A WITCH HUNT IN SMALLVILLE - After Lana (Kristin Kreuk) reads from a spell book written in the 1600s, she, Lois (Erica Durance) and Chloe (Allison Mack) become possessed by witches that had been burned at the stake. The three witches have come back seek revenge and search for the powerful Kryptonian crystals, wreaking havoc on the town in the process. Clark (Tom Welling) attempts to stop the witches but they strip him of his powers and force him to reveal the location of the crystal he hid in the cave.

Lois (to Clark): It's not going to be Sodom & Gomorrah. Mr. Ivy League won't even even know we're here.

Isabelle/Lana: Hair of two virgins (plucks her own hair) We've been a good little girl, haven't we?

Isabelle/Lana (to Clark about Chloe's present): Well i'm sure she'll love it. Especially since it came from you.

Isabelle/Lana (to Clark): Don't worry about it. It's water under a very tall bridge.

Clark: Jason's my friend.
Isabelle/Lana: Well he doesn't think so.

Chloe (to Lois): Uh, hello... investigative reporter... nothing gets past me..

Isabelle/Lana: Madeline... Brianna... welcome to the twenty first century.

Brianna/Lois: I'm gorgeous! Look at these!
(emphasizes her breasts).
Isabelle/Lana: Yes, they're very nice.

Madeleine/Chloe: Ahh... the woods of France. I'd know them anywhere.
Isabelle/Lana: We're in Kansas, Madeleine.
Brianna/Lois: Where?

Madeleine/Chloe: Is that the same quest that got us burned at the stake?
Brianna/Lois: That was not pleasant.

Isabelle/Lana: We don't have time for this.
Madeleine/Chloe: Time is the only thing we do have. Isn't that what you said right before the angry mob set us on fire?
Isabelle/Lana: You're really not going to let that go, are you?

Jason: What'd you do with Lana?
Isabelle/Lana: She's in there somewhere.

Clark: What'd you do to Lex and Jason?
Isabelle/Lana: Nothing compared to what we're going to do to you.

Isabelle/Lana: This body I inhabit, you have desires for it don't you? Well it desires you Clark. Very much.

Isabelle/Lana: Bear witness Clark Kent to the dawn of a new age.

Madeleine/Chloe: His powers are restored.
Brianna/Lois: How?
Clark: I'm not from around here...

Chloe: Why are we lying in the dirt?
Lois: And what the hell are we wearing?

Clark: Hi Dad!
Jonathan: Hey, Clark. So, is there maybe a little something you'd like to tell your mother and me?
(holds up bra)
Martha: Where'd that come from?
Jonathan: From out in the barn. In the hay.
Martha: Clark...
Clark: It was magic.
Martha: I'm sure it was...

Clark (to Jonathan): Magic exists. I saw it, and worse, it can hurt me.

Lex: Lana, Clark didn't get Jason fired. I did.

Lana: My interests are none of your concern Lex. I'm old enough to decide who I want in my life and who I don't.

Clark: It’s good to have the old Lana back. Isabelle was... aggressively sexy.
Lana: Oh great, possessed by an evil slut.

In a flashback to 1604, a trio of witches, including Lana ancestor (and look-alike), Countess Isabelle Thoreaux, are burned at the stake, but not until after Isabelle says a spell and spits some blood on her book…a book which Lana, in modern day, has purchased on eBay. And when Lana touches the blood on the page, her body is taken over by Isabelle. She begins creating a potion to bring back her two friends, and with Lois conveniently in town to throw a birthday party for Chloe, she has her two bodies handy. She goes to Lex for a bottle of fancy wine (since she can’t just go to a liquor store at her age), and when they end up arguing about the illuminated manuscript page, she uses a spell to make it disappear, then forces Lex to play piano non-stop. After drinking the potion, Lois and Chloe become possessed by the other two witches, and the three of them show up at Clark’s barn for Chloe’s party. But since the party’s not fun enough for them, they enchant everyone so that they strip down to their underwear (or less) and act drunk. This includes Clark, who is fully affected by the spell, and blows it when an alumni from Princeton shows up to talk to him. The next morning, he goes to Lex to see if he has any connections there, and finds him still playing piano to the point that his fingers are bleeding.

Jason figures out what’s happening and tries to burn the book, then has to be saved by Clark when ‘Lana’ tosses him out the window of her apartment. At the barn, the witches attack Clark and steal his powers, as well as the secret of where he’s hidden the Kryptonian stone in the cave. After they go to get the stone, Jason shows up and unties the powerless and bloody Clark, who suggests they may have gone to the school. Having thrown Jason off-track, Clark shows up at the cave with a shotgun but they get rid of it easily. However, when ‘Lana’ tries to grab the stone, it burns her hand and Clark gets a hold of it and gets his power back. He burns the book with his heat vision and the next thing they know, they’re all waking up on the cave floor.

"Lois is conveniently in town to throw a birthday party for Chloe." The next morning the Kents, who had been out of town, ask Clark about a bra Jonathan found in the hay out in the barn, and they kid him about talking about magic. But things get serious when he tells them he’s serious, and that magic can actually hurt him. Lex visits Lana, who apologizes and wonders why Clark would risk his life for everyone after getting Jason fired. Lex admits that he was the one who got Jason fired, and that he felt it was inappropriate for someone in a position of authority at school to be having a relationship with her, even if she is an adult. Lana goes to Clark at the barn and tells him what Lex confessed to her, and says she should have known he wouldn’t have done that. She also tells him everything about the tattoo and shows it to him, then asks him if he knows what the symbol means. Clark lies to her and says he doesn’t.

While this may have seemed on the surface to be a comedic fill-in episode, in reality it (finally) advanced the major subplot about Lana’s tattoo (why is it the boring ones keep going and the good ones get resolved right away?), had an element of real danger when Clark lost his powers, and also established a very important part of the Superman mythos—his ‘other’ weakness: magic. I heard a lot of complaints ahead of time about this episode being too much like CHARMED, since there were three witches. And while it certainly did have some gratuitous sex and nudity thrown in, it never got to the point where I was cringing at that or any other campiness involved.

And speaking of sex, it didn’t escape my notice that ‘Isabelle,’ in need of the hair of a virgin for her potion, pulled out one of Lana’s and mentioned how she’d been a good girl (and the fact that Lois’ hair didn’t work). One of my major complaints about this show earlier this season was Lana’s relationship with Jason, and not only have they now established that they never had sex, but they also reiterated (through Lex) how wrong it was for them to be dating since she’s still in high school and he was in a position of authority, even if she is legally an adult. (more...)

John Glover doesn't appear in this episode.

Jason doesn't seem to notice that Clark's face and chest have miraculously healed from the injuries Jason saw on them earlier in the barn.

The teaser takes place in the year 1604. A young, dark-haired woman named Margaret Isobel Thoreaux (Isobel) etches the same Kryptonian symbol tattooed on Lana’s back into the dirt. She has a fire burning and stands in a circle of stones, with the 3 Kryptonian symbols matching the 3 “crystals”, placed in the center.

She chants in Latin from a Spell Book embossed with Kryptonian symbols – “The body is not what binds us. It is a vessel to be emptied. It is a vessel to be filled.” Just then 2 girls - Madelyn and Brianna, who look battered and frightened, pop out of thin air. They tell Isobel that they have to go because the Magistrate, his comrades, and the villagers are coming after them.

Isobel is determined to finish the chant. She says that she “will bend it (time) to my will” and that if they’re unsuccessful, they will rise again. She wants to possess the power of the 3 stones, so that “our kind will never be persecuted again.” When the chant is complete, Lana’s Kryptonian symbol in the dirt vanishes and is now on Isobel’s lower back as a Tattoo.

The Magistrate charges after them with a dagger. They use their magic to escape but end up captured. Isobel, Brianna, and Madelyn are tied to wooden stakes. The Magistrate condemns them to burn in the fire for practicing the darkest art of witchcraft. Brianna and Madelyn beg for mercy but Isobel laughs and says “I but sleep a while, and when I wake…I will have vengeance!” Her Kryptonian tattoo grows red.