Thoughts on the King Kong remake - two years after the fact

Being at my wits' end already during this summer television hiatus, I was flipping through channels and came across Peter Jackson’s very good King Kong remake. I’d forgotten how much I liked this movie when I saw it in the theater (Captain Engelhorn and Bruce Baxter are so very pretty!). The CGI effects for some reason don’t translate quite so well to the small screen, but even so, Kong is the coolest. Andy Serkis did such an incredible job as the big guy; I understand he studied live gorillas for months to learn their behaviors and expressions. Kong is clearly the hero of the film: fierce, lonely, sulky, funny, protective, confused and ultimately victimized. The Kong vs. the three T. Rexes scene is great fun. And Naomi Watts completely commits to her character; watching her go from being terrified of Kong, to accepting him as her protector, to realizing his loneliness is believable and touching.

I turned the movie off after the T. Rex battle though, when Ann falls asleep in Kong’s hand as the sun goes down – I wanted to stop before the sad part began. I just couldn’t watch it again. Carl Denham is the Big Bad here, ripping Kong out of his jungle and exploiting him just because he can. Typical human behavior: wanting to control and destroy nature. Kong’s rampage in NYC and his subsequent violent death were never his fault. I remember walking out to my car after seeing this movie for the first time and being a little choked up. Imagine - teary-eyed over a brutal, fictional 25+-foot tall CGI gorilla!

Pirates of the Carribean At World's End (mini) review

I will confess: I like the Pirates movies. I like the costumes and the make-up effects (Davy Jones's fish-crew are the stuff of nightmares), I like the over the top spectacle of it all, and mostly I like Johnny Depp in eyeliner. Mmmmmmm-mmm. This third Pirates movie is bigger, longer, crazier, soggier, more confusing, more unintelligible, more exhausting ... name a superlative and it pretty much applies. My complaints: I couldn't understand a bunch of the lines - whether from shouting or mumbling; the final battle between the crew of the Black Pearl and the crew of the Flying Dutchman seemed to go on forever; and I thought the whole Calypso story could have been dropped entirely. But, taken for what it is - a big ol' blockbuster meant to entertain its audience on a hot summer day - it's a treasure. Yar!

Firefly – Episode 1 recap “Serenity”

Very little in the world of entertainment has saddened me like the untimely cancellation of this amazing show; Michael Hutchence’s strange suicide was another, and the recent cancellation of Veronica Mars rounds out the trifecta. So many story-telling opportunities wasted - feature film notwithstanding. I never saw Firefly when it was actually on TV. (and by “actually” I mean “briefly”), but it was love at first sight on DVD. I’m going to attempt to write these recaps as though I’m meeting Mal et al., for the first time. I hope you’ll forgive me, however, if my fangirl fondness creeps in every now and then.

We open with war: ground forces and space ships. Our hero, Malcolm Reynolds, in raggedy revolutionary garb, is pinned down with his team; they seem to be insurgents of some sort, fighting against much better equipped troops, the “Alliance.” In rapid succession Mal demonstrates that he is resourceful (shooting down an enemy fighter ship with his second in command, Zoë), inspiring (rallying his soldiers against the odds) and devout (kissing the crucifix around his neck and waxing nearly poetic: “We are just too pretty for God to let us die.”). But as everyone dies around them, Zoë tells Mal that their command has ordered surrender, their battle is lost. He watches the Alliance forces descend and the light dies in his eyes.

Six Years Later. Mal, Zoë and Jayne are in spacesuits, breaking into a derelict ship’s cargo hold. There are some great no-gravity/floaty effects here. On board Mal’s ship, Wash, the pilot, plays with some plastic dinosaurs as he waits for the away team to collect the booty. An alarm sounds; Wash swears unintelligibly in Chinese, and calls to Kaylee, the ship’s mechanic. A huge Alliance ship is cruising by and they discover Mal’s ship, Serenity, “lowlife vultures picking the flesh off the dead.” Wash launches a decoy and Serenity and her crew escape to twangy music. Serenity is really pretty. The Alliance ship declines to give chase, but notifies the authorities that a Firefly-class ship is out and about scavenging wrecks. Although his crew has gotten away with the goods, Mal seems a bit more bitter than he did when we first met him.

As the crew stows the goods, Mal notices an official-looking imprint on the bars; he doesn’t show the others. We learn that Serenity and her crew are poor and that they’ll need to pick up paying passengers to afford fuel, food and repairs. We also learn that Zoë and Wash are married, and that there is some tension about her role as regards her husband vs. her captain. The crew plans to rendezvous on Persephone as soon as possible to find such passengers and to pick up the “ambassador,” Inara. Wash wonders if they should tell Inara to hurry; Mal mutters, “No, somebody on this boat has to make an honest living.” Cut to Inara: she’s a prostitute of some sort, beautiful, cultured, refined, and her shuttle – where she makes her living – is full of opulent Asian textiles and furnishings.

Serenity lands in the docks, which look to be a combination of Chinatown and the Old West. Wash takes off to collect supplies; Mal, Zoë and Jayne head to the local fence, Badger, to talk about payment for their cargo. Kaylee is sent to find passengers: she meets Shepherd Book, a traveling preacher and former cop on Barney Miller. Their conversation is very cute. Mal, Zoë and Jayne meet with Badger; it doesn’t take long for Jayne to get everyone’s guns drawn. Badger and Mal negotiate: Mal just wants to get paid for the job he’s done, but Badger refuses to pay for “imprinted Alliance goods.” Zoë glares at Mal when she hears the goods are marked. Badger dismisses them and suggests Mal try to sell the goods on an outer planet where folks are more desperate. Mal, Zoë and Jayne head back to Serenity. Jayne points out that he gets a share of whatever the ship’s take is: “10% of nothing is …carry the one …” I love Jayne. Rumors of Reavers hitting the outer planets give them cause for concern (“Them people ain’t human,” says Jayne) but Mal and Zoë decide to sell the goods to a contact on Whitefall: her name is Patience and she shot Mal the last time they met. As they get aboard the ship, Mal says, “Pray there ain’t no more surprises” and we cut to prissy-looking Simon overseeing the loading of his big metal box into the cargo hold. Now, I’ve seen a Joss Whedon show once or twice before (ha!) and I’m pretty sure Mal shouldn’t have said that.

In the ship’s kitchen (galley?), the crew reviews the rules with the new passengers [Shepherd Book, Simon and Dobson – you know, that guy who’s already been in both BTVS and Angel]. Mal mentions that they will be making a slight detour to Whitefall to – ahem - deliver some Alliance medical supplies. Simon is a surgeon and wants to know what kind of supplies; Zoë thinks on her feet and fends off his inquiries. Inara arrives on board and Mal takes great delight in trying to make both her and Shepherd Book uncomfortable about her profession. At dinner, everyone feasts on the fresh vegetables Book has donated, but Mal is testy when the preacher wants to say grace. The crew supplies the passengers (and the audience) with some background exposition about how the Alliance settled the outer planets. Luckily, just as we’re getting bored, Jayne makes a crass comment about Kaylee getting “lubed up” over Simon and “wishing that [he] was a gynecologist.” Kaylee is mortified, and Mal sends Jayne from the table. Simon wants to know what Jayne’s role on the ship is; Mal deadpans: “public relations.” I love Mal. And Jayne.

Oops! Wash discovers that one of the passengers has contacted the Alliance; he scrambles the signal, but not before some gets through. Mal assumes that Simon is the Alliance mole and starts to pound on him. To his credit, Simon is taking the beating pretty well. Book comes up: “Captain, you’ve got the wrong man.” Mal looks up to see Dobson holding a gun on them. It seems that the feds are after Simon – for a moment, Mal is hopeful about a reward, that opportunist! Lots of guns are drawn, and as the rest of the crew rush in to see what all the ruckus is about, Dobson gets nervous and shoots Kaylee. Mal, Simon and Inara rush to her while Book disarms Dobson, Jayne ties the fed up, and Zoë regains control of the situation. Simon refuses to treat Kaylee until Serenity turns around and flees from the approaching Alliance. I didn’t think Mal could glower more than he was, but yes, yes he can. They run from the Alliance and Simon, appeased, operates on Kaylee. There is a wonderful shot of Jayne hunched down, arms wrapped around himself, watching the surgery through the window. After Kaylee is resting in the infirmary, Mal decides that he wants to know just what is so important that Simon would risk all their lives to escape the Alliance. They all go to the cargo bay and Mal, over Simon’s frantic protests, opens the big metal box and looks inside. “Huh,” says Mal.

What’s inside? It’s a crazy naked screaming girl, of course. Her name is River, and she is Simon’s off-the-charts genius little sister, taken and experimented on by the Alliance. Simon rescued her and he is determined to protect her. Everyone is pretty riled up – worried about harboring fugitives, about River’s possible insanity, about the federal agent they’ve got tied up – and Mal ends up punching Simon again. Oh, why not? Mal leaves Jayne find out what Dobson knows. Did I mention I love Jayne? The fed spills what he knows before Jayne can get down to it, but he also plays on Jayne’s mercenary appetite, and tries to bribe him. “Does helping you mean turning on the captain?” asks Jayne, with a smirk.

On the bridge, Wash sees another ship approaching them: he and Mal realize it’s a Reaver ship. “Oh god oh god,” breathes Wash. Mal gets on the intercom and tells everyone what’s approaching; Book prays; Jayne pulls a number of large guns from behind his bed; Inara pulls out a syringe filled with a suicide dose and sits on her bed, waiting. Simon catches Zoë outside the infirmary. He hasn’t really heard about Reavers so she explains: Men who are more animals than men, living on the edge of space, and if they board Serenity, “they’ll rape us to death, eat our flesh and sew our skins into their clothing. And if we’re very lucky, they’ll do it in that order.” Simon is visibly shaken and backs away. They hold their collective breaths as Serenity and the scary pointy Reaver ship pass each other; the Reavers do not alter course – they must not be hungry.

Mal goes to check on Kaylee. They are clearly fond of each other, although he tries to be tough (he calls her “mei mei” which, I believe, is “little sister” in Chinese). She smiles at him and falls unconscious. On his way back to the bridge, Mal runs into Simon. He tells the doctor that his time has run out: Kaylee is dead. Simon, stricken, races to the infirmary … where he finds Kaylee awake and chatting happily with Book. Simon shakes his head, “The man is psychotic.” Cut to the bridge where Mal, Zoë, Wash and Jayne are in hysterics. “You’re psychotic!” giggles Wash. Mal grins and admits that it looks like Simon is a pretty good doctor. They call Patience; she’s tough and cagey, but agrees to pay his price for the goods. Mal looks at his crew: “I believe that woman is fixin’ to shoot me again.” Jayne asks, “Why don’t we shoot her first?” and Wash agrees, “It is her turn.” Back in his room, Dobson (remember him?) is cutting through his bonds with a knife that Jayne apparently left for him.

On Whitefall, Jayne hides the goods and takes position to cover Mal and Zoë in case of an ambush. Zoë doesn’t like the site and thinks it’s a trap. Patience arrives on horseback with a bunch of her own men. As Zoë suspected, it’s a double-cross and soon erupts into a full scale Wild West shoot out. Serenity’s crew shoots most all of Patience’s men; they leave her alive and collect their money. Back on the ship, Dobson has escaped, bludgeoning Book viciously and grabbing River. River’s hair is gross! Simon chases Dobson to the cargo bay and does some jumping from the catwalk-fu. Wash sounds the alarm – again: the Reavers are back! Mal, Zoë and Jayne rush back to the ship on borrowed horses (Adam Baldwin = not so good a rider). Mal takes in the tableau of Simon and Dobson as he strides onto his ship; he shoots Dobson in the head, almost nonchalantly, ending the standoff.

Chase scene! The CGI is really quite good for a TV show (I guess I already said that, but it is). Jayne and Book take Kaylee into the engine room and she walks them through the adjustments necessary for Wash to perform some funky flying, enabling them to escape the Reaver ship. As Inara tends to Book’s injuries, he tells her he is troubled: he thinks he may have gotten on the wrong ship, what with all the criminals and fugitives and killing. She is very gentle as she says, “Maybe you’re exactly where you ought to be.” Simon tucks River (who has finally washed her hair) into bed and promises to take care of her. Mal, who has deduced that Jayne may have had something to do with Dobson’s escape, asks the big guy why he didn’t turn on him when he had the chance. Jayne admits that the money wasn’t quite good enough and, when the money is good enough, they will have an interesting day. Simon approaches Mal to ask when he and River will be put off the ship. With no trace of rancor, but with no particular amity either, Mal offers Simon a job as ship’s doctor until something better [for Simon and River] comes along. Simon wants to know how he can trust Mal not to shoot him in the back while he’s sleeping. Mal says, “The day I kill you, you’ll be awake, facing me and armed.” Simon: “Are you always this sentimental?” And Mal just smiles, clearly happy. He had a good day.

If the episodes had aired in their intended order, this series would have made a lot more sense. We would have been introduced to the Serenity crew with this double episode, and by the end of it, we would have known that Mal is wounded goods, and that his crew, his ship and his freedom are more important than anything to him; that Wash is a great pilot, goofy and riddled with insecurities; that Zoë is loyal but not blind, and that her relationships with the two men in her life are complicated; that Kaylee is a talented tomboy mechanic, yet girlish and sweet - everyone’s little sister. We would know that every person on board Serenity is human and layered, laden with secrets and conflict, and we would look forward to having all the stories spun out over time. Yeah – not so much.

Waitress - movie (mini-)review

Anybody who has made their way to this blog has undoubtedly heard of the movie, Waitress. Written, directed and acted in by Adrienne Shelly, this little film has gotten way more press than it would have, had Adrienne not been found murdered in her office on November 1, 2006 [thanks to Wikipedia for the link to the story]. Sadly, she never got to see her magnum opus in its final form. I saw it today, though, and the rest of you should see it too.

Quickie story overview: Keri Russell is a waitress and a pie impressario at a pie diner in an indefinite Southern town, along with Adrienne Shelly and Cheryl Hines. Jenna is trapped in a terrible marriage to Jeremy Sisto (if I were Jeremy's agent, I might try for a role as a likeable character next time - doesn't he always play jerks?) and finds herself pregnant. Not happy about it, she meets her new gynecologist, a delectably dorky Nathan Fillion, and ends up having an affair with him. Andy Griffith is fantastic as the cantankerous owner of the diner.

It's quite different from the movies I've seen recently in theaters (the last was 300, I believe) : no monsters, no axe-murders, no swearing. There's not much suspense and it has a fairly predictable plot, mind you, but this film is a lovely little character sketch with good actors who are clearly enjoying what they're doing. Plus there's lots and lots of nummy-looking homemade pies. And it's just fanned the flames of my Nathan Fillion crush. Mmmmm.

Lost: "Through the Looking Glass" - airdate 05/23/07

Flash: Jack is on a plane and then on a bridge, with an ugly beard, a drinking problem and apparently an urge to kill himself. On Island: Preparations are underway to hike to the radio tower. Sayid tells Jack that he is willing to sacrifice his life, if necessary, to ensure rescue for the group. There seems to be a lot of that going around: has he been talking to Charlie? Jack moves his people out – oh, look, there’s Vincent! – as Sayid, Jin and Bernard watch them go.

Naomi shows Jack how her sat-phone works, in case something happens to her: they’re just waiting for Charlie to clear the signal. Charlie, however, is busy being worked over by the two gorgeous women manning the Looking-glass Station. They are quite unfriendly, and the blonde (Tracey Middendorf) was in Angel S1E1. The women decide to call Ben for orders and Charlie gets a glimpse of the flashing yellow light and the switch he is destined to turn off. In the Others’ camp, Ben gets the call and bugs his eyes out a little more. He sends Mikhail to clean things up. Mikhail points out that Ben told everyone that the Looking-glass Station was flooded. “I lied,” snaps Ben. He then tries to call Tom and the Other commandos at the beach to let them know his plans are unraveling. They have their walkies off, however, as they stealthily infiltrate the Losties' camp. The snipers wait … wait … then BOOM BOOM! Fantastic explosions and flying bodies as Sayid and Bernard, using rifles, detonate their tents. Poor Jin cannot get his pistol to shoot straight and is soon captured. Bernard runs for the hills but doesn’t get far; Sayid is nabbed as well. Up in the mountains, the Losties see the two explosions. Rose says, “There were supposed to be three” while Kate, horrified, breathes “It didn’t work!”

Flash: Bearded-Jack is getting stitched up after having rescued a woman and her child from a car wreck. His heroism is marred by the fact that the woman crashed because she was distracted by seeing him on the bridge preparing to jump. On Island: The Losties are panicking but Jack keeps them moving towards the radio tower. Where did Kate get that clean hoodie? Sun and Rose are extremely concerned about their sniper husbands. Back underwater, Charlie is amazingly confident as he continues to get pounded on. The commando Others report to Ben that the explosions killed all but three of the raiding party and that the only Losties still on the beach are the three snipers. Ben, who is looking increasingly unstable, tells Tom to kill Jin to make the other two spill the Losties’ location. Bernard totally caves and gives up not only the Losties’ destination but that Carl helped them. Ben’s head is about to explode and he gives Alex a look of pure fury.

Ben decides to go after the Losties and tells Richard to continue taking the Others to the temple as they’d planned. Alex wants to go with Ben and, surprisingly, he agrees. He claims he will talk the Losties out of being rescued. During a break for water, Kate tells Sawyer she wants to go back to help Sayid et al. Sawyer is pretty withdrawn and isn’t interested. She gets upset, saying he hasn’t been himself since returning with Juliet’s tape and, trying to draw him out, reminds him that Juliet was going to test her for pregnancy too. Sawyer glares at her: let’s hope you’re not. Desmond finally comes to on the outrigger, and is promptly shot at by Mikhail. Desmond dives for the Looking-glass hatch and, fortuitously, comes up while the women are arguing in another room. Charlie, thrilled to see him, tells him to hide; he ducks out of sight and Charlie gets punched some more. Boy, there are a lot of commercials.

Flash: Bearded-Jack pops some pills. A doctor, played by the second Las Vegas actor to make a guest appearance on this show (Naomi being the first), checks in on him. Jack wants to do the surgery on the woman he rescued; Dr. Las Vegas says nope. On Island: The Losties are still hiking. Why do so few of them wear their backpacks correctly, on both shoulders? It’s much more comfortable that way. Sawyer decides to go back to the beach; Kate wants to go too but, with a haunted look, he tells her he doesn’t want to go with her. Jack, cheerful as ever, says it would be a suicide mission to go back without guns. Juliet pipes up that she knows where some guns are hidden. She and Jack smooch, and then she and Sawyer head back down the mountain. Kate tries not to be jealous of either. At the Looking-glass, Mikhail scubas up and asks where [Desmond] is. Thinking quickly, Charlie suggests that a better question might be why Ben lied to the Others about this hatch, and why they are jamming signals coming to and from the Island. Mikhail, being a communications guy, does not like the sound of that. When Ben calls them, Mikhail pretty much asks, what the fuck, dude? Ben says he’s doing it all to protect the Island. He goes on to say that he needs Mikhail’s help to clean up his mess: first kill Charlie, then kill Bonnie (the blonde) and Greta (the brunette) so they can’t report back to any of the Others. Mikhail hesitates but seems ready to obey. I wish he would put his eye-patch back on – ick.

Sawyer and Juliet zing each other a couple of times and then Juliet admits that there are no guns. She lied so Jack would let them go. Hurley shows up, wanting to help, but Sawyer dismisses him, saying he’ll get them killed. Sawyer is pretty tense these days. Alex asks Ben why he’s letting her tag along; he says he’s going to hand her over to her new Lostie family, since she likes them so much. She asks why he won’t just let them leave the Island. “Because I can’t,” he snarls. Back in the ditch of dead Dharma-ites, Locke is still alive (of course)! He can’t move his legs, though. He finds an old pistol among the corpses and in despair moves to shoot himself. Suddenly, it’s Walt! He tells Locke to put the gun down and get up, you have work to do. The magic of the Island has aged him several years in the month or so since he and Michael boated away; the Island has not, however, made him a better actor.

The Losties are still hiking and I wish Kate would put all that hair in a ponytail. She looks a little sad and Jack tells her that Sawyer didn’t mean what he said, he was just trying to protect her. She smiles, “Why are you sticking up for Sawyer? He wouldn’t do it for you.” Jack says, “Because I love you.” Whatever. Flash: Bearded-Jack keeps looking at an obituary he tore from a newspaper. He walks into a funeral home and keeps popping pills. Who’s in the casket? On Island: Rousseau says that they’re nearing the tower but she’s not leaving when the rest of them get rescued. Just then, Ben and Alex appear, causing much consternation among the Losties. Jack goes to parlay with Ben.

Mikhail dons his patch (thank you!), kills Greta and shoots Bonnie in the back. Desmond pops out of his hiding place and nails him with a spear-gun. Nice! Charlie tells Des not to kill Bonnie since they need to get the code out of her to turn off the signal jammer. Ben and Jack go off to talk alone. Flash: There are no Oxycodone refills left for Bearded-Jack and he is very cranky about it. On Island: Ben asks Jack why he wants to leave the Island when there is nothing left for him out there: no father, no wife. He goes on to say that Naomi is not who she says she is and if she’s allowed to call her ship, the Bad Guys on it will kill every living person on the Island, Lostie and Other alike; he wants Jack to get the sat-phone and give it to Ben. Jack: no f’in way. Ben calls Tom on the beach and tells him to kill Sayid et al. if Jack doesn’t do what he says. Jack continues to refuse; Ben says he is not bluffing, and three shots are heard over the walkie. Jack goes insane and beats Ben senseless. He calls Tom: “I am getting my people rescued and then I am going to find you and kill you.”

Underwater, Bonnie gives up the code but Charlie can’t write it down fast enough. With her dying breath she tells him it’s to the tune of “Good Vibrations,” that the keypad was programmed by a musician. How serendipitous! Jack drags Ben back to the group. Ben groggily looks up to see Rousseau and introduces Alex to her mother. Away from the group, Jack tells Kate that he heard Sayid et al. being killed. On the beach, however, Sayid et al. have not been killed and, in fact, Ben had instructed the commando Others to fake the executions. Tom thinks they should have done it anyway – he thinks Ben’s lost it. Juliet and Sawyer lurk in the bushes, trying to figure out how to rescue their guys. Just then, Hurley busts in, driving his Dharma VW van! Yay, Hurley! He runs over one Other and Sayid manages to snap the second Other’s neck. Seeing all is for naught, Tom surrenders to Juliet, and then Sawyer shoots him anyway: “That’s for taking the kid off the raft.” Hurley is astounded: “Dude, it was over, he gave up.” Sawyer: “I didn’t believe him.” I love new scary Sawyer.

Flash: Bearded-Jack is stealing Oxycodone from the hospital. Dr. Las Vegas tells him he knows Jack was trying to kill himself. Jack says Dr. Las Vegas can’t help him. On Island: Dear god, they’re still hiking. Hurley calls in over Ben’s walkie and reports that everyone, including Sayid et al., is okay. Claire asks him about Charlie. In the hatch, Desmond readies the scuba gear while Charlie plays “Good Vibrations” on the keypad. He clears the signal and a transmission comes through immediately: it’s Penny! And she didn’t send any boat! Damn, I hate when Ben is right. Desmond notices that Mikhail’s body is gone; that’s because he’s in a scuba mask outside the hatch with a grenade. Charlie realizes what Mikhail is going to do, and closes the blast door as Mikhail blows a hole in the wall. As sea water floods the communications room, Charlie writes “Not Penny’s boat” on his hand and holds it up to the window for Desmond to see. Des, stricken and helpless, watches his friend drown.

The Losties turn off Rousseau’s distress call and Naomi goes back outside to make her call. Locke staggers out of the jungle and throws his knife, killing her. Jack picks up the phone and Locke points his gun at him: put down the phone or I will kill you. Ben, who is now tied to a tree, practically begs Jack not to contact the ship. Locke, true to form, is unable to kill Jack (although I really thought he was going to go through with it this time) and Jack speaks with someone on the boat, joy and relief washing over his face. Flash: Bearded-Jack is sitting in his apartment, drinking expensive tequila, surrounded by maps. He calls someone and pleads with them to meet him at the airport. It is night, and he parks at the end of a runway. Someone drives up: it’s Kate, clean, combed, wearing makeup. She’d read about him rescuing the woman from the car accident. He smiles faintly, “Just can’t stop pulling people from wreckage.” Holy crap – these have been flash-FORWARDS? He says he thought she’d go to the funeral. Kate is incredulous – why would I do that? Jack says he’s been flying a lot, every weekend, hoping to crash again. He’s making Kate uncomfortable, and she says she has to get back, “he’ll wonder where I went.” Jack speaks more urgently as she backs away: they made a mistake; they were never supposed to leave the Island. “We have to go back!”

My first reaction: who was in the fracking casket?! I think, since these flashes were forward, is that it’s Ben in the casket. That might account for Clean-Kate’s scorn for the funeral. Or maybe it’s Locke, since he and Jack crossed each other’s science/faith lines on several occasions. Also, who is Clean-Kate’s “he” – Sawyer? A non-Lostie (maybe she got back together with Nathan Fillion – ooh!)? Now that Charlie’s gone, I miss him. His character was allowed to be interesting again in the last couple of episodes, and Dominic Monaghan did a great job; I loved Charlie’s confidence in himself and his destiny down in the hatch, all the way to the end. I wish, and I suspect I am not alone, that more of Season 3’s episodes had the movement that this one did (although the Jack-flashes were a little tedious, at least they were fairly brief). Hopefully Season 4 will keep the momentum going.

Veronica Mars: “The Bitch Is Back” – airdate 05/22/07

Logan tells Veronica what he saw, handing her a disk. When she insists that she has not had sex with Piz, he says, “You were naked, I just assumed.” Shaken, she throws him out and watches the video. She gets to Piz and Wallace’s room just as they are returning from the infirmary. Piz is in bad shape (cracked ribs, face a swollen mess) and Wallace is seething. Veronica asks Piz if he recorded them. Piz - “I’m sorry, I’m on some morphine here … what?!” - denies it. Wallace wants to kick Logan’s ass; Veronica says she’ll deal with him. My theory: it’s The Castle who set up a bug to record Wallace and when they got bonus Veronica/Piz footage, they ran with it. At the hotel room, Parker is a wreck: nothing says you’re still in love with your ex like beating up your ex’s current boyfriend. She stands as if she’ll splinter if she moves, and breaks up with Logan. Me, I don’t care, and Logan scarcely notices that she’s in the room. Veronica gets off the elevator as Parker gets on. Parker sniffles, “He’s all yours.” Veronica snarls, “Trust me – not why I’m here.” She is furious with Logan, saying that Piz is having trouble breathing. Logan is incredulous and reminds her what he’s learned with her over and over: that someone always has to pay ... and this time it shouldn’t be him. Veronica spits that they cannot be friends with each other – he is out of her life forever. Logan looks shattered, as he always does when his best intentions backfire. He can’t believe that he fucked up again.

Veronica corners Dick and finds out that Chip Diller sent him the email with the video. Ryan Hansen is really fantastic in these final episodes. As Veronica stalks across campus with everyone pointing and laughing at her (“and I’m back in high school,” she voice-overs), Weevil offers his help. She says she’ll probably accept. Chip is easily intimidated by her and tells her he got the video from Dominick. Veronica finds Dominick (who looks like he’s about 45); he doesn’t know her and foolishly is not intimidated. She cuts off all his credit cards and gets Weevil steal his rims. Chasened, Dominick gives her another name: Gorya Sorokin. This guy (who only looks 32) is not only not intimidated by the tiny blonde, but is pretty lewd and scary in his own right, and she settles for bugging his room. A-ha! I was right: The Castle is behind this.

Ack -another side ponytail. Veronica grills Wallace a little and he ‘fesses what he knows about The Castle (not much). She asks him to go undercover and get some pictures for her. She then talks with Nish (the former school newspaper editor/strident feminist) who had written an article about The Castle –the members are said to be the richest and most powerful men in the country - and who is involved in an attempted lawsuit for discrimination: The Castle won’t admit women. When Wallace is picked up, Veronica follows the car to a self-storage warehouse. Wallace goes inside, is told to strip down and put an electric dog collar on. In front of a video camera, he is grilled about the incident in Chicago when the homeless man was killed. When he tries to lie, another pledge in another room is zapped by the collar. The screams are pretty awful.

Veronica gathers Wallace up when he finally staggers out. Although he didn’t get her any pictures, he’s deduced the identity of another pledge, and she plans to follow this kid until he leads her to The Castle. In the food court, Veronica and Piz are heckled; Piz tells her to let it go and that karma will take care of those guys. Veronica: “Oh yeah – I’m going to run him over with my karma.” Hee. Dick congratulates Logan on the magnificent beating he gave to Piz. Logan says that Piz wasn’t the bad guy and looks sad. At night, Veronica follows the pledge to a mansion; she scales the wall and sneaks in through the dog door to try for a money shot. She is startled to see an enormous (and icky) portrait of Lilly Kane on the wall.

The mansion is Jake Kane’s and he is the putative leader of The Castle. Gorya gives Jake the recorded confessions from the storage units and Jake transfers them to a hard drive on his desk. Our girl is almost caught, but steals the hard drive. The next morning, Keith is at the mansion as Jake tells him that the stolen hard drive contains five years of research and intellectual property worth gazillions. Clarence Weidman is there and he’s still scary. Keith finds a thread caught in the dog door. The neighbor has security footage of the backyard and, as Keith recognizes his daughter as the thief, he collects the DVR as evidence. On his way out, Keith asks the security guard for a list of license plates; the guard is one of the fired deputies and refuses to help. [See? What did I tell you about the continuity?] Unfortunately, the guard does not have a grudge against Weidman and gives him the list. Mac and Veronica use a supercomputer on campus to try to decipher the hard drive’s password. Keith finds Veronica’s snagged sweater in her laundry. When he confronts her, she is too embarrassed to explain what is going on and runs out. Jake Kane has a full-on hissy fit when Weidman tells him Veronica took the hard drive. It seemed a little over the top, actually, but I suppose he still holds a grudge for helping Duncan escape with his love child. As Keith is giving a pre-election interview, Jake, Weidman and the DA burst in and accuse Keith of hiding evidence against Veronica. The reporter is quite interested by all this. Back at the lab, Mac and Veronica are still trying to break the password. Keith tries to call Veronica; when he can’t reach her, he goes into the Evidence Room and erases the DVR with the Veronica footage. He looks so sad.

When Mac finally breaks the password, the hard drive contains dirt on about eighty years of Castle members: business leaders, congressmen, etc. They watch a bit of Gorya’s “confession” and realize his family has Mafia ties; Veronica thinks she may just let him keep his secrets. She does, however, give the list of Castle members to Nish. Nish says, “You’re going to make some very powerful men very unhappy.” Won’t be the first time, says Veronica. In the food court, Logan tries to apologize to Veronica, but she’s not having any of it. Gorya comes up and says some really nasty things. When Veronica doesn’t react, Logan moves to go after him. She stops him, saying that Gorya is “connected.” Logan muses that he wondered why she didn’t rip him a new one. He watches Gorya walk off a ways and then beats him up anyway. Pretty much all Logan has gotten to do in the last 80 minutes is beat people up. Veronica has a little half-sad, half-satisfied smile on her face. Logan apologizes, fairly sincerely, to Piz as he leaves; Piz looks from Veronica to Logan and back again, and there are some really complicated emotions swirling among the three of them. At the Kane mansion, Weidman lets Veronica in (“So you’re the butler now?”) and she returns the hard drive to Jake. He says he’ll have her arrested; she retorts that if he does, the members’ confessions will go public. “And leave my dad out of it.” Jake bemusedly he tells her it’s too late for that.

Veronica goes home. Keith has made gumbo and asks her no questions. They are both melancholy but it’s clear how much they love each other. In the morning, the front page of the paper says that charges have been filed against Keith for tampering with the evidence. Veronica cries, and goes to vote for her dad for sheriff.

Damn you, CW.

Veronica Mars: “Weevils Wobble But They Don’t Go Down” – airdate 05/22/07

Veronica and Mac are waiting in line to pay for their fro-yo. They are discussing Piz’s issues with Veronica leaving for the FBI internship: she’s annoyed that he’s mopey about it, but admits she would be annoyed if he weren’t mopey. Mac thinks she ought to let Piz know that she will miss him too. In front of them, a girl gets her student ID confiscated. Weevil – oh how we’ve missed you! – has injured his leg on the job and is talking with an HR flunky about his worker’s comp claim. The actor playing the flunky was the paranoid bookshop owner in Angel S4 (“Magic Bullet”). Back in Piz’s dorm room, Veronica is wearing some really strange overalls/suspenders as she flirts with Piz. This leads to some chemistry-free foolin’ around which has me squirming with horror. The campus police have gone to Keith regarding the fraud with the fake student IDs; the two students who were nabbed pick Weevil out of the lineup.

Weevil, who has been fired, uses his one phone call to call Veronica: “I need a bail bondsman and a PI, and you need a 21^st century answering machine!” She goes to the jail and they work out that he is being framed. The only people who know he is an ex-con are the students in her Criminology class. [This double-episode does a really lovely job with continuity, wrapping up as many loose ends as possible and answering questions we might otherwise never know because the damn CW has CANCELED THIS SHOW.] At the bursar’s office Veronica gets to flash her shiny new PI license and learns about the mag-card machine used to code the ID cards. Wallace notices that he is being followed by some student and is slightly weirded out by this. Another mag-card machine is found in the empty locker next to Weevil’s and, after Veronica does some interviews, it turns out that he has no alibi.

Veronica keeps Wallace company while he works on his airplane in the aerodynamics lab; he mentions that he’s being followed. They’re very cute together – it’s like old times! Veronica asks Wallace’s professor about the mag-card machines; he refers her to a grad student, saying the technology needed to code the machines is unbelievably sophisticated. Piz invites Keith to be in a pre-election radio show to rebut Vinnie, mentioning the available 4,000 college votes. Keith tells Veronica that only Weevil’s prints were found on the mag-card machine. When Veronica meets with the grad student, they discover that all his research has been stolen from his files. [Hey! These acts are really short. And there are really a lot of commercials in between. Stupid CW.]

On Piz’s radio show, things go badly for Keith as Vinnie insinuates that he doesn’t care about underage drinking in campus-adjacent bars. Wallace confronts his stalker and it turns out the Hearst College secret society, The Castle, has tapped Wallace for membership. Wallace is alternately creeped, worried and proud. Veronica and Weevil retrace his steps, trying to discover how the people framing him might have gotten his fingerprints. On a stop at a dorm room, they discover that some boxes that he touched when working on the sink are now missing. One of the roommates living in this room is in Veronica’s Criminology class. A suspicious Veronica manages to get a photo of a photo of the roommate with a group of friends.

Upon closer inspection of the photo, Veronica picks out the roommate, the grad student and the two students who identified Weevil. Logan [finally!] is on the phone with Parker when Dick staggers in, wanting to talk about Beaver. Logan tells him that they’ll go surfing to get Dick’s mind off things. At the beach, Veronica, Piz, Mac and Wallace test Wallace’s plane; the surf boys are there too. Dick: “Why is this wetsuit like a cheap hotel? No ballroom.” Hee. Piz says that flying the plane is bringing out his inner nerd and Mac asks, “Wait, you have an inner one?” Hee again. As the plane stalls out, Wallace wants some alone time with it, so Veronica, Piz and Mac join Logan and Dick at the fire pit. Dick takes Mac aside and apologizes for being, well, a dick to her and his brother. Back at the fire, it’s truly awkward, and Logan is an asshole to Piz. On campus, Veronica manages to track down the rest of the group in the photo. They bring her to a room in the library where they are all waiting. She smiles.

The group of students tries to bribe her and she sneakily records them. If charges aren’t dropped against Weevil by the next day, she’ll take the recording to the sheriff. She calls Weevil with the good news. He thanks her, and the camera pans down to the third mag-card machine he has collected from the students’ lab. Looks like our boy will never, ever learn. In the meantime, Dick receives an email with a video file; he shows it to Logan, and it’s Veronica and Piz, in Piz’s room, foolin’ around (chemistry-free, of course). Logan completely wigs. He rushes to the campus radio station, pulls Piz out of his show, and administers a horrific beat down. Poor Piz can barely defend himself; Logan is a wild man. At the Mars PI office, Logan staggers in, his hands in shreds. “Veronica, there’s something you should know.” Oh, Logan, this will go badly for you, I just know it.

Heroes: “How to Stop an Exploding Man” – airdate 05/21/07

As Linderman’s henchmen burst in, Niki and DL phase through the wall to escape. Molly recognizes Matt, and Mr. Bennet lowers his gun. Hiro stands up to Mr. Sulu, refusing to abandon Ando; Mr. Sulu sends him on his way with a glint of what may be pride in his eye. Sylar is in Isaac’s studio, working on his latest vision-painting: it is Peter and Sylar in a standoff at Kirby Plaza. Sylar growls. He’d be pretty darn hot if he’d wax his eyebrows just a teensy bit.

Mrs. Petrelli (Nathan’s mom, not his wife) arrives at Nathan’s office to tell him that Linderman is dead, but his plan should still proceed. Nathan looks momentarily relieved that his puppeteer is out of the picture but does acquiesce to his mother. Power corrupts, Nathan! Niki and DL are hunting for Micah in the office building. He’s getting weak, however, and sends her on alone. Mohinder and Mr. Bennet hide Eric Roberts’s body as Mr. Bennet insists that Mohinder trust him. Mohinder snarks: “Right, because that’s worked very well for me before.” Sassy! Claire, in the rental car with Peter, calls her dad to let him know that Sylar has killed Atomic-Ted. Mr. Bennet asks to speak with her Uncle Peter and tells him that they’ll let him know where Sylar is. Peter takes Claire to see Nathan. Claire is pissed and feels betrayed, saying they can’t trust him. Peter, who is looking quite delicious in this scene in the car, says he’s afraid and his brother will help him. He goes to talk with Nathan, who can’t hide his thoughts: you can’t stop it; they’re all going to die. Peter backs away, stunned that Claire was right. He runs up to the street, shouting for Claire. He’s so upset that his hands start glowing and he passes out. Oops. Meanwhile Claire slips out of the car and runs smack into Mrs. Petrelli. Double-oops!

Molly agrees to look for Sylar. She explains to Matt (who is just starting to realize that the events unfolding around him are way bigger than he thought) that she can find anyone at all … except for one person who is much, much worse than Sylar. “When I think about him, he can see me,” she moans. And right there, my friends, is the first mention of our Big Bad for Season 2. She locates Sylar in Isaac’s studio. Matt wants to go after Sylar himself but Mr. Bennet says they need to find Peter. The young man in question wakes up in Simone’s father’s greenhouse. This is either a dream or a flashback, and our current-Peter watches it unfold as Past-Peter, Simone, Simone’s dad Charles and Mrs. Petrelli come onto the roof. Past-Peter and Simone have a clunky conversation about death. Simone looks so pretty with her curly hair. Mrs. Petrelli and Charles talk about Linderman’s plan to blow up NYC. Current-Peter overhears Charles saying that Peter should be able to save the world, but Mrs. Petrelli thinks her younger son is too weak, and that Nathan will step into power after the bomb. She leaves; Charles sips his coffee and looks straight at Current-Peter. “I know you’re there,” he says. Current-Peter boggles.

Sylar catches Ando as the latter sneaks into the loft with his sword. Just in time, Hiro teleports in and, notwithstanding Sylar’s taunting, manages to teleport Ando to safety, back to Tokyo. Sylar is a bit surprised that his quarry has escaped. Niki, looking for Micah, stumbles upon his body and “Jessica,” who is smoking hot, by the way, smirking nearby. No one in the viewing audience for a minute believes that she is anyone but Candice, but Niki falls for it, and Jessica/Candice begins beating on her. A mirror gets broken, the real Jessica tells Niki to stop being such a puss, and Niki taps into her doppelganger’s super-strength, knocking Candice out. Micah comes out of his hiding place to give his mom a big hug. Matt arrives at Isaac’s studio – luckily for him, Sylar is already gone – and stares in semi-shock at all the paintings, recognizing Claire, Hiro, Niki, Peter, Nathan. He is so in over his head and he now knows it. Claire, at Nathan’s office with Nathan and Mrs. Petrelli, is furious that Nathan won’t help stop the bomb. “The future is not written in stone!” she cries. “This one is,” mutters Nathan. Claire wants to know why, then, if these events are inevitable Mrs. Petrelli has schemed to keep Claire apart from the Petrelli boys. Nathan is startled at this, not having considered it before. Mrs. Petrelli smarms up, saying that they can offer Claire a place to belong, a family. Claire hugs Nathan, then whispers “I already have a family,” before throwing herself out the window. Nathan: No! Friend Mouse: Awesome! Claire plummets many stories to the street below, puts herself back together, and runs off to find the other Heroes. Nathan stares after her while his mother insists that he let her go.

Mohinder and Molly, trying to escape the building, find DL who looks quite bad. Micah and Niki show up and they all get on the elevator after Micah works his computer-fu and fixes it. Micah and Molly share a wicked cute we-may-be-superheroes-but-we’re-still-kids look. Hiro leaves Ando in Japan, saying that he’ll be back for him, and teleports back to NYC. In the dream/flashback, Charles tells Current-Peter that he’s a good guy and his capacity for unconditional love will allow him to save the world. What? How will that help? Mr. Bennet wakes Peter up and promises to stick with him in the fight against Sylar. “Thank you, Mr. Bennet,” says our polite boy. “Call me Noah,” says Mr. Bennet. He does have a first name – wow! They go to the plaza and Sylar appears, telekinesis-ing Mr. Bennet [like I’m going to start calling him “Noah” after all this time] into a building. “What took you so long,” Sylar sneers as he and Peter square off.

As Peter and Sylar start to fight, Matt arrives and fires his gun at Sylar. This is not a problem, however, as Sylar stops the bullets and flings them back into Matt’s chest. He goes down wheezing. Niki steps up and wallops Sylar a few times with a parking meter before Peter calls her off. I think that’s stupid – wouldn’t he want all the help he could get? Peter beats on Sylar, perhaps having absorbed a bit of Niki’s strength, until Hiro appears and runs Sylar through with his sword. Well, that was fairly anticlimactic. Peter is worked up enough that his hands start glowing; when he asks Hiro to kill him, Sylar telekinesis-es Hiro into a building until Hiro teleports himself away. Sylar collapses. Claire runs up and almost shoots Peter as they’d planned, but Nathan swoops in, taking the gun away and saying that she was right, this wasn’t written in stone. Peter doesn’t want both the Petrelli brothers to have to die, but Nathan scoops him up and flies into the stratosphere. As everyone (yes, everyone: Niki, DL, Micah, Molly, Matt, Mohinder, Mr. Bennet and Claire) looks on, BOOM. And that’s it. In the aftermath, Matt is unconscious and being loaded into an ambulance; DL is looking better (??); Claire and Mr. Bennet head off together; and Sylar has apparently dragged himself into the sewer. Nobody noticed the bad guy escaping? END OF VOLUME ONE.

VOLUME TWO: GENERATIONS. Hiro has teleported himself into some field outside of Kyoto. It’s 1671 and there’s a scary-looking army in red battle gear approaching. On the other side of the field, a lone figure in dark armor – either Kensei and/or Hiro’s father – is mounted on a horse, carrying a banner with that S symbol. And then we have the solar eclipse.

Hm. I like the twists of Sylar escaping, the foreshadowing of a villain worse than Sylar, and the predicament Hiro has gotten himself into. I felt a little let down by the battle on the plaza, though: all season we’ve been led to believe that all the Heroes had to be there to fight Sylar, but really they just watched Peter, and it didn’t end up being much of a tussle. I don’t think the Petrelli boys are dead: perhaps Nathan flew way up and then tossed Peter away, knowing Peter could regenerate and flying himself to safety. And I think Mrs. Petrelli looks like Sharon Osborne, only scarier. Also, that Evan Almighty movie looks mighty bad.

Springtime in Boston

You may have noticed that my Lost recap went up a few days late. This is because my husband and I took his parents to Boston for two days. We’d taken his folks to NYC for his father’s 65^th birthday; this trip was for his mom’s 65^th, and I got to be tour guide this time since I used to live in Boston. We had pretty terrible weather – high 40s and raining, low 50s and raining, low 50s and not raining – but we managed to pack a fair amount into our two days.

Since you really don’t need a car in Boston (and parking is neither readily available nor affordable!), we took full advantage of public transportation: the bus from Maine, and multi-day unlimited T-passes. I found a great little guesthouse in Back Bay (on pretty, residential Beacon Street, just blocks from the Hynes T-stop … and one block away from the Crossroads Irish pub – where we ended up no less than three times. Sure do love me some Guinness.).

The first order of business was the Duck Tour. We had a fantastic guide - stage name of “Ace Bandage” - who was funny (but not over the top), well-spoken and full of information. The tour is a great way to see the whole of the city before you go off exploring on your own. After the duck, we took the Red Line to Cambridge for lunch at John Harvard’s Brew House in Harvard Square; I was disappointed that they were out of porter but made do with a yummy red ale instead. A stroll through Harvard showed not much action on-campus, so we headed back to Charles Street and prowled around Beacon Hill for a while. It is amazing how quiet that neighborhood is, even being in the heart of the city. We took Newbury Street via the Public Garden back to check in and rest our feet briefly, then jumped on the T to Government Center. We saw the Holocaust Memorial, peeked in the windows of the Union Square Oyster House, and made our way to the North End.

My favorite place in the North End is Dairy Fresh Candies at the start of Salem Street: in my three years living in Boston, this candy store is the only place I was ever recognized as a regular. They carry imported and domestic chocolates, candies and nuts of all kinds, fresh fudge and roasted nuts, pasta, sauces and cakes. I managed to get out of there after spending only $36.00 (my usual is closer to $50, especially around Christmastime). We explored for a bit, finding North Square and the Old North Church, and took our time perusing menus before settling on a place for dinner. Our waiter, Joe, was great; the antipasto and bruschetta appetizers were quite nice; my shrimp and asparagus risotto was tasty but could have been a little creamier. As we headed out, Joe asked me if I was a football fan and pointed out Bill Belichick, head coach of the New England Patriots, dining with a girlfriend in the back dining room.

Friday was pretty much pouring rain all day, so we decided to be indoor kitties as much as possible. We grabbed bagels at a Finagle-A-Bagel (mine: chocolate chip bagel with plain cream cheese) and zipped over to the Museum of Science. Luckily for us, they had a Bank of America/MBNA promotion going on and all four of us were admitted for free – yay! We explored for a couple hours (along with about eight million field-tripping grade schoolers) and then decided that we needed more sustenance. On to another one of my favorite places: the Parish Café on Boylston Street. Each sandwich recipe on the menu has been contributed by a local celebrity chef: I was tempted by the mussel po’boy special, but ended up with smoked ham and cheese on warm banana nut bread with peach chutney. Mmmmmmmm. The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum was our next stop – the one thing my mother-in-law really wanted to see. I had never been there before and can now wholeheartedly recommend it. Mrs. Gardner was a rich Bostonian who liked to collect art, and she designed and built this museum to house her collection. She placed the artworks in the rooms as she wished, not grouping them by any rhyme or reason, and instructed that the collections be left as she had put them. She also decreed that anyone named “Isabella” should have free admittance for life – very cool. We wished that more of the exhibits had been tagged, but were fascinated by the collection even so.

Our final stop was dinner at Tapeo on Newbury Street (another of my favorite restaurants); I was glad I’d thought to make reservations because it filled quickly, even with the dismal weather. This is a Spanish restaurant with a large tapas menu, and I knew it might be pushing the envelope of my in-laws’ food comfort zone a little. But they totally rallied and, I think, enjoyed it quite a lot. I had sangria (several glasses, actually), and we all shared a number of tapas: skewered spiced pork with dates, sole stuffed with asparagus, salmon in a dill cream sauce, empanadas, garlicky chicken, and beef tenderloin on toast with pimiento. So delicious! Also, Tapeo serves their bread basket with a little scoop of hummus instead of butter: flavorful and a bit healthier.

Since it was still raining Saturday morning, we decided to just head home; frankly, I couldn’t have stomached anything for breakfast at that point! I’m going to call our mini-trip a success: my husband enjoyed himself for the first time ever in Boston, my in-laws wore big grins the entire time, and me, I always like being back in the city for a visit.

Lost – “Greatest Hits” airdate 05/16/07

Who is that, crashing through the jungle and diving into the outrigger canoe? I think it’s Carl. Jack, reasserting himself, leads the Losties into a field to demonstrate what he, Juliet and Rousseau have been planning. He opines that for the first time, the Losties know when and where the Others are coming, and that the Others will have no idea that the Losties are going to fight back. Then, Rousseau blows up a tree. Sayid seems semi-impressed, Kate looks incredulous, Sun and Jin seem worried, and Sawyer just looks distrustful. Now, that was a really big explosion. Since the Others have eyes and ears seemingly everywhere, I can’t imagine that huge boom went unnoticed. I think the Losties just tipped their hand. Way to go, Jack. Oh, also: Desmond seems to have had another Charlie-vision.

Flashback: Charlie, Liam and the band hear their song on the radio for the first time. Present: Charlie is making a list on a piece of notebook paper: the flashback we just saw is #5. The Losties are all rigging their tents with wire for the explosives. Sayid, still working on Naomi’s satellite phone, wants to go to the radio tower to turn off Rousseau’s distress call, which he assumes is overriding all other signals. Juliet says no outgoing signals leave the Island: Ben jams everything from the Lookingglass Station (underwater). Sayid is sure that this station is connected to the cable that runs out of the ocean. Desmond tells Charlie that once again, he’s going to die but, because of his death, everyone else will be rescued. If Charlie doesn’t die, the rescue won’t come.

Flashback: Charlie as a young boy, is at a public pool with his dad; Charlie is afraid to jump in the water, but finally does so. Present: On Charlie’s list, the swim lesson is #4. Desmond says that in his vision, Charlie goes down a hatch underwater, flips a switch on a control panel, and then drowns. Sayid comes up with a diagram of the Lookingglass station (taken from Mikhail’s cabin before Locke blew it up): someone will have to follow the cable and swim down to the station to turn off the jamming signal. Jack thinks this is crazy – a suicide mission. With meaningful glances at Desmond, Charlie volunteers for the job. Jack says he is focusing on fighting the Others: “You’ve wanted me to make decisions here for 90 days. I just made one.” Charlie and Des make more meaningful faces at each other. Suddenly, Carl (I knew it was Carl!) lands on the beach in the outrigger and races towards the Losties. Sayid tackles him but Sawyer intercedes on Carl’s behalf, invoking their cage time together. Carl says that the Others are coming! Sawyer says we know, tomorrow night. Carl says no, now! Tonight! Oops!

Flashback: the Others’ camp, six hours ago. Ben comes back from having shot Locke and tells the assembled group that the attack on the Losties will commence immediately. Richard objects, wanting to know where Locke is; Ben insists and the thugs in the group get a move on. Alex runs into the jungle to where Carl is hiding, and sends him off to warn the Losties. Present: On the beach, they’re making new plans. Instead of wiring all the tents, they’ll stack dynamite in three tents, and then the three best shots will stay behind to sniper-shoot the dynamite to detonate it. Rousseau will take the rest of the Losties to the radio tower for safety and to turn off the distress call. Charlie and Desmond will head to the Lookingglass station to shut it down. Flashback: sometime during Drive Shaft’s heyday, after Liam started shooting up but before Charlie succumbed, Liam gives Charlie a ring that was a family heirloom. Present: Charlie lists the ring as #3. He tells Claire not to be afraid and tells Aaron that he loves him. Claire gives Charlie a really sweet kiss and then he strides off resolutely.

Flashback: In London, Charlie rescues a woman from a mugger. She tells him that he is a hero. Present: The mugging interruptus is #2. Bernard turns out to be a pretty good shot, so he will be one of the three snipers waiting in the Losties’ camp; I think Bernard is fodder. (Sayid and Jin are the other two shooters.) Jack wants to stay behind for the fight but Sayid tells him to act like the leader he is claiming to be. I sure hope Sayid doesn’t get killed off. Hurley wants to come with Charlie and Des but Charlie won’t let him, saying Hurley is too big for the boat. “That’s not cool, man,” says Hurley. Charlie feels badly, and gives his friend a big hug, sending him on his way.

Charlie and Desmond pull the outrigger hand over hand along the cable. Flashback: It’s season 1, and Charlie introduces himself to Claire by a campfire on the beach, the airplane wreckage behind them. Present: Meeting Claire is #1 on Charlie’s “greatest hits” list; he gives the list to Desmond and asks him to give it to Claire. Des says wait, I’ll dive down instead of you. Charlie says okay, and then whacks Des on the head with a paddle, knocking him out. Charlie dives down and makes it into the station. It’s a new set! And clearly not flooded. He pulls himself onto the decking, thrilled to be alive. Suddenly, a door flies open and two women charge out, guns drawn.

It’s fairly heavy-handed, the way they have Charlie saying goodbye to everyone. Since he’s the odds-on favorite to get killed off, the build up makes you certain that he’s not going to make it to the end of the episode. It was when he said goodbye to Hurley, however, that I guessed he wouldn’t get killed off quite yet – it was too obvious for this show. Again, for a detailed analysis, try The House Next Door. His position is that this was one of the all-time best Lost episodes; reading through his post may just convince you of it.