LOST
Season 4 Episode 10
“Something Nice Back Home”
Written by Adam Horowitz & Edward Kitsis
Directed by Stephen Williams
(WARNING: SPOILERS)

WTF?! She just disappeared into the jungle?!

Sorry.

Okay.
Flash-forward first.

We get a post-trial Jack and Kate, and apparently, Jack took Kate up on her offer and has evidently come to terms with seeing Aaron, so the three of them are currently playing at Happy Families, with Alice in Wonderland the bedtime reading of choice.
But the old obsessive Jack is still around, as he catches Kate on the phone with someone, and he clearly suspects something’s going on that he’s not supposed to know about.
Jack then gets a glimpse of Christian, and gets called down to Santa Rosa, where Hugo’s stopped taking his meds. Hugo tells Jack of Charlie’s visits, and says Charlie has a message for Jack: You’re not supposed to raise him. (Really creepy, this, particularly since it purportedly came from Charlie’s mouth, and it seems to imply that the “him” is Aaron.)
Hugo also tells Jack that Charlie said someone would be visiting Jack, soon.

As if to disprove the pronouncements of Hugo’s “Charlie,” Jack asks Kate to marry him, and she says… Yes.
But Jack sees Christian at work and this shakes him to the core, so he asks a fellow doctor to write him a prescription for some meds, claiming the stress from the engagement is getting to him.
Kate arrives at home to find a sloshed Jack, who confronts her about where she’s been. She says she had some “errands” to run, but Jack doggedly persists, and Kate says to leave it, but Dr. Obsesso is back in the house, and it comes out: she was doing something for Sawyer. (I suspect something for his daughter, given that Kate already met Cassidy before.)
This pisses off Dr. Obsesso, who pointedly says, Sawyer isn’t here. He chose to stay behind. I’m the one who came back. I’m the one who’s here. I’m the one who saved you.
Kate says, I don’t want you anywhere near my son if you’re going to be like this.
Jack, angrily, He isn’t even related to you!
Enter a sleepy Aaron from screen left, and Kate tearily watches Jack walk out.

Now.
Back to the Island.


The discomfort Jack was taking some meds for in a previous episode turns out to be a troubled appendix that’s fit to burst.
So Juliet tasks Sun and Jin to return to the medical station to retrieve surgical instruments and medical supplies for the instant Island appendectomy. But since the Kwons aren’t familiar with the instruments and medical paraphernalia, Daniel (who’s experienced at conducting animal autopsies) volunteers.
No one’s really crazy about the idea, but Daniel manages to persuade them that all he really wants to do is help, so he and Charlotte go with the Kwons.
In retrieving the surgical instruments, we learn that, a) Daniel likes Charlotte, and b) Charlotte knows Korean.
Jin picks up on the Brit B!tch’s fluency with the language, and confronts her one-on-one about it, finally getting her to admit she does understand Korean by threatening to break Daniel’s fingers.
Jin asks Charlotte to make sure that when the helicopter returns, that Sun is on it so she can leave the Island. Charlotte apparently agrees.

Meanwhile, Jack requests that he be awake during the surgery so he can talk Juliet through it. He wants Kate to be there, to hold up a mirror so he can view the proceedings, while under a local anesthetic.
Things get hairy during the appendectomy though, and Juliet is forced to have Jack chloroformed.
The procedure looks to be a success, and while Juliet is suturing an apparently unconscious Jack, she tells Kate about the Tempest kiss, and that she believes Jack kissed her so he could prove to himself that he wasn’t in love with, ahem, someone else.
Kate thanks Juliet for saving Jack’s life, but after she’s left the tent, Juliet says, I know you’re awake, and awake Jack is…

Meanwhile still, Sawyer, Claire, Aaron, and Miles continue to make their trek back to the beach.
They come upon the site of the ambush and Miles picks up the ghostly whispers of dead Rousseau and Karl, and finds their shallowly buried bodies.
When Miles begins to show an interest in Claire, Sawyer gets protective and warns the angry ghost whisperer to stay away from Claire.
They then run into Frank, who tells them to hide, since Keamy’s right behind him. Keamy’s leading the survivors of Smokey’s attack back to the helicopter. Keamy hears Aaron’s soft cry, and is just barely distracted by Frank, who insists they have to leave before dark. And leave they do.
Later on, in the middle of the night, Claire wakes up to find Aaron missing from her side.
She then sees Christian holding the baby.


The following morning, Sawyer awakens to find Claire missing. Miles says she got up in the middle of the night and walked out into the jungle, with someone she called “Dad.”
Sawyer hears Aaron’s cries, and finds the baby.
But.
There’s.
No.
Sign.
Of.
Claire.

WTF?! She just disappeared into the jungle?!

Okay, so we have the flashforward which puts into motion the events that will lead to the suicidal, pill-popping Jack we saw in Season 3’s finale. That’s a Jack who came this close to having a happily-ever-after with Kate, and is presumably receiving visits from his deceased father.
Poor Dr. Obsesso…
But, while that section had some interesting bits in it, this installment’s real kick in the ‘nads is that cliffhanger, as Claire’s just suddenly not there anymore, having apparently gone off with her dead da.
And what’s with Miles’ interest in Claire? Is there something there that he sees, which Sawyer can’t? (The interest Miles was showing for Claire seemed to be more than a mere attraction sort of thing. Could he have been sensing Christian’s presence around Claire, or is there something else? Something about Aaron, or about Claire herself?)

Other bits that were noteworthy include Rose’s observation that people get well on the Island, and not sick. So why did Jack develop appendicitis?
Is the Island lashing out at Dr. Obsesso for some reason? For using the NaomiPhone to call the terrible Boat People to the Island?
And then there’s the bit with Ju-Ju telling Kate about the Tempest liplock, while knowing full well that Jack wasn’t unconscious, that he would hear everything she said. I felt so bad for Ju-Ju just then, as not only was she making a verbal acknowledgment of her place in the Island quadrangle, but she was also giving Jack his out, if he so wanted it…
Poor Ju-Ju…

Oh, and I loved Rose giving the Brit B!tch attitude. You go, girl! Put that C.S. Lewis harpy in her place!

COUNTDOWN: 38.

(Images courtesy of ABC, impawards.com, and ew.com.)

LOST
Season 4 Episode 7
“Ji Yeon”
Written by Edward Kitsis & Adam Horowitz
Directed by Stephen Semel
(WARNING: SPOILERS)

And the neighbours were said to have heard: Bastaaaardds!!!

Okay, let’s do it like this; let’s divvy this up between on the Island, on the freighter, and off the Island…

On the freighter:
Frank takes a whole bunch of canned goods to Sayid and Des, who are under lock and key once more after their unauthorized excursion to the comm room, during which time poor Minkowski did an Eloise.
On guard, Regina in the flesh, portrayed by Zoe Bell. Finally we see Zoe. Only to have her wrap some chains around herself and jump overboard.
Bye bye, Zoe.
WTF?!
And I thought Fisher Stevens came and went…

Anyway, no one even tries to jump in to save Regina, and Sayid and Des finally meet the freighter’s captain, Gault (Grant Bowler), who says that a) a number of his crew have been having some mental issues, as evidenced by Regina’s swan dive; b) there’s a saboteur on board; and c) the ship belongs to one Charles Widmore (so, Ben wasn’t lying about that).
The captain also shows Sayid and Des what is supposed to be the black box recovered from the Oceanic 815 crash, where all those corpses were found, including one that was supposed to be Sayid…
So the captain claims that the man behind the elaborate ruse (which required 324 corpses as props) is one Benjamin Linus…

Returning from their audience with the captain, whom Sayid wryly describes as “surprisingly forthcoming,” they’re moved into a new room, and who do they meet but Kevin Johnson.
You know, Kevin! Who looks exactly like some scummy traitor known as Michael.
Of course, Sayid and Des are on the ball, and don’t let on to the fact that they recognize this schmuck. (Of course, right now, I’m doing some memory scrabbling and trying to recall if Des was sober enough to have remembered Michael…)

On the beach:
Jin and Sun are talking baby names, but Sun doesn’t want to jinx it, so she doesn’t play along. Jin thinks it’s going to be a girl, and wants to name his daughter “Ji Yeon.”
When Kate and company get back, Sun asks what went down, and Kate tells all (I love Sun’s reaction to hearing that Charlotte whacked Kate on the head; go, Sun! Show that Brit b!tch some Korean whoop-a$$!), including the fact that Juliet euphemistically referred to the poison gas factory as a “power station.”

This penchant Juliet has for sometimes avoiding the truth like the plague, gets Sun suspicious once more of the Other woman, and after unsuccessfully trying to get something out of Daniel in regards to their rescue, she gets it into her fool head to go join Locke, because she doesn’t trust these newcomers.
But when Sun needs some prenatal vitamins from Juliet, Juliet is deathly opposed to the idea, since Sun really needs to get off the Island, and quick. But Sun’s gotten dubious about Ju-Ju’s claims, so she’s off for LockeLandia.
Kate draws the Kwons a map and all, and tells them she has to tell Jack, but she’ll give them a good head start first. Sun says she wanted to tell Jack, but decided not to because “he wouldn’t understand.”
But Ju-Ju busts that party and at first tries to tell Jin about Sun’s condition (as Jin explained to Jack earlier, he understands English better than he speaks it), but when Jin says, Wherever Sun goes, I go, Ju-Ju whips out her trump card: Juliet tells Jin about Sun’s affair! (And although I understood precisely why Juliet said that, I still so hated her guts just then.)
Sun slaps an already beaten-up Juliet (ouchee), and Jin stalks off back to the beach.

Sun tries to explain, but Jin just wants to go fish. Luckily, Bernard, bless his soul, arrives, and at first unaware of the argument, asks Jin if he can tag along.
Bernard realizes he’s walked right into the middle of something, and is apologetic and is backing off, when Jin says it’s okay.
So the only two married men on the Island (well, from 815; who knows how many of the natives are married; come to think of it, some of the 815 sock puppets could be married too, but how are we to know?) go fishing, and Bernard tells Jin about Rose’s cancer.

Back on the beach, Juliet tells Sun, I just had to stop you from leaving.
Ju-Ju then outlines the next handful of weeks for Sun, an inevitable scenario that ends with her death, and right after that, the baby’s.
You’re my patient, Juliet says, and you need to get off this Island.
When Jin gets back, he prepares dinner for Sun (Jin’s practicing English is adorable), and basically says, I know the man I was back then, before the Island.
I know that what you did back then, you did to that man.
I forgive you.
(Which, let’s face it, already slew me at face value, but in light of our final Off the Island section, well… devastating…)
Jin says, I’ll go with you to Locke’s camp, but Sun says, I don’t want to go there anymore. Juliet was very convincing.
They have a helicopter, she says.
Jin says, I’ll do whatever it takes to protect you and the baby…

Off the Island:
A very pregnant Sun, back in Korea, goes into labour.
Cut to Jin, who’s frantic to get to the hospital, but passes by a store to buy a stuffed panda first.
With Sun, it’s all labour pains and new doctors (her usual one is at a conference, damn him!), with Jin, it’s all, played for laughs, need to get to the hospital, oh crap, I need to buy another panda, oh more crap, my cell phone just got ran over.
So all through this, I had a bunch of suspicions.

Suspicion A: this new doctor and that nurse doping up Sun were evil, evil I say.
They were here to steal Sun’s baby, to study it, it apparently being the first infant to have been conceived on the Island, and to have lived to tell the tale. (Unless Ben used to do that in the past—get the preggers women off the Island before they reached their third trimester, have them deliver off Island, then bring them back when both mother and infant were a-ok—which I always wondered about and I believe I mentioned here at the Iguana before.)
Anyway, it would be that whole Knots Landing, Oh, we’re so sorry, but your baby died during labour, but then Valene just knows she gave birth to a baby that was alive, and no, I was not confused by the drugs, where is my baby you bastards?!
So.
Anyway.
Evil baby snatchers.

Suspicion B: somewhere along the way, I began to think, Oh no, what if they both got off the Island, but in the end—due to the whole Sun having an affair thing—didn’t end up together, and Jin’s actually hurrying up to get to some other woman who’s now his wife, who just happens to be delivering at the same time as Sun.
Of course, if I had had the luxury to think this suspicion through, it would be impossible for Jin to have both found (and perhaps married) another woman and gotten her preggers so that her delivery would coincide with Sun’s. (Unless Jin actually physically time-traveled somehow and that his sperm stayed healthy and alive even after he’d gotten off the Island…)
Anyway, the core of this particular suspicion was that Jin was not heading to Sun’s side, that when he got to the hospital, we’d have the reveal of some other woman with her newborn baby.

Suspicion C: which, before we get into it, I must say, was a niggle at the back of my mind, pretty much overshadowed by Suspicion A (Evil! Evil!), was that Jin and Sun were in different timelines (which would also have worked hand-in-hand with Suspicion B).
But as I said, it was a niggle, so when the reveal came that they were indeed in different times (Sun, post-Island; Jin, two weeks into their marriage, and he was hurrying to the hospital to deliver the panda to some ambassador or other, on orders of Sun’s evil da), the immediate question which overrode the small, though still significant surprise, was, Where’s Jin?
And this is the point where I irrationally shouted at the screen, Bastaaaardds!!!

Hurley shows up to greet the proud mama and Ji Yeon, and then they all troop off to see Jin… who’s in the cemetery.
I say again, Bastaaaardds!!!

I can only assume at this point that Jin did do all he could to protect Sun and the baby, and this is the price.
If so, though, is Jin considered part of the Oceanic Six (as a nurse points Sun out to be)?
Officially, with verbal confirmation on the show, it’s Jack, Kate, Hugo, Sayid, and Sun. We’ve seen Ben, and of course, Aaron, off-Island, but neither were 815 passengers. Or is an unborn infant considered a passenger?
Is Aaron part of the Six, or not?

Of course, my steering the pondering over to the Oceanic Six question is simply me trying to avoid having to deal with Jin’s upcoming demise.
It’s Charlie all over again…
But, as hard as this is going to be, at least I get to psyche myself out for the inevitable, as opposed to, say, the sudden departures of Shannon (Ana-Lucia, you b!tch!) and Libby (Michael, you bastard!).
Still.
I say again, Bastaaaardds!!!

Or was that part of the elaborate ruse and Jin’s still alive, on the Island? Though I doubt that possibility, as I can’t see Sun going through the masquerade of visiting an empty grave just so she could get me to blubber like an idiot…
Of course, the date of death on Jin’s marker read September 22, 2004, the date of the 815 crash, since he was purported to have died then. But that still leaves us with possibilities…
Either Jin really did die back on the Island, and Sun can’t really have the date of death on the grave marker changed because that would contradict the “official story” of the 815 crash, or the visit to the cemetery was indeed part of the ruse and Jin is still alive, back on the Island.
Graaar! I say again, Bastaaaardds!!!
Now I don’t even know if I should prepare myself for Jin’s demise or not…

Sigh.
I love this show.

COUNTDOWN: 41.

(Images courtesy of ABC, ew.com, and variety.com.)

LOST
Season 4 Episode 3
“The Economist”
Written by Edward Kitsis & Adam Horowitz
Directed by Jack Bender
(WARNING: SPOILERS)

So this episode’s flashforward had me going, “Noooo, he’s gone over to the Dark Side!” with the occasional “Bad! Bad!” throughout its running time.
But first…

As Sayid attends to Naomi’s body, he sees a bracelet, with an inscription that reads, “N. I’ll be with you always. R.G.” (Or was it R.C.?)
Sayid then comes up with a plan: to go get Charlotte back from Locke, and if he can get her back in one piece, he asks to be brought to the freighter. Frank agrees. Miles goes off with Sayid, and Jack suggests Kate go along as well (as Jack doesn’t trust Locke, and he knows Sawyer won’t allow Locke to do anything bad to Kate). Of course, you can sort of see that Kate feels she’s being taken for granted by Jack, but she goes along with the plan anyway.
Meanwhile, since they find the DesPenny pic on Naomi, they decide to call Des over from the beach, and Juliet goes off to do the fetching.
Oh, and apparently, Miles has no idea why Ben’s such a hot ticket. All he knows is he’s being paid a lot to find the guy, so find him he will.

Meanwhile, Locke goes to where the cabin should be (and that protective circle of ash is there), but it isn’t.
Ben of course, taunts Locke for being Jacob’s b!tch and not knowing what to do.
Hurley then starts to argue that maybe handing Charlotte over would be a good thing to do, but Locke will have none of that sort of talk. (The man can be just as monomaniacal as Ben…)

At the apparently still deserted Barracks, Sayid, Kate, and Miles find Hurley tied and gagged inside a closet, and he claims that Locke’s lost it and that he got left behind after he started to disagree with Locke.
They head on over to Ben’s house, and while Sayid finds a secret room with oodles of cash in different currencies and lots of passports and suits and stuff, Kate finds Sawyer.
It turns out that Hurley was bait, and Locke confines Sayid and Miles. Sayid gets locked up with Ben, and when Locke visits for a chat, Sayid says, Give me Charlotte, and I can get to the freighter, and I can see what’s going on. Locke says Ben has a spy on board, but when Sayid asks who it is, Ben of course keeps mum.
As an aside, Sayid says, The day I trust [Ben] is the day I sell my soul…
Locke then says, Why should I give you Charlotte for nothing, and Sayid says, You misunderstood. I never said anything about taking Charlotte for nothing…

Over with Kate and Sawyer, Kate asks why Sawyer is here, and he says he doesn’t have anything to go back for and that he’d rather stay on the Island.
Kate asks how long can they play house here, and Sawyer says, Let’s find out.

Meanwhile, Daniel conducts an experiment, and seems to discover that on the Island, time (or maybe distance, or perhaps space; or perhaps all three) doesn’t quite work the way it normally does. Whatever. I ain’t no loony physicist. (Note also that last episode, he observed that light doesn’t scatter normally on the Island.)
Anyway, if memory serves me right, there’s a time differential of 31 minutes on the Island.
Juliet then arrives with Des, who starts to question Frank about Penny, but he doesn’t seem to know what Des is talking about, so Des says that when the helicopter leaves for the freighter, he’s on it.
Then Sayid arrives, with Charlotte. Apparently, he traded Miles for Charlotte, and Kate decided to stay at the Barracks. (Damn, girl! Make up your bloody mind!) There is, of course, a flicker of emotion on Jack’s face when he hears why Kate is absent.
Ahhh, what a Valentine’s Day episode…

Jack then tells Sayid to go to the freighter, so off he goes with Des.
Before they leave, Daniel pulls Frank aside and warns him to stay on the exact same bearings they took on their way in, and to not deviate from them in any way.
And since there’s an extra seat on the helicopter, and Daniel and Charlotte opt to stay on the Island to start running whatever crazy-a$$ work and experiments they need to, Sayid says they should bring Naomi home.
The helicopter takes off…

And in the future…

Sayid plays golf! And shoots a man dead!
Before he shoots the poor schmuck though, Sayid says he’s one of the Oceanic Six, which gets the schmuck all bothered and scared.
Then he shoots him.
Then I start with the “Noooo, he’s gone over to the Dark Side!” whinging and bleating, unwilling to wrap my head around the fact that Sayid’s gone stone cold kill crazy.

Later, in Berlin, Sayid meets Elsa (the gloriously named Thekla Reuten, seen recently in Martin McDonagh’s In Bruges).
She says she works for an “economist” who dabbles in “emerging markets,” and that she’s on call 24/7, and if she’s ever needed by her employer, that he’ll page her. (Yes, a practically obsolete, low tech device. Hmmmm.)
He says he’s a headhunter, a corporate recruiter.
They go out to dinner. (Before that though, Sayid gets on a disposable cell phone and tells the person on the other line—who may sound familiar if you listen closely—“I’ve made contact,” then tosses the cell in a dustbin.)

The affair with Elsa progresses, and it’s clear that Sayid is here for the “economist,” so he needs to dilly dally (and get all randy) while Elsa waits for that magic page.
At one point, Elsa asks why Sayid is still in Berlin, and shouldn’t he have left already. He says the job he’s on is taking longer than he’d thought. She says, Oh, I was hoping you were still here because of me.

At a later point, Elsa says, I don’t know anything about you. I understand you don’t like to talk about the Oceanic 815 crash, but what about your life now?
I don’t know anything about you, she says. Tell me about yourself, she says. Isn’t that what people in love do, she asks.
Love, Sayid repeats.
Then he says, All right. No more secrets. What do you want to know?
Naturally, the pager goes off at this point, and Elsa says she has to go.
As she’s dressing up though, Sayid says, Get out of Berlin now, because something’s about to happen to your boss and you shouldn’t be around to answer any questions.
This is about my boss, Elsa asks. You’re here to kill him, she says. You used me, she accuses.
Then the b!tch shoots Sayid (roundabout the shoulder).
While she thinks Sayid is suitably disabled, she gets on the phone and speaks German to whoever’s on the other end. The page was a ploy to smoke Sayid out; she’s been on him for awhile now, maybe even from the start.
Sayid of course, our once-and-perhaps-still-could-be-hero, recovers and shoots Elsa dead. He’s clearly shaken though, and takes a bracelet from Elsa which looks awfully similar to the one Naomi was wearing.

Sayid then staggers off to what appears to be a veterinarian’s clinic, and at first I think maybe it’s Juliet there, but of course, it’s Ben.
It seems Ben’s Sayid’s boss now, and he’s gotten Sayid to play hitman to ice whoever’s on his list. As Ben attends to Sayid’s wound, Sayid’s crying, and Ben asks, Are you crying because it hurts, or because you allowed your heart to get in the way again?
Do you remember what happened the last time you used your heart instead of your gun? Ben presses.
You used that as leverage to get me to work for you, Sayid accuses.
Ben says, I have your next target.
Sayid says, But now they know I’m after them.
Ben says, Good.

Aarghh! Sayid’s Crying Freeman for that manipulative lunatic! Nooooo!!!
Presumably, Ben’s now after whoever was behind the Boat People, though I dread to imagine what could have been that pivotal event that got Sayid to end up working for the sleazebag.

And what is up with Kate?! (I refuse to say any more on that matter at the moment.)

Oh, and who is R.G. (or R.C.)?
And can we safely assume that R.G./C. is the mysterious Economist (if the two bracelets in the episode are related, of course)?
And why does the Economist have a thing for low tech, just as Jacob apparently mistrusts technology?

Some great little bits: Daniel’s experiment, and Hurley’s staying clear of Sayid after he sold them out to Locke (“I saw what you did to that guy’s neck with that breakdancing move you did with your legs”).
Priceless.

Parting shot: So we know that Jack, Hurley, and now Sayid are officially part of the Oceanic Six.
We also know that Kate and Ben got off the Island, though whether they’re publicly known as part of the Six is still uncertain.

COUNTDOWN: 45

(Image courtesy of abc.go.com.)