Fin

January 2009 can't come soon enough.

Lost 4.12
I rewatched the episode from last week tonight because I heard there would be more footage of the press conference. The only intereesting thing I recalled was that in the cover story, Boone, Charlie, and Libby survived, but all died on the island, Charlie dying a few days before the rescue. :(

Lost 4.13/14
Wow. I can say I really enjoyed the first hour more than the second. I'm not sure why, I guess there was tons of shit happening, and I kept looking at the clock, and I was like "WOAH WE'RE NOT EVEN HALF WAY THROUGH THE FIRST HALF!" in a good way. Not in an exasperated way. To be clear, I'll try to refer to the first hour as "Part Two" and the second hour as "Part Three", because two weeks ago was "Part One". So I enjoyed "Part Two" more than "Parts One and Three", not to say those other episodes didn't have their moments.

I guess I'll just do a huge review, lumping in things from both episodes. They're starting to blend together, so I can't just break it up.

-- I really enjoyed seeing the continuation of the scene we saw one year ago. It was a really nice touch, even if it only revealed Jeremy Bentham, something that meant nothing to us viewers. I liked seeing it tie in with the context of what we've learned about Jack through the flash forwards.

-- How to move an island, in one easy step: push the frozen wheel. I don't know, but the entire thing felt a little anti-climactic. I mean, there's this huge build up to the Orchid, and then Ben just trashes the time travel machine and pushes a frozen wheel and JUMPS A YEAR INTO THE FUTURE. Oh, and it moves the fucking island. Intense. Well, now we know how Ben ended up in the jungle. Nice touch with the arm wound, clarifies that Ben did jump about a year into the future and it wasn't some other occasion he tried to move the island.

-- Ben kind of rocked though. I mean, he basically made me realize something very important: TIME TRAVELING BUNNIES FTW!

He also had my favorite exchange of the evening:
Locke: "You just killed everybody on that boat!"
Ben: "So?"

That was the quintessential Ben Linus moment, I mean he was just so cold and distant, it rocked. But then, when Ben got his parka and said goodbye, it was such a sad moment, like we really saw what the island meant to him. To never go back, he developed his identity around the island, Ben Linus ruled a whole civilization there, and he didn't know what would happen after. Also? His little snide "I hope you're happy Jacob" bit reaffirmed my theory that Ben was responsible for Jacob asking Locke for help. Jacob needing someone who wasn't Ben leading, hence giving him cancer. That Jacob fellow is slick.

-- So Locke is the new head Other. I think we all saw this coming, but it was still creepy watching Richard basically bow down to his new overlord. But it looks like the island might be moved in the future, as Locke does end up off of it. Or maybe he found that magic box (does the dude get that there MIGHT not be a physical box, but actually a metaphor?) and wished himself off. But you have to wonder, why do all of the Oceanic six (plus Desmond?) need to go back? Surely the Others have enough guns and things that go boom to handle the freighter people. Or maybe there's another threat coming. Perhaps John is trying to help them, because the Six are getting creepy undead messengers.

Back to Locke, so Jeremy Bentham, hmm. The dude must've done something really bad to force the Oceanic Six to never use his name. Who is he, Voldemort? But nonetheless, me, one year ago, was right. I did a little shriek and happy dance when I saw Locke in that coffin. I wonder why the corpse needs to go back? I totally didn't think it would be Locke tonight. I was thinking it was Ben, but I couldn't reason why the Oceanic Six wouldn't use his name. Ben's done such horrible shit, you'd think they'd have already reached the point when his name would be forbidden. So I was thinking it was Christian Shephard in the casket, but that would have been a really confusing mindfuck. Then at the last minute I was wavering between Christian and Desmond. I kept thinking who else left the island with wasn't one of the Oceanic Six, and I could only think of Des. But thankfully he's still alive and kicking. I hope.

-- Claire!!!!!!! OK, she's so dead. You can't be a dead island messenger without being dead (OK she was in a dream, but I'm calling Island) Claire was always this quiet, calm character, I was so pumped to see her flip a shit in that dream about Aaron. Sure it was tame, but there was power, I liked it!

-- DESMOND! I worried for like 5 seconds that he died in the helicopter crash. Like yelling "NONONONONO!" at the TV. But after going to first base with Jack, everything worked out, and he got to go to first with Penny! Imagine how horrible it would be if Des died and Penny received his dead body :( I shudder to think about that. But yeah, we had this incredibly sweet payoff with Desmond and Penny, I teared up. I loved how Des, like a little kid, showed off Penny to everyone. Heh.

-- So what do you think happened to Faraday? I mean, he was sort of away from the island, but I didn't see the little boat left behind... I think he got teleported, right? I hope he's not in some weird ass limbo, or in the void (don't get me started on voids) He's probably with the island, with Charlotte. Charlotte's got something interesting. Miles did his eerie "I'm a ghost whisperer and kind of psychic" thing, and basically we know that Charlotte was on the island before. She told Daniel something about searching for the place she was born... I'm going with the Island as the place of birth. I wonder how you put that down on a college application "City: Deserted island that bends the properties of time and space."

-- Hurley is a wackjob. I mean, we knew he was... Well things could get dicey in the brain sometimes. But playing chess with Eko... Yikes. I mean, sure Jack's been seeing his dead father, but I don't see why Hurley would get overwhelmed with ghost messengers. I buy the Island sending Charlie, but Eko? Yeah, doubt it. Unless Hurley's got a bizarrely strong connection to the Island... Or not... Watch Hurley end up being the only Oceanic Six sane enough to do anything. Heh.

-- Jin. Is he, or isn't he? Sun thinks he's dead, or does she? Why on earth would she team up with Widmore unless he has something... or someone. Maybe Sun doesn't know about Ben and Locke running around trying to get people back to the island, so she's left to team up with Widmore to go back and hope Jin is there. Because he wasn't in the explosion, he was on deck, and after the first boom, he could easily have jumped off and swam to shore. I don't see that being so farfetched, I mean Sawyer did it! Dunno, watch tomorrow the executive producers tell us Jin is dead, and all this spec is useless. SEE WHAT YOU DID TO ME BATTLESTAR GALACTICA!

-- So everyone's got to go back. Jack's going to have a tough time working that out, I mean, Kate's not going to take Aaron at all, so that seems to ruin the plans right off the bat. Everything pretty much came full cirle with the flash forwards. They served their purpose of showing the off island life and needing to go back. Now that we've seen them leave, it was a nice way to round out the whole story telling device.

I'm starting to see how next season's going to be confusing with present/future/past. This season we could rely on the island as a standard point of reference, December 2004. Present. But now it appears the action with the Oceanic Six will occur three years(?!) after that time. My mother, with the established period as present, couldn't keep track of the time shifting and was left confused. It also didn't help that she didn't regularly watch. But nonetheless, without the fixed reference point, will we just shift from three years future off island, to present (2004/5) on the island? Not done properly, that could be a little wacky.

OH Frak! BSG aired in the UK Wednesday Night! WTF! How did I not know?! *downloads* Guess I'll have to watch it tomorrow afternoon... I haven't written much about this season, maybe I'll do a roundup post tomorrow, when it's not 3am...