already & not yet

With 2 hours to rehash, we’ll get right to it: our last LOST recap of 2009. (tear wells up in corner of eye)

The opening sequence was worth the price of admission for me. We finally got to see Jacob; we discovered what the rest of the statue looked like (a crocodile head? Taweret?); we see what I believe to be the arrival of the Black Rock to the Island circa 1845 (I’m willing to bet our boy Richard Alpert is on board); and I believe we were introduced to the ultimate villain in the show, the man in black, Jacob’s Adversary. The dialogue between Jacob and Adversary hearkened back to the pilot episode. Remember when Locke was teaching Walt how to play backgammon? “Two sides. One light, one dark.” Now we see these two beings, two forces, pitted against one another with the Island as the playing ground in some sort of cosmic game of destiny vs. free will. Once again, this is why I love this show.

From Doc Jensen’s column (bold emphasis mine):

“The dialogue between these two rivals dripped with tension and subtext. Nameless accused Jacob of bringing the boat to the Island. Jacob didn’t deny it. The man in black sighed deeply and oozed a deeply cynical perspective on the drama that the ship was about to trigger on the Island:

NAMELESS: You’re trying to prove me wrong.
JACOB: You are wrong.
NAMELESS: They come, they fight, they destroy, they corrupt. It always ends the same.
JACOB: It can only end once. Everything before that is progress.

That exchange blew my mind. The conversational shorthand between these two familiars made for much interpretive obliqueness. Nameless seemed to see history — or at least, history on the Island — as an endless cycle of darkness and despair. You also got the sense he was weary of playing whatever role it is he plays in this drama. Jacob, on the other hand, seemed to see history/just Island history as a forward moving saga marked by incremental progress. These castaway dramas he stages on the Island are building upon each other and leading toward something that he desires very, very much. Nameless, on the other hand, expressed homicidal contempt for Jacob and his ambitions. ”Do you have any idea how much I want to kill you?” The line reading chilled me to the bone. So did Jacob’s response: ”Yes.”

I think I agree. It seems that Jacob’s whole thing has been to bring people to the Island. This is implied in the opening exchange when the Adversary says he doesn’t need to ask how the Black Rock came to the Island. “You brought them here,” he scowls. And the flashbacks give us insight into how Jacob has been at work to shape the destiny of these characters. Did you notice how he touched each character? Go back and watch it, but the common denominator is that each of our flashbacks (excepting Juliet, who wasn’t on Oceanic 815 anyway) depict Jacob interacting with, and physically touching, each of our castaways. With that touch, it seems that Jacob was exerting his own magnetism, drawing these individuals to a shared destiny on the Island. And I’m pretty sure we even witnessed Jacob resurrecting John Locke immediately following his eight story fall. Awesome.

As for why Adversary wants to kill Jacob, I suspect they’re simply playing out the age old metaphorical roles of God and Satan. But it seems that something is keeping Adversary from slaying Jacob himself. He has to find a “loophole”, a proxy, someone willing to commit the crime for him. By playing on Ben’s insecurities, Adversary accomplishes exactly what he wanted to do.

Nameless Adversary of Jacob = The Monster. Put it down now. The Monster “judged” Ben, convincing him (via an appearance of Alex) that he had to do anything Locke told him to do. But what Smokey / Alex didn’t tell Ben was that Locke wasn’t really Locke. Instead, Locke 2.0 is really Nameless Adversary of Jacob.

What lies in the shadow of the statue? Jacob’s crib, apparently. When asked this cryptic question, Richard Alpert responds in Latin. Translated, he said “He who will save us all” or “He who will protect us.” I think this is another obvious reference to Jacob as some sort of benevolent being. His death should spell very bad things for Season 6.

Rose and Bernard! And Vincent! Finally! Glad to know they’re alive. I still think they’re the best candidates for Adam and Eve, at least to date.

As for that ending, as cool as it was, I was a bit upset. The whole season has hinged on the question of whether you can or cannot change the past to alter the future. With Juliet detonating the bomb and the screen going to white (a nice touch, I thought), we finally witnessed the much discussed incident, but where’s the payoff? After a season of trippy time-traveling and questions at the meta-level, I guess I expected at least some hint of resolution to our season long question. But the producers warned us to expect a reaction similar to the one we experienced at the end of Season 1, where we waited with bated breath to see what exactly was down in the bottom of that hatch only to find…Boom. LOST. So, the debate rages: Did the castaways change the course of history or not? I’m inclined to say yes, but I’d like some empirical proof to back that claim up. Call me a man of science, I guess.

Best moment of the episode: Juliet’s tearful goodbye to Sawyer. I mean, how could that not top the list. But an equally cool moment for me was Miles leaping into action to save his father, Dr. Chang. Did you catch that heartfelt, “Dad!” that Miles belted out as he raced to save the good doctor? Too bad he’ll have to go all Montand from this point forward. But hey, it beats being dead, right?

Worst moment? Jack’s lame-o line of reasoning for blowing up the Island and resetting the giant timeline in the sky. What? Because your relationship with Kate is in the crapper? Come on, man! Given all we’ve seen this year, I refuse to think this is Jack’s sole motivation. Last episode, he seemed concerned about all the castaways they’d lost and the prospect of resurrecting them in a non-Island timeline seemed heroic to me. Why not go with that as Jack’s motivation? To his credit, Sawyer was asking him what he wanted most, to which he answered, more or less, “Kate”. Will the two of them end up together? The more I think about it, I think yes.

So….if Locke 2.0 really isn’t Locke but rather he’s Alterna-Locke, the bodily host to the spirit of Nameless Adversary Guy, then why did he need Richard Alpert to lead him to Jacob? That whole thing made sense if Locke was really Locke. But are we to believe that Nameless Adversary really doesn’t know where Jacob lives? They’ve been warring all this time and he never thought to look in the foot of that statue?

Whatever the case, I’m thinking Christian is aligned with our Nameless Adversary in the big picture battle of good guys and bad guys. Think about it: Christian is the one who tells Locke to move the Island last year. Christian is the one who helps Locke get off the Island this year. Dead Locke serves as Christian’s proxy on the Ajira flight, which allows Nameless Adversary to somehow become Locke 2.0. I don’t know how all this adds up, but it seems clear to me that Christian is a bad guy here. Am I right?

What did Jacob mean when he said to Adversary, “They’re coming”? I think he has to be referring to our 1977 castaways. As much as Jack thinks his destiny was to detonate the bomb, I don’t buy it. Remember, though, Alpert told Sun that he watched all the ’77ers die. I’m predicting the Others knew all along that the Swan was being built and they had surveillance of the whole project. I’m also predicting that the blast didn’t kill our castaways but either transported them back to 2004 or to the Island present of 2007 (thus Jacob’s cryptic “They’re coming.”). I’ve been wondering this all season: How is it that the Others don’t know anything about the Swan project (which has a massive crew at work with all manner of loud equipment and bells going off and people dying when their fillings go ripping through their brains) but when Ethan’s Mom and her former lover try to slip off to have a quiet picnic on Other-property, they’re nearly killed? Alpert must’ve been watching the bomb detonate and since the castaways were gone after the blast, he assumed they all died when in actuality, they were transported to fulfill their destiny in the present. Or something like that.

Well, this puppy is getting pretty long. I’ll make a season review post tomorrow that I’m sure will have more finale reaction. Chime in here and let me know what you think.

OK, so I’m still trying to process what happened last night. Is it still “whatever happened, happened”? Or did Farraday / Jack’s hair brained H-bomb plan induce a time-rebooting paradox that will change the course of history? And what to make of the revelation that Locke wasn’t really Locke but some nameless bad dude locked in an eternal struggle with Jacob over the notion of destiny vs. free will? And is Jacob really dead? What about Jack, Kate, Sawyer, etc? Where and when will we see them next? Great cliffhanger…

Like I said, still working all of that out. I’ll have a full fledged recap late this afternoon / early evening. Until then, the first page of Doc Jensen’s recap over at EW is well worth the read. I especially like his theory that whatever happened last night hinged upon the decision of Juliet “I changed my mind” Burke, the most important human variable in this season long equation. Feel free to leave your comments here, and I’ll have a full recap later today.

I just finished listening to the most recent LOST audio podcast. If you’re a LOST fan and you’re not subscribing to the podcast, you’re missing out. There’s nothing here that is essential for watching the show; the producers have always tried to make things like the podcast and the ARG available to fans who enjoy that kind of thing, but all of the essential information is revealed on the show itself. Still, Cuse and Lindelof are always entertaining on the podcast and they often help clarify what’s going on for me. So check it out.

If you’re not listening to the podcast, you may want to avoid reading the rest of this post. I’m very sensitive to the fact that many people like to avoid any kind of information about upcoming episodes and, while I wouldn’t consider any of this to be spoiler-ish material, I respect the fact that some of you like your LOST to be completely free of any outside information. So, this is your warning. Proceed at your own risk.

I did want to comment on a few things from the podcast and get some of your feedback. At the beginning of the podcast, the producers address what they think fan reaction will be to the Season 5 finale. This isn’t a verbatim quote, but here’s the gist of what they said: People will like the finale; the show’s mythology will be advanced in some fairly significant ways. But the producers are anticipating that there will be a fair share of annoyance that we have to wait 8 months to find out what happens next. That sounds a lot like the reaction to the Season 1 finale, when Jack and Locke blew open the hatch, but we had to wait until the start of Season 2 to find out what (who) was down there. The producers go on to say something to the effect that Season 6 will seemingly share a lot in common with Season 1. Whatever that means.

We’re told that after we see the Season 5 finale and the Season 6 opener, we’ll have pretty much all the information available to us to finally put together a valid “theory of everything” that will help us understand the ultimate direction of the show. And this upcoming episode will reveal a piece of information that will move things forward in a very significant way. While I have no idea what this means, it’s exciting to hear. Makes me even more interested in what we’ll get to see in the finale.

Also, in the podcast the producers address the whole “good guy” / “bad guy” thing we’ve been debating since the Season 2 finale when Ben quipped, “We’re the good guys, Michael”. When a viewer asked which side she should be rooting for, the producers basically avoided that question by addressing specific characters, designating them either good, bad, or “haven’t decided” (which I guess means the jury is still out on said character’s motivation or ultimate allegiance). Here are the results for the characters they mentioned:

Hurley – good guy
Kate – good guy / gal
Alpert – haven’t decided
Lapidus – good guy
Sayid – kind of a bad guy, could be a good guy, but he’s done some bad things
Jacob – good guy

Jacob – a good guy? If Locke is truly committed to killing Jacob, does this mean Locke is actually playing on the “wrong” team, the team of “bad guys”? Is it even possible to kill Jacob? I’m thinking no. And I’m thinking Locke might know that. I’m thinking maybe he’s just telling Ben this to get a rise out of him. After taking Ben’s junk for the past several seasons, maybe Locke’s just toying with Ol’ Bug Eyes. Or…maybe Locke really has no idea about Jacob and he really thinks he can kill him. Either way, I’m doubting this can even happen.

I’m once again drawn to the ways in which Locke and Jack have exchanged places on this show. For 4+ seasons, Locke was the Island mystic who spouted pithy lines about “destiny” and what was “supposed” to happen. Jack, conversely, played the role of the man of science, the man of reason who has little regard for things like “fate” and “destiny” and “miracles”. Now, in differing eras, the two have completely traded places. Locke 2.0 is imbued with some sort of Island knowledge, but he’s also demanding empirical evidence of Jacob’s existence and he has about 50 redshirts following his every move. Jack, meanwhile, finds himself stuck in the bowels of the Island, looking straight at Jughead, pondering a cataclysmic event (sort of like Locke’s decision to stop pushing the button at the end of Season 2) that will potentially change everything, all because he believes it to be his destiny.

So, what do you think “The Incident” will be? And who else would fall in the “good guy” or “bad guy” camp? What about Ilana and Bram and their “shadow of the statue” peeps? Good or bad? What do you think?

So in honor of this week’s season finale of LOST (the last episode we’ll get until 2010), I’ll be posting exclusively about my favorite TV show this week. For those of you who aren’t fans of the show, this will be an extremely boring week here at this blog. But all of us LOST geeks are going to have to get all of this out of our system, because we’re about to enter the black winter of hibernation that exists between LOST seasons. Later this week, I’ll have a post that will summarize my thoughts on this the penultimate season of ABC’s hit drama. And, of course, Thursday’s post will rehash the 2 hour finale. I’ve avoided spoilers like the plague. All I know is there’s supposed to be an event that, according to Michael Emerson (Benjamin Linus) “redefines the word ‘game changer’.” Whatever that means. (Doesn’t a game changer by necessity “redefine” something? That’s what I thought.)

Until then, I’m polling my LOST readers. Do you realize that Wednesday is the last cliffhanger season finale we’ll ever get? Almost makes me sad. With that in mind, I’m asking you to vote on your favorite season finale. Was it the horror / outrage you felt at the end of Season 1 when you realized you’d have to wait until next season to find out what (or who) was down in that hatch? Maybe it was the Season 2 finale with its climactic build-up: Jack, Kate, Hurley & Sawyer being taken captive; Michael sells them out; the hatch implodes; and we catch our first glimpse of life off Chez Island. Season 3’s finale flash forward blew our minds and left us wondering what was going to come next. Season 4 (my favorite season so far) ended with the revelation that John Locke was the one inside that coffin after all. Which one was your favorite? I’ll leave the poll open all week.

Also, a reminder: feel free to comment about the show, even the upcoming finale, but remember, THIS IS A SPOILER FREE SITE. If you know details about the finale, keep ’em to yourself. We want to be surprised.

Be warned: this is long. With only 2 more hours of LOST until 2010, I’m getting all my theories and thoughts out here right now.

Great episode. I have absolutely no idea where this season is going in the final two hours, and I love it! Is Jack really going to detonate an H-bomb, causing an entire reboot of history? Is Locke actually going to find Jacob and kill him, as he promised? And how are they going to get Juliet, Kate, and Sawyer out of that sub? Great stuff going on here.

I’ll deal with the Jack / Kate / Eloise thread first. Looks like I was wrong about Farraday; he’s dead. At least for now. Maybe he’ll come back to life if Jack is able to reboot time or whatever. But for now, he’s gone. As Ben says, “dead is dead”. The Comicon video was what I was basing my thoughts on; in the video, you clearly hear Farraday talking to Chang. But the producers have come out and said that this is simply a continuity error. So there goes that. Frustrating, but what are you going to do, watch Criminal Minds? Please.

Jack picked up the torch from Farraday and seems utterly determined to blow up the Island. While I doubt that this will actually happen (I mean, how are they going to blow it up? More dynamite from the Black Rock?), it’s nice to see Jack with a purpose again, misguided though it may be. Did you catch Charles touching Eloise’s tum-tum when she told him she was taking Jack to the bomb? Looks like little Dan may be alive after all, albeit in utero.

I’m wondering if what we witnessed in this episode was an irreparable rift in the Jack / Kate relationship? Did you see how wounded she looked when he said he wanted to wipe the slate clean? Earlier this season, she told Jack “I’ve always been with you.”; now, for the first time in their time on the Island, it seems as if Kate has completely given up on Jack and his “plan”. And who could blame her? My favorite moment of the night was when Sayid emerged (minus the ghastly purple shirt) to protect Kate from Nameless Rifle-Bearing Other Minion #1. I actually did a little fist pump when the camera panned to Mr. Jarrah. It’s about time, I say.

I suppose these underground tunnels help explain what we saw earlier this season when Richard circumvented the sonic fence and infiltrated Dharmaville. For the record, I don’t trust Eloise and her willingness to help Jack rewrite history. I know she’s saddened by the fact that she killed her son, but I’m not convinced. Remember, Farraday said she couldn’t be trusted. Granted, he was talking about the 2007 version of his Mum, but then again, she’s the one who sent Jack back to the Island with all this “destiny” talk. I guess we’ll see next week.

Meanwhile, back in 2007, I’m totally loving Locke 2.0. The scene with him “seeing” himself and telling Richard what to say could’ve been pretty hokey, I think. But it worked and I’m not exactly sure why. Suffice it to say, it made me remember the mystery and wonder I felt during Season 1 and after 100 episodes, any time a show can make me feel that way again, it’s noteworthy.

Locke’s comment to Sun was a poignant one: “We haven’t done all of this for nothing.” I hear in that comment a word from the producers to those of us who are worried about Jack’s effort to re-write history and, more importantly, 4+ seasons worth of gripping narrative and character development. In the grand scheme of things, I can’t see the producers leading us down this path for nearly 5 seasons only to pull the rug out from under us. The bottom line is that these characters have found redemption on the Island; they have been changed by their experiences here. And so, even if there is some sort of reboot and Flight 815 does happen to land in Los Angeles, I have a feeling that these characters will somehow retain an awareness of these shared experiences and the ways in which they’re all better people now than they were before. Even characters like Michael and Shannon, characters who have already died, if they were suddenly “resurrected” in a new, alternative timeline sans Island, they would re-emerge as changed individuals. Again, I hear a great deal of reassurance here: we haven’t done all of this for nothing.

And ultimately, that’s what makes this more than a television show for me. It’s a show that is trying to make a statement about life, about our quest to find meaning, about free will, about fate, about the forces that are at work in our lives whether we realize it or not. What other show has the ability to make us reflect on our experiences, both good and bad, and consider how those experiences have helped shape us for better or worse? What other show is willing to delve into this kind of narrative with implications at the meta-level, at a cosmic level? What other show is asking these kinds of questions about the nature of reality and human existence? More than anything else, this is why I love this show.

I’ve been saying for the past few weeks that I’m going to reserve judgment re: Season Five until I’ve been able to view it in its entirety. I think that’s only fair, even though portions of this season (specifically the time-travel stuff) have been, as the wizened sage Randy Jackson would say, “just a’ight for me. Just a’ight.” But in light of what I’ve written in these past few paragraphs, there’s a legitimate chance that this could end up being my favorite season of all when it’s all said and done. If nothing else, my hat is off to the producers for giving me a show that, 101 episodes in, is causing me to reflect on a pretty deep level about my own life and the way my life intersects with the lives of those around me. More than that, this show renews my hope that these intersections aren’t merely random and meaningless, but rather they are all a part of a much greater mosaic, greater than I can even realize at the moment, but one that I can still be aware of nonetheless. It would seem that Locke’s “out of body” experience from this episode is a metaphor for how this show would cause each of us to view our own existence.

OK, so sorry for the multi-paragraph diversion into the uber-philosophical! The other action in the episode centered around Sawyer & Juliet. Did Sawyer really sell out the location of the Others to save himself and Juliet? I think not. But maybe this is a foreshadowing of where we’re going with all of this. Sawyer is a con man, he finds redemption (and love) on the Island, becomes a heroic leader, only to throw it all away to save his own skin. Hurley still believes in him (“Sawyer always has a plan,”), but judging by his “Good riddance” comment when he boarded the sub, I don’t think he has any plan to stage a rescue operation on behalf of his pals. And how about when Kate comes down the steps of that sub, interrupting Sawyer and Juliet’s sweet-nothings talk? Awkward! Fearless prediction: Sawyer follows through on his threat to kill Phil in next week’s finale. But I also have a bad feeling about Juliet and Sawyer’s long term relationship. I hate it, too, because I’m rooting for them to stay together. But I don’t think it’s in the cards. I hope I’m wrong. But given my theory about the irreparable rift between Jack and Kate, I’m thinking this is bad news for Juliet.

Another fearless prediction: Sun will step to the forefront and play a major role in whatever happens in the finale. After letting the boys take center stage in the 2007 timeline of “Follow the Leader”, I fully expect Sun to step up and do whatever it takes to be somehow reunited with her man. Season 6 then becomes Sun & Jin’s quest to return to the mainland for the sake of their daughter. Once she realizes that Locke has no interest in reuniting the castaways, look out. It’ll be on like Donkey Kong.

That’s enough for now. I’ll have a pre-finale post next week, as well as a full-fledged recap on Thursday. Until then…Namaste.