Tonight's Lost

[apocalypsos]

Okay, here's the thing.

Right now, I have only four shows I watch religiously, all of which have finales in the next few weeks or, in the case of TAR, already had a finale. TAR is sort of my reality TV candy, in that I get all excited and obsessed and usually the only time I cry is during the finale, if someone I like wins. (See: last night's finale.) Extreme Makeover: Home Edition is my comfort food, because I'm a contractor's kid and seeing guys measuring out lumber and putting up drywall gives me a warm fuzzy. Also, there's people who've gone through dire situations getting lots of presents, and that I can always get behind. :)

As for my dramas, I've got Desperate Housewives and Lost. With Desperate Housewives, it's basically my fix of a soap opera in primetime. It's well-written froth, but it's froth just the same. Lost is supposed to be my serious, thought-provoking show, goddamn it. And you know what? In the past few weeks, I've spent more time theorizing about and analyzing Desperate Housewives than I have Lost. I just ... ARGH.

Needless to say for anybody who knows me, but I sooooooooooo did not need a Kate episode the Wednesday after that amazing scene with Felicia and Paul this week and Gabrielle apparently dropping the paternity bombshell to Carlos next week.

Kate just ... Kate. JESUS. Why am I supposed to like this woman? Why?! I can't for the life of me figure out why she's supposed to be a heroine or at the very least, someone I should root for or even be entertained by at all while she's on screen. Because seriously, there are two options when it comes to Kate --

1.) She is a murderer, a bank robber, a fugitive, a liar, and now a homewrecker.

or --

2.) She can track, sail, handle a weapon, birth a child, get every guy on the island to swoon over her at least once, yadda yadda get-the-writers-a-Mary-Sue-litmus-test-yesterday cakes.

What am I supposed to like about either option? I could like the first option if she weren't so damn intent on checking off seemingly every entry on a list of bad behavior. And it's not even about "like," it's about not being bored for an hour straight. That's the difference between Jack and Kate with me anymore. They both have their problems, but at least Jack confines his knowledge to doctoring and occasionally displaying his questionable leadership skills. He's fallen into that leadership position due to the fact that he's a doctor, so he has a reason to be on every single expedition or know about every single thing that happens on the island. Kate has no such reason, hence the "I can track" or "I can sail" that suddenly pop out of fucking nowhere like a bat out of a basement.

Damn it, I didn't want this to become yet another "Kate sucks" rant, but ... yeah.

And that's what gets me. Watching the show tonight, I realized that Evie is not my problem, it's Kate. Evie is gorgeous, so that's not a problem, and she might be new at acting but she's not that bad. (She's not going to win an Oscar next week, but I've seen far worse.) It's that the material she's got work with is awful. Honestly, who could make Kate fun to watch? The character has five kajillion skills, can apparently disguise herself as anyone, is incredibly beautiful, gets to go on every expedition, and has had at least four of the main male characters chasing after her, flirting with her, or hitting on her at one point or another in the first season. She'd be intimidating if she weren't idiotic.

Given the flashbacks, we're supposed to get this impression of her as some sort of fresh-faced femme fatale, and it'd probably work if she ever did or said anything of import that actually meant something (when her flashbacks EVER make sense when strung together, I'll be sure to feed myself to zebras), she didn't run away from people every time she got them killed or injured (you shouldn't even have let a father of small children near the car during a getaway if you gave a shit about him, Kate), and her motivations were the least bit understandable. I don't know why she does half the stuff she does, and unlike Locke, I don't have interesting dialogue, an intriguing storyline, or weird vibes to fall back on.

Meanwhile, back at the really interesting storylines, you have things like Michael being poisoned, which it turned out Kate asked Sun to do. Oh, Sun, sweetie, step away from the Mary Sue. Just go over and fawn over Jin and for God's sake, TELL HIM YOU LOVE HIM. I want you to say goodbye to him with sex with LOTS of sex.

And Charlie and Claire! With the haircutting and the guitar-playing and the oh-so-casual invitation to live with him in L.A.! Until she gets on her feet, of course, which can be quickly translated in a fic into, "Until Turnip Head is staying at a babysitter's house one night, Claire and Charlie have the place all to themselves, and stuff just sort of ... you know, happens." This, of course, will be translated in a fic by someone else, right? Right?!

"Hey, Steve didn't even know about the polar bears!" *snerk* I love Hurley.

Okay, enough. Bah. This episode left a bad taste in my mouth. We'd better be getting a hell of a finale in our future to make me feel better.

EDIT: I'm heading off to bed. I'll do a music post tomorrow, when I'm in a better mood and have had a good eight hours worth of sleep.

Comments

[aconite.livejournal.com]

Re: Kate. Exactly! I've tried and tried to like her but there just isn't a reason that feels real. Whenever a skill is needed - give it to Kate! Problems? Kate can fix it! Angst? Kate has angst! I want to like her, I do, but it's really hard.

Aww but Charlie and Claire (and little Turnip Head) could not have been more adorable. *loves them*

[apocalypsos.livejournal.com]

The thing I loved about Charlie and Claire talking in that scene is that they're just so comfortable together. He tosses out the invite to L.A., she accepts graciously without argument. They're like those friends of yours who are really, really close and make you wonder why they just haven't broken the ice and started dating already.

[bailunrui.livejournal.com]

I totally agree. Can't we exchange her or something? Substitute Kate for five worthless background castaways? Please? Pretty please?

[apocalypsos.livejournal.com]

Hell, one scene with Dr. Artz and I already like him five times as much as I like her.

[thebratqueen.livejournal.com]

I loved Artz being all high school teacher. "And what's to the south of us? Does anybody know?" Hee!

[fyrdrakken]

Frankly, I just appreciated the, "Hey, a background extra was given a name and some lines and a wee bit of backstory (a career, anyway), rather than one of the main cast being given sudden inexplicable weather pattern knowledge!"

[thebratqueen.livejournal.com]

Esp since you know if anybody was going to get the magic weather knowledge, it'd be Kate. It's right up there with sailing, tracking, identity theft, being a notary republic...

[fyrdrakken]

Yeah, and it was a great touch that towards the latter part of his speech he sounded exactly like a teacher nudging the students to speak up and prove that they're paying attention and comprehending at least some of the lesson.

[foresthouse.livejournal.com]

THANK YOU for the Kate rant. After my recap I had no energy left to do justice to that aspect of this ep - that I HATE THE KATE STORY. It's not Evie, it's the character and I just...feel like they totally haven't developed her character logically, or something. GAH.

Also? She is totally a Mary-Sue. And I didn't realize it until you said it. That's half of why I hate her right there!

[apocalypsos.livejournal.com]

Exactly. I mean, I've seen Evie in interviews, for God's sake, and she's bubbly and happy. She's fun to watch on screen, and I have no clue how the writers are managing to just smother that aspect of her.

[valerie]

Argh, THANK YOU. You've put this far better than I ever could.

[drewbeartx.livejournal.com]

No one in my family can stand Kate. She's nasty, in that clingy, oily way. You're right; she runs from every problem she creates (and so far, they're ALL her fault), refusing to take responsibility, uses sex and her body to get what she wants (as her first option, mind you, not the last resort) and doesn't seem to understand why people dislike/hate her when they find out what she's really like.

Also, based on some of the stuff they implied this ep, I'm *really* afraid that the writers are going to try to explain away her behavior because she was abused. Thereby adding more angsty goodness to our favorite person EVAR OMG!

[apocalypsos.livejournal.com]

I know! I got the impression at the end of the episode that we were supposed to feel sorry for her because "OMG KATE HAS NO FRIENDS ANYMORE WOE!" And there wasn't a single person who walked away from her in that scene that didn't have a good goddamn reason to do so. Shannon has already lost her brother to betrayal, in her mind. Michael was busy being poisoned. Charlie's protecting Claire and the baby, considering what the last personal betrayal to them did.

She asks for this shit, and we're supposed to feel sorry for her. Yeah, thanks, but no thanks.

(Seriously, I do not get it. Evie is fun and interesting to watch in interviews. How the hell are they hiding that? Sheesh.)

[neadods.livejournal.com]

I adore Hurley. He's the voice of the watchers. "How can I keep straight who knows what around here?"

As for the Kate rant- right on! And frankly, it's only cosmic justice that Kate is taking the fall for something Sun did, since it was Kate's idea in the first place.

My only hope is that now that the castaways are shunning Kate, she's going to stop being in the middle of every storyline.

[fyrdrakken]

My only hope is that now that the castaways are shunning Kate, she's going to stop being in the middle of every storyline.

Sadly, now that Locke and Jack have made up, that's probably going to be a new subplot of Kate becoming the least popular castaway. Until she does something flashy and spectacular to make them all lurve her again.

[phillyexpat.livejournal.com]

For a minute, I wondered if I was watching an episode of Dawson's Creek. The Tom-Kate thing was very Dawson & Joey. The Sawyer-Kate thing? Very Pacey-Joey. Joey had, in my mind, no redeeming qualities and the men who loved her had their lives screwed up forever.

Stupid Joey. Stupid Kate.

[spyderqueen.livejournal.com]

More reasons to dislike Kate: I think I know where they're going with this. She killed her father, probably because of sexual abuse. Oh noes! The Wangst!

Though the confrontation scene had my roommate yelling how no body there had the right to judge the morality of anyone's actions. Except maybe Claire and Hurley. They seems to have the fewest skeletons in their closets.


Reasons the ep rocks though: Sawyer delivering the smackdown on that stupid ho-bag Kate, Jin defending Michael, and the return of uber-creepy Walt.


Oh, and mocking Jack's optimism RE the hatch. "Worst case scenerio, shelter". Thank god Sayid has some common sense ("I can think of many worse cases than that")

[apocalypsos.livejournal.com]

If they go the child-abuse route with Kate (and they will, even a blind person could see that), I'm going to vomit. A lot.

[erinlin.livejournal.com]

The writers should just bite the bullet and make her evil already. Make her the Anit-Jack. Make her cold, calculating, manipulative, self-centered, evil. And let her screw up-big time! Then she might actually be interesting.

[jedusor.livejournal.com]

Know what I really hated? The part where she was exposed as a fugitive to everyone, and they all looked scared and left her alone, and she dropped to her knees and looked all pathetic. You know we're supposed to feel sorry for her, and take that "what I supposedly did" as irrefutable proof that she's innocent.

I hope she does go on the raft. And drowns.