Lost Review: “Across the Sea”
Hmph.
If I had to sum my my feelings about last night’s Lost in four letters, it would be those, although I guess **** is four letters too.
I was just expecting an entire episode dedicated to the backstory of Jacob and Not-Locke (though today I’m calling him Esau) to contain some real answers, with only a few hours of Lost to go. Unfortunately, this wasn’t really the case, and thought we learned some interesting facts, like Jacob and Esau being brothers, where they came from and how they split, facts are not necessarily answers, and all our big questions are still looming.
I’m not even sure what century this episode what supposed to be in, nor where exactly Jacob and Esau’s shipwrecked mother came from, but she stumbles on shore, ready to pop, and quickly runs into Island Mom, who helps her give birth to unexpected twins, the first named Jacob and the second named nothing because she only had one name in mind.
“GIMMIE MAH BABIES!”
I had a vibe the moment I laid eyes on Island Mom that someone was getting murdered, and my suspicions were confirmed almost immediately when the new mom’s head is bashed in with a rock.
The boys are raised by Island Mom to believe that they are the only people to ever exist and there is nothing more to the earth than the Island. It would be nice to pause for a second and think about how absolutely insane that kind of upbringing would be, but the show plows forward, and I had a constant feeling that I wasn’t even watching an episode of Lost at this point, as everyone onscreen was people I had literally never seen before.
Island Mom leads the boys to an underground waterfall of light, and tells them it’s the reason she’s there, in order to protect it from the other bad people on the island who the boys have recently discovered. What is the light exactly? Uhhh, moving on…
Behold, the Maguffin!
Esau has the Hurley-like power to see the dead, and his real mom appears to him and tells him his entire life is a lie. He flips out, and grabs Jacob to run away to the original “Others” settlement, but Jacob is a big momma’s boy and won’t agree to come and wants to stay in a cave and weave rugs for all eternity.
Flash forward thirty years later, and Esau is living with the tribe, discovering pockets of electromagnetic energy which he believes he can use to get off the island, and begins crafting the “wheel” we’ve all come to know and love. His scientific explanation is a bit lacking as to how exactly the wheel is going to do anything with the energy, but I think we’ve pretty much thrown science out the window at this point in the series.
The last ten minutes or so of the episode are why we all really tuned in, although by the end we can see everything that happens coming a mile away. Island Mom confronts Esau about his excavation of the islands’ energy. When she kills all his friends and destroys his dig site with magic unseen god powers, he becomes enraged and stabs her with his iconic dagger. Jacob sees this, and beats the hell out of Esau, then drags him to the glowing light cavern and tosses him down there, a place that his mother said “would be worse than death.”
Whoops.
The smoke monster immediately bursts forth from the cave in all its mystical glory, and short distance later Jacob finds Esau’s real body, and presumably all later appearances of Esau are just post-death smoke body stealing. Jacob puts his mother and Esau in the cave where hundreds (thousands?) of years later, Jack, Kate and Locke discover them, christening them the “Adam and Eve” of the island in a plot development that COULD NOT have been planned six seasons in advance. It’s nice it lined up like that, but sorry, not buying that was organized from the get-go.
So for an origin story about the two most powerful people on the island, we sure didn’t get a whole lot of answers, and because of that, I’m worried that Lost is just going to end up going with a “you figure it out” explanation for the whole thing, and I was pretty disappointed with the evening overall.
The great “who built the wheel” mystery is solved!
The half-answers we got really weren’t answers at all. How did Jacob get his powers? Well, his mom gave them to him. Great, but how did she get them? How did Esau become the smoke monster? He was thrown into a cavern of mystical light. Great, but how did it happen and why an electronic smoke column? What is the island? The home of a mystical energy source that’s inside all of us containing “life, death and rebirth.” Great, BUT WHAT DOES THAT MEAN?
Honestly, at this point, if these questions aren’t answered by now, I’m not sure they’re going to be. I can’t envision any sort of reveal at this point that’s would make absolutely everything fall into place, and that’s a disappointment considering Lost seemed like it had the potential to really make all its ends meet eventually. I have a feeling we’re just going to be left with a “the island is whatever you want it to be” type ending where questions about demi-gods and energy forces are just going to remain abstract concepts, having been written without the possibility of a concrete explanation for them.
You are not an answer, only another question.
I guess the few fundamental questions that we REALLY should see answered in the final few hours are:
– Where does this energy come from, and what is it actually capable of?
– Why does Not-Locke leaving the island doom everyone?
– Who is ultimately behind it all, the island, the energy, the god-like powers bestowed upon mortals? A deity? Aliens? An alien diety?
– What the f*ck is the alterverse?
Well, at least we found out who those kids running around in the jungle were.
Come on Lost, bring us home. I know you’ve got it in you.
and also, why did they speak Latin for the first 5 seconds of the episode, and then switch to English? QUO VADIS, Lost?
Maybe the worst episode of the series…and I am even comparing it to the diamond smuggling episode. What a load of crap we were fed.
I can’t help but wonder if the mom was a smoke monster as well. She seemed very familiar with consequences of diving into the light and it makes sense on how she could wipe an entire village and bury a huge hole
So that brings the question if she was a smoke monster and she was killer by what we see as her adopted son then who is the best candidate for killing Not Locke? My bet? Claire. I think it would be unexpected and she is the closest thing Not Locker has to somebody
Either that or his mother a magical pan dimensional ostrich. With Lost it seems that everything is possible
Why do you call these reviews? All you do is recap what happened in the episode.
When Jack found Adam and Eve, he said the bodies had been there around 50 years. What gives?
The light is negatively charged exotic matter. We heard that from Pierre Chang in the season 5 premiere. It’s also been called a pocket of electromagnetism. Essentially, it’s a misunderstood scientific phenomenon, like dark matter or the god particle.
I bet Alex is right I kept waiting to see her change during the episode. I liked the episode, It seems to me that the light is the fountain of youth. The source of the energy that makes up our conciousness that makes sense that the dead would wonder around on the island.
The creators claim that they wrote the general story of lost from begining to end before the pilot. Why would you doubt that “adam and eve” of the island weredn’t planned from the begining? why would else would that scene have existed in first season.
Anyway good review I like reading these after I watch the episode because you bring up past events that I had forgotten about. Don’t be a nay-sayer its amazing they’ve managed to keep this show pretty good for six seasons. Hey it even survived michelle rod-whatever god I was glad to see her go.
Like she said last night “any answer I give you will only lead to more questions” You know that was the writers telling us something.
@ Kamy
I’m willing to bet that Jack was just guessing based on the apparent rate of decay. Then I’d also be willing to bet that there was some magic “force” of some sort that kept bugs at bay or something, essentially preventing normal decomposition in a jungle.
Another reason is maybe Jack was just trying to sound all smart and pulled that number out of his ass. I mean, in a jungle after 50 years, wouldn’t they be picked clean? I don’t remember what was left….
I miss when the show felt like there was a scientific explanation for everything. The overused black v. white/dark v. light metaphores and all the mysticism are really starting to wear thin.
Was the man in black evil and all that before Jacob sent him into the light?
If he had left before being transformed or whatever would all the doom happen?
Was the smoke monster always there in some form (the dead people the man in black saw as a child) and perhaps the act of the “guardian” throwing his twin in the light was a unique circumstance that allowed it to assume a corporeal form?
We know Jacob left the island A LOT, why was he allowed too do that if his brother needed to be killed to prevent it as a child?
I could list so many more questions, and i agree that at this point it looks like the show is gonna leave far to much for us to speculate on and figure out on our own.
Why everything has to have an answer? You are asking very specific questions that add nothing to the story. Who cares what the smoke is made of? Do you really need its chemical composition in order to understand the story, to enjoy the fable? I think those fans that watch Lost only for the answers do not deserve a show as smart as Lost. Finally, I don’t understand why you doubt the Adan and Eve moment wasn’t planned. The writers said from the begging they knew where the show was heading to, if not the details. You ask for everything to fit nicely and what it does you think is too much of a lucky strike.
I think getting thrown into the light essentially stripped the man in black of all that made him good.
Call me crazy but I think this episode will be looked upon in a much brighter light once the show is over. People are mostly upset because they were expecting an answer heavy episode but instead we got another transitional episode that is setting up for the finale. And I fully expect the finale to be a doozy. I have put my faith in these writers for 6 years, why should that change with only two episodes to go?
And why do you say that Adam and Eve couldn’t have been planned from the start? For me, it proves they planned on humanizing the smoke monster from the beginning, as the man in black, and they also planned on him losing his body and having it stored in the cave. The only thing that throws a wrench in that for me is the fact that Jack said they couldn’t have been more than 50 years old. But call me an overly faithful lost fan but if an island can cure a broken spine and cure cancer, what’s to stop it from slowing the rate at which two bodies decompose?
@Jonas
You lost me when you starting talking about “a show as smart as Lost.”
Well I’m just going to go straight to the point.
Dumb useless waste of time episode.
Sometimes things are the way they are, and thats the way it needs to be. Who cares if we dont get every answer? Are we too dumb to figure out for ourselves where things came from? I prefer the mystery. That way, its probably more awesome than anything they could have delivered. And Im thankful for that.
@ Sam
I couldn’t agree with you more.
If you’ve been following Lost for 6 seasons, through all the journey an expecting straight black and white answers for everything. Of course you’re bound to be disappointed for last night’s episode. I can totally understand that. Personally, however, I agree with someone’ saying that this will be one of the better episode once Lost is over.
They had created a Lost realm that consists of wonderful mysteries that engaged audience from the get go. Expect everything to be explained is too much to ask. That’s me, I’d prefer the producers keep my asking over giving me all answers.
Yes I love the Sopranos’ ending if you’re wondering.
@ Xeno – right on, brother. I had all those same questions after watching the show. Why is Esau bad? How come Jacob could leave the island? Why can’t Esau leave again? Because his lying mother said it would be bad? Or his brother that already killed him once?
For the all the attempted subtlety and tongue in cheek reference, they sure do beat us over the head with “Esau is Bad”, and it pisses me off.
Lost isn’t smart, it is hamfisted, meandering, and convoluted. They started with an end in mind, sure, but I bet if they could they’d keep drumming up ‘mysteries’ and push the show out another three or four seasons, why not?
My main beef isn’t that I want to know ‘why’, I want to know ‘how come’. How come Walt was written off the show? How come Ben got a tumor on his spine? Not the ‘lost mythology’ reason, the real life production reason.
I want to hear the director’s cut of an episode that has a sentence like: Yeah, we had this idea of [some failed plot thread ala Walt magically appearing covered in water talking backwards], so we had to [set up Walt as a powerful demigod psionic], but then we changed that to [Jacob and Esau thread], because it did better in testing, and [Walt aged too quick].
Like how Jack was supposed to die at the end of the first episode, but people loved him, so they kept him on. I want to hear more of that, because that will let me understand what the director’s intent was a lot more than random macguffins dropping out of the sky.
Honestly, after this last episode, I am more convinced that the writer’s have no idea what is going on with their show. They contract themselves all the time, nothing is nearly as important as they broadcast it to be, and, for some reason, everything is black or white (literally and figuratively).
Once again, I disagree with you. I loved this episode and still have no big questions besides “how will it end?” Which we will find out shortly. I am positive about the ending and was enthralled with last night’s episode. Your questions just don’t seem to matter in my opinion. I will repeat what other posters have said. If you want a black or white answer, you shouldn’t be watching this show.
Seriously, LOST has always banked on questions. If they answer everything then that’s all well and good but people enjoy the mystery. Stop bitching and moaning about new questions arising. Holy Shit! LOST posed new questions and didn’t answer my old ones?! How are you not used to this by now. It would be fucking perfect to leave the whole finale on a “What the flying titties was that all about” kind of episode. It’s about the journey folks, you’re all acting like the douchebag who tries to cheat at a scavenger hunt because he wants the prize instead of getting to second base with the hot chick on your team while you’re searching for clues.
This episode was a huge let-down.
Throughout MIB’s life, not one single person he meets (and I assume he makes some sort of an emotional connection between the others too, given that he clearly mourns their deaths) give him a name. Not even a codename or a nickname.
And they could have done something with that too; maybe he’s so messed up as a DIRECT result of not having an actual name – you know, like he resents his real mother for that reason, turning him into a jerk-wad.
But, and this is rather surprising, he actually shows remorse at his actions at the end essentially telling the audience he was wrong and jacob was right, thus indicating character growth – this is the best bit of writing in the entire episode.
They beat you over the head with the title (it is said no less than 6 times, 4 in the same scene) in addition to the game analogy treating the audience like a retard….and then they have the nerve to remind you 3 times (in a row, just in case you forgot) via the use of flash back (or is it flash forward?) of the adam and eve reveal, which in the grand scheme of things really isn’t that significant —-> we still don’t know what the hell is going on this island, what the eff the smoke monster actually is, why all these rules and why this shit makes no god-damn sense!
There’s also several plot holes:
1) Crazy mom says to her kids that she’s made it so they can never hurt each other…fast forward 10 minutes and jacob beats the holy snot out of his bro. He does this again right near at the end….(which at least makes sense given the situation, but still…)
2) If crazy mom knew jacob was the rightful guardian all along, why not let MIB leave when he wanted? He made it clear he wanted to leave BEFORE he knew about the light thing.
3) If Jacob is supposed to keep this place safe and secure from mankind, why the hell does he keep bringing people to the island? One candidate maybe, but an entire slave boat AND plane full?
4) Jacob constantly leaves the Island (and thus equally his post as guardian) throughout…clearly the rules don’t apply to this guy, in which case….what the hell is going on?!
On the slim chance that these are somehow rectified in the FINAL TWO EPISODES EVER, it will only raise the question: why pull this shit in the first place if you’re going to reset it? Especially given it’s the 3rd last episode of lost. Ever.
Just my 2 cents.
@ Jonas:
Because everything up until now in the series has been questions. And we were promised answers. Do you think we watch the show just so we can have a millions questions that we are supposed to fill out for ourselves?
@ pakman
1) maybe thats why the man in black didn’t really die.
2) She didn’t know the whole time. Listen more closely to the quote.
3) becuase at some point jacob and MIB started a wager about men. also so jacob could retire he needed the right replacement.
4) see explanation 3
There was a shit load of answers reveiled last night If you pay attention and keep an open mind. just because you didn’t get the answer you wanted doesn’t mean there wasn’t one.
tht was cheesey using the end by the doors on the preview for next week. someone needs to tell holywood that just becuase a single phrase of a song matches an idea of a show doesn’t mean the song as a whole has ANYTHING to do with said idea.
EXAMPLE: C.S.I. opening and who songs. hollywood exec. mind: uh the shows about solving crimes so they’re looking for someone how about “who are you” by the who. Thats about looking for people right?
no its not.
My wife says that this was the best episode she’s seen, simply because the other idiot characters weren’t in it.
@ chelsea
I’m looking for a black or white answer – doesn’t mean I shouldn’t be watching the show….and I think ALL Paul’s questions matter because if they don’t – what’s the point of watching? In my opinion, your input on the show is a bunch of bull**** to be honest.
Of course it is a smart show. Just see how many followers it has wondering what is going to happen next. It is smart because it makes you think how all pieces fit together. It’s not, of course, a deep philosophical treaty on the human nature nor anything like that. But is a very enjoyable quest for small mysteries. Trust your writers, people. You lost me at “you lost me at”, and here we are all nicely lost in Lost.
Being a lost n00b since I stopped watching after season 2 and came back during season 4 while watching reruns at the same time, I really like last night episode. You can’t watch fucking Lost and expect all your questions to be answered. Why don’t folks just…enjoy the show?
Just block the multiple synapses firing telling you that every implausible question must be answered.
There is a very large difference between just enjoying a show and watching a good show.
I enjoyed the movie “Transporter”. I could suspend belief and watch a film where all bullets are tracers, the bad guys attack one at a time, and people can parachute onto a moving semi going down the highway. I don’t sit there and yell at the movie screen because I knew what I was getting myself into. I was there to be entertained.
Lost, on the other hand, suspends belief alright, but always promised that there would be a reason in the end. We would be able to figure it out. There would be some theme or clue or godbomb that would make us go ‘ooooooooh’ and then buy the DVDs to rewatch the series.
Time is running out for that godbomb. Tuesday we were supposed to be hit with a big one, and it turned out to be a cave full of light that we still don’t really know what is inside. That blows.
Watching a show without finding out the ‘why’ or ‘how come’ behind the constant questions and mysteries would be like “Law and Order” only they drink coffee on a stakeout for an hour and never find a perp, or “Jeopardy” but they don’t tell you the right answer, even if you say it aloud. Alex just puts the card down and reads the next question, leaving the viewer to decide if the contestant is right.
You can’t just sit back and say, ah, it’s good because it’s confusing and open to gray. Anyone can dream up a fantasy world, but tethering that world to reality and passing on your myth is the tricky part.
And so far, this season, I’m not buying the myth. It smells like hamfisted dues ex machina.
@clint
ok, let me rephrase… if you are expecting the next 2 episodes to answer every question every viewer expected to be answered in great detail over the past 6 seasons, you will be disappointed.
i liked last night’s episode and thought it “filled in gaps” more than answered questions.
i’ve said it many times before, there aren’t any REALLY big questions i have left besides how it ends. i think with a show like Lost, they have to leave some things open-ended. there were so many cans of worms opened and each viewer has their own idea of what is “important”. i don’t think that some of paul’s questions are relevant or will be answered.
i do, however, feel that i will be satisfied with the ending. the alt-verse and not-locke leaving the island will most likely be wrapped up. i’m just not so sure the show will give it to us in a nice, clean wrapped package like so many expect it to be.
Great review, and I’m with NY not NYC.
If I just wanted to be mystified by open-ended questions, I’d spend an hour every Tuesday night staring at Rorschach ink blots, not watching Lost. I’ve stuck with Lost for six seasons in anticipation of some kind of intellectually and emotionally satisfying resolution to the narrative, and it doesn’t look like I’m going to get it.
I should have known better, though. Alias had a great start, too, and then spent the next four seasons jumping from shark to shark.
@ clint
Thanks for replying
1) MIB is totally dead – they show it in that episode. But, the issue I was raising was the so called rules were broken almost immediately (I’ll come back to this point later on)
2) I’ll give you this one actually. She does qualify her statement a lot more than I initially gave her.
3) He didn’t need to bring an entire slave ship nor a plane full. I assume he also brought several hundred people in between that time, too…but since being granted guardianship of this island he’s never had to relinquish his position, so all this stuff about candidacy is bs.
I suppose one could say that by the constant flux of people keeps MIB there as he’d have to kill them to get off the island (why is still never made clear, just another rule I suppose)…but this ties directly into:
4) Why can jacob leave the island (and for that matter, break all of the rules) and not mib,,,even as a child (i.e pre black smoke era), crazy mom said he cannot leave the island.
Or does becoming guardian grant you the magic ability to make your own rules up (in which case we have a wish for more wishes issue) but it has been previously established (ab aeterno) there’s a limit to his power as guardian…more questions.
Perhaps they are doing something thematically with the rule breaking (as this seemed to be the theme of this episode) and the questions (a daring move indeed, but at this late in the game, is insulting to long-time viewers), but it just feels like the writers don’t know what they are doing.
I think we should all go back and think about the part in the episode where Esau says that one day, Jacob will get to make up his own game and rules (it’s where they first found that game at the beach). Thus explaining why Jacob can leave the island, while Esau cannot.
you guys know this wasn’t series finale right? there are still 3.5 more hours to answer your questions.
@ Lera: yep. was going to say the same thing.
Worst episode since since the Charlie centric where he thought Aaron was in a piano in the water (“Fire + Water”?).
@ Chelsea
It’s a bit unfair to tell someone that the show isn’t for them because they want their questions answered. If anything, it’s not a show for you. If you want something puzzling and is open to viewers interpatations, try something else. But Lost is a show built on questions they were planning on answering and now that that time has come they have somewhat failed at delievering what we, the fans wanted.
I’m surprised no one mentioned that the cave of light ends of being the pool in the temple later on.
Me, I’m just in it for the ride…..
You are all acting as if this episode was the series finale of Lost. How about we all wait until the Series finally before we judge this episode?