the awesome/terrifying freedom

written by: edward kitsis and adam horowitz. the guys are clearly damon and carlton's favorites.

directed by: stephen williams. a veteran 'lost' director.

yet another episode that goes into the 'will play much better when you can see it back-to-back with the next one' category. we spent an hour saying goodbye to charlie, and then had the goodbye cut off in mid-story. after all that (effective) emotional rape, he'd better die next week, that's all i have to say.

i'm trying to stay off fan sites b/c apparently the script to the finale was leaked and spoilers are -everywhere-. who would want to be spoiled on this? who reads the last page of a book before they've gotten there? idiots.

there's only one episode left! not much time to wrap up some lose ends that i think need to be addressed.. here's my questions/talking points for this week:

1. the van. was the entire purpose to hurley's van episode to tease out ben's father's story? it seems like that van still needs to play a part in the final showdown.
2. room 23. we can assume that it brainwashes you, but to what end? what do you become/believe after being strapped in it? was jack put in it?
   
3. will jack's flashback next week be on-island, or pre-island?
4. will alex finally meet danielle? she's met everyone else.
5. rose/bernard return - why?
   
6. did desmond -actually- go back in time?
   
7. what is the season-ending game-changer going to be?
   

1. it lovely seeing all those sparkly new dharma vans in ben's episode, but in planning for the other's attack, it seems like the losties have forgotten that they have a car! can they just drive away? or at least drive to a new spot? what happened to the season 1 caves? why can't they just go back there?

2. room 23 was too big a nugget to just drop in and not address again before the finale. it was so frustrating that kate and saywer never grabbed the kid by the shoulders while they had the chance and said TELL US WHAT THE HELL THAT ROOM WAS FOR. now they have the chance. they'd better do it. which brings me to #3:

3. if jack's flashback is on-island (which, due to recent episodes, seems less likely), i would love to find out that he had been 'room 23'd.' but now that jack is talking a little more, it doesn't seem like he's actualy holding onto any major piece of information anymore - but i could be wrong. last year, at this point, we got 'three minutes,' in which we find out how the others got michael to do what he did.. will we get a similar story about jack?

if jack's story is from his past and goes off-island, then i'm really hoping it's a followup to the lackluster thailand tattoo story. i'm holding out hope that the writers will be able to rescue it by giving a satisfying conclusion to what felt like half a story .

4. i have this awful feeling that alex is going to die accidentally. one of the losties, who doesn't know shes a good guy, will kill her, or the dynamite plan will backfire in an awful way. rousseau and ben will both morn, maybe rousseau will finally get to meet her before she dies, and then it will be a vengeful war between them..

5. damon and carlton have said that they can't justify flying in rose and bernard unless they have a good story for them - so what's the story going to be? i can't help but think that one or both of them is going to die.

6. so charlie's street flashback, which weirdly crosses him with sayid through nadia, was interesting. at first i thought 'oh my god.. desmond is going to show up, like he did in 'flashes before your eyes' and he's not going to recognize him, and it's going to be crazy!' but then desmond -didn't- show up, which i think is very very important. because of the perfectly-timed rainstorm, i believe that this was intended to be the very same moment we saw in 'flashes,' but the designers made a deliberate choice to have charlie in a slightly different outfit. i was wondering if we would get a scene where charlie 'retroactively remembers' desmond from the street, and here it seems clear that this is not the case. 'our' charlie never met desmond before coming to the island.

what i think this tells us is that -if- desmond went back in time, he went to an -alternate- timeline, where things have proceeded slightly differently (naomi's timeline). whatever changes he caused by going back will not directly effect the survivors on the island. however, the alternate timeline continued on, and in it, the plane crashed somewhere else, with no survivors.

while the scene didn't have desmond in it, it does have this pretty cool tivo moment, a sticker on charlie's guitar that says 'i was here moments ago'



7. everyone is abuzz with how the finale will 'change everything.' what could it possibly be? some ideas:

• i can see the game changer as confirmation of on-island time-shifting - michael and walt appear, and walt is man-sized - this is more an eventual inevitability than a shocker, though, but still, boom.
  
• claire and aaron get onto the helicopter, fly out to the ship, which turns out to be manned by others. they take arron and throw her overboard. her body sinks to the bottom of the ocean, to the alternate timeline plane wreck, and she comes to rest by her still-pregnant alternate corpse. boom.
  
• locke appears at the end of the episode, with hair, throws a knife into the chest of a cast member (bernard? ben?), and introduces himself as jacob, the leader of the island. boom.
  
• hurley is stepped on by a 400 foot tall, four-toed man. boom.
  
• desmond will get hit on the head again, and will go back in time to the day he followed inman outside, didn't press the button, and caused the plane to crash.
  this time he will stay inside, push the button, and the plane crashes elsewhere, changing everything and restarting the entire story. boom.
  
• don't forget, the finale happens just before christmas, island time. jack runs into a clearing where libby, ana lucia, his dad, eko, boone, shannon, nikki, paolo, the others, and everyone else shout 'surprise! merry christmas!' and reveal that for his xmas present, jack's family chipped in, and this whole time he's been playing the game. boom.
  

minor gripe(s) of the week: nadia's hero speech was a little heavy handed, and crossing nadia with charlie -and- locke in this 'two ships passing in the wind' style feels arbitrary. is it just because that actress is always available?

how is charlie able to make this swim? i've been re-watching season 1 with my roommates, and in the 5th episode, "white rabbit," a woman named joanna dies at sea, and charlie stands there saying with deep regret "i don't swim.. i don't swim." it would have been a nice moment if jack remembered this incident when challenging charlie.

oh and alex, i hate to break it to you, but your 'boyfriend' is a total 'mo.