Lost: The End

"I'll see you in another life, brother."

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Lost S6E15: What They Died For

"We're very close to the end, Hugo."

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Lost S6E15: Across the Sea

"Because you wouldn't tell me."

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Lost from the Irish Perspective

Faith and Begorrah! There's a fucking bomb on this sub!

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Lost S6E14: The Candidate

"I think that I can fix you."

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Lost S6E13: The Last Recruit

"Alright, let's catch up."

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Lost S6E12: Everybody Loves Hugo

"Why aren't you afraid?"

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Lost S6E11: Happily Ever After

"What if this wasn't supposed to be our life?"

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Lost S6E10: The Package

"That's one stubborn tomato."

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Lost S6E9: Ab Aeterno

"We're all dead."

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Lost S6E8: Recon

"I'm the smoke thing"

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Lost S6E7: Dr. Linus

"What was devastating to him was the loss of his power."

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Lost: S6E6: Sundown

"I'm a good man."

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Lost: S6E5: Lighthouse

"I guess we weren't looking for it."

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Lost S6E4: The Substitute

"Ben Linus, European History."
"John Locke, substitute."

We've always maintained there was a certain brilliance to how Lost was put together in such a way as to gain the widest possible audience. Like we said last week, if it was just a sci-fi adventure show, it would never have gained the audience it has. By populating it with heavily romantic characters like the con man with a secret, the surgeon who wants to save everyone, the angel of death assassin and torturer whose every girlfriend seems to die in his arms, the wild and untamed girl fugitive, the beautiful British star-cross'd lovers, circling the globe looking for each other, it ensured an audience who probably wouldn't have tuned in or stayed tuned in otherwise. To counter all the stock romantic characters and subplots, the Lost creators managed to sneak in some hardcore nerdery. Of course, there's the whole time travel thing, but less obvious is the fact that the entire story is structured like a video game. Every season, the "players" reach a different level. Season 1 was the beach, Season 2 was the hatch, Season 3 was the Hydra and DHARMAville, Season 4 was the freighter, season 5 was the '70s, and now in Season 6, it's the Temple and the room with the cliffside view that apparently served as Jacob's office. There's always secret rooms being unlocked and new bosses to conquer on this show. Remember when Ben seemed like the big bad guy on the island? That almost seems quaint now.

Much like the ghost of Rousseau hanging heavily over last episode's developments, the ghost of John Locke, our John Locke, whose life we've been following for the past 5 seasons, hung heavily over this episode.

Okay, there was a ten-minute pause as we stared at our monitor trying to bridge that last sentence to the thoughts to follow. We're just gonna have to break it down.

John Locke finally gets his funeral. We've been staring at his corpse for how many seasons now, as it awaited burial? This scene made us happy for a couple of reasons. For one, we've always been deeply affected by how tragic a character John has always been. As UnLocke put it a couple weeks back, an irrevocably broken man, bouncing from job to job, belief system to belief system and getting smacked down every time, until he came to the island and got shoved around a chess board because he wanted desperately to believe he had a higher purpose, and in the end he died, never understanding what it was all about. If anyone deserved a proper burial - and John would have definitely wanted to be buried on the island - it was him.

And that leads to our second reason for loving this scene. This show has always had a ... relationship with death, we guess is how we'd put it, that was unusual for a network adventure drama. Not only did it always have a high body count, which gave it an "anything can happen" vibe as former main characters dropped like flies, it also had a tendency to write some fairly emotionally gripping death scenes (Charlie, Juliet, Boone, Shannon, Libby, Charlotte, Faraday, Naomi), and to follow that up with some equally emotionally gripping funeral/memorial scenes. In fact, every season has been full of both childbirth and funeral scenes, a cycle that repeats over and over. Anyway, we were pleased to see them return to this because there's been so much death on this show that if you don't take the time to acknowledge it, the characters come off a little cold and the deaths become a little less meaningful. Add to this that Ben Linus managed to give a eulogy that was both heartbreaking ("John Locke was ... a believer... a better man than me...") and hilarious ("I'm sorry I murdered him.") and Frank's pitch-perfect "Weirdest damn funeral I've ever been to," and it made for a very satisfying close to our John Locke's life.

Except, it wasn't, because we were also shown the Locke that could have been. Except it wasn't quite that either. This B-timeline isn't just about what would have happened if 815 hadn't crashed because the histories of the characters in the B timeline are shaping up to be significantly different. Here's a Locke engaged to Helen. Here's a Helen talking about inviting Locke's father to their wedding. They're only hints, but they're hints of a significantly different John Locke. So different that he can laugh when he finds himself in a humiliating position on his front lawn; so different that he just wants to move forward from the past and look to the future he can have with Helen. So different that this is a John Locke who CAN be told what he can't do.

As an aside -- ROSE NADLER, Y'ALL! We love every scene she's in . And like all the B-timeline meetups, they're between characters who had significant relationships in the A timeline. On the island, Rose and Locke shared a secret, the secret of the island's healing powers, and they both knew that the other knew it. Once again, destiny forces them to connect on a powerful level as she uses her cancer to get him to wake up to reality.

And of course, of all the relationships John Locke had on the island, none were as important (and ultimately, destructive) as the one he had with Ben Linus. If a Ben Linus existed in timeline-B, you knew he'd show up and they'd hit it off. But this kind of forces the question: WHY does a Ben Linus exist in timeline-B? If we assume that the island sunk when the bomb went off, then wouldn't Ben be dead, as he was off getting healed with the others at the time? So okay, let's assume that the island sunk at some point after The Incident, in this timeline. Wouldn't that still mean that this is an "Other'd" Ben Linus teaching European History? Questions, questions.

One final thought about the B-timeline and then we'll head on back over to the island. Hugo was another person who had a significant relationship with John Locke and whose appearance here further illustrates just how off this timeline is. A confident, self-assured, business casual Hugo is a jarring sight to see, but we were happy to see this relationship acknowledged. They established ages ago that Hugo owned the box company John worked at, so it's nice to see the writers pick up on that and use it.

Okay, now. The island. Just as in the B-timeline, the life of John Locke was center stage and not just in the funeral scene. Along with Rose and Hugo, Sawyer always had a highly unique relationship with Locke and we JUST LOVED that he took one look at Smokey and immediately realized it wasn't him. You can't con a con man. Not even Ben Linus figured it out. In fact, Ben went right on believing Smokey was Locke up until Richard shoved his face in Locke's corpse.

There's something else that stuck out about Sawyer in this episode. He could see that blond kid running around and Smokey was surprised about that. Richard couldn't see him. This is notable because we remembered another time Sawyer got tuned in to someone else's vision: the time he saw Kate's horse with her outside the hatch. Coincidence? Or does Sawyer have some sort of connection with the island that we haven't discovered yet? And just who is that kid, anyway? We suspect he's a version of Jacob, not least because he resembles him so much and in his first vision had blood all over him. "You know the rules. You can't kill him," he says to a visibly angry Smokey, who responds with an alarming "DON'T TELL ME WHAT I CAN'T DO!" The very John Locke mantra that the B-version was rejecting in this same episode. How much of an effect is the dead John Locke having on the being wearing his form on the island now? How much of Locke's personality is going to come through? And who can't he kill? Sawyer? And what does this have to do with the "rules" that prevented Ben from killing Charles Widmore?

Smokey tells Sawyer he's trapped on the island, but "Before I was trapped I was a man just like you." Should we believe him? Should we believe any of what he told Sawyer this episode? We're still inclined to think of Jacob as the good guy. and Smokey as the bad guy in this scenario, but it's hard to think of Jacob as good when he's apparently been manipulating all the main characters their whole lives. As Smokey put it to Sawyer, "the choices you thought you made, you never really made at all." These are almost exactly the same words Sawyer used to describe the long con to Cassidy. Smokey has to know that. He's manipulating James into following him. As Ilana said, "He's recruiting."

And what are we to make of the names on the cave wall? For one, Kate is noticeably absent. There were a lot of names on that wall, but it appeared that they were all crossed off, except for the ones noted by Smokey:

4: Locke
8: Reyes
15: Ford
16: Jarrah
23: Shephard
42: Kwon

Why the numbers? Because "Jacob had a thing for numbers," according to Smokey. So the numbers we've been hearing about since Season 1 represent the position on the list of the remaining characters, except for Kate and one of the Kwons. Remember, Justin and Aldo, the two Others shot by Claire at the end of last episode, had an argument about killing Jin because "he might be one of them." The Others know a Kwon is on Jacob's list, but not which Kwon. If Jin is the "chosen" Kwon, this may explain why Sun didn't wind up in the '70s, although it doesn't explain why Kate did, if she's not a candidate. And why isn't Kate a candidate? She was one of the ones Jacob "touched" last season.

One final tidbit and we'll turn the floor over to you to tell us what we missed or what we're crazy for thinking: With the exception of Hugo Reyes, the remaining names on Jacob's list are John (since crossed out), Jack, James, Jin, and Jarrah. Discuss.

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Lost S6E2: What Kate Does

I'm thinking of running, Kate."

Part of the success of Lost is that the writers wisely give the fans not what they want, but what they need. The result is that the viewers are constantly in a state of wanting, so they keep coming back for more. Upon first viewing, this episode came across as a slight disappointment after the fireworks of the season opener, but upon reflection, we have to say that it was the right direction to go in. Without the deep characterizations on this show, it'd just be another goofy sci-fi adventure series, one that may not have lasted as long as it has without all that character work. If these were just a bunch of boilerplate adventure characters, chances are the viewership would have lost interest a while ago. Besides, this is the final season and each major character deserves to have one last episode centered solely around themselves.

And so, we got probably the last Kate-centric episode, cleverly titled "What Kate Does," a callback to the Season 2 episode "What Kate Did," which revealed for the first time the crime that turned Kate into a fugitive. Despite the attempts of a portion of the viewership to make Kate all about which man she's going to choose (we are neither "Skaters," nor "Jaters," thank you very much) Kate has always been about herself and her own motivations first. This point was driven home last season when we were teased with the idea that Kate returned to the island to reunite with Sawyer or to be with Jack, only to find out she had reasons that had nothing to do with either man and those reasons revolved around Claire and Aaron.

Well, we got a repeat of that last night, as we were teased with the prospect of either a Kate and Jack moment or a Kate and Sawyer moment and we got neither. The Kate and Jack moment came in the temple where we saw the spark of that old partnership ("I'll take care of James. You take care of Sayid.") The Kate and Sawyer moment? Pick one. There were several. And yet none of these moments were the romantic teases they first appeared to be. The fact is, she lied to Jack when she said she'd bring Sawyer back and the fact is, she's not looking at Sawyer romantically at the moment and he's not looking at her that way either. She's concerned for a friend who's grieving (and feeling guilty about her part in it) and Sawyer's grief was revealed to be far deeper than anyone really thought. By the way, kudos to Josh Holloway, who's been knocking it out of the park, acting-wise. His grief is real and palpable and punches through the TV screen so you can feel it. Everything from his voice to the way he walks illustrates that this is a man who's lost everything, including hope.

And can we just say, Kate is always FAR more interesting when she's following her own agenda? When she knocked out both others in the space of 5 seconds we were all "YOU GO, KATE!" But whenever she's sighing and leaning in to almost-but-not-quite kiss one of her paramours, we find all the interesting parts of her just drain away. Kate's just more fun when she's on the run. By the way, we've been racking our brains, but we don't think Jin and Kate have ever had a scene together, just the two of them, before this episode. It's amazing to us that after all this time, the writers can still come up with new character combinations.

In other news, the mystery of just what the hell is going on with Sayid deepens. So maybe we were wrong last week. He's not Jacob in Sayid's body. He's apparently "infected" in much the same way Rousseau's team was. Rousseau's ghost hung heavy over everything last night, but we'll get to that in a bit.

One of the overriding themes of Lost is destiny and we saw a lot of that last night. It is apparently Sayid's destiny to be tortured again and again as payment for his sins and it's Kate's destiny to run, no matter where she is or what reality she's in. Kate is also destined to play a part in Claire and Aaron's life, no matter the reality too. In fact, one thing the B timeline is establishing is that even if flight 815 never crashed, certain things are going to happen: Jack will save Charlie's life in either reality, Kate will be there for Claire when she goes into labor, Ethan will be there to stick needles into Claire, Claire will always scream "Moy bye-bye!" As in, "They're troying to tyke moy bye-bye!" And more and more, the B versions of the characters appear to be retaining some sense of the A timeline. Kate looked puzzled for a second when she saw Jack outside the airport. Claire got back into the cab with the woman who had pulled a gun on her. Kate looked momentarily confused and surprised when Claire blurted out the name of Aaron. Also, there appears to be something with mirrors. Jack had a moment in the season opener when he peered in the mirror, seemingly confused about where he was and Kate had a similar moment when she opened Claire's bag and peered into the mirror, confused. These characters are literally Through the Looking Glass.

Now, let's quote an exchange between Jacob and his Nemesis from last season:

Nemesis: "They come. They fight. They destroy. They corrupt. It always ends the same."
Jacob: "It only ends once. Anything that happens before that is just progress."

Why are we quoting this? Because it popped into our heads last night when Claire showed up toting a rifle in the jungle. We mentioned last week about the echoes. Those scenes and moments that refer back to earlier scenes and moments. Like we said, Sayid gets tortured over and over again. Kate runs over and over again. Charlie's life is saved over and over again. Locke sustains leg injuries over and over again. We could go on and on, but we'll stop there. The point is, it is apparently destiny that there will always be a crazed, rifle-toting woman wandering the jungle after having lost her child. With Rousseau gone, it became Claire's turn to set the traps and stop using hair products. According to Dogen (who incidentally serves as an echo of Sun, an Asian character who can speak English, but refuses to do so), Claire has been infected. What this means, we can only guess. Actually, we can't even do that. We have no clue what's going on there.

Okay, we've rambled enough. Here are some discussion points for extra credit:

* Why is there no technology of any sort in the Temple? From the typewriter to the mortar and pestle to the hand-cranked torture device, it seemed like there was a point being made but we can't figure it out. Is this a philosophical conceit or is it by necessity?

* What's the deal with the pill? Why does it have to be taken willingly?

* Jack, like Sawyer, is at the end of the line after the events at the Swan. He swallowed that pill because he really doesn't care if he lives or dies. That makes both characters much more dangerous.

* Miles keeps looking at Sayid funny. Granted, the guy pulled a full-on Jesus in front of him, but he was looking at him funny even before he rose from the dead. Since Miles has a connection with the dead, we're wondering what that means. Discuss.

* Despite his puzzlement, Miles got off a couple great lines. "As you can see, Hugo here has assumed a leadership position, so...that's pretty good. " "We'll be in the food court if you need us."

*If Ethan is alive in the B timeline, that must mean he was taken off the island before the bomb went off. Pierre Chang ordered all the women and children off the island. Does this mean his mother's wandering around somewhere? Is there a Ben in the B timeline? Discuss.

* As we said, the characters are literally through the looking glass. "The Looking Glass" was the DHARMA station that used a beacon to guide submarines to the island. Discuss.

* Claire's tatty-ass wig in the B timeline. Discuss.


Pictures courtesy of ABC TV.

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Lost S6E1&2: LA X

"Nothing is irreversible."

Okay, if our viewing experience of last night's two-part premiere could be summed up in a sound effect, it would be "SQUEEEEEEE!" If it could be summed up in a facial expression, it would be a shit-eating grin. If it could be summed up in textspeak it would be "OMGLOL WTF?" Not coincidentally, "SQUEEEEEEE!" "WTF?" and shit-eating grins is about all you could get out of us last night. It was so nice to be back and the creators threw a whole bunch of "welcome home" bits at us. They've been pitching this as a season anyone can jump in and understand without previous Lost experience, but we don't see how that's possible. It's all about the payoffs that come from watching the show all along. And those payoffs were coming one right after another.

What we're trying to say is, how awesome was THAT?

In keeping with the theme of last night's show, we're just going to bounce all over the place on this one. Not because we're trying to be thematically appropriate but because it's over 15 hours and two viewings later, and we're still trying to wrap our heads around it. Besides, we never were the strict recap types. We'd rather throw out our observations and opinions to start a conversation.

Okay, so. There are two timelines now. The "A" timeline, the one where everything in the previous 5 seasons happened as we saw it, and the "B" timeline, where Oceanic 815 landed safely in Los Angeles. So the questions start immediately. Did Juliet set off the bomb, causing the alternate timeline? Does this mean that Jack did it yet again and came up with a plan that in one timeline, caused the deaths of Juliet and possibly Sayid (we'll get back to that) and in another timeline, sunk the whole fricking island to the bottom of the ocean, presumably killing everyone on it? When are these fools going to realize that every time they let Jack lead, people die? Sometimes by the dozens.

And that B timeline has an awfully unsettling feel to it, wouldn't you say? First Jack notices a mysterious cut on his neck in the bathroom on the plane, then HELLO? DESMOND?!?! What the hell is Desmond doing on the plane? And where did he disappear to? And while it was fun to see Frogurt and Arzt again, it was unsettling seeing a Charlie so deep in the throes of his addiction that he wanted to die. It was unsettling seeing a Hurley proclaiming himself the luckiest guy in the world. It was REALLY unsettling to hear Boone say to Locke "Are you pulling my leg?" (remember how he died?) and then following it up with "If this thing goes down, I'm sticking with you." (remember WHY he died?) Then there's the B-side Kate, who's not exactly having a fabulous time in the new reality. That Marshall is just this side of a Keystone Kop what with all the times Kate's managed to slug him and give him the slip. And we were treated to one of the best "in another life..." moments (in an episode chock full of them) when the fugitive Kate commandeered a cab with Claire in the backseat, pregnant with the child that, in another life, Kate would raise for her. We also got Jin in trouble with customs and Sun not willing to dig him out of trouble. As UnLocke said later in the episode to Ben, crashing on the island was the best thing that ever happened to these people. This B timeline is probably going to serve to illustrate that. We're not predicting a lot of happy endings for the B-Sides.

Although there was that intriguing scene with Locke and Jack in the airport. It's funny. Through all the multiple viewings of every previous episode, we never actually made the connection that Locke had a spinal injury and Jack is a spinal surgeon. We have no idea where that little B storyline is going to go.

One more thing about the B timeline and then we'll move on. We wondered why the hell we had to sit through another heartbreaking Juliet death scene, but we came up with a theory. Just before she dies, she uttered the seemingly nonsensical "We should go for coffee some time. We can go Dutch." Now, this echoed Charlotte's death scene when she said "I'm not supposed to have chocolate before dinner" just before dying. The episode was full of echoes and we'll get to some of the others in a minute, but this one stands out. Charlotte uttered those nonsense lines and then later, much later, we saw WHY she said those lines and we saw them said in context. We think the same thing's happening here. At some point, we're going to see B-side Juliet and she's going to say those lines. This means that just before she died, A-side Juliet got some sort of glimpse of the B timeline. Why else would she send the "It worked" message to Miles? Also, B-Jack initially seemed to have some residual memories of the A timeline. These two timelines aren't as independent of each other as they first appear.

Okay, moving on from alternate timeline theorizing, let's get back to that echo thing we mentioned. We had Boone obliquely referring to his death. We had Juliet's death scene mimicking Charlotte's. We had Jack standing over an unconscious Charlie, trying to save his life. We had him consider a tracheotomy with a pen (something he considered with Rose in the pilot, right after the plane crashed). We had yet another scene of people peering down a deep hole where the Hatch once stood. We even had a scene with Hurley treating a stomach wound and trying not to throw up or pass out, like he did back in season one when Jack was treating the Marshall on the beach. We wonder if the writers threw all these references to iconic scenes from the show's history as a shoutout to the fans or if they're making some point about all the time travel and alternate histories. Either way, each callback gave us a little thrill.

Okay, what else? Oh, yeah. Sayid. Here's another theory: Sayid really is dead and we're seeing Jacob doing a riff on his nemesis' body-stealing schtick. And as for that nemesis... call him UnLocke, call him Smokey, call him the Man in Black, but one thing's for sure, he definitely seems to be the bad guy in all this. It appears that the entire mission of The Others is to serve Jacob by keeping his enemy in check. Hence, the ash circles and the sonic fences and such. This would explain why the NEW Others or the Other-Others, those dirty hippies living in an old Tomb Raider set, lost their shit when Hurley told them Jacob was dead. They knew that meant Smokey was large and in charge.

And Smokey did a little muscle-flexing, killing off most of Ilana's backup dancers and knocking out Richard before slinging him over his shoulder. Throw out any theories you can think of because THAT whole part of the storyline just leaves us open-mouthed. It's not like we have a handle on anything else going on, but the UnLocke storyline has us the most baffled as to where it's going to go.

Still, it means more scenes between Michael Emerson and Terry O'Quinn and these two actors have a clearly productive relationship. They simply bring out the best in each other. "You're the monster." "Let's not resort to name-calling." And it has to be said, for all Smokey's apparent evil, he gave a truly touching, sad, and honest eulogy for John Locke, who died never understanding and who never received a eulogy from anyone.

So? What next? Who the fuck knows? We're just happy to be along for the ride. If there's any guess we can make, it looks like UnLock is about to unleash hell on The Others, otherwise, why are they all going "The Orcs are coming!" back at the temple?

Oh, and we forgot to mention Sawyer and how he is awesome and we cheered him beating on Jack. Plus the Sawyer and Miles scene, which showed their history and depth of feeling for each other. And why did B-Sawyer seemingly help B-Kate escape the airport? Honor among thieves kind of thing or something else? Plus, where were B-Michael and B-Walt? Did they not get on the plane? And seriously you guys, what is up with those dirty hippies? And the big wooden ankh which apparently had their names on a list inside it? And what the hell did they do to Cindy Stewardess? And did A-Rose and A-Bernard wind up in 2007 on the island like the rest of the A-group did? And is there anything we missed?

We're pretty sure you can answer that last question.

Pictures courtesy of ABC TV.

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