the blast door map

directed by: greg yaitanes, who has not directed for 'lost' since season 1, where he helmed two excellent episodes: 'solitary,' and 'special.' 'solitary,' was sayid's first flashback episode, so i'm sure everyone was quite happy to have greg back to tackle more of his backstory.

written by: eddie kitsis and adam horowitz. after this season, i think these guys are better at continuity than damon and carlton. highlights: 'this place is death,' 'the lie,' 'ji yeon,' and 'greatest hits.'

director of photography: edward pei. check out the last two video podcasts for a fascinating visit to the soundstages in hawaii where all the interiors are shot. the illusions perpetrated on the show go far beyond the obvious. sometimes two halves of a seemingly pedestrian scene are shot 2 weeks apart. once again, this episode had the set decorators working overtime - russia was impressive, but iraq got shortchanged.

nutshell: a long slow buildup to a full-on omfg ending. also, this show is becoming 'return of the jedi.'

topics of conversation:

1. ben.
2. sayid.
3. jack.
4. sun.
5. desmond.
6. sawyer.
   
7. gripes.
8. details.
   
9. preboomer.
   

1. ben.



first:

• ben is not dead.
• ben is not going to die (not in 1977, anyway).
• there will be no alternate timeline - events we have already seen are not going to change.

my theory: what we witnessed in that final, shocking moment was, in essence, ben's birth, which gives new meaning to when ben said he was 'born' on the island. surviving being shot in the chest by a person he trusted, admired, and placed all hope for his future is a somewhat formative experience in a young boy's life. it's the kind of event that could plant that crucial seed to transform someone from relatively well-adjusted to a completely creepy enigmatic expert liar. it's rather like when darth vader was 'born,' and how obi wan referred to him as being separate from luke's father.

while he had no knowledge of 'the rules,' sayid's attempted murder of ben is the first time that a character has actively challenged faraday's 'rule' of time travel: "whatever happened, happened," which is also, poignantly, the title of the next episode. what it means is that no matter how hard sayid tries, he cannot undo the events of his past, or ben's future, despite his position in the timeline. and in the oldest of time-travel tropes, whatever sayid does in hopes of preventing the future, is in fact guaranteeing it.

the two men now have a kind of an amazing relationship with each other. let's look at ben's story:

• i'm a boy with a crappy dad

• my dead mom appears and says, 'you need to be with the hostiles!' richard says 'be patient!'
  
• i wait for years to join the hostiles
  
• finally, a hostile appears, he promises to take me to his people!
• i risk everything to make it happen. the burning van thing was not easy to wrangle.
  
• out of frickin nowhere the guy shoots me in the chest!
• (prediction) jacob saves me. this is the beginning of my understanding of his power. after getting shot, i'm gonna make damn sure i always maintain control of the situation.
  
• (a lot of stuff happens)
• 2001: richard says 'this is going to surprise you.. remember juliet? she's going to solve our pregnancy problem.' i recognize juliet and begin to understand the workings of the island.
• 2004: juliet diagnoses me with cancer.
• 815 crashes. i get the passenger manifest from mikhail. the names look familiar. i compare it to dharma records and photos and realize that the people who vanished from the island during the incident have returned.. including that crazy guy who shot me!
  
• research on the passengers reveals that janitor jack is actually a spinal surgeon. whew!

• i throw myself into one of rousseau's traps. the first person rousseau brings is the guy who shot me!

• as i scheme to get my tumor removed, save the island from widmore, etc.. i end up having to push the frozen donkey wheel.
• i end up in 2005, and decide to make sayid's life hell. i shoot his wife and exploit him as a killer. i realize that these actions are eventually going to cause sayid to shoot me in the chest.

• i understand that being shot by sayid is what made me who i am. so i press sayid even harder. my job now becomes to ensure that he shoots me.
  

'lost' has one timeline, and each episode of the show provides us with new tiles that snap into place. just like the show itself - each piece of the timeline we see becomes 'locked-in,' and all retcon scenes, and surrounding bits of story must fit what's been established. tampering with this undoes the dramatic stakes of the story.



one thing that was unclear until this episode, was exactly when ben and his father arrived on the island. we now know that it was 1973, a year before sawyer, juliet and the rest of the time-jumpers appeared. this gives olivia goodspeed and horace a timeframe in which to break up. considering that horace isn't pining after olivia the same way he frets about amy's continued attachment to her dead husband, i'd say horace dumped olivia and sent her away.

a moment to rewatch: when locke tells ben that jin is still alive - something changes in ben. is that the moment ben realizes that this is when jack, kate, hurley, and sayid jumped into his childhood?

2. sayid.

the story from sayid's perspective:

• i killed a chicken. woo. dinnertime!
• i shoot myself so nadia can escape.
• (lots of stuff happens)

• i crash on craziness island, hook up with hot blonde chick. ..hm? who's nadia?
  
• shannon is shot. dammit!
• rousseau takes me to ben, caught in her ewok trap.
  
• i torture ben, it's fun.
• i escape the island. marry nadia. ..who's shannon?
  
• nadia is shot. dammit!
• ben shows up and says widmore shot nadia. ben says 'kill all these widmore people.' i say 'ok.'

• kill kill kill.
• in moscow, ben says 'ok you're done.'

• confused, i wear a yellow t-shirt for the first time in my life. also, i build houses.
  
• ben shows up and says i need to start killing people again. why does he keep goading me to shoot people?
• 'ana-lucia 2' gets flirty at bar, just like 'ana-lucia 1.' we're totally gonna do it. ..nadia who?
  
• 'ana-lucia 2' kicks me in the face, arrests me and puts me on a plane to guam. dammit!
  
• whoosh. young ben gives me a chicken salad sandwich. little does he know, since childhood, chicken unleashes my killer instinct.
  
• if i kill ben, the purge won't happen, radzinsky and inman will press the button, the crash won't happen, i will be living in LA with nadia, and she won't get killed by widmore (or ben).
  
• aw screw it, i'm shootin' ben. what difference does it make? though, it'd all make a little more sense if i'd found out that he killed nadia beforehand.
• waiting to disappear like in 'back to the future' and 'frequency' (also starring elizabeth mitchell!) and reappear in new, happier timeline...
  

bounty-hunter ilana is clearly working for widmore, who as we know from his bedside chat with locke, wants the oceanic 6 back on the island as much as everyone else. this nonsense about taking sayid to guam is just cover to get sayid on the correct flight. what surprises me is that widmore didn't use his pull with sun to get aaron on the plane as well, which would have been exceptionally easy. aaron's absence from that flight may be the reason we ended up in 1977.

3. jack.



here's what missing from jack's storyline, and had better be addressed very very soon. one of the most emotional moments of season 4 was his discovery that he had in fact left his half sister behind. he should probably be asking 'has anyone seen claire? she's my half sister!' kate should probably be asking that too.. she may be off the show, but since they're bringing her back in season 6, the payoff will be better if we get the sense that she's actually, well, missed.



is the grand finale of the show actually building towards a big, on-island shepard family reunion? is the jacobean reincarnation of christian shepard collecting his children so that he can redeem himself for his sins against them?



is all of this like when ghost anakin shows up at the ewok party to smile over his children?

4. sun.



the most compelling argument i've heard for why sun, lapidus, and ben were not sucked back in time off the plane is that locke simply did not invite them to the island. i can't think of any other reason - that's the only factor we know of that separates those three from the others. some people have argued that ben didn't go back because his younger self is already present on the island in 1977 - and that this means sun is also somehow present on the island at this time. i don't think so. the island clearly has no qualms about jumping people into situations where they might run into themselves. also, the idea that sun is on the island in 1977 raises yet another birthdate continuity error since sun's 1980 birthdate has been established from very early on in the show. we've also seen sun as a young girl breaking the glass ballerina in korea. it's unlikely that she was ever on the island as a child. however, connections between her father and widmore have been established* - so it's not improbable that her family is somehow tied to the island.

the other argument is one that frustrates me: "sun didn't jump to 1977 because the island 'has work for her to do' in the present. this is similar to arguing that lapidus didn't get sucked off the plane because he needed to safely land it on hydra island. these arguments pull at the show's theme of destiny vs. free will - and i think can be true in retrospect, but i don't believe that damon and carlton have ever used this kind of circular justification for the same reason that they are not allowing multiple timelines: it deflates the dramatic stakes of the show. if things are just going to start happening because they 'need to,' why watch at all? no one's choices would ever make any difference.