Before I get into the meat of the matter, I have to ask this of the folks out there who didn’t like the finale of Lost last night:

You didn’t like the Battlestar Galactica ending either, did you?

I ask that not to accuse you of just not liking finales to shows you’ve loved. I ask that because in both cases, I believe the ending was absolutely the culmination of everything that came before.

The endings MADE SENSE. Yes, you can nitpick and complain about little things here or there that didn’t make sense. When you’ve unraveled as much string as both of these shows did, it’s hard to get it all back into a neat little ball of yarn.

Not all questions were answered, and in some cases that was infuriating (from both shows).

But, in the end, the show was what it was always about: The people. Love. Fate. Free will. The afterlife.

The only way to tackle last night’s action-packed ending is by bullet points. I’m emotionally exhausted and I still have two hours of 24 to watch tonight, and that promises to be as equally emotionally wrenching.

The afterlife

Let’s get one thing straight: The island wasn’t purgatory. Not for our Losties, at least. Sure, there are some people who are stuck there forever, running around whispering stuff, like Michael. But our Losties’ Purgatory or waiting room or whatever you wanna call it was the alternate universe. The flash-sideways.

The island was real. The Losties were absolutely alive.

The flash-sideways was a place where these people who had become a family could come together and finally find peace. And once they finally all came together, it was time to go into the light.

OK, that moment was totally hokey. But did you notice the statues of Vishnu and the Buddha in the rectory? Did you notice the stained glass window that had symbols from Judaism, Islam, Jainism, every religion, practically?

This wasn’t about a Judeo-Christian afterlife. This was a recognition that every religious or spiritual practice in the world has some sort of belief system about what happens after life on this world is over. If you were Buddhist, you could believe that the island and their tests there were their final tests before enlightenment. Or maybe the flash sideways was, and now they don’t have to be reborn again.

Love

Omg, when Juliet and Sawyer met again and recognized one another and kissed, I was bawling like a baby. (KNEW that the baby doctor was gonna be Juliet and that she was going to be Jack’s ex-wife.) And Jin & Sun, too. Like. A. Baby.

This show has always been about love and loss. From Day One.

And you know what? Team Darlton made us love these characters. Even the ones who annoyed you, you had moments of loving. Don’t deny it. Denial is ugly.

Jack/Jacob/Hurley/Ben

It made so much sense to have Hurley be the new Jacob. He was always the one who took care of people, made them feel better.

Jack’s job was always to fix things. In the end, he fixed the island. He sent Desmond down there to break it – but that was only, really, so he could kill Flocke. Flocke couldn’t be killed until the island was broken. When Des pulled the cork out of the island, Jack and Flocke became mortal.

By the way, how freakin’ awesome was that flying punch-down that Jack did to Flocke on the cliff? Cut to commercial. WOW.

So, anyway, Flocke could be killed. He couldn’t leave the island and bring his evil with him. He couldn’t end life, the universe and everything by leaving.

That was Jack’s job. He was always the fixer. Only when he gave up the idea of having to fix everything was he actually able to fix the thing he’d been working toward his entire life.

Once that was done, he wasn’t the person to keep the island safe. It made so much sense for it to be Hurley. The second Hurley went back with Jack to save Des and the Island, it became exceedingly obvious that was what was going to happen.

And bravo to Ben, in the end, doing what was right. Even telling Hurley that he could send Des back to Penny and his son, Charlie. Indeed, if Hurley was the new Jacob, couldn’t he make his own rules? Why couldn’t people leave the island?

Fine job, Ben. I liked that they invited Ben inside the church to come with them, but that Ben chose more time in purgatory, to atone for what he’d done, to make things right with Alex and Danielle. He’d redeemed himself and was “eligible” to move on, but he chose not to. Which redeemed him even more.

Desmond/Penny

Thank you.

De plane! De plane!

Who else let out a yelp and applauded when Miles and Richard found Lapidus bobbing in the ocean! That. Was. So. Awesome. I don’t know, I had a feeling he was still alive.

And Richard was still alive, too – was it his brush with death with Smokey what made him mortal again, or was it the cork being pulled out of the island? Probably the latter.

So Lost to have him find a reason to live again, once he knew he could die.

Duct tape fixes everything.

When Kate, Sawyer and Claire come upon the Ajira plane just about to taxi and Frank gets ‘em on, total sigh of relief, but also an intake of breath. Would they still escape the island? Nothing was ever certain on Lost, and they’d killed almost everyone else by this point, so it could have happened.

Questions:

Why wasn’t Miles in the church? And Richard, too? What about Frank?

Dharma initiative? Um, totally confused about that. How did they ever get to the island? Obviously, they were trying to find Elvar Hanso’s ship and did, but how did they even find it? Did Jacob allow them to come? Or did the MiB allow them to come, knowing the destruction they’d reign down on the Others.

WTF were the Others? Just people gathered by Jacob over the years to protect the island? Were they candidates? Were some candidates?

Why couldn’t babies be born on the island? Was it the nuclear bomb? I assume that, but it was never made clear.

Why did the Others have that superhuman strength? Did the exposure to the radiation make them all Hulk-like, except not green and huge?

What was Widmore’s backstory? We never really got that. We never learned how he got to the island, why he was there (Eloise, too). And who was Penny’s mother? How did that all transpire that he met some woman off-island whom he loved and had a child with? And how did Eloise and Faraday end up off-island? Did she leave when she found out she was pregnant so her child would live? (They hadn’t had Faraday yet when Widmore was forced to leave, right?)

Who in the hell was Matthew Abbadon? I know he worked for Widmore, but wtf? Ilana, too.

I’m sure I’ll come up with more questions and more thoughts.

_____

But I do want to say this:

Thank you to the entire cast and crew of Lost – you provided excellent entertainment and diversion for six years. The acting, the writing, the music, the editing, the cinematography – it was all better than we’ve seen on television in, maybe, ever. OK, a close tie with The Wire and Battlestar Galactica, but in a totally different way.

Thanks for being my Constant.

Bookmark It

We’re down to the last 2.5 hours of one of the best shows in the history of television (1- that’s not hyperbole and 2- even if it were, I’m allowed). If you haven’t watched Tuesday’s ep yet, LEAVE NOW.

So, we had two very distinct sets of stories going on last night and they’re hurtling toward one another, faster and faster, ready to culminate in … what?

The Island – Jake & the candidates

• Kate was still a viable candidate. Her name being crossed off had nothing to do with her being killed (though that could still happen) – it had everything to do with her having a purpose in life. Once Kate became mom to Aaron, she no longer was a viable candidate, because she had someone who needed her. Once she chose to get Claire back to Aaron, she became viable again.

• Jacob was visible to the candidates now, not just Hurley. Why? Could he always have made himself visible, but only let Hurley see him because Hurley wouldn’t freak out at being able to see him?

• Jack! I was never a Jack hater, but I’ve really grown to love him the last few episodes. He has finally accepted his place in the world and he’s much more enjoyable to watch. And now he’s the new Jacob and needs to find a way to destroy (or, at least, bottle up) the MiB.

• How long does it take to burn a bag of ashes? Jacob was still there for a long time, no?

• Who was Sawyer trying to kid, saying he was doing just fine until Jacob came along? None of the final candidates was doing OK. All four were all behind bars – either jail or the crazy farm.

• DESMOND! Where are you, brotha? Are you going to save the world in both timelines? (Note to Team Darlton: Remember what I said about Desmond and Pennah!)

The Island – Ben & Flocke, together again for the first time

• What did Widmore tell Flocke?

• Ben, you bastard! I knew you couldn’t be all good, but I didn’t realize you had all that bad left in you, either. I guess when faced with the man indirectly responsible for Alex’s death, however, that was bound to happen.

• Miles: The smartest man left on the island. RUN, MILES, RUN! Don’t answer Ben if he calls you on the walkie, btw.

• Will Flocke still kill Pennah if he manages to leave the island? Oh, wait, if he leaves the island, everyone and everything comes to a screeching halt, so, kind of, yeah.

• Bye Zoe. We hardly knew ye, but you weren’t very important anyway.

• So, Widmore’s dead. Wow. Just when I was starting to maybe kind of like him.

• Is Richard dead? He was released by Jacob from living for all eternity, right?

Off-Island

• Sawyer’s an honest cop. Go figure. But that’s OK, Kate got away anyhow.

• Ana-Lucia! Wow, you’re a crooked cop. Somehow, I was glad to see that Ana-Lucia was a bad one. I never liked her. Love that Hurley and Desmond were basically being like Starsky and Hutch or Laurel and Hardy, maybe.

• Ben, in the haze of Desmond’s beating, saw his other life. Did he see what he did to Danielle? What if she suddenly flashes on her other life? That’ll end her fondness of Dr. Linus. It’s interesting to see, though, the happy, non-crazy Danielle.

• I realize that most of the Losties are happy in the alternate timeline. Only Kate and Sayid are pretty frakkin’ miserable still. What’s going to happen this weekend at the Concert?

Random questions remaining that somehow were raised by this ep

• Why couldn’t women have babies on the island? It’s not the MiB preventing it, as we know of at least once baby conceived and born on the island – Ethan. Was it the detonation of Jughead?

• In the alternate timeline, with the island at the bottom of the ocean, is that an alternate way of keeping MiB from getting off the island? Can we have our happy Losties and leave the Island at the bottom of the sea or do they have to go back to the original timeline and all die?

Bookmark It

Didn’t watch? Get the frak outta here!

OK, so this episode answered soooooo many questions, even as it raised others. The biggest question it answered (and theory it put to rest) was the identity of the island’s “Adam and Eve” – Jacob’s adoptive mother and his brother, the actual MiB.

Loved that it flashed back to that scene from Season 1 where Jack and Kate found the skeletons in the caves and Locked dubbed them Adam and Eve, reminding anyone who may not be keeping detailed notes about the show (all five of you). The “Rose and Bernard are Adam and Eve” theory was shot to hell there. (Also, nice foreshadowing of Flocke; he was still the Locke we knew and loved at that point.)

No time warp, no one we knew – but extremely important to the history of the island.

By the way, remember when Locke was dragged into the ground by Smokey in Season 1 or 2, but was dragged back out and said he’d seen the heart of the island and it was beautiful? Yeah, he was doomed all the way back then.

Here’s what we learned and questions I have:

• What is MiB’s name? Drove me crazy that he was never named, but somehow appropriate. Obviously, he had a name. Wouldn’t have been raised for so many years without one. But in true Lost fashion, his name was never uttered. Even though, as I said, it drove me crazy, I loved that detail. His name isn’t important. He’s Smokey. He’s Flocke. He’s Smocke. He’s Christian Shepherd. He’s the Man in Black.

• MiB could see dead people. Jacob couldn’t. Does this mean, somehow, that Hurley is more like MiB? We saw from his background that he wasn’t a bad person/being. Didn’t start out that way, at least. He discovered the ultimate betrayal – that he’d been lied to his entire life about his parentage, about there being things in the world besides the island, about everything. But if he had been told the truth earlier, would he have tried to leave the island earlier? I think so.

• MiB instinctively knew how things worked. He knew how to play that game he found on the beach. He knew how to build the Frozen Donkey Wheel. He knew how to use the light – the source – for his own purposes. How did he know these things? Obviously, he had shared how to use the wheel with those he drew close to him – Ben, for example. Did Widmore use the wheel to get off the island before? And if so, how did he get back? I thought one of the side effects of using the wheel was that the island moved in time and space. And if he didn’t use the wheel, how, exactly, did he get off? The submarine? Was it that it was easier to leave through the correct coordinates underwater? And why? (Wow, this bullet point ended far from where it began.)

• MiB was far more intuitive and “special” than Jacob. Jacob had no guile, but didn’t seem particularly bright. He was totally an annoying mama’s boy. By the time he decided to rebel, it was too late, and he was the only option for protecting the island, so he did it. He never cared about leaving the island, had no natural curiousity.  I found his talk with MiB about the people in the settlement interesting – MiB, having lived among them, found them deeply flawed. Jacob, by watching them only from afar, really saw nothing wrong with them. MiB’s knowledge of man comes from experience, while Jacob’s comes from ignorance. The problem is, MiB had a very small group to study, and was discounting the good things he found among them – all the clever men who helped him find the places on the island where metal acted funny. MiB so desperately wants to leave the island that he doesn’t care that it will eliminate all everything.

• MiB is not just some evil smoke monster. Smokey is not just a manifestation of evil, or the devil. MiB IS The Source. He went into the cave and came out as Smokey. His body died (which confused me, as I thought that the boys could not kill one another – interesting that MiB could not kill Jacob, but Jacob could kill MiB, or was that only because it was an accident that MiB died?), but his essence came out as Smokey. The crackling in the cloud is part of the Source light. Does some of The Source remain inside the island?

• The Island isn’t Purgatory or Hell. It is, in a sense, Eden – the Source of all life. To destroy the light is to destroy everything – it will all cease to exist. Jacob accepted that he had to keep MiB on the island in order to keep the Light from going out. MiB doesn’t even particularly care about that. He has always wanted to leave the island, to see what else is out there. He doesn’t seem to care/realize that if he were to leave the island, there would be nothing/nowhere to see. Why do I suspect that, in the end, he’s going to realize that and become the island’s protector – as he was meant to be all along?

I’m glad the show isn’t just a matter of good and evil. I suspected Team Darlton had some game-changer in their pockets, but couldn’t for the life of me figure out what that is. Once again, they’ve shown that Good and Evil aren’t simply a matter of Good and Evil. Nothing (and no one) is pure good. Nothing (and no one) is pure evil. Jacob beat the crap out of his brother more than once; MiB never raised a hand at Jacob, even to protect himself.

This is my prediction: All our candidates are going to die, but MiB will realize that he truly needs to protect the island, or else he’ll have nowhere to go anyway. And so he’ll stay. And because he can see dead people, he’ll get to hang with Jacob and their “mom” and all the others who’ve died and run around on the island. It will be a sad ending, because these people we’ve followed and traveled with for so long will be gone, but a happy ending, because the world will be saved. (Also interesting: Locke was probably the best candidate for saving the island because he believed in it so strongly, so with MiB manifesting as Locke, how will that affect things?)

Oh, and Desmond and Penny had BETTER be together, or else I’m gonna be really pissed. Not sure if I’ve mentioned that before. DO NOT KILL THEM OR KEEP THEM APART, DO YOU HEAR ME DARLTON? kthxbai.

Bookmark It

I had a sudden moment watching Lost tonight (first chance I had to sit down and watch!) that made a whole heckuva lot of things make so much more sense.

(Insert usual spoiler alert, blah blah blah.)

The cabin that Ben used to visit Jacob at wasn’t Jacob’s cabin at all. Jacob had trapped Smokey there.

Before I continue, I want to say two things:

1) Bear with me; I know that there are some inconsistencies with this, as we saw Smokey around the island anyhow in this time. But I may have the answer to that. Or, at least, a partial answer.

2) I am just not that smart sometimes. This theory is more than likely all over all the message boards and blogs already, but I haven’t been reading the lately because I really have been trying to absorb Lost myself this season. So apologies if my epiphany is a bunch of, “Really? You just recognized that?” I may very well be pathetically slow to pick up on certain things.

OK, so: Why Jacob’s Cabin was really Smokey’s Cabin, by Amy Vernon:

We know that Smokey pretended to be Christian Shepherd. That’s how he got Claire to come with him and kind of made Jack crazy, thinking he was seeing his dad.

Remember how when Ben took Locke to see Jacob in the cabin? “Jacob” was in a rocking chair, “help me,” he implored Locke. And then, the screenshots seen around the world: “Jacob” was Christian Shepherd.

So from that episode, we all assumed that Jacob was in trouble. His cabin was surrounded by ash (which we now know keeps Smokey out — or in), he begged Locke for help. I posit that Jacob had trapped Smokey in this ever-moving cabin, in hopes, maybe, that Ben wouldn’t be able to find it and be swayed by him.

See, I think that Ben THOUGHT he was visiting Jacob all that time. And all the anger he had toward Jacob was, in actuality, toward Smokey. Smokey told him to kill all the Dharma folk. That’s not Jacob’s style.

Jacob’s a pretty hands-off kind of guy. But The Others have been, for years, manipulated by Smokey, even as they thought they were serving Jacob.

But wait! you say. Didn’t Jack see “Christian” the third day on the island? Didn’t we see Smokey multiple times before the episode where Locke visited? Didn’t Eko see his brother and face down Smokey?

Didn’t Locke himself face down Smokey?

Well, remember how when Keamey killed Alex, Ben rushed to the basement of his house in New Otherton and did some weird things with heiroglyphic panels and Smokey suddenly rushed up and killed Keamey and his men?

Ben had control over Smokey through whatever that interface was. He could leave the cabin whenever directed to by that, though had to do what he was directed. He may, actually, have been directed to kill Locke, but I think Smokey saw his future self there and was unwilling to kill his future vessel.

Once Jacob’s cabin was burned down, Smokey was freed. He no longer was kept to a single spot on the island, let out only like a dog to do his master’s bidding.

And so he convinced Ben to kill Jacob by reminding him of all the things that he – Smokey, NOT Jacob – had done to Ben, had gotten Ben to do without ever caring a whit about him.

Everyone who really knew Jacob knew he lived in the statue. So why would he have ever lived in that cabin? And it does not appear by any stretch of the imagination that Jacob was ever captured by Smokey and kept prisoner.

So that’s my brilliant insomniac insanity.

As for the rest of the episode tonight, it’s very clearly building toward something big. Was the episode in and of itself better than the last couple weeks? No. But did it very deftly set the stage for the awesomeness of the coming four final episodes? Yes.

Everyone is being moved ever closer together in our flash sideways. Even Ilana’s there. Jack’s operating on Locke, who was accompanied to hte hospital by Ben. Claire is outed as Jack’s sister. Jin and Sun are together and are gonna have their baby. Miles and Sawyer captured Sayid, and it seems likely they’re gonna bring him back to the police station, where Kate is being held. Not sure where Desmond is, but he’s definitely lurking somewhere. Hurley’s gonna pop up, too.

The timelines are bleeding through even more, as Sun is extremely aware that Locke is no good. (Speaking of, the reason Sun couldn’t speak English anymore was because flash sideways Sun couldn’t.)

It was sweet to see Sun and Jin together again, but with the specter of Desmond and Penny potentially not being together for the rest of their lives, I just can’t feel the love. I’m a bit stressed out that the best couple ever in the history of television may not be together in the end.

DO YOU HEAR ME, TEAM DARLTON?

And speaking of Desmond: No way Sayid killed him. Seriously. Sayid dared Flocke to check on him because he knew Flocke couldn’t imagine that one of his zombies would actually not do what he said.

Desmond pierced Sayid through the heart when he asked what his lady love would think when she learned what Sayid did to be with her once again. And, as we know, love is powerful on this show. It’s what’s making the two timelines begin to merge. And it’s what kept Sayid from killing Desmond.

And love also is what got Claire to give up Danielle’s life and agree to put down her weapon. She realized that Kate was telling her the truth. And her love for Aaron is stronger than any hold Flocke could have over her. To know that she could raise her own baby and that Kate’s sole purpose in coming back to the island was to get her and reunite her with Aaron – the love dissolved just enough of Flocke’s hold on her.

Just in time, because Jack may or may not be under Flocke’s thrall. What I’m not certain of quite yet is whether Jack came back to the island because he is Jacob’s replacement and feels the pull of the island so strongly or because he is one of Flocke’s zombies.

Thing is, if it were as simple as that – as simple as Flocke talking to you that “captured” you, why wouldn’t Kate and Sawyer be his zombies, too?

Or is it because Claire basically died. Sayid died. Jack just died from the explosion (though he didn’t know it), and so freshly dead people Flocke can turn into his zombies, so he does?

So many questions; so few hours left to answer.

I’m so curious, though, whether you all think I’m just basically crazy or maybe onto something. Or, even, WAY late to the game.

Bookmark It

I was always pissed off that Libby was killed. I really liked her character; thought she had a lot of depth. Nevermind that Hurley so totally deserved to have some love in his life, too.

But we’ve always had hints that Libby was more important to the overall storyline than her one-season stint implied.

She was in Hurley’s looney bin, though we never knew why. And Hurley never realized she was there, either. And she (or her doppelganger) gave Desmond the boat that got him to the island – we’ve never really found out what that was about.

But Libby is an important piece of the puzzle, which should have been obvious from our Desmond-centric (PENNNAAAHHH!) episode last week.

Love is the key, sorta, somehow. And she and Hurley were, indeed, soulmates. They were in love. And her kiss brought Hurley’s memories flooding back. And made me cry. Don’t tell me it didn’t make you cry, too, because if you say you didn’t, you’re lying. Or you have no soul. Your choice.

The thing is, with love being the key to the island bleed-through, it raises an interesting conundrum: who does Kate love? And who loves Kate? And will we see Juliet again? Will she help bring back Sawyer’s memories? I’d SO prefer Juliet being the yin to Sawyer’s yang than Kate.

But if Juliet doesn’t come back, this is what I think is going to happen with the three of them: Kate and Sawyer. And Jack is going to become the new Jacob. He’s accepted his fate, we saw last night.

He’s stopped trying to fix everything, and just do the best he can. He has accepted that he can’t control everything and everyone. He even has the name – Jack/Jacob? Not a coincidence.

Sorry, so back to last night:

In our alternate reality, Libby’s in the crazy house because of our original timeline. Which really makes me wonder why she was there originally. Remember how Lance Reddick visited her there in the original timeline? Speaking of, what’s up with him? Are we going to see Abbadon again?

Desmond obviously has the manifest now, as he managed to find Hurley (poor Hurley!) at Mr. Cluck’s and convince him to pursue Libby. Hurley knew he knew her, just didn’t know how or why. Desmond can be ever-so-convincing (and dreamy!) and it didn’t take much for him to get Hurley to ask her out.

Of course, a picnic. On a beach. Then, The Kiss.

It wasn’t overly dramatic or passionate, but it was a token of love from Libby to Hurley, across time and space. All the memories of their other life came flooding back.

I want her to appear to Hurley on the island, though. I want him to have a chance to talk to her again, in the real timeline.

Speaking of, the theory that the island is purgatory certainly got a big boost last night, with Michael explaining he couldn’t leave and confirming that the whispers were of the dead who could not move on from there.

Gee, sounds like purgatory to me.

I did feel so sorry for Michael when he apologized to Hurley. He only ever did what he did so he could be with Walt. And in the end, the Island took him anyway, and took Walt from him. I am kind of bothered, however, that the mystery of Walt has sort of been cast aside. I know he grew up because, well, he was a kid and now he’s a young man in OUR real life, but this is Lost. There’s gotta be some way to explain that all away. Maybe his special powers enabled him to age in the real timeline as opposed to the island timeline.

Everything else

• I hated that Miles went with Richard. He and Hurley need to hang more. Not surprised that Ben went with him. Should get interesting.

• Didn’t care much that Ilana got blown up as she was getting a bit annoying, though I am kind of curious about her and would like to know more about her background. And I wonder if she’s really dead, or was she just blown off the island and the scene where we saw Jacob visiting a very injured Ilana in a rustic hospital somewhere was her recovering from her injuries? Hmm? C’mon, this is Lost. It’s totally possible, and you know it.

• Fascinating juxtaposition between Desmond killing Locke (I’m not 100 percent sure if Locke is dead) off-island and Flocke tossing Des down the well on-island. I didn’t get what Des was going to do until he started his car. But I knew that Flocke was gonna toss him down the well. I kept hoping I was wrong, but… However, I know, even without seeing “next week on” that Desmond’s still alive. He did what he did because he knows how things have to be. He wouldn’t have gone with Flocke to the well if he didn’t know how it was going to turn out. I truly believe that.

• Sayid totally gives me the creeps. What role does he have left to play? I wonder if we’ll see Shannon off-island and she’ll bring all the memories flooding back for him? I hope. I have always loved Sayid’s character and would be so sad to see him remain this shell of himself.

• Dr. Chang! Did you not jump out of your chair when you saw him introducing Hurley? I love all these little things they’re doing to bring back all the characters, major and minor, we’ve seen over the past several years. Of course, he’s Miles’ father, and this is the hospital where Charlotte works. I feel the tension building toward a resolution and I’m both terribly excited and terribly sad to see it all coming to an end.

• Remember, I called it: Jack becomes the new Jacob.

• By the way, why is Hugo’s nickname Hurley?

Bookmark It

Let me start off by saying that if Team Darlton does NOT end Lost with Desmond and Penny together, I will riot. I will grab a folding chair and smash it through something and encourage everyone around me to do the same.

Just sayin’.

I’ve said that from the start of this season, particularly after seeing Des on the plane next to Jack and no Penny in sight and Penny being on Flash Forward and all. But last night gave me hope that Lindelof & Cuse may have recognized that they could wrap up the show in almost any way they want, but DON’T FRAK WITH DESMOND AND PENNY.

So what more could a girl have possibly wanted than last night’s episode? I didn’t think it would be possible for this show to get better, but it did. As the Bad Robot sig came on the screen, I put my hand to my chest and said, simply, “That was SO good.”

And because this episode was about Desmond, everything began bleeding together and I don’t even have to separate the off-island and on-island action.

An interesting thing I noticed last night, though, was that although I knew – just knew – that Desmond’s boss would be Widmore, Widmore’s wife would be Eloise and their son would be Faraday, it didn’t spoil a thing for me. One of the things I’ve always loved about Lost is that I’ve been almost incapable of guessing who someone was before they showed the person. They’re just that good.

But given that it was Desmond, it made perfect sense that he’d be working for Widmore. And Eloise and Daniel were, after all, his actual wife and son, so those were not much of a stretch.

So what did we learn last night? So very much.

This off-island action is, indeed, the result of Juliet setting off the bomb. It did indeed work. In a way. The action split off from the original timeline. It exists not in place of the original timeline, but alongside it. If that were not the case, the two timelines could not bleed together as they have for Charlie, Desmond and Daniel.

And, of course, the key to the bleed-through is love. Pure, deep, beautiful. Love that transcends the bounds of time, space and parallel dimensions. Charlie will always love Claire. Desmond will always love Penny. Daniel will always love Charlotte. Perhaps Jin and Sun will see the bleed-through when Sun’s life is on the line – she was shot, remember? And who will spark the bleed-through for Kate? Sawyer or Jack?

The problem is, Charlie and Daniel are dead in the original timeline. So they’re not there to feel the bleed-through from the other side. Desmond is the only one of the three who’s still alive.

So riddle me this: How does Eloise know what’s up? And does Widmore? Being that he’s from the island (please let us get a Widmore-centric episode??????), it’s quite possible. Probable, in fact. But we only know that Eloise knows for sure. Perhaps he sent Desmond to tell her the news about Charlie specifically because he wanted Eloise to determine if he were “ready” yet to merge the two timelines?

Aha! Is that what he needs to be ready to do? To merge? Eloise said he wasn’t “ready” yet – ready for what? He’s ready back in our original timeline. I think he is so accepting of what he has to do and the potential sacrifice he needs to make because he knows that no matter what, no matter how time and reality separates them, he and Penny WILL make their way back to one another.

Penny, remember, is Desmond’s constant (another one of the best episodes ever of this show). And Desmond is Daniel’s constant, which is why Daniel sought him out. Daniel doesn’t know that Des is his constant (though that’s what I thought he was going to show Desmond in his journal), but on some level, he must.

I have to say, the episode didn’t answer any questions at all about what the island is or who Jacob and the MiB are, but it doesn’t matter. It addressed so many other things on so many levels.

The reason all our Losties are encountering one another in the alternate timeline is because, just as they were in the original, they were meant to come together. They were meant to save the world. And each other.

I still can’t help but wonder, as I always do, where fate ends and free will begins. Desmond tells Charlie, “You always have a choice.” But their actions last night seem to belie that.

Are we all thrust along a path in our lives that may meander and take different routes but still arrive at the same destination?

Remember, no matter what Charlie did in the original timeline, he was destined to die. And he did. But he did it saving others. He did it out of love.

In our alternate timeline, Charlie isn’t in danger of being killed; he just continually takes risks that would result in his being killed, in hopes of a glimpse of this other reality where the love of his life is his. He did it for love.

Bookmark It

Even though I love the star-crossed Jin and Sun, I sometimes find the Jin/Sun-centric episodes a bit lacking. A little boring, even.

But with just seven episodes (now six) left in the series, I find nothing boring. I need to study every detail, examine every motivation, and last night did not disappoint.

On-island

Finally, Jin and Sun really know the other is there. They are so near, yet so far. I really thought that Sun was going to go with Flocke, but was glad to see she didn’t. Her frantic flight through the jungle, though, left her with a concussion and the inability to speak English, shades of Season 1, hmm?

Gotta admit, though, I couldn’t figure out why no one gave her a pen and paper earlier on. That was the first thing I thought of. Yeah, I’m smart that way. Whatever.

OK, so why did Sun, who is willing to do ANYthing to find Jin, flee from Flocke? Well, she did see him stroll out of Jacob’s lair (while Real Locke was laying on the ground, you know, still dead), punch Richard in the face and carry him off.

One might be predisposed to avoiding someone after experiencing a situation.

This couple, perhaps because no one is quite sure which of them is the “candidate,” is so vital to the solution as to what this show actually is. That was never more clear than last night. Some have theorized that their daughter is actually the “Kwon” whose name is on the cave ceiling.

But she’s not there. Will she somehow show up before the season ends? Will she be what stops Flocke from leaving?

As for Jin, I found it interesting that he, too, is completely unwilling to trust Flocke to bring his wife to him. He didn’t even trust Flocke enough to take his advice and let his leg wound air out.

I didn’t realize, however, that Jin was the one who helped Dharma map out all the pockets of electromagnetic energy on the island. That was an interesting twist. And makes sense why Widmore and his crew wanted Jin. Not sure why Widmore was so upset it was done sooner rather than later. Perhaps he just wanted to take care of the MiB first?

But Jin’s background has nothing to do with geology or electromagnetic fields or any of that stuff. He’s the son of a fisherman who became the muscle for his father-in-law. What’s up with that? And why would seeing Desmond be important to him? Can Des tell him something about the future that will be a game-changer?

Off-island

To me, the significance of the off-island situation was simply this: Jin and Sun are meant to be together.

They’re not married off-island. They’re not even supposed to be dating. How Jin got a job with Mr. Paik is a mystery in this flash sideways. He got the job with Mr. Paik in the real timeline because he and Sun were in love. But how did he get in with Paik here?

Probably not important, but I want to know. And we know that Widmore and Paik had some sort of connection, as Sun went to Widmore about her dad at some point.

I can only guess that Paik sent Sun on the trip with Jin simply to prove his point: Sun will not have a relationship with anyone other than who he selects, and it sure as heck ain’t gonna be his hired muscle. So he took her money and hired Keamy to kill her lover.

Poor Keamy. Dead in any timeline. OK, he was pretty much a slimeball in both timelines, so I don’t really care. He made a great bad guy. Though he was oddly sweet to Jin, I thought, as he duct-taped him to a chair in a meat locker.

I’m thinking the baby is saved, by the way. How they’re gonna explain the gunshot wound at the hospital, though, is another story. Sun’s gonna have to ‘fess up that she speaks English, I’m thinking.

Whoa!
• Desmond was the package. Who else thought Jin & Sun’s daughter was gonna be the package. Raise of hands?
• Holla for Mikail! Love how the eye that gets shot out is the same one that he had a patch over on the island. By the by, that also is another tick in the column of “whatever happens, happens” and there ain’t a damn thing you can do about it.
• Did Flocke just tell Claire to do whatever she wanted to Kate after Kate made sure that all the boys got on board with leaving the island? Um, yeah, he did. Dayum. P.S. He also declared war on Widmore.
• I really liked Jack last night. I think his realization that he really is on this island for some greater reason, that there is a fate of some sort, has given him a peace he’s never had. He doesn’t know how he’s going to fix anything, but he knows he’s a part of how things can be fixed. Instead of forcing the fix, it will come naturally. That might sound jumbled, but read it again. I truly think that Jack has found a peace with knowing he actually is a part of the solution and accepting that he doesn’t understand what’s going on, but he will when he needs to.

Bookmark It

OK, so we’ve been waiting a loooong time for this. Tuesday night we finally found out how Richard got to the island, why he’s been ageless and what his relationship to Jacob was.

I would say we’ve learned who Jacob and the Man in Black are, but we still don’t really know that, do we?

Let’s break it down, shall we?

Richard’s background

He’s not nearly as old as I thought he was.

I had visions of Richard having been around for a thousand years. Maybe since ancient Egypt. I suppose it’s his dark eyes that look like he’s wearing eyeliner that engendered thoughts of that.

But 1867? Color me surprised. He’s only, what, 175 to 200 years old?

So Richard killed some rich guy and therefore was sold into slavery (instead of being hanged). He lost the love of his life (murder and personal loss is a huge theme in this series, no?) and had nothing to live for, though he still couldn’t let go of his life.

Somehow or another, Richard was able to see his beloved after the Black Rock was moored in the middle of the island. It actually WAS moored in the middle of the island. And it was the Black Rock landing there that caused the four-toed statue to be smashed to pieces.

Though, to be honest, I don’t really see how the Black Rock, a wooden ship, could do that, but that’s not going to hang me up. This is Lost, after all.

What I’m curious about, though, is how Richard was not a candidate. How did he end up being brought to the island, and who brought him there? Jacob obviously didn’t. So the MiB did? Did he do it because he thought he could manipulate Richard into killing Jacob?

OR, is Richard really THE candidate, but he had to find his own way to eventually become the island’s protector? Jacob didn’t seem to know him when he came to the island, but he could have been pretending, in order to let Richard come to his own conclusions. Jacob seems to be all about free will. Well, sort of all about free will. He nudges, but never forces or lures.

And were all the other “candidates” were people who needed to come to the island and do certain things to help Richard develop into a new Jacob?

OMG, imagine if that’s it? Did I just figure it out? Probably not. But it’s making you think, isn’t it?

The Black Rock

It was a slave ship, but not of the sort we expected. I do have to say, I was surprised that Alvar Hanso was killed by Smokey. How did his journal get back to the “real world”? We know that Widmore traveled between the island and the “real” world (for lack of a better way to describe it). Did he bring the journal back? And if so, how did he lose track of it?

If it wasn’t Widmore, was it Ben? If it wasn’t either, then who?

Was Hanso actually trying to find the island? It didn’t seem that way, but we know that you don’t really accidentally stumble upon it. Though if Richard was meant to come to the island, then his being on board would have been all it would have taken to find the tiny slot through which it could make its way there.

By the way, the Canary Islands are in the Atlantic, off the northwest coast of Africa. The “New World” is just across the Atlantic. So they obviously were not in the Pacific. We know the island moves across time and space. So the island, at one point, was actually in the Atlantic.

Side note: I’m not sure why Richard didn’t try to get the nail he dropped by using his feet. They weren’t chained against the wall, and could have reached out quite a bit farther than his hands or face. One of the exceptionally rare errors by Team Darlton. I love it when I catch things like that, because it makes them more human. lol.

Jacob and the MiB

As previously mentioned, the warning (and the sword) the MiB gave Richard to kill Jacob was exactly the same as Dogen gave Sayid to kill Flocke. As we know, there are no coincidences on Lost. So perhaps Dogen was actually telling Sayid the truth and that would have killed Flocke.

Despite the fact that it seems so very obvious that Jacob is protecting the rest of the world from the MiB, I’m still not totally convinced that Jacob is right. That’s mainly because this is Lost, and until the very last moment of the very last show, we’re not going to know everything.

But let’s look at what happened in this episode and take it face value for the moment.

Jacob can’t tell anyone what to do. He can’t be seen by everyone, even. What I wonder is when that occurred, when he became “invisible.” How did he come to be living in that shack instead of under his statue? The MiB obviously gained power over the years (was that because of all the people brought to the island whom he gained control over? Danielle couldn’t have been the first), driving Jacob to have to be in the shack, surrounded by the ash.

We also know that the MiB has been under the temple for a long time. That’s how he got some from Danielle’s crew. That’s where he appeared to Ben as Alex. How come he couldn’t get INTO the temple until recently? Or did he somehow infect the pool when Ben was put in it, too, but in a different way?

What was with the rock that Jacob gave the MiB? What did it symbolize?

Odds and ends
• How utterly heart-wrenching was it when Hurley was acting as mediator between Richard and Isabella? To see Richard so human after his being so so long was beautiful.
• We know that Richard basically helped lead all the Others all that time. We now know why he was never the “leader.”
• More curious than ever about where Widmore came from.
• Who are all the other Others? They’re obviously not all candidates. Were the “lists” that Ben & co. drew up when Flight 815 crashed just of people likely to do whatever The Others said? The children, obviously, Cindy seems to have adapted well to Others life, along with many others. But she’s not a candidate. So why is she still alive?
• How does the island have healing properties? Is it Jacob who has the healing properties and that’s why Locke was cured, but Ben wasn’t? (Jacob never really trusted Ben.)

Anything else? I know I’ve missed something, because I always do. Please share!

Bookmark It

Don’t pretend you didn’t notice.

I liked the twist on Sawyer, and the fact that they gave a nod to it with Sawyer saying he was either gonna become a criminal or a cop. In fact, he was pretty much the same person, just a cop instead of a con man.

His “well, hey there” to Kate when he captures her at the end (who didn’t see it coming that she was the runner?), his sheepish attempt to get Charlotte to forgive him, his anger at Charlotte learning too much – even his buddy relationship with Miles was pretty much the same as on-island.

It made me wonder, though: Was the difference in this timeline that Jacob never touched these folks at whatever point in their lives?

We’ve heard from Richard (we get his story Tuesday???? AWESOME) that Jacob’s touch is as much a curse as anything else. What if Jacob’s touch was meant to get our Losties on the road to being Losties?

What if, without his touch, their lives were extremely similar, but yet still different enough that they were no longer candidates?

That would be why their planes didn’t crash.

Yeah, it doesn’t make much sense to me, either, but, then again, what about this show ever does? I mean, except for the parts that totally make sense.

I have to say, I enjoyed seeing Charlotte again. But I’d rather have seen her in some flashback with Faraday, in love and living together. I’d like to have thought that in this alternate reality, flash sideways, whatever you want to call it, Daniel and Charlotte would have found one another and lived happily ever after.

I have to say, I’m exceedingly curious about the Widmore folks. Did they kill the rest of the plane crash survivors? I honestly can’t remember if there were other survivors other than Ilana and her crew. Sawyer wouldn’t have known, given that he didn’t crash with them.

What I still don’t understand at all is what exactly Richard Widmore is. Obviously, he’s a Jacob ally, as he was leader of The Others. But if he was supposed to be leader, why did Jacob allow Ben to run him off? Or is that the Free Will portion of Jacob? I wonder if we’re going to find out where Widmore’s from in the Richard-centric episode on Tuesday??????? I’d love to get some more background on that.

We have just eight episodes left. We’re headed toward a huge showdown, with Flocke and Widmore clashing soon.

I’m getting really excited on the one hand, melancholy on the other. And scared. Scared that not all the questions I have will be answered. I think if that were to happen, my brain just might explode. Asplode.

Bookmark It

For the first time – it felt that way, at least – Lost gave us a hint that not everything is predetermined and there just might be the chance to decide your own fate.

In fact, that’s what “Dr. Linus” was all about.

On the Island, Ben spent the hour first trying not to admit he killed Jacob, trying to weasel out of his punishment for killing Jacob and then, finally, explaining why he did. Telling the truth, for once.

And his telling the truth saved his life. Ilana knew he was speaking the truth. Knew that Ben had given his life to serve Jacob, serve the Island, sacrificing perhaps the only person he’d ever cared about for … what? For an island that Jacob, whom he’d never seen, had asked him to protect.

And Ben may actually be redeemable. He chose to stay with Ilana and the others because they’d have him, rather than going with Flocke, who gave him a gun and freed him. And told him to kill Ilana. (What’s he gonna do when he finds Ben isn’t coming to the Hydra station?)

The fact that Ben chose not to kill her, even though he knew she would kill him in a second, showed there are third acts in life.

But more importantly, in our alternate timeline, Dr. Benjamin Linus, history teacher, chose Alex’s future over his own. He had the chance to get his own fiefdom and run the school however he saw fit, but at the expense of his favorite student.

Say whatever you want about the fact that all these folks are thrust together again in non-island life – Ben, Locke, Doc Arzt, Alex, etc. – but we learned last night a very important lesson: We have control over our own destiny.

Whatever happened? Well, maybe it didn’t have to happen.

Though Ben and his dad WERE with the Dharma initiative, still. I think that’s because the timeline split with the bomb, and Ben and his dad were already on the island. Everyone was forced to leave, and that must be where Ben and his dad returned home. But obviously they had reconciled many times over, his father forgiving Ben for “killing” his mom.

Which brings us to Richard.

We now know why Richard is ageless: Jacob made him that way. He’s not technically immortal, as someone else can kill him. He just can’t kill himself. But this also explained to us how Jack managed to be saved at the last minute when he was trying to kill himself – he can’t kill himself, either.

Jacob’s touch is a gift – and a curse. Could Jin & Sun, Hurley, Sayid or Sawyer kill themselves? It would seem not, based on last night. Hurley shouldn’t have run away. Though it was funnier that way. And more suspenseful, actually.

Don’t tell me you didn’t heave a sigh of relief when Jack was proved right.

But you know the moment I liked most Tuesday night? The reunion scene. When Jack, Hurley and Richard come back to the beach and Sun delightedly runs to hug them. They’re family now, for better or worse. Even Frank (love him!) is part of the gang. Then Ben, standing alone on one end of the crowd, Richard alone on the other side. Both apart from the crowd, all alone with no Jacob left on the island.

THEN, WHAMMO! WTF? Richard Widmore, in the submarine, under the ocean. It’s like a game of Clue, but Lost-style.

This gives me great hope that we’re going to get some real answers soon. Richard’s background (obviously he was a slave on the Black Rock, thus the chains and his never having been back there all his time on the island); who Widmore REALLY is and what his purpose is.

I love this freakin’ show.

Bookmark It