It has begun.  At long last the final season of LOST is in full gear.  This episode will receive a 5-star rating from me, only the third episode of LOST ever that I have rated the maximum.  Watch this episode in your most sacred environment.

***SPOILERS***

I got roughed up watching this episode.

FAREWELL JIN AND SUN

The most powerful scene in LOST to date, the horrible scene of Jin and Sun, alone, sinking to the bottom of the sea.

God damn you Jack, just grab Sawyer because you know you cannot stop him with words!

WHAT I LIKED:

• FINALLY . . . THIS is what I wanted to happen in LOST’s final season
• Great acting by Matthew Fox and Terry O’Quinn
• “push the button”
• “Who has the gun now dough boy?”
• Flocke/MIB outthinking all of them
• Jack figuring it out at the last second
• Jack knowing he cannot die just standing up shooting at people in the open
• Sayid able to come back enough from zombie state to make a sacrifice
• Jack mentioning the “rules”
• outstanding directing by LOST’s best director Jack Bender
• Sun and Jin dying together, still roughed up about that
• “I’m going to finish the job.”

WHAT I DID NOT LIKE:

• maybe didn’t like seeing Jin & Sun’s hands drifting apart, just let the final shot be the sinking sub, maybe
• nothing else, this is a 5-star episode, therefore cannot really dislike anything

Now it is really on.  Flocke/MIB’s plan is revealed.  I think we can finally put to rest just who the good guy is and who the bad guy is.  Flocke/MIB is the bad guy.  Widmore was just trying to protect them.

I guess here is a complaint, why in the world was Widmore’s FIRST priority not setting up the damn sonic fence?  Screw the generator and Desmond experiment, get the fence up FIRST!!

Great final moment for Sayid.  He delivered his last line to Jack so well telling him where Desmond was and that if Flocke/MIB wanted him dead Jack would need him, because Jack is going to be the one.  Jack always wants to fix everything, so he is the perfect candidate to inherit Jacob’s powers and get to fixing.

Powerful final scene with Jack and Locke in the flash-sideways.  Great logic used by Jack and great moment telling Locke, “I was hoping you’d be the one to go first.”  I shared Locke’s smile.

There seems to be no doubt we are on the final ride to the end now.  In addition to my sadness about losing Jin and Sun, my sadness comes from the end of my TV fandom in general, a topic I have mentioned before.  In just 2.5 weeks (the finale is on a Sunday!) it will all be over.  The final LOST thump will be the last note of the golden era of high production value, genre serialized drama on TV, which began in 1993 with The X-Files.

I give this episode of LOST 5-stars, which I very rarely do.  The only episodes that receive such a rating have to be transcendent.  ”Live Together, Die ALone” and “The Constant” are the other two episodes of LOST I gave 5-stars to.  The first season I do not remember thinking of in terms of rating so much.

I look forward to reading everyone’s reactions to this powerful episode.  I will now place my 5-star vote, better than we deserve.

UPDATE:  the finale will be 2.5 hours long!

LOST has finally done it again.  “The Incident” is the first 5-star season finale since the second season’s.  Damon and Carlton knocked it out of the park along with Jack Bender’s excellent direction (the best director the show has).  They can be proud.  And the LOST faithful can feel vindication.  

***SPOILERS***  ***SPOILERS***

“The Incident” = delivery

Checklist of what was delivered:

1. Complete view of the 4-toed statue –check
2. Complete view of Jacob in the flesh –check
3. Revelation of “The Incident” –check
4. The Black Rock –check (somewhat)

And Damon and Carlton did all this with leaving us with NO CLUE WHATSOEVER about what will happen in the final (6th) season.  That was the real thing that put this episode at 5-stars for me.  Could we all be back at LAX?  Could Jack, Kate, Sawyer, etc. live things on on the island fro 1977 to forever?  Will the character of the island radically change with the death of Jacob?  Who knows.  We have an 8.5 month wait.

WHAT I LIKED:

• Seeing how Jacob touched all the major characters, and the new curly haired character that long ago go seriously made love to by Pullo
• The look of determination on Sawyer’s face when standing the road before the van
• Uh, see the 4-toed statue in full, come on!
• Seeing a black rock before seeing THE Black Rock!  Come on!
• The fairest of all Juliette bringing DESTINY to everybody
• Fake Locke!
• the traveling score perhaps only pulled out for season finales
• Jack looking at the last second to Kate for the go ahead
• Juliette’s smile to Sawyer right before Jack tosses the bomb
• Phil getting shish-ka-bobbed
• Razinski getting punched
• Rose & Bernard and Vincent cameo

WHAT I DID NOT LIKE:

• Jack and Sawyer having a chat while Sayid bleeds out!  Made no sense.
• The lack of authority Dr. Chang has, should have been higher ranking that Razinski
• Jacob just accepting getting stabbed, he speaks infinite languages but doesn’t know kung fu?  

So here we are….our very last season finale of LOST.  No more.  This is the last summer and fall of wondering the fate of the island.  LOST is on course as much as it ever has been.  The true genius and scope of the show is coming into view now, not to mention its attention to detail.

The throwaway ep where Hurley finds the old VW van in the jungle providing a comic relief ep?  That VW van has been critical throughout the rest of the series.  

Let the theories for what we see after the white out begin!

The penultimate LOST season 5 episode did a good job of setting the table, if this episode itself was lacking action.  Perhaps the final destinies of all the main characters have been set.  I find myself growing a little impatient with LOST.  I used to be the most patient viewer never complaining about not getting answers.  However, now that we are close to the end, I just want to know all without setup episodes, filler episodes, or anything in between.

***SPOILERS***  ***SPOILERS***

I felt like we were getting some closure with this episode.  Could we really be seeing the last of Sawyer, Juliette and Kate??  By far the best scene of the episode, and the best acted, was just as Sawyer and Juliette exchange the L-word, who gets locked in right between them?  Kate.  Great plotting, if the setup of Kate going off into the jungle by herself was a bit of a gimmick.  

WHAT I LIKED:

• Hurley, “Alright dude, we’re from the future.”  Possibly funniest Hurley line ever.
• Swimming through an underwater tunnel to get to the bomb.
• Locke saying he was going to kill Jacob…that would be sweet.
• Locke taunting Ben for never having seen Jacob.
• Juliette’s unfailing willingness to show us a glimpse of her divine cluh-vage (and Eloise seems to want to as well).
• Dr. Chang being open minded and taking action.

WHAT I DIDN’T LIKE:

• Kate abandoning Jack again
• Sayid just popping out of the jungle to gimmick his place into the finale
• There still be NO explanation of Richard, beyond the tidbit we got from Ben this time about him being a “guide” and having done that for a looong time.

I just hope this won’t be another season finale that is just a bunch of violence like two seasons ago.  I hope we get some definitive information on Jacob, Richard and the 4-toed statue.

At the three-quarters mark I was beginning to think this might be the first 5-star episode of lost since THE CONSTANT and only the second 5-star episode since the Season 2 finale.  Alas, this episode couldn’t quite get me to 5-star territory.  I will elaborate after the break where spoilers will be.

SPOILERS  SPOILERS  SPOILERS

What would it have taken for this episode to have gotten 5-stars from me?  Penny dying, or short of that, Ben dying at the very end.  As it stands, DEAD IS DEAD did not go as far as it could.  It addressed an important concern for me that I’ve long had, that Ben said when he left the island last season that he wouldn’t be able to come back.  The reasoning might be a bit gimmicky, but at least it was explained and noted.

WHAT I LIKED:

• NO Kate!  NO Jack!  Are they not totally expendable characters right now?
• Back to the big dogs getting screen time:  Ben, Locke & Widmore
• The lighting on John’s face in the opening scene, outstanding
• The fear on Ben’s face throughout this episode
• Ben Man-ing the F up and going to be judged, how many others would have the STONES to do that?  Few, very few
• Penny’s acting when pleading to spare her son
• Danielle’s acting when pleading to not take her son, in particular her French
• The stone carving depicting the Smoke Monster judging the dog-person
• Widmore calling Ben “BOY!”  love it!

WHAT I DIDN’T LIKE:

• Ben not killing Penny
• In light of the above, Ben not dying
• John doesn’t look good playing smug
• No further details (yet) on why Widmore got booted off the island, and how Ben acquired the power to do so
• Lapeidus just leaving Sun, Ben, Locke for no reason other than it’s inconvenient for the plot to have him there

Though I put that I didn’t like the lack of death in this episode, it was only a minor copout by the writers not killing Penny or Ben.  As soon as a bullet would have hit Penny though, I would have clicked the 5-star button.  That would have been stones by the writers to do that.  And if Ben is ever to die on the show, in my mind there would have been no better way for him to pass than by being judged by the Smoke Monster.

It was a powerful scene with Ben re-seeing his past with Alex and he and the audience (i.e. me) were ready to see him be given the ultimate judgment.  Yet he was spared because he had not done enough wrong.  I can live with this, but it would have been an epic death scene and I was prepared emotionally for it to happen.  The same for Penny dying.

So British choosing the boat name, “Our Mutual Friend.”

In case anyone was wondering where they’ve seen the actress that knocked out Lapiedus before, she would be the wench that Pullo aggressively made love to in the kitchen on the HBO series, ROME.  

Only four more episodes left in Season 5.  I have a feeling we might be on the fast track now in the storyline to a certain…incident.  

my rating:  4.25 stars