aaaaaaaaand, FAIL.

i've only gotten through a few episodes of this season, and i shan't be going back. what a piece of shit. why did they change a winning formula? from forced plot devices to shoehorned new cast members, this season took everything good about the first season, scrapped it, and made it exactly what TV has proven to be over and over and over again -- uninspired, unintelligent drivel that's trying to be smarter than it really is.

the best example i can think of here is making cameron "forget" that she's a terminator just so you can have her giggling along with a foosball game. that is a fail of the HIGHEST degree. there were any number of more intelligent ways to show alison's story in the future. they tried to make it more complicated than it needed to be and in doing so, created a story arc that literally makes me fucking sick to my stomach. what an affront to the canon. what a deeply insulting mockery of the films' history and significance. i'm appalled. i demand your resignation, sir. you have literally caused me sickness.

and let's not forget kidnapping a kid under the pretense of protecting him from terminators, but then having him slide right into the little family they're creating without ever questioning the fact that he'd been kidnapped or trying to escape or anything, you know, reasonable. nope, they just needed to shoehorn a kid in to the family to complete the dynamic of 2.5 kids. i'm disgusted at the inadequacy of these writers. physically repelled. it's obvious that they did it so that they could create "story" moments of sarah interacting with a young boy, being a mom that's not a soldier. EXCEPT FOR THAT'S THE GODDAMN POINT.

but hey, they've been successful. so far this season, she's driven a car around and made some PB&Js. awesome.

i'm so fucking disgusted. this season has taken what may have been a really good series and shat upon it.

but at least derek does more than sit on the couch and bleed in this season, though.

1/10 CLANKS! this season of this show is an affront to the terminator franchise, linda hamilton, james cameron, arnold schwarzenegger, mario kassar and andrew vajna, carolco pictures, and anyone who's ever popped on a terminator film and enjoyed the ride.

Related posts:

1. review : "terminator – the sarah connor chronicles," S1
2. Terminator: Sarah Conner Chronicles S2 Premiere
3. Terminator: Sarah Conner Chronicles: Automatic

i've long resisted this show, and WR and snackboy have both given me shit for it, saying that i'm missing out on something special. so now that i'm a complete fucking netflix on-demand addict, sitting with a hand down my pants eating leftover indian food 2 nights a week as pixels bombard my inner cortex for 5 hours at a time, i decided to give it a shot.

the reason i've resisted it is two-fold. one, television (at least network television) is rarely capable of creating visually compelling imagery while delivering smart and well-developed storylines placed in the hands of capable actors. and two, television extensions or retreads of previous things that i've loved have ALWAYS let me down. take "the bionic woman," for instance. i almost shot my television.

but, as with all my sweeping, judgemental, and generally irrational bans and hatreds -- i reneged.

and there's a lot of good in this show. i think the first thing is the faithfulness to the original two movies. the timeline of this show is shunted a bit from the movies' timelines, in that sarah and john jump ahead of her death. so terminator 3 takes place concurrently in a separate timeverse. since "terminator : salvation" wasn't even penned when this was being developed, any future they show is often inclined to drastically violate the canon's storyline, but if you can separate yourself from that (which is pretty easy, since T3 sucked so much ass and T:S is pretty good about honoring the story set forth here in T:tSCC), it actually works.

that single thing is what makes this show watchable. i mean the level of faithfulness they give to "terminator" and "T2:JD" is SO tight that i find myself getting EXCITED about it. they have characters both mentioned and SHOWN, who were in the original movies. (different actors, as a rule, but still -- dyson's wife, dr. silberman, enrique -- fucking AWESOME.) they even go so far as to recreate imagery from the first two movies, which is a little bit jarring at first, but you get over it quickly. for instance, the famous burned photo of sarah in the red jeep with the dog behind her. they've reshot that with lena heady in the pic, and at first you give it a wtf, but then it settles into your consciousness and it becomes ok. recreated film footage of sarah and dr. silberman talking in the psycho ward. recreated film footage of sarah breaking OUT of the psycho ward. so fucking amazing. i LOVE that. it makes it feel more real to me. it FITS.

and while it took me a LONG time to get comfortable with cameron the cute grrl terminatoress, i think she's finally growing on me. i had to spend a lot of time convincing myself that it made sense for skynet to make a little waif terminator in the first place. i'm still not sure that i HAVE, actually. but i just keep on thinking that skynet would have sent terminators to all different points of time (validated in "T2:JD" and here in this series), and that at least one of those would have been created with the intent of magnetizing a teenage boy with sex appeal. (kristanna loken's abhorrent T-X validates this potential part of skynet's "thinking" process, too.) so i'm getting over it.

and while those and some other things are very cool about this series, there's definitely a lot of bad. for one thing, sarah's SUPER watered-down. this is not even CLOSE to the sarah connor that linda hamilton became in "T2:JD," and anyone who says otherwise is kidding themselves. lena heady is great and can look motivated and driven and in control both physically and mentally, but the character's WRITTEN differently. maybe she's chilled out a bit because she knows about her own death, maybe she's starting to realize that john needs a mother and not a drill sergeant, or maybe television just sucks, but it bothers the SHIT out of me. sarah connor went from waitress to paramilitary commando out of fear and knowledge. that's not something that calms down after a couple years. so i'm not buyin it.

john is a tough nut. he's older than furlongConnor by a couple years, but still way younger than stahlConnor. so i just don't know how i feel about his completely uninspired, sleepyEyed teen boyStar paperDelivery of his parts of the stories. it makes sense on the one hand, cause he's just recently gone from white trash foster mom to full time paramilitary mom, so his rebellious attitude would be a little diluted as he rebooted his brain to get used to this new life. but on the other hand, there's just something about this kid that's not believable. he's impulsive and brash, which fits, but he's also about as magnetic as a bar of soap. like i don't CARE to get to know him. that's not maybe the best way to enamor a character who's supposed to lead the human rebellion against a robot army.

another thing that blows is this -- HOW THE FUCK DOES CAMERON HEAL? she's had her fucking face smashed open and holes blown through her and all this and she's just as pretty as a picture every time you see her next. it's fucking bullshit. i can accept that she laughs. i can even accept that she occasionally eats. i can NOT accept that she heals. NOT. FUCKING. COOL.

i'm growing weary of the inconsistencies in terminator weight these days. cameron and a T-888 can be throwing themselves around the back of an armored car with enough force to almost overturn it, but then they can put a giant man-terminator on a wooden dining table? GTFO. terminator weight has never been TOO terribly consistent, but at least they've fucking TRIED. this show doesn't even give me the respect of basic physics knowledge.

i know everyone's tried to give brian austin green credit for being a big ole badass in this show and i just don't know yet. he's distrustful and he's strong and he can pull off a 5 o'clock shadow just fine, but he's kind of incapable. so far i've seen him get shot at by an HK, get captured by a terminator, get brainwashed, look confused at downtown LA, and then stand there doing nothing while he gets shot in the lung. and he bleeds through his shirt occasionally. not exactly "one of john connor's best soldiers" if you ask me.

i think overall, i have to say that this is one of the rare few TV shows that spends a MASSIVE amount of energy on tying back to the source material, and that's a HUGE sell. the homages are always nice, too -- "there's a storm coming," "come with me if you want to live," and "no fate but what we make" have all had appearances. and eventually, i have come to peace with the teenage terminatoress. but watered-down sarah and beige john and brian austin shoot-me-again are becoming more and more problematic to me.

i'm giving this a 6/10 CLANKS! currently. more data is necessary.

(bonus fact! summer glau and i share a birthday, 8 years apart.)

Related posts:

1. review : "terminator – the sarah connor chronicles," S2
2. Terminator: Sarah Conner Chronicles S2 Premiere
3. Terminator: Sarah Conner Chronicles: Automatic

well, i finished season one last night and this show pretty much fucking rules.

there will be light spoilery things here, but no specifics (i'll leave out names and places and episode numbers and specific events), so fear not...

i'm STILL having trouble with ron perlman. he just doesn't seem the part to me. it's little things, such as the way he rides his motorcycle, the way he crosses his legs when he sits, the way he does a shot of whiskey -- it just doesn't feel right.

whatever, that's such a non-issue.

one of the things that i absolutely love about it is that right when you think the show's about to pull a bonehead plotline out of it's collective ass and saddle you with a story point that you'll forever be WTF'ing, it turns out to be all part of the plan. on two separate occasions, i thought, "waitwaitwait, WHAT? they'd NEVER do that in real life!" and then it turns out they DIDN'T. the show's subtle about this. you'll see a scene that leads you to believe one thing, but then when it's turned on you and you realize that thing was a double- or triple-cross, you remember back that they never SHOWED the end of that scene in the first place. it's very cool.

another thing that's happened over the course of season one is that there are characters whose motivations you thought were one thing are actually another. there are two characters in particular who are actively working against another. wait, let me rephrase that. they're not working against another character, they're more trying to control the way the other character sees things so that they can keep this character on their preferred path. this only very slowly becomes apparent over the season, and oddly, even though you know that it'll bring serious conflict in the club family before too long, you don't lose all respect for the two who are doing it. it's pretty amazing.

there are revelations over the season that you saw coming, and others that you didn't ever consider. splits and reconciliations, revelations and secrets, and a shocking and utterly mortifying mistake on the part of one of the guys out on a hit. every couple episodes, you can rest assured that something will go completely pear-shaped.

i really like how SAMCRO is always hustlin. they find themselves strapped for cash and they hurry up and find a hundred different ways to get it. like in a day. they find themselves in a war and they hurry up and make a plan to defuse or even stop it. like all criminals, they're constantly jiving and thinking, trying to position themselves at the top of the food chain but under the radar of the law.

the law knows what's up -- they're not stupid -- but they always find themselves unable to do anything about it, which i love. fuck the law.

there is, as always, a recurring plot point here, and that is the character who keeps wondering if SAMCRO is living the original vision. this character continues through the season to try and veer the club back onto the original path that it was started on. it's always in subtle ways, and it's always very smart, and it always ends up taking loose hold before falling completely apart again, so it manages to stay a plot point for the whole season. and then, at the end of the season, you find another character starting to lean towards the same path.

i have very high hopes for season two, which releases on netflix in august.

9/10 CLANKS!

Related posts:

1. review : "sons of anarchy," season 1, eps 1-7
2. Sons Of Anarchy
3. review : "terminator – the sarah connor chronicles," S2

i've only seen two episodes of "louie" on HULU, and i don't know that i'm going to go back for many more, but time will tell.

the reason i wouldn't return to it is not because it's a poorly concepted or executed program, because in fact, it's whatever's the opposite of that. i think i may not go back because (i can't believe i'm about to say this of a television show) it's almost too much for me.

this show is REALLY heavy, and not in a constructed hollywood way. in fact, nothing about this show feels constructed in ANY way. it feels so natural and honest that when they get into subject matter that's deeply impactful stuff (which they make a rule of), it's like being involved in it your own self.

this show is way, way, WAY deep. louis CK plays himself -- an NYC-based comedian and divorced father of 2 grrls, with whom he shares custody with his ex-wife. he's generally a pessimist/realist, and his comedy is very observational. the format is slightly similar to "seinfeld" only in the sense that the episode's stories are punctuated with pieces of his stand-up act that are relevant to the story. but that's where the similarities begin and end. unlike jerry's character, louis' character is insightful, compassionate, a little confused, and sort of sad. in one episode, as he seeks out a crush he had in grade school, his flashbacks to that time of his life are so stunningly impactful to you that you get a little uncomfortable both for him and for your own self. in another moment, he and his poker buddies begin goofing on the one of their crew who's gay. it starts out as the good-natured kind of conversation you might have with any of your own gay friends (or straight friends, for that matter), but it eventually leads louis to ask the guy if he's ok with louis' use of the word "faggot" in his act. and just like that, in a 1-minute explanation of how the word came to be used as an insult towards homosexual males, the conversation becomes something that's so emotional wrenching that you forget you were laughing 60 seconds ago.

"louie" is a funny show, don't get me wrong. but the humor is equally as offset by enough drama and real-life situational elements that it feels almost disturbingly real.

i'd say give it a go (it's on FX and HULU), but be warned -- it's not what you're expecting.

9/10 CLANKS! after two episodes.

Related posts:

1. (500) days of summer review
2. review : "sons of anarchy," S1, eps 8-13
3. Review: Modern Family S01, Ep13: Fifteen Percent

Good Guys is the latest show from Burn Notice creator Matt Nix. It plays with some fairly long in the tooth conventions, but dances around letting them stagnate. Straight-laced young cop is partnered with old-school has-been drunkard cop, written off and yet solves crimes. However, where it's fun is the details. Nix has infused this formula with some great touches that appeal to viewership of my ilk, at least I think. The humor is wry and knowing. There's irony, but not snark. There's clever scriptwriting, but not excessively distracting dialog. The crimes and plot elements in the episode are linked in interesting ways, not too obtuse to let you focus on the plot at the expense of character, nor simple enough to make you wonder why they haven't solved the case yet. That sort of thing. At the end of the day, it's not a cop buddy show, it's not a crime-solving show, it's not a police procedural. It's a character show. And the best character? Hands down: Bradley Whitford's MUSTACHE.



That's not a slight to Whitford or Hanks or anyone else. It's just so damn FUN. It's real. He grooms it proudly, despite being drunk at 8am and barely coherent. They find the balance between mocking these classic memes and embracing them for nostalgia value. And while the old school/ new school thing is definitely played up, it's not one-note. Colin Hanks, even more a spitting image of dear old dad than ever before, may be straight-laced, but he's also socially inept and rude and annoyingly detail oriented and devoid of social lubricant, and it's great to see a charming guy with so much potential struggling in the 'Property Crimes' department because he pissed every superior off by correcting them. Meanwhile Bradley Whitford's Dan Stark may be this shy of a Ron Burgundy cartoon, but he's got heart and instincts and actually CAN be a good cop, if he's kept from drinking himself to death or getting shot from telling the same story a thousand times to the wrong person. I will also admit, I'm in for Jenny Wade, a beguiling actress last scene on Reaper, who has a fragile, almost blown glass quality to her facial features.

Anyway, in the Pilot, Hanks' Jack Bailey has been begrudgingly partnered with washed-up Detective Stark in the Property Crimes department, chasing down the report of a stolen humidifier. The case leads to drug trafficking, Colombian assassins, victim interviews full of hot sex, facial reconstructive surgery in the form of Erik Estrada's visage, and more. I had a blast.

Now, to be fair, I'm not the harsh critic many are when watching new shows. Much like the rest of my life, I prefer to find the good. It's by no means a visionary piece of showmaking. But if you like Burn Notice, you'll like this, and I happen to find Burn Notice fun as hell. I think there's a place for cop type shows that aren't so serious.





Items!

- The title screen, at least for the pilot, was an orange and yellow illustration type shot of the two leads, some ghetto lettering and a drawing of a Trans Am. I was sold.

- "they say you are the second best assassin in the world"
This is how the drug kingpin introduces us to the assassin that heads to America and shoots the guys up, played by the same actor who played Mikhail on Lost. I mean, second best. As a badge of honor.

- The 'second-best assassin in the world' has a habit of correcting people's spanish, like the burglar/pawn shop owner who barked at him in broken spanish defiantly during the shoot out, or with others later on. Nice connection to the fact that Hanks' character was demoted for correcting everyone. This guy is bad ass though.

- "Didn't think I'd make it through that shower. Then found that bottle of conditioner. Peppermint schnaps!"
Frank Stark, on being picked up at his RV in the morning by his partner. I wasn't sure what I liked more, that he stashed Schnaps in the shower for emergencies, that he drinks SWEET liquor, or that he forgot it was there in the first place.

- Captain: "You called for backup AFTER you shot up the pawn shop, then Stark jumped on his car?"
- Stark: " it's called The Stark!"

- Humidifinder. Let's not forget, two detectives were sent out to investigate a reported theft of a humidifier.

- Stark wears a little pewter handcuff tie clip

- There's a meet set up by the Colombians at a 'Stripping club'. Thereafter, the title cards refer to the location the same way.

- Stark sees a used car pulled up onto racks at a deslership nest to the gas station they're in, and declares: "That Trans am is mint!"
Then the worker posts a sign that says "$6500 mint"

- "He's gone and he ain't never coming back!"
From the pawn shop guy, about having ditched the bodies in Mexico, never to be recovered.
Immediately cut to a desert scene of a Ford Festivva, nose down in a ditch about 15 feet deep, and the guy pops out of the trunk, still alive, half-surgically cut-up from the facial reconstruction, screaming with rage.

- "He's interviewing the stripper."
Hanks' Bailey, to the Captain, about where Stark is in the crime scene. Please note the strippers had nothing to do with the crime. Also, recall Stark hooked up with the woman whose humidifier was stolen in the first place (played by Nia Vardalos) Player!

- The criminal needing facial recostruction after going on the lam, specifically requested looking like Erik Estrada.

- "So you know about rules and evidence and how to work a computer machine!"
Stark, defiantly and defensively decrying his partner's reliance on new technology.

"I'll take the other room with the cable TV and you take this bed. It's the assassins bed."
The Colombian kingpin, forcing the second-best assassin, and now the BEST assassin who he brought with him, to share a bed.

- The pawn shop guy was given a puffy Kitten sweater to hide his vest and wire for the big meet. It was garishly wrong. In the meet itself, the Colombian kingpin stares at it, looks at him, and doesn't say anything. Which was awesome. Like, it wasn't even worth it.

- "One day you wake up and everything robots and lasers. Shaving where once hair grew free!"
Stark, complaining to the liquor store attendant in a drunken speech, after being suspended.

- "Please let me save her."
Hanks' character, to the assassin, in the middle of their shoot out, after seeing the girl being dragged out the back. Best part, the assassin, who is now the BEST assassin in the world after killing the best moments earlier, LETS him.

- When Stark stole the Trans Am and comes tearing around the corner, guess what they play.
'Texas, yeah Texas, and we had some fun!"
That's right. THUNDERSTRUCK

- "How long can they stay like that?"
Captain, to another, about the assassin, and the second best assassin, in a locked gaze guns-drawn impasse. "Hours!" says the other guy, and then describes your typical Good Bad and Ugly scenario in detail.

- Upon returning to Colombia, the now-BEST-assassin in the world sends the detectives a letter praising their bravery, and a photo of him posing with his children.

- In the closing scene, they jump into the Trans Am to hit the road, but Stark sort of slides and gets tripped up a bit, because it's hard to jump INTO a T-top.

Excellent.

8/10 Clicks

:::

See several eps here, but not the pilot reviewed OF COURSE.
http://www.fox.com/watch/goodguys

Related posts:

1. Threshold- Pilot
2. Andy Barker, P.I. – Pilot
3. Fringe S01, Ep 01: Pilot

snack GAVE us the heads-up to get on board with this show, and since it was already on my queue, i bumped it up near the top.

WHOA DUDE.

"sons of anarchy" is the name of an outlaw motorcycle club, often referred to as "sam crow," which is a pronunciation of their full moniker, SAMCRO, which is an abbreviation for "sons (of) anarchy motorcycle club, redwood originals."

all the details (that i know of) of outlaw motorcycle clubs seem to have been studied to get the look of the club right, so i'm super down with that. i know two guys who are in a motorcycle club, and as such i've been at social events with many others, and from what i've seen so far on this show, they did their homework. one detail that i love is how the main character jax (charlie hunnam, from "undeclared," who i knew i knew but couldn't place until i re-read snack's post) is styled. jax is a young guy, maybe in his late 20s or early 30s. well, there's a whole different look to new-era motorcycle club guys -- they don't look like the angels you saw in the 60s. in one scene jax is shown wearing his club colors over a hoodie, and wearing baggy pants and white adidas. that's CLASSIC new-school motorcycle club. but then the other characters are all older heads, so they're still standing in boots and wearing their colors over a leather or jean jacket. other attention to detail includes patch placement (specifically rank and club insignia), riding style, tattoo placement and significance, and some other little things that are very well done.

SAMCRO is in the business of running guns, they get in on protection sometimes, and they are active in keeping drugs out of the streets of their fictional northern california town of charming, which is apparently in the bay area. (that's kind of attentive to detail, too, considering the angels were born here.) some of their enemies include the aztecs (a mexican rival motorcycle club), and a white-power group headed by an almost-unrecognizable mitch pileggi. some of their tentative allies are the niners (a black oakland gang to whom SAMCRO sells weapons), and some of charming's cops.

one of the best characters on the show, without a doubt, is katey sagal's "mother gemma." she's jax' mother and clay's (ron perlman's) wife. side note : clay is not jax' father. jax' father and clay (and apparently 7 others, given that clay wears a "first 9" patch) started the club, and were best friends. when jax' father died, apparently gemma married clay. anyway, she's a fucking badass. she takes NO shit, and you can tell she's an old mama -- she has old weathered tattoos poking out here and there and she dresses in a modern variant of old school biker mama style. she does NOT bullshit around, and in fact she reminds me of an even more badass version of carmella soprano. they're very different characters in almost every way, but the similarities are pretty stunning.

other great cast members so far are maggie siff (mad men), drea de matteo (sopranos, as well as most of my dreams), and the aforementioned mitch pileggi (x-files). obviously, charlie hunnam is very good, but strangely, i'm not really buying ron perlman just yet. maybe i will eventually, but something about him just doesn't seem outlaw biker enough to me. i have to imagine got the role because he's huge and weathered, and that's fine, but something outside of that is bothering me and i can't quite place it. eh, doesn't matter.

the story so far seems to be showing the relationships within the large and somewhat fractured club family, the tensions experienced through living (and in at least one case, leaving) the outlaw life, the business difficulties of illegal trade, and the pretty deep exploration by at least one character of whether or not this is what SAMCRO was meant to be when it was started. it's a multi-layered show that promises to get even deeper as it goes on.

anyway, i'm only 7 episodes in, so i can't say much other than the performances are great, the attention to the details of outlaw biker culture is very tight, the stories are taut, and experientially it's very similar to "the sopranos" or even "weeds," in that the outlaws are the protagonists.

definitely worth sticking on your queue. so far i'm giving it 9/10 CLANKS!

Related posts:

1. review : "sons of anarchy," S1, eps 8-13
2. Sons Of Anarchy
3. art show review – a different look at religious icons

Much like JesusPoliticians and iPerfect products, the finale of Lost was a release anxiously awaited with impossible expectations, certain to disappoint and outrage almost everyone in one way or another, yet managed to do what it DIS very well. Put me firmlt in the camp of those that felt the series endcap was a great finale in general, and a near-perfect Lost episode: it had the slow-cooking stew of half-explained mythology, action, romance, a wonderful score, solid acting, and brilliant editing, yet in the end it was a thematic piece, asking viewers to let the episode, and the series, be what they want it to be, but gave us some fairly profound concepts to think about afterward. And I suspect it had everyone up late thinking, whether in outrage or philisophical contemplation. Or both.

Though Smokey and Ben didn't find Desmond, who was already long gone from the well, Smokey insists that Desmond will help him destroy the island anyway. Desmond was actually recuperating under the 'keep us out of this' pair of Rose and Bernard (in the camp they forged in the 70s when they originally dropped out, and where they resumed living once the island hopped that final time) and when Smokey finds them, Desmond agrees to follow him in exchange for their lives. Meanwhile, new island protector Jack leads his people towards the bamboo field where Jacob informed him the secret entrance to the island's Lifeforce core would be. He is certain that Smokey will be there, and that the ending of this almost ageless struggle will include doing the very thing Smokey wants: using Desmond to shut the island down. He banks on Desmond being a weapon brought there by Jacob in the first place, for a reason, cementing the change of approach Jack followed after years of the opposite attitude (Locke was right, etc). At the cave, Jack and Smokey lower Desmond into a subterranean lightwell, where he uses his ability to withstand electromagnetic radiation to enter the source, pull a crazy hieroglyph-covered cork, and kill the power, leading to what appeared to be a tap tot he earth's core, complete with heat and red glows and fire and magma and the like. Immediately, the island begins to collapse. Smokey planned to escape using his boat (actually, Desmond's boat) but Jack, horrified that whatever he expected to happen didn't happen, emerges from the cave with Smokey and attacks him. Smokey clocks him with a rock and flees. Eventually, they have a balls-out physical battle amidst tremors and cave-shearing that threatens to send them into the drink, but to Smokey's horror, his immortality has disappeared and he is being wounded by Jack's blows. Ultimately Smokey stabs Jack in the gut, essentially a fatal blow, but before he can finish the job Kate shoots him from afar. Jack kicks him over the side, and the contest with the Man in Black was finally over. Terribly wounded, Jack asks Sawyer and Kate to retrieve Claire, meet the not-dead Lapides, Miles and Alpert over on Hydra station, and flee via the improbable aircraft repair, before the island implodes, or Jack restores it, either of which theoretically limits their escape course. Ben and Hurley stay with Jack, and he makes his way back to the cave, where he passes the torch to Hurley, and descends into the chamber once more. He ties Desmond to the rope Hurley and Ben hold, then personally steps in and pulls the wellcork into place, restoring the light and so on. He wakes up farther upstream, having been blown clear by the pulse... staggers to the bamboo forest... and lays down to die, in the same place he lay when he first awoke on the island after the crash of Oceanic 815.

Meanwhile, or thereafter, all of the connections between Losties are made in the Sideways reality, culminating in Jack coming to the church where he planned to hold the funeral for his father. Everyone is waiting for him inside, including Hurley (Ben stays behind) and in the final moments of the show, Jack sees his father, who informs him that he leads to let go, join the people that meant the most to him, and move on.

So, I think this was actually a pretty solid approach. Sure, if you look at the plot details, much of the sideways reality was very plot-driven and specific, and much of the island remains a mystery. But since the show was always a character study, with a serialized plot as a mechanism for that exploration, as Jack says to Desmond: "Everything matters." and yet it doesn't. In the end, the messy details of life fall away, and you die. It's the universal equalizer for the human experience, the awareness of mortality, and the embrace of that inevitability. I think in many ways that aspect of this show was an attempt to bring our largely-secular, complicated lives a little bit closer to the awareness of life and death co-existing the way older cultures knew it. The common themes of the show: good vs evil as a choice vs inherent trait, faith vs science, choice vs predeterminism, making your piece wioth your parents and loved ones who passed and so on, all were touched on in this finale with a strong sense of closure. It was sentimental, but I felt it was respectful of the series as a whole of the characters and the actors who portrayed them.

And for the record, I do believe the island, albeit with all of it's mysteries, timespace shunting, etc really happened. The 815 folks crashed, lived their, died at various points in time, some got away, some stayed the rest of their days. The Smoke Monster wasn't a primoridal evil, but the twisted soul of the nameless brother, who DID have the ability to snuff out the lifeforce of the island and destroy the world, literally or figuratively. And in the end, what Jack did absolutely mattered. The sideways reality was a collective holding area for these consciousnesses, gathering in a 'I would have done things differently' state of flux until one by one they became enlightened to their passing and were ready to move on, with Jack being the final one to allow them all to pass on. I don't think it was purgatori, per se, because it was a non-denomionational form divorced of the implications of the Judeo-Christian concept: they weren't trapped souls... they were waiting to join the afterlife (the overmind, the life force itself, whatever you want it to be based on theological viewpoint)... merely waiting to be ready. And I think the magic of this Hopi-like post-life existence was that it transcended time and space, was merely the essences of these people finding each other and recognizing the value of their shared life vs individual experiences. Going back to that early statement, 'live together or die alone'... they had to truly be together to move on.

Bullets.

1. I thought it was profound that regardless of choices and circumstances in life, ultimately death is inevitable, really calling the 'whats the point' thing into clarity: with the inevitability of mortality (including for the island specials rendered momentarily vulnerable when the light was extinguished) the choice of doing good vs. not, expending effort vs. not, being selfless vs selfish, and ultimately the question of sacrifice itself, become even more poignant. The show did not postulate that there was a heaven or sentient afterlife, only that there was something beyond, even if only to give these souls a chance to find peace with their lives before moving on. Choices made in the living did not effect their candidacy, so to speak, for heavenly riches. They did, however, influence their ability to be at peace in the first place.

2. Presumably, Hurley protected the island for the rest of his days, much like Mother Other's original conceit, not from Smokey, but from being extinguished period. Ben being asked to be Hurley's number two was a wonderful catharsis for Ben as well. It was my hunch that Jack would die and Hugo would be the new Jacob, but the way it actually unfolded, and Ben's role in it, was surprising and satisfying.

3. I'm a sucker for structure. I loved the symmetry in the finale. The series opened and closed with Jack's eye, made especially poignant as Jack was not meant to survive the pilot. The Apollo bar in the candy machine, Kate delivering Aaron, Jack and Locke peering down a lightwell, injuries sustained... it was almost perfect symmetry after the pinch point of the season three finale, right down to a plane leaving the island in the finale just as a plane crumbled over it in the pilot.

4. I don't believe the church was meant to be overly Judeo-Christian. I believe it was just the perception of Jack's worldview and theology. It was actually littered with symbols from various religions, from Buddhist statues to menorahs to the stain-glass windows showing symbols from many religions, even an effing donkey wheel... it was spiritual imagery, yes, but it was meant show the legacy of humanity, in it's most fervent attempt to explain the world and the meaning of life as it relates to the afterlife. It was kind of Unitarian. But I also liked the fact that those final moments, as religiously tinged as they were, were also consistent with secular philosophical concepts of the afterlife as well: Jungian, transcendentalist, whatever. It fit.

5. I loved the shout-out to duct-tape.

There were a million other small references I quite enjoyed, but I'm kind of in post-Lost shut-down. I hope to one day hear from the producers about some of the island mythology, ie. the Egyptian connection especially, but I was OK with leaving the source and meaning of a lot of things ambiguous. All in all, though, I was quite satisfied.

Related posts:

1. Review: Lost S06, Ep 17: What They Died For
2. Review: Lost S06, Ep 16: Across the Sea
3. Lost, Season 3, Episode 0: "Recap"

The season finale of Modern Family was pretty meta, in a way. It was ostensibly about Claire's frustration at attempting to organize a family portrait. It dives into all the trappings of extended family interaction: expectations of each other, flakery, last minute plan changes, misalignment of assumptions, things going wrong... and then in the end, the photo IS taken and it's perfectly imperfect. Everyone, whitewashed in these summer outfits, smeared with mud, unruly and laughing. It IS a classic, iconic shot about family, and this family in particular. Sub-plots include Jay having to dictate the tale of his younger days to Phil's youngest son, doing a report on the 60s (he makes it all up), Phil and Gloria going to the Lakers game and being caught on the Kissing Cam (actually, he's caught not answering his phone while Claire calls, watching him live... but he THINKS he got caught kissing Gloria, which snowballs int he climax of the episode), Mitchell elects not to go to Cam's A Capella rendition of Ave Maria at a wedding, but is tortured by an indoor pigeon instead, and Claire's OCD gets the better of her as she prepares for the photo, finally going after my favorite recurring detail in the season: the loose stair tread.

Bullets:

1. They handled the obligatory celeb guest in a low-key fashion: Kobe Bryant. I love that Phil yelled Kobe's name, and Kobe actually replied, to which Phil went blank. 'Stay on your toes. It's a mental game.' how classic. We never DO expect the far-away celebrity being sighted to say something back, do we?

2. Cam can't really sing. And he was hired based on karaoke. Really.

3. The slo-mo pigeon smashing scene was very late-60s dramatic film. I'm sure there's a specific reference there, but it dovetailed (so to speak) nicely with all of Jay's lies about his celebrity 60s barbershop.

4. "Is there really a more clear way to describe white pants?”
-Clair, in asking Phil to try his pants on before the photo shoot, and Phil, not really paying attention, asked which ones.

5. “The question is why isn’t all of your underwear good?”
-Gloria, in response to Jay's outrage that his underwear got switched with Manny's by the new maid (his junk was tangled up in a tiny harness, while Manny thought the new room meant he was losing weight)... he was complaining losing 'his good underwear'

6. “What people do in the privacy of their own sports arena should be their own business.”
-Phil, complaining about his mistaken belief that they broadcast the Kissing Cam footage to TV

7. “I know you’re mad at me and I know this foam hand can’t make up for everything.”
-Phil, on his return from the game. Oh you don't even know yet, Phil...

8. Claire smashing up all the framed photos... of the family... in a great physical comedy moment as she loses control of her hammer while notFixing the stair tread.

9. They plastic-wrapped the youngest son so he wouldn't get dirty. And it becomes a third act PLOT POINT.

10. Gloria's 'wildly inappropriate dress'

11. There's nothing wrong with bringing your own snacks.

12. Claire's facial expression when Phil hung up on her. (above)

13. "We should totally prank dad! Tell him I got pregnant!"


Hooo buddy
10/10 clicks!

Related posts:

1. Review: Modern Family S01, Ep22/ 23: Airport/ Hawaii
2. Review: Modern Family S01, Ep12: Not in My House
3. Review: Modern Family S01, Ep 21: Travels with Scout

So this was the penultimate episode of the Lost series. Those that complained perhaps that last episode was to allegorical, mythological and wishy-washy so close to the end would have little to complain about in this one. Wow. With the body count rising and so many plans aborted or abandoned on the island, the whole season, and this ep especially, reminded me of a role-playing game campaign. In my campaigns, I liked to encourage the players to develop plans, and then try to execute them, enjoying the entropy when their plans, and those of their foes or targets, fell apart. It happened the bad guys as often as the players, and sifting through the detritus, as Hannah's wife said in Heat, was half the fun.

On the island, Ben, Miles and Richard Alpert have made their way back to the Others Compound that was once Ben's childhood home in the Dharma Initiative, then his home in the Others takeover, and more recently home to the re-stranded Losties like Sawyer... but of course, as Miles pointed out, he and the rest of the time-shunted folks lived there as part of the Dharma team even before Ben took it over. Very interesting overlaps of continuity. Anyway, they're after the C4 which Ben hid in his secret safe. Noting a stone gateway covered in hieroglyphs in the closet's secret room, the others are told that this was where Ben was told he could summon the Smoke Monster, before he realized the Smoke Monster was summoning HIM. This was a subtle reminder that much of the island's cryptohorror deity business we saw in previous seasons claiming to be Jacob speaking to Ben was in fact Smokey doing same. Anyhow, as they collect the goods, the home is entered by none other than Zoe and Widmore himself. This was a nice touch of consistency in storytelling, as while we see all these disparate characters interacting in a big picture way, the characters themselves have allegiances and motivations that are real and local; while it sometimes feels like the Losties accept paranormal entities like Smokey and Jacob and the like too easily, here we were reminded of Ben's deep-seated seething hatred for Widmore over the death of his adopted daughter at the hands of Widmore's men, and also that while Widmore seemed to have returned to the island in a protagonist capacity, Ben hasn't forgotten not only his specific grievance, but that at the end of the day, he has more in common with Smokey than the Losties.

When they hear that Smokey is coming, Ben shephards (so to speak) Widmore and Zoe into the closet, Miles makes a run for it, Alpert goes out to reason with Smokey on the mistaken assumption that Smokey was still int he recruitment business, and Ben just sits on the porch. Alpert's sent into the sky in a Smoke attack, and Ben surprisingly leads Smokey right to the others, for a brutal and shocking confrontation, in which Zoe's throat is cut and Widmore is killed... by Ben. The details of this exchange were very interesting also, especially because Widmore admitted defeat, and took Smokey at his word that if he told him what he wanted to know, Smokey would spare Penny out in the world. This fascinated me, because it meant that Widmore was a realist to the end: he knew his goose was cooked by Smokey and that his failsafe with Desmond was hopeless. He knew Smokey was going to win regardless, so why not try to secure a deal for the one person he loved? He had nothing to lose. However, this struck a chord in Ben, who shot Widmore in attempt to keep him from revealing the info to Smokey that would seal that Penny-saving pact. Or so we are led to believe anyway. I still suspect Ben has a few irons int he fire, just as the other big con artist on the island, Sawyer, did.

Meanwhile, Jacob finally reveals himself to the remaining Losties, and tells them 'what they all were dying for' in the most blunt way possible for Lostian mythology. It was refreshing, if a little stark by the standards of the show. But it was consistent with setting up the finale, letting them all understand now, while he had time, that they were candidates to replace him, and that they needed to protect the WTF lightsource at the center of the island from Smokey, or everything goes to hell. It was a pragmatic scene. And of all of them, Jack stepped up and volunteered. The whole thing was predictable and kind of redundant with everything we'd seen all season, but it was a necessary plot element to enable these characters to understand what we already did. Ultimately, Jack took the ceremonial sip, became an island protector, and off we go.

In the sideways reality, a number of dots were connected by Desmond, bringing Losties together and openeing their eyes to a shared connection, and in the most direct tether between those realities, Locke finally made the CHOICE to undergo surgery with Jack, just as Jack was making the choice to inherit the role of island boss.

I loved the episode for all the plot elements and seeing the characters in action, many of them doing what I liked best from them over time: Miles, being sarcastic, smart and spooky; Hurley, well-meaning, gentle and having perspective; Jack rising above his issues and owning the leadership role, Sawyer admitting fallibility and being burdened by his shaken confidence, and Kate, actually impressing me by calling Jacob on all the unnecessary deaths and manipulations. While I enjoy my Lost a bit more mysterious and suspenseful, this felt like the ramp-up to the end, as it should.

But here's the thing: we have a 2-hour finale coming. The stage is set for the final showdown. I don't believe Jack is going to be the guy. I think he's going to bite it in the finale, and I still think Hurley is going to be the one. However, a lot of interesting pieces are falling into place to let Ben become a new Smokey and Jack to be the new Jacob. And I think it's a red herring. I suspect the finale is going to be messy, a bit ambiguous, and heart-wrenching. I'm looking forward to it.

Bullets:

1. The discussion with Jacob was refreshing not merely because of the straight talk and the answers provided (not just for us, but for the characters who've put up with manipulations and mysteries and suffering for a long time) but because Jacob, who was once seen as a deity, then proven to be human last week, finally admits failure, in that he created Smokey and the biggest threat to the island in his own folly.

2. I loved that the question about why THESE people were selected came into blunt focus: they were all broken, had difficulty with their relationships, had little to lose, needed a bigger purpose. And what really intrigued me? These are the same psychological factors exploited when recruiting extremist footsoldiers and suicide bombers.

3. I'm a sucker for parallel filmmaking, with recurring scenes or references to previous scenes. I love when we see connections to the narrative of earlier seasons. This time, we got the focus on the eye, PLUS the inversion of the pilot, with Jack sewing Kate up.

4. The Smoke Monster doesn't want lemonade.

5. Richard Alpert: like Lupidus, he got an unceremonious smashing. Unlike our wise pilot, however, he has all sorts of immortal, mysterious abilities and was a pretty serious player in the battle between Jacob and Smokie. He'll be back.

6. Part of me is delighted that they have refused to show us Locke-form turning into Smoke on a regular basis, other than in the statue temple. It makes the anticipation of such things even better. I hope to see some kick ass transformations in the finale.

7. I was intrigued by the fact that Ana Lucia, in the sideways reality, was still doing exactly the same thing as before: cop who's lost her way. 'not ready yet' according to Desmond. However, it was cool how Rich Hurley and Desmond are hitting the plan like clockwork.

8. Who thinks David's unseen Mother, and ex to Jack, is going tobe Juliette? I sure do. This gives Sawyer a chance to have his reality check, when he sees her there, dragged in by Miles.

9. A frequent annoyance for me has been why Smokey spends so much time in Locke's body, not just around others but alone in the jungle. It was referenced this time, in an answer to Ben ciphering for us: he likes the reminder of what it was like to be human once, oh, 2,000 years ago.

10. The confrontation with Jacob felt pretty realistic. I loved Hurley warning Kate to zip it as she was challenging Jacob over the deaths and injuries of all the red shirts.

11. Now we know why Ilyana kept Jacob's ashes, and why Hurley was digging around in her stuff... it was a last-ditch method for Jacob to communicate, a failsafe of his own.

12. I love broken Sawyer. Not self-loathing Sawyer or revenge-fueled Sawyer as we've seen before, just overwhelmed. Shaken by the knowledge that he got several people killed including his friend, on the basis of his pride and stubbornness. And in the Jacob scene, he starts to mock Jack's volunteering to lead... then just falls away from it, like he can't even summon the mock sarcasm because he knows this shit is REAL, as the kids say.

13. It was interesting that Jack was told the light cave is close to the bamboo field he crashed in in the pilot, as if he was the likely candidate all along, just needed to let go, so to speak, enough to accept it and have some allegorical clarity of vision.

14. The implication, in Widmore's answers, was that Widmore got his return pass to the island directly from Jacob, and turned a page post-freighter after a Jacob meeting clarified a few things for him. I'm still not sure that's true, but that's what he said. It took me back to the freighter days, when the main rivalry seemed to be Widmore vs Ben for ownership ie. stewardship, of the island.

15. Of knives and blood: the more I think of Smokey having been a man, then disembodied, and finally taking a permanent tangible form (recall this is the only form he's used to physically interact with, the others all being manifestations) and enjoying the tether to the past... well, here's the thing about Locke and weapons. He's always carrying the rifle or the blade, but he'll put the rifle down, and take the blade out and mess around with it, perhaps clean his nails, or eviscerate a new castmember... I think it's a nice callback to Man in Black's obsession with the blade that he used to kill Mother Other with, which has been floating around ever since (I lost track of what happened to it after Sawyer failed to use it)... similarly, I'm finding the repeated spots of blood on the neck of sideways Jack intriguing too... sure wants to seem like a likely sign of Jack eating it, doesn't it?

Anyway, exciting. And having the finale a few days off is fun too...

Related posts:

1. Review: Lost S06, Ep 18: The End
2. Review: Lost S06, Ep 16: Across the Sea
3. Lost S06, Ep 06: Sundown

As Lost wraps up, I note that I have about 3,333 reviews of episodes in drafts, all the way back to season 3. While those are never going to see the light of day, i'm going to hit a few of these while I still can, in bullet point style.

Across the Sea was the 'origin story' of Jacob and the Man in Black, and in typical lost fashion it asked as many questions as it answered. We see a Roman woman wash ashore on the island, a victim of a shipwreck, received by a matronly wiccan-type woman (the Mother Other, I call her, nameless as she is) who cares for her, discovers she bears one, then two, twins in sudden birth, and then crushes her head with a rock. She raises the two boys in isolation on the island, telling them nothing exists beyond the horizon. Eventually the seed of deceit, or at least free-thinking cleverness, is evident in the Boy in Black, who remains also nameless, when attempting to hide the board game he found on the shore. We come to see that Mother Other may value Jacob, the golden boy who dutifully obeys her, but she respect the Boy in Black more for different reasons.

Ultimately the boys find evidence of others, in the form of a small tribe of barbarians boar-hunting on the island. Boy in Black has the thirst for knowledge and self-determination, and wants out, so after they confront Mother Other about the men and receive a new set of lies and warnings, off he goes to join them, leaving Jacob to stick to their mother's side. The Boy in Black sees ghosts, too, by the way, that Jacob doesn't, and meets his true mother's spirit, who encourages him to leave the nest. Later, he's hard at work organizing the tribe he's joined: Mother Other cast some weird voodoo that made the brothers unable to harm each other, but also warned they couldn't leave the island (which we know at least one of them has, Jacob), and Boy in Black is determined to find a way. As kids, Mother Other showed them a creepy cave that glowed with light and metaphor, warning that she guarded it from men like the barbarians and, well, everyone else, and never to enter it. So Boy in Black has deduced that he needs to get at that light, because if you tell a kid not to do something, that's what they MUST do.

They've figured out that not only is there this creepy glowing cave, but areas of the island where metal behaves strangely, ie. magnetic interference. So Boy, now Man in Black, and his guys are digging wells at the areas of magnetic mystery, hoping to find access to that underground light, and thus, somehow, escape the Island's pull (I don't know if he had tried to escape using conventional means at this point or not, but whatever... the story was steeped in allegory and the details aren't even that important.) Once Mother Other finds out about Man in Black's machinations, she steals away while Jacob sleeps, and visits her other son, down in one of these wells, in fact the home of the magic donkey wheel. She reasons with him, begs him, finds out he told everyone about the light and what not and that the monkey is basically out of the bottle now and then once again, moves in for the loving embrace and then bashes Man in Black's head with a rock. When he regains consciousness, he's in camp, the camp is destroyed, the well buried, and all the tribesmen murdered. RAGE!

Meanwhile, she's lt Jacob in on her guardianship secret. He resists the calling, with some jealousy of his brother or what not, but she insists he doesn't have a choice, and gets him to drink from her metaphorical bottle of wine, sealing the deal. Now he's the new lightcave guardian. Back at their little camp, while he's off doing chores, Mother Other is stabbed through the chest from behind by a bitter and distraught Man in Black, begging afterward to know why she lied to him, prevented him from leaving, etc. We see some mysterious release on her face, as she thanks him for killing her. When Jacob returns, he freaks out, beats the hell out of Man in Black (the third time he's done this, for those keeping score, who maybe wonder at how 'good' Jacob really is, who let me remind you DID take out Nadia just to influence Sayid) before dragging him to the mystery cave... he throws Man in Black in in defiance, and his unconscious body drifts down the river and into the cave. We see a blast of light and sound, the giant familiar clackity Smoke Monster flies out of the mouth of the cave, and then the light ominously fades. And that's that. Seasons worth of deification and mystery and guesswork about the celestial, biblical or egyptian origins of Jacob and Esau are bashed in by allegorical vagueness like the heads of loved ones in this episode.

Is that a bad thing, though? I think it's true that the episode wasn't balanced: it was entirely set in I believe 48AD, it had no tether to the rest of the cast or storyline in the, or rather a, present, it was heavy on allegory and light on pseudoscience, and maybe a bit too wishy-washy with lostian mythology in a way that didn't satisfy some of the more detail-oriented devotees like me. But I think that was sort of the point: they weren't going to be able to satisfy everyone, and they wanted to remind us that the structure of the big picture story on Lost has been about relationships, trust, faith, familial wrongs and the fairly existential nature of reality. Int hat way, it all clicked. And yes, they connected a lot of dots, even if imperfectly. I also think it was a curious calm before the storm of the finale to come.

Bullets:

1. OK, so they don't explain the lightcave, what that energy is, or how it works. It was so allegorical that it reeked of the kinds of paganism that Christians like to complain about. By design I think. It's got connections to lots of things: it's apparently a pool of life force, it's the meaning of life perhaps, in terms of man's quest to obtain it, it's magnetic, it's powerful, it can be tainted maybe, and it involves choice, like the forbidden fruit. But while many interesting, tantalizing questions came out of the cave in this episode, I felt, like many did, that there was something demystifying about it. It's a cave... with effing light in it. YEEE. I will say that the lack of explanation and the flowery way Mother Other talked about it and her guardianship might make sense in context, being millennia ago. Still. Light cave.

2. Did they cave of light turn dark once Smokey flew out of it, like it was tainted ( the way the pool of light at the temple turned black after Sayid was drowned in it) OR, was the light a cap of sorts on the darkness beyond it, snuffed like a flame? I know it's the allegorical nature of good vs evil thing, but I continue to wrestle with the idea that the island is a hellmouth, a cork on an evil darkness trying to slip out into the world, perhaps first made manifest by Man in Black's body floating into it. Did his body not only lend it's visage, but a sentience to a primordial darkness? And is that Smokey business, while tied to a human visage one way or another, now bound to the island such that his escape would very literally destroy the island itself? Is that the way the world ends, figuratively, that the hope is gone?

3. The reveal that the Adam and Eve skeletons in the cave in Season one (holding the bag of senet stones, the same cave that was Mother Other's lair) were in fact Mother Other and her dead son, Man in Black, not some time-shunted pair of Lostians, that was kind of weak and also kind of gross. Plus, Jack had claimed those bodies were 40-50 years old. That's why I was hot to see them be time-traveling Losties. I mean, hello. 50s, 60s, we've seen this.

4. That board game is apparently a Senet. Senet boards were often placed in the grave alongside other useful objects for the dangerous journey through the afterlife, according the historian types who've been studying it relentlessly ever since.

5. Were the Island, Mother Other, and the Man in Black all nameless by design? I think so. And did Mother Other relate more to Man in Black than Jacob because she shares something inherently with him? It all depends on what Smokey is, and if it existed prior to that climactic scene. It's interesting that one set of people over time have been 'important' and one set have been able to see ghosts. Are they playing the same roles in cyclical fashion that started with Jacob and MIB or did these roles predate even Mother Other, whose presence was never explained. There's some chicken/egg business going on here.

6. Smokey's explanation of the wheel and his "system that channels the water and the light" was baffling and tantalizing. It seemed to be leading somewhere, in fact to one of the Lostian physical mysteries that's always bothered me (the donkey wheel) but dammit, didn't explain it.

7. Now, Smokey. Assuming that wasn't the first Smokey manifestation, there's something dodgy about Mother Other. For one thing, she was apparently immortal, like Alpert and the ageless Jacob. For another, she knew everything about everything. For yet another, she effed up that entire village in a very Smokey way. So was she a Smokey who was tired? Was she a white Smokey?

8. The light, and people in it: well, Sayid touched the light, and poof, it's extinguished and he was or wasn't tainted and soulless (or maybe that was Others' propaganda). Ben apparently was cured in similar fashion back in the day. But Desmond, apparently pivotal to the Island and Widmore's schemes, was the one guy to survive the light, or in contemporary Lostian terms, the extremely intense blast of electromagnetic radiation. So, is this individual specific, or achtype specific?

9. I thought the fact that Jacob was pounding people, wracked with insecurity, and then seemed to cause the Smokey incident, as well as his later well-established pattern of manipulation, was interesting from this purity vs. sin, cause and effect vs predetermination kick on Lost. To me, I read this as cause and effect, NOT a fate rumination. Smokey is Jacob's problem because Jacob caused it. Maybe.

10. What about the childbirth thing... I think Jacob and Man in Black being born on the island was a big deal. Worth head-bashing over, not sure.

11. Interesting that Man in Black used 'brother' constantly in reference to Jacob, as if stressing the familial bond, even though Jacob had a name and he himself didn't. Desmond too uses that term famously. Deliberate?
sau anything about life off of the island fuel his desire to leave?

12. The obsession with games and manipulation was well established in this episode, as a pattern on the Island. The cause and effect part, I'm not sure yet... may of the Lostians have turned to manipulating each other, lying, using strategy, having Machiavellian goals... is the Senet board merely allegory, or is it part of the power of the island itself...?

13. No one seems to have commented on this around the supernet, but the barbarians had metal crescents as necklaces. Are they moon worshipers? I know the egyptian thing smells like a maguffin at this point, but I thought that was pretty interesting...

Related posts:

1. Review: Lost S06, Ep 17: What They Died For
2. Review: Lost S06, Ep 18: The End
3. Lost S06, Ep 06: Sundown

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