Episode Report Card Cindy McLennan: A | 2999 USERS: B- YOU GRADE IT Namaste Or Nama-Go Now?
By Cindy McLennan | Season 5 | Episode 9 | Aired on 2009.03.18
You know, I thought this episode was weird in that... it wasn't all that weird. For Lost, anyhow. And then I saw all my friends posting about it, and its overwhelming weirdness, and thought, "Hmmmm. Perhaps I need my weird-o-meter recalibrated." Then I spent the weekend immersed in the series finale of Battlestar Galactica, after which my weird-o-meter levitated and flew out of the house toward the sun, along with my forks, measuring cups, a trowel, toilet tissue, toothpaste, soap, bandages, crazy pills, and all my other hi-tech stuff like that there. And I share that, by way of explaining that a bitter, confused, shell of a woman is writing this recap, and if Lee Adama had his way, I'd be doing so in the sands of the Sahara, with my frakking finger. So let's thank heaven for small favors and move on. How was your weekend? What's that... the recap? Um, sure. Of course. Let's get to it, shall we?
Nighttime. We open up on Ajira flight 316, its tail lit as the plane glides above the clouds. In first class, Kate, Sun and Jack each sit alone. Sayid sits next to the dozing Ilana. Huh. Some marshal she is. Hurley has the guitar. Ben has his eviltude. Same old, same old. In the cockpit, the co-pilot thinks he's letting Frank in on a big secret when he shares that the big guy with the curly hair is one of the Oceanic 6. "Guy's got nerves of steel, man. He survives a full-on commercial airliner crash. Now he's back flying over the same South Pacific?" No, it's a different South Pacific, on New Earth. Sheeesh. Try to keep up, co-pilot dude. Frank (the character, not the actor) seems to have gone to the Joey Tribbiani smell-the-fart school of acting, because that's what we're getting for his poker face, when he says, "Yeah, well... Maybe he doesn't believe that lightning will strike twice in the same place." Oh, Frank, lightning strikes maybe once, maybe twice... The co-pilot chuckles, which is lightning's cue, or at least turbulence's cue. The people in the cabin wake and shake and bake. Back in the cockpit, Frank turns on the No Smoking; Fasten Your Seatbelt; Use Seat Bottom for Floatation; We Hope You're Wearing Depends Undergarments sign. Hurley tells Caesar he might want to buckle up, then pulls down his sleeping mask, because he already knows he doesn't want to see what's going to happen to him. Back in the cockpit, things go south, fast. In the cabin, luggage falls out of the overheads. The passengers are in a tizzy. In the cockpit again, Frank shuts off the auto-pilot and takes the controls. In First Class, the flight attendant gets thrown around and things are pretty much upside down. The buzzing comes first and then the FLASH!