"Whatever Happened, Happened" (Season 5, Episode 11)

For me, this episode definitely goes in the hit column. When you get right down to it, it was essentially a series of emotional duets. Juliet and Jack. Kate and Sawyer. Kate and Cassidy. Kate and Roger Linus? (I can see it now. Roger: Ben, meet your new mom.) There was humor: Hurley and Miles attempting to explain time travel to each other? Classic. There was heartbreak: Even if you're not a parent, Kate's parting line to Aaron "Bye-bye, baby" was wrenching. There was foreboding: Locke and Ben in a role reversal with Locke in the position of power giving Ben a clever line ("Welcome back to the land of the living.") followed by a knowing smirk before the final thump.

Best Lines

• "No, you're all free to leave whenever you want. But I'll have to shoot you in the leg." Miles in response to Jack's question of whether they were under house arrest.
• "You're an idiot." Miles's opinion of Hurley after his Back to the Future time travel comments.
  

Did You Notice?

• Patsy Cline's "She's Got You" was playing in Kate's car. The singer, who died in a plane crash, has had her songs featured throughout the past seasons of the show.
• Kate was singing "Catch a Falling Star" to baby Aaron, which is the song Claire told the prospective adoptive parents in Season 1 that her father sang to her and she would like them to sing to her baby. It was also the melody of the plane mobile in the Dharma nursery in Season 2.
• We got the answer as to what Sawyer whispered to Kate in the helicopter: Take care of his daughter Clementine.
• I loved that even the show's characters (Hurley and Miles) cannot figure out the convoluted nature of time travel.
  
• Since Jack refused to operate on young Ben, Kate was then forced to take matters into her own hands, resulting in Ben being given to Richard Alpert and the Others. Was this the island fixing itself? If Jack had saved Ben, then would Ben never have turned out the way he did? Would his innocence not have been gone?
  
• Our second answer of the night was what happened to Aaron: Claire's mum is taking care of him.
• Thank you to my co-worker Carl for pointing out the obvious (but not to me) that "Ellie and Charles" mentioned by the Other to Richard was a reference to young Ms. Hawking and Charles Widmore. Sometimes I'm so intent on the details, I miss the easy ones!
  

The Numbers - 2 3 4 5 6 8 10 15 16 23 42 108

• The grocery store stock boy told Kate the juice boxes were in aisle 5.
• Claire's mum was in motel room K10 and Kate checked into a room 2 doors down.
  

Previews - Next week's "Dead is Dead" looks like Indiana Linus and the Temple of Smoke. Plus, it appears we'll see who Ben may have shot at the marina. Inside sources say it isn't Penny. Well, Desmond, the island may finally be through with you after all. And in two weeks, "Some Like It Hoth" (yes, as in the snow planet from "The Empire Strikes Back") will feature a young Miles and perhaps answer the question of whether he is the son of Pierre Chang/Marvin Candle/Mark Wickmund.