FlashForward – Episode 1-14 Review

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Dem, Janis, Vogel, and Simon, masquerading as aid workers are in a helicopter learning a couple of phrases in the Somali language.  They learn the phrase for “What did you see,” and immediately start to give their guide fake answers.  Janis was baking bread; Dem was water skiing.  That reminds Dem that this was the weekend that Janis was really supposed to “bake bread,” but she tells him that the field trip closed the window on that.

Simon wants a gun.  His point is that he’s not going into Somalia without some sort of protection.  Vogel refuses to give him one.  His point is that if he sticks to the group, he won’t need one.  We’ve all watched Scooby Doo, so you probably know how this works.  The second Fred or Velma told Daphne that she’d be fine if she “just stuck to the group,” the goons would grab the one meddling kid who didn’t have the means with which to defend herself.  So, basically, Simon is screwed. 

Stan’s in his office when Mark gives him a picture of a Hydra (seven heads, bad breathed creature).  He also tells him that Simcoe finally gave up D. Gibbons’ real name.  Dyson Frost is a Berlin-based, MIT-educated particle physicist who minored in Victorian Lit.  A Francophile chess master who still plays – despite his death in a boating accident in 1990 aboard a boat whose name translates  to “Boaistuau’s Master.”  Boaistuau, a French author, used to feature illustrations of monsters in his books.  These monsters included the Hydra, and that picture was on Mark’s board on the 29th of April. 

So now, it comes down to Charlie’s vision.  Whatever she saw, she knows that “D. Gibbons is a bad man.”  She’s not opening up, so what is Mark supposed to do with that?

Back in Somalia, the team find the tower with “666″ spray painted on the side.  They’re then ambushed by a group of local rebels.  Vogel explains that they’re Red Panda Aid workers, but the translator gets peppered with bullets for his trouble.  The trigger man introduces himself, in English as Abdi, and announces that the team doesn’t need a translator anymore.  The rebels take the team into a building, and Abdi tells Simon that he knows him. He saw him on Al Jazeera telling the world he caused the blackout.  Simon thinks it’s nice to meet a fan and gets bitch-slapped for it.  Vogel, again, tries the “We’re Red Panda” route, but the rebels call him on it.  Dem tries to tell them that they had mechanical problems that required their landing in the area.  Abdi is done with the lies.  He shows them a photo of the towers and tells them that they’re exactly where they wanted to be.  They’re just like the others.  Janis asks him what he’s talking about, and he tells them about the crow die-off when he was a child.  He was the little kid who was on the hill when the rest of his village blacked out.  Rebels lead the pilot outside and fill him with bullets.  The faux-Pandas are left to explain their real reason for being there.  Otherwise, they die.

Bryce vomits up lunch before running smack into Nicole on his way to a page.  He spills her organic chemistry books and an assortment of change.  She tells him that she’ s considering going into Pre-Med.  She doesn’t want anyone to know about it because it’s hard and if she fails then she’s got to explain it to a lot of people.  There’s some cute banter about picking the proper “Doctor Name,” and the artist formerly known as “Martin Goathead” before he went with “Dr. Varley,” promises not to tell her secret.

Back in Somalia, the Pandas debate the wisdom of just telling the rebels who they really are.  Dem tells him that he’s not standing around waiting for a bullet in the head.  Vogel points out that he’s just waiting for three in the chest.  Dem punches him, and the two scuffle. As they do, they fling each other into their rebel guards and swipe the guns.  Vogel reminds Dem that he wasn’t supposed to get the face.  They fight their way to the chopper, but are soon recaptured.  Abdi tells them that they won’t fail him; they’re destined to fulfill their part of the plan.

Mark arrives home and finds that Liv’s been looking at properties in Denver.   Two major hospitals and an FBI division, it’s a perfect location for them.  Mark would rather talk about Charlie.  Liv doesn’t want to push her, but Mark thinks it’s time to get the truth out of her.  Liv wants to try before he takes her to the office. 

Back in Somalia, the execution of Red Shirts Pandas is about to continue when one of the randoms reveals that they are CIA, sent to investigate the tower.  Abdi doesn’t think it was a blackout because he saw the Black Camel.  Like him, it was the only thing awake in the village at the time, and in Somalia, a black camel is considered an omen of death. That’s why he swears his friends and family were dead, not merely sleeping.  Later on, when he returned from the refugee camp, the bodies were gone and one tower remained.  Word spread that he had lived while others had died, and everyone was afraid of him.  On the day of the blackout, he too had a vision.  He was speaking to a crowd of people called the “Better Angels.”  He saw himself leading the people in one last war and then ruling the country.  Thankfully, the CIA is here and they can help get the things that he needs to make this happen (planes, tanks and boats). Vogel says that that won’t happen and gets punched in the stomach.  Then, the talky Red Shirt dies.

Janis thinks Vogel should make the call.  Vogel doesn’t think anyone’s going to pick up the phone, so he won’t.  The Better Angels arrive and pick up Simon.  They’re about to execute him when Janis announces that what Abdi saw was wrong.  She knows about the Better Angels.  It’s from Lincoln’s inaugural address, a speech about unity.  She asks if they can get on the Internet.  Turns out, it’s possible!  She shows him the Mosaic website, and they see that everyone is talking about the Peace Conference was speaking at on April 29.  He was wearing a distinctive necklace that belonged to his mother.  The weird thing is, he hasn’t seen it since the Somalian Blackout in 1991.  Janis says that his destiny isn’t to start the war; it’s to stop one.

Charlie’s playing video games, and Liv wants to talk.  She needs her daughter to be a hero and tell her what she saw in her FF.  Charlie starts to shut down.  She thinks that if she tells, something bad will happen.   Liv tells her that isn’t possible, so Charlie starts to tell.  She was in the kitchen with Dylan, and the two of them got cookies.  They overheard Lloyd tell Mark that D. Gibbons was a liar.  Then , Dylan spells out “D. Gibbons is a bad man” on the fridge with magnets.  Charlie heard fireworks outside and walked to the back door to investigate.  Two men in suits were in their backyard.  One turned to the other and said, “Mark Benford is dead.”

Liv tells Mark about Charlie’s vision.  He doesn’t think it’s possible.  On April 29, he’ll be in his office with the board of lies.  She wants to go to Denver, but she knows he’ll just say no.  He needs to stop the future blackout.

Abdi grants the remaining members of the team access to the towers after Dem explains that the working theory is that the village was first and that the villagers were carted away while Abdi was gone.  The 666 is actually from the Koran: “O you who believe! save yourselves and your families from a fire whose fuel is men and stones….”  Abdi hasn’t been back in the tower, but he believes that there is one thing that can push a man more than fear: Destiny.

Entering the tower, Dem finds a chessboard with a VHS tape hidden inside.  On it, a series of villagers are asked about their visions.  They also report that they came true.  Then, the tape shifts to a young D. Gibbons, who reports that “Test Group B” experienced a consciousness shift two weeks into their future.  Simon finds another room, and the team heads downstairs.  They find the pieces of a radiation coil that, in addition to the other four towers built a coil around the village.  Since Abdi was outside of the village at the time, he wasn’t caught up in the coil and, hence, didn’t black out.  Sadly Vogel finds something else…a room full of the skeletal remains of Abdi’s friends and family.  One of them is confirmed to be his mother when the necklace is found around her neck.

They were shot, execution style.   Abdi, full of grief, blames Simon.  He’s about to shoot him, but Vogel shoots him instead.  Janis remembers his vision of the Better Angels.  That wasn’t supposed to happen.

Liv REALLY wants to go to Denver.  He insists that he has to stay and see the whole thing through.  She reminds him that there’s another piece to it: they’re not together.  He can’t have it both ways.

Janis and Dem  drink rum and talk about Willa.  She’s the baby Janis was expecting to expect by now, but she won’t have now that she’s out of the country.  She thinks she’s a little selfish for thinking about the baby after seeing a mass grave.  Dem reminds her that the weekend isn’t over and sweetly offers to “take one for the team.”  Janis laughs in his face.  What about Zoey?  Dem says that chances are, he’s not going to be around in a few months; it might be nice if Willa was.

Simon gets a gun for fixing the rebels’ satellite TV.  He asks Vogel what he saw. Though he tells Simon that he was just doing his job, he saw himself in Mark’s backyard and a hysterical little girl watching through the back door.

Bryce finds Nicole pilfering graham crackers on behalf of a little boy who stayed still for an MRI.  He gives her his lucky calculator and cheers her on.  She wants to be a psychiatrist, so after the twelve years of college and specialized training, they’ll be able to work together.  About that…he tells her that he’s not going to be around in twelve years.

Dem’s watching the tape again when Simon walks in.  Simon distracts him, so he doesn’t turn it off when the snow starts.  After a couple of minutes, Gibbons returns:   “Hello Demetri,” he says.  “My name is Dyson Frost.  I’m recording this message in 1991. Got your attention, didn’t I?”