Culture Fiend

Lost Redux

Spoiler: We take a look what’s new and confusing in Episode 9 of the final season.

Posted by: Laura Dannen on Mar 24, 2010 at 11:00AM 4 Comments

I can’t stop thinking about last night’s episode, “Ab Aeterno.” It was easily one of the best hours of Lost I’ve ever seen: rich, heady, emotional, with more information packed into it than an Introduction to Philosophy lecture. And it played out like a mini-feature film, with an amazing performance by Nestor Carbonell (don’t be surprised if he gets his own ABC series after this). Admittedly, I was invested in finding out about Richard’s past, but even if you’re not, how can you resist an episode full of island history? That’s what Lost is about, baby!

Mystery #1: Who is Richard? Call him Ricardos, a poor farmer working the land on the Canary Islands in 1867 (he’s not even that old!). His wife is dying, so he goes to the doctor to barter his way to some medicine. He gets in a scuffle with the doc over the meds, kills him accidentally, returns to find his wife dead anyway, is arrested and charged to hang, is told by a priest that he’s going to hell for his sins, and at the final hour, is sold into slavery instead. All in the first 15 minutes of the show.

Assumption alert: Jacob blows up a storm that shipwrecks the slave ship, the Black Rock, on the island…though he misjudges those winds and sends the ship crashing into his statue instead, leaving just a giant foot as a sanctuary (mystery solved!). Richard, one of the few left alive, is caught in between Jacob and the Man in Black. MIB welcomes him with (now-snarky) “It’s good to see you out of those chains,” hands Richard the same old sword, and gives the spiel he gives Ben and Sayid: You must kill Jacob. Jacob is bad (in this case, the devil). Don’t let him talk! Just stab him in the chest, and you’ll get your wife (life) back.

Sounds good, right? But Richard loses a fistfight with Jacob, and lets the man chatter for a while, which is when we hear…

Mystery #2: The wine bottle theory. Shaking a half-empty decanter of wine, Jacob says: The wine is Hell, a pool of evil. The island is the cork—the only thing keeping evil from leaking out. So…the island is the gateway to hell? Jacob doesn’t quite say, and I doubt we’ll find out any earlier than the final episode. Jacob also discusses his theory of humanity (like I said: heady ): that we’re all inherently good and have the power to choose right from wrong. But he does like to nudge people in the right direction, and appoints Richard his representative of nudgement, granting him eternal life (mystery solved!).

With all the smirking Jacob does in this scene, it’s hard to tell if he’s telling the truth…

Mystery #3: Is Jacob good? In my opinion, yes—because he doesn’t kill indiscriminately like the Man in Black/Smokey does. Yes, he brings people to the island (Black Rock, Dharma), and they often end up dead. Yes, he sends Others out to look for candidates—but it’s not his fault that they kill and “kidnap.” He takes a hands-off approach, trusting in their inherent good, while Smokey would rather be rid of the whole lot—nasty, corruptible bunch they are. (Though Smokey’s probably just jealous, since humans have bodies and he doesn’t.)

It’s a fuzzy area, a gray good—but it makes sense when you consider how often moral ambiguity comes up in Lost. The candidates/castaways themselves are a motley crew, but this godlike Jacob chooses them because of their faults, not in spite of them. You didn’t seen Rose on the candidate list, right? Because she isn’t a challenge, a work-in-progress. She already has faith. The rest don’t, and it’s up to Jacob to prove his point that people who walk the line between right and wrong will ultimately choose what’s right. It’s a pretty messed-up social experiment, when you think about it.

So what of hell, and Richard’s Bible open to the Gospel of St Luke (to the verse dealing with the devil’s temptation of Jesus)? Is it time to lay down the Christian theory that’s been batted around? That Jacob is God, the MIB is the devil, and the island is the Garden of Eden?

It makes a lot of sense…until I think about all the pre-Christian icons on the island. That statue. The hieroglyphics in the temples. Are they incongruities? Or signs of a different religion, one with its own agents of good and evil that also apply to this storyline? I don’t think the Lost writers will ever be so specific to call a character God, but he could very well be a representative of God, from any background.

Final thoughts:
Now that we’re at the halfway point in the final season, we’ve seen inside the temples, found out why there’s a giant foot on the island, learned who Richard is and why he doesn’t age. All that’s left is the final reveal: what is the island (exactly), who are Jacob and the MIB (exactly), and what are the fates of the Oceanic 815? Is Hurley going to be Jacob’s successor? Will Sun and Jin ever get back together? Or all they all dead already?

Plus, the sunken island at the bottom of the ocean in the Sideways world is now a scary, scary prospect.

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Tags: Television, Lost

Lost Redux

Spoiler: We take a look what’s new and confusing in Episode 8 of the final season.

Posted by: Laura Dannen on Mar 17, 2010 at 11:00AM 0 Comments

It’s a conman’s world: Josh Holloway plays James “Sawyer” Ford on Lost.

Back from my island adventure—and I’m happy to report that Maui is free of smoke monsters. Many thanks to Matt for doing such a good job dissecting last week’s episode of Lost.

Call it what you will—filler, set-up, character development—but this week’s episode, “Recon,” had a lot less to chew on than the Ben burner last week. At least they brought Sawyer back, giving him one of the best flash sideways stories to date. Sadly, I can’t say the same for his island self, where he’s stuck exchanging shy “hellos” with lame Kate like they’re high school freshmen flirting in the hallway. When will it end? Jack wants Kate, Kate wants Sawyer…unless Sawyer wants Jack, I’m bored with this love triangle. How about a new love quadrangle? Consider this…

Mystery #1: Why is Claire holding Kate’s hand? Okay, I’m kidding, but Claire does play an interesting role here. First she tackles Kate and nearly slits her throat; then the Locke-ness Monster scolds her, and Claire comes back blubbering apologies and giving big hugs. Was Claire’s attack a set-up so LNM could intervene, and convince Kate of his goodwill? Or is Crazy Claire so far gone that she’s going to be an X factor, trying to kill friend and foe for the rest of the season? I’m pretty convinced she’s LMN’s puppet for the long term, primed to do his bidding. Same goes for Sayid. And though I don’t think Kate will intentionally take sides with Locke, she’ll probably get in the way (again) and screw things up for Jack or Sawyer (again) as they go head to head with the forces of evil.

Mystery #2: Does Evil Locke have mommy issues? The Locke-ness Monster reveals a bit about his childhood (whenever that was), which featured a “crazy mother” and some sinister-sounding “growing pains.” Begs the question: How does a gaseous substance have a mom? Maybe I’m being too literal, but…WTF? Was she a witchy woman who turned him into smoke in the first place? Did Eve ever bestow superpowers on Cain or Abel? Or is the Locke-ness Monster really Aaron? Hear me out: The fortune teller told Claire several seasons ago that she had to raise Aaron on her own, and if she didn’t, he’d be in danger. Has Aaron been possessed? Have to mull this over a bit more.

Mystery #3: Would Charlotte and Sawyer make a good couple? In the flash sideways, Sawyer’s life is still defined by the death of his parents, but rather than turning to crime to cope, he becomes a cop for the LAPD who likes to be alone and watch Little House on the Prairie. I love it. It’s a little hint of his Dharma Initiative “past”—Miles is even his partner in LA. But this Sawyer doesn’t have the calming influence of Juliet, so he still lies semi-professionally, sleeps around on the job (do undercover cops actually do that?), and is incapable of being in a relationship because of his obsession with finding the real Sawyer. Even when he goes on a respectable blind date (with Charlotte!), he scares her off. He’s a loner, totally unpredictable—and capable of anything, here or on the island. Could the man who “ain’t with anybody” be the ultimate martyr this season?

Mystery #4: Are there two meanings to the episode title “Recon”? Yes. Back in the jungle, the Locke-ness Monster sends Sawyer to Hydra Island on a “reconnaissance mission”: to find the crashed Ajira plane that they—supposedly—will fix up and fly home. Right. Because LNM was an airplane mechanic in a past life? It’s another set-up—a con—but Sawyer responds by pulling his own “re-con” on LNM and the recently arrived Charles Widmore. A three-way scuffle between Jacob’s candidates, LNM and Widmore could be coming very soon…

Final thought: I think the producers slipped in a little hint for us this week. When Zoe, a Widmore crony, tells Sawyer “Thank God” (for something, I forget what), Sawyer replies, “Trust me, God’s got nothing to do with it.” Does that hold true for the entire show? Maybe this battle between faith and free will, good and evil, isn’t Biblical after all.

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Tags: Television, Lost

Lost Redux

Spoiler: We take a look what’s new and confusing in Episode 7 of the final season.

Posted by: Matthew Halverson on Mar 10, 2010 at 11:00AM 1 Comments

Poor Ben. Michael Emerson stars as Ben Linus in Lost.

Greetings, fellow Lost-o-philes. Your regular guide to WTFing through the previous night’s episode is off having her own island adventure (hopefully sans smoke monsters and khaki coveralls), so I’m filling in. Don’t worry, kids — we’ll get through this together.

I hate Ben. I don’t hate him for killing Locke or trying to kill Penny or forcing Sawyer to eat fish biscuits in a cage. I hate him for making me care. Despite all of his conniving and duplicity, as that bug-eyed bastard in the high-collared Banana Republic dress shirt dug his own sandy grave last night, just a diamond’s throw from dearly departed Nikki’s and Paolo’s plots, I couldn’t help but get a little misty about his seemingly inevitable execution at the hands of Illana. After all, as we learned in “Dr. Linus,” his only crime was that he just cared too much.

Mystery #1: How did flash-sideways Alex get to LA? At this point, you’ve either accepted the coincidental connections in the castaways’ flash-sideways world or you haven’t, so the fact that Rousseau’s daughter is a student in Ben’s modern European history class was either a dope surprise or an eye-roller. But whatever you thought about the development, it gave Mr. Linus — I mean, Dr. Linus — an opportunity for off-island redemption. The irrepressible schemer hatched a Machiavellian masterplan to depose Principal Reynolds and steal his job, only to find that the nurse-shtupping administrator could assure acceptance to Yale for hard-working Alex, so following through with the coup would sink her higher education dreams. Foiled! (Also lost in the failed power play: a choice parking spot for grumbly science teacher – and Ben co-conspirator – Dr. Arzt. But hey, big guy, at least in this life you didn’t explode and end up all over Hurley’s shirt.) Ben, it turns out, does have a heart. And while his island iteration put power before Alex, his sweater vest-wearing alternate version sacrificed a promotion for her future. Island Ben is another story, though: He laid out his “I watched my daughter die” sob story to Illana, who welled up and spared him — just minutes after FLocke promised to hand him the island. He may have rejoined Illana’s crew and offered Sun some help in rehabbing her seaside shack, but do we really think he’s not going to take Sir Smokey up on that offer?

Mystery #2: Is Jack invincible? The man of science has completed his transition to man of faith. When Richard begged Jack for help in shuffling off his immortal coil, Doc Shephard was happy to light the fuse on an unstable stick of dynamite and stick around to watch it burn — because he believed Jacob had chosen him for a higher calling and won’t let him die. And he didn’t! He has a purpose. And every week, it seems more and more that that purpose is a steel-cage death match with FLocke to decide the island’s fate. (Bonus question: When Richard groused that Jacob’s touch is curse disguised as a gift, was that just sour grapes, or might Jack be in for a faith-rattling letdown? Discuss.)

Mystery #3: Where the hell is Sawyer? Flocke continues to amass his army of anti-island misfit toys for…whatever it is he’s planning, but we’ve seen neither hide nor scruffy beard hair of his first recruit since “The Substitute.” Is Sawyer still in the cave, whipping up some boar stew for Flocke’s return? Or is he off hatching a plan of his own? (Once a con man, always a con man, I say.)

Final thought: The answers are — finally — really starting to flow. Which is good, because I can stop throwing things at the TV in disgust. But just as the climactic clash between roll-reversed FLocke and Jack is ramping up, Charles Freaking Widmore has to show up in his sub. (A cool development, for sure, but how cheesy — in a Scooby-Doo-villain sort of way — was the periscope popping up out of the water?) Is the battle royale for island supremacy about to become a three-way?

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Tags: Television, Lost

Lost Redux

Spoiler: We take a look what’s new and confusing in Episode 6 of the final season.

Posted by: Laura Dannen on Mar 03, 2010 at 11:00AM 2 Comments

Naveen Andrews plays Sayid, the man “full of darkness.” Photo courtesy ABC/Touchstone TV.

Is anyone else devastated by Sayid’s Los Angeles-Alternate Reality story line in Tuesday’s episode, “Sundown”? The poor guy loses love-of-his-life Nadia in past/alternate lives, and here, she’s married to his brother. Sayid claims it was his decision—he can’t have her because “he doesn’t deserve her”—but he also “claims” his job is to translate oil contracts in Australia. And Toronto. Where everyone speaks English. Who is he translating for?! Dodgy. Lots of questions left to answer in this all-Sayid episode, starting with…

Mystery #1: Why is Sayid alive? Turns out it wasn’t the temple pool that ultimately brought Sayid back to life. According to Miles, Sayid was dead for two hours before popping back up. So who—or what—reincarnated him? Um, we still don’t know. We do know that he’s “full of darkness,” according to Dogen’s machine that can read good and evil…. I mean, really? I can buy that the island moves through time and there’s a lighthouse mirror for spying on people, but I draw the line at a busted old machine that sniffs out evil. What, is it a bile-odomoter? Sugar-and-spice meter? It’s ridiculous. Anyway…Dogen tries to kill Sayid, stops short because a baseball rolls off a table and reminds him to be good (more on that in a second), and banishes Sayid to the jungle instead, where he runs into the Locke-ness Monster. LNM gives Sayid an offer he can’t refuse—roughly, “Deliver a message for me, and I’ll bring Nadia back from the dead”—which sets up a nail-biter of a final scene where Smokey invades the temple and destroys everyone in his wake. This is the stuff of classic Lost, when each episode seemed to end with a terrifying reveal. Remember the close of season two’s “Two for the Road,” when Michael kills Ana Lucia and Libby without warning? This was right up there.

Mystery #2: Who is Dogen? It’s hard to tell how long Dogen (aka the Japanese guy) has been ruling the island temple, but we do glean some insight at the end of “Sundown”—right before Sayid kills off the character entirely. Dogen tells an incredibly sad story about how he used to be a businessman who occasionally got hammered with colleagues. One night he drank too much and drove home to pick up his son at baseball. There was an accident—he survived, his son did not. Jacob came to Dogen and told him he could save his son, as long as Dogen agreed to leave his family and work for him. Dogen assents and becomes guardian of the temple—and, apparently, the only other person who could keep the Locke-ness Monster at bay. I think it says something about Jacob seeking candidates/Others who are broken…or meek and “poor of spirit” (Locke). He wants them to inherit his island, and keep “evil incarnate” (as Dogen calls it) away. It smells more and more like a Biblical showdown every day, but I know people who say the struggle is pre-Christian. Any ideas?

Mystery #3: Claire vs. Kate. Kate and Claire have their long-awaited reunion, though the circumstances aren’t great. The temple Others are holding Claire captive at the bottom of a hole. In the two minutes Kate’s allowed to talk to Claire, she says this (paraphrased): “Yes Claire, I took your son. And I raised him. And he’s beautiful.” How creepy does she sound?! No wonder Claire wants to kill her! Instead of saying, “Claire, you disappeared for a long time and we didn’t want Aaron to die in the jungle, so we took care of him for a little while,” Kate sets herself up to sound like a kidnapper. It’s a beautiful bit of writing by the Lost team. Can’t wait to see how this plays out.

Final thought: This episode was thrilling and infuriating—all the things I love about Lost. And if there was ever a sure-fire way to get people to tune in next week, it’s to allude to Ben’s impending demise. Who do you think will stay alive over the next few weeks? And will Sun and Jin ever be at the same place at the same time? Sigh.

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Tags: Television, Lost

Lost Redux

Spoiler: We take a look what’s new and confusing in Episode 5 of the final season.

Posted by: Laura Dannen on Feb 24, 2010 at 09:00AM 1 Comments

Snore. Another “Jack has daddy issues” episode—though there is a nice twist on the old plotline in this week’s “The Lighthouse.” Let’s get right to it.

Mystery #1: Jack’s inferiority complex. Okay, not so much a mystery: We all know that Jack’s dad Christian Shephard browbeat Jack into thinking he wasn’t “good enough” at anything (a phrase that will haunt the doc throughout the episode). But now, we see the ramifications of that in Alternate Reality Los Angeles, where Jack transfers his problems to his teenage son. This poor boy is so scared of failing, he won’t tell Jack he has a piano audition at a big-time music academy. Instead, he sneaks off on his bike, in the dark, without leaving a note. (Insert fist shaking here. I don’t even have kids and that made me mad.)

So how does this help answer any of the show’s lingering questions? It doesn’t. But as we’ve seen so far, these Alternate Reality stories focus more on character building than big reveals; plus, it furthers the discussion of destiny versus free will, etc etc. And I’m sure the AR will matter more in the second half of the season, as we’re trying to decide whether Jacob manipulated the Oceanic 815, aka “his candidates,” all their lives, or if he just gave them a nudge in the right direction. Unfortunately, that leaves us with about half an hour each week to figure things out.

Mystery # 2: What has Claire been doing for three years? Island Claire has actual lines this episode, yay! For three years, she’s lived by herself in the jungle in a creepy Carrie-style shelter where she keeps explosives, rusty medical equipment, and a fake baby fashioned from a dead animal. Nice. She thinks the Others have taken her son Aaron, so she’s on a crusade to kill, maim, and torture as many of them as possible until she “find’s my baby!” Goodbye Claire, hello Rousseau. (“Clouseau?” I like it.) She also did time in the temple, where they tortured her to find out if she was “infected,” a la Sayid. This island is such a happy place… Oh! Almost forgot: Jin’s under Claire’s watch and hints that Kate, not the Others, took her baby. Claire thinks he’s lying, but calmly says that if Kate did take Aaron, she’d have to kill her. Meanwhile, Kate’s on a mission to find Claire and tell her she took Aaron. Uh oh.

Mystery #3: The lighthouse. At the end of last week’s episode, we find out Jacob has designated a handful of the Oceanic 815 gang as “candidates” to protect the island, and attached numbers to their names. I claimed it was an ordered list—close, but not quite. See, Jacob hung out in the island’s lighthouse (which, of course, we’ve never seen before), where he essentially spied on (manipulated?) his candidates through a mirror. The candidates’ names were written next to each degree of a sundial—next up, [Hurley] Reyes, 8—and Jacob would turn the dial to the number/candidate he wanted to see. Call it a looking glass, crystal ball, whatever. It’s weird. And it bothers Jack. Hurley, who’s chatting with dead Jacob, leads Jack to the lighthouse on Jacob’s orders. Jack sees his name and his childhood home in the mirror, realizes Jacob’s been messing with his free will, and smashes the mirror in a very petulant, childlike freakout. Great, Jack. Now it’ll take us even longer to figure out what’s going on. If Jacob really has big plans for Jack, I hope it extends beyond “leading people” on and off the island, because right now, he’s about as authoritative as Locke, season 1. Kate had the right idea going after Sawyer. Oooh I said it.

Final thoughts…

Jacob’s still dead, presumably, but Hurley can communicate with him; is Hurley the next top candidate? And when Jacob says “someone is coming,” I really hope he means someone other than the Locke-ness Monster, because that’s not surprising at all. Maybe Desmond? What do you think?

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Tags: Television, Lost

Lost Redux

Spoiler: We take a look what’s new and confusing in Episode 4 of the final season.

Posted by: Laura Dannen on Feb 17, 2010 at 01:00PM 1 Comments

Poor Locke. Photo courtesy Mario Perez.

Now we’re getting somewhere! This week’s episode, “The Substitute,” was easily the most satisfying of the season…so far. They hint at what the numbers mean and what “candidates” are, and we also catch a glimpse of either Jacob’s or the Locke-ness Monster’s (new nickname alert!) secret island cave—a very Harry Potter/Voldemort moment. By the way, I’m refraining from making Lost-related Plato/Allegory of the Cave analogies; I showed up late to that class in college and any speculation would do us more harm than good.

Know what never hurts? An all-Locke episode. I could watch Terry O’Quinn shift between sad Locke and bad Locke all day (it’s all in the eyes). This week’s Alternate Reality shows a Locke in love—still in a wheelchair, but with Helen at his side. More on that in a bit.

Mystery #1: Why is the Smoke Monster running around as John Locke? Or should I say, zooming around. The show opens with a series of shots from the point of view of the Smoke Monster—which was, um, awesome. If the people at Disney doesn’t take that idea and make it a new theme park flight simulator, they’re crazy. Once Smokey takes the Locke-ness Monster form again, he stops for a little chat with Richard, whom he’s sentenced to hang in a bag in the trees for a few days. Richard, quite understandably, is annoyed. He wants answers. “Why do you look like John Locke?” he asks. “Because I knew he’d get me access to Jacob. He was a candidate— was a candidate.” Ouch. Don’t forget: Poor past-tense Locke is lying dead on the beach, doomed to a hereafter as an avatar for evil black smoke (not sure if that’s what Locke had in mind when he talked about having a purpose). At least he gets a proper burial in this episode, with Ben delivering the line of the night during the eulogy: “He was a better man than I’ll ever be, and I’m sorry I murdered him.” Classic.

Which brings us to…

Mystery #2: What the hell is a candidate? If you believe what the Locke-ness Monster tells Sawyer as he lures him into the aforementioned secret island cave, Jacob was in the market for an island protector, and he maintained a list of “candidates” who might be worthy. But Locke wasn’t the only Oceanic 815 survivor in consideration. Also on the list, which we see scrawled on the ceiling of the cave: 4—Locke; 8—[Hurley] Reyes; 15—[James “Sawyer”] Ford; 16—[Sayid] Jarrah; 32—[Jack] Shephard; 42—[Sun? Jin?] Kwon. AHHH. The numbers! "Jacob had a thing for numbers,” the Locke-ness Monster says dryly. Right. I’m betting good money this is an ordered list; after all, wasn’t Locke the top candidate? The only one we ever heard about? There are lots of other names up there, all crossed off (because they died?) but Kate’s is nowhere to be seen. What does that mean? And which Kwon is a candidate? Meanwhile, why are these humans with serious character flaws—one’s a torturer, one’s a con man—in line for island bodyguard? And how did the numbers end up on Hurley’s lotto ticket, and on the hatch? Does any of this matter now that Jacob’s dead? Or is he…

Mystery #3: The weird little blond boy with bloody hands. The disappearing-reappearing boy speaks just once: “You know the rules: You can’t kill him.” My theory is that the boy is Jacob reincarnated, though he also bears a striking resemblance to a young Sawyer. What I love is how much this boy spooks the seemingly fearless Locke-ness Monster, even prompting him to shout a Locke catch phrase: “Don’t tell me what I can’t do!” Seems like there’s a bit of Locke left in the Monster—I’m hoping it alludes to future crossover between the Alternate Reality and the island reality.

A few random thoughts…

—What a great new storyline they created for Alternate Reality Locke. It’s a bit of redemption after that whole “murdered by Ben” thing. So what if Locke was unceremoniously canned from a soul-sucking job by his prick of a boss? He has the love of a woman, a dad who presumably didn’t try to kill him, and now, a better job as a substitute teacher—at the same high school that Ben Linus works at. Ha! As an aside, does anyone else find it funny that Ben teaches European history? He even looks a little like Napoleon.

—Why does Sawyer get hotter as he gets grimier? Even when he’s sitting around in his dirt-covered tank and boxers getting drunk on whiskey, he still looks like he had time to whiten his teeth. They’re beautiful.

—Sawyer might be lost (ahh pun) and despondent without Juliet, but I still don’t think he’s dumb enough to side with the Locke-ness Monster. The dude’s pulling a con, and I can’t wait to see where this goes.

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Tags: Television, Lost

Lost Redux

Spoiler: We take a look what’s new and confusing in Episode 3 of the final season.

Posted by: Laura Dannen on Feb 10, 2010 at 09:00AM 2 Comments

Emilie de Ravin as Claire in Lost.

(In case you’re already confused by my post, the season premiere was a two-parter, episodes 1 and 2.)

Was anyone else excited to see Claire stick around for more than one scene last night? Poor Emilie de Ravin has been on stand-by for the last two seasons after the writers sent her character into the jungle on a never-ending walkabout. She’s made appearances, to be sure, but always fleeting; was she a ghost? The walking dead? Alive and stoned out of her mind on jungle grass? Or none of the above.

Mystery #1: Claire. In the final few minutes of the episode, we find out from Dogen, the Japanese leader of the temple-bound Others, that Claire has been “claimed.” Infected, diseased, possessed. Remember when Rousseau’s team was taken by the smoke monster, and she had to kill them because they were “infected”? Same thing. According to Dogen, being “claimed” means “a darkness grows inside”—or that they’ve crossed over to the dark side, the smoke monster/Evil John Locke’s side. Here’s what’s stumping me: Can the smoke monster “claim” the living? Or can it only claim people who’ve died, infect them, and make them part of its army? For now, I’m assuming the latter.

I love that when Claire does appear, she looks just like Rousseau: disheveled hair, a crazed look in her eye, wearing flannel? And toting a shotgun. Too perfect. And a bit creepy.

Mystery #2: Sayid. Speaking of claimed…looks like newly resurrected Sayid has also been “claimed”—but the Others had to torture him, just to be sure. Torturing the torturer. But they never ask him any questions, just gauge his responses. Of course, he reacts like any normal person being burnt by a hot iron—but the real Sayid isn’t normal. He’s a murderer. He expected punishment in the afterlife; wouldn’t he be more reticent here? I’m thinking the Others would agree. Hence, he’s now a baddie.

Mystery #3: Alternate Reality. This episode’s story line focuses on Kate and Claire, and in a really nice touch, Claire goes into labor and Kate’s by her side to help—just like on the island. Gotta love destiny. I wonder how many island events will transpire in Los Angeles: Will Jack fix Locke’s back and get him to walk? Will Jin and Sun still have a baby? Will Juliet appear like Ethan does in the hospital room???

Stay tuned.

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Tags: Television, Lost

Lost Redux

Spoiler: We take a look at what’s new and confusing in Episode 1 of the final season.

Posted by: Laura Dannen on Feb 03, 2010 at 10:00AM 3 Comments

Oh man. Pandora’s box is wide open in the sixth and final season of Lost. We’re only one episode in, and we already have people coming back from the dead, an alternate reality, and six new questions for every one answered. I love it in a sick, sick way. Here’s what we learned in Episode 1: “LAX”:

Mystery #1: After the white flash: Juliet detonates an atom bomb to end season five, hoping to send everyone from Oceanic 815 back in time to before the plane crash. That’s the plan at least—keep in mind she’s also about to nuke the whole island. There’s the white flash and… they’re back on the plane bound for LAX. It worked! Everyone’s accounted for: Jack, Sawyer, Kate in handcuffs, Locke in a wheelchair, Bernard, Rose, Jin, Sun, Hurley, Sayid, that stewardess, even Boone and Charlie. And Desmond. … Yeaaaah. Desmond’s on the plane, which means he never shipwrecked on the island, and Shannon is still in Australia. Looks like we’re moving on from flash forwards and time travel to an alternate reality storyline—which, admittedly, could be fun to watch play out, especially if destiny ends up dragging them all back to the island anyway. For now, we just get reinforcement that life ain’t that great back in the States.

In Reality No 2, post white flash, we find Kate hanging from a tree on the island (introduced by a nice “eye” shot a la season 1) circa 2007. Jack, Sawyer, Hurley, a mortally wounded Sayid, Jin, and Miles were also transported to 2007. The plan doesn’t work, Sayid’s a mess, and Juliet is … alive? For a few more minutes at least, long enough to share a tearful goodbye with Sawyer and whisper, “I have something very, very important to say,” then die before she can say it. Classic. I wish Juliet would stick around, if only to avoid the inevitable love triangle between Jack, Kate, and Sawyer, but it looks like she’s starring in the new ABC show V instead. Good for her, bad for us.

Thankfully, we do find out what she wanted to say, courtesy of Miles (remember, he hears dead people). The line? “It worked.” So…if it worked, then they’re back on the plane….but how does Juliet know? Is she in a different reality altogether? That’s when my head started to hurt.

Mystery #2: Locke: Turns out Locke 2.0—aka the Man in Black, aka Jacob’s nemesis—is actually the smoke monster. And while he’s killing people left and right, he’s doing it in a bid to “go home,” he tells Ben.

Home, as far as I can tell, is the island temple, which we finally get a glimpse of. It’s inhabited by Others in Partridge Family costumes, including the flight attendant from Oceanic 815 and the two kidnapped children. Home décor is minimal: They have a random punching bag in the courtyard, and a healing pool (baptismal font?) that likely cured young Ben of his gunshot wounds back in the ’70s. Hurley speaks to dead Jacob (remember, Hurley can see dead people) and is told to bring Sayid to the temple to be healed. The pool doesn’t seem to be working (out of order?), and Sayid dies. Or does he? In the last minute of the show, he pops back up, good as new. WHAT. I wonder if he’s going to be better, worse, or possessed by Jack’s dad, Christian Shephard, in the next episode. You never can tell.

Final thoughts: It’s aggravating that there are so many new questions to answer, but I have faith in the writers. It’s like they’re writing a novel now rather than a serial—it has to have a beginning, middle, and end, and with luck, it might actually make sense. As for the end, the producers keep talking about the battle of good versus evil, and I can’t shake the idea that this struggle is biblical. So many religious references anyway (Christian Shephard??). But for now, I just like watching Terry O’Quinn master his sinister glare.

What do you think?

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Tags: Television, Lost

Nerd Alert!

Final season of Lost premieres tonight, and I’m freakin’ excited.

Posted by: Laura Dannen on Feb 02, 2010 at 10:00AM 0 Comments

Where are all the Lost viewing parties in Seattle? Seriously, this is driving me nuts. I’ve been looking. Our interns have been looking. You’d think there’d be a gathering somewhere of crazed fans wearing WWJLD shirts and drinking beer with fake Dharma Initiative labels, but to the best of my knowledge, nothing. Sigh. Prove me wrong—where are you?

Still, it won’t stop me from watching, and blogging, as the final season kicks off. It’s a bittersweet moment, like cracking open the seventh Harry Potter book or watching the last episode of The Sopranos. You don’t want Lost to end, but you know it should; otherwise the writers might work dinosaurs and aliens into the script. But before it does, we sure as hell better find out where Claire is. And who the Man in Black is. And whether the producers have been lying about the castaways being in purgatory, because then I can feel vindicated.

Before the two-hour premiere airs tonight at 9, here’s a clip of Entertainment Weekly’s senior writer Jeff Jensen interviewing Lost’s executive producers Carlton Cuse, Eddy Kitsis and Adam Horowitz at last year’s Bumbershoot. (Not much to look at, so this is for your listening pleasure.)

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Tags: Television, Lost