What Kate Does

This episode is almost up there with Jack's Thailand Whore Escapade, or Nikki and Paulo's forced-into-the-script attempt. Not to say that there weren't some redeeming qualities in there, but it's cutting it close.

This is clearly a Kate-centric episode, so it naturally has some suck-factor to it. The title coincides with Season 1 Episode "What Kate Did" to show the parallel of what is happening after our friends get off of flight 815. Kind of clever, I guess, but it is still confusing as to why any of this is happening, or why it's being shown simultaneously with the island's chain of events. That being said, we do get a lot of Claire in this episode, so I will get off the negative train for now and proceed with my original train of thought.

Kate is hijacking Claire and steals her purse. She kicks her out and finds a mechanic to get her handcuffs off. She finds Claire's bag full of baby stuff, and then quickly finds Claire again somehow, waiting for a bus. She gives her a ride, and finds out about her potential parents for her new baby. She bonds with Claire like they did on the island, and she drives her to the adoptive parents' house. Claire asks her to walk up there with her, and Kate suddenly went from frightening carjacker to BFF. I'm sure it happens all of the time.

The lady answering the door is in tears, and tells Claire that her husband left her. She tells Claire that she can't raise a baby on her own, and apologizes. Claire and Kate both take turns yelling at her about not calling beforehand and wasting her money, when all of the sudden the baby moves. Claire screams and Kate drives her to the hospital. She thinks it is a good idea to keep the gun she stole from her U.S. Marshall in the back of her pants as she pushes Claire into the hospital in a wheelchair. I mean, come on, it's a hospital for crying out loud. You don't think there are cops there or anything? Wanted posters or.... I mean, even the idiots in Prison Break knew to stay away from hospitals.....

Anyways, Kate ditches the cab and gives the front desk a fake name as she checks Claire in. The fact that the adoptive parents broke up and can't raise this child was freaky and coincidental enough, but the even more creepy and coincidental part of this episode?

That's right, kids! Ethan is back!

I forgot how frightening his face is! Anyways, Ethan introduces himself as Dr. Goodspeed, and tells Claire that the baby is moving. He tells her that he can give her drugs now to prevent her from giving birth prematurely, or she can go into labor today. Claire looks at Kate for assistance and she is kind of dumbfounded. She is holding her hand, and she tells Ethan that she wants to wait because she isn't ready. Ethan smiles at the two of them and gladly gives her the drugs to prolong her pregnancy.

A short while after, some detectives come into Claire's room asking for Kate under a fake name while Kate hides in the closet. Claire lies for her and tells them she doesn't know anyone with her description. The two detectives leave, and Kate thanks her.

"You didn't have to do that."

"You didn't have to, either." Awww.

Meanwhile, back on the Island, Sawyer thinks it's a good idea to run away from the people protecting him. He gets a gun, shoots a guard on the way out, and tells Kate not to come looking for him. Doesn't he know by now that whatever you tell Kate, she is going to do the opposite? Stupid Sawyer. Stupid Kate. Stupid Episode.

Kate tells the new Others that she can track Sawyer and bring him back. The hippie guy from Forrest Gump says that it is paramount that all of them remain safe. I suppose they were all on that list inside the guitar case, but who really knows anymore? Jin says that he will go and keep Kate safe as she searches for Sawyer, and two Others agree to go with them. They have to make sure they come back like they said they would, right? Right.

So, while Kate and Jin run through the jungle, Avatar and the Hippie take Sayid into a room where he is strapped down onto a table. Avatar hooks little clasps onto Sayid's chest and stomach hair and.... wait. Did I just write a sentence that consisted of the phrase 'chest and stomach hair'? Yes, yes I did. What if they were doing this to a girl with no chest or stomach hair? What would they clasp these things onto? Her nipples? Her sports bra? Maybe I am the only person in the audience thinking of these things.

Avatar turns a crank around that's attached to these clamps, and proceeds to electrocute Sayid. He then takes them off, and takes a red hot poker to his stomach. Sayid screams and yells and yes, even cries before Avatar's men come in and untie him. The Hippie tells him that he is sorry they had to do that to him. He says that it was a test, and that he shouldn't worry because he passed. Sayid is confused, continues to cry, and is taken out of the room.

"I just lied to him, didn't I?" The Hippie asks Avatar.

"Yes."

What.... the... fuck? So, first of all I am wondering what kind of test requires electroshock therapy and hot pokers? Then I am wondering what would one have to do to pass this test? I mean, Sayid didn't vomit blood or curse anyone or try to esscape or anything. How did he fail? Was it because he was crying? I guess I haven't really seen Sayid cry before, and for someone who deals with torture on a daily basis, I can assume that he might not be himself anymore. But this test? Is it to test if he is still himself? Is it to test if he is Jacob? Is it to test if he is infected with HIV? Your guess is as good as mine at this point.

Meanwhile, Kate runs away from the seemingly nice Others. She stumbles upon New Otherton and finds James in his old house, digging up the floorboards in his old bedroom. He takes something out of it and walks through the neighborhood to the dock. Kate approaches him and notices that he is weeping. Kate apologizes for Juliet's death. She says that if she didn't get on that submarine, the two of them would have been alive and together. She begins to tear up as James stares off into the ocean, and says that she wishes she could take it all back.

James says that it's not her fault. He tells her that Juliet's death is his fault because when they first joined the Dharma Initiative, all Juliet wanted was to get off this island. He made her wait to take another submarine because he didn't want tobe alone while he waited for John Locke to return. He said she could have been happy, she could have been alive, but he was too selfish.

"I was going to ask her to marry me!"

James throws the diamond ring into the ocean, and Kate tells James that she came after him to find Claire. She needs to get to her so she can give Aaron back and make everything right again. I don't think James really heard a single thing she said.

Back at the Temple, Jack barges into Avatar's room and demands to know what they did to Sayid. The Asian man gives him the most vague and ambiguous answers one could expect on this show, so nothing is really solved. Jack does, however, ask him who he is, and how he came to be here. He replies with a name that is sadly not Avatar, but Dogen. He says that he was brought here, like everyone else on this island. Jack asks him what that means and he just says "You know what I mean."

He finishes crushing a bunch of herbs together and puts it in a pill form. He gives it to Jack and tells him that he needs to give it to Sayid. He says that Sayid is sick, infected, and that the pill will stop the infection from spreading. Jack takes the pill skeptically, and walks back out to the pool area where Sayid, Miles and Hurley are.

Let me take a moment here to acknowledge my ever-growing astonishment at Miles' survival skills. I mean, his name wasn't on any of the lists that we know about. He wasn't on Flight 815, and yet he is still here, in the very end. One could say that he has survived so long or is important because he was born on the island. Or that his dad is Pierre Chang, so he has a special pass or something. But Charlotte was born on the island, and in my mind Daniel Faraday was a thousand times more important to the plot than Miles ever was. Sure, he can talk to dead people, sure he got "It worked!" out of Juliet's dead body when he helped James bury her, but..... I don't know. It just seems strange, like a treak of dumb luck that he is still here.

Don't get me wrong, I really like Miles. I like him a lot. This episode's "Food Court" line reminded me of how we need a sarcastic, semi-lighthearted character on the show that isn't Hurley. In a way, Miles is Season 5 and 6's Charlie Pace. Only instead of being a rock star, he is an ex-punk rock kid who talks to dead people. His skepticism and humor not only make the more serious characters stay on their toes, but I feel that Miles Strohm is the main proxy for the audience in these final episodes. He is always the one asking "What the hell?" when most of the other characters just accept their surroundings. Maybe that is why the writers have kept him on for so long. A little heart and soul never hurt anybody.

Jack tells Sayid about the pill, and tells him about his ambivalence. Sayid says that he trusts Jack, and if he tells him to take the pill, then he will. Jack contemplates the effects of taking a pill from people who just tortured his friend, and decides not to drug his friend. Instead he goes back into Dogen's (I am stll bummed his name isn't Avatar) room and asks what is inside the pill. When Dogen beats around the bush for a few more minutes about trust and hope, Jack puts the pill in his mouth and says something like "Let's put trust to the test."

Dogen punches Jack in the stomach, forcing the pill out of his throat. He picks it up, and Jack relaizes that these people were not trying to help Sayid at all. He asks Dogen what is wrong with Sayid. Dogen says that the pill was poison, and that Sayid actually is infected. The only difference from his original statement is that there is no stopping this infection once it starts. He describes it as a sickness, a darkness that overtakes the mind and body. He says that there is no saving Sayid.

Jack, the ever skeptical doctor, asks Dogen why he is so sure that this Darkness will overcome his friend. He has no reason to trust anything he says at this point, so his vehemence is expected.

"Because it happened to yoour sister."

Duhn Duhn Duuhhhhnnnnnnn!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The next and last scene is Jin running away from The Others after Kate makes her escape. Now that they are in 2007, he has made it clear that he wants to find Sun. After three years in the Dharma Initiative watching Sawyer and Juliet play house knowing that your own wife is out there would surely get on your nerves. I can't imagine how long Jin has been itching to break away from the pack to get to his true love.

He runs away from Aldo, and just as he is about to be shot by him, both of The Others are shot and killed by someone in the distance. The camera pans into the jungle and we see Claire, Jack's sister, Aaron's mom, Kate's friend, and now.... infected Darness Woman.

This episode ends with this bombshell cliffhanger, and I surprisingly haven't come up with any theories as to what she has been doing for the past three years. Sure, I wonder who took her to the Temple to get 'healed'. I wonder if she was even taken there to get healed in the first place, or if she was tricked by the smoke monster and turned evil like Rousseau's team. I mean, the last time we saw her, she was with Christian. And the leading theory about Christian is that he is one of the many embodiments of the smoke monster. So, I guess, that would make sense. Another question I have for Claire is if she time-jumped with everyone else. Did she go to the 1970's and hang out with Richard for a few years? Is she a recluse like Rousseau? Is she now a part of the island and immune to the time jumps like Richard and friends? I hope we find out soon.

The only other question I have burning in my brain right now is this: What is going on with the alternate universe? Why did Desmond appear to Jack on the plane? What did Juliet actually mean when she said "It worked."? Is it really going on at the same time? Or is it just kind of a 'What if...' situation?

Tony and I were discussing this the other day at the gym, and he brought up a good point. He said that maybe Jughead did work like Juliet said. Maybe the alternate universe is actually a result of the bomb going off, and why the island is now underwater. He said that in Season 4, Faraday conducts a timing experiment with a rocket from the freighter. He said that the light doesn't scatter quite right. The timing of the island is clearly off from the rest of the world.

Tony's theory in regards to the island being underwater, was that the Island is far behind the rest of the world. He said that the island really did blow up and give everyone a restart. The rest of the world is compensating and moving on, while it is taking the island the extra time to catch up with what they did. He said that by the end of the series, the island will have caught up with th real world, and none of the crazy stuff on the island will have ever happened.

This sounded like a great explanation to me at first until I looked up just how far off the time limit on the island was. According to Faraday, the island was only off by 31 minutes. So after the first half of the first episode, the island should have caught up with real time. Kind of disappointing, but it also makes me wonder about the doctor on board the freighter. He died almost 8 hours after they found him on the beach. That is clearly not 31 minutes. And the island was actually receiving stimulus hours ahead of time in comparison to the real world......

Ugh. I need to do more research on that, and update my theory.

'Til Tuesday...

Namaste