
(S04E01) In honor of the Lost season premiere, we're doing a live chat during the 9pm ET airing of the episode. Watch the show and share your thoughts with Lost fans in real time! The full review follows after the jump. In "The Beginning of the End," the 815 survivors' feelings about being rescued were influenced by Charlie's message.
You can still join the chat by following this link. You can also check out AOL TV's coverage of Lost .
The Beach
The beach heroes didn't have a lot of time to celebrate their recent victory. Hurley was thrilled to go home, since his cursed lottery money would likely be gone. He did the happiest, chubbiest, slow-mo cannonball in TV history, only to have the moment ruined by Desmond's return. Everyone looked genuinely sad to hear about Charlie's death, even stone-faced Juliet. Mourning gave way to confusion once Desmond told them that Naomi wasn't who she claimed to be. After some debate, the group set off to warn Jack about Naomi in person.
Hurley made an unexpected (and unintentional) stop while in the jungle. Shortly after he fell behind the rest of the group, the show's trademark wind and spooky whispers kicked in. Somehow he ended up in front of Jacob's cabin, the scariest place on earth. Hugo's curiosity led him to the front window, where he caught a glimpse of the dog painting and someone (it looked like Christian Shephard!) sitting in the rocking chair. Suddenly a blue eye (Locke's?) met his, and Hurley ran off. Unfortunately for Hurley, the cabin followed him around before it eventually disappeared. John Locke appeared in its place.
It's killing me that Hurley didn't ask Locke about the cabin, but I suppose they couldn't fit everything into this episode. Hurley's news about Naomi only strengthened Locke's beliefs about the freighties. John and Hugo agreed that the people on the freighter were dangerous, and should be avoided at all costs. Does anyone else think that Locke was using Hurley's grief over Charlie to get him on his side?
The Radio Tower
Ignorant of Charlie's warning, the rest of the 815 survivors eagerly awaited their rescue. Ben was the only person who wasn't celebrating. He begged Danielle to take Alex and hide from the freighties, but made the mistake of calling Alex "his" daughter. Hostages should always be careful in their choice of words. A call from George Minkowski brought us another huge twist--Naomi wasn't dead! She crawled off into the woods while Jack's back was turned and left two trails. Jack, Danielle, and Ben followed one trail, and Kate followed the other (with the satellite phone that she stole from Jack).
Jack and Danielle realized that they took the dummy trail, giving Ben a perfect opportunity to gloat. Even when he's tied up, Ben makes time to mess with people's heads. You have to admire his work ethic. Kate's instincts about the blood trail were correct, but they weren't sharp enough to anticipate Naomi's next move. Naomi jumped Kate, took the phone, and contacted Minkowski on the freighter. She lied about her injury once Kate told her about Locke, then died. For real this time. Her last words were "Tell my sister I love her."
The Jungle
The survivors reunited with one another in the jungle. Rose was happy to see Bernard, Juliet hugged Alex, Sun found Jin, and nobody was pleased to see Locke. Hugo took it upon himself to tell Claire that Charlie was dead. I had tears in my eyes before he even spoke. Jack's first order of business was to punch Locke and hold a gun in his face. Locke calmly began to tell Jack that he wasn't going to shoot him, but was interrupted by Jack pulling the trigger. The gun wasn't loaded, of course. I'm impressed that Jack followed through on his promise to kill Locke.
Fed up with defending himself to Jack, Locke told the group that he was going to the Barracks to hide from the freighties. Hurley and Claire joined him out of loyalty to Charlie. The rest of Team Locke is as follows: Danielle, Ben, Alex, Karl, a few random survivors, Vincent and Sawyer. Is it wrong that I was more upset about Vincent than I was about Sawyer? Some redshirt with glasses decides that Vincent doesn't want to be rescued, and that's that? To her credit, Kate was upset to see Sawyer leave.
Jack and Kate stayed behind while the rest of Team Jack returned to the beach. Suddenly, a helicopter flew over the jungle, and another person parachuted out. It was a man (played by Jeremy Davies), who will hopefully have better luck than Naomi. The freighties have officially landed!
For the record, here are the new team rosters:
Team Locke--Hurley, Claire, Danielle, Ben, Alex, Karl, Sawyer, at least 4 random survivors, and Vincent.
Team Jack--Kate, Jin, Sun, Sayid, Desmond, Juliet, Rose, Bernard, and the rest of the survivors.
Flash-Forward: Hurley
Instead of an eye, the episode began with a close-up of a pile of fruit. Before anyone could figure out what it meant, a familiar-looking Camaro crashed through the pile and sped off. The as-yet-unseen driver led police on a high speed pursuit around Los Angeles, complete with media coverage. Jack caught Channel 8's footage of the chase over a breakfast of vodka and OJ (a family favorite, no doubt). He was surprised to learn that he knew the identity of the driver. Once the chase ended, Hurley emerged from the car looking extremely freaked out. He kept yelling "I'm one of the Oceanic Six!" as he was arrested. That's right--some of the 815 survivors are famous.
It turns out that Hurley's post-island future wasn't as liberating as he expected it to be. The past followed him to the police interrogation room in more ways than one. Big Mike, Ana-Lucia's former partner, was the detective interviewing Hugo. Detective Mike asked about Ana-Lucia and shed some light on the car chase. Security footage from a convenience store showed Hurley running from someone and knocking down tons of merchandise in the process. After denying any knowledge of Ana-Lucia's fate, Hurley had a vision of Charlie swimming underwater in the two-way mirror. His erratic behavior landed him back in the Santa Rosa Mental Health Institute.
During his stay Hurley had three upsetting visitors. One was Matthew Abbadon (the incredible Lance Reddick), a man posing as an Oceanic Airlines attorney who turned out to be far more sinister than your average lawyer. His offer to give Hurley an "upgrade" gradually felt like a threat. I was relieved when Hurley asked for a business card, which Abbadon forgot to bring. Before he left, he terrified Hurley by asking one question: "Are they still alive?" I'd like an answer to that question, too. Is Abbadon with DHARMA, Widmore, the group that sent the freighter, or another mysterious organization?
The second surprise visitor was Charlie Pace, who was somehow dead and talking to Hugo at the same time. This was his latest of several attempts to speak to his old friend--he was the one that Hugo ran from in the convenience store video. Apparently, ghost Charlie is big on messages in the afterlife as well. His newest message: "They need you, Hugo. You know they need you."
Hurley's final visitor was Jack, who tried to pass off his visit as a friendly one. In reality, he was there to ensure that Hurley wouldn't reveal an important secret. The Oceanic Six are hiding something, but what? Their time on the island, the circumstances of their rescue, or something worse? Hurley apologized for going with Locke, and admitted that he made a mistake. He was also convinced that they were wrong to leave the island, and believed that "it" wanted them to go back. Jack refused to listen, and told Hurley that they were never going back. Hurley and Jack sounded a lot like Jack and Kate in the season three finale. Interesting.
Final comments/questions:
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Between the mobisode and what Hurley saw in the cabin, you could argue that Christian Shephard is still alive.
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That bespectacled dog-napper is on my list.
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Jack: "I'm thinking about growing a beard." Hurley: "You'd look weird with a beard, dude."
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There were some interesting images in Hurley's flash-forward. When Hurley walked over to Matthew Abbadon, there were drawings on the chalkboard in the corner. A boat, the sun, waves, a palm tree, and a shark were all visible. In the scene with Charlie, Hurley was painting a watercolor of an igloo and a person dressed in cold weather gear holding a harpoon and several fish.
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What happened between this episode and the season finale flash-forward to make Jack change his mind about going back?
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Jack's wink to Ben as he told Hurley to pack his bags was priceless.
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I still want to know why Naomi had a picture of Desmond, since she wasn't sent by Penny.
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How cool was the scene when all the beach folks grabbed guns and set off to find Jack? They looked like one tough posse.
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Ben: "Better call the boat and tell them she's getting a really big bundle of firewood."
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Best line delivery of the episode: "Jack, with your permission I'd like to go with John." --Ben, for the win
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Locke said that he'd never done anything to hurt the 815ers. I think Boone's corpse and Sayid's head (Season One) would take issue with that.















Reader Comments (Page 1 of 5)
1-31-2008 @ 10:02PM
Phish said...
OMG!!! they killed juliette!
Reply
1-31-2008 @ 10:16PM
Kasey Johnson said...
Uh, no.
1-31-2008 @ 10:19PM
Oreo said...
Wishful thinking, maybe she will die later.
1-31-2008 @ 10:28PM
Wii60 said...
Snape killed Dumbledore!
1-31-2008 @ 10:36PM
Oreo said...
I think Rose and her husband will die.
Good episode. Jack is just a bastard. "We have to go to the beach so they can find us". Wouldn't the phone have GPS in it? How else will they find the island?
Reply
1-31-2008 @ 10:43PM
Darren said...
I'm more confused then ever - what an awesome show! Can't wait until next week.
Reply
1-31-2008 @ 11:03PM
Phish said...
i'm surprised sayid joined jack's team. jack is a gullible moron, sayid's instincts have ALWAYS been right. (ben, michael etc..)
so i'm very surprised at his decision.
team locke would be unbeatable with sayid on their side, it would be like a dreamteam! hehe
Reply
2-01-2008 @ 2:57PM
collin said...
It seemed to me that Sayid never trusted Locke, and Sayid's terse "welcome" to Locke (upon seeing him) only makes me wonder why.
Ultimately, Sayid trusts himself most of all, and probably felt that Jack would be the most dependable alternative (when compared to Locke).
The writers seem to have set the stage for a showdown later in the season, if we will ever get to see it.
1-31-2008 @ 11:38PM
Steve said...
I think Charlie's do that weird "time travel" thing that Desmond did last season. Desmond was able to travel through time and interact with that woman at the antique shop; why couldn't Charlie?
In fact, I think Christian (Jack's Dad) did the same thing in Season one. Yemi might have done the same thing too, with Eko.
Yeah, yeah...it's all just a guess...
Reply
1-31-2008 @ 11:49PM
Oreo said...
That's a good theory. In one of the episodes last year that had a video, when played backwards, that said "Only fools are bound by space and time".
1-31-2008 @ 11:32PM
Laura said...
Hm, maybe I just missed this and someone can fill me in - but how did Locke know that Charlie wrote "not penny's boat?" on his hand? He wasn't on the beach when desmond came in, yet he brings it up verbatim with Hurley after he sees the cabin.
Reply
1-31-2008 @ 11:44PM
Blair Mitchelmore said...
That's because in a conversation that Hurley and Locke had off screen, Hurley filled him in on what happened on the beach. Locke shows up above Hurley. Cut to... the aftermath of tedious exposition which was wisely left unfilmed.
1-31-2008 @ 11:52PM
Jake said...
@Phish: I wouldn't read too much into the initial divisions between Team Jack and Team Locke, obviously since there were more than six people that went with Jack and Hurley initially went with Locke.
@ Erin: What happened between this episode and the season finale flash-forward to make Jack change his mind about going back?
Good question. I think the death of the yet unnamed person in the finale flash forward obviously set something off with Jack. Makes me wonder who it is even more!
I loved the premiere. I wished it was really 2 hours instead of the fake advertising by ABC making it seem like it was a 2 hour premiere. Next Thursday can't come fast enough.
Reply
1-31-2008 @ 11:46PM
Jake said...
@Phish: I wouldn't read too much into the initial divisions between Team Jack and Team Locke, obviously since there were more than six people that went with Jack and Hurley initially went with Locke.
@ Erin: What happened between this episode and the season finale flash-forward to make Jack change his mind about going back?
Good question. I think the death of the yet unnamed person in the finale flash forward obviously set something off with Jack. Makes me wonder who it is even more!
I loved the premiere. I wished it was really 2 hours instead of the fake advertising by ABC making it seem like it was a 2 hour premiere. Next Thursday can't come fast enough.
As for Christian Shepard being alive, I'd buy it, considering Locke's dad showed up on the Island all the way from Tallahassee. Maybe it has to do with the box Ben was talking about.
Reply
2-02-2008 @ 11:42PM
desiree said...
ya whats up with the oceanic 6 anyways? We know it is most likely hurley, jack and Kate... who are the other 3? Desmond says Claire is rescued- but was the audience ever given the opportunity to see that physic experience? Maybe desmond made all that up so that Charlie would do it.
1-31-2008 @ 11:57PM
Michael said...
As far as sequencing goes, I think the flash forward from last season's finale actually takes place much later than the scenes with Jack & Hurley in the premiere, hence the comment about growing a beard. As evidence, one only has to look at Jack's demeanor. He was pretty much "good ol' Jack" in this week's flash forward with only a few twinges of doubt and only a wee bit of vodka in his drink. In the finale last season he was freakin' OUT OF CONTROL Jack - barely able to stand because he was drugged/drunk out of his skull trying to forget whatever it is we haven't seen yet. I actually liked the comparison to Hurley/Jack and Jack/Kate in the recap - that may be the best way of putting where our heroes' current states of mind are after escaping the island.
All I can say is, I for one am happy that LOST is back on the air after an extremely long hiatus. Say what you will about Season 3, I just sat down and watched it straight thru last week (finished it up last night before the premiere) and it was a heck of a season. We've still got a ton of loose ends to clean up and you just KNOW the writers are going to throw some new craziness in there in addition to all the stuff that's happening already.
Is it next Thursday yet???
Reply
2-01-2008 @ 1:00AM
Carl said...
Well I think that the line with the beard hints that the events of the premiere FF are before the season finale FF
Reply
2-01-2008 @ 12:35AM
Dan Buckley said...
The flash-backs appeared in a non linear matter. I would assume that the flash-forwards would come in the same way.
Reply
2-01-2008 @ 12:46AM
Tommy said...
It sucks that I'm in Iraq and have to wait until my wife sends me the episodes. But at least I get to read what's going on and not be too far behind when I get them.
Reply
2-01-2008 @ 11:29PM
girlnextdoor said...
Try watching/downloading the episode at www.fanpop.com. It takes some time and the episode is in pieces but it works. I was able to watch the season 3 finale via fanpop while in Serbia last spring.