US: 2X14 - "One Of Them" [**SPOILERS WITHIN**]

otron

doh.ie wrote:

** You say you flew here in a balloon four months ago. What was the last thing you remember happening in the real world? Who is the US president? What was the last film you saw? Remember any showbiz gossip? Anything from international politics? There was a hurricane last year - what was it called? Where did it hit? etc etc. **

Exactly - or he could ask 'What happened in Sept 2001?' Easy one.

steviec

Considering the others have a boat and seem to be well kitted out, they're likely to know whats happening in the outside world anyway. They don't seem particularly helpless or trapped on the island. Ethan managed to pass himself off long enough and so did the guy on the tail end. I doubt Ethan went all that time without ever once discussing anything from the media with anyone.

It's an interesting one, the only solid way to find proof is to find the balloon or the grave, but what if he directs them into a trap when he's telling them where they are?

LFCFan

Sleepy wrote:

That was honestly the first episode this season that felt like an episode from season 1. Got the Henry Gale reference immediately because I'd been in the Wizard of Oz in college and in the musical, Dorothy does indeed escape Oz in a balloon (the same balloon that originally brought the wizard to Oz from Kansas).

I thought she was going to use the baloon but then it gets loose with the Wizard in it and he flys away without her and then the Good Witch comes in her bubble and get's Dorothy to click her heels together 3 times while saying there's no place like home and then she wakes up back at home????

ObeyGiant

doh.ie wrote:

T'Pol once bizarrely ordered a 'root beer' at a fast food place

Tiny, tiny aside: why is this so weird? "Root beer" is pretty standard for American fast food restaurants. I can't remember the brand of it, so I always asked for a root beer and they didn't look at me as if I was bonkers.

doh.ie

8

ObeyGiant wrote:

Tiny, tiny aside: why is this so weird? "Root beer" is pretty standard for American fast food restaurants. I can't remember the brand of it, so I always asked for a root beer and they didn't look at me as if I was bonkers.

Is it standard? I never saw it on any menus any of the times I visited. (That's not to doubt you, but that we must have been in different places.) And it's always been a peculiarly Trek thing to use 'root beer' for generic-20th/21st-Century-drink-we-don't-want-to-actually-use-a-brand-for. Why not lemonade? Or cola?

In relation to Lost, I was wondering if the producers are invoking a similar kind of 'real world' rule. Charlie mentioned The Kinks recently and Sawyer called Hurley 'Barbar' last week, but sometimes the flashbacks don't feel as real as they should. Maybe that's because they're filming in Hawaii and there's extra effort required to get sets looking American/British/Nigerian etc. But like the Trek trips to the 90s, they often feel less genuine than they should.

doh.ie

8

steviec wrote:

Considering the others have a boat and seem to be well kitted out, they're likely to know whats happening in the outside world anyway. They don't seem particularly helpless or trapped on the island. Ethan managed to pass himself off long enough and so did the guy on the tail end. I doubt Ethan went all that time without ever once discussing anything from the media with anyone.

It's an interesting one, the only solid way to find proof is to find the balloon or the grave, but what if he directs them into a trap when he's telling them where they are?

I don't know if the Others are are clued in as this. I don't think they're as familiar with the world as it was just before the crash either, certainly not enough to get by on questions on real world politics or movies. (Otron's September 11th point is spot on - no one could but know this, and yet I half-think the Others may not.) Ethan may well have passed himself off as a genuine survivor of 815 by talking generically and purposely avoiding questions of this sort. I don't think he (or Goodwin - remember his line about being in the Peace Corps? Ana Lucia said, "They still have that?!") or even Henry Gale (if he does turn out to be an Other) know much about the world pre-Oceanic 815's crash at all.

Agamemnon

7

If the Others don't know what's going on in the outside world, then they could have used Ethan to get information about it. There were plenty of magazines, books and newspapers on the plane so he could have learned about the outside world that way to pass himself off convincingly as a flight 815 survivor.

Mitch Connor

doh.ie wrote:

Is it standard? I never saw it on any menus any of the times I visited. (That's not to doubt you, but that we must have been in different places.) And it's always been a peculiarly Trek thing to use 'root beer' for generic-20th/21st-Century-drink-we-don't-want-to-actually-use-a-brand-for. Why not lemonade? Or cola?

In relation to Lost, I was wondering if the producers are invoking a similar kind of 'real world' rule. Charlie mentioned The Kinks recently and Sawyer called Hurley 'Barbar' last week, but sometimes the flashbacks don't feel as real as they should. Maybe that's because they're filming in Hawaii and there's extra effort required to get sets looking American/British/Nigerian etc. But like the Trek trips to the 90s, they often feel less genuine than they should.

i suppose its no different then going to a pub and asking for a pint of Cider.

FrankGrimes

doh.ie wrote:

Goodwin - remember his line about being in the Peace Corps? Ana Lucia said, "They still have that?!")

That's a really good point, I remember thinking that was a very weird thing for him to say alright. I think this is pretty good evidence The Others are not up-to-date on current affairs outside the island, and you have to wonder why the survivors' first instincts weren't to ask loads tricky questions (who won this years Superbowl? etc). That said, poor auld me hasn't managed to get my grubby mitts on episode 14 yet, but just had to look here, and it does sound like a goodun, which after the tripe they've served up so often this season (particularly 2x11, 2x12) is good to see, but they are defo losing viewers with the insultingly slow pace of plot development.

ObeyGiant

Er, they do still have the peace corps (peacecorps.gov), and I have a friend involved in it. It's just such a 'romantic' notion that it's not very popular these days, but that doesn't give any evidence that the Others are "out of touch."

As a matter of fact, I'd guess that "the others" would be remarkably in-touch with what's going on in the rest of the world. They knew about the plane, enough that Ethan was on the ground with the rest of the guys in a really short space of time.

But besides, all this is pure speculation on our part. There's very little evidence on the Island that the Others are "out of touch", so it's unreasonable to expect the Losties to use it as a way of finding an "other."

8

I havent read the rest of this thread.
I thought this episode was very well put together and nice TV candy.
Not so Subtle references to Rendition in it.Like most episodes theres something abstract thrown in,thats one that jumped out at me.

loon

agamemnon wrote:

If the Others don't know what's going on in the outside world, then they could have used Ethan to get information about it. There were plenty of magazines, books and newspapers on the plane so he could have learned about the outside world that way to pass himself off convincingly as a flight 815 survivor.

i think people are reading too much into this... personally i think that the others don't care whats going on in the outside world... as they said, 'its their island' and i think thats all they care about... they're probably aware that the outside world does not affect them

Takeshi_Kovacs

well sorry for being a few days behind the times, but did anyone notice when the numbers ran out and the hiero's started spinning, that the second hiero from the right (the bird one after it settled down.) very briefly showed up a different picture almost like a man three times before it settled on the bird pic. I drew a quick sketch of it here