4.13/14 There's No Place Like Home, Parts 2 & 3

Follow along! The GARGANTUAN episode guide for “There’s No Place Like Home, Parts 2 & 3” is in Finding Lost — Season 4, pp. 170-195.

I remember when I first watched this finale. I thought it was amazing. Not season 3 finale amazing, but amazing nonetheless. Now, going back to rewatch it after season 5, I love it even more than I did the first few times I saw it. What great stuff we have here!

Fun things I noticed:
• With “Enter 77” so fresh in my mind, I noticed the C-4 set-up on the boat is very much the same as the one in the Flame station. Is it possible Widmore is the one who rigged the Flame many years ago the same way he’s now insisting on them rigging the freighter?
• Seriously. DO NOT try to attack this badass Iraqi. Watching Sayid kick Keamy’s ass in this episode was as much fun as watching Jin go after Mikhail in season 3. I’d love to see the two of them pitted together in a steel cage match: “Jinja versus the Wacky Iraqi!” Ooh, Vince McMahon could make a mint, I tells ya.
• Walt asks Hurley why they didn’t come to see him. Obvious answer: Because you CHANGED YOUR NAME and were in hiding. Even if we’d WANTED to find you, there’s no way we could, Dude.
• SUCH a fantastic scene between Locke and Jack. So amazing. Note to Patrick or anyone making those videos: Parse together the scene where Locke pulls Jack up off the cliff in season 1 and Jack hangs on Locke’s every word, then the big “Do you really think this is all an accident?” scene from the finale, then one of the great Destiny vs. Free Will arguments that Jack and Locke have in season 2, then the showdown in this episode, then Jack pulling the trigger against Locke’s head, and then Jack talking to Locke’s corpse as he changes his shows in “316.” Let’s string ‘em all together. I’m DYING to see one more scene with these two… with Locke as the Man in Black facing off against Jack, the guy who now has faith.
• Rose: I’m gonna keep my eye on your, Shorty. Ha!
• You know, I’ve never been in a plane crash, but *I* would be nervous around that open helicopter doorway, and yet everyone seems extremely calm to be taking off in a helicopter. Strange, since the last time they were in a flying apparatus it was hurtling toward the earth.
• Oops: Didn’t notice this for my book (dammit) but when Sawyer leans in to kiss Kate, he tilts his head to the left. When the camera moves behind his head, it’s tilted to the right. And then back to the left when shown from behind Kate’s head.
• Sayid tells Hurley, “They say it was suicide,” referring to Locke. Who’s “they”?
• Honestly… I’ll never forgive Jin for staying with Michael. What kind of husband/father DOES that, just abandons his wife and child to the deck of the freighter to be a good buddy to Michael? I understand the symbolism (everything comes around… this was the guy who he’d punched because of a watch and who caused him to wear a handcuff for weeks and now they’re all good and all that) but it’s just… ridiculous. Desmond wastes no time in racing off, and Penny’s not actually STANDING ON THE DECK the way Sun is.
• In Season 3 Desmond uses CPR to save Claire, and now Claire’s brother saves him.
• “Gouge Away” by The Pixies. I’ve had my issues with Jack, but I adore his taste in music.

Things that have new meaning:
• I STILL don’t buy that Bentham crap that was strung out throughout this episode. I’ve ranted too much about that so far, though, and don’t really want to go on about it again. But after “The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham,” where he barely even mentioned the name, and when he did he never insisted on anyone calling him that, I doubt they’d all be calling him Bentham in this episode. Thank goodness for Hurley asking Sayid why he’s calling him that…
• Ben thanks Richard for helping him, and Richard says flatly, “My pleasure.” But his tone would indicate it’s anything but. His immense doubts about Ben are already in place, and his sights are set on Locke.
• Did you notice the liquid nitrogen tank that Michael’s pulling has the date “1977” on it? Interesting that it’s got THAT year of all years on it as the UN registry date.
• Miles knows all about Charlotte: since we now know he’s right, is this proof that he has been talking to the Dharma Initiative dead? How would he know that?
• Locke and Ben go down into the Orchid station: The level that they descend to, where Locke watches the video and Ben blows it all up, do we assume that’s the same long pathway that we see still under construction at the beginning of season 5? They do a sonogram of the wall and find the FDW, and yet Ben goes down a long tunnel, then descends down a staircase and finds the FDW… yet in “Because You Left,” the construction worker says the FDW is 15-16 feet inside the rock wall, not a hundred meters away. Is it possible they were digging in a different spot?
• Here’s another question: If the people were evacuated in 1977 in “The Incident,” then who stayed behind to finish the construction on the Orchid?
• Ben’s apology to Locke seems sincere, and even bigger than it should have at this point. Is it possible Ben can already see into the future and knows what he’s going to do to Locke later?
• There’s definitely some significance to that kerosene lamp. It’s like it’s a way of bringing Jacob’s spirit into a place.
• I remember at the time wondering why they didn’t just leave Aaron with Desmond and Penny (stable couple who would take care of him and get him to civilization much quicker, and would keep him away from the glaring media spotlight and make it so Kate doesn’t have to create a big story) but in “The Lie” we’ll see that she’s already immensely connected to Kate shortly after getting onto Penny’s boat.
• Pretty much everything Jack tells Ben that Locke told him… Locke never actually told him.
• In this final scene we get the proof that Jack talked to Locke a full month before seeing him in the coffin, yet Locke killed himself only a few days after talking to him. I find it strange that the corpse didn’t decompose at all. Something’s up with that.

And that completes season 4!!! We're almost there, everyone! Make sure you pick up the season 5 disks this week, on DVD or blu-ray, and you can get a copy of my season 5 book here. More words on this season than any other one previous to it!!! You can't go wrong. :)

Tune in tomorrow for my rundown of season 4!

4.12 There's No Place Like Home, Part 1

Follow along! The episode guide for “There’s No Place Like Home, Part 1” is in Finding Lost — Season 4, pp. 159-170.

The beginning of the three-part ender, where we see what really happened when the Oceanic 6 first returned to civilization. So much to love in this episode!

Fun things I noticed:
• I ♥♥♥ Carmen Reyes. That scene of her running to hug Hurley and then Sayid is just… sigh. I ♥ her.
• This episode once again raised the question about Sayid’s parents: Are they dead? Or are they just hard-hearted? Kate seems completely alone at the airport, while Sayid is enveloped by the Reyes family, but no one shows up for him, either. We know what a hard person his father was, but what about his mother?
• Does anyone else find it strange that Juliet knew all about the Looking-Glass station – even though Mikhail and everyone else were surprised to discover it existed – but she didn’t know about the Orchid? Maybe it’s the toppermost of the top-secret places on the island.
• Sawyer: “You don’t get to die alone.” That still makes me laugh out loud.
• There’s a LOT more on the DVD than was shown in the original TV version of the episode: we see new questions from the reporters, Sayid is asked a question, Jack’s father is brought up by another one. I’m surprised in all the extra footage there’s no reaction shot of Sun’s parents when she leans forward and speaks English for the first time. You’d think they both would have fallen out of their chairs in shock.
• Why didn’t a doctor ever notice that Sun had conceived the baby post-crash? An ultrasound can usually figure out the date of conception to the exact day, give or take a day or two. You don’t think they would have noticed that the baby had been conceived a month and a half AFTER her husband had supposedly died?
• I still remember being on the edge of my seat in that final week between this ep and the finale: we know the O6 will be leaving together, yet at the end of this episode Kate and Sayid are with the Others, Hurley’s with Locke, Sun and Aaron are on the freighter with Desmond, Jack is with Sawyer, and Ben has been taken by Keamy. How will they EVER get back together to get off the island?! ;)

Things that have new meaning:
• I love the disgust with which Ben tells Hurley those crackers are 15 years old. In light of S5, those crackers are still a mystery. Is it possible they’re actually not old at all, but somehow time-jumped? Wouldn’t you love it if at the beginning of S6 they’re all back in 2007 and Miles says to Hurley, “You’re the one who wanted to rewrite Empire” and Hurley says, “Dude, that was THIRTY YEARS AGO. Let it go.”
• Who could Ben have been communicating with? Jacob doesn’t seem to be an option anymore in light of S5. Could it have been Richard? Someone suggested on my site that he could have been communicating with an earlier version of himself (and then when I posted that suggestion over on DocArzt, I was told that was one of the stupidest things ever suggested in the Lostverse… but I’m not sure it should be dismissed so summarily).
• There’s Alpert in ratty clothes again! I forgot we saw him dressed like that in this episode. By S5, he’s completely well put-together (always in a dress shirt with the sleeves up) but here he’s not. In case you weren’t watching Lost at the time, the reason Alpert suddenly begins showing up at the end of S4 rather than being a large part of the entire season is because he’d moved over to another series, Cane, which was on CBS, and CBS refused to let him do guest spots for ABC. Then Cane was cancelled and he was free to come back. Whew.
• What if the Temple allows you to see the future? Is it possible that when Ben was taken there and “lost his innocence” as a boy, that it allowed him to see across time, and so that’s how he always knows what’s going to happen? That’s why Alex’s death might have been a surprise to him (it wasn’t in what he’d seen) and why he could march right up to Keamy and know he’ll be just fine.

Lost Season 5 DVD Out Today!

Hey all: The Lost Season 5 DVD and blu-ray are both being released today, and since we're launching into season 5 next week, it's probably a good time to grab a copy! There are deals all over the place today. Come over to the Nik at Nite blog for more of a rundown (and some cool hieroglyphs that were also released from Buena Vista today!)

4.11 Cabin Fever

Follow along! The episode guide for “Cabin Fever” is in Finding Lost — Season 4, pp. 141-154.

Awesome Locke flashback, and it also contains many of the seeds for S5, bringing in Richard Alpert as a far more significant character, and tying together a storyline that will come later.

Fun things I noticed:
• When Emily leans down to put on the record at the very beginning, you can see her stomach. That girl is NOT 6 months pregnant. But then again, if they can pass off that Kate was 6 months pregnant when the plane crashed, I guess this could pass, too, in the fantasy pregnancy world of Lost. ;) In this wonderful world women don’t look pregnant until their 8th month, and two hours after the baby is born they’re skipping through the sand wearing skinny pants. Ah, bliss.
• I LOVE the scene where everyone is arguing about who is following whom (and Hurley’s, “Oh this is AWESOME” retort) but when they separate from Sawyer’s group, Ben specifically said, “Follow me.” So I have to go with Hurley and Locke on this one.
• Horace has the same hair from “Man Behind the Curtain” and not that longer, bigger version he has in S5. I wonder why they went so huge in the later season?
• Did anyone else watch Journeyman and become as upset as I did when they cancelled it? Young John played Dan’s son on the show.
• “Destiny, John, is a fickle BITCH” is still one of my all-time fave taglines for the show.
• Ben and Hurley sharing the AstroBar is still an awesome, awesome scene. It made me remember Annie handing Ben the Astro Bar and I wonder now if he sits on that log and takes a bite and it reminds him of his childhood and everything he’s lost?

Things that have new meaning:
• Ben says, “I used to have dreams.” Could they have stopped after he was taken to the Temple?
• When would Horace and “the Missus” (who we would now presume is Amy, and not Olivia as previously thought) have had time to head out to the cabin? Here he comes off as more of an underling, but in season 5 he’s running the whole show.
• Richard Alpert looking at baby Locke in the incubator and smiling makes SO much more sense now that we know Locke told him in 1954 to seek him out in 1956. I LOVE continuity like this!!
• RA says to young John, “What belongs to you already.” Since he’s already seen John walking around in 1954, that question makes more sense. He saw him with the compass, he mentioned the beach, and he had a knife in his pants, so one would presume that young John chose correctly. However, he also mentioned Jacob, so I’m thinking the Book of Laws would be something that would belong to Jacobites (and remember Eko telling John that the Old Testament is the Book of Law, and handing it to him? Technically that already belongs to him). But the knife still seems like the right choice to me. This is one thing I DO expect to have explained in S6.
• So… who WAS in charge when they wiped out the DI? Ben says it wasn’t him. Eloise and Widmore would have already left the island at that point (it would have been in 1992). Was Alpert in charge temporarily until he could find a real leader?
• Abaddon says he experienced a miracle. What was it?
• Abaddon tells John that when they run into each other next, John will owe him one. They run into each other next when Abaddon is ferrying John around. What does John owe him, and does Abaddon ever ask for the repayment? Now I sort of wish we’d seen Abaddon saying, “You owe me one.”
• If Christian is a manifestation of the Man in Black, that moment of John Locke saying he’s here because he was chosen and the MiB smiling seems even more sinister, like he’s patting the head of a silly toddler and saying, “Oh… you are… RIGHT. YES. Carrots ARE candy. You go right ahead and eat those candy carrots. (snicker)” It’s almost as if the MiB needs to inhabit the body of a true disciple, and they discover JL really is that disciple here.

**Just a quick note that next week is the end of Season 4, so make sure you've got your copies of season 5 of Finding Lost before we begin the Season 5 rewatch (and get your S5 copies on DVD!) ;)

4.10 Something Nice Back Home

Follow along! The episode guide for “Something Nice Back Home” is in Finding Lost — Season 4, pp. 121-131.

Another great episode (season 4, for the most part, was simply fantastic). This contains the not-so-big mystery about what Kate had been doing behind Jack’s back that we discover in S5 (which I’m still baffled about), and the beginning of Jack’s downfall.

Fun things I noticed:
• Presumably it wasn’t just Sun who got the big Oceanic settlement, but all of them. So why is Jack working all these crazy hours when he’s probably a millionaire? We can probably assume Sun got twice what the others got (she would have received compensation for Jin as well as herself) but the others would have walked away with a lot of money. I’m assuming it’s just Jack’s nature: no matter how much money he’s got, he’ll still be trying to fix things.
• There’s a strange juxtaposition of Jack asking Kate to marry him right after Hurley tells him they’re living in Heaven… it’s almost as if he’s testing the theory. He sits outside the mental institution, staring at where Charlie visits Hurley, and then he offers her a ring, as if her saying “yes” might actually uphold what Hurley’s saying. Is he already starting to listen to the big guy?
• Sawyer finds Aaron in a tree, in the same spot where Danielle always put her trap dolls. Is Aaron a trap in some way? By grabbing him out of that tree, is the trap that eventually, down the road, it’ll bring them back to the island?

Things that have new meaning:
• Again, something I pointed out at the time, but notice that Jack takes the battery out of the smoke detector, so when “Smokey” appears in the form of Christian, it can’t be detected. (And I also pointed out how unlikely that a large hospital would have a tiny smoke detector and not a state-of-the-art fire prevention system, but let’s ignore that for now.)
• And… again. One more time I’ll say it: I don’t understand why Kate lied to Jack. Here she says that Sawyer wouldn’t have wanted her to tell him the truth… why? Why would Sawyer have expected her to lie? That makes zero sense. Just tell him the woman’s name is Cassidy (not Noreen) and that she was actually Sawyer’s lover and they have a child together. Would that make Jack jealous? Perhaps, but maybe knowing there was another woman out there with one significant tie to Sawyer might have made things better, not worse.

4.09 The Shape of Things to Come

Follow along! The episode guide for “The Shape of Things to Come” is in Finding Lost — Season 4, pp. 107-117.

Amazing, amazing episode… this one is up there with “The Constant” as tops for season 4. This is the first time we see the big rivalry between Ben and Widmore, and it’s a signal for the shape of things to come in season 5.

Fun things I noticed:
• Widmore is staying in the penthouse suite, and Tom was staying at the penthouse suite at the Hotel Earle. Something about being on top, I guess…
• Oh that ENDING!!! It never fails to send chills down my spine.

Things that have new meaning:
• In “The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham” Locke lands in the desert and Widmore has cameras everywhere, and the Bedouin eventually arrive via car. In this one there are no cameras, and yet the Bedouin arrive immediately, on horse. Was the site already being monitored somehow? Why did it take longer for them to arrive for Locke?
• So is Ben lying about Ishmael? Did he really kill Nadia or did Ben just use that image to recruit Sayid?
• I pointed this out in S4, but notice the line when Miles is sitting at the kitchen table and Claire wanders in saying “I’m OK, I’ll live.” Miles glances at her and says, “I wouldn’t be too sure of that.” Is that an indication that he knows she’s not quite alive? What does he mean by that?
• Let’s look at that final scene again:

BEN: Wake up, Charles.
[Charles Widmore pulls on a bedside lamp.]
WIDMORE: I wondered when you were gonna show up. I see you've been getting more sun.
BEN: Iraq is lovely this time of year. When did you start sleeping with a bottle of scotch by the bed?
WIDMORE: When the nightmares started.
[Widmore pulls back the covers and pours himself a glass of MacCutcheon.]
WIDMORE: Have you come here to kill me, Benjamin?
[Widmore sips the whiskey.]
BEN: We both know I can't do that.
WIDMORE: Then why are you here?
BEN: I'm here, Charles, because you murdered my daughter.
WIDMORE: Don't stand there, looking at me with those horrible eyes of yours and lay the blame for the death of that poor girl on me, when we both know very well I didn't murder her at all, Benjamin. You did.
BEN: No, that's not true.
WIDMORE: Yes, Benjamin, it is. You creep into my bedroom in the dead of night--like a rat--and have the audacity to pretend that you're the victim?
[Widmore leans forward.]
WIDMORE: I know who you are, boy. What you are. I know that everything you have you took from me. So... Once again I ask you: Why are you here?
BEN: I'm here, Charles, to tell you that I'm going to kill your daughter. Penelope, is it? And once she's gone... once she's dead... then you'll understand how I feel. And you'll wish you hadn't changed the rules.
[Widmore shifts in his bed.]
WIDMORE: You'll never find her.
[Ben turns to leave.]
WIDMORE: That island's mine, Benjamin. It always was. It will be again.
BEN: (Turning) But you'll never find it.
WIDMORE: Then I suppose the hunt is on for both of us.
BEN: I suppose it is. Sleep tight, Charles.
[Ben leaves, pulling the door shut behind him.]

• There’s just SO much there for S5. Widmore says I know WHAT you are, as if he’s referring to Ben becoming some sort of “thing” after visiting the Temple. He refers to him as “boy” and we think of 40-year-old Widmore visiting young Ben in the tent. He tells Ben that he’s responsible for the death of his own daughter and in “Dead Is Dead,” Ben takes that responsibility. Ben says he’s going to kill Penny and that leads to him confronting her on the dock. SO much of season 5 is sparked by what happens in this scene. Which means this might be the most perfectly titled episode of Lost yet.

4.08 Meet Kevin Johnson

Follow along! The episode guide for “Meet Kevin Johnson” is in Finding Lost — Season 4, pp. 94-103.

I said it in my book and it bears repeating: while all of the characters have found themselves pushed to the limits, no one has been abused more than Michael. His time on the island was hell, spent trying to get his son to listen to him, and when they FINALLY bonded the kid was taken from him, forcing Michael to become a monster he could never forgive. Now the poor guy has hit an all-time low and the island won’t even let him off himself. Worst life ever. I know a lot of fans hated Michael for what he did, but I could just never bring myself to feel hatred for the poor guy. I can’t help but think of younger Michael, so in love with his baby son and having him taken away from him. The guy never recovered from that blow, he’d never done anything terrible in his life to that point, and he’s had nothing but misery ever since.

Fun things I noticed:
• I’ve always been annoyed by that scene at the beginning where the Lost writers reveal a ton o’ freakin’ obvious: The freighter folk are here for Ben. Yeah, we knew that. Oh yeah? Well.. my man on the boat is MICHAEL. Um, yeah. Figured that out, too. You mean the Michael who shot and killed two people and then put us all in danger and left us, THAT MICHAEL? Yes, Sawyer, thank you for narrating for the viewers at home who’d fallen asleep during season 2. Sheesh.
• I still wonder if the timing is off on this? Michael’s mom says he was gone for over 2 months, which means if they disappeared September 22, let’s assume he got back around Dec 1. When he visits her the Christmas decorations are up already, so it must be mid-December or slightly earlier. But if he returned on December 1 he somehow lost Walt, fell into a depression and moved to the brink of suicide (exceedingly fast, since it would normally take a much longer time for that to happen), got into a car accident, was all banged up, HEALED, and got back to his mother’s, ALL… in just over a week. Then he goes to get the gun, can’t kill himself, sees the thing on Oceanic on the news, is on the freighter instantly and next to the island, all within another week.
• I love how Tom asks him if he’s got the time… after he’d just pawned the watch. Did Tom maybe go to the pawn shop and reclaim it?
• I know I mentioned earlier that I only saw one helicopter on the freighter and someone else said no, in this episode you clearly see two… but I still only see one. But there are definitely two copter pads in this ep.
• In case you weren’t watching S4 when it first aired, it was after this episode that the show went on hiatus due to the Writer’s Strike.
• Did anyone else notice that on the DVDs, there are 3 eps on the first disk, 4 on each of the next two and 3 on the last one, which is exactly how we've been watching them?? That was completely by coincidence!

Things that have new meaning:
• Now that we know Rousseau will be dead by the end of this episode, and having so recently watched her first encounter with Sayid in “Solitary,” I’m more saddened by the fact that we never really got any reunion scenes between her and Alex. Yes, there was the touching one where she touches Alex’s face and they realize they’re mother and daughter, but back at Chez Ben they’re just acting nonchalant and hanging out, not acting like this is a recently life-changing experience (much like Hurley and Claire are back to life as usual about 12 hours after finding out Charlie was dead).
• Seeing Rousseau die at the end of this episode is more sad now that we’ve seen the younger version of her come to the island and we know how lovely she was before she went mad. :(