Lost: Stranger in a Strange Land

Achara: "There are things that happen here you could never understand."

How cool that they wrote an entire episode centered on part of Matthew Fox's tattoo. Are we going to get one about the rest of his tattoo next season?

There were lots of parallels. Jack was destined to be a special leader, and marked by the mysterious Achara. Juliet was marked as a traitor for helping Kate and Sawyer escape. Jack and Juliet are both marked, both prisoners, both doctors. I liked that Jack decided to protect Juliet, that he saved her life, even if it turns out that she's playing him. I don't think she is, though. Not after seeing her backstory.

We were supposed to see similarities between the Island and Jack's adventures in Thailand, too. There were deliberate parallel scenes between the primitive, barbaric Others who marked Juliet and the superstitious people on the beach who beat Jack up because of his tattoo. (It actually felt mildly racist to me, although I could be overreacting.) What sort of community brands a miscreant? Why these primitive, barbaric rules? They said that the Others were into the old eye for an eye, so I'm guessing that the position of the wound on Juliet's back was supposed to echo Ben's surgery scar.

Cindy the flight attendant looked drugged, or brainwashed. I don't think the kids were, though. I'm also confused about young Karl; he's hard to figure. Probably shaking off the brainwashing ("God loves you as he loved Jacob") that Cindy the flight attendant has probably undergone. What are they "here to watch"?

The Kate/Sawyer bits were fun to watch, and not a surprise that they're struggling for dominance. What struck me about it was that Sawyer really thinks that Kate made love with him only because he was going to die. Sawyer doesn't think Kate loves him. He doesn't feel worthy of it. It's things like this that make Sawyer such an appealing character, despite the despicable things he does.

Character bits:

-- We have a new player: Isabel, whom Tom called "The Sheriff." She's sort of a female Ben. I thought Juliet was going to be the female Ben.

-- Karl has never seen "The Brady Bunch." Lucky Karl. But Ben showed Jack television from the outside. Maybe only the higher ups are fortunate enough to watch "The Brady Bunch."

-- Alex took out the video camera with a rock. I like Alex more with each episode she's in.

-- Sawyer was in fine nicknaming form: Captain Bunny Killer (Ben), Magellan (Kate), Bobby (Karl), and my favorite, Sally Slingshot (Alex).

-- Kate appears to call Sawyer "James" when she's ticked off at him.

-- Was Achara psychic? Achara saw who people were, and marked them. She had a tattoo on her lower back, too. Like Juliet's brand.

-- The kids asking about Ana Lucia was a jolt. That was sad.

-- So Ethan was a surgeon, huh?

Bits and pieces:

-- The Stepford suburbs appear to be on the main island. Guess we'll find out soon.

-- Ursa Theodorus. The teddy bear. The kid was carrying a teddy bear, too. Coincidence? Is anything on this show coincidental?

-- I think "Stranger in a strange land" is a quote from the Bible. It's also the title of one of the great science fiction books by Robert A. Heinlein about the second coming. Some Jesus symbolism for Jack, perhaps?

-- Bai Ling's striped hair was just striking. Loved it.

-- Matthew Fox and Josh Holloway both looked too scruffy for me. Let's hope for a plot twist that will allow them both to start shaving regularly.

Quotes:

Karl: "What the hell was that for?"
Sawyer: "So you'd cowboy up."

Achara: "My work. It is not decoration. It is definition."

Isabel: "He walks amongst us, but he is not one of us. Your tattoos. That's what they say."
Jack: "That's what they say. It's not what they mean."

Two out of four polar bears,

Billie