Perhaps I'm easy, but I am not cheap. "Happily Ever After" gets an A+ from me, for both reasons, or neither. Who knows. Look, it gets my A+ because I'm an incurable romantic and no Lost love story has pushed my 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, 42s as well and thoroughly as that of Penny and Desmond, so let's get right to it.
Island Reality: When Desmond wakes up and finds out he's not in an L.A. hospital with his lovely wife and son by his side, he beats the crap out of Charles Widmore with an I.V. pole and the fans go wild! Des demands to be returned to his real life, but Charles tells him, "I can't take you back. The island isn't done with you yet." Why, Island? Why? Don't you believe in love? Charles orders Zoe and the Widmorons to run "the test" now, even though they insist it is ahead of "schedule." Yeah? So was nabbing Jin, which forced Charles' early confrontation with Faucke; deal with it, Widmorons. While an albino bunny, Angstrom (or perhaps Updike's Angstrom, but my money's on the former) looks on, the Widmorons test their magical generator, and when it fails, the red shirt of the week, Guy Fried, goes out to the shed to investigate. Let's bid him a fond adieu. Crackle crackle sizzle sizz. My 11-year-old is still hung up on the caged rabbit, though. "Mommy, these writers have Daddy Issues and Bunny Issues." Baby McWord.
Charles Widmore doesn't give a hoot about the late Guy Fried. He just wants Desmond to walk into the same chamber where Guy Fried got fried. The Widmorons tie Des to a chair, make sure he has no metal of any kind on him, and then Charles blathers about how he hates to force this on Des, but once it's over, he's going to ask him to make a sacrifice. The boys bicker about sacrifice, but Widmore wins. His son died. His daughter hates him. He hasn't met his grandson. If Des doesn't help him, it will all be for nothing, and Penny and wee Charlie Hume, and everyone else will be gone forever.
The Widmorons leave Des in the shed, with a magical, electro-magnetic donut, where he struggles his way out of his bonds. As Charles and the Widmorons watch on a monitor, Jin demands an explanation. Charles tells him that Des is the only person in the world to have survived a catastrophic electromagnetic event akin to Smokey. Chuckles needs to know Des can do it again, or everyone dies. He orders the Widmorons to "turn it on." Baby-Face hits the switch, and once everything is running at full power, Widmore operates the gears. The gigantic, magical electro-magnetic donut glows. Des faces it down. "Let me out, you bastards!" The Gauss meter goes off the scale. Scott asks if Dean and Sam know about this super-duper EMF meter, and we flash to the...
Sideways Reality; Just After Oceanic Flight 815 Lands: Des runs into Hurley (who tells him their bags are on carousel 4) and Claire (he tells her she's expecting a boy) in the airport. , Desmond's driver, George Minkowski (Fisher Stevens) meets him and offers to get him anything he wants while he's in L.A. -- including lovely ladies of questionable repute, but Des just wants to go to the office and see his boss -- WHO IS CHARLES FRICKING WIDMORE. Sideways Des is Widmore's righthand man, and Chuckles has a job for our laddie. Des must pick up junkie Charlie Pace from the airport courthouse, where he's been held on drug charges, because Charlie and his band, Driveshaft, are to play at a charity gig arranged by Charles Widmore's wife. It seems their son, a classical musician, has conceived of this concert that combines classical music with rock-n-roll. Before Des leaves, Widmore pours him a generous shot of MacCutcheon's. "A drink to celebrate your indispensability... Nothing's too good for you." I'ma get a tissue for my bloody nose, give me a moment.
Des meets Charlie Pace, who is either batshit insane, or a one-eyed chick in the land of the blind. He starts talking to Des about spectacular, consciousness-ending love. He encountered it, on the plane from Sydney. Seems he felt he was made by Kate's Marshal, so he ducked into the loo and swallowed his bag of heroin, but just then, the plane hit some massive turbulence. Charlie inadvertently choked. And in that moment, after everything went dark, he saw this beautiful blonde woman and just knew they were together, like they've always been and always will be. Just as he was engulfed in love, he woke to find this sodding idiot (Hi, Jack, I still love you) asking him if he was okay. When Des mocks, "Well, that's just poetry brother; you should write a song about that," Charlie protests that he's now seen something real.
As Desmond drives, Charlie tells him that he feels sorry for him, since he hasn't seen what's really real. "I can either show you what I'm talking about it, or you can get out of the car." Before Des can give due consideration to his choices, Charlie grabs the wheel and drives them off the pier and right into the water. As the car fills up, a conscious Des tries to rescue an unconscious Charlie. When it doesn't work, he swims to the top, takes a breath, and goes back under. When Des knocks on Charlie's window, Charlie holds up his hand. It's clean at first, but suddenly, it reads, "NOT PENNY'S BOAT." Then it's clean, again. Des gets Charlie out, and brings him to the pier, where they wait for help.
Sideways St. Sebastian's Hospital a.k.a. The Only Hospital in L.A.: The staff wants to do an MRI on Des, but when they start this electro-magnetic laden test, he has more visions of Penny and knows he has to find Charlie Pace ASAP, so he pushes the fail safe panic button, and ends the test. No one will give Des any information on Charlie Pace, since he's not family. But then, Dr. Jack Shephard appears. Des recognizes him from Oceanic 815, and tries to hit Jack up for some intel, but before Jack has to decide whether or not he should run afoul of HIPAA, Charlie runs through the halls. Des chases after him, but never says, "At least get some pants, brothah." Once he catches Charlie, Desmond demands to see his hands. "NOT PENNY'S BOAT," is not on either one, but Desmond's desperation is enough to clue Charlie in on the fact that his plan worked. Desmond's near-death experience showed him his really truly true reality and soul-scorching love, too.
Later, Desmond reports to a nearly unforgiving Widmore that Pace is a no-go for the Mrs. and young Master Widmore's classical music/rock extravaganza. Widmore tells Des he gets the pleasure of telling the less than understanding Mrs. Widmore that her event is a bust. Des mans up, and does just that. Mrs. Widmore is none other than Eloise Hawking, and she's totally fine (or pretends to be) with Desmond's disappointing news. On his way out of the venue, Des overhears some employees reading off the approved guest list. The name Penny Milton is the one that catches his ear, but the previously oh-so-cool Madame Widmore won't let Des find out one detail about Ms. Paradise Lost Milton. She runs him off, telling him that what he's doing is a violation, and he needs to stop. "You're not ready yet, Desmond."
Back at the limo, George has booze waiting for a disconcerted Desmond, but before he can put away a significant amount, the musician-son of Mr. Charles and Mrs. Eloise (née Hawking) Widmore knocks on the limo window. Another hopeless romantic, Daniel Faraday Widmore just recently saw the love of his life -- a striking redhead with brilliant blue eyes (eating chocolate, probably before dinner), who works at the museum. I hope he doesn't mind James Ford's sloppy seconds. Anyhow, when Daniel saw her (Charlotte), that's when things got weird. That night, he fell asleep and then woke and had to write all these hi-tech equations. As a mere musician, Daniel couldn't make them out, but a friend at Cal-Tech told him they were quantum mechanics stuff of which lifelong physicists only dream. "What if all this wasn't supposed to be our life? What if we had some other life and for some reason we changed things... I don't want to set off a nuclear bomb, Mr. Hume.... I think I already did." Their conversation turns to Penny, who Desmond dismisses as just an idea. Daniel says, "No, Mr. Hume. She's my half-sister. And I can tell you exactly where and when you can find her."
Des finds Penny running the steps at the stadium, where -- a lifetime ago -- she once found him, and in which -- another lifetime ago -- Des once found Jack. Des introduces himself and strikes up a conversation. They shake hands and we cut to...
Hydra Island: Des wakes up in the room looking at the hand Penny just shook in the other reality. He's okay and has been unconscious for only a few seconds. Charles wants to make his sales pitch, but Desmond already understands. "You brought me here to the island to do something very important. When do we start?"
As Zoe and the Widmorons move Des through the jungle, they're accosted by Sayid, who makes quick work of the men and orders Zoe to run. Once they're alone, Sayid tells Des that the Widmorons are extremely dangerous. "We need to go, now." Des, as relaxed as he was during his last conversation with Widmore, says, "Aye, of course. Lead the way."
Sideways: Desmond wakes; when he and Penny touched hands, he fainted. Awww. Once he's back on his feet, they make a date to have coffee on the corner of Sweetzer and Melrose. She's totally feeling it, too. Once she's gone, Des exhales and returns to his limo, and to George, who asks, "So, did you find what you were looking for?" Des smiles. "Yes, George, I did. Corner of Melrose and Sweetzer, please." George: "You got it, and if there's anything else I can do for you, Mr. Hume, you just name it." Desmond leans forward. "Actually, there is one thing, George. Can you get me the manifest from my flight from Sydney -- Oceanic 815 -- just the names of the passengers?" George: "Sure, I can. Do you mind if I ask what you need it for?" Des sits back. "I just need to show them something." DUN! Bad robot.
Well, the realities are bleeding into one another fast and furious, now. For those of you who are keeping track of such things, Sideways Desmond caught a glimpse of his reflection in a door window. There were some glorious parallels between Desmond of seasons past and his Sideways counterparts, and some spiffy anti-parallels, too. At the end of the day, though, this episode worked because, despite how long we spent in the Sideways 'verse, it was character-driven, and driven by characters who have captured our hearts.
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