Once the series ruled out an Appointment in Samara approach, which they took from the novel, the ambiguity of a glimpse of Not-the-future but which still gave valid information about the Future-Product-of-Free-Will necessarily gets played out. And it gets played out in a prolonged form, with ample time for chewing over the inconsistencies, with minute dramatization magnifying every logical flaw. What Sawyer got away with in a novel, which is at best closer to a miniseries so far as commitment of time goes, just doesn't work so well in a full season of television.
That said, the mystery plot is developing quite a narrative momentum. It feels coherent, although the ultimate motives are yet obscure. But all the action is plainly driven by Frost wanting to get out and Campos not really wanting to get in. Frost was clever enough that his efforts could not be wholly contained. Campos was too key a scientist to the whole project to be omitted, hence such self exposing efforts as kidnapping Annabelle. The point of taking Campos to Detroit was apparently to frame him, keeping him from relying upon the authorities.
I'm not quite sure what metaphysics means. But free will does not mean the power to determine the future. It means the power to make the choices you want. Again, voting is an excellent analogy. You have free will to vote for whomever you wish, but not to determine who is actually elected.
The analogy holds in another way: Ignorance acts against free will. If a candidate has made secret plans but refuses to reveal them, colluding with other candidates to keep them secret, the free will of the voter means nothing. The show could have been about how glimpses of the future pierced the veil of ignorance and in truth expanded free will. Instead, the television show, like the novel, confused the ability to succeed in imposing outcomes with free will. When the novel and show made the flashforward about some other future, the veil of ignorance was draped before our eyes again.
I think they may have had some idea about the illusion of hope in solely determining your future as somehow being necessary to the human personality. If so, they've approached the theme without the clarity to integrate it into the story.
And since the story is a mystery whose final interest is still to be determined, the episode is at best average.
PS The schematic representation of the blackout event sure looked like the intersection of two waves was responsible. Did anyone see where perhaps the second wave was centered? It looked to me like the Indian Ocean somewhere.
