Episode Report Card Erin: A+ | 2 USERS: A YOU GRADE IT Say goodbye to reality, Uncle Arvin.
By Erin | Season 4 | Episode 16 | Aired on 04.19.2005
Hell-Lay. Syd and Vaughn are hanging out on the Balcony of Revelatory Announcements. Jack walks up. Syd thanks him for coming, and Jack comments that she sounded desperate on the phone so, like, what is it? Vaughn pipes up that for the past month, he's been investigating leads -- "Which suggest your father is still alive," interrupts Jack. "So? What did you discover?" Heh. Vaughn's trying to be all dramatic and intense here and Jack's just like, yeah. Cut to the chase, soldier boy. Vaughn tells Jack about the Non-Dead Daddy Vaughn Hoax and how Sloane was apparently behind the whole thing. Jack's like, what possible motive would Arvin Sloane have to do something like that? Vaughn's all snitty and bitchy and he says that Sloane wanted him to steal the Rambaldi thingy and he hasn't reformed and he's still after the same things he's always been after: Rambaldi and world domination. "There's more," says Syd. Uh-oh. Syd tells Jack that it wasn't Irina who was behind the contract on her life; it was Sloane. And she's seen the bank records that prove it. "I'm sorry, Dad," she says. "We should notify the agency. Chase --" "No," says Jack with a steely expression. "I'll handle everything." That is NEVER a good thing, by the way. When Jack "handles" something, it winds up blown up or dead. Or both.
Torture Chamber of Wayward Professors. Bad Baldy removes the hood that's over Dr. Sinclair's head, and she asks him what he wants. He says nothing. Just then, a door at the end of the room opens up, slicing blue light across the floor. It looks like they're in the middle of some empty industrial space. There's a desk in front of Sinclair. A small figure makes its way across the floor. "Welcome, Professor Sinclair," says the ooky voice of Arvin Clone.
Back in Hell-Lay, we're in a men's room somewhere. Jack enters and slowly walks across the room. Waiting for him is Sloane, leaning against a wall next to a row of urinals. What, they couldn't do this out at some oil plant or something? We have to look at urinals during one of the best scenes of the season? Guh.
"What's this about, Jack?" Sloane says impatiently. Jack suddenly grabs Sloane and shoves him up against the wall. "You can't imagine what it felt like," spits Jack, not even bothering to keep his emotions in check, "looking into the face of the woman I once shared a life with, and with a single bullet, ending that life. I ran through every scenario. Why? What was the purpose in having me believe the only way to save my daughter's life was to kill her mother?" Sloane almost effortlessly shoves Jack off. Heh. He's little, but he's mighty. Jack goes on to surmise that Sloane did it to get at Sydney, to drive a wedge between the two of them. Sloane just blinks his lids slowly like the Galapagos lava lizard that he is. "I had nothing to do with Irina's death," he says calmly. And that's when Jack pulls out his gun and presses it to Sloane's right temple. "One good reason why I shouldn't do to you," says Jack, "what I did to my wife." I honestly can't think of any, Jack. Pull the damn trigger. Oh, okay, don't. The show's no fun without Commander Batshit Crazy around to entertain us.