7.21 Apocalypse by TW and AM (Part XVII)

as retold by Bill C

TW: Back to Clark as Kalibak's arms loosen and drop. Clark then rears back and punches Kalibak right in the jaw with everything he's got; tracking shot as Kalibak goes flying, nearly taking out Lionel--
JG: Wait, Lionel's been in the same spot during all of this?
TW: Yes. Kalibak hits the far wall, making a crater of his own, and slumps to the ground in a big sprawl--and the camera zooms in to his face, which looks completely devoid of any sort of expression other than his eyes being crossed. The two black marks on his forehead are smoking and bleeding rather profusely down his face.
MR: Damn, Tom. That is gross.
KK: Angry Clark is...angry.
TW: Deal with it. Back to a from-below shot of Clark, breathing heavily and looking completely maniacal, clothes torn and bleeding in a couple of spots. Total silence as he stands there, and as we cut to Martha looking genuinely shocked by what she just saw...then Hope, also shocked...then Lex's suit slowly lowering its arm.
KK: I...holy shit, Clark just deliberately--
AoT [sings]: Mama, just killed a man...put my eyes up to his head, pulled the trigger now he's dead--
TW: He's not dead.
KK: Braindead is better?
TW: Yes, goddammit.
KK: You been smoking your own crazy logic there, Tom?
AM [to TW]: Now, see, this is how I managed to sneak the HoYay by you.
TW: Yeah?
AM: Yeah. You were too focused on that.
TW [sighs]: Damn. So...we go back to Clark as he suddenly looks up and off-camera--and some ominous
"Oh, hell..." music cranks up as we cut to Lionel looking just a little--
KK: Like "Oh, shit, what the hell did I just do?"
TW: Basically, yeah.
MR [astonished]: No way.
JG: You wouldn't dare!
ED: Are you kidding? He would dare!
TW [smirks]: Reverse shot on Lionel as Clark super-speeds up to him and grabs him by the throat, lifting him off the ground. The camera pans up and then angles down to show Clark, still looking crazed, as his eyes begin to glow a faint red.
JG: Tom, if you kill Lionel here--as God is my witness, I'll--
MR: No way! If anybody needs to kill Lionel it's got to be Lex! The son must triumph over the father!
JG: Only if the father doesn't kick his ass first, Rosenbaum!
ED: But Clark is sort of an adopted--
MR: Shut up!
ED: Kind of? Like a cous--
JG+MR: Shut up!
AoT: No, no, wait. The next shot is Martha calling out across the room. "Clark, no!"
KK: Martha talks him down? [thinks] I suppose this was coming, too...
ED: Really? I didn't see it coming.
AM: Reverse shot on Clark of Lionel gasping for air.
AoT: Martha, now thoroughly disheveled, runs across the room and up to Clark. She then touches his arm. "Don't...don't do it, Clark. Let him go. Come on...don't do it, honey. Let him go."
TW: Clark doesn't say anything, but we see his head turn slightly in Martha's direction. Back to the reverse shot of Lionel as the red fades from Clark's eyes, and then a three-shot as he slowly lowers Lionel to the ground. Clark then stalks off out of the shot.
JG: Lionel gasps for air some more. "Th-thank you, Martha. I--"
AoT [huge grin]: Martha glares at him, sounding both angry and hurt. "It's better than you deserve. You betrayed Clark. And you betrayed me. And you were about to...to..." And... [pauses] ooh.
KK: Oooh?
AM: Reverse shot on Lionel as Martha just up and punches him.
ED+KK+MR: Damn.
AoT: In the face.
ED+KK+MR: Damn!
JG [sourly]: I hate this. The God of Bastards shouldn't have to put up with this.
TW: Welcome to Clark's world, John.
JG: Oh, fuck you.
MR: Martha Kent resorting to violence? God, the ratings...
TW [cheerfully]: The camera pans down as Lionel falls to the ground.
JG: Fuck you!
AM: Lex pops a hatch on his battlesuit and we cut to his head looking around for a few seconds, all business. We then go to a shot of Clark, breathing heavily and still pissed, facing a wall--and he suddenly punches it hard enough to get his arm up to the elbow in it.
KK: Oh, that's nothing like being punched into a wall. That sucks.
TW: Closeup on his pissed face, and we go to commercials.
ED: So how do we follow up Clark lobotomizing a man?
MR: A Vagisil spot?
KK: Bonus points for ripping off Justice League, Tom. I never imagined you'd ever plagiarize that.
TW: What?
KK: Come on, the heat-vision lobotomy was already done.
TW: I came up with it on my own!
KK: Sure you did.
TW: I did!
KK: So, what happens after the commercials?
TW [grumbles]: Allison, tell her this was my idea?
AM: Let it go, man. We come back from the ads on a panning shot across the FoS, from Hope and Lex to Lionel sitting on the edge of the control panel nursing his cheek where Martha punched him--
JG: I'm saying it again: fuck you.
AM: --and over to Martha with her hand on Clark's shoulder as he stands there glaring off-camera.
TW: Clark gets a line. "Mom, I--I've got to try again. This has to stop Darkseid...regardless of what he thinks." He aims his glare at Lionel for a second while talking.
AM: Quick shot of Lionel looking up, obviously in a little pain, but he doesn't say anything.
AoT: Closeup of Martha. "Clark, if you're sure..."
TW: Bitter Clark. "Well, we can't wait until Steppenwolf or Darkseid show up and then throw them into the Phantom Zone."
KK [laughs]: And there's our Plan B, folks.
AM: And at this point we hear Jor-El's voice.
ED: Okay, why didn't Jor-El speak up while Clark was, oh, beating down Lionel's new friends?
[AM looks at TW]
AM: We never figured that out, did we?
TW: Damn, I knew we forgot something.
AM: Okay, so he says something about...um...
KK: Being disabled by Tom's bullshit "dramatic license"?
ED: Or Lionel opening the boom tube into the FoS?
TW: I like it. [scribbles in script] Okay, disruption by the boom tube, yadda yadda yadda. Though that comes after he says how he isn't normally powerful enough to create a portal outside of the FoS, let alone one powerful enough to hold an immensely powerful being such as Darkseid.
AM: Accompanied by a shot of Lex and Hope looking around in surprise for the mystery voice.
MR: Yeah, Kristin, you're right. Plan B.
KK: You'd think it'd be easier to pick out.
MR: We're slipping in our old age.
AoT: Old age?
TW: Will you stop?
AM: At about this point, we cut to Hope as a low chime sounds. She digs a cellphone out of a bag she's carrying and answers it as some ominous music probably reused from a previous episode starts up. "Go."
ED: Hope's the Exposition Fairy again?
AM: Pretty much. Cut to Lex looking down at her from inside his suit, then pan over as she finishes listening to the caller. "Yes, General Weiss. Of..of course."
TW: We jump cut to reaction shots of Lionel and Martha as Hope talks.
AM: She finally hangs up, then looks up at Lex. Her face is pale. "Lex, General Weiss...he said that satellites in orbit have detected what appear to be spacecraft near the Moon."
KK+MR: Dun-dun!

KK: There's no way we can use the Independence Day soundtrack, is there?
ED: What about the old show with the hamster-eating aliens disguised as humans?
AM: Quiet, you. "Large ships, definitely not asteroids or space debris. And they appear to be moving towards Earth at some sort of approach speed...ETA, approximately eight hours."
TW: Lionel pipes up at this point. "The deadline wasn't for another two days!"
JG: As his final humiliation, you're showing Lionel as a whiny bitch? Fuck you, Welling!
TW: He's not really whiny, he's just...well...
AM: He's kind of whiny.
JG: Mack? What am I about to say?
AM: Fuck you?
JG: Precisely.
MR: Lex chips in right about now. "Wonderful job delaying us, Dad. Martha's right--this is all you've left us. Now we have no choice but to fight."
TW: Clark walks up to Lionel. Still sounds pissed. "You didn't really believe that someone like Darkseid would keep his word, did you?"
JG: Lionel speaks quietly, but firmly. "There was no reason to believe otherwise."
TW: "Not even when Fairbanks was attacked? You're deluding yourself."
ED: No, he's just embracing his inner whiny bitch.
[JG scowls]
TW: Clark turns his attention to Lex and Hope. "You'll need to get back as fast as possible, Lex."
MR: Lex puts his serious face on. "Clark...all the military simulations have shown that while we may be able to stop a full-blown invasion...the damage to Earth, the loss of life...both would be astronomical."
JG: Zoom on Lionel as he looks up. "Cut off the head, and the snake will die."
ED: Now he gets philosophical?
TW: It's got a point. Cut to Clark considering Lionel's words. "The head of the snake...that's Darkseid. Zod nuked him on Apokolips, and he survived that..."
AM: Jor-El pipes up again. "He can be imprisoned, given enough power, in the Phantom Zone. Without him, his armies will falter."
TW: "But you said you don't have--"
AM: "There is a solar eclipse tomorrow, Kal-El."
TW: Quick reaction shot of Hope going "How does he know that?"
AM: "While the loss of sunlight will weaken you, it will also strengthen me. This will be the time when you can imprison Darkseid."
TW: At this point the control panel glows slightly. A small white crystal rises from it and floats past Lionel over to Clark, where it drops into his open hand.
KK: McGuffin, go!
TW: Closeup on it to show that it's a larger version of the seal of the House of El.
MR: Back to Lex. "All right. So if we can hold out long enough for the eclipse to happen..."
TW: And back to Clark. "I can use this to capture Darkseid."
ED: This isn't possibly going to work, is it?
MR: Probably not, but what the hell. "But that means we'll have to draw Darkseid out. How do we do that?"
JG: Slow zoom on Lionel as he again speaks up. "Darkseid is powerful--but his strength is matched by his vanity. While he may be satisfied to see Earth simply conquered, I think he would prefer to see it...humbled. Broken."
MR: Lex nods. "And he himself would show up to ensure that happens...especially if his true enemy were fighting on the side of the lowly humans."
AoT: Cut to Martha looking away from Clark, off-camera. "His true...you mean Clark?"
KK: Technically it'd probably be this old alien guy, but Clark works too.
JG: "He would eventually appear if Kal-El fought...to defend his chosen home. His vendetta against Krypton would demand it."
AoT: "So if Clark stood with the rest of humanity...and fought with them..."
TW: "Considering how everyone on the planet considers Kal-El a fugitive from interstellar justice, that might not go over very well." Pan up from Martha to Clark looking serious. "But since we're out of time...and I don't want anyone else getting hurt--"
MR: "We'll figure something out, Clark. But right now we've got to get back."
TW: Back to Clark as he pockets the crystal and walks off-camera. Martha follows him a couple of seconds later, and the camera pans to follow her as she walks past Lionel without a word; hold on Lionel as he quietly straightens up and follows her out of the shot.
JG: I don't believe you did this, Welling. Wouldn't it have been more humane to simply kill Lionel rather than turn him into...that?
KK: At least you weren't turned into a sexbot, John.
JG: Sexbots don't have a whiny bitch mode!
AM [to TW]: Aren't you glad I talked you down from that?
ED: From what?
TW: Yeah, I guess so.
ED: From what?
AM: It's not important.
TW: We cut hard to a CGI shot of Earth from orbit, with the Sun and Moon clearly visible while increasingly ominous "Here comes the pain" music going. After a few seconds, a group of four huge oblong spacecraft--they basically look like abstract skyscrapers made out of metal Lego blocks with lots of lights--slowly move into the shot from the right, accompanied by--
KK: That everpresent low rumbling noise all spaceships make on TV?
ED: Yeah!
TW: ...yeah, that's it.
ED: Space bass in your face, Smallville!
TW: And after a few seconds of that, we cut to a TV screen showing the same image accompanied by Evelyn's voice. "It...it appears that this is the invasion fleet sent from the planet Apokolips, ladies and gentlemen. We have just received word that the President has issued a state of martial law, in addition to mobilizing all emergency relief groups in preparation for a possible attack."
AM: Cut to the Daily Planet bullpen. Lois, Bittleman, and some other reporters are watching the screen in silent astonishment.
KK: You realize that in my head I'm picturing Europe's The Final Countdown playing during this scene, right?
TW: You would, you lunatic.
ED [to KK]: Really? I was kind of thinking it too, though...
KK: Great minds think alike.
AoT: That's a great mind?

Continued...