Hola, all.
Lost begins it's final season tonight, and if you're like me you're having a little trouble staying focused. I thought I'd toss a post up to give people the chance to comment on the premiere both before and after it airs. Feel free to use it to talk about what you'd like to see, what questions you're dying to have answered first, and your reactions after the fact.
I'll have my own comments and reactions up on Chud.com tomorrow afternoon and I'll probably check in later tonight after the show airs with a brief reaction.
The final rewatch column for "The Incident" should be up on Chud.com in a few hours.
Lost begins it's final season tonight, and if you're like me you're having a little trouble staying focused. I thought I'd toss a post up to give people the chance to comment on the premiere both before and after it airs. Feel free to use it to talk about what you'd like to see, what questions you're dying to have answered first, and your reactions after the fact.
I'll have my own comments and reactions up on Chud.com tomorrow afternoon and I'll probably check in later tonight after the show airs with a brief reaction.
The final rewatch column for "The Incident" should be up on Chud.com in a few hours.
Hey Morse, I'll bite. Definitely excited here. On the way back from lunch I did the math - less then six hours til the recap starts and less than seven until the feast begins.
ReplyDeleteFirst, the obligatory but genuine thanks and praise. It's really made the show that much more enjoyable for me that I've been able to come here and read your reviews and the comments of your other readers. There have been a lot of new ideas and a lot of AHA moments that have resulted. Anyway, thanks. I'm very psyched that you'll be keeping it up through the new season.
In regards to expectations and hopes, I've been thinking about all this press coverage about "They better answer all those questions!" that has been going on. It's fun to see non-spoiler LOST coverage, but I find that I'm starting to get tired/annoyed at the idea that the show has not answered questions. I mean, there ARE open questions, but there are a lot that have been answered - particularly for people who watched the first season. That got me thinking about how many of Lost's original questions still are unanswered. This may not be complete, but here's what i came up with:
These are the underlying core mysteries that the pilot set up:
- Monster? - Partially answered
- Polar Bear? – Answered
- Where are they? – Partially answered (maybe almost as complete as it will be)
- French Lady? - Answered
Other big season one mysteries:
- Numbers – Partially answered, suggested that they are coincidence and Hurley’s fear
- Whispers – Unanswered
- Christian Shephard – Hinted at/unanswered
- Others – Mostly answered (only missing element is exactly why they are there or came to be there)
- What's in the Hatch - answered
- Kate’s crime – answered
- Locke’s paralysis – answered
- Walt’s seeming powers – unresolved, possibly just hinted at and didn’t actually exist.
- Claire’s psychic insisting she be on that plane and that she must raise her kid, no one else. - seemingly answered as he was a fraud. Could be another layer.
- How’d the Black Rock get into the middle of the Jungle – hinted at
- How is is that the survivors were connected in the past by one or two degrees - unanswered/thematic?
That’s all that comes to mind, but it seems that many of the questions that original viewers of the show may have had have actually been answered from watching the show. The remaining items seem pretty answerable in the coming season. Although exacting definition of the island is probably not forthcoming. There will probably be an explanation of what is going on there, but not why it moves through space time and is the source of these activities.
There are many other questions, but they come later and have to do with things that Season One viewers hadn't even learned about. Really, aside from a few over-arcing things like the monster, most of the unresolved seems to be focused on the end of season 3 through season 5.
Or am i just completely missing something?
Congrats on finishing the recap Morse!
ReplyDeleteI was going to go back and post this on the 316 or Namaste post, but i had this thought last night which is still hurting my brain:
ReplyDeleteWhat if the real reason Jack, Hurley, Kate and Sayid vanished from Ajira Flight 316 was not because they didn't approximate/replicate Flight 815 sufficiently (as the producers gave a the reason they transported in the recap show before the finale)? instead, what if they are like Locke's/Alpert's compass with no clear point of origin?
What if they disappeared from Ajira because Faraday's/Jack's plan worked and therefore the four of them weren't ON the Ajira flight that crashed on the island in 2007. They were already on the island or somewhere else for another reason. They transported back in time to the moment when they'd be able to succeed because they HAD/WOULD succeed. And they succeeded because they were flashed off the plane back to 1977.
There are some flaws with this (why did other passengers notice they weren't gone? why did they only retain memories of that timeline if they flashed because of another timeline? etc). But this would preserve a lot of the 2007 events from season 5 for the most part.
Again, there are some big holes in this thought, but maybe someone else has another non-spoiler-i-watched-the-opening-online-already-and-have-insight-from-that idea.
I would just like to say thanks for your rewatch columns. They have been consistently fantastic, and have helped ease the pain of the long wait between seasons. Looking forward to your continued commentary!
ReplyDeleteMiles,
ReplyDeleteYou just blew my mind.
I think the word I'm looking for is 'wow.'
ReplyDeleteFirst thought: The off-Island scenes are a reconfiguration of time resulting from the successful completion of the castaways' task on the Island.
ReplyDeleteNice that they paid off Hurley's ability to see ghosts, and confirms that it's just as valid as Miles' method (Why did Miles claim that trying to find out Juliet's final thoughts wouldn't work when it clearly did?)
What is Smokey's "home"?
Why/How does Richard know Smokey/MIB's identity from that one line of dialogue?
I thought it was interesting that on the Island, Jack recognizes Desmond instantly, but off the Island it's a deja vu moment.
ReplyDeleteAfter learning that Locke remained dead, Ben's reaction is to follow the instructions Smokey gave him. Is this because he recognizes a higher power at work that's a danger to him? Does he not care (about Richard or anything else) anymore? Is he just in shock?
I would like to touch on some of the things mentioned in the comments here. Not in any particular order.
ReplyDeleteThe conversation between Richard and anti-Locke (MiB) was significant. since we know now that Richard (and more likely the rest of the original Others)was a passenger on the Black Rock. This explains the "chains" comment. the Black Rock passengers found the "Fountain of Youth". Since we know that Jacob and MiB can only "guide" to preserve free will, explains why anti-Locke said to everyone "I am very disappointed in you." because the Others chose to follow and protect Jacob instead of following the MiB. Since MiB has been around for so long, and working so hard, the "home" he referred to is more likely "death".
Ben now knows that MiB/anti-Locke is Smokey, so he is scared out of his wits at this point and self-preservation has taken over.
Jack did sort of recognize Desmond on the plane, but it was not enough to envoke the actual memory of where he knew him. In Season 2, Desmond said his phrase "See you in another life brotha" at the same point that Jack was in a situation that had him thinking back to the time where he was running in the arena (flashback). That is the difference.
And finally, before I shut up, is the dual time stream. It was mentioned in a previous episode (not sure which) foreshadowed this. Time is like a stream, or river, running in one direction. You can put a rock in the middle of the stream and it will divide it in two, but they will always eventually meet up at some point and end in the same place. We are more likely going to see the same characters that died, die in the other timeline. Juliet before she died in Sawyer's arms flashed to the other timeline where she asked him to meet for a cup of coffee. Miles said her last thoughts were "it worked".
My thoughts....
Darth,
ReplyDeletegood thoughts there. Two questions:
1) When did the show confirm that Richard was on the Black Rock? There's been a hint when he was building a model ship in Follow the Leader, but I didn't see confirmation last night.
2) It makes sense that a lot of Others originated from the Black Rock, but as there had already been a long history of coming, fighting, destroying, corrupting, it seems that the faction is probably based upon an amalgamation of arrivals/imports rather than just the Black Rock. Many of the Temple dwellers last night seemed to be of other and more ancient backgrounds. This is all still just guesswork though.
Sure Miles ... I would be happy to discuss those points.
ReplyDelete1) When MiB/anti-Locke/Smokey approached Richard in last night's episode, he said (I can't remember the exact quote) "Richard, you look different without all those chains.". Richard looked at him in horror and said "You?" followed by a punch in the face. This elludes to the slace ship Black Rock.
2) Yes, you are correct. after thinking this through a little bit, the Others are a mixture of people brought to the island various ways, and at various times. Richard was called an "advisor" making me now think he is the last survivor of Black Rock. The rest of the passengers probably killed themselves via fighting/corruption/destroying each other. I agree that the temple dwellers are also a mixture of people from various times. (hint?)
Another thing I thought of that I want to point out ... Smokey cannot break breach a circle of ash, or a sonic fence. Representing he can be stopped by faith AND science.
Darth, cool point about Smokey. Makes it also seem that maybe it is something about the enclosed circle that stops him? So maybe it doesn't have to be ash?
ReplyDelete1) Gotcha. I also believe that Richard was on the Black Rock, and I had the same reaction based on Anti-Locke's statement about the chains. However, there are a number of events that could put Richard in chains during any such interaction. I don't think this confirms this just yet. I expect that we'll still get some Richard flashbacks sometime in the first part of the season which will spell all of this out. Or i hope anyway.
2) One of my first thoughts last night after seeing the Temple Others was that for the first time, some of the Others actually looked like they could have been "the island's indigenous people." The phrase indigenous people was tossed around a few times last season, but everything we saw about the Others looked like "got here sooner, but not native." Here, it seems that there may actually be some basis for an original population that has absorbed joiners (I got a Dharma vibe off the translator). Or it could just represent descendants of the first group to arrive. Regardless, I'm damned curious.
I also shared Morse's theory that the "temple" would be anything but and actually be some sort of futuristic or anachronistic location. There may be something like that yet, but clearly the temple structure appears to be very ancient.
BTW, does anyone remember if any of the castaways aside from the original/real/dead John Locke have ever been explicitly told about Jacob or heard the name mentioned? Juliet did, but... I can't remember if Hurley would have any context for the name Jacob or not.
ReplyDeleteAll that I can remember is that the name Jacob flashed on the screen in season 3 when Kate and Sawyer saved Karl. But they weren't attuned to that name like the audience was and they were not analyzing the random content on the screen.
@ Miles -
ReplyDeleteI do not recall any of the Losties being aware of Jacob other than Hurley in the taxi at the end of Season 5.
Miles: Hurley had heard Jacob's name when he was forced to look for his cabin in Season 4. He heard enough to probably assume that Jacob was Ben/Locke's boss, but nothing more.
ReplyDeleteMatthew Fox did an interview end of June 2009 about Season 6 where he told what the structure of this season was. I wonder if that still holds, or if it's changed since then. They hadn't started shooting at that point, but some of the scripts were done.
Awesome. Thanks Resident01. You're right. I felt like there was recognition on Hurley's part last night, but I couldn't attribute it to anything.
ReplyDeleteI took Not-Locke's comment to Richard about the chains to mean "You look good now that you are no longer Jacob's slave."
ReplyDelete-The Mutt
@ The Mutt Anonymous -
ReplyDeleteThat is a good point. However I do not think if what you said was true, that Richard would have recognized him right away like he did.