I really want to like "Further Instructions", especially as it takes us away from the unbelievably awful (and make no mistake, nearly every second of it is worthless) Hydra island storyline, but it simply is not very good. Basically the episode covers what happened to Locke, Eko, and Desmond after the hatch implosion, but doesn't really get to Eko's part of things, instead focusing on mute Locke, annoying Charlie (who insists on reminding us constantly of "Fire + Water", as if "Further Instructions" wasn't mediocre enough already, and naked Desmond.
"Further Instructions" is in many ways indicative of the creative rut "Lost" was in at this point. Without an end date agreed upon, the stalling was becoming noticeable, and "Lost" was very, very close to 'jumping the shark'. This has it all- a rushed, poor script attempting to cover a bunch of things but failing to do so, some half-assed attempts at humor and 'action', crappy dream sequences, and most of all the completely useless and dumb flashback. Granted, all of this was done far worse in "Stranger in a Strange Land", which came very close to putting even me, an avowed enthusiast and defender of the show, off "Lost". Instead of being as aggressively, hilariously bad as "Stranger in a Strange Land" was, "Further Instructions" is kind of banal and bland, and leaves me wishing for it to be over half-way through. It's not absolutely terrible, but it's a frustrating mediocrity, especially because it had the potential to at least feature solid on-island scenes.
The script by Carlton Cuse (?!) and Elizabeth Sarnoff is surprisingly flat, the dream sequences/hallucinations fall flat as well (and aren't even visually interesting, though it's nice to see Boone and Shannon again), the flashback is quite bad (and even the Geronimo Jackson reference/connection/whatever doesn't quite work), and it's all a bland, pointless affair which is far, far from being as good as it should have been. On the bright side it's not set on the Hydra island, so it's not quite as bad as it could have been.
5/10
"Further Instructions" is in many ways indicative of the creative rut "Lost" was in at this point. Without an end date agreed upon, the stalling was becoming noticeable, and "Lost" was very, very close to 'jumping the shark'. This has it all- a rushed, poor script attempting to cover a bunch of things but failing to do so, some half-assed attempts at humor and 'action', crappy dream sequences, and most of all the completely useless and dumb flashback. Granted, all of this was done far worse in "Stranger in a Strange Land", which came very close to putting even me, an avowed enthusiast and defender of the show, off "Lost". Instead of being as aggressively, hilariously bad as "Stranger in a Strange Land" was, "Further Instructions" is kind of banal and bland, and leaves me wishing for it to be over half-way through. It's not absolutely terrible, but it's a frustrating mediocrity, especially because it had the potential to at least feature solid on-island scenes.
The script by Carlton Cuse (?!) and Elizabeth Sarnoff is surprisingly flat, the dream sequences/hallucinations fall flat as well (and aren't even visually interesting, though it's nice to see Boone and Shannon again), the flashback is quite bad (and even the Geronimo Jackson reference/connection/whatever doesn't quite work), and it's all a bland, pointless affair which is far, far from being as good as it should have been. On the bright side it's not set on the Hydra island, so it's not quite as bad as it could have been.
5/10