"Follow the Leader"

So here we are...one week away from the Season 5 finale of LOST. Where has the time gone? More importantly, where has the story gone?

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I liked this episode okay considering that going into it I knew it would be "setting the table" for next week's finale. So what did we learn? John Locke is taking instructions from the Island and his ultimate mission, for now at least, is to kill Jacob. So much for the "help" Jacob asked for in "The Man Behind the Curtain." Or maybe this is exactly the help that Jacob needs. After all, it did appear as if he is being held prisoner in the cabin in the woods in a way.

When we first saw Richard, he was constructing a ship in a bottle. Why? Is it possible that he might have actually been on the Black Rock as some of us have speculated? It's probably just a red herring, but as Ben reminded us again, Richard has been around for a long time. And I wish we could get a better explanation of his role besides that he "is a kind of adviser." I have some thoughts about what that might mean, but why is that his role? It was very troubling to hear Richard's answer to Sun regarding the fate of Jin and company in 1977 as she was told that he witnessed their deaths. Was it from Jughead? Will it still be that way? Will whatever happened, happen?

I liked seeing John Locke's story loop closed that began in "Because You Left." It was interesting to see that it was Locke ho did indeed tell Richard to tell a past version of himself that Locke must die to bring the Oceanic 5 back to the Island. But it was also very troubling to hear the doubts expressed by Richard and Ben concerning Locke's decision to take the Others to Jacob. I think Locke is right, I don't think Ben has ever seen Jacob. It was pretty clear in "The Man Behind the Curtain" that Ben was very upset to learn that Jacob had actually spoken to Locke. It will certainly be intriguing to finally see Jacob next week but I am afraid that we will be left with more questions that won't likely be resolved until the end of the final season.

Things are looking very iffy in 1977. As much as I have come to dislike Kate this season, I agree with her refusal to detonate Jughead. As usual Jack has slipped into his Mr. Fix-it mode and feels he must erase the three years since the crash. He may have been a great surgeon, but he never really was very good at actually fixing problems in his own life mostly due to his stubborness. I hope he and Sayid are not successful in the detonation of Jughead but if they are and the last three years are erased, things will hardly be fixed.

Speaking of Sayid, it was nice to see him again although I do wonder where he has been or if it is even important to the story. I had really almost forgotten about him. Another casualty of too-large scale of Season 5 I suppose. I have said before that I have not liked this season nearly as much as the last (although I will have my definitive impression after next week) and I think that the scope of the story has been the reason. I liked the idea of the split on- and off-Island storylines, but I felt that the execution has been less than stellar. This has resulted in a degradation in quality of the show because too much information has been shoehorned into the limited number of episodes. It is unfortuante and I hope that we see a contraction of the story next year rather than an expansion although I fear that the latter is much more likely.

Pierre Chang has accepted that Miles, Farady, etc. are from the future. I loved how he got Hurley to admit it by asking him when he was born, if he had fought in the Korean War and who the president was. That last question was his biggest fear when he first arrived in 1977. Great callback! So Chang is going to evacuate the women and children from the Island thus saving young Miles' and Charlotte's lives so that they might one day return to the Island. And with the evacuation, Juliet and Sawyer are being sent back to the mainland (1977 version) but who really thinks they are going to make it? And was it just me, or did anyone else think that when Sawyer offered Juliet to get in the sub first that he was going to make a run for it? And how sucky was it to drop Kate in between them just as they were having a tender moment. When LOST is over next year, I will not miss the Kate/Sawyer/Jack/Juliet drama one bit. And we saw that the sub actually works. I'm still not sure if I believe that it is the actual method used by the Dharma Initiative to reach the Island but it was interesting to actually see it operational.

So the pieces are in place for the finale. Who will live and who will die? Will Jack and Sayid be successful in erasing the last three years? Will Sawyer, Juliet and Kate get off the Island? Will Locke kill Jacob? Will Ben kill Locke? Will we learn what Ilana and Bram are up to on the small Island? I hope these and other questions will be answered before we go on our last hiatus before the final season of LOST.