Lost: Season 5, Episode 13 Review: Some Like It Hoth
Some Like It HothOriginal Airdate: April 15, 2009
Writer: Melinda Hsu Taylor and Greg Nations
Director: Jack Bender
While critics and fans warmly embraced the freighties, they were introduced late in the game, especially when plot has caught up with character development for importance. The one episode they had devoted to back story (not counting Michael’s) was split among five of them and so we only got the foundation. With a little more than twenty episodes left, it’s unlikely the surviving three will get more than an episode each. So for possibly Miles’ only episode they have to explain how he became a part of the Kahana’s “science team”, his issues with his father and his gift while dealing with the building action of the story. While the pieces are well done, it doesn’t have anything to tie it together besides Miles.
Much like Sayid, being in 1977 gives Miles an opportunity to deal with a major piece of his history, in Miles’ case it’s his life long struggle living without a father. While Sayid quickly reacted in a way he thought would save himself a lot of torment, Miles didn’t take the opportunity to make up for lost time and start any relationship with his dad in three years. It speaks to the differences in the characters: Sayid is a man governed by his emotions whereas Miles hides his under layers of sarcasm and put downs.
Since Miles’ father left them when he was a baby, his perception was informed by his mother, who was justifiably angry at Chang for leaving them. They went from a nice life in Dharmaville to seedy apartments and leaving Miles alone to deal with his mother when she gets sick. That anger permeates throughout his life, as seen when he confronts the father who wanted Miles to find out if his dead son loved him, telling the father he should’ve done that while he was still alive.
So on a trip to hide the death of one of the Swan’s construction crew, he winds up on a road trip with Hurley, who is delivering sandwiches to the same location Horace told Miles to deliver the body. Hurley was the only person who could tell Miles what he needed to hear. He too dealt with an absentee father for most his life. He speaks to dead people, but as he says, his power is better. However, Hurley has overcome his daddy issues by giving his dad a second chance. Certainly glimpsing his father lovingly caring for his baby self offered some solace to all that pain he suffered, but ultimately it is bittersweet.
The other major piece of Miles’ backstory is how he came to be on the freighter. Turns out his freelance medium work caught the eye of Widmore (or maybe he found him first because he had a tie to the island). Some have speculated on the ambiguous reading of Felix, Miles’ “audition”. Since it wouldn’t be smart to have an outsider read a man they killed, it’s a safe guess that The Others killed Felix to get the information Friendly handed Michael in “Meet Kevin Johnson”.
But Widmore isn’t the only person who noticed Miles; he also caught the attention of the people seen with the mysterious container, as Bram warns Miles not to take up Widmore’s offer. Through this exchange we learn two things: there’s a war coming and Widmore is on the opposing team. The scene also explains that Miles asked Ben for 3.2 million dollars a season earlier because he wanted to know if Ben was on Bram’s side and as far as he knows, he isn’t.
Among the landmarks that take us to the finale is the reveal that The Swan station is already under top secret construction. The problems are there from the jump when Miles is put in charge of covering up the death of Alvarez, a Dharma worker whose tooth filling was ripped out of his skull like a bullet in reverse. It’s also interesting that the construction is taking place in Other territory. So ultimately Dharma is breaching the truce just because they can. The true agenda of Dharma, personified by Radzinsky is coming to a critical point with the perceived face, personified by Horace.
The other big turning point is the façade Sawyer created for the Island Five and the Ajira 77ers finally falling. It was inevitable to happen, from the interest Kate had in Young Ben getting on Roger’s radar to the biggest piece, the video incriminating Sawyer and Kate in Young Ben’s disappearance. They managed to put a bandage on it by knocking out Phil, but that’s not going to last and they know it.
The nerdiest bit of the episode, one that lead to one of my favorite instances of Wikipedia vandalism, was Hurley writing The Empire Strikes Back “with a couple improvements”. While this humor doesn’t fit the tone of the rest of the episode, it’s still fun (although wouldn’t Hurley know that Luke gets his hand cut off before he learns of Vader’s paternity?)
Daniel’s return reeks of the writers not knowing how to end the episode. It just comes out of no where and while it may coincide with the story heading to its climax, it doesn’t work in context. It’s obvious why it’s there, but the end of the episode was better off leaving with Miles watching his father care for his newborn self.
This episode felt like it could’ve been a Hurley episode in early drafts. He’s featured prominently, all the episodes after “Namaste” featured one of the characters who returned and he and Sun were the two left & there are moments of comedy and pop culture references down to the pun in the title. However, if the writers realized what was mentioned in the first paragraph, they must’ve scrapped it in favor of giving Miles a shot in the spotlight.
Overall this episode is a mess, but the pieces are well done. They had to cram a lot of information about Miles’ background and ultimately not much ties it together neatly. It’s crunch time for the writers and while this episode is a disappointment, hopefully this is just a hiccup and not a sign of what’s to come.
Much like Sayid, being in 1977 gives Miles an opportunity to deal with a major piece of his history, in Miles’ case it’s his life long struggle living without a father. While Sayid quickly reacted in a way he thought would save himself a lot of torment, Miles didn’t take the opportunity to make up for lost time and start any relationship with his dad in three years. It speaks to the differences in the characters: Sayid is a man governed by his emotions whereas Miles hides his under layers of sarcasm and put downs.
Since Miles’ father left them when he was a baby, his perception was informed by his mother, who was justifiably angry at Chang for leaving them. They went from a nice life in Dharmaville to seedy apartments and leaving Miles alone to deal with his mother when she gets sick. That anger permeates throughout his life, as seen when he confronts the father who wanted Miles to find out if his dead son loved him, telling the father he should’ve done that while he was still alive.
So on a trip to hide the death of one of the Swan’s construction crew, he winds up on a road trip with Hurley, who is delivering sandwiches to the same location Horace told Miles to deliver the body. Hurley was the only person who could tell Miles what he needed to hear. He too dealt with an absentee father for most his life. He speaks to dead people, but as he says, his power is better. However, Hurley has overcome his daddy issues by giving his dad a second chance. Certainly glimpsing his father lovingly caring for his baby self offered some solace to all that pain he suffered, but ultimately it is bittersweet.
The other major piece of Miles’ backstory is how he came to be on the freighter. Turns out his freelance medium work caught the eye of Widmore (or maybe he found him first because he had a tie to the island). Some have speculated on the ambiguous reading of Felix, Miles’ “audition”. Since it wouldn’t be smart to have an outsider read a man they killed, it’s a safe guess that The Others killed Felix to get the information Friendly handed Michael in “Meet Kevin Johnson”.
But Widmore isn’t the only person who noticed Miles; he also caught the attention of the people seen with the mysterious container, as Bram warns Miles not to take up Widmore’s offer. Through this exchange we learn two things: there’s a war coming and Widmore is on the opposing team. The scene also explains that Miles asked Ben for 3.2 million dollars a season earlier because he wanted to know if Ben was on Bram’s side and as far as he knows, he isn’t.
Among the landmarks that take us to the finale is the reveal that The Swan station is already under top secret construction. The problems are there from the jump when Miles is put in charge of covering up the death of Alvarez, a Dharma worker whose tooth filling was ripped out of his skull like a bullet in reverse. It’s also interesting that the construction is taking place in Other territory. So ultimately Dharma is breaching the truce just because they can. The true agenda of Dharma, personified by Radzinsky is coming to a critical point with the perceived face, personified by Horace.
The other big turning point is the façade Sawyer created for the Island Five and the Ajira 77ers finally falling. It was inevitable to happen, from the interest Kate had in Young Ben getting on Roger’s radar to the biggest piece, the video incriminating Sawyer and Kate in Young Ben’s disappearance. They managed to put a bandage on it by knocking out Phil, but that’s not going to last and they know it.
The nerdiest bit of the episode, one that lead to one of my favorite instances of Wikipedia vandalism, was Hurley writing The Empire Strikes Back “with a couple improvements”. While this humor doesn’t fit the tone of the rest of the episode, it’s still fun (although wouldn’t Hurley know that Luke gets his hand cut off before he learns of Vader’s paternity?)
Daniel’s return reeks of the writers not knowing how to end the episode. It just comes out of no where and while it may coincide with the story heading to its climax, it doesn’t work in context. It’s obvious why it’s there, but the end of the episode was better off leaving with Miles watching his father care for his newborn self.
This episode felt like it could’ve been a Hurley episode in early drafts. He’s featured prominently, all the episodes after “Namaste” featured one of the characters who returned and he and Sun were the two left & there are moments of comedy and pop culture references down to the pun in the title. However, if the writers realized what was mentioned in the first paragraph, they must’ve scrapped it in favor of giving Miles a shot in the spotlight.
Overall this episode is a mess, but the pieces are well done. They had to cram a lot of information about Miles’ background and ultimately not much ties it together neatly. It’s crunch time for the writers and while this episode is a disappointment, hopefully this is just a hiccup and not a sign of what’s to come.
Overall Score: 7/10
posted by Matt @ 3:29 PM
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