Follow along! The episode guide for “Exodus, Part 2” is in Finding Lost, pp. 150-159.Oh, how I love this finale. Aaron is kidnapped and saved, Walt is kidnapped, the raft is blown up (and so is Arzt), the hatch is opened, Sayid gives Charlie the most wicked cauterization ever, and we get a hilarious Hurley flashback.
Fun things I noticed:
• The “previously on Lost” bit was said by someone else.
• Best. Opening. Ever. I don’t think I’ve ever been laughing so hard when the LOST whirs toward me on the black screen.
• Did anyone else notice that Hurley lost one of his carry-ons partway through his race to the terminal? He had a black and blue bag with him, and by the time he’s running to the man on the scooter he’s lost the blue one. (And he didn’t check it, because he still has it after the check-in.)
• I asked in the previous guide when it was that Jack officially hated Locke, and now I think it’s this ep, where he says that Boone’s death was a sacrifice the island demanded. For Jack, that would be where Locke’s obsessions officially became looney-tunes.
• I love how they contrast Locke the warrior with Locke the disabled man who needs to be carried onto the plane. His humiliation is so palpable there. But one question: if they don’t have the chair on the plane that can move him about… does he really have to last a 15-hour flight without going to the bathroom once? Now THERE is agony. No wonder he thought the plane crash was a salvation…
Things that have new meaning:
• I talk about this in my book, but it’s worth reiterating here: I’m intrigued by the focus on Aaron’s eye at the beginning of this episode. If the episode that follows is usually from the perspective of the person whose eye is featured in the beginning, then it would stand to reason that what we see in the episode is from his perspective. It’s always been this one detail that’s made me think he’s more important than we might think, and I was surprised when he didn’t return to the island with Kate. You’d think he’d be the one person the island would want back. But it could be a Charlotte thing, where he spends his life trying to get back there or something. (Can you tell I cannot WAIT until season 6???)
• I’ve never understood how Sawyer knew the Black Rock had sailed from Portsmouth, England in S5 when he’s talking to Horace, but now I see it says PORTSMOUTH in giant letters on the hull. Strange, then, that Locke immediately assumes Mozambique. Perhaps it originated from Portsmouth by way of Africa?
• There’s a lot of fate and destiny talk in this ep, and not just between Jack and Locke. Michael tells his mom (who, incidentally, WILL be the person to take him when they return) that Walt wasn’t supposed to be his, that this wasn’t part of the plan. Weird that a man so hell-bent on getting his kid back 8 years ago has changed his mind so much, but I guess the poor guy had given up when his EVIL ex-wife had made it near impossible for him to ever see him again (that and her evil pep-talk at the hospital where she said he was just doing this for himself… grr, I hate her). Sun believes in fate; Claire doesn’t.
• Hurley’s prediction of what’s in the hatch wasn’t actually far-off – there were probably TV dinners in there somewhere, and while there wasn’t a ton of TVs in this hatch, they were in the Pearl. But it definitely had a 1950s vibe to it (and 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s).
• Locke says that he believes hope is inside the hatch; yet after it’s opened, he slowly loses his hope on the island.
• Locke’s speech is integral to this entire series (it was used by theblackbox in the Destiny season 6 prep video):
LOCKE: Me, well, I'm a man of faith. Do you really think all this is an accident -- that we, a group of strangers survived, many of us with just superficial injuries? Do you think we crashed on this place by coincidence -- especially, this place? We were brought here for a purpose, for a reason, all of us. Each one of us was brought here for a reason.
JACK: Brought here? And who brought us here, John?
LOCKE: The Island. The Island brought us here. This is no ordinary place, you've seen that, I know you have. But the Island chose you, too, Jack. It's destiny.
JACK: Did you talk with Boone about destiny, John?
LOCKE: Boone was a sacrifice that the Island demanded. What happened to him at that plane was a part of a chain of events that led us here -- that led us down a path -- that led you and me to this day, to right now.
JACK: And where does that path end, John?
LOCKE: The path ends at the Hatch. The Hatch, Jack -- all of it -- all of it happened so that we could open the Hatch.
JACK: No, no, we're opening the Hatch so that we can survive.
LOCKE: Survival is all relative, Jack.
JACK: I don't believe in destiny.
LOCKE: Yes, you do. You just don't know it yet.
• OK, so Locke was wrong about the path ending at the hatch (maybe… season 5 ALSO ended at the hatch, so…) but he’s right about Jack believing in destiny, just not knowing it yet. By season 5, he believes in it completely.
• Sawyer muttering, “I ain’t no hero” to Michael certainly sounds ironic from a season 5 perspective. Also, you can see that he always had it in him right from the start, from jumping in the water to get the rudder to pulling out the gun to try to save Walt.
• Sitting by the hatch in the bushes, Jack asks Kate if she has his back, and she says yes. Fastforward to season 5, where they’re sitting by the hatch in the bushes, and Jack asks Kate if she’ll have his back, and she says yes.
