Lost - There's No Place Like Home Part 1



**** / ****
“We are in shock, Jack.” – Sun-Hwa

When you see the faces of Kate (who just looks defeated and worn), Jack (who appears to be in peak form among his companions in terms of “sticking to the story”), Sayid (with an expression of, “great more secrets to carry around”), and Hurley (who looks as if he lost his best friend), as they prepare for home off-island after such experiences not so easy to just leave behind and put away from their hearts and minds, I think we all can see the weight of being on this cargo plane—when others weren’t so lucky—and attending to life away from where they had spent quite a traumatic time, encountering plenty of danger and just fighting to survive. When the cargo plane lands, the door opens and a welcoming party awaits, Kate and baby Aaron have no hugs for them. Jack has his mother. Sun has her mother and the father that has continued to haunt her even while on the island. Hurley, of course, has his jovial mother just tickled to see him okay. Sayid, like Kate, has no one. But Hurley introduces Sayid to his mother and she more than is giving in the hugging and affection department. I don’t know what it was, but that moment when they find “home” off the island, as if it didn’t appear there was a home to return to, it had (or continues to have) resonance with me. It was similar to when Jack saw Frank’s helicopter for the first time. That idea, just an idea, passage off the island was possible creates this sense of relief, as if stranded so far where escape seems remote at best. What was the sacrifice, though, for achieving such passage home? That has been an ongoing arc throughout the fourth season. We have spent time with those off the island, given the faces of those who made it and how life isn’t exactly as inviting, warm, and pleasant as anticipated. I felt Kate looked as if she was just as alone and stranded back in Hawaii as she was on the island.

“That son of a bitch is so stubborn. Hold up! You don’t get to die alone.” –Sawyer to Jack as she storms forward to meet up with Keamy and the chopper (who have set their course for The Orchid).

A radio is tossed seemingly from Frank’s helicopter. Jack, Juliet, and those with him on the beach listen to Keamy insisting on a course for The Orchid. So what does Jack do? After surgery on his appendix he sees fit to move forward to their location to stop them with Kate’s assistance. Meeting Miles (who Sawyer nicknamed “Genghis”!) and Sawyer with Aaron, Jack learns of Claire’s disappearance, not too thrilled but still persisting on his journey to Keamy. Kate, with the baby, and Miles, are to head back to the beach, with Sawyer grimacing and frustrated but nonetheless forbidding his return to camp to follow Jack despite reservations. Something very bad is about to happen because Daniel forewarns Charlotte they must get off the island before Keamy reaches The Orchid. All of this seems to tie in with the previous episode when Locke is told by Christian (Jacob? Island?), in the cabin, to prepare to “move the island”.

There is this elaborate work of fiction told to the press regarding how the Oceanic 6 made it home. A press conference where Jack takes the lead and others follow, saying only what is necessary (and mostly a lie), goes seemingly without a hitch. Sayid even embraces Nadia in an emotional moment, while in the “present on-island” he returns to the beach in a motor-raft with warnings of Keamy and the chopper. He learns of Jack and Sawyer’s plans to meet up with Keamy, understanding all too well what awaits them if such an altercation does present itself. Sayid and Kate (giving over Aaron to Sun who gets in the motor-raft with Jin, and a few others as Daniel voluntarily leads) will try to get to Jack and Sawyer despite a distance between them. And with Locke, Hurley, and Ben headed for The Orchid (up in a secluded mountain on the island Ben had knowledge of, securing safe travels there through a hidden box containing a mirror for communication, sending a signal to whoever it is in the station), the episode is really preparing us something big.

I have felt in just half of the episode, we get a lot of information to absorb. So much that even little moments can be lost if we don’t give proper time to them. Like Jin telling Sun he promised to get her off the island, and the information that we have which says he won’t be there with her when the child is born. Or the cargo plane door opening to reveal “normal life” just in sight for those six granted the chance to reemerge into society off-island. I mean the scene off-island where Jin informs her father that she bought a chunk of his company and that he is responsible (partially) for his death: this, to me, is absolutely powerful. With all the daddy issues so many of the Lost characters have, to see Jin stand right up to her controlling, course father and signify her emasculation of him is on its own incredible. But it has to compete with so much going on during 50 minutes of television leveling us with one impactful scene after another. Even the fantastic line of “Jesus Christ is not a weapon” when Hurley thinks a prowler is at his mansion, discovering his mom, dad, and a party full of guests giving him a happy birthday; this might get lost in the shuffle. That is par for the course when an episode of such magnitude has so much, scene to scene.

“How many times do I have to tell you, John? I always have a plan.”—Ben after explaining to Locke exactly what he must do before giving himself up to Keamy and his armed soldiers at The Orchid.

Locke, Hurley, and Ben have been moving to The Orchid. Before doing this, Ben uses a mirror signal to someone afar but will not divulge its purpose to Locke. When Sayid and Kate march into the jungle after Jack and Sawyer, they encounter Alpert and the Others who take them prisoner. The Others (although Alpert has been extensively featured) have almost went into story arc purgatory, left abandoned because their purpose wasn’t needed in the current narrative. But as the fourth season is coming to an end, Ben never forgot about them, although it would appear he might have. What he told Alpert is left for us to see later, but Kate and Sayid are now in the possession of Richard and Others. The ending of the first part of the season finale has a musical accompaniment solidifying the dramatic course taking us into the second part…Kate and Sayid follow Richard among the gun-wielding Others, Jack and Sawyer free Frank from his handcuffs and head their aim onward, and Ben gives himself up to Keamy so that Locke and Hurley can infiltrate The Orchid.

That is a lot to conclude the *first part* but even more bookends the episode as the freighter is wired with explosives, leaving Desmond, Jin, and Michael with a very big problem. Sun, with Aaron in hands, looks out into the ocean as the freighter situation proposes great horror. The freighter appears to be going nowhere. Jin revealing to Michael that he understands him as Sun listens on to his story of returning home, and not working for Ben but trying to rectify his wrongdoing (killing Ana and Libby, betraying Jack, Sawyer, Hurley, and Kate) is one of my personal favorite moments in the entire episode. Considering the wealth (I could find nary a bit of fat in the entire running time; it seems every single scene has importance, including Hurley seeing the numbers in the odometer of the car his dad finally fixed) in the episode of such moments, that says something.




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