"...I heart you online..."

This song is a work of genius. Two girls sat on a bed. One singing, the other playing a ukelele... turn up the twee factor to eleven, please. 

I heart it (online) to bits... 

"...I sometimes feel I'm sweeping the nation..."

Oh, mere days after the Lost season finale and I am becoming ever more aware of how a junkie must feel if told he's got to wait something like 8 months for his next fix... 

But what of this blog? Surely it cannot have escaped your keen gaze that the number of entries here with the tag "Lost" is roughly the same as the four next most common tags put together... what will I write about? Never fear, oh faithful reader. (They always say you should address each reader as if they were the only reader; however, just between you and me, you really are the only reader...) There are many more things to write about. 

This is the shape of things to come;

There's that thing starting the next Bank Holiday Monday (that's next week, dude). There's my further plan to start up some kind of new fanzine. Really, this time I'll get it done. There's talk of the novel; which will mostly be me berating myself for lack of output, and the sub-standard quality thereof. And plenty of other TV shows. I'm behind on Dollhouse by four weeks, and behind on Fringe by pretty much the whole season. 

So, there's plenty for me to yak about...

"...it only ends once; anything that happens before that is just progress..."

In my last post, I commented on how Heroes really doesn't know how to do end of season episodes... they could do well to take a few hints from Lost which, conversely, does end of season episodes brilliantly. The Incident, the two part finale to Season 5, does not disappoint. 

Oh, where to begin, though... 

...the beginning. And at long last we get our first, genuine, look at the elusive Jacob. Here he engages in a conversation with another, un-named, chap, who appears to be his rival, and we learn that all the people who come to the island are there because of Jacob. He brings them there. In the specific case at the start of tthe episode, we see a boat - presumably The Black Rock - appraoch the island. In an echo of the Ben/Widmore conversation from season 4, it seems that the other chap - already dubbed MaybEsau on the interweb (Biblical reference...) - can't kill Jacob unless he finds a "loophole"... 

Intriguing is that Jacob is another ageless character (the first being Richard who says "I'm this way because of Jacob") who essentially looks the same in the Black Rock times, as the 70s, and through on in to 2007. He visits (and in each visit touches) various of the castaways. Kate, whilst shoplifting; Sawyer at his parents' funeral; Jack just after the operation on his wife; Sun and Jin at their wedding (the only time this season we see the two characters together); Sayid just before Nadia dies; Hurley, to get him on A316; and most  intriguingly Locke just after his plunge from 8 floors up... he is unconscious to start with, and when he gets Jacob's touch he wakes up. There has been much talk in the past of how someone or something had been manipulating the 815ers in order to get them on the island, and now it seems that we have this person. How exactly all this works... well, that remains to be seen.

Anyhow... as per recent times we have two parallel story thread; 1977 and 2007. 2007 concerns Locke's plan to meet, and get Ben to kill, Jacob. As well as this Ilana and Bram have a mysterious box with something interesting in it. "Terrific" says Frank as he is shown in it... As ever, we're kept waiting for the answer...

... which comes quite quickly. As Ben and Locke enter the room under what's left of the statue, we get probably the biggest shock of the episode. In the box is Locke's corpse. Now, it's a skill that a show can pull the same trick in two consecutive finales and still make it work... and work it does... 'cos if that's Locke in the box, who exactly has been walking around the island since the A316 crash...? We soon learn when Ben and notLocke meet Jacob. He talks of a loophole, and is clearly, somehow, the same person Jacob was talking to in the opening scene of the episode. But, again, how does it work? If we take it there are these two forces on the Island, Jacob and MaybEsau, which is for good and which for evil? And how are they connected? We've seen various other dead people appear on the island - Christian, Yemi, Alex, etc - are they all some manifestation of MaybEsau? When notAlex told Ben to do everything notLocke commanded was this because they were one and the same entity? Is this other entity the smoke monster?

Still, whatever, Ben does exactly as notLocke commands and kills Jacob. Or does he? They make a great play of the stabbing, and how when he's down he's kicked on to the fire, and catches fire. As if to somehow intend to be saying "he's not only merely dead, he's really most sincerely dead". So, I think we'll be seeing Jacob again next season...

Meanwhile in 1977 things are going as expected. Faraday's previous dictum, "whatever happened, happened" is once more evident. Whatever the 815ers do, the Incident will happen, and indeed it does. We get to see how Pierre Chang loses his arm. There's huge wodges of electromagnetism, the bomb is dropped... and doesn't go off. All sorts of metal things go rushing in to the drill pit... including some chains which wrap around Juliet who plunges down to what looks like certain death. There have been some comments that the way how Juliet is pulled down the hole is similar to how Smokey pulled Locke down a hole in Season 1. There's even a school of though that suggests that this incident is what leads to the creation of Smokey, and that Juliet is somehow turned in to it. Still. I think it's a load of baloney... 

And then we get to see Juliet, down in the pit. Still clinging to life. She bashes the bomb with a rock. It goes off and we fade to white. Black text "lost" on a white background. And we scream "NO YOU UTTER SWINES, YOU CANNOT END IT THERE!!!" at the television. This is the mark of a wonderful finale. It built the tension up wonderfully throughout to a - literally - explosive ending. And all the events occurring followed logically on from each other (unlike the Sylar/Nathan thing in Heroes), which makes it ever more satisfying. That we also got to see some key moments in the characters' hirstories - Sawyer starting to write his letter, Jack counting to five to let the fear out for the first time - was the icing on the cake. Just wonderful.

We now have an agonising wait until February next year for the final season. Those last 17 episodes. It's going to be a long wait, and I kind of want to be even more spoiler-phobic about these episodes. I've long since disliked spoilers, but haven't minded teasers, but I think for the final season coming to not even look at casting lists. As soon as they announce the regulars for the next season, and early guest casts it'll be obvious if Jacob, or Juliet, are actually dead or not. And, really, I don't want to accidentally find out the final ending before I see it on the telly. I may, for the duration of Season 6, go to almost complete internet exile. We'll see.

Still, if the accuracy of some of the "spoilers" for this finale are anything to go by, it won't matter as they'll pretty much all be baloney. Such as:

• Sawyer sacrificing himself for the greater good at some point during the incident. (Can you imagine the outrage if ol' shirtless were killed off and not be in Season 6?)
• A scene some time in the future whereby we see Aaron and Ji Yeon in their twenties getting married. (Which actually turned out to be a flachback to Sun & Jin's wedding...)
• An aged Jin, 30 years older, emerging from beneath the statue and being reunited with Sun. (Total tottenham...!!!)

I could list more, but... 

Still, it's going to be very interesting to see where they go from here. It's very hard to see what's going to happen next. According to Damon Lindelof, once you've seen the season 5 finale and the season 6 opener you will have enough information to hypothesise how the show will end. This is again another reason why I'm kind of wanting to avoid, at least Lost places on, the internet in the approach to Season 6. 'Cos someone will work it out, and whilst it will be mere speculation, I just don't want to know it. I want to work things out myself. Maybe the only Lost place I'll go is Lostpedia as they are very good about ensuring spoilers are not shown. We'll see. 

So, 17 to go. The last season. Let's just hope it doesn't go all Babylon 5...

As a coda to this post; one of the finest moments in the whole episode is the Rose & Bernard scene. The world and his lobster has wanted to see them again since they were last seen just before the time jumps started. It's a truly touching moment; the pair of them are clearly at peace with themselves, and are living a great life on the island. "We just care about being together; that's all that matters in the end" Bernard says. They're clearly unbothered by the hostiles; I can't imagine they do not know they are there. Maybe the hostiles realised that the pair of them want to live in harmony with the island, not exploit it, and are happy to leave them alone. It only ever appears to be those who wish to harm, or exploit, the island that the hostiles are... er... hostile to. The way the scene is played, I can't help but think this may be the last time we see the pair of them.

"...that hurt..."

Strewth. Heroes really can't do Season finales properly, can it? The end of Season 3 is really only the second "proper" season finale they've had (let's not forget that the "end" of Season 2 was only meant to be the mid-point of the season; and, ironically, ended up being the best "finale"). Season 1 had it's somewhat anticlimactic fight at the Kirby Plaza; blink and you almost missed it. Which was a shame, as everything up until that point was pretty much superb. But, in terms of massive suckiness, it pales in comparison to the guff that is the Season 3 finale...

...oh, and I suppose I should interject here and state the blimmin' obvious; from this point on there are massive spoilers. Oh, and later on I'll be talking Lost episode 100, The Variable, and there will be massive spoilers there, too...

...so, of you've not seen them, don't read on...

...again, to start with it was going so well. Ever since Bryan Fuller came back, the show has really got back on track (even if that did mean one of the better characters, Daphne, being killed off in order that Janice could make a comeback). So, high hopes for the finale. And it started off so well; a great deal of tension being built up, with a great sense of danger that someone would be killed. Sadly, the lack of budget showed in a couple of places, most notably the Peter & Nathan vs Sylar fight which consisted of a bit of blue light shining through a door. Hmm... but we'll forgive them this one. Clearly the big Peter vs Sylar fight we've been leading up to since Season 1 is still to come.

Then we get the episodes big shock moment; Sylar slitting Nathan's throat and killing him dead. I mean, proper dead. Ange even says he's dead. Dead is dead is dead. And suddenly you think Sylar's going to win; he's going to get to the President and bosh...

...and there he is in the car with the Pres. But we get the biggest "YES!" punch-the-air moment as he turns in to Peter who injects Sylar with a trank. Beaten by his own game, with the powers Peter presumably took from him in the fight earlier. But before you know it... here comes the utter wank moment. The bit where, after crafting a wonderful work of art you think that the best thing you can do with it is to put it on the floor, drop your trousers and do a big shit on it. They turn Sylar in to Nathan...

...somehow, Matt is able to force Sylar to change his appearance in to Nathan (well, he did have the shape shifting powers), supress all Sylar's memories, and keep only the memories of Nathan that Sylar acquired by using the "touch an object and get memories" power... So, Sylar - to all intents and purposes - becomes Nathan. *sigh* Bunch of utter wank. And why didn't they inject Nathan's corpse with Claire's blood? It cured him before. It cured Noah when he'd been shot in the brain. Surely rather than go through all that bollocks with Sylar, that should have been the first thing they tried. It's not as if she'd have said "no". I mean, the guy's her bio-dad and all... 

Anyhow, this Nathan/Sylar malarkey is, of course, going to lead to a most predictable plot (and one which any buffoon could see coming even before the teaser with Nathan and the clock) whereby Sylar will internally fight Nathan for control of the body. A Jekyll and Hyde kind of plot...

Far more interesting is whatever will happen to Hiro now? And how come Tracy can now turn in to water...? Also, it's a shame Greg Beeman's no longer on the show; his blog, with all sorts of behind the scenes chat, and photos and so on was an essential visit every week... 

Much better this week was episode 100 of Lost, entitled The Variable. At last we got to see Daniel again, who had been absent since the first episode since they on-island Losties ended up in 1974. There was another unsurprising reveal that his mum is Eloise Hawking, also that she was the "Ellie" in the Jughead episode, also that his dad is Charles Widmore. All things that had been guessed quite some time ago. Still, it was good to see them confirmed. 

In his time off island, Daniel's clearly come to think that his previous hypothesis that "whatever happened, happened" may be flawed; he thinks that the Losties can change the past as they are the variables in the equation. The people that are not constants... now it does seem to me that this new hypothesis is the flawed one. They were always clearly meant to be there. Whatever things they do in 1977 have already happened (from the perspective of the time frame of the crash and Oceanic 6 etc), so whatever they do to try to change things is doomed to failure as everything will happen as it always did. 

This is best illustrated by the episodes big shock moment. Daniel getting a bullet in the chest and dying. Killed by his own mother (though, before she ever conceived him... time travel, don't you just love it...). Every action Eloise has made subsequent to shooting him was made with the knowledge that at some day in the future she would have a son, that he would do certain things, that he would be a scientist, go to the island, go back in time, and one day in 1977 be shot dead. There was nothing she, or even Charles, could do to stop this. It has happened. It will happen again. "All this has happened before and will happen again" was a phrase that cropped up again in Battlestar Galactica, but really it's far more appropriate for Lost. As the show moves towards the season finale, and the Incident it's clear that whatever Jack et al do in 1977 to stop the Incident occurring, it will happen. Their actions or inactions will cause it. 

One thing comes to mind though; there's the video of Dr Chang recording a message in 1977 (age of the baby Miles means it can't be any earlier), and the camerman of this is thought to be Daniel (his voice is heard). So, when was this recorded? 

What's left of the Season is going to be very interesting. It's still hard to see exactly how those on the Ajira flight will connect with the 1977 characters, or indeed what they're doing there. Ilana and Bram are the most intriguing as they are clearly there for a reason, but what is that reason? And will we get that Sun and Jin reunion this season? 

"..you’re free to leave whenever you want; but I’ll shoot you in the leg..."

We all knew that The Island in Lost was special; that it had healing powers, and that there were many things about it that are strange indeed. I never realised it had the power to move bullet wounds. Next time you watch the latest episode of Lost, episode 11 of the fifth season, Whatever Happened, Happened, pay heed to the side of the chest that Sayid shoots Young Ben (it's in the recap of the previous episode) and then compare and contrast with where the would is when Jin turns him over... 

Anyhow. Small potatoes...

Much of the last few episodes has been relatively sedate, doing what Lost does so well; really getting under the skin of the characters. However, this episode is clearly a transitory one. Going from the character stuff, building up to the season finale. 

This is one of those episodes that mixes the emotions so well. Any scene this episode with Miles and Hurley is practically a sit-com. Miles' efforts to explain how the time travel to Hurley are brilliant. Though, really, it's hard to fathom how Hurley isn't grasping how it's all working. Young Ben can't die as they know he lives to become Big Ben. But any of the characters who've gone back in time can, as their fate is not known. Hardly rocket science...

So, Young Ben can't die. Jack clearly knows this, as he refuses point blank to save Ben. He's ascribing to the Faraday theory that "whatever happened, happened". So, whatever Jack does or does not do, Ben lives. So Jack refuses to help. Kate, and Sawyer, however have to help; he's just a kid, and you don't let a kid die; no matter what he grows up to be. 

And, yet, whatever happened, happened. The way things are going it's obvious that the way how Big Ben turns out is a direct consequence of the actions (or inactions) taken here by Sayid, Jack, Kate and Sawyer. When Ben's handed over to Richard, and taken in to the temple, that's where he becomes the Ben we know of old. And what exactly will happen to him in the temple? And what will Smokey have to do with things? It just gets more and more intriguing...

Intriguingly just before he's taken in to the temple, one of Richards people notes that Ellie and Charles will freak out if they find out; Richard retorts that he doesn't answer to them. Are Ellie and Charles somehow in charge of Richard's people - the Hostiles? And is he less than impressed at this? We know Ben will eventually lead these people, overthrowing Charles (and presumably Ellie?) and banishing him (and her?) from the island. Could this all be at Richard's instigation?

Other aspects of the episode were a little predictable; Aaron being left with Claire's mum was pretty much the favourite explanation for where he was. The only really surprising thing was that Kate's reason for going back was, essentially, to rescue Claire and bring her back. The sheer effort it must have taken for her to come to that conclusion, and to give away the child she'd been looking after the last three years must have been overwhelming. No wonder she orders Jack never to mention Aaron's name. 

So. 11 down. 6 to go this season (and 23 more overall). Next week's looks like a corker. It's centred around Ben - both small and big - and we get to see Smokey again. 

"...take a look at the law man..."

Earlier today, I saw one of the funniest things I've seen in ages; the conclusion to the US version of Life on Mars. Now, I had reservations about the ending of the UK version... but they were minor in comparison to how the US version ends.

For the most part, the last episode is relatively straightforward. Some guff about Sam's dad, who gets shot dead by Gene Hunt (who, here is played by Harvey Keitel; who would have been about the right age for the part circa when he filmed Reservoir Dogs, but now...?). And all is going well. The plot threads are resolved. Sam & Annie get together, and she gets promoted. Then Sam and Gene embrace and the picture breaks up.

To start with I think it's the file. But no.

Oh, and before I go on; I really should point out that from here on in there are spoilers.

Really big spoilers.

And, if you do decide to read on, I promise you that all that follows is what actually happens. I am not winding you up.

So... the picture breaking up is a proper part of the episode.

We see Sam wake up, and he's in some kind of a pod, and he's in a blue uniform. And he's on a spaceship. Just arriving at Mars...

...you see, it turns out he's an astronaut, in 2035, on mission to find life on Mars; looking for genetic material. They're on a gene hunt. No, really, that's actually used as a genuine line in the show.

Whilst they've been in some kind of a suspended animation, they've been using virtual reality simulations to stimulate their minds. Sam's was to be a cop in 2008, but there was a glitch when they went through some asteroids and the program transposed him to 1973...

...and get this; his fellow astronauts are the characters from 1973; Ray, Chris, Annie, and Gene. But they're all a little different to how they appeared in 1973. It's almost as if someone had seen the Red Dwarf episode Back to Reality.

But there's more.

It turns out that "Gene's" real name is...

...and no, I'm not making this up...

...really...

"Gene's" real name is... Major Tom. And the absolute cherry on top of the cake is that Tom is Sam's real dad... (which is clearly supposed to resonate with Gene killing Sam's "1973 dad" earlier in the episode; unfortunately this is subdued by the peals of laughter.)

I promise; I'll never criticise the UK version again...

"...awaiting an audience..."

Ah... Skins... what were they doing with that ending...? That last episode (which rather annoyingly completed excluded the twins, Naomi, Panda and Thomas) ended with somewhat of an anticlimax. The first had ended with that wonderful Tony gets hit by a bus (or was it a car? I forget now) cliffhanger, and the really odd "Wild World" moment. Season 2 ends with you just willing Sid to find Cassie, with that moment where they're so close to each other... and you just don't know if he's going to turn his head (and, of course Time to Pretend - but more on music in a minute)... and there's that cut to Effy in bed with a smile that oozes the same kind of charm and menace as Malcolm McDowell at the very start of A Clockwork Orange... but Season 3...

That last episode was actually a very good one. It brought to a head all of the things that had been bubbling throughout the season. Seeing Cook's dad really helped you understand the reasons as to why Cook is the way he is; the two Cooks were two peas in a pod, behaving in essentially exactly the same manner as each other. Cook Sr even tries to hit on Effy. There were so many things that were right about the episode. Perfect blend of drama and humour throughout (the Granny steeplechase was a partcicular highlight). But the ending... the boat speeds away.No-ones saying anything. They've reached some kind of understanding, and appear to have all made up. Though Cook looks a little contemplative. And finally Freddie says... "So, what do we do now?" And that's it. It just felt so underwhelming. It's almost as if they weren't confident of getting a Season 4, and decided to leave all the storylines at a place where if this occurred there would be some kind of a conclusion. It just felt a weedy way to end the season, and if there's one thing Skins never normally is, it's weedy. Even when there are things that are utter wank, it's never weedy.

Oh, and the last line is (almost) the same as the last line of the last episode of the last season of Buffy...

One thing I must also mention about Skins is the music. Back at the end of Season 2, the last couple of minutes of the action (from Sid arriving in NY) and over the end credits, they played a wonderful track; that was Time to Pretend by MGMT. And I found myself adoring, so I went out and bought the album. I immediately wished I hadn't as most of the album is tosh. Time to Pretend remains the only track from it I've ripped to my MP3 player. 

So, at the end of the first episode of this season when I heard the track playing over the end credits, I downloaded the album to see if the rest of it was any good. Within a day, I'd ordered all three CDs that band had released, so impressed I was with the one I d/led. This band is Asobi Seksu, and you must buy all three of their albums. Though, if you want to try just the one, get Citrus. I haven't been this excited about a band in ages, and the more I listen to them, the more I love them. Sheer beauty!

(Note; if you're waiting for my regular Lost post, it'll be up here when I've seen the episode a second time. There's a few things to say about this one...!)

"...Namaste, new recruits..."

I actually find myself with very little to say about the last two episodes of Lost, Namaste and He's Our You, as they're both relatively straightforward episodes. Just, really, a handful of points;

It was good to see Radzinksky at last, and even better to see his model of The Swan, which in 1977 had yet to be built. However... Pierre Chang, in his introduction to new Dharma recruits which we saw in Season 3 when Ben arrived on the island as a small boy (now dated to 1973), was wearing a Swan patch on his clothes...

Another point is that Sayid is meant to be trained in the art of the assasin. We see him giving the Russian bloke a double-tap (that is, two shots in quick succession). Yet, when he shoots the young Ben, he just shoots him once. Why not a double-tap? And knowing how slippery a fellow Ben is, and how he keeps on getting out of sticky situations etc, why not also just make sure with a shot to the head at point blank range...

...'cos there's no way Ben's dead from that shot. Not a chance in the world.