THE GIFT

Good news everyone! I have learned how to capture screen shots!
Now I can get the shots I want and not ask to borrow or steal them.

If I wasn't already hooked on Flashforward, I would be after watching The Gift. Almost every scene had me glued to the screen, watching, wondering and waiting.

Already Ghosts, or the Blue Hand Club, was so depressing for me to see, and yet I can see reality mirrored there. When people feel they have no future and no hope, they tend to make irrational decisions. The participants in the Blue Hand Club believe that some time in the future, certainly before April 29th, they will die. They don't know when. They don't know where. They don't know how. They only know that they will die.

But we will all die sooner or later and many of us have no idea when, where or how either, so I'm not so sure I am buying the reasoning's for people taking drugs, getting drunk and testing fate. I think I'd rather take my chances.

We see many people beginning to make changes in their lives. Some want their futures to occur and other are fighting against what they saw.

Lloyd tells Olivia that as soon as the hospital transfer is approved, he wants to take Dylan to the Bay area, so we see him taking steps to ensure his own vision does not come true.

Mike Wellington, who served with Tracy in Afghanistan, visits Aaron and returns a pocket knife to him. Aaron had given it to his daughter and she carried it with her at all times. Later, Mike explains that Tracy is not alive and that he watched her die. The knife represents hope for Aaron. We see a bit more of his flash and he is giving a wounded Tracy the knife. Later, Aaron arranges for Mike to get a job at his place of work.

Olivia suggests that Nichole volunteer at the hospital, and leaves her in Bryce's hands. When an elderly Japanese woman comes to the nurses station with a bouquet of Sweet Peas and the nurses are unable to understand her, Nichole calms the situation by speaking to her in her own language. This gets Bryce wondering and he asks Nichole for her help, showing her his sketches of the mystery woman and a symbol he can't quite make out. Nichole finishes the symbol and tells him that it is Kanji for Believe. She then suggests that Bryce put his story on the Mosaic to see if they can find the mystery woman.

Al commits suicide, unable to cope with his own vision of the future. He leaves a suicide note with Dimitri and a letter to Celia, the woman who's death he believes he is responsible for. He believes that by removing himself from the equation he can change the answer. He is trying to give hope to those who have none (read Dimitri).

Dear Celia,

I don't know your last name and I don't know where you live, but know that you have two young boys. Twins, I believe. And I know that you didn't have a flash forward.

I understand how terrifying that is, and how powerless you must be feeling. I want you to know that you are not alone, and that your situation is not as hopeless as you think.

Our paths were meant to cross. I didn't know how. I didn't know when. But things have changed now and things are no longer going to unfold as I had feared.

My gift to you is a release from that dread, from the feeling that you are no longer in control.

We will never meet. I will never know you. So, live your life. Live every day and know that the future is unwritten. Make the most of it.

Al's gift will have wide effects and change many futures. Olivia and Mark. Dimitri and Zoey. Celia. The twins.

Hi Dad! Yeah, am I the only one who looked at her legs to see if she had both? How much of a shocker was that ending?

So, Tracy did NOT die in Afghanistan. She was abandoned and left to die, only to be saved by an unknown. Remember when Aaron was talking at the AA meeting, in the first episode? He said that there was very little left of Tracy to be identified. He had the DNA testing done, and, yes, I called it in my 137 Sekunden post! Go look!

QUOTES:

The Gift was so full of really great quotes that it was difficult to choose a few of them. I might need to do a separate post.

"What you call cheating, I call finding a way to change the game, my friend." - Dimitri

"Nice to meet you again...For the first time." - Fiona Banks upon being introduced to Al

"You've got to be kidding me. A death club?" - Stan Wedeck

"It's like a book club with bullets." - Mark

"You said that you didn't want to give up hope? Then don't." Zoey, to Dimitri

"We have two conflicting visions. We can choose which one we want to believe in. I choose hope!" - Zoey

"You won't be the first screwed up Vet this place has hired" Aaron

I have two favorites

"It's worth a shot"

This was said twice in this episode. Once by Al and again later by Nichole.

"But if I'm not here that means we can change things. What I saw, what you saw, doesn't have to play out that way. I found a way to change the game."

QUESTIONS:

1. What did Al do to cause Celia's death?

2. If everyone in the Humvee ran for their lives, how do they know for sure that she died? Mike saw her laying on the ground missing her leg, but the only piece of her to be returned to US soil weighed 36 lbs. That might be the leg she lost?

3. once Dylan is in the Bay Area, will he hop another bus to get to Olivia's house again?

4. What, or who is "Jericho"?

5. Now that they know their MOSAIC site is being used to find certain people, will they close it down to protect everyone who has posted there.

6. Will Celia ever know the sacrifice a total stranger made so that she could have a life with her boys?