life, and a little more

Recon Recap

Mar 17

metalman777Lost recap, season 6 1 Comment

“Recon” is the 8th episode of Season 6 of Lost and the 111th produced hour of the series as a whole. It was originally broadcast on March 16, 2010. The Man in Black tasks Sawyer with a mission.  (Lostpedia.com)

Ok, I’m going to start this post a little differently! I found this video recapping last night’s episode, and it is hilarious!

Now, on to our regular analysis!

1. We’ve actually seen Mr. Ford working with police before. There were his Dharma days as Head of Security, of course. But, also, remember his flashback in Every Man for Himself? That situation was somewhat similar to this one – he was conning on behalf of the police. This time, of course, he IS the police. The woman remarks that he is a lousy con man, but man is she wrong. Though Lost has offered up no shortage of con men, Sawyer is without a doubt the best, as Flocke points out later in the episode.
2. Back at the station, Miles informs Sawyer that he’s going on a date with a “friend of mine – works with my dad at the museum.” I actually missed this upon my first viewing, but it’s pretty key. It would make sense for Pierre Chang and Charlotte to work together at a museum. We know based on what Roger told us in “Dr. Linus” that in the ATL, the Dharma Initiative and the island still existed at some point. If Roger and Ben were there, most of the rest of the Dharma crowd probably was, too. Chang was probably friends with Charlotte’s parents, and it would make sense for them to work together, and for Miles to know her (them both being Dharma babies and all).
3. This of course means that Miles was indeed born on the island in the ATL. Since we’ve never discovered how exactly Miles gained his power, my best guess is that it’s the result of some funky island electromagnetism. Since he wasn’t actually on the island for very long in the MTL, maybe whatever caused his powers happened very near his birth, or was even passed onto him at birth or conception from one or both of his parents being exposed to electromagnetism. This leads me to believe that Miles will still talk to dead people in this reality.
4. One more word on Miles – he mentions that he has a girlfriend. Want to guess who? Since it basically has to be someone we know, there are only a couple good guesses. It can’t be Kate, Claire or Sun, Shannon is still in Australia, if Libby shows up she’ll be with Hurley, Danielle is too old, Alex too young, Juliet will end up with Sawyer (getting coffee) if she appears at all, and we know it’s not Charlotte. You know who that leaves?  Ana Lucia!  Come on, that makes sense! She’s an LA cop, her bad attitude can match Miles… they’d be perfect for each other. I’m not spoiled or anything, this is just a guess. But really, who else could it be? (Second best option – Juliet’s sister, Rachel Carlson, as a way of introducing Sawyer to Juliet in the ATL).
5. The fact that he never wrote the letter might mean that Jacob never existed in this reality (or died much earlier). It was, after all, Jacob who pushed him to finish it after his uncle warned him not to. Jacob pushed James down the path of obsessive vengeance, of becoming a con man rather than a law man. Are we seeing a world without Jacob? A world where our characters are free to live their own lives without this meddlesome entity and his damned island? I must say, Jacob isn’t exactly looking like the good guy at this point (I actually don’t think Jacob or the Man in Black are all good or all bad, but I’ll discuss that in the Flocke section).
6. The fact that Anthony Cooper is still responsible for the deaths of Sawyer’s parents in the ATL raises some interesting questions, because it appears inconsistent with other information we have on Anthony Cooper. John Locke seemed to be on good terms with his father in “The Substitute” – he had a picture of them together on his desk and Helen mentioned that Cooper was invited to the wedding.
7. My honest guess – and that’s all this is – is that Cooper did cause Mr. Ford to kill Mrs. Ford, but he later came to feel bad about it/his con man ways. I’m also going to bet that Sawyer meets him, finds him to be apologetic, and forgives him. Wouldn’t that be a fitting way for ATL Saywer to find redemption
8. Flocke, however, is a much more effective leader than John Locke, because he knows when to be soft and he knows when to punch people in the face. After Sawyer raises his voice, Flocke privately scolds him and then says, “I forgive you.” This struck me as something a very powerful, important person would do. Flocke is kind of like a mob boss, isn’t he? He offers his protection to some people, he wipes out others.
9. Do we believe him, at this point? I myself have gone back and forth. After “The Substitute” I wrote extensively on the parallels between Flocke and Walter, the villain of Stephen King’s books, noting Walter’s use of rationality while simultaneously being full of deceit and evil. But last week, I changed my tune and discussed the notion that Jacob and MIB are not good and evil, they are merely personifications of faith vs. science and destiny vs. free will, previously identified by Jack vs. John. Now Jack is a man of faith and destiny, and John is dead, his body inhabited by a seemingly logical, free will-supporting entity.
10. Later, as Kate attempts a frustratingly difficult conversation with Zombie Sayid, Claire tackles her and attempts to stab her as Sayid watches, doing nothing. But Flocke comes to the rescue and even hits Claire in the face. Eventually, he apologizes to Kate and confesses to confusing Claire with his “the Others have your baby” nonsense. He was only trying to give her a sense of purpose. “Have you ever had an enemy?” he asks. “Someone that you needed to hate? Very powerful, isn’t?” We know of course that Flocke’s hatred for Jacob may very well have been his motivation for many of his actions. Perhaps it was the thing that kept him going when he was a prisoner for possibly years or decades or centuries.
11. We soon learn that Jacob may not be the only person whom the Man in Black hated. In what was undoubtedly the biggest reveal of the episode, Flocke tells Kate that he had a mother who was crazy. The craziest thing, though, is the way he tells it – with extreme hesitation/uncertainty. He struggled to form his sentences, and could only say that his mother was crazy, it caused him “growing pains”, and things could have been different. I can draw 3 different conclusions.
    1) He struggles to tell the story because he’s making it up on the spot. So far there have been several cases where we’re not sure whether he’s telling somebody the truth or simply what they’d like to hear. This might have simply been an on-the-spot attempt to recruit Kate. Even so, I don’t like this explanation, because Flocke seems fairly bright. He may have been trying to recruit Kate, but I’d expect him to rehearse his story first.

    2) He struggles to tell the story because it’s true, and it’s painful for him. This is highly plausible. If you believe the Jacob and Esau Biblical connection, there should be a mother named Rebekah. Rebekah preferred Jacob whereas the father, Isaac, preferred Esau. But thanks to the machinations of Jacob and Rebekah, Esau was cheated out of his inheritance. If MIB is supposed to be Esau, he might very well think his mother was crazy. This could also account for a host of other things, including the inability of women to survive childbirth on the island. Perhaps Esau took revenge against all mothers in his domain by initiating such a curse (by toppling the Statue of Tawaret, maybe?)

    3) He struggles to tell the story because he’s reaching into his subconscious and stealing it from John. John, after all, had a crazy mother who made his life difficult. While I think the parallel exists regardless, Flocke seemed to be taking on more and more of John’s better traits this episode. I still hold the view that the real John might be buried in his subconscious somewhere, available to be mined for information and mannerisms. How else could Flocke know what John was thinking when he died?

12. Anyway, I couldn’t help but wonder why Widmore was still in the sub. I think it’s possible that he can’t set foot on the island yet. Perhaps he needs MIB contained in order to do that, or something (his team is setting up a sonic fence-like border). Also, what do you think is in the locked compartment on the sub? Yeah, I’m rooting for it to be Desmond, but doesn’t some sort of explosive seem more likely, given the history of things that Widmore brings to the island? But if it were Desmond, that would be awesome.
13. But you know what? They might still have been working together. Sure, Sawyer seems like Lost’s greatest con man, but Flocke might be better. What if he is working with Widmore, and this whole reconnaissance mission was only Flocke’s test to see if Sawyer was loyal to him? This could be why Widmore almost seemed to be expecting Sawyer. Flocke could have told him – after murdering the Ajira folk – that he was going to send Sawyer over. “Tell him you want to kill me,” Flocke may have said, “and see how he reacts.” The pylons could have been part of the con to convince Sawyer of false enmity between MIB and Widmore.
14. Also, think about “Dr. Linus”. Remember when Flocke told Ben to head to the Hydra Station? Well, he told his group that they might not leave their present camp for a couple days, whereas he told Ben to ditch (and kill) Ilana and head for the Hydra right then and now. If Ben had shot Ilana and made his way to the Hydra, he would have fallen right into Charles Widmore’s clutches. Since I’m guessing that killing Ben might still be Widmore’s top priority, Flocke may have agreed to deliver Ben to him in exchange for help.  (1-14 by Robz888 at Darkufo.com)
    ==================
15. This ‘’set-up” episode was all about set-ups, from its opening sequence fake-out that seemed to present Sideways James Ford as every bit the slutty, soul-numbed vengeance-questing criminal as his Island iteration, but then revealed himself to be a… slutty, soul-numbed vengeance-questing cop. No doubt the happy sunflower glory days of his previous life as Dharma Initiative security chief had prepared him for the gig. But alas, there was no Juliet in this sad sunflower’s life, and we were made to ponder if that made all the difference
16. And you know what, kids? I think I do know. Because it seemed to me that Fake Locke was pulling another con, too, one that may have revealed his true character. The episode was called ”Recon,” which itself was a con. We were clearly supposed to assume it was short for ”reconnaissance mission.” But ”Recon” was also a pun for ”Re-con” — as in ”a previously executed con, done again.” The story flicked at all of Sawyer’s classic con man stories, from ”Confidence Man” to ”LaFleur.” I think FrankenLocke picked one of those scams to repeat anew — and I think I’m pretty creeped out by the implications.
17. Regardless, my guess is that Sideways Ford will get a chance to prove his moral metal when he finally tracks down Sideways Anthony Cooper at… Sideways John Locke’s wedding.
18. But thinking through ”Recon,” I realized that looking at the forest was more valuable than examining the trees. This was a story about an authority figure — a lawman — who was working the system and abusing his position with it to pursue a self-serving, possibly evil agenda. I hope that sounds like the Man In Black to you, because it sure does to me. Until the events of ”The Incident,” what role did he serve on the Island? Rousseau: ”Security system.” Eko and Ben: Judge.
19. Like Detective Ford’s botched ”Pigeon Drop” sting, when Ford told the grifter woman that the cops wanted her husband, not her. The woman was a dead ringer for Charlotte Lewis, who during her brief time on Lost was romantically linked with… Daniel Faraday. Then there was time on the clock: 8:42. Back in ”The Substitute,” we learned that 8 = Hurley Reyes and 42 = Kwon, which could either be Jin or Sun. Interesting that as of last night’s episode, Hurley and the Kwons were the only Jacob candidates who have not gotten a Sideways episode yet. BTW: Jin is the only husband on the show — even if his wedding ring is currently in Sun’s pocket.
20. Sawyer fetched refreshment, while Charlotte searched for a T-shirt. Clever Lost. Charlotte: archeologist. What do archaeologists do? Dig up the past. What does Indiana Jonesette find buried in Ford’s sock drawer? The ruins of past. The ”Sawyer” folder, plus the wrinkled family photo. Together, a complex symbol of… the Law, broken justice, judgment/vengeance (Raiders); stolen childhood (Temple of Doom); a dark knight grail quest (The Last Crusade); a dream of family reunion that violence and ”answers” will never fulfill (Crystal Skull). We’ve seen Charlotte dig one other time on Lost — the season 4 episode ”Confirmed Dead,” in which she found a polar bear skeleton and a Hydra Station collar in the sands of Tunisia. And what happened later in ”Recon”? Island Sawyer went to Hydra Island, returned to the polar bear cage where he had been held captive, found Kate’s dress, and recalled their intimacy — a pivotal turning point in his heroic journey on Lost.
21. My theory that the 18 hours of Lost 6.0 are analogous to the long weekend of Jesus Christ’s crucifixion and resurrection is holding. ”Recon” — which took place the day after ”Sundown”/Good Friday — conformed to the part of the Easter story known as The Harrowing of Hell, wherein Christ descended into the underworld. Some traditions say Jesus confronted Satan; others say he liberated captives, especially prophets, leaders, and ”holy fathers” of the faith whom God had exiled to Hades because of Original Sin. The word ”harrowing” comes from a Greek word pertaining to a military mission — you know, like a ”recon.” The ”Hydra” in Hydra Island pertains to a six-headed female snake demon that guards the entrance of Hades. And what did we spy on Hydra Island last night? Cages. Dead people. And the former ”holy father”/chief prophet/leader of The Others, the exiled Charles Widmore.
22. I’d also use Abominable Faux Bunny as one more proof that Fake Locke really is some kind rotten apple, because he surely must have indulged this f’d up fantasy. I appeal again to The Great Divorce, which gives us a scene where a mother is denied entrance into heaven because she has no desire for God or truthful living. For her, belief in ”God” is just the means to an end — to be reunited with her young son, who had died 10 years before. Her idolatrous relationship to the memory of her boy is such that she never packed away his old room and refused to move out of the house, despite the wishes of her husband and daughter. She is told that her morbid fixations are ”the wrong way to deal with sorrow.” The mother snaps: ”You are heartless. Everyone is pitiless. The past was all I had.” This is why the Anti-Locke is the Anti-Christ: He keeps the castaways shackled to the past, to their demons, to their infernal affairs; he’s using the castaways as means to an end. And worst of all: it appears he sincerely thinks he’s doing right by them.
23. Almost immediately upon arriving on Hydra Island, Sawyer found himself at the polar bear cages where he had once dined on fish biscuits, received a brutal beat down by Ben, and got busy with Kate. The sight of the cages knotted his guts. He found Kate’s dress — the one that Ben made her wear to breakfast with him on the beach. Sawyer picked up the dress. He felt the dress. Memories surely must have flooded his mind. What did this moment mean for Sawyer? The pessimist might say: heartbreak, pain, despair, damnation. The optimist might say: renewal; resurrection; reconstitution. The affair of the polar bear cage was a turning point for Sawyer. This wasn’t miserable-con-man sex. This was heart-full-of-love sex! Maybe it didn’t mean much to Kate. But it definitely meant something to him. He loved her. He wanted her to love him. He chased after her. She would never have said ”I do.” Still, he sacrificed himself for her, and when he thought she had died, he was heartbroken… but he grieved the loss
24. Then, the Hydraville Massacre. Sawyer followed a swath of trail formed by the drag of dead bodies to a pile of corpses hidden in the underbrush. Insects swarmed. He gagged, nauseated. Who killed these people? My chief suspect is Smokey. He’s demonstrated a proclivity for mass murder; see: the Temple. His motive? Among many options, including some kind of vampiric binge on human souls for some kind of demonic power-boost? I think Smokey killed these folks just so Sawyer would find them. Just like Ben wanted Jack to watch Kate and Sawyer hump in the cage to break and control him, I think Smokey wanted Sawyer to see the pile of death to better manage the threat Sawyer represents. The message Smokey was trying to impart: Don’t f— with me. You know Kate? You know your friends? You know all those people I took out of the Temple, including those little kids? I’ll kill ‘em. Especially the kids. I’ll kill ‘em all if you get in my way. And we are reminded: Thou shall not steal. And we remember why bad men kidnap kids: extortion.
25. We were left to wonder what exactly Kate was supposed to make of that story, and what she actually took away from it. To me, it sounded like FLocke was trying to convince Kate that Claire was an unfit mother. To me, it sounded like he wanted Kate to move off the dream of reuniting Clair and Aaron. To me, it sounded like he wanted Kate to think about saving Aaron from Claire lest he become a scary super-monster like FLocke. To me, it sounded like FLocke was… setting Kate up to murder Claire
26. Not the Daniel Faraday who was shot and killed by his crazy mother in 1977. And not the fetal Daniel Faraday who was growing inside his pregnant mother when she shot and killed adult Daniel Faraday back in 1977. I’m saying: It’s a freaky fusion of both, a disembodied mutant hybrid soul, essentially left behind on the Island as a consequence of the Jughead time reboot that also rebooted pregnant Eloise Hawking. It’s possible that this entity may have been grafted onto an eternal supernatural being that has lived on the Island performing some great spiritual function that it has now tired of. Or it could just be a feral supernatural force that’s been left to develop and grow haphazardly on its own, possessed by the dream of one day becoming a real human being again. Either way, Smokey Faraday is all kinds of wrong — and I think that’s why his father, Charles Widmore, has come to the Island. To take responsibility for his own Abominable Faux Son, and put it/him out of its/his misery. What does Charles have locked up in his submarine? A secret weapon. A weapon more powerful than the dream of vengeance that possessed Sawyer and Claire for so long: It’s the toxic brew of guilt and love, damnation and redemption. Her name was Theresa Spencer. She’s the woman that Daniel Faraday once loved, but whose mind he broke as a result of his time travel experiments that his psycho mom spurred him toward, a woman that Charles Widmore kept alive on his own dime for years, just so he could use her for this very moment.  (15-26 by Doc Jensen at EW.com)

That’s it for today boys and girls.  Next weeks episode looks amazing!  Finally, we learn Richard Alpert’s back story!

And also, you can pre-order the entire LOST series, in Blue-Ray or regular definition.

Today Was A Great Day

Mar 13

metalman777Life good day 1 Comment

The sun is shining brightly and the wind is blowing coolly, so today is a perfect day to work outside. That makes today a pretty good day.

I was able to attend Nathan’s last basketball game and see him crash the boards mightily (get rebounds for all you non-basketball people).  That made today really, really good.

Today is also the last day of  the mega-all-consuming overtime that has literally ruled my life for the last 5 months!!  Tomorrow is my first day off in a month!  That makes today a great day!

Dave Ramsey was right.  If you live like nobody else, then you can finally live like no one else!  All that overtime went to paying off quite a bit of debt I’ve accumulated over the years.  Probably since I had my first credit card at 17.  I’m sure I’ll post a blog entry about getting out of debt at a later date.

I just want to say a huge thank you to my wife for holding down the family fort all this time.  I think your work was harder than mine!

Dr. Linus Recap

Mar 10

metalman777Lost recap, season 6 No Comments

“Dr. Linus” is the 7th episode of Season 6 of Lost and the 110th produced hour of the series as a whole. It was originally broadcast on March 9, 2010. Ben and Ilana deal with the consequences of an uncovered lie. Meanwhile, Jack and Hurleystumble across Richard in the jungle.  (from Lostpedia.com)

1. In ”Dr. Linus,” Ben Linus was exposed as a soul who only has himself to blame for his woe-is-me bad self, whose corrupt nature is an accumulation of freely made choices. Which also means that Ben is also fully capable of resisting evil and selecting virtue, as well. His Sideways story was the proof. We were presented with a new version of Ben that was a truly decent man — a smart, idealistic teacher who cared for his students; a devoted son who cared for his ailing father, Roger Linus — but also one who yearned for a grander station in life
2. But then Ben made another choice: He bared his soul. He told the truth about killing Jacob, shared his rage over feeling betrayed by his Island god andhis shame for choosing Island power over his daughter, and then offered this heartbreaking explanation for why he was joining Mr. Evil Incarnate (Allegedly): ”Because he’s the only one that will have me!” Then Ilana did something that left Ben gobsmacked: She forgave him. ”I’ll have you,” she said, and walked away. Ben shuffled after her, as if sucked in by the undertow of her grace. He came to the outskirts of the Beach camp, then stopped and considered his options. Stay and serve in this humble little patch of heaven, or join Devil Locke and coldly play for a shot at living the ”Vida La Vida” once again. You always have a choice. This time, Ben made the right one — fulfilling, perhaps, Jacob’s dying thought hope that Ben had the capacity for change
3. Sideways Roger presented himself as a sad old soul who viewed his son as an underachieving talent but only blamed his own bad parenting choices for Ben’s fate. An improvement over Island world Roger? Yes. But I was left to wonder what it must have been like for Sideways Ben to grow up burdened by his father’s ambition for him. Regardless, we saw the result: Ben the Overeducated, Overqualified High School Teacher, dogged by enough feelings of inadequacy to deem himself a loser. I got the sense Ben saw his father clearly — clearly enough to feel a little resentment, but not so much that he hated him, or, like, wanted to drive him out into the jungle and gas him to death. In a clever flick at ”The Man Behind The Curtain,” we got a scene where the Good Son changed his ailing father’s oxygen tank and doted on his comfort. Bottom line: Sideways Ben was more like Florence Nightingale, less like Heinrich Himmler.
4. Categories: Sideways Island Sinkage; Parallel World Historical Discrepancies.
   Analysis: Until last night, it had been safe to assume that both the Island and Sideways worlds shared the same history until 1977, which is when the time-traveling castaways detonated Jughead. But the Linus men of the Sideways world blew up that thinking. I took the story to mean that Sideways Roger and Ben left the Island prior to its sinking. But Island Roger and Ben were still on the Island when Juliet banged the bomb. Implication: If the two worlds share a common history, the fork in the road is sometime before 1977. Rebooted Theory: The divergence begins on that fateful night when some phantom stranger struck John Locke’s teenage mother, causing her to give birth three months early. That phantom stranger? I’m saying it’s Charles Widmore.
5. We got a reference to Napoleon in exile on Elba, neutered by the loss of his power. Island Ben would later link himself to the reference. But CharlesWidmore and Smokey also fit into Napoleon’s pantaloons. After all, Napoleon ultimately escaped from his Island prison and reclaimed France (if only for 100 days) — and both Widmore and Smokey are exiles wanting to get back to their respective kingdoms/homes. (Something to also think about: after Napoleon got booted out of power again, he was exiled to another, less desirable island, Saint Helena, where he would die of stomach cancer/ulcer/poisoning. Foreshadowing for Smokey or Widmore’s final fate?) (I’m telling you, that knife Sayid stabbed Smokey with last week? Dogen poisoned it.) (And didn’t Alex last night mention she was nursing a stomach ache while the principal and the nurse were… you know… ”doing it”?) Dr. Linus also spoke of the East India Trading Company, the powerful British business entity that was established to execute trade with India, but wound up ruling much of it. And we recall that Ben has long alleged that all Widmore wants to do is exploit the Island for his material gain… although I personally suspect what Widmore wants most the Island is to use it to cheat death.
6. Ben’s Sideways story mirrored his entire Island arc and even suggested many possibilities for the entire saga. You might even say Ben’s parallel world yarn works as a theory of Lost
7. Shortly after Rousseau had finished off the rest of her fellow French scientists and given birth to Baby Alex, Chief Executive Other Widmore ordered Ben to ”exterminate” both of them from the Island. He coldly dismissed baby Alex as an ”it,” as if she were an animal that would just be a drain on Island resources that needed to be devoted elsewhere. Yep: definitely sounds like a guy that ain’t about ”taking care of the kids.” So Ben balked. He couldn’t bring himself to murder. Ben clearly had developed a different vision for how the Others should be managing the Island and living their lives. Widmore dismissed Ben’s ”idealism” as sentimental and self-serving — about him needing to feel needed. But he didn’t stop Ben from taking on the project of raising Alex alone. Ben’s victory inspired him to dream bigger. And when he uncovered the truth about Widmore’s off-Island slick willying, he staged his coup and forced him into exile. He also moved the nomadic Others out of the wild and into Dharmaville. But Ben’s dream of settling down and playing house — modifying Others culture in such a way to service and fulfill his own desires and needs — was surely antithetical to the Others’ true purpose, and was most likely what earned the Others’ their baby-making curse from the Island/Jacob. Richard Alpert said as much when he encouraged Locke to make a play for Ben’s job. ”Ben has been wasting our time with novelties like fertility problems,” Richard said. ”We’re looking for someone to remind us that we’re here for more important reasons.”
8. While Ben and Arzt ate lunch and griped about Reynolds, it was the Substitute who spoke up and encouraged Ben to act on his dissatisfaction. ”Maybe you should be principal. It just sounds like you care about this place,” Locke said. ”And if the man in charge doesn’t, then maybe it’s time for a change.” When Ben wondered who, if anyone, would listen to someone like him, Locke raised his hand and flashed either his warm smile or mischievous, baiting one. ”I’m listening,” he said. I KNOW WHAT YOU’RE THINKING! I have no doubt the burning question that’ll be making the rounds in the Lost fan culture is going to be this: Is Sideways Locke actually…
   THE MAN IN BLACK/SMOKEY/FAKE LOCKE…
   Throughout his Others reign, Ben insisted he was hearing the voice of Jacob and heeding his will. He justified everything by putting it all on his Island god. But the time has come to begin wondering how attuned to Jacob that Ben has been — if he’s been attuned to him at all. In our real world, there are those who claim to know God and hear God’s voice in their lives, but they could be wrong. Doesn’t mean there isn’t a God, just that God ain’t talking to them. I suspect Ben is one of those people. ”What about you?” Jacob asked Ben last season. It sounded so dismissive. But Jacob could have also been challenging Ben on his self-deception, or basically saying, ”I’m sorry. Do I know you?” Ben’s either been faking his rapport with Jacob, or (and this is my theory) the supernatural entity that’s been speaking to him all along has been the Man In Black. Ben thought he was serving Jacob the Christ, but he was most likely the victim of a long con perpetrated by a snake oil-selling false messiah, Smokenstein the Anti-Christ, who was just using Ben in his master plan to escape the Island and live anew as a man in a separate reality, one with no Island and no Jacob to trap him: the Sideways world.
9. She called Jacob the closest thing she ever had to a father. Which means only one thing for certain: Jacob wasn’t her real father. He could have been her father in the God sense of father — a supernatural entity responsible for her existence and purpose. Maybe it’s more of a Godfather thing; she could beJacob’s consigliore (like Tom Hagen, a Ben-esque stray/outsider taken off the street and groomed into a top assistant), maybe his Luca Brasi. We have a few missing years on the Island — the three years between when the castaways began time traveling (late 2004/early 2005) and 2007. We also know that Ilana spent some time in the hospital with bandages wrapped around her face and Jacob visited her and tasked her anew with a mission. How did she get injured? I’m guessing she was on the Island during those missing three years fighting a battle that went badly, possible trying to keep Smokey bottled up. She is now charged with protecting the candidates to replace Jacob. Don’t ask her what it means: she doesn’t know or isn’t telling us. She was asked how many were left, she said six. Was she counting John Locke? Fake Locke? Jin and Sun twice?
10. While Ilana brooded and nibbled on mangoes, Fake Locke appeared to Ben and made him one of his Faustian offers: future management of the Island. I couldn’t tell if Smokey was being sincere; this promise would be the easiest to keep, but I was kinda getting the sense — or maybe just making the assumption — that the Monster had no desire to see the Island continue existing. Fake Locke’s screen time here was about equal to the amount of time Sideways Locke got with Sideways Ben. He also presented to Ben as a sympathetic, supportive ally. Ben’s survival instinct — and Somebody Wants Me!! instinct — kicked in. He ran to where Smocke had said he’d find a rifle. He got the drop on Ilana, but instead of shooting her, he was suddenly overwhelmed by a desire to explain himself — as if realizing for the first time what he really wanted: to be known, understood, and not rejected, even though he was about to reveal his ugliest inner bits. His confession was part self-laceration, part rage against the Jacob/Island machine: ”I watched my daughter Alex die in front of me and it was my fault. I had a chance to save her. I chose the Island over her. All in the name of Jacob. I sacrificed everything for him, and he didn’t even care. I stabbed him. I was so angry. Confused. I was terrified I was about to lose the only thing that ever happened to me, my power. But the thing that really mattered was already gone. …I can never forgive myself.”
11. Saved, the once-lost, now-found wretch made the first of two heroic choices that represent the proper response to such a gift. The first: renouncing evil. Ben became the first person this season to turn down a FrankenLocke bargain. That’s going to have consequences. The second: sacrifice. He entered the beach camp and offered Sun his help putting up the tarp, just as his Sideways version would have easily, effortlessly offered assistance to one of his students.
12. It was hard to hear the line and not think Lost was saying something about its two-track, parallel world structure. Then Richard showed up and offered a third path. Jack followed. When Hurley asked if Richard could be trusted, Jack said, ”At least he’s not stallin’.” It was another wink at the audience in an episode full of them. Combined with the line about Napoleon’s Elba being the place where ”everything became clear,” I wondered if Lost was addressing anyone griping about the pace of ”answers” and saying, Don’t worry. Trust us. Okay?
13. Ironically, then, Richard’s path ended with… a lie. He took them to the Black Rock, which was not where he said was taking them, although it was where we’ve been wanting Alpert to go for a couple years now as we’ve wondered if the ageless Others came to the Island via the slave ship. (Another reading of Richard’s third way as a metaphor for Lost’s storytelling: We won’t lead you astray, but we’re not going the way you expect. We’ll be doing this ”answer” thing our way. ‘Kay?)
    
14. But I remain suspicious of Jack. When we last saw him, he was furious over the Lighthouse revelations. Now, after a long gaze out over the beach, it seemed Jack had thought over a few things and was totally activated to chase after all of the Island’s magic white rabbits — whether they look like his father or wear eyeliner — and see where they lead. Does Jack want to know Jacob’s purpose so he can faithfully fulfill it… or so he can angrily subvert it? He crackles with so much crazy mania, it’s hard to know if he’s a true believer or a great deceiver. Is it possible the title of the episode hints at an even more provocative possibility: that Ben, a.k.a. ”Dr. Linus,” has replaced Dr. Shephard as the story’s hero, while Jack has replaced Ben as its villain? Consider that sentimental slow-mo reunion sequence that ended the episode. We saw everyone in their huts and tents — including Miles, inspecting the diamonds he purloined from Nikki and Paulo’s grave (all $8 million of it? No going dutch on coffee with him!) — as Jack, Hurley and Richard approached. This moment was staged to deliberately echo the scene from the season 3 episode ”One Of Us,” when Jack, Kate, and Sayid returned from New Otherton, bringing Juliet with them. When the beach crew saw her, the happy-huggy moment abruptly ended, and everyone gave her the stink-eye (especially, ironically, Sawyer) — just like Jack and Ben traded suspicious looks in last night’s episode. We learned at the very end of ”One Of Us” that newbie Juliet was indeed shady; she had been sent by Ben to spy on the camp. (The moment was mirrored, I think, by having ”Dr. Linus” end with Widmore’s submarine spying on the castaways.)
15. Why might Jack be so angry? Oh, I don’t know. The same reason Sally Brown was so angry after spending all night in a pumpkin patch with Linus Van Pelt waiting for transcendent revelation to arrive. This Island thing — Jacob, Ben, everything — has made a big mess of his life, and he wants someone to take responsibility for it. He wants payback. Sally’s cry is his cry: ”YOU OWE ME RESTITUTION!”  (1-15 from Doc Jensen at EW.com)
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16. But hey, we get our first real reference to the island here – and that’s big. Roger Linus confirms what bad CGI has already told us this season: Dharma does exist (or at least did exist) in the alternate timeline. Not only that, but both Ben and his father have spent some time on the island. What made them leave is unclear, but Roger goes extra-crazy-special out of his way to pointedly wonder (aloud and for our benefit) just what life would’ve been like if they’d “stayed on the island”.
17. When Miles approaches Ben with bananas and beanpods, the subject of Jacob comes up again. Here, Ben echoes what many of us have already thought: that Jacob didn’t really care about being killed at all. Miles immediately corrects him however, telling Ben: “No, he cared. He was hoping he was wrong about you.”This is highly interesting, because it seems to go against the original theory of Jacob knowingly accepting his own demise. If what Miles says is true, Jacob’s last words to Ben about ‘having a choice’ now carry a lot more weight. At the same time however, I find it difficult to believe Jacob’s not still pushing Ben from beyond the grave. Through the use of Miles, maybe Jacob is allowing Ben to know his disappointment for a very specific reason. Perhaps Jacob is trying to appeal to the good within Benjamin Linus, because bringing that good back to the surface again is the only way to successfully recruit him.
18. Illana is as confused about ‘Kwon’ as we are. Whether the name of the candidate 42 refers to Sun or Jin, Illana explains she plans to protect them both. How she’ll do this with a single rifle is beyond me, but maybe she’s got a sick dagger buried somewhere that we don’t know about.I also found it interesting that Illana said there were “six candidates left”. She already knows John Locke is dead AND occupied by the man in black, which would leave five at most. It left me wondering if Illana knew of a sixth candidate, and whether or not that candidate was Kate.
19. From our standpoint, replacing Jacob’s role seems to be a piss-poor job. Maybe Illana doesn’t see it that way, which is why she talks about it so openly. Later on this episode, we see the MIB talking about enlisting a replacement as well. So does the island need two replacements? A ying and a yang? Or are Jacob and the MIB really just two halves of the same entity, waging an internal, Tyler Durden-like war of fate vs. free will? Great question. But sorry, not this episode
20. Perhaps it’s because Ben was so far disconnected from the island’s roots (again, the barracks), or maybe it’s because the MIB just assumes every leader of The Others is as inherently power-hungry as Charles Widmore… but it turns out the dark man doesn’t really know Benjamin Linus. Because of this, he mistakenly assumes Ben’s greatest wish is to rule the island. Just as Sawyer’s biggest desire was to leave, and Sayid’s only wish was to be with Nadia again, the dark man approached Ben offering the one thing he figured a deposed leader would certainly want most: to regain his power.
21. The beach camp is a sacred place for us, and with very good reason. It represents the origins of the show we love so much, and memories of a more mysterious yet simpler time. It makes sense that LOST would begin and end in the same place, especially with all the circle and loop references scattered throughout the show. So when everyone ended up back here, including Jack and Hurley (and even Richard?) – it wasn’t all that shocking. Cue dramatic montage, and bring on the hugging.
22. Standing just outside the circle of trust, Richard and Ben are the newcomers. They’re fallen defenders of the island who’ve finally come to the realization that everyone’s been pretty much on the same team all along. The sides are being chosen up very quickly, and they’d better be… because here comes the periscope of Widmore’s sneaky sub. What havoc will he wreak? What shenanigans will he be up to? Not really sure, but having been off-island for so long he’d better be damned good at playing catch up.
23. Okay, here’s a guess: Widmore will unknowingly end up following the wrong side. As leader of The Others, let’s assume he’d been doing Jacob’s will (or thought he was) for the entire time he was on the island. But what if he was actually listening to the MIB, without even realizing it? What if he were taking baby-killing direction not from Jacob, but from his nemesis instead?Knowing what we know now, Widmore’s words to John Locke about the upcoming war now contain a more sinister connotation: “If you’re not back there, the wrong side will win”. It’s as if he knew (or was coached) that John Locke’s body was necessary to the dark man’s ultimate plan. In a way, Widmore participated in the MIB’s long con, whether he knew it or not. (16-21 by Vozzek69 at Darkufo)

And unfortunately, I have to cut this post a little short.  Only 9 more episodes left!