"There's No Place Like Home, Parts 1, 2 & 3" is the season finale of the American Broadcasting Company's fourth season of the serial drama television series Lost, consisting of the 12th through 14th episodes. They are also the 84th through 86th episodes of the show overall. The three constituent episodes were split into two broadcasts; "Part 1" first aired on May 15, 2008, and "Part 2", serving as the two-hour season finale of the fourth season, first aired on May 29, 2008, on ABC in the United States and on CTV in Canada. The episodes were written by executive producers/show runners Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof; "Part 1" was directed by co-executive producer Stephen Williams, while executive producer Jack Bender directed "Part 2". The episode's title is a reference to The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.

The narrative takes place in late December 2004, 100 days after the crash of Oceanic Flight 815. The survivors of the crash team up with the Others, natives of the island where the plane crashed, to confront the mercenaries from the freighter Kahana, who have come to the island. Following this, some of the survivors escape the island, which is afterwards moved by Ben Linus (Michael Emerson). Flashforwards show the first actions of the Oceanic Six, those who are rescued, after returning home in January 2005, and their lives in late 2007. The cliffhanger from the previous season finale, "Through the Looking Glass," is resolved by revealing John Locke (Terry O'Quinn) to be dead and in the coffin that Jack Shephard (Matthew Fox) visits in that episode.

Production and broadcast of the fourth season were interrupted by the 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike and following its resolution, the writers were unable to compress the remainder of season four into the five allotted episodes and the season finale was extended by one hour. Subsequently, the production schedule was compressed and post-production work was completed in three weeks, instead of the usual two months.

The second part was watched by 12 million Americans, making Lost the most watched show of the week, for the first time in the show's history. Both parts were met with critical acclaim. Matthew Fox's acting in his flashforward scenes was praised, as was Michael Giacchino's musical score. The episode's editing was nominated for both a Primetime Emmy Award and Eddie Award.

Plot

Part 1 In flashforwards to January 2005, the Oceanic Six—Jack Shephard, Kate Austen (Evangeline Lilly), Sayid Jarrah (Naveen Andrews), Sun-Hwa Kwon (Yunjin Kim), Hugo "Hurley" Reyes (Jorge Garcia) and Claire Littleton's (Emilie de Ravin) infant, Aaron—arrive in Honolulu, where Hurley and Sun are reunited with their parents; Jack with his mother; and Sayid with his girlfriend, Nadia Jaseem (Andrea Gabriel). In the ensuing media circus, a press conference is held, where they lie about everything that has happened on the island; claiming that they are the only living survivors and that Kate gave birth to Aaron on the island. Sometime later, Hurley's dad (Cheech Marin) gives Hurley his newly rebuilt 1970s Camaro, at a surprise birthday party. Hurley, however, becomes panicked and runs away when he notices that the car's odometer displays the numbers. In Seoul, South Korea, Sun visits her father and informs him that she used the money from her settlement with Oceanic Airlines to buy a controlling interest in his company because she blames him for her husband's, Jin-Soo Kwon (Daniel Dae Kim), death. In the final flashforward, Jack eulogizes his deceased father, Christian Shephard (John Terry). After the ceremony, Carole Littleton (Susan Duerden), Claire's mother, reveals to him that Claire is his half-sister; as she walks away, she smiles at Aaron in Kate's arm, oblivious to the fact that she is staring at her grandson.

On December 30, 2004, following the events of "Cabin Fever", Jack and Kate follow the tracking signal on the phone given to them by Frank Lapidus (Jeff Fahey), who dropped it onto the survivors' beach from a helicopter. They encounter James "Sawyer" Ford (Josh Holloway), Aaron and Miles Straume (Ken Leung); Kate returns to the beach with Miles and Aaron. Jack and Sawyer meet up with Lapidus at the helicopter, but decide to rescue Hurley, who is with Ben, the mercenaries' target, before leaving for the freighter. Meanwhile, Sayid arrives at the beach on the freighter's Zodiac boat and informs the survivors that they must go to the freighter as soon as possible because the mercenaries' secondary objective is to kill everyone on the island. He and Kate go after Jack and Sawyer, but are captured by Richard Alpert (Nestor Carbonell) and the rest of the Others. After unsuccessfully attempting to convince his crush, Charlotte Lewis (Rebecca Mader),"Freighter Folk". Lost: The Complete Fourth Season – The Expanded Experience, Buena Vista Home Entertainment. Featurette, disc 6 (DVD), disc 5 (Blu-ray Disc). Released on December 9, 2008. to leave the island, Daniel Faraday (Jeremy Davies) starts ferrying people to the freighter. Sun, Jin, and Aaron arrive at the boat, only to discover a bomb, consisting of a large amount of C4 explosives, on board.

Meanwhile, in their quest to move the island, Ben, Locke and Hurley arrive at the Dharma Initiative Orchid station, which is disguised as a greenhouse. Ben sends Locke to the real part of the station and surrenders himself to Martin Keamy (Kevin Durand) and the other mercenaries from the Kahana, who had previously arrived. A final montage shows the Oceanic Six and Ben in their respective predicaments.

Parts 2 & 3 On the island, Jack and Sawyer meet up with Hurley and Locke at the Orchid station. Jack and Locke once more argue about the nature of the island; Locke implores him to lie about the island once he and the other survivors leave. At the helicopter, Kate, Sayid, and the Others free Ben by ambushing and killing the mercenaries, except Keamy, who feigns death. In return, the Others allow Kate, Sayid and the other survivors to leave the island on the helicopter. Ben returns to the Orchid, where he gets in a hidden elevator with Locke.

Inside the underground part of the Orchid station, Ben puts every metal item he can find into a small compartment at the back of the room, while Locke watches the orientation video for the Orchid. On the tape, Pierre Chang (François Chau) begins to discuss time travel involving "negatively charged exotic matter" when the VCR malfunctions and the tape rewinds itself. Shortly, Keamy arrives and tells Locke that if he (Keamy) dies, the C4 on the freighter will detonate, due to a remote trigger linked to a heart rate monitor he is wearing. Regardless, Ben kills Keamy with no remorse or sympathy for those on the boat, in order to avenge his adopted daughter Alex (Tania Raymonde), whom Keamy executed. Ben seals and then activates power to the compartment he had loaded with metal items, blowing a hole in the back of it. Ben, now wearing a parka, tells Locke that whoever moves the island is forced to leave it and never come back; Ben must do it so that Locke can stay and lead the Others. Locke then goes to the Others, who welcome him home. Ben climbs through the hole and down a rocky tunnel beyond it into a frozen chamber, cutting his arm in the process. He then turns a very large metal wheel. As he completes the rotation, an eerie sound and white-yellow light soon envelop the entire island. Ben disappears, only to reappear several months later in the Sahara Desert (as seen in "The Shape of Things to Come").Vaughan, Brian K. (writer) & Goddard, Drew (writer) & Bender, Jack (director). "The Shape of Things to Come". Lost, ABC. Episode 9, season 4. Aired on April 24, 2008.

Jack, Kate, Sayid, Sawyer, Hurley, and Frank Lapidus leave the island on the helicopter, but discover a fuel leak on board. In order to lighten the helicopter, Sawyer jumps out after whispering something in Kate's ear and kissing her. The helicopter makes it to the Kahana in the nick of time; they refuel it, fix the leak, pick up Desmond Hume (Henry Ian Cusick), Sun, Aaron and Kate leave seconds before the C4 detonates. The resulting explosion kills Michael Dawson (Harold Perrineau), who is told that "he can go now" by a vision of Christian Shephard. The status of Jin, who is still on the boat, is left uncertain as a cliffhanger. Sawyer swims back to the island and laments the destruction of the boat with Juliet Burke (Elizabeth Mitchell). The people on the helicopter decide to return to the island, but as they approach, they see the island vanish in the white-yellow light. With nowhere to land, the helicopter runs out of fuel and the survivors are forced to ditch into the ocean. They drift in a rescue raft for several hours, where Hurley suggests that Locke succeeded in moving the island, but Jack refuses to believe it. Jack convinces the other survivors that they must lie about their experiences on the island, to protect those left behind.

That same night, the survivors are rescued by Penny Widmore (Sonya Walger), Desmond's girlfriend, with whom he is finally reunited. In keeping with the faked wreckage of Flight 815 found in the Java Trench, the Oceanic Six are dropped off near the island of Sumba, where they are found by local villagers.

In flashforwards to late 2007, following those in "Through the Looking Glass", Jack, Kate and Walt Lloyd (Malcolm David Kelley) all recount stories of being approached by Jeremy Bentham, the dead man in the coffin. Kate has a dream in which Claire tells her not to bring Aaron back to the island. In London, England, Sun confronts Charles Widmore (Alan Dale), Penny's father, who sent the Kahana to the island, and tells him that they have common interests involving the island. After finding out that Bentham is dead, Sayid breaks into the mental hospital where Hurley is staying and convinces him to go "somewhere safe". Jack returns to the funeral parlor, where he is confronted by Ben, who says that the island will not allow Jack to return without everyone else who left joining him. This includes Jeremy Bentham's body, who is finally revealed to be John Locke.

Production

Cast

The episode features the last appearance of actor Harold Perrineau, whose character Michael dies in an explosion, as a main cast member. The character of Michael was absent for the entire third season of Lost and returned midway through the fourth season in "Ji Yeon." Perrineau was disappointed that he was brought back to the show only to be killed and that Michael does not get a chance to reunite with his son, Walt, saying, "there are all these questions about how [the writers] respond to black people on the show ... Walt just winds up being another fatherless child. It plays into a really big, weird stereotype and, being a black person myself, that wasn't so interesting." The fate of Jin, who is also on the freighter when it explodes, is left uncertain. Actor Daniel Dae Kim was arrested for driving under the influence of alcohol, which prompted speculation about his future on the series, due to co-stars Michelle Rodriguez (Ana-Lucia Cortez) and Cynthia Watros (Libby) leaving Lost after DUI arrests. This episode also marks Malcolm David Kelley's first appearance on the show since the third season, excepting a computer effects shot of the actor in "Meet Kevin Johnson". Kelley's character, Walt, was "benched" for the majority of the second and third seasons because the actor's growth was disproportionate to the amount of time that has passed on the island. The writers got the idea to show him in flashforwards in his older form while writing "Through the Looking Glass".Cuse, Carlton & Lindelof, Damon, "There's No Place Like Home, Part 2". Lost: The Complete Fourth Season – The Expanded Experience, Buena Vista Home Entertainment. Audio commentary, disc 4. Released on December 9, 2008.

Writing