Episode Report Card Erin: C- | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT "André"? Seriously? That's the best you could do?
By Erin | Season 5 | Episode 1 | Aired on 09.28.2005
We return from the break to a hospital room, where Vaughn's having a million imaginary bullets pulled from his chest. That's probably an alien's body under there or something. They had it shipped in from Nevada. Jack shows up, and Syd tells him that Vaughn's still in surgery and no one's told her anything about his condition. Jack just looks at her and then launches into his version of "I told you so." He's basically like, uh, way to run off to help your total criminal of a fiancé, honey. He tells her about Renée Rienne and she's all, dude. Way ahead of you. Already know that. Jack's all, uh, then, what're we talkin' here? Why'd you risk your life for a guy who was working with a known criminal? And that's the precise moment that Syd decides to tell her father that he's going to be a grandpa, even though she's not really answering the question. I mean, Syd went off to help Vaughn before she found out she was pregnant, so…I think I need to grab yet another delicious bat guano and river rat martini. Excuse me.
There's a beautiful moment that Victor Garber has where his face goes from "Dammit, Sydney!" to "Oh, honey!" in about two seconds flat. Syd swears she'll explain everything to him. The doctor exits the operating room and informs Syd that Vaughn's in recovery, but he sustained extensive organ damage. Syd wants to see him and the doctor says she can wait in his room until he wakes up. Then he walks off to write an email to Ripley's Believe or Not: "Dear Sirs: I never believed in miracles until the day a man who'd been shot four gazillion times in the chest got wheeled into my operating room AND HE WAS STILL ALIVE."
Jack turns to his daughter and declares that he's going to do everything he can to help her and Vaughn. Syd just kind of nods at him and walks off, and again, there's this great moment where Jack's face is like, "Honey? Where ya goin'? Need a hug? Oh, never mind. Moment of opportunity missed. God, I'm a cold-hearted jackass." His phone rings. It's Dix. Gordo wasn't Special Investigations at all; he went off the grid two years ago. How the fuck did that guy get through the door at APO, then? What, they don't do extensive background checks on people who come knocking at their door about potential double agents? The fuck?
Syd goes to see Vaughn and, in yet another glaring lapse of reality, he's actually awake. And coherent. And I'll tell you one thing: my father went through six hours of surgery for esophageal cancer and when he came out of it, he was awake, all right. He was also on morphine, terrified, flailing, and kept trying to show us his catheter. And he was like that FOR THREE DAYS. And, yes, it was funny. But it was only funny on the fourth day, when I convinced him that I was a Puerto Rican waitress and he was on leave and his glass of water was actually a cerveza muy fría. But I have a note for the writers: don't try to tell me that someone with severe organ damage just leaves the operating room and is in a regular room fifteen minutes later without a billion tubes coming out of their body and not knowing where they are, okay? A little reality check here woulda been nice, buds.