Lost – Episode 4.8 – Meet Kevin Johnson

In Meet Kevin Johnson, we finally get to see what happened to Michael after he and Walt left the island. The entire episode is a giant Michael flashback, with only one scene at the beginning and one at the end that take place in the present.

Basically, we find out that Mikey felt so guilty over shooting Libby and Ana Lucia that he had to tell someone. That someone was Walt. From what I can tell, Walt did not take the news well, as he ended up living with his grandma while Michael gets a ratty apartment somewhere in New York. He spends all of his time feeling sorry for himself, and repeatedly tries killing himself. Enter Mr. Friendly/Tom, who uses his Otherly manipulation techniques to persuade Michael that the only way he can make up for those muders is if he works for Ben as a spy on Mr. Widmore’s boat. You see, according to Ben and the Others, Widmore is the one that planted that fake flight 815 and has plans to kill everyone on the island for his own gain. All Michael has to do is stop the boat from reaching the island. He eventually takes job, and we are caught up to the present. Sayid, obviously not trusting Michael at all, turns him in to the Captain, and the episode ends. Lucky for us, we only have to wait a month for the next episode.

Other noteworthy bits form this episode:

• The island is apparently not letting Michael kill himself. Tom tells him this, and it is true that all of Michael’s attempts have ended in failure, via gun jams, or other odd flukes. Is this something like the effects of the numbers?
• How much time has gone by for Michael in the real world? I mean, as far as the island folks are concerned, he’s been gone for, what? Maybe a month, or a month and a half? Yet, here we see him well established in an apartment in New York City, having tried to kill himself multiple times. THEN we see him crash his car, and end up in the hospital with a neckbrace and who knows what other injuries. Then we jump ahead again, and he’s already healed. I don’t think he could have gone from escaping the island, to losing his son, to living in New York, to repeated suicide attempts, to what would appear to be a lengthy recovery from the car accident, to more suicide attempts, to being recruited to work for Ben, to the boat trip BACK to the island, all in a month and a half. We know time runs differently on the island, so how much time went by for Michael after his escape. I think it was much more than a mere month and a half. Just my opinion
• We get a glimpse into what Tom meant when he scoffed at Kate’s refusal to take a shower in front of him and he responded “You’re not my type.” That’s right, Tom has a hot young boyfriend.
• Ben says that Widmore planted the fake 815, and Widmore claims that Ben planted it. Awesome. They are both liars, and I am anxious to find out which of them is actually responsible.

Anyways, this was a decent episode. It was not what I was expecting when I heard it would be a “What has Michael been up to” flashback episode, but I still liked it. I had expected to see him and Walt on the boat, and getting rescued, etc….It was still satisfying in this form as well.

*SIGH* Now we have to wait a month for new episodes, and I am totally happy about that. We almost had to wait 9 months, so yay!

Lost – Episode 4.7 – Ji Yeon – Whipp’s Thoughts

We’re seven episodes into the abbreviated fourth season of Lost and the hits just keep on coming. While not the strongest of the season, this was still one hell of an episode. First, we find out that Sun (as I long suspected) was one of the Oceanic Six…and for a while, we all thought that Jin was one as well, until it is revealed that within the same episode, Jin is having flash-backs and Sun is having flash-forwards. Tricky tricky!! Turns out, good old Jin is taking a dirt nap in the future. There was an excellent scene at the end of the episode in which a teary Sun takes their new born daughter Ji Yeon (named just as Jin wanted) to visit her daddy’s grave. You have to wonder, though: Is Jin dead-dead or pretend dead. We know that the Oceanic Six lied about how many survivors there were, and we have to assume that there are a large number of people from the flight still on the island. Who’s to say that Jin isn’t one of them, and that this grave is just like all the other empty graves that were no doubt set up for the folks who “didn’t survive the crash.” Dead or not, since it is in the future, we know that Jin will be around for a while. I’m a Jin fan, so I’m hoping that in the future shown in that flash-forward that Jin is alive and kicking back on Lost Island.

As for the happenings on the island in the here and now, we had several interesting developments.

1) Sun decides that she doesn’t trust the boat people, and she and Jin decide to move to Locke’s camp. Juliet REALLY doesn’t want Sun to die (which she will if she stays on the island), so she uses a stall tactic to get them to wait…that is, she reveals to Jin that Sun had an affair before they came to the island. The stall works, as Jin runs off all pouty, and Sun won’t leave without him. In the end, Jin decides that he was a different guy back then and that he doesn’t blame Sun for cheating, and they both decide to stay on the beach and wait to get rescued. It was a touching scene of making up as Jin brought Sun dinner. Too bad only one of them is around for the birth of their daughter. Bitter sweet.

2) Out on the boat, Desmond and Sayid are finally granted an audience with the captain of the ship…but not before they see one of the crewmembers walk off the side of the ship wearing a whole lot of chains. Stranger yet, none of the crew make a move to save their drowning crewmate. Strange. The captain tells them that the crew has been experiencing severe cases of cabin fever. You don’t say? Anyways, they ask the captain what they are doing at the island, and he explains that the boat belongs to Charles Widmore, Penny’s dad, and that he is after Benjamin Linus. They think that he is the one that staged the fake crash of flight 815. They want to know how someone funds something like that, not to mention where he got 300 + dead bodies. These are very good questions. Personally, I think both Widmore’s people and Ben are lying about everything and we probably still don’t have a clue about why the boat people are at the island…and who or what Ben is. He obviously has a life off of the island, based on all of those passports and bundles of money that Sayid found in his house a few weeks back. Time will tell.

3) Lastly, as Desmond and Sayid are brought to their new room on the boat, we see cockroaches everywhere and a huge blood splatter on the wall. Yummy. Anyways, the boat’s janitor is called over to clean it up. He seems extremely reluctant, but finally comes down the hall and out of the shadows and…it’s Michael!!! We knew he was coming back to the show, and now he is here. YAY! My money is on him being Ben’s “man on the boat.” Mikey is introduced as Kevin Johnson, and Sayid looks extremely confused.

We won’t have to wait long to find out what Michael is doing on the boat, as I believe this week’s episode is all about him and where he has been since he left the island.

So, there you have it. If I missed something, or you disagree with anything I have said here, please feel free to comment!