I’m normally not a big fan of Jin/Sun episodes.  It seems to me like they’ve almost always been lacking in either the flashback or the island aspect.  But D.O.C. succeeded on both fronts, delivering a solid, if question-filled island experience, with a nice character-driven flashback.

Let’s start with the flashbacks.  Usually, if I’m going to enjoy the time we spend off of the island, it has to be something that radically affects what we know about what’s happening on the island, like in Desmond’s Flashes Before Your Eyes or Locke’s Man from Tallahassee.  D.O.C. didn’t really affect what we see happening on the island, but it did a tremendous job of deepening Sun’s character, in particular, and I give it full points for that.  Catch 22 would have been a very appropriate title for this episode, as well, as Sun continued to find herself between a rock and a hard place throughout the episode.  She has to choose between crushing Jin with shame about the fact that his mother was a prostitute, and forcing him into a lifetime of servitude for her mobster father.  She chooses the latter, and that brings her to what I feel like was her best performance, as she threatens Jin’s blackmailing mother.  Great flashback.

On the island, Sun still seems stuck, as she finds out that, if her baby is the result of her one-night stand with another man, she lives, but if her baby is Jin’s she will die.  I love that her reaction was to burst into tears when she found out that it was her husband’s baby…not because she knew that she was doomed, but because it was Jin’s. 

So, we know that everyone who’s gotten pregnant on the island has died in the middle of their second trimester, but we also know that Claire, who was pregnant before she came to the island, survived.  According to a friend’s precise calculations, if the show continues at the same rate that it has, Sun would have until about when the show is scheduled to end when she hits that point.  I think that we’ll find out that, if they can get off of the island, Sun and her baby will survive.  Thus, at the end of the series, we’ll have a whole other reason to cheer on their rescue.

They just keep pulling back layers on Juliet, don’t they?  We knew that she was playing the Losties, but we couldn’t be sure if she was with the Others 100%, or if she was working against her will.  We can see now, with the “I hate you” to Ben, that it’s pretty obvious that she’s not happy about what she’s being forced to do.  There are rumors that Ben may die by the end of the season…and I feel like, after last night, if he dies, Juliet will be the one to kill him.

I was crushed when they ‘killed’ Mikhail a few weeks ago before we really got to know him, so when he reappeared last night, I was thrilled.  As with every other stinking thing that happens on this show, it presents us with more questions.  Was he just knocked into some kind of deep unconsciousness when he went through the fence?  Did he die and then somehow healed by the island?  Or did he fake the whole thing?  I know you can fake the foamy mouth, but the blood coming from your ears is a little tougher.

And then, we’ve got the big reveal that the wreckage from Oceanic 815 was recovered, and there were no survivors.  We discussed it yesterday, but now that it’s ‘official’, discuss away!!!