Jack & Juliet?

My friend Brian (hi Brian!) has asked me to address a question. Hopefully, I’ve got the question right. If I don’t, I’m sure he will let me know what the question is.

If Kate and Sawyer are destined to be together (see my earlier post), what do I think about Jack and Juliet? Are they made for each other? After all, unlike Kate and Jack, Jack and Juliet are intellectually compatible.

I can’t disagree that Jack and Juliet are both intellectually compatible. Both are physicians. They have other similarities, too – they both have failed marriages and, at one time, they both really wanted to get off the island. We know that they have kissed at least twice. We also know that Juliet has strong feelings for Jack. And Jack trusts Juliet, something no one else did for a long time.

But we really don’t know much about Juliet, really. In her pre-island flashback, she is already an adult, divorced, trying to help her infertile sister become pregnant. She seems to have no qualms stealing medications from the hospital where she works (another similarity with Jack), but is apparently powerless to leave her employment there because of her ex-husband. After her husband is killed by a bus, she is horrified to think that her new employers, Mittelos, might have caused it to allow her to work for them. Once on the island, she engages in an affair with a married man, whom she truly seems to love. As she realizes the depths of Ben’s manipulations and deceptiveness, she tries to convince Jack to kill Ben in surgery. Juliet threatens to kill Kate if Sawyer continues his rebellion, and kills Pickett when he refuses to allow Kate and Sawyer to escape. She agrees, reluctantly, to spy on the survivors to determine who’s pregnant.

Yes, I know, Juliet eventually confessed to Jack what she was doing, and seems since then to be on the side of the remaining Oceanic survivors. And yet, for some reason, I don’t entirely trust her. Who wasn’t horrified when she broke Sun’s confidence to tell Jin that Sun had had an affair? Her motives may have been pure – had Sun remained on the island, she and her Ji Yeon would have died, but her methods were abominable. Juliet will do anything if she feels the cause is just. But what causes does she feel is just? That makes me very nervous about Juliet.

All that said, I think that Juliet and Jack would not make a good couple, not because of any fault on Juliet’s part (we’ve already covered Jack’s problems), but because Jack is in love with Kate, and Juliet knows it. And Jack knows Juliet knows. Even their kisses, while sweet, lacked passion. They are not soul mates.

So, intellectual compatibility notwithstanding, I do not think that Jack and Juliet are a good couple. Their goals and desires are different, and they seem to lack chemistry. Maybe when Jack returns to the Island (and I’m convinced that he will), he’ll have a clearer idea of what he wants and we can reassess. But if he continues to desire Kate, then he and Juliet will not make a good couple.

What do you think?