What's up with Lana? Lana surprises Clark with a cake for his birthday. Its really the day the Kents picked off the calendar from his adoption, so Clark is not too eager to celebrate. Lana asks him to make a wish. "I've been wishing the same thing since I was five," Clark says, "now I don't have to, she's standing here in front of me." He takes Lana in his arms and they kiss. The next day at the Talon, there is an awkward moment between Clark and Lana when Chloe comes in. Lana tells Clark it might be a mistake. Clark later asks Lana if her reluctance is to protect Chloe's feelings. Lana admits she is afraid to put any of their friendships at risk. Clark tries to convince her that it is worth the risk. Suddenly Clark hears a voice "the day is coming." He leaves Lana to follow it.
What's up with Dr. Walden? In a coma since the incident in the caves, Dr. Walden awakens. He tells Lex "the day is coming." Dr. Walden's blindness and cataracts disappear. While under medical observation, he breaks out through a glass wall using a powerful ray of light emitted from his hand. Lex shows Clark the padded room where Dr. Walden was held. Dr. Walden has burned symbols into the room. Clark claims ignorance.
Back at the cave, Dr. Walden activates the wall using the power of light from his hands, rearranging the message. On the cave wall, he sees a figure of a man and says to himself, "I know who you are."
What's up with Lex? Lex invites Jonathan and Martha to be seated at a a place of honor at the head table at his wedding rehearsal dinner, since his own parents won't be there. They accept. As the best man, Clark is busy preparing a toast. Clark invites Lana to the party.
What's up with Helen? Lex's fiancée Helen suggests Lex reconcile with Lionel before the wedding, but he refuses.
Helen's office at the hospital is vandalized. An unmarked vial of Clark's blood has been stolen.
What's up with Lionel? Lionel catches Helen snooping in files at the mansion. She has found a file on Martha Kent. Lionel insinuates that Lex broke into her office at the hospital. Helen accuses Lionel.
Later while looking for Dr. Walden in the caves, Lionel finds Clark there. Lionel tries to get info from Clark when he notices that the symbols on the wall have moved and changed.
Lionel goes back to the mansion, finding Lex. Dr. Walden bursts in and tells Lex and Lionel his interpretation of the cave symbols, and that he knows that the "last son" is Clark Kent, who must be killed. The doctor treating Dr. Walden arrives and shoots him with a tranquilizer.
What's up with Clark? At home telling his parents what has happened, Clark reveals his worry over the message now on the cave wall that says "The day is coming when the last son will begin his quest to rules the third planet."
At the rehearsal dinner, Clark can't take his eyes off Lana. Lex privately tells Clark about Dr. Walden's ravings about Clark ruling the world. Lex warns Clark that Lionel won't let it drop.
Clark proposes his toast as the best man. His words about the love between Lex and Helen are also directed at Lana. After the toast, Clark gets a migraine-like pain, and excuses himself from the party. He knows there is something wrong with the key at home and rushes there to find Dr. Walden holding the key. Dr. Walden uses the power in his hands to direct energy, pushing Clark through a wall and lifting him into the air. Clark defends himself using heat vision. Dr. Walden's energy backfires when a propane tank explodes and he is burned to death. Clark recovers the key.
What's up with Chloe? Chloe suspects Clark and Lana were together on Clark's birthday night when Lana didn't return home until 2 a.m. She makes attempts to mend her friendship with Clark. Clark tells her it'll take time. Chloe asks for honesty.
At the Torch office, Lionel tells Chloe he has arranged for her weekly column in The Daily Planet. Lionel asks Chloe to write a story on Clark and the Kents for his personal use. Chloe refuses. Planting doubt, Lionel asks if Clark would sacrifice his dream out of loyalty to Chloe.
How it ends: Alone at the mansion, Helen tells Lex she found his copy of the confidential medical records on Martha Kent. Lex explains he obtained them out of concern for Martha's health. Lex tells Helen "If you think I'm capable of that kind of deceit, maybe you shouldn't be marrying me." "Maybe you're right," replies Helen as she leaves. Lex opens a box containing a vial. It is the blood sample stolen from Helen's office.
Prior to Dr. Walden's autopsy, Lionel views the body. Burned beyond recognition, the palm of Dr. Walden's hand bears an imprint of the key. Under the impression, the skin in not burned. Lionel asks that the hand be sent to him.
After the party, Lana visits Clark in his barn loft. She compliments his toast speech. He tells her she was his inspiration. They kiss. Chloe peeks in and seeing them together, tearfully runs away. After Lana leaves, Clark hears a voice "Kal el...it is time," which draws him outside and into the glowing storm cellar.
TO BE CONTINUED...
[back to top]

We open on a computer showing someone's hot brain. It's a computer-generated image of somebody's pulsating cranial activity. A computer-geek-looking guy in a white lab coat is staring at the screen. Something important must be happening. He goes over to an MRI machine where somebody is lying down, getting the head scan. The technician pushes a button to make the machine's clanking stops and causes a slab carrying a person to come out. Hey, it's Professor Snideface! Even in a mind-blown coma, he still looks kinda peeved. Lex shows up. He asks "Doctor Marcus" what was so urgent that he was needed. The technician -- who looks a bit like Beaker from the Muppets -- urgently says that Snideface's brain has completely normalized. Lex sexily says that considering what happened to Snideface, nothing about his condition surprises Lex. The pseudo-doctor asks what happened in the caves. He asks how a linguist gets his mind thrashed deciphering a Native American language. Maybe it was really good gossip. "If you had that answer, doctor," Lex says, "you'd be running the place." The guy smiles as if that would be just a peachy fantasy. Snideface suddenly pops awake. Ack! I know I wished for this with all my heart, but now that it's actually happening...I just don't know. Snideface stares, wide-eyed, with blue cataracts. I get a nasty LASIK flashback. Snideface clutches Lex. "The day is coming," Snideface says. "The day IS COMING!" Snideface says again as Lex tries to get that hand to stop gripping him. Junior Mint Doctor lays Snideface back down flat and Snideface closes those terrible eyes. Lex and Jr. Doctor are both, "Whatthafuck?"

The Barnness of Soon-to-Be-Total-Heterotude. Clark is studying. And to prove how hard he's studying, he erases something. Unfortunately what he was erasing said, "Plato = philosopher. Not Mickey's dog." Lana shows up. She's carrying a box. Clark closes his book. "It's almost midnight," Clark says. Lana -- wearing a weird blue jacket -- says she figured Clark would still be up. By which she means "awake." Lana asks if Clark is writing his term paper. Clark says he's writing his toast for Lex's rehearsal dinner for the wedding. If there's one thing Lex has always wanted Clark to do for him, it's to get toasty. Clark briefly describes the immense pressure of such an act. He asks about the box Lana's holding and whether he's supposed to guess what's in it. He squints for a second, but we don't get the sound effect, so I guess he didn't x-ray the box unless he did it sneakily and without letting the sound guy know. Lana tells Clark to close his eyes. He does. Hard. Lana turns around. She bends over a tad provocatively and sultrily says, "Don't peek." (Hey, I'm not about that, so just shut your mouth. I'm merely writing what I see.) Clark puts his big-ass hands over his face. Lana blows out a match. She presents Clark with something and smiles. It's a little cake with four candles. She says it's not his birthday for another seven minutes, but that she wanted to surprise him. "You did," Clark says and stands. He's not happy. Clark says it's not really his birthday. Oh, you ungrateful bastard.

Just take the f'ing cake, smile and eat it. Is that so hard, superbeing? Clark says this day is just a day his parents picked off a calendar for the adoption papers. How is that any more arbitrary than the random process of being born on a particular day anyway? Lana looks hurt and, for once, she didn't bring it on herself. She goes over to Clark, who really just needs to be kicked in the balls with a Kryptonite boot right now. She tells Clark that maybe they should celebrate the day Clark came into their lives. "I never thought of it that way," Clark says. Or, more to the point, "I never thought." Lana asks Clark to make a wish. Clark says he's been wishing for the same thing since he was five. Now, he says, he doesn't have to. He's been wishing for cake an awful long time. Oh, maybe not. He puts the cake aside, still lit. "She's standing right here in front of me," Clark says. Oh. Jeez. He was one horny five-year-old. Clark leans in. He and Lana kiss. Tentatively at first, then with a little more sugar and spice. The camera pulls back and the stars outside the loft window look awfully low. They manage to get the cake into the frame as Lana rubs Clark's arm and they continue to kiss. Way to go for that erogenous elbow, Lana. (more...)
-- Omar G (TWoP)

Dr. Walden wakes up from his coma and tells Lex and Lionel that Clark is an alien and must be destroyed. Meanwhile, a romantic encounter between Clark and Lana hints at a promising future, but after Chloe finds out they are together, Lana pulls back. Sam Jones III, Annette O'Toole and John Schneider also star.

Lex: None of us really understands the fairer sex. That's why we're so captivated by them.

Chloe: (to Lionel) I don't know what your interest is in Clark, but you can take your job offer and shove it down your $1,000 pants.

Lana: You have so many secrets in your life.
Clark: I know. I just don't want my feelings for you to be one of them.

Lionel: Send it to me.
Coroner: Send you what?
Lionel: The hand.

Chloe (in large part due to Allison Mack's consistently fine performances) is one of the most sympathetic characters on the show. The audience really feels for her when she gets her heart stomped on again and again by Clark's Super-love (or Super-"love") for Lana; Lana gets the fairy princess label, but Chloe really comes across as the show's snarkily self-aware Cinderella, pre-fairy godmother. Or fairy godfather, a role Lionel seems to have stepped up to play in his own creepy, self-interested fashion.

If Chloe accepts his help, as the end of "Calling" seemed to foreshadow, she'll get her dream, but also, as she has to at least subconsciously realize, her revenge. But does Chloe, however hurt, really have any right to seek revenge? She's always known Clark was far more interested in Lana than he was in her. Maybe if Clark and Lana were a little more considerate (another way of saying, perhaps, a little less adolescent), they would have admitted they were together, not asking for Chloe's permission or blessing, but rather giving her their honesty, instead of their blatant and poorly done dishonesty. But being inconsiderate is not a cardinal sin, for which an appropriate punishment is being essentially handed over for dissection to Lionel Luthor. So yes, Chloe, like Lex, stirs the audience's sympathy and wins its rooting interest. But not having a mommy or anybody to love does not completely excuse bad behavior. (more...)
By Kathleen O'Shaughnessy