Lost: Preparation for the Final Season, Season One

The wife and I have started rewatching Lost from the beginning in an effort to amp up for the final season.  In order to contribute something valuable to the blogging community I've decided to report on a few things that have jumped out at me as a result of the review.

First off, I have the "What We Still Don't Know" section where I round up information we still don't have a concrete answer to going into the final season.  My second category is the "Inconsistencies" section where I catalog how the writers seem to have contradicted themselves.  That section is rather small and could possibly already have been explained (I'm not perfect) or will be explained by the end of season 6.  That's followed by the "Worth Noting" section where I mention a few things that jumped out at me upon the review.

Before you continue please remember that this entry is extremely spoiler filled so don't continue if you've yet to complete seasons 1-5 of Lost (and if you haven't make the time, it comes back soon and you'll want to see what happens as the rest of the world does).

What We Still Don't Know

"Pilot"

What is the smoke monster? How does it work?

"White Rabbit" 

Jack's Dad makes his premier appearance and becomes the first of the walking dead on the island.  We still are unsure as to what/who is animating/controlling the walking dead, though the Island itself, Jacob, and Jacob's enemy are all leading contenders.

"House of the Rising Sun"

Who still don't know who the two people found in the caves are other than Locke dubbing them Adam and Eve.

"Raised by Another" 

Why can't someone else raise Aaron? What happens now that Kate raised him and Claire's mom has him now? I know the psychic was proven false later but I believe the prophecy to be true.

"Special" 

What is the deal with Walt, what kind of power does he have and where does it come from?

"Numbers"

What do the numbers mean? Where do they get their power?

Inconsistencies 

"White Rabbit" 

Charlie wakes Jack up to inform him that a woman is drowning because Charlie doesn't swim.  Obviously Charlie swims... enough said about that sad moment in Lost's history.

"Deus ex machina" 

Boone reached someone on the radio before the plane crashed, that would be impossible because the radio tower was blocking all transmissions to and from the island.  Unless of course Boone radioed to the "Others". (I forgot that Boone was able to contact Bernard who also located a short wave radio so obviously this was never inconsistent).

Worth Noting

Sayid prays with Islamic prayer at least twice in the first season.

Music was used to bookend the end of the episodes more often in the first season.  The moment when Hurley's Walkman ran out of batteries was terrific.

It's amazing how many questions raised in the first season are completely answered.

Michael was the only one to notice that there was something untrustworthy about Lock.

The first season has 25 episodes, that's insane, season two has 24, season three has 22, season four has 13 (writers strike), and seasons five has 16.

At the end of the episode where Boone dies (Do No Harm) Jack comments that "Boone didn't die, he was murdered".  Jack was right, the island killed Boone by setting in motion a series of events that started with his fever dream about Shanon's death.

Jack comes at Locke with intent to kill for the first time at the beginning of the episode "The Greater Good"

Avatar: A Love Letter

I just returned from Pandora and I must say that I am in love.  Avatar is the most amazing  experience I have had in a movie theater in a long time, possibly ever.  James Cameron should spend another 12 years making his next movie if the result will turn out anything nearly as impressive as this masterpiece.  While Avatar is not without its imperfections it heralds the dawning of a new age of movie magic.

Pandora is a magical place where "The People" (Navi) have evolved elegantly with the planet.  The Navi can literally plug themselves in to other indigenous creatures of Pandora in effectively guide them through mental suggestion.  The Navi can also plug into the plant life of the planet and be guided by the very essence of life itself on their home world.  

The creatures are simply gorgeous and fully believable as animals that have evolved on this unique planet.  Pandora itself is beautiful by day but breathtaking by night as all the vegetation on the planet glows in the moons (of course there is more than one) light.  The gravity on Pandora is less than that of Earth (which explains the massive flying creatures, and our heroes ability to survive falling from unbelievable height) and while I'm still not sure how that explains flying mountain ranges, I'm not bothered, it's just worth noting.

The Navi themselves are all distinctive and never once did I think to myself, "wait which blue alien is that now?"  They also happen to be massive (like everything else on the planet) 8 to 10 feet by my eye and stunning to look at (like everything else in this movie).  I had a hard time remembering that the elegant Navi were computer generated because I truly believed all the performances of the actors portraying these alien creatures throughout the film.  

Speaking of alien, I'm a sucker for a movie/television experience that places humans in the role traditionally reserved for non-Earthlings.  For the humans to be the aliens and the Navi to be the seemingly primitive people that the aliens cannot see the grace and beauty of was a fun and thought provoking turn on an old formula.  

In another amazing feat, after spending 3 hours on Pandora with the Navi I'm dying to go back to the planet to experience more stories.  Cameron's world is rich in the same way Tolkien's is, loaded with supplementary information that is not necessarily important to the story currently being told.  I'd love to know how Neytiri's great grandfather was able to ride the great beast, I'd love to see how the Navi learned they could integrate themselves into other creatures on the planet, I'd love to see really anything else this world could offer me. 

I viewed Avatar in digital 3-D and I can't imagine watching this film in any other format.  In fact, I might have to buy a 3-D TV to replicate this experience at home.  The 3-D was not used solely make you jump out of your seat (shrapnel flying at the audience) but to help more fully immerse the viewer in the world of Pandora.  I have a hard time seeing many effects in the third dimension (which is part of the reason the state of NJ tried to take my drivers license away) but Pandora literally popped off the screen and into my field of vision. 

It's rare that I go into a movie with such high expectations, rarer still that those expectations turn out to be less than the movie actually earns upon viewing.  Could I complain about and nitpick this movie?  Actually, I can't, do yourself a favor, go see this movie!

Benjamin Linus: The Red Scare-er

We recently realized that Benji is the last in a long line of spaniel mixes descended from Senator Joe McCarthy's dog Pinko.

Fringe: Grey Matters

That was certainly a much better episode than last week, which is a good thing considering it was the "fall finale" episode.  While I didn't find the episode as satisfying as I had hoped it would be it did leave me with enough momentum to push through till March or whenever they decide to air Fringe again*.

I loved Broyles and Olivia verbalizing the "answers lead to more questions" phenomenon that is previlent in so many shows I love watching.  Olivia even asked aloud what they learned from Walters abduction as if to give viewers disgruntled with the lack of progress this season since she came back from bizarro NY a voice.

On the "I may be a psychic" front, I did call the GPS chip as an integral part of this episode!  On the "maybe I am not a psychic" front I did not think it would be such a dead end so quickly.  Last weeks poor episode was made that much worse by the GPS tracker being such a non-issue this week.

Didn't they introduce a new FBI agent at the beginning of this season? Didn't her and Peter have a bit of a possible love connection brewing?  Where's Olivia's sister and niece?

I did think the cutting out Walter's brain and placing it in order people's heads to make them crazy storyline was actually interesting.  William Bell is quite the character, he's a grandfather figure to Olivia, a big brother to Walter, and his own evil twin.

Speaking of heads, I believe that the cryo-headed bad guy genuinely meant it when he apologized to Meredeth's father about leaving the back of his head off his brain (I can't be the only person out there watching Grey's Anatomy and Fringe).

*Correction: In the previous post I made a few references to Fringe returning in March.  In the blogs first user submitted correction Blue Sunflower commented that Fringe will return in January for 4 weeks before taking off again until April Fools Day (let's hope it's not a joke).  Thanks Blue... your my boy (figuratively speaking)!

While I'm back in this post, I forgot to mention "the Blight" that is affecting the other side of the door.  If it's as bad as it seems, this gives our ambiguous bad guys motivation to take over our world.

Fringe: Snakehead

Well, other than the fact that I have no idea why the doctor didn't just synthesize the drug compound that the worms created I found this episode somewhat enjoyable.  It was definitely not one that inspires me to write pages worth of prose but it does seem like this particular episode was all about one thing, getting Walter to put a GPS tracking device in his neck.

Which is actually a bit odd.  Why did Walter feel the need to be independent in the first place?  As far as I can remember, this is the first time he's felt any need to be off on his own, for the principle of it.  He's had secret meetings with the "observers" but never had a hard time finding his way back to the lab.  Walter even had that little tryst with the girl he used to drug (for research purposes) and was able to find his way home without Peter watching over him.

Therefore the fact that Walter chipped himself must play big into the next episode.  That being observed (get it?), at the moment when Walter inevitably gets kidnapped would it not have been more elegant for Peter just to comment about his father putting a GPS chip in himself because he's wacky and thought it would be fun?  Why waste a whole episode?

The worms were gross.  Peter was a bit more idiotic than usual storming into the lab thinking his Cantonese would defend him I guess.  I'm surprised that Walter waited in the car and nothing happened to him.  That was a nice change of pace from the normal "wait in the car" cliche (see "Chuck").  Another nice moment in this episode was Walter and Astrid hugging it out.  Their relationship has come a long way from Walter being completely incapable of remembering her name.

FlashForward: A561984

Wedeck hates Mark Benford. Aaron hates Mark Benford.  The Persian lady hates Mark Benford.  Mark Benford hates Mark Benford.  Olivia probably is going to hate Mark Benford because of the way he's bound to treat her when he finds out she's adopting Dylan.  Most importantly, I hate Mark Benford.

On the bright side, things are looking up for Demetri who happens to be a character I like much more than Mark.  I don't know why Zoey is so in love with Dem considering how much he ignores her and shuts her out but I do like them as a couple more than I like Olivia and Mark.  Did Zoey tell Demetri that she didn't actually see him in the flash when they originally had that conversation or did they insert that in the flashback?

Continuing on a positive note, I must admit I legitimately enjoyed this episode.  I like that Simon is a man who has convinced himself of the genius he possesses to the point that he can't fathom someone coming up with an idea about plasma whatit's before he did.  I also like that he's so concieted that he can't understand a man could invent something so world changing and not want an ounce of credit for it.

Olivia is falling for Lloyd and the fact that she's now his son's only parental figure is only going to help cement their future relationship.  That being said, the kidnapping of Lloyd was a fairly obvious plot point.  Maybe I've seen one too many escape/abduction movies but the second they mentioned that Dylan was going to be "transfered" I knew it was going to end up with Lloyd having a gun to his head.  On a side, why is Dylan even in the hospital?  He seems to be fully recovered to this medical non-professional.

I like Keiko the office drone turned rock star as much as anyone but I really like Nicole and don't want to see her crushed by Dr. "I want to kill myself, just kidding".  The kitten jar was a nice gesture.

The Iranian agent plot line bordered on being really cool but was constantly pulled off track by Mark making dumb decisions.  Additionally, I'm annoyed by the fact that this show portrays the CIA as being an extra government organization.  Why would a CIA agent have any control over what happens in China?  Especially considering the government of the USA pointed a finger at China regarding the blackout.

No more FlashForward until March.  I hope they take some time to focus on the stronger elements of the series and kill off the less enjoyable characters (Mark).

The Kitchen: Part III

As previously explained, we awoke Friday morning a bit befuddled by the size issue of the cabinet over the refrigerator and we were debating how to proceed.  To make matters worse all the demolition was done so I could not take my feeling of frustration out on a piece of drywall.  Continuing to compound the problem was the fact that screw drivers, pliers, tape, and other random smallish tools seemed to disappear with alarming regularity.  

We did some minor jobs, messed around with a bit more of the electricity, and were feeling a general sense of morose when Uncle Don showed up.  Thankfully he brought much needed energy to the project.  Uncle Don also completely ditched the plans my father and I drew up to splice current off old wires to make for simpler work.  He explained why that would have been a bad idea but in all honesty most of the meaning of his words were lost in my morning haze.  

The good news was that with Uncle Don and myself pushing the crew forward electrically, my father and Uncle Bill were free to hang some cabinets.  This process took us through most of the daylight hours as both the electricity and early cabinets proved more demanding jobs than originally thought.

Eventually our rag tag group was joined by my cousin Billy.  Billy brought us coffee.  He was a hero.  My Dad recruited Billy for cabinet work while Uncle Don and I toiled in the basement with the circuit breaker box.  At one point Billy attempted to solve our height issue by staggering the cabinets in such a way to look intentional.  I thought it might work but the wife was not having any of it.

At approximately 8:00 PM on Friday the electrical work was finished, we thanked Uncle Don and sent him on his way back to North Jersey.  At this point the wife had a research breakthrough and believed she had located the cabinet we needed at a Lowes approximately 45 minutes away.  This caused some concern because we needed to get to Lowes and purchase the cabinet by 9:00 PM when they closed.

I grabbed the truck key from my father but the wife convinced me that was overkill because the cabinet in question was so small it would fit easily in the trunk of my Versa.  Billy and I arrived at Lowes at 8:55 and caught some nasty looks for the exhausted Black Friday workers.  We high tailed it to the appropriate section only to discover that the cabinet was the wrong color.  Lowes makes a 12 inch cabinet in Red Oak not Honey Oak and we needed Honey.

As Bill and I were mere feet from the door and the clock struck 9:00 PM we got a call from my father in which he requested a half sheet of plywood.  The helpful girl at the check out counter responded that they did not sell half sheets but they could cut them for us.  After 5 minutes and one completely non-verbal encounter with the man who cuts plywood at Lowes at three minutes pasted closing we were wheeling 2 half sheets of plywood towards my Versa.

A Versa is a great car and it does some things really well.  Hauling plywood, however, is not one of them.  We unsuccessfully attempted to put it in the trunk.  We tried squeezing it in the back doors in vane.  We even thought we could tie it too the roof but Lowes had locked their twine behind the gates in the garden section and I was in no mood to scale the fence.

At this point a blind rage overcame me.  I lifted the (half) sheet of plywood over my head and slammed it into a curb in an effort to crack it in half (again).  When that did not work I leaned it against the curb and tried to kick through the wood (this would have worked if the curb was a bit taller).  Finally I decided I would have to jump on the wood like a trampoline until it would crack beneath my impressive (yes that's the adjective I'm going with) weight.  Fortunately or not plywood is made of fairly strong stuff and I was defeated.

While I was busy engaging lumber in mortal combat Billy had called the wife who was already on her way to pick the wood up. By the time I finished weeping in the cold on the plywood she was in the parking lot and loading the truck.  

The Kitchen: Part II

The Wednesday before Thanksgiving saw much progress on our kitchen.  My father arrived at around 6:30 PM and we resumed destruction immediately.  Every cabinet was ripped unceremoniously from their resting place, the old wall above the cabinets was removed (which made it rain insulation), and I re-tiled the floor in some key areas that the new cabinets were not going to cover.  The other spots in the floor were left bare because my father swore he'd be able to shim the cabinets later. 

Other than accumulating the bulk of the garbage from the kitchen project on the whole the work of Wednesday night was efficient and uneventful.

Thanksgiving morning I awoke at 6:30 AM to my father knocking at my bedroom door whilst singing a song about how much he loved Dunkin' Donuts (the melody of which I have thankfully blocked out) because the coffee gives him the energy he needs to work all day long.  That song unbelievably continued until the wife returned with D&D 20 minutes later.

In the meantime my father and I did some electrical mapping and had a serious discussion about whether or not what we had planned could burn down the house.  At the end of the debate we decided that we'd need to call in my Uncle Don (the familial electricity guru) for the heavy electrical hitting.  We did some cleaning, moved some wires around, and then left for Thanksgiving dinner (conveniently enough at Uncle Don's).  

Driving on Thanksgiving day was miserable as expected and after a 2 1/2 hour car ride in which we traversed every major highway in the state of NJ we sat down for our meal.  Dad badgered Uncle Don about coming back with us that night but he was not having any of that.  After some wheeling and dealing the old man got my uncle to agree to leave for South Jersey first thing the next morning.  

Once we got guaranteed participation from one uncle we went across town to interrupt my other uncle in the middle of his Thanksgiving dessert course.  Dad didn't give Uncle Bill any options, he explained that we were leaving in 10 minutes and Uncle Bill needed to be in the car.  Amazingly, Uncle Bill was excited about work on the kitchen and agreed to come down.  45 minutes later (Uncle Bill moves at his own pace) we were all back in the car and headed to South Jersey.

We managed to find enough to work to do on the kitchen until about midnight and went to bed exhausted.  Once 6:30 AM rolled around I heard a familiar knocking on the door but this time there was no song to accompany it.  After a brief inquiry my father informed me that he had been up all night trying to solve a kitchen problem I had not even realized existed.  It turned out that the cabinet I had bought to place over my fridge was about 2 inches too long and would have to be returned.

Unfortunately because we went with stock cabinets, there was no alternately smaller cabinet we could buy in it's place.  Most cabinets come in 3 inch increments but Lowes does not stock them in all possible sizes (must not be cost effective).  A brief Google search proved fruitless so we decided we'd deal with the over-sized cabinet problem when it inevitably came back up.

The Kitchen: Part I

The wife and I have been slowly remodeling our kitchen since the day we moved in to our home almost three years ago.  It was a small cramped space hemmed in by four walls and a giant peninsula that took up 55% of the available floor space (I did the math).  Over time we made some minor adjustments (ripping down a wall to connect the kitchen and dinning room) and some major adjustments (ripping down another wall, retitling the floor, installing a dishwasher and island in the place of the peninsula) but left the ancient cabinets and most of the appliances in place.

After approximately 1 year, 3 months, 21 days, and 2 hours of me making the case to completely overhaul the kitchen, the wife relented so I immediately grabbed a hammer and threw it through one of the remaining kitchen walls (that is the custom that signifies the beginning of a new job in our household, it's rather permanent).   

That weekend I convinced my father to come down so we could buy cabinets from Lowes.  In an effort to save the all mighty dollar we went with stock cabinets rather than custom.  While much cheaper, this would cause some serious problems down the road.  Additionally, if I never again hear someone at Lowes explain "Lowes is a warehouse, we only have what you see on the shelves" it'll be too soon.

Once construction (or destruction) began we immediately recruited the most useful family members to complete key jobs.  Johnny (the 5 year old nephew) and Jordan (the 2 year old niece) came over to pull the the wall oven out and remove the wall that contained it (their dad and mom came too but honestly Johnny was way more useful than his parents, Jordan not so much).  Note to all aunts and uncles; When attempting destruction jobs with 5 year olds, give them toy hammer, the real thing is far too nerve racking as it seems they are always inches from whacking themselves in the noggin.  After 4 hours of "hard work" the kids left and our kitchen was minus one cooking implement and another wall.

Then the real fun began because the bulk of the kitchen work was done over the Thanksgiving weekend.  Dad showed up on Wednesday (Thanksgiving Eve) to begin old cabinet removal.  We'll pick up the story from there in the next post!

Men of a Certain Age: Advanced Screener

First let me get to the good stuff, "Men of a Certain Age" came bundled in an awesome package.  The outside of the mailing box was made to look like a cassette tape container and the show itself was bundled on a 2 gig reusable USB key which resembled a cassette tape.  This packaging had me very excited about the prospects of a new comedy from the network that claims to know drama, TNT.

Sadly, once the show got started I was less than thrilled.  Either this was a slow screener episode with few moments of levity, let alone laugh out loud funny bits or I am simply not of a certain age that would enjoy this series (I know that was a bit of an obvious joke, but I can't help myself sometimes). 

Watching this show on the computer had a few downsides, for example, my computer screen was dark and reflective in my viewing environment and I simply could not find the best viewing angle.  More unfortunate however was the way the computer was constantly ticking how much time was left in the episode.  I made an unconsciousness point to look down on the time remaining gauge almost every 30 seconds and that makes me believe the show was less than engaging. 

The show was co-created by Ray Ramano but it seems to have none of the charm that worked for him in "Everybody Loves Raymond".  While I do like all of the actors in this series what they had to do in this episode was boring and depressing.  If "Men of a Certain Age" was billed as a drama with comedic tones I think I might be willing to give it another chance, but being a half hour comedy I simply should not have been this bored, this long.

Therefore, "Men of a Certain Age" should be passed up at any age!