[S4E13] It's Ben A Long Time UPD

While Rio relies on intimidation and bravado, Nick approaches things differently. He's more mild-mannered and interested in working on something from the inside. And it's suited him well for a long time. But just because he's not out stuffing people in freezers doesn't mean he's not getting his hands dirty in other ways.

[S4E13] It's Ben a Long Time

But this was the first time that Darlene and Ben felt like friends since long before they'd broken up. Ben sincerely seemed to want to help Darlene get back on her feet and start a new chapter of her life.

But it's been so long since the show mentioned Emilio's immigration status or his marriage to Becky that I've begun to wonder if they've dropped the entire storyline much as they did with David being in Lanford to reestablish a relationship with his kids.

It's the first day of Meredith's trial. Izzie says nobody cares about her trial, but she admits she's jealous. Cristina complains about Hahn not talking to her. Izzie says Hahn enjoyed talking to her. Cristina bounces back that at least she's not spending all her time in the clinic. Izzie likes the clinic, it's her happy place. Cristina asks Meredith to use the sparkle pager to get her on Hahn's service. Meredith says she has no time for the sparkle pager today because of her trial and she thinks that if Izzie and Cristina take a moment, they can be happy that she's found her path to medical history. She walks off and Cristina and Izzie both say they're not happy for her.

Addison finds Mark in his skin lab. She came to check on her patient's skin flap. He's grown actual skin from stem cells, like God. He says they can lock the door and tear one off for old time's sake. Addison says everything is exactly the same here. He's horny because the nurses are shutting him down. Addison says it's an amazing skin flap and walks out.

Callie walks up to Addison for lunch, but Cristina stops Callie to tell her Hahn is no longer welcome at the apartment. Hahn is unfair to her and won't teach her, while she could have gone to any other hospital to get taught. Callie says Erica is a good listener. She may come off harsh at first, but she's got a really good heart. Cristina should tell her how she feels. Callie sits down with Addison as Cristina says she doesn't speak girl. Callie tells Addison she lives with Yang now. Addison asks if Callie is speaking the vagina monologues now. She's all for it and Erica seems great. Callie can't believe Addison thinks she and Erica are a couple. She laughs awkwardly and says it's insane. Callie likes penis and she says Addison has been living in L.A. for too long.

Izzie is eating potato chips at the nurses station. Addison comes over and Izzie asks her for a favor. She wants Addison to talk to her patient. Izzie explains the case of the pregnant HIV positive woman. Addison says she doesn't have to terminate, but she doesn't work here anymore so she can't talk to the patient. If she still worked here, she would be performing surgery after surgery and maybe even get back together with her husband, who's apparently back on the market. That would be simpler than the messy single life she's currently living. Her point is that she no longer works here, so Izzie has to pull her face out of the potato chips bag and go tend to her patients herself. Addison says Izzie's a fighter and she wondered what happened. Izzie says she lost a lot of fights. Addison tells her it's time to get back up. She has to be the change that she wants to see in the world. Addison walks off with the potato chips. Izzie can't believe she just quoted Gandhi to her.

Izzie enters the room where Sarah and Freddie are waiting. Izzie orders her interns to come in and listen and learn. Sarah thinks Izzie disapproves and that she wants to push some kind of agenda. Izzie says no. If Sarah wants an abortion because she wants to, that's her choice. But, if she wants an abortion because she thinks that's what medicine is telling her to do, it's between her and Izzie. Izzie was ineffectional and unclear. Izzie wasn't telling her there's some chance her baby might not be sick. There's a 98% chance that the baby is perfectly healthy. Sarah stammers she can't do this. Izzie understands she gave up on having children a long time ago and she understands it's difficult to readjust her thinking so quickly, but if Sarah takes her meds responsibly, this is her chance to be a mother. Sarah repeats the odds and hugs Freddie, who thanks Izzie. Izzie's interns are impressed.

Evil Troy and Evil Abed are hosting an evil version of the "Troy and Abed in the Morning!" show. After introducing their special guest "Evil" Ben Chang they present a glimpse into another timeline - the timeline in which Abed went to get the pizza, Timeline 5 - featuring an alternate Troy and Britta. They proudly show off their child who they have named "Chewbacca." Evil Jeff then interrupts the show to remind Evil Troy and Evil Abed that it's not real. When he leaves, Evil Troy and Evil Abed sing song their signature sign off.

Stedman, I thought the same with the opposing forces...but opposing forces within one dream? crazy stuff lolAs for Present Day being bearded Jack and flashing back to the Island...I was thinking something like that too...but our current flashbacks and flashforwards have always focused around a character that is in both times.... So if it's a Jack Flashforward-when we return to the island, we're focused on Jack....and Aaron Flash Forward - focuses back on Aaron (that happened last night btw..)....so this would cause a continuity issue with the 1st 4 seasons. But, they changed things up this season, so no telling that they won't do it again!

First timer... Desmond said something specifically about "as long as I have Penny I should be alright." Ben said he was going to kill Widmore's daughter. May we have some crazy time travelling by Desmond again?

If we accept that Widmore was in control of the island before Ben (after all Widmore said something like it was my island long before it was your island in talking to Ben), then maybe Ben can't kill Widmore because the island is able to move through space and time. Therefore, if Ben kills Widmore, the events that led up to Ben being in control of the island may not have happened. Similar to why you can't go back in time to kill your grandfather.But what if Widmore or Ben can kill Locke in the present, as a way to get back to the island, without disrupting the events that led up to their individual reigns? Similar to traveling to the future and killing your grandchild (i.e., it wouldn't affect your existence in the past). I think that this would be an interesting way to expound on the time traveling elements already introduced in the show and a simple explanation why Ben can't kill Widmore, but why Widmore wanted Ben brought to him alive (so he can kill him? and use his body to get back to the island?).Also, maybe Jack's gun didn't work because Locke needed to die off island in order to bring Jack and/or Aaron back to the island. Maybe in trying to kill Locke, Jack wasn't ready yet to fulfill his destiny in the same way that Locke wasn't ready as a boy when he chose the knife.-Addict

You may be right about Ben knowing he had "gone to far" and had to give up leadership of the island when he let his emotions take over and released the smoke monster. After that he really seemed to accept his fate - that John was his replacement and he (Ben) would have to leave the island. He certainly looked anguished when he was turning the frozen donkey wheel. I still can't imagine why/how Locke died, but I do believe that it must be the catalyst that sends the Oceanic 6 back to the island (dragging along a body bag!).One more thing - about Aaron... I don't believe he is supposed to go back to the island with the adults, so that's why Claire appeared to Kate in the dream. Kate will have to go back, but Aaron technically wasn't a passenger on the plane when it crashed. Even though they are being called the Oceanic 6, the press was told that 8 people survived the plane crash then Boone, Libby and Charlie died. Aaron wasn't born yet, and I'm hoping that Claire is still alive and when Jack & crew go back to the island it will be to rescue the ones they left behind, and Claire and Aaron will be reunited off-island.Maybe they'll figure out a way to time travel back before the crash, destroy the island's powers, and Oceanic 815 will arrive at the airport like nothing happened, and they'll go on about their lives with no memories of being LOST!!!(Gotta get Christian back in that coffin!)

As you said, Mike, BOOM LOST!!!So Jack's idea to lie about what happened to the media was actually Locke's idea? That might be one of the few times Jack has ever followed Locke's advice! At least the way Jack explained it to the rest of the Oceanic 6 was a lot more detailed than Locke's vague insistence, "to protect the people who stay on the island."The scenes with Ben and Locke in the Orchid were great. We begin to piece together that time travel has been on the agenda for a long, long time, then the instruction video cements the notion. But why did the video tape stop and go in reverse at that critical point? Did they ever explain that within this episode?Ben had several good lines, the best of which was definitely "Time traveling bunnies? Yes." But once again, he demonstrates how little he cares about anything or anyone that doesn't contribute to his immediate objective and kills Keamy, thereby dooming the freighter. Boom Lost indeed.As little as I cared for Michael, at least I'm glad the dude is out of his misery (or so we're led to believe). Christian! AAURGH!!At least now I can believe that Jin is still alive. It did seem like the deck of the freighter was empty five seconds before it blew, and if Jin made a deep dive off the bow, he could have avoided getting blown to bits. I can't say the same for Michael. He was right there with the C4.Locke is the new leader: Well yeah, of course, if Ben ever left the island or died, I knew Locke had to be the new leader of the Others. The only other option was Richard, and he seems to serve a different purpose than being in a leadership role.The island disappears: Last week I said it would happen with barely a ripple. There was a little more than a ripple, but not much. I'm still hanging on to my state of consciousness theory, even though the island will obviously reappear somewhere on Earth, and probably in a different time (a different year? different decade? different century?), which will make things even more freaky.It was awesome seeing Penny reunite with Desmond. Man do I want a happy ending for those two! But man do I think this show is going to be stingy when it comes to handing out happy endings. If you could give me a guarantee, I'd settle for a happy Oceanic 3 after the series finale! (Plus Penny and Desmond of course, who weren't part of the 6 anyway.) And Hurley has to be one of the three.Claire was super creepy when she appeared next to Aaron's bed. This girl sure has changed since meeting daddy. And Locke was the mystery corpse in the coffin! I didn't hear his name come up a lot in the commentary, so I guess Lost did a good job with the big reveal. I just let the sweet surprise hit me like a ton of donkey wheels. It will be very interesting to see how season 5 is conveyed. I imagine flashbacks, flash forwards, flash diagonals, flash ups, downs and sideways. There's just SO much going on, but I'm cool with that as long as Mike is here to straighten it all out for me! Man, I thought I wrote long comments. I can't hold a candle to some of these other people! Mike, did blogger allow longer comments in the past (remember when I had to break up a too-long comment into two different posts)? Or did you set a character limit on the blog at a later date? I'm good with the limit; it lets me know when I've prattled on for too long! 041b061a72