Smallville: Wrath (Episode 707)

We open on Lana and Clark horseback riding to "My Eyes" by Travis, which doesn't make sense to me from a storytelling standpoint unless Lana is pregnant with their baby, but whatever. It's pretty, and it distracts me from the director's clever but obvious tricks to hide the fact that, with the exception of one medium shot of Lana, it isn't really Kristin and Tom on the horses.

"Come on, Tom! It's fun!" "I refuse to sit astride something with bigger balls than me. Sorry."

They dismount, and Lana thanks Clark for the romantic afternoon. He remarks that she's been distant lately, and she shrugs it off as a symptom of getting used to her new life -- but it's the life she wants. Thunder cracks, and they start to hurry for the house -- leaving their horses tied to the fence, WTF -- but Clark doubles over with weakness as they pass by a windmill. Lana notices a meteor rock nestled at its base and picks it up, meaning to throw it out of range. However, in the midst of her windup, lightning strikes the windmill and flows through both of them, throwing Clark several meters away. The windmill breaks off at its base and begins to topple right on top of Clark, when Lana catches it. She stares at him in incredulous wonder as she raises it above her head.

Back from the credits, Lana and Clark race at superspeed through pasture to the barn. Lana is all "This is the coolest thing ever!" while Clark tries to reason that historically, the transfer of his powers to a human has not gone well. Lana arches a suggestive eyebrow and agrees that they'll have to get rid of them eventually, but in the meantime?

WOCKA CHICKA.

What follows is possibly the most hilarious, understatedly naughty thing in the history of Smallville. A shot of the barn from maybe a mile away. There is a sound as though from a shotgun (!) and the camera shudders, and leaves shake loose from a nearby tree. HAHAHAHAHAHA. Across town in the Talon, Chloe raises an eyebrow as the whole place shakes as though from a distant earthquake.

Later, a shot of the barn roof reveals several gaping holes and a broken weather vane. *cough* Clark, having changed clothes, joins Lana in the kitchen, and they share the obligatory I've-never-felt-so-close-to-you cakes. Chloe barges in on them kissing, demanding to know why they haven't responded to any of her messages, since the town has been rocked by ejaculatory seismic activity for hours. Clark and Lana stare wide-eyed at each other and admit sheepishly that it must have been them. Reality dawning, Chloe turns to Lana, sotto voce, all, since when is your vagina made of steel, and Lana is like, well it's kind of a new thing, and Clark is all OMG YOU GUYS TALK ABOUT MY SPERM? Hee. Clark, honey, grown men talk about your sperm.

Lana accidentally breaks the refrigerator handle trying to put away the lemonade and excuses herself to find a screwdriver. Chloe hits Clark up for an explanation, and he tells her about the kryptocution. Chloe points out that when this happened to Eric Summers, he went from mild-mannered Jimmy Olsen-lookalike to Belle Reve nutjob. Worse, Jonathan's temporary assumption of Clark's powers caused his heart to fail. Well, that would be reason enough for me to let Lana carry on, but Clark understandably sees it differently. Meanwhile, as Lana inexplicably looks for the screwdriver in her bedroom, she superhears Clark ask Chloe to keep an eye on her. She is not pleased.

Later, at the Talon, Lana moons excitedly to Chloe about all the sneaky avenues these powers open to her. When Chloe warns her to be careful, Lana merely admonishes that as a reporter, Chloe would hardly hesitate to use these powers if she had them. Lana certainly has a particular target in mind.

Your Brainiac greymatter, sir. Cream and sugar?

At Luthor mansion, one of Lex's scientists shows him a cylinder containing several tubes of krypto-material and a jar of black liquid. He tells Lex that the "metallic dust" that used to be in the jar suddenly liquefied. Lex helpfully clarifies that the dust was what was left of Milton Fine's ship, and that if something happened to it he would be most displeased. The Lexentist protests that the liquid appears to be sentient. Sure enough, the black ooze twitches within its jar, partially forming spiny protrusions. The Lexentist says that in addition to its life goal to become a porcupine, it appears to want out. He presents Lex with a hard drive containing all the data on "Project Scion."

Lana watches from her video surveillance room as Lex places the hard drive in a safe behind a painting. Having read her Cat Burglars For Dummies guide and dressed for the occasion in a black turtleneck with her hair in a bun, Lana superspeeds off. We watch on the monitor as Lex and his Lexentist walk away and Lana enters the frame to bust into the safe and retrieve the hard drive.

"Yes, Martha, I miss you terribly. I'm having to use my right hand far too much without you."

At Luthorcorp, Lionel chats cheerfully on the phone with Martha, who is apparently taking Washington by storm. Throughout the scene he plays with one of those rubber stress balls in his right hand, and I've only just now realized he's using it for therapy to regain strength and mobility in that hand. Which is kind of a cool way to show Lionel's progress without mentioning it in dialogue, though it might be more effective if there were scars. Anyway, he hangs up as Clark enters to ask for his help switching Lana back to normal. Lionel is disturbed by this information, and informs Clark that Lana was the one keeping him in captivity all those weeks. Clark doesn't believe it, and accuses Lionel of saying these things because Clark has been spending time with Lana instead of blindly following Jor-El's decreed path. Lionel uses the tale of Samson and Delilah to illustrate that trust does not preclude betrayal. Also it can lead to a bad 'do, if that helps.

Clark returns to a darkened house to find Lana not home, but he sees her planner on a table and opens it to find a brochure for the Isis Foundation. Lex speaks up from the shadows, unsurprised by Clark's lack of trust. He wants an explanation for his destroyed safe and his personnel spotting Lana leaving the mansion. Clark suggests the enhanced strength is caused by a meteor infection, but Lex is more interested in the fact that her attention to his dealings indicates a stronger attachment to him than she's willing to admit. As for Clark's insinuation that he knows Lana better than Lex does, Lex nods to the brochure and sneers that Clark is the last to know about her Isis Foundation, and that if it were as innocent a venture as it appeared, she probably would have told him about it. Clark tries not to sulk.

Handwriting analysis: subject is loud, obnoxious, slightly shady, and has a blush to set a lady's panties aflame.

At the Daily Planet, Babriel sits at his desk, nose wrinkled at Lois's footlong dog, and hands her a draft of her latest story with red proofreading marks all over it. On the one hand, Lois's weak grasp of spelling and grammar never fails to amuse, but on the other hand? He's the Editor in Chief, not a Copy Editor. Lois playfully accuses him of not being down with the people, and starts to head out, only to meet Lana on her way in. She presents Babriel with Lex's hard drive, telling him it's proof that Lex hasn't become an angel. When she orders him to print it, Babriel smirks that he can't use stolen sources. Lana grabs him by the collar and shoves him against the wall, and when Lois tries to pull her off him ("Somebody needs to switch to decaf." Heh.), Lana flings her through the office window into the hall outside. Showing no concern whatsoever, she steps over an unconscious Lois and goes after Lex herself.

At the hospital, Clark meets Lois and Chloe in the waiting room, where Lois holds an icepack to her shoulder but seems otherwise fine. She tells Clark that Lana was after a story on Lex, and that "the look in her eyes made Medea look like Mother Hubbard." Possibly she means Mother Theresa, since Mother Hubbard makes no sense, but whatever. The nurse calls Lois to see the doctor, and Clark whines to Chloe that Lana would never hurt Lois on purpose. Never: a word which here means "never, except when she feels like it."

Later, Lois sneaks out of her room in a hospital gown and makes for the elevator. Okay, 1) there's no way they admitted her for a bruised shoulder, and 2) sneaking out works much better if you change into your street clothes first. Keeping her eyes on the hallway, she backs into the elevator, giving its unexpected occupant, Babriel, a clear view through the slit up the back. He wastes no time appreciating the view and presents her with the flowers he was bringing. They flirt adorably. She explains that she's escaping in order to get a jump on the Project Scion story, but Babriel repeats his warning from a few episodes back that he doesn't want her mixed up with the Luthors. He tries to cover that it's out of concern for losing his "star reporter," but Lois has never watched TV before, so she misinterprets his concern as a move to get into her pants. She stalks off the elevator, covering her tush with the flowers, while Babriel watches her with the most adorable blush of all time.

An ass by any other name would smell as sweet.

At the Planet, Clark and Chloe have made no progress finding out about Project Scion. Clark wonders if, for once, Lex's activities are not shady. He suggests that the powers are causing Lana to feel things more strongly, and that Lex's underhandedness could be in Lana's imagination. Chloe, though, recognizes denial when she sees it, and Clark admits that Lana has been different ever since her return from the presumed dead. He asks Chloe if she knows anything about the Isis Foundation.

In his car, Lex jabbers to his Lexentist about the liquid metal, wanting to know whether it is acting of its own accord or if something is controlling it. Dude, either way, if it means James Marsters is back, excuse me while I tune out. If ever there was an actor meant for one role and one role only, homeboy is it. Suddenly Lex sees Lana in the middle of the street and swerves to avoid her, dropping his still-live cell phone on the seat. Coming to a stop, he stares as Lana steps onto his hood and punches through the windshield.

Chloe leads Clark into the (unlocked) Isis Foundation office, relating that Lana didn't tell him about it because he'd say it was too dangerous, but maybe Lana just wants to help the victims on her own terms. Clark's x-ray vision leads him to open the hidden door to the surveillance room. Chloe: "...or she's secretly spying on Lex and she doesn't want us to know how totally depraved she is." Chloe Sullivan for the win, ladies and gentlemen. She assures Clark she had no idea "there was a La Femme Nikita lurking behind the Florence Nightingale." See, Lois? That's how you draw obscure literary-historical metaphors. One of the monitors is labeled "Lex's mobile," and they play back the track to hear Lana ask a choked Lex where Scion is. He tells her it's at Plant #4.

At said plant, Lana flings Lex into a lab like a sack of potatoes. A hot, bald, snarky sack of potatoes. A screen on the wall streams krypto-script, and Lex tells Lana the password for the project is 5-18-05, which Lana helpfully reminds us is the date of the second meteor shower. She enters the password, and the screen changes to a diagram of one of the ships. They argue like caged lions about his continued investigation of aliens, and Lex accuses her of coming to him because she trusts him over Clark. She swears to keep after him until he is fully exposed and can't hurt anyone else, but Lex swears he's trying to help protect people from more aliens to come. He compares himself to St. Paul, who did not find his true calling until he was struck blind by lightning. If Clark is the Jesus in that scenario, Lex, I think you've got a few things to rethink.

Lana rips apart some wires and tears open Lex's shirt, preparing to electrocute him if he doesn't tell her what he's really up to. He warns her that if she kills him, she's the one who'll suffer -- not from guilt, but from being a disappointment to Clark. "He's not like us, Lana," he says. "We understand doing whatever it takes to survive." They breathe heavily at each other for a moment, and Lex kisses her. She kisses him back for a moment, then grabs his throat and tosses him across the room.

"Look, I have no use for a villain who won't even use tongue."

Clark zips in and tells Lana to back off, that killing people is not a choice they get to make; but Lana counters that countless people would still be alive if Clark had gotten rid of Lex long ago. They grapple, and Lana knocks Clark into a cabinet, out of which rolls the cylinder containing the kryptonite and the black ooze. They both writhe in agony. Lana spits angrily that Clark is all-powerful, yet chooses to hide on the farm. YES, WE KNOW. God, this season is full of Oliver Queen wannabes. Can we just have the real McCoy himself back, instead of his disciples? Clark busts open the cylinder to reveal the kryptonite, grabs the live wire swinging nearby, and zaps himself and Lana. Across the room, the black ooze escapes from its jar, hopefully on its way back to the X-Files playbook where it belongs.

At the Planet, Babriel is on the phone to a "sir," to whom he gives his word that "it's been taken care of." He hangs up and begins deleting all the files on the Project Scion hard drive. This falls under the category of Not Surprising, since I (and probably many of you) called it that Babriel was in someone's pocket at least two episodes ago when he first warned Lois to stay away from the Luthors. What I like is that he also seems genuinely taken with Lois, so I can still love him. He's sort of like Jason Teague in that way. Mmm, Jensen Ackles.

Lois enters to tell Babriel that the Project Scion thing was a dead end, but she also wants to talk about what happened in the elevator. Without a word, Babriel stands and kisses her. Lois pushes him away, eyebrow peaked. Babriel: "I'm glad I got that off my chest." Insert adorable smile. Goddamn, y'all. Was Michael Cassidy this good on The O.C.? I might have to go rent the cursed thing after this. Lois says she could have him by the balls now, since that was sexual harassment. I'm not even going to touch that one, because what happens next is too cute. She grabs him by the lapels, and kisses him back. Lois: "...but that wasn't!" Insert adorable smile. I'm sensing a pattern of adorableness with these two. They kiss again.

Sexual Harassment: Or, the Tale of Puppies and Sunshine

At Luthor mansion, Lex enjoys what my grandpa calls "a very refreshing drink" and registers no surprise when Clark walks in. Clark tells him that Lana's "infection" is gone, and he's come to find out if Lex plans to press charges. Lex finds it interesting that out of all this, he's the one who got what he wanted: Lana still has feelings for him. "What do you think is stronger, Clark? Her hatred for me, or her affection for you?" Ohhh, SNAP. He tells Clark with satisfaction that obsession outlives even love, and that further, Clark taught Lana about betrayal long before Lex did. "It's hard to face what you've created, isn't it?" Nice, writers. Raise your hand if you think he's talking about Lana. Nobody? Right. I wish they would stick with this idea that Lex eventually becomes irreversibly evil as a result of Clark never trusting him, but I have this fear that they're trying to make Lex into a mere jilted lover. That way lies cliché, writers. Be strong like Wookiee!

Lana enters the Isis Foundation office to find all her surveillance monitors showing static. Chloe appears from the shadows and admits it was she who cut off Lana's Big Sister scheme. Chloe says she thought "Isis" was a lovely name for the Foundation back when she thought its purpose was only to help people, as Isis was the Egyptian goddess of love and healing, who "went to the ends of the earth to help jump-start the man she loved." Yep, by making him a penis out of gold. Perhaps Osiris and Clark have more in common than previously assumed! But Chloe isn't sure Clark needs Lana's particular brand of loyalty. She points out that Isis was also the goddess of the underworld, and that whether she means to or not, Lana has the ability to destroy Clark. With a gentle half-smile, Chloe assures Lana that she's not going to let that happen.

Chloe Sullivan: Better Than You Since October 16, 2001

At the plant, Lex brandishes the broken cylinder and suggests his Lexentists find the missing liquid alloy if they don't want to die slow painful deaths brought on by having to listen to Marsters' uniquely un-American American accent. As he leaves, the black ooze porcu-slithers over to a female Lexentist and absorbs itself into her hand. The camera pans up to her eyes, which glaze black for a moment before returning to normal. Oh goody.

In the barn, Clark approaches Lana to tell her that Lex isn't pressing charges. And hey, at least now they know that Lex is still tracking Kryptonians! Way to look on the bright side, Clark. Lana pleads with him to believe she would never hurt him, and that her behavior was brought on by the powers. Clark points out the flaw in that: she kidnapped Lionel before she ever had powers. Lana claims she would do anything to protect the one she loves, and Clark observes that she sounds like Lex. She counters that she sounds just as much like Clark. He blames himself for her not trusting him with the Isis thing, since he didn't trust her with his secrets for the first twenty years of their lives. Lana: "Don't do that. Don't take all the blame so that you don't taint the image of me that you created." Heeeeeey, that's logic talking! I may fall over.

All Lana asks is to know that Clark loves her no matter what.

Clark does not answer.

If the strike ends soon? Whatever you want.

screencaps courtesy dj_capslock