Wow so much happened this episode and though there wasn’t a lot of direct answers, we did get a really intense final 10-15 minutes of the show! So much stuff, where to start? I suppose with Sayid.

Sayid

First, Dogen is pretty badass. Thinking of all the people who have been killed at Sayid’s hands throughout the past seasons, few have been able to go toe to toe with Sayid (and won).

So after all the talky stuff in the Temple with Dogen, Sayid agrees to go meet (and supposedly, kill) Man In Black outside the Temple. This is where it gets interesting – Man In Black tells Sayid he could see Nadia again. This could be the first inkling we’ve gotten as to what purpose the flash-sideways are here to serve. I think ultimately it’s going to come down to choice.I think the irony in this is Jacob allowed Nadia to be killed with Sayid made it back to the real world, only for Sayid to come back to the Island, fall prey to Man In Black and go back to an alternate timeline with Nadia? Talk about gong in circles!

Will our Losties choose to be with the Man In Black and perhaps choose to “live” their flash-sideways lives? Or will they choose to follow their own (or Jacob’s) path and stick to their existing timeline?

Anyway Sayid heads back to the Temple (and it’s raining, sure sign bad things are going to happen) and tells the remaining other Others that they can join Man In Black, or they’ll die.

Sayid makes his final turn to the dark side and kills both Dogen and Lennon and I think that cements his place on Team MIB (at least for now).  Even Ben knows to leave him alone after seeing his crazy, creepy eyes. Speaking of Ben, where is he? Miles, Frank, Sun and Illana make it to the Temple (and do a piss poor job of saving anyone) but Ben is seemingly left behind, or at the very least missing.

So who’s with who?

So at the end of the on-Island story, the Others seem to be decimated and Team MIB looks to have a few other Others (red shirts), Cindy, Zack and Emma, Sayid and Claire. I still think Sawyer has an agenda so I won’t say he’s squarely on that team, Jin isn’t there by choice, and Kate looks to be following blindly so I won’t include them either. I still think a Claire/Kate showdown is going to occur and someone is going to die because of it. Not necessarily one of them, but someone will die (maybe Sawyer when he tries to intervene).

In the other corner of the ring, we have a severely depleted Team Jacob – no more Others, Illana, Frank, Miles, Sun, Jack and Hurley. I presume Richard will meet up with them in the end, and probably so will Ben. Of course they do have a secret weapon, which I believe to be Desmond.

This episode definitely moved all the chess pieces into play (which we usually see only towards the end of the season) and hopefully, it’s going to be breakneck speed from here.

The Man In Black aka Flocke aka SmokeLocke aka Smokey aka Anti-Jacob aka Nemesis

Let’s talk a little about the Man In Black. Dogen essentially confirms that everytime we’ve seen someone who’s dead, he’s been the Man In Black (or Smokey). So we’ve seen that happen and end in tragedy (with Eko and Yemi) but also end in good (with Jack following Christian and finding water to save them in Season One). So what is Man In Black’s deal? Why did Locke see Smokey back in Season One and find it beautiful (I forget his exact wordings now)? The writers have said they’ve known all along what was going to happen, so I hope all this fits in somewhere.

Off-Island fun with Sayid

Okay now the off-Island stuff. We’ve begun to have a hint at the purpose of showing us their sideways lives and Sayid’s isn’t all that different. He’s still a hard core killer, though it seems he didn’t torture Nadia, but neither does he have a happy ending with her (as yet). I could care less about his “Oh I’m a bad man I don’t deserve you” nonsense though. When we say Keamy X I thought “Oh looks like his sideways life is better – like at least he has a life” but of course, Sayid took care of that quickly before finding…. Jin?!

So if indeed the Man In Black and choices theory plays out, I’m going to find it a little weird. So only our Losties are given a “better” life? How about the other 6 billion people in the world? Do the just exist for the sake of molding reality to fit our Losties? For example Claire, who has seemingly taken Man In Black’s offer and is indeed still with Aaron in the sideways-life. She chose that so that’s fine. How about the others who she met (say, Ethan) or even others like Arzt? Or for Sayid’s sideways-life, how about Nadia? What choices did she make? Or do only our Losties matter?

Great episode, here’s how I’m ranking the season so far:

1. The Substitute
2. Sundown
3. LA X
4. The Lighthouse
5. What Kate Does

First, let me start off by saying Kate is my least favourite character on Lost and almost every single episode that has been Kate-centric, I have hated. I can’t stand the way she got everyone in trouble with the Others back in the earlier seasons, and her constantly changing mind in later seasons (Jack we shouldn’t detonate Jughead, okay we should detonate the bomb I’ve always had your back blahblahblah).

——- Don’t read further if you haven’t watched the episode!!! ———-

On to the show – first, random thoughts (a bit more coherent this week). I haven’t read any other analysis online yet, so these are pretty raw. All references to the “alternate” timeline will have the suffix “X” as in “LA X”:

• I get the feeling Miles knows something when he’s talking to Sayid. And is it me or is Sayid’s accent slightly off since his “resurrection?”
• Why does Dogen keep holding the left side of his vest?
• Nice touch with Aaron X’s whale
• These other Others are crazy. What’s with the “test” on Sayid? And why do they always have to speak in riddles and lies?
• Okay so Claire X probably took another flight to LA with the same intention to give it up, but I guess her fate is to keep Aaron?
• Loved the whole Ethan X/Claire X/needles thing. How far we’ve come since those days.
• Damn right it’s Kate’s fault Juliet is dead and Sawyer is sad. 100% her fault for getting back on that sub.
• Okay where does Sawyer get an engagement ring from when he was on New Otherton from 1974 to 1977?
• What in the world happened to Claire? And one more time, after the end of the episode, WHAT HAPPENED TO CLAIRE?

Now that we’re done with the randomness, a few more concise thoughts.

What was the point of the X storyline in this episode? I might be biased because I can’t stand Kate, but really, what purpose did it serve? Aaron wasn’t born, Ethan didn’t stick any needles in her and Kate was… Kate. I’m hoping there’s a greater scheme but at this point in time, the X plots were a waste of my time. Sucks even more that we had to give up screen time with Flocke/Richard/Sun/Frank/Ben/Desmond to make time for this.

Sayid – Okay I have no freaking clue what is going on here. Is he “infected” like the French team? Or are the Others pulling yet another of their deceptions? After all whatever we know of the “sickness” has come either from Crazy Rosseau or the Others. Neither of which is really a source that inspires much confidence. Religious references from last episode aside, what’s up with Sayid? Even if he is infected, what infected him? The spring? Did they do the same “torture” stuff to young Ben?

Glad obnoxious Aldo died (it was obviously going to happen) but the other Others are still very much a mystery. What’s up with Dogen and Lennon and where do they fall in the hierarchy in relation to Richard and Ben? And what did Dogen mean when he said he was brought to the Island?

Finally, Claire. So the last we saw of her she was traipsing through the jungle with Christian (who was possibly Man In Black?) and according to Dogen she was “claimed” by some darkness and changed forever. When we see Island Claire again she’s definitely channeling some Rosseau energy (read: crazy, frazzled, shooting at anyone and setting traps). The writers have said she would have a role to play in the final season, which I suppose would be more than a corpse animated by Smokey, so what’s up?

In any case, that all takes a backseat to the promo for next week, in which it is hinted that Flocke aka Smocke aka SmokeLocke aka Smokey aka Man In Black aka Anti-Jacob aka Nemesis is going to try to turn Sawyer, or at least use him for his own evil purposes, and Richard is going to get everyone back together. Hell yeah.

Okay so I watched the season premier and within 4 minutes it was obvious I was going to have many MANY reactions to the show, so I figured I’d write them down. Skip this post entirely if you’re not a Lostie.

If you are though… here we go:

The plane is fine?
Desmond on the plane?!
The island sunk?
Dharma shark!!
Familiar eye scene – this time it’s Kate
And wait, she’s in a tree?
Here’s Miles.. where’s everyone
Credits show Dominic Monaghan – Hello Charlie!
Wait here’s Jack, wasn’t he just on the plane?
Boone!! (Ian Somerhalder’s name appears in the credits)
Back on the plane?
Arzst!!
I wonder if Hurley and Sawyer really sat in those two seats for the original Oceanic 815
Wait not Hurley’s lucky instead of unlucky?
Juliet’s alive?!?!
Jacob! Go Team Jacob!!
Wow they’re really wearing the same clothes for the Oceanic 815 shots
Damn you old Jin!
Hmm wonder if Locke can walk
You can’t kill Jacob!!
And hheeeerrree’’s Charlie!!
Why is Jack’s pen gone?
I never thought I’d be happy to see Juliet!
Best. TV. Couple. Ever.
SMOKEY!!!!!!
WHAT?!?!?!?!
How is Juliet even still alive?
: ((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((
This makes the Season 5 finale even sadder.
Greg Grunberg! (okay his voice) – you should’ve stayed on Lost instead of Heroes!
Nooooo!! Charlie is supposed to be redeemed!!!!
Nope. Locke’s still in a wheelchair
Christian’s coffin is missing?
New Others!
Why an ankh?
Again with the Lists?!!?
Sayid!!
Claire!!
After 4 seasons we see Zack and Emma again
Holeeeeshieeeettt what’s going on?!?!
Let’s not resort to name-calling!
DON’T YOU MOCK LOCKE!!!!
Terry O’Quinn is badass.
Miles knows something.. I’m thinking Sayid isn’t dead
Wow in the “other world” could Jack and Locke have been friends?
Maybe Jack even fixes Locke?
OMGWTFBBQ?!?!?!?!?! (Is it too easy to predict Jacob’s back in Sayid’s body?)

And that’s that. This show has really done everything. Time travel and now possibly alternate universes. So awesome. I definitely missed some thoughts on the new Others and on the Richard/Fake Locke interaction but those I wrote were those that really caught my attention.

John Locke Lost

I’m not so much concerned about where things are going right now and how two Jacks and two Lockes and two Kates can exist. I think Damon and Carlton know the story they want to tell and what will make the fans happy. At this point the big question I wanna know is what happens to Locke. I know some people hated the early character focus in seasons 1-3 but to understand where Locke IS you have to understand where Locke HAS BEEN. And this is true for any of the characters whether it’s Jack’s transformation, Sun and Jin’s relationship or Sawyer’s redemption.

On one level I want to believe that Damon and Carlton will give us Locke back and not let his entire life be a tragedy after all the signs of him being “special”, but some part of me wonders what if this is truly going to be the biggest tragedy of Lost – that Locke has indeed that sad and pathetic life who died confused and never amounted to anything?

Next Wednesday cannot come soon enough.