“Are they alive?”

Oh boy oh boy. This is it. Season 4… this is the REAL reason I’m watching Lost again, why I think this is a great enough show to warrant an occasionally exhausting (*glares in Season 2′s general direction*) day by day reexamination. I just love the story Season 4 tells, how it tells it, and how it utilizes all of its characters. All that, and we’re coming off another incredibly strong season, there’s two discs of bonus features including a Darlton commentary on the season finale, and no writer’s strike to derail my momentum. Ladies and gentlemen… I am excite.

After being less than thrilled with #2.01 and still a little reserved towards #3.01, I feel like The Beginning of the End is finally a Lost season premiere done right. It’s not because of the focus being off Jack, although it’s great to see Hurley get the spotlight. It’s more about how the episode chooses just the right elements to focus on.

All three season finales so far have ended with multiple characters left in multiple dire incidents. The S2 and S3 premieres chose to focus intensely on the aftermath of just one of those incidents, then gradually expand the scope as the season went on. The trend in the Seasons 4-6 premieres, and I think it’s a huge improvement, is to jump right in and address everything that went down in the last finale. Going in, the audience wants to see Charlie’s death resonate, survivors reacting to the prospect of the rescue, and just how the flash forward device is going to be employed. We get all three, and any new elements are held off for Episode 2.

After three season openers that made you think we were off the island, we open on a pile of oranges carefully laid out against a beautiful blue ocean. Smash, car, a display all along, chase, Jack watches on TV, Randy Nations cameo, mysterious rotund denim jacket clad figure pulled from car. You’ve seen the episode. It’s Hurley, and the question of whether this is a flashback or flashforward is answered when he screams he’s “ONE OF THE OCEANIC SIX!” But what? Six people got off the island? Jack, Kate, Hurley, what other three? Why couldn’t anyone else get off? What happened to the people left behind? I know this is seen as the weakest or second weakest of the Lost openings, and that could be true, but what other show generates so much conversation over the first commercial break alone?

On the island, both clusters of survivors collectively get about five minutes of happiness. Then Desmond shows up on the beach with tidings of Charlie’s death and NOT PENNY’S BOAT, and the seemingly dead Naomi goes missing just as the freight people want to talk to her. There’s still some joyful reunions late in the hour, but otherwise that sense of dread and impending doom that infuses the second half of this series shows up early and often.

*whoosh* After an interview with Ana Lucia’s former partner and a bizarre vision of Charlie, Hurley is back in the asylum. It’s there he has a rather frightening encounter with, in his first appearance, Matthew Abaddon. At this point, I did not know Lance Reddick as Cedric Daniels, an almost wholly admirable man whose physical appearance is roughly 93% less alarming than Abaddon’s. On Lost, his hair is gone, his head is weirdly shiny, and he’s always shot at an upwards angle that makes him seem like nine feet tall… dude looks like the Devil in Disguise, seriously. Definitely one of the most memorable minor Lost characters.

Jack and Kate set out to find Naomi, but only after Kate snatches the satellite phone (something really noticeable on Viewing Number 2). Good thing too, because Jack reaches a dead end. But at least Ben’s demeanor for the year is established; all of his power is gone, and the only thing he can do is provide insulting commentary on everything the Losties do. And it’s hilarious. Kate does manage to find Naomi, who is justifiably upset at being killed. Maybe she shouldn’t have exerted so much energy on a dummy trail and an elaborate tree ambush. But despite that, without explanation, she uses her dying breaths to ensure that her people will find the island. Creepy.

Hurley runs into Locke, but not before having a run in with the cabin (it’s confusing, more on that later). As the mystery I was most intrigued by in Season 3, it was thrilling to see this revisited right off the bat. But anyway, Hurley justifies his position as the lead character of the first episode by opting to side with Locke. Without his support, it’s a sure bet that Locke and possibly Ben would have been the only ones to go hide at the Barracks.

All parties meet up at the front of the plane. It’s where it all began in the Pilot, and now that we’re at the Beginning of the End, it’s the place where every character currently in play converges before going off to their fate and/or death throughout the following three seasons. Tidy, that. I always like the Jin/Sun and Rose/Bernard reunions, and of course the Jack/Locke confrontation is spectacularly messy (“It’s not loaded!”) But I’m a little disappointed by the encounter that doesn’t happen, Ben vs. Juliet. I don’t think anybody realized that this would be the last time these two characters would ever be in the same place, and there’s a lot left unsaid between them, sadly.

Locke makes his pitch, and the long foreshadowed division between characters who led by him and characters led by Jack finally comes to fruition. The configuration of teams here is highly interesting, but this review is running ridiculously long, so I’ll get into that later. The important thing is that Charlie’s death is the catalyst for splitting up the groups. It would be nice if his death had more emotional impact outside this episode, but it does nicely motivate the events of the season. And his speech does seem to strain Jack and Hurley’s relationship. “I’m not listening to you! I’m listening to my friend!” Ouuuch.

Of course, in the future, we hear Hurley apologize for going with Locke, implying that something disastrous will come of it. In real life conversations, I talked to quite a few people who said “I’m not watching this show anymore. They’re just telling you what happens, what’s the point?” Baaah! Philistines, I say. This idea of glimpsing the future, stating something bad is going to happen but not telling us what it is, that just heightens the suspense in the island based storytelling all the more. That, and the flashforwards allow us to get a brand new take on the characters in a way that still directly relates to the season’s overall narrative. The potential of the flashforward device is huge, and I think Season 4 capitalizes on it wonderfully.

Best of all is the way the episode recasts Hurley. For the first time, the character lends no comic relief to the episode. He deals with Charlie’s death on the island and is this completely melancholy, broken figure in the future. It’s the first episode after the season’s first significant shift in format and it conveys very strongly that things are about to get grim. Jorge Garcia is up to the change of pace, he develops into a solid dramatic actor by the end of the series and that process begins here.

Loose Ends:
I’ve got two. First, the two men in the cabin. One is Christian in the chair, a favourite avatar of the Man in Black. And then we’ve got this man who jumps in front of the window, who I think is intended to be the same strange man Locke saw in “Man Behind the Curtain.” The only possibly explanation is the least interesting one, the Man in Black was simply in two forms for some reason. Here I was hoping that we’d eventually get the other side of sort of pivotal Jacob/Man in Black conversation in their eventual flashback episode. Time to let that dream die, so that I may continue to enjoy the show for its own merits.

And there’s the moment in which Hurley talks with Charlie at the mental institution. It wouldn’t be a problem, it seems consistent with what Hurley can do later, except for the fellow inmate who is also able to see Charlie. AAAGH, CAN OF WORMS! Is it the Man in Black? If so, how did he get off the island? Or can the inmate see dead people too? A huge huge inconsistency, it would seem. Until you see some other guy in the background right behind Charlie.

He isn’t looking at Hurley in the particular screencap, but the inmate points vaguely enough that he could be referring to him as the “weird guy.” It’s possible he was even put in there deliberately, to give the showrunners an out in case Hurley’s powers evolved in a different way. In any case, it’s an explanation for us fans who are desperate to make sense of it all. :/

So that’s our Season 4 premiere. A really long review to come back on, but the episode used its 43 minutes so economically that nearly everything warrants some discussion. The darkness is kicked up from the outset as the show’s most broadly comic character is cast in a more grim light. On the island, a dead character gets his due and the episode deftly deals with aftermath of the finale and set-up for what’s to come simultaneously. And the flashforward is solidified as a fresh and wonderful new storytelling device that gives us new perspective on the characters and the story. All in all, you really couldn’t ask for a better kick-off to the show’s end game.

Rating: 9.5/10

NEW TOP 10 ENTRY: 9th, pushing out “The Brig.”