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PENULTIMATE LOST! Previously on Lost: Sun and Jin died needlessly. Tonight on Lost: we try to convince you that What They Died For was a good reason. Did anyone notice that Jacob didn’t exactly give a satisfying answer to Kate, Hurley, Jack and Sawyer about Sayid and the Kwons’ deaths not being a waste? Or about any other aspect of protecting the ‘heart’ of the Island, for that matter? But I’m getting way ahead of myself . . .

Anyway, first, some business: this weekend! They’re re-airing the series premiere on Saturday night from 8 to 10 (come on up if you’re interested), then Sunday is a clip show from 7 to 9 (during which I suggest a round of Jackface), finale from 9 to 11:30, local news from 11:30 to 12 (a.k.a. Jears piñata time at my place), and then live interviews with the cast and creators on Jimmy Kimmel until 1 a.m.

It turns out even 2.5 hours isn’t enough for the finale, and there’s going to be an extra 20 minutes (which would basically be an extra full half hour on television) on the DVD. My coworkers think that if the finale is awful (and since the season pretty much has been) that we should all boycott the DVDs, but hopefully they saw the look of panic on my face and know that I just cannot do that.

More fun stuff: an interview with Damon and Carlton about how much everyone hated the previous episode, “Across the Sea,” and how it’s not their fault that the show we’ve been watching is apparently not the show they’ve been writing; videos of some of the cast interviewing each other; and, finally, a couple of sets of photos from a huge event they had on Hawaii over the weekend (where they actually aired the episode we are watching as I type this). Mainly these photos are fun because Taller Ghost Walt is now HOLY GUACAMOLE Ghost Walt.

And then the episode opens with Jack X’s eye opening in LA, which is totally Sam’s prediction for how the entire series is going to end (the eye part, not the LA part — her vote is for the Island). So, either they ran that this week to tease us that the series will not be ending that way — kind of an “it’s NOT purgatory!” inside joke — or it was supposed to be a reminder so that next week we’ll remember seeing it. Hmmm.

I’m on board with people remembering the original timeline, but how does Jack keep ending up bleeding in the X Universe? Does anyone have any ideas that can make that particular twist make sense? Jack X and David are so adorable! They are really pretty much bashing us over the head with that (and with the whole “WHO IS THE MOM?!? OMGWTFBBQ?!?” question). Later when Locke X says that David looks just like Jack, he says, “Don’t tell him that!” Um, why? Why would a kid not want to look like Matthew Fox? Say what you will about Jack and what a ridiculous tool he is — and I have said that, a lot — but don’t tell me you don’t like watching him.

He’s stitching up Kate just like she stitched him up way back in the beginning! Awwww. Are they winning me back? And then she decides to kill Flocke! And then Desmond X beats the living daylights out of Ben X! And we see Miles and Richard and Ben again, FINALLY! And since we last saw them, they have been having excellent adventures! And Widmore always calls Ben “Benjamin”! And someone rescued Desmond from the well and we have no idea who! And Jack actually says the words, “I’ve been wrong before”!!! Wow, that’s a lot of exclamation points, especially compared to what we’ve had lately (namely, my bitterness and lots of question marks). Perhaps they HAVE won me back! Hopefully this is more enjoyable for you to read than the last few weeks have been.

You know what’s going to be really awkward if Ben X starts remembering his Island life? He’s going to become convinced that one of his AP History students is his daughter. Which is a little extra creepy, no?

So Desmond X’s plan is accelerating a bit now. It’s about time! Sounds like Jacob’s is too: “We’re very close to the end, Hugo.” Oh, Jacob, this is why you’re my favorite character on this show — wait, you’re brand new and a huge distraction from the stuff I actually love. Slip of the tongue!

Aaaaaaaaand there goes Richard. That was quick! Wait, what about the rules? If Flocke could kill Richard, why wouldn’t he have done that some point in the last couple of hundred years? Is it because Richard isn’t protected by Jacob anymore? Seriously, how do these rules work?? I wonder whether they’re ever going to show us Smokey actually turning into Flocke — I can’t tell whether we’re supposed to be thinking that’s a huge mystery we’ll get to see happen in the next couple of hours, or if it’s more a question of not having the budget to do a good job with the special effects and we’re just supposed to imagine it being somewhat like Clark Kent.

Fact: hardcore Island Rousseau with the guns and the guns is way cooler than fancy coq au vin Rousseau X with the bangs and the dress and the looking like maybe she wants to make out with Ben. Also, Dear Lost: a parent would never say “You’re the closest thing to a father she’s ever had” to a teacher they are just meeting for the first time. Yeah, because teaching AP history is totally like being a single mom!

Flocke killed Island Liz Lemon! Love this guy. Isn’t Terry O’Quinn just great? From SpaceCamp to Lost, I think I’ll stick with him. And remember a few weeks ago when I thought Ben was totally beaten down into submission and had lost all his spirit? Yeah, this is way, way better. Not that I’m really jazzed about the whole “Penny dying” aspect of this, but the “Ben killing everyone” thing could be fun. And let’s be honest: redemption stories can be cool, but a really fantastic villain is a terrible thing to waste. Also: Widmore says he’s been three steps ahead of Ben, and he says that he was going to blow the plane up, but if you’re really, really trying to keep someone from escaping from the Island, don’t you use your C4 immediately?

Wait wait wait is Kate a candidate again? Oh Lost, thank you! I knew the whole “Austen was crossed out in the cave, but not in the lighthouse” thing couldn’t be an error (um, but it’s a good thing Widmore didn’t shoot her — and so much for ‘the rules’: if you can just volunteer to be a candidate, why would Smokey be so hell-bent on taking out some specific subset of them?). I love that they just sit down around a fire and Jacob finally says one thing that I actually have been waiting to hear: none of them were doing okay in their lives. I mean, you have to ignore the dozens and dozens of other people on Oceanic 815 who died in the crash, and people like Sayid who was on his way to a reunion with Nadia, but at this stage in the game we’re assumed to be pretty good at ignoring the parts of Lost we’re supposed to ignore. I didn’t love his attitude that this meant they had no reason to complain about coming to this awful place and having even more terrible things happen to them, but at least we’re getting one answer that fits in with what we suspected all along.

I’m not really sure that I have any capability to understand why Kate “becoming a mother” means crossing her name out, but, um, you know, WHATEVER, Lost. She’s too delicate of a flower for Jacob to drag her to the Island because she’s a mom? Only he did anyway, but because of his ‘principles’ he wasn’t doing it for a good reason and was really just wasting her time and risking her life? This is why sexism doesn’t actually make good sense. Also, there was still a Kwon up on that ceiling, so either this rule didn’t apply to Sun (doubtful) or this rule doesn’t apply to fathers (ding ding ding). On the other hand, Jacob makes Jack cry bitter Jears, so that’s pretty sweet. You win some, you lose some.

Hurley: “I’m just glad it’s not me.” Pffft! We were all hoping you were gonna have a really awesome ending, so this had better not mean that you don’t! Along the same lines, I’m not exactly sure how this is progress. Jacob says that he pulled everyone out of pretty miserable lives into a situation that would help them change, and I’m with him as far as that (pretty major theme) goes. But Jack started off this show being a guy who just had to fix things no matter what and wouldn’t let anybody else in — how, exactly, is him volunteering to chain himself to an Island for the rest of his miserable existence a step forward??

You know, I can’t help but thinking how last week’s episode wouldn’t have driven me as completely nuts if it hadn’t aired last week. It’s not like I’m sitting here saying, “Wow, Jacob just asked Jack to drink from the cup just like Mother did way back in the third season!” It doesn’t count as a mystery if we found out about it seven days ago. I really think they would have been a lot wiser to incorporate those threads much, much earlier.

On the other hand, though, this episode didn’t waste any time. We all knew Jack was going to be The Candidate, and they rushed us through that and through him drinking from the cup pretty quickly so that we can get to the action. And the water wasn’t even turned into wine, thank you very much. I appreciate that, because if someone had asked me to bet, I would have thought we were going to have an hour of Jack angst with him deciding whether or not to drink and hemming and hawing and crying in the jungle, and we didn’t have to deal with any of that. It’s over, Jack is going to stick around to protect the Island (or die trying — guess we’ll find out Sunday!), and now all that’s left is the endgame. Also, I guess I had just assumed that we would not find out who Jacob’s replacement would be until the very, very end (even though we all “knew” it would be Jack), but I like this way better. It’s definitely set up so that Sawyer, Hurley, and Kate can each have a major role to play and a good ending to their story even without being The One True Protector Of The Magic Golden Cave, and that’s better news than I was expecting. In other words, being The Candidate doesn’t, we now know, necessarily mean being the best or the brightest or the favorite or the one who contributes the most — this is a role Jack is taking, but it’s not diminishing what the others can do in the next 2.5 hours.

Ana-Lucia X as a crooked cop is the best possible reinvention for her. Hurley X in cahoots with Desmond X is the best possible reinvention for him. And now they’re all going to go to a concert to hang out with David and Pierre Chang and we’ll finally find out who David’s mother is and maybe it will be Juliet (that’s the going theory, though if having intense experiences with someone you knew on the Island makes you remember the other timeline, how would that not have already happened?) and somehow having them all in the same place is going to save the Island and it’s gonna be AWESOME. And Desmond is a failsafe and is somehow going to destroy the Island which doesn’t actually sound like a bad thing to me. Next week is just going to be everybody trying to kill everybody, including Ben being back with a vengeance (and, we hope, maybe double or triple crossing — you never can tell with that guy). This is much, much better, no?

Are you excited? I’M SO EXCITED. This weekend I won’t be blogging during the finale, so that means you’ll need to wait a little bit longer for discussion — but, at that point, there won’t be much to discuss other than love or hate. Fingers crossed. For now, I leave you with Ack’s Ode to Lost, which reminds us of a simpler time when Lost wasn’t about an epic battle of good and evil and was a bit more about the Hurley Bird and Scott and Steve.

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