Best. Last Line. EVAR!

I mean, really, did you see the look in Ben’s big, bugged-out blues? Classic! Then, Locke smirks, smash-cut…*pah!*…”LOST.” That, my friends, is how you end an episode and leave ‘em wanting more. Truly, do you ever get enough of Locke and Ben? I know I don’t!

And what about Miles and Hurley? Much like Sawyer and Hurley in the pre-Sawyer-as-derring-do-er days, those two sure know how to provide some great comic relief doubling as being the in-show voice of the fans. Ahhh…good times, good times.

And Sawyer and Juliet! What great chemistry they have. How heroic, how noble, and how smart are they, eh? Truly the golden couple of the show right now, and not just for both being blondes.

Oh, wait… *le sigh*

I suppose I should mention Kate seeing as “Whatever Happened, Happened” was one of her centric episodes and all. And really, where does she get off having a second centric episode in the time travel season anyway? All right, all right. We’ll start with her, and then get to the good stuff, m’kay?

How can you have any pudding if you don’t eat your meat?

Thankfully, the Kate-related content of this episode wasn’t any kind of ‘shipper’s delight. The more the ‘shippers are tortured, the happier a girl I am. Ahh, schadenfreude…

And I do have to be fair to old ferret-face. She’s shown some character growth even if she hasn’t picked up any acting chops. Kate did The Right Thing™ at every step along the way of this episode, both on the Island and off it. Let’s break it down:

• She gave Aaron to the one person who should really him in Claire’s absence, Claire’s mum, thereby paying proper attention to her near-Claire experience. (Called it!)
• She told Carole the truth about Aaron and that the O6 lied.
• She told Cassidy the truth about the O6′s lie.
• She honored her promise to Sawyer to deliver the money for Clementine.
• She went above and beyond to save a poor tween boy who’d been shot, even if that boy grew up to become the Ben Linus we all love to hate.
• She never once reproached the suddenly contrite Roger Linus for his woeful lack of quality parenting.
• She delivered news back to a grateful Sawyer about Cassidy and Clementine.
• She even took the news of Sawyer’s “doing this for her (Juliet)” with its accompanying backhanded message about Kate’s prospects with Sawyer without even flinching.
• Even though we saw it in “316,” Kate still got on that plane to face up to her destiny on the Island.

So, this isn’t the same old “making messes and running away from them” Kate. We get it.

You want answers?
I want the truth!
You can’t handle the truth!

But there’s something even more important going on in there, in the off-Island bullet-points. Can you see what it is? No, it’s not that she’s going to be single for at least the foreseeable future, though I’m pleased as punch about that, too.

It’s that Kate has joined Hurley and Locke in a very exclusive club of off-Island people: those who’ve exposed the lie of the Oceanic Six. But why, you may well ask, is that important?

Because this little trend is putting into place something I think is going to be a very important plot development for Season 6. Call it the “815 Truth Movement.” To paraphrase the ever-pithy über-pilot, Frank Lapidus, you know those nuts that think 9/11 was an inside job? Well, this is like that…only real.

The list of people who know some or all of the truth about the Oceanic Six’s deception, or who will vociferously question their re-disappearance is growing. Carmen & David Reyes, Cassidy & Clementine Phillips, Carole & Aaron Littleton, Mr. Paik & Ji Yeon, and Waaalt could sure grab some media attention if they went and validated the conspiracy theories about Oceanic 815 that have already been hinted at by the “The Oceanic Six: A Conspiracy of Lies” bonus feature on the Season 4 DVD set. And none of them would be the sort to be silenced or placated by anything Ben Linus, Charles Widmore, or their operatives have to offer. (I’d have added Desmond, Penny, and wee Charlie, but I’m somehow sure they’ll be on the Island sooner than next season.)

There are also just too many on-screen instances of this sort of “loose end” being left now to ignore the evidence. I’d actually been pondering this going all the way back to Hurley’s original admission to his mom in “The Lie,” though I only brought it into these pages with my treatment of the last Kate-centric episode, “The Little Prince.”

In the larger sense, the only confirms to me that the off-Island world is actually going to be a major factor in the end-game rather than just fading into the background to focus solely on the on-Island chess-match, which I still think is all about finding out whether or not the time-stream can be altered after all…or else, in the words of the always-cheery Eloise Hawking, “God help us all.” Or is it the alteration that one side wants to perform that God needs to help us avoid? Alas, we have too little info as yet.

Oh, of course! It’s all about you, isn’t it?!?

Of course, one of the benefits of having the “present-day” storyline happening in 1977 DHARMAville (future site of New Otherton!) is that everything has become something of an extended Ben flashback, allowing us not to have to think about dramatically lesser characters like Kate too terribly much if we don’t want to.

And before we get into the heavier plot elements, I just want to take a moment to reflect on the fact that we actually, finally got to see a different side of Roger Linus than “abusive asshole” or “dessicated corpse.”

I have to admit that, after seeing Jon Gries playing far gentler souls like terminally shy savant Lazlo Hollyfeld in Real Genius and lovable techie Broots in The Pretender, seeing him be so mean to young Ben was causing me no end of cognitive dissonance. So it was a bit of a relief to finally see Roger express a positive human emotion by confessing to Kate his shortcomings as a father and expressing due concern for the life of his boy.

If only it weren’t a case of “too little, too late.” Just another one of the many poignant stories woven together on this crazy drama we all love so…

Now, in the latest performance of the predestination loop mambo, we have evil, cruel, nasty Ben bringing assassinified Sayid back in time to shoot young Ben so he can become cruel and nasty enough to want to do that to Sayid. (I’m still holding out for Hurley to be the one in whose voice The Numbers were being broadcast when Leonard Simms heard them…)

We also have Hurley raise his one good question in his dialogue with Miles about the nature of time travel—that of why Ben didn’t remember Sayid shooting him—only to possibly have a possible answer given shortly thereafter by Mr. Guyliner himself.

Annnnnd a big question about the mysteriously-migrating gunshot wound flip-flopping which side of the Prime Meridian of Ben’s hoodie it’s on between “He’s Our You” and “Whatever Happened, Happened.”

There’s already been a lot of wailing, gnashing of teeth, and rending of garments about both of these questions. Some people think that the “he won’t remember any of this” line was too facile in explaining why, as Hurley was curious to know, Ben wouldn’t remember Sayid as his would-be killer upon being tortured by Sayid as “Henry Gale” in the Swan hatch in 2004. And does it mean that Ben suddenly doesn’t remember anything before that point at all, making his lie about being born on the Island into his belief of the truth? Or else surely that means he actually remembers everything!

Well, I’m going on record to say that both are wrong. The only “all this” Ben won’t remember is being shot and handed over to the Others…and probably the day or two previous, in which he would have met Sayid. The rest of his fucked-up upbringing, including the fact of being brought to the Island at 8 years old, he’ll remember. After all, he’s still going to need a reason to still hate Roger enough to gas him up close and personal even though I’m quite sure Roger will moderate his parenting style upon miraculously getting his son back alive. And what’s more, some part of Ben, conscious or otherwise, is going to retain the memory of being shot by Sayid, adding fuel to the fire of Ben’s treatment of Sayid from 2005-2008. But I’m betting it suits the Island’s/Jacob’s/Smokey’s purposes for Ben not to remember Sayid clearly when he’s captured in 2004 despite having other foreknowledge of the time-tripping Lostaways in DHARMAville remain intact.

And to the “total amnesia” proponents I only ask this, did Robert and the other members of the French team forget their past lives after being mysteriously reprogrammed by the smoke monster in “This Place is Death?” Based on the intimate knowledge of their past together displayed by Robert in his final standoff with Danielle, the answer to that is a very clear “no.”

The whole world keeps spinning around me. All life is future to past, every breath leaves me one less to my last.

Now, about that gunshot wound…

A quick look at the screencaps is enough to show that this wasn’t a simple case of horizontal inversion, which is more common than you think in TV shows. Checking out Young Ben’s hair in both scenes nixes that. So we’re left with either a pretty colossal continuity error on the part of Lost’s costume and makeup people or else another one in an ongoing series of small alterations indicating that someone or something is somehow constantly changing the timestream in small ways, as in the case of the mysterious pictures on the stairs (pictured right) during Miles’ ghostly powwow back in “Confirmed Dead.” There have also been slight dialogue differences in each revisiting of the scene at the pier between the O6 and Ben, which strikes me as very odd since it’s not like they didn’t have the script for “This Place is Death” lying around to double-check against.

I’m certainly not beyond believing that it’s easy to make mistakes from one episode to the next or even one day of shooting to the next on a show as complicated and intricately-plotted as Lost, nor even believing that at least some of the examples I’ve cited, or that others would cite, are in fact bloopers. But there are just too many of them and some of them are just plain too egregious to simply be errors. I’ve been saying it for some time now, but it bears repeating: the timeline of Lost isn’t fixed and fully fated…for the right people or beings.

Like the Island itself. And Desmond. And quite possibly Walt.

I mean, just think of the ripples through time it would have taken to ensure a failure to fire in both Michael’s and Keamy’s guns, preventing Michael from dying before his appointed time, for example. Or to orchestrate a rare bird smacking itself dead into the Lloyds’ window right as Walt and stepdaddy were talking about it all the way back in “Special?”

It’s just that for poor schmoes like the rest of our Lostaways, all they can do is follow along the tracks through time that only they can’t see.

You’re worn and used and you cant talk. Your flight has been postponed, now you must walk…straight up that hill, now you must push your own rock.

Which brings us to easily my second-favorite scene in the show: Hurley and Miles sounding a lot like arguing Lost fans with Miles playing the generally clued-in role and Hurley being mostly sans clue, aside from the insightful question about Ben’s memory that probably has nothing to do with time travel at all.

What Miles was trying to explain to poor, unequipped-to-cope Hurley was the difference between objective and subjective time (which I was busy defining way back at the beginning of the season, if you’ll recall). All of which makes me wonder why there weren’t more sci-fi geeks among the Lostaways. Maybe the Island didn’t want anyone around who could really explain things properly to the returned O6ers, hence the disappearance of Faraday.

But getting back to the point, it really is quite simple, as I’m sure the vast majority of the readers here will agree. But for the confused few, it’s quite simple…everything that the time-travelers experienced up to the point at which they were thrown back to the ’70s is subjectively “past” to them. They lived from their respective birthdates one day at a time until the Island started its time-skipping (in the case of the Left Behinders), or until the flash aboard an out of control Ajira 316 (in the case of the time-tripping O6ers).  So, their existence in early 2005 or early 2008 is in no way contingent upon their surviving their experience in 1977.

But people who haven’t time-traveled to the past, but are merely the 1977 versions of people we know in the 2000s can neither die (e.g. Ben) nor be prevented from dying (e.g. most of the DHARMA Initiative) no matter what the time-travelers do. By the time we get to 2004 and the crash of Oceanic 815, Ben is alive and the DHARMA Initiative is dead, and that’s all there is to that.

Got it? Good. Miles was 100% right and Hurley was 100% wrong, as much as we love him.

That’s what the title is all about. Nothing that any of these people do during the DHARMA days can even possibly be anything different than what the future knows they did. No matter how “unpredictable” you try to act, your actions will inevitably be exactly what they always would be. And it’s that knowledge that drove poor Daniel Faraday quite mad after the last time-skip took him away from the mortal remains of Charlotte Lewis, which now resides forevermore on the Island in whatever ancient time that was when the statue still stood.

The only exceptions, as previously stated, are those special, exceptional “wild-cards.” But will their influence be enough to enable whatever alteration one side or another of the Great Game of Lost is trying to get away with? This is exactly why Season 5 is all about giving fate the edge, so that free will can be the fan-favored underdog going into the all-important Season 6.

Hello there, ladies and gentlemen! Hello there, ladies and gents! Are you ready to rock? Are you ready or not?

And finally we complete the circle and arrive back at that most triumphant episode ending. That better-than-classic-Lost moment we’ve been waiting for since “The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham“…Ben getting an eyeful of one seriously resurrected Locke.

And it was all we could have hoped for and more.

We got some genuine-looking shock from The Man Who Always Has a Plan™, a righteous smirk and verbal smackdown from The Once and Future Island King™, and the setup for what looks to be a big-time, bad-ass Ben episode called “Dead Is Dead”…even if it should be called “Dead Is Dead (Unless You’re the Island’s Miracle Boy).”

So, is Ben’s look actual shock, as in “How can you be alive?!? I killed you!”? Or is it disbelief more along the lines of, “I knew you’d come back, but…holy crap, it actually happened! Now there’s something you don’t see every day.”? There’s only one way to find out, isn’t there. And even then, Ben might lie through his teeth.

Still…”Hello, Ben. Welcome back to the land of the living.”

Brilliant!

Have I mentioned Sayid’s always been one of my very favorites since the pilot episode, along with Locke? ‘Cause he is.

All the more pity, then, that his self-assigned “purpose” will only bring about the exact fate he hopes to avoid, in the very best Greek Tragedy™ tradition, sealing the latest in a series of known Lost predestinstion loops. Or, to use a more recent example, like Bruce Willis’ character in Terry Gilliam’s amazing 12 Monkeys.

Unfortunately, this leaves your humble author in a bit of a bind. What to theorize about when the direct effects of this episode are completely obvious despite an inevitable attempt (and failure) to set up dramatic tension next episode about young Ben’s recovery from Sayid’s gunshot. He’s gonna live. Duh. Like the man said and like they also named next week’s episode: Whatever Happened, Happened.

Thankfully, that’s not all there was to “He’s Our You.”

One pill makes you larger and one pill makes you small…

We also had this guy. (Pictured left.)

And I have to say that I was more than a little disappointed. I mean, yes, we got ourselves our umpteen-thousandth inversion on Lost and got to see Sayid suffer poetic justice for his time as an torturer (again). But really…when Sayid had Sawyer tied to a tree, we got some “bamboo shoots under the fingernails” action. All “psychopath” Oldham had was some light bondage enhanced with drugs.

In some of the circles I’ve been known to run in, this constitutes “a fun way to spend a weekend.” And the use of “truth serums”—particularly ones that will make a hardened ex-Republican Guard cackle with glee—hardly seems an inhumane form of interrogation.

I can only hope that we’ll see Oldham again, if only so that we can get some actual evidence of his allegedly psychopathic nature, ’cause so far, I’m just not buying it. If he hasn’t flayed anyone alive or performed an act of equivalent lunacy by the time we get to The Incident™, I’m going to feel severely let down. Though, that said, it’s always nice to see an old friend from Newhart getting work.

But I’m betting we’ll get more from DHARMA’s resident psychopath before we’re through. Keep reading.

In the meantime, Sayid got to play Cassandra and Chicken Little all rolled up into one, spilling the beans about his origin, Sawyer’s old handle, an intimate knowledge of DHARMA stations yet to come, and the mass murder of the Purge, only to be believed by nobody but his fellow time-traveler. Well, maybe by Radzinsky a little.

By the way, is it just me or are you also starting to feel less and less sad about the fact that Radzinsky ends up a splotch on the Swan station’s ceiling? Every time he opens his mouth, I like him less and less.

And he wore a hat, and he had a job, and he brought home the bacon so that no one knew…

Sawyer, as usual, had the pithy quip to sum things up perfectly: “Three years, no burning buses. Y’all are back for one day…”

But all the excitement and the “kiss kiss, bang bang” simply has got to result in the blowing of our time travelers’ cover. There really isn’t any other way this can go down. It may not happen next episode, or even the episode after that, but it will still be the release of Sayid and the shooting of young Ben that ends up being the root cause of Sawyer, Juliet, et al being found out.

Even if they manage to smooth over the actual release—play it off as a young boy entranced by one of the mysterious Hostiles to do his bidding—the Oceanic 815ers are going to somehow break character or otherwise act suspicious. And, despite Roger Linus’ opinion of the DHARMA Initiative, it’s not exactly full of dummies. Horace, Radzinsky, Chang…clearly big brains, all. Once they actually have reason to scrutinize all the mysterious arrivals in their midst, their shoddy cover stories will develop more holes than a centipede’s bowling ball.

Besides, we still haven’t seen Faraday kneel to fate and warn off young Charlotte yet or do his Radio Free DHARMA act with Pierre Chang, so we know that they’re going to be believed as being time travelers from the future before the season’s out at the very least.

You’re so vain, I’ll bet you think this song is about you. Don’t you? Don’t you?

And speaking of time travelers with flimsy stories who attract chaos, I have to admit that it was with no small amount of schadenfreude that I saw Jack and Kate reduced to practically being spear-carriers in this episode, actually requiring Hurley to bring news from over at the cool kids’ table. If you’ve been reading my synopses and analyses here for any length of time, you may have developed the entirely correct opinion that I don’t care for either of these characters or actors very much.

Matt Fox, when not making Jackfaces, could easily be replaced by a tailor’s mannequin and Evie Lilly still looks like a ferret to me.

I didn’t really have much else to say with regard to those two except to ask what the hell Sawyer was thinking going knocking on Kate’s door instead of Juliet’s before the burning bus rolled in and all hell broke loose. And, oh yeah, is it just me or is it completely obvious that sooper-surgeon Jack is somehow going to be required for the saving of young Ben, in yet another of Lost’s many mirrorings (going back to “I Do,” when he operated on an adult Ben)?

Stupid predestination.

I repeat myself when under stress. I repeat myself when under stress. I repeat myself when under stress. I repeat myself when under stress. I REPEAT!

If there’s one thing this episode had in spades, it was mirrorings, echoes, and inversions. These are common in Lost, of course, but this episode was chock-a-block…see for yourself:

• Young Sayid kills to prevent his brother from having to, echoing Eko’s flashback in “The 23rd Psalm.”
• Ben “frees” Sayid from assassinations in the future in a perversion of his freeing of Sayid from captivity in the past within this single episode.
• Sayid is, yet again, tortured…though this one most closely resembles his torturing of Sawyer in “Confidence Man.”
• Illana flirts with a drunken Sayid in a bar, mirroring Ana-Lucia sitting next to both Jack and Christian Shephard at various points.
• Illana dupes Sayid with sex only to attack him, much like Ilsa in “The Economist.”
• Sayid knocks back glass after glass of extremely expensive MacCutcheon whisky, the same whisky denied Desmond by Widmore, then presented to Desmond by Charlie and Hurley (both in “Flashes Before Your Eyes“).
• Sayid sees an echo of his own hard-ass father in abusive Roger Linus…not that it stops him or anything.
• Young Ben’s repeated sandwich deliveries aimed at getting something from Sayid mirror Juliet’s plying of captive Jack with cheeseburgers on several occasions during early Season 3.
• Sayid’s lie that he was actually there to bring Ben back to the Others mirrors Ben’s later lie to Locke that he was the Lostaways’ captive for the same reason. (“Two For the Road” Thanks, Bundt! -SL)
• Sayid denies that he’s a killer by nature to Adult Ben on one tropical Island only to affirm it to Young Ben on another.
• The cyrillic writing over the door as Sayid leaves the building after killing Andropov reads “Oldham Pharmaceuticals” and later, Sayid will be interrogated by Oldham with pharmaceuticals.
• A be-hoodied Ben uses fire as a diversion to liberate Sayid much as a be-hoodied Charlie used a fire as a diversion to abduct Aaron in “Fire+Water.”
• Ben gives a book to captive Sayid like Locke will give books to a captive Ben on two separate occasions.
• Young Ben burns a vehicle, creating chaos, just like Walt burned a vehicle (the first raft), creating chaos. (“…In Translation“)
• Even Hurley, practically in a cameo, echoed his stint as Keeper of the Food in “Everybody Hates Hugo” by becoming a cook for the DHARMA Initiative.

Like I said, even by Lost standards, that’s a lot. In this case, I think it’s meant to drive home with all the subtlety of a jackhammer (but hey, sometimes subtle is overrated) that our characters—and particularly our centric character, Sayid—are trapped in the machine of this giant time-loop and cannot escape.

Whatever happened, happened. The record of everything our heroes did in the ’70s has already been written and nothing they do can be anything other than what they’ve already done. And even worse, some people know more about this than they do, what with living in 2004-2007 with a solid thirty years to review things.

Can there be any doubt now that Ben knew exactly what would happen when Sayid returned to the Island, that Sayid’s subjective future held the event Ben could hardly have forgotten from his subjective past? Or, for that matter, can there be any doubt that Ben remembers the entire Class of 2004 from his youth and has at least some foreknowledge extending beyond the crash of Ajira 316? Really, the only unsure question in this paragraph is this one: Did Ben know in advance that Locke would be resurrected upon his return to the Island? His dialogue in “The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham” inclines me to think he didn’t know, but it’s still going to be very interesting to see his face when confronted by the Island’s risen messiah.

Getting back to what I said at the beginning, though, you really have to admire Sayid’s moxie for being the one person to try to defy fate, even if it’s completely impossible.

Much like Sayid himself, if you think about it.

The latest installment from entertainment’s resident spoiler queen gives us some insight into what to expect from relationships formed and forming. Here is a rundown of what we should expect and  :

1- APPARENTLY IT IS DOUBTFUL WE WILL SEE A JACK/KATE REUNION THIS SEASON

2- WE WON’T BE SEEING A JACK AND JULIET REUNION EITHER

3- WE MAY SEE SOME LONGING LOOKS BETWEEN KATE AND SAWYER BUT WE WON’T BE SEEING ANY TRYSTS

4- JULIET AND SAWYER WILL REMAIN A COUPLE AND WE WILL BE APPARENTLY BE SEEING A LOT MORE OF THIS

5- THE WEDDING WHICH WE HAVE HEARD IS TAKING PLACE IS SUPPOSEDLY GOING TO BE A FLASHBACK TO THE WEDDING OF JIN AND SUN, WHO WON’T BE REUNITING UNTIL CLOSER TO THE FINALE

Source : Eonline

But, with “He’s Our You” looming mere hours away, I do think I have a few keen insights to glean from “Namaste,” impacting Lost’s past, present, and future and very much befitting a show with time travel at its core.

Like for example, notice that the ever-instructional Dr. Chang is seen wearing a Swan-logo lab coat in the new-DHARMA-worker orientation video in an episode in which we see Radzinsky actually designing the not-yet-constructed Swan station? Mere continuity blooper or…something more? (*dum-dum-DUMMMM!*)

That’s why I’m paid the big bucks…oh, wait, I’m a volunteer here. Blast!

It’s a big rock finish, a big finish…the plane is going down. It’s a Tin-Pan Alley grande finale, just seconds from the ground!

There are so many things on Lost we still don’t know, but one thing of which I’m 100% certain is that, if I’m ever in aeronautical peril, I want Frank Lapidus at the controls. Can that man fly or what? Notwithstanding the freak “leaf on the wind” outcome of his Ajira copilot, has he ever lost a passenger…even one? Not that we’ve seen in two completely insane chopper landings and one deeply adverse airliner set-down. Not since Catch-22′s bomber-pilot, Orr, have we seen any pilot so adept at crashing without casualties.

I mean, OK, he got the assist from the Others’ foreknowledge in building the runway on Hydra Island back at the beginning of Season 3, but it’s still pretty damned impressive. And, by the way, that suspenseful landing sequence gave us confirmation for the slow about said runway which the astute among us had picked up episodes ago.

Which, in turn, also verifies that the Others have had the aforementioned foreknowledge of the landing of Ajira 316 for several years…which we also already knew. I’ve been banging on about it for weeks now.

See what I mean about these bridge episodes?

Still, that was one exciting landing sequence. Serious kudos to Jack Bender for directing a scene that actually had us on the edge of our seats even though we knew exactly how it would end. That’s talent right there. There’s a reason he’s this show’s go-to director, you know?

(Side note: Anyone wanting to see more excellent work from both Mr. Bender and Lost’s own Kelvin Inman, the inimitable Clancy Brown, could do far worse than to spend about 24 hours of their life watching the brilliant—but tragically killed mid-cliffhanger—HBO series, Carnivàle. Layered storytelling, rich symbolism and allegory, slow-building creepy wrongness…it’s a Lost fan’s delight!)

And, in all fairness, we did get one tantalizing detail out of the landing sequence: hearing the Numbers on the plane’s radio as they were coming in to land. Someone at some point between the Lostaways finally stopping Rousseau’s recording in “Through the Looking Glass” circa 12/24/04 and Ajira 316′s landing in early 2007 actually turned back on the repeating broadcast of the Numbers that’s caused so much mischief over the years since the DHARMA Initiative started the broadcasts. I’ve seen some recappers say that it was either a continuity goof or else proof that some major alteration had occurred in the Lost timeline, but I’m not buying it when such a simple explanation functions at least as well. I like to keep my Occam’s Razor sharp.

Moles and trolls, moles and trolls, work, work, work, work, work. We never see the light of day. We plan this thing for weeks and all they want to do is study. I’m disgusted.

At long, long last we finally got to meet the storied Radzinsky…he of Blast Door Map fame, responsible for one of the biggest “TiVo moments” in the history of television. And he’s kind of an ass. The way he was acting toward Jin kind of makes feel OK with knowing that the station he was designing would eventually become his prison, then his mausoleum. It also makes one wonder if being moody was a requirement to staff the Flame station given the proclivities of its subsequent Other inhabitant, Mikhail.

But, clearly, the man had a grade-A cranium or else he wouldn’t have been designing a station with the ability to harness sufficient electromagnetic energy to cause an implosion large enough to leave this crater, cause passing jetliners to crash, and actually unstick the triggerer of its fail-safe mechanism in time.

Also, clearly, Radzinsky is going to be completely instrumental to the plot at least until the end of this season. If anyone’s going to be able to help (the seemingly MIA) Faraday and Chang beam a message to the future with 1970s technology, it’s Radzinsky. Likewise, he’s also obviously going to be the recipient of a hefty dose of future knowledge one way or another. Jin already piqued Radzinsky’s suspicions by asking about mysterious plane crashes that never happened, and both Sawyer (er, ‘scuse me, LaFleur) and Radzinsky isn’t dumb enough to fail to notice that both “LaFleur” and Jin were treating their captured “Hostile” in a rather unorthodox manner.

He’s onto ‘em and he’s going to get to the bottom of things, mark my words. And hey, if anyone’s going to be able to grok something as quantumly-insane as time travel, it’s going to be the biggest of the big brains among the DHARMA Initiative, don’t you think?

Only someone with foreknowledge would have designed the protocols of the Swan Station exactly the way they ended up, complete with fake quarantine procedures and a blacklight-rich lockdown mode, the better for Locke to see his mysterious map about 27 years later. This guy is going to be up to his eyeballs in “The Incident,” even if he appears to survive it long enough to recruit and train Kelvin before finally having his spirit crushed by the inexorable gears of predestination.

Take it easy on the kid, SilverFox316; everybody kills Hitler on their first trip.

And speaking of predestination, poor Sayid hasn’t gotten the memo about the Grandfather-Paradox-free nature of time travel in the Lost universe quite yet. Our unlucky hero had the misfortune to be placed far enough away from Jack, Kate, and Hurley that he wasn’t getting rounded up by Sheriff LaFleur and passed off as a new DI recruit. The Island is being a perverse little land-mass in this, just as it is in seemingly-capriciously separating Jin and Sun by a few decades.

You can see it in Sayid’s eyes the second young, comparatively innocent, Ben Linus introduces himself while rather sweetly bringing Sayid a sandwich…even if he forgot the mustard. He’s going to go all Sarah Connor and try to prevent his dire future from happening, and thereby become extremely frustrated when he’s inevitably unable to do so thanks to the fact that we know Ben Linus manages to live at least until early 2007.

It’s actually enough to make me fear for Sayid’s safety. Team Darlton has a way of knocking off a major character or two every time we get to a season finale and trying to kill off DHARMA brat and the Others’ answer to Harry Potter isn’t likely to endear him to either of the major factions on the Island as of 1977. What’s more, Sayid’s story is looking more and more tragic and closer and closer to an end. Literature has never been kind to those who struggle against prophecy, now has it.

It also would explain why 2005-vintage Ben is so very keen to use Sayid as a killer catspaw later in his subjective timeline, but tragically earlier in Sayid’s. Time travel, as the man said, is a bitch…and this particular bitch has been spilling her guts to young Ben so that he “always has a plan” by the time he meets the still-clueless 815ers shortly after their crash.

Mephistopheles is not your name. I know what you’re up to just the same. I will listen hard to your tuition. You will see it come to its fruition.

So, much like Richard Alpert knew about John Locke and Eloise Hawking knew about Daniel Faraday for a good half a century, Ben Linus has known about several figures he would “meet” decades later since childhood.

Suddenly, the “her” to whom Juliet bears the striking reseblance commented upon by Harper Stanhope in “The Other Woman” might not be Annie or Ben’s mother after all, but rather Juliet herself. Suddenly, the selection of Jack, Kate, Hurley, and Sawyer as the group to be rounded up by Michael for the Others in trade for Walt in “Three Minutes” makes a lot more sense.

And over the rest of Season 5, we’re only going to see more and more examples of foreknowledge being given to Ben and to any other DI Purge-survivors who later become Others. I’m totally on board with the theory that elderly Other Amelia is Amy 30 years later now that we know her son—quite possible the last human actually conceived and born on the Island—would grow up to be none other than Ethan Rom.

And by the way, is it possible that the story of the intervention of a Juliet mysteriously (to Amy) wise in the ways of obstetrics and appearing in the nick of time would inspire young Ethan to take up medicine? He was the Others’ surgeon before Charlie shot him, don’t forget.

Watch out for Christian…he’s a dick!

Exhibit number 42 that the Island isn’t very nice: whooshing all the rest of the Oceanic 5 back to 1977 while leaving Sun, the one person with an actual spouse among those living in the past, stuck in the present and then telling her she had “a bit of a journey” ahead of her. And why? No doubt she’s got “work to do.”

I mean, I get that the stakes are high in this game. “God help us all,” as Ms. Hawking, among others, is so very fond of telling us. But still…to tantalize poor Sun and Jin like that? What’s more, separating them both from Ji Yeon. That’s just mean.

And that kind of cruelty still looks rather petty when stacked up against the Island’s rather impressive body count…the soldiers back in 1954, the vast majority of the DHARMA Initiative, all the 815 casualties to date, Charlotte, Danielle & Alex, the French science team, Karl, who knows how many Others, the real Henry Gale, the entire crew of the freighter Kahana, one can only assume the crew of the Black Rock, and John Locke (well, sorta) that we know of.

There have been actual wars worthy of the name—and even Arnold Schwartzenegger movies—with lower casualty numbers. If the stakes are anything less than the very fate of the world, I kinda hope that Jughead the bomb blows the hell out of the Island in the series finale…but only after all the remaining characters have cleared off of it.

In further Christian Shephard news, some eagle-eyed viewers managed to catch a glimpse of what looked like a blonde-haired woman crouching behind some furniture during the conversation beween Christian, Sun, and Frank. Could it be Claire? Or is it just a careless Production Assistant lucky enough to be nowhere near Christian Bale while getting into a camera’s sight line? Odds are we won’t find out anytime soon, given that Emilie de Ravin is unlikely to be seen before Season 6. But then, we’re going to need plenty of questions to occupy us for the final season, yeah?

Sonya’s “Aww, Yeah!” Moments of “Namaste”:

1. Sawyer laying the verbal smack down on Jack and proving he’s a better leader than the dithering Doc ever was.
2. Sawyer sticking Jack with Work Man duty. *snerk*
3. Ben snarking, “And how’d that work out for everyone?” at Frank after he’d reminded Sun that a whole team of commandos was sent after Ben.
4. Sun belting Ben with an oar. He had it coming for withholding the info that Jin was in 1977, which we know he knew!
5. Just seeing Sayid (reasonably) safe and sound after the Ajira crash. I’m such a mark for Sayid.
6. Seeing some good, old-fashioned Monster-based deforestation to greet the newcomers.
7. Hurley asking Sawyer why he wasn’t going to tell the DI about the impending Purge.
8. Sawyer’s reply that he wasn’t there to “play Nostradamus to these people.”

PS: Note to Darlton: More Desmond please! We’ve had too many episodes without hide or hair of our favorite Scot. And ditto Locke. You can’t resurrect a guy and leave us hanging regarding him for so long. It’s just not cricket! OK…I feel better for having vented.

Yes, on this Island you’re brave, daring, handsome, you’re someone…

And you know? Ben would know. Is there any way in Hell that Ben Linus wouldn’t have instantly recognized post-crash Sawyer in 2004 as looking and sounding the spitting image of the DHARMA Initiative’s drawlin’ lawman he must have known in his youth? Didn’t think so. We may not have seen young Ben Linus wandering around on camera, but given what we know of Ben’s chronology (born ~1962, arrived at the Island no more than 12 years old) and “LaFleur’s” (with the DI at least 1974-1977), he has to have been there by the time Sawyer drifted into town and talked his way to the top security gig.

But back to Sawyer’s heroism for a bit here. I really find myself buying this version of Sawyer. His vendetta has been carried out, his sacrifice allowed the O6 to get off the Island, his vigilance ensured that the O6 would find the other time-trapped 815ers when they returned, his quick wits and willingness to tell the truth kept the peace between the Others and DHARMA. He is now acting like more of a leader, I think, than Jack ever did. In fact, there was only one single moment in the whole episode where James acted selfishly, like the Sawyer of old, and that was when he ran out on Juliet without telling her that Jin had found their Oceanic 815 friends returned to the Island…especially Kate. Aaaaaaand we’re back in ‘shipper territory. Blast.

Am I the only one out here who actually thought that the 3-year Sawyer-Juliet pairing during DHARMA days was the single most healthy coupling on this show since Des & Pen finally found one another again, (hopefully) never to let go? Seriously, let Doctor Fix-It and Fickle Freckles have one another. They’re beyond lame and deserve one another and that would finally keep all this ‘shipper crap from getting in the way of all the amazing mythology yet to come for all the worthwhile characters. (Aside: Am I also the only one who thinks Evangeline Lilly looks kind of like a ferret? Just asking…)

OK…breathe, Sonya. I know it won’t happen, but a geeky girl can hope, right?

Well, that’s OK. We were also getting a steady stream of answers and tantalizing half-answers that more than made up for the revenge of the inane lurve quadrangle.

Same as it ever was, same as it ever was…

While fellow DocArzt recapper, Fishbiscuit, beat me to the punch, I also noticed that the rope pulled back through time in Sawyer’s hand got left sticking out of the ground in some presumably ancient time after the Lostaways did the time warp again, presumably serving as the cue to its builders to build it. Much like Locke & Alpert’s compass and Faraday’s instrument settings, that rope looks like one more candidate for one common side-effect of time-loops: ontological paradox.

For those of you not wanting to go through a whole Wikipedia article on the subject, ontological paradox is one in which an item or piece of information is eternally circulating through a time loop, and therefore having neither origin nor end. Who made that compass? It gets passed from Locke to Alpert, back to Locke, who in turn hands it back to Alpert. Where did Faraday’s instrument settings come from if Faraday gave them to Desmond who gave them to Faraday’s past self? And where did the well’s rope come from if the original makers of the well used the same rope left them for them from the future, which will always be brought back from the future to be found coming mysteriously up out of the ground? You see my point?

The “grandfather paradox“—aptly named since it’s also the granddaddy of all paradoxes, the one which holds that no time-traveler can take any action which will prevent their time-trip from occurring in the first place—may not be one that can exist in the Lost universe, but the smaller paradoxes of these bits of matter or information seemingly without origin is one I think that Darlton and the other writers are going to have to address now that they’ve introduced several examples of same. And I’m confident they can. Desmond’s exceptional nature, the capabilities of the Island, Walt’s special abilities, oddly-shifting home decor…we’re clearly not in a purely deterministic, Tralfamadorian model of time here. Only mostly so. I’m willing to buy the idea that one or more of these special few could allow the past to be re-written slightly or something to enter our timeline from a “nearby” parallel one.

But in the meantime, poor, poor Dan knows full well that no matter how much he doesn’t want to be time’s bitch, he’s still somehow going to try and fail to convince a young Charlotte that she needs to never, ever come back to the Island. And he’s none too happy about it. His desperate attempt to involve temporal wildcard Desmond Hume didn’t succeed in keeping Charlotte from dying and her body from being swept away from him by the last of the time-skips, and now he’s stuck in “whatever happened happened-land.” Now the question is, can he still find it within himself to perform whatever mission it is that Mama Hawking’s been grooming him for all his life…or to even want to do it?

(By the way, to all you people nattering on about Charlotte being “too young!” to be the scampering redheaded girl we saw this episode because Ben said she was born in 1979…did it ever occur to you that she might have had falsified documents? Again, just asking…)

But now that we have evidence that several of our 815ers were actually part of the DHARMA Initiative (and remember, kids, that means they were always part of the DHARMA Initiative, even if it happened to them subjectively four months after their crash). Doesn’t that also put a whole new spin on a lot of the behavior of the Others toward the 815 survivors during the first four seasons?

Other interlopers (the US Military, the French Team, who knows who else) were wiped out without mercy, but the DI and the 815ers were granted truces and delineated territories (well, until that nasty Purge business, but what’s a few cans of neurotoxin between friends?). High-ranking Others clearly had foreknowledge which guided their dealings with these two groups. In the case of the 815ers at the end of 2004, the effort was at least in part to keep them away from any potential store of information that could reveal foreknowledge to them of their impending time travel follies while still keeping alive all those who had to be kept alive. Could you imagine if they’d found a group shot of Sawyer, Jack, Kate, Hurley, and maybe Sayid, Sun, or Frank in ’70s vintage DI jumpsuits?

Can you imagine the hue and cry among the rank and file Others too young to remember the various visits by time travelers about why they weren’t disposing of any “off-list” crash survivors?

Sooner or later, they’re going to have to show us which Others got what information when, aside from what we’ve already seen of Locke’s and Sawyer’s interactions with Richard and Faraday’s with (presumably) Eloise Hawking. I’m telling you, at the very least, there was foreknowledge of Ajira 316, given that survivors from that plane ended up in the ’70s. But I’m betting foreknowledge goes at least a little further than that, althought probably not too much further. If the foreknowledge doesn’t run out before Season 6 is wrapping up, then I’ve seriously misjudged something in my analysis of the stakes of the “game.”

Turn me to stone, do anything you want with me!

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the saucy half-reveal of the four-toed statue’s full-sized glory in what I can only agree were probably ancient times going back some millennia. The Name that Egyptian Deity pool is getting awfully full, to the point where only obvious “not-its” like Bastet or Khonsu are left.

But I personally don’t even think that which God(dess) it is is nearly as important as the fact that it really does seem to be Egyptian. Those really do look like ankhs in its hands, and it does jibe with the Hieroglyphs we’ve seen scattered throughout the show in the  Donkey Wheel chamber, the Smokey Summoning Room, and the Temple, among others.

That the “exit” from the Island after turning the wheel is in the middle of the African desert has also justly been connected to the ongoing Ancient Egyptian thread slowly weaving its way through the tapestry of Lost. I just don’t think we have nearly enough information at the moment to make any kind of educated guess as to whether or not the current Others are to greater or lesser degree descendent of the Ancient Egyptians (or may even be one, in Alpert’s case), or whether the Egyptians descended from the Island’s old inhabitants, or vice-versa.

All we know for sure is that some Ancient Egyptian-esque civilization at least was on the Island and built some pretty amazing things.

The telephone is ringing. Is that my mother on the phone?

We also learned for sure that, whatever happened on the Island to stop women who conceived on-Island from being able to deliver safely on-Island, happened between that last known-good birth in 1977 and Juliet’s original arrival in 2001, and it didn’t have a damned thing to do with the statue. (Sorry, folks, but it couldn’t have. That statue was long since rubble and a remaining four-toed foot by 1977.)

The way I see it, this reinforces the popular theory that it was somehow Ben’s fault and likely had to do with a tragedy involving his childhood sweetheart, Annie. If Annie’s not the first Island-slain mother, I’ll eat my hat. In fact, I’ll go out and buy a hat, roast it, put some ketchup and salt on it, and then eat it.

But it also tells us another thing…if the Island was once safe for motherhood, then it could be again. Juliet’s original task on the Island isn’t impossible after all. So, mark my words once again. We haven’t seen the last bit of time travel. Somehow, sone way, Juliet is going to get back to 2005 or later and fix things once and for all.

DHARMA days are here again

And finally, we learned that the five Lostaways who joined DHARMA in “LaFleur,” plus at least three more (Jack, Kate, and Hurley…more if we believe the teaser for 2 weeks from now) are going to be stuck in the late ’70s for at least a little while now that the Island’s record seems to have gotten its groove back thanks to the funktastic J-Locke.

That being the case, be on the lookout for the following:

1. Faraday and Dr. Chang/Candle/Wickmund/Halliwax getting together for a little cross-temporal home videography.
2. Finding out just how Horace and Olivia are related if Horace is gettin’ it on with Amy.
3. Lots and lots of Li’l Ben’s back-story. Will Sawyer or any of the others be tempted by the old “kill Hitler as a kid” idea even if it would never work?
4. Faraday yielding to the inevitable and delivering his Message of Doom™ to the redheaded moppet.
5. Some kind of future-info-download from the Lostaways either directly to the Others or else to DHARMA staff that will find its way into Other hands after the Purge.
6. All Lostaways getting the hell out of Dodge before said Purge…they know it’s coming.
7. All our Lostaways somehow reconnecting in the post-Ajira 316 “present”…but will our DHARMA-bound Lostaways have to do that the slow way?

Tune in in two weeks, true believers!

(PS: Since there’s an off-week and DHARMA’s figuring so prominently, look out for my “How to Make Your Own DHARMA Jumpsuit” post, coming soon!)

Well…there you have it. The Passion of the Locke, as others have already been perceptive enough to call it. And did I call it? Of course I called it! But then, did anyone really not believe that Locke the Miracle Man’s™ story arc wasn’t leading him inexorably toward that ne plus ultra of miracles (and ultimate validation of his importance in the scheme of things), resurrection? Anyone? Bueller…?

Don’t worry, I wouldn’t own up to it either in your shoes after seeing the proof.

But before he could rise again, Locke needed to suffer the death of ego courtesy of his travels in the underworld, by which I mean the outside world. Shall we? Hang on…

I’ve heard of you. I heard you were dead!

This episode wasted little time in establishing several things. They are, in increasing order of importance:

• New guy Caesar is shifty and not to be trusted, possibly has Island knowledge, and is almost certainly a catspaw of Widmore.
• At some point, the DHARMA Initiative got its grubby little mitts on Faraday’s journal in order to make that copy.
• Frank Lapidus managed to land Ajira 316 reasonably safely on Hydra Island, leaving most if not all of the passengers alive. Can that man fly under adverse conditions or what?
• John Locke is back from the dead…and looking more than a little reminiscent of Obi-Wan Kenobi during the dramatic de-hooding as he introduces himself to the Ajira 316 survivors. Unfortunately for Locke, he doesn’t seem to have come back with any more knowledge than he had when he died.

However, seeing as I’m going to be spending the bulk of my time in this piece talking ’bout my main man, Locke, how’s about we start with Items 2 and 3 on that list, as they actually tell us something new and interesting and not immediately related to Locke’s strange journey?

What they tell us in no uncertain terms is that the knowledge of future events specifically included foreknowledge of the crash of Ajira 316, just as I theorized in my recap of “316.” Otherwise, why would Juliet and the Others have been clearing a runway there back in Season 3, hmm?

I told you Ms. Hawking was simply using the rather impressive and arcane environs of the Lamp Post as a set for her play of having spent a great deal of effort finding out about where the Island would be and which plane would be the most likely to get them through their “window.” She already knew exactly which plane would be crashing there on that particular day, as did whoever gave the order to build that runway, either Ben or Richard. Of course, as with the very best lies, hers contained a kernel of truth. I’m quite sure that the Lamp Post was used for exactly the purpose she says it was and could, in fact, still do that job if required. Hell, she may very well have still been crunching the numbers to verify what she already knew, but the fact remains…she already knew it.

Furthermore, if DHARMA had Daniel’s papers and journal, to say nothing of presumably having a period of access to Daniel himself, then it’s almost certain that a pretty extensive info-download occurred. This past year’s Comicon teaser video was a testament to that fact.

So, the gears of determinism keep grinding away to get us to the point at which things will finally have an unsure outcome. Really puts Abaddon’s remark about “getting people where they need to go” into perspective, doesn’t it.

Everybody’s coming, leave your body at the door. Leave your body and soul at the door.

Now, on to the Stations of the Locke. I’m not going to try to draw one-to-one correspondences here. I’ll leave that to the more fanatically detail-oriented among the Lost fandom. But the Passion imagery was simply too obvious to ignore, right down to Locke’s “why hast thou forsaken me?”-like lament to Jack (in the note) and Ben (in person).

The betrayal, the stumbles, the falls, the scourging, the sharing of the burden, the final death…it was all there, with Ben more than anyone playing Judas Iscariot and Widmore, despite protestations to the contrary, doing his best impression of Pontius Pilate.

Let’s start with Widmore. As is ever the case with paternal figures in Locke’s life (Cooper, Christian), he seems to be leading Locke down the primrose path by feeding Locke’s need to feel special and important. He makes sure there’s going to be medical attention available to Locke when he appears at “the exit” from the Island (a place known at the very least to himself, an unfortunate polar bear, and Ben), indicating that he knew someone would be there even if he didn’t know the precisely time. He expresses concern and support, gives him a new identity and resources, and sends him off with Lost’s answer to Charon, Abaddon.

But all of Abaddon’s actions in his role as Locke’s sherpa through Hades seemed to be intended to cause Locke very calculated distress. He brandishes that most hated symbol of impotence at Locke—the wheelchair. A crutch would have done every bit as well without being nearly so demeaning. He digs at Locke with every failed or passed-on attempt to persuade someone to return, adding insult to the injury inflicted by four of the O6 and by his struggle with the prospect of dragging Walt back into the fray. He plants the seed of taking Locke to see someone “who’d be glad to see [him],” likely knowing full well there would only be one person who matched that description, and she’s either dead or else has one very premeditated staged grave.

Clearly, where Locke “needed to go” was right into the pit of despair. Somehow, Widmore knew that it would be Locke’s failed attempts plus his suicide that finally drives the O6 into the vortex of events leading them to the Time Witch, then back onto another airplane known to be making an unscheduled stop on Mystery Frickin’ Island.

But then Ben seems to save Locke from Abaddon. Out of nowhere, he guns Widmore’s lieutenant down and, after losing Locke in the car chase and crash, tracks him down to whatever skeevy flophouse Locke was using for his last little leap. He gives a masterclass on improvised manipulation and then…strangles the man he just talked down?

Of course he does. He got the piece of information that he wanted out of Locke: that Ms. Hawking knew how to get the O6 (accompanied by Ben, of course) to the Island. He couldn’t have gotten that if Locke had killed himself first. I think that this information was all Ben ever wanted out of Locke, and that he always intended to kill Locke once he had it. Like Widmore, he knew that Locke had to be a corpse on Ajira 316.

But the big question now is whether either Ben or Widmore—or even Hawking, for that matter—knew that Locke would be resurrected once back on the Island.

What did he say to make you such a believer?

The Island, on the other hand, knew. It also planted, though zombie-Christian, the seed that germinated into Locke delivering the correct message to the correct O6-er to start the dominoes falling. This culminated in most of the off-Island Lostaways (even Frank…yay, Frank!) getting on their appointed flight to land on their appointed runway and find their appointed Island Messiah™.

Given Christian’s (and therefore presumably the Island’s) distaste for Ben, it also looks like Ben’s got some appointed comeuppance headed his way. If Ben was morose over the fact that Locke had been shielded against death from Ben’s bullet at the mass grave through the trifling expedience of having his kidney on that side conned out of him several years prior, just imagine how not-so-gentle Ben is going to respond to Locke getting up again after being dead for what I can only imagine was about three days.

So, our Locke has a destiny and is important. Important enough for the Island to have gone above and beyond merely “out of its way” to ensure that he’s where he needs to be when he needs to be there. Not premature birth in the ’50s, disability, or even death itself is being allowed to stand in Locke’s way, despite his moments of weakness and failure. Mark my words…somehow, some way, Locke will be the one who ends up either winning the “game” of the show or making the choice that decides all the temporal shenanigans. Either way, he’ll end up showing up both Ben and Widmore in so doing.

By the way, was it just me or was it not incredibly satisfying to see the Jackface (pictured right) issued by Matt Fox upon hearing the news that zombie-Dad passed along a wee greeting by way of that nice Mr. Locke? Yeah, I thought so, too!

And when the Zetas fill the skies, will our leaders tell us why?

There was also one major Cassandra-like warning in this episode which resonated nastily with some of the more mysterious goings-on in “The Little Prince.”

Taller Non-Ghost Waaalt had himself a vision of Locke in a suit on the Island surrounded by people who wanted to hurt him. Locke and the rest of the passengers of Ajira 316 land pretty miraculously intact on Hydra Island. Time-skipping Sawyer, Juliet, Locke, et al find the same outrigger canoes we saw on Hydra Island over at an ominously empty and disshevled Beach Camp. Subsequent unknown canoers take potshots at our time-skippers.

I don’t know about all of you, but I have to say I’m not terribly sanguine about the prospect of watching whatever Bad Dudes and Dudettes someone (probably Widmore) placed on Ajira 316 do nasty things to our beloved left-behind Lostaways and their camp. Though, I am kinda looking forward to seeing just who it was that Juliet was able to hit with that Olympic-caliber riflery of hers. Does that make me a bad person?

So it seems that poor John Locke is still beset on all sides and really does have “a lot of work to do,” even if he’s going to end up triumphant. But, if Team Darlton is listening, can you guys just lay off the poor man’s legs for the rest of the series? Seriously, guys…Joe Namath didn’t have this many problems, and his knees were reputed in New York to be “the best-known joints in town,” m’kay? Thanks.

Now bring on “LaFleur!”

That breather’s also going to come in handy, given that the next episode is the obviously Locke-tastic “The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham,” which can only mean another serious download full of head-scratchers from the more mystical side of Lost.

But then, maybe things weren’t quite as straightforward as they seemed…

I am a rock, I am an island. And a rock feels no pain. And an island never cries.

So the Oceanic…er…5 made it back to the Island, giving us a lovely mirror of Jack’s series-launching eye-opening among the waving bamboo and returning some of the Island’s favorite toys to it to be played with anew.

[***WARNING: Major Spoiler for The Dark Tower. Skip this paragraph if you haven't read the series and don't want it spoiled!***]

I sincerely hope that this puts to rest any notion of a Dark Tower-like ending in which the time-loop simply starts again, but with one minor alteration suggesting some differences this time around. I’ve been hearing that one for quite some time and it’s always bugged me. Next to a Sopranos-like cut to black or Bob Newhart waking up to find it was all a bad dream, I don’t believe I can think any less-satisfying ending to the series. But I digress…

[***End of spoiler zone! Carry on.***]

Literally as soon as he wakes up, we see the return of Action Jack™, hero at large, savior of the imperiled, bearer of Locke’s talismanic “I wish” suicide note fragment, and terrible diver.

Hurley and Kate turn out to be OK and, as our little “holy shit!” moment, we get ourselves a DHARMA-outfitted Jin looking mighty surprised to see his departed friends back again in the same time-slip as him. End of on-Island story.

But the fact that the majority of the O6 (plus Ben and Lapidus) are back on the Island this early in Season 5 has some far-reaching implications, and not just to do with Jack’s opening eye not being the last shot of the series in May of 2010. To my mind, this really opens up the storytelling possibilities of the show for the remainder of Season 5. Many amateur and professional Lostologists were thinking that the return of the O6, et al to the Island was going to be the climactic finale to this season, setting up whatever the on-Island end-game would be for next season.

Instead, we still have about 2/3 of the season left to go during which it looks like we’ll visit with the DHARMA Initiative to get their story, see how an Ajira Airways water bottle ended up in an outrigger canoe in the future, and get some potentially interesting off-Island action with Des & Pen, Widmore, Hawking, Aaron, Ji Yeon, Waaaalt, and other friends and loved ones of the O6. That all the adult members of the O6 would suddenly go missing simultaneously seems like the kind of thing that would draw some attention, don’t you think? Can an “815 Truth” movement and/or public knowledge of the mysterious Island in the outside world be far behind?

Of course, the very fact that there’s a comparatively flimsy Ajira water bottle in 2005 or later and a set of Ajira passengers back in DHARMA days also strongly implies that not everyone on Flight 316, including the plane itself, ended up in the same time-zone. All that remains to know here is who and what ended up when, and why. (By the way, anyone wanna take bets that Caesar is Widmore’s plant on the plane? Didn’t think so.)

Don’t leave false illusions behind. Don’t cry ’cause I ain’t changing my mind. So find another fool like before, ’cause I aint gonna live anymore believing some of the lies while all of the signs are deceiving.

(Or maybe I should be quoting the Thompson Twins…”Lies, lies, lies, YEAH!” But really, they were so cheesy weren’t they?)

Verily, I say unto you that the lies were flowing fast and freely from the mouths of both Ben Linus and Eloise Hawking this episode, and I’m betting that something of a long con was pulled. From Ben, we know that he lied about not knowing about the Lamp Post station, about something as niggling as his dead-in-childbirth mother teaching him to read, and almost assuredly about not knowing about Locke’s suicide. We also know full well that the “promise to an old friend” he was keeping was an attempt on Penny Widmore’s life seeking vengeance for Alex’s execution…and that everything didn’t go exactly as planned given Ben’s bloodied and soaked condition during his call to Jack.

But I think the far bigger lie was Hawking’s. Oh, it contained kernels of truth the way all the very best lies do—the Lamp Post no doubt was DHARMA’s way of finding the Island, for example—but fundamentally, she was lying about everything else except which plane the O6ers needed to be one. Why? Because I would lay dollars to donuts that she’s known all along that it would be Ajira flight 316 on that particular day that would hit the “window” that would allow it to get to the Island.

She knew that because some time-traveler in the past had given up that info. Just like the elder Others—and seemingly everyone else but the actual passengers of Oceanic 815—knew that 815 would come crashing down on their shores on 9/22/04 for 50 years. She just needed to make it all look good and sound plausible with the impressive setting, mammoth Foucault  pendulum, charming retro tech, and lovely story of the Lamp Post.

I’m also all but certain that she’s playing Ben right along with the O6. She might also be playing Widmore, both sides against the middle, as it were. Her availability in both Ben’s and Widmore’s rolodexes certainly leaves her ultimate allegiance murky. But really, I wouldn’t be even a little surprised to learn that Hawking and Faraday have an agenda all their own pertaining to the Island.

By the way…Ben’s strategic telling of the story of Doubting Thomas to make him out to be a hero? Smooth. The ol’ Benster’s still got it!

See there! A man is born, and we pronounce him fit for peace. There’s a load lifted from his shoulders with the discovery of his disease. We’ll take the child from him, put it to the test…teach it to be a wise man, how to fool the rest.

So now, let’s handicap the answers to the obvious (and a few not-so-obvious) questions of this episode:

1. Aaron, Aaron, who’s got the Aaron?

Ben’s lawyers: 5-1
Cassidy Phillips: 3-1
Carole Littleton: 2-1
None of the above: 100-1 

To my way of thinking, Carol Littleton (Claire’s mum and Aaron’s gran) is the logical choice here, though I do rather wonder if wee Turniphead didn’t get to her by way of Dan Norton, Esq. I’ve also heard the notion that Kate stashed her moppet with Sawyer’s old flame, Cassidy, and while I find it an intriguing notion, I don’t think it makes a whole hell of a lot of sense. Carole Littleton’s “coincidental” appearance in LA surely couldn’t just have been a red herring in “The Little Prince“…could it? And couldn’t you just see the Carole and the Mr. Paik getting more than a little agitated by the abandoning of their grandspawn by their children?

2. Who roughed Ben up before giving him a dunk in the drink?

Desmond: 3-1
Sayid: 5-1
Penny: 10-1
All of the above: 3-2
None of the above: 20-1 

Everything clearly did not go according to plan in Ben’s plan to avenge his adoptive daughter’s death. His arm’s damaged badly enough to be in a sling, he looks like he went a few rounds with Mike Tyson, and he obviously took an unplanned swim. Given Ben’s track-record of badassery, I’m not buying anyone but former Royal Scot Desmond and/or former Republican Guard Sayid (with possible assist from Penny herself…you can’t be Widmore’s kid and not be tough!) doing that kind of damage to our international man of bug-eyed mystery. I’m just not buying Ben being taken down like that by a bunch of rented goons from Charles Widmore.

3. What was Sayid doing in cuffs in the custody of US Marshall Hottie?

Being deported for either his murders for Ben and/or his beat-down of Ben: 2-1
Being conned by a fake Marshall to do what Ben wants: 10-1
Conspiring with the Marshall, real or fake, to take down Ben: 20-1
It’s all just a great big misunderstanding: 1,000-1

Ben’s clearly not above using law enforcement to do his dirty work for him…especially after getting beaten to a bloody pulp. Even if it wasn’t Sayid who put that hurting on him, he may very well still have used it to implicate Sayid. And we know he has a scary-good lawyer.

4. Who got Hurley out of jail and told which plane to be on?

Dan Norton, Esq.: 3-1
Zombie-Charlie: 5-1
Other Island Apparition: 10-1
Anyone else: 100-1

Unlike any of the Island Apparitions, Dan Norton has the juice to get Hurley out of the pokey before telling him which plane to get on. And wasn’t it just the sweetest thing that Hurley let himself be thought of as a dick in order to save 78 people from enduring a crash and stranding on the Island? That boy is SO the moral center of the show!

5. Who’s the “clever fellow” who came up with the method of finding the Island?

Enzo Valenzetti: 7-1
Gerald DeGroot: 12-1
Pierre Chang: 30-1
Charles Widmore: 25-1
Alvar Hanso: 100-1
Daniel Faraday: 50-1
Horace Goodspeed: 10-1
Someone we haven’t met: 15-1
We’ll never find out:  20-1

OK…Chang’s an astrophysicist, so freaky earth-bound electromagnetism isn’t his area of expertise. Hanso and Widmore don’t seem to be scientific minds of any sort, despite clearly being high-wattage bulbs. Faraday would be a bit too cutesy and coincidental for my liking. It could easily be that we’ll either never find out who did it or else meet them later. But, of the people we’ve met or heard about, I like Valenzetti, DeGroot, and Goodspeed the best for coming up with that kind of mathematical model. Yes, I know Valenzetti isn’t exactly canon what with being from The Lost Experience and all, but I’ve always looked at the Sri Lanka Video as being at least as canonical as the Orchid orientation film bloopers and the transmission to the future shown at Comicon the last couple of years.

And, finally…

I told the priest, “Don’t count on any second coming. God got his ass kicked the first time he came down here slumming. He had the nerve to come, the gall to die and then forgive us. No, I don’t wonder why…I wonder what he thought it’d get us.”

That brings us back around to faith, Christian imagery, and our dear corpsified friend, John Locke.

For all that faith often seems to get the upper hand on science in that particular great debate on the show, it sure does seem to be for suckers, doesn’t it? People making appeals to faith on Lost all seem to be manipulating others or are being manipulated by others (and sometimes Others). Ben and Hawking trying to buck up Jack’s courage to get him back to the Island, Locke trying to convince Jack of his “destiny” of staying on the Island, Locke seeming more and more like the Island’s dupe as time goes on, and so forth.

Most of the people who keep asking for faith from others—Ben, Hawking, the Island via Christian—seem to have empirical data to work from and don’t exactly need faith. The faith is for those who don’t have “need to know.” The fate of the faithful on this show is certainly looking like it’s to be used and then discarded…usually involving death. We the audience don’t need any convincing that there are miracles to be had on the Island. We’ve seen them. Actual gnosiskind of  eliminates the need for faith, don’t you think? If you have direct knowledge of the supernatural, you don’t need to have faith that it exists.

On a related note, am I the only one who’s deeply annoyed by ABC’s teaser for next week? None of the other recappers I’ve seen have mentioned this. I won’t get into the details for those who haven’t seen it, but ABC really looked like it spoiled a major reveal from next week’s episode and they should know better than that. Given what it was, I can’t even hope that it was misleading. Whoever did that should be canned post-haste.

Right. That’s it for now. See you probably about this time next week as I’m going to be out of town from Wed-Sun and won’t be in much of a position to be doing all the watching and gathering of resources I need to do for a proper recap. Sorry in advance!

(PS: Was it just me or was it more than a little poignant that an episode with so many CS Lewis allusions happened after Charlotte died?)

(PPS: Best line of the whole episode, “Wait a second…we’re not going to Guam, are we.” )

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There’s a little white porch – and you wanted it so – Can you let me go down – to the end of the road/ In the black and the white – a technicolorful life – Can I stand by your side – we can make it alright/ Like home.

‘Cause I’m home – There’s a little white porch – and you wanted it so – can you let me go down – to the end of the road/In the black and the white – a technicolorful life – then another arrived – it’s a cowardly lion.

What I want from this world – what I wanna resolve – when I want you to stay – so I want you to wait – I don’t wanna be bold – I don’t wanna be cold – I don’t want grow old – I don’t wanna go HOME.

-          Breaking Benjamin “Home”

TEASER

A – The Oceanic 6 is on a cargo plane (bad mojo) and Jack takes the lead in deciding to stick to the story of how they survived on the island.  As they exit the plane, everyone except Sayid, Kate and Aaron has someone waiting for them.

A – Back on the island Jack has Faraday monitor the chopper with the sat-phone Lapidus dropped. He decides that he and Kate will go after the chopper.

Act Out- Faraday knows that the chopper is going to the Orchid and that means that Keamy is enacting the Second Protocol. He tells Charlotte “We have to get off this island, now!”

ACT ONE

A – Jack and Kate trek through the jungle while Jack bleeds on the flora. Kate points out how Jack looks a person in the eyes when he lies to them just before Milo, followed by Sawyer and Aaron, stumble across them. Sawyer and Jack conflict over who was right and wrong before Jack assumes responsibility for Sayid and Desmond (not on the chopper). Sawyer joins him in their “rescue” (Wait, you don’t get to die alone).

A – At the press conference the Oceanic 6 tells their story.

-          Jack initially lies about landing in the water.

-          Hurley takes offense to his “health” and wealth.

-          Sun says Jin died in the crash.

-          A reporter points out Kate would have been six-months pregnant when the Marshall caught her and took her on the plane.

-          Sayid says there are no other survivors.

As they leave the conference Sayid finds Nadia waiting for him. Ah, bittersweet.

Act Out – Sayid arrives back on the island ready to ferry everyone to the freighter when he learns that Jack and Kate have gone after the chopper.

ACT TWO

C – Locke, Hurley, and Ben deliver exposition just before finding a 15 year-old supply cache and signaling the Others.

B – Faraday takes over ferrying duties so that Sayid and Kate can go after Jack and Sawyer. Juliet insures that Sun is first on the raft (note: Juliet, Charlotte, Milo, Rose and Bernard seem to be the only ones still on the island when the raft launches).

Act Out – Back home, Sun takes over controlling interest in her father’s company. “Two people are responsible for [Jin's] death. You are one of them.” Sun promises to discuss the future of Paik Industries after she gives birth.

ACT THREE

A – Hurley arrives home with his Mr. Cluck’s chicken to find a coconut and whispers waiting for him. He discovers a surprise birthday party (Jesus Christ is not a weapon) with Kate, Aaron, Sayid and Nadia waiting for him. He then learns that his dad restored the Camaro, but the odometer is set to 4815162342!!!!!! Run, mad man, run!

Act Out – Hurley, Ben and Lock deliver some more exposition before discovering that Keamy is already at the orchid.

ACT FOUR

B – The raft arrives at the ferry and Sun and Jin learn that Michael is on the freighter while Desmond and Hendricks learn that something is transmitting from the freighter.

D – Jack and Sawyer find Frank Lapidus cuffed to the chopper with no Desmond or Sayid. Sawyer tells jack that “Hugo” is with Ben at the Orchid (I guess wanting to rescue Locke would be pointless).

Act Out – Jack leads his father’s wake then learns from a coma-free Mrs. Littleton that Claire was/is his half-sister. Final frame is an OTS shot of Aaron looking at Jack as Jack stares back wide-eyed and teary as HIS NEPHEW! (duh-duh-dun)

ACT FIVE /TAG

B – Michael tells Sun and Jin his story then Desmond directs him to the C-4 in the radio room. We assume the Korean Jin speaks to Sun is, “You know that raft we just came in on? Get back on it.”

A – In a scene reminiscent from Season Two, Kate and Sayid are taken by the Others, but unlike Season Two, this time we’re glad they captured Kate.

C – Ben gives Locke future exposition on what to do in the Orchid before revealing he has plan.

Montage – Sun and Aaron head toward the raft. Jack and Sawyer head toward the Orchid. Kate and Sayid head to wherever the Others are taking them. Locke and Hurley keep their heads down.

In the Teaser and Act One we learn that simply getting off the island is not going to be as easy as Jack wants it to be (oh, this isn’t a Jack-centric episode, but he’s got his stank all over it). We learn on the cargo plane that whatever happens between this episode and the Oceanic 6 getting off the island has left them all in shock, but Jack still takes control by keeping everyone focused on the story they’ll tell.

In Act Two it’s clear that everyone is willing to stick to the lie, necessary or not, except Hurley.  The first question (health) he dodges like politician and the second (wealth) he wants nothing to do with. It’s our first glimpse in how the Oceanic 6 might not keep their story.

But it is in Act two, through Sun’s story, we catch are first glimpse that “home” isn’t so sweet, nor will it be and that not everyone is going to stick to the story. Why? While Sun points out that she holds her father responsible for Jin’s death she also points out that she holds one other person responsible. There’s no need to say this to her father unless she wants him (and not just the audience) to know there’s another person. So even though we saw that the story is already unraveling at the conference we get a glimpse into how it’s going to continue to unravel . Notice in Ji Yeon that only Hurely came to see Sun’s baby and in this episode he didn’t lie. Also, Sun gives someone off the island a tiny hint that there is more to the “story.”

Act three ends with what seems to be redundancy, Keamy and his boys are at the Orchid. But what this shows is that there is going to be an unavoidable confrontation that is going to shake our survivors to their core. Is it any wonder why Act Three is all about Hurley? In television Act Three usually is the point where the hero/heroes try a new approach, but end up in the worst state. Hurley tries to strike a balance between being home and giving up the cursed money, but all signs (coconut, whispers, and numbers) point to the fact that it’s impossible (and we know that Charlie’s ghost will eventually show up). In the Act Out Hurley is concerned about what will happen to him if they move the island and he’s still on it.  Well, we know he won’t be, but the difference is that Hurley is privy to what Ben and Locke are doing. He actually understands it, therefore once he’s off the island, of the Six, he’s the only one that knows what really happened and why, but it won’t be until Hurley learns to trust himself, in fact, love himself, that he will be able to face that truth and bring everyone together.

In Act Four, everything is on island, no flash-forward, and we get a glimpse as to how matter will be resolved. There’s the raft for Sun and Aaron, and the chopper for Jack, Kate, Hurley and Sayid, we know that this is how they’re going to escape the dangerous situations they are in, but clearly something is going to happen to both Hurley and Sun that will distance them from the other four and lead them to being the ones that lead the return to the island in Season Five.

Is it any wonder why we began the episode with Jack being the ring leader of the falsified story, then we see him doing what Jack takes best, try take responsibility for everyone and control the outcome, but when he runs into Sawyer it’s one of the first times that we see someone point out that Jack is wrong and his only response is, “Well hiding out didn’t seem to work for you guys.” Jack is wrong, but he’s not willing to admit it and we’re seeing the first signs of that.

Now, this episode seems as just a set up for the finale, but that’s only the case in Act Five when we see the montage (that for some reason made me think of Return of the Jedi), and four factions each of our Oceanic 6 are broken down into and we are forced to wonder how they’ll come together to get off the island.

Oh, but wait! This episode still stands on its own legs as a major part of the overall monomyth because we learn how two of our main supporting characters, Hurley and Sun, will be integral to bringing about the overarching conclusion of the show.

The Season Finale will be the pinnacle of “The Reward” (See Part 4 of Journey to Redemption) where are heroes will be living the truth of their new identities and accepting the consequences.

 There is the Oceanic Six, a new identity for these five adults that will forever link them together with the island, and there are those who stay behind, but as some characters are arching for the better, others are not. Sayid has his Nadia and we know that things are not going to end well there. Kate, the fugitive, has someone to love, but when she got off the plane she was truly alone. Hurley and Sun, the guy who cares for everyone but himself and the once docile but now independent woman, cannot separate themselves from the people or events on the island.

Jack, well Jack has learned who Aaron is and it’s going to be impossible for him to continue to ignore that being on that island was destiny. When this season ends, as we’ve seen, Jack will be taking responsibility as a leader by living in denial (is this art imitating life…I digress), but in order for him to return to the island the first thing he’s going to have to do is admit he’s wrong and then start to trust those he once led.

“Can I stand by your side, we can make it alright, like home.”

First the Breakdown, then the analysis, shall we?

TEASER

A – The show kicks off with Jack being awakened (Jack, I need you to wake up) and going outside his tent to make the peace between his people and the freighties before reiterating his promise to get everyone off the island and then collapsing.

Act Out – In the future we discover that after her trial, Kate, Jack, and Aaron are living together [note: Jack wakes up and finds Kate in the shower)

ACT ONE

A - Still in the future, Jack reads "Alice in Wonderland" to Aaron and appears very fatherly.

B - While crossing the island back to the beach, Sawyer and Claire learn that Danielle and Karl are dead when Miles reveals their bodies.

Act Out - On the island, Juliet confirms Jack's need for an appendectomy.

ACT TWO

C - Juliet sends Sun and Jin to the staff for medical supplies to perform the surgery . Dan and Charlotte join them.

B - Sawyer takes a "Big Brother" (not the show or Orwellian) role toward Claire and imposes a "restraining order" against Miles.

D - There's a D story? Yes, it's very brief but it's the conversation between Bernard and Rose where they discuss the implications of Jack's need for surgery. 

A - On the island Jack wants Kate to hold the mirror for him while he directs his own surgery.

Act Out - Jack visits Hurley and learns that he has been seeing Charlie and that Charlie has a message for Jack: You're not supposed to raise him. Then he also learns that someone will be visiting him very soon.

ACT THREE

C - Sun, Jin, Dan, and Charlotte arrive at the Staff and Jin suspects that Charlotte knows Korean. [Note: Daniel goes into the Staff first]

B – Sawyer, Claire and Miles come across Lapidus, who warns them to hide from Mr. Keamy.

A – Jack and Juliet convince Kate to help with the surgery.

Act Out – Jack wakes Kate up to propose to her.

ACT FOUR

C – Jin confirms his suspicion about Charlotte and makes her promise to get Sun off the island regardless of what happens to him or his friends.

A – (Bernard: Wouldn’t you rather be dreaming about something nice back home?) Juliet begins the surgery Jack’s way, but they have to toss Kate out of the tent and chloroform his butt.

Act Out – Claire wakes up in the middle of the night to find her dead dad holding Aaron.

TAG

(This tag is long enough that it is nearly an Act Five)

A – Juliet lets Kate know that Jack loves her while he pretends to be sleeping. In the future Jack and Kate start to fall apart when he learns that Kate is doing a favor for Sawyer.

Act Out – We end on the B-story when Sawyer wakes up to find Claire missing, learns that she left with her dad, and finds Aaron a few yards away. Claire! Claire!

Now, deciphering the intent of this week’s episode isn’t as easy as last week’s when we could just follow the act outs…or is it? Let’s see.

First up, notice the number of times people are being woken up: Jack wakes up to make the peace between his people, then wakes up to find Kate in his shower, Kate wakes up to a proposal, and Claire wakes up to dead daddy holding her baby.

Bernard asks Jack about the chloroform: Wouldn’t you rather be dreaming about something nice back home? Think back to the Alice in Wonderland reference. The line that we’re clearly meant to hear is “I wonder if I’ve been changed in the night? Let me think: was I the same when I got up this morning? I almost think I can remember feeling a little different. But if I’m not the same, the next question is, who in the world am I?”

One of the themes of this episode is what is real and what is a dream? Jack thinks Hurley is crazy because he tells him he sees Charlie, but when Jack starts seeing his father his happy world with Kate begins to unravel. We know where this will eventually lead, but what it truly reveals is Jack’s inability to deal with reality and more importantly his inability to place faith in others based on the reality that surrounds him. Remember, Jack has been seeing his dead father since Season One, but for Hurley to see Charlie is crazy. Not only that, but the guy can’t even let a trained fertility doctor do a simple appendectomy because he doesn’t trust anyone.

That leads us to the second part of this episode – trust. This is played out in the all stories as the need to protect someone. Notice, that in the future we first see Kate in the shower. If that isn’t a vulnerable place then watch Psycho.  Jack wants to protect everyone, but he needs Kate to protect him by holding the mirror. Juliet tries to protect Jack from himself. Bernard wants to protect Rose, Jin – Sun, Sawyer – Claire, and Dan -Charlotte. What’s the one thing none of these people are trying to protect? The island! And I believe that is because none of them has learned to trust it like Locke seems to have. The big key to this episode isn’t who is dead and who isn’t, it’s that small D-story, when Rose points out that it can’t be mere coincidence that Jack is ill the day before they are set to leave an island that heals people.

The story fits into the big picture by revealing that until these people unite (for example, Jin needs to care for more than just Sun and his baby), care for one another, and protect the island, then any hope of happiness is just a dream.