There have been many romances in LOST. Yes, even in the midst of potentially demonic smoke monsters, pissed off polar bears who so desperately want to transport (or time travel) back to the North Pole, and Others who do frightening Otherly things, there has been time for romance. You have the Desmond/Penny Separation Saga, Jin/Sun's Messed Up Marriage, and Charlie/Claire's Accented Attraction (non-Americans in English-speaking countries only). There's also Rose/Bernard, Sayid/Nadia, Sayid/Shannon, Sayid/Whoever Else He Falls In Love With Who Will Die, etc. By far the most fascinating (or obnoxious, depending on who you ask) romantic relationship has not really been a single relationship though. It's been the love triangle-turned-quadrangle involving Jack, Sawyer, Kate, and Juliet. And by now, we've seen every combination of these four imaginable except for, well...
"LaFleur" started out really rocky for me. Coming off the greatness that was "Jeremy Bentham," this was to be expected I suppose. I was initially disappointed with what I saw happening in the first 15 minutes of the show: cramming THREE YEARS of island life into 43 minutes. Seriously? We'd spent the first three seasons absorbing just 108 days, we'd spent the entirety of season four and the beginning of this current season absorbing the three years off-island. And were we really to believe that three years on-island could be squashed into a single episode here? I kinda dreaded where this would go. But, in the end...it most definitely worked for me.
But first things first...the statue! The statue! Don't blink, because you might miss it! Or rather, another time warp will come wisk you away from it. Technicalities...
I'd been looking forward to this moment for quite some time now. It blows my mind (in a good way) that the writers could come up with something so deliciously odd and random as a giant four-toed statue on the shoreline in SEASON TWO and then just set it aside until the time was right to reintroduce it again. Seriously, how do these writers see that far into the future of their story? Incredible.
Take a look at the comparisons. The first would be what Sayid, Sun, and Jin saw in the season two finale; the second what "Jim LaFleur" and Gang saw after Locke disappeared into the netherworld.
Naturally we're led to believe that each of these images are one-in-the-same, just taken from different angles (and different time periods, obviously). Wouldn't it be cool though if they're NOT the same thing? Like, what if there's ANOTHER statue out there somewhere? What if it's one among many? Or what if the four-toed foot is just that: a four-toed foot that always has been, always will be. The statue from this past episode certainly looks Egyptian from the back, which begs the question...HUH? Did a group of Egyptians go out on a trade expedition down the Nile one day and get horribly lost on the way to Ethiopia? The only explanation I can sense is time travel's buggersome counterpart: teleportation. We've seen Ben and Locke teleport (AND time travel) to the Tunisian desert after cranking The Wheel (it's "the exit," according to Charles Widmore), but is there a "reverse" to this teleportation? Can one transport from Tunisia (...or nearby Egypt?) to the island? According to that Egyptianesque statue, I tend to think yes. And did the Egyptians bring some Hebrew slaves with them? Because we all know that Egyptians themselves don't do squat. Wouldn't that be something if Moses and some of his Hebrew comrades were temporarily transported to LOST island to help build this statue(s)?
I'll have to ask God that in Heaven someday.
I was definitely disappointed we didn't get to see more of the statue before the final flash, but finally my appetite for this mystery was met.
For now.
The Egyptian imagery was fairly prevalent throughout the episode as Dharma Amy's dead husband wore an ankh necklace. Something similar to this:
According to the great minds at Wikipedia, the ankh is the Egyptian symbol for eternal life. It's something worn by the Egyptian gods to symbolize their immortality.
Makes you wonder if Richard Alpert's got one of those things hidden 'neath his shirt...
Yes, we finally got the line we've all been waiting for:
"The guy with the eyeliner, let me talk to him."
Thank you, Sawyer. Thank you! It's about time somebody questioned Mr. Alpert's choice in eye-fashion. Now if only somebody will question why he's frikin hundreds (or thousands? or...more?) of years old! Apparently Egyptians were all into the eyeliner thing, so that little line may indeed be more significant than the typically comedic Sawyerian jab-at-another-character.
Richard Alpert, whose initials "RA" could stand for the Egyptian sun god Ra (or, if you'd prefer, "rheumatoid arthritis" [that's it! I knew he had to have some kind of weakness!]), has clearly been on this island for quite some time. With the time flashes apparently over, I wonder if we'll ever fully understand his role in the island's history though. Would that seriously not have rawked if we had gotten a (longer) time-flash to the Ancient Egyptian LOST era and we saw Alpert leading about this ancient group of people?
Loved Sawyer's and Alpert's conversation on the bench. Only in LOST could a potential Egyptian god and a con artist-turned-hero with a knack for nicknames sit on a bench in the dead of night and have a nice talk about hydrogen bombs and time travel. Man I love this show.
But clearly the overarching theme of this episode was the kindling relationship between Sawyer and Juliet. We've seen the clues all season long (and even in the past couple seasons, if you were paying attention). I've been predicting this to happen ever since Sawyer and Juliet broke from the group in the season three finale to head back to the beach and save Sayid, Jin, and Bernard. So for me, it was thoroughly rewarding for their connection to finally come through. And honestly, I love this relationship. Love it more than Desmond/Penny; even love it more than Sayid/Shannon! (Although to be fair, I think I'd love the relationship between Vincent the Dog and a polar bear more than those two.) Let's hope this relationship lasts! Long live Sawiet.
But in true LOST fashion, once you think a part of the Quadrangle is set...something disrupts it. Sure enough, here comes Kate (carrying Jack's baby...I'm calling it right here!). I'm definitely looking forward to the "what next?" to come. We've spent all season wondering how and when the Oceanic Six (minus Aaron) would get back to the island. But now...well, now what do they do? I'm very curious to see what the rest of this season has in store. Can't believe it's half-over already! Time flies when...well, when you're flying through time.
SKATE forever! BOO Sawiet!!! haha. No seriously.
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