Yikes!
Remember your spoiler tags until after it airs in the west!
[spoiler]
Syd gone for two years?
What has Sloane created with the artifacts?
Vaughn is married?
How did Will survive?
What happened to Jack? [/spoiler]
Well, it’s going to be a long summer. Part of me worries that the Alias creative team has reached the point in two years that it took the X-Files team approximately five years to reach, namely, the point of no longer caring whether the uberplot makes any kind of sense. X-Files had the luxury of having episodes that did not focus on the uberplot, so there were still quality episodes even after the creative team as a whole stopped caring about the conspiracy arc and whether it made any sense. Alias doesn’t have that kind of storytelling structure. This could either be really freaking cool, or a shark-jumping moment. Time will tell, I suppose.
Part of me wants to think that everything after Syd being clocked upside the head by her mother on the skating rink is a dream. If not, Lucy has some ‘splainin’ to do.
Is anyone familiar with Season One enough to recap the whole "Someone who looks exactly like Syd/Irena was drawn by Rimbaldi and profesized to be “The One”? It looks like they’re going back to this plotline, which could be good, could be bad.
That fight at the end kicked ass.
Well, in a nutshell, someone who looked like Syd/Irina was drawn by Rimbaldi and was prophesied to be The One. Sydney was arrested and interrogated. There was a line in the prophecy that The One would never see some mountain or other, so Vaughn broke her out and took her to see the mountain in question. I don’t recall what One it was she was supposed to be, other than it was something fairly lower-case a apocolyptic.
So then Syd wakes up and goes to take a shower with Bobby Ewing but accidentally trips over a sled once owned by Orson Welles that has the word, “Rimbaldi” written on it and…
Yes, there are a few plot holes to fill next fall, but the writers have all summer to work on that.
Still, it was an excellent season finale and can’t wait to start watching again next season!
All I could think of at the end was “If this whole season past the fall of SD-6 is a dream, I’m outta here…”
Still, I’m a bit skeptical. There better be some DAMN good reasons for all this.
Let’s see, I think Will is alive, because he’s a spy and only non-spies die on this show. I think we’re going to learn at some point next season that Fake Francie is dead (loved the expression on the actress’s face when the squibs went off…that perfect little O with her mouth) and that Sydney was picked up by Sloane’s agents (or possibly specifically Sark) who are working some sort of mojo on her with the Rimbaldi device. I think the Rimbaldi device is going to be revealed as a proto-computer of some sort, capable of performing elaborate statistical forecasting and projecting three-dimensional images of the reults (which is what Sydney’s in).
Hmmmmm, let’s see.
Syd’s in Hong Kong. SARS is in Hong Kong.
Ah, now we can blame that nasty Sloane/Rambaldi coalition for the disease to end all humanity.
In a non-linear yet related thought, I liked the SARS bit on South Park, where they realized that the cure for SARS was Campbell’s Chicken Noodle Soup, Nyquil and Sprite.
Yeah, that chick fight was awesome. And fake Francie was starting to really creep me out a lot. But don’t take my Will away from me!
Was anyone else getting pissed off by the commercials? I started timing it - FIVE minutes of the show, then commercials. Extending it to two hours like that was, IMHO, pretty damn despicable. So was the blatant close-up of the badge “SVT Focus” as it pulled away before one commercial break…for the SVT Focus.
As for my opinions: I started watching the show this year, so I had no freakin’ clue what the hell was going on, beyond the imposter chick getting exposed. Otto’s post was brand-spanking new information for me. Perhaps someone could proivide a quick summary of what has happened until before this season? I will say this though - I definitely enjoyed this season. My wife likes the plots, while I greatly enjoy the lengths they go to put Jennifer Garner in skimpy outfits for no real reason.
Speaking of plots, do you get the feeling everyone’s lives would be made easier if they had a friggin’ SIKORSKY?? What’s with all the top-level government agents cruising around in SUVs?! I also enjoyed Tippin’s password: Sydney. No wonder there’s so many security breaches around that place. 
It’s not actually all that complex. In the beginning, Syd believes she works for the CIA and that her estranged father is an executive at an airplane company. Her department, SD-6, is engaged in recovering artifacts of a Reinassance artist and inventor named Rambaldi. When her boyfriend Danny asks her to marry him, she confesses to him what she really does for a living. He’s not careful and leaves a drunken message on her answering machine which Sloane intercepts; he has Danny killed. Syd decides to quit, even though she knows Sloane will have her killed if she does so. When Sloane’s goons come after her she’s saved by her father, who reveals 1) SD-6 is in reality not affiliated with the government but is actually an arm of The Council of 12, a group of rogue intelligence agents who’ve formed their own freelance intelligence/terrorrist network, 2) he (Jack) is an agent of SD-6, and that 3) he’s also a double-agent working for the real CIA.
Syd decides that she’s going to bring down SD-6, so, borrowing Will’s sister’s passport, she goes on a freelance mission to China to recover a device built via Rambaldi plans. The device is a u-shaped machine that suspends a small red ball in the air; when the device is unplugged, the ball pops like a water balloon. Syd then delivers this to Sloane, getting back in his good graces. She then goes to CIA headquarters and becomes another double.
From here on out the synopsis gets a little more complicated in that I’m describing various threads, all of which are being built up episode by episode, but it’s impossible to describe them that way/
Throughout the season there are various missions for SD-6, often to recover Rambaldi artifacts, which Syd sabotages on instructions from the real CIA. Also there are skirmishes with other freelance terrorrist groups, such as FTL and K-Directorate. Near the end of the season, a new faction, lead by the young Mr. Sark and his anonymous boss, “The Man,” appears and quickly becomes a powerhouse, worrying SD-6 and the CIA.
Syd and her handler, Michael Vaughan, become close and start to have inappropriate feelings for each other, although they don’t act on them. (Also, Vaughan has an on-again-off-again girlfriend, Alice.) At one point Syd and the ever-smitten Will get drunk and make out, but she considers it a mistake.
Vaughan and Syd’s relationship is complicated when Sydney discovers in her father’s old books secret messages to and from the KGB. It appears that decades ago Jack was working for the KGB and that he killed several agents who were on his trail – including Vaughan’s father. Syd doesn’t want to report this at first but to try to clear her father herself. Vaughan finally convinces her; the go through channels and learn that the real KGB agent was not Jack, but actually Sydney’s mother. She was killed when, while fleeing from the CIA, she drove her car into the ocean.
During this period Sloane consolidates his power in the Council of 12. He murders one partner and then maneuvers himself to possibly take his place. He also spills the beans himself to his wife, Emily, as she lies on her deathbed. However, she recovers. When the Council learns of this, it demands that Sloane kill her. If he does, he’ll be given the partnership; if not, both of them will be killed. So he poisons her wine and she dies – Syd learns that he killed her, so this motivates her hatred of SD-6 even more.
At one point, Syd recovers a page of Rambaldi material which has a drawing of her on it. As Otto noted, it’s part of a Prophecy which says that the woman pictured will cause a great upheaval or something like that, but will do so before ever seeing some mountain near Rambaldi’s home town. The CIA decides to put Syd in custody; Vaughan busts her out with the idea of getting her to the mountain so she can’t fit the prophecy. On the way, while chased by CIA, Syd’s own car plunges into the ocean, but she survives on the air from her tires; she realizes that her mother may have done the same and could still be alive.
Throughout the seasonSomeone starts feeding Will information about SD-6. (He’s a reporter.) He follows the story and starts to learn the truth about the organization. At one point Jack, afraid Will will get in over his head and also put Sydney in danger, puts on a disguise and tries to scare Will of the story, but it doesn’t work.
In the final episode all this comes to a head. Sloane kills Emily and takes his seat at the Council. While Syd and Vaughan go to Berlin to disrupt Rambaldi-related operations of The Man, the curious Will has gotten in trouble and is also in Berlin, being tortured by SD-6. Sydney rescues him but he learns that she and Jack are spies. Then, Syd and Vaughan find the Rambaldi device they’re there to sabotage. It’s a huge version of the same device from the first episode, but the red ball is probably about 30 ft. in diameter. Syd and Vaughan set charges to destroy the device and then high-tail it out of there. When the charges blow, the ball shatters, and a huge wave of water comes rushing down the corridor. Syd makes it through the door, but Vaughan does not before it closes; the last we see of him is through the little window as he’s crushed against the door by the wave.
Sydney is then captured by The Man’s goons. She’s brought in to a room where she’s confronted by The Man. It’s her mom.
–Cliffy
Thanks Cliffy! That was exactly what I was looking for and explains so many things that went right by me. Now I’m definitely hooked for next season!
Damn, Cliffy, I’m impressed.
I just saw the finale. I guess maybe Merrin Dungey (Francie/fake Francie) will be showing back up on Malcolm in the Middle again (funny they were in the same time slots). And maybe Vaughn’s new wife is a non-spy! Which means she’ll die, opening the door for rekindled romance! 
Actually, this happened a lot less in the first season, so maybe you didn’t miss all that much after all.
Do they ever even attempt to explain where they get all of her outfits and wigs? Should I worry about this? In the finale they didn’t know the guy was in a sex club until they got to the city (berlin?). Next edit she’s in full regalia. Not that I’m complaining.
I just picture a huge cargo plane that follows her around, carrying wardrobe, makeup, and accessories for every conceivable eventuality.
Just like in her real life.
Walgreens.