Sorry it’s taken me so long to make this week’s LOST post. It’s funny how little things like work and family leave so little time for blogging, eh? Anyway, last night we were treated to “Namaste”, a transitional episode that gets our players in place for the home stretch of Season Five. I know you can’t judge a season until you’ve viewed it in its entirety (Exhibit A: Season Three), but it is very difficult to not judge this season in light of the stellar Season Four. I’m still diggin’ it, but all the time-travel stuff has changed things for me. It’s getting hard to remember how it all fits together sometimes. Anyway, more to say about that at season’s end.

On to “Namaste”:

• This episode confirms what I beleived to be true for the past few weeks: the survivors of Ajira 316 are in the “present”, circa 2007. Remember in Season Three when Kate and Sawyer had been captured by the Others and they’re told they’re breaking up rocks in order to make a runway? Now we know that was the truth. I suppose the runway could’ve been built in anticipation of something else, but personally, I have a feeling Ben had some sort of prior knowledge of the Ajira crash. Knowing he would be on the plane in the future, he commissions the construction of a runway to save his hide. That Benjamin Linus is a sneaky one, let me tell ya.
• Is it just me or does Ilana (the law enforcement agent who had Sayid in her custody) remind anyone of Ana Lucia? Not sure there’s anything to that, but I had to register that here. I might be on to something. Doc Jensen at EW says she muttered the name “Sarah” when she woke up during the turbulence. If that’s true, what does that mean?
• Josh Holloway is a great actor. He completely sold the reunion shot with the Oceanic Three (Jack, Kate, Hurley). But Sawyer also quickly moved to save his old pals by getting them Dharma-ized. Anybody else think Sawyer had something to do with Jack being assigned janitorial duty? That made me laugh. There’s a part of me that thinks Sawyer is secretly hating the fact that his old friends have returned. His Dharma life with Juliet was better than anything he’d ever known; now Jack, Kate, Hurley, and Sayid have jeopardized that. I think it’s all going to come crashing down on him very soon. And I hate that, because I rather like this new Sawyer.
• One thing that bugged me: the dialogue between Sawyer and his pals re: the time travel. After referring to Hurley as “Kong”, Sawyer drops the bomb: the year is 1977. And Jack and Kate and Hurley are like, “Oh, OK. That’s weird.” I guess the writers were trying to get us to a certain point in the narrative, but we labored through so many episodes early on this season where Sawyer and Juliet and the crew are trying to wrap their brains around this time travel stuff. And now the Oceanic Sixers are just supposed to roll with it? I don’t know, seemed kinda lame to me. But I digress.
• I’m guessing Sawyer’s reference to Farraday (“He’s not here…anymore.”) is a tease about an upcoming episode. My guess is that Farraday somehow hooked up with Richard Alpert and the Hostiles / Others. You’ll remember from the opening sequence of Season Five that Farraday eventually infiltrates The Orchid. I’m guessing his M.O. will be to turn the donkey wheel again, perhaps in an effort to go “back” to the present (or prior to his time on the Island) in order to save Charlotte. The real question: over the course of the past 3 years on the Island, has Farraday finally decided to take off that ridiculous tie?
• Did you catch Ben’s comment to Lapidus before Sun capsized him with the raft oar? When Lapidus says he doesn’t want to leave his people, Ben says something like, “Well, I have people I have to take care of, too.” Who is he talking about? The Others? The Oceanic Six? Is he lying? As always, you can take anything he says a hundred different ways. Is there another character in this series (or on network television, for that matter) who requires as much interpretation as Ben?
• Speaking of Ben, I LOVE the creepy young Ben at the end of the episode. Hope we see more of that kid. His eyes look just like Michael Emerson’s.
• In the scene where Sun was talking to Christian in the cabin, a blonde haired individual can be seen standing behind Sun. Any idea who this is? Claire? Garth from Wayne’s World?

The next two bullets are, in my opinion, the most important pieces of information to come from this episode. These two items get at the heart of Season Five and all this time travel stuff. I think this season hinges on two key questions: Can you change the past? If so, does that mean you can change the future? Two pieces of information for us to discuss:

• Amy & Horace’s baby is Ethan. Interesting. There has been significant debate as to whether or not Sawyer and Juliet were “supposed” to save Amy from the Hostiles. If they hadn’t come upon them, it’s safe to assume that Amy would’ve died and her child would never have been born. But in the Island’s timeline that we’re familiar with, of course we know that Ethan plays a major role. It seems that Sawyer and Juliet didn’t change the past at all; in fact, they were simply playing the roles “fate” or the Island had predetermined for them (or something like that). When Sawyer approaches the Hostiles in “LaFleur”, one of them fires at him but misses. It could be that the Hostile has lousy aim; but it could also be that the Island won’t let Sawyer die because of the role Sawyer must play. Remember, we’ve seen this sort of thing before (when Michael kept trying to kill himself or when Jack was going to commit suicide by jumping off the bridge in the Season Three finale). In this regard, the Island is some sort of grand puppeteer and our castaways are simply players in the Island’s drama. (If that’s true, isn’t it interesting that Radzinsky was watching 1977 episodes of the Muppet Show over at the Flame? Perhpas that’s a significant nod to the fact that the Island is indeed some sort of puppet master?) As for why Ethan doesn’t have the last name “Goodspeed” (we’ve always known him as “Ethan Rom”), I have no idea. I do think it’s interesting that Ethan was one of the individuals who accompanied Richard Alpert when he recruited Juliet; in essence, he recruited the woman who gave birth to him. It would seem that Sawyer and Juliet didn’t change the past / future at all. In Farraday’s cryptic words, “Whatever happened, happened.”
• I’m still curious as to why Sun didn’t make the jump back in time. As she and Lapidus dock the boat, they see / hear Smokey. As they enter the Barracks area, you could hear the whispers and then we see Christian again. But that’s where things got really interesting, because the Barracks don’t look anything like they did when we last saw them. You’ll remember last season when Keamy and his crew had Ben baracaded in his home and Alex was murdered. That prompted Ben to “call” Smokey, who proceeded to unleash his smoldery wrath upon them. But in that time frame (late 2004), the Barracks had been Other-ized. That is, there were no Dharma Initative logos on the doors, no building labled “Processing Center”, certainly no dusty old pictures of Dharma recruits hanging on the wall. This means that either a) between 2004 and 2007, someone has reconstituted the Dharma Initative on the Island and it has subsequently been wiped out (again), thus the Barracks are left in the disheveled state we see; or b) the “past” (which Jack, Kate, Sawyer, Hurley, Sayid, etc are all living in) has in fact been changed to the degree that the Barracks were never populated by the Others. Despite the evidence we’ve seen so far, I’m of the opinion that the past can be changed and the future can be altered. (And I think Farraday will make an about-face on this issue, too; that’s why I think he’s infiltrating Dharma). I’m thinking somebody (Sayid, as the previews would seem to indicate) is going to spill the beans to the Dharma folk that a purge is coming. That will set off a chain of events that will ultimately keep Dharma in power. That is, until the Island chooses to “course correct” and the Dharma peeps are wiped out some other way. Maybe Widmore is responsible. Maybe Ben and Richard simply purge them later. Maybe resurrected Locke walks on water from the Hydra Island and blows up the “new” Dharma stations like he did with the Swan. And the Flame. And the sub. I’m sure there’s plenty of dynamite left in the Black Rock. All of this to say, the debate is still ongoing, at least in my mind, as to whether or not “past events” can be changed, thus leading to an alternative future. Time will tell if this is true or not.