"What Kate Does"

JANUARY 21, 2011

FOCUS: KATE
EPISODE: 6.3
AIRED: FEBRUARY 9, 2010

While it still has too much Lennon and Dogen for my tastes (ANY Lennon and Dogen is too much for my tastes, admittedly), "What Kate Does" is an improvement over the 2nd half of "LAX", proving once again that the show works better when focusing on a character on and off the island and working in the other folks as necessary. And, as anyone who has read this site for the whole run knows by now, focusing on Kate is always a good thing for me (she also ties Jack's record for centric episodes with this one, by my count).

When I started I said I would try to look at her role more objectively, to see if I could agree with the many folks who hated her - and I still don't get it. I fail to see how she's somehow an "annoying" character; she's tough, her "gray area" that a lot of the characters possess is fairly compelling, and she's one of the few who can be counted on to protect her fellow castaways, even the ones she's not particularly close to. Hell she even helped rescue BEN in Season 4 - that's a heroic act! And she gets a great "Flash Sideways" story here, realizing that Claire was pregnant and risking getting caught by going back to the airport area to help her. Yeah, what a jerk. Her breakdown after realizing Sawyer's misery is partly her fault is also quite moving, and Ms. Lilly really makes you feel the weight of everything that's happened to her over the past few years.

The episode also opens up more of the mystery of the sideways world, when Ethan appears at Claire's hospital. The hardest thing for me to wrap my head around was that everything from 1977 on would have been different, not just from the moment that their plane would have crashed, so at first (ironically) I was thinking "Well this can't be real, he should be on the island!". Now, knowing that it WASN'T real, I realized my error - if the bomb went off in 1977, his parents would have escaped, returned to the mainland, and had him there. Ditto for Desmond being on the plane - it's perfectly logical (in a Lost sort of way) that he could have been on a trip, as there would be no island for him to be stuck on.

However, on the other hand, Ethan's presence (as well as Keamy and other folks who'd appear along the way) just confuses me - is the entire world in this waiting area? Where do they go? I think we should have gotten a glimpse of "Lost Hell". Plus, maybe I'm wrong, but wasn't Michael not allowed in the flash-world because of his Island crimes? Wouldn't Ethan be under the same restriction? He killed one of the random castaways, beat the piss out of Jack, nearly killed Charlie... Just seems inconsistent to me.

I didn't mention the "Sayid dies" story yesterday, because here is where it got really annoying so I figured I'd save it. Part of why I hate the Lennon and Dogen characters is because all they do is create more questions (that are never answered) when we should be getting answers to the existing ones, and this is a perfectly good example. What do they mean by "infected" or "claimed"? Why poison him - if they wanted him dead they can just shoot him or Dogen could use some of his badass martial arts skills. HOW did he become infected? What the hell is up with the water turning color? WHO THE FUCK ARE THESE TWO ASSCLOWNS? Etc. And it just continues the complete destruction of Sayid's character - he gets to redeem himself a bit when they're on the sub later in the season, but "Evil Sayid" is easily one of the dumbest decisions they made this season (and there are plenty of them).

To be fair, there is one scene with Dogen that I like, when him and Jack talk (in English). There's nothing particularly exciting about it, but I like seeing Jack talk calmly to someone he is at odds with, instead of just mocking him the entire time like he did with Locke pretty much every time they met over the past 3 seasons. And Dogen's explanation of why he doesn't speak English was pretty good, especially since he's saying it to Jack, a guy who knows from saying shit no one wants to hear.

Oh, and Claire returns, saving Jin by shooting that asshole Other who made me long for the old Jin, who would have beat the guy senseless after two seconds of his bitching. Kate casually drinking water while he explained why he hated her so much (and then hitting him again) was hilarious though, so I guess that's better than a Jin beatdown. Still, Daniel Dae Kim hasn't gotten any good action in a while, and he hasn't had sex for at least three years - gotta be a lot of pent up aggression there (Jin, I mean, not Mr. Kim). Speaking of which, another thing about the three years they spent in Dharma-ville - what did Jin do all that time? Did he just give up trying to get back together with Sun? She thought he was dead, so she had an excuse, but he knew she was OK. Kind of lazy.

Tomorrow - the return of Helen! All hail the hiatus from Sons of Anarchy!

Where are we?

PLEASE, GO ON...

"Whatever Happened, Happened"

JANUARY 13, 2011

FOCUS: KATE
EPISODE: 5.11
AIRED: APRIL 1, 2009

Proving once again that when they stick to their formula, Season 5 works, “Whatever Happened, Happened” is a pretty solid episode for this massively uneven season, and that has nothing to do with the fact that it’s a Kate episode (and/or that she looks GREAT in her 2007 scenes – I say again, she cleans up nice). Finally depicting what led her to decide to join Jack and the others in returning to the island, it’s both an emotional and an “answers” heavy addition to the season.

And not just answers pertaining to Kate. Once again acting as the audience surrogate, Hurley flat out asks how they can be in the past but not remember it, prompting an exasperated Myles (which I guess is “Miles”, with an “i”, but screw it, I like the “y” version better) to simplify it as best as he can. And I do agree it makes sense (though it’s hard to explain with words – I think it’s just one of those things that requires someone to think “fourth dimensionally”, as Doc Brown might put it), until Hurley presents the ringer – why doesn’t Ben remember them, if this stuff always happened? Of course, that’s what the temple is for, which is just a really lame deus ex machina, in my opinion, but at least they covered their bases instead of just saying “ah, fuck it”, like they did with most of the show’s unanswered problems (i.e. the people shooting at the Island group from the outrigger a few episodes back).

But back to my lady, Evangeline does really good work here. The scene where she talks to Claire’s mom is heartbreaking, and even though her actions on the island don’t really jive with her plan (if her primary goal is to find Claire, why hasn’t she even asked Hurley or Myles if they had seen her?), I liked that reveal, and the whole process of coming to realize that she couldn’t be Aaron’s mother (the grocery store scene, for example). Solid writing and acting all around.

I also enjoyed seeing her with Cassidy. I would have liked a moment where Cassidy was like “Holy shit, you know Sawyer too?”, but her theory on why he jumped out of the chopper actually makes sense, and adds another layer to their little triangle. And the scene where Kate tells Sawyer about Clementine (again, why isn’t Sawyer surprised that they had actually known each other?) is quite touching – Holloway’s baffled and sort of puppy dog-ish expressions are wonderfully odd to see on the guy.

Another good confrontation is between Jack and Juliet. First, it’s hilarious that she doesn’t even give him any privacy (nor does she seem too interested when he steps out of the shower, presumably nude – either she’s really pissed or Jack’s got nothing down there), but it’s also one of the few scenes that they’ve had alone together in ages. Considering how much of S3 was built around their growing relationship, it’s a bit odd that they never really had any one-on-one time in S4 (apart from a few conversations about the Freighter Folk), and this is obviously the first time they’ve had a scene to themselves in S5. Wish it went a bit longer, but I love that Jack seems to be admitting to himself for the first time that he doesn’t know what to do.

And while I hate the subplot about Ben being shot, I liked seeing Roger being sympathetic for once. It’s easy to just think of the guy as a jerk, but if you put yourself in his shoes, you’d probably be a mean drunk too. And unlike Phil or Radzinsky (and now Horace) he doesn’t treat our heroes (in this case, Kate) with suspicion when they reveal that they’re not sure what they’re doing there, even though it’s pretty sad that Kate can’t even work a one lever device (she can figure out the difference between Boone and Sawyer’s “tracks” but not how to move a lever up and down?). And I actually feel bad for him when he finds out about Ben – it’s the most dad-like we’ve ever seen him.

So to sum up: an immensely satisfying episode, big on character moments and even answering a few questions without being too retconn-y or confusing. I was wrong through – this isn’t the one where Jack just shrugs and goes around cleaning chalkboards. I guess it’s in the next episode or so. Our hero!

Where are we?

PLEASE, GO ON...

"The Little Prince"

JANUARY 6, 2011

FOCUS: KATE (SORT OF)
EPISODE: 1.4
AIRED: FEBRUARY 4, 2009

Man, what a polarizing episode. On the one hand, Evangeline Lilly has never looked more beautiful than she does in “The Little Prince” – the lady cleans up good. On the other, you have the most annoying scene in the entire series run (including any other scenes I’ve made the same claim for – my memory sucks): when our heroes are getting shot at by the occupants of another outrigger, a group that is never identified in any way. So I’m at a loss.

Actually it doesn't matter, because as a whole it's just a filler episode, with the folks both on and off the island mostly just traveling from one place to another and not really doing much. There’s a really nice moment with Kate and Jack, when he says that Aaron is his family too (dude, if not for the pressing matters, she would have jumped the shit out of the good doctor right then and there). I also like the scene where Sawyer sees Kate delivering Claire’s baby (why he didn’t just ignore Daniel and run over saying “hey don’t believe that Henry dude he’s lying!” or something else of use, I don’t know), and I like how Juliet has seemingly gained power over Sawyer (she tells him to shut up and go away, and he does! Doesn’t even call her anything), but really the entire episode is just a bunch of driving or walking around.

Even the big moment in the show – the reunion of the Oceanic Six – doesn’t actually happen! They leave it as a cliffhanger, which is the rare instance of the show being hurt by watching them back to back. At least when they aired, there was some suspense to the ending, because they seemed to be hinting that Sun was planning to kill them or something, but now we know she doesn’t, so the episode just sort of stops and we have to wait until tomorrow to find out what she does (nothing). And as much as I love fighting and action scenes, I’m pretty goddamn sick of seeing dudes trying and failing to kill Sayid. Like, of all the six, why is he the only one that ever gets assassins after him? Why can’t some dude try to kill Jack at the liquor store or something?

I’ve also (re) had it up to here with the time travel flashes. Maybe if there was some sort of system to them – every hour, or every time someone says “Fluffernutter” – anything but “OK here would be a good spot to flash again, because we’ve written ourselves into a hole” (or a character would have enough time to reveal something that they were trying to hide from us, i.e. when Locke and Richard were talking). The random times don’t make much sense either – they go to the 50s, the 70s, a few days ago, the future... no pattern whatsoever. Daniel compared it to a record skipping, but if the record skips it stays in one spot and has a weird rhythm to it – it doesn’t just go all around the record like some sort of needle-based asshole.

The “resurrection” of Jin is pretty good though. Again, I’m confused why he doesn’t go to the same time periods as everyone else (unless he just slept through all of the previous flashes?). But I like that he is found by Danielle – a nice little twist that I didn’t see coming. I also appreciated that they didn’t try dragging out the “Jin is dead” nonsense for too long; 4 episodes is fine I guess. Especially considering how long they drag out his separation from Sun; it’s actually lightning quick in comparison.

Eh, the season as a whole is just a bunch of hooey until Jack and the rest get back on the island, in my opinion. If you look at the whole series as one movie, this would be the portion where I’d go check my email or make a sandwich or something.

Where are we?

PLEASE, GO ON...

"Eggtown"

DECEMBER 19, 2010

FOCUS: KATE
EPISODE: 4.4
AIRED: FEBRUARY 21, 2008

I never realized how gloriously stupid Kate’s legal issues are depicted in “Eggtown” until this, my 3rd or 4th viewing. Apparently all of the stuff she did (bank robberies, beating up on US Marshals, etc) didn’t yield any other witnesses – the prosecution was resting their entire case on her mom testifying against her (after the defense called their own witnesses, for some further unknown reason). I was always a bit confused why the trial was in Los Angeles too – wasn’t the house she blew up in Kansas or something?

On the other hand, she looks great in a suit. I’m torn.

Well, as I mentioned yesterday, this episode lives on only as the one that stalls time until “The Constant”, but it’s not too bad if you try to forget about that (which is hard since half of it deals with Jack and Juliet getting really worried about the fate of the chopper – events explored in the other episode). I like the brief con that Sawyer and Kate pull on an increasingly hostile Locke, and any episode that features Myles heavily is worth a look. Plus, it’s nice that Kate gets revenge on Hurley for selling her out in the last episode by “Scooby Doo-ing” him here. The look she gives him when he asks her not to tell Locke is pretty priceless too.

I also enjoy Kate’s out-of-nowhere backhanding of Sawyer. Dude was being a total dick (not to mention the unfathomable sin of not being happy with cuddling/makeouts with Ms. Lilly!), and had it coming. But on the other hand, I loved the line that got him said backhander – pointing out that once she gets pissed at Jack she’ll come back to him. When you watch these things back to back, it’s a lot easier to tell why people got annoyed with her; she DOES flip-flop between the two of them in pretty rapid succession.

Speaking of which, Jack’s trial appearance is fairly ridiculous (he even botches their fake story!), and doesn’t quite jive with later episodes anyway. At the end, he’s refusing to see Aaron, but then the next time we see them in flash-forward, they are together and he’s being a perfectly good dad (technically uncle!) to the little guy. So, again, why do they build climaxes around these go-nowhere subplots or plot points? We never saw what led Jack to change his mind or how the two of them ended up living together.

In fact, apart from the minor Ben/Myles drama and the reason Kate returns to the beach, you can pretty much ignore this entire episode, because everyone else spends the next episode in the same predicament (“Where’s Sayid and Desmond?”). And as for the future, just assume Kate got off her charges because she was a hero or something, and that her and Jack got drunk at Hurley’s party, humped like rabbits in the backseat of his Camaro (which would be how Jack recognized it in “The Beginning Of The End”!), and moved in together. Everything else basically falls in place.

Where are we?

PLEASE, GO ON...

"Left Behind"

DECEMBER 2, 2010

FOCUS: KATE
EPISODE: 3.15
AIRED: APRIL 4, 2007

I can only assume the Lost producers were specifically seeking to rectify my recent disapproval with a few episodes of the show by writing “Left Behind”, in which half the episode finds Kate and Juliet handcuffed together and occasionally mud wrestling, and the other half finds Kate teaming up with Cassidy, whom I’m also smitten with. Add in some wonderful comedy with Sawyer and Hurley and you got a pretty great episode.

It’s funny how a throwaway subplot about Sawyer not being able to use nicknames was consistently referred to several times over the next few episodes – it’s actually one of the best reminders of how little time passes between episodes that we’ve ever gotten. And it’s always funny to see how hard it is for him, I think he actually forgot Aaron’s name at one point. I also love “You sir, are rotund.” I say again – one of the dumbest moves on this show was splitting these two up for such an extended period. Maybe even more so than keeping Jin and Sun apart. One line sticks out though – Hurley’s claim that Claire is influential on the group. Really? Why? We never see her interacting with anyone besides Charlie and Sun.

Anyway, it’s a nice little subplot, and the epilogue, with everyone enjoying boar and warm Dharma beer (why not keep it in the ocean in one of Jin’s nets?), reminded me of some of the first season’s final scenes, when they’d always play a song from Hurley’s iPod and such. I also like that Dharma has their own A1 sauce.

Then in the main plot we have Kate and Juliet sort of bonding but mostly fighting and running around soaking wet and/or covered in mud. This, of course, is awesome for several reasons, but it doesn’t appeal solely to my prurient interests – there’s actually some great dialogue exchanges and even the odd nugget of info here and there. I love the scene where Juliet tells Kate why Jack didn’t want her to come back, and it’s pretty awesome to see the smoke monster stopped in its tracks by the sonic fence. And anyone who has suffered through Via Domus should appreciate the scene where they hide in the Banyan tree, albeit without a Native American-sounding Locke guiding them (nor do they lose their bearings going in and out and get killed 5 seconds later, as you would in the game).

The flashback story is also pretty good; I like the idea of Kate being the one to convince Cassidy to turn in Sawyer, and the scene they meet is cool, because we see Cassidy trying to pull a con that doesn’t work, which is how she was introduced (with Sawyer trying to con her). A nice little full circle moment, eh? Some of the plot doesn’t make any sense (they grilled Cassidy for hours but never noticed her crappy wig? Why didn’t Kate’s mom recognize Cassidy? And how did Kate get into the restaurant if the place was being watched?), but as I’ve mentioned before, this show favors the male characters, so any time they have two of the females teaming up (both in the flashbacks and on the island!), it sticks out and feels fresh enough to forgive some of its logic issues.

I won’t, however, forgive yet another odd detail about Kate and Edward’s relationship, with Cassidy being sort of stunned at how badly the guy wanted her. What the hell’s the deal with these two?!?!? I think I’ll just go find some fan-fic and accept it as canon just to ease my mind.

Tomorrow’s isn’t as fun. But after that is another Desmond episode, so it’s all good.

Where are we?

PLEASE, GO ON...

"I Do"

NOVEMBER 22, 2010

FOCUS: KATE
EPISODE: 3.6
AIRED: NOVEMBER 8, 2006

When “I Do” originally aired, it was scheduled as sort of a mini-season finale. The idea for this (and only this) season was to have a 6 episode block airing back to back, then take a long hiatus and come back in February and air new episodes non-stop until the end of the season, which was their way to combat complaints about the frequent 2-4 week gaps that would occur during the usual September to May TV season.

Thus, it seemed like a very real possibility that Sawyer would get killed at the end of the episode, because holy shit! What better sock to the gut and “what will happen next?” moment could there possibly be? Plus he’s in the rain, and Giacchino’s music swells to nearly Thomas Newman-ian heights... all signs point to goner. Well, it was not to be (admittedly, I’m glad), and the cliffhanger was just Jack telling Kate to run, which wasn’t quite the awesome cliffhanger we were expecting. Kate, running? No shit! That’s all she ever does anyway! Might as well have a cliffhanger on whether or not Hurley will eat a sandwich.

Indeed, the flashbacks for the episode remind us, again, that Kate can’t sit still for too long (and if she does, she grows her hair out hideously). And to hammer this point home, they have her even try marriage, to Nathan Fillion no less – one of the greatest men alive, as far as nerd TV watchers are concerned anyway. If she can’t even “settle” for marital bliss with this guy, there truly is no hope for her. So she confesses her secret to him after slipping him some drugged lemonade, cries, apologizes, and takes off. I always wondered why they didn’t even mention him again – I mean, she is technically MARRIED to the guy, right? Did they ever get a divorce? Why wasn’t he at her trial? Etc. Stupid Castle/Drive!

Speaking of things they just dropped the ball on – what the hell is up with her calling Edward? From what little hints they offer, she calls every holy day, which is weird enough – but why is she calling him, PERIOD? Can they just come right out and tell us whether or not these two ever had a fling? It drove me nuts while I was watching the show for the first time, and it drives me nuts now. But I do like how he baits her by telling her he won’t chase her anymore if she promises to stay put, which is pretty much what sets her off (she didn’t seem to have a problem with Taco Night prior to their conversation. Furthermore – I would very much enjoy weekly tacos, preferably with Evangeline Lilly. Or Nathan Fillion, for what matter.)

The big thrust behind the episode is whether or not Jack will perform surgery on Ben, and if so, will he do it right or will he kill him like Juliet asked him to. Or will he just take advantage of the Others’ rather poor lapse in judgment and nick Ben’s artery and threaten to let him die unless they let Kate go. And he does this for her AFTER he watches her nail Sawyer in his cage. Score one for Jack in this episode – that is the highest of high roads.

There’s also the business of burying Eko, but it’s pretty much just two or three scenes’ worth of the episode. I get why they wouldn’t want to bum everyone out with another funeral, but wouldn’t they be MORE suspicious of some of the island’s more mysterious people (Locke, Desmond, Nikki and Goddamn Paulo), plus Sayid the torturer, coming back and saying “Eko is dead, we buried him, let’s move on”? And they could have at least gotten Bernard to join them for their little half-assed ceremony – he was pretty close to the guy, and they were the last of the 23 tail survivors.

Oh, and Jacob is mentioned, though curiously Pickett says Jack “wasn’t on Jacob’s list”. What list? Because if it was the list of potential heirs to his island throne, then that’s way fucking wrong, isn’t it? Maybe it was a list of people who got some on the island.

Anyway, it wasn’t as good as a real season finale, and it’s probably the weakest of this 6 episode “arc”, but since things would drag for a while when it returned, it’s nice to see a sense of urgency – it would be a while before things got real exciting again (besides the Charlie death storyline).

Where are we?

(Yes, this video came up when I searched "I Do" - don't ask me why, just enjoy!)

PLEASE, GO ON...

"What Kate Did"

NOVEMBER 2, 2010

FOCUS: KATE
EPISODE: 2.9
AIRED: NOVEMBER 30, 2005

As a Kate fan, “What Kate Did” was obviously a highlight of Season 2 for me, since it promised both a surplus of Evangeline Lilly as well as the answer to a question we’ve had since the first episode (gotta love that the episode’s title is basically a response to fan questions instead of the usual pun or biblical reference). And what DID Kate do? Blew up her step-dad, because he turned out to be her biological dad (something I’m not sure if he knew, but either way it didn’t stop him from making lewd comments about her looks). All of the characters on the show have major daddy issues, but this one has to take the cake.

We also get Kate climbing a tree, Kate making out with Jack (hell yeah...), and Kate continuing to nurse Sawyer, who is delirious through most of the episode and then gets to share her vision of a black horse. This is of course an inverse allusion to Rob Zombie’s Halloween II, where Michael Myers (who also killed his step-dad) kept seeing a WHITE horse. And if you don’t believe me, then you explain what the hell this subplot is all about, because I got nothing better.

Also, for the 2nd episode in a row, Jack has to remind someone to push the button. For someone who thought it was a ludicrous exercise, he sure is gung ho about making sure it’s done. Luckily he has some more folks to help, with Michael and Eko learning about the button and also watching the “Orientation” video, which leads to a subplot about Eko having the missing part of the film, which explains that no one should ever use the computer. I never quite understood this scenario – why would someone go to the trouble of removing a 30 second chunk in the middle of a filmstrip and putting it in a bible on the other side of the island? But it at least allows for a fun scene between Eko and Locke (“Let me start at the beginning,” Eko says, and follows it with “Before the birth of Christ...”), and introduces (at least, overtly) a driving theme on the show – “Do not mistake coincidence for fate.” By now we’ve seen how everyone had an encounter with at least one other survivor in the past, but is it part of a grand design, or mere coincidence? Most of the show seems to point toward “grand design”, but I fail to see how even Jacob could pull all this stuff off. The real thing to learn? “Do not mistake Damon Lindelof and Carlton Cuse for infallible beings.”

It’s also a good episode for Jin. He starts the episode smiling, basking in the morning sun and glowing from what was obviously a full night’s worth of sex with Sun, something Hurley totally approves (kind of creepy, Hugo). Later, he talks to Locke for the first time and finally gets the handcuff taken off (did they ever explain where the key was?), showing it to Michael without a hint of resentment. Speaking of which, I like how over the course of 2-3 weeks, Jin has gone from a total dick to the most loyal and protective member of the group. So far in this season alone he has risked his life to help Sawyer, Michael, and Sayid.

Speaking of Michael, I just want to give the show’s writers a big THANK YOU for the final scene, where Michael talks to someone that turns out to be Walt on the computer. Why? Because he doesn’t say what he’s typing! The writers (or director) had enough faith in the audience that they’d be able to read “Hello” and “Who is this” as he typed it, without having Harold Perrineau awkwardly say aloud what he was typing, something no human being does (or should, at least). You think I’m sitting here saying everything I’m writing?

Back to Kate, Lilly’s pretty good in this episode. She was probably the least experienced actor in the group, and she had trouble staying consistent with regards to how she played the character, but she delivers here. The pain of her mom’s betrayal, her emotional breakdown with Jack, and her typical bickering nature with Sawyer – she has a lot of sides to show in this one, and doesn’t disappoint. And she seems more comfortable with everything; compare her work here with the pilot (I didn’t mention it, but her scene with Jack and the sewing in the first episode is PAINFUL) and you can see she had gotten a lot more natural a performer. Also, purple suits her. So that didn’t hurt.

Where are we?

PLEASE, GO ON...

"Born To Run"

OCTOBER 21, 2010

FOCUS: KATE
EPISODE: 1.22
AIRED: MAY 11, 2005

The last episode before the 2 hr season finale, “Born To Run” finally answers one of the most pressing questions Lost fans had – “What is the meaning of Kate’s stupid little toy plane?” Oh wait, I’m sorry – I got that backwards. It answers one of the least interesting questions Lost fans had. In retrospect, it’s sort of foreshadowing Lindelof and Carlton’s approach to Season 6 – answering pointless shit no one really cared about while leaving other mysteries unresolved.

It’s fitting then that this episode provides our strongest evidence yet of Walt’s “powers”, which were also never explained. Somehow he knows about the hatch, and also that it shouldn’t be opened. Granted, he’s right (other than the fact that it provided Desmond, one of the show’s most endearing characters), but how did he know? Does he have ESP? If so, why is it so intermittent? Well, Malcolm David Kelley grew nine inches, so we’ll never know.

Speaking of characters knowing things they shouldn’t, I love that Hurley freaks out over not knowing who knows what. It always seemed odd to me that folks never caught on about certain goings on – it’s not like they’re spread out really far or have much else to do with their time. So when Kate makes her big “reveal”, it’s sort of anticlimactic – I figured everyone knew by then anyway (I assume Hurley’s scene with Locke was put in just to remind us that it was still a secret, but it still fell flat, especially since she didn’t tell us what her crime was).

Nitpicks aside, it’s a decent episode. You know I love Kate, so I’m happy to have her in the flashbacks as well as on the island. And I feel for Tom, the dude who was obviously sweet on her but she never returned the affection in a way that mattered (you can tell she’s jealous that he got married). Been there, dude! Though those girls never got me shot while trying to escape the cops after seeing their dying mother. So I can’t really relate to that part of his arc.

And it introduced Arzt! I love that guy. Daniel Roebuck is one of the nicest actors I’ve met since moving here (in fact, my first “Hollywood” job was as an extra on Navy NCIs, where he was the guest star of the week), and he’s a big nerd as well, collecting old Universal Monster memorabilia and such. It’s a shame they killed him off two episodes later; I would have loved to have him around for a while. It’s also the first major instance of introducing another survivor (not counting Ethan) who everybody seems to know even though we’ve never seen him/her before. It’s certainly the most successful – future folks (Nikki and Paulo, Froberg) would be major distractions because the show had been around for so long at that point. Here it had only been 20 episodes, so it wasn’t as jarring. And he’s lovable enough to welcome the addition.

I also liked the interplay between Jack and Locke, with Locke questioning Jack’s presumption that he’s in charge and Jack mocking Locke’s tendency to hide things. But ultimately, they both wanted to open the hatch (much to Sayid’s dismay), so I like that they were tentatively allies again. Forgot about that. Another little moment I forgot about is when Jin protects Michael from Sawyer – amazing how building a raft with a guy can really make you forget how much you wanted to kill him a week or so ago.

Where are we?

PLEASE, GO ON...

"Whatever The Case May Be"

OCTOBER 2, 2010

FOCUS: KATE
EPISODE: 1.12
AIRDATE: JANUARY 5, 2005

According to the invaluable Lostpedia, "Whatever The Case May Be" was the highest rated episode of Lost's first season (which means, given the show's decline in ratings as it went on, would also make it one of the highest rated episodes period), which is kind of ironic, since it's a Kate episode, which a lot of fans tended to dislike, and it's also not a very good episode.

And by that I mean it's an episode that follows the pattern of (too many) later season episodes, with a lot of treading water. Last week's episode introduced the hatch, but we only get one scene about it this week, with Boone bringing Locke an ax to help open it - and that's it, we don't see them actually USE it. Meanwhile, Kate wants to get a locked briefcase that's in Sawyer's possession, but won't say why. And when we find out, it means nothing to us (and it won't until near the end of the season), though it does have a few handguns that will be very useful over the course of the show. And then Sayid and Shannon translate the papers he stole from Rousseau, but they turn out to just be some lyrics from "La Mer", i.e. worthless (though we get a nice little Finding Nemo reference, so there's something).

The most significant thing in the episode is probably the creation of a new camp further up the beach, which I think will be the location for camp for the rest of the show. It's interesting to see everyone settling into their lives on the island, picking out good spots to set up their new homes rather than just toss something up for hopefully temporary shelter. According to Lostpedia, the episode takes place on Day 21, so it's been 3 weeks - not an unreasonable reaction. I probably would have built a hut (or at least asked someone who knew how to make one to do it for me) after like, 3 days tops.

Hell the episode doesn't even really bring up any new mysteries (save the toy airplane), even unsolved ones. The closest we get to one is how the Marshal's briefcase, which we learn was checked, ended up underneath the seat of a passenger who presumably was in the main cabin. But that's the sort of thing that's more of a plot contrivance than a mystery, I think. I am also curious about Boone's claim that the other folks see him and Shannon as jokes. I would like to know where that came from. Like, with all the shit going on and 46 people around, who was like "You know sucks? Boone. Guy's worthless!"? Then again I'm also baffled why out of 46 people, there's at least 20 or so men around, yet none of them hit on Shannon, who is hot as hell and just sitting by herself sunbathing most of the time. Kate makes sense - she's always off doing stuff and/or palling around with the two alpha males; you'd have to be a moron to try to hit that. But why is Sayid seemingly the first guy to even talk to her since Charlie in the first couple episodes?

Speaking of Kate, she looked good in her flashbacks. It was the first time we saw her sort of made to look pretty, and further cemented my crush on her. But I was disappointed, as I'm sure many were, that the episode didn't reveal anything about why she was on the run, and instead just introduced a new mystery. It also doesn't fit very well into her entire backstory - once we have all of the information, we know that the "bank robbery" would have occurred after she was already on the run for killing her dad - is this really the sort of crap she should have been focusing on? And if it was indeed that important, wouldn't Edward have known that and thus had someone watching the place? Just doesn't quite gel for me.

I'd like to point out that we're now halfway through the first season, and things will start getting more mythology-heavy. We will also soon be losing the survival aspects of the show, as they will open the hatch 12 episodes from now and never again have to worry about food, shelter, supplies, or anything else one might have to worry about on a deserted island. In retrospect I wish they had stretched this part of the show longer, but alas. Makes me appreciate these pre-hatch episodes all the more I guess.

Where are we?

PLEASE, GO ON...

"Tabula Rasa"

SEPTEMBER 23, 2010

FOCUS: KATE
EPISODE 1.3
AIRED: OCTOBER 6, 2004

As I mentioned in the review for the pilot, I am quite taken with Ms. Evangeline Lilly, so for my money, there was no better way to secure me as a committed Lost fan by giving her the first full blown “character episode” of Lost with "Tabula Rasa". While the pilot had just a single flashback for each of the three characters, this one nicely sets up the template for a typical Lost episode, where flashbacks reveal more about the people on the island, one at a time (with occasional crossover).

At first, they were just sort of showing how each one ended up on that plane to Sydney, and then they would set up further mysteries. "Tabula Rasa" is a good example, we learn that Kate was on the run, but we still don’t know what for (and won’t for a while). In fact, for a while, the pre-crash flashbacks set up more mysteries than the stuff on the island. This episode has even less “What’s with this place?” information than the pilot did, I think – the island stuff is pretty much all focused on Edward the Marshal (Fredric Lane, who like future Lost antagonists would also play a villain on Supernatural, my other favorite show), who is slowly and painfully dying of his crash injuries. There’s a bit of a clunky “sum up” at the top of the episode, where the characters all relay information to each other that they were present for when it was first revealed, but otherwise, Smoke Monster and polar bear fans will be disappointed with this one.

Instead, the non-Marshal stuff deals with an element of the show that was pretty much phased out after Season 1 (due to the Hatch, and later, Othertown) – basic survival. One of my favorite scenes in the episode is when Jack seeks medicine in the corpse-filled plane wreckage, only for Sawyer to make a pretty good point about doing things for the greater good. And there’s more of the “we have to get along” stuff – I love the quick bit of Sayid tossing Sawyer an apple (which is kind of a dick move – Sawyer wasn’t even looking. One more second and the scene becomes “Sayid whips an apple at Sawyer’s head”), and other small moments like that.

It also begins the Lost tradition of scenes of people filling water bottles, which I contemplated making part of the “top of the review” information (like “Water Bottles Filled: 3”). Such scenes make up probably 2 hrs worth of the show over its run, but I like the realism of that. If you’re a HMAD fan, you might remember the review for The Canyon, in which two people were stranded in the desert for 2-3 days and never once even mentioned being thirsty, let alone drank. Until the deus ex machina of the Hatch came along, the show was very good at depicting what they had to do in order to survive.

Another thing they had to do was make shelter, and throughout the episode there’s kind of a depressing background “subplot” of the assorted unnamed crash survivors lugging things around and making tents and such. It’s depressing because these poor saps all got killed over the course of the show, due to the fact that we don’t know their names and thus, presumably, don’t care about them. I did, though, and I wish they had allowed a FEW of them to live – it’s actually kind of silly if you think about (these cataclysmic events occur and only wipe out the extras?). Starting in Season 2, there was a brief book series that focused on these no-name folks, and I was hoping they would write one for each of the 30-odd people we never really met, but the books must not have sold well, because they only did three of them (four if you count "Bad Twin"). Then there was a game, Via Domus, which focused on a 5th, but it was a terrible game so let’s ignore it.

As for “unsolved mysteries” – they never really got into the odd relationship Kate had with Edward. It’s hinted at here and other times throughout the series that they may have had an affair of some kind, and there’s definitely some respect (at the very least) stemming from her toward him (which is unusual – I tend to hate the guys who chase me around the world trying to put me in prison), but they never spelled it all out. I wish they had – it seemed like one of the more interesting character bits, and may even have helped clarify her island actions. And again, there’s an odd tendency to make Locke look creepy – what the hell is up with that final shot (though the music is the culprit more than Terry O’Quinn) where he just stares at Walt and Michael? Luckily the next episode, Walkabout (one of the all-time best episodes of the series) explains some of his behavior, but the creepiness just feels really weird.

(MAJOR SERIES SPOILER - Then again, if we believe Darlton about them planning everything, maybe it’s just the most baffling foreshadowing ever. “He was being creepy because he knew someday he’d get off the island, die, and then he’d become the smoke monster when he returned.”)

The numbers also start to come in play a little more, with the farmer getting 23,000 dollars for helping them catch Kate. So far we’ve had 815 (duh) and the French message was 16 years... if there was a distinct 4 or 42 I missed them (though now that I think about it, kind of interesting: 48 survivors minus Oceanic 6 = 42). I’ve actually been one of those “23 is everywhere” people since high school (so, yes, long before that shitty Jim Carrey movie) so I was delighted when the numbers became an actual element on the show – but I remember being tickled by the odd amount when the show first aired (before I knew anything about the numbers, obviously). Wouldn’t 15,000 have been a little more normal?

One final note – the episode is titled "Tabula Rasa", which is A. also the name of episodes of lots of geek shows (including Heroes, ugh), and B. it summarizes the point of the episode (“Clean slate”) without actually ever saying it in the dialogue (at least, not that I can recall). One of the comments on yesterday’s review pointed out how lame it was that the pilot was just called “Pilot”, and he/she was right, especially when you consider the interesting show titles they would have for most episodes. Some were obvious (“The End”), but others were obtuse, or even meta-jokey (“What Kate Did”). I remember Aintitcool used to run stories that were just the names of the episodes that were coming up – and even that would be kind of interesting.

Where are we?

PLEASE, GO ON...

"Pilot" (Part 1 and 2)

SEPTEMBER 22, 2010

FOCUS: CHARLIE, JACK, KATE
EPISODE: 1.1, 1.2
AIRED: SEPTEMBER 22/29, 2004

When Lost premiered, I didn’t have DVR or Tivo. I was still using VHS and the ever tricky “timer”, which caused many a panicked “Did I shut the VCR off? Did I cue the tape up to the right spot?” moments in my life (we didn’t have Hulu back then either). And I can’t remember what it was, but I was already taping something else the night Lost premiered, so I had to watch it live. By the end of the hour, I knew this was going to be a show I ALWAYS watched live, or as close to it as possible.

Because I watch a lot of shows, and some just sort of get left behind, caught up during the summer season (I just finished 24 like, last month). But Lost is the exception – throughout its 6 year run, I never went more than a couple hours after it aired without watching it. If something came up and I had to be out late, I’d watch it when I got home, even if it was 2 am and I had to be up at 7. There were two reasons for this. One – it was a show built on revelations that folks could spoil on the internet. I remember during season 3, a major death was spoiled by someone on the East coast, as I was on the West before it aired. That’s not cool.

But the main reason is, the show was just too damn good, and I didn’t want to wait for the new episode any longer than I had to – it would be like opening your gifts on December 27th, as far as I was concerned. And re-watching the two part pilot just reminded me of that all over again. I hadn’t seen it since the days leading up to Season 3 (I would always re-watch the previous two seasons whenever one was about to begin), and while I could have made the same point then, it’s even more relevant now: the pilot is almost remarkably simple when you think about the show as a whole, and it got so much right that other serialized shows got wrong.

The pilot is fascinating by virtue of how much ISN’T in it. No Ben or Juliet, hell, no Others, period! No time travel. No Desmond (boo!), no hatches, no Dharma, no convenient stockpiles of food or fully developed neighborhoods, nothing. Just 48 people and some plane wreckage, for the most part. So many of the serialized shows that came after Lost made the fatal mistake of introducing all of its mysteries right up front, giving you too much to process and too little reason to care. But Lindelof/Carlton (and Abrams, I guess) knew that in order for anyone to stick around for the long haul, they needed to care about the folks at the center of the story. The debate over whether or not they had the whole show planned from the start will go on forever, but we can probably all agree that they never intended to have 5-6 seasons of folks on an island simply trying to survive until rescue comes.

Yet, in the pilot, we are only given brief tastes of that sort of stuff. The monster eating the pilot (which I still don’t get, in the long run, the smoke monster didn’t usually just kill folks at random), the French broadcast, and the goddamn polar bear are the only “big story” things in the two-part pilot. Just quick tastes and hints - nothing that ever overshadows the always compelling “desert island” scenario. And for every “sci-fi” type moment, there are about 5 that are nothing but character development. Sure, the scene with the polar bear is pretty bad ass, but the scene where Hurley gives Claire some airplane food, and then gives her an extra for her baby, is the type of stuff that got people to love the show.

And they were terrific at setting up character mysteries without them being too distracting. Sawyer reading the letter, Jin and Sun’s volatile relationship, etc – these are small moments that help you realize that understanding the truth about these folks is just as, if not more, interesting than anything involving polar bears. The one exception is Locke, who is just too creepy in these episodes. I suppose it can be chalked up to him just being weirded out by having the use of his legs again, but these moments just don’t feel right to me. Especially in contrast to folks like Hurley or Jack, who already had their characters down pat. Of course, I think Locke was the most mangled character over the show’s run, but we will discuss that more when it starts to become relevant. Otherwise, another amazing thing about the show is how little it suffers from the usual pilot problems, such as different looks for the characters, clunky exposition, or a focus on things that ultimately aren’t embraced by the audience and thus phased out. It’s not just a pilot, it’s a great episode of Lost – that’s not something you can say about too many shows (Community comes to mind – the pilot of that show is borderline painful at times, and almost every character is completely different than the one they ended up being).

Even without all of the “looking at it now...” type stuff making it interesting, it’s simply an amazing pilot episode, yet to be topped in my opinion. The opening post-crash stuff is as riveting as anything that was ever on ER, and the journeys around the island (transceiver, high ground for the signal) are exciting in all the right ways – there’s a sense of adventure, some tension/suspense, and a lot of character building – I love the bit where Kate’s trying to get Jack as impressed as she is about Charlie being in Driveshaft, and Jack’s just like “What? Whatever, can we go?” There’s also a great deal of humor, and even that reveals character (Shannon explaining why she doesn’t know French). This show characterizes 12-15 people in one episode better than most shows do with half that number over an entire season.

One thing I never really noticed before was that Jack was barely in the 2nd half of the pilot (possibly leftover from the fact that he was originally going to die, at the hands of Smokey if memory serves). It’s an ensemble show through and through, but Jack was always sort of the main character (him and Kate appeared in the most episodes, whereas folks like Jin or Desmond would disappear for 4-5 episodes at a time), and there aren’t too many hour long episodes in this first season that he wasn’t a significant driving force behind the island stories, even if the flashbacks were about someone else. But the 2nd half is mostly about the folks going off with the radio, and he’s not in their number.

Kate is, however, and I guess I should get this out of the way in case I haven’t made it clear over on HMAD or twitter – I think Evangeline Lilly is the most beautiful actress in the world, and I was smitten almost instantly with her (despite that horrid orange shirt). It’s funny how often I’d read about people hating Kate, and I was never sure if I just disagreed for real or if I was just mentally blocking any potential issues I might have with the character because she was played by someone I found so alluring. One thing I’ll definitely be doing with this “re-view” is trying to look at her character more objectively to see if she really was a weak link of sorts.

Another thing I will be doing is pointing out mysteries that were never really solved in any satisfying way. I can let the goddamn sneaker slide, but I’m still sort of baffled how Jack got that far away from the plane, in thick brush, without his seat (we see that he is buckled in during the crash) and with almost no signs of injury. Plus Rose was right next to him on the plane (and Locke right behind her), but they both were on the beach. This is the sort of thing that probably didn’t help when the finale came around and lots of unintelligent people thought they were dead the whole time.

Also the fact that the comic book seemed to mirror some of the island events, I don’t recall any explanation for. But then again my memory is shit, so if I think something went unsolved, and it didn’t, please let me know!

The biggest thing I took away from the pilot was how much I am going to miss this show, and more importantly, how much I miss what it used to be – simple, centered on character, and not disappointing. Every season had a couple of clunkers, but I never was disappointed by a season as a whole until the last 2, which I thought spent too much time on things that didn’t matter (S5 – 1977, S6 – The Temple) and lost sight of (or just plain ruined) too many characters. I didn’t hate the finale like many did, but I definitely had problems with it. But this pilot? It’s friggin perfect.

Where are we?

PLEASE, GO ON...