Lost season 4 episode 7 review

There’s a great anecdote that David Cross, creator of The Sopranos, has about going to see Planet of the Apes with his wife when it was first released. Sitting with her in the cinema, he’s watching the movie through to its famous conclusion, at which point he turns to his wife and says “they had a Statue of Liberty too?”

I refer to this totally non-Lost story due to the fact that this week, I (kind of) had my David Cross moment. In the final moments of “Ji Yeon”, what we believed was a flashforward starring Jin was, in actuality, a flashback, meaning that somewhere in the future, the former mob hand is dead.

Big news, except I firstly read it as follows: the Jin flashback is a flashforward and since leaving the island, he’s had to take up work with Mr Paik (Sun’s shady father) (a la Sayid working for Ben) and is working in hiding with an unknown new wife while Sun mourns. Of course, this is wrong wrong wrong.

Several clues that the Jin-buys-a-panda shenanigans were in the past: it was the Year of the Dragon (either 2000 or 2001), blocky-looking old mobile phone, his hair, the violent/stressed attitude towards anything and everything. Oh, and the big bad SWOOP noise that marks the end of a flash sequence, which I didn’t hear because I had already jumped to aforementioned conclusions and was yelling “WHAT?!” at the TV. So it was best that I rewatched this episode straight afterward, just to take it in again.

“Ji Yeon” was well worth the repeat viewing so soon. I’ve always been a fan of Sun and Jin episodes, which only serves to make the revelation that FutureJin is dead all the more upsetting. On the island, Sun made her wishes clear to defect to Locke’s camp after having had an unhelpful conversation with Faraday concerning that whole are-we-getting-rescued thing.

Juliet found out about this and jumped to try and stop her – as we know, Locke’s camp means no rescue which means no Sun, who would die during her third trimester on the island – by fibbing on Sun’s past adultery with Jae Lee (the skinny bald dude, you remember). While Jin went off to fish with Bernard (yay, Bernard!), Sun dealt with her guilt, both reconciling by the end of the episode. “Whatever you did,” Jin told Sun, “you did to the man [I used to be].”

The flashback showed us exactly what kind of man he used to be, and the contrast between these two versions of Jin only helped make the final moments of the episode more heartbreaking. If Jin is well and truly dead, it’s really a shame – not only from a character viewpoint, but for the pending exit of Daniel Dae Kim from the cast. Under-rated and, let’s be honest, under-used for the past couple of seasons, he’s always been an interesting character, a total teddy bear with an action figure past. So, is Jin really dead? Why does he have the date of the crash on his grave?

Okay, so we have all six members of the, er, Oceanic Six. Jack, who will grow a prop beard and take too many painkillers; Kate, who is off playing house with stolen baby Aaron; Hurley, who has thrown himself into a mental institute, ignoring his destiny; Sayid, who plugs fools in the name of Ben; Sun, who has her child successfully off the island; Jin, who supposedly died upon their return. I think. The gravestone conundrum throws this one up in the air – is Jin one of those two cats Jack mentioned that died in the events after the plane crash? I thought we’d get a resolution to the whole Oceanic Six plotline, but I’m still guessing. And dammit, that’s the way I like it.

Back in Flashforward City, Hurley arrived at Sun’s door to see the new baby girl, Ji Yeon (the name Jin mentioned at the beginning of the episode). They seemed very comfortable around one another, with none of the awkwardness that seems to follow members of the Six around when they meet one another (e.g. Hurley and Jack in the season premiere, Kate and Jack in “Through the Looking Glass”). However, this awkwardness shone through when Hurley warily asked Sun “is… anyone else coming?” Sun shook her head. “Good,” the big guy replied, visibly relaxing.

What’s the deal? How bad are the relationships between the Oceanic Six by this point? And will Sun support Hurley in his mental institute state? I’d love to see more of Sun and Hurley’s friendship, at least because it shines a well-needed ray of light into the darkness of Flashforward City. (PS. If any of you guys have been downloading the official Lost pocasts, you’ll have seen the one after “Eggtown” in which Evangeline Lily shared her happiness that Kate had a baby to take care of. Yay! Oh wait, that’s Claire’s baby. Which, for the time being, IS NOT CONSIDERED COOL. That is all.)

Freighter talk! I’m telling you, you wait nigh on ten months for Zoë Bell to show up on Lost and when she does, she throws herself off of the ship in a daze. Thanks, showerunners. We did meet the captain of the freighter who is sadly not Captain Awesome from Chuck but is called Captain Gault. Apparantly, seeing as how I just couldn’t make out his name after a while.

He said that members of the freighter’s crew had been affected by a hightened case of cabin fever. (Cue “We’ve Got Cabin Fever” from Muppets Treasure Island in my head.) Apparantly this has something to do with the closeness of the island, which got me to thinking – could this have something to do with those shenanigans involving Rousseau’s crew? I mean, you guys do remember “the sickness”, right? The one that affected Rousseau’s crew and let to many of their deaths? I think we’re being teased with a resolution to that at the moment. They’ve certainly teased us on the Zoë Bell front. God, bring her back! Flashbacks, flashforwards, cloning, whatever!

There was other odd stuff happening on the freighter – clanging that I’m thinking comes from a prisoner communicating via morse code; a massive bloodstain on the wall of a filthy room; Ray, the creepy doctor, going from normal at the start of the day to having some kind of wound on his face; muscly Keamy taking the ‘copter for some arcane and unmentioned mission to the island. Who are these people? I’m getting Other-it is all over again, just being perplexed about these people and their motives.

We have a version of their motives however – Captain Gault revealed to Desmond and Sayid that the fake 815 wreck was orchestrated by Ben. Who else could have the power to get over three hundred dead bodies and put them in a trench near Bali? Erm, Widmore or Hanso, probably. I’m going to call the Captain’s bluff on this one, seeing how Michael slipped a note through Des and Sayid’s door saying “DON’T TRUST THE CAPTAIN”. I’ll sit this one out and just wait to see where all the finger-pointing goes.

And as for The Most Obvious Reveal Ever i.e. Michael’s Return… it was obvious. It’s been blatantly obvious since the “Confirmed Dead” cliffhanger. That wasn’t to say that I wasn’t jumping up and down in my seat like a mad man. It’s good to have Harold Perrineau back, what with his short new hair and all. And next week’s episode – one of the last for a while, damned writer’s strike – is going to fill in some of the gaps concerning just where the frak Michael’s been. I can’t wait. I’m sure you guys can’t. Even if we have to call him Kevin Johnston. Just how the hell did he weave his way around the information on the 815 manifest?

Well then, I think I’ve covered pretty much everything that I could cover. I can’t believe that season four is having a hiatus after next week and that we’re more than halfway through the season. Just what are we going to do when Lost is off the air? Seriously! Keep that question in mind, as well as these other questions: what did Doc Ray do to get that bruise? Do you already miss Regina? The flashback/forward trade – inspired move or an emotional swindle? Where’s Miles – and does he still have that grenade in his mouth? And most importantly – now that Sun has about three weeks until her third trimester, we have a time limit for the Oceanic Six to get off the island. Who gets off first and when? And how?!?

‘Til next week, I’m Lost. But hopefully not as badly as I was this week.