking away. Tess manages to move her foot just enough to kick the instrument tray out of one guy's hands. She catches a scalpel when it goes flying. She slices through the strap on her right wrist, elbows the nearest guy, cuts the straps on her right leg and kicks another guy. When the guard approaches, she slams his arm to the table, pins him down with her thigh, then cuts through the final strap and takes the gun from the guard's hand. This was the best fight scene in the finale and nobody super was involved. She shoots Lionel through the chest. He looks genuinely surprised as the blood bubbles out of his mouth. Tess makes a hasty retreat as Lionel struggles toward a button that opens the specimen wall. As Lionel drags himself toward Patches, an eerie fog begins to fill the room. The fog coalesces into a semisolid Darkseid. "You refused me once," he says. "But this may be the moment when you reconsider my offer." How does he win people over to the dark side with dialog like that? Lionel begs Darkseid to save his son. I don't really see Lionel being selfless enough to not beg for his own life instead, but whatever. Darkseid grabs Lionel with a gassy arm and rips out his still-beating heart. Lionel's eyes glow red. Some time later, Patches begins to stir. His pretty blue eyes flutter open and he reaches up with his pizza hand to rip the mask off his face. He looks fairly surprised at this turn of events, as one might expect.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
Daily Planet. Apokolips has nearly eclipsed the sun in full. Clark wanders through a crowd of people before putting on his glasses and heading inside. He catches up with Lois and then catches her up on his unsuccessful attempt to find Tess. They pause to listen to a radio address from the President. He says the eclipse is being caused by a meteor. Clark pulls Lois aside. "We know the prophets have been using people's darkness to mark them with an Omega," he says. "What we don't know is why." I thought it was some kind of accounting procedure, you know, like when you take inventory of your stock and mark what you've already counted so you don't recount stuff. That makes sense, doesn't it? Clark has another idea: "Tess quoted one of the prophecies as saying the markings weren't just spiritual. They're some sort of anti-life dark force that could bring upon the apocalypse." So this thing was prophesied and yet nobody acted preemptively in any way. "Maybe the marking has some sort of unexplainable gravitational pull," Clark surmises out of nowhere. Clark starts trying to figure out a way to "lift the darkness" and break people free of their bond with Apokolips. He scans the news floor and realizes everybody has been marked. Lois thinks Clark should just do what he did for Oliver, what with the peppy talking, but Clark thinks he can't do that for everybody on the planet. Didn't it seem like this was going to be the payoff for all the moping and whining he did about having to go public as the Blur? Like he was going to get himself on a Jumbo Tron and make everyone cry out their ooze by "bringing the light" to them? Clark uses Tess's video footage to look up the license plate of her abductors' car. Lucky for them, the internet still seems to be working and they find out the car is registered to PreClox. Switch the vowels and you get ProClex. Just wanted to mention that. A little more digging and they decide that Lionel must be the guilty party. The building shakes as chunks of Apokolips hit the streets. Clark and Lois have a weirdly stiff goodbye scene punctuated by a kiss. Welling is barely phoning it in.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
As Clark goes off to find Tess, Lois goes back to the radio. "Our military has a precision plan to take care of the meteor fragment," the prez says. "They will take swift action, ensuring the world's safety." Lois hears this and realizes this is why her father was called away from her wedding. Yet he didn't get her a word of warning? "Hey, Lo, watch out for the planet coming our way! Daddy loves you!" She follows a pretty, dark-haired woman into the copy room. The woman makes a copy of her passport. Lois asks her if she's covering the President's visit. She gets a wordless bitch-face in answer. She asks this lady to warn the President about the military's plan to nuke the "meteor." Why she thinks the President isn't in on this is a mystery. The radioactive fallout will kill millions, she says. Lois's colleague, named Janet, sneers at her. "Take it to the Inquisitor. I've got a plane to catch with the President." Something tells me that the President would cancel his interviews in a situation like this. Lois whacks Janet over the head with a hole punch and takes her Air Force One clearance badge. So much lack of logic! So little time to recap it all!
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
Lair. The prophets watch the slight devastation of the world with pleasure. They congratulated themselves on "saving souls" for Darkseid. There is nothing about this plan that I understand. Nothing! Oliver walks in, all duded up in his Green Arrow outfit. The prophets are shocked that Oliver's Omega is gone. There's some blah-blah and then Granny raises her hand to smite Oliver. Her palm glows red. Oliver readies three arrows and looses them all at once. Despite having telekinetic powers, all three prophets just sort of stand there and get shot. Each arrow finds its target. Granny, DeSaad and Godfrey all explode in puffs of light and smoke. Well, that was easy.
Air Force One. Because even the President on this show has terrible security, Lois has managed to con her way onto the plane using Janet's badge. Why this thing is even in the air with chunks of a giant flaming planet crashing all around them is a mystery, but whatever. Lois tries to get into the President's section of the plane. When a Secret Service agent stops her, she pulls the old "hey look out the window at the extra planet!" trick and makes a run for it. The agent stops her just as she runs into a conference room. A handful of people sit around a small table. Nobody looks that disturbed to see this madwoman. Even Mr. Secretary decides to let her speak instead of ordering her shot where she stands. "I have proof that the meteor you're about to nuke into oblivion is much larger than you realize," she says. She warns them of the nuclear fallout that will result. Everyone exchanges slightly guilty looks and Lois realizes they already knew all this. For some reason, they try to justify themselves to her. Lois asks them to let the heroes -- one in particular -- do their jobs. She gives them a rousing speech about heroes that they listen to instead of taping her mouth. They decide to wait five minutes.
Farm. Clark fetches his Jor-El crystal from the loft. He stares at it for a while instead of immediately zipping off to the Arctic to use it. This gives Darkseid a chance to pay him a visit, this time in Lionel's zombiefied body. Also, for some reason, he's covered in thick, gooey mucus from head to toe. "The lost son of Jor-El," Darkseid greets him in a deep, distorted voice. He shuffles towards Clark. Why is he in this old man's decrepit body instead of his slightly-more-impressive gassy state? "Darkseid," Clark says. Now that introductions have been made... "My father sent me here to protect this planet," he says, "and I will fight you to my last breath." A first-grader would recite the alphabet with more gusto than Welling is putting into his delivery. Clark and Darkseid have a chat about how weak humans are, but Clark remains firm in his faith. "It may be easier to hate, but it's stronger to love." Darkseid drones on about how long it's been since someone could tip the balance toward the light or whatever the hell. "You are the light!" he grumbles. Remember this for later, because... aw, screw it. You get the gist of it. Darkseid says lots of other horrible, cheesy things that I can't bare to transcribe, then he raises his hand and Vaders poor Clark into a chokehold. He hurls Clark across the barn. As Clark crashes through a wooden beam, everything slows to a stop. He hears Jonathan's words about Jor-El's guidance.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
Suddenly, he finds himself standing in darkness, surrounded by a beam of blue light and those Kryptonian hula hoops that move of their own accord. "You have always had the power within you," Jor-El's voice intones. Is he hallucinating? Did Jor-El zap his mind to the Fortress despite being deactivated? Who knows? The hula hoops vanish. Large crystals thrust up into view. Via images on their surfaces, he's treated to flashbacks of all the many super moments of his life, starting with the day Lex ran over him on the bridge. Other memories include saving Lana from that ridiculous tornado at the end of the first season, saving Perry White's life, winning a football game at super-speed, super-leaping to catch a missile, stopping many bullets from killing people, flying with Lois, and so on. Clark's ego gets wood from being stroked so hard. "These were my trials," Clark realizes. "Your final trial is upon you," Jor-El says. "You are ready. Seize your destiny!" Clark comes to and finds himself levitating in the barn. He clenches his fists, concentrates, then flies through Darkseid. Lionel's body turns to smoke and red light. Flaming crows fly out of the smoke. I don't even have snark for that.
LuthorCorp. Tess walks into her office for a reunion with her brother. She finds out he knew she was his sister all along. I bet they dated anyway. Tess says all she wanted was redemption, but knows she'll never get it. Lex caresses her cheek, then pulls her into a hug. "I love you, sis," he says, then stabs her in the gut. "You know I'm actually saving you." She falls against him and he lowers her gently to the floor. "From what?" she asks, gasping for breath. "From turning into me," he says. She reaches up and touches his cheek with a gloved hand. She wipes something black onto his skin. "It's the neurotoxin you started at Summerholt," she exposits. It will seep through his skin and wipe away all his memories in thirty seconds. "The world before this moment won't exist to you," she says. Then why explain it to him? He's not going to remember it anyway! Tess gasps and dies for no reason at all. Her big brother has a series of flashbacks as his memories are wiped from his mind. Gone are memories of losing his hair in the meteor shower, of being an abused misfit of a child, of his epic and sometimes sexy friendship with Clark, of killing his father and marrying Lana Lang and trying to kill Clark and himself in the Fortress. In other words, having the character of Lex Luthor on this show for seven years has just been rendered completely pointless. Everything that went into making this Lex is gone. All that's left is Patches the Amnesiac Clone. Patches wanders over to the window and stares out at the scene of interplanetary destruction before him.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
Fortress. Clark and Jor-El have a nice chat that doesn't really follow from all the shitty things Jor-El has done in the past. It's all about being proud and accepting each other and whatever. Jor-El: "You and you alone possess the courage, the determination and the compassion that will be required of you to lift the darkness from the Earth." There's a rumble and the crystal closet pushes up from the icy ground, revealing the Super suit. Jor-El gives props to Martha and Jonathan for helping to make Clark a hero. Where was this nice Jor-El for the first, well, nine seasons? For some reason, dead Jonathan Kent is suddenly standing behind Clark, the Super suit draped over his arms. "Always hold onto Smallville," dead Jonathan says. The leathery red cape totally looks like a big Fruit Roll-Up. Clark steps up, takes the suit, strikes a pose and leaps into the air. As he streaks toward the sky, he changes into the suit, although all we see are flashes of the cape here and there, alternating with flashes of his face. He busts through an ice column instead of flying through any number of holes that were already there.
Meanwhile, Apokolips is close enough to start making out with planet Earth. Amazingly, Air Force One is still in the air. Longest "five minutes" ever. The plane jostles, tossing everyone inside like a drum full of bingo balls. Lois is tossed to a window just in time to see Clark flying up to the plane. He grabs it by the engine and straightens it up. He stops by Lois's window to give her a smile before flitting off. Lois picks up a handy video camera, turns it on herself instead of the window where the superheroics are going on. Then, out of nowhere, the President finally shows up and she turns the camera on him.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
Down on the streets of Metropolis, a smattering of worried people have gathered. They seem relatively calm, given they're seconds away from being turned into pate. Oliver joins them. As they watch, a bad CGI rendering of Clark whooshes overhead. He whooshes up to Apokolips. A few moments later, the giant flaming planet begins to move away from Earth. Omegas flash on the spectators' foreheads, then vanish. Everyone cheers and hugs each other while Oliver beams proudly at the sky. Up in space, Clark gives Apokolips a shove toward some unknown destination. He hovers there for a while against the backdrop of Earth. Except for the CGI version of him, you never really see him in the suit, but it's still kind of a nice shot.
The image of Clark gives way to an illustration in the comic book Chloe is reading to her boy. "And that," she says, "was the day the boy turned into Superman." "Wow," the tyke breathes. Chloe pats his hair, a big honking diamond ring visible on her married finger, and kisses his brow. He asks her to read it again, but it's time for bed now. As she tucks him in, subdued strains of the Superman theme play. Chloe pauses at the door, looks back at her boy as he looks at his toy bow and arrows. He lights up, as does the music. Chloe's raising a future hero.
As Chloe closes the boy's door, she gets a call on her cell. "Did you get it?" she asks by way of answering. "I thought you might need something blue." The scene cuts to Lois, opening a package from Chloe and pulling out a blue ribbon. She asks her cousin for luck, gets it, then hangs up to get back to her busy day at work. Aaron Ashmore, looking like a newsie from the Great Depression, walks up to Lois, camera at his side. He warns her against going into Perry's office. Lois pauses at Perry's door. Although we don't see him, we hear Michael McKean's voice, railing about something "Luthor" has done. This new Jimmy Olsen asks if Lois liked his pictures. She did, but thinks they lacked drama. Where the Man of Steel is concerned, she wants to see "pecs, cape and pearly whites." She walks with Jimmy through the news floor, remembers the other Jimmy that was actually Jimmy's brother. In the background, Perry is shouting, "Great Caesar's ghost!" As Lois scatters to avoid Perry's wrath, she walks by a monitor showing a news clip of Patches the Amnesiac Clone being elected President of the United States. He overcame total baldness, total memory loss, the total lack of an election year and a totally white suit to somehow win the confidence of the American people. I would totally vote for him.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
As Lois heads for the basement, she bumps into Clark as he bumbles his way up the steps. "I'm sorry, Miss Lane," he says, adjusting his glasses. He gets down on his knees to help her with her spilled papers. "Can it, Clark," she says. "Nobody's paying any attention." After seven years, they're still not married, but they aim to change that as soon as possible. Clark even has the wedding bands -- and neither of them appear to be made of butterscotch candy this time. Before they can kiss, some guy runs around the place shouting that a bomb has been reported on an elevator uptown. "Just tell the minister I may be a few minutes late," Clark says as the Superman theme strikes up. As he darts up the stairs, he's already unbuttoning his vest. He reaches the roof in majestic slow motion. Against the backdrop of the golden sun, Maxfield Parrish clouds and a fluttering American flag, Clark tosses aside his glasses and rips open his shirt. The iconic S-shield on his chest fills up the screen and gives way to the end credits one last time as trumpets herald both the beginning and the end.
So. That was it. The very last episode of Smallville, ever. In the end, possibly the most disappointing thing is that, for all the talk of light and goodness and compassion, it was brute strength that saved the day. Clark saved the day not because he was the only one good enough, but because he was the only one left after a plot contrivance. If not for Jor-El's meddling, Kara would have been there to give Apokolips a shove. Instead, Clark got the save by default. It wasn't his fight against injustice, it wasn't his symbolizing of hope and goodness, or his tipping the scales toward the light. No, it was just that he was strong enough and in the right place at the right time. That's not legendary or inspirational. It's not even heroism by coincidence, as when a doctor just happens to be on a plane when someone on board has a heart attack, since Clark was carefully maneuvered into this position. Even still, I have to admit a got a fangirl chill seeing the last shot.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
I've asked Omar G. to contribute the last words of this last recap. I felt it only fitting that the man who recapped the first episode be there at the end. He survived freaks of the week, Lana's witch year and the "tuna and chocolate" that was Lois and Clark's early relationship. Goodbye, show. You were often fun, sometimes funny, occasionally very good and all too frequently frustrating and terrible. But, even knowing what I know now, I'd still want to recap you. Take it away, Omar:
Thanks, Tippi, for letting me come visit Smallville one last time.
I said my goodbyes to you, the readers, and to the show two years ago when I stopped recapping, so I won't rehash all that again.
Instead, I wanted to return briefly to take a quick look back at the 10 years we spent following the character we all knew would one day take flight and become Superman. I wanted to talk about the tremendous change that our main man Clark Kent went through to get here and to become that hero.
So.
Right.
Uh... I'm kind of drawing a blank here. I skipped a few episodes, honestly. Did I miss that part? Who was the beefy, turgid executive producer in the last episode who couldn't shut up about leaving the past behind, only he could never shut up about leaving the fucking past behind even when he was saying out loud that he was RIGHT NOW AT HIS MOMENT LEAVING IT BEHIND, SEE LOOK WHAT I'M DOING HERE, I'M LEAVING THE PAST BEHIND, THIS IS ALL VERY META.
Who was that guy? Superman? Seriously? Wow. I should have quit sooner.
But OK, perhaps I'm being unfair. For quite a long time, the show was really not bad. It was even pretty good. Just when you were ready to quit it, they'd pull out a "Shattered" or a "Transference" to keep you from completely giving up hope.
If Smallville was, for all of us long-suffering close-watchers, the story of missed opportunities and not-quite-theres, it was also at times a place where expectations were so low that small pleasures (John Glover's purr; Allison Mack's sunshine grin, Cassidy Freeman's class) broke through like rainbows in the proverbial Dio dark.
What I'll miss most was the heady mix of cheesy earnestness and patent absurdity (and, of course, the Gay that was unintentional until it clearly wasn't) that made recapping the first few seasons so much fun. The platitudes, the cows, the sweet, coppery-tasting anvils.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20
When Wing Chun called me that summer of 2001 to ask if I wanted to recap a show on the WB about Superman, we agreed that it sounded like big, dumb fun. You guys, we had no idea. None. The show was the recapping gift that kept on giving; for me, it gave for eight seasons, long past the time we'd grown weary of each other.
Despite about a million and a half words or so worth of text to the contrary, I don't think we wasted our time. We had a lot of fun eviscerating and complaining, occasionally cheering and sometimes disagreeing about why the show did or didn't work from week to week. We formed a really great community that, for a time, was the model for silly, civil online TV fandom. We took a show to task for its constant, wanky bullshit, but in the end the damn thing lasted 10 seasons at about 22 episodes for seasons, which equals HOLY SHIT HOW DID THEY DO THAT? Really, who's laughing now? Not us, it turns out. They cranked out a show with special effects and comic book characters on a network that could barely afford doorknobs and somehow beat all the odds. The last episode was ridiculous and verbose, hammy and portentous with more fat than a McGriddle, but it was also kind of beautiful in its gawky montages and unwillingness to tie everything up without a few last-minute outrages to piss us all off.
It went out the show it always was: frustrating and embarrassing, but weirdly lovable. Lex and Chloe and Pete and Oliver and Tess and even Lois and Lana and the rest were part of our dysfunctional fandom family. We welcomed them even when we couldn't stand them. They were pretty great to be around, it turns out. But not that Clark Kent guy. That guy was a total mopey, lame, never-learning-a-damn-thing, bucket-headed dick. Screw that guy.
Thanks for reading and thanks again to Tippi for carrying the torch (though, sadly, not The Torch. Miss that place!). TWOP will miss Smallville fiercely and, in my weaker moments, so will I.
- Omar G.
Tippi Blevins will soon be recapping Doctor Who. You can reach her at b_tippi@yahoo.com or http://twitter.com/tippib.
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
- 5
- 6
- 7
- 8
- 9
- 10
- 11
- 12
- 13
- 14
- 15
- 16
- 17
- 18
- 19
- 20