"This Place Is Death"

JANUARY 7, 2011

FOCUS: JIN, SUN
EPISODE: 5.5
AIRED: FEBRUARY 11, 2009

Yay, Charlotte’s dead! Of all the main characters, I am pretty sure she is my least favorite – she was cold, uninteresting, and just downright unpleasant most of the time, with a ludicrous (and error-filled) back-story to boot. But her death in “This Place Is Death” serves two purposes; in addition to amusing me, it also raises the stakes on the time travel shit – you can DIE from this crap (just like the ratings! Hey-o!). A common problem with any continuing narrative is making sure that the audience understands how dangerous something is, and we usually just have to take their word for it. Not on Lost! Cast members are barely safer than the average extra.

Or should that be "safer than John Locke’s leg"? For what seems like the 59th time on this show, he falls and hurts his leg again (for a magical healing island that he supposedly has been “chosen” by, it sure injures him a hell of a lot). The first time, it was like “Oh no!”, because a. we still liked Locke and b. didn’t want him to have to be crippled again. But they’ve gone to that well (heh) too many times now, and he’s no longer as sympathetic anyway.

This scene is pretty interesting in retrospect, because Christian (who if I am remembering correctly is the Man in Black/smoke monster at this point, right?) won’t help him walk, when we now know that this being allows Locke to “live” again when he takes his place. The “Locke as smoke monster” shit really annoyed me, but at least there seems to be some evidence that it wasn’t something they pulled out of their ass during season 6.

Speaking of inconsistencies, nothing we see of Danielle’s past matches up with what she has related in the present day, but I guess she didn’t want to tell Sayid or whoever about the Asian guy who would disappear at random (don’t forget – according to Daniel, everything that happened, happened! Jin has ALWAYS met Danielle before she had her baby!). Jin’s plan to “prove” he’s dead also makes little sense – wouldn’t his word be enough for her? He’d have to pry the wedding ring off his dead hand (not to mention bury him without it – harsh) to make it so? And Jin knows Locke isn’t a fan of this plan – he could just as easily use it as proof he was alive (which is exactly what Ben does).

Also, since when does Jin not want to save his friends? He’s risked his life on several occasions to help Michael, Sawyer, etc – if Locke is telling him it’s the only way to keep all of them from getting hurt/killed, why doesn’t he trust him? Guess it’s because it’s only the 2nd time these two have ever spoken. On that note, his reunion with Sawyer is pretty sweet – good bro-hugging and genuine emotion all around! I also loved Ben freaking out on Jack and Sun for talking about wanting to kill him right in front of him – they have a point, but so does he – he HAS been quite protective of the Oceanic Six (he let them leave in the first place, for starters). Makes up for the sad moment where Sayid tells Jack to fuck off – they had been strong allies almost from the first episode, so this bummed me out. Then again, Sayid’s character is completely ruined from the moment he gets on the Ajira plane anyway, so I guess it doesn’t matter.

And can we get a break on the fucking Geronimo Jackson references? It's the dumbest running gag in entertainment history.

Tomorrow – Jack and Kate play Blue Valentine!

Where are we?