Lost, Season 6 – “What Kate Does”
As this week’s episode of Lost came to a close, I at first thought that it was a slow and disappointing installment. After thinking about what went down in this episode, however, I think I may be getting a grip of what is going on this season, and only time will tell if my assumptions are correct.
When last we left our favorite castaways (Screw you, Professor and Mary Ann!), the mortally-wounded Sayid had been mysteriously resurrected by some of the remaining Others. Sawyer, still bitter about the death of Juliet, escapes the temple where they are being held and heads out into the jungle. Sayid is then taken by Japenese-speaking leader and his “interpreter” (played by yet another Deadwood
While all this is going on, Kate and Jin volunteer to go find Sawyer, escorted by two of the Others (one of whom is played by Rob McElhanney of Its Always Sunny In Philadelphia
Both of these subplots are told in conjuction with glimpses of the Losties arriving safely in Los Angeles in 2004. As seen last week, Kate successfully escapes her captor and hijacks a cab with Claire in it. The driver bails, and Kate kicks Claire out, only to return to her when she finds Claire’s bag with all the baby accessories in it. She takes Claire to the people who were going to adopt Aaron, only to find out that they’ve changed their minds. Claire then immediately goes into labor, and Kate rushes her to the hospital, where she is treated by an eerily familiar doctor. The labor turns out to be a false alarm, and after ducking out, Kate tells Claire that she should keep the baby.
I’m still a bit fuzzy on how these flashes of the characters never crashing on the island fit into the overall narrative. At first I thought it was a divergent timeline, but now I’m wondering if it’s an extended epilogue to the entire series. After viewing and contemplating this week’s episode, I have come up with what I have dubbed the “Groundhog Day” theory. Nearly everyone who got off of Oceanic 815 in the season premiere seemed relatively mellow, as if they left all of their emotional baggage in Sydney (as well as Jack’s literal baggage). Kate of course had to escape her handler and perform a random act of kindness to find some sort of redemption, and then she hints to Claire that she may be innocent of the crime she was accused of, which would completely retcon her back story. The surprise appearance in the hospital also suggests that in this scenario, not only did the Losties not crash on the island, but perhaps none of the other characters ever set foot on the island as well. All of this leads me to believe that this scenario is the real ending of the series, resulting from what will happen this season on the island. Apparently their attempt to blow up the Swan last season was not what needed to be done in order to bring everyone home and that the island is giving them one last chance to make everything right again. I’m sticking with this theory until I’m proven completely wrong and will remain glued to the screen to find out.
This episode was lacking a bit in “Holy Crap” moments, at least until the last fifteen minutes or so, but the revelations that this episode may have helped reveal earn it 4 out of 5 Friendly Mechanics.
“Sun branches off on his own, desperate to find out what happened to his wife, Sun”?
Lol…Typo!
“incontrovertingly”
Incontrovertibly. ~_^
The eerily familiar doctor was Ethan.
Jin was rescued from being killed by the 2 guards by rifle toting claire near the end of the episode.
tourist – The reviews are supposed to be spoiler-free. That’s why he didn’t put what you just did.
And, Ben, I think what Kate meant by “I’m innocent” was “He had it coming, and I was completely justified in doing it”. Not that she didn’t do it.
get your facts straight. It was Jin who ran into a gun toting Claire in the woods not Kate. Im not even going to finish reading this column, I’ll just wait for the Doc’s column around lunch time.
Put away your red pens and just talk about the episode, people!!!
@ Tenime: Yeah, but that’s still murder. Of course, I know your stance on that matter LOL.
The typos have been corrected and the names have been clarified.
Dicks.
^ Smiley immunity on that last comment, btw.
Lol…murder’s murder. You can’t be innocent if you’ve killed someone.
But in the twisted mind of a murderer, like Kate’s, I can get how they’d justify their “innocence”, because “what they did really wasn’t as bad as the things the person they killed had committed”. *rolls eyes*
It’s like the Punisher. He doesn’t consider what he does as wrong. So, why would Kate? ~_^
And, Jesus Christ, nitram, calm the eff down and pull the stick out of your ass.
I would like to say, I had to catch up on LOST by DVD’s. This is my first time watching it LIVE, and I gotta say, when they cut to commercials, you can like almost catch it, gets kind annoying.. Glad I have my DVR to record it and just FF through the commercials.
This episode seemed kinda slow and dull, I mean there were some moments, but not many. The “second chance” timeline is confusing as all hell. I like Ben’s theory, but we’ll see I guess.
Regarding Kates innocennce in the other timeline, I read a spoiler that that I will not place here, but, let’s just say there are things that happend and didn’t happen in this new timeline. Remeber in the new timeline, there were folks that were not on the plane. Focus on things that were supposed to happen after 1977, that is when the changes start to happen. Not on the boarding of the flight.
Kate never said she was innocent, she only asked Claire if she would be believed if she did say she was innocent. After Claire said she would believe her, Kate didn’t say anything.
^ Denim, I’ve heard the same possible spoiler. We’ll see if it pans out that way.
The whole emotional baggage theory, Dharma-nature, is pretty convincing to me. You should look up the Zen Master, Dogen, to which the character in Lost is named after. Interesting stuff.
^ Oooh, interesting. God, I love this show!
Like Denim said… anything that would have happened after the Swan could have played out differently in the new timeline. I’d think the two timelines were going to converge at some point, but I’m not certain on that.
Here’s the question I have… Ethan wasn’t on the island in the alternate timeline. Ethan was an OB in the alternate timeline. One could then extrapolate that in the alternate timeline, there’s no need to import OB’s to the island. Or, in other words, there’s no problem with new births on the island. And, if there’s no need for OB’s on the island, Juliet SHOULD be alive and well on the mainland in the alternate reality.
If the Island sunk to the bottom of the ocean in 1977, there would’ve been nowhere to recruit her to, so, yeah, she would still be alive in Miami.
Oh yeahhhhhhhh… I forgot that one little detail. XD
Here’s the Wiki page on the real-life Dogen
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dogen