A Tale of Two Cities
Original
Airdate: October 4, 2006
Story:
J.J. Abrams & Damon Lindelof
Writer:
Damon Lindelof
Director: Jack Bender
When I got the season two DVD set, I re-watched the
season premiere, “Man of Science, Man of Faith” (unfortunately I haven’t had
time to watch more). What really got my
interest was how clueless I really was as to what was the big picture for the
hatch. After seeing this season
premiere, I wonder when this season wraps I’ll feel the same way on a repeat
viewing. That’s probably the hardest
thing about reviewing serialized television.
While season one focused heavily on the
characters, there was plenty of setting up for future seasonal themes. The hatch became a central piece of the
second season and they introduced that halfway through the first season. This season The
Others have the focus. Their influence
has been there since Claire’s abduction, which coincided with the discovery of
the hatch. With Henry Gale’s, now called
Ben, introduction midway through last season, we were due to learn a lot about
The Others. Before then, the encounters
we had with The Others had been in passing if we ever saw them.
Like last season, there is a lot of ground to
cover, as the castaways are dispersed all over the island. Had they incorporated all of this into the
episode, there would’ve been little breathing room. So like last year, they’ll spend an episode
to cover one or two of these aspects until ultimately they’re reunited, which
is probably the best decision. Hopefully
we won’t see too many backtracks that don’t reveal
much like last time. It is a little
frustrating not to see a follow up of the two biggest cliffhangers, what
happened to the hatch and what is Penelope doing, but it wouldn’t have fit the
story in this episode.
The opening, with Juliet in a suburban-esque neighborhood that turns out to be the living quarters
for The Others, draws comparisons to last season’s opening of Desmond in the
hatch, where we don’t know who this person is (she looked like Penelope) or
where we were. With that expectation, it
isn’t as shocking as Desmond being in the hatch, but that’s expected when that
device is used again. Shock value aside,
the ability for The Others to live in this suburban replica is
interesting. The hatch was able to have
various conveniences of the modern world there, but Otherville’s
community outdoes whatever technological advances the hatch had.
While The Others were unaware of Flight 815’s
crash until it hit the turbulence, there is a protocol for when new people come
to the island and it is enacted within seconds.
The first assumption is that this isn’t the first time they’ve done
this, but why? Was there a previous
group of hostile people? At this point,
they can’t keep too many of these secrets much longer. The reintroduction of these elements seems to
bring that promise.
It is interesting how well the infiltrators
obeyed Ben’s demands. We didn’t see
Ethan on the island until the episode before he took Claire. Goodwin, however, didn’t have the luxury of a
large group of survivors to blend in with and as we saw in “The Other 48 Days”,
was one of the primary leaders of The Tailies. Also, while Ben told them he wanted lists in
three days, Tailies were abducted in the first
night. We still don’t know what the
lists or the infiltrators real mission was, but hopefully we’ll understand what
it was by the end of the season.
With that introduction, they move to explain what happened to the three
captives. While it would’ve been nice to
see more from the rest of the cast, this season’s theme demanded a focus on The
Others and those captured for the first episode, like the hatch did in “Man of
Science, Man of Faith”.
Some complained that Jack’s subplot not
revealing much that we couldn’t figure out already, but it added more than some
may have been willing to admit. This
episode feels like a logical bridge between “The Hunting Party” and “White
Rabbit” flashbacks. Perhaps Jack’s lack
of faith in his father caused Christian to fall back on his demons, resulting
in the botched surgery that cost him is livelihood and brought both of them to
Jack’s anger and frustration over not knowing
the identity of Sarah’s other man reminds me of the angst of some disgruntled
critics. Starting around midway through
the first season and exploding in the second were these “fans” who slammed
every episode for not having some earth shattering revelation on the level of
“Walkabout”. People on their blogs and message boards have been demanding major answers
that the series isn’t ready to reveal.
Essentially, this episode tells them to chill out for now. As said on JJ Abrams other show, Alias (whose
fate hopefully won’t be shared by Lost’s), “truth
takes time”.
What is interesting about this captivity is that
Jack is kept by himself in the underwater hatch while Sawyer and Kate are kept
in the cages outside. We’ll probably not
find out why they wanted these three anytime soon, but we can deduct that Jack
serves some purpose separate from Sawyer and Kate. We also can’t take The Others’ word that
Hydra is underwater. Jack could be
stored in the Hydra tank near Sawyer’s cage.
The water that flooded the tank could be from another tank and not the
ocean.
Karl, Sawyer’s first neighbor in the bear cage,
felt like a plant. Considering there is
so much invested in these new arrivals, having only Juliet apprehend Sawyer
with a taser with no sign of The Others’ muscle until
Sawyer’s down is a bit unrealistic.
Also, how would Karl know about a plane?
I’m a bit surprised master con-man Sawyer didn’t catch that tell. If their mission is to break Sawyer by
humiliating him and taking his power away, this is certainly effective.
Kate’s situation is rather odd. Unlike Sawyer, who comically has to figure
out how to use the (polar?) bear cage’s device to give him a Dharma biscuit, or
Jack, stuck in a dank underwater (or is it) hatch, Kate has a nicer
experience. She gets to shower, put on a
nice dress and eat breakfast by the shore.
However, she is made to wear handcuffs during breakfast, and when she is
thrown in with Sawyer, she has suspicious bruises on her wrists. What did they do to her from breakfast to her
reunion?
Juliet is an intriguing new addition to The
Others. It’s clear there is some
intimate history between her and Ben.
Considering her state at the beginning of the episode, they might’ve
broken up shortly before the plane crashed.
This break up hints at bigger divisions within The Others’ camp and the
persistent theory that there are other Others (I like the term “Neithers”).
Juliet implies that The Others may not be
related to Dharma at all. In her
conversations with Jack, she also touches upon an element central to Lost, the
concept of change and redemption. Some,
including Jack, assume that these people are remnants of Dharma, or possibly
the human experiments. But as we saw
with the four toed statue, this island has been busy long before Dharma showed
up. We still don’t have any clear
direction where The Others came from, but it seems like this season will be
largely about them.
This solid premiere does a good job of setting
our expectations for the season, at least as far as the three captives and The
Others are concerned. While the back
story may be seen as redundant, it works well along the storyline of Juliet
breaking him.
Overall
Score: 8/10