The press release for "The Variable" promised that Faraday would "come clean" about what he knew about the Island. After watching the episode, I'm still leaning toward him knowing "not a whole lot". At least we know more about how a few things work after watching it.
Widmore is Daniel's father, which isn't really a surprise by this point, seeing as how we've gotten the parenthood "surprise" for Miles and (sort of) Charlotte and (once already) Daniel earlier in this season. Intriguingly, that makes Daniel and Penny half-siblings, with Penny's mother presumably the woman who Widmore fooled around with off the Island, much to Ben's dismay.
But if parentage has gotten to be a bore lately, death never is. And Faraday's looking pretty toast... shockingly, shot to death by his own mother. "Hi Mom," you can almost imagine him saying, "you haven't given birth to me just yet, but you will soon enough, and when I get to be an adult, I'm going to time travel so you can shoot my adult self." It's a wonder Eloise isn't a lot more screwed up than she actually is, knowing that she shot her own son.
Big question here: why is Eloise so insistent that Daniel go back to the Island, knowing well her past self is going to shoot him--and also knowing well that she can't do a thing to stop it?
Like most of the episodes this season, "The Variable" flirted with what's turning into a major theme: can you change the past to affect the future? Time and time again, the answer turns out to be "no". Sayid thought he could by shooting Ben; didn't work. As soon as Daniel starts questioning his own theory and getting notions about detonating Jughead to prevent the Incident, he's shot in the chest for it. Still I maintain that there's no mystery here at all; the only character who can really do these things is Desmond. And at some point, probably because he knows about a calamity that's about to strike the Island, he'll bring himself to go back and set things right.
Let's talk about our favorite Scotsman for a second. Owing to Desmond's "special" nature in being able to change the past, I have no doubt in my mind that he's the "Variable" that the title referred to. Remember Eloise's comment on Desmond's condition? "I have no idea" how he'll turn out. The great Ms. Hawking, temporal policeman and oracle, for once is at a loss. And that scares her. He's the one actor who's not just a cog in the great machine, not just another piece of determinism that Eloise can smugly predict.
In that way, Desmond represents the free will that Daniel was so quick to cite just before his death. I, for one, will be really disappointed if he never exercises it before the story ends.
Yet again, I'm reminded that I really can care about relationships and love stories on this show. Every time I see Desmond and Penny, I'm touched. Theirs is the most sincere, genuine relationship on the show--by far--and I still maintain that their reunion at the end of Season 4 was one of the best moments of the entire show. They still love each other and care for each other, three years later in real time, and a season later in show time. It's almost like the Desmond-Penny relationship is a "constant" of its own, one thing that we can always count on even when everything else is going to hell.
Of course, "The Variable" is the episode most on my mind, because it's the only Lost I've gotten in the past two weeks. It's almost tough to remember "Dead is Dead", which I think is the most mythology-saturated episode the series has thrown at us so far. More Monster and Temple that you can shake a stick at, and even more in the accumulation of clues that Monster and Temple and Island are all bound, somehow, to the underworld. Recall the engraving of Anubis kneeling before the Monster and tell me you don't want to know what that means.
The Dharma people really have gotten to be my favorite slew of supporting characters we've seen so far. Radzinsky in particular is excellent. Yeah, he's a douche, and yeah, he's directly opposed to our people's interests, but his personality is spot-on and Eric Lange is doing a wonderful job. I was excited that we'd get to hear more about Radzinsky mostly because of his tie to the Blast Door Map. Turns out he's awesome even without the mythology tie-in, and I'd put money on us getting to see how Radzinsky ends up exiled to the Swan for fifteen years by the end of the season.
What else are you looking forward to for the finale? I still won't spoil the title, though I think Faraday made it perfectly clear where this storyline is headed when he described what was going to happen "in a few hours". Do you think we'll get to see the Sun and Jin reunion? (I think yes.) Jughead exploding? (Probably not, but what an awesome cliffhanger that would be!) Find out "what lies in the shadow of the statue"? (Again, probably not, but I assume we'll at least find out what Bram and Ilana are up to.) Better understand resurrection on the Island? (Possibly we'll head in that direction, but I think the exact mechanics are a season 6 issue.)
Currently listening: Paste Magazine sampler, Volume 52
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment