This episode, “Night of Desirable Objects,” picks up roughly where the last one left off, and we see Olivia being discharged from the hospital.  She’s not 100%, though, not by any means: she’s walking with a cane, has nasty bruises all over her back and shoulder, still has a bit of the shakes in her hands, and … what else? … oh yeah, she’s got superhearing.  That’s right, if you ever wanted to know what a fly’s footsteps sound like, you might want to have a talk with Olivia Dunham; she’s got the scoop.

I’m already seeing reviews that are expressing disappointment with the lack of development in the alternate-universe storyline, but as with last week, I found this week’s episode to be a perfectly satisfactory example of making Olivia’s amnesia, and her confusion over it, a vital enough part of the story that I’m okay with not knowing more for now.

This episode isn’t as good as the season premiere, but it’s certainly got its moments, and it’s grounded enough in character that it easily sails over the more problematic elements.

Those problematic elements?  Well, it’s hard to care about the monster of the week very much.  There are some wonderfully creepy moments, some of which rival vintage X-Files monster-moments; however, as was the case with many a lesser X-Files episode, the monster plotline just never manages to amount to much of anything on the whole.

The opening sequence is great, though, featuring a creepy cornfield and a creepy scarecrow and a frightening Carrie-esque moment.  Later, there is a spooky shot of a monster bounding into partial view in an underground cave, and toward the end of the episode, there is a genuinely frightening moment in which the same monster suddenly appears behind one of the main characters.

But the mumbo-jumbo about the monster being a genetic experiment using scorpion DNA to allow a baby to gestate inside a lupus-stricken mother is of almost no interest at all.  I’m thnkful that it didn’t turn out to be yet another former experiment of one Walter Bishop, though; maybe that too-frequently-used plot device has seen its last days.

What we’re left with is the story of Olivia continuing to deal with her amnesia, and now with her ability to hear all sorts of things she shouldn’t be able to hear.  To me, that’s what this episode is really about, and it mostly succeeds on that level; the monster stuff is just window dressing.

Olivia’s enhanced hearing first manifests itself when she suddenly begins hearing a fly as its feet make noise while it walks.  Later, she hears somebody moving around in a house she and Peter are investigating, and she is so much on edge as a result that she very nearly puts a bullet in Peter’s skull.  Even later, while she’s in the tub — oooh, Anna Torv plus bubbles – she begins hearing all sorts of things all at once, and then abruptly stops hearing them again.

She’s also been visited by Nina, who gives her the contact information for one Sam Weiss, a fellow who helped put Nina “back together again” at one point, whatever that means.  Olivia goes to see Weiss, who apparently works at a bowling alley; he asks her if the headaches have begun yet, and when she says no, he says that they will.  Who is this Weiss?  I’m sure we’ll find out; as far as information goes, we’re just along for the ride with Olivia on this one, for now.

Olivia has also confided in Charlie, who, as you might recall from last week, is no longer Charlie at all.  No, he’s just a soldier from another dimension wearing a copy of Charlie’s body, and he gets to sit for another session at the interdimensional typewriter.  Whoever is on the other end isn’t happy to find out that Olivia doesn’t remember anything, and orders “Charlie” to help her remember … presumably by any means necessary.

Another element running through the episode is a theme involving Walter and Peter, father and son.  Just as Dr. Hughes has gone to great lengths to create a son for himself, Walter has … well, we still don’t know what he’s done, but we know by now that he’s surely done something.  Walter just has too knowing a look in his eye after it is discovered that the grave of Baby Boy Hughes is empty; “The grave of a boy who is not in his grave,” Walter says to himself, significantly not specifiying who he’s talking about.  John Noble, as always, is great this week.

He’s also got a fine scene in which Peter makes a date with him to go fishing.  While investigating this new case, Peter has seen a fishing lure on a wall; it’s called a “Night of Desirable Objects” lure, and Peter once bought a similar one to take on a fishing trip with his dad.  That trip never came off, but years later, they’ve got a second chance.

Joshua Jackson is good in this scene, and in the episode as a whole.  Anna Torv is very good this week, also, and the chemistry between her and Jackson — practically nonexistant during much of the first seaon — is finally starting to click.

And Kirk Acevedo makes for a great creepy faux-Charlie; he was underused during the first season, and it’s gonna be a shame to see him leave the show, but at least he’s getting to go out playing something interesting.

The guest cast is pretty good this week, too, with Charles Martin Smith playing a thankless role as a police officer; it’s always nice to see him, though, even if he’s wasted, as he is here. 

Also popping up is John Savage, who you might remember from The Deer Hunter, and — in the role of Sam Weiss, who is sure to be a recurring character — Kevin Corrigan, from The Departed amongst many other roles.

All three of those actors have more gravity and weight than is typically the case for guest stars on Fringe; it tends to be workmanlike in many of its smaller roles, and having people a bit further up the talent scale makes the whole endeavor seem a bit more worthy this week.

Not a perfect episode, by any means, but good enough for me to heartily endorse it.

Now, just you try and tell me you aren’t glad to see this show back for a second season.

And a pretty darn good season premiere it is, too.  “A New Day in the Old Town” is the title; it was scripted by J.J. Abrams and Akiva Goldsman, and directed by Goldsman, who previously directed the first-season episode ”Bad Dreams.” 

As you might recall, that episode was probably the best of the first season, and while this one isn’t quite up to that standard, it is nevertheless fairly gripping stuff.  This suggests two things: one, that J.J. Abrams being hands-on with his shows is almost always a good thing; and, two, that Akiva Goldsman ought to direct one out of at least every four episodes of this series.  The dude knows what he’s doing; it’s just that simple.

I can imagine large portions of the audience being quite disappointed with this episode, though, based not so much on what it is, but instead on what it isn’t: a direct continuation of last season’s finale, which found Olivia Dunham chatting up William (Leonard Nimoy) Bell in a parallel universe’s version of the still-standing World Trade Center.  Yes, I’d imagine a lot of folks will be annoyed that this episode doesn’t pick up exactly where that one left off.

I’d be one of them, too, if not for the fact that Abrams and Goldsman obviously want you to be expecting the episode to begin that way.  The fact that it doesn’t immediately mythologizes whatever experiences Olivia has been through while sojourning in that other dimension, and it means that the mystery surrounding those events is almost certainly going to form a large part of what this sophomore season will be about.  Also, since for the time being Olivia herself doesn’t know what happened, it’s not at all a cheat; instead, it’s a device, and one I’m happy to let play out.  Abrams ain’t no chump; he’ll bring the goods, if not this episode, then maybe two or three or twelve down the line.

I’m all for that.  Assuming Olivia’s extradimensional vacation will be an ongoing plot thread, I’ll be pleased for the series to contain more mythology and less X-Filesish standalone plots.  (Speaking of that show, you can glimpse it playing on a television at one point while a particularly X-Filesian incident is taking place.  Later on in the episode, a senator even refers to paranormal things as having “the old ‘X’ designation.”  Nice.  I think it’s something the FBI actually does — label unexplained cases with an “X” designation — but, still … nice.)

As with “Bad Dreams,” what Goldsman really seems to bring to the table as a director is a great skill with his actors.  Anna Torv spends the entire episode bedridden — oops, spoilers, lol — but shows more vulnerability than we’ve ever seen her imbue Dunham with heretofore.  I think I said this when I reviewed “Bad Dreams,” but I’ll just go ahead and repeat it here, since it’s still true: I think Torv is a pretty good actress, and Goldsman seems to be good at both writing ways for her to show it and then capturing her actually doing it.  And he’s also quite good with Joshua Jackson as Peter.  Both Olivia and Peter seem to be richer characters in this episode than was typically the case during the first season, and that is why Goldsman needs to be a regular fixture on the show.  Abrams’ writing is probably also responsible for this in no small way.

The episode — and I won’t be doing much more in the way of spoiler-divulging — mostly involves Olivia returning in an unexpected way from the parallel universe, and being pursued by a shape-shifting soldier whose mission is to get some (apparently crucial) information out of her.  Do we learn exactly what it is he/she/it is looking for?  Of course not, silly!  Haven’t you figured out by now that it makes no sense to do anything other than play that sort of plot out over numerous episodes?

The shape-shifting soldier plotline is executed quite capably; the Olivia/soldier story is interesting, and is intercut with a b-story involving the government trying to shut down the Fringe Division because, under Broyles’ leadership, it has failed to produce anything usable.  Abrams and Goldsman do a pretty good job of making that storyline dovetail with the main one, and as such, the episode stays interesting pretty much all the way through … something first-season episodes were not always successful in achieving.  Hopefully, this is a sign that the second season is going to be an improvement on an already good show.

Other items of interest:

*     The episode begins with a brand-new saga-sell in which Blair Brown tells the audience — which Fox obviously hopes will include millions of new members in the show’s new Thursday-night home — what Fringe is all about.  Saga-sells are a strange, and somewhat antiquated, device, but if this one keeps the show a hit, I’m all for it.

*     I’m not sure what to think about the new FBI agent: Agent Jessup, played by the oddly attractive Meghan Markle.  Markle has done a fair amount of acting, but she was also one of the suitcase models on Deal or No Deal at one point, and I’ve got to be honest here: I’m not sure Markle has the chops to be on this show.  Considering how good Goldsman seems to be at directing actors, I’m not sure it’s anything other than a terrible sign that so many of Markle’s line readings in this episode sound stiff and forced.  We’ll have to see how it plays out, I guess, but for now, I’m kinda pessimistic on the subject.  As for Jessup herself as a character … same deal.

*     How cool was that interdimensional typewriter?  When I was a kid, I used to pretend that typewriters were the helm controls of the U.S.S. Enterprise, so I guess I’m predisposed to enjoy this as a sci-fi device.  Either way, it’s one of the cooler things the show has come up with so far.

*     Going back to that photo I posted up top … seriously, Gene the Cow wearing a birthday party hat is just genius.  Unfortunately, there is still no sign of an actual storyline for Astrid in the near future.

Video Games

Rock Band: Beatles – PS3 / XBox 360 / Wii

Featuring more than forty songs from the band’s career, this game appears to have all the polish and care that are completely missing from the band-specific titles put out by that other music-based franchise. From the faithful replicas of the Fab Four’s instruments to the high-gloss, era-specific videos in the song backgrounds, this one looks like it will be bigger than Jesus for any fan.

Mini Ninjas – PS3 / XBox 360 / Wii / Nintendo DS / PC

I know very little about this title except for the following: the demo is fun, the character designs are awesome, the humor is sharp, and I have a badass button with the “Fox” character on it. In truth, this one looks to be a fun-for-anyone action/platformer in the tradition of the Spyros and Jaks out there.

Dirt 2 – PS3 / Xbox 360 / Wii / Nintendo DS / Sony PSP

The sequel to one of the most critically-acclaimed — and drop-dead gorgeous — racers on the market brings even more to the table, according to the developers. Apparently, the focus this time is on “making players feel like they’re at a real event.” So in the background of any screen, there will always be other races taking place, crowds coming and going, and the general atmosphere of being at a rally tournament. If the controls and car modeling can hold up, this one might steal some thunder from later racing releases.

DVD / BluRay

The Office Season 5 – DVD / BluRay

Arguably the best season of the show so far, this DVD release is a no-brainer for me, even though I already have access to all the episodes. The additional features on this title tend to be excellent, and I will undoubtedly end up sitting in front my of TV for hours on end re-watching these episodes.

Fringe Season 1 – DVD / BluRay

My knowledge of this show extends no further than J. Wolfwood’s initial description of it to me: “It’s like Fergie mixed with Jesus.” I do know that word-of-mouth on it alone will probably get me to buy this set, especially since the upcoming season will feature Leonard Nimoy in a recurring role. Like Lost, I will probably watch through it non-stop until I fall asleep from sheer exhaustion and have to start whole sections over again.

Parks & Recreation Season 1 – DVD

Another one that passed completely under my radar, friend reviews tell me that it delivers the laughs. Not likely to pick this one up, but very likely to borrow it from someone soon.

Harper’s Island: The DVD Edition – DVD

Apparently, I just didn’t watch TV recently… This one comes from Jericho veteran Jon Turteltaub, and will be purchased because my mom freakin’ loved this show. I’m stoked about getting to watch it, but do not want spoilers! I’m looking at you, Jeremiah.

Crank 2: High Voltage – DVD / BluRay

As kick-ass a movie as I have ever seen, this sequel delivers in an over-the-top way that makes it equal to the first, if different. Maintaining the tongue-in-cheek humor and breakneck pace of the first one, Crank 2 goes one step further by eliminating any semblance of reality. Balls-out (literally) fun, this one’s best when viewed with friends.

(1)  Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen ($112 million, $26.453 per screen, $201.2 million total):  America, you got a “what the fuck” from me once already this year after the opening weekend of Paul Blart: Mall Cop, but this time, you’ve really done it.  Honestly, what the fuck?!?  As a giant fan of the movie industry, I’m thrilled to see any movie pull in $200 million in five days, but I am genuinely mystified and unsettled for Revenge of the Fallen – a movie with virtually no actual value — to be the one to have done it.  There are positives I am going to choose to take away from all this: one, that the industry as a whole is still quite strong in terms of its potential; and, two, that this is probably a good omen for how future sequels such as Iron Man 2 and Star Trek 2/12 will perform.

All ire aside, it’s a phenomenal debut, and once the final figures are released, there’s a possibility that The Dark Knight could be unseated as the top five-day earner in movie history.  The question now is, how much more will Revenge of the Fallen make during its run?  It’ll almost certainly be well past $300 million by the time I write this column again, and $400 million would seem to be a lock.  Past that, frankly, I don’t care to think about.

(2)  The Proposal ($18.4 million, $6039 per screen, $69 million total):  The rest of the top 10 seems almost irrelevant considering how well Transformers did, but let’s soldier on anyways.  The giant robots threw everything for a loop, but The Proposal held up relatively well, considering, and now qualifies as a genuine hit.  It’s going to make $100 million, and for a movie starring Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds, that’s awesome.  Both are suddenly bankable, at least on paper and in contract negoatiation meetings.

(3)  The Hangover ($17.2 million, $4884 per screen, $183.2 million total):  Dropping 36% this weekend (steeper than has been the case, but still good), The Hangover continues to chug along.  It’ll pass the $200 million mark sometime around the 4th of July, marking a time of celebration for missing-toothed dentists and roofie salesmen everywhere.

(4)  Up ($13 million, $3741 per screen, $250.2 million total):  It’ll take a big hit this week when Ice Age 3 opens and takes away most of its 3D screens, but even if Up earned nary another dime in cinemas, it’s had an awesome run.  And the fact is, it’s not finished.  It’s a long, long way to $300 million, but Up might have what it takes to get there.  Then again, it might not: it was down nearly 45% this weekend, a steeper drop than it has been experiencing, which suggests that families opted for Autobots instead of Octogenarians this weekend.  With Transformers and Ice Age on screens, and the kids at Hogwarts just arund the corner, the competition may simply be too fierce for Pixar to hit $300 million with Up.  If so, nobody will feel it was a let-down.

(5)  My Sister’s Keeper ($12 million, $4616 per screen):  I’m nt sure anybody expected much from this movie, so with that in mind, My Sister’s Keeper actually had a pretty good weekend.  Per screen, it made more than Up, in fact.  With the choices for adults still pretty slim, this might be able to stick around for a few weeks and end up being a mild sleeper hit.

(6)  Year One ($5.8 million, $1918 per screen, $32.2 million total):  Plummeting 70% this weekend, Year One is clearly not a well-liked film.  It’s going to make even less than Land of the Lost, probably putting an end to comedies set in ancient times for a while.

(7)  The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 ($5.4 million, $1803 per screen, $53.4 million total):  Dropping another 55%, this movie is simply not doing very well.  It isn’t an outright bomb, but it was misplaced in the summer, and Sony is probably kicking themselves for it.

(8)  Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian ($3.6 million, $1619 per screen, $163.3 million total):  Down 53%, the museum-comes-to-life movie was obviously hurt by the robotic-cars-come-to-life movie.  Of the two, I’d pick the one with Amy Adams, but hey, that’s just me.

(9)  Star Trek ($3.6 million, $1978 per screen, $246.2 million total):  Given that Transformers 2 will make as much in something like ten days, it’s hard to get too impressed by Star Trek‘s total gross.  But it is fairly impressive, and the movie continues to play well from week to week.  It made more per screen this weekend than the three films above it in the top ten, which is a good sign of how devoted people are to it.  I continue to wonder, though, if it’s new fans finding it each weekend, or if Trekkies are just going to see it nine times each.  I’m hoping it’s about half and half.

(10)  Away We Go ($1.6 million, $3390 per screen, $4 million total):  Making a surprise appearance in the top 10, the Sam Mendes dramedy expanded to semi-wide status this weekend, and got decent results.  Clearly, this is no Little Miss Sunshine or Juno, at least not yet, but if Focus can continue to get good results from the larger cities, maybe the smaller burgs will follow suit.  It’s going to be hard to get those screens freed up, though.  Netflix will be the beneficiary of this one.

Next weekend should be an absolute barnburner.  With one Optimus Prime-sized colossus already in theatres, the industry also offers up a 3D sequel to a very popular animated series.  Oh yeah, and some Johnny Depp gangster movie, too.

My prediction for Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs is that for the five-day, it makes over $100 million and ends up in first place.  This could easily fail, however, if Transformers manages to hold its audience.  I’m betting half of it evaporates, but if that doesn’t happen, it’ll be on top for a second straight weekend, and Ice Age will have to settle for the silver.

As for Public Enemies, it’s a dark horse, but also a bit of a wild card (if I may be allowed that many metaphors in a single sentence).  The appeal of Johnny Depp shouldn’t be underestimated, and neither should the perpetual appeal of the gangster flick.  Also, there haven’t been too many movies lately for grownups.  If all of those factors come together just right, John Dillinger will be culturally relevant again; if it doesn’t, then we’ve got a movie that is going to fail to make much of a dent.  Personally, I think the latter scenario is the likeliest: I’m predicting $30 million for the five-day.

The move toward more nominess seems to be specifically engineered to include more popular films, and, I suspect, to boost ratings for the telecast of the show.

So, what box-office champs will benefit from the decision this year?  Could we be looking at the first-ever Best Picture-nominated Star Trek movie?  Or could Pixar finally get their due?  I’ll go ahead and put my bet on The Hangover, and I make to you this promise: if Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is nominated for Best Picture, I will never watch the Oscars again.

Hah-hah-heh-hah-hah!  Get it?  Hang over?  Ooh-eeh-hooh-hah-hah!  (EDITOR’S NOTE: Ting-tang, walla-walla bang-bang…?)

You know, like the movie The Hangover!  Is big hit!  You like!

(1)  The Proposal ($34.1 million, $11,163 per screen):  No, they did not hang over to a third consecutive #1 performance.  Top of the heap this weekend belongs to Sandra Bullock (having a career-best opening weekend) and Ryan Reynolds (possibly cementing his status as an A-lister).  The writing was on the wall for this one when sneak previews did extremely well last weekend, and while The Hangover – a de facto date movie — might have hurt it in Spock Prime’s universe, in this one it doesn’t seem to have hurt it a bit.  Legs could be long, because they usually are for romantic comedies.

(2)  The Hangover ($26.8 million, $7575 per screen, $152.9 million total):  Down a measly 18% this weekend, this movie is starting to look less like a word-of-mouth hit and more like a word-of-mouth phenomenon.  For stinging red fuck’s sake, Hollywood, please pay attention to this: a movie that isn’t a superhero flick or a remake CAN still be an enormous hit.

(3)  Up ($21.3 million, $5568 per screen, $224.1 million):  Speaking of which … please take notice of Up.  Actually, don’t.  Unless you actually are Pixar, you ain’t Pixar, and I’d truly hate to see what Hollywood aping Pixar would look like.  It’s down 31% this weekend, and will likely take some abuse from both Transformers and Ice Age over the next couple of weeks, but its status as a classic and as a big old fat hit is already in the bank; everything from this point on is gravy.  And there may yet be a lot of gravy.

(4)  Year One ($20.2 million, $6684 per screen):  Not nearly as bad an opening as it might have had, when you consider how bad the reviews were, and how well the considerable competition (specifically, from The Proposal and The Hangover) did this weekend.  Where will the movie go from here?  My inclination is to say straight to the $5 bin at Wal-Mart, but I didn’t think it would open this well, so maybe I’m not the best judge of Year One‘s appeal.

(5)  The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 ($11.3 million, $3672 per screen, $43.3 million total):  Yikes.  Down 52% this weekend; not good for an adult-centric movie.  Unless this thing levels out quickly, it’s not going to make even $75 million.  And if that gets Tony Scott to stop making movies, then I’m all for it.  People: go see The Hangover or Up instead!

(6)  Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian ($7.3 million, $2465 per screen, $155.9 million total):  With summer in full swing, parents are getting desperate to get their children out of the house … so desperate, in fact, that they’ll stoop so low as to take them to see this movie.  It’s down only 24% this weekend, which is really quite good.  Fox is doing extremely well with this movie in its later weeks, and while it’s still not going to get close to the performance of its ancestor, it’s doing okay.

(7)  Star Trek ($4.7 million, $2037 per screen, $239.4 million total):  Ah, yes, Star Trek.  This movie is doing extremely well at this point in its run.  This weekend, it dropped a best-in-the-top-ten 14%(!), and managed to sneak past Star Trek: The Motion Picture to become (arguably) the most successful Trek movie of all time.  Until somebody does a better job, J.J. Abrams has set the bar for how to properly do a remake, or a reboot, or a reimagining, or whatever you want to call this.  I can’t wait to see where it goes from here (not just for the franchise, but for the director and his new superstars).  Here’s hoping Chris Pine can avoid Shatner’s mistakes, and that Zachary Quinto’s agent can get him out of that Heroes contract, stat.

(8)  Land of the Lost ($3.9 million, $1350 per screen, $43.6 million total):  Fading fast, the Will Ferrell-led sci-fi comedy is going to go down in history as a grave misstep for all involved, except for composer Michael Giacchino, who’s got Star Trek and Up to keep him warm at night.

(9)  Imagine That ($3.1 million, $1030 per screen, $11.3 million total):  Somehow, this movie managed to add three screens this weekend.  Seriously…?  Who looked at its performance last weekend and said, “Yep, better get me some o’ that”?  Regardless, it’s a huge dud for Murphy and Paramount, and will be long gone two weeks from now.

(10)  Terminator Salvation ($3 million, $1599 per screen, $119.5 million total):  Continuing to slink off in disgrace, McG’s magnum opus spends one final week in the top ten in America.  No word yet on how it did overseas this weekend; it’s been doing admirably outside the states, though, so maybe all is not yet lost for the franchise.

(17)  Whatever Works:  Opening on nine screens and averaging $31,222 per, Woody Allen’s latest comedy got mostly good reviews and did standard opening-weekend Woody business.  It likely won’t go much further from there, but hey, you never know.

Next week — Tuesday around midnight, in fact — brings us the much-anticipated Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.  Yawn, says I.  “Sure, we’ll be thrilled to part with our $175 million,” says America by the time Monday has arrived.

Also opening, for some unknown reason, is My Sister’s Keeper, a Cameron Diaz/Abigail Breslin movie.  It hits on Friday, and I’ll be surprised if it cracks the top ten.

First impressions: “The production looked flawless”; “Most of the characters rang true”; “I was impressed and taken with the obvious concern to honour our original series.”

Solow’s review is largely positive, but he does have reservations about certain aspects.  To find out what they are, visit the full article.

Airing Fringe against those other heavyweights is likely a tremendous sign of faith in the J.J. Abrams-produced series.

In other Fox news, James Hibberd spoke with Joss Whedon about the renewal of Dollhouse.

Obama, according to the article, is the first U.S. President to screen a Star Trek film at the White House since President Ronald Reagan’s viewing of The Search For Spock in 1984.

To find out how Obama liked the film (as well as how Reagan liked Star Trek III), read the full article at TrekMovie.com.

I’m not entirely sure I’m up to the task of reviewing this episode.  There’s so much going on, it’s hard to figure out where to start.  And since so many of the events cannot be properly appraised until we know how they turned out, and why they happened to begin with, and what they actually mean from a plot standpoint … well, it’s just hard to determine how to feel about some of this episode.  And by “some,” I mean about 90% of it.

That’s an audacious thing to do during a season finale, but the producers of this show are audacious folk.

I think what I’ll do for a review is just do a recap, and see where it leads me.

The episode begins with a man working on some sort of tapestry, which he appears to be weaving.  He goes out into the sun, catches a fish, and sits down on the beach to watch a ship out on the ocean.  And when I say “ship,” I mean a sailing ship; as in the Black Rock (we don’t see its name, but I think we can pretty safely assume its identity).  Another man comes and joins him, and calls him Jacob.  They are both there to see the ship, which they have apparently called to the island in some way.  The second man talks about some sort of cycle of violent struggle being enacted and always ending the same way, and Jacob refutes him, saying that it can only end once.  “Do you know how badly I want to kill you?” the second man asks; Jacob says yes, he does.  The second man says sooner or later, he’ll find a loophole; Jacob says when he does, he’ll be waiting.  The camera reveals that they are on the beach where the statue sits; it is an Egyptian statue of some sort, with a beast’s head, and an ankh in one hand.

This scene alone was enough for me to be convinced I was about to see something that would really change the nature of the series.  The events haven’t yet played out, but it’s abundantly clear that something is happening here that I probably would not have been able to predict in a thousand guesses.  I don’t want to speculate as to who, exactly, these characters are, or what they are, so instead I’ll talk briefly about the actors playing them.  Jacob is played by Mark Pellegrino, whom I’d only ever seen before when he played Rita’s abusive ex on Dexter; he’s terrific in this episode, and I hope Pellegrino will be sticking around for season six.  As for his counterpart, that’s Titus Welliver, who you might remember as Adams on Deadwood.   I hope we’ll be seeing more of Welliver, also; I’m all for guys named “Titus.”

Flash back to Kate as a child, getting caught shoplifting a lunchbox from a store.  Is this the same lunchbox she and her boyfriend used as their “time capsule”?  Probably.  Anyways, Jacob shows up and pays for the lunchbox and sends her on her merry way.  In the 1977 timeline, Kate shows up on board the sub which is departing the island, and tries to convince Sawyer and Juliet to help her stop Jack from detonating the bomb; Sawyer refuses.

Meanwhile, in the present, Locke and his troupe of Others are on the march.  Richard and Locke have a conversation about the fact that Locke has, apparently, returned from the dead; John speculates that it’s because of Jacob.  He also says that before they go to see Jacob, they have to take care of the rest of the passengers from the crashed Ajira flight.  (Locke must forget about that, because he never mentions it again, and neither does the episode.)  Speaking of those other passengers, they’ve taken a boat trip and come ashore carrying both Frank and a big metal box, and Ilana decides to show Lapidas what’s inside.  It may or may not be Gwyneth Paltrow’s head; either way, it’s enough to make Frank say “Terrific,” in a tone of voice that strongly implies sarcasm.

I wrote in a review of one of the other episodes from the latter half of this season that I was concerned over the fact that Lost was — in Ilana and Bram — introducing yet another set of characters.  The fact is, there aren’t that many episodes left, and some of the regular cast members have been sorta getting shortchanged lately.  Another fact is that the writers on this show are very, very good at creating new characters (Nikki and Paolo being notable exceptions, granted).  They are also very, very good at casting those new roles.  And so it is that despite my reservations, I already want to know more about both Ilana and Bram, who keep telling people that they’re the good guys.  Come to think of it, this very episode introduced two new characters during the first scene, and I want to know more about them, too!

Season six needs to be about forty episodes long … preferably at about two hours per episode.

The next act begins with young James Ford, who is attending his parents’ funeral.  Jacob is there to loan him a pen, with which he begins writing his letter to Sawyer.  I kinda got the chills a little bit during that scene.  In 1977, Sawyer continues to refuse to help Kate, but Juliet uses her awesome ninja attack skills to knock out a guard and get herself free of the handcuffs, and announces her intention to go back with Kate and help stop Jack.

Back on the island, Sayid is working on extracting the bomb’s core so he can have his very own backpack nuke.

In the present, Locke finds out that Ben has sworn to do whatever Locke tells him to do; Locke is pleased to hear about this, and says that he’s not killing Jacob, Ben is.

It’d be hard to go overboard in talking about how good Terry O’Quinn is in his scenes this episode.  Both he and Michael Emerson are powerhouses, and their scenes together are almost always revelations.  They both have the power of utter persuasion, and have the even rarer gift of being able to turn on a dime and still be persuasive no matter where the new turn takes them (and us).  If there were an Emmy for best on-screen duo, these two would be nominated every year.

We next see Jacob standing on the side of the road as Sayid and Nadia walk past.  He stops Sayid to ask him for help with directions, and moments later, Nadia is struck by a car and killed.

Well, as if it wasn’t obvious enough before, it’s definitely obvious now: Jacob is some sort of agent of fate.  Given his work on the tapestry during the opening scene, it’s entirely possible that Jacob is writing – make that “weaving” — fate.  Is he doing what he’s doing to ensure that these men and women end up on the island?  That seems likely.  But this scene takes place after Sayid left it once; is Jacob ensuring that he returns?  Did he play a hand, as yet unseen, in Sayid’s first trip to the island?  Will we see further such visits from Jacob in sixth-season flashbacks?  It’s all maddeningly unclear, and yet utterly compelling.

Down in the bomb cave, Richard grabs up a sledgehammer and knocks a hole in the wall; it leads into one of the Dharma houses.  He knocks Eloise out and takes her back to their camp, while Jack and Sayid put on Dharma jumpsuits and try to sneak out past all the chaos of the evacuation.  It doesn’t work; they get in a big ole gunfight, Sayid gets gutshot, and Hurley has to ride in to the rescue in his van, with Jin and Miles along for the ride.

This seems like a good place to mention how very unconcerned both Richard and Eloise seem to be over the fact that they are, presumably, going to be dying soon in a nuclear explosion.  Now, I know why Eloise is doing it; she’s trying to save Daniel’s life.  What’s Richard’s excuse?  I’m going to go out on a limb and say that there is probably some reason for it we’re not yet privy to.

Sawyer, Kate, and Juliet make their way ashore, and damned if Vincent doesn’t come bounding up to them.  He’s been living with Rose and Bernard, who claim to have “retired” from the struggles that Sawyer and Jack are always seemingly bound up in.  “All we care about is being together,” says Bernard; “that’s all that matters in the end.”  Rose points them in the direction of the Dharma camp, and as they’re going, Bernard asks Juliet very pointedly if she doesn’t want to stay for a cup of tea.  Sam Anderson is gold in this scene, in a way I can’t quite put my finger on.  The implication, I think, is that Rose and Bernard have broken free of the cycle of strife described by Jacob and his adversary at the beginning of the episode, and are basically urging Juliet and friends to do the same.  Obviously, they’re unsuccessful, but it’s intriguing to ponder how Sawyer was essentially arguing for the same thing on the sub, and also to ponder how differently the episode might have ended if they had all just stayed where they were and had tea with Bernard.

Ilana’s party comes to Jacob’s cabin in the jungle, and finds that a ring of ashes around it has been disturbed.  (I can’t remember; did we see this happen in a previous episode?)  This, apparently, is cause for concern.  We get a flashback in the middle of the scene; Jacob comes to Ilana, who lies severely bandaged in a hospital bed, and asks her to help him.  She obviously already knows who he is, and agrees to help him.  Back in the present, Ilana comes to the conclusion that “someone else” has been using the cabin; they torch it and set off for the statue.

We next see Jacob sitting on a bench, reading Flannery O’Connor’s Everything That Rises Must Converge, in front of a building; Locke comes crashing out of one of the windows and onto the ground.  Jacob goes to John, and touches him, and Locke is either brought back to life or just woken up. (Has Jacob pysically touched each one of the people we’ve seen him interacting with in flashbacks?)

We rejoin Locke’s hunting party just in time for them to stop at the old beach camp of the Oceanic survivors.  Ben asks John why he wants him to kill Jacob; Locke asks Ben why, with all the things Jacob has allowed to happen to him (his cancer, Alex’s death), he wouldn’t want to kill Jacob.  Meanwhile, Sun finds Aaron’s old crib and Charlie’s old Driveshaft ring, which causes her to remember her wedding; she and Jin are approached by Jacob, who gives them his blessing in fluent Korean.  He definitely touches both of them.

The van full of Jack and friends is continuing to make its escape, but comes to a roadblock consisting of Sawyer, Kate, and Juliet.  Sawyer demands that Jack give him five minutes, and Jack reluctantly agrees.  Flashback to Jack making the mistake in surgery that he told Kate about way back in the pilot episode; it plays out, and Jack buys a candy bar that gets hung in the machine.  Luckily, Jacob is there to buy another and give Jack’s to him.  “Looks like all it needed was a push,” Jacob says (or somethig to that effect); he does not touch Jack.

Speaking of pushing, that’s the end result of Sawyer talking to Jack, only they push each other in certain parts of their faces and abdomens, and use their fists to do the pushing.  Juliet shows up and has another change of heart, this time saying that they should help Jack.  Sawyer is obviously confused, frightened, and heartbroken by this change of events.  We see a flashback of young Juliet learning that her parents are getting a divorce; her mother tells her that when she grows up, she’ll understand why they aren’t supposed to be together, and rightly or wrongly, Juliet must have taken this talk to heart, for that’s exactly the realization she’s come to with Sawyer.  She knows that Sawyer still has feelings for Kate, and says that if she never has to meet him then she’ll never have to lose him.

This Sawyer/Juliet scene is in some ways my least favorite scene of the episode, because some of the dialogue, frankly, stinks.  Also, I’m just not sure I buy the idea that Kate’s mere presence can be explosive enough to make Juliet think Sawyer is going back on three years worth of relationship.  This sort of thing probably would play a lot better in a novel than it does on the screen.  I will say this, though: the acting of all persons involved is stellar.  Josh Holloway, in particular, delivers what might well be his best performance of the series to date.

It’s also worth pointing out that the flashback scene with young Juliet is the only flashback scene of the episode that doesn’t involve Jacob.  The way the episode has been structured, you’re sorta led to expect him to show up during the scene, but he doesn’t.  Now, I’m wondering: are we meant to notice his absence and assume that it means something, or is this simply a flashback designed to illustrate Juliet’s frame of mind?  If it’s the latter, that’s poor judgment on the part of the writers (Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof, in this instance); you never want to set up an expectation and then fail to deliver on it, unless the failure is intentional and is its own kind of payoff.  As always, I assume that I’m supposed to be making connections on Lost, so until I see otherwise, I’m going to choose to feel that the lack of Jacob in Juliet’s life means something.  (Could it be that we will later discover that it was not Jacob who set her on her path to the island, but instead his adversary?)

Jack, meanwhile, has moved on to the Swan, where he’s spying on things and planning his next move.  Kate asks him what happened to his face; he asks her why she made him promise to never ask about Aaron.  (Which, technically, isn’t asking her about Aaron, so he’s found a bit of a loophole there.  I doubt that has anything to do with the other quest for a loophole in this episode, but you never know.)  I can’t actually remember what Kate’s response to this is, and I didn’t have the sense to write it down in my notes.  I did note that Jack ends the scene by telling Kate that nothing has ever felt so right to him as does the idea of putting things back the way he thinks they ought to be.  Matthew Fox is more alive during this scene than he has been since arriving back on the island; he’s a little bit frightening in his conviction.  Kate is obviously both attracted to him and frightened of him, and that seems pretty reasonable to me on both counts.

Another flashback, this time of Hurley getting out of jail.  He shares a cab with Jacob, who convinces him to get on the Ajira flight.  He also leaves Hurley a guitar case.

In 1977, Jack takes the bomb, which Sayid has rigged to explode on impact.  Speaking of Sayid, he’s not looking too good; he says that he can’t be saved, and he might be right.  (It occurs to me that, spiritually speaking, “saved” is the opposite of “lost.”)

Richard shows Locke how to get into the statue, and he and Ben head inside.  Richard isn’t happy about Ben going along; he tells Locke that only the Leader can demand an audience of Jacob.  Locke tells him that he thinks Richard is making up the rules as he goes along.  In they go, and Locke promises Ben that “things will be different once he’s gone.”

At the Swan in 1977, a shootout ensues, and Jack is basically pinned down with no ability to get to the drill site (he’s got to drop the nuke down to the area of the electromagnetic activity) until Kate, Juliet, Jin, Hurley, and Miles show up to provide backup.  Jack drops the nuke into the shaft, but nothing happens … except the elctromagnetic event, which Dr. Chang tries to nip in the bud by turning off the drill, but it’s too late for that.  All the metallic objects in the vicinity start getting sucked into the shaft, including a heavy chain, which wraps around Juliet and pulls her in, as well.  Sawyer and Kate try to pull her back out, but they can’t hold on to her, and she plummets into the chasm.

Ilana and the rest of her group arrive at the staue, and ask “Ricardos” what lies in the shadow of the statue.  He answers, in Latin, “he who shall save us all” (thank you, Lostpedia).  She opens the box to show him what it contains, which turns out to be the corpse of John Locke.

Ben and “Locke” find the inner sanctum of the statue, and sure enough, Jacob is waiting there for them.  He shows them his tapestry, which is considerably more complete than when we last saw it; “it takes a very long time when you’re making the thread, but I suppose that’s the point, isn’t it?” he asks.  He, of course, recognizes “Locke” for who he truly is, and says, “you found your loophole, didn’t you?”

Jacob tells Ben that he has a choice about what he does next, but Ben asks Jacob why he’s never shown any interest in him before now; and yet the first time Locke asks to see Jacob, Jacob treats him like he’s Moses.  “Locke” gives Jacob a knowing look at this, and there’s no way that look has no significance.  I don’t know the Bible well enough to know what transpired between Jacob and Moses, or to know who Jacob’s adversary might represent in this equation, but there’s just no way this is a random connection.

Ben ends his pitiful rant/plea by asking Jacob what was so wrong with him that Jacob ignored him so; “what about me?” he asks.  “What about you?” Jacob asks in return, with considerably more coldness than he had shown when telling Ben he had a choice.  It seems almost as if Jacob, aware that Ben has already made his choice and resigned to his fate, is now pushing Ben toward action; and Ben takes action, plunging a knife into Jacob’s chest.  Jacob says to his adversary, “they’re coming,” and “Locke” then pushes him into a fire.

Speaking of fire, Juliet is about to cause one: lying (implausibly not dead after a very long fall; what is this, Z’ha’dum?) at the bottom of the shaft, she grabs a rock and starts whacking the nuke.  It takes her a few tries, but she eventually hits it just right, and the screen goes white.

And that is the end of season five.

There is, as I mentioned at the outset, quite a lot that I simply cannot assess until I know more about what is going on.  So in that sense, this is an unsatisfying episode.

But it is also incredibly provocative, and it was certainly entertaining.  I’m not sure where I’d rank it amongst Lost‘s other season finales, but I think it might come in second behind season three’s.

As for the season entire…?  Time may change my opinion one way or another, but I think it was the best season this show has had since its debut season.  That’s a good sign for season six.  It feels as if the writers are now definitely working toward a specific endgame, and if it’s anywhere near as cool as this episode suggests it could be, we may be in for a doozy of a season come next January.

Frankly, anything else would be a letdown.