Lost
Homecoming
original airdate: 02-09-05
Hurray, the wait is over. The wait for new episodes and
the wait for Ethan’s return. But the fans will have
to wait even longer to get back to the impenetrable hatch
(kind of reminds of a puzzle from one of the early computer
text adventure games like Zork or, um, Adventure...)
Actually, there may be a good reason the writers don’t
bring up the hatch this week: Audience members, if they
have not done so already, might conclude that Ethan is seemingly
appearing from nowhere via hatches. Makes perfect sense,
especially in the context of this episode’s climactic
confrontation. Mark my words. But
I’m getting ahead of myself. What gets this episode
going is Claire’s return. Alas, she has amnesia and
can’t remember the crash, the island, Ethan, or why
any of the men only have at most a George Michael look despite
“about a month” on the island (maybe Hurley
is eating beards, thus simultaneously solving the mystery
of his consistent girth. I mean, even contestants on Survivor
lose an amazing amount of weight despite a relative abundance
of nutritional support).
Ethan,
on the other hand, has no amnesia. He remembers exactly
where to find Claire and delivers a grim ultimatum: Deliver
the girl or someone else dies every night.
Despite
Locke and Sayid’s best efforts to secure the camps,
the islands soon learn that Ethan is a man of his word (or
is that android of his word? or alien? I mean, why does
it take Sawyer of all people to ask at one point “who
or what Ethan is?” One would have expected Jack and/or
Locke to pose that second query long ago...)
(OK,
stop reading here to avoid a major spoiler...)
Of course,
Charlie wants to do his best to keep Claire safe regardless
of the fact that she doesn’t know him from the next
Hobbit...um, guy.
A series
of uninspired flashbacks explain Charlie’s motivation,
but doesn’t add that much new information. It almost
seems like the flashbacks are more a device to stretch out
the episode before the inevitable “Ethan-asia.”
Let’s hope Jack does an autopsy next week to find
out what made this guy tick. And that Locke and Boone remember
that they have a hatch to open.
Overall,
it’s an OK episode though not a lot happens. Maybe
that’s just fine to ease the fans back into what can
be a potentially confusing and/or overwhelming storyline.
Plot complexity is good thing as long as the writers know
where it’s all headed (Babylon Five excelled
at that; Mr. Carter lost it with the X-Files...)
And it’s better to have the occasional “training”
or “re-indoctrination” episode occasionally
than to have the producers panic and completely dumb down
the show a la ALIAS.
OK,
I’ll end with another prediction: Jinn also speaks
English. Now if Vincent does too, I’ll be truly surprised...
|
