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"The Shape of Things to Come" is the seventy-eighth episode of the American Broadcasting Company's Lost, and is the ninth episode of the fourth season. It aired on April 24, 2008 on ABC in the United States and on the CTV Television Network in Canada. The episode was written by co-executive producer Drew Goddard and co-producer Brian K. Vaughan in late February 2008 and directed by executive producer Jack Bender in mid-March. The narrative centers on Ben Linus (played by Michael Emerson) as he and the Oceanic Airlines Flight 815 crash survivors at the Barracks come under attack in December 2004, while flashforwards to late 2005 show him recruiting Sayid Jarrah (Naveen Andrews) as a hitman and confronting his enemy Charles Widmore (Alan Dale). "The Shape of Things to Come" is one of a few Lost episodes to contain footage filmed outside Hawaii. The episode aired as the first of the second batch of fourth season episodes that were originally planned to air uninterrupted by a hiatus with the rest of the season; however, the one hundred-day 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike paused production and caused the writers to condense the second half of the season, which aired after a four-week break. "The Shape of Things to Come" received positive critical reviews and the original was watched by fourteen million Americans. Much praise was directed at Emerson's acting skills, particularly in his reaction to the execution of his character's daughter Alex (Tania Raymonde). Emerson and the episode's editors are nominated for Primetime Emmy Awards.