Last night’s Lost will go down as one of the most epic episodes in the history of the series. “The Candidate” was full of big moments: Deaths! Bad Guys! Smoke Attack! But it’s most titanic (and Titanic-like) moments, the tragic loss of three (maybe four) major characters, felt a tad underserved, particularly for one character who can snap a dude’s neck with his legs!
But before we get to that, let’s talk about *gasp* the side-flash. Despite all that happened on the island, Deaths! Bad Guys! Smoke Attack!, the side-flash gives us the most to talk about. And it starts almost immediately, with Jack hovering over a recovering John Locke and Locke instantly recognizing Jack. We’re led to believe it’s from their meeting at the lost luggage depot at LAX (missing: Locke’s knives and the body of Jack’s dead dad), but there’s clearly more to it than that as John’s near-death experience allowed him to see the “other side” that we’ve been watching for five and a half seasons: the island and its events.
And for some reason I’m stuck on the scene where Jack goes to visit Bernard, DDS. Was I imagining a far-too sentient Bernard pushing Jack along a path? Though Bernard said it was weird that he and Jack both happened to be on Oceanic 815 (the one that didn’t crash), he sure didn’t act like it. I may be overanalyzing that scene a bit too much, but it gave me weird visions of Bernard being a much bigger player in this thing than we first expected. Pipe up in the comments below if you got a similar tingling.
Jack then tracks down Anthony Cooper and the truth about how John was hurt (plane crash, courtesy of John’s new pilot license). It’s should be interesting to note that John, at least in the alternate timeline, can fly a plane, according to whatever aviation committee gave him a license. That kind of talent could come in handy should real John be able to wrestle control from Smoke Monster Locke. Just sayin’.
I was also a big fan of Jack and John’s final scene in the corridor. When was the last time we saw Terry O’Quinn and (more importantly) Matthew Fox just be able to relax and act? It may not have had the fireworks the rest of the episode had, but I couldn’t take my eyes off these two thesps, the cornerstones of the series we’ve been entranced with for six years.
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