Lost 6.14: The Candidate, Part 1

Sayid died again. But this time for a good cause, although everyone still had a fun time escaping. And most of us knew he didn’t kill Desmond. But here’s the thing. Why didn’t he kill Desmond? Why, if he is so soulless, did he even give a crap about getting Nadia back? What the hell was up with is character this season? Will we get any sort of explanation for inconsistencies in the apparent death and resurrection of his soul? He’s a zombie then he’s not? He’s NOT SAYID ANYMORE, gone to the dark side, then suddenly he’s completely normal again? Please please please tell me there’s some logic to this that we just haven’t gotten yet. The Anakin thing is nowhere near a good enough analogy.

Sun/Jin. First their reunion was ruined by the bizarre idea to have them meet at the sonic fence. We are trained to freak out when anyone goes near that fence. The distraction of picturing them hitting each other and collapsing in ear-bleeding seizures kind of ruined the moment. But more annoying, her voice came back why? As if they couldn’t just speak in Korean to each other like the old days. They even had them speaking English in private. And had Frank add a cheeso line, why? All that said, I was moved by their deaths. Jin just wasn’t going to do it anymore and who could blame him? They’d been separated for 3 years. Dying together was better than living alone. I get it. How do you be the guy that leaves his wife to die after all this? OH, because of your daughter! Wait! I was totally into the moment…then, disruption. I KNOW that Ji Yeon exists and they should have mentioned her. I know the father should save himself to find the daughter. I KNOW these things are true, but I wanted to ignore them for just 10 more seconds, let the sad death music play and watch our tragic couple float away together, then blast it during commercials. But I didn’t get to. Not that I disagreed with the Cold Commentator.

IMO the writers were, disappointingly, perfectly consistent in this scene. They have never dealt with Ji Yeon in any logical, loving way. I am not a mother, but still I never bought that Sun would give up her daughter to find her husband on the promise of Ben and a ring. Even if it was pretty positive he was alive (it wasn’t anywhere near that) I would have given some pictures to Ben and said, “My child is all I have left and the most important thing in the world to me. I will never abandon her, just like her father never would have abandoned me. If you see him in Guam, give him these and help him escape. See ya.” In addition, I never bought that Jin would be GLAD that his wife would abandon Ji Yeon to find him. Wouldn’t you be kind of like, “Wait, this was nice and all, but you LEFT her? Because BEN said I might be alive?? What? Are you crazy? I did everything I could to get you off this godforsaken place and then you just abandon our child and come back?” I do feel it is plausible that Sun had issues with the Jin/Island situation that caused her to never bond with Ji Yeon properly, but isn’t just as likely that she would have bonded with her even more because of the loss of Jin and the experience of the Island? And if no one’s going to bother to explain it either way, then I really am disappointed. This will probably always be a big plot hole to me. I hate that it ruined an otherwise moving and appropriate ending for these two characters. I hope there is something that redeems it.

Kate. Thank god somebody shot her. Too bad she didn’t drown. They made sure to point out her uselessness, which probably implies some sort of usefulness that poor sun and Jin didn’t get the privilege of getting.

Frank. Well, damn. That’s it? Welp, can’t wait to see the swift pointless clobbering of Miles next!

Sawyer. Why’d you go and try to kill everyone? Didn’t you see that if someone ELSE chooses to do it, Locke isn’t the perpetrator, you are? “Get it in the water. I’ll take care of the rest.” I am going to assume we didn’t see the end of that plan yet. Because otherwise, nothing happened.
ETA: If the whole point was, “Get him wet because he gums up and can’t turn into smoke” then wow, how anticlimactic, and to paraphrase a line from the Hangover, this guy’s a gremlin, all the instructions and shit.

Other mysterious phrases of the day: “Because it’s going to be you.” “Desmond–you’ll need him.” “To finish what I started.” “Candidate.”

And since I’m criticizing so much, I don’t think it made much sense for Jack to say to Locke, “I wish you believed me.” Locke not wanting to be fixed doesn’t much have anything to do with whether he believes Jack, even if it might have a little to do with it. I get it was a throwback, but Locke’s real problem if this is real life is more likely survivor’s guilt; he feels unworthy of being fixed. In fact, possible bad writing/character development alert. When we met him off the plane, it was implied that he had sort of tried to “get fixed” a few times but was now “accepting himself.” So am I to believe that pre-Australia he had wanted to be healed (implying a sense of worthiness) despite putting his father in a vegetative state? I’m confused. Is he now accepting of himself or feeling a new-found sense of guilt? Am I supposed to feel like he’s better or worse? Should I root for him to be fixed or not? I have no idea. Maybe I’m just in a bad mood.

I did love the Oceanic connections coming together for Jack in particular. Bernard. The Claire/Jack in the mirror of the “Catch a Falling Star” music box. Jack all throughout, actually. He’s mostly figured it out. Locke’s smile as he holds Claire back from the sub. And the fact that Anthony Cooper is a drooling vegetable is exactly the appropriate punishment for him, despite the fact that in this life Locke and he liked each other and were close. Of course, it remains to be seen if he is Sawyer’s same Cooper… It’s also appropriate that Locke is the one who paralyzes himself.

I’m sure I have much more to say. Maybe back later, maybe not! Smell ya later!