FlashForward 1X10: A561984 - Grading and Discussion

[Jim Gamma]

OK, so I don't see a thread for this yet, but we Brits got it on Channel 5 yesterday, just before the Americans. So I'm posting a thread.

Don't have a screencap but if someone wants to post one for the mods to edit into my post, feel free.

The blurb:

Spoiler: A561984

Against Wedeck's orders, Mark and Demetri travel to Hong Kong in search of the woman claiming to know details of Demetri's fate; Lloyd tries to come clean about his and Simon's involvement in the global blackout—against Simon's better judgment—and Zoey discovers the true meaning of her flashforward.

I'm voting Excellent.

 

[MikeS]

Were they suggesting that this "flashforward" was an alternate reality, not the leap into the future that we assumed it was?

Does this show deserve its own subsection yet?

 

[Christopher]

^They were visions of the future, but Al Gough's suicide demonstrated that the future can be changed.

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

That's what I don't get. If it's been demonstrated that the future can be changed, why are they still going around apparently believing that they have no such ability?

 

[Christopher]

That's what I don't get. If it's been demonstrated that the future can be changed, why are they still going around apparently believing that they have no such ability?

Just because something's possible doesn't mean it's easy. You can deflect one or two pebbles in an avalanche, but redirecting the entire avalanche is a much more difficult proposition.

It's basically the same temporal theory that applied in Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. No matter how many minor things they changed, they didn't prevent Skynet from arising, because they hadn't changed enough. Nothing in history has only one cause. It's the result of many factors converging. And if you just change one or two elements in the equation, you may alter how a future event happens without necessarily preventing it altogether.

 

[Scout101]

It's a tough situation, because some things in the flash forward are things that would happen on their own, but it seems that others only happen BECAUSE they saw them in the flash forward, so what future are they really showing?

Can't have really been what WOULD have happened (at that moment) with no flash forward, because some things that happened afterwards only happened because they saw them. (the FBI board is its own paradox, the guy doctor is only alive because he saw a reason to live, etc). SOME things might have happened on their own that won't now, as well, so it's not really consistent one way or the other...

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

I'm not very keen on the direction that the show has taken. There doesn't seem to be an overall goal that seems worth achieving (like stopping Skynet in the T:TSCC case as Christopher mentions). Given that the motives of the D. Gibbons and his cohorts are still completely unknown, I'd have much rather they'd stuck with the "its your inevitable future no matter what you do" approach even if that's just a tad nuts. I just don't care much about following the moronic antics of the current crop of loser soap opera characters.

 

[Aragorn]

Okay, the FlashForward threads are ALL YOURS now, Jim Gamma.

 

[MikeS]

^They were visions of the future, but Al Gough's suicide demonstrated that the future can be changed.

I was thinking of the scene where Lloyd discusses the multi-world theory with Olivia and she says she would have been his neighbour had she moved to Stanford(?), implying that they, rather than the girl that actually became his neighbour, would have married in an alternate reality.

It then got me thinking of her flashforward and whether this vision of herself wasn't actually the alternate reality in which they were married.

Clear as mud?

 

[Starbreaker]

This episode actually moves the plot forward. I'm impressed.

 

[Anwar]

So maybe instead of flashforwards, they were quantum shifts?

 

[Christopher]

Wait a minute... people are talking as though they've already seen this episode, but it doesn't air until Thursday. Did you guys have your own flashforwards? Or does it air earlier in the UK?

 

[Jim Gamma]

Quantum what? That's not a theory I've heard of... think I can guess but would appreaciate an overview!

And the only reason I posted this was that we got to see it in the UK before America!

EDIT: Christopher: We usually get it the Monday after you, but you had Thanksgiving, and we didn't - so we got the season halfway ep before you. Blame the turkeys.

 

[Daneel]

Hm, so I guess this means there will be a new episode on Thursday. I wasn't sure if it had gone on hiatus yet -- I guess not.

I read somewhere that production on the show has shut down (apparently temporarily). The network downplayed the significance of that, but with the decreasing ratings, I don't think it bodes well for the future of this series.

 

[Christopher]

^The production shutdown was for six days, and if all went as scheduled, they would've resumed production yesterday. It was just a brief pause to let the writer-producers catch their breath and rethink some things. The broadcast schedule for the season was designed to allow for such minor delays. There's nothing particularly unusual about a show having such brief pauses in production -- especially considering that this one overlapped Thanksgiving weekend. I think it's just that all the news about V's ongoing delays has made people hypersensitized to any report of a delay, even a minor, routine one.

 

[MikeS]

Wait a minute... people are talking as though they've already seen this episode, but it doesn't air until Thursday. Did you guys have your own flashforwards? Or does it air earlier in the UK?

That's a nice way of looking at it. I would like to believe we all had a collective flashforward in the UK.

 

[Starbreaker]

Is this the last episode until January for everyone?

 

[Jim Gamma]

Channel 5 (the UK channel on which it airs) said it was the "Mid-Season Finale" so I guess so.

Looking forward to the second half of the season!

 

[Australis]

We had it in Australia ths week as well.

The conversation between the doc and the kid's dad definitely implies they're talking about alternate universes in the future rather than the same universe. The question for me is, are there multiple alt.universes that each character is seeing, or the same alt.universe?

And will we ever get an answer to that?

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

Alternate futures -- oh the novelty! How will we live?