The Cinemaphiles

Flashforward Ep.3 – 137 Sekunden

Written by Brando Calrissian on October 19, 2009

137 Sekunden, the third episode in the first season for ABC’s Flashforward, begins with the complete conversation that Agent Dmitri Noh has with the mystery woman concerning his fate. We find out that he is to be murdered on March 15th, 2010 due to being shot three times.

From there most of the episode surrounds Agent Benford’s trip with Agent Hawk (I’ve been referring to her as just Janis) to Germany to visit a prisoner (who was/is a Nazi) who claims to have valuable information for Agent Benford. Since they do not know each other and since the prisoner, Rudolf Geyer, names Agent Benford by name, it is assumed that he clearly did have a flash forward which relates directly the investigation (or at least Benford). Most of the episode is a tug of war between Geyer and Benford, constantly pushing and pulling, each trying to gain leverage over the other throughout. Geyer confidently states that he knows his information is valuable because in his flashforward he was being released from prison. Eventually Benford agrees to a conditional release of Geyer, dependent solely on his flash forward information checking out and proving to be true.

So we take things back stateside where Agent Noh joins the investigation and seeks out a future airport attendent who is a key figure in Geyer’s flash forward. He cross checks the flash forward of Geyer and when the information proves true to Geyer’s claims Benford readies himself for the valuable information Geyer claims to hold. As it turns out, though, Geyer was just using his flash forward as leverage to get his release. He reveals that he gave them bogus information, such as stating the blackout lasted 2 min 17 seconds (or 137 seconds…137 sekunden) because of a tie in to Jewish mysticism/Kaballah. He does offer one last bit which he genuinely does believe will help Agent Benford, though, which is the mysterious effect the blackout had on crows. Geyer claims that when he awoke from the blackout he noticed that there was a mass of crows that dropped dead out of the sky.

Agent Benford takes this information and researches major and sudden dips in the crow population throughout the world to see if there are any recent trends. He notices the global population of crows did indeed drastically fall immediately after the blackout and also finds a similar occurence that happened in Ganwar, Somalia back in 1991. The episode closes with a flash back of that occurence in Somalia and as we see a boy follow a large flock (a murder, right?) of crows they, of course, all drop dead at once. The final shot is that of a giant tower looming in the distance as the boy looks over the horizon… DUN DUN DUNNNNN!!

The Good, the Bad, the Ugly, and further notes of mine:

• What did blind people see during their flashforwards?  Or did they just hear their flashforwards?  Since they aren’t dreams, we’re to assume everyone actually experienced their flash forward.   Just a weird thought that popped into my head as I watched…

• I still must beg the question: Why has everyone in the world jumped on board with this notion that everyone actually flashed forward into the future?  I know that as the viewers we know that’s what happened, but is it plausible for everyone in the world of the show to be so unified in believing they flashed forward to the future?  That’s just absurd!  I’m fine with following a show of believers, but at least have some peripheral characters show some doubt or something.

• Some of these characters seem like contradictions.  The one who especially just doesn’t seem to fit right so far is Mark’s sponsor Aaron.  In this episode he had the following quote that just didn’t seem right to me, “The world has changed.  Maybe the rules need  to as well.  If it were my family I’d do whatever I had to do.”  That’s an extreme statement to make, and a seemingly dangerous one, too.

• I feel like the show is starting to become a series of DUN DUN DUNNNNN!  moments.  Just watch the show and I swear at each commercial break there’s some reveal or line of dialogue that’s supposed to make us gasp.  Cue the sound effects!  DUN DUN DUNNNN!  I sense a Flashforward drinking game in the making folks…

• Every single character also uniformly calls their blackout moment their “flash forward.”  Would EVERYONE really call it this?

• It was nice to see Kim Dickens in this episode.  She plays Kate (Aaron’s ex I gather?) and was great in the old HBO series Deadwood and has also played a bit part in Lost as Sawyer’s baby mama.

• Do we know if Zoey (Dmitri Noh’s girlfriend played by Gabrielle Union) actually saw Dmitri in her flashforward of her own beach wedding?  Perhaps she was just assuming it was him?

• Someone had the line that the flashforwards “make us do things we wouldn’t ordinarily do.”  I’m glad someone acknowledged this.

• It was also good writing when someone mentioned how life has changed since the blackout with the following quote, “we’re making decisions based on what will happen rather than what could happen.”  At least someone in the world has a grasp on how the flashforwards are changing global decision making.

• So Aaron had his daughter’s body exhumed to check if the remains are really her.  Towards the end of the episode we’re told that the remains are indeed those of his daughter.  So what of his flashforward then?  Was he lying to Kate just to put her mind at ease?

• I liked the massive tower at the end.  Did it look like to anyone else that it was emitting some sort of signal?

• What in the world happened to the babysitter from the first episode?  What did she see that has caused her to go MIA?

• The actor who played Geyer was great.  He pretty much roflstomped Joseph Fiennes in their scenes together.  I wish Fiennes could just speak in his normal british accent, by the way, his breathy husk of an American accent is starting to detract from his performance.   Er.   “Performance”    I like Fiennes.  Here’s to hoping he steps up his game in future eps…even knowing his American accent will be staying.