Super quick LOST thoughts...recap to come later

I think I am solidly in the middle when it comes to my thoughts on this episode...as the great(ly useless) Randy Jackson might say: It was just a'ight for me.

Stuff I liked:
- The opening scene of the X timeline. I was already digging the fact that it was an almost word-for-word recreation of the beginning of Sawyer's long con with Cassidy. Then it was revealed that this James Ford is actually a cop...and Miles is his partner! Now THAT is a buddy cop show that I would watch!

I thought that whole scene was very well done.

- The dynamic between Miles and "Sawyer" (though that's not his name now) was great.

- Great to see Charlotte again...but we'll come back to this in the "Stuff I Didn't Like" section.

- Evangeline Lilly was really fantastic in this episode. I think she captured the emotions that Kate would be feeling at this moment perfectly...think about all that Kate has had to go through since she came back to this Island, and the only reason she came back is to somehow reunite Claire and Aaron. Now she finally finds Claire, and she goes crazy on her and tries to kill her.

Plus, you could see Kate's confusion all over her face as she talked to the people she supposedly knows. Sayid, Claire, Locke....everybody is acting so WEIRD! Kate was really thrown for a loop in this episode, and I think Evangeline did a great job of conveying that.

- Love that Sawyer is playing both sides in the Island struggle. He has always been one of the smartest ones on the Island, and he's positioning himself in the best way possible.

Stuff I Didn't Like:

- I'm starting to get really irritated with the X timeline. Yes, it was cool to see Charlotte alive and well (and looking F-I-N-E), but what does it really MEAN? She's not even the "same" Charlotte, right? Same thing with Miles...plus, X Miles seems to be not nearly as funny as Island Miles.

Once again, this storyline was fun to watch, but I'm really starting to fear that we are not going to find out what the relevance is until the finale, and I'm going to be REALLY frustrated by then. I have my theories, but we're still just guessing as to what it is we are actually watching. And, yes, I'm aware that this is LOST, and that guessing has been part of the viewing experience since Charlie first asked, "Where ARE we?". But there's not much time left, and on a personal level I was hoping that this season would be more about getting some closure to some of these things we have been guessing about, rather than stringing us along with more unanswered (and at this point unanswerable) questions.

Or, maybe losing that hour over the weekend just has me really cranky...

- I'm DREADING the implications of Sawyer's little "moment" he had as he was fondling Kate's old dress in the Hydra cages and his subsequent promise to "Freckles" that they were going to get off the Island together. I'm REALLY hoping it was more along the lines of, "You know, we have a lot of great memories together, and after everything that has happened between us it's stupid if we can't be friends. And if she's my friend, she's probably the only one I have left and I'm not going to leave her behind"...rather than "YEAH!!! SKATERS 4-EVAH!!!".

I mean, in the show timeline it's been like three days since Juliet died in his arms...it would be really annoying and unrealistic if we are being told that he has already moved past that and is ready to run back into Kate's arms.

Really, there was more about this episode that I liked than stuff I didn't...it's just that the stuff I didn't is really annoying me right now.

I'll rewatch it a couple of times, try to get back on a decent sleep schedule, and see if my feelings have changed by the time I post the full recap this weekend.

Be back later with my thoughts on a surprisingly non-disastrous night on Idol!