Previously on Alias, it was the year 1969 and men landed on the moon. Or maybe Hitler threw down his paintbrush because he couldn't get the landscape right and minced off to declare war on a bunch of innocent people. Perhaps it was 1888 and an unfortunate woman's body was discovered in a rank alleyway in the East End of London. No, wait, it was that time when that guy invented cheese. Or pasteurization or something. Maybe I'm confused. Maybe it's been so long since the last damn episode that the "previouslys" actually pull footage from the fucking STONE AGE in order to bring us all up to date on what in the hell is going on.
Seriously? Let's run through the previouslys here. Syd wakes up with a scar on her stomach. She's lost TWO YEARS of her life. Jack wants Vaughn to stop being nice to Sydney. Lindsay Crouse tells Syd that "This woman here depicted will possess unseen marks, signs that she will be the one to bring forth my works; at vulgar costs, this woman will render the greatest power, unto utter desolation," and then we see a picture of a woman that's supposedly Syd, only, like, sketched on ancient goatskin or something. Sark burns Papa Lazarey with a mini blowtorch. And the box Syd nabbed from the hotel where she and Will did the nasty actually holds a vial of genuine no-kidding living Rambaldi tissue. If all of this means nothing to you, then I suggest you go back and read every last damn recap from the beginning of time, because, y'all? If you're heading blind into this episode, you are gonna be one sorry puppy.
Marshall's Office of Omnigeeks. A bunch of suits are messing with the Rambaldi tissue. They're taking notes, snapping photos, pretending to analyze it in their flashy white lab coats that make them feel all special and "scientific." Finally, they lock up the box and head out. Elsewhere at Oops Center, Marshall's paying homage to the Brady family by constructing a house of cards at some random desk. Syd walks up and asks if he's had a chance to analyze the tissue. Marshall's all, dude, I wish. Unfortunately, a big bunch of bureaucratic beeyotches are all up in my kitchen and playing with my tissue. And that's not supposed to be as pornographic as it sounds.
Syd's all, whuh? In the whuh whuh? Marshall's all, did I stutter? Oh. Wait. Yeah, I usually do stutter. Sorry about that. Um, the Bureaucratic Beeyotches are from some secret government agency, and they're taking our cute little cube o' tissue away. Syd's all, where? Marshall's all, dude? I just work here. You think they TELL me crap like that? You know, just for kicks, I really should put a tracer on the package just to see where they take it. That'd be cool. Then I could see inside their offices and look at them naked and think about kumquats…
Syd totally ignores him, something catching her eye on the other side of the center. It's the BBs, and they're heading, en masse, to lands unknown. Syd intercepts them and asks the head BB whassup. He's all, we're taking the flesh, or hadn't you noticed? Syd's all, yeah, I picked up on that. But what I want to know is, WHERE are you taking it. Head BB's all, well, that's for me to know and you to find out. We're from the Department of Special Research, baby, and we don't spill our guts to just anyone. Unless, of course, you have a bottle of Southern Comfort hidden somewhere on your person, in which case, a few slugs of that and we'll sing like shadowy governmental canaries, sister.
After the head BB blows her off, Syd does what any highly respected CIA agent would do: she runs to her daddy. She's pissed that every time they get even remotely close to learning about her Lost Years, they somehow wind up even further away from the truth. Syd spits and spews about how Lazarey led her to the cube and before it was handed off to the BBs, she would have appreciated it if Marshall could have at least finished his report on it. Jack shuts her up by saying that they've already pretty much broken every damn law in the books in order to uncover the Lost Years, and he's confident that, moving forward, they'll go ahead and break any laws that remain. Hell, they'll even invent a few and break THOSE for good measure! But for now, sadly, there's really nothing they can do. Syd wants to bring Dixon into the loop. Well, okay, Syd, but I really don't see how that's going to help anything. He doesn't even like you anymore. Jack just tells her that the order to remove the box came from Langley. Syd frets that there has to be something they can do. Jack says that they can start by reevaluating every last piece of information they've collected so far, starting from the beginning. Oh, okay, Jack. Nothing like pushing paper around when there's a living piece of Rambaldi flesh on the loose. Way to be proactive. I'm sure that if Syd's head were on fire, Jack would just look at her calmly and say, "Yes, I know your head's on fire. What we need to do is go back and look at the origin of fire itself. Determine its creation and uses. Then we'll be on the track to finding a solution. Here. Have a Slushee."
Cut to later that night at Syd's most awesome house. Have I mentioned yet how much I love her new most awesome house? I love it. I love it. I love it. It's all wood and West Elm and soft glowing lights and supposedly in Manhattan Beach, which is just, sigh. Right. So, anyway, Syd's following Spy Daddy's instructions and she's got acres of paper spread out on her bed. She's poring over everything with an intense look of concentration on her face. Then she hears a noise outside. She grabs her gun and heads out to investigate. We see a shadow pass behind her. She goes back inside, and gets shot in the back with a tranq dart. Ouch.
We're then treated to a shot of a plane taking off in a sunset, although I thought it was already night, but, you know, it's been so long since I've watched a new episode of this show, I've probably just forgotten to turn off my what-the-fuck-o-meter, because discrepancies like this used to just roll right over me like water off a duck's back. Excuse me while I just flick the switch on this little hummer. Ahhh. That's better.
Syd regains consciousness on an ugly plaid pillow and sits up. She looks around and sees Kendall sitting across the aisle from her. Oh, HEE! I missed you, Kendall! Welcome back, you ol' baldy, you! "Good to see you," he says to Syd, showing some of the inner essence of Terry O'Quinn which, I am told, is incredibly sweet and nice and good-humored. Syd's all, uh, what the? "You're part of this?" "Well, that all depends on which part you're referring to," he says good-naturedly. Heh. "You're Covenant," she says, her eyes narrowing. "No!" he says, almost chuckling. "No no. No, that wouldn't go over too well at home. No, I'm with Special Research." His Rambaldi Flesh Transport team was ambushed and the Covenant got the cube.
Syd's all, and? This has to do with me how? Kendall comes over to her and tells her that it has everything to do with her and that they need to talk about the Lost Years. Syd's all, dude? Didn't you read the memo? I can't remember anything about the Lost Years. Kendall's all, oh, keep yer panties on! I know you can't remember anything! I can, however. "I know what happened to you, Sydney," he says. "I know the whole story. Or…most of it." "You've known…" hisses Syd. "All this time…" "Yeah," says Kendall in this sort of "yup" tone that's just hilarious. He's like, yup yup yup. Sure did. You want some coffee with this big reveal? Donut? Aunt Jemima buttermilk pancakes with extra syrup? "Why haven't you said anything?" asks Syd. "Because you asked me not to," says Kendall. D'oh!
And now is the time on Alias when we dance.
Back on Regurgitation Airlines, the Exposition Fairy enters the cabin from the cockpit, her captain's hat askew, and parks it in the corner with a copy of Variety and a bowl of macadamia nuts. "Y'all?" she says, picking a nut out of her left molar. "You think maybe you could get on with this whole Lost Years thing? I got an appointment for a Brazilian wax in about twelve hours and, at the rate you two are molasses-ing your way through this goddamn storyline, I'm afraid I won't make it. So let's pick up the pace, dammit! Mr. Exposition Fairy likes his honey smooth, ya know what I'm sayin'?"
Kendall tells Syd to put her hand on a scanner and then reads a statement that pretty much just makes her swear not to tell anyone, ever, about what she's about to hear. Not even if they tickle her and make her pee her pants. Not even then. "Before we get started," says Kendall, "I'm curious about how you found the cube. What led you to it?" Syd's all, are you joking with this shit? "Start at the beginning and do it now," she snaps. "I'm all out of patience." Hee. Syd's kicking Kendall's ass. Nice. Also? Since when did Kendall ALLOW his ass to be kicked, huh? What, he goes from being the biggest bureaucratic badass to this mincy smiling nice guy? I am so confused.
Well, looks like I'd better get used to being confused, because look out -- Kendall's starting his tale. He tells her that she died. As far as the CIA was concerned, she was a goner. The DNA of the body in the burned-out apartment matched Syd's, so everyone just assumed she was a goner. Kendall even went to Syd's memorial service. Aw. Did he send flowers? A nice big wreath with "Sorry to see ya go, kiddo!" scrawled across it in gold letters? Class-ay. "Nine months went by," continues Kendall. "One day, I got a phone call. It was your voice. You were calling from Rome. You said you had just escaped from the Covenant. You wanted to come in." We get a shot of Syd in a very realistic blonde wig, talking into a public phone and gesturing with her hands. She and Kendall meet up at a safe house in Tuscany. Speaking of Tuscany, I wish I were there RIGHT NOW.
At the safe house, Syd's going a wee bit mental, pacing around, asking if her dad or Vaughn knows she's alive. She's all twiggy and shit, and finally Kendall demands that she just cut the crap and tell him what happened to her. Back on the plane, Kendall explains that Syd's disguise was unfamiliar to him (duh) and that he had a lot of questions back then, seeing as the U.S. government knew to nothing about the Covenant at the time. Yeah, whatever. Get back with the whole Lost Years explanation. "I second that emotion!" shouts the Exposition Fairy, spraying nut crumbs all over her crumpled tutu.
Kendall then tells Syd that she took a deep breath and told him exactly what happened to her, in her own words. Well, I'd hope they'd be her own words. Who else's words could they be? Britney's? Mandy Moore's? Jessica Simpson's? Man. You'd better hope it wasn't any one of their words; those dingbats can't put a decent sentence together between the lot of 'em.
And now, for your reading pleasure, The Tale of the Lost Years.
After shooting the Francinator, Syd passed out. When she woke up, it was days later, and she was strapped down in the back of a van. (Feel free to shout "DOWN BY THE RIVER" after that sentence. I know I did. Poor Chris Farley. Poor Chris Farley and his mound of coke. Aw.) Syd wakes up rather violently and sees the creepy Russian scientist guy she shot back in the first episode of the season. He tells her they're going to work together. Syd can't respond, due to the rather large piece of duct tape slapped onto her mouth. He shoots her full of a neurotoxin that paralyzes her temporarily. She can't move or speak; all she can do is watch. And emote. And grunt. And wiggle her eyebrows. God. Some neurotoxin! I really hope he saved the receipt on that one.
Creepy Russian Guy (I'm assuming he's Russian -- his accent is dubious) moves Syd to a vertical position so that she's facing the windows. He blah blahs something about Syd's roommate being easy and how they unearthed her body and planted her in the apartment. Syd was a more difficult case. Basically, they just burned the shit out of some random body so badly that the only way it could be identified was through the DNA in the teeth. Luckily, they'd somehow extracted pulp from Syd's teeth while she was out and just plugged it into Unfortunate Dead Syd Stand-In back at the Ovary Electric. Yeah. I don't know. No idea.
While Creepy Russian Guy is blabbling on, we watch as the men in Syd's life gather together on a beach, listening to a priest talk as the waves crash in the distance. How sad is it that there's not one woman in Syd's inner circle? Francie's dead, her mom's AWOL, and all she has left is Jack, Dixon, Kendall, Marshall, Weiss, and Vaughn. I mean, they're great and all, but that's still really sad. Of the mourners, Jack looks traditionally stoic, Dixon looks extraordinarily pissed off, and Vaughn just looks terribly pained. As the rest of the men look on, Vaughn tosses Syd's ashes into the sea. Of course, some of the ashes just fling back onto his legs and all I could think of was The Big Lebowski and "Shut the fuck up, Donny" and this whole scene totally didn't make me cry the way it was supposed to, which totally wasn't its fault or anything, it's just this: funerals are funny. And flinging ashes is funnier. Sorry. But it's true.
Jack's face cringes in pain as Vaughn slings the last of the ashes to sea. Then the mourners walk up the hillside, right past the VW van with totally black windows where Syd's making paralysis-fighting facial expressions and Creepy Russian Guy just won't shut the fuck up. Yeah. Nobody thinks its weird that a couple of surfers would have tinted windows in their VAN. Nope. Nobody thinks that's weird at all. Vaughn goes to put his key into his car and Weiss stops him, pulling him in for a totally non-gay but also non-typical-heterosexual hug. Like, there is NO back-slapping going on, people. Vaughn breaks down, and Weiss just continues to hug him. Aw. Sniff.
"He vill morn and move on," snits CRG. "Find somevone else, perhaps." Oh, shut up, CRG. I haven't thought about Lauren Reed for almost a month now and it's been bliss. Put a lid on the "somevone else" talk, all right? Syd watches her boyfriend in pain and can only make frowning motions with her eyebrows. CRG tries to get Syd to believe that Sydney Bristow is gone. Tears spill down her cheeks. We hit the Unfriendly Skies again as Syd wonders why she can't remember any of this. Kendall's all, we'll get to that! Hold yer horses! We got all the time in the world!
"Oh no we don't!" shouts the Exposition Fairy. "The clock is tickin' and I ain't talking about the biological one, right? Jesus. This is SO easy to do! They tried to brainwash her. It didn't take. Because she's a Christmas Project mutant or Nativity Organization freak something. So she faked her identity change into Julia Thorne. She totally knew she wasn't really Julia. Then she worked with the Covenant. Then got out. Contacted Kendall. Continued to work with the Covenant. Slept with Soymoan (siiiigh). Worked with Lazarey. Nabbed Rambaldi's flesh. Found out her eggs were needed to make possible the second coming of Rambaldi. She freaked. Hid the Rambaldi flesh. Wiped her memory. thing you know, she's in Hong Kong with a raging headache and a gaping hole where her memory used to be. There. Done. CAN WE GO NOW?"
Oh ho ho. Not so fast, Mrs. Fairy. There are forty more minutes to this episode, and it's MY job to recap them. Not that I'm totally loving my job at this moment, because FLASHBACK EPISODE ANYONE? But it's my job and I have to do it, so I'll kindly ask you to STEP OFF. Kendall shows Syd a picture of Creepy Russian Guy and tells her that his name is Oleg and that he's the one who was with her in the van, and he took her to some Covenant facility outside St. Petersburg. Syd recognizes him as the man she shot back in episode one. The scene where Syd shot him is then replayed, you know, in case we don't REMEMBER IT. If you want a recap of that scene, however, you'll just have to read the recap for yourself. Homey don't play recap the recap. Syd wants to know what Oleg did to her. Kendall tells her that the Covenant needed her cooperation, that it was somehow crucial to their operation. Of course, Syd wasn't about to cooperate, so, you know, they just had to brainwash and torture her a little bit. You know, for fun!
We get extended shots of Syd being tortured and brainwashed and generally beaten to a pulp. Sensory deprivation. Electroshock. Oleg even ran an IV with a barbiturate into one arm, then shocked Syd awake with an amphetamine IV into the other arm. Nice. "I will kill you, you son-of-a-bitch!" Syd shouts at him while shaking with amphetamines. "I promise you!" Once Oleg believed Syd had been broken, he started with a reconditioning process, trying to program Syd to think that her name was Julia Thorne and that she was born in 1973 in London. "My name is Sydney Bristow, you ugly bastard," is all Syd has to respond. Heh.
All righty. More hypnosis, narcotics, and solitary confinement scenes. If you like that sort of thing, then I suggest you go right back and watch your tape again. Because Homey also don't recap the useless expository torture scenes. Especially ones involving the eating of rancid dog food, followed closely by the vomiting up of rancid dog food. I mean, hey, the whole sequence is very well done and thoroughly creepy, but if I tell you that Sydney was tortured and brainwashed for nearly nine months, you'd know what I meant, yeah? Yeah.
The details that Oleg tries to feed Syd about Julia Thorne's past are that Kenneth Thorne was her father, Daniel and Tom were her two brothers, she had her confirmation at All Souls Church, and her entire family died in a fire. I'm not sure if any of this has any significance, but if Lauren Reed turns out to, like, BE Julia Thorne or something, I thought I'd better mention it in order to give all the conspiracy theorists out there a head start. After losing her family, this Julia Thorne became a contract killer, and her first targets were the men who destroyed her family. While Oleg's yammering at her about Julia's past, Syd looks straight ahead at a screen showing what looks like a child's birthday party. Oh, and she looks like two tons of sleep-deprived dogshit in a two-pound bag.
The shot we see of Syd, she's cleaned up and sitting at a table, reading a book. Oleg enters and says, "Julia?" Syd puts away her book and looks up. "Yes?" Oleg serves her lunch, and Syd's face holds almost no emotion. Back in present time, Kendall tells Syd that, once Oleg believed she was ready, he gave her a test that proved that she believed she was actually another woman. We switch to the smoky interior of some room. Uh-oh. Smoker. A smoker is in the room. Badness and evil are just around the corner, my friends. Smokers are naughty. Naughty naughty! Nice people never smoke! Only naughty ones! Speaking of which, if you'll excuse me, I have to go lick a box of American Spirits.
Oleg enters the smoky room and introduces Sydney. She enters, dressed in a periwinkle suit and sporting a blonde wig. At the table in front of her are several people whose faces we can't see. One of them speaks up, and yeah, it totally sounds like Quentin Tarantino, obviously reprising his role as McKenas Cole, a.k.a. "Shovelhead." More on that in a second. Some guy is wheeled into the room in a wheelchair. Shovelhead orders Syd to kill the guy in the wheelchair. She stabs him without even flinching. We get a glimpse of the dudes at the table, but I can't identify anyone. One sorta looks like Sloane, but I can't be sure. Again, more on this in a minute.
Regurgitation Airlines. Syd wants to know who the guy in the wheelchair was. Kendall has no idea. "So, I was programmed," surmises Syd. "No," says Kendall. "Not by the Covenant." Well, if not them, then who else? The same guy who programmed Michael Jackson to think that it's not only okay to sleep with little kids, but that it's also okay to announce it to the world while wearing BLUE SATIN? Kendall gets up and walks over to this twee little coffee pot and pours himself this twee little cup of coffee. I have no idea why this cracked me up, but it just did. Like, he drops a bomb on Syd and just has to have some Starbucks? Poured from the world's SMALLEST coffee carafe? The whuh?
Syd's just as confused as I am. She doesn't know how she could just murder a guy without having been programmed first. Kendall reminds her that Spy Daddy put her through Project Christmas when she was a kid. Syd's all, yeah, yeah, yeah, my dad sucks at the parenting thing. Tell me something I DON'T know. Kendall's all, dude? Project Christmas made you virtually immune to programming. Get it? No, really, do ya get it? Syd wasn't programmed. During that whole scene. She was only pretending to be Julia Thorne. Which means that she pretty much killed that dude in cold blood and didn't even flinch.
So, now, we have to backtrack for a moment. See, when Syd entered that room as Julia Thorne, if that really was Quentin Tarantino doing the talking, then Syd would have known him. So, what, she enters the room, and she's supposed to not know who he is? And then not mention the fact that Shovelhead is back and he's the head of the Covenant to Kendall when she meets up with him in Tuscany, where she's supposedly spilling this whole load of horseshit? Huh? Also? If Sloane was in that room as well (which he very well may have been), wouldn't Syd have mentioned THAT fact to Kendall? My point is, there's no way Shovelhead and Sloane could have been at the table without Kendall, and by default, US, knowing about it, because at the time that Syd told Kendall her whole story, her memory hadn't been wiped yet, so she would have remembered EVERYTHING. And I think Shovelhead and Sloane heading up the Covenant would have been a pretty important tidbit of info to impart upon old Baldy McBalderton over here.
Aaaaaanyway…Syd's not too pleased with herself for offing the innocent dude. Kendall tries to convince her that she had no choice, but she still mopes about it for a bit anyway. We return to the safe house in Tuscany where Syd's moaning about wanting to go home and wanting to see her dad. Kendall informs her that Jack's under deep cover and can't be contacted. Oh, reaaaaally? Isn't that interesting? Deep cover for what? I thought he was in prison this entire time. Hmmm. Kendall tells Syd that if she returns home, she's going to endanger the lives of everyone she loves. Oh, and if the intel's correct, the Covenant has the potential to be far deadlier than the Alliance ever was. "Which is why you need to continue as Julia Thorne," finishes Kendall. Syd's all, oh, bite me, Baldy. Kendall's all, dude? If you don't go back to them, they're going to come after you. And your family. And your VAUGHN.
That's all Sydney needs. She's all, Vaughn? Did you say Vaughn? I think my thighs just went up in flames. Oh, I need to see him. I need to see him RIGHT NOW. Kendall's all, dude? It's been nine months. And the way he says it, you can totally tell that he knows about Vaughn and his whore -- erm, I mean, "girlfriend." Syd doesn't give a damn. "He loves me," she says. "Nine months is nothing." She storms out in her kickin' leather jacket and heads home for the great reunion. Except that, when she gets there, she sees Vaughn and Lauren getting out of a car, laughing and happy and -- OW! MY EYES! THEY'RE KISSING! AAAAAAAGGGGHHHH!
Ahem. I wonder if Syd looked at Lauren, then caught a glimpse of herself in the side mirror and went, "Dude! I look JUST LIKE HER! Even my eyebrows are darker than my hair! What the?" Because I know I sure as hell shouted that at my TV screen when I saw it. Like one big "duh," this episode is. Syd, after seeing her beloved with his skank -- erm, I mean, "girlfriend," decides that she can't confront him, because seconds after the Disgusting Duo leave the scene, a car with two thugs drives by, and Syd sees one of them talking into an earpiece. For some reason, this indicates to Syd that her confronting Vaughn will only put him in danger.
Syd picks up her cell phone and calls Kendall. "I'll do whatever you want," she says, hanging up on him before he can respond. "And that's how we started working together," says Kendall, back on the Exposition Express to Boring Storyville, Population: Two. Syd became Julia. We get an extended shot of Sydulia stalking down a supposedly European sidewalk, looking extremely hot, as No Doubt's version of "It's My Life" pulses over the soundtrack. I'd have preferred the original Talk Talk version, but then, my soft spot for eighties bands and music knows no bounds.
Apparently, Syd was sent to Algeria to meet with Soymoan. Hi, Soymoan! Sigh. Too bad we only get a damn 8 x 10 photo of him instead of the real flesh and blood version. Mmmm…flesh…Soymoan…mmmm. Excuse me. Anyway, Sydulia and Soymoan started working together, and their mission was to find the Rambaldi Cube o' Flesh. While Syd worked with the Covenant and Soymoan, she kept Kendall in the loop by passing on intelligence to CIA operatives in the field.
Then, one day, Syd informed Kendall that Soymoan had found Lazarey. You'll forgive me if I don't recap Kendall's complete explanation of just who Lazarey is; if you know what's good for you, you'll go back and read all the damn recaps. They're far more entertaining than this episode and A MUCH FASTER READ. I'm of the opinion that this episode tends to toss a bunch of explanatory crap in with the more meaningful stuff because, well, it HAS been a month since the last episode; god knows what we've remembered or forgotten.
So, anyway, it was believed by the Covenant that Lazarey knew the whereabouts of the Rambaldi Cube o' Flesh. Soymoan told Syd that she was supposed to get the info out of Lazarey, then kill him. As it turned out, she saved his life. Syd went to Lazarey the night before she was supposed to kill him and struck a deal with him. They faked Lazarey's death in order to put on a show for whomever might be watching on the closed circuit cameras. Lazarey was even carted off in an ambulance. Once inside, he rips off his own neck wound. Hee. And ew.
Unfriendly Skies. Syd starts spewing at Kendall about how she wants to know what she's doing here, why's he telling her all this now, and where in the HELL are they going? He tells her that they're going to his facilities in Nevada: Project Black Hole. Heh. Heh heh. "Four years ago when I was called in to question you?" he says. "I was never FBI. I was Special Research, called in to oversee the project." "I've never heard of Project Black Hole," says Syd. "Thank you," says Kendall with this really cute, really proud smile on his face. Hee.
Kendall then hands over a file that has everything ever collected on Rambaldi since the mid-1940s. Syd pages through the file as Kendall tells her that the Covenant believes in the Rambaldi prophecies, and they also believe that Syd is, indeed, The Chosen One. Syd pauses at a picture of the Prophecy page that holds a drawing of a woman who looks remarkably like Syd. Syd recollects that her mother, just before she dove off that building in Mexico, said as much. Oooh! Lena Olin! Hi, Lena! Come back! Irina tells her daughter that she's the one in the prophecy and that's all we get of Lena Olin, dammit!
And we're back with Kendall. He says the Covenant thought that if they had Syd and the Rambaldi Cube o' Flesh, they'd have everything they needed to fulfill Rambaldi's prophecy. Syd continued to work for the Covenant, but she was really working for the CIA, and she and Lazarey were working together to find the Cube. They finally found it nine months later. It was in the Fish River Gorge in Namibia. Yes, it's a real place. It's the second largest canyon in the world. What's the first? Why, I'm glad you asked. That would be the Grand Canyon, ladies and gentleman. Thank you! Thank you! Don't forget to tip your Google!
Then we travel to Palm Desert, California, where a CGI painting of a big-ass mountain is flashed at us so that we'll think we're all in Namibia. Syd and Lazarey enter some cave. It's really uncanny how much Syd looks like Lauren in these scenes. Which, actually, I think is the point. Finally, Syd and Lazarey come upon this humongous vault that's about five hundred years old. Then there's this elaborate set up involving twelve vault keys and entering the keys and unlocking each different lock. Yawn. Whatever. It's cool and everything but GET ON WITH IT.
Syd and Lazarey start unlocking the separate locks, and then Lazarey gets a bum lock and has to keep his hand on the key in order for it to remain open. Syd turns her final key, the vault opens, she pulls out her hand, and all the little lock doors slam down. Lazarey's trapped, and the cave's collapsing. Syd breaks off a stick and slaps it into Lazarey's mouth, telling him to clamp down on it. Uh-oh. That can't be good. She grabs a machete and lops his hand off at the wrist. Ew. Then Syd nabs the Rambaldi Cube o' Flesh, grabs Lazarey, and they get the hell outta the collapsing cave. They're safe.
Back on the Plane of Never-Ending Stories, Kendall tells Syd that part of Lazarey's agreement was that after the Cube was recovered, he be allowed to disappear. After Syd got the Cube, she was supposed to hand it over to Kendall. But she never showed up. Instead, Kendall got a disc. He heads over to a mini DVD player and pops the disc in. A picture comes up on a screen at the end of the plane. Syd gets up and moves toward it. Onscreen, Syd as Julia takes a seat in front of the camera. "You'd better sit down for this," says Kendall wryly.
Syd parks it as we get a shot of smoke billowing from the plane's jet engines. What, is it on fire now? Also? Why are they on a fucking plane? This couldn't have taken place at, say, the Denny's off I-290 or something? Whatever. Syd's sitting down for what winds up being the longest home movie EVER MADE. I could recap the whole thing. I could also attempt to swim to Antarctica. Guess what? Neither one of those things is happening at any time in the near future.
What actually happens in the little home movie? Well, she cries a lot. Then she says she can't go along with the plan as she and Kendall discussed. "You know what this is about," she whispers, looking kind of scared. Syd-on-the-plane is all, dude? What in the fuck am I talking about? Good question, Sydney. Good question. Kendall, however, ain't answering. Instead, he just makes a face and continues watching the movie as if to say, dude? Why should I tell you when little Blonde Sydulia here can do it just as well? Or at least with a lot more lip-gloss?
Syd-on-the-screen says that she's taken care of the DNA, and that she can't trust it with the CIA. Primarily because somehow, everything they ever get their hands on winds up getting stolen. No, Syd. Everything they ever get their hands on THEY LOSE ALMOST INSTANTLY. Seriously. Rambaldi hearts, scientists, dead agents with a penchant for colored wigs -- you name it, the CIA's lost it. Syd-on-the-screen announces that she herself elected to have her memories erased by some random doctor who knows how to do this or something. At the end of the video, Syd-on-the-screen beseeches Kendall to not tell her what she's been through in the past two years, if, by some miracle, she survives the memory wiping. She cries some more and then the video ends.
Syd turns to Kendall and asks him why he's telling her all this if she, you know, TOLD HIM NOT TO. He starts blah-blahing about how Rambaldi's prophecy speaks of a second coming. Oh, Jesus. Oh. I mean, oh, JESUS! Heh. Syd's all, oh, great, those freaks want to clone the dead Italian guy, right? Kendall's all, oh ho ho! If only it were that NORMAL. No. The Covenant believes that Rambaldi's work was destined to continue beyond his time, and in order for that to happen, well, he'd need an heir, wouldn't he? Syd just stares at him for a second and then gets this kind of sickened look on her face.
Suddenly, Syd starts reciting the prophecy. "This woman here depicted will possess unseen marks, signs that she will be the one to bring forth my works; [at vulgar costs] this woman will render the greatest power, unto utter desolation." Yeah, yeah, yeah. Been there, done that, read the Oprah Book Club recommendation and turned it into a three-hanky weeper already. God. Kendall pipes up that Rambaldi's fanatical followers believe the DNA can be transformed and used to fertilize the egg of a surrogate mother. "Someone referred to in his prophecy as 'The Chosen One,'" he finishes.
Syd looks like she's just had half a crate of Krispy Kremes on an empty stomach and is about to hurl glazed donut pieces all over the nice gray flannel airplane sofas. She lifts up her shirt and reveals the scar on her abdomen. Like, where are her ovaries, in her lower intestine? I mean, I'm not all that familiar with egg harvesting (read: not at all), but I'm fairly certain that if you want access to someone's eggs, you don't go in through the goddamn large intestine, turn left at the small intestine, and then go picking through the fallopian tubes with a magnifying glass and a pair of tweezers, okay?
Whatever. Syd's properly horrified at the idea of someone cutting her open and harvesting her eggs for any purpose other than to introduce them to Michael Vaughn's spermatozoa. Kendall grimaces that Syd's knowledge of her abducted eggs explains why she was so vigilant about not handing over the DNA to the CIA: because Rambaldi's child would also be hers. Right. Don't trust that DNA to any nasty old government agency, Syd. Just come up with your own safety plan. Because there's nothing safer for some five-hundred-year-old DNA than a hotel safety deposit box UNDER YOUR OWN NAME. God. Syd continues to boo-hoo. Kendall continues to hammer away at the remaining exposition. "Glad somebody's doing somethin' around here," says the Exposition Fairy, waking up from her nap. She snorts and rolls over. "Anybody got a heating pad? My wand arm is KILLING ME."
As Syd continues sniveling, Kendall tells her that he came to her now, after all this time, because he thought that she would want to know all this, seeing as the Covenant now has everything they need to start making themselves some genuine Sydbaldi babies. Kendall says that he got Syd's little video present two days before she wound up in Hong Kong, and despite being pissed off, he honored her request not to tell her about the past two years. Wow. If Syd made that video two days before she wound up in Hong Kong, then she has the FASTEST growing hair on the face of the planet. Do you remember her hair from the first episode of the season? It was practically waist-length, it was so long. And it was wavy. And streaked with blonde. From shoulder-length blonde flippy 'do to Elektra-like tresses in forty-eight-hours or less -- wow, she really IS the chosen one!
Kendall's all, dude? I didn't tell you about the Lost Years because you asked me not to, and here we are, four months later, and you go right for the goddamn cube! Why? Why'd you do that when you so clearly thought you SHOULDN'T do that four months ago! Suddenly, Syd's tears dry up and she remembers the envelope that Sloane handed her in the limo that was addressed to him in her handwriting. Remember that? The key to the Rome apartment was in there. Syd then basically runs through the last ten episodes in order, ending up with the moment when Syd and Will finally found the Rambaldi Cube o' Flesh.
Syd rightly surmises that the Covenant basically set her up, knowing that if they gave her enough clues, she'd actually go after the cube herself and lead them to it. Yeah, the explanation is more convoluted than that and takes Syd far longer to spit out, but that's pretty much the gist of it. Kendall wonders why Syd didn't just destroy the damn thing when she had the chance. Good question, K-Dog. Unfortunately, Syd doesn't have the answer, having, you know, NO MEMORY OF THAT TIME. Syd questions out loud whether or not there was someone else involved or if there was some other step or something. Kendall just kind of leans back and tells her that when they get to Black Hole base, he wants her to look at every Rambaldi artifact and see if anything jogs her memory. Syd just snaps around and shouts that she needs a phone and she needs it RIGHT NOW.
Then we're in Marshall's Dugout of Do-Goodery and General Geekitude. His phone rings, and he picks up. It's Syd, pleading with him to tell her that he really did put a tracer on the Rambaldi cube that the "jerks" removed from Oops Center. Marshall's all, sorry, dude. I didn't do it. Syd's all, I know you did! You won't get in trouble! Marshall's all, nope. No how. Nuh-uh. Not me. Syd's all, seriously, Marshall? DID YOU PUT A TRACER ON IT? Marshall's all, I SWEAR I DIDN'T, okay? Syd just snivels and says, "Okay." There's this pause, then Marshall leaps out of his chair and is all, okay, I totally DID put a tracer on it, but you can't tell anybody, okay? Hee. Hee hee.
Syd's all, Marshall? I love you. Marshall's all, I love you too. But, seriously? DON'T TELL ANYONE ABOUT THE TRACER. Heh. Syd wants to know if he can locate the Cube o' Flesh. Not exactly, says Marshall, but he can narrow it down to a ten-yard radius. Syd just grins through her tears. "Marshall?" she says. "That's called locating it!" Heh. She wants to know where it is. Instead of finding out, we instead switch to a shot of a gloved hand taking the Rambaldi DNA from one place to another in what looks like a lab of some sorts. Well, now, that was an exciting shot. Here's another: David Anders as Sark, pacing back and forth behind the "scientist" who's performing what I assume to be the fertilization. Hell, any shot of David Anders is an exciting shot. But maybe I'm biased. Rowr. While the "scientist" guy, who really looks like a thug, continues his work, just for shits and giggles, we get a close-up of some test tubes with "Sydney Bristow" labels on them. Yeah. We get it. THEY'RE MAKING SYDBALDI BABIES HERE. Moving on.
After a string of rather unimpressive commercials, we're back with Kommandant Kendall and his Krazy Krew of Kut-Ups. Except. Wait. Are they at Oops Center? What happened to Project Black Hole? What, it wasn't in the budget to head back down to Mexico or whatever? Come on! I feel gypped. Anyway, at Oops Center, Kendall orders the troops, which include Vaughn, Weiss, and Syd, to drop onto Patagonia and stop the fertilization. Okay. So now it's okay to talk about Syd's Lost Years and the whole fertilization thing? I don't…what? And how does Vaughn feel about some of his ex-girlfriend's non-Vaughned eggs out there, just running around willy-nilly getting all fertilized an' shit by some dead Italian guy's DNA? He is looking rather, shall we say, green around the gills at the moment…
Kendall picks up a call on his cell phone and walks off. Syd and Vaughn share a couple of rather guilty-looking and slightly hostile looks; then Syd walks off. Agent Sean's all, dude? What is UP with you two? Vaughn's all, tell ya later, dude. They walk off. Elsewhere, Syd runs into Dixon. They're both dressed in swanky black op duds. Syd's all, dude? What're you doin' in op duds? Dix walks over and drops the bomb that the day Syd called Kendall from Rome, he (Dix) was in the office. He knew that Syd was alive. He's known the truth about what happened to Syd all along, but he was ordered to say nothing. He kind of comments that now he knows how she must have felt all those years at SD-6, having to keep the truth from her loved ones. Syd asks if he's coming with them on the op. "Of course I am," he says with emotion. "It's personal for me too." He walks off, and Syd looks after him.
Patagonia. I totally can't come up with anything funny for this location because I just think of Patagonia coats when I hear this name. I don't even think of the location anymore. Isn't that kind of sad? Also? When you type "Patagonia" into Google, the coat company comes up first. I think that's even sadder than the fact that I didn't know where in the hell Patagonia WAS. Right. So, a plane flies over Patagonia. The Krew fling themselves out and sail down in their parachutes. Once on the ground, they gather their guns and get moving toward some church in the distance.
Outside the church, they drop a guard with a tranq. Inside, they make their way toward the fertilization area. Heh. "Fertilization area." Heh heh. Yeah. Because I am TWELVE. Also? I am annoyed. A church? For a sanitized laboratory experiment? Hi. They couldn't have, oh, I don't know, HIJACKED AN ACTUAL LAB or something? The hell? I mean, it's pretty and all, but it's totally unrealistic. Even for this show. The Krew toss some tear gas near the altar, and the guns start blazing. Shooting shooting shooting. Approximately four trillion, three hundred billion, twenty-two million blanks were used during this scene. No Sarks or Vaughns were harmed. Several useless henchmen were, however. I'm quite impressed to see that Sark actually pulls a little double-gun shooting action here that makes him hotter than ever, if that's even possible. After the final squib has, erm, squibbed, the Krew makes their way toward the altar, where a computer screen shows what looks like an egg, splitting in two. That can't be good.
Dix and Syd stand at the altar of fertilization, and Dix tells her that Kendall wants everything brought back to Oops Center for analysis. Dix just shoots Syd a look. "Do your thing," he says, walking off. Syd's "thing" obviously involves a flame thrower and some opera music, because she takes a torch to the place, paying specific attention to her harvested eggs, while a chorus of angry castratos heave and moan over the soundtrack. Good thing Syd brought along her handy Fire Blaster 2004, yeah? Because, you know, Sark probably didn't get away with a couple vials of DNA and some eggs, right? So taking a flamethrower to the place actually ends this whole thing, huh? HUH?
Syd starts to walk away. Vaughn and Weiss walk up with a beaten Lazarey between them. He just looks at Syd and goes, "Julia?" Then we're on some road and some car is driving along. It's Sark and he's on the phone. "They have my father," he says in his plummy Brit tones. "Take care of it." He hangs up, and we head on over to Hell-Lay. We catch a ride with Syd and Lazarey in an ambulance as Syd tries to talk him. She tells him he's going to be okay. He removes his mask and says, "You know…about the passenger?" Syd's all, the whuh? In the whuh whuh? Lazarey repeats himself. Syd just replaces his mask and tells him they'll have time to talk when they're at the hospital. Oh, yeah, he is SO dead.
They get to the hospital, and doctors meet the ambulance. Syd gets out and the EMTs cart Lazarey out. The second he hits daylight, however, three shots hit his abdomen. See? Dead. I knew it. Everyone takes cover as someone on a roof in the distance runs off. Syd takes aim, looking for the sniper, but can't see anything. Well, duh, Syd. If YOU were a sniper, would YOU stick around? I don't think so. Syd gets on the horn and informs someone of the circumstances. Then we head up to the roof and check in with the empty rifle shells as a gloved hand picks them up one by one. The same gloved hands disassemble the gun and pack it into a suitcase. The suitcase shuts, the camera pulls back, and it's LAUREN, looking all kinds of evil in her slinky black assassin get-up. She gets on her cell phone and informs someone, "The matter's taken care of." Then she says, "Yes, sir. I will." Then she hangs up the phone, looks off into the distance with her best "I am SO evil!" expression, turns, picks up the suitcase, and disappears.
Aw yeah! Evil Lauren? Now that's some shit I can get behind!
on Alias: Syd and Vaughn face a firing squad and decide to make out right before they die. And Isabella Rossellini shows up long enough to make us all wonder what kind of virgin blood the woman bathes in, because, dudes? She looks GOOD.