Toe Pick!

Last night's Law and Order guest-starred Moira Kelly as a kinda insane woman who shoots her psychiatrist husband dead. So? Who cares? Well, all I know is that I'm glad that I'm not the only one who thinks of the phrase "Toe pick!" every time I see her. It was tough to get through Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me when I realized that Miss Kelly had replaced Lara Flynn Boyle in playing heroine Donna Hayward. It would have been awkward to yell out "Toe pick!" during this scene.

So, combine that with the fact that D.B. Sweeney is a villain on Jericho and the awesome Terry O'Quinn tearing it up over on Lost (with an Emmy to boot, bitches!), it's like The Cutting Edge is taking over TV! How much longer til this dude shows up on CSI or something?

Toe pick!

Lost 3.10: Tricia Tanaka Is Dead

"What's the problem, jumbotron?"
"Stop calling me names, Red... neck... Man..."

Now, the thing with the flashbacks on the island is that each characters' flashbacks have their own feeling, their own mood, and Hurley's flashbacks are usually pretty humorous, yet intrinsically connected to the island's goings-on, and there is a musical montage ending. I usually love Hurley's episodes - in fact, the major tear-jerking moment for me of this show's history was in Hurley's second flashback "Everybody Hates Hugo." This one, however, I must say is probably my least favorite of the Hurley episodes because... I don't know. Let's talk it out.

It starts off totally promising - Hurley is at Libby's grave (awwww!) and giving this heartbreaking speech to her when Vincent (!) returns and leads Hurley to an abandoned VW bus, complete with a decomposing Dharma dude inside. Hurley and Charlie make it their mission to get the bus up and running, for purely symbolic reasons: both want to outrun their fate - Hurley's curse with the numbers and Charlie's gonna die fate. They enlist Sawyer (who has just returned with Kate to the camp) and Jin to help them, also with a twelve-pack of Dharma Initiative Light Beer. Nice product placement, ABC. Anyway, Hurley and Charlie get the bus working, then decide to drive it down a hill into a patch of rocks to tempt fate with... and they survive! Cue the musical montage.

In flashback, Hurley's dad returns (played by the awesome Cheech Marin) after he wins the lotto money, all sleazy-like. Hurley is rightfully suspicious, but Cheech says that he's returned also to do Hurley's mom (which... wow. And also, here's a nitpick of mine: in the first few flashbacks of Hurley's, Carmen, played by Lillian Hurst, was Hurley's grandmother, but now she's his mother. Which is very strange.). Cheech says he's gonna cure Hurley of his cure, which is a very Spic-ish thing to say (believe me, I am one), and takes him to a fortune teller, in a hilarious scene that makes it obvious that Cheech paid her to "cure" Hurley of the curse. I must say, I am always impressed by how this show uses fortune tellers and psychics in the flashbacks, but this is the first time that it was for comic relief. And it was... it was something. Cheech then admits that he did come back for the money, but is going to leave him with honor. Or something.

Oh! And the episode title? Hurley has bought the Chicken Shack, and reporter Tricia Tanaka (and who else wasn't thinking "Asian Reporter Tricia Takanawa?" Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?) is doing a story on it. When she dies. When the Chicken Shack is hit. By a FRICKIN' METEORITE! I know! Oh, those wacky numbers and their curse!

I don't know. This episode was very good, and solid, but... sadly, it seems forgettable to me. It's not a bad episode like, say, the past three Sun-and-Jin episodes, but... I feel like it'll fall into the shuffle, which is kinda sad since thusfar all of Hurley's episodes have been ridiculously memorable. But, we all can't win all the time.

All in all: B

Until next time, same bat time, same bat channel.

Lost 3.09: Stranger in a Strange Land

"You need to stop crying and cowboy up!"

First of all, someone needs to desperately dick-slap the ABC promo monkeys, because the promo for this episode (which, for the record, I thought was pretty good) told us MAJOR LIES, saying that the episode would answer three mysteries that we had all been wondering about. The three said mysteries were implied to be the following:
1. What do Jack's tattoos say? (First of all, not really a major mystery that I've been wrapping my brain around, just a minor curiosity. And, actually, that is answered in the episode. The tattoo on his arm says, according to the Others' "Sheriff" Isabel: "He walks amongst us, but he is not one of us.")
2. Why did the Others take the children? (The commercial made it seem like Kate was asking a major Other this question, but alas, she is only asking Carl, who says that "we give the kids better lives." Which is what they've been saying for, like, years!)
3. What is the Others' major plan? (Nope, not until the season finale.)

The episode is a Jack-centric episode, which I was figuring might be more "My dad is a mean drunk, and I hate him but I love him wah wah wah!" And while the Jack/Christian drama was good during Season One, and partly some of Season Two (when Ana Lucia was involved), I think we have that story in complete complete detail. Plus, I was promised that Libby would be the new Dr. Christian Shepherd (I was totally gonna write Dr. Christian Troy, so much brain has Nip/Tuck taken over) in terms of appearing in everybody's flashbacks, but I still haven't gotten her. Anyways, this flashback begins a new chapter in the Jack-flashback story, so...

Jack's in Thailand and begins screwing Bai Ling, who is a sort of psychic tattoo artist. She reads him like a book when he psychologically-rapes her into tattooing him, but it causes the Thais to kick him out of the country because he isn't one of them, which is funny because that's what his tattoo says! Which is a really fucked up tattoo for Bai Ling to give him. Now, I wonder, while they were fucking, did she ever start singing, a la But Can They Sing? Imagine her belting "I Touch Myself" while they're in that mosquito-netting bed... freaky. Maybe she's the smoke monster on the island? That would make a lot of sense... well, at least the smoke monster noise sounds like Bai Ling's singing. Oh, Bai Ling, "you-a a littoo-a strange."

But Bai Ling's not the only hot-woman-who-shouldn't-be-hot in this episode. Jack meets the Sheriff of The Others (whatever that means): Isabel, who may or may not be another attempt by the Lost writers to make fun Grey's Anatomy references. Well, honestly, I think this is another coincidence, just like having a Dr. Shepherd. But naming Juliet "Dr. Burke"... completely on purpose, and don't try to tell me otherwise, bitch. Only if they start calling Isabel "Izzy"...

Anyways, Isabel, played by Diana Scarwid, aka the adult Christina Crawford from Mommie Dearest, is overseeing Juliet's trial (or hearing, or whatever other judicial system thing that The Others perform) for killing Pickett. Isabel has some hot and heavy dialogue exchanges with Jack, not in the double entendre, sexual innuendo kinda way, but in a very "I'm in charge and you're gonna take it, bitch" kinda way, which she must have inherited from Faye Dunaway. So, does this mean she's gonna beat Jack with a wire hanger at some point? (I totally typed "come point" by accident, which... Freudian slip, anyone?) I think it more likely that she'll make Jack chop down some palm trees, however. And if you haven't seen Mommie Dearest, then this whole paragraph isn't nearly as funny as it is for me.

Jack convinces Ben to convince Christina Crawford to not kill Juliet, but instead Ben decides to mark her, which totally is a bad thing for The Others. So Juliet Prynne returns to Jack to thank him for saving her life, and gives him a grilled cheese sandwich, her way of saying "Thank you and I love you."

In other story (is)land, Kate tries to get Sawyer to turn around the canoe to go back and save Jack, but Sawyer's like "Fuck him! He wanted us to leave him!" Which, of course, is because he's pissed off that she's worried about Jack when he's the love of her life. Carl is sad about Alex, who he used to stare at the stars with in their back yard, which is a lovely sentiment, actually. Sawyer allows him to escape to go find Alex in Othersville, which kinda pisses Kate off, but Sawyer says that it's because Carl is a walking target. But really, it's because Sawyer's a big teddy bear.

The episode ends with Jack and Juliet looking at the water. Juliet glances at Jack, and Jack smiles and is all, "Yeah, I know you want this."

All in all: B+

Until next time, same bat time, same bat channel.