One Sentence Review

One of the big questions about the future is answered, a lot sooner than I expected with not one shock but two to end the episode on

Episode Synopsis

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Thoughts and Analysis

One of the big questions in FlashForward has been whether or not the future is fixed. In the bad House clone episode they had a chance to answer this question but failed. In The Gift however they answered it in a dramatic fashion that while in retrospect is obvious from the start of the episode but is still a shock when it actually comes.

Before I get onto the surprises at the end of the episode, we learn quite a bit about the Blue Hand “organisation” and how it is a death club for people like Demetri who had not had a Flash Forward. I loved the way that “The Raynaud” aka Jeff Slingerland taunted the FBI with the fact that the Blue Hand was using Mosaic to recruit fellow “Ghosts”. This makes me wonder just how many “ghosts” are out there.

It also raised the question of self fulfilling prophecy, people think they are going to be dead in the future so they act in such a way that ensures this is the case, but if they did not act in such a way then they would still be alive.

There is also continuing tension in several relationships following the events of previous weeks and Zoe finally gets the truth from Demetri. This was probably the part of the episode which annoyed me the most since from what we have seen of her Flash Forward it does not appear that she saw Demetri at all, and it was all an assumption on her part.

The main emphasis of this episode though was on Al Gough and we finally learn what upset him in his Flash Forward, which was he had accidentally killed a woman (Celia) orphaning her children. While we don’t know how he killed her the tone of the conversation suggests to me it was probably a car crash or something similar given his lawyer states “it could have happened to anyone” and he was free to continue in his work.

The real shock came though when Al commits suicide at the end of the episode. To be honest I was expecting something like this to happen at some point as there would be people who could not live with what they saw of the future, but I was expecting it to occur either in an earlier episode or a later episode, the timing of the suicide as much as anything made it a surprise (though obvious once the scene starts) which is something that is rare in modern television when bombshells like this are normally left for “big” episodes.

In many ways his suicide can be seen as “the gift” in the episode as it proves that the future can be changed, and while tragic gives them hope that they are not doomed to the fate they saw. This does raise the question of are the creators of the show going for the multiple possible future universe option or a “2 Universe option”.

I suspect if this is explored then a 2 Universe or at least a finite number of futures will be the result going from Simon’s explanation. In this scenario we have 2 linked universes where in one universe people had a Flash Forward and saw the future in the “FlashForward” world, while in the “FlashForward” world they saw the future in the other universe.

This would result in some people having almost identical FlashForwards in both universes as they strive to make the future occur or take actions intending to avoid the future that lead to it occurring, while other people manage to make radical changes to what results due to their or other peoples actions. To take two examples of the future one of a potentially the same and one that will be different, firstly we know that Fiona Banks while potentially still investigating the Rutherford case would not have Al present or the pidgeon incident occur. On the other hand Marks is still potentially viable since he could always get another friendship bracelet from his daughter.

Moving on, the B plot of this episode surrounfed Aaron and his daughters friend Mike. In it we learn what happened to his daughter and see a possible out on the body/DNA issue as she lost a leg. We then get a big shock when she turns up alive and well at Aaron’s house later on. Now there are crutches in shot suggesting that she lost her leg indicating it is not a fake daughter (though still possible), the question is what has she been doing for the past 2 years.

I suspect that Mike knows Tracey survived and was sent by her to see if her father shared her FlashForward and that she has been in hiding for some reason. One possibility is that the whole incident was faked and that she is AWOL though losing a leg is a bit drastic. Another possibility is she is tied into the terrorist cell that Mark and Demetri where investigating in the first episode.

To be honest though until we get a bit more information on what happened it is difficult to know what is going on as my initial assumption was that she had lost a limb presumed dead, captured but survived and Aaron found out somehow and went to save her, but this scene blows that theory out the water.

Overall then a superb episode that manage to pull a couple of things out the hat that surprised me, which is what good television should do.

Episode Rating

9/10