Lost is very good at leading you from one episode to the next. So, it is only natural that they set up this Claire-centric episode by focusing on Danielle in Solitary. Ha ha ha. Claire visits a psychic this episode. She shares more than just peanut butter with Charlie. And after some nightmares, gets in an argument with Jack. Stupid older brothers! Since Claire feels like she was actually attacked, this prompts Hurley to once again take care of people.
I see the dream that Claire has in the opening scene more of a vision from the island. They all seem to have them. I feel like this just another manipulation by MIB. Her “friend” Locke is there in the dream. “He was your responsibility but you gave him away, Claire. Everyone pays the price now.” He is using Claire’s relationship with Aaron to try and get her to do what he wants her to. MIB is pretty successful with her. But I still haven’t figured out what he needed her for. She was a candidate, but was crossed off. So why not just kill her? For a while I thought MIB was going to use her to manipulate Jack, but that didn’t really happen.
I know that the psychic told Eko in Season 2 that he is a fraud, but I believe that he really saw something in this episode when he was doing Claire's reading. I think that he can see flashes, similar to Desmond. I believe that the blurry he saw was actually what happened to her when she went a little crazy from losing Aaron and being alone on the island with MIB as her only friend. I think the psychic manipulates her here by saying that she must raise Aaron or else he will be in danger. But in fact, she is the one in danger. The way to get a parent to do something for their own good is to let them know their child is in danger. I also think that the psychic may have seen a flash of Kate and Jack raising Aaron in LA. I do not think Aaron was special either. I just think that was a very good tool the writers used for throwing us off from thinking there was something wrong with Claire. It worked. Claire was always going to be Clairousseau. As you can see, they had that planned. And again, I drew some nice conclusions for myself.
Speaking of things they always had planned, I noticed something different in the scene when Sayid gets back to the caves. They had Locke placed there perfectly overhearing Sayid tell them they they are not alone on this island. Locke gets a look of being found out when he hears the news Sayid has brought him. Locke hasn't had much time on screen since The Moth, but when we do see him, he is acting very, very, very MIB in Season 6. I think at this point MIB has quite a hold on Locke and this makes Locke feel accepted and happy. We will never know what went on between those two, but the way Locke's face gets in this scene makes me feel like he did meet with MIB as Jacob's brother.
I loved Hurley in this episode. He believes Claire and he wants to take care of people by starting a census. They really do a good job of showing how caring he really is. It makes me very interested in what he does as the new man in charge. I was not a fan of Jack this episode. He did not believe Claire. Their argument in the caves really gave me a sibling feeling between them.
Even though this seems like a simple Claire-centric episode, it begins some really key mysteries. We kind of start to get the idea that something is up with pregnancy on the island here. At the end, we see Ethan coming after Claire and this begins the relationship with the Others. Since pregnancy and infertility issues is one of the big mysteries on Lost, it is kind of interesting that they introduce it here in this episode with pregnant Claire being attacked by the only person we see as (probably) being conceived and born on island. (This became awesome discussion on the We Talk About Lost Podcast for this episode!)
The episode title was very misleading. Everyone thought it had so much to do with Aaron and nothing to do with Claire. I wonder how many more of these tricks we are going to see throughout the rewatch. Aaron does wind up being Raised by Another for a little while and Claire does have to go through the blurriness. But without the blurriness, she may have not kept her baby, she would never know she had a brother, and she most certainly would have never met her soul mate Charlie. I think that everything turns out fine in the end. We will never get to know what happens to everyone who got on the plane, but I would like to think they get a happily ever after. And I hope to think that Claire gets reunited with her son and they live a happy life.
