Collision (S0208)
Airdate: 23 November 2005
Written by: Javier Grillo-Marxuach & Leonard Dick
Directed by: Stephen Williams
Running Time: 42 minutes
The two-part narrative experiment that began with Abandoned and The Other 48 Days was a bold, if structurally gimmicky, stroke from Lost’s creators. By concluding two consecutive episodes with the identical, heart-stopping cliffhanger of Shannon’s death at Ana Lucia’s hands, the show temporarily shattered its own formula, forcing the audience to sit with the brutal consequence from two agonisingly different perspectives. Collision, however, represents a deliberate and somewhat deflating return to the programme’s established rhythms. While refreshingly free of mythological obfuscation, the episode resolves its predecessor’s high tension with a series of pragmatic, character-driven decisions that steer the narrative back toward a safer, more predictable normalcy. The initial promise of Jacobean-level revenge tragedy dissipates, leaving in its wake a competently executed, yet ultimately conventional, instalment that reasserts the show’s core dynamics while failing to elevate its most controversial new character.
The plot mechanics of this return to form are meticulously engineered. We open with the raw material for epic vengeance: Sayid, utterly shattered, levelling a gun at Ana Lucia. The potential for a bloody cycle of retribution is palpable. Yet, almost immediately, this path is blocked—first by Mr. Ecko’s pragmatic intervention, and then by the swift unravelling of Ana Lucia’s tenuous authority. Her desperate, paranoid strategy of using Sayid as a hostage collapses when Ecko disobeys her to save Sawyer, an act of basic human decency that proves more compelling than her fractured leadership. Bernard and Libby follow him without a second thought, and even her former prisoners, Michael and Jin, slip away. Her command, built on fear and survivalism, evaporates in the face of a greater immediate need. This domino effect of sensible choices continues at the Swan Station. Jack’s initial, visceral reaction to the news—to arm himself and confront Ana Lucia with force—is a believable overreaction. But he, too, is talked down by the ever-pragmatic Ecko. The looming confrontation between the two camps is thus systematically defused by a chain of characters choosing the rational, less destructive option.
This culminates in the episode’s most significant, and most quietly effective, character beat: Sayid’s dialogue with Ana Lucia. Chained and consumed by a grief compounded with the guilt of his own violent past, he forges a strange, weary connection with his captor. He recognises in her a kindred damaged spirit, understanding that killing her would be an empty gesture that could never fill the void left by Shannon. His decision to forgo revenge is not a forgiveness, but a profound exhaustion. Her reciprocal act—freeing him and allowing him to carry Shannon’s body home—is a tentative, twisted honouring of that understanding. The episode thus ends on a note of sorrowful resignation rather than cathartic violence, punctuated by the awkward, loaded reunion between Jack and Ana Lucia. These moments are underscored by the genuine joy of other reunions (Jin/Sun, Bernard/Rose), a tonal balance the show often mastered, reaffirming the community’s resilience even in the wake of trauma.
It is in the flashbacks, however, where the drive for “normalcy” and explanatory backstory works most against the episode’s ambitions. Introducing Ana Lucia as an LAPD officer is a conceptually sound choice, aiming to contrast her structured, law-bound past with the anarchic present of the Island. Yet, the execution drowns in a quagmire of procedural cliché and unconvincing detail. The very setting—Los Angeles—feels like a generic television default, lacking the specific texture given to, say, Sayid’s Iraq or Sun’s Seoul. More crippling is the central dynamic of her mother, Captain Cortez (Rachael Ticotin), being her direct superior. This nepotism is so glaringly unrealistic for a public relations-conscious organisation like the LAPD that it strains credulity from the outset. It feels less like a believable character detail and more like a clumsy shortcut to create familial tension. The subplot of her vengeful execution of Jason McCormack (Aaron Gold), while granting Michelle Rodriguez a solid, grimly committed scene, does little more than provide a simplistic, “origin story” justification for her trigger-happy paranoia. A more nuanced setting—a small-town police department where such personal entanglements might feasibly fester—could have offered greater psychological plausibility. This was a missed opportunity to ground her volatility in something more uniquely compelling than big-city cop drama tropes.
Collision was the final credit for writer Javier Grillo-Marxuach, an original producer whose influence helped shape the show’s early identity. In many ways, this episode serves as a microcosm of his and the show’s strengths and weaknesses: a masterful handling of large ensemble logistics and character-driven conflict, paired with a sometimes overly convenient approach to backstory. The episode successfully re-integrates the tail-section survivors into the main narrative fold, re-establishing the core dynamics of leadership (Jack), pragmatic morality (Ecko), and wounded humanity (Sayid). It advances the plot in a coherent, rational manner, avoiding fantastical twists in favour of human choices. Yet, in its quest to normalise the narrative after a bold structural experiment, and in its reliance on hackneyed flashback elements to explain its most divisive character, Collision ultimately feels like a return to business as usual. It is a well-constructed piece of television that settles the score, but in doing so, sacrifices the thrilling, tragic unpredictability its two-part prologue had so tantalisingly promised.
RATING: 6/10 (++)
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