Season 4, Episode 4: "Eggtown"
Rarely do I get too "deep" in this here blog, but the title of this week's show ("Eggtown") was too strange not to investigate just a little bit. And in perusing some of the sites that I steal from to formulate these recaps, I came across a very intriguing analysis of the title's meaning. In short, "eggs" could refer to a number of fairly straightforward aspects of the episode - from the last two eggs that Locke cooks for Ben, or Locke's reference to the "easter eggs" we love to find in each episode ("you might catch something you missed the next time around"), or even to Kate's "pregnancy" - but the most interesting analogy could be the most obvious: what comes first, the chicken or the egg? This "cause and effect" visual is unbelievably appropriate for a show like Lost, and for most of this season we have been seeing only the "effects" (read: flash forwards) of what has happened in the past (Island rescue). In other words, we are maddeningly kept in the dark as to what caused Oceanic 6 to make it off the Island, or what caused Sayid to start working for Ben, or what caused a Polar Bear to end up in a desert in Tunisia, or...I think you get the point. Obviously, this type of storytelling has been prevalent for the whole series, but it has really come to a head here in season 4. It can be a frustrating game to play, but at the same time I think the hole between future and present is shrinking, and soon we will learn more and more about the chickens that created these eggs. Or not. After all, Locke did kill one out back for dinner....
(to read more on this topic, check out Luhks excellent recap here)
And now on to the actual episode. I knew that we were in for a good one when it started with ole' eyeball opening shot. This is a picture that has shown itself throughout the series...and it usually precedes rather "revealing" episodes (I was gonna say "eye opening" but just couldn't bring myself to do it). It was no different in the case. Some things we learned:
Ben still owns Locke.
Just as Locke was getting comfy in Ben's Other house and feeling pretty good about the little dictatorship he's got going on with this group, Ben totally F's with his mind like it's nothing. Great scene between the two figureheads...it was like old times. But Ben's right on this one, Locke seems "more Lost than ever" at this point in the season. No one has told him what to do in a while now, and it's starting to show. We'll have to see what ends up happening here, but we know for a fact that at least Hurley and Ben get out of his grasp. And in another nod to Locke's transformation from "hey I can walk now; this place is great" guy to "THIS IS NOT A DEMOCRACY" asshole was summed up nicely with the brief backgammon game that he and Sawyer started. If you remember, back in Season 1 Locke taught Walt about backgammon, and played with the white pieces. Now in his game with Sawyer, he's turned to the black side... (Cue evil laughter...)
Miles is in it for the cash.
As expected, Miles doesn't really give a shit about his Freighter team, or about all the mysterious Island hullabaloo, but he does give a shit about money. He found Ben (with help from Kate and Sawyer), and now it's payday. But why 3.2 million? As Ben states, "why not 3.3, or 3.4?" Ahhh, but how soon we forget about Miles' uncanny ability to read between the lines. Miles struck a cord during that meeting with Ben and his abilities may not be limited to the dead. Ben almost seemed to stop in his tracks once he realized that Miles may have been able to "sense" that 3.2 million may be exactly what Ben is worth...
There were 8 original survivors.
We once again see "pre-breakdown" Jack looking dapper in a flash forward at Kate's trial and has no problem lying under oath about what happened to the eventual Oceanic 6. We can deduce that the 6 survivors spend quite a bit of time conjuring up their story, and it makes sense that they made Kate the hero of the tale. I mean, Sawyer was right, Kate's a fugitive in the real world...why would she want to leave? But she did, so why not make it a little easier for her to get off by making her save a few folks in the process. But in terms of their story, we learn that there were originally 8 survivors, but that only 6 eventually made if off? So who are the other two? And why make your story more complicated by adding them in? Maybe just so that it sounds a little bit more realistic? I guess having two people die from injuries after a plane crash is very plausible. Ok. But then, who are the other two? My guess is that they will turn out to be Shannon and Boone. I mean, I know plenty of other folks died (the entire tail section, Dr. Artz, ect), but Shannon and Boone make a nice little package, being quasi-family and all. I'm sure we'll find out eventually, but I definitely thought it was interesting that they added such detail to a story that is completely false. I wonder if that will come to haunt them in the end. After all, we eventually see how sick Jack becomes of living all the lies.
Daniel Faraday is ... special.
The scene where Daniel and Charlotte were playing "guess this card" was more interesting than it originally seemed. Some folks are chalking Daniel's failure of being able to go three for three on the cards as another one of the Islands mind-fucks. Meaning, that in some way, the cards actually changed from what they were after they were put face down. I mean, Faraday's a genius physicist, so he should be able to remember three cards, right? Well maybe not. We recently learned that in the first scene of the first episode this year, where Daniel is seen inexplicably crying as he watched the flight 815 rescue footage, that the woman in the scene with him is his caretaker, and not his wife or significant other (we learned this by watching the "enhanced" repeat version of the show - these versions run at 8p every Thursday and show the previous week's show with pop up factoids). Add that to the fact that Daniel has so far continually showed us that he's...a little off. Something is going on with him. The best guess so far is that he suffers from some sort of short term memory loss. Think about it, he couldn't remember why he was crying at the TV, he couldn't remember a simple three card Monty set up, and he regularly just seems out of it. But then why bring a "head case" (Naomi's words) onto such a mission? Could it be that only he knows something crucial about the Island, but can't remember exactly what?
Kate's a baby mamma!
Well then. In true Lost shocker form, we learn that Kate's "baby" is in fact Aaron (Claire's son...I hate to have to spell this out, but I got an alarming amount of questions as to who Aaron was). I have no answers to this development, and we are clearly stuck again with an effect that currently has no cause. But I think we can assume that Claire dies. How she dies, I have no idea. But let's not also forget that Aaron was basically deemed to be the "world's evilest baby" by that psychic that Claire saw in Australia. Again, not sure what's happening there, but it's important to remember. And while we're on the topic of Aaron, do we deem him to be one of the "Oceanic 6"? At first I said no, but the more I think about it, I can be convinced that he is. I mean, regardless of Kate's lie about the situation, the baby was born on the Island, and has now been rescued. I guess whether or not baby Aaron was indeed a "life" yet during the crash is a question that only an abortion clinic bomber can answer, but I think that until we hear otherwise, it's plausible that Aaron is our 5th survivor. He was rescued off the Island, after all.
Man, I think that's all I got this week. I thoroughly enjoyed "Eggtown" though, and hope that the rest of the season continues to be as strong as the start. And in what better way to end the post about "Eggtown" than to have a few Easter eggs:
Books, books, books...they are everywhere in Lost. Of particular interest this week though was what Sawyer was reading: "The Invention of Morel." A brief summary of the plot:
"A fugitive hides on a deserted island somewhere in Polynesia. Tourists arrive, and his fear of being discovered becomes a mixed emotion when he falls in love with one of them. He wants to tell her his feelings, but an anomalous phenomenon keeps them apart."
Interesting.
Remember this dude outside of the courtroom in the Flash Forward? Well, no one could understand what he yelled at Kate until someone played it backwards. What he said: "we hate you!" Why would anyone hate a hero??
I really wanted to find a picture of the "Breakfast Grenade" that Locke fed Miles but couldn't. There were no easter eggs or mysteries there (although I suppose you could argue that the grenade is yet another homage to an egg), I just thought that it was a wildly imaginative way to torture someone. Kudos to Locke for that one...Sayid has apparently taught you well.
See you next week....
Rarely do I get too "deep" in this here blog, but the title of this week's show ("Eggtown") was too strange not to investigate just a little bit. And in perusing some of the sites that I steal from to formulate these recaps, I came across a very intriguing analysis of the title's meaning. In short, "eggs" could refer to a number of fairly straightforward aspects of the episode - from the last two eggs that Locke cooks for Ben, or Locke's reference to the "easter eggs" we love to find in each episode ("you might catch something you missed the next time around"), or even to Kate's "pregnancy" - but the most interesting analogy could be the most obvious: what comes first, the chicken or the egg? This "cause and effect" visual is unbelievably appropriate for a show like Lost, and for most of this season we have been seeing only the "effects" (read: flash forwards) of what has happened in the past (Island rescue). In other words, we are maddeningly kept in the dark as to what caused Oceanic 6 to make it off the Island, or what caused Sayid to start working for Ben, or what caused a Polar Bear to end up in a desert in Tunisia, or...I think you get the point. Obviously, this type of storytelling has been prevalent for the whole series, but it has really come to a head here in season 4. It can be a frustrating game to play, but at the same time I think the hole between future and present is shrinking, and soon we will learn more and more about the chickens that created these eggs. Or not. After all, Locke did kill one out back for dinner....
(to read more on this topic, check out Luhks excellent recap here)
And now on to the actual episode. I knew that we were in for a good one when it started with ole' eyeball opening shot. This is a picture that has shown itself throughout the series...and it usually precedes rather "revealing" episodes (I was gonna say "eye opening" but just couldn't bring myself to do it). It was no different in the case. Some things we learned:
Ben still owns Locke.
Just as Locke was getting comfy in Ben's Other house and feeling pretty good about the little dictatorship he's got going on with this group, Ben totally F's with his mind like it's nothing. Great scene between the two figureheads...it was like old times. But Ben's right on this one, Locke seems "more Lost than ever" at this point in the season. No one has told him what to do in a while now, and it's starting to show. We'll have to see what ends up happening here, but we know for a fact that at least Hurley and Ben get out of his grasp. And in another nod to Locke's transformation from "hey I can walk now; this place is great" guy to "THIS IS NOT A DEMOCRACY" asshole was summed up nicely with the brief backgammon game that he and Sawyer started. If you remember, back in Season 1 Locke taught Walt about backgammon, and played with the white pieces. Now in his game with Sawyer, he's turned to the black side... (Cue evil laughter...)
Miles is in it for the cash.
As expected, Miles doesn't really give a shit about his Freighter team, or about all the mysterious Island hullabaloo, but he does give a shit about money. He found Ben (with help from Kate and Sawyer), and now it's payday. But why 3.2 million? As Ben states, "why not 3.3, or 3.4?" Ahhh, but how soon we forget about Miles' uncanny ability to read between the lines. Miles struck a cord during that meeting with Ben and his abilities may not be limited to the dead. Ben almost seemed to stop in his tracks once he realized that Miles may have been able to "sense" that 3.2 million may be exactly what Ben is worth...
There were 8 original survivors.
We once again see "pre-breakdown" Jack looking dapper in a flash forward at Kate's trial and has no problem lying under oath about what happened to the eventual Oceanic 6. We can deduce that the 6 survivors spend quite a bit of time conjuring up their story, and it makes sense that they made Kate the hero of the tale. I mean, Sawyer was right, Kate's a fugitive in the real world...why would she want to leave? But she did, so why not make it a little easier for her to get off by making her save a few folks in the process. But in terms of their story, we learn that there were originally 8 survivors, but that only 6 eventually made if off? So who are the other two? And why make your story more complicated by adding them in? Maybe just so that it sounds a little bit more realistic? I guess having two people die from injuries after a plane crash is very plausible. Ok. But then, who are the other two? My guess is that they will turn out to be Shannon and Boone. I mean, I know plenty of other folks died (the entire tail section, Dr. Artz, ect), but Shannon and Boone make a nice little package, being quasi-family and all. I'm sure we'll find out eventually, but I definitely thought it was interesting that they added such detail to a story that is completely false. I wonder if that will come to haunt them in the end. After all, we eventually see how sick Jack becomes of living all the lies.
Daniel Faraday is ... special.
The scene where Daniel and Charlotte were playing "guess this card" was more interesting than it originally seemed. Some folks are chalking Daniel's failure of being able to go three for three on the cards as another one of the Islands mind-fucks. Meaning, that in some way, the cards actually changed from what they were after they were put face down. I mean, Faraday's a genius physicist, so he should be able to remember three cards, right? Well maybe not. We recently learned that in the first scene of the first episode this year, where Daniel is seen inexplicably crying as he watched the flight 815 rescue footage, that the woman in the scene with him is his caretaker, and not his wife or significant other (we learned this by watching the "enhanced" repeat version of the show - these versions run at 8p every Thursday and show the previous week's show with pop up factoids). Add that to the fact that Daniel has so far continually showed us that he's...a little off. Something is going on with him. The best guess so far is that he suffers from some sort of short term memory loss. Think about it, he couldn't remember why he was crying at the TV, he couldn't remember a simple three card Monty set up, and he regularly just seems out of it. But then why bring a "head case" (Naomi's words) onto such a mission? Could it be that only he knows something crucial about the Island, but can't remember exactly what?
Kate's a baby mamma!
Well then. In true Lost shocker form, we learn that Kate's "baby" is in fact Aaron (Claire's son...I hate to have to spell this out, but I got an alarming amount of questions as to who Aaron was). I have no answers to this development, and we are clearly stuck again with an effect that currently has no cause. But I think we can assume that Claire dies. How she dies, I have no idea. But let's not also forget that Aaron was basically deemed to be the "world's evilest baby" by that psychic that Claire saw in Australia. Again, not sure what's happening there, but it's important to remember. And while we're on the topic of Aaron, do we deem him to be one of the "Oceanic 6"? At first I said no, but the more I think about it, I can be convinced that he is. I mean, regardless of Kate's lie about the situation, the baby was born on the Island, and has now been rescued. I guess whether or not baby Aaron was indeed a "life" yet during the crash is a question that only an abortion clinic bomber can answer, but I think that until we hear otherwise, it's plausible that Aaron is our 5th survivor. He was rescued off the Island, after all.
Man, I think that's all I got this week. I thoroughly enjoyed "Eggtown" though, and hope that the rest of the season continues to be as strong as the start. And in what better way to end the post about "Eggtown" than to have a few Easter eggs:
Books, books, books...they are everywhere in Lost. Of particular interest this week though was what Sawyer was reading: "The Invention of Morel." A brief summary of the plot:"A fugitive hides on a deserted island somewhere in Polynesia. Tourists arrive, and his fear of being discovered becomes a mixed emotion when he falls in love with one of them. He wants to tell her his feelings, but an anomalous phenomenon keeps them apart."
Interesting.
Remember this dude outside of the courtroom in the Flash Forward? Well, no one could understand what he yelled at Kate until someone played it backwards. What he said: "we hate you!" Why would anyone hate a hero??I really wanted to find a picture of the "Breakfast Grenade" that Locke fed Miles but couldn't. There were no easter eggs or mysteries there (although I suppose you could argue that the grenade is yet another homage to an egg), I just thought that it was a wildly imaginative way to torture someone. Kudos to Locke for that one...Sayid has apparently taught you well.
See you next week....
posted by Rutherford at
4:14 PM
5 Comments:
hmm, nothing about why jack wouldn't want to see kate's baby? Maybe it's cause it's his niece? I mean, claire is his sister after all.
well, HALF sister, kev ;). But yes, I thought about why, but couldn't really come to a solid conclusion. I think we need to know what happens to Claire first to make any assumptions? Thanks for bringing it up, though, cause the nephew / half sister thing is important to remember (even if they don't know it yet).
Two things:
1)I haven't seen the episode in a while, but if you remember the episode way back when with Claire's psychic dude, he made it very clear that only Claire can raise the child. He kept saying it over and over. Maybe there will be some consequences to Kate taking the reigns in Aaron's life.
2)When I first watched the episode, I didn't think Daniel Faraday (sp?) was having trouble with his short term memory, but rather, Charlotte was quizzing him, as if he were having episodes like Desmond did going back in time and reliving his island experience. Does that make sense at all? Maybe I'm totally over analyzing it the time traveling theory...
Regarding the "8 survivors but only 6 made it off the island" topic. I think the other 2 referenced were Michael and Walt. When the O-815 6 are "found", they probably still don't know if Michael and Walt survived. (Last Jack and Kate saw, they were headed off on Ben's "specific coordinates" via a boat - probably the same coordinates that the helicoper dude just took- the only path on or off the island). So when the 6 were found, to be safe, they said there were originally 8, in case Michael and Walt turn up on a beach in Oahu (inside joke intended).
Great blog, by the way. Keep it up!
-gb-
great points guys: GB, I thought about Michael and Walt being the other two, but what it doesn't allow for is an "airtight" story for the other 6. If Jack claims that 8 survived the crash and only 6 made it back, then I think that we have to assume the other two died, right? And if Mike and Walt were still out there...wouldn't the rest of the world be looking for them? And if so, wouldn't that kind of jepardize the secrecy of the Island itself (and presuming that they made a "deal" to get off the Island I'm not sure that the people that saved them wants anyone back)? Good thought though...my personal theory is that Michael is Ben's "man on the boat" (he got those coordinates for a reason!).
Nikki: you're crazy ;) j/k. I do recall the psychic as mentioned in the blog, so I think that's a great thought about him going ape shit one day (or has he already?)
In terms of Faraday, I'm not sure I follow your train of thought, but folks have definitely theorized that he has time travel abilities...good stuff!
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