Episode Report Card Cindy McLennan: B+ | 739 USERS: A- YOU GRADE IT How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb
By Cindy McLennan | Season 5 | Episode 3 | Aired on 2009.01.28
In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.Fitting an entire nut tree into a nutshell is tricky, but here goes nuttin'. (I am not even sorry about that). Penny gives birth to Desmond's son and they name him Charlie! This makes me tear up, but then cackle, because although I'm sure he's named for our Charlie, Charles is Mr. Widmore's first name. Two years later after Charlie Hume's birth, the little family sails back to Old Blighty so Des can find Faraday's mother at Oxford. Desmond swears he'll only spend a day on it all, and that Penny's father will never know they're there. Penny asks him to promise that he won't go back to the island, and while Des scoffs at the very idea, he never does promise. There's no record of any Faraday ever employed at Oxford, so Des snoops in Daniel's old lab, which has been sealed with a fumigation warning, but that's just a ruse. Desmond finds papers scattered about and the equipment shrouded, and a picture of Daniel and a pretty young blonde woman. A workman finds him in the abandoned lab and informs him that Daniel was involved in wild experiments in which he was trying to send rats' brains back in time. And then there was some girl to whom he did ghastly things...
That girl is Teresa Spencer, and although she's lying in her bed, seemingly in a vegetative state, her sister Abigail informs Desmond that Teresa is "away" right now, but sometimes she'll wake up thinking she's 3, and other times she'll claim to have been talking to their dad who has been dead 5 years. After his research left Teresa in this condition, Daniel abandoned her -- ran off to the States, and it's only thanks to Charles Widmore, Daniel's research benefactor, that Theresa is getting good care. Des mans up and goes to see Widmore, who gives him an L.A. address for Faraday's mum, in exchange for Desmond's promise that he'll take Penny back into hiding, and keep her safe. Assuming Hawking is the mother, I guess the lab from The Lie wasn't in Oxford, after all, and Ben's trip to it is more straightforward, now. Speaking of lies, Des lies to Penny that Faraday's mother is dead. She calls him on it, so he admits Ma Faraday's in L.A. Desmond won't leave Penny again, not for this or anything, so Penny says then they'll all go to L.A., together. How I love them.
Charlotte's having headaches and double-vision as she, Daniel, Miles, and two Redshirts trudge through the jungle to the creek. Miles realizes a skosh too late that it's surrounded by landmines. Bye-bye Redshirts and hello commandos. About a half-dozen of them, armed with bows and (non-flaming) arrows surround Charlotte, Daniel, and Miles, and a blonde woman, Ellie, follows behind, and trains her rifle on them. They lead Daniel and crew to the Others' camp. Daniel notices burns on an Other's hands and when he combines that info with intel Miles got from a fresh grave, the wheels of his amazing mind start turning. When Richard greets them, he assumes Daniel and crew are U.S. military (because the military was testing H-bombs there) so they let him think that. Daniel realizes there's a hydrogen bomb on the island that needs to be disarmed, so he offers to do it. As proof that he's not on a suicide mission, he confesses he's in love with Charlotte; Richard takes him at his word.
Meanwhile, Locke, Juliet, and Sawyer march two commandos through the jungle; one is Brit Boy, whose uniform name reads Jones (Jughead's last name). He and his comrade speak to one another in Latin, which Juliet says is an Others thing. She talks the second commando into telling her where Richard Alpert is, but Brit snaps his comrade's neck before he reveals the location. When Brit runs off, Locke can't make himself shoot Brit, because they're "his" people.
Ellie takes Daniel out to the bomb, with the name "Jughead" on the side (which was a model of H-bomb used in 1954). Daniel realizes it won't blow up the island, because the island's still around 50 years hence. He tells Ellie he's from the future, and that all she needs to do is have her people seal it with lead, bury it in concrete, and stop worrying about it. Meanwhile, Locke, Juliet and Sawyer track Brit Jones back to Richard's camp. Locke gives Juliet and Sawyer a 10 minute head-start to go after Ellie and Daniel Faraday. They do, and Juliet coaxes Sawyer and Ellie into dropping their weapons.
Locke goes down to the camp, and tells Richard that Jacob sent him. Richard orders Brit to drop the weapon he has trained on Locke. When Brit doesn't comply, Richard says, "I said, put the gun down, Widmore." And yep, it's Charles, which doesn't escape Locke. He presents Richard with the compass, a little back-story, and the information that he's their leader. When he learns it's currently 1954, Locke tells Richard that he (Locke) will be born on May 30, 1956 -- and if Richard doesn't believe him, he should come visit him. Before Richard can or will give Locke information on how to get off the island, there's a flash, and he, Sawyer and Juliet, Miles and Charlotte, and Daniel have all jumped in time. They're not too far off from one another and regroup where the camp was. Charlotte seems fine for a moment, but then falls to the ground, and her nose starts to bleed buckets. Daniel cradles her in his arms and we fade to black. Bad robot!
Things I can't help but wonder -- is Ellie actually Eloise Hawking (Daniel Faraday's mother)? They're both rocking Heidi-esque hair. If she's one in the same, she hasn't aged as well as Widmore; no wonder she's so stern. Also, will Daniel's love somehow make him Charlotte's constant? I've got to re-watch that episode. Will she live? If she doesn't, will we still see her around the island? I'll be back with the full recap next week.
Want more? The full recap starts right below!Welcome back to the third hour of this season's Lost! Was that the longest week ever? That didn't involve donkey-wheel propelled time manipulation, that is? I'm thinking yes. This is a foundational episode, dusted with glittering call-backs from the Continuity Fairy's wand, so let's allow the magic to work its will. We open on a beach that tries to trick me into thinking it's our island's beach in times long past (or yet to come, or something), but that would be too linear. Instead, it seems to be a beach in the Philippines. I say this because the closed captioning reports that people are speaking in a Filipino dialect and because at some point we see a sign bearing a small Philippine Islands flag, which reads Mabuhay and Google indicates that's a Tagalog greeting. Desmond runs along the beach (run Des, run) and through an adjacent marketplace yelling, "Efren Salonga," over and over until he finds what he's looking for, i.e. Efren Salonga -- which is not a what or a which, but a whom -- a doctor (not a witch doctor and not Dr. Who; which I note because either option could also work on this show). The good doctor is gambling in some sort of gambling... er... hut. As you can tell, I got this gig thanks to my extensive vocabulary. Dr. Salonga follows Des back to the boat. Des yells about there being "a lot of blood" but doesn't quantify that for the doctor. Poor Penny waits below deck, alone and... IN LABOR!
Dr Salonga and Des help Penny deliver her child with the biggest-ass pair of forceps you can imagine. I mean they're toss-his-eff'n-salonga-overboard big; you could deliver something the approximate size of the inside of a Tardis with those puppies. Now, I'm crying, not just because of the forceps which I've mostly and conveniently blocked out, but because of the BABY! (yay), who is also crying. And thank goodness for that, because that means he's breathing, although it might also mean he's not happy being smeared with plum puree and rice cereal ala tapioca, or whatever it is they've put on this little one so that he looks fresh from the oven. Whatever, it's a boy, and he thinks his hands are tasty. Pen and Des are too in love to realize their son is licking off amniotic goop, but their love brings so much light to this dark show I'll give them a pass.