Flashback - Juliet
The bulk of the flashback closed the gap between Juliet's last flashback and the crash of flight 815. Juliet, freshly recruited by Richard Alpert at the morgue (ew) showed up at Mittleos with her sister. Adding color to the opening scene of the season, the last song that played on the radio before she said good-bye to the "real" world was Petula Clark's “Downtown,” the song that made her so wistful and sad just before flight 815 went down. Ethan greeted Juliet at the gate and took her bags, and Richard introduced himself to Rachel. Juliet commented on not knowing there was an airport in the area. For security, Richard had to take her in the rest of the way. Juliet had a feeling that the job was a mistake, but Rachel gave her the pep talk she need to board Richard's creepy white van…
which took them to a private airfield, Herrarat Aviation ("Earhart Aviation?). Ethan took some vitals, and Richard, referring to Juliet's six-month project, said, “you’ll be amazed at how time fl
ies.” In a stunning bit of frankness, Richard told Juliet the OJ he prepared for her was laced with some major tranquilizers which she would need for the trip. After Richard observed that deep down, she knew the place they were going was special, where she could do something special. He couldn’t tell her where, but she’d see things there she could never have imagined. As he tried to assure her, she metaphorically "ate the fruit from the tree of knowledge" and greedily gulped down the tranquilizer (yup, those writers are up on the bible)...
Before she knew it, Juliet awakened on the Others’ submarine, strapped to a bunk. Ethan pointed to the sub’s open hatch, and Juliet climbed out for her first glimpse of the island, from the dock, where she met Ben Linus for the first time.
Months later, on a Dharma operating table, a woman died. Goodwin(!) tried to console Juliet, who clearly failed in the task for which she was brought to the island, and he offered to talk to Ben. Juliet spent some alone time watching the tide. Ben joined her, and said the patient knew the risk of getting pregnant. That's right, it's time for...
Big Reveal #1 - Why the Others Seem Baby-Happy
It turns out the Others don't so much have a baby problem as a pregnancy problem. For some reason, every woman who becomes pregnant on the island contracts a strange ailment whereby her body turns against both the fetus at itself. Juliet, the miracle-worker who helped her sterile sister conceive, was to be the answer to their prayers, but her work on Others island was a failure...
Juliet theorized it happened at conception. She wanted to take a woman off the island to see if that made a difference, but Ben refused. She pleaded for Ben to let her go home, only to receive Michael Emerson's most evil look to date on the show. To dissuade her from wanting to leave (Ben really doesn't seem to like people leaving...)Ben told her that her sister would not be giving birth, that her cancer had returned and she would die within three months. He showed her tests, and said he got them from Mikhail. Ben told her she could join her sister for her final days or help the Others with their problem. The cruel news about Rachel's cancer was the stick, but the carrot Ben offered was a cure for her sister’s cancer. He told Juliet that Jacob would do it himself. Who in the name of Drive Shaft is Jacob already? As proof Jacob could do it, Ben pointed out the lack of cancer on the island.
Big Question # 1 - What's up with Jacob?
Each passing reference to "Jacob" is less subtle than the last. Who is this guy? Can he cure cancer? Does the reach of his influence extend beyond the island? Did he make the bus kill Edmund Burke? Has Juliet seen him, or is "Jacob" just a story Ben tells his fellow Others? Are Jacob's miracles really Ben conning his people?
Back to Juliet's story...
Juliet had an ice cream-laden affair with Goodwin. She realized she was about to hit the third anniversary of her time on the island. A knock on her door sent Goodwin scrambling for his clothes, and Juliet was given x-rays of Ben’s spine...and his cancer! The meaning was clear – Ben had lied about the cure for cancer. Or had he?
Ben was just finishing Carrie (the book club selection from the season-opening scene) when Juliet presented her diagnosis. In yet another great acting moment in the episode, the look of shear horror on Ben's face when he heard he had cancer was brilliant. It conveyed so much, but what did it really say? This was not the look of a man who just got caught in a massive lie. And it was not, to me, the kind of terrified look one would have when the "c" word is uttered. Instead, it seemed like a shock to Ben that Jacob, or the island, or whatever, had let him get cancer. Maybe I'm reading too much into it...Juliet demanded to talk to Rachel, for proof that her cancer was cured. Ben, fearing again that Juliet may try to leave (really, what's so bad about people leaving?) said that would not happen, but he gave his word that Rachel really was cured.
The flashback then looped over and revisited the opening scene of the season, with Juliet listening to “downtown” while setting up for the book club, and the Others’ detection of the plane crash (they couldn’t blow that effects shot for only one use, could they?) Ben sent Ethan and Goodwin off, and realized Juliet had booted him out of the book club. Sadly, this was the last Juliet would see of Goodwin.
Random aside # 1
It's a shame Ana Lucia was killed off before Juliet ever met her. Juliet, transformed in her time on the island, can kick some serious tail, and her righteous anger for Ana's impaling one of the few good things Juliet knew on the island would have been awesome (and seeing Ana get beat up would have rocked!)...
Ben told Juliet they needed to talk, that it was important. He took her to the flame station and radioed Mikhail. Patchy didn’t answer, so Ben tried shouting. They entered, and we got...
Big Reveal # 2 - How the Others Know Stuff
It seems Mikhail "mushbrain" Bakunin was the operator for the Others appropriated ex-of-Dharma communications array. The Others had no fore-knowledge of who would be on that plane, but they were able to determine from news feeds that it was the missing Oceanic Flight 815. The rest was just a matter of using the tech-toys in the Flame to obtain lots and lots of quality intel (more on this later).
Big Reveal # 3 - What Mikhail Was Doing at the Flame
Apparently as a spoil of war, Mikhail wore that Dharma/ Flame jumpsuit since before 815 went down. The Flame station was his prison/ castle, and he was responsible for maintining communications with the outside world and Stateside Others like Richard and Ethan. No wonder he was bummed when the sky turned purple...
At the Flame, Ben had Mikhail switch his feed to Richard in Florida, who showed Juliet live video of sister Rachel and her three-year-old son, Julian. See? No cancer!!!
Big Question #2 - Was Rachel Cured, or Was She Ever Sick?
Occam's Razor suggests Rachel was never sick in the first place. All Juliet had to suggest she was was a set of sterile medical records (online screencaps reveal that the records clearly stated "Male - 197 pounds," which makes Juliet's ability to get Rachel pregnant that much more interesting...) The simplest explanation was that Ben lied about the cancer and, when he showed Juliet live video nearly three years later, the "cure" was all a lie. But if so, why the big surprise when Ben contracted his tumor? And isn't just a bit coincidental that a famous spinal surgeon arrived just days after the diagnosis? Is it the case that Jacob taketh away, only to then giveth back?
Ben summoned Richard back to the island (where we now know he is apparently stuck), and Juliet lost her precious feed. Ben thus proved he was not a liar (in Juliet's mind, anyway). Their revised deal was now that she would stay until her work was done, and, heck there may have even been a mother on the plane...
Juliet is conscious of Sayid’s eyeing her. He asks what the Others are up to, and who she is.
On the beach, Charlie hears
Aaron crying. Claire was sleeping through the crying fit, feeling “a little bit off.” Charlie takes on babysitting duties to let Claire rest. Claire wanders out of bed and asks for aspirin, looking faint and dazed. As Sawyer goes to get the aspirin (newly emergent do-gooder Sawyer, how quickly he gets deposed), he sees Jack, and mutters, “son of a bitch.” Soon the whole camp sees the party, but all Sawyer cares about is seeing Kate safely returned. Not just to the beach, but to him, as it's clear somehow that, despite heading into danger for Jack, she is not with Jack. Josh Holloway got one of his finest acting moments on the show in with his touching welcome back hug for Kate. Hell, now that the triangle is a line (take that, Jaters!) Jack and Sawyer even give each other a friendly nod, a handshake and a hug. Sawyer clearly knows he has Kate back, when he spots Juliet and becomes the first of the beach crew to demand an explanation.Juliet sits alone on the beach, and Hurley joins her. He asks some awkward questions, “you’re like one of them, huh?” He doesn’t remember her from the dock, and she mildly charms him (and makes Juliet fans swoon with the best line, hands down, of the season...) “I had the day off.” She deduces he’s been sent to keep an eye on her. In one of Jorge Garcia's finest moments on the show, Hurley tells her what happened with Ethan, the last Other to "join" the beach, and points to his grave on Boone hill.
At night, Sun leads the charge to not trusting Juliet (based on what we learned in Juliet's flashbacks, offhand I'd say Sun should start distrusting anything and everything on this island). Sayid says he will not torture her, much to Sawyer's chagrin. Desmond asks about Locke, and Jack tells the story. He starts to argue the benefits of his plan with Ben, when Claire collapses with a bad nose bleed. Juliet asks what is happening to her, and Sun, translating for Jin, says "what do you care?" Juliet tells Kate she can help Claire, that she knows what’s wrong with her, “because I did it to her.”Kate relays the message to Jack. Sawyer and Sayid look on as Jack, Kate and Juliet confer. Juliet says Claire was reacting to the medication Juliet designed that was to keep her alive. On the island, pregnant women’s bodies reject fetuses and their own immune systems kill them. Ethan’s plan, though he went rougue…was to give Claire the injections of Juliet’s serum, until Hurley sniffed out the lie, and Ethan was forced to really go off the reservation and kidnap Claire. Claire, Juliet explains, was the first to survive a pregnancy on the island (guess she didn’t know about Daneille Rousseau, but then again, Ben has been telling people Alex's mother died…)
Juliet treks in search of Ethan’s secret stash of the vaccine, and finds it next a tree marked with the same symbol branded on her skin. 
Jack brings Juliet the basics of a beach tent – tarp, blanket, pillows, etc. Juliet is pleased, perhaps more than she is because her research seemed to work, finally, with Claire. She asks why Jack doesn’t need her answers or explanations like Sayid and Sawyer do. He says it's because they were standing together when the sub exploded. He saw it her eyes – how much she wants to leave. That makes her “one of us.” Juliet sets up her tent...
Juliet was a plant, and the lie to Kate in last week's episode was the way to the beach. Claire had an implant put in her that caused her illness, a manufactured crisis for Juliet to solve with the serum. Ben said he’d see her in a week, and left Juliet with a gas mask. 
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