Meet Kevin Johnson SE4 EP8

“What’s it look like we’re doing? We’re shooting things.”

Groundhog Day
Michael is tortured, depressed, miserable because he can’t see Walt. He can’t see Walt because he told him about killing Libby and Ana Lucia. Walt is so traumatized by this he’s living with Michael’s mother—who refuses to let Michael see him.

So Michael wants to kill himself.

First, he drives into a dumpster to a groovy little tune called “Getting better every day” which sounds suspiciously like it might be part of Desmond’s workout soundtrack in his old hatch-dwelling days. He hits that thing going well over a hundred, but he survives. He wakes up in a hospital in intensive care with a neck brace and with tubes up his nose. Then his nurse comes in and it’s……Libby! “It’s a cold night, I brought you some extra blankets…..” Aaarrgghhh!!!!!!

But not really. His real nurse comes in and asks him if he wants her to call Walt, since Walt is who he addressed his suicide letter to that he had pinned to his shirt. Michael is silent.

Michael makes a miraculous recovery in a few short weeks—or is it? I’m unclear as to how much time has elapsed since Michael’s return to the mainland and then, how much time has elapsed between his suicide attempt and his recovery. It cannot be more than a month, island time. Let’s say he drives that car into the dumpster a few days after he gets back and he meets up with Mr. Friendly right before the discovery of 815 at the bottom of the Sunda trench, which is where we started this season. That's like, what 4 weeks, Island time? I doubt that's enough time to recover properly from the injuries he apparently sustained.

So back to his miraculous recovery, after which he goes to his mother’s, attempts to see Walt again, and she says no, you need to tell me what you said to him, you need to tell me how you survived that plane crash, you need o tell me why I can’t use you or Walt’s real names, you need to tell me where you’ve been for the last two months and you need to tell me why Walt wakes up screaming in the middle of the night. “Will you tell him I love him?” Michael asks. “Yes, I will.” Momma says. Michael turns to go and sees Walt lean out the window, they exchange a look and Walt goes back in.

Distraught again, Michael finds his way to a pawnshop where he hocks Jin’s watch for a gun. Now, people are all freaked out about gun laws, but if you saw someone as crazed as Michael come in there and say he wants a gun and bullets, would you sell it to him, or worse, trade it to him for some Korean watch?

So he’s worked up his nerve to blow his brains out, sitting in an abandoned alley when Tom walks up and asks him for the time. So Michael gets a short reprieve. Tom and Michael scuffle, Michael breaks a champagne glass for a weapon and Tom pulls the gun. Michael grabs the gun and holds it to his forehead, “Do it man!” Oh you’d like that, wouldn’t you? But you’re not going to get it.” You didn’t think we’d let you leave without keeping tabs on you?” Seems our Mr. Friendly came back to ask for Michael’s help. But first he figures out what is torturing Michael so: “You told him, didn’t you? You couldn’t keep the guilt of what you did to those two women to yourself, so you told a 10-year-old kid.” Mr. Friendly, seeing Michael is in no mood to talk like “adults” tells him where he’s staying then tells him he might as well give up trying to kill himself because the Island won’t let him.” He hands him back the gun and tells him to give it his best shot.

So Michael goes back home and indeed, does give it his best shot, but the gun, of course, jams. Just then a news bulletin announcing the discovery of 815. Notably, the report says that there would be no chance of recovering any of the bodies or black box.

It’s interesting that Michael cannot kill himself an indeed can be an indication of the power the Island has over it’s one-time residents. Remember, Jack was unable to kill himself in “Through the Looking Glass”, too.

Undercover Brother
Michael shows up at Tom’s penthouse only to find out that Tom is GAY!!!! Aaaarrrggghhhh!!!! Tom reveal only some of the Others can come and go at will. He then explains how Widmore staged the whole wreckage. Tom produces a folder with pictures of the graves where he stole the bodies, the purchase order for the 777 aircraft and the shipping logs for the freighter he used to drop the bodies.

So who was it that staged the wreckage? There are valid reasons to believe it could have been either Ben or Widmore, so who is the real “good guy”? Who is telling the truth about how the staged flight got there? Tom’s evidence seems more convincing and Widmore does seem way more vile than Ben, so I’m going to say at this point that I’m still with Ben.

So Tom continues to give Michael his undercover assignment as a deck hand. This is Michael’s only chance to redeem himself for what he has done. Tom explains, in his friendly way, that the people on the boat are going to kill everyone on the island and that he, Michael, must kill everyone on the boat.

Michael gets on the boat, meets a few familiar faces and struggles with his assignment, especially when he sees the bomb he has to take into the engine room. As he passes Miles, “Your name isn’t Kevin. But don’t worry, 80% of the people on this boat are lying about something.” Tom calls, realizes Michael is getting cold feet and gives him friendly pep talk as only he can. On board, Frank tells Michael that he knows the Flight 815 wreckage has been staged and he’s on the boat because he knows it was staged and Widmore believes him. Frank seems a basically good sort, so Frank’s sharing this information with Widmore may not have been his smartest move.

So Michael is doing his deckhand thing when the some of the boys decide to start shooting a little skeet—with high-powered automatic weapons. Now why would this rescue mission boat need high-powered automatic weapons and big burly mercenary types who like to shoot them? Michael was wondering the same thing. “You guys playing cards?” He asks. “What’s it look like we’re doing? We’re shooting things. Now I don’t believe you’ve met Jugdish….” After meeting these friendly folks, Michael comes to the conclusion that it’s time to blow up the ship, so he takes the bomb into the engine room, enters 1776, hears a little snatch of that groovy Des workout music then Libby appears with her head creepily cocked to one side: “Don’t do it, Michael….” Aaaaaaarrrrggghhhh!!!!!

So does Michael listen to Libby? No, he sets the bomb off anyway. Except it doesn’t go off, a little flag pops up “Not Yet.” It says.

Shortly thereafter, Minkowski comes to tell him he has a phone call from Walt—only it’s not Walt. It’s Ben calling from the secret closet. Aaaaarrrrggghhhhh!!!!

Ben is surprised that Michael actually set off the bomb. But he needs Michael to know that there are innocent people on the boat and Ben will not kill innocent people, even though he will do what he needs to do when he’s at war. (I think Frank may be one of the innocents—a “useful idiot” to Widmore). Ben has further instructions for him: I want a list of names, disable the engines, disable the radio room, and this is how you will redeem yourself and get your son back. And what wouldn’t a father do for his son? When Michael agrees to do what Ben asks, Ben congratulates him, “Consider yourself one of the good guys.” Cue balloons and streamers.

Thoughts on the appearance of Libby
I think that the image of Libby was used by either Ben or the Island to manipulate Michael into doing what they wanted--in much the same was Harper was used to communicate with Juliet. Juliet seemed to know this was how Ben communicated and she wasn't as freaked out by it. Other instances of images used to manipulate our Losties: Christain Sheppard to Jack, Dave to Hurley, the Horse to Kate, the ugly Cat to Sayid, Yemmi to Eko, Charlie to Hurley at the nuthouse, and Walt to Shannon. Sawyer also saw the horse. Also, I forgot Walt and Shannon--and Sayid. I don't think these are figments of a dream or illusions--I think they are legitimate materializations, but of short duration, therefore easy to miss unless one has a very personal and emotional connection with the image being shown. Keep in mind that Sawyer also saw Kate’s horse, the other nut at Hurley’s nuthouse saw Charlie, Jack also saw Harper and Sayid also saw Walt.

Town Hall Meeting
Locke brings Miles in to talk to the Lockies. Locke’s philosophy is “no more secrets”, and “you deserve to know everything I do.” Miles tells the Lockies that his team is here for Ben. “Um, we kinda like knew that forever though.” Hurley observes. Sawyer is all for turning Ben over to them, which Locke and Ben immediately dismiss and the rest of the Lockies begin arguing amongst themselves since turning Ben over doesn’t really seem like such a bad idea, seeing as how he tried to kill Locke and all. Ben explains that once they get him, they will kill everyone else on the island. Hurley notes, “He won’t even tell us who his spy on the boat is.” “It’s Michael.” Ben explains. Which only ticks everybody off more since he was the one who killed Ana Lucia (whom Sawyer has fond memories of) and Libby (who Hurley has fond memories of). “You mean the guy who sold us all out so he could get off the island? That Michael?” Sawyer asks. “Yes James. That Michael.”

Later, when Locke is escorting Miles back to his prison, Sawyer comes out and confronts Locke about not disclosing the whole $3 million dollar deal with the rest of them. Locke didn’t think it was worth mentioning since there isn’t a bank on the island, which promptly sends Miles into contemptuous laughter. “Linus will find a way to get it. He wants to survive and considering a week ago you had a gun to his head and tonight he’s eating pound cake, I’d say he’s a guy who gets what he wants.”

Meanwhile, back inside, after disapprovingly eyeing Carl’s arm around Alex, Ben finally gets his chance to say what he’s wanted to say to Alex. He gives her a map, tells Rousseau to take them to the Temple, where the rest of their people are. Carl wants to know why they all can’t go and Ben cryptically explains, “Because the Temple’s not FOR them, Carl. It’s for us.” And when Carl asks why nobody else has heard about the Temple Ben replies “Because it wouldn’t BE much of a sanctuary if EVERYONE knew about it.” Ben kindly does not add “DUH!” after both of these sentences, but the “Duh” is definitely implied. He tells them to go quickly and reassures Alex that her mother will protect her. “If they knew who you were—that you were my daughter—they would use you to get to me.” “These people—you said they’re dangerous. More dangerous than you?” Alex asks. Ben has to think about that. “Yes.” He finally decides. “Now GO!”

Three men in a tub
Sayid and Desmond are awakened by an alarm. They rush up on deck to see the Captain kicking the crap out of someone for leaving the boat. This is a form of discipline: “Does everybody remember the last people who left this boat and what happened to them?” There’s a nice big bloodstain on deck. “Johnson! Come over and clean this up!” Hopefully “Johnson” will do a better job on this bloodstain that he did on the one in Sayid’s and Desmond’s bunk. Sayid wants to know what Michael is doing on the boat. Michael does not want to be seen talking to Sayid because he doesn’t want anyone to know that e knows them. “Why are you here?” Sayid asks again. “I’m here to die.”

Later Sayid and Desmond find their way into the engine room where Michael is “fixing” the damage her has done to the engines. Sayid doesn’t care about Michael’s cover—he wants answers.

When Michael finishes telling Sayid how he came to be on the ship, Sayid promptly turns him in to the captain, explaining that he is a traitor. Sayid could be the cause of Michael’s death, or the deaths of some of the other Losties, by turning Michael in, which may be how Ben then gets Sayid to work in turn for him.

I’d like to point out here, apropos of absolutely nothing, that Desmond has done little more in this episode except stand by and look in turns confused, then concerned, then back to confused again. These may very well be the same expressions, however, I would have appreciated a little dialog for our Des rather than his use as a mere prop in this episode. Now where was I? Oh yeah…..

On the way to the Temple
Alex, Rousseau and Carl stop for a quick break. Carl is nervous, but he’s not sure why. Suddenly: Pffft! Pffft! Carl’s water bottle is leaking, then Carl. Carl is dead. Rousseau leads Alex to shelter behind a tree. She says she will count to three, and then they will run. “I love you,” Rousseau tells Alex. They go and Rousseau is shot immediately. Alex surrenders: “I’m Ben’s daughter! Don’t shoot!”

So who is shooting at them? Could it be Ben’s people in an effort to get Alex away from Rousseau and Carl—two people who were clearly in Ben’s way when it came to Alex? Or is it the Widmore people?

Aaaaarrrrggghhh! Has that been eight episodes already??? Five weeks to a new episode! How will I live?????

April 24 (Next Episode)
All of the Oceanic Six have been revealed and Aaron is definitely one of them. The war has begun, Ben is afraid of the Widmore people and something is up with Claire.