planet LOST

Thursday, May 18. 2006

Three Minutes [SPOILERS]

[OK, I've slept on it :-) ]

Well, we get a bit of a departure from the usual format of the show here.  Instead of a flashback where we gain some sort of insight into the current plight of a character's specific circumstance through the telling of his backstory, we apparently only get the backstory.  I'm not entirely sure if there was any other significance there.  It just didn't have that same "feel" of having a theme to it.

The Blood

I have to mention this, since I thought it was an awesome bit of imagery on the part of the writers.  Near the beginning of the show, Michael is cleaning up the blood from the shooting.  Ecko comes across this, and starts to help.

He tells the tale of a boy who confessed to him that he had beat his dog to death for biting his sister.  The boy was protecting her and was concerned he would go to hell for this.  Ecko told the boy "God will understand" and that the boy was less concerned with forgiveness than facing the dog in hell.  A nice bit of allegory and foreshadowing in its own right.

But the shots of Ecko wringing the blood from the cloth were priceless.  Interesting how these Catholic/Christianity themes keep popping up.

Michael's Journey

The backstory, of course, was Michael's mission to rescue Walt from the others.  He is captured by "Zeke" and taken back to the others' camp.

Rousseau's daughter Alex makes a return here as the sympathic other, concerned about Claire and the baby before apologizing to Michael for giving him the rifle butt.  I suspect we'll be seeing more of her at some point.

He's then led across the island to their camp, by the large rock with the "window" in it.  I don't know if that rock has any significance, or if we'll even learn anything more about it.

The camp is made of temporary structures (gurts?) and it looks like some of them are working on them.  We also discover that they have a hatch of their own, which they keep under armed guard.  I was unable to make out the symbol on the hatch.  It doesn't look like any of the described symbols on the '?' map.  Maybe it was water, or what? Something else?  What's in there that they are guarding so fiercely?

There they (rather forcefully and un-medically) extract some blood from Michael.  This might suggest that they (at least some of them) are not the experiment-ers on the island.  This is presumably to determine if 1) he is Michael's biological son, and 2) to see if there's anything there to explain Walt's abilities.

He is introduced to Mrs. Klugh (pronounced "clue"...significant?) who interrogates him about Michael.   "Has he ever appeared anywhere he's not supposed to be?"  Apparently they know something about him and his abilities?  Walt himself says that they're "making him take tests", so they're subjecting him to psych evaluations or what? 

They conveniently skip about 8 days (they go from 11 days prior to 3, at least what I caught) when Klugh propositions Michael.  Free Henry, and they will let both him and Walt go.  The only condition is that he return with four, and only for, of his companions: Jack, Sawyer, Kate, and Hurley.

Now what is so important about those four? And why only those four?  Even more importantly, why is Locke not on that list?  Henry's self-described mission was to retrieve Locke, so why? Why?!

Michael agrees after seeing Walt, but he has a condition of his own.  He wants their boat.  It's not said if they agree to this, but they must have if they let him go.

Also, as he's carried from the tent, Walt also managed to yell out: "They're not who they say they are! They're pretending!"  Oooh!  Tell us something we don't know, son!

Ecko's New Mission

Meanwhile, back in the hatch (seem to use that phrase a lot, don't I?)  Ecko has taken up the mission of pushing "the button."  I'm unsure really why this is so important to him.  I understand fully why Locke has abandoned it, but Ecko's determination is a mystery.  It just kind of "came to him" back in the Pearl hatch, but never really got an explanation, where Locke's reversal did.

On his way there, just as the alarm is sounding, his crucifix is briefly levitated by a magnetic field.  Whoa!  Seems to me something like this happened before but I can't remember the specifics.

Charlie, of course, is disappointed (and apparently more lost) by Ecko abandoning the church and decides to continue on his own.  There's a bit of leader/follower thing going on with Ecko and Charlie, as there was with Locke and Charlie previously.  Just kind of interesting.  Charlie's growing up perhaps?

More Random Tidbits (in no particular order)

Charlie brings Claire the vaccine he's found on the supply drop.  Apparently he's taken some himself(?)  It looks like this is the start of Charlie coming back into favor with Claire. Maybe.

Saied is approached by Michael, and told in no uncertain terms he's not going on this mission.  Being the expert interrogator, he deduces that Michael is lying, and tells Jack about it.  They start to formulate a counter-plan, but no more is said about it.

Sawyer tells Jack that he's "the closest thing to a friend" he's got.  Which is kind of interesting given their past.  We also get a bit of the "kinder gentler" Sawyer here.

The dog brings Charlie one of the heroin-laden Mary statues.  He discovers Sawyer's stash, and proceeds to lob all of them into the ocean, only to discover that he's being watched by a bemused Locke.  Bet they're going to need that stuff again sometime.  Seemingly out of place, I wonder what significance that carries?

Michael is re-introduced to the rest of the group, and the group also learns about the deaths of Ana and Libby.  They have their funeral, and Hurley makes his final decision to go with Michael.  (He had been not wanting to go.)

The Ending

Locke is still sitting on the beach as the funeral starts, contemplating life, the universe, and everything as all good philosphers named Locke are prone to do.  He cuts off his splint (cured already?! ;-) ) and just walks off in the opposite direction.

And in the "WTF" moment of the show, during the funeral, Sun gets this amazing look on her face and just says, "boat!"  Sure enough, here comes a rather well-to-do sailboat making its way toward shore.

And there we end.

Conclusions

Well, the big questions for this week are:
  • What will Jack and Saied do about their suspicions toward Michael?
  • Where the hell is Locke off to now?  Why did he not at least go to the funeral?
  • Will the Others keep their word and release Walt back to Michael? Or will something happen to prevent it?
  • Just what is up with the sailboat?  I have my own theory!  [Just kidding :-) ] Others have posited that its the return of Desmond.
  • What is in the others' hatch that they're guarding so fiercely?
In all Three Minutes *started* to answer a lot of questions, as well as bring up new ones.  It was a disappointment in that they didn't delve into the usual morality play with the flashbacks focusing on a specific character's current circumstances.  This time it was used to directly tell the story.  Not a huge deal, but I hope it doesn't become the standard.  I rather enjoy the parallels the past-stories bring.

Not only that but I'm starting to become a little perturbed with this whole "Hanso Foundation" commercial tie-in garbage.  The "Bad Twin" book? OK, I'll let you have that one.  The Sprite tie-in from last week? Hmph, I'll play along. 

Now we've Daimler-Chrysler jumping in with the circa 1980 Jeep video ad on the THF site (WHAT is that text over the Dharma logo at the end?), and the "brought to you by Daimler Chrysler" Foundation spot during the show.  Come on, enough of this business already.  This is just blatant milking the money machine here.  Stop it.

The Preview

The preview for next weeks show, the two hour season finale was a head-scratcher.  "What if they never really crashed at all?" WHAT?  What are they going to pull on us?  I'm somewhat concerned by this.  Of course it will probably be like last season's finale and almost get there, totally stringing us along, and leaving the big answers (like what was in the hatch) until season three.

Technorati Tags: lost, abc, tv, three minutes, hatch, michael, walt, others, spoilers




Posted by PlanetLOST in episodes at 09:03 | Comments (0)
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