Ep. 505 - "This Place is Death" for One Character

Precap

Before we begin – a question I posted on both Facebook and Lost Users this week – if the past can’t be changed by time travel (big if), then why didn’t 2004 Rousseau remember meeting Jin in 1988 on one of the most memorable and traumatic days of her life? Is it because she’s nuts? Or because she didn’t have a whole heck of a lot of contact with Jin in prior encounters with the 815 survivors? Or did the past in fact get altered by the presence of Jin and the other left-behinders? Something to ponder. Some possible answers, courtesy of Doc Jensen at ew.com, will follow below…

One more note – The Numbers made two slight returns last week, that I didn’t catch in my recap. First, Ben had Jack bring Kate to slip 23 in Long Beach. Even more interesting, and subtle, was when Rousseau’s team first meets Jin on the beach. Montand, fiddling with a radio, picks up the transmission of the numbers by DHARMA – the same transmission Rousseau would soon swap with her distress call, which will play continuously for 16 years.

Tease
Smokey returns! Montand (finally) loses his arm!! A major character dies!!! All this, plus Locke’s repair job on the frozen donkey wheel, in “This Place is Death.”

Island
Poor Jin. Having been separated from the other left-behinders, he has no idea he’s been traveling through time, and thus, he has trouble believing the young pregnant woman is crazy ol’ Rousseau. She tells him they sailed from Tahiti on November 5, 1988 (at which point the time travel thing seems to dawn on Jin). He says he needs to find his camp, to find his wife, which prompts Danielle’s crew to ask if he had been on the island before. Jin asks if they saw a helicopter (the one that took off with Sun). Montand scoffs at this. First, he snorts, Jin told them he was on a ship. Now, there was a helicopter? Next thing, snorts Montand, Jin will say there’s a submarine. (Oh the delicious irony). They ask Jin about the radio tower that’s sending the numeric transmissions Montand has been tuning in and out. Jin admits he can’t find his camp from where they are, but he could get there from the tower. So they agree – Jin has to take them to the tower, to call for help.

Aside…Jin never went to the tower – he was on the beach when older Rousseau took the group to the tower. Error in script supervision, or did he just study the map before Jack hatched his divide-and-conquer-the-Others plan?

The group enters the jungle, tracking the numbers signal by its strength. Fetus Alex kicks, and Danielle has a tender moment with Robert (will the baby be “Alexander” or “Alexandra”?)

They suddenly realize that one of their group has disappeared – Nadine, who had their canteen. They hear a noise, which Jin recognizes as an early harbinger of the smoke monster. They frantically search for Nadine, over Jin’s protests that they need to leave. Backtracking, they find Nadine’s pack. Suddenly, there’s a blast, like a smoky geyser, and Nadine’s broken body falls from the sky. The noises get louder, and Jin tells them to run. Montand loses his friends for a moment, only to fall prey to Smoky/Cerberus, who coils, then springs. Smoky grabs and drags Montand into the trees, just as it did to Locke in the first season finale. Robert dives and grabs Montand, as the gruff Frenchman gets pulled into a hole. Jin and the other men grab Robert to help his efforts to pull Montand out of the hole. Smoky pulls harder…and Montand freakin’ loses his arm!!!

Aside – this was far and away one of the biggest “thank-yous” ever for Lost geeks like yours truly. Ever since Danielle Rousseau took Jack and Company to the Black Rock in the first season, and uttered those immortal words, “this is the Dark territory…where Montand lost his arm,” the running gag in podcasts and the online community was whether we would ever learn what the heck she was talking about? Here, in spectacular fashion, at long last we did. 64-dollar question - was Locke in the same danger as Montand? Or was his confidence that Smoky didn't want to hurt him well-based in reality?

After losing Montand (less and arm) into the hole, the group (and the audience) got a look at where that hole went. What we see is – it’s a temple, or at least the ruins of a temple.

Aside – making an assumption here, but this must be “The Temple,” where Ben sent Richard and the Others at the end of Season 3, and where he told Rousseau to take Alex and Carl in Season 4. Strange, then, that Rousseau would willingly go towards this horrific place, and believe it would protect her daughter. Also strange that this appears to be Smoky’s home base. Is that why the Others would be safe there? If so, why would they have needed the sonic fence around the Barracks?

They hear Montand calling, “I’m hurt, help please.” Robert insists on going in after him. Jin only manages to convince Rousseau not to go. She picks up a rifle – the one she’ll have years in the future. Suddenly, there’s another flash. Jin feels a lot of pain, then finds himself alone at the temple.

Aside - was this really Montand, or was Smoky pulling his Yemi/ Dave/ Horse gimmick, and pretending to be Montand, only to lure his people inside? If so, to what end? An efficient way to wipe them out? Or did it in fact want Rousseau, and, presumably, Alex? Why?

The hole is still there, only Montand’s arm has decayed. The temple, we see, is covered in hieroglyphs, similar to the ones under the Orchid and on the countdown clock in the Swan. Jin takes a drink from a leaf, then turns and sees a plume of gray smoke. He heads for it, and sees a camp, with the last remnants of a fire. There’s a music box playing. Flies buzz. There are packs, and a violin. Jin sees two dead, recently-shot bodies – the "extras" from Rousseau's crew. He finds Danielle, still pregnant (so less than 2 months have passed) holding Robert at gunpoint. Robert tells her, it’s not a monster, it’s a security system guarding the temple. She thinks Smoky’s done something to Robert. Robert pleads with her not to shoot him. She lowers her gun…then Robert tries to shoot her, only his gun jams. So Danielle shoots the father of her unborn daughter dead, then sees Jin, accuses him of disappearing, and starts shooting.

Aside - it would appear that, years after she killed him, Danielle still trusted Robert in a sense, when she told Jack and company that Smoky was a "security system." Given that this explanation came from a guy who seconds later would try, in vain, to kill the woman he told it to, I'm doubting the extent to which the security system explanation for Smoky is valid. As to whether Robert had been changed or, rather, replaced...assuming he's a Smoky manifestation, can they really be killed with bullets? Or is the assumption misplaced? For that matter, should we now understand that the "sickness" Rousseau told Sayid about had something to do with going into the temple? What happened in there?

Also, here are Doc Jensen’s explanations of whether Rousseau recognized Jin all those years later: “The answer could very well be: Does it matter? For Rousseau, Reappearing Jin was one more scary, inexplicable situation that was about to become a way of life. By the time their lives intersected once more in her future timeline, seeing Jin again (if she even recognized him), the significance probably just bounced off her. ‘Oh. You again. Whatever.’” Jensen then goes on to offer a further theory, a meandering, but thoroughly entertaining romp, about how the term “Jinn” from Arabian tales and the Koran means an amorphous, powerful, magical creature – also known as “Genie” – that can disappear and reappear at seemingly random times. If we’re to believe that the writers really have had a roadmap in place for the show since very early on, and if we’re to observe how clue-filled character names are on the show, perhaps this explains why Mr. Kwon is named Jin. Moreover, as with Desmond not “remembering” his past meeting with Faraday until Faraday went back in time and made it happen, perhaps that offers one final explanation for why Rousseau seemingly ignored Jin at their future meeting – the universe had not yet course-corrected before her death. It’s enough to make your head spin. So let’s leave this little conundrum alone for now…

Jin runs from Rousseau, there's another flash, and he trips over a root. He hears a gun cock, then hears...Sawyer. They hug each other. Jin explains he wasn’t on the boat, he was in the water. Jin asks where Sun is, and Sawyer’s face drops a little. Miles wonders where Jin came from. Daniel guesses he was blasted clear enough from the freighter to get inside the radius. Jin can’t figure out the time traveling, so he has Charlotte (who he figured out last season could speak Korean), translate. She explains Lockes’ plan to bring Sun and the others back. Jin can’t understand why anyone would want to bring them back.

Locke explains he has to go alone, but he promises he’ll bring Sun back. Charlotte’s condition worsens. Dan asks if she speaks other languages, she jokingly says just Klingon. Dan says it makes sense to go back to the Orchid, but bringing the Oceanic 6 back – that’s where science runs out. There are two more quick shifts, and everyone suffers each time. Charlotte collapses. She gets up, looking very pale and screams to Jin in Korean, then to the group in English. “don’t let them bring her back, no matter what. Don’t let them bring her back. This place is death.” First Juliet, then Sawyer, sprout nose bleeds.

Charlotte gets loopy – "why won’t daddy come with us?" "You know what mom would say about marrying an American." Locke and Sawyer want to leave her behind. Another flash. Charlotte tells them to leave her. Daniel tells the group to go, and says he’ll stay with Charlotte. She tells them to look for the well – that’s where they’ll find the Orchid if it’s not been built or no longer stands. They get to the Orchid. "Thank God," says Juliet, "what are the odds that we’d end up the same time as this thing?" Another flash, and it’s gone. (Loved Sawyer's "ya had to say something" response)…Locke makes a beeline into the brush, and finds the well that Charlotte mentioned. Miles wonders aloud how she knew it was there.

Charlotte, perhaps remembering from her incoherent flashes, tells Daniel she was born and grew up on the island, as part of DHARMA. Her dad went crazy, so her mom took her away, leaving dad behind. Her mom then told her the island was just a fantasy she had invented as a young girl. She tells Daniel she became an anthropologist because she’d been searching for the island her whole life. She remembers a crazy man from her DHARMAkind years, who told her she had to leave the island and never come back, because if she did, she would die. Now that it's all coming back to her, it occurs to Charlotte - that man was Daniel, himself!

Sawyer asks Locke if he plans to find a subway off the island. Jin makes Locke promise not to bring Sun or their child back to the island. But if Sun finds him, and asks him, John won't stop her. Jin says to tell Sun he’s dead, and they found him and buried him. Jin gives him his wedding ring to offer as proof. Locke takes the rope. Sawyer offers to lower him down, but, Locke smiles, "where would be the fun in that?" As they begin to lose sight of Locke, another flash hits. It emanates from the bottom of the well. Sawyer tells Locke to hold on…but Locke loses his grip, and drops to the bottom. After the flash, Sawyer is holding a rope…extending into the ground. Juliet pulls Sawyer back, and says they can’t help Locke.

It looks like Juliet's theory is correct - whatever you're holding during a flash stays with you. Here, the rope sticks around, even as the well it's dropped into disappears. Weird, right? It also begs the question of when they just jumped to. If there's no well, then presumably it has not yet been built. It looked mighty old when they found it, which was apparently before the Orchid was built. Was this jump that much further back in time, even longer than the 1954 jump? Is this the jump that plunged Black Rock into the middle of the jungle?

Charlotte gets even worse. Daniel tells Charlotte about his message to Desmond, how his mother can help. She looks relieved. Then Charlotte smiles, babbles about how she's not supposed to eat chocolate before dinner…she slips away and dies. And guest star Rebecca Mader's time on Lost is done.

Something about the amount of exposition in Charlotte's final scenes made me wonder if this got forced. Is Rebecca Mader going to be unavailable faster than previously contemplated? It's just not like Lost to have a character tell us about her backstory when showing is would be so much cooler. That said, I really liked how Charlotte's character arc came together so well. Right back to that initial flashback, where she seemed so excited to find the DHARMA polar bear. We now know it's because that moment confirmed a memory that she had been told was false. Similarly, her pure delight at returning to the island after jumping out of Frank's chopper - it all comes together now, at her death. Thinking forward (or backward), we now have to wonder - will Daniel, knowing the futility of it all, still try to stop Charlotte from coming back to the island? After all, he already did, in her memory, even though he hasn't done it yet in his. But knowing what he does, why even bother...unless he thinks he can figure out a way to change the rules...

Locke has a compound break – his leg bone is sticking out. He shouts up, but nobody responds. Then Christian Shepherd shows up lighting the way with a lantern. He says he’s here to help the rest of the way. John asks why the jumps are happening, and Christian points out that Locke didn't listen to his instructions from Jacob's cabin - "I said that you had to move [the island], John." Locke pleads that Ben said he knew how to do it, and John had to stay and lead the Others. "Since when did listening to him get you anything worth a damn?" (loved this line). Christian says there’s a woman in L.A., Eloise Hawking, who will tell them how to come back. Christian says he believes in him. John asks about Richard telling him he was going to die. "I suppose that’s why they call it sacrifice," says Christian. Christian tells him to put the donkey wheel back on its access, but that he can't help him along to the next chamber to do it. Why not? Is he really physically there? Why the limitation? Locke sees the frozen donkey wheel, which is pushing back and forth, and pulsing with flash energy as it does. Christian wishes him luck. John lifts the wheel back into place. Christian tells him to say hello to his son. "Who’s your son?" asks Locke, but before he hears an answer, he sees one last...flash.

Will Locke put 2 and 2 togehter and figure out that Jack is Christian's son? Will telling Jack that his father sent him be the thing Locke said that, in Ben's words, made Jack "such a believer?" We'll know for sure in two weeks, in the episode entitled, "The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham." But first, we still have to cover this week's time spent with the Oceanic 6...

But before that, I leave the island time with one perverse question - if the time jumping began when Ben knocked the wheel off its access, wouldn't it make sense that it would end when Locke lifted it back in place? If so, why would he need to sacrifice himself further, or come back with the Oceanic Six? I'm just sayin', if the left-behinders were made safe by the wheel repair, it will be a bit of a bummer for Locke to go through what looks like a tough time...

Oceanic Six
Picking up where we left off in the previous episode, Sun, in her car, takes a call from her mother, who is with Ji Yeon. Sun tells her daughter she’s met her a new friend – Aaron. She says good-bye, hangs up, then goes to do what she came to do – kill Ben (who’s still confronting Kate). She blames Ben for killing Jin. “I didn’t kill your husband, Sun…neither did anyone else, because he’s not dead…Jin’s still alive, and I can prove it.”

It is so rare for Lost to quickly cure dramatic irony - where we know things that the characters don't. Then along came Ben, who delights in doling out patial revelations at just the right time. I hope he gets more to do soon.

Sun demands proof that Jin is still alive. He says there’s someone in L.A. who can prove it – the same person who will show them how to get back to the island. Kate thinks Jack was just pretending to care about Aaron to trick them back to the island. Sayid says he doesn’t want any part of this, and if he sees Jack or Ben again, it will get unpleasant. Kate, Aaron, and Sayid then leave. Ben tells Sun she can have proof in 30 minutes or kill him and never know. “Let’s go.”

Sun, beaten, is upset that more than 30 minutes have passed. Ben says he didn’t account for traffic. Jack apologizes to Sun for leaving Jin behind, then says he’ll kill Ben himself if he’s lying about Jin, after learning what he did to Kate and Aaron – Ben pulls over, and yells at them – "you have no idea what I’ve had to do to keep you safe, to keep your friends safe."

Sun tells Ben to drive.

Ben takes Sun and Jack to the church where Ms. Hawking is. He asks permission to reach into his pocket, then pulls out Jin’s wedding ring. He says Locke gave it to him. "You said John never came to see you," protests Jack, as though he still expects some level of honesty from Ben. "That’s true, Jack, I went to see him." Very Obi-Wan Kenobi of him. Sun asks why John didn’t tell her about Jin (we know the answer there - see above), and Ben suggests, maybe he just didn’t have a chance before he died. (I for one am starting to think Ben had quite a lot to do with that death. We'll see in two weeks, I suppose). Ben says the people on the island need their help. There’s someone inside who can help, but they’re running out of time. Sun looks at the ring, then agrees to help. Desmond steps out suddenly, and asks what they're doing here? "I assume the same thing you are," says Ben, to which Desmond responds, "you’re looking for Faraday’s mother, too?" Ben seems surprised by this. Ben turns and leads them in. "Hello, Eloise," says Ben, looking like he knows he’s been duped.

A lot to pack into Ben's little looks in this scene. On the one hand, seeing Desmond has to make him think his main quarry, Penny, is about to show up on his virtual doorstep. On the other, if in fact he didn't know about the Hawking/ Faraday connection, he has to be wondering to what extent he's being played by Widmore. Either way, the game is afoot!

Ms. Hawking is in there, lighting candles. Desmond sees her and recognizes her from the ring store, back before he arrived on the island. "I thought I said all of them," she scolds Ben. "This is all I can get on short notice," responds Ben, leaving out the part about Sayid, Kate and Aaron having been with them less than an hour ago. "Well, I suppose this will have to do for now," she says. What happened to absolutes and 70-hour deadlines? "All right," she says, "let’s get started."

Well, clearly, this first attempt has to be doomed to failure - no Hurley, no Kate, no Sayid. The question I'm starting to ask is, what about Aaron? Could Ben's attempt to remove him from Kate have been because Aaron is not supposed to go back to the island? Was his birth on the island not supposed to have happened?

Anyway, that's all for now. Until next week, when we'll gather for "316,"...Namaste.