I have to confess that as Season 3 of LOST slowly developed, I began to notice something, or rather a lack of something, something that I miss and have continued to miss through Season 4 and Season 5: conversations, in all actuality more like monologues on the part of the speaker, blatantly based off some historical figure(s) or something of that nature. I'm talking about Locke telling Boone about Michelangelo's unappreciative father and his creation of the Statue of David. I'm talking about Locke's amazing (albeit fictional) story of Ernest Hemingway's jealousy of Fyodor Dostoevsky. These stories always seemed to highlight something that was happening at that very moment in the plot and/or character development of the show and were just plain awesome. They provided for some interesting storytelling within the story that simply allowed the show to slow down and cause viewers to ponder the principles or questions where prompted by said stories.
These stories were sort of, err, "lost" I felt as we got further into Season 3 and had largely disappeared with the blisteringly fast pace of Season 4. Now, don't get me wrong, Season 4 is perhaps my absolute favorite season of LOST (maybe...), and I can understand considering the writer's strike and the short season length, but still, I miss those slow "story" moments.
Arguably my favorite part about last week's episode? IT HAD ONE, and a good one at that.
...Oh, and let me apologize by saying that last week I noted the importance of "316" succeeding "This Place Is Death" when "The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham" was originally planned to succeed "This Place Is Death." Let me correct myself by saying that the real significance in the order of "316" and "The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham" being switched is that we got to see the events taking place in "316" before the events which will take place in "The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham." I sort of got my interpretation wrong there, and I apologize.
Anywho, on to the episode synopsis!
- Jack wakes up lying in the middle of a jungle -- a scene intentionally shot eerily similar to LOST's opening pilot sequence, the first scene of the entire show. If you hadn't already guessed it, it's obvious that this is a scene depicting Jack's return to the Island when you realize how alert and unphased he is by the situation and his surroundings. Jack hears a drowning, hyperventilating Hurley yelling for help and discovers him splashing crazily in a pool of water probably more than fifty feet down from the waterfall at the top of which Jack is standing. Jack dives down to Hurley's rescue (obvious bamf moment on the part of the LOST co-producers) and helps him calm down. He then rushes to Kate's unconscious side and tenderly wakes her up. Kate's first words almost are "Are we...?" and before she can finish her statement, in pipes Jack, "Yeah. We're back." Great opening scene.
- Forty-six hours earlier, we come to where we left off with our beloved Losties off-Island. Ms. Hawking's dialogue with Ben -- you know, the whole "I thought I said all of them" bit -- is repeated but this time the scene continues with Ms. Hawking taking the group down into her "secret lab" which we saw before, now revealed to be "The Lamp Post," an off-Island Dharma Initiative station used by the Dharma Initiative to find the Island initially! (...on the assumption of Ms. Hawking's integrity) Ms. Hawking explains that the Dharma Initiative devised the technology to find the Island because they realized that without it, they would have no chance of finding the Island because it is constantly moving. She explains that they have 36 hours to get on a certain plane -- Ajira Airways Flight 316 -- if they hope to get back to the Island in the small "window of time" opportunity that they have.
- All this nonsense about the Island and the whole Foucalt pendulum deal pushes Desmond over the edge, who emphatically expresses his anger with the entire situation and leaves, warning Jack not to get mixed up in all of it. Ms. Hawking takes Jack to her private study or something of that nature, alone, and tells him that in order for them to get back to the Island, things must be as close to the original crash as possible in terms of similarity. In addition, she gives Jack John Locke's suicide note, which Locke apparently wrote for Jack specifically. She tells Jack that this is John Locke's purpose with it all: He is to serve as a sort of proxy for Jack's dead father in the original crash. Because of this, Ms. Hawking tells Jack that she has to find something that belonged to his father and give it to John Locke in the coffin. Jack has (finally -- we were waiting for it) grown upset with all the "ridiculous" mumbo-jumbo that Ms. Hawking has been rambling on about. I love her response to his protests of logical and tangible truth: "Oh stop thinking how ridiculous it is and start asking yourself whether or not you believe it is going to work. That's why it is called a leap of faith Jack." BEAUTIFUL.
- Jack leaves Ms. Hawking's study and finds Ben in the church's auditorium. Jack asks Ben about Ms. Hawking and how she knows all the stuff about the Island and the Dharma Initiative, etc. that she does. Ben ignores Jack's questions and instead (YES! This is the story part!!) points out to a Jack a painting of the apostles crowded around the risen Messiah in wonder and Thomas feeling Jesus' wounds. Ben tells Jack how Thomas the apostle had every intention of dying with Jesus when they found out about Jesus' intentions to go there, knowing he would be killed. Instead, though, Thomas is not remembered for his bravery but for doubting Jesus' resurrection, hence the title "Doubting Thomas." Ben ends the story with a cutting statement: "He just couldn't wrap his mind around it. The story goes that he needed to touch Jesus' wounds to be convinced," to which Jack responds, "So was he?" Ben's answer? "Of course he was. We're all convinced sooner or later Jack." Amazing. LOST's own "Man of Science" is slowly being transformed into his arch-enemy Locke's "Man of Faith." LOVE IT.
- Jack leaves and the next day gets a call from his grandfather's nursing home, telling him that (apparently again) Jack's grandfather has tried to run away from the nursing home. Jack goes to see Granddad Ray and skillfully manages to acquire a pair of his father Christian Shephard's shoes -- Jack has found that "thing" which he can use with Locke to mimic the original flight.
- As Jack returns home, he notices that something isn't quite right. A quick survey of the house reveals that someone had been sleeping/waiting for him...in his bed... You guessed it! Kate. She's obviously been crying and she asks Jack if he still plans on going back to the Island. Jack tells her yes, he does, and she says that she's going to go with him. Jack asks what about Aaron, and Kate tells Jack that if he wants her to go back with him, he can never ask about Aaron again. Yikes. Jack concedes and Kate proceeds to thank him...and no, not just verbally either.
- The morning after, Jack receives a phone call from a battered and bruised Ben who tells Jack that he has to go to the butchery and get Locke's body from Jill, the woman who Ben left in charge with the coffin. Jack heads over there and has a conversation with Locke and puts his father's pair of shoes on him. He gives Locke the note back, too, placing it in his jacket lapel. Jack doesn't want to read it: " I've already heard everything you had to say John. You wanted me to go back, I'm going back." He then ends the "conversation" with a simple three-word farewell that must have been so hard for him to say: "Rest in peace."
- At the airport, Jack clears Locke's body onto the plane with the Ajira Airways counter attendant (the questions asked by the counter attendant are reminiscent of Jack's difficulties with the Oceanic Flight 815 counter attendant when he was trying to get his father's body on the plane). Sun and Kate are also there at the airport. We then see Sayid, as well, seemingly being escorted in handcuffs by a strange woman. In the waiting area for Ajira Airways Flight 316, Hurley is reading a Spanish comic book. Yet another similarity to the original Oceanic Flight 815 ordeal. Hurley buys up all the remaining seats on the plane, hoping to save as many lives as he possibly can, unsure of what will happen to the people on the plane who aren't meant to go back to the Island.
- On the plane, Ben boards, a little late, complete with bruised, scathed face as well as slinged arm. Hurley freaks out but Jack manages to get him to sit back in his seat and calm down, which, Hurley's seat, by the way, is next to a menacing-looking man. It is probable that Sayid's relationship to the woman under which he is in custody is similar to that of Hurley's relationship to this man. Who are these people??!
- Jack realizes that good ol' chopper pilot Frank Lapidus is the pilot of the plane. Jack requests that he speak to the pilot, Frank, and the flight attendant allows the meeting to take place and gets Frank from the cockpit. A very clean-shaven Frank almost immediately makes the connection: "Wait a second... We're not going to Guam, are we?" haha Poor Lapidus... *sigh*
- Jack is nervously sitting in his seat, anticipating the crash or landing or however they're apparently going to get to the Island. Ben on the other hand is quietly and contentedly reading a copy of "Ulysses." Jack inquires as to how Ben can be so calm to which Ben responds that it's better than what Jack's doing. True. Jack asks Ben if he knew how Locke died. Ben says he doesn't and Jack tells him. Jack continues to show Ben the suicide note which somehow made it back into Jack's pocket and tells him that it's like "John needs [him] to read it." Ben asks Jack why he doesn't read it then. With no response Ben asks Jack if it's because he's afraid. Jack asks what of to which Ben replies, "Afraid that he blames you. That it's your fault that he killed himself." Jack asks Ben if it was his fault and Ben simply responds: "No Jack it wasn't your fault. Let me give you some privacy." Alone, Jack opens the note and reads it. "Jack, I wish you had believed me. JL". Wow. Amazing.
- The plane begins to shake; it has hit turbulence. The fasten your seat belt sign turns on and there is a flash of bright light. Now we recover from the bright light to the opening scene of the episode with Jack waking up much like he did in the first scene of the show in the jungle. A quick recap of Jack saving Hurley and finding Kate is shown and then something new happens: There's the sound of a vehicle pulling up near to where Jack, Kate, and Hurley are. A Dharma van much like the one Ben's father "Roger, Work Man" drove pulls around the corner and Jin hops out, aiming a rifle at the survivors. A sudden look of surprise comes over his face. LOST
Story/Narrative - I loved the conversations between Jack and Ben. Priceless. I really can't wait to see what all happened with John Locke off the Island before his apparent suicide.
On another hand, all the many, little similarities between Oceanic Flight 815 and Ajira Airways Flight 316 were incredibly interesting. I'm sure there are lots more that I neglected to mention in my plot summary. I'll have to re-watch the Pilot!! ;)
Oh, and Jack's dive from the waterfall after Hurley, in my opinion, represented a lot! But I'm going to cover it in the "BAMF moments section" because let's face it, it was a very bamf dive. 5
Lost Theory/Mythology - So the Dharma Initiative found the Island by building that Lamp Post station. And they knew it existed because of proof they had found; they just didn't know where it was. Ms. Hawking speaks of a "very clever fellow" who built the swinging pendulum "on the theoretical notion that they should stop looking for where the Island was supposed to be and start looking for where it was going to be." Hmm...
Also, of GREAT importance to the mythology behind the history of the Island and its discovery. A certain picture distracts Jack. It appears to be a picture of the Island and, at the bottom of the picture, it reads: "9/23/1954 – U.S. ARMY – OP 264 – TOP SECRET – EYES ONLY." Nice...
Desmond's purpose in relation to the Island is not over with yet, according to Ms. Hawking. And she was the one who predicted his future with the hatch and the button, as we saw in Season 3. After all, she was the one who convinced him to break up with Penny in the first place! What are her motives?... 5
BAMF moments - Jack's dive symbolizes so much. Consider Jack off the Island. Ever since he left, practically, Jack has been a whiny bitch about having to go back to the Island, etc. No discredit to him because it's obviously important to his destiny that he be there, but still, we're all sick of whiny, mopy Jack and have been waiting for heroic, leader Jack to come back. With this dive, Jack assumes this role, and you can tell: this time, I doubt it'll be hard for Jack to accept his leadership position. On a separate note, I believe this dive symbolized a baptism of sorts representing Jack's slow shift from Man of Science of Man of Faith, which I believe will be the main focus of his character's development for the remainder of the show.
As far as actual fighting-esque action goes, this episode was pretty devoid of it, which makes me think that I should re-think my rating style...because this episode was definitely every bit as good as last week's, if not better, but unfortunately it's going to receive a worse review number-wise from me... :/ 3
Overall Score - (5 + 5 + 3)/(3) = 4.33
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