Sorry. That’s just where my head’s at after having read the following:
Anyway, below we begin the 2005-2006 round-up. Rather than gathering them all, I’ll just do them as I go along (since I’ve been out of town, I’m just now catching up with stuff.)
Spoilers below:
LOST: Understand, I’m not one of those who’s been screaming for everything in “Lost” to be explained. (Personally, I doubt the numbers will EVER be explained in any sort of satisfactory manner.) I’m just enjoying the ride.
That said, I thought the season debut was twenty minutes of program crammed into an hour of time. When it takes an episode dámņëd near forty minutes to get your hero back to where he was in the teaser, that’s a problem. And whereas most of the backstories have had at least some direct connection to the island–some sense of why this person was “picked” to be there–Jack’s this go-around did nothing for me. Connecting the notion that Jack used to be uncaring with his patients to a passing comment made to Hurley that “they’re just numbers” is pretty weak. It wasn’t as if Hurley was lying there hemorrhaging and Jack said, “It’s just blood.”
Frankly, it’s as if they had a great way to end the episode, and had to stall for time until they got to it. Still, it’s not as if I’m going to stop watching at this point. But not the strongest outing by a longshot.
CHARMED: Going into its eighth season with sure-handed assurance, “Charmed” follows up on the girl’s predicament (the world thinks they’re dead thanks to the producers thinking they were going to get canceled last year)with a compelling episode featuring new set-ups, a Quantum Leap-ish solution to their dilemma (the world sees them in their new identities; we see them as the actresses) and the continued question of why the hëll they don’t have some sort of mystical wards around their house so that demons can’t just pop in at will and try to kill them.
High points of the episode were Phoebe’s ill-advised trip to her former office where she finds a shrine to her and everyone sobbing their guts out, and also a psychic flash of an interesting potential future for her. That, and the great close-up shot they had of Wyatt toward the end when he had apparently dispatched a passel of demons without breaking sweat.
The demons we’ve seen thus far are standard issue; we haven’t had a really good villain on this series since Cole. So as the sisters take in hand a novice witch who’s apparently seen “Elektra” too many times (like, say, once) which promises to be an interesting storyline, here’s hoping the producers can come up with a serious quality nasty for the witches.
WEST WING: I’m not familiar with the writer of last night’s debut episode, but she’s certainly managed to come closer to nailing Sorkin’s style than anyone else. The flashforward to the establishing of the Bartlet library was a brilliant touch, showing us the future of several key characters and providing some tantalizing clues as to things that are going on now.
Note, for instance, Leo’s absence. Since I think we can safely assume Leo wouldn’t miss such an event, and dismissing the notion that Leo and Bartlet had some sort of major falling out, that leaves us with three options: 1) Leo’s dead; 2) Leo’s the VP and therefore can’t be with the president, Santos; 3) Leo IS the president (wouldn’t that be a scenario? Santos wins and, the day he’s sworn in, is assassinated?)
And CJ’s there. CJ, the prime suspect for leaking classified information. Married and with a child, which would indicate she didn’t get to jail. Which means either she cut some sort of deal (which would take some doing), or else she wasn’t the one who leaked the information in order to save the astronauts. If not her, then who? My money’s on Margaret. With razor sharp hearing, an established tendency to listen at the door, and a key enough position to be considered in the know, the loss of Margaret to the series–while it would suck for the actress–wouldn’t be the crippler that losing CJ would be.
As for the remainder of the episode, lots of really good stuff, including the interesting notion that their “polling” regarding Santos matches up with my own perception: A nice enough guy to go and knock a few beers back with, but you’re not sure you’d want to vote for him. Then again, it was enough to get Bush elected–I’m sorry, inserted into office–in the real world, so maybe that’ll be enough. And the line that Bartlet “took an oath of office, not an oath of party” was great.
Hey…going back to that earlier notion: Santos is assassinated (I mean, it’s not like Smits tends to hang around for more than a few seasons anyway); Leo is made President, and then Leo selects as his own VP…Vinick. Not that it would ever happen, but that’d be intriguing.
PAD
• 
Peter,
I have got to believe that Tobey IS the leak too… For EXACTLY the reason you think he isn’t. You wrote, “My problem with the notion of Tobey being the leak is that the MOMENT C.J. is under suspicion, the Tobey that I’ve known for five years comes clean.”
Well, I agree and disagree. The old “Sorkin” Tobey WOULD come clean the moment that C.J. was under suspicion. The post “Sorkin” Tobey… Well, not so much. A lot of crap has been laid on Tobey’s doorstep in the post Sorkin years and he hasn’t reacted well to much of it. (By “well” I mean like the Tobey we used to know.) The rather infamous Tobey/Josh fistfight (or “girly man wrestling match” if you can’t imagine what they had was really a fistfight) pretty much blew my hope that those two would ever act exactly like themselves ever again.
But getting back on point– I think Tobey IS the leak because of the almost obscene number times he kept inquiring about C.J.’s progress in the meeting. When he said (paraphrasing here), “C.J. Craig is the LAST person who would leak this!”– I was reminded of those old Quinn Martin produced detective shows like “Barnaby Jones” and “Cannon” where the person who stood up for an accused innocent’s character was ALWAYS the one who actually committed the crime. I think the same thing is going on here.
It’s poor sloppy writing/plotting.
So, you are absolutely correct when you ask, “Now is it possible they’re writing him out of character?”—And you know you are. 🙂
It’s poor sloppy writing/plotting.
That said (twice), I do think this was one of the strongest “West Wing” episodes in years… Even if I am 99.9% certain the winner is Santos.
Extreme wonderful imagination points to you for your great Santos assassination idea!
THAT, Ladies & Gentlemen, is why they pay Cowboy Pete the BIG BUCKS.
I predict that CJ will be the leak, but that Bartlet will do a last-minute, about-to-leave-office pardon.
Donna is in no way qualified to be Deputy COS. She’s a secretary. She scheduled his appointments and got him coffee. Is she capable, yes. But she isn’t even a college graduate. She wasn’t his deputy in the past, she was his assitant, and there’s a HUGE difference between the two.
Oh but did you see last season? They were pushing her to the top. Remember the scene last year where she and Josh discussed Santos running as Russell’s VP? With a flash of old WW rapid back and forth, they came to the same conclusion and Josh asked her How she got so smart. Her reply? “I had a good teacher.”
My problem with the notion of Tobey being the leak is that the MOMENT C.J. is under suspicion, the Tobey that I’ve known for five years comes clean.
***But does Tobey know that C. J. is under suspicion? The White House Counsel let C.J. know she was under suspicion, but didn’t voice his subject of his suspicion in his conversation with President Bartlett and Tobey.***
“But does Tobey know that C. J. is under suspicion?”
Well, Tobey was informed in the last episode of the previous season that the FBI had a theory as to who the leak was…and he was told he “wasn’t going to like it.” Then they did a fast cut to CJ. Granted, this could be a sleight of hand: The FBI could think that Tobey was responsible and the cut to CJ was just a misdirection. The thing is, that would require a subtlety of storytelling technique that has largely been absent in West Wing over the past few years.
PAD
Jason, BSG has set up the new season in January for a big finish to the Pegasus story. I think they managed last season’s cliff-hanger very, very well, if a little overdrawn out. I’ve a lot of faith in the producers, writers, and crew of this show, and I don’t think we’ll be let down by how this plays out.
I only watched the West Wing episode once (I have gotten in the habit of taping the shows and watching a second or third time during the week of broadcast to see if I can catch more of the subtleties upon subsequent viewings), but I’m torn that the leak is either CJ, Toby, or someone else altogether (CJ and Toby are both obvious for all of the reasons stated above (which almost rules them out) so it could very well be someone else.
I too loved the flash-forward as it gives the producers a mark towards which to shoot if the show doesn’t get picked up after this season. As for who becomes the President, Alda was quoted as saying (paraphrasing here) “Who do you think is going to win? They already have all these Democrats under contract.” Although that comment was made prior to revelations that the show was moving to Sunday and the budget had been cut, so anything’s possible, I suppose.
The Perfessor
and he was told he “wasn’t going to like it.
Hmmm, that makes me think maybe Andie, his ex? (Course she wasn’t mentioned or shown at all.) The cut to CJ that you mentioned made me feel it was her too, but that may be what they wanted us to think, to throw us off. Good way to use camera work to tell a story too.
“The thing is, that would require a subtlety of storytelling technique that has largely been absent in West Wing over the past few years.”
I don’t think “subtle” is a word that has ever been a trademark of The West Wing
I just watched the second episode of LOST. I am NOT going to spoil anything that happened in the episode, but I just wanted to say that I am now a convert to PAD’s POV on how the first episode ended. The moment that they started showing us stuff happenning in the Hatch I knew exactly how it was going to end. Watching it happen reminded me of the old adage about watching a trainwreck.
Just my two cents
Interestingly enough, though this episode seemed a bit drawn out as well, I found it more engaging than the season premiere. At least, now we have a hint of some answers to speculate on (Which, let’s face it, is conservatively half of the fun of the show) and a sense of some real forward momentum going.
Fred
Re: _Lost’s_ second episode:
Minor SPOILERS for those who haven’t seen it.
I liked that we got to see what happened to Michael, Sawyer and Jin. Personally, I would have had at least _one_ scene involving one or more of them last week; but at least this week we did learn what fate(s) befell the men on the raft.
I also liked how the episode jumped back a bit, to show us what Locke saw and did when he went into the hatch after Kate last week; as well as what Kate was doing when Jack arrived.
And I liked a certain revelation in the teaser for next week’s show about a passenger Jack had known, pre-flight. It suggests possible good news for another passenger.
What I _didn’t_ like is that the confrontation between Jack and Desmond returned to the exact moment it left last week. That’s a cheat, as far as I’m concerned. I expected that we would learn something about how and why Desmond is down there; and whether his meeting with Jack years before, and this reunion now, was just coincidence. I imagine most viewers had similar expectations. But we didn’t get that. Instead, we got a tease, a “ha ha, you’re gonna have to wait _another_ week to learn what you wanna know.”
Another thing I don’t like is that _Lost_ and _Veronica Mars_ are on opposite each other.
Rick
I love Lost. I love alternate perspective storytelling. I love/fear CGI sharks. So I was pretty much loving last night. Season 1 told a story that lasted 44 days, so I’m in no rush to see the clock advance, so much as I want to see things happen. And for each of the major characters, there’s more than one timeline to follow. There’s the “what happens on the Island after the crash” story, and then there’s the “what happened before the Island” story. Each episode is almost more, but at least half, about the before the Island story for one character, which makes the progress for the after the crash story slow. But since it’s becoming more and more apparant that what happened before is very important to what happens after, we’re actually able to see progress in both timelines in one episode.
I don’t think these folks that captured Jinn are part of “The Others.” I suspect that they are ALL survivors of the plane crash. Perhaps they were preyed upon by The Others much more than Jack/Locke’s gang were and that’s why they are hostile to Jinn, Sawyer and Mike. No reason for my feeling this way, just a hunch.
I have to wonder if Jack answered incorrectly when asked if anyone in his group had been infected. My guess is that the infection that has been spoken of a few times now that wrought havok on the original crash survivors years ago was the gradual turn to a survival-of-the-fittest mentality, base savagery, and bickering that we have already seen regularly tearing at the group’s cohesiveness.
It would explain the fear that was shown by both old-timers that spoke of it, the savagery of the others, the taking of Michael, who as a young child is weaker, more vulnerable and easily kept under control to serve, etc.
Should this prove to be the case, than the awful moment of realization that each has when they figure out that they have been infected would be a solid tv moment, in my opinion.
Fred
Just to clarify.. wasn’t it Locke who answered no one was infected?
Also, Michael is the black guy. His son is Walt. Walt was taken by “The Others.”
-BBayliss, Mr. Stickler for the truth.
Thanks for the clarification, Mr. Stickler. I typed from work and had the professional hat on. 🙂
Fred
I have enjoyed the first two episodes of LOST this season. I am recent convert to the show after spending the last week watching the first season on DVD. Great show. Watching the dvd has cost me a lot of sleep. I am also enjoying the extras and easter eggs on the dvd.
My guess is that the Others are not the infected ones. They are two separate groups. I also suspect that the people who captured Jin are not the same group that took Walt.
Another possibility for the leaker on TWW: The Secretary of Defense, a recurring character that has shown over and over he has no respect for CJ or the rest of the main cast and would love to try and throw them under a bus.
Bobb: Don’t take my musings as any major complaints – I still think it’s one of the best genre shows in a long, long time. It can be a little plodding at times, but I think their almost over-focus on character development is what makes it stand out.
As another recent convert to LOST, after watching the entire first season, then the first two of this season, am I the only one who wonders whether the writers actually have a plan, or if they just keep making weirder and weirder šhìŧ up? Either way, the show’s the greatest mind-f*** in a long time.
Just a couple of thoughts/musings/potential SPOILERS. I think that they ones who took Walt and Jin are the Others and that the girl who shows up momentarily in the teaser for next week is the oft-mentioned, now 16 or 17 years old Alex.
Also, did anyone manage to catch what the name was on the emblem on the stuff in the hatch? I know the symbol is Chinese, something to do with the Chinese zodiac or the I-Ching, I think.
-Rex Hondo-
Now here’s something that I don’t think anyone has figured out yet. Desmond orders Locke to enter the Numbers into the computer and, after he does, the countdown on the clock resets itself to 108…minutes? hours? My first thought was that that amount of time almost made sense as 108 hours is exactly four and a half days. Then it came to me: It’s the numbers!
4+8+15+16+23+42 = 108!!
Now, all you lesser intellects: KNEEL BEFORE MY POWER!!! (Sorry, PAD. Couldn’t resist.)
LOST 2.2 SPOILERS
This made up for the lackluster season premiere, I thought. Kind of redeemed it.
1. Rex Hondo wrote: “that the girl who shows up momentarily in the teaser for next week is the oft-mentioned, now 16 or 17 years old Alex.”
If you’re talking about the one with dialogue, played by Michelle Rodriguez, that’s the woman Jack was talking to at the airport bar just before the flight. She was in the back half of the plane.
I’ve been expecting Alex to show up since the Season 1 finale, however. Probably whenever we get to see Walt in the clutches of the Others. (And I’d bet that if Alex was raised by them, he/she may have joined them.)
On the logo (on Desmond’s uniform, on the shark, etc.), I’ve only seen this mentioned one place and haven’t checked myself, but they’re definitely I-Ching symbols, each one associated with one of the Numbers. Don’t know if it’s connected to Jack’s tattoo or not. They might be overplaying the Numbers thing a bit.
2. J. Alexander wrote: “I also suspect that the people who captured Jin are not the same group that took Walt.”
I hadn’t thought of that, but that makes sense from the writers’ POV – this means they can hold off showing the Others for a good part of the season, while introducing more threatening groups. Maybe the captors are tied to the Black Rock? Maybe they’re the rest of the back-half survivors gone goofy?
Either way, it made for a great episode end, IMHO. First I’m worried that Jin’s dead, then I’m relieved to see him, then the Others, or the pseudo-Others arrive.
3. Rick Keating wrote: “What I _didn’t_ like is that the confrontation between Jack and Desmond returned to the exact moment it left last week. That’s a cheat, as far as I’m concerned.”
I actually thought they did a nice job of it, giving us Kate’s priceless reaction when the music starts, confirming that she was the person we could just barely hear shouting beneath the music at the end of the previous ep, etc.
Rick Keating: “I expected that we would learn something about how and why Desmond is down there; and whether his meeting with Jack years before, and this reunion now, was just coincidence. I imagine most viewers had similar expectations. But we didn’t get that. Instead, we got a tease, a “ha ha, you’re gonna have to wait _another_ week to learn what you wanna know.”
But we did learn more. Note Desmond’s confusion when questioning Locke about what’s going on in the world – seems like he hasn’t been topside in a long while, and wasn’t sure there was much left up there. He seemed pretty relieved when he thought Locke was someone he expected too. How long since Jack’s stadium encounter? (Or, when did Shannon and Boone’s father die?) And who did he expect to show up with the correct password?
Also, look at the way all the equipment and whatnot in the facility is old, circa early 80s, right down to the music, the LPs, the exercise bike, the old mainframes and the old Apple computer. The way he asked Locke if he knew how to work the computer, as if they weren’t ubiquitous.
And when we’re back to the confrontation with Jack, and Desmond calls him “brother,” it’s now clear that’s not a name he simply reserves for Jack or a (near) fellow doctor, since he called Locke “brother” as well.
Basically, the Hatch stuff laid out a bunch of clues, the significance of which is not yet entirely apparent. It also suggested we should re-evaluate some assumptions from the previous episode.
For example, it seems we can probably rule out the possibility that Desmond/the Hatch facility is entirely (or even partly) tied to the control of the island – he had no clue who Locke and Kate were, and really, given that we don’t get to hear him say anything after Jack says “you,” we don’t know yet if he even recognized Jack.
After the first episode, I figured the stadium scene meant whoever runs the island has been keeping tabs on the Lostaways before they crashed, manipulating their lives perhaps. I figured they’d go all conspiracy on us and we’d start to see Desmond in other people’s flashbacks nudging them toward their destinies as part of some nefarious design. Now, I’m not so sure. Maybe he’s on the side of the angels, so to speak.
Temporary hypothesis, sure to be shot down by next week: Is Hatch Desmond even the same as Stadium Desmond? After last night, I’m not so certain. There was a pair of twins on the Other’s boat. Maybe we’ve just seen another pair – one stuck in a well-stocked island bunker since the 80s, one prepping for an “around the world race” searching for something or someone, maybe. (Or maybe there’s some kind of cloning, or genetic manipulation thing going on? If someone can populate the waters off the island with tattooed guard sharks, surely a bit of the old cloning isn’t out of reach.)
So, IMHO, The Hatch stuff last night provides plenty of ground for further speculation – not a cop out at all.
whoopsie… That’s what I get for watching the show dámņ tired after my first night back to work… 😛
I also wonder if there’s some significance to polar bears in particular (the stuffed polar bear in Michael’s flashback) or if the writers are just yanking our collective chain.
-Rex Hondo-
Jason, the funny thing is, about halfway through last season’s Lost, I found myself tired of all the flashbacks, and just wanted some answers. Then we got the season finale, which answered maybe just one thing (and also made me thing I have precognitive powers, as I started that episode asking “how long till the blow Arnst up?”), but left tons more questions. I supposed I’ve started this season trying not to get into that mindset.
Rex said “As another recent convert to LOST, after watching the entire first season, then the first two of this season, am I the only one who wonders whether the writers actually have a plan, or if they just keep making weirder and weirder šhìŧ up? Either way, the show’s the greatest mind-f*** in a long time.”
From interviews the creators have done, they do have something like a super secret storyboard that has all the answers. And their rule, apparantly, is that for every answer they give out, the need to replace it with one or more new questions. But they also know that when they run out of answers, the show’s over, so their goal is to try and keep as many mysteries going for as long as the show has legs, only wrapping everything up when it looks like they’re about to get cancelled.
Which means, I would take it, that to a certain degree, yes, they are just making crazy stuff up along the way, filling in the time so they don’t have to do big reveals too often. In many ways, Lost mimics a really good comic run, which I suppose is one of the reasons I enjoy it so much.
It’s stuck in my head. Make it STOP!!!
Make Your Own Kind Of Music
Mama Cass Elliot
(Mann/Weil)
copyright 1968
Nobody can tell ya
There’s only one song worth singing
They may try and sell ya
Cause it hangs them up
To see someone like you
You gotta make your own kind of music
Sing your own special song
Make your own kind music
Even if nobody else sings along
It can’t be nowhere
The loneliest kind of lonely
It may be
Just to do your thing is the hardest things to do
You gotta make your own kind of music
Sing your own special song
Make your own kind music
Even if nobody else sings along
And if you will not take my hand
Then I must be going, I’ll understand
You gotta make your own kind of music
Sing your own special song
Make your own kind music
Even if nobody else sings along
You gotta make your own kind of music
Sing your own special song
Make your own kind music
Even if nobody else sings along
You gotta make your own kind of music
Sing your own special song
Make your own kind music
Even if nobody else sings along
No no no no
Even if nobody else sings along
If nobody else sings along
Hmmm. LOST fans, we should be grateful that they did not use “I Write the Songs” instead.
Actually, Bobb, I was talking about Battlestar Galactica; I haven’t actually watched one second of Lost…
Peter:
You’ve got way more street cred than me, but I was VERY unhappy with the opening tease to the first WEST WING of the new season. More questions would have been left unanswered without it, PLUS we have the dramatically unsatisfying knowledge that the Bartlett character is still alive in three years.
M
I don’t think anyone else has posted this yet:
http://homepage.mac.com/mprieve/.Public/lost.mpg
It’s a great ad for LOST. (for Bristish TV, I think.)
Slow mo dancing to Portishead, with Locke and Walt doing the conducting…if that’s not entertainment what is?
i’m looking for my brothers and sister. todd, peter, and heather. i don’t know where to find you. i heard dad’s nothing to be proud of. please contact me. i’m your little sister for christ’s sake. beckalyn@hotmail.com
CJ isn’t the leak; nor is Margaret; it’s the one person with the knowledge AND a personal connection to NASA.
Next week: stay tuned for the firing of Toby Ziegler.
They had that promo of firing someone quite a few weeks early. Finally, though, on the 16th we actually found out who it was and I presume on the 23rd we actually get the firing.
Neil