An Unstuck-In-Time Review of Last Week's LOST, Brother!

So I never got to talk about last week's episode of LOST, since, well, I didn't get a chance to actually watch it until last night. Now, I usually hate when an episode of a show gets a ton of hype and I'm forced to go into it with raised expectations rather than simply with a blank slate. But a number of fellow Lost fans yelled at me that I HAD to watch this ep ASAP, that it was one of the best of the season if not ever, etc ... I was getting a little annoyed, but went in optimistic anyways, as the episode had all the ingredients to be a good one: Desmond-centric, some big-reveals, time-travel ...

So bear with me, pretend, say, that I've gotten a bit unstuck in time and that my conciousness is hurtling between this week and last week. Whoah - it's last Thursday - a time when Barack Obama was sitting pretty, Patrick Swayze was just another washed-up actor, and I was actually in New York City freezing my ass off. Hmm, it's suddenly a bit colder, but anyways, about that episode of LOST ...

And ... holy crap -- now that I've seen it, I'm a believer. "The Constant" was an incredible episode of TV. Someone hand Henry Ian Cusick an Emmy ASAP. He's made Desmond Hume into one of the show's true standout characters - his intensity, likability, and pathos as a character has made him a universal fan-favorite. Everyone I talk to says the same thing - they love Desmond, and I can't really argue, brother.

And how about Jeremy Davies as Daniel Faraday? Just awesome.

Really though - this episode had two great things going for it aside from some superb performances. First was the mind-bending unstuck in time storyline - it was masterfully handled, really well-edited, and intricately crafted. We got some really cool insights into the way the island works, it's history (the Black Rock journal), and some new clues as to what role the Whidmores and Hanzos of the world play in this whole crazy scheme. Plot-wise, this one jsut hit all the right notes, taking pieces of Slaughterhouse V, Back to the Future, and much of what makes Lost itself great and combining all of the disparate pieces into one brilliant tapestry.

Secondly, this was far and away the most emotionally-affecting episode of Lost since, well, maybe ever? Certainly, in terms of getting us invested in a romantic relationship, this one was tops. But what really got me was how the emotional punch just kind of snuck up on me thanks to how brilliantly Cusick helped to get us wrapped up in Desmond's story. By the time we got to that climactic scene of him calling Penny from the boat, eight years after he had obtained her new number ... well, let's be honest, who among us wasn't a little choked up? Suffice to say, it's quite a feat for an episode to be jam-packed with geek-friendly time travel and scifi goodness, yet also be a legitimate tearjerker, to be this unabashadly romantic.

So man, this ep is going to be a tough one to follow up tonight. But regardless, the Lost crew can take pride that in "The Constant," they've crafted another bonafide classic, brotha.

My Grade: A