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Lost Season 3

I Do

LostFlashback: Hiding out in Miami, Kate is trying to settle down. She’s taken the name Monica and is about to marry Kevin, a police officer. At first she’s happy to have found a home. She even calls the marshal pursuing her to ask him to back off, but he replies that they both know that she’s going to keep running and he’s going to keep coming after her. When Kevin tells her to get a passport so they can take a delayed honeymoon to Costa Rica, and she briefly thinks she might be pregnant, Kate decides that it’s time to move on again.

The Island: In order to avoid distressing the castaways on the beach, Locke decides to bury Eko near the Pearl hatch. He takes a detour into the jungle to find Ekp’s prayer stick to use as a grave marker. But as he hammers it into the ground, a particular inscription catches his eye, telling him to lift up his eyes.

Kate watches Pickett threaten Sawyer, and becomes convinced that the man, grieving over Colleen’s death, means to kill Sawyer. Those fears are only raised when Alex storms into the quarry, attacking the Others with a slingshot, demanding to know what happened to her boyfriend – the man Sawyer saw try to escape. Sawyer, meanwhile, seems resigned and practically defeated. When Kate wants to escape, Sawyer tells her there’s no point – they’re on a smaller island, totally cut off from their own. There’s no place to run, but Sawyer didn’t want her to lose hope. They kiss, then make love, and as they lay together in Sawyer’s cage, Sawyer tells her that he loves her.

Jack tells Ben that he has about a week before the tumor becomes inoperable, but he doesn’t plan to do the surgery. After all, he has no reason to believe anything the Others tell him. Even when Kate comes in, pleading with him to do the surgery so that Sawyer won’t be killed, he refuses. Some time after Kate’s visit, the door to his cell opens. Jack makes his way to the surveillance room, where he finds a gun – and a monitor showing Kate and Sawyer huddled together. Ben appears behind him, admitting his surprise. Jack says he’ll do the surgery – anything to get off the island.

Once Ben is in surgery, Pickett storms out to find Sawyer. He’s clearly angry that Ben has put himself in Jack’s hands, and mentions that Jack wasn’t even on someone named Jacob’s list. He decides to get his revenge on Sawyer then and there. But Jack makes a sudden incision in Ben, and his vitals suddenly change. Jack demands that Mr. Friendly bring the walkie talkie into the operating room. He does, and tells Pickett to let them go and put Kate on the line. Jack tells her that she’s going to get a one hour head start on the Others, and that she has to run. When she’s away, she should tell Kate the story he told her the day they first met on the beach. Otherwise, Jack will let Ben die.

Order the DVDswritten by Damon Lindelof & Carlton Cuse
directed by Tucker Gates
music by Michael Giacchino

Guest Cast: Kiele Sanchez (Nikki), Rodrigo Santoro (Paulo), M.C. Gainey (Mr. Friendly), Tania Raymonde (Alex), Michael Bowen (Pickett), Nathan Fillion (Kevin), Eden-Lee Murray (Suzanne), Mark Stitham (Minister), Frederic Lane (The Marshal)

Notes: This episode was advertised as the “fall season finale,” with the series taking an extended break in order to be able to run the remaining episodes of the season without any breaks or reruns.

LogBook entry by Dave Thomer

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Sarah Jane Adventures Season 4

Lost In Time – Part 1

The Sarah Jane AdventuresSummoned to a mysterious shop of curiosities, Sarah, Rani and Clyde are alarmed to discover that they’re been drafted into helping solve a mystery involving three artifacts made of an alien metal, scattered through Earth’s history. Without even being given a chance to refuse this assignment, the three are sent to different time periods – Clyde to war-torn England in 1941, Rani to the Tower of London in the last hours of the reign of the nine-day Queen, and Sarah to a house whose sole occupant is certain that the place is haunted. Each only has a limited amount of time to find the missing pieces, and each is in much more peril than they’re prepared for.

Get the DVDDownload this episodewritten by Rupert Laight
directed by Joss Agnew
music by Sam Watts / title music by Murray Gold

Guest Cast: Cyril Nri (The Shopkeeper), Amber Beattie (Queen Jane), Elizabeth Rider (Mistress Ellen), Fiona Hampton (Lady Matilda), Richard Wisker (George), Tom Wlaschiha (Koenig), Gwyneth Keyworth (Emily), Lucie Jones (Gemma), Morgan-Faith Hughes (Katy), Llewcus Oaten (Ben)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Categories
Red Dwarf Season 10

The Beginning

Red DwarfRed Dwarf and its crew are ill-equipped to survive an attack by rogue simulants, especially simulants hell-bent on recovering a map of wormholes and other safe passages through space recently acquired by Lister. Leaving Red Dwarf unmanned and escaping aboard Blue Midget, Rimmer, Lister, Cat and Kryten hide out in a nearby asteroid belt, hoping to plan their next move. Ultimately, they decide it’s time for Rimmer to utilize the expertise that (they hope) he has after a lifetime of absorbing stories about military strategy. Rimmer also brings along a holographic message left for him by his late father, in the event that Rimmer ever becomes an officer. Despite the fact that he’s still a second technician aboard a derelict mining ship, Rimmer plays the message, hoping for some invaluable advice or a rousing pep talk. Instead of the benediction he hopes for, however, Rimmer instead learns something that sets him free from a lifetime (and a three-million-year living death) of disappointments. But can it save his crewmates?

Order the DVDswritten by Doug Naylor
directed by Doug Naylor
music by Howard Goodall

Red DwarfCast: Chris Barrie (Rimmer), Craig Charles (Lister), Danny John-Jules (Cat), Robert Llewellyn (Kryten), Richard O’Callaghan (Hogey the Roguey), Gary Cady (Dominator Ziurth), Alex Hardy (Chancellor Wednesday), Colin Hoult (Chancellor Thuusday), Simon Treves (Lecturer Rimmer), Taylor James (Big Simulant Advisor), Philip Labey (young Rimmer), Joanne Gale (Wendy)

Notes: Rimmer’s father was played in the 1988 episode Better Than Life by the late John Abineri; obviously the role had to be recast. The episode is dedicated to the memory of Red Dwarf’s original visual FX designer, Peter Wragg (1947-2012). Actor Gary Cady is a genre veteran with a much more peaceful role behind him, that of the ill-fated Luke Ward in 1985’s Doctor Who story The Mark Of The Rani (very, very early in Cady’s TV career). Richard O’Callaghan appeared in Red Dwarf: Back To Earth as the Creator.

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Categories
Short Treks Star Trek

Calypso

Star Trek: Short TreksStardate not given: His stolen escape pod failing, an Alcorian soldier who identified himself only as Craft is brought aboard Discovery. But the crew didn’t rescue him, because the ship has no crew – Discovery is unoccupied, and has been for a thousand years. The ship’s onboard computer, in that millennium alone, has evolved to sentience, and relishes having humanoid company again. Unsure if he can ever return home to his wife and child, Craft is willing to provide that companionship…up to a certain point.

Order DVDsStream this episode via Amazonteleplay by Michael Chabon
story by Sean Cochran and Michael Chabon
directed by Olatunde Osunsanmi
music by Jeff Russo

Cast: Aldis Hodge (Craft), Annabelle Wallis (Zora voice), Sash Striga (Zora holo-dancer)

LogBook entry by Earl Green

Categories
For All Mankind Season 1

Prime Crew

For All Mankind1971: The ongoing race to establish the first permanent human presence on the moon has now claimed casualties – one of the women in NASA’s astronaut training has died, and a Lunar Orbiter satellite spots debris from a failed Soviet lunar landing – debris indicating that the Soviets were ready to start building a base on this flight. Nixon again realigns NASA’s goals to favor a moon base, and the plan to land a woman on the moon is all but cancelled…except that Deke Slayton assigns the four surviving female candidates to the Apollo program, and reassigns Molly Cobb to the upcoming Apollo 15 flight, bumping Gordo Stevens from his seat. While this wins NASA points with women, it earns Slayton the most powerful enemy he could possibly have in Washington. And in the weeks leading up to liftoff, Ed Baldwin, who was reinstated to the Apollo 15 prime crew after his contrite Congressional testimony, begins to wonder if his new crewmate is ready to fly.

For All Mankindwritten by Naren Shankar
directed by Allen Coulter
music by Jeff Russo

Cast: Joel Kinnaman (Edward Baldwin), Michael Dorman (Gordo Stevens), Sarah Jones (Tracy Stevens), Shantel VanSanten (Karen Baldwin), Jodi Balfour (Ellen Waverly), Wrenn Schmidt (Margo Madison), Chris Bauer (Deke Slayton), Sonya Walger (Molly Cobb), Eric Ladin (Gene Kranz), Michael J. Harney (Jack Broadstreet), Dan Donohue (Thomas Paine), Arturo Del Puerto (Octavio Rosales), Olivia Trujillo (Aleida Rosales), Krys Marshall (Danielle Poole), Meghan Leathers (Pam Horton), Nate Corddry (Larry Wilson), Brian Stepanek (Shorty Powers), Dave Power (Frank Sedgewick), Lenny Jacobson (Wayne Cobb), Edwin Hodge (Clayton Poole), Noah Harpster (Bill Strausser), Nick Toren (Tim “Bird Dog” McKiernan), Daniel Scott Robbins (Hank Poppen), Spencer Garrett (Roger Scott), Matt Battaglia (John Glenn), Teya Patt (Emma), Tony Lewellen (Coop), Teddy Blum (young Shane Baldwin), Jason Scott David (young Daniel Stevens), William Lee Holler (young Jimmy Stevens), Dan Warner (General Arthur Weber), Tracy Mulholland (Gloria Sedgewick), Darin Cooper (Businessman), Krystal Torres (Cata)

LogBook entry by Earl Green