Talk about your wild mood swings.
After I feverishly scoured the internets for a downloadable copy of tonight's episode, "Ab Aeterno" (and if you don't know why I was doing so, then I guess you didn't read the post before this one...yikes...), and was still raging about not being able to watch it until after midnight, and on my computer at that, I not only found and downloaded it, I also found a site that streamed it - thank you zshare.net! - so I didn't even have to wait for the download!
So, was it worth all the sturm und drang that I foolishly endured?
Yes, yes, a thousand times yes.
Yes, in all it's pixelated glory, yes.
After my ordeal in trying to simply watch it, after all the flying off the handle and the yelling and whatnot, 40 minutes later, I was transfixed; I had chills, and more chills, and more chills; my jaw literally - literally - was opened the entire episode; I was reminding myself to breathe; I was even in tears.
"Ab Aeterno" was an absolute masterpiece. I can safely add it to the list of the likes of "Walkabout" and "The Constant" - episodes that demonstrate how special this show is. How, when they do it right, as they often do, they really do it right. These are the episodes you have in mind when you try to convince someone to watch the show for the first time. Maybe it was because I watched straight through without commercials, though I doubt that's the reason, but this wasn't television; this was cinematic territory.
No, it had nothing to do with Benjamin Franklin (I know at least three of you that will get that reference - I couldn't resist), but we finally - FINALLY! - got Richard Alpert's story, and it was unlike any LOST episode we've ever seen. So, let me stick to my original plan and mention a few things off the top of my head:
Ab Aeterno - loosely translated, means "since the beginning of time."
I've never wanted to know exactly who these two men - or beings, or whatever - are more than at this moment.
It's more and more like that Twilight Zone episode I mentioned in a past post (can't think of the title at the moment), with the devil trying to escape from being trapped by a group of holy men so that he can wreak havoc on the world again.
The Island is the cork that contains evil. LOVE it. And the Monster ignoring the cork and not-so-subtely just smashing the whole bottle? I think this means that a lot of people are in trouble...
The two scenes that had me tearing up: for some reason that I can't exactly explain, the first was when Jacob was talking to Richard as they sat on the log on the beach. It stuck me as one of the most beautiful moments on the show because of what Jacob was saying - as humans, we have to choose the right path ourselves. If there's someone there telling us what to do, what's the point? Not to get too religious or too personal, but this is so similar to my own view of just the simple idea of faith and having a belief in something larger than ourselves. It's not about someone controlling your life. There are so many false steps that people take because they feel that there is a higher power that can and does control their every move, and if they just say or do the right thing, this higher power will make what they want to have happen happen. And when it doesn't, people lose faith in this higher power, when in fact, all they've done is never had any faith in themselves. Jacob, I think, is saying something along these lines; I'm giving you an opportunity here to do something worthwhile - what are YOU going to do with it? This is where I part ways with fundamentalists of any stripe - they seem to discount the fact that this higher power (again, if you believe in this sort of thing) gave us the gift of reason, and this is the most powerful gift, besides life itself, that we were given, because it means we have the power of choice. Or I'm blaspheming. Either way. (Honestly, I hope I'm not offending anyone.)
The only flaw in all of this is that Jacob is the one bringing them to the Island in the first place, which is a method of control. He's forcing them into making this decision, so it's not of their own volition. And, as Richard points out, if he doesn't guide these people he's brought to the Island, then the Man In Black will. That's an excellent point. They almost seemed to be preparing us to discover that Jacob really is the devil early on in the episode, but I think that tide turned back to Jacob-as-the-good-guy again. (I say this all the time, but can you believe that this is a network television show we're talking about?)
The other scene that had me weepy was more obvious: Isabella returning to Richard, even if just for a moment, through Hurley. Jorge Garcia continues to impress - he played that scene with the perfect amount of gravity, humor, understanding, and sadness. Richard is a man who has lost everything, and everything that we saw tonight leading up to that moment gives us a full understanding of the depths he was in. Yes, he wanted Isabella back, but really, all he wanted was absolution. He believed he was in hell because he was never given that absolution. Interestingly, when Richard asked Jacob for that very thing, Jacob said he couldn't do that. I wonder if this is a clue about Jacob...
We now know how the statue was demolished - who had "the Black Rock was thrown into it" in the office pool?
I definitely need to do some rewatching to gather my thoughts, but this was my initial reaction to the episode. I intend to post a second entry about "Ab Aeterno" later in the week or over the weekend. I also intend to respond to comments people have left; you know, I finally get comments and then I don't reply to them - what an ingrate!
I also want to give you all a heads-up that I will be away at Nature's Classroom next week, and so I will be relying on someone to lend me their laptop for an hour to watch on Wednesday, which would be the earliest I could watch it online (unless I use zshare.net again!), and another hour (at least) to post if I can. These things may not transpire; we'll see. But I am planning on making a special post about Nature's Classroom that is LOST-related, so stay tuned for that!
In the meantime, I'm tuning out for the night. Can't wait to hear what you all thought!
Until next time,
Good Luck & Namaste,
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