I want to first apologize first to Jodi and my other faithful readers who've been wondering/disappointed in my lack of timely recaps of LOST. Not only have I not really been watching the episodes until the weekend (hectic schedule right now), but I've been on a job hunt and just taking care of bidness right now. No excuses, let's bring the recap arguably one of the better episodes of this year...I hinted at it at the end of my
"Left Behind" recap, and so it came to past: this whole "Juliet got left" thing turned out to be an elaborate ruse set up by Ben himself for... who knows. I like how Juliet continues to play that role well - underneath all of her "loyalty" to Ben and the Others, there seems to be a seed of striking out inside of her. I don't know what it would take for her to bounce on the Others - lack of hope? And I'm wondering why she still sided with Ben... am I being put on? I mean, I know she has a connection with Jack, esp from her asking Jack to save Ben whilst showing Jack that video of her saying don't trust him...
From her flashback, it seemed that for a while, her trust and support always lied with her sister. She was stuck on the island for years, and only wanted to go home and be with her. The day Oceanic 815 crashed, the thing that brought her to tears was seeing Rachel and her child playing. And she was recently about to get off the island with Jack, until Locke blew up the sub. Now, is she realigning herself because she is feeling like she can never get off the island? What does she know that we don't... and what does Ben hold over her?
One interesting piece was seeing how Juliet got to the island, however short the piece was. The
"Herarat" Aviation thing was a nice touch - I knew it was important, but it didn't make sense until after I finished watching the episode. The one thing that interested me was not the fact that they gave her tranqulizers before the trip, nor is it the fact that she gulped the drink down, but the reasoning. Dude didn't say "oh, you don't need to know where we're taking you or how you get there"... Ethan kept referring to the trip being "pretty intense", which had me thinking - I am ignorant to submarines and such, and I figure there's a certain pressure on the body that's taken, but is there something ELSE going on in that trip? Like crossing a different dimension or SOMETHING that would put your body through additional stress? Kind of far-fetched, but I have to present the idea...
A couple of other things were done rather nicely this episode:
- The use of the "Downtown" song. Having her drive up to Mittelos with her sister, and the song playing, made the later scene of her crying while it was on make that much more sense.
- The whole Mikhail/The Flame scene cracked me up. "He never has his walkie". It just played so well to what we already knew about the station...
- How did Juliet and Goodwin end up fucking? And was this the reason her and Ben have strain in their relationship?
- Why did Ethan's improvisation turn from taking samples to kidnapping Claire to continue giving her the medication? I don't see why he would do that... of his own free will.
- LOL @ Hurley trying to be hardcore with Juliet (his whole "the last one of you guys who came to our camp is buried over there" thing had me rollin').
- Don't you just love how, if Sawyer was never on the island, Kate & Jack would be humping to high heaven every night?
- Speaking of Sawyer, it was good to see him exchange a handshake and a hug with Jack. These two have been through a lot...
I do have to say, though, that Jack looks like the ultimate fool. While you can't find a better leader (Sayid is the man, but I don't see him leading the camp without constant headbutting), he is too trustworthy. He questions a lot of the survivors of Flight 815, but seems to give Juliet a long rope (to hang herself with, maybe)... for what? For love? Or is it something else? She might be "One of Us" in terms of wanting off the island, but her dealings in how to meet that end is surely not the same as Jack, or many of the survivors. To each their own, though.
Now just a batch of questions: why does the island seem to make women infertile, yet make it so no one has disease on it? And why does Ben get a tumor/cancer? who/what is Jacob, and why do we never see him? why does no one believe Sayid when he has doubt about someone/something (this past ep with Juliet, he also had beef with bringing back Mikhail, etc.)?
In any case, I'm just typing aloud at this point. I do wnat to point out that, despite previous rumors,
LOST fans are still watching - we are just watching LATER! Stats show that Nielsen ratings for shows watched on DVR later in the week have
LOST jumping up by considerable numbers (even if that doesn't look good for advertisers - we fast forward commercials!)... so take that, haters!
Tonight's episode looks tough as well, get LostPedia's brief lowdown
HERE. You can also peep the official
LOST podcast (dated 4.16.2007)
HERE for a rehash of "
One of Us", as well as a prehash of tonight's ep, "
Catch-22", which will focus on Desmond and feature the return of
Penny Widmore! More on that later, though. And if you aren't afraid of spoilers (I didn't even read this article yet), you can check out
Doc Jensen's "LOST in translation" article over at EW.
Sorry for my CPT. Hopefully my thing shifts in the near future...
Until next time... namaste.
