Tuesday, October 27, 2009

FlashForward: Gimme Some Truth



Since this takes place largely in Washington D.C. during Senate Hearings into the FlashForward Mosaic Program and possible ongoing funding, the title is humorous.

The episode certainly has plenty of tension, skullduggery and backroom dealings, however.

It turns out Wedeck, FBI LA Bureau chief is a long lost pal of the President of the United States. He uses this and a bit of blackmail to make sure his group gets additional funding despite the nasty witch-hunting Senate Intelligence Committee head Joyce Clemente (who sees herself as President in six months).

Agent Janis begins an affair with a female restaurant owner, and they seem perfect together until the restaurant owner pushes her luck and says she "Mosaic-ed" ( a variant of "googling" for the Mosaic era crowd) Janis, knows about her pregnancy, and her own Flash shows her newly married. Janis apparently has privacy issues (though she put her vision out on the Mosaic boards) and commitment issues so she stalks out, outraged at the intrusion and her own unresolved feelings about the baby in her future.

Mark, under pressure in Washington as he testifies about his Mosaic board, worries his wife and Aaron, who both know that the last time Mark went off the wagon it was in a similar situation. He tells his boss Wedeck that he is drinking in his FlashForward and so his description of events isn't as detailed as the Intelligence Committee would like.

Someone texts Olivia that Mark was drinking in his FlashForward. Since only Aaron and Wedeck know, it has to be one of them. My bet is on Aaron, who might feel that it would be better if she knew and they dealt with this before it happened. I can't see any reason for it to be Wedeck, really.

The episode begins and ends with an attack on Mark, Dmitri, Wedeck and crew in a D.C. parking garage, and a simultaneous attack on Janis back in L.A. by what looks like Chinese terrorists (casually mentioned by a C.I.A. agent in testimony before the Senate Committee as the proposed cause of the Blackouts). Mark and company handle their attackers in style and are fine. Janis, though she guns the bad guys down, is terribly wounded and lies in the street bleeding and seeing her FlashForward as she fades out.

My prime suspect for sending out the assassins is the President who was seen making a phone call to have something taken care of, calling in his own favor. Guess he doesn't like being blackmailed, and he for sure couldn't have liked buying off Joyce Clemente by offering her the vacant Vice Presidency. The episode should have been called "Gimme Power".

A final thought: This is the second episode which presents two very conflicting FlashForwards. The first is Dmitri seeing nothing and his fiancee seeing them wedded on a beach. This episode has the president seeing himself in bed and having an advisor step in and say something is wrong. Joyce Clemente says her FlashForward has her as the President. It is possible that because we don't see anyone's entire Flash that these conflicting visions could both be true. So, will the show at some point show anyone's or everyone's complete Flash?

No comments:

Post a Comment