Smokey & the Banditas

We’re in the homestretch now, so I expect things to pick up a little bit in this current batch of episodes. Unfortunately, that momentum didn’t really pick up with tonight’s “Chockful o’ Setup” show. That’s not to say it wasn’t good, but I’m ready for some real development and reveals of the Others’ past, what’s going on back in the real world, and the origins of Dharma on the island. Based on what I’ve seen of the slate of flashbacks for the rest of the season, I think we’ll get plenty of each.

As for tonight’s Lost, we got the Sawyer Makes Nice Project, some redundant flashbacks to Iowa, and our old friend Cerberus. Nothing too spectacular thematically, thus I shall get straight to my fast food analysis vis a vis bullet points.

Quick Hits

• Cerberus the Smoke Monster is always a welcome addition to an episode, and we even learn a little more about it–or maybe a little more about what we don’t know about it. The Others, as Juliet tells it, don’t know much about the security system other than the fact it doesn’t like sonic fences. The security system we once thought may have been a tool of the Others seems to be a wild animal with no allegiance to anyone but the island itself.

  

  Perhaps Cerberus is the last remaining “member” of the Dharma Initiative on the island, its’ actions preserving and even furthering whatever their cause might’ve been. The question is who built the sonic fence? If it was the original Dharma members, was it built because they lost control of one of their projects? Or, if it was built by the Others, Cerberus may not be their biggest fan.

• I look forward to the day we finally find out what the frick it is, but until then, I think we’ll first see its’ impersonation of someone from Juliet’s past. The beast clearly scanned Juliet in the jungle. If the Kate’s horse from last season was indeed Cerberus, as I surmise, then Smokey’s probably already got Kate covered in its memory banks.

  

• If the fences we first saw two weeks ago are off, as Juliet made clear to Kate, then it seems Mikhail may just have a future in the special effects business with the ear-spurting-blood trick of his. Then again, the audible pulse the pillars emitted when he stepped through the perimeter was pretty convincing.
• Is it just me or does the size of the Federal detachment after Kate seem a little too big and too hell-bent on catching her? Don’t they have terrorists to track down somewhere? She’s a murderer and all, but is it necessary to have six guys camp out at her mother’s house day and night waiting for her?
• Sawyer’s got some work to do with Sun down the road. He failed to win her over with his Dharma barbecue and thus we’ll likely have to sit through some tedious moments of the con man trying to convince her he’s not that bad a guy after all. If Jack’s back on the beach next week, I’ll be happy to see Sawyer resume hurling insults Hurley’s way. Jack’s return would also seem to render Hurley’s entire endeavor irrelevant, as Sawyer no longer has to lead the castaways. So it’s either weak writing or set-up for a showdown between the two alpha males. Meh.
• I’d like to guess that the Others evacuated Otherville for Hydra Station, but I think they’ve probably gone elsewhere. Jack, Kate and Sawyer have all seen that station and know where to find it, and the Others would be more careful than to go back to familiar ground at this point. A heretofore unrevealed Dharma station?

  

• A repeat entry for Sawyer’s book club with Watership Down. Boone originally had the book before the crash and found it in Sawyer’s possession early in season one. Wiki-summary:
  

  Watership Down tells the story of a group of rabbits who — against the wishes of their Chief Rabbit — escape from their threatened warren. The story follows their subsequent adventures. They find sanctuary in a warren on the down (for which the book is named), but the story continues after this.

  

  My choice of analogy for tonight is that the Others are that group of rabbits, and Otherville the threatened warren. YEAH!

• Juliet looked to be quite the ninja master in her scraps with Kate, though maybe not enough of one to avoid a dislocated shoulder three or four times in her past. Something Juliet picked up in her spare time, or regimented martial arts training during the Other indoctrination process? She seems to be unique among most of the Others in her ability, as I’m not sure Fat Tom or Pickett ever exhibited an iota of kung fu mastery.
• I questioned Locke’s allegiances a couple weeks back, and while I’m not convinced he’s become a full-fledged Other, I think his priorities have shifted in a new direction–or perhaps a more focused direction. His chief aim has steadily become serving the island, and his joining the Others must have that intent in mind, his comments to Kate about her sordid history notwithstanding. I’m not saying he’s up to anything underhanded with the Others quite yet, but we’ve seen in his flashbacks that he’s always searching for that sense of belonging wherever he can find it. The Others gave him not only a chance to confront his bastard of a father, but also to join a virtuous group of like-minded individuals. Unfortunately for Locke, the attachments he nurtures have always ended badly in the past. I’m sure his newfound relationship will end no differently.
• I suppose I should mention Cassidy, Sawyer’s wronged con-woman companion, whom we last saw in The Long Con in season two. We already know about Sawyer’s baby, named Clementine, from the episode flashing back to his prison time in Florida.

  

Other Stuff from Other Sites

• Create your own analogy to the Others with this:
  

  “The remedy is worse than the disease”, one of several possible translations of the Latin phrase “Aegrescit medendo”, which is written on the blast door map, is a direct quote from Watership Down. It is spoken by the Chief Rabbit in the chapter “For El-Ahrairah to Cry”, in Part Two. He means that it would be easier for the community to stay where they are and hope to survive the plague that threatens them, rather than evacuate. [Lostpedia]

• Service all your non-lethal law enforcement needs at ALS Technologies!

  

• Kate always takes the names of Catholic saints when creating a new alias. Tonight’s was Lucy. St. Lucy is the patron saint of blindness, having had her eyes torn out by the spurned bridegroom of a marriage she rejected. In the past, she’s used Margaret, the patron saint of pregnancy, and Monica, the patron saint of patience. [Wikipedia]