In Defense of Juliet...

A lot of people have come down hard on Juliet for the way she acted in the finale. I’m not talking about detonating a hydrogen bomb (somehow the people who don’t like her seem to have forgiven her for that… oh Lost. How you change us) but for the way she cuts loose from Sawyer and tells him he loves Kate, despite his protestations to the contrary. Some say she’s whiny and needs to stop bitching just because Sawyer might have looked at Kate. Others think she’s emasculated Sawyer because of the way she talks to him like he’s a child. Others, defending her, say she’s jealous because she’s a woman (and that’s not intended in a sexist way, but saying she’s perceptive and not stupid and can see when a man is showing affections to someone else), and maybe she has a right to be so.

I think also the writers have tried to establish a history with Juliet that justified her behavior in the finale. I think I'm the last viewer who actually sees her point. :) But then again, I’ve loved Juliet from the beginning, so maybe I’ve always been able to see things from her point of view.

First, her parents break up. She apparently didn't see it coming, and while I'll admit the idea that your parents divorced and therefore you're doomed (come ON) is a little bit simple, I do know a few people who seem very jaded after watching their parents' marriages dissolve.

Then she has an affair with and marries Edmund Burke. Grade-A asshole. He sleeps with another research assistant and tosses her aside. She knows what it feels like to be the other woman. She leaves and comes to the island, BECOMING the other woman, but as much as she loves Goodwin, she hates thinking that she's actually the other woman (witness her breakdown in front of Harper when Harper confronts her on it). Goodwin is impaled, and she soon finds out that Ben thinks she's his, that he controls her and owns her. She makes a deal with him to leave the island, but is scarred by the experience.

So she comes to the camp, where it seems to be inhabited by Men Who Love Kate. Man #1, Jack, will do anything for Kate, but joins forces with Juliet and they seem to have a thing. But when they go to the Tempest station and she breaks down and tells him about Ben, he kisses her. Later, when Jack is on the operating table, she realizes he loves Kate and was just using Juliet as a pawn. He kissed her, and TOLD HER that he had her back and nothing would come between then. And then, like that, Kate did.

Sawyer pined for Kate for months after she left the island. No doubt in my mind. He stared at the ocean, we SAW the scenes of him going on and on and on about how painful it was for him, and it was. No doubt in the past 3 years he's been able to tell Juliet all about his brief but meaningful relationship with Kate, that they slept together, that he left her in the helicopter and he probably believes she’s with Jack. Eventually he resigns himself to the fact she’s not returning, and takes Juliet, who is, well, there. If Kate had been there, would he have been with Juliet? Probably not. And she knows that.

After three years, they’ve now established themselves, and Kate might be a memory, but she’s the one that got away. He loves Juliet, I truly believe he does, and he’s happy with her. He’s a better man, even if she does tend to talk to him like he’s a child at times, and he’s not the cad he was when he was with Kate. No more sarcastic remarks, and they’ve settled down. Then the Oceanic 3 show up in a Dharma van and Jin calls him and… he lies to Juliet. Doesn’t tell her where he’s going, just says he has to go somewhere. That lie was the beginning of the end. When he returns he tells Juliet, and Juliet’s whole world collapses. It’s the Jack situation all over again, but it’s more devastating because she truly believed she had Sawyer, and that they’d always be together, and she’d been with him for 3 years as opposed to Kate’s 3 months. But now it’s no different than her parents’ marriage, than her marriage, than Goodwin, than Jack. She begins watching for signs.

People can criticize Juliet for being whiny despite Sawyer professing his love, but there’s a reason the cliché “Actions speak louder than words” is so popular: it’s true. You can tell someone you love them until you’re blue in the face. But if you’re making ga-ga eyes at someone else, calling them Freckles (which, face it, is a far more endearing nickname than “Blondie”), looking in her direction when Bernard and Rose talk about true love, and following her everywhere, we know where his heart lies. And Juliet is heartbroken. He can corner her in the jungle and say, I will ALWAYS be with you, I love you, blah blah blah… but she’s right when she says she knows, and that’s why she has to leave. He’s staying with Juliet because maybe even HE doesn’t realize he loves Kate. Juliet is not being whiny or annoying in this scene… she’s a broken woman who’s been let down so many times, and now it’s happening again. (And many fans hate Kate now because of it, but it’s not her fault, either.)

Sawyer might believe, truly believe that Juliet is wrong, but she knows deep down that Kate is the one he loves. I’m not shipping here, I’m simply watching the program in front of me, and I think Juliet has every right to be upset. If she’s pregnant, as some people have speculated, that makes her upset even more heartrending. She certainly hasn’t told Sawyer, if that’s the case, and she’d rather lose the baby inside of her than have to deal with her heart being ripped out the way it has been. So… she detonates the bomb.

IF by detonating the bomb she rewinds the clock and puts things back to where they were, and we zip back to 2004 or 2007 or wherever and we watch some of these characters meet again like they don’t know each other, imagine how heartbreaking that will be for us. Have you seen the Buffy episode, “The Wish”? It’s an alternate universe where Buffy never came to Sunnydale, Willow and Xander are vampires, Oz and Giles are vampire hunters, and when they begin staking and killing each other, not really caring what’s going on, our hearts break. We’ve seen what they were when they were closest friends, so this alternate reality where they aren’t even aware of each other’s existences actually hurts to watch. It could be one direction the show takes next season, and it’ll be tough.