Month: March 2010

I’m having a bit of trouble combining school and creative writing with a personal life, so the LOST reviews are a tad late. Also, as the story starts wrapping up and more and more questions get answered, it’s getting harder to write a lot about the episodes. Which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.

The Episode…

Oh Sawyer, you’ve returned back to your roots. You’re no longer the security man slash husband – you’re back to good old conning people. Or are you? In the flashforward, it appears our favourite Southerner is exactly what he was in the last Season – with the exception of the sparkling love life. But now that our man has run into Kate, that’s bound to change.

It seems that, as the season progresses, the flash sideways get consistently better. Especially this one was a perfect mirror image of the man we’ve come to know and love on the island. Even Miles was there: it seemed like the perfect reproduction of the DHARMA times. Interesting is, that they’ve shed light on the deepest of Sawyer’s psyche: he would either become a cop or a criminal. Enough said.

But enough about Sawyer. This episode also gave us some insight in the true dynamics between Locke’s bunch of baddies. For those wondering whether Claire was under complete control of Locke – your question has been answered. As with every group of bad people, it appears that everyone’s got very diverging ideas of the end goal. Claire is just in it to get Aaron back – a goal for which she tried to kill Kate. And, as in every group of bad people, she got smacked around by the leader, survival of the fittest style.

The Questions…

As for the questions, I’m going to take a new approach. Every episode has a mystery set up for the next episode, so, due to lack of usable predictions this year, I’m going to smash my keyboard randomly at those.

This week: the door on the submarine. What’s behind it? It would be awesome symbolism, à la hatch, if it would be Desmond. It would even make a bit of sense: Widmore knows that Desmond (and Penny) still have a destiny on the island, maybe he brought him (and her) back? Alan Dale said he read all his lines, and left unsatisfied about his character – but then again, Dale started hating LOST shortly after he received a guest spot, so meh.

Next Week…

Next week’s episode is called “Ab Aeterno” and focuses on Richard Alpert – our favourite non-aging man. It’s an episode we’ve been waiting for for a while; I expect that it’ll be very, very good.

In All…

At some time during Season 3, I started thinking that there was no way to possibly make Sawyer an interesting character – flashbackwise. I tend to think that the writers figured the same thing, so he was left untouched until season five. But the real revelation came in this episode: Sawyer is a man with a psychological duality; he can be either a cop or a criminal. In a way, it’s kind of like as if the writers only started to understand their own character just now.

Favourite Quote: Charlotte: “Yes, I’m exactly like Indiana Jones.”
Sawyer: “You got a whip?”
Charlotte: “Maybe.”

Benjamin Linus must be one of the more brilliant characters ever to grace a TV show. He’s cunning, malicious, intelligent and knows how to bend the rules like heated steel. But on the other hand, he’s a senstive kid that couldn’t help some of the things that happened to him, things that changed his fate forever. He’s a victim of a loveless life, a ghost in the shell. So, in a way, you can’t help but pitying him – even if he is odious.

The Episode…

The interesting thing about the character, from a dramaturgical point of view, is how they could give him a satisfying end. It was my belief that Ben had done so many things over the last few seasons, that it was nearly impossible to still redeem him. But lo and behold, within forty minutes, he found his redempting without dying. And I believed it.

It was refreshing to see Ben acting like a normal person, a motivated high school teacher, a loving son, a good friend. Sure, he still had the treachery somewhere inside him, but it was to be used for good. And this time, it did save Alex instead of costing her her life. Finally, they interact like normal people. Finally.

I did not expect to see Charles Widmore coming back to the island – I thought that Faraday’s death in Season Five pretty much cleared all of that up: he’s a rich guy with a temperament looking for the island. But in his daughter’s love for Desmond, he saw that he had blood on his hands and redeemed himself. Apparently, I was wrong. The old geezer is back! I can’t wait to see what he’s up to.

I loved the parts with Richard, Jack and Hurley. A normal series would (a thought I already had during the jammed gun scene in “Meet Kevin Johnson” back in Season 4) make the dynamite explode, the boat burn down and have Jack and Richard come out of the flames, action hero style. LOST will have none of that and says: “Less is more, let’s keep it cheap and have the fuse malfunction”. Great. Jack’s creepy motivation made sense backwards, I was put off by it at first but it worked in the end. Is he a believer, or am I being tricked again?

The Questions…

It is certain now: Richard Alpert was on the Black Rock. I wonder if we will still have a Richard flashback? I get the feeling that everything we need to know, has already been said, and the story is told. Would Richard’s story count as a flash sideways, given that it happened before Jughead? It’s complicated. It would be nice to see, as it would shed more light on Jacob and fake Locke – but I’m not sure if they’ll do it.

Frank missed his flight because he overslept. He was probably drunk, too. Damn, I laughed hard at this. Frank rocks.

Next Week…

Next week’s episode is dubbed “Recon”, so it will undoubtedly be about Sawyer. Will we see Juliet again? Whose side is Sawyer really on? I’m excited, but slightly scared he’ll end up with Kate again. It looks like the action’s shifting back to the beach, back to where it all began. Wonder if that’s where the final battle will take place? And what would a final LOST battle entail?

In All…

I think this was the best episode of the season so far. The mythology episodes are awesome, but when the series is done with, it’s going to be the character-driven episodes I will go back to. This one was stellar, Ben’s final scene left me teary-eyed. Stunning performance by Michael Emerson.

Welcome to the team, Ben.

Favourite Quote: Ben: Just let me leave.
Ilana: Where will you go?
Ben: To Locke.
Ilana: Why?
Ben: Because he’s the only one who’ll have me.

If the sixth season of LOST was a movie, I’d say this is the end of act one. The good guys are defined, the bad guys are defined, now on with the middle part of the season!

The Episode…

Finally! I’m going to say this right away: I’m so glad they’re finally out of that temple. I wasn’t a huge fan of Dogen and Lennon – there was just way too much stuff going on for me to want to focus on them. I like them, it just wasn’t the right time. It seemed like the temple was an energy sucker – all the time spent in there amounted to nothing for me: once they had all arrived, it was just a question of getting everyone out before the shit hit the fan. Simple as that.

I like how the writers, at some point during season four, stated that Sayid was a “bad guy”. It’s nice to see they stuck to their word, and have him run to the dark side. He will probably find redemtion in the end, but I think it’s a daring move to shove a fan favourite (not mine, by the way) in a nasty position. I think that for the first time, I’m actually engaged in Sayid: he’s not pretending anymore.

If you hadn’t felt the dilemma through the course of the last few episodes, you’ve now officially had it thrown in your face: do you want Kate to give Aaron back to Claire, now that she’s gone totally off her rocker? I’m deciding against it, I hope Kate manages to do the right thing. But what is the right thing? In a show that’s taken six seasons to define what is good and what is evil… not an easy thing to do.

The Questions…

This wasn’t such a hot week for the questions. Again. I guess that’s a good thing, keeps it from getting to expectible.

Next Week…

Without a doubt, next week’s episode will feature a lot of Ben, the vilain I have come to know and love. Incidently, Ben is at the top of my death poll. He’s done so many nasty things that it’s hard to think of something he can do to attone for his sins. I wonder what schemes he’ll be up to in the alternative timeline?

In All…

Great episode, the start of something fresh. Using catch a falling star and put it in your pocket at the end was briliant – and somehow fitting. So now Sayid and Kate have joined the bad guys. I wonder if Kate only followed to observe Claire further? It’s obvious she’s not a bad person – but Bad Boy Locke certainly has his eye on her next. You know, the patricide and all.

Favourite Quote: KEAMY: Hey, you want some eggs? I can, uh… make whatever you want. Fried, scrambled, uh… We still got that poacher? Where’s the poacher? Want poached? ‘Cause I can make you some good poached eggs.

I’m always a bit biased when a Jack episode is about to hit. But this time, I was curious enough what our wacky doctor would be up to in his Sideways story, that I was actually looking forward to it. Looking back, I don’t know if I’m disappointed or just annoyed that Jack doesn’t seem to have learned as much as I thought he did.

The Episode…

The episode focused heavily on Hurley and Jack. Hurley warned Jacob at the start, that Jack would just do his own thing and go with it, and he was without a doubt right: Jack smashed up the lighthouse mirrors, thus rendering the thing useless. It’s the ancient version of the tempest – the Dharma poison gas station – a little tidbit that gets mentioned but never explained. A shame: we’re in six seasons, up to our ears in questions, drowning in them, and we need another ancient building added to the mix?

Apparently, Jacob condones Jack’s behaviour: Jack has to learn it all by himself. I kind of understand this, but I’ve waited five and a half seasons and he still doesn’t understand. Isn’t it time to take our hero by the hand and show him what it’s all about? Jack episodes can never calm me down, there’s something inside me that wants to slap him around the head and tell him to see reason.

But hey, the B-side of this episode was pretty nice: we got to see creepy, creepy Claire again. She’s hitting people with axes, keeping baby squirrel bones in a crib, shows more cleavage than before and has a very, very nasty friend. She’s jumped way up in my list of interesting characters. What does this mean for Aaron? Seriously, you can’t expect Kate to give Aaron back to a mad woman – even if Kate is, well, Kate.

The Questions…

We got tossed a little bone this week: LOST has not forgotten about Adam and Eve. They’ve been absent for about a hundred episodes, but we know they’ll be back. I’m curious – Hurley gave the obvious answer as to how they could’ve ended up there, and Hurley is the audience’s voice… Does that mean Hurley is right, and so are we? That never happens!

Not that many answered questions this week, unfortunately. But I do think that Hurley is the top chosen one at the moment.

Next week…

Sundown. A Sun episode? It would match the parallels this far with the first season centricity. But to be honest, I’d rather have them break it soon. I’m kind of missing the characters I do like: Frank, Ben, Richard… But hey, I guess Sun’s one of those. All she’s been doing is looking for Jin, maybe it’s time for her to do something else?

In All…

A solid episode. But I’m still not that convinced about the lighthouse. Maybe it did appear now because they were looking for it? I am starting to wish for the sideways stories to go somewhere interesting. It’s too much new information and we don’t know if it’ll ever be useful. Throw us a bone here, we know you’re going places with this, but being in the dark for about 20 minutes per episode… it’s kind of mean.