What Kate did: Blew up her parents' house with her drunken redneck stepdad inside (who, in a bizarre twist, is later revealed to be her real dad).
What Sawyer did: Apparently became possessed briefly by the ghost of Wayne, said redneck dad. Wayne proceeds to later show up as a horse. To say this was weird and random would be understating it.
What Jack did: Had a drink with Ana Lucia. If you don't think they're getting these characters together, you're nuts - but then we already knew this because there wouldn't have been much reason to introduce her when they did (in the first half of last season's finale) if not to set up some eventual relationship. The fact that she instituted herself as the leader of the tail section tribe is only further proof in this direction.
What Locke and Eko did: Spliced together a missing piece of the film in the hatch's apparent post-production studio, while engaging in a bad-ass-off. The film was, well, a bit disappointing. Okay, it got a little more specific, but we certainly could have guessed that "do not attempt to use the computer *blip* Good luck!" meant something more ominous was missing. I'd say the more important part of this discovery is wondering why someone took that part of the film and hid it in a Bible on the other side of the island.
What Michael did: Used the computer for something other than entering the code. Oh noooooo! Where's Walt hiding, anyway? Do the Others have a cybercafe in the jungle somewhere?
Wednesday, December 07, 2005
Wednesday, November 30, 2005
s2e08: Collision
Not the worst episode, though a bit of a slog for a while. It happens to be an Ana Lucia episode, meaning we're forced to deal with more of her aggravating behavior in both present time and flashbacks. We at least see why she's so reluctant to trust people and, ultimately, I think she comes off okay, though she's still annoying as all get out.
In other news: Kate likes Sawyer (no kidding), Jack stinks at golf, and everyone reunites. For as rough as the rest of the episode could be to watch at times, I have to admit that I was reduced to tears by the slow-motion reunion scene, particularly between Rose and Bernard. Sure, it was obvious they were going to be reunited from the minute we knew there were other survivors (if not from the very minute that Rose announced that her husband was alive, which was way the hell back in like, s1e04 or something like that), and it almost seems like the only reason Rose's character existed was for a scene like this. But it worked on me.
In other news: Kate likes Sawyer (no kidding), Jack stinks at golf, and everyone reunites. For as rough as the rest of the episode could be to watch at times, I have to admit that I was reduced to tears by the slow-motion reunion scene, particularly between Rose and Bernard. Sure, it was obvious they were going to be reunited from the minute we knew there were other survivors (if not from the very minute that Rose announced that her husband was alive, which was way the hell back in like, s1e04 or something like that), and it almost seems like the only reason Rose's character existed was for a scene like this. But it worked on me.
Saturday, November 26, 2005
s2e07: The Other 48 Days
I realize I'm a little behind on this, but the day after this episode aired, Drew went out of town for a week and a half, so discussion is sort of curtailed. Anyway, quick notes on this one:
1. I liked that we saw a little more of the Others. Goodwin gave them more of a face than Ethan did last season, though not much of one. I got a little bit of a "Left Behind" vibe off him, though - Nathan was not a good person, so he was killed, but other people (notably the children) were simply taken away. Kind of odd. With other concerns cropping up, I wonder how long it will be before we actually hear from the Others again.
2. Finally, a little humanization of Ana Lucia! Granted, it was right after she shot somebody, but you could see in this one why she was so sensitive to people running out of the jungle at her. I still hate her character, though.
3. I liked that they just opened it the way they did, as if it were another pilot, rather than doing some "previously on Lost" thing that explained why you weren't going to see any of the normal characters this week, as I had expected them to. Good on them for not being predictable.
4. That said, the format of the whole episode was a bit lame. The "Day x" screens were silly, and the slow-mo overlap scenes at the end were cringe-inducingly dumb. I know they had to get back to the present somehow, but couldn't they have skipped a little, or at least done a few new shots and given us something we hadn't already seen?
5. Drew needs to get his ass back from Europe so I can watch s2e08.
1. I liked that we saw a little more of the Others. Goodwin gave them more of a face than Ethan did last season, though not much of one. I got a little bit of a "Left Behind" vibe off him, though - Nathan was not a good person, so he was killed, but other people (notably the children) were simply taken away. Kind of odd. With other concerns cropping up, I wonder how long it will be before we actually hear from the Others again.
2. Finally, a little humanization of Ana Lucia! Granted, it was right after she shot somebody, but you could see in this one why she was so sensitive to people running out of the jungle at her. I still hate her character, though.
3. I liked that they just opened it the way they did, as if it were another pilot, rather than doing some "previously on Lost" thing that explained why you weren't going to see any of the normal characters this week, as I had expected them to. Good on them for not being predictable.
4. That said, the format of the whole episode was a bit lame. The "Day x" screens were silly, and the slow-mo overlap scenes at the end were cringe-inducingly dumb. I know they had to get back to the present somehow, but couldn't they have skipped a little, or at least done a few new shots and given us something we hadn't already seen?
5. Drew needs to get his ass back from Europe so I can watch s2e08.
Sunday, November 13, 2005
s2e06: Abandoned
I'm guessing the title of this episode refers to Shannon, post-Boone death (and also in the flashbacks where her evil stepmother steals all her money), which is kind of a curious choice when they were just going to kill her off.
Yes, Shannon dies. It's kind of odd that they would crush that entire angle by killing off both characters, but I guess the case I would make is that the deaths of those characters had larger ramifications on more important ones - Boone's death gave some depth to Locke, and Shannon's looks like it's going to do something major to Sayid. (Something so major they're not even coming right back with it next week, instead spending a whole episode on 1.25 seasons' worth of tail-section survivors' plot.)
What else went down in this episode? Let's break it down in bite-sized form, because you could read a streamlined recap pretty much anywhere:
1. Locke realizes that Charlie knows about the heroin from the plane when Claire mentions that he carries around a Virgin Mary statue. (Though Charlie doesn't appear to actually be using, since he's evidently carrying around an unbroken statue if Claire is anything to go by. Of course, he could just be replenishing his supply constantly. I'm sure we'll find out more about this later.)
2. Fake-out deaths galore, as Sawyer collapses in the jungle and Cindy Lou Whoever vanishes. (When the tail sectioners start calling for Cindy, I muttered to Drew, "That better not be it.")
3. Shannon and Sayid get it on. Then Shannon sees Walt in the tent and freaks out, and gets Vincent to lead her into the jungle. Sayid catches up with her and also sees Walt; Shannon chases after him and gets shot by Ana Lucia. The tail sectioners, along with Jin and Michael, had started hearing the whispers and assumed Shannon running up was the Others.
4. In flashbacks, we learn that Shannon got jerked around by her stepmother after her father died (thanks partially to Jack's decision to operate on Sarah instead; the brief shot of Jack walking past Shannon in the hospital is also all we get of him in this episode). Boone tries to help but she ends up telling him she can manage on her own. (Of course, as we found out last season, this "management" largely involves her tricking Boone into giving money to guys she's sleeping with, so I guess she never really got settled.) On the other hand, what does any of this matter now? They're both dead.
That's about it. It was a pretty good episode; Drew noted that some of the scenes near the end provided more genuine tension than just about any this season; it's hard to disagree with that. Certainly not since the first episode back, I would say.
So... Walt. I think we all assumed that Walt's appearances to Shannon were hallucinations on her part, what with the backwards talking and that he could apparently show up anywhere at any time and then vanish again. (Plus, we've already seen this sort of thing with Jack's dad in S1.) But since Sayid saw Walt, that would seem to confirm that Walt is, in some measure, real.
So how can he move so easily without being detected until he appears in front of your face? A couple possibilities here:
a) He has somehow been drawn into whatever the Others use to move as silently as they do (see s2e05), as a result of his abduction by them.
b) It's some sort of shared hallucination inspired by the island's strange magical powers.
c) The writers are just jerking us around to make Walt's appearances seem more mysterious than they actually are.
I don't buy that last one, largely because there's enough crazy crap going on that I don't think the writers need to turn the pedestrian into the mysterious as well. I like (a) myself. It could also explain the backwards whispering - the suggestion behind Ana Lucia's shout of "Run!" is that the mysterious whispers in the forest signal the presence of the Others. So Walt's ability to walk softly and carry a big backwards-whisper stick could be indicative of a connection to the Others... what, I don't know, but of course we should eventually find out, if that's the case. (I mean, yes, he was presumably abducted by them - not that we know for a fact that the boat people and the Others are really the same people, we just assume - but how exactly would he get these "abilities" from them?)
Shannon's death appears that it may be a turning point in a way that Boone's, frankly, was not. The look on Sayid's face alone suggests that he will never in a million years be able to coexist with Ana Lucia, and possibly by extension no one in that party (certainly no one in the tail section).
I wonder if this coming week we'll see anything current, or if it will all be flashbacks. (I hope they don't use a cheesy "here's what happened" framing device, at least.) Previously on Lost: ker-blooie, there goes the plane... and I guess they'll probably have to throw in a couple scenes like the one in the pit where Michael says to Ana Lucia, "You were in the back?" because otherwise casual viewers will be all, "Why don't I recognize anyone on Lost?" At least I expect that's how it will go. And then come back next time for more important stuff. Because unless there's a big revelation about the Others coming, I'm not sure I care what Ana Lucia and Mistereko and Bernard and Libby have been doing for seven weeks.
Yes, Shannon dies. It's kind of odd that they would crush that entire angle by killing off both characters, but I guess the case I would make is that the deaths of those characters had larger ramifications on more important ones - Boone's death gave some depth to Locke, and Shannon's looks like it's going to do something major to Sayid. (Something so major they're not even coming right back with it next week, instead spending a whole episode on 1.25 seasons' worth of tail-section survivors' plot.)
What else went down in this episode? Let's break it down in bite-sized form, because you could read a streamlined recap pretty much anywhere:
1. Locke realizes that Charlie knows about the heroin from the plane when Claire mentions that he carries around a Virgin Mary statue. (Though Charlie doesn't appear to actually be using, since he's evidently carrying around an unbroken statue if Claire is anything to go by. Of course, he could just be replenishing his supply constantly. I'm sure we'll find out more about this later.)
2. Fake-out deaths galore, as Sawyer collapses in the jungle and Cindy Lou Whoever vanishes. (When the tail sectioners start calling for Cindy, I muttered to Drew, "That better not be it.")
3. Shannon and Sayid get it on. Then Shannon sees Walt in the tent and freaks out, and gets Vincent to lead her into the jungle. Sayid catches up with her and also sees Walt; Shannon chases after him and gets shot by Ana Lucia. The tail sectioners, along with Jin and Michael, had started hearing the whispers and assumed Shannon running up was the Others.
4. In flashbacks, we learn that Shannon got jerked around by her stepmother after her father died (thanks partially to Jack's decision to operate on Sarah instead; the brief shot of Jack walking past Shannon in the hospital is also all we get of him in this episode). Boone tries to help but she ends up telling him she can manage on her own. (Of course, as we found out last season, this "management" largely involves her tricking Boone into giving money to guys she's sleeping with, so I guess she never really got settled.) On the other hand, what does any of this matter now? They're both dead.
That's about it. It was a pretty good episode; Drew noted that some of the scenes near the end provided more genuine tension than just about any this season; it's hard to disagree with that. Certainly not since the first episode back, I would say.
So... Walt. I think we all assumed that Walt's appearances to Shannon were hallucinations on her part, what with the backwards talking and that he could apparently show up anywhere at any time and then vanish again. (Plus, we've already seen this sort of thing with Jack's dad in S1.) But since Sayid saw Walt, that would seem to confirm that Walt is, in some measure, real.
So how can he move so easily without being detected until he appears in front of your face? A couple possibilities here:
a) He has somehow been drawn into whatever the Others use to move as silently as they do (see s2e05), as a result of his abduction by them.
b) It's some sort of shared hallucination inspired by the island's strange magical powers.
c) The writers are just jerking us around to make Walt's appearances seem more mysterious than they actually are.
I don't buy that last one, largely because there's enough crazy crap going on that I don't think the writers need to turn the pedestrian into the mysterious as well. I like (a) myself. It could also explain the backwards whispering - the suggestion behind Ana Lucia's shout of "Run!" is that the mysterious whispers in the forest signal the presence of the Others. So Walt's ability to walk softly and carry a big backwards-whisper stick could be indicative of a connection to the Others... what, I don't know, but of course we should eventually find out, if that's the case. (I mean, yes, he was presumably abducted by them - not that we know for a fact that the boat people and the Others are really the same people, we just assume - but how exactly would he get these "abilities" from them?)
Shannon's death appears that it may be a turning point in a way that Boone's, frankly, was not. The look on Sayid's face alone suggests that he will never in a million years be able to coexist with Ana Lucia, and possibly by extension no one in that party (certainly no one in the tail section).
I wonder if this coming week we'll see anything current, or if it will all be flashbacks. (I hope they don't use a cheesy "here's what happened" framing device, at least.) Previously on Lost: ker-blooie, there goes the plane... and I guess they'll probably have to throw in a couple scenes like the one in the pit where Michael says to Ana Lucia, "You were in the back?" because otherwise casual viewers will be all, "Why don't I recognize anyone on Lost?" At least I expect that's how it will go. And then come back next time for more important stuff. Because unless there's a big revelation about the Others coming, I'm not sure I care what Ana Lucia and Mistereko and Bernard and Libby have been doing for seven weeks.
Friday, October 21, 2005
The Lost s2e06 Death Pool
ABC has promised us that one character will die in the upcoming - three weeks hence - episode of Lost. So... which character might it be?
Shannon - 2 to 1
Someone on a forum I read pointed out that killing off Shannon wouldn't make much sense, because it would mean that Shannon and Boone were totally useless characters with an arc that didn't go anywhere. I think that that sounds about right. Every other major character has had at least two episodes; Shannon and Boone got one stuck together, and then Boone was killed off. For her part, Shannon has proven to be both pretty useless and just generally unlikable, so why wouldn't they kill her off, really? Of course, I don't think she would even have occurred to me if I hadn't heard a rumor that she was going to be the character. But she wouldn't have occurred to me because she's so uninteresting, and this show has a history of killing off faceless and/or uninteresting characters (Boone wasn't setting the world on fire either). So that could work too.
Libby - 4 to 1
Another character I probably wouldn't have thought of - mostly because she's had about three lines in two episodes - but she was shown in the group of people in the teaser, and again, this does work with the faceless aspect. I mean, when Ethan threatened to kill a castaway in the first season and then did so, who was it? Steve. A guy so faceless I don't think he even had a line in the show; even Arzt got to be annoying for a couple episodes before he turned into kibble. It seems too early in the season for any character with a serious arc to get whacked, so if it's not Shannon, it's probably someone who doesn't matter.
Mistereko - 10 to 1
I doubt it highly - if anyone goes from the tail section, it's got to be Libby - but more likely Shaft than any of our heroes. The fact that he made it into the opening credits suggests that he's probably not going anywhere, though; if he were only going to be around for four episodes, presumably they wouldn't have bothered. Ditto for Michelle Rodriguez's Ana Lucia, who I'm certain isn't going anywhere, so I won't even bother including her.
Sayid - 30 to 1
Not much has changed with this guy lately. He gets a brief foray into the hatch in two episodes, but otherwise we've barely seen him all season. Could his reappearance be linked with a tragic accident? Part of this whole thing, I think, depends on why you think the people are on the island. If the island is, in some ways, making people atone for previous mistakes, then Sayid should still have some part to play and should not logically be killed. If it's not something that far-reaching... well, then theoretically anything goes. The fact that his trail has otherwise gone a bit cold - something he has in common with love interest Shannon - could be a warning sign... or maybe they just haven't gotten back around to him yet. (You can bet that if Shannon does bite it we'll be hearing from Sayid in some way.)
Another faceless character - 50 to 1
It's this high largely because I think they're making too big a deal for it to be this cheap, and I don't think they're mean enough to kill off Bernard. If it's anyone "new," it'll probably be the disposable Libby.
Sawyer - 100 to 1
No matter how often he's shown collapsing in teasers, I'm not buying this one. He seems too important and popular of a character to be dispatched in this way.
Jin - 500 to 1
I'm throwing him out there as a possibility, mostly because he's out there in the jungle with the Others. But I don't think it will happen. Too much potential for that character.
Michael or Walt - 1,000 to 1
Nah. But again, near the Others. So I guess you at least have to think about it.
Any of the other main characters (Jack, Locke, Kate, Charlie, Hurley, Claire, Sun... I'm not forgetting anyone, am I?) - 5,000 to 1
I don't remember if any of these characters showed up in the teaser, but even if they did, I don't think it's happening. Certainly not the first three, can't see it with Charlie and Hurley, I don't think they'd kill off Claire with the baby, and Sun would just be a bad choice to dump, for any number of reasons.
So there's my thoughts. Who's your money on?
Shannon - 2 to 1
Someone on a forum I read pointed out that killing off Shannon wouldn't make much sense, because it would mean that Shannon and Boone were totally useless characters with an arc that didn't go anywhere. I think that that sounds about right. Every other major character has had at least two episodes; Shannon and Boone got one stuck together, and then Boone was killed off. For her part, Shannon has proven to be both pretty useless and just generally unlikable, so why wouldn't they kill her off, really? Of course, I don't think she would even have occurred to me if I hadn't heard a rumor that she was going to be the character. But she wouldn't have occurred to me because she's so uninteresting, and this show has a history of killing off faceless and/or uninteresting characters (Boone wasn't setting the world on fire either). So that could work too.
Libby - 4 to 1
Another character I probably wouldn't have thought of - mostly because she's had about three lines in two episodes - but she was shown in the group of people in the teaser, and again, this does work with the faceless aspect. I mean, when Ethan threatened to kill a castaway in the first season and then did so, who was it? Steve. A guy so faceless I don't think he even had a line in the show; even Arzt got to be annoying for a couple episodes before he turned into kibble. It seems too early in the season for any character with a serious arc to get whacked, so if it's not Shannon, it's probably someone who doesn't matter.
Mistereko - 10 to 1
I doubt it highly - if anyone goes from the tail section, it's got to be Libby - but more likely Shaft than any of our heroes. The fact that he made it into the opening credits suggests that he's probably not going anywhere, though; if he were only going to be around for four episodes, presumably they wouldn't have bothered. Ditto for Michelle Rodriguez's Ana Lucia, who I'm certain isn't going anywhere, so I won't even bother including her.
Sayid - 30 to 1
Not much has changed with this guy lately. He gets a brief foray into the hatch in two episodes, but otherwise we've barely seen him all season. Could his reappearance be linked with a tragic accident? Part of this whole thing, I think, depends on why you think the people are on the island. If the island is, in some ways, making people atone for previous mistakes, then Sayid should still have some part to play and should not logically be killed. If it's not something that far-reaching... well, then theoretically anything goes. The fact that his trail has otherwise gone a bit cold - something he has in common with love interest Shannon - could be a warning sign... or maybe they just haven't gotten back around to him yet. (You can bet that if Shannon does bite it we'll be hearing from Sayid in some way.)
Another faceless character - 50 to 1
It's this high largely because I think they're making too big a deal for it to be this cheap, and I don't think they're mean enough to kill off Bernard. If it's anyone "new," it'll probably be the disposable Libby.
Sawyer - 100 to 1
No matter how often he's shown collapsing in teasers, I'm not buying this one. He seems too important and popular of a character to be dispatched in this way.
Jin - 500 to 1
I'm throwing him out there as a possibility, mostly because he's out there in the jungle with the Others. But I don't think it will happen. Too much potential for that character.
Michael or Walt - 1,000 to 1
Nah. But again, near the Others. So I guess you at least have to think about it.
Any of the other main characters (Jack, Locke, Kate, Charlie, Hurley, Claire, Sun... I'm not forgetting anyone, am I?) - 5,000 to 1
I don't remember if any of these characters showed up in the teaser, but even if they did, I don't think it's happening. Certainly not the first three, can't see it with Charlie and Hurley, I don't think they'd kill off Claire with the baby, and Sun would just be a bad choice to dump, for any number of reasons.
So there's my thoughts. Who's your money on?
Thursday, October 20, 2005
s2e05: ...and Found
Kind of a wimpy title. I guess one of the plots is about Sun losing her wedding ring, but nothing else of any significance is really "found," is it?
In what I guess is the main plot, the supremely bossy Ana Lucia decides that Michael, Jin, and Sawyer are going to head across the island to find our heroes' camp. Michael, however, just takes off to find Walt. Jin and Shaft (whose name is apparently "Mr. Echo," however much sense that makes) take off after him. Ana Lucia, Sawyer, Bernard and a couple women whose names I don't remember keep going the other way. In the end, Jin and Mr. Echo catch up to Michael after seeing the feet of the "others." They manage to convince him that he will find Walt, but that the others won't be found if they don't want to be, and everyone just sort of walks away.
In the other plot, Sun loses her wedding ring and flips out a little. We see in the backstory how they met - Jin's friend reads his fortune and tells him love will be colored "orange" for him. He gets a job at a ritzy hotel as the doorman, under strict orders not to let in anyone common like himself. He does anyway and decides to quit. Meanwhile, Sun thinks she's starting to date the heir to the hotel chain, but he really just wants to be friends; he's using her to get his parents off his back before he moves to America and marries someone else. Walking along after quitting, Jin sees a woman in a skimpy orange dress pass him. He turns to watch her go, and when he turns back runs straight into Sun. It's apparently love at first sight.
Finally, as Drew mentioned, it is confirmed that Kate likes Sawyer. Whoopty-freakin-doo. You do have to wonder why she would, but let's bear in mind a couple things: 1) Kate is something of a dangerous character herself; 2) Sawyer does reveal a heart of gold from time to time. He really feigns aloof but comes through when things are actually on the line (just as he did by stomping out of the house when he saw the kid back in S1).
Did I forget anything? Probably not, but even if I did, there wasn't much worth mentioning in the whole episode. I know that in 22 episodes or so they can't all be loaded with plot, and I like a lot of the character-driven episodes, but this one was nothing special - Sun and Jin's backstory is like a condensation of a schmaltzy romantic comedy, and aside from the fact that they don't wear shoes and there is apparently a kid among them (Alex, perhaps? It didn't seem to be Walt), we really didn't learn anything about the "others." If there's more than about fifteen seconds from this episode used in, cumulatively, every single "previously on Lost" for the rest of the season, I'll be shocked.
ABC appears to be justifying the three-week hiatus with the promise that someone will be killed off in the next episode. The teaser wants you to think it's Sawyer, which means it is almost certainly not. A few other people were flashed as possible candidates. I heard a rumor from a loud guy at work (who was talking to someone else, but loudly!) that it was...
DO NOT READ ON IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHO IT MIGHT BE! SPOILERS!!
...Shannon.
And I mean, good riddance. Boy, do I hope it's her. Talk about the worst character of the entire first season (though if you ask me, Ana Lucia will need some deepening to avoid challenging her for worst in the show's run), for several reasons. First, she almost never does anything useful - aside from the French in the pilot. (After that, she really only assists in the French translation as a means to get into Sayid's pants.) She's a totally self-absorbed bitch, and this never actually changes. If that weren't enough, we see in the finale that she sent the airport security after "this Arab guy" - aka Sayid - basically just to prove to Boone that she could be a total bitch and get away with it, or something. It's just a shame he doesn't manage to remember that she's the one he asked to watch his bag. But yeah - useless, whiny, annoying, self-centered, and just plain uninteresting. (As far as backstories go, Shannon and Boone's has to have been the worst.) Boone at least got some depth before he died, but Shannon hasn't yet and I doubt she will. I'm not going to miss the character, if indeed it's her. If not... well, I guess it will just be a big surprise, then.
In what I guess is the main plot, the supremely bossy Ana Lucia decides that Michael, Jin, and Sawyer are going to head across the island to find our heroes' camp. Michael, however, just takes off to find Walt. Jin and Shaft (whose name is apparently "Mr. Echo," however much sense that makes) take off after him. Ana Lucia, Sawyer, Bernard and a couple women whose names I don't remember keep going the other way. In the end, Jin and Mr. Echo catch up to Michael after seeing the feet of the "others." They manage to convince him that he will find Walt, but that the others won't be found if they don't want to be, and everyone just sort of walks away.
In the other plot, Sun loses her wedding ring and flips out a little. We see in the backstory how they met - Jin's friend reads his fortune and tells him love will be colored "orange" for him. He gets a job at a ritzy hotel as the doorman, under strict orders not to let in anyone common like himself. He does anyway and decides to quit. Meanwhile, Sun thinks she's starting to date the heir to the hotel chain, but he really just wants to be friends; he's using her to get his parents off his back before he moves to America and marries someone else. Walking along after quitting, Jin sees a woman in a skimpy orange dress pass him. He turns to watch her go, and when he turns back runs straight into Sun. It's apparently love at first sight.
Finally, as Drew mentioned, it is confirmed that Kate likes Sawyer. Whoopty-freakin-doo. You do have to wonder why she would, but let's bear in mind a couple things: 1) Kate is something of a dangerous character herself; 2) Sawyer does reveal a heart of gold from time to time. He really feigns aloof but comes through when things are actually on the line (just as he did by stomping out of the house when he saw the kid back in S1).
Did I forget anything? Probably not, but even if I did, there wasn't much worth mentioning in the whole episode. I know that in 22 episodes or so they can't all be loaded with plot, and I like a lot of the character-driven episodes, but this one was nothing special - Sun and Jin's backstory is like a condensation of a schmaltzy romantic comedy, and aside from the fact that they don't wear shoes and there is apparently a kid among them (Alex, perhaps? It didn't seem to be Walt), we really didn't learn anything about the "others." If there's more than about fifteen seconds from this episode used in, cumulatively, every single "previously on Lost" for the rest of the season, I'll be shocked.
ABC appears to be justifying the three-week hiatus with the promise that someone will be killed off in the next episode. The teaser wants you to think it's Sawyer, which means it is almost certainly not. A few other people were flashed as possible candidates. I heard a rumor from a loud guy at work (who was talking to someone else, but loudly!) that it was...
DO NOT READ ON IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW WHO IT MIGHT BE! SPOILERS!!
...Shannon.
And I mean, good riddance. Boy, do I hope it's her. Talk about the worst character of the entire first season (though if you ask me, Ana Lucia will need some deepening to avoid challenging her for worst in the show's run), for several reasons. First, she almost never does anything useful - aside from the French in the pilot. (After that, she really only assists in the French translation as a means to get into Sayid's pants.) She's a totally self-absorbed bitch, and this never actually changes. If that weren't enough, we see in the finale that she sent the airport security after "this Arab guy" - aka Sayid - basically just to prove to Boone that she could be a total bitch and get away with it, or something. It's just a shame he doesn't manage to remember that she's the one he asked to watch his bag. But yeah - useless, whiny, annoying, self-centered, and just plain uninteresting. (As far as backstories go, Shannon and Boone's has to have been the worst.) Boone at least got some depth before he died, but Shannon hasn't yet and I doubt she will. I'm not going to miss the character, if indeed it's her. If not... well, I guess it will just be a big surprise, then.
Wednesday, October 12, 2005
s2e04: Everybody Hates Hugo
Again, spoilers.
Better episode than last week's. They finally decided to settle things down and move back into what made last season so great - the character-driven episodes. Better still, this one fleshed out Hurley a bit, giving him something to be concerned about other than all numbers, all the time. (Though it's a little plot-holey to watch him pressing the button with bored unconcern, isn't it?)
We start with, oh guess what, a dream sequence. Why Jin needed to show up here I don't know - perhaps it will pay off later? It could just be a call-back to Hurley telling Jin about the rumor he spoke English last season... or it could just be Abrams and Co. intentionally messing with our heads. Either way, I'm officially embarrassed to have devoted an entire post to it when it was such an obvious fake-out. (I do still wonder if Jin doesn't at least understand English a little better than he lets on, though.)
In the main plot, Hurley is put in charge of doing inventory on the food and then not giving anyone any. Because everyone on the island is good at having secrets but terrible at keeping them, Charlie finds out about the food and makes Hurley feel like a jerk. Hurley brings Rose into the hatch and then, remembering how winning the lottery and lying about it cost him a friend, decides that everyone is going to hate him no matter how he tries to parcel out the food, so he plans to blow it up (yeah, no one will hate you for that!) before just deciding to hand it all out in one big go, so that everyone can just kind of have a good night.
(For the record, do we think there's anyone in the world who wouldn't immediately run out to collect 114 million dollars? Odd behavior on Hurley's part here. I understand the idea - he's a big loser, so he needs to know who his friends are before he cashes in and everyone wants to cozy up. But he couldn't tell DJ Qualls? How was it not obvious already that this guy was his friend?)
In the other plot, sulky Sawyer eats up some time. Finally everyone comes out of the hole and go to another bunker where the tail survivors are holed up. Supposedly there are 23 of them, but it ends up being more like six. The woman who gave Michael the 23 number seems as surprised as he is. (By the way... 23, eh?) One of them is Bernard, Rose's husband - everyone who didn't see that coming, raise your hands. (I'd better not see any hands, people. Come on.)
Oh, in still a third plot, Claire finds the bottle with notes from the raft washed up on the beach. She and Shannon have a little freak and decide to give it to Sun (I guess because she's the only one on the island with connections to someone on the raft). Sun buries it at the end of the episode.
On the next Lost! Sun is tired of everyone saying the raft is fine because she knows it's not! (I know something you don't know, Sun.) Meanwhile, Sawyer flirts with Ana Lucia because who doesn't love a dirty, scowly, hairy Southern dude? And we finally get a glimpse of The Others and their handiwork as Michael goes in search of Walt yet again.
This was a good episode. It was definitely emblematic of what I love about the show but so many people dislike - the plot takes a backseat for an episode (for the most part) while character development hits the forefront. Yeah, we didn't learn much about anything, but it was a very nicely-done episode in giving us some Hurley background, and you had to be touched by the ending. I'm glad they're finally reining themselves in after giving us probably too much information in the first three weeks.
Better episode than last week's. They finally decided to settle things down and move back into what made last season so great - the character-driven episodes. Better still, this one fleshed out Hurley a bit, giving him something to be concerned about other than all numbers, all the time. (Though it's a little plot-holey to watch him pressing the button with bored unconcern, isn't it?)
We start with, oh guess what, a dream sequence. Why Jin needed to show up here I don't know - perhaps it will pay off later? It could just be a call-back to Hurley telling Jin about the rumor he spoke English last season... or it could just be Abrams and Co. intentionally messing with our heads. Either way, I'm officially embarrassed to have devoted an entire post to it when it was such an obvious fake-out. (I do still wonder if Jin doesn't at least understand English a little better than he lets on, though.)
In the main plot, Hurley is put in charge of doing inventory on the food and then not giving anyone any. Because everyone on the island is good at having secrets but terrible at keeping them, Charlie finds out about the food and makes Hurley feel like a jerk. Hurley brings Rose into the hatch and then, remembering how winning the lottery and lying about it cost him a friend, decides that everyone is going to hate him no matter how he tries to parcel out the food, so he plans to blow it up (yeah, no one will hate you for that!) before just deciding to hand it all out in one big go, so that everyone can just kind of have a good night.
(For the record, do we think there's anyone in the world who wouldn't immediately run out to collect 114 million dollars? Odd behavior on Hurley's part here. I understand the idea - he's a big loser, so he needs to know who his friends are before he cashes in and everyone wants to cozy up. But he couldn't tell DJ Qualls? How was it not obvious already that this guy was his friend?)
In the other plot, sulky Sawyer eats up some time. Finally everyone comes out of the hole and go to another bunker where the tail survivors are holed up. Supposedly there are 23 of them, but it ends up being more like six. The woman who gave Michael the 23 number seems as surprised as he is. (By the way... 23, eh?) One of them is Bernard, Rose's husband - everyone who didn't see that coming, raise your hands. (I'd better not see any hands, people. Come on.)
Oh, in still a third plot, Claire finds the bottle with notes from the raft washed up on the beach. She and Shannon have a little freak and decide to give it to Sun (I guess because she's the only one on the island with connections to someone on the raft). Sun buries it at the end of the episode.
On the next Lost! Sun is tired of everyone saying the raft is fine because she knows it's not! (I know something you don't know, Sun.) Meanwhile, Sawyer flirts with Ana Lucia because who doesn't love a dirty, scowly, hairy Southern dude? And we finally get a glimpse of The Others and their handiwork as Michael goes in search of Walt yet again.
This was a good episode. It was definitely emblematic of what I love about the show but so many people dislike - the plot takes a backseat for an episode (for the most part) while character development hits the forefront. Yeah, we didn't learn much about anything, but it was a very nicely-done episode in giving us some Hurley background, and you had to be touched by the ending. I'm glad they're finally reining themselves in after giving us probably too much information in the first three weeks.
Thursday, October 06, 2005
English as a second language
Drew and I went back to look at the Dharma Initiative film sequence today and ended up watching several other parts of the episode. Of particular note once we stumbled across it was the sequence with Michelle Rodriguez in the pit, after Sawyer brings out his gun. There is a brief shot of Jin - seemingly unprompted - where he looks between Sawyer's hand and Rodriguez... it's hard to explain in this context, but it really looks not only like he thinks she is going to steal the gun away, but that he fully expects her to and is actually anxiously awaiting her move.
Note the following things.
1. Jin was separated from Michael and Sawyer for quite some time after the raft blew up. But he was apparently never under shark threat and had seemingly been on the island for some time already when they made their way back to the beach the next morning, which had to be a time difference of at least a few hours. Could he have somehow grabbed the side of the boat belonging to the "others" and made it back much quicker?
2. As I noted yesterday, when Jin comes out of the jungle to meet Michael and Sawyer on the beach, he is tied up. But when they are taken back into the jungle, they are not tied up - they are thrown into a pit from which, one presumes, Jin alone would not have been able to escape (certainly not if he had also been tied up). This leaves open the possibility that Jin knew, to some degree, his captors.
3. In one Season One episode, Hurley tells Jin there is a rumor that the latter speaks English. This is, of course, mere speculation on the part of the survivors, but it must have come from somewhere - remember that Sun got busted by Kate because she gave a knowing smile after something Kate said; Jin could have had similar looks at times if indeed he did speak or understand English.
4. Of course we have now seen Jin speak English. The common belief is that this is part of a dream sequence, but I'm not so sure. For one thing, he's in a place with artificial light and it doesn't look much like any place in the hatch (though to be fair, we don't get much of a look at it). That being said, why would any of the characters have a dream that takes place in such a location? Why would a dream on this show be so seemingly stoic? Yes, it's annoying if the promo people blew such a huge development if it's real, but when have we ever known promo people to be good at keeping secrets?
Possible theories:
1. Perhaps Jin simply speaks English and has been hiding it like Sun. He didn't seem to have much of an accent in that one line - I daresay he seemed downright American - but maybe he has a little bit of one. Sun's accent isn't very strong either. So why didn't Jin ever bust it out before now, at a point where it could have been useful? One of the following theories might explain that.
2. Perhaps he is connected with the project somehow, if the project is indeed connected to the castaways' ending up on the island. As someone whose inability to communicate well and general reticence would help him maintain a low profile, he could perhaps be observing and/or trying to exert a certain level of control over the proceedings.
3. Perhaps he stumbled upon whoever this other group of people is (at least partially Flight 815 survivors) at some earlier point, and formed an alliance. Note that for much of the first season Jin desires to keep separate from the other survivors, yet he still manages to join with them at crucial times even though he is most interested in his own survival and seems to think he can assure it himself. Why? Perhaps he is trying to move things in the direction that will most benefit him - i.e. helping this other group of people that may be better equipped to get him off the island.
Or maybe it's just some sort of dream sequence. The problem with the other explanations is that I have a very hard time conceiving of a way for them to be satisfying. Even if they exist, we're probably waiting two weeks - I have to figure that if it's not a dream, Jin's English will be one of the last things we get next week (though if that's the case, the promo people dropped the ball even worse than could have been expected). And I just don't know how this question could be answered and keep things reasonable. Though Lost thrives on its mystery and twists, getting too crazy could be a death knell, particularly for my interest. We've got a long way to go this season, though - 19 episodes or so - so there are still plenty of things that could happen. I just hope Abrams and Lindelof don't dig too deep a hole for themselves.
Personally, I'm hoping right now that it's a fakeout. It would explain the prominent promo placement - this show has been known for juking in the past, be it the hallucinogenic paste or... well, that was the big one, but certainly things on the island aren't always what they seem at first glance. And if this is what it seems, the questions it raises are far more problematic than the English-speaking itself. For the sake of not having huge, ugly plot holes, it either needs to be a fakeout, or the answer needs to be really, really, ridiculously good. Good to a degree that I'm not sure actually can exist in this dimension. If Jin does speak English and the explanation is not 100% mind-blowingly outstanding, it's going to become obvious that the shot of the shark circling in the second episode was meant to show the thing the show was jumping. Let's hope that doesn't happen. Don't get me wrong, it could be a cool twist, but if it doesn't work just right it could also be devastating.
(For the record, yes, I'm aware that this blog has started off on kind of a negative foot. Hopefully this won't last, but it's sort of up to the show. Seems like I didn't pick the best episode after which to start.)
Note the following things.
1. Jin was separated from Michael and Sawyer for quite some time after the raft blew up. But he was apparently never under shark threat and had seemingly been on the island for some time already when they made their way back to the beach the next morning, which had to be a time difference of at least a few hours. Could he have somehow grabbed the side of the boat belonging to the "others" and made it back much quicker?
2. As I noted yesterday, when Jin comes out of the jungle to meet Michael and Sawyer on the beach, he is tied up. But when they are taken back into the jungle, they are not tied up - they are thrown into a pit from which, one presumes, Jin alone would not have been able to escape (certainly not if he had also been tied up). This leaves open the possibility that Jin knew, to some degree, his captors.
3. In one Season One episode, Hurley tells Jin there is a rumor that the latter speaks English. This is, of course, mere speculation on the part of the survivors, but it must have come from somewhere - remember that Sun got busted by Kate because she gave a knowing smile after something Kate said; Jin could have had similar looks at times if indeed he did speak or understand English.
4. Of course we have now seen Jin speak English. The common belief is that this is part of a dream sequence, but I'm not so sure. For one thing, he's in a place with artificial light and it doesn't look much like any place in the hatch (though to be fair, we don't get much of a look at it). That being said, why would any of the characters have a dream that takes place in such a location? Why would a dream on this show be so seemingly stoic? Yes, it's annoying if the promo people blew such a huge development if it's real, but when have we ever known promo people to be good at keeping secrets?
Possible theories:
1. Perhaps Jin simply speaks English and has been hiding it like Sun. He didn't seem to have much of an accent in that one line - I daresay he seemed downright American - but maybe he has a little bit of one. Sun's accent isn't very strong either. So why didn't Jin ever bust it out before now, at a point where it could have been useful? One of the following theories might explain that.
2. Perhaps he is connected with the project somehow, if the project is indeed connected to the castaways' ending up on the island. As someone whose inability to communicate well and general reticence would help him maintain a low profile, he could perhaps be observing and/or trying to exert a certain level of control over the proceedings.
3. Perhaps he stumbled upon whoever this other group of people is (at least partially Flight 815 survivors) at some earlier point, and formed an alliance. Note that for much of the first season Jin desires to keep separate from the other survivors, yet he still manages to join with them at crucial times even though he is most interested in his own survival and seems to think he can assure it himself. Why? Perhaps he is trying to move things in the direction that will most benefit him - i.e. helping this other group of people that may be better equipped to get him off the island.
Or maybe it's just some sort of dream sequence. The problem with the other explanations is that I have a very hard time conceiving of a way for them to be satisfying. Even if they exist, we're probably waiting two weeks - I have to figure that if it's not a dream, Jin's English will be one of the last things we get next week (though if that's the case, the promo people dropped the ball even worse than could have been expected). And I just don't know how this question could be answered and keep things reasonable. Though Lost thrives on its mystery and twists, getting too crazy could be a death knell, particularly for my interest. We've got a long way to go this season, though - 19 episodes or so - so there are still plenty of things that could happen. I just hope Abrams and Lindelof don't dig too deep a hole for themselves.
Personally, I'm hoping right now that it's a fakeout. It would explain the prominent promo placement - this show has been known for juking in the past, be it the hallucinogenic paste or... well, that was the big one, but certainly things on the island aren't always what they seem at first glance. And if this is what it seems, the questions it raises are far more problematic than the English-speaking itself. For the sake of not having huge, ugly plot holes, it either needs to be a fakeout, or the answer needs to be really, really, ridiculously good. Good to a degree that I'm not sure actually can exist in this dimension. If Jin does speak English and the explanation is not 100% mind-blowingly outstanding, it's going to become obvious that the shot of the shark circling in the second episode was meant to show the thing the show was jumping. Let's hope that doesn't happen. Don't get me wrong, it could be a cool twist, but if it doesn't work just right it could also be devastating.
(For the record, yes, I'm aware that this blog has started off on kind of a negative foot. Hopefully this won't last, but it's sort of up to the show. Seems like I didn't pick the best episode after which to start.)
Wednesday, October 05, 2005
s2e03: Orientation
Spoiler warning. Please note that this will be implied in pretty much every future post, so I don't want to hear any whining.
So, this episode... not the greatest. The season premiere was awesome, the second episode had its moments, but this... it seemed to have "filler" stamped on huge chunks, like the writers really only had a couple things they wanted to squeeze in there (Jack and Locke coming to an understanding, how Locke came to be this way, starting the "fate of the tail" plotline) and had to fill up the rest with Jack being a nearly insufferable boring ass. Locke's backstory was pretty slow too, and the appearance of Sayid and Hurley felt all but perfunctory. It would not at all be exaggeration to say that the coolest moment by far was the revelation in the teaser for next week that Jin apparently speaks English. (Not only English, but unaccented English at that, which raises further questions.) It's a shame they had to blow something so potentially huge, but you can see how they'd need to pull everyone back in who might have been annoyed at this episode's relative crappiness.
I don't think there's an episode from the first season that doesn't hold up in one way or another - those that are slower on advancing the overall plot at least work in a lot of decent backstory. There are a couple of relative clunkers, but even a bad episode of Lost isn't awful and I'd rather watch it than much of what's on TV, so I'll grant that. Still, this early in the second season I would have hoped for a little better, not a stopgap episode, which is how this one felt.
We open pretty much exactly where episode 2 left off, continuing this season's trend of leaving virtually no second unchronicled (and a number of seconds chronicled far too many times). Jin has run out of the jungle, tied up, as Michael and Sawyer come ashore - he gasps, "Others!" As we open here, the huge black guy beats the crap out of Sawyer, and they all get dragged off and thrown in a hole. (Why this didn't happen to Jin the first time is unclear.)
Back to the hatch. We have to see parts of things AGAIN, which is really unfortunate since the editor appears to have gone on a bender and completely changed the order of the dialogue from the previous episodes. Anyway, Kate goes to hit Desmond with a gun, his gun goes off, and the computer gets hit. Desmond has a spaz and tries to fix it, but ends up making things worse. Meanwhile, Jack is even more obnoxious than usual and it finally seems to get to Locke a bit, explained by his backstory in which it's shown that he used to be just as bad at letting go of things as Jack has been shown to be. We also meet Helen, the name Locke later (earlier) uses with the phone non-sex worker. Gee, I wonder how this ends.
Michelle Rodriguez shows up! She gets dumped in the hole and it's revealed that she was on the flight. Then she kicks Sawyer's ass (not a good episode for him), takes his gun, and is hoisted up out of the hole, because she's either one of or in cahoots with the people who seem to be the "others," which probably means they're not them.
Jack and Locke watch a film stamped with the same seal we see around the hatch and on the shark - it belongs to the Dharma Initiative. The film is vague but seems to suggest that the whole thing is some sort of social experiment. Jack says as much to Desmond. Desmond's response is "Yeah, but what if it's not?" Jack doesn't really have a comeback for that.
The computer seems unfixable so Desmond takes off running. Jack follows and confronts him. Desmond finally recognizes Jack and inquires about Sarah; hearing that they were married but now are not, Desmond is apparently satisfied (that makes one of us) and leaves. Welcome to Plot Hole Island. I assume they have to call this back at some point.
Sayid and Hurley are brought by Kate. Hurley sees the food that will apparently get him in a lot of trouble next week. Sayid fixes the computer apparently by waving his hands around, and then Locke convinces Jack that he has to press the button because Locke doesn't want to be alone in having faith that something larger is going on. Jack waits until the last possible second and then presses it. Locke declares "I'll take first shift" (since the counter must be reset every 108 minutes) and... we're done! Are you as bored as I was?
So we learned basically nothing about the Others. Next week it seems like we will, and if we don't at least there will be some character development in the form of Hurley doing dumb things or what have you. I'm most interested in this Jin thing, though.
So, this episode... not the greatest. The season premiere was awesome, the second episode had its moments, but this... it seemed to have "filler" stamped on huge chunks, like the writers really only had a couple things they wanted to squeeze in there (Jack and Locke coming to an understanding, how Locke came to be this way, starting the "fate of the tail" plotline) and had to fill up the rest with Jack being a nearly insufferable boring ass. Locke's backstory was pretty slow too, and the appearance of Sayid and Hurley felt all but perfunctory. It would not at all be exaggeration to say that the coolest moment by far was the revelation in the teaser for next week that Jin apparently speaks English. (Not only English, but unaccented English at that, which raises further questions.) It's a shame they had to blow something so potentially huge, but you can see how they'd need to pull everyone back in who might have been annoyed at this episode's relative crappiness.
I don't think there's an episode from the first season that doesn't hold up in one way or another - those that are slower on advancing the overall plot at least work in a lot of decent backstory. There are a couple of relative clunkers, but even a bad episode of Lost isn't awful and I'd rather watch it than much of what's on TV, so I'll grant that. Still, this early in the second season I would have hoped for a little better, not a stopgap episode, which is how this one felt.
We open pretty much exactly where episode 2 left off, continuing this season's trend of leaving virtually no second unchronicled (and a number of seconds chronicled far too many times). Jin has run out of the jungle, tied up, as Michael and Sawyer come ashore - he gasps, "Others!" As we open here, the huge black guy beats the crap out of Sawyer, and they all get dragged off and thrown in a hole. (Why this didn't happen to Jin the first time is unclear.)
Back to the hatch. We have to see parts of things AGAIN, which is really unfortunate since the editor appears to have gone on a bender and completely changed the order of the dialogue from the previous episodes. Anyway, Kate goes to hit Desmond with a gun, his gun goes off, and the computer gets hit. Desmond has a spaz and tries to fix it, but ends up making things worse. Meanwhile, Jack is even more obnoxious than usual and it finally seems to get to Locke a bit, explained by his backstory in which it's shown that he used to be just as bad at letting go of things as Jack has been shown to be. We also meet Helen, the name Locke later (earlier) uses with the phone non-sex worker. Gee, I wonder how this ends.
Michelle Rodriguez shows up! She gets dumped in the hole and it's revealed that she was on the flight. Then she kicks Sawyer's ass (not a good episode for him), takes his gun, and is hoisted up out of the hole, because she's either one of or in cahoots with the people who seem to be the "others," which probably means they're not them.
Jack and Locke watch a film stamped with the same seal we see around the hatch and on the shark - it belongs to the Dharma Initiative. The film is vague but seems to suggest that the whole thing is some sort of social experiment. Jack says as much to Desmond. Desmond's response is "Yeah, but what if it's not?" Jack doesn't really have a comeback for that.
The computer seems unfixable so Desmond takes off running. Jack follows and confronts him. Desmond finally recognizes Jack and inquires about Sarah; hearing that they were married but now are not, Desmond is apparently satisfied (that makes one of us) and leaves. Welcome to Plot Hole Island. I assume they have to call this back at some point.
Sayid and Hurley are brought by Kate. Hurley sees the food that will apparently get him in a lot of trouble next week. Sayid fixes the computer apparently by waving his hands around, and then Locke convinces Jack that he has to press the button because Locke doesn't want to be alone in having faith that something larger is going on. Jack waits until the last possible second and then presses it. Locke declares "I'll take first shift" (since the counter must be reset every 108 minutes) and... we're done! Are you as bored as I was?
So we learned basically nothing about the Others. Next week it seems like we will, and if we don't at least there will be some character development in the form of Hurley doing dumb things or what have you. I'm most interested in this Jin thing, though.
Onto the bandwagon.
It took literally one episode - the first of the second season - for me to get on the Lost bandwagon, and once my first season DVDs arrived I devoured them in a weekend. I daresay I now know as much or more about Lost than most people not named J.J. Abrams, but there's no need to be competitive here - we're all allowed to like Lost, and we should. Why? Because it isn't just gimmicky cliffhangers and weird plot twists, it's an excellent character drama (although it could stand to get back to that; it's been stifled a bit so far this season in order to answer the questions it set up for itself). It didn't win the Emmy because of some hatch.
So what are you going to get here? Episode recaps. Speculation. Perhaps general chatter if my roommate takes up my offer to make this a multi-author blog. Either way, know starting out that I'm doing this as much for myself as anyone else, so keep the snark to yourself. That's my job, where called for (and there will be some; the show isn't perfect, God knows).
Anyway, that's the premise. Catch on quick, because this entry is soon to be buried.
So what are you going to get here? Episode recaps. Speculation. Perhaps general chatter if my roommate takes up my offer to make this a multi-author blog. Either way, know starting out that I'm doing this as much for myself as anyone else, so keep the snark to yourself. That's my job, where called for (and there will be some; the show isn't perfect, God knows).
Anyway, that's the premise. Catch on quick, because this entry is soon to be buried.
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