It's funny: Damon and Carlton on their latest podcast said this episode would serve as a breather, a chance for some laughs, right before things got really serious on the road to the Finale. Well... somehow despite focussing on a character with father issues (on LOST? NO FRAKKIN WAY!) who can talk to the dead the show did indeed deliver on a couple chuckles. It's an odd choice to make Miles' centric the humorous one of the season... I wonder if his episode was a part of the strike shortended Season 4 as planned how his backstory would've been told. EVERYONE having daddy issues or mommy issues) is getting tiring but it gave us a chance to see Miles soften up and better get to know Candle/Waxman/Pierre Chang.
*So... the hatch is being built yet it's already doing it's thing, causing someone's filling to dislodge and kill it's owner from the inside out. Hate to say but I think that would've made an interesting visual if we got to see it. But what does this mean: is the crazy magnetism of the Swan already in full effect? Does it just get worse when the hatch is built over it?
*Still not quite sure what to make of Jack... he seems to really just be hanging around for the sake of hanging around.
*I think the crazy would-be kidnappers were just Ben's people. Shame they cost Miles that fish taco. I love fish tacos.
*Now after finally getting the Miles episode, is anyone disappointed? I mean, I thought we'd get a lot more. I would've had him wander around the Island just talking to dead people, just filling the whole episode with cameos by former cast members. Maybe throw a twist in at the end with some spectacular reveal from a dead corpse. I mean imagine if he hung around the Caves and listened to Adam and Eve or went to the Black Rock. There's tons of stuff that could've been revealed here. I'm not going to call it a lost opportunity because these moments could still come. But with fewer and fewer episodes left it'll probably just be random moments.
*Next week: CLIP SHOW! They teased it'll be done in a way we've never seen before which usually means it'll be painful to watch.
*Two weeks from now: "The Variable" apparently starring Farraday.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Wednesday, April 1, 2009
5x11, "Whatever Happened, Happened"
And now:
YOUR reigning, defending, undisputed champion of worst LOST line ever is....
"He will forget this ever happened and his innocence will be gone."
I think they could've just gone with, "Oh, the Temple healed Ben, but then he became embittered by Sayid betraying him and turned evil and he kept quiet in Season 2 about having ever met Sayid in his own past just to fuck with him even more."
I mean I feel like we've dealt with equally annoying bullshit before.
Instead, the writers knew they'd backed themselves into a corner and turned The Temple into a two-in-one plot device/deus ex machina that not only raises you from the dead but erases your memory, too.
There's a reason that soap operas are always made fun of for using amnesia storylines: it's easy and a cop-out. LOST typically doesn't go the easy route so why go there now?
What else has been (or *will be*) conveniently forgotten in the history of the show? The mind reels at the possibilities...
What annoys me the most though is how they're saying Ben was given his diabolical personality by having his "innocence" (WHAT?) removed, as if he just couldn't become a dick the regular way: by being born one. Benjamin Lynus has been one of the most fascinating villains in television history because you almost couldn't believe how consistently manipulative and self-serving he always acted. Yet you could because you've met people like that or people who could've become like that if certain paths had been followed, certain choices made. Again, it just feels like another cop-out.
*Meanwhile...
Kate thinks abandoning Aaron to his grandmother after telling him she was only stepping out for a bit is OK? I mean how fucked up will Aaron be when he grows up?
I can almost accept her seeing Aaron walk away so easily with someone who sort of, kind of looks like Claire as the moment when she realizes she'll never be his mother. But it's just not that strong enough a moment for me to buy. After seeing her broken on Jack's bed I thought something tragic must have happened, maybe Widmore or Ben blackmailed her, maybe she saw the ghost of Claire.
And the Cassidy/Kate storyline really needed more time. I can't believe it was compressed into this one episode. Easily could've been two or even three.
*Overall, a second disappointing episode. I think the season is careening headlong toward the season finale with plot development taking precedence over character development. I also think a very scary ending is being set up when amnesia and turning evil can get so easily exported out of The Temple.
YOUR reigning, defending, undisputed champion of worst LOST line ever is....
"He will forget this ever happened and his innocence will be gone."
I think they could've just gone with, "Oh, the Temple healed Ben, but then he became embittered by Sayid betraying him and turned evil and he kept quiet in Season 2 about having ever met Sayid in his own past just to fuck with him even more."
I mean I feel like we've dealt with equally annoying bullshit before.
Instead, the writers knew they'd backed themselves into a corner and turned The Temple into a two-in-one plot device/deus ex machina that not only raises you from the dead but erases your memory, too.
There's a reason that soap operas are always made fun of for using amnesia storylines: it's easy and a cop-out. LOST typically doesn't go the easy route so why go there now?
What else has been (or *will be*) conveniently forgotten in the history of the show? The mind reels at the possibilities...
What annoys me the most though is how they're saying Ben was given his diabolical personality by having his "innocence" (WHAT?) removed, as if he just couldn't become a dick the regular way: by being born one. Benjamin Lynus has been one of the most fascinating villains in television history because you almost couldn't believe how consistently manipulative and self-serving he always acted. Yet you could because you've met people like that or people who could've become like that if certain paths had been followed, certain choices made. Again, it just feels like another cop-out.
*Meanwhile...
Kate thinks abandoning Aaron to his grandmother after telling him she was only stepping out for a bit is OK? I mean how fucked up will Aaron be when he grows up?
I can almost accept her seeing Aaron walk away so easily with someone who sort of, kind of looks like Claire as the moment when she realizes she'll never be his mother. But it's just not that strong enough a moment for me to buy. After seeing her broken on Jack's bed I thought something tragic must have happened, maybe Widmore or Ben blackmailed her, maybe she saw the ghost of Claire.
And the Cassidy/Kate storyline really needed more time. I can't believe it was compressed into this one episode. Easily could've been two or even three.
*Overall, a second disappointing episode. I think the season is careening headlong toward the season finale with plot development taking precedence over character development. I also think a very scary ending is being set up when amnesia and turning evil can get so easily exported out of The Temple.
5x10, "He's Our You"
We're staring in the face of two scary possibilities:
-Ben Linus is dead thus changing the history of the Island. The Purge likely never happened and the DHARMA Initiative was never destroyed. It makes sense now that DHARMA signs were still hanging up in Othersville in 2007 because they were never taken down by The Others. Yet: why was Ben still alive in 2007 when Sun and Lapidus left him?
-Ben Linus will be risen from the dead by the island, Locke and Christian style. OK... I can accept the resurrection of Locke but you'd think that if Ben had been shot in the chest by Sayid as a twelve year-old and then rose from the dead later he would've said something about it at some point along the way. In true LOST fashion, Ben could just go, "Oh I couldn't tell you because then it would change the past," but that just feels like a deus ex machina than a well executed plan.
Both of these options are really bizarre, yet I think they've been preparing us for this moment all along by repeatedly stating the past can not be changed. I've been thinking they've been meaning to say that, "You can't change the past unless you were always meant to change the past." This would now be the case if Ben is dead and DHARMA un-purged. But I think it'll end up being the latter, with his resurrection serving for Ben as evidence of The Island's power the same way Locke regaining the ability to walk did.
*I expected a far more dramatic parting of ways between Ben and Sayid. We've seen Sayid act toward Hurley as if Ben did or said something that convinced him definitely of Ben's duplicity. So how could Sayid really just have let Ben go after killing all those people for him? You'd think Sayid should've asked why they just don't go after Widmore himself then. How could he have just accepted, "Ok, we're done here" as the end of his killing spree?
Overall, I thought this was the weakest episode of the season. It didn't really break new ground so much as remind us that what Sayid was capable of. Even with all that, I still didn't think he'd pull the trigger on a twelve-year old so the episode managed to plant enough doubt about Sayid's killer instincts. I think I just expected a lot more out of an episode that was supposed to fill in the blanks of Sayid's backstory. It did that, just not in any particularly memorable way.
-Ben Linus is dead thus changing the history of the Island. The Purge likely never happened and the DHARMA Initiative was never destroyed. It makes sense now that DHARMA signs were still hanging up in Othersville in 2007 because they were never taken down by The Others. Yet: why was Ben still alive in 2007 when Sun and Lapidus left him?
-Ben Linus will be risen from the dead by the island, Locke and Christian style. OK... I can accept the resurrection of Locke but you'd think that if Ben had been shot in the chest by Sayid as a twelve year-old and then rose from the dead later he would've said something about it at some point along the way. In true LOST fashion, Ben could just go, "Oh I couldn't tell you because then it would change the past," but that just feels like a deus ex machina than a well executed plan.
Both of these options are really bizarre, yet I think they've been preparing us for this moment all along by repeatedly stating the past can not be changed. I've been thinking they've been meaning to say that, "You can't change the past unless you were always meant to change the past." This would now be the case if Ben is dead and DHARMA un-purged. But I think it'll end up being the latter, with his resurrection serving for Ben as evidence of The Island's power the same way Locke regaining the ability to walk did.
*I expected a far more dramatic parting of ways between Ben and Sayid. We've seen Sayid act toward Hurley as if Ben did or said something that convinced him definitely of Ben's duplicity. So how could Sayid really just have let Ben go after killing all those people for him? You'd think Sayid should've asked why they just don't go after Widmore himself then. How could he have just accepted, "Ok, we're done here" as the end of his killing spree?
Overall, I thought this was the weakest episode of the season. It didn't really break new ground so much as remind us that what Sayid was capable of. Even with all that, I still didn't think he'd pull the trigger on a twelve-year old so the episode managed to plant enough doubt about Sayid's killer instincts. I think I just expected a lot more out of an episode that was supposed to fill in the blanks of Sayid's backstory. It did that, just not in any particularly memorable way.
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