Won’t it be awkward if Flocke gets his “last recruit” and then kills all of them? That’s the going theory over at the Ack Attack. Nothing much else is new this week, other than Damon and Carlton talking to a real, live, superfamous cosmologist about time travel, wormholes, and everything else that may or may not be going on on Lost Island.
One part of this article really made me think: I know we’ve complained that it is completely clear that some of the weird stuff that came up in the first season was clearly not meant to be resolved in the way it has been. But that’s a little unfair: we’re looking at a final endpoint, and expecting them to have had that specific endpoint in mind and have worked backwards. Damon points out that it’s a bit more important for them to have had some endpoint in mind for each specific mystery they brought in, not necessarily have interwoven all of them into the ‘final’ answer — and honestly, I think they succeeded in that. The article also acknowledges that time travel was used as a device to get at the themes of destiny vs. free will, and so I don’t know that we can expect that time travel to be “explained” as much as we can expect its impact to be large. Damon and Carlton also point out something interesting: you can always attack time travel or other science fiction aspects as a deus ex machina, but keep in mind that using physics means there are rules that they have to follow, or, thinking of it in a more helpful light, rules they can follow — scientific elements help keep the narrative on a track, even though it might seem like they allow the narrative to fly off in any direction.
I’m also reassured that they’re not going to try to come down on one side of the coin as far as the Big Philosophical Questions “Are we living with order or chaos?” and “Is there a God”? Instead, it sounds like what they’re doing is saying, “Those are age-old questions that any narrative is going to be struggling with, on some level; we’re bringing that into the context of ordinary people in extraordinary situations and tossing in the added complications of time travel, supernatural beings, multiverses, and other Big Questions that haven’t necessarily been asked in tandem with these particular Big Questions.” When you think about it that way, it’s extra cool that the Jack/Locke ‘man of science’/'man of faith’ issue has actually turned more into a Jack/Flocke ‘man who thinks we live in a world that carries meaning’/'man who think we live in a world of people who suck’ debate.
So: the Last Recruit? Jack decides to sit down with Flocke and get some ANSWERS. And finally someone, #1, encourages the asking of questions and, #2, has a conversation that involves the exchange of information. Then Jack and Claire get all family-shmoopy, and of course he doesn’t ask her any questions about the whole “once you talked to him you were WITH him” thing. Again, with our answers, we get more questions: the Smoke Monster, according to his conversation with Sawyer, can’t leave the Island by just flying over the ocean, so what was going on when Jack had visions of his father on the mainland? Was that Jacob? Was that still the Enemy, but just through a different mechanism?
I love how Ben X has a PhD in European History, and he doesn’t go, “JOHN Locke? No freaking way!” This show can be so ridonkulous. Along the same lines, Sawyer’s “Who the hell’s Anakin?” is a little ripe coming from a show that has dropped hundreds of Star Wars references, and plenty of them from Sawyer himself. I was also going to point out that Zoe’s pretty hardcore for just being a geophysicist, but then I thought about my PhD supervisor and she could definitely blow up an island or two if she wanted.
Kate X’s theory that Sawyer X didn’t arrest her at LAX (that is a LOT of X’s) because he didn’t want anyone to know he had been on a flight from Australia is an intriguing one. I had myself convinced he hadn’t actually killed anyone in this version of events — in particular because he was looking for Anthony Cooper once he arrived back in LA, so I’d assumed he’d avoided that misadventure. I’m also a bit in love with Jack’s idea that leaving the Island this time isn’t a good idea — first, because Flocke wants them to do it so badly, and second, because he doesn’t think this feeling of having something to accomplish on the Island is going to go away until that mission, whatever it is, is fulfilled. It makes a lot of sense, but it also gives us something to drive the action for the next four episodes: what is it that Jack has to do, and what happens after he does it? My mother noted that it’s hard for us to tell whether Jack or Sawyer was right in that argument, and I think the answer is that they were both right: Jack is the only one (with, of course, the exception of Locke) who felt that getting back to the Island was something he was ‘meant’ to do. Kate wanted to go because of Claire, Sun because of Jin, Sayid because of Ben. So I think it makes sense that Sawyer would be leading one group off the Island, and that would be the right thing to do, but that it would be the wrong thing for Jack to leave without having accomplished whatever it is he came for.
For a few sweet moments before that argument comes up, Jack and Sawyer are buddies! I love Leadership Sawyer. It’s also really interesting to me that Jack has been so beaten down by these experiences that he actually left Claire behind — any other time, he would have argued (and maybe he would have been right?). And the boat is back! The one named after Libby! You guys might not be aware of this, but the internet has been freaking out about the existence of that boat and whether the writers were going to forget about it and how sloppy that would be etc. etc. A lot of people were made really happy tonight. That includes me, but for different reasons: every episode of Lost should be made up of shots of hot dudes sitting on boats on a beautiful day. On that same note, this might sound a little bit nuts, but I’m beginning to suspect that there is real significance to it when people are wearing blue shirts. I’m also beginning to suspect that someone needs to make a video of Lost boat scenes with this playing in the background.
Why does Ilana X think that a SECRET SISTER is a GOOD SURPRISE for someone who is mourning his DEAD FATHER? And thinks he is showing up for a routine reading of a will? Sorry for overdoing the caps there. But, seriously? Worst lawyer ever, right? Also, when Jack and David first walked into the building, my initial thought was, “Why are they going to an adoption agency? Oh, man, David, you really shouldn’t have believed him when he promised you that you could never disappoint him.” I really loved the great attention to detail when David and Jack went to the hospital — they walked with exactly the same gait. It does seem a little weird that they are all totally lovey-dovey pretty much instantly, when two weeks ago David was terrified to tell Jack about the most basic facts of his life, but I get that there are some pretty serious time constraints to work with.
Sun X is alive! Best day ever! But you know things are going to get bad when Jin X says, “We’re all going to be okay.” Also, when regular Jin says, “We’ll never be apart again, I promise you” (which read as another Princess Bride reference to me, but I might be a little biased there). I think this means that they are totally screwed in the entire multiverse. By the way, were you all as concerned as we were that they were going to get fried by that sonic fence? We also noticed that Sun X recognized Locke X at the hospital; is she remembering him from the Island, or have they had some interaction in the X timeline other than on the plane?
Before we wrap up: here is the part where I rant about a couple of things. WHY do people keep INSISTING on using the word “raised” when referring to what Kate did for Aaron? Claire is nuts. You can very, very easily soften the blow just by saying “took care of.” You know how else you can soften the blow? “Your baby is with your mom, who isn’t in a coma anymore. Yay!” Don’t bait someone who is really struggling; it’s just cruel! And you’re not cruel to people who have guns, generally. And on that note: I understand that it’s pretty adorable that Kate wants so badly to reunite Claire and Aaron, and that it’s ultra adorable that Sun could magically speak English again when she saw Jin (even though, considering that they both speak Korean, it’s the exact opposite of necessary and sensical). But both of those scenes continue to place the importance of women on the Island in the exact 2 categories we’ve been dealing with for a few years now: motherhood, and being in love with dudes who get to have actual storylines where they get stuff done. They didn’t even let Sun go with Sawyer and they all know that she knows how to for-real sail, not just how to “Kate has apparently been on a boat but I don’t know when” sail.
Now for non-ranting mode: Lost is pretty cool these days. There’s never too much for me to write about, again because we’re getting a ton of answers and picking up speed rather than having strange clues thrown at us all the time. But every week now, I like the episode. There was a whole lot of switching-sides and double-agenting and running-into-people-in-the-X-timeline in this episode. Now, on-Island, we have everyone “together” in two groups, and the same is basically true in the X timeline — that hospital and that police station are pretty crowded places. I feel like things are in a pretty different situation now than they were an hour ago. Why didn’t Widmore want Jack? Does he not need him? Did he just want to get his hands on a majority of candidates? Why did they feel that they had succeeded when they had that particular ensemble on the beach? What is going on here? And what happens to Jack now? Why is he Flocke’s last recruit? Why doesn’t Flocke like to kill people himself? It seems silly for him to send Sayid off to do his dirty work when we know how many people have been killed by Smokey (by the way, I do not think Desmond is dead, and I think that’s because Hurley was right — you can bring people back from the dark side . . . like Anakin). Does this mean that he really can’t control what he does as Smokey? I know I’m supposed to help you guys with the answers, but right now, all I have is questions . . .
I think we’ve got a lot of momentum heading into the last four episodes. Each season, things pick up a lot just before the finale episodes, and then Lost basically turns into a movie, where everything happens in one continuous set of actions. I wonder whether that will happen both on Island and in the X timeline, since we seem to be all set up for that to happen; it might pick up there 2 weeks from now (oh, by the way: no Lost next week!) in which case we’d better be prepared for a bumpy ride. What to do next week? I suggest we spend some time outside or with loved ones. Just kidding, I’m totally going to work late!
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