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We catch you up on this week’s episodes of your favorite programs!
By Wade Gum |
Posted May 11, 2007 11:00 AM |
EDITOR’S NOTE: There’s a lot of good programming out there these days, and here at Wizard Universe, we want to make sure you don’t miss a moment of any of it. In the interest of keeping you up to speed with your favorite series, we’ve recruited our resident pop culture critic, Wade Gum, to run down the past week’s slate of programming and tell us what went down and, in some cases, what blew up in each episode of the hottest shows this week. Check back every Friday for a new installment of our TV roundup.—RM
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 Smallville—“Prototype”
Lex Luthor’s purely humanitarian work at the water treatment facility hits a little snag this week. Something breaks through the security barriers and massacres every single armed guard in the facility. The superhuman prototype weapon Lex created is apparently ready for action. Astute nerd viewers will recognize the prototype as Helo from “Battlestar Galactica,” but he’s known as Wes here. Lex is quite impressed at his new toy’s ability to turn invisible and wipe out an entire battalion of guards in just a few minutes. If he can slaughter that many people that quickly, just think of how much water he could purify!
Senator Burke pays a visit to the Luthor household to ask about the prototype, better known as Ares. He’s pleased to hear things are going so well but questions Lex’s ability to keep his little project a secret. One of Burke’s employees has heard some rumblings about a mole within Luthor’s security detail. Burke can’t get caught with his hands in the cookie jar by the rest of the Senate, so he decides to shut Project Ares down. That snoopy do-gooder Lana Luthor overhears the entire conversation.
Clark Kent decides to talk business and barges into Lionel Luthor’s office for a chat. He wants to know what Lionel is holding over Lana’s head and why she decided to marry Lex. The two exchange vaguely menacing threats and clench their jaws at each other for a few minutes before Clark storms off.
Lois Lane, investigative reporter extraordinaire, decides to tail Senator Burke and see what dirt he’s into. She’s already figured out that someone has been giving him money in a Cayman Islands account. Burke tells his goons to get rid of Lane, but then they all somehow get killed by the invisible man. Wes murders Burke and all of his security before uncloaking. Lois recognizes him before he takes off at the sound of a police siren.
The Daily Planet is abuzz with activity once news of Burke’s death hits the papers. Clark visits with Chloe, who is getting the inside scoop from Lois. She recognized Wes from their days together as army brats. She’s sure that she saw Wes, even though official records say Wes died in a plane crash. It’s too bad for Lois that Lex knows there was a witness to the attack on Burke. Snitches get stitches, so Wes gets prepped for another assassination.
Clark takes Lois to the farm, where he thinks she’ll be safe from any future attacks. Of course, that doesn’t work and Wes finds her without a problem. He sucker-punches Clark with his invisibility and then prepares to kill Lois. Perhaps he recognizes Lois as well, because instead of killing her he decides to just kidnap her and turn invisible.
Chloe uses her snooping abilities to find out that Wes was married to Jody Keenan, the woman who tried to blow up Lex’s underground labs a few episodes ago. It becomes pretty obvious that Lex is somehow involved with what Wes has become. Since Lex would never admit to his dirty deeds, Clark decides to pay a visit to Lana. She tells him about Lex’s meeting with Senator Burke and Project Ares. Naturally, they also have to share a relationship moment about their forbidden love as well.
Wes takes Lois to the military base they grew up on. He seems to have some sort of affection for her, but remembers nothing about his past. Even a touching story about sharing a first kiss and puking doesn’t jog his memory. A few tears and soap opera-level acting later, Wes finally seems to recall some vague notion of his former life. He’s really not happy to hear about all the killing he’s been doing lately.
Lex is upset that his billion-dollar super-soldier has gone AWOL and decides to use his crazy Brother Eye-type satellite to track him down. The satellite pumps another brain control signal into Wes’ head to make him cooperative again. Lois runs for her life as Wes turns into an invisible killing machine once again.
Thanks to Chloe’s snooping ability, Clark figures out that Wes more than likely took Lois to the military base and speeds off to save the day. Lois is conveniently knocked out once again so that she can’t see Clark use any of his powers during his throwdown with Wes. Clark’s heat vision totally screws up Wes’ programming and sends him to that great scrapheap in the sky.
In the craziest coincidence in the world, Lionel Luthor arrives at the Kent household the next day to tell Martha Kent that since Burke is dead, she’s been selected by the governor to fill his Senate seat. What about the voters? You can’t just appoint some random person! Martha isn’t too keen on moving to Washington, but Clark assures her he can take care of the farm.
Lex takes possession of Wes’ body and orders an autopsy to discover what went wrong with Project Ares. He has an entire facility full of war veterans just waiting to be turned into invisible killing machines.
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 Heroes—“The Hard Part”
All that “Days of Future Past” nonsense from last week is over now that Hiro and Ando are back in the present. It’s time for Hiro to man up and fulfill his destiny by killing Sylar with his sword, just like in the 9th Wonders comic book. Unfortunately, Isaac never filled in the dialogue in the comic, so it’s just pictures with blank word balloons. Hiro figures it’d be good to know what’s being said in the comic, so he and Ando go to visit Isaac. At the same time, Mr. Bennet, Matt Parkman and Ted Sprague are on their way to New York to stop the new Primatech tracking system known as the “Walker System.”
When Jessica made the mistake of turning down Mr. Linderman’s request to use Micah’s powers, Linderman had Candice pose as Jessica and steal Micah away. DL is incensed when he learns what has happened and becomes even madder when it appears Jessica isn’t even that upset about it. DL says he’s going to Linderman’s casino to save Micah and afterward, Jessica is never going to see her son again. Jessica is content to let him leave, but a desperate Niki (in the mirror, of course) begs her to help DL out, otherwise he’s surely going to die. Jessica does have a heart after all, and tags along to help DL.
As for Micah, he’s being housed in a hotel room and watched over by Candice, still posing as his mother. Micah doesn’t want to help Mr. Linderman and just wants to go home, but Fake Jessica isn’t having any of that and yells at Micah to do what he’s told. When Fake Jessica goes to take a shower, Micah uses his powers to fiddle with the security system and run out of the room. Oddly enough, every room he tries to escape into ends up bringing him right back to the same hotel room. Candice emerges from the shower without her disguise and tells Micah that she can make him see whatever she wants him to and unless he behaves, she’s going to make him see some really traumatizing stuff. She’s going to make him watch “Battlefield Earth”!
DL uses his phasing ability to get himself and Jessica into Linderman’s gallery. They discover a painting that depicts New York City in flames and Micah at the middle of it. They also discover tons of documents about their lives, including DL’s report cards from middle school. It appears as if Mr. Linderman has been keeping tabs on them for a very long time.
Sylar, the evil brain eater, is having a bit of emotional conflict. Now that he’s stolen Isaac’s future-painting powers, he’s been creating a lot of art. He’s convinced that he’ll be the one to absorb Ted’s powers and destroy New York in an awful explosion. He’s not conflicted over the fact that he’ll destroy New York but why he’ll do it. He kills superpowered individuals because they don’t deserve their gifts. He has no reason to kill so many innocent people. He’s so conflicted that he even calls Mohinder and asks for guidance, but hangs up when he figures out Mohinder is calling the cops.
Mohinder goes to meet with Thompson again regarding his offer to join their forces in order to stop Sylar. Mohinder says he won’t work for Thompson. Instead, Thompson and Primatech will work for him. Primatech needs his father’s formula in order to find more superpowered individuals. Thompson agrees that Mohinder is holding all the cards and brings him into one of their laboratories.
It’s there that Mohinder gets to meet Molly Walker, whose parents were killed by Sylar earlier in the series. Molly has the ability to locate anyone on Earth if she thinks about them hard enough. Her ability would be quite useful when it comes to locating Sylar (or any other superpowered individual Primatech wants to find). Unfortunately, she has a genetic disease that is inhibiting her power and slowly killing her. It’s the same disease that killed Mohinder’s younger sister before he was born. Mohinder’s father created a cure for the disease but only after his daughter passed away.
Mohinder tries his best to find a cure for Molly’s disorder but just ends up frustrated. Molly tells Mohinder that it’s okay. The two of them dig through the files of Mohinder’s father for clues. Molly discovers a family photo of Mohinder’s family that provides the crucial clue. The key to the antibody is in Mohinder’s blood. He was born with healthy antibodies in order to cure his sister, but he just happened to be born too late. Mohinder gives Molly a transfusion of his blood and cures her disorder.
Hiro and Ando arrive at Isaac’s studio to find his lovely corpse lying on the floor. Sylar is in the bathroom freshening up to meet with someone. When Sylar gets out of the bathroom, he uses his super-hearing to figure out Hiro and Ando are hiding behind a painting, but the duo teleport out before he can eat their brains. Foiled, Sylar heads off to meet with his mother, with Hiro and Ando tailing him the entire time.
Sylar’s mother is excited to see her darling Gabriel come home for a visit. He even brings her a new snow globe for her collection. Sylar is distressed to see that his father’s clock has fallen into disrepair and goes about fixing it while his mother harps on him like a sitcom mom. She’s convinced that Sylar is destined to become something special and could even be president if he wanted to (har dee har), but Sylar wants her to say that it would be okay if he were just a simple watchmaker for the rest of his life.
Sylar decides to show his mother some of his abilities and begins changing water into snow and moving things around telekinetically, transforming the living room into a giant snow globe. In the heat of the moment, he cracks his mother upside the head with one of the snow globes and she goes running into her bedroom. Sylar apologizes to his mother and begs her to come back out. He wants to know why he would kill so many innocent people in New York.
Eventually his mother comes out of the room, but tells Sylar that she’s leaving and that he had better be out of the apartment when she comes back. She says that Sylar is damned and that he’s not her son. She wants to know what he’s done with her Gabriel. Sylar tries to calm his mother down but she reaches for a pair of scissors and the two grapple in the living room. In the midst of the struggle, Sylar accidentally stabs his mother in the heart with the scissors.
With Sylar distracted, Ando thinks it’s the perfect time for Hiro to make his move. Hiro refuses because it’s against the bushido code to kill a man who’s asking for forgiveness. To motivate Hiro, Ando pulls out one of the missing pages from 9th Wonders where he gets killed in the New York explosion by Sylar. That proves to be sufficient motivation for Hiro, who freezes time and makes his way into the apartment. He puts his blade at Sylar’s neck but can’t make himself go through with the act.
When time unfreezes, Sylar grabs hold of Hiro’s blade and demands to know what he’s doing. Hiro says he has to kill him before he explodes, so Sylar begs him to do it. When Hiro makes it obvious he won’t do it, Sylar calls him a coward and says that Hiro will have to die now. Sylar freezes Hiro’s blade and is about to make with the brain eating when Ando enters and the two teleport off. Once they’re safe, Hiro and Ando commiserate about their failure. Ando says they still have two days to kill Sylar before the explosion, but Hiro says that it’s going to be impossible since Sylar broke his sword in two. Meanwhile, Sylar paints a pretty picture of the explosion with his mother’s blood and finally agrees with her that he’s meant to be special.
Sylar isn’t the only one with artistic ability. Peter Petrelli absorbed Isaac’s ability as well and is busy drawing his own pictures of the upcoming explosion. Mama Petrelli is gearing up to take Claire to Paris for a few weeks until Nathan wins the election. Peter doesn’t want Claire to leave because he thinks she has a destiny and will help save the world. She doesn’t believe any of that stuff so Peter tells her about how he thinks he’s going to explode and take out New York. Claire says that the exploding power sounds a lot like Ted Sprague, who blew up her house a few weeks ago. An intrigued Peter demands to know more about Ted.
Peter thinks this information is crucial enough to bring Nathan into the fold. Peter and Claire tell Nathan all about Ted’s exploding ability and Nathan places a few phone calls in order to track him down. Naturally, he starts with Mr. Linderman. Later that day, Claire and Peter return to check Nathan’s progress and see him talking with Thompson. Claire recognizes him as the man her father is trying to hide her from and figures Nathan is working with the bad guys now. Peter urges Claire not to jump to conclusions, but her mind is made up and she quickly leaves.
Thompson is visiting on behalf of Linderman and tries to assure Nathan that allowing the explosion to occur is a good thing. It’s being done with the best of intentions. Even dear old Mama Petrelli is in on the plan and chastises her son for having no faith. Many people have worked to see this plan to fruition so that Nathan can be the one to unite the nation in its grief.
Back at the Petrelli residence, Peter fishes a pistol out of a drawer and gives it to Claire. If either Peter or Ted goes nuclear and threatens to destroy the city, Claire is the only one who can get close enough to them to stop it. Peter says that Claire is a part of all that’s happening and begs her to help. She finally agrees and the two of them go off to meet Ted at the location Peter drew in one of his sketches.
Peter and Claire wait for Ted and are surprised to see him arriving with friends. Claire runs up to her father and hugs him while Matt Parkman gives a little nod of recognition to Peter. Unfortunately, the happy moment is broken up when Peter begins to absorb Ted’s power and starts glowing red. Someone has to make it stop before Peter goes nuts and destroys New York! Will someone stop it? You won’t find out until the season finale, unless you read some spoilers and ruin everything for yourself.
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 Lost—“The Man Behind the Curtain”
It’s time to learn everything you ever wanted to know about Benjamin Linus but were too afraid to ask! We get to meet Ben from the very beginning when he escaped through his mother’s birth canal near Portland. Ben decides to get born prematurely and his mother, Emily, goes into labor while she’s walking through the woods with her husband, Roger.
There are complications during the birth and Emily continues bleeding heavily. A distraught Roger carries Emily and his new baby out to the road, where a hip cat named Horace and his wife pull over and try to help. Emily never has a chance though, as she quickly bleeds out and dies. Her last request to her husband is for him to name their child Benjamin.
The next time we see Benjamin he’s around 10 years old and is a Harry Potter look-alike. Horace became friends with Roger after the incident with Emily and hooked him up with a job at the Dharma Initiative. Unfortunately for Roger, he doesn’t have any skills and ends up as a workman. It’s even printed on his uniform! Ben doesn’t talk much, but one of the little girls on the island takes pity on him and tries to forge a friendship.
One day, all the children are getting their learning on in the school building when an alarm sounds. The teacher grabs a rifle and lots of Dharma workers swarm outside packing guns. “The hostiles” are attacking the complex. It seems the natives are restless. Later that night, Horace tries to explain to an angry Roger who the natives are and why they attack. Roger doesn’t want to hear any of it. He just wants some extra hazard pay and some more beers to chug down. All of his father’s yelling prevents Ben from getting any sleep, which is what leads to him seeing a vision of his dead mother appear outside his window.
On his birthday, Ben’s little girlfriend gives him two hand-carved dolls she made to represent the two of them. That way, they never have to be apart. Can’t you just feel the framework being laid for some heartstring tugging? When Ben returns home, Roger is passed out drunk and doesn’t even know it’s his birthday until he sees the present Ben already received. Roger says it’s hard to be happy about the day that Ben killed his mother. Now he’s stuck on this stupid island with a worthless kid. Happy birthday Ben!
Ben runs away from his home in tears and out into the jungle. He runs all the way to the sonar fence and sees a vision of his mother yet again. Before he can cross the sonar fence, the vision of Emily tells him to go back because it isn’t time yet. Ben goes back, but he doesn’t stay for long. He packs up some supplies and steals the code to the fence. Once he deactivates it, he goes trekking through the jungle and looking for his mom. There’s no sign of mom, just the creepy whispers in the jungle. However, he does run into a shaggy Richard Alpert, one of our favorite Others! It turns out Richard is one of the original inhabitants of the island.
A frightened Benjamin asks Richard if he’s one of the hostiles. Richard is kind of offended by such a statement. He asks Ben what he’s doing out in the jungle. Ben begrudgingly admits that he’s just taking a stroll through the jungle…looking for his dead mother. Richard asks Ben about the things his mother told him. Ben begs Richard to let him join the natives of the island because he hates living with the Dharma Initiative. Richard says that Ben can join the natives, but that it will take a lot of patience. Almost as much patience as it takes to enjoy this show!
The next time we see Ben, he’s all grown up and has a workman uniform of his own. It’s his birthday yet again and the only gifts he has to cherish are those old wooden dolls. He helps Roger load up the van with Dharma beer and supplies for the Pearl station. Roger has forgotten his son’s birthday yet again. At least he feels kind of bad about it this time and offers to chill with Ben on the mesa for a little father-son time. Once the pair arrives, Ben tells his father that he’s sick of having to put up with him. He puts on a gas mask and then opens a canister of deadly gas that causes Roger to bleed from his nose and fall over dead.
When Ben arrives back at the Dharma community, all the employees have been gassed and are dead. As Ben surveys the carnage, Richard and the rest of the natives arrive in gas masks of their own and begin to carry off the corpses.
As we fast forward to present day once again, it’s Ben’s birthday! This is getting to be pretty familiar. Once again, he’s cherishing those wooden dolls. He has feelings after all! The day starts off with a bang as Locke arrives in camp with his dead father in tow. Now that he’s done what Ben requested, he wants to know all the secrets of the island. Ben starts off by explaining that he’s not the leader of the crew. They all take their orders from Jacob. Naturally, Ben is the only one who’s allowed to talk to Jacob or knows where he is. Locke isn’t a moron and believes that this is just a “Wizard of Oz” situation and Ben is the man behind the curtain.
Mikhail arrives back in camp to Ben’s surprise. Luckily for Mikhail, that sonar fence wasn’t set to a lethal level when he ran through it. He tells Ben about Naomi and the ship she said was a few hundred miles off the coast of the island. Ben says they’ll take care of Naomi when they invade the camp in a couple days to steal the pregnant women. Mikhail is insistent on capturing Naomi now and tries to persuade Ben to do so. Locke is dead set on meeting Jacob though, so he beats the crap out of Mikhail to make the decision academic.
Before Locke and Ben begin their trip to meet with Jacob, Alexandra Rousseau gives Locke a gun because she says he’ll need it if he meets Jacob. She also wishes her “dad” a happy birthday. What a loving daughter. The pair doesn’t arrive at Jacob’s cabin until night. Ben tells Locke to turn off his flashlight because Jacob isn’t fond of technology. When the two enter the cabin, there’s no one there. There’s just an empty chair at the end of a table. Locke is incredulous when Ben insists that Jacob is sitting in the chair. Likewise, Ben is shocked that Locke can’t see him.
Ben carries on a merry little conversation with the invisible Jacob in the chair until Locke yells at him to cut the crap and stop the show. Ben says that he’s sorry that Locke is too limited to see Jacob. Disgusted, Locke begins to leave the cabin when he hears a mysterious voice say “Help me.” He turns around and wants to know who said it. Ben insists it wasn’t him. Locke turns on his flashlight to search around the cabin and then everything goes crazy. The table catches on fire, windows begin to get smashed and Ben gets shoved into the wall. Just as he runs out of the cabin, Locke catches a glimpse of a shadowy figure sitting in the chair.
The next day, Locke and Ben are trekking back to camp. Locke has suddenly become a nonbeliever and insists he didn’t see Jacob. He threatens to tell the rest of the camp how much of a fraud Ben is and that Jacob doesn’t exist. Ben admits that he’s lied about a few things, such as the fact that he wasn’t born on the island. He tells Locke that he has one last thing he wants to show him.
Ben brings Locke to the mass grave in which the natives dumped all the corpses of the Dharma Initiative employees. Ben explains to Locke that these are his people and represent where he comes from. Those people couldn’t learn to co-exist with the island and paid the price when one group had to be purged. Ben survived because he was smart enough to not end up in that ditch, which makes him smarter than Locke. Ben pulls out a gun and shoots Locke in the chest, knocking him into the ditch. As Locke lies there dying, Ben demands to know what Jacob told him. Locke tells him about Jacob’s message of “help me,” which seems to annoy Ben. As he leaves Locke for dead, Ben tells Locke that he certainly hopes Jacob helps him. Stone Cold Benjamin Linus.
Back on the beach, Sawyer arrives and shows Sayid the tape recording Locke gave him last week that proves Juliet is a mole. The two try to find Jack, but he’s out somewhere with Juliet. Kate catches them snooping around and since she’s such a chatty Cathy, the two decide to cut out the middleman and hold a meeting with all the castaways. They bring Naomi out and tell everyone all about how she got to the island and the ship that’s offshore. They also play the tape recording of Juliet to everyone.
As the message finishes playing, Jack and Juliet arrive back in camp. Juliet says that as long as she’s being burned at the stake, they might as well listen to the other side of the cassette. On the flip side, Ben gives Juliet her marching orders about how to mark the tents of the castaways that need to be kidnapped. Juliet reveals that she told Jack what Ben wanted her to do as soon as she examined Sun. Jack and Juliet have been off deciding what to do about the impending invasion. It looks like Jack and the rest of his former friends have a lot of catching up to do.
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 24—“2:00 a.m.–3:00 a.m.”
It’s time for another pulse-pounding week in what is unquestionably the worst season of “24” ever. The main problem with this season is that the writers are under the mistaken impression that the audience cares about the secondary characters rather than merely tolerating them so that they can see Jack Bauer shoot things. If “24” wants to get back on track, it needs to destroy all its annoying characters with a massive explosion.
Secretary James Heller makes good on his promise to keep Jack away from Audrey by taking her with him and filing a restraining order. The tip that Audrey gave CTU seems to be a good one as there’s an abandoned copper factory in the vicinity. Jack wants a chance for revenge and to keep his word to President Palmer by going out with CTU to stop Cheng and get the stolen Russian component back. Naturally, Nadia refuses because everyone who works at CTU is a moron and thinks they can succeed without Bauer’s help.
Doyle is no substitute for Jack, but he is the least prone to completely screwing up. Nadia puts him in charge of the tactical team that will try to apprehend Cheng. There’s no time to waste as Cheng is already in the process of pulling the Russian defense data off the stolen component. Of course, he needs someone to crack the encryption on the component. The only place with someone that skilled is CTU, so Cheng hires some mercenaries to dig their way into CTU and wreak havoc. You know these mercenaries are tough because they have facial hair and wear wife-beaters.
Acting President Noah Daniels’ slimy assistant Lisa got caught in an affair with Michael Bishop last episode. Bishop was taking the information that Lisa relayed to him and giving it to the Russians. Now Tom Lennox and Daniels want her to start feeding him fake information. They force her to schedule a rendezvous with him in order to convince the Russians that the Americans have the component within their possession.
Cheng’s commando crew saves us from any further soap opera drama with Nadia, Milo, Chloe and Morris by blowing up some explosive charges and disrupting all of CTU’s software and outside communication. Nadia gives the code red order to lock the place down but it’s too late. The commando crew is already in the CTU hallways and shooting the guards. A friendly security guard frees Jack Bauer from his cell and then promptly dies since his usefulness is at an end. Jack takes the guard’s pistol and immediately starts dispatching commandos left and right.
The commandos hold the rest of the CTU hostage and demand to know who’s in charge. Milo steps up and says that he’s the acting director of CTU. As a reward for his bravery, the commando shoots him right between the eyes. Didn’t you ever see “Die Hard,” Milo? Never volunteer when terrorists are involved!
Bauer plays the part of John McClane and rescues Marilyn and Josh Bauer once the commandos try to kidnap them. Why do the commandos want someone as whiny and worthless as Josh Bauer? It is a mystery! Jack manages to help Josh escape but then ends up getting captured by the commandos along with Marilyn. The savvy commando gets on the public address system and tells Josh that unless he gives himself up, his mother might meet a rather unfortunate end. The mama’s boy ends up surrendering to the commandos.
Who wants Josh Bauer so badly? Phillip Bauer! Dear old dad provided Cheng with the security codes needed in order to infiltrate CTU and kidnap Josh. In return, Phillip has removed the security encryption on the component. What a nifty curveball to help tie up some loose ends.
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