Some mixed feelings this week. I didn't think this episode was as strong as the last couple have been.Charlie and Hurley debate the results of a smackdown between Superman and the Flash while they trudge through the woods with Jin and Desmond. Charlie is shot through the throat with an arrow when he triggers a trap. Of course, this is one of Desmond's forward flashy things, and none of it has happened. Yet.
Backstory:
Desmond is in a monastery. He takes his shirt off. Is it wrong to say he's hot when he's changing into his monk garb? Brother Desmond is peacefully putting labels on wine bottles when a stranger comes into the winery and slugs him in the face. That's not very monastery-appropriate. This guy turns out to be the brother of a woman Desmond left at the altar. A not-Penelope sort of woman, whom he left because he felt he was called to the monastery. The experience he relates here is a bit odd--I wonder if it was an early manifestation of the flash-forward phenomenon.
Later, Desmond gets toasted on expensive monastery wine. And gets thrown out of the monastery so he can go find out what he's really meant to do. He heads into the town with a shipment of wine. Turns out the person buying the wine is Penelope's father--and this is how they meet.
This backstory bit bothered me. It didn't seem to dovetail as well with the main story as they usually do, plus Desmond as a monk didn't seem to me to fit his character. The only thing that seemed to tie in was the name of the wine, Mariah, and its relationship to Desmond's statement later that maybe he's being tested. And that was a bit of an anvil and didn't work all that well for me. The interweaving between Desmond meeting Penelope and his rescuing the dangling body in the jungle was very nicely done, though, and set us up for the twist when the dangling body's face was revealed.
And Desmond took his shirt off, so it's all good.
Beach Story:
Sawyer walks in on Kate in her underwear. I mean Kate is wearing underwear and Sawyer walks in, not that Sawyer is wearing Kate's underwear when he walks in on her. She tells Sawyer that Jack saw them doing the deed on the cameras. He uses this as an excuse to come on to her. He asks if she wants a mix tape. He should chat with Dean Winchester about that. I bet Dean makes good mix tapes.
Later, Kate has oatmeal with Jack. They're eating oatmeal at night. I do that, but I still think it's kind of weird. Then Jack goes to have oatmeal with Juliet, and Kate is not happy about this. She goes to see Sawyer. Oh, wait. She goes to do Sawyer. Kind of an extreme reaction to oatmeal, if you ask me. In the morning, Sawyer challenges Jack to ping pong.
Sawyer begins to put the pieces together. Sawyer gives Kate a mix tape. It's the best of Phil Collins, and he lifted it from Bernard. He asks Kate if she jumped him because of Jack and Juliet. He seems to be not all that unhappy about this. After all, he got laid, so he's happy. But he didn't take his shirt off. He should take lessons from Desmond.
Front Story:
Desmond works to recreate the series of events he saw leading to Charlie's death. Apparently this also led to him hooking back up with Penelope. Desmond tries to trace back the series of events he saw that led to Charlie's death, but which also led to his reunion with Penny. He goes to gather Charlie for the trek, and Charlie realizes Desmond has had a vision. They all set out. Someone is coming to the island, Desmond says. On the beach that night, Charlie plays his guitar while Jin tels scary stories in Korean. They hear a helicopter, which doesn't sound at all well, and crashes into the ocean, but not before someone bails out of it.
In the morning, they head into the jungle. Charlie finds a hula doll and Desmond finds a backpack in a tree. The backpack has a satellite phone in it, but it's dead. There's also a copy of Catch-22, in another language. Inside is the picture of Desmond and Penelope. Charlie works out what's going on--that Desmond thinks Penelope was in the helicopter. Charlie says they're perfectly happy to help get Penny back, and why would they want to change anything? This is, of course, fraught with dramatic irony. As they continue, the Flash/Superman conversation gets underway. When Charlie springs the trap, Desmond pushes him out of the way of the arrow. The group splits, Charlie and Desmond going one way, Hurley and Jin the other.
Charlie confronts Desmond, accusing him of being willing to sacrifice Charlie for Penelope. Obviously, Desmond wasn't, Charlie, or you'd be writhing on the ground hacking up blood. But Charlie doesn't know that. Desmond says maybe he's not supposed to keep rescuing Charlie, that maybe it's a test, thus creating that flimsy callback to the flashback bit. Jin finds the parachute and a person hanging from a tree. Desmond climbs up to bring her down. She's still alive. But it's not Penny. Not-Penny says Desmond's name and promptly expires. So if Desmond hadn't saved Charlie, would Penny have been in the tree? Given what show we're watching, possibly... However, Desmond's reunion with Penny wasn't shown explicitly, so maybe Desmond was taking disparate chunks of his vision and sticking them together incorrectly.
Overall, fairly entertaining but it didn't do much for me. Desmond's "gift" didn't seem to fit into the show very well when it was introduced, and it still doesn't. Unless there's some sort of logical explanation further down the road, it's going to continue to feel like an awkward digression to me.
Lost at iTunes:
