TDTVS

Episode 9 of Season 3 is number 56 of 82 and is a Jack episode. In the off-island flash back we see him vacationing in Thailand where he meets a mysterious (is there any other kind on this show?) local woman who helps him fly a kite, has sex with him, looks into his soul and she tells him he is a leader and a great man, but this makes him lonely, frightened, and angry and he makes her tattoo Chinese characters on his arm to that effect.

On island he strikes a bargain with Ben that he will help doctor his now infected back to prevent further damage he is prevents Juliet from being executed for killing someone while helping Sawyer and Kate escape. One of he others who speaks Chinese tells Jack his tattoo means, “He walks amongst us, but he is not one of us.”

(55/82) This was considered a odd departure because we get a flashback that happens during a flashback, but is it really? When Desmond turned the fail safe key and destroyed the hatch he was sent back 5 years earlier when he was dating Penny. He can remember some of the things that happened, a sort of deja vu, and he stumbles on Charlie as a street musician and remembers him from the island, but Charlie doesn’t know him.

On island in the present Desmond can see the future, not all of it and not at will, but he gets random bits at random times. Right now he can see how Charlie dies. He can prevent it, but the universe will course correct, and eventually it will happen.

We are less than 7 weeks to the Season Five premier of TDTVS and ABC has started tossing out promotional photos. Here is one that shows all the main cast members. Where is Jin? Was he left off because he actually did die on the freighter? None of the other main dead people are in there either (if you don’t count Locke who was in the coffin in the final scene of Season Four), Christian, Claire (of course there is some speculation that she isn’t actually dead) and Charlie.

Here is the link to the full resolution image – clickee – just look at the faces, smooth as babies bottoms.

Number 54 of 82 concerns how Juliet ended up on the island, she was recruited by a company called Mittelos Bioscience that wants her for her fertility research, but as with all things Lost, that doesn’t end up exactly what she does. My favorite bit is where she tells the folks recruiting her that her husband would never agree to let her go, the only way that’ll happen is if he gets hit by a bus. Guess what happens…

Episode 53 of 82 centers around Kate and central part in the on island love triangle of her, Jack & Sawyer. Kate is taken to where Jack is being held and tells him he has to operate on Ben to save him or they will kill Sawyer. Jack refuses. She figures out a way to climb out of her cage and breaks into Sawyer’s. They end up doing the deed, but Jack “happens” to see them on a security camera. Thinking that Kate cares for Sawyer he agrees to operate to spare Sawyer after all. Very soap opera-ish episode in that regard.

In the off island flashback Kate, or Monica as she known here, falls in love with a cop named Kevin while still a fugitive and on the run. Our groom is played by none other than Captain Tightpants, Nathan Fillion from Firefly. In the end Monica can’t really stay married, so she has to leave. She drugs Kevin’s iced tea and runs from him. I can only hope that the producers just thought of trying to work in a way for Kate to have the knock out drugs on her lips and kiss him, like Mal had Saffron do to him in the Firefly episode “Our Mrs. Reynolds”, before dismissing it.

Fifty-two of eighty-two is Mr. Eko centered. Off island flashbacks show him in his first days taking over as priest from his now dead brother. The former “bad man” has a very hard changing ways when faced with the black market, medicine and the “militia” in his African village. On island in the present day he is still recovering from the effects of the hatch explosion and sees his brother in a vision. In the end he is killed by the mysterious black cloud. I’m ging to miss Mr. Eko, he was the most interesting character both on and off the island.