By Mike Frey and johnnysweeptheleg
Think you have issues with your parents? Try being Daniel Faraday. Not only does his mother force him to quit playing piano in order to focus on physics, but she and his father — who just might be the most evil dude in the Lost universe — conspire to send him to an island where he will be killed … by her. Most moms just make their kids eat broccoli and stop slouching. Then again, very few of the parents on Lost will be contending for a Mother or Father of the Year award any time soon …
johnnysweeptheleg’s “Lost” in a Moment:
Welcome back, Twitchy! Which is more surprising — that Faraday is back on the island or that Dharma’s headquarters can be found in Ann Arbor, Michigan, of all places?
It feels like Faraday’s on The Amazing Race. He’s on the run the entire episode. First, spending 17 seconds by Jack, waking him up to notify him that Eloise was wrong about this being their destiny, but not staying long enough to hear Jack explain the wild dream he had last night involving Kate, Juliet and the Smoke Monster’s younger sister, who is, you guessed it, smokin’ hot.
Like that, Faraday’s off on his next mission to The Orchid, to see if he can blow Chang’s mind. He tells Chang that he must evacuate the island. In six hours, 30,000 times the electromagnetic energy that killed the nameless worker will be released. He knows this because he’s from the future. He also knows that Miles is his son. Chang looks to Miles, who gives a “My name is Paul, and this is between you all” look.
Now here’s Chang. A scientist on a magical island, who is studying time travel — yet even he doesn’t initially believe Daniel Faraday. At this point, don’t you think maybe it’s time to have the Queer Eye guys give you a makeover, when you’re so creepy and shifty-looking, that even the scientist studying time travel doesn’t believe you came from the future?!
But Faraday has successfully planted that seed of thought in Chang’s mind. While that grows, Faraday tells the rest of the team he needs to visit the Hostiles. Why? Because Mommy Dearest is a hostile. Remember Ellie from back in the 50s? It was at this point where I shouted at the television, paraphrasing the late, great, Chris Farley, “She and Widmore got – it – on!” Why? Like we learned before, Widmore loved the ladies. In his prime, Widmore seemed to set up franchises in a number of area codes.
And through flashback, Widmore visits Faraday at his home while Daniel watches the discovery of the Oceanic flight below the ocean. Crying uncontrollably, for reasons he can’t figure out, he explains to Widmore that since his experiments, he’s been having side effects that didn’t show up on the side of the bottle. Widmore tells Daniel that all of this can be solved, if he goes to a super secret island to conduct his studies. Oh, and to stop crying at the TV, since he staged the whole thing and everyone’s actually alive. If he wants something to really cry about, rent Old Yeller. Still not sure if he wants to go, Faraday visits with his mom who urges him to go, saying it’s very important. “Will it make you proud of me?” asks Norman Bates, I mean, Dan Faraday. When she answers “Yes,” he says if it makes her proud, then he’ll go. Serious mommy issues, here.
So we know how Faraday got to the island. But currently, not everyone’s down with DF’s plan to visit Hostile territory. After all, they are named THE HOSTILES. Not exactly inviting. So while Sawyer’s heart will be there with Freckles, his body is staying back with Juliet and Miles.
Of course, Faraday is still on his world tour, 19 stops in two hours, with this one being the infamous meeting with Little Charlotte. He pleads with her to convince mom to jump aboard that submarine when Chang orders the evacuation. This would be touching, if only there wasn’t a creepy bearded man, a swing set, and chocolate involved.
Faraday, Jack, and Kate move on to the weapons locker. But Radzinski, who’s always on edge, happens upon them and a shootout ensues. Faraday takes a bullet graze to the neck, while Radzinski takes shrapnel of his own, but like an A-Team episode, everybody gets away alive.
Radzinski goes right to his head of security. Unfortunately, a bound and gagged Phil makes enough noise in the closet to get Sawyer busted. And he’s probably going to be demoted, too.
Things are going a little better for Faraday’s crew. While marching to hostile territory, he explains to Jack that he has it all figured out. You see, in four hours, Dharma will drill into the ground and tap into this massive amount of energy. Like, four Red Bulls worth. So the DI creates a hatch to bottle up all of this energy. And as long as someone continues to hit that button, they’ll be able to keep that energy leak at bay. Unfortunately, Dez won’t push that button one day, and that will cause their plane to crash, which will cause the freighter to be sent with Faraday’s team, and this whole chain of events has now been started.
But, Faraday has flip-flopped on his notion that what’s done is done. He now believes they can change their destiny, because they are the variables, not the constants. So if he can destroy the energy before it’s leaked, then there will be no hatch-creation, which means no button needs to be pushed, so Dez won’t miss it, and the plane won’t crash. Great! So how do we do this?
Faraday’s great plan? He wants to detonate the H-bomb. And we’re ready for Jack to drop an F-bomb in shock.
Not really good at this tough guy stuff, Faraday walks right into Camp Hostile with his gun drawn, demanding to see Eloise. Alpert exits his tent and explains that she’s gone back into town to stock back up on his Guyliner. Faraday doesn’t buy it. He gives Alpert to the count of three before he’s going to shoot. There’s a gunshot, but it isn’t from Faraday. He falls to the ground, and sees that his mom has shot him. Freud saw this coming a mile away. While dying, he comes to the realization that Eloise knew all along that she was sending him off to the island to die. And he does. But not before he divulges to her that he’s her son, thus keeping the notion of “destiny” alive, despite all his words earlier to the contrary.
Back in the future, we see Eloise and Widmore outside Desmond’s hospital and we get confirmation that Widmore is Faraday’s father. So both parents sent their child off to the island, knowing the sacrifice they were making. Wait, does this make Penny and Faraday siblings? At this point, Montel Williams arrives to make sense of all the Baby Mama drama. Their family tree is more tangled than the Hapsburg empire. Would we expect anything else from this show, though?
Questions Answered
Why did Daniel Faraday come back to the island? To make his mother proud. He just didn’t know that the pride would be the result of her excellent shooting skills.
Why isn’t Daniel Faraday part of the Dharma Initiative, circa 1977? He’s been hanging out in Ann Arbor with the rest of the Dharma nerds.
Are Ellie and Eloise Hawking one and the same? Yes
Why did Widmore fund Faraday’s research and pay for Theresa Spencer’s care? Presumably because Faraday is his son.
Who really put the fake Oceanic 815 at the bottom of the ocean? Charles Widmore
New Questions To Be Asked
Daniel Faraday is dead … right?
Did Faraday do enough to convince Dr. Chang to build the hatch?
What’s going to happen to Sawyer and Juliet now that Radzinski has blown their cover?
Photo: Credit: Mario Perez/ABC
