Dead Man Walking

My first reaction after seeing that closeup of Jack's eye wide shut in the final frame was, "so this was what Lindelof and Cuse had in mind all along?! That Jack Shepard would die in the final scene, even though they mentioned time and time again that the character of Jack was originally supposed to die in the pilot?!"  No wonder they've gone into radio silence.  They're probably thinking, "Gotcha, suckers!"

But, to their credit, even if the entire series was bookcased with Jack's eyeball,  then I'm glad I never figured out what that final frame was going to be.  Sometimes ignorance truly is bliss.  And for me, all the wild and unpredictable plot turns, twists, flashbacks, flashforwards, and flashsideways were pure TV bliss.  The actual ending of the series may have sucked - depending on your expectations - but for me, it will always be about the journey this show took me on. 

Having said that, I still enjoyed a lot of this final episode. Mainly all of the epiphanies the folks in Sideways World had when they finally made that connection with their past.  It did seem a bit Stepford Wives-ish as they all came to the conclusion that they were all walking zombies late for a rendevous at the Church of the Inner Light (the way Kate smiled a knowing smile at clueless Jack as she led him to the church, the way Jin and Sun nodded and left a clueless Sawyer standing in that hospital room, and the way Hugo bid farewell to Ben, who obviously still had some issues with letting go).

I feel for all of  those Lost fanatics who wanted more of the Island's mysteries solved, but honestly, would it have made any difference?  Maybe the lesson for them is to also learn to just let it go.  Life is confusing and unexplainable, get used to it. Sure, we never did find out how turning  the Donkey Wheel makes you land in Tunisia, but then, the answer might have been as lame as what was finally revealed inside the Glowy Cave.  Now that we know that the island was - literally - a giant cork holding the evil of the world at bay (I guess) I have to admit I felt a  little letdown.  That giant cork plugging up that hole seemed pretty lame.  It took the Smoke Monster hundreds of years to find someone to crawl down that hole and unplug that cork?!

So, for me, even though I came away from the finale feeling a bit disappointed with how things were wrapped up, I now look back on the series with a great deal of fondness.  And I actually appreciate the fact that not every single mystery was solved.  I also liked the fact that Hurley and Ben lived on to rule the island as #1 and #2 for (evidently) many years.  And  l liked that at least some of the castaways actually made it off the island.  It was a great suprise to see Frank Lapidus alive and well and wise-cracking his way into the horizon with a still-living but now mortal Richard Alpert, Kate, Sawyer, Claire and Miles.  I would have liked to see Desmond end up with Penny, instead of being stuck on that kooky island with Hugo and Ben, but in The End, he and Penny still had each other in Sideways World, and on into eternity...I guess. 

Honestly, there was no perfect ending for such a convoluted and complex series like Lost.  I'm sorry to see it go, but I'm still really glad I got to experience the ride.

"I shall dub thee.....Jack-ob."

"You're all flawed."

Not exactly a ringing endorsement for the group Jacob must select an island savior from, but at least we finally got to find out which flawed soul will get to take over the job of guarding the Cave of Glowing Goodness in this penultimate episode of Lost.  And the winner is......Jack?!!! 

(by the way, I never understood why the word 'penultimate' would be used to describe the second-to-last episode of something.  It always seemed to me that 'penultimate' should mean 'fantastic',  as in, "that was really a 'penultimate' episode!"  After learning what the word actually means, it just sort of seems less.....penultimate.)

Whatever.  Anyway, I'm fine with Jack becoming the new Jacob.  After all, if all it requires is to keep the The Light hidden from the rest of the world - which seems sort of pointless - then Jack is just the man to do it.  Throughout all six seasons of Lost, Jack has always been the one with no real purpose in life, anyway.  Sawyer would miss coming up with dastardly new schemes, Kate would miss raising giant baby Aaron, and Hugo would miss all that fried chicken.  Jack would only miss.......exactly.

Now that we finally know who gets to carry the island torch, and now that Charles Widmore is dead (missed the finale by 'that much') the stage is finally set for the Final Showdown between good and evil.  I'm still wondering which side Ben will end up on.  His sudden turn to the dark side seems a bit suspicious to me.  Sure, he might have convinced the Man in Locke that he wants to go on a killing spree, but honestly, I think he just wanted to see Charles Widmore dead.  I really doubt that he believes that Smokey is going to give him the keys to the kingdom, anyway.  Or at least, I'm hoping he's not that stupid.

Not exactly sure how this final showdown will take 2 1/2 hours, but then, we will also finally get to find out exactly how the Sideways World characters will somehow reconnect with Island World.  My guess is that Desmond is going to take them all to a Phish concert and give them each a tab of acid.  That should open their relunctant doors of perception once and for all and force them all to realize that they never ever really left the island in the first place, and that life is really just an illusion where time and space is meaningless and nothing else matters but to love one another right now.  The end.

Okay, maybe that would be a crummy ending, but all I know is that I am ready, ready, ready for the final episode.  I have loved this show and have stayed faithful since Episode One, but now with everything wrapping up and winding down, I have to say I am ready for one gigantic 2 1/2 hour climax this Sunday night!  I have a feeling it's going to be....penultimate!

"Soon, all of your answers will be questioned."

With just 3 1/2 hours of Lost left, it's finally time for all of our questions to be answered....right?!

Don't count on it. 

'Across The Sea' provided us with an entire hour of island flashbacks where we discovered the origins of Jacob and The Man In Black, how they came to the island, why they are on the island, and what it all means to the present day island inhabitants....right?! 

Anyway....

Personally, I was a little bothered with the casting choice of Allison Janney as Jacob & the MIB's "mother".  She's a great actress, but part of what always made Lost so unique was how they always managed to cast the rolls of all the characters - even down to the most  insignificant roles - with relative unknowns, which made everything seem all the more original.  Allison Janney has been in tons of TV shows, most notably The West Wing, and she would not have been my choice for the Mother Earth character (or whatever she was supposed to be).

It also kind of bugged me, after learning that Jacob and MIB are brothers, that MIB looked so much older than Jacob.  I guess that's what hanging out with sinners will do for you.  MIB even looked older than his mama in their final scenes together.  But then, I guess Mother Earth was not a mere mortal, now was she?!  Also, after Jacob put their dead bodies side-by-side in the cave where they were discovered years later by Jack, Kate and John Locke, it did kind of creep me out that Jacob never bothered to even bury them!  Yuck!  Wouldn't their rotting flesh stink up the cave quite a bit?! 

Given all of that, I thought the episode did a nice job of explaining these mysterious characters and their origins.  It might have been nice to give us a bit more info on Mother Earth, how she came to the island, how she managed to hide from everyone, and how she managed to massacre all those other Others and fill up their well, all while MIB was lying unconscious. 

I was actually sorry to see the death of the Man in Black.  In my opinion, his ultimate fate was not all that different from that of John Locke's.  Both men were in search of a better life, and yet both men ended up getting the royal shaft.  Then, in both cases,  Smokey steps in to suck up their souls and exploit them to his/her/its benefit. 

After watching this episode, I am still wondering what is up with that bloody Smoke Monster!  How was it possible he could be hanging out in the Cave of Light?!  I would think if the Light represented all that is Good in the world, then how could such a destructive force as Smokey be allowed to camp out down there?!  I think that bothered me more than anything in this unfulfilling episode.

And now that we know there is a powerful Light that shines from the heart of the island, we still don't know A) why that Light is there, B) how it got there, or C) how that area eventualy became a frozen wasteland (as shown in the Frozen Donkey Wheel scenes). 

Sure, we got a lot of answers in this episode, but with just 3 1/2 hours left, I would say to the producers the same thing that Ricky used to say to Lucy: "You got a lot of 'splainin' to do"!

"You're going to be fine, Mr. Locke.
As long as you give up smoking."

I'm not exactly sure I like where this series is heading.

At this point, with just a few episodes remaining, I see two possible scenarios....

1. The main characters will be killed off one-by-one, leaving maybe one or two characters left....which would suck. Or...

2. The main characters will be killed off one-by-one, only to be resurrected in some sort of flashback/flashsideways/flashforward event where everyone comes back alive and lives happily ever after....which would also suck.

I suppose the resolution to this amazing series is bound to be disappointing in one way or another, but it does bother me that in this last episode, the Kwons were both Dwowned, Sayid was blown to smithereens, Frank Lapidus went missing, and Jack still remains alive.  That scene of him staring up into the night sky, wondering why, why, why...left me thinking the same thing.

It should now be painfully obvious that the Man in Locke is definitely not a Good Guy after all.  He obviously wanted to kill everyone on board that submarine when he hid that bomb in Jack's backpack.  If that's the case, and if it is also true that Charles Widmore also wants them all dead, then we'll be lucky if anyone makes it to the finale alive!

My previous post was a brief speculation on how I thought the finale would play itself out, but it's now quite obvious that the Kwon's names will be scratched off that cave wall...that is if anyone is still left to do the scratching. 

One thing that bugged me about how they died, though.  What exactly did Sun get trapped behind inside that room?!  I never could tell what it was they were all trying to pull off of her.  It obviously had to be heavy enough for Jin, Sawyer, and Jack to not be able to pull it off of her, and yet not quite heavy enough to cause her any real pain!  From the few underwater shots we saw, it looked like she was trapped behind one of those subway turnstiles.  Didn't anybody think to just stick a quarter in it?

On the other hand, Sayid's sacrifice felt correct to me.  He was obviously used throughout the season as a mindless killing machine so that we wouldn't feel too bad when he was blown to tiny bits.  Too bad his character had to deteriorate to that extent.  He wasn't one of my favorite characters, but still, he deserved better than that.

My other nitpik concerns the title of this episode (as well as the previous episode, for that matter).  It turns out that 'The Candidate' for the island was not revealed, but that it was just a clever ruse used in Sideways World where John Locke learns that Jack thinks he is 'a candidate' for spinal surgery that would allow him to walk again.  Booo!  That was almost as disappointing as never really learning who 'The Last Recruit' was supposed to be.

At this point, I just hope that Frank Lapidus manages to wash up on shore, find Desmond, and together they can save what's left of these doomed characters!

With just a few short weeks to go before the season finale of Lost, this might be a good time to do a little speculating on exactly who is going to actually inherit this crazy little island.

Now that we've learned Jacob has lured particular people to the island over the years in order to annoint one of them to be the new island ruler, then it might be kind of fun to speculate on how the island might change under new management.  Here's an idea of some possible finale results...or series spinoffs. 

King Kwon's Island

The Kwons will rule the island as a team, separating the men on one side of the island, the woman on the other, where Jin and Sun will educate them in the fine art of blending into the background. 

Jack's Island of Confusion

Jack Shepard will be chosen as the new leader of Lost Island, and will lead everyone in one direction, then change his mind and lead them in another direction, never really finding any resolution no matter where he leads them. After all, with all those magic mirrors he broke in the Lighthouse, he's definitely in for many, many years of bad luck.

Sayid's Zombie Island

Sayid Jarrah will be the only living person to survive the final big battle between Good and Evil on the island.  He will immediately be empowered with the ability to resurrect the dead, only to force them all to sit around like zombies and listen to his endless flashbacks of his one true love Nadia.

Sawyer's Island of Insults

James Ford will become the new head honcho of Lost Island and immediately confiscate everyone's possessions, force everyone to use his choice of nicknames, then demand that they build a new temple in honor of Juliet.

Hugo's Happy Island Hangout

Hugo Reyes will be selected as King of the Island and will be empowered with the ability to force everyone to just chill.  Everyone on the island will slowly begin to realize that life is good, there's nothing to worry about, and there's no reason to try and leave the island...as long as the food supply holds out.

Gilligan's Island

No, not THAT Gilligan. This would be a suprise ending in which Vince Gilligan, the creator of AMC's Breaking Bad, discovers that the electromagnetism on the island would be the perfect place for Walter White to set up camp and turn the island into one huge meth-producing factory, free from any meddling from the DEA. Plus, everyone will get to use the S-word.

We Have To Go BAAAACK.........AGAAAIN!!"

 
"Well.  Here we go."

And with those brief words spoken by the Man In Locke after having his camp rattled by one of Widmore's missiles, the show finally moves into the final story arc.  And with only 4 regular episodes to go before the Big Finale, I say bring it on.

Now that Hurley has managed to unite Team Jack and Team Locke, it seems as though the stage is finally set for the Team Locke vs Team Widmore showdown.  However, in true Lost fashion, a few more misdirections managed to occur throughout this episode.  The main one being the defection of Claire from Team Locke to Team Jack, and the defection of Jack back to Team Locke.  Sheesh!!! If this show really does turn out to be all about discovering one's destiny, it sure has picked some wishy-washy characters to represent it!  After all, over the past five seasons, Jack has managed to change his mind almost as many times as Kate has waffled choosing between Jack or Sawyer, Sayid has waffled between doing the right thing and the wrong thing, and Ben has waffled from being likable one minute to being despicable the next.

And at this point, I'm STILL not sure who the Good Guys or the Bad Guys are.  By the end of this episode, it seemed as though Sawyer, Kate, Hurley etc. have walked into a trap, which may lead to Widmore being the true bad guy (and which might require Jack to actually become the hero he always wanted to be and come to their rescue).    After all, the Man in Locke did have a very reassuring tone at the end of the episode when he told Jack, "Don't worry, it's going to be okay. You're with me, now.  Give your old Smoke Monster a big hug." or words to that effect.

Meanwhile, back in Sideways World, worlds are definitely colliding.  Jack is introduced to Claire, Sayid gets captured by James and Miles, and Jin and Sun are one hospital room away from Jack getting ready to operate on John Locke.  Can somebody just tie a string to all these people and yank them back to the island, please?!  The coincidences are getting on my nerves!

Another thing that kind of bugged me was just exactly how Widmore was able to send missiles over to the main island all the way from Hydra Island?!  And just exactly how many missiles was he able to fit into that submarine, anyway? 

And how did that nice speedboat show up out of nowhere?!  That's supposed to be the Man in Locke's boat?  If he's been so determined to get off the island for all these years, why the heck didn't he just hop on board and head for Tahiti? 

And my final nitpick....who the heck is The Last Recruit, anyway?!  I kept expecting a new character to pop up throughout the episode, but that never happened, did it?!  Or, did I miss something?  And are we ever going to see a Team Jacob, or do we just have to wait until later this Summer for the next Twilight sequel? 

This show can really be confusing and frustrating, even going down to the final few episodes.  And I guess I wouldn't want it any other way.

 P.S. -  A friend comented on my Facebook page that The Last Recruit might be Jack.  Since Locke said to him, 'You're with me now",  that Jack might have some Smoke Monster in him now.  Hmmm...

Happily Ever After
(oops...sorry, wrong episode)

If it takes surviving a plane crash, a nuclear explosion, and a journey into a parallel universe in order for these characters to find true love, then what chance do the rest of us have?!  Personally, I will feel a bit let down if the main goal of this show is to make sure all of these characters find their soulmates and live happily ever after.  I'm at least hoping for a bit more of a finale than seeing Captain Stubing and the rest of the Love Boat crew showing up to rescue these people from the island.

I'm guessing that this latest episode was just the producer's way of bringing some closure to some loose ends before the final story arc kicks in.  Having a chance for Michael to come back to the show and apologize for shooting Libby in the belly, as well as bringing back Libby so that she and Hurley can finally have that picnic on the beach (as well as tie up that loose end of seeing her in the mental hospital way back when) should satisfy a lot of Lost fans, but for me, let's get on with the Final Showdown!

At least Sideways World has now become quite a bit more relevant.  Now that Desmond is operating on all cylinders in Sideways World (and possibly in Island World, since he seems to have that Chesire Cat grin on his face no matter what happens to him - even in next week's preview where he's sitting pretty at the bottom of the well) it now seems inevitable that these worlds will collide at some point very soon.  I'm just wondering if Desmond will have to convince everyone in Sideways World to take another doomed flight over the island of doom in order to get everyone back in the same universe.  At least this time, it doesn't look like they will get any help from Eloise.  I'm still wondering what she meant when she told Desmond that 'he wasn't ready yet'.  I would love to see an Eloise-centric episode before this thing wraps up, but I'm not holding my breath.

This episode did give us some advancement of the Team Locke vs Team Good Guys storyline, though.  Unfortunately, I guess poor Illana won't be part of that final showdown (or maybe parts of her will, "Dude, you've got some Illana on ya").  It did seem a little ridiculous that she would be stuffing those supplies into her backpack on top of that very unstable dynamite.  Didn't she watch Season One?!!

I'm really hoping that Desmond's decision to hit and run down John Locke will knock some sense into the guy, and that he will have his own personal epiphany of his other pathetic life from Island World and will decide to do something about it.  It just seems that his character has really been played for a sap throughout this entire series, and I'm really hoping that he will get some major redemption before this whole thing wraps up.   At this point, I really don't believe that the Man In Locke will be successful with his attempt to escape the island, and nothing would please me more than if the Real John Locke would have something to do with his defeat. 

I'm just glad it's not up to me to figure out how to make that happen, though.

Looking For Love
In All The Wrong Places

Desmond Hume is kidnapped by Charles Widmore and forced back to the island where he is placed inside an electromagnetic box where he passes out and wakes up in Sideways World, where he is now BFF with Sideways Charles Widmore, who hooks him up with Sideways Charlie Pace who convinces Desmond he's not happy because he's not in love, which leads him to Sideways Heloise, who is throwing a birthday party for Sideways Daniel, who convinces Desmond that they're all lovesick (or maybe just....lost). 

It now seems inevitable that the events of Sideways World are destined to intersect at some point with Island World in these final episodes of Lost.  I guess I can accept that.  I haven't been a big fan of Sideways World, for the simple reason that I could never rationalize how NOT crashing on the island would have caused such dramatic character changes for most of these people. 

However, after coming to the conclusion that setting off the bomb in 1977 actually tossed these people into an alternate universe in the year 1977 (which would make more sense as to why Sawyer and Miles grew up to be cops, Locke and Linus grew up to be teachers, Hurley grew up to be lucky and Jack just grew more dense) but what I don't get is how Daniel Faraday got tossed into Sideways World and became musician Daniel Widmore who writes complex physics equations he can't understand which leads him to think he once set off a nuclear bomb!

After all, if the producers can basically make such radical character changes as making pretty much everyone in Sideways World a direct decendent of Charles and Heloise Widmore in order to wrap this thing up, then so be it.  Hoping for a logical conclusion to this show is pretty much out the window at the point, anyway.  Might as well just enjoy sit back and enjoy the ride.

At least Sideways World is a great opportunity to bring back characters like Charlie, Penny, Heloise, Daniel and even George the Chauffeur.  Only now it seems as though all of these people will somehow have to merge with the Island World people in order to make everything right again.  I'm wondering if another big bomb will have to go off in order to merge these two worlds.  Either that, or everybody can just climb into Widmore's electromagnetic box and duke it out.  May the strongest parallel universe character win.

And speaking of that electromagnetic box, how the heck did Charles Widmore get that thing on the island if he showed up in a submarine?!! (Oh, sorry, I forgot; logic went out the window)

As frustrating as this show can be, it is still entertaining as hell.  I still have faith that the resolution to this epic story will be somewhat satisfying.  And as for all of those lingering questions left behind, I'll just set off a nuclear bomb in my brain and send them all off to Fantasy Island.

He Touched Me

The end is near!
Soon, we shall all know the truth! 
Soon, all of our questions will be answered! 
Soon, we will be Lost no more!
Bummer.

As it is with any great mystery, there is always that point where the story ends and the mystery is revealed.   And sometimes the actual mystery is better than the actual revelation.  Fortunately, in the case of Lost, the revelations are still pretty darn satisfying!

With Ab Aeterno, (latin for 'since the beginning of time') we are now officially rounding the corner and heading down the jungle path to seeing the epic story of Lost come to an end.  Epic, because evidently what it all really comes down to is a showdown between Good and Evil.  Kind of ironic that all the the main characters we've cared about and rooted for over these past five years are nothing more than pawns in the game of life.  But then, aren't we all.

We learned that Richard Alpert arrived on the island as a mere mortal in the late 1800s on board the Black Rock.  We also learned that it was indeed Jacob who brought the ship to the island, and it was also the Black Rock that smashed into the giant statue, leaving nothing but a giant footprint in the sand.

And, we learned exactly how and why Richard was 'touched' by Jacob and thus given the 'gift' of immortality.  Careful what you wish for, Ricardo.  We also learned that the island is actually a metaphorical cork!  A way to keep evil bottled up and away from civilization (not exactly sure if that plan has really been very successful, though).

In one of the very few flashbacks I've actually enjoyed watching, we learned that Richard Alpert - Ricardo Alperto(?) - was a condemned man, accused of killing a man all in the name of love (so beautifully represented in such a few short scenes).  Ricardo's backstory was epic in itself, and Nestor Carbonell was excellent throughout.  The only problem I had with this episode was why Isabella, the love of his life, showed up on the island.  After all, doesn't a person have to die on the island in order for the Black Smoke to suck out some of their DNA and manifest as that person?!  I had a bit of a problem with that.

What I did not have any problems with were any of the scenes with The Man in Black.   Too bad this character was given such short shrift throughout these six seasons.  One mystery still remains as to where this character went, since the Smoke Monster is now using John Locke's body.  Hopefully, we'll get a Man in Black-centric episode before this whole thing is over.

I'm guessing we'll still get a few more curve balls thrown at us before this whole thing winds down.  If all we have to look forward to now is the final battle between Good and Evil, and which castaway sides with which entity, it could get a bit boring.  These 'immortal' characters are much more interesting to me. I think it was very wise to decide to end this series after 6 years.  It would've been a bit of a letdown to invest say, 8 or 10 years in this show and the 'main' characters, only to learn that they were really just the supporting cast after all.

Then again, I might be getting ahead of myself. Something tells me that the producers still have a few tricks up their sleeves, even after giving us such a rich and satisfying episode as Ab Aeterno.  And fortunately, unlike reading a great mystery novel, taking a peak at the final few pages of this tale just isn't possible.

Ford Hybrid

I'm really getting tired of starting each of my reviews for Season 6 with, "Once again, how did NOT crashing on the island cause THIS to happen?!"  I still haven't quite figured out how Sideways World is such a completely different place for some castaways and yet not so different for others (Jack still being a doofus doctor in both worlds). Evidently, blowing up the island in 1977 must've changed all of these character's lives from that point on, and we're just now catching up with their lives post-non-island crash?  That sorta makes sense....right?!!

Because that's the only way I can be at peace with the concept of Jim and Miles growing up to become undercover cops, Ben growing up and becoming a wimpy history teacher, Hurley becoming the luckiest person on the planet, and Jack having his own dysfunctional son, all before the events that led up to the plane NOT crashing on the island in 2004.  I guess the only constant has been the fact that John Locke remains a loser in both worlds. And speaking of constants, whatever happened to Daniel Faraday and Desmond Hume?!   Why aren't they showing up as anyone's sidekicks in Sideways World?!  As intrigued and invested as I have been with Lost over the past 5 years, I am really hoping that this Sideways World stuff is not going to be clever but insignificant filler material (or possible opportunities for Lost spinoff series).

And as fun as it was seeing Charlotte showing up again (at least she's still an archeologist, only one who prefers digging through underwear drawers) I really don't care that Sawyer - sorry, Detective James Ford - was rejected by her, anymore than I care that Sideways James enjoys TV dinners and Little House on the Prairie reruns. Give me more of Crazy Claire and her creepy rodent skull baby! Who would've thought that Emilie de Ravin would've been such a primo psycho! That hug she gave Kate was almost as disturbing as watching James Ford having an epiphany watching Michael Landon on an episode of Little House on the Prairie!

As I have stated before, I really only care about what is going on at Island World this season. Give me an hour of Island plot and I'll be happy. Just as long as it doesn't focus on Kate, Jin, Sun, Sayid or Jack. Oh, who am I kidding, just make the last few episodes about John Locke, Ben Linus, Crazy Claire, Jacob and the struggle for good and evil and I'll be happy.

As far as advancing the plot this week, we at least got to see that Charles Widmore is safely hiding away on Hydra Island awaiting a showdown with the Man In Locke. Bring it on!  Although, I'll be more than happy to wait another week for that to happen, since it looks like next week's Richard-centric episode will finally shed some light on some of the island's ancient history.

Bring THAT on!