3.20 The Man Behind the Curtain

Follow along! The episode guide for “The Brig” is in Finding Lost — Season 3, pp. 161-169.

(I just finished watching the episode, so I figured I'd just go ahead and post tonight after all!) Aside from the finale, this episode is still THE highlight of season 3 for me. The first Ben flashback is as brilliant and full of shock as the early flashbacks of the main characters in season 1, and watching it again in light of season 5 is even better.

Fun things I noticed:
• At the time this first aired I thought it was funny that Ben’s mother was being played by Michael Emerson’s real-life wife. Now I just find it strange that Arlene from True Blood has somehow made it from Bon Temps to the island… and where did her red hair go? ;)
• Horace’s Dharma wig looks better here than it does in season 5.
• Sun sticks up for Jack in front of everyone, and yet in DOC, she immediately suspects him of foul play when he asks her normal ob/gyn questions about her baby.
• Jack’s comment, “Because I hadn’t decided what to do about it yet” still irks me. Especially since you’d think by now he would understand someone like Sayid is smart, strong, and reliable, and could be a good advisor to discuss it with.
• In my Finding Lost book, I mention that I like Horace and say, “Here’s hoping he’ll make a return engagement in a future Ben flashback.” Heehee!! OR… how about we just take everyone back to where HE is?!

Things that have new meaning:
• Ben says, “I am one of the last that was,” and reiterates that he was born on the island. I suggested in one of my earlier rewatch posts that maybe to Ben, he WAS born on the island through his rebirth at the Temple. Despite coming clean to Locke at the end and admitting he wasn’t, in fact, born on the island, he still says with some conviction that he WAS born on the island, and I keep wondering if this line will take on greater meaning after we’ve season 6, and, presumably, what happened at the Temple.
• We were discussing back in season 2 the possibility of Locke already being the Man in Black – I mentioned in one post that maybe Locke died when he fell out of the window, and when Jacob touched him, he actually put the Man in Black in him at that moment, so when Locke opened his eyes and looked around, bewildered, it wasn’t John Locke anymore, but the Man in Black instead. So when Jacob said, “I’m sorry this happened to you” he wasn’t addressing Locke anymore, but his longtime frenemy. That, of course, was me just throwing out some food for thought (if that turns out to be the case, I think I’d be deeply disappointed because part of the reason I love Lost is because of Locke’s journey). But, for fun, let’s imagine that he IS the Man in Black in this episode… you could see why he insists on being taken to Jacob, and why he beats Mikhail to a pulp. (That said, I don’t think he’s the Man in Black… and will say why below.)
• Horace was present at Ben’s birth; Richard was present shortly after Locke’s. That means Ben was visited by Dharma; Locke was visited by an ancient Other. That makes Locke more authentic already!
• Annie is still one of the biggest unsolved mysteries. I REALLY hope this isn’t a storyline that’s dropped, and instead we find out in season 6 what happened to her. Could her death/disappearance be what contributed to Ben’s coldness?
• I think I asked this at the time, but I wonder if that volcano that Olivia mentions could have some significance later? Was the volcanic eruption important to the story of Jacob or Richard? (And I asked this in the book, but where is Olivia Goodspeed when Sawyer et al are at Dharma? Ben arrives there around the same time Sawyer does, so you’d think Sawyer would have seen her at some point. We all assumed at the time that she was Horace’s wife – is that true? Could she have been his sister?
• Ben’s mom says, “It’s not time yet, Benjamin.” The important word there being “time,” but… time for what? What TIME is correct? Is she a manifestation of Smokey? She doesn’t really follow the protocol of the other visions on the island – Eko saw both Yemi and Ana Lucia, and they both died on the island. Christian’s dead body is also on the island, but we’ve seen him walking about a lot now. Emily died off the island. Perhaps it doesn’t matter where they died, but just that they are dead and mean something to the person seeing them.
• Jacob hates technology, and yet he took a plane off the island to see everyone? Was he really there or was he a vision of some kind?
• Now we know Ben never saw Jacob, and was making that scene up the entire time. In retrospect, it makes sense, since on the one hand his hand is shaking just talking about Jacob, and then he talks back to him like Jacob’s some petulant child, which isn’t exactly reverent. Notice the shock on Ben’s face when he’s thrown backwards, like up to that point he was just assuming this was all smoke and mirrors and the “island being the island” and then he’s shot backwards across the room. D’oh.
• In “The Incident,” the Shadow Seekers come across Jacob’s cabin and look through it, and Ilana declares that Jacob hasn’t been in this cabin for a long time, and “someone else has been using it.” Perhaps we’re to assume she means Christian, but I think she means the Man in Black. I believe the man we see in this scene ever-so-briefly is NOT Jacob, but in fact is the Man in Black. He tells Locke to help him, and he’s been trapped somehow on the island or in that cabin. He pushes Ben away because he sees Ben as some insignificant bug, and it’s Locke he’s after. It’s as if he’s given up on Eko being his possible target, and now he’s decided maybe Locke’s the vulnerable one who could die at some point and he could inhabit his body. And by instilling fear in Ben in this scene, he sets up the series of events that will happen where Ben will kill Locke and bring his body back.
• The Purge was essentially death by nosebleed, just like the time jumps caused nosebleeds in everyone. And notice a few episodes ago, Claire’s nose started bleeding.
• Richard Alpert’s strange hair and dress is the only inconsistency in this episode, and I’m thinking that’s pretty much all it is. The writers already decided he’d be immortal (hence his whole NOT AGING thing) but they didn’t think that maybe his hair would always be just so, and that he’d always be wearing that blue top with the sleeves rolled up. When he strolls into the camp in “LaFleur” in season 5, everyone knows him, and he’s the guy talking to Horace. His hair is short, his shirt is nice, and he’s not wearing rags. So I think the only way to deal with that is just to chalk it up to the writers not having fully fleshed out the complete Alpert idea yet.

3.19 The Brig

Follow along! The episode guide for “The Brig” is in Finding Lost — Season 3, pp. 152-158.

This episode saddens me to no end – Holloway gives his best performance to that point in the series, and the pain experienced by Sawyer and O’Quinn cuts through both of them. I remember when this episode aired, and being so baffled by the fact that a plane had been found, and Cooper was saying they were all in Hell – could he be right? Were they really all dead and ended up in Hell? It was a great ep that had many people scratching their heads and forums lighting up afterwards.

Fun things I noticed:
• I still get the biggest kick out of “Rousseau.” “Locke.” Hearing those two names in juxtaposition is great.
• Cooper’s “blahblahblahblah” is the most painful “etcetera” I’ve ever seen. Wow.
• Sawyer strangles Cooper the way Leia killed Jabba the Hutt… and Cooper looks about the same by the end of it.

Things that have new meaning:
• I could be wrong about this, but Sawyer is still barefoot by the beginning of season 5, and I'm wondering if it all started with this episode. Poor guy will never have another pair of shoes… he’ll have to go to 1977 to get those. ;)
• Ben tells Locke they’re going to an old place, and it appears to be the same clearing where Alpert had his people in 1954, when Locke first approached him to tell him he was the chosen one in “Jughead.” Cindy tells Locke that everyone’s staring because they’ve all been waiting for him… since when? 1954? How much do they know?
• Naomi’s helicopter story doesn’t mesh with what we later see – that the freighter only holds one chopper on deck. If her helicopter went down, then where did the second one magically appear from? When the Kahana leaves the dock in Fiji and Michael is on board, there’s only one helicopter on the freighter.
• Ben hands Locke a knife and tells him to stab his father, and Locke doesn’t do it. Not-Locke hands Ben a knife and tells him to stab Jacob, and Ben does it.
• Ben says, “It’s time” right before trying to get Locke to stab his father, but it appears that “time” is the very element that can temper someone’s anger and feelings for revenge. Ben stabs Jacob because he’s so freshly angry that Locke has usurped him; he kills his father because his father has been right there nattering at him for years. Locke, on the other hand, has been out of Cooper’s clutches for years, and has been given a second chance at walking on the island, so his anger isn’t as fresh, and therefore he can’t bring himself to do it. Had Ben handed Locke the knife a week after he’d been thrown out the window, things would have been very different.
• “John Locke. My dead son.” CREEPY! He will be dead, and then he’ll be resurrected, just like Cooper believes he’s been resurrected on the island already.
• Watching Alpert give Locke the file on Sawyer is completely different now that we know what Alpert’s role in all of this is. He’s the “advisor” to the leader, and the one who gets orders from Jacob to give to the leader. But it’s also different knowing that Alpert’s been watching Locke since before Locke was born, and truly believes he’s the leader and will travel back in time to tell him that. SO much in this episode is different now in retrospect.
• Locke telling Sawyer that his future girlfriend is a mole is yet another one of those awkward moments in light of the Suliet pairing.

I've Fallen a Wee Bit Behind...

I've watched up to "The Brig" and that post will appear tonight, but I don't think I'll get to "The Man Behind the Curtain" until late tonight, so that post should appear tomorrow night. Sorry for the delay!

3.18 D.O.C.

Follow along! The episode guide for “D.O.C.” is in Finding Lost — Season 3, pp. 144-151.

Loved this flashback, and despite the NUMEROUS nitpicks I have for Juliet’s knowledge of fertility and pregnancy (see the book), I love the scene of Juliet and Sun bonding over the ultrasound. Too bad it’s about to be thrown to the dogs when Juliet betrays Sun to Jin.

Fun things I noticed:
• I still think it’s unfair of Sun to immediately suspect Jack after everything he’s done for her and everyone else. It’s always irked me that she immediately went, “Gasp! He wants to know how my pregnancy is going… he MUST be working with Ben.”
• JINJA!!!! Oh how I love Jin’s new ninja moves. I wish we could see those on EVERY show. Why has that talent been so incredibly underused on an island where we need more Jinjas?
• I heart Jin’s dad so much. It’s such a sad irony that he’s probably the best and most loving father on the show, yet A) he might not even be Jin’s biological dad, and B) his son is ashamed of him.
• I loved the little gesture of Jin’s father wiping his hand on his shirt before deigning to touch Sun’s face, as if that simple contact would have somehow sullied her. It made me love him even more.
• Sorry… I just have to say it. Juliet’s line, “When did you last have sex with your husband” is one of the most RIDICULOUS things a fertility doctor could have said. If Sun lumbered into Juliet’s office at 8 months pregnant, and she asked that question, what would it have to do with anything? “Well, Jin and I had sex last week.” “Well, then. Your baby is exactly 7 days old. Congratulations!” Huh? Does Juliet think that women clamp on some sort of chastity belt at the moment of conception and never have sex again until the baby comes?

Things that have new meaning:
• In “The Incident,” we see Sun wearing a strapless white beaded wedding dress. In “House of the Rising Sun,” she’s wearing a high-collared silk wedding dress. In this episode, the wedding notice has Sun wearing a traditional Korean robe. Why would she have opted for such a traditional robe in the photo when in the other two episodes we haven’t seen her wear anything even close to it at the wedding?
• Compare this scene to the one that’s going to come later. In this one, Sun hesitates at the bottom of the staircase, then tentatively walks up, interrupts her father confidently talking to his associates, and she walks in and timidly asks him for money. While she subtly threatens him, it’s clear that Paik is holding all the cards and he’ll make Jin pay for her request. Now, think of the same scene in “There’s No Place Like Home.” A pregnant Sun walks confidently up those stairs, interrupts her father as he’s yelling at his associates and looks completely flustered about something (someone has bought a controlling interest in his company and he doesn’t know who or how) and then announces HE will respect HER and he ruined her husband’s life and now she controls his company and there’s nothing he can do about it. On the one hand, it’s sad to see how sad she is in this scene and you know she’s probably not getting the pleasure out of this that she should, but on the other, it’s WICKED to see Paik brought down like that.
• The scene of her telling Jin’s mother not to push her or she’ll make her fake death a reality is AWESOME, and ranks right up there in the kick-ass Sun moments alongside Sun clocking Ben in the head with an oar.
• Could Mikhail be the Man in Black? What if he really died at the sonic fence and somehow the Man in Black inhabited him? That’s why he could seem to have come back to life just like Locke did. It would also explain his oddness to Charlie, taunting him and leering at him and saying, “what?” when Charlie’s talking to him… it’s like he KNOWS he’s going to kill him.
• Desmond keeping his word with Mikhail will ultimately lead to Charlie’s death.

3.17 Catch-22

Follow along! The episode guide for “Catch-22” is in Finding Lost — Season 3, pp. 135-140.

First, I think it’s important to pause for a moment and take in the image of Desmond with his shirt unbuttoned. Mmmmmm…. OK, where was I? Oh right… taking in Desmond with his shirt unbuttoned…

Fun things I noticed:
• Just to jump shows for a second, it was interesting to me when Desmond says if he tells them one piece of the puzzle, they’ll change the picture on the box. It reminded me of Flashforward – they’ve all seen their puzzle piece from the future, and while some people are trying to change the picture on the box, others are doing their damnedest to keep that picture EXACTLY the same.
• I can never get enough of the guys whistling as they walk along the beach, and the ghost stories. Notice in both cases it’s boys being boys, and yet Desmond doesn’t participate in either one.
• Och! More bad accents!
• How did Charlie’s guitar not smash when he fell backward onto it?
• Have you ever noticed that Desmond says “Pen-neh” the same way Bill the Vampire says “Sook-eh”?

Things that have new meaning:
• The line “Someone’s coming” is now a harbinger for the entirety of season 4. It’s amazing how pivotal this episode was, and how much it drives the rest of the series.
• Again, as in season 1, it’s crazy to see Jack just ignoring Kate, knowing that later he’ll be willing to drop a freakin’ BOMB to get her back.
• Sawyer says to Jack and Juliet, “You two arguing over who’s your favourite Other?” It immediately reminded me of when he walks up to Locke and Juliet in “Jughead” and says, “I hate to bust up this ‘I’m an Other, you’re an Other reunion, but…’”
• We still haven’t gotten an answer as to why Brother Whatsit had a picture of Eloise on his desk. Or why Naomi was carrying Desmond’s pic, for that matter.

3.16 One of Us

Follow along! The episode guide for “One of Us” is in Finding Lost — Season 3, pp. 124-130.

Another great Juliet flashback (I know she has her share of detractors, but with the exception of Season 4’s “The Other Woman,” I’ve never seen a Juliet flashback I didn’t like). And I just need to give some extra props to Robin Wiegert, who plays her sister Rachel. I LOVE HER. Deadwood fans out there will remember her as Calamity Jane, a role she played superbly.

Fun things I noticed:
• So… I started writing up something that I thought was an inconsistency in the show, and while I was writing it I realized, no, it wasn’t actually an inconsistency at all, but another example of how perfectly written this show often is. So I’m going to keep it in just to show you what I realized. Juliet says that Ethan was administering the injections and was going to give the serum to Claire that way, but then Hurley found out he wasn’t on the manifest and so Ethan had to improvise, and that’s what changed his plans. But back in season 1, when Hurley runs into the caves to say Ethan wasn’t on the manifest, Ethan was already out in the woods kidnapping Claire and Charlie. He wasn’t improvising because he’d been caught, because he had no idea he’d been caught. BUT… as I was typing that part, I realized that he caught on when Hurley was asking him all of the questions to create his own manifest that he was probably going to find the REAL manifest, and so that’s when he improvised. Hurley didn’t have the real manifest at that point, but Ethan’s a really smart guy and would have figured it was only a matter of time before Hurley would find it.
• If Juliet didn’t have a serum by September 22, how did she have one 10 days later? What part of her story is true? Was Ethan really injecting Claire with a serum, or was he putting the implant in her that Ben could later activate?
• That scene of Juliet looking at Rachel pushing Julian on the swing makes me cry every time.

Things that have new meaning:
• Sawyer confronting Juliet and her reminding him what a convict he really is. WOW how far they’ve come. It’s so weird seeing Juliet in these earlier episodes and comparing them to the woman she would later become.
• This was that episode that made many a fan gasp at the end of it, where we suddenly didn’t know if she could be trusted (and many fans still feel that way, thinking she has her own agenda and is basically a sinister individual). But her flashbacks showing the relationship with her sister are what make me refuse to think of her as evil. Yes, she was probably acting as a double agent, but isn’t everyone pretty much looking to help themselves at this point?

3.15 Left Behind

Follow along! The episode guide for “Left Behind” is in Finding Lost — Season 3, pp. 116-123.

This is one of my favourite of the Kate flashbacks. So much of the past came together in this one, from Cassidy’s relationship to Sawyer (and her reaction to her pregnancy) to Kate’s relationship with her mother (who makes Roger Workman look WARM).

Fun things I noticed:
• There’s still no explanation for why the Others have superhuman strength.
• Cassidy isn’t exactly taking care of the baby, since she appears to be having a hard drink in the bar with Kate.
• Is Cassidy wearing the same green coat that Kate’s wearing when she goes to see Tom in “Born to Run”?
• There’s another insinuation that Kate and the marshal had some sort of relationship beyond fugitive and cop when Cassidy says, “I don’t know what happened between the two of you, but he is REALLY angry.”
• You know, my husband watched this ep with me this time around and even he couldn’t stand Diane. The old battle axe couldn’t even offer her daughter a hug. UGH.

Things that have new meaning:
• I couldn’t help but think of the friendship Cassidy and Kate strike up after Kate gets off the island throughout this episode. In both instances it’s Kate coming to Cassidy for advice and Cassidy is sometimes blunt, but gets the point across. And yet at her core, Cassidy is in pain. I also thought of Cassidy opening the door and saying, “Oh my GOD, I’ve been telling everyone, ‘I KNOW that woman!’” And I thought if anyone in the law ever heard her saying that, they’d wonder WHEN exactly Cassidy knew “that woman” and had she been helping her stay underground?