Lost Episode Review 4.05: "The Constant"

Quote: " I love you, Penny. I'll always love you."

Buh-bye, Jate. Or Skate. Or Sackate. Or whatever you want to call the endless love triangle that we really just don't care about anymore. Penny and Desmond are not only the best couple on the show, but I think they've my favorite all-time pair of star-crossed lovers. And I'll admit I got a bit verklempt when Desmond's phone call went through.

And folks, we have the first candidate of the season to bump "White Rabbit" off my Top 10 Lost Episode list.

Lots of stuff to talk about today. Onward!

1. Okay, Doc, what's up with all the freakily neato time travel-y stuff?

First off, physics are not my forte. But despite this, my one disappointment about the episode was how much you had to suspend disbelief in all the "science" we saw. However, given that I suspend disbelief very easily, let's go through what we've learned today about the island and time.

1) Daniel's been conducting time travel experiments since the mid-nineties, frying rat brains with a giant pink hairdryer (which, as Lostpedia points out, may have been taken from Slaughterhouse 5). He again reiterates that you can't change the future and that the process is unstable unless you have a constant.

2) The theme of instability is something TPTB mentioned in the EW preview for this episode (I don't read these before the episode airs, BTW, but they're well worth checking out afterwards). Remember that there was only a 31 minute time difference between the two clocks in Daniel's first experiment, but that it took the helicopter a day to reach the freighter. Methinks this does not bode well for those people who aren't part of the Oceanic 6. Or Ben. Or Desmond, perhaps.

3) We know now that Daniel's memory is likely screwed up from years and years of irradiating rodents and that he's probably bounced around in time before much like Desmond did this episode. The reason he was probably crying over the TV report on Flight 815 being found in the season opener is that he probably was remembering something from the future that's all muddled up inside his brain now.

4) Island time is now about a day in the past. Imagine if this difference were to increase exponentially? Ruh-roh, Raggy.

(Edit: I originally had this backwards in my review. Obviously it's not so bad if the outside world begins moving much, much faster than island time. That would mean if the Oceanic 6 came back to the island they could basically pick up right where they left off).

5) The freaky time travel stuff only seems to happen to people that have been exposed to massive amounts of radiation or electromagnetism. Since Sayid wasn't affected, it seems that merely being on the island during the Discharge isn't enough to trigger it. Desmond was affected because he was in the Hatch. So who else could be affected by this that we know?

Charlie was in the Hatch too, but he's dead.

Eko was also in the Hatch, and he's also dead. That leaves... hmmm...

Methinks John Locke might not want to leave the island, given he may have killed his only possible (evil) constant last season. What about the rest of the Others? What about Juliet? She's a lab geek too, she probably had some radiation exposure. I'd totally be bouncing around myself - I'd probably have to use, I dunno, maybe the Simpsons as my constant. It's been around for twenty years. =)

2. So now that Desmond's off the island, does he stay off? What happens if he goes back?

Okay. So Desmond makes it successfully off the island, but he can't be one of the Oceanic 6 since he wasn't on the plane. So is he alive in the real world and in hiding (Penny could certainly whisk him away somewhere with all money) or is he dead?

And what happens if Desmond tries to go back - not that I think he would - Does the whole process start over again? And can Desmond still get his flashes now? It would probably be very, very useful if he could.

3. So who's Ben's mole on the boat and why is he/she helping the Losties?

The person who opened the sick bay door is most likely Ben's mole. Was it one of the guys just saw (we met Keamy, Omar and Ray, the Doctor) or someone new? Frank said he was trying to help them, but I don't think he's a good candidate for the mole since he was just hired for this mission to get Ben. It certainly wasn't Minkowski or Brandon.

4. What's Charles Widmore's interest in the island?

We now know Charles Widmore has, at the very least, in interest in the island, given that he owns the only surviving journal from the Black Rock (that he purchased all the way back in 1996). Remember too that the original Henry Gale's balloon, who crashed on the island likely back in 2003, was also sponsored by Widmore.

Question now is, did Charles himself sponsor the freighter? And was he also responsible for giving Desmond's photo to Naomi? Maybe it was a possible bonus mission for her, i.e. "BTW, if you happen to run into this man, please kill him. Painfully, if possible."

5. So, uh, what's going to happen when the Christmas tsunami hits the boat?

So we now know that it's officially Christmas Eve 2004 on the freighter, Christmas Day on the island (remember the time difference). The 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake that caused the tsunami that devastated parts of Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India and Thailand hit on December 26th, 2004. Now we don't know exactly where the freighter is, but presumably it's going to be affected, should the writers stay true to current events (and the writers have regarding the 2004 Red Sox and U.S. elections).

Something to keep in mind for the next couple episodes.

Other tidbits:

* Numberage: Penny's new address - 423 Cheyne Walk & the frequency that Faraday gives Desmond is 2.342.

* The name of the freighter is "Kahana"

* Daniel's really my favorite of the new characters.

* Sayid better kick some evil freighter people ass in the next couple episodes.

* So what happens to Desmond's future consciousness when he's flipping? Again it seems very similar to Days of Future Past, as I've mentioned before.

* Below is Frank's "cheat sheet" for those interested. Lost UFO has a lot of other images, especially of Daniel's journal pages. He seems to like the idea of "imaginary time" quite a bit, whatever that means.



Summary: I'm going to give this one a 4.7 out of 5. It would be a perfect score, but I have to deduct something for all the hokey science stuff. I know it's all good sci-fi, but c'mon, the guy had a giant pink radiation gun in his study. Please. I have to jump through hoops and ladders nowadays just to get the smallest amount of the most harmless isotope. But I LOVED Desmond's and Penny's story. She waited for him, just like the real Penelope. And, again, I think if there's a tragic ending to the show it will be that Desmond has to sacrifice a chance to spend the rest of his life with Penny to save the world.

Damn, guess we'd better pick up a case of kleenex at Costco. Can't wait for next week and don't forget to vote in the poll too! =)