I have figured out the problem with Lauren. Because I was thinking, the Lauren-Vaughn scenes would have been really nice had it been Sydney. And then I was thinking about how, all the actors said in interviews that it would be impossible to hate the wife. I think from the script, the scenes with Lauren might actually have made us like her, but we just hate her so much and I personally find it hard to believe that JJ and the actors could have misjudged the response so totally.

So I have a theory. I think they planned for her to really be a nice person, and the script works for that. But some casting person made a REALLY bad decision, and maybe for some reason it couldn't be reversed. Maybe Melissa George's daddy pulled strings? All Australian actors seem to have influential families. Anyway, Melissa George got cast. And she's just not the type of person that you look at, and think that she must be a nice person. If it had been someone who looks at first glance like a sweet woman, I really think we could have liked Lauren Reed. Unfortunately MG looks like a horrible person, and her accent is all wrong, and she has no chemistry whatsoever with Vartan. And she just turns Lauren into a super-bitch.