The Smallville Project: Episode 1.06 – “Hourglass”
| August 4, 2013 | Posted by Jess under Comics, Television, The Smallville Project |
So I accidentally skipped posting this episode recap. Whoops! I am a great blogger.
Jess: Clark and Pete walk through a senior citizen home. “Man, I don’t know how I let you talk me into this,” Pete says. Clark exposits that they have to do community service, and Pete asks why they’re not servicing their community by lifeguarding the girls’ swim classes at the Y: “I mean, what’s the attraction?”
Shocker! Lana is also volunteering here! OMG I NEVER WOULD HAVE GUESSED. I do like that they set this up like Clark was doing something selfless and turned it into him being a passive aggressive horndog, though. And by “like,” I mean NYARGH.
Rebecca: Clark continues to be a weirdo stalker. SO SUPERMAN.
Jess: Boring chatter ensues, in which we learn that Clark is going to be a companion to “Cassandra,” who some of the nurses say can see the future. I c whut u did there. For some reason literally every shot in this back-and-forth includes a zoom in. This is not a dramatic moment, show.
Cut to an old woman in dark glasses skimming glowing fingers over a page of Braille. “It takes two of you to read to me now, does it?” she asks, and Clark and Pete look at each other in befuddlement. She beckons them in and Pete asks if she can really tell the future, much to Clark’s embarrassment. “Mr. Ross, if you want your fortune told, go to the circus,” she says, accidentally dropping her book. Pete picks it up and she grips his hand. “It’s a long walk home, Mr. Ross. Check your pockets.” Pete gropes at his pockets in alarm, only to discover that he’s locked his keys in the car. “Dude, you’re on your own,” he tells Clark, and leaves. Okay, Flash may be a senior, but Pete should definitely not have his license yet.
Rebecca: This scene has nearly constant windchime sound effects because Cassandra is so ~mysterious, and it is SO ANNOYING.
Jess: Lana wheels the book cart into “Mr. Bollston’s” room, where he’s listening to classical music rapturously. “The Langs moved to Smallville in 1938,” he says, turning his wheelchair around. “Took over a couple of dustbowl farms. Knew a bargain when they saw it.” Lana’s delighted by the local trivia. Cutesy banter ensues, and she agrees to take his chair for a turn around the grounds.
They stop on a bridge over the leaf-covered pond. The wooden railing is missing in this spot, replaced with a low-hanging chain. Bollston asks Lana to fetch him a scarf, and she agrees, trotting off. Yeah, this isn’t gonna end well.
Bollston smuggles a pack of cigarettes out the minute she’s gone, but drops the lighter. He reaches for it, coughing – and we cut to Cassandra coughing similarly as Clark reads to her. (Side note: I hope he’s reading really trashy romance novels.) She asks him for a glass of water, and he hands it to her, but it drops and shatters on the floor – just as Bollston’s wheelchair tips over into the water. Electricity shoots through him (why? the chair is mechanical) and he turns young as Cassandra leaps back in surprise.
Bollston stands up, pushes his hair back, and stares at his hands, then starts cackling. We pan across to see there are a couple of kryptonite meteorites in the water. Of course there are.
Rebecca: Here we have treasured comedy actor Eric Christian Olsen, executing an incredible maniacal laugh.
Jess: Meanwhile, Cassandra stares into the distance, hand brushing Clark’s face. “What’s wrong?” he asks. “Someone close to you is going to die. Very soon,” she says. He looks, at best, mildly perturbed.
SOMEBODY SAAAAAAAAAAVE MEEEEEEEEE!
Clark zips into the barn, where his folks are sawing a board in half – until suddenly the electric saw stops working, because Clark has unplugged it. “Guys, if you need something done, just ask. It’s what I’m here for,” he grumps. Okay, but I don’t think you have heat vision yet, so how were you going to do this one? Martha asks if something’s bothering him, and he says they should start putting safety first: “If you haven’t noticed, this stuff is pretty dangerous.”
Rebecca: Clark’s such a buzzkill old person, at his very worst. I wish him acting like a grandpa were thematically linked to the episode somehow. Also, I love the idea that he’s “here for” helping his parents use dangerous equipment and definitely not Helping People Because It’s His Destiny.
Jess: I mean, I thought him nagging his parents like a fishwife was pretty cute, but I take your point.
Jonathan looks amused at this scolding and asks Clark what the problem is. He sighs and tells them about Cassandra. Jonathan says Cassandra’s probably just trying to scare the nurses, and Clark tells them about the Pete incident. The Kents are still skeptical, which is a bit rich coming from the parents of a super-strong space boy with X-ray vision. “Even if she can predict the future, there’s nothing she can do to control it. Nobody can,” Jonathan says. Except…everyone can? By just…doing different stuff?
Back at the senior citizen home, Bollston skips down the stairs in scrubs. So…they just let people pretend to be nurses? Did Lana not report his apparent death and disappearance? He smirks at an older man hobbling by and goes into his room, where he pulls a packet of newspaper clippings about a murder out from under his mattress. There’s a closeup of a handwritten list of names, specifically “Zoe Garfield” and “Jim Gage.” He looks at himself in the mirror: “Fate’s given you a second chance, Harry boy, and this time, they’re gonna pay.” He aims a menacing finger gun at the mirror. A MENACING FINGER GUN.
Rebecca: I hope he becomes a feared finger gun criminal known only as Harry Boy.
Jess: Cut to cleavage adorned with a unicorn necklace. An apron reveals the cleavage to belong to a waitress, and the nametag reveals the waitress to be named “Zoe.” Ruh-roh! Zoe brings a burger to Bollston, who I’m gonna call Harry from now on, and who is still wearing hilariously high old man pants. He says he hasn’t been able to eat the burger since his bypass and then claims it was a joke. She giggles and asks if he wants a drink. Doesn’t that usually come before giving the customer a meal? He glances at the elaborate cafe menu and is baffled, which is pretty funny. (Also, they spelled “mocha” wrong.) Then he’s outraged by the price of a cup of coffee, which is also pretty funny.
Rebecca: But, like, how long has he been in the old folks’ home that he doesn’t know what coffee costs in 2001?
Jess: Having worked as a barista, I can assure you that plenty of old folks who aren’t in old folks’ homes are regularly shocked and appalled by the price of coffee these days. Also, they fucking hate flavored coffee.
Rebecca: HOW DARE YOU MAKE IT TASTE BETTER.
Jess: As the waitress walks away, Clark, Chloe, and Lana come in…and side at the table right next to Harry’s. Lana’s upset because she “lost” her old dude + wheelchair. They didn’t see the wheelchair in the shallow pond? Clark tries to be sympathetic while Chloe snarks. Harry’s ears perk up at the mention of his name, and he jumps in on the conversation. Chloe shuts him down pretty handily, and he apologizes: “I’m new in town. I just heard this is where young people congregate.” The girls are like “what” but Clark introduces himself and shakes Harry’s hand, which is nicely Super of him. He wishes Lana luck finding her “missing old man,” and Lana squints at him, puzzled.
Senior citizen home. Harry, back in scrubs, plays the classical piece from earlier on the piano. So he’s just, like. Living there? And no one’s noticed? Cassandra tells him he plays beautifully, and he says he was supposed to attend the Metropolis Conservatory. “Your voice sounds young,” Cassandra says. “The Conservatory closed its doors in the 70s.” He quickly covers by saying he wishes he could have gone. Cassandra nods and asks for help back to her room, reaching her hand out. “I already know my future,” he replies, and her face falls.
Luthor Castle. Clark is unloading a crate of Kent Organic Produce when Lex comes fishtailing up the drive in a sports car. “You might want to try taking those curves at a speed that won’t actually break the sound barrier,” Clark says sternly, and I didn’t know how much I wanted Superman nagging Lex Luthor until it was a thing that was happening.
Rebecca: 😀 😀
Jess: Lex asks why Clark’s so protective and Clark tells him about Cassandra. So Clark considers Lex to be “someone close to him?” Because they don’t ever, like, hang out. Lex scoffs. Clark: “You sound like my parents.” Lex: “That’s gotta be a first.” Hee!
Clark holds firm to his belief, and Lex asks if he really wants to know the future. “Don’t you ever wish you knew how it was all gonna turn out?” Clark asks. I c whut ur doing here, show.
Rebecca: Incidentally, I don’t wish that I knew how it all actually turns out.
Jess: Your life, or Lex’s?
Rebecca: Well, I meant the show, because it’s making this episode a bummer. But I guess there’s also not a really strong argument here for soothsaying in general.
Jess: Most one-off stories about clairvoyance don’t. Like Oedipus Rex.
Lex Kerouacs something about life being a journey, and Clark looks at the floor and mumbles, “It still wouldn’t kill you to drive more slowly.” “Why?” Lex asks. “I have you as a friend. You changed my future once, remember?” Clark gives him big moon eyes for a weirdly long shot until Lex’s mouth twitches. Clark returns the faint smile. This scene is fraught, y’all.
“You never told me this woman’s name,” Lex says as Clark starts to leave. “Maybe I’ll ask her for some stock tips.” “Cassandra Carver,” Clark tells him, and leaves.
Rebecca: Drink that phallic blue water bottle as you watch Clark leave, Lex. DO IT.
Jess: Senior citizen home. Clark approaches Lana, who’s fretting over a bulletin board that has two pictures of each of the residents: one young, one old. But Harry’s younger picture is gone. Clark asks Lana what’s wrong, which seems like an odd question considering the circumstances, and Lana tells him that the police are involved now. “Harry Bollston’s real name is Harry Volk. He was a murderer, Clark…It happened 60 years ago when he was 17. I guess they figured he’d served his time and was just a harmless old man who’d moved back to his hometown to die. Back in the 40s he was studying to be a concert pianist. He was up for a full scholarship to Metropolis Conservatory. But the teacher recommended someone else…He said the teacher killed his dream, so he killed the teacher’s dream: the man’s son.” Welling works that mildly perturbed face like a champ.
Nighttime. A man with gray hair is watching football enthusiastically when the power gets out. He gets up and finds a flashlight, then picks up the phone. Harry knocks on his door, dressed as a power company employee. Where’d he get the outfit? He gives the guy some flimflam about checking his circuit breaker, and Gray Hair lets him in.
Rebecca: I like to imagine that Harry leaves a trail of dead bodies wherever he goes. Just like Clark!
Jess: I have to assume he killed the power company guy, and the gas guy from later.
As he fiddles with the fuel box, Harry too-casually asks if anyone else is home, but no, Gray Hair is divorced. “Saw the name on the account was Jim Gage. Any relation to Rudolph Gage?” Gray Hair confirms that Rudolph was his father. There’s some chatter about Gage Sr. opening car dealerships, and Harry takes a coiled wire out of his toolbox as he says “Sounds like your father left you a bright future.” Ominous music plays.
Cassandra’s room. “Are you gonna come in or not, Mr. Kent?” she asks. Clark walks in and asks how she does it, and she gives him the boilerplate line about heightened senses. Okay, Daredevil. “After yesterday I thought I’d never see you again,” she says. He admits that it shook him. “Imagine how I feel,” she replies. “When it first started happening, I thought it was a curse. I kept getting snapshots of things I couldn’t control.” She tells Clark that the meteor strike burned out her optic nerve but gave her the second sight. Clark apologies, and she tells him it wasn’t his fault. He shifts guiltily.
“My friends and family, they think that you’re…” “A fraud?” Cassandra asks. “People are afraid of the unknown, Clark. They only want to know if everything’s going to turn out all right. I can’t guarantee that. What I can show you are signposts on your journey. What you do with them is up to you.” Boy there are a lot of monologues in this episode.
Rebecca: The writers are scrambling because they had to introduce TWO new characters with motivations and feelings. So many!
Jess: Clark says he has a lot of questions in his life, and Cassandra takes his hand. There’s a flash of light from their hands, and we cut to Clark kneeling in a graveyard in the pouring rain. Lightning illuminates the graves one by one: Jonathan Kent. Martha Kent. Peter Ross. Chloe Sullivan. Lana Lang. They are surrounded by more and more headstones. “NOOOOO!” he screams. On his knees. In the rain. In a graveyard. YES.
Back in Cassandra’s room, he jerks away from her. She looks as alarmed as he does: “You saw that too?” He superspeeds away as she calls his name.
You know, this is pretty obviously not an accurate future, but they never explain why they had this vision. Hmm.
Kent Farm, morning. Martha suggests the vision was a hallucination, but Clark is sure it was a vision of the future. A future cemetery where his two BFFs and his not-girlfriend share a weirdly circular plot with his parents? Jonathan continues to mock the idea of clairvoyance, even after Clark mentions the meteor shower. “Is it so crazy? I get hit by a car and I’m fine, I walk through fire and I’m okay, what’s next?” Point for Clark.
Clark says that he doesn’t want to end up alone. “The only person who controls your destiny is you,” Jonathan tells him. “Right now I don’t feel like I have control of anything,” Clark says and storms out.
Rebecca: Clark’s desperation to believe in Cassandra’s ability is so sad. He doesn’t want to be alone after all his friends and family die, but he also doesn’t want to be alone as the only person with superpowers who isn’t also a serial killer. He wants to be able to trust someone who understands him! Oh, Clark, you non-emoting tragedy.
Jess: Senior citizen home. Cassandra reads the Braille edition of the Daily Planet. Lex strolls up to her: “Cassandra Carver.” “Do those expensive shoes come with a name?” she asks. Hee! Lex puts a flower on the table and introduces himself. She asks what “the savior of Smallville” wants with an old blind woman. He mentions Clark and that he was hoping she could give him some insight into the cheekbones thereof. “And you call him a friend, do you?” she asks. Touche. “He saved my life, but he’s also a mystery,” Lex replies. He offers to pay her, but she tells him she couldn’t answer his question even if she wanted to: “I can only tell the future of the person I touch.”
She holds out a hand. “I don’t need to know my future,” Lex says. “Why? Because your father already has it mapped out for you?” “I believe we make our own destiny,” Lex says. She tries to coax him into seeing the destiny he’ll make, but he isn’t biting. In fact, he seems super pissed at her for some reason. “Come back again. When you’re ready,” she says as he stalks off.
Rebecca: Cassandra REALLY likes to see people’s futures, despite her protestations to the contrary. I need to know more about this lady.
Jess: School. Clark bursts into the journalism room to find Lana there instead, gazing at the Wall of Weird. Apparently Chloe called both of them, claiming she had info on Harry. Lana is extremely displeased to find her Time cover up there next to “a three-headed calf.” Clark assures her that the wall has nothing to do with her. “Remember when you said people keep their darkest secrets hidden?” she asks. Huh, I don’t. Remember, that is. “Mine’s up there for all the world to see,” she continues bitterly. Uh, but it’s not a secret. It’s never been a secret.
Rebecca: Girl, you are talking about it and/or wearing related trinkets CONSTANTLY.
Jess: Lana sniffles about how she can never put her parents’ death behind her: “All I’ll ever be is a little girl in a fairy princess costume who lost her parents.” Sadly, knowing the writers, she’s probably right. “I don’t see you that way,” Clark says. “I know you don’t, Clark. You’re the only one who doesn’t.” Uh, no one’s ever treated Lana that way. Whatever. Lana leaves, so I guess we’ll never find out what Chloe knows. Clark sadfaces.
Attic of Sad Voyeurism. Chloe and Pete arrive and Clark asks where they were. Pete’s like “Um, we were supposed to meet at the Torch.” “Will the lovely Miss Lang be joining us?” Chloe asks. Chloe and Lana should get married. Clark says no, and his buddies exposit about Jim Gage’s death – strangulation by piano wire. Chloe’s also found a picture of Young Harry, and Clark recognizes him as the kid from the Beanery. Clark thinks it’s a copycat, Pete thinks it’s a grandson, and Chloe inexplicably jumps straight to it being the real Harry. Clark suggests they track a potential copycat through potential fanmail he might’ve sent Harry.
Rebecca: Cool 14-years-olds straight up investigating a serial killer. Cool show.
Jess: At the Beanery, Harry is holding forth on the piano. “We close at nine, Mozart,” Zoe tells him. He asks for one more coffee, and she relents, locking the front door.
Senior citizen home. The kids are there to search Harry’s room, but Cassandra identifies Clark and beckons him over.
Rebecca: Clark says that their plan is to not be seen and then he IMMEDIATELY gets spotted by A BLIND PERSON.
Jess: She has heightened senses! He sends the others to scope out the room and heads over to Cassandra. She wants to know how Clark shared her vision: “We both know you’re not like other people…I’ve seen you, before we ever met. More than once I’ve touched people and I’ve seen such pain and despair…but then you were there, and the pain was gone. I think that’s your destiny, Clark. To help people. To save them from fear and darkness.” Take a shot!
Rebecca: I really hope no one (me) gets alcohol poisoning from this game.
Jess: She holds out her hand, and Clark takes it. There’s a quick montage of Clark saving people, including Zoe. “Who are they?” he asks. “People who need your help,” Cassandra says. “How am I supposed to help them if I don’t know who they are?” he asks. “I’m not the radio, I don’t pick up continuous transmissions,” she replies. Hee. She promises to keep his secret, and he leaves.
Clark joins the others in Harry’s room, where Chloe is going through newspaper clippings. One has a picture of Zoe, and Clark recognizes her from his vision. He races off.
At the Beanery, Harry stops writing something on a napkin to flex his hand in apparent pain. Zoe takes her apron off and tells him to scram. He shows her the napkin and translates the Greek for her: “The sins of the father are visited on the children.” Harry menacingly exposits that Zoe’s grandmother took away his future and now he’ll take away hers. He lunges at her with the piano wire just as Clark crashes through the front door. Harry whips out a knife from God knows where and tells Clark to stay back as he drags Zoe out of the Beanery.
But Clark is already in front of them. He tells Harry to let Zoe go, and Harry throws Zoe in front of an oncoming truck. Clark throws himself on top of her as the truck passes over them, which scrapes up his jacket so badly it starts smoldering (???) but obviously doesn’t hurt him. He hands Zoe off to the panicked truck driver and runs off to find Harry.
Rebecca: Poor truck driver. This isn’t his problem.
Jess: Suddenly, Harry lunges at him with the knife, and we get a bizarre slow-mo shot of the CGI knife shattering when it hits Clark and pieces of it flying everywhere. It’s played like a reveal, but we all already know Clark is invulnerable, so it’s just strange.
Rebecca: Get ready to see this shot in the opening credits for ages after this. Keep in mind that 2001 was a heady time for CGI slo-mo. We’d all JUST seen The Matrix.
Jess: Clark throws Harry onto a car and oh I just realized Cassandra’s the one who’s going to die in this episode. I feel kind of stupid now.
Rebecca: I probably shouldn’t admit that I get fooled, like, every time.
Jess: Kent Farm, exposition time: Zoe is fine and doesn’t know why Harry wanted to kill her, Harry is in the hospital for observation, the truck driver isn’t asking any questions. Jonathan asks if Cassandra knows Clark’s secret and Clark is silent. Jonathan tells Clark he shouldn’t see her anymore: “Your destiny may be to protect people, but ours is to protect you, and that’s gotta come first, okay?” Well, that’s somewhat less dickish than Jonathan’s “screw ‘em” policy in Man of Steel.
Rebecca: It really shows what a weird asshole Jonathan was in Man of Steel if he’s worse than Bo Duke’s version.
Jess: Luthor Castle. Lex shows Clark the trashed Porsche. Clark asks why he still has it, and Lex rambles something about fate before telling Clark that he had a team of experts go over the car and there’s no way the impact could’ve ripped open the roof like that. Clark’s all “Gosh, weird,” and is pretty convincing at it, though Lex is still clearly not satisfied. He’s clearly picking at the idea that he “should” be dead like a scab, and Clark snarks that, kooky though she may be, at least Cassandra doesn’t dwell on the past: “Lex, you’re alive. The question that you need to ask yourself now is where do you go from here?”
Rebecca: Clark’s so smug about lying to Lex’s face in this scene. In an episode about prophecies, this is ironically foretells the most about the rest of the series.
Jess: Hospital. A cop and a doctor open the door to Harry’s room to find Old Harry handcuffed to the bed. “Help me,” he begs.
Senior citizen home, the bridge over the pond. Lana tells Clark that Harry claims he was kidnapped by “the young man.” Clark is skeptical, but the kryptonite in the pond makes him woozy and he heads inside.
Harry’s room. Clark tells Harry he thinks he and “the kid” are the same person. Harry makes some weird comment about Clark not being on the family tree, which, uh, Clark has been legally a part of the Kent family for 12 years, so no? Clark tells Harry he’s watching him and Harry calls for a nurse to take away the boy who’s “harassing” him.
Rebecca: Watching Clark intimidate an old man by staring at him is so hilarious to me. Clark, bro, you are weird.
Jess: Later, Harry wheels his chair out onto the bridge, where the chain has been replaced by police tape, which is even dumber. He smiles and tips himself in. The chair goes all zappy again.
Journalism room. The pacing of this episode is weird. Shouldn’t it be over by now? Clark, Chloe, and Pete investigate Harry’s case. Pete asks if anyone’s watching Harry and Clark says “Lana’s got an eye on him.” Chloe and Pete exchange glances. “I heard that,” Clark says without looking up. Hee!
And sure enough, in comes Lana to tell them Harry’s gone and they found his chair in the pond. Clark says that he found meteor rocks in the pond, and Chloe’s like “Aha!” Clark tells Lana he’ll explain later, which, dude, it won’t take that long, she already knows Chloe and Clark think all the weird stuff in town is because of the meteors.
Rebecca: Also, WILL SOMEONE PLEASE TELL LANA THAT KRYPTONITE IS DANGEROUS SO SHE’LL STOP WEARING IT AROUND HER NECK?
Jess: PROLONGED EXPOSURE GIVES HUMANS CANCER (IN SOME CONTINUITIES)!
Rebecca: INCLUDING THIS ONE, ACCORDING TO THE SYMBOLIC GLOVE IN CASSANDRA’S UPCOMING VISION!
Jess: Seriously, though, why doesn’t Lana have powers after all this time?
Chloe finds a paper listing the jurors in Harry’s original trial. Preeeeetty sure they don’t publish that. Anyway, Rudolph Gage and Zoe’s grandmother were both on the jury…and so was Hiram Kent. “He’s gonna kill my dad,” Clark realizes.
Kent Farm. Martha opens the door for Young Harry: “I got a report about a gas leak. You mind if I come in?” Martha isn’t having it and asks who called it in and where their regular gas guy, “Kurt,” is. “On vacation,” Harry claims. Martha excuses herself and closes the door. She tries to make a phone call, but the line is dead – and then Harry lets himself in, holding the wire. “Kurt isn’t your regular gas man, is he?” MARTHA U R SMART.
Martha asks what he wants and Harry says he’s there to kill Jonathan. Martha hits him with a vase, grabs her keys, and runs for the car. MARTHA U R GREAT. The tires have already been slashed, so Martha runs for the barn. Harry follows, wielding a giant knife. Martha hides in…the grain silo? I have no idea where she is. Anyway, Kurt finds her and walks in after her. He approaches – and she yanks a chain, sending a stream of grain into the maybe-silo. They struggle in the falling grain.
Jonathan drives up to the house – and Clark superspeeds in front of him. “Somebody’s trying to kill you. Where’s Mom?” Clark asks, and then spots the slashed tires. “He’s already here.”
Grain silo. Harry, then Martha, are buried in grain.
Rebecca: You’d think that maybe after you almost drown in grain, you might give up this farming thing.
Jess: Clark spots them with his X-ray vision and yanks a panel off the side of the silo, sending grain spilling out. The Kent men climb in and dig for Martha, who is unconscious. Jonathan gives her mouth-to-mouth until she gasps and starts coughing. “Are you okay?” Jonathan asks. “You think I’d ever leave you two alone?” she says, and clutches at them. “Cassandra was wrong, Clark. Nobody’s gonna die.” Clark looks up and sees Harry’s hand sticking out of the grain. It shifts from young to old and goes still.
Rebecca: fuck yeah martha kent dot tumblr dot com
Jess: Senior citizen home, day. Cassandra is putting a puzzle together when Lex arrives with a bouquet. He tells her he’s there to have his fortune told: “I lived when I should’ve died. There must be a reason for that. See, I don’t wanna do good things. I wanna do great things.” She’s like “Psh, you don’t need me for that,” and he taunts her: “Afraid of what you’ll see?” “Sit,” she snaps, and he does. “You’ve been warned.”
She holds out a hand and he takes it. There’s a flash, and we see Lex in the Oval Office in an all-white suit. He steps out into a field of CGI sunflowers and bends to smell one (oh my God, you guys) before touching it with a black-gloved hand. It withers, as does the rest of the field, which turns into a landscape of bones beneath a red sky. Lex tilts his face up to a rain of blood.
Rebecca: PERFECT. SEQUENCE. This looked cool in 2001, I swear. But now it looks like a video game cut scene written by Dan DiDio. AKA perfect. Also, I wish this wasn’t so similar to the vision Clark has in Man of Steel. FIELD OF SKULLS.
Jess: Back to the present. Cassandra is motionless. “What did you see?” Lex asks, then realizes in horror that she’s dead. He drops the flowers and calls for help, wiping his hands on his clothes, deeply freaked. Breathing hard, he stumbles out of the room.
A nurse comes in, checks Cassandra’s pulse, and closes her eyes – just as Clark walks in. “I’m sorry, son. She’s gone.” “She saw it,” Clark realizes. “Saw what?” the nurse asks. “Her future,” Clark replies, and we fade out.
Rebecca: Drop the mic.
Rebecca: When you do an early Season 1 episode about the future and then your show runs for 10 seasons, it takes some wind out of your sails. I remember really loving this episode at the time, but it turns out that there’s very little going on here. We get almost no non-Clark content because the show seems incapable of juggling more than one new character at a time. I like Cassandra, but not at the expense of Chloe, Pete and Lex. Also, I might be in the minority of Superman fans on this, but I really get nothing out of other people telling Clark that he needs to help people; I’d like to think he could maybe figure it out on his own time.
Jess: No, I agree – it should be an instinct. I actually liked the episode fine – you’re right that it didn’t deliver much outside of Clark Clarking up the A-plot – but I’m just relieved to have a break from teenagers trying to murder their rivals and love interests. Also, no one in this episode tried to kidnap Lana! Amazing! So though there’s nothing too groundbreaking in the plot, I like Cassandra, it has an effective villain, and it’s not the same damn formula we’ve seen five times already.
Also, and I almost feel like it’s unfair to point this out in a Smallville episode, there are two giant plotholes that really irk me (although none so much as The Mystery of the 30 Artichokes from last week): 1. How the hell was Harry continuing to live in the senior citizen home, pose as an aid/nurse, and apparently even sleep in his own bed without anyone noticing, and 2. Clark’s vision doesn’t actually come true, so what the hell?
Rating: A brisk trot.
Next week: The once and future Lois Lane eats a deer.
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I’m getting back into Smallville, after our traumatic breakup in Season 4.
Clark’s vision doesn’t actually come true, so what the hell?
The fan interpretation of this scene has always been that it’s (slightly) metaphoric, and that it *will* come true. Clark is an alien who will, in time, outlive all the humans he knows …
except there’s no tombstone for Lex. Who has super-healing, and who later masters cloning.
Who has super-healing, and who later masters cloning.
omg this show