Lost: Women and Children First

Oh no, the episode was Every Man For Himself .... that's right. Personally I love a good con story so as a standalone piece of television, I'd rate this episode pretty highly. A little predictable perhaps - both the Warden twist and fakemaker was pretty well broadcasted I think. I am, however, glad it turned out to be a fakemaker. If the writers had wanted us to believe that Sawyer had chest surgery, recovered in a few hours and than survived being outside in a filthy cage and having the tar beaten out him ... I think they may have crashed their own plane of plausibility. That kind of sloppy writing would probably make me stop thinking about the show completely.

We didn't learn anything particularly new about Sawyer, other than he has a kid and fans of the show will now have another character to suggest that "maybe X is Sawyer's kid" to go with "maybe X is Him" or "maybe X is the real Sawyer" or "maybe X is Jack's dad's hooker" or "maybe X is the monster".

We learned Kate may or may not love Sawyer and that's it is good to be flat-chested sometimes. Personally, I'm just darn glad the whole episode didn't pan out as some kind of elaborate ruse to get Kate to profess an emotion.

Oh, and before I rail against the machine for a few paragraphs - some of the dialogue here was just top notch. Jack's scenes with Juliet were brilliant and Michael Emerson (Ben) is proving to be simply golden in nearly every moment he has.

Now, the questions, caveats and concerns:

Question: How could they not know Sawyer's age?
The have everyone's full names. They had a complete bio on Jack. They seem to know if you are bad or good - but they didn't have a birthdate for "James"? Seriously? It would have made more sense for Ben to walk up to Sawyer and state, "You are thirty five years old and weigh one ninety four." And then break into a comedy routine with Sawyer debating the obvious truth.

Caveat: No crash cart?
I'm assuming this is a plot point to be explained - but a co-worker this morning informed me I assume too much. She might be right. I mean, The Others have a book club, cartoons, tapes of recent baseball events, a submarine ... but not basic medical supplies? They've got the big freakin' needle from Pulp Fiction but they don't have a critical piece of hospital equipment?

Question/Concern: Why can't Bernard play golf? Or Rose? Who needs a Paolo?
The introduction of Paolo and Nikki feels forced and artificial - and sadly so does the delivery of most of their lines so far (all like five of them). Why the producers felt the need to pad an already large ensemble with a couple people that look like they wandered in from the set of a underwear ad really escapes me. The possibilites don't feel good - either they are tapping out on flashbacks for the main characters or Pool Boy and Hot Girl have been introduced just to get killed off ... which means the show has completely surrended its edge. Either way, doesn't feel good.

Concern: Desmond
Desmond was such a neat character - until he got crushed into a small ball by the implosion of several feet of concrete around him and was somehow transformed in the Messiah. These kinds of characters quickly devolve into a "thing" and not so much a "person". Desmond will become the "link to the island" or "the speaker of the true way" or some such. What sucks is that Desmond is now such a left turn from what most of us consider reality that the show hardly feels worth analyzing anymore. To quote from Green Wing - next week on Not Making Sense, I'll wax an owl. What's the point in trying to figure out what happened or will happen when miracle saves and precognition is on the table?

Concern: Why was Pickett so shocked and surprised?
No, I get that he was angry for losing his wife. That makes sense. There is, however, I think a fundamental contradiction with The Others. They do everything they can do to scare and intimidate the Losties. Kidnapping, killing, mind games and funky costumes. They're also smart, as Ben is often good about saying. They can think well in advance and form complicated tactics to meet their end goal. I wouldn't be surprised if Ben didn't get himself captured just to have the groundwork ready for Michael to betray Jack & Co.

So why do they constantly act shocked when the Losties defend themselves? They seem so annoyed that anyone might pull a gun to keep from being pulled into the jungle. They launch a stealth attack to steal a boat from frightened armed people - but it's the Losties fault that "Cole" died? How can they be so clever and fundamentally stupid at the same time?

Perhaps there is a twist down the way to help explain much of this. Problem with having faith in the show is it seems to be willing to bury the past pretty quickly. Much of Season One's questions seem to revolve about Walt and his relationship with The Island and his potential and whatnot. Then he disappears and later is whisked away on a boat. Season two is all about the hatch - but it implodes before we can get a full understanding of what was going on there. Both aspects seem to be completely left behind as we move on to understanding the Book Club now.

Hopefully we'll get more answers before they go imploding away onto a boat (or some such).




tagged: television, lost