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!
