Flash Forward Commentary HERE!

[JasonEvans]

Lemme start by saying I enjoyed it and I like the concept.

It does feel a little bit like Lost, though the cast does not feel as strong and I am not as hooked into the characters as I felt like I was on Lost almost from the very start. By the way, did everyone else catch the Oceanic Airlines billboard in the background as John Cho and Joseph Finnes were staking out the terrorists at the beginning?

There are some problems with it already.

1 - The future simply must be changeable. I am not talking about the big stuff like "we will break up." I am talking about the millions and millions of people who saw small, tiny things that are far too easy to change. I am sure someone saw themselves eating Coco Puffs cereal for breakfast. Well, on April 29th that person could very easily decide to eat Cap'n Crunch instead if for no other reason than to prove that they can determine their own future (something humans really, really believe in). Somewhere, there is a guy who saw a future where he was getting a ticket for running a red light. There is no way that guy runs that red light on April 29th, 2010 because he knows the consequences. The futures these folks saw must be changeable. The show may imply for a while that the future is written in stone, but I am going to have a really hard time believing how they make that happen.

2 - Picking 10pm in LA as the moment everyone flashed to was really stupid. The vast, vast majority of the East Coast saw themselves sleeping (it would be 1am on the East Coast). It is also worth noting that the woman agent who saw herself pregnant and getting a sonogram must have been in Moscow or Tokyo getting that sonogram because a) no West Coast doctor is giving a routine office-visit sonogram at 10pm and b) the room she was in appeared to have a window and it was light outside. Again, I am going to have a major problem if the show does not explain this. I will be angry if they merely picked 10pm as the time in an effort to explain why Joseph Finnes was alone at the FBI office (which would not happen during the day). They had better be logically consistent in maintaining that 10pm PT reference for every character.

3 - I was not all that bothered by the preview of the rest of the season. I enjoyed seeing Dominick Monnaghan a bit and like that he is on the show (along with a few other Lost refugees like Penny Whidmore). The thing that encourages me about seeing the previews is that it shows they are really plotting out where the show is going. That is VERY IMPORTANT!!

--Jason "more later-- all in all, a good start for this hyped program" Evans

[Olympic Fan]

You reminded me on the Flash Forward disaster scene. While it was well done, did anyone else marvel at the disaster caused by a 2 minute blackout. How many jets would fall out of the sky in two minutes. Don't most of the big ones run on auto pilot most of the trip. Wouldn't they have safety features on AF2. Seemed a little over done.

The one part of the disaster scenario that I questioned were the number of airplane crashes. Certainly every vehicle moving on the roads would crash (some violently, some not). Some people would fall awkwardly (I think they mentioned a person killed falling down a flight of stairs). It would be horrific.

But they did mention 800-some aircraft down in the United States alone. My immediate thought was that most airliners cruise in automatic pilot. I wondered at that figure. Does any pilot reading this have a clue if that's right? Are there any automatic controls if the autopilot is not engaged and the pilot stops flying? Are there 800-plus planes in the air at one time in the United States?

I understand that there would be crashes. Pretty sure military aircraft don't use autopilot. Every helicopter in the air would crash. Small, private planes would probably all crash. Planes landing and taking off would crash. Is that 800-plus planes?

Curious ... what happens in autopilot when the pilot slumps over the controls?

The one shot that bothered me was the flash on Paris with the Eiffel Tower burning after being hit by a plane. Do you know the odds of that? It's a movie cliche that in any disaster, especially something falling from the sky, the impact has to hit a famous landmark. Go back and watch Armageddon -- we have meteor hits on downtown New York (Grand Central takes a beating!), downdown Hong Kong and downtown Paris -- another blow for the Eiffel Tower!

I'm with Bird in that I'm already bored with the whole story line about the breakup of Shakespeare's marriage. But I also like the whole philosophical debate about the inevitability of the future visions.

PS I'll suspend judgment on the whole 3-star tattoo thing. But I've got to admit the final shot -- of one grainy figure moving at Tiger stadium while everybody else was passed out -- was deliciously creepy.

[HaveFunExpectToWin]

Flash Forward was good and I'll definitely keep watching it. I hate that I naturally am drawn to compare Flash Forward to Lost, b/c it's highly unlikely that anything can live up to that. Although, the Oceanic billboard doesn't help unlink the two much.

Good points about the 10pm references and glad I'm not the only one with an East Coast bias . Where was the FBI director on the public John at 10PM reading the paper?

Has anyone here read the book that the series is based?

[JasonEvans]

Good points about the 10pm references and glad I'm not the only one with an East Coast bias . Where was the FBI director on the public John at 10PM reading the paper?

And he was in his suit too. I guess he is supposed to still be working at that hour.

I can imagine that 10pm on April 29th is going to become a big moment for the world. It is not hard to see a lot of folks thinking that the world is going to end or something cataclysmic is going to happen right at the end of the vision moment. I mean, if that dude couldget all his purple pajama wearing followers to commit suicide so they could all ride on Halley's Comet back to heaven a few years back then convincing folks that the world is going to end at the end of their vision would not be all that hard. I really hope the show deals with the psychological implications on a wide scale from these visions of the future. Religion and panic should both be very much on the rise in the flashforward world.

--Jason "the future had better be changeable... I just cannot see it being any other way" Evans

[jma4life]

The bit at the end actually got me more excited about the show. Definitely don't think the characters themselves will be as strong as Lost, but for now, I think I'm going to keep watching.

[Exiled_Devil]

I'm intrigued by flash forward, and can come up with rationales for most of the issues so far -

FBI chief...working late
Sonogram ... not in LA
London bird... I'm at a loss. It's 6 am in London at 10 pm in LA

I would, at first, go 'lets see how they manage these issues'. But upon reflection, the production staff on this show are not really doing a good job with the details. I hope it does well, but I am not completely confident.

Two interesting tangents:

Flash forward is based on a book - I don't know how much, and the wikipedia entry gives away a big thing in the first sentence (frustratingly). The book apparently leaps everyone ahead 29 years, which changes the plot issues.

I fully expect Harold (&Kumar) to die. And I realized that is because of Lost. That show has trained me to expect real, honest stories form TV shows. I am so going to get disappointed.

[budwom]

I've only watched the first few minutes so far, but also wondered about the planes.
I think 800 might be OK since most planes taking off, landing and circling to land aren't on automatic pilot, so a couple minutes of sleepy time would presumably leave hundreds of planes in a bad situation. Not sure if 800 is the right number, but it doesn't sound crazy.

The one part of the disaster scenario that I questioned were the number of airplane crashes. Certainly every vehicle moving on the roads would crash (some violently, some not). Some people would fall awkwardly (I think they mentioned a person killed falling down a flight of stairs). It would be horrific.

But they did mention 800-some aircraft down in the United States alone. My immediate thought was that most airliners cruise in automatic pilot. I wondered at that figure. Does any pilot reading this have a clue if that's right? Are there any automatic controls if the autopilot is not engaged and the pilot stops flying? Are there 800-plus planes in the air at one time in the United States?

I understand that there would be crashes. Pretty sure military aircraft don't use autopilot. Every helicopter in the air would crash. Small, private planes would probably all crash. Planes landing and taking off would crash. Is that 800-plus planes?

Curious ... what happens in autopilot when the pilot slumps over the controls?

The one shot that bothered me was the flash on Paris with the Eiffel Tower burning after being hit by a plane. Do you know the odds of that? It's a movie cliche that in any disaster, especially something falling from the sky, the impact has to hit a famous landmark. Go back and watch Armageddon -- we have meteor hits on downtown New York (Grand Central takes a beating!), downdown Hong Kong and downtown Paris -- another blow for the Eiffel Tower!

I'm with Bird in that I'm already bored with the whole story line about the breakup of Shakespeare's marriage. But I also like the whole philosophical debate about the inevitability of the future visions.

PS I'll suspend judgment on the whole 3-star tattoo thing. But I've got to admit the final shot -- of one grainy figure moving at Tiger stadium while everybody else was passed out -- was deliciously creepy.

[JasonEvans]

FBI chief...working late
Sonogram ... not in LA
London bird... I'm at a loss. It's 6 am in London at 10 pm in LA

(snip)

I fully expect Harold (&Kumar) to die. And I realized that is because of Lost. That show has trained me to expect real, honest stories form TV shows. I am so going to get disappointed.

Regarding the FBI chief-- he is reading the newspaper. Do folks really read the newspaper (the sports section) at 10pm? Seems like an earlier in the day activity so the news is not so old.

Ok, where was the Sonogram being done? Hong Kong? 10pm in LA is midnight in Chicago and 1am in New York. It is 6am in London. The parts of the world where regular OB/GYNs are seeing patients extends from Moscow to Korea.

I didn't know that the bird was at all controversial. a bird hit a window, happens all the time.

I agree that Harold is likely to die, but that does not jive with the image his fiancee told about in the preview where she says she sees the two of them getting married. I guess we will hear more about that scene. Perhaps she sees a wedding but does not see the groom and he realizes it is not him.

-Jason "I hope the producers are paying close attention to all the details on this show-- cause I am " Evans

[duke23]

Speaking of all the details - what was up with the kangaroo??? Reminded me of the first Lost polar bear.

I do have one theory (not about the kangaroo) that will probably be wrong. Do we trust that Harold actually didn't see anything during the flash? Or isn't somehow involved in what happened? Playing up the belief that he didn't see anything because he was dead would make it unlikely that anybody would question the truth of his story. I thought it was strange that he would have gotten out of the car without pulling out his fellow agent out first...

[brevity]

Speaking of all the details - what was up with the kangaroo??? Reminded me of the first Lost polar bear.

I do have one theory (not about the kangaroo) that will probably be wrong. Do we trust that Harold actually didn't see anything during the flash? Or isn't somehow involved in what happened? Playing up the belief that he didn't see anything because he was dead would make it unlikely that anybody would question the truth of his story. I thought it was strange that he would have gotten out of the car without pulling out his fellow agent out first...

Good theory. I could see Harold being one of the few who could move around during the 2:17 blackout, which would explain why he's nowhere near Shakespeare. Doesn't seem like he knows more than anyone else, though, so he may not be among those responsible for what happened. Maybe he's a uniquely-situated protagonist.

[Olympic Fan]

Just a couple of suggestions:

-- I was just thinking about Harold's supposed non-vision ... what kind of vision would he have seen if he were sleeping? With everybody else spread out around the world, why couldn't he have been in New York (where it would have been 1 a.m.)?

-- I have no problem with the FBI chief reading the sports pages on the can at 10 p.m. in LA. He's in a suit because he has to wear a suit at the office (and the bathroom was definitely an institutional facility and not a home bathroom). He's still in the office because everything is approaching crisis and he's working long hours. He's reading the sports pages because early in the morning, he set that aside while checking the news -- which is important to his job. He's a sports fan who finally got around to reading the paper late in the day.

The only problem with these two explanations -- and now with Shakespeare being beseiged in his office at 10 p.m. -- is that now that we have the flash forward visions, wouldn't everything be on alert at 10 p.m. on April 29? I mean, the office, which would normally be empty, would be packed at 10 p.m. on the 29th, so Shakespeare wouldn't be caught there alone. And the FBI chief wouldn't choose that moment to take a dump. And if Harold is alive, he wouldn't be asleep at that moment.

One other thought. April 29th sounds like a fairly reasonable date for a season-ending show. Do you think we'll see 10 p.m. on April 29 ... at 10 p.m. on April 29th???

[hc5duke]

One other thought. April 29th sounds like a fairly reasonable date for a season-ending show. Do you think we'll see 10 p.m. on April 29 ... at 10 p.m. on April 29th???

that would be a bad stunt considering it would be 1am thursday night/friday morning on the east coast... that's a lot of potential viewers not tuning in because they have work the next morning.

[mkirsh]

Definitely intrigued by Flashforward and curious to see where it goes.

Question: does anyone know if this show has a set number of episodes/seasons? I could see a really cool run where this entire season builds towards 4/29/10, kind of like a long mini-series. However, we know that TV doesn't work that way, and if a show is good the network will want to keep it around, so how does a show with a defined future do that? I think it would be dissapointing to drag out 6 months of "TV time" over a few seasons, and the alternative of more flashforwards/constant changing of the end date is what has driven Heroes off the rails as they have made the future and consequences have less relevance since the future (and past in that show) always changes. All a long way of saying I hope they can make this work, but worried this won't give the satisfying conclusion like what we are expecting from Lost.

Also, was Seth MacFarland in the show? I could have sworn I heard Brian Griffin's voice as one of the FBI agent extras, but he wasn't listed on IMDB.

[HaveFunExpectToWin]

Also, was Seth MacFarland in the show? I could have sworn I heard Brian Griffin's voice as one of the FBI agent extras, but he wasn't listed on IMDB.

I saw the same thing. That's a weird cameo.

[JasonEvans]

The only problem with these two explanations -- and now with Shakespeare being beseiged in his office at 10 p.m. -- is that now that we have the flash forward visions, wouldn't everything be on alert at 10 p.m. on April 29? I mean, the office, which would normally be empty, would be packed at 10 p.m. on the 29th, so Shakespeare wouldn't be caught there alone. And the FBI chief wouldn't choose that moment to take a dump. And if Harold is alive, he wouldn't be asleep at that moment.

I had that exact same thought about the show. It is why I say the future must be changeable. 10pm PT on April 29th has become far too important a moment in world history for people to not be doing something important tied to that moment. Everyone is going to know to pay attention to that time. No FBI agent is going to pick that time to take a dump and read the sports section.

--Jason "I wonder what odds you could get on the Rays to sweep the Sox on April 27-29? " Evans

[hc5duke]

--Jason "I wonder what odds you could get on the Rays to sweep the Sox on April 27-29? " Evans

too bad they don't play each other on those days

[mkirsh]

10pm PT on April 29th has become far too important a moment in world history for people to not be doing something important tied to that moment. Everyone is going to know to pay attention to that time. No FBI agent is going to pick that time to take a dump and read the sports section.

You could make this same argument about everyone - no way Shakespeare would be in the office at 10pm if he knew an assault team was coming for him, no way Penny goes near the other kid's dad, etc. However, here is my theory: in a short period of time, like 24-48 hours, everyone will forget their flashforwards. People will remember that they had them, but will not recall the details. Everyone will slowly go back to living their normal lives, except Shakespeare. He will obsess about the case, and wonder why he has random information on his corkboard. He will try to piece those items together (along with anything that people have put into the web database the other agents thought of in the first episode) and try to figure everything out Memento-style. This will lead him to drink, pushing him away from his family, and pushing Penny to the other dude. He'll probably get Harold killed, leading to more drinking and more obsessing. That's why he'll be alone in the office at 10 - no one else will have any interest left in the case, and he won't remember that bad stuff goes down at 10. Basically he will be responsible for causing his future to happen the way he saw it (as often is the case with TV shows that have destined futures).

As for the other agent in the can at 10pm, not sure how that fits but not everyone is like Jack Bauer - some people need to use the facilities at least once in 24 hours.

Lastly, I think Harold's girlfriend is lying to him in the trailer for next week - who gets married at 10pm on Thursday? (Although Harold should be able to see right through this).

[JasonEvans]

You could make this same argument about everyone - no way Shakespeare would be in the office at 10pm if he knew an assault team was coming for him, no way Penny goes near the other kid's dad, etc. However, here is my theory: in a short period of time, like 24-48 hours, everyone will forget their flashforwards. People will remember that they had them, but will not recall the details. Everyone will slowly go back to living their normal lives, except Shakespeare. He will obsess about the case, and wonder why he has random information on his corkboard. He will try to piece those items together (along with anything that people have put into the web database the other agents thought of in the first episode) and try to figure everything out Memento-style. This will lead him to drink, pushing him away from his family, and pushing Penny to the other dude. He'll probably get Harold killed, leading to more drinking and more obsessing. That's why he'll be alone in the office at 10 - no one else will have any interest left in the case, and he won't remember that bad stuff goes down at 10. Basically he will be responsible for causing his future to happen the way he saw it (as often is the case with TV shows that have destined futures).

As for the other agent in the can at 10pm, not sure how that fits but not everyone is like Jack Bauer - some people need to use the facilities at least once in 24 hours.

Lastly, I think Harold's girlfriend is lying to him in the trailer for next week - who gets married at 10pm on Thursday? (Although Harold should be able to see right through this).

Excellent!! I love this. It works, it is somewhat logical, and it allows the show to move forward with some mystery and drama. Well-done! Of course, it is a little silly to think that lots of folks would not have written down or otherwise recorded exactly what they saw. But still, I like your path for the program and think you should be a writer on this show

--Jason "it is worth noting that in his FFwd, Shakespeare seems to have solved very little about the FlashForwards - so don't expect a lot of answers over the next 6 months of show time" Evans

[HaveFunExpectToWin]

Here's a thought that negates the everyone-forgets-their-memories idea:

flashforward.google.com

[juise]

flashforward.google.com

Is this a link? The address didn't work for me.