Lost season 5 episode 7 review

I decided to allow myself a couple of days to digest The Life and Death Of Jeremy Bentham, to re-watch the episode (sober on both occasions, despite my previous advocacy for watching Lost whilst hammered), and then to post my piece on the episode.

First and foremost, I have to agree with the numerous other reviews, comments, etc. that I’ve read in stating that Terry O’Quinn and Michael Emerson are beyond compelling as Locke and Linus.

The involvement of Widmore and Matthew Abaddon was also fantastic. Why? Yes, we all knew Locke would come back to life upon return to the island… however, with Widmore and Linus both portraying the other as the source of all evil, the doubt that became apparent in Locke as to whom to believe was mirrored a little in us all-and certainly enough to knock me sufficiently off kilter to almost make me skip over the fact that it was obvious that Ben would be the person to kill Locke.

However, with all of that aside, I should now return to the Matthew Fox bashing…(Only Joking)

Well, sort of. I’ll admit that I didn’t enjoy the two and a half minute scene with Jack and Locke in the hospital. However, that Jack alluded to the fact that he’d heard all of this “destined to return” malarkey before, and that Locke tried to say that it was fate that had conspired to bring them together hints more at poor editing (ie: removal of Locke’s previous visit to Jack) and poor writing (why on earth didn’t Locke explain that he was drawn to seek out Helen-who happened to be buried in West L.A. in response to Jack’s cart-blanche refusal of Locke’s belief that it was simply a matter of probability?). And perhaps, we could even point to the director with regards to Jack’s attempt at a Guiness World Record for most emotions portrayed in a single minute when Locke mentioned his father, however, giving some credit here – could we not simply put this down to Jack’s ambivalence regarding such news?

I think that for all my charted problems with Jack, I might actually be able to cope with him in these small doses-especially opposite either Linus or Locke (And for those of you who follow my pieces enough to know that my opinion of Fox/Jack could be described as featuring the word “Low” more than a Flo Rida Greatest Hits album, you should know that this is probably as good as my relationship with the character will ever get).

Back to the story. Walt’s involvement (or lack thereof) surprised me a little, however, he was used rather nicely as a spoiler for a future conflict, presumably between Locke and the survivors of the most recent plane crash.

All in all, despite the glaring obviousness of knowing a large extent of what would happen beforehand, this was a relatively good show. By no means am I stating that this episode scaled the heights of episode five of this season, let alone previous season’s high points, but if the last few days and my brief step back from the world of Lost has taught me anything, it’s that the last two seasons of Lost appear to have been written as an entertainment rollercoaster. Sure there are, and will be more, highs, and plenty of lows to go with it. This episode once again felt like a steady climb, and for once during the visual ascent, we were provided with some information which seems to have some bearing going forwards – which can only be a good thing – so long as the writers deliver, and we get more action and more explanations in the coming episodes.

Check out Arron’s last episode review here.