So it was hard for me to get a handle on these episodes. Add the fact that I still don’t have any real information about who The Others are and you can see why I couldn’t think of a good topic for this blog post. Luckily for me, the wonderful readers of this blog deigned to help me by giving me some good topics and questions to overthink. But before we get to that, let’s review what we watched last week…
Episode 2.9 (“What Kate Did”): In the past, Kate done blowed up her step-dad (step-boyfriend?) when she found out he were her real daddy. In the present, Kate makes out with Jack but Sawyer loves her and she wants to bone him except he reminds her of said step-dad and oh the drama. Although I have to say, I did find Kate more interesting in this episode than ever before. So kudos, writers, for that. Meanwhile, in Non-Kate World, Eko gives Locke the rest of the Dharma Initiative film strip that he found, and Michael chats with Walt (maybe?) on the hatch computer.
Episode 2.10 (“The 23rd Psalm”): In the past, Mr. Eko had a really interesting past. In the present, he makes Charlie lead him to the heroin plane, which has Eko’s dead priest brother inside. On the way to the plane, Eko stares down the Monster, because he is that badass.
Episode 2.11 (“The Hunting Party”): In the past, Jack became the miracle worker doctor but then failed to live up to his name. So he makes out with some Italian lady and his wife leaves him. In the present, Michael runs off to save Walt, and the titular hunting party runs off to find Michael. The bearded dude who kidnapped Walt tells the hunting party to back off, under pain of Kate’s death. Then Jack asks Ana Lucia to start building an army. Then I say “yay!” because this totally validates the theories about empire in my post from last week. Score one for me.
Episode 2.12 (“Fire + Water”): This episode was weird. In the past, Charlie was screwed over by his brother. In the present, he’s having symbolic Renaissance painting dreams about Claire’s baby. Eko tells him it means the baby needs to be baptized, so of course Charlie sets the jungle on fire (!) and kidnaps the baby (!) so he can baptize the kid himself. At no point does Charlie or anyone else on the island suggest that Charlie go see Libby, the new island shrink. Oh, and Locke doesn’t destroy the Virgin Mary statues for some contrived reason.
Episode 2.13 (“The Long Con”): Here’s a tip, in case you’ve never seen a con artist movie before. When you watch a movie or show about a con, the plot is a con. The person being conned is you. The person conning you is the writer. Within the world of the story, the con-artist is the main character. Yes, even when it looks he’s screwing up, he’s totally conning everyone. This is the case in this episode. I like that Sawyer owns all the camp’s medicine and guns now.
Episode 2.14 (“One of Them”): In the past, the Americans taught Sayid how to torture. U.S.A.! U.S.A.! In the present, Rousseau catches a potential Other, Henry Gale, and Sayid tortures him. Um, Sayid, I thought you said you weren’t going to do that anymore? Oh, and I almost forgot the best (worst) part: Jack almost lets the timer run out. Actually, it DOES run out. And I sit up really excited. But then the timer turns back to 108. Damn you, writers!
Episode 2.15 (“Maternity Leave”): In the distaff episode of Lost, Claire, Kate, and Rousseau go off on a hunt for medicine for Claire’s baby, based on Claire’s returning memory of her kidnapping a month ago. Apparently, Ethan drugged up Claire and was going to cut the baby out of her, killing her (maybe?), until Rousseau’s daughter (maybe?) saves Claire’s life. Meanwhile, in the hatch, everyone is busy interrogating Henry Gale, who seems to be having a fun time pitting Locke and Jack against each other.
Episode 2.16 (“The Whole Truth”): In the past, Sun was told she was infertile, but really it was Jin. Meanwhile, she was having a kind-of affair with the hotel guy the matchmaker set her up with that one time. In the present, Sun tells Jin’s she’s preggers, though she never does come out and say, “BUT IT’S NOT YOUR BABY!” in the soap opera way I was hoping for. In other news, Ana Lucia gets Henry Gale to draw her a map to his hot-air balloon and goes off with Sayid and Charlie to find it. But, in the words of Admiral Akbar, it’s a trap! …Or is it?! Dun dun dunnn!
“I was never really much into literary analysis.” –John Locke
Not knowing what to write this week, I went to you, the readers. Some of you e-mailed me; some of you commented on the open thread. I also went back to old comments from my other Lost posts to see if there were any questions I hadn’t yet answered. So let’s do some old-fashioned T & A! Did I say T & A? I meant Q & A! Boy, am I a scamp or what?
Question 1: What’s your take on the “security system”?
I can’t really overthink the Monster without knowing what it is, so I’ll just regular-think it. Without going back to Wikipedia to refresh my memory, these are the things I remember the Monster doing:
- It ate the pilot.
- It tried to drag Locke down a hole. Locke said it wouldn’t hurt him.
- Eko stared it down, scaring it away.
- It makes roaring sounds and knocks down trees.
- Rousseau says it’s for security.
Okay, so it seems to me that the Monster doesn’t want people leaving the island. That’s why it ate the pilot. It’s going after “good” members of the camp like Locke and Eko, which suggests that the Monster’s goal may be similar to the goal of The Others, who apparently write lists of “good” people to kidnap. It is a smoke monster, which always brings to my culturally-Jewish mind that scene in the Ten Commandments where the angel of death whooshes around killing bad Egyptian babies while letting the good Jews live. So my guess is that the Monster is protecting the island and its “good” people (like The Others) and from the nasty people (like Jack, et. al).
But that brings up another question. Are The Others “good”? This week, it did seem like the show was trying to ask, “Who are the real bad guys here?” Especially when Sayid was going around torturing people. (By the way, am I the only one who wishes Burn Notice’s Mike Westen were around? He’d get the info out of Henry Gale, no problem, and without having to resort to physical torture.)
Anyway, the writers seemed to want to pull off a bait-and-switch, where Jack’s crew turns out to the be bad guys, the Evil Empire, and The Others are the good, innocent natives. But, as Sayid himself said, that’s bull, because I remember how The Other’s strung Charlie up by his neck. Tell me how The Others can figure out the difference between “good” people and bad when they’re going around kidnapping and murdering.
So, long story short: I don’t know what the Monster is.
Question 2: What are your thoughts about the major turning point episode that happened this week?
I can only assume, Tom P., querent of this question, that you’re talking about the arrival of Henry Gale, a man I’m going to dub the plot catalyst. The chemicals have been mixed; the liquid’s bubbling. Now Henry Gale is trying to make it explode. Why? I can only assume that he is an Other and that he’s trying to take down Team Jack from within so they’re no longer a threat. Or he’s completely innocent. Don’t look at me; I was the one who thought Locke would turn out to be a villain. Que sera, sera.
But I do find it suspicious that his name is Henry Gale. You know. The uncle from The Wizard of Oz? Yeah, I noticed. Why didn’t anyone else? (I guess for the same reason none of the characters on the show ever said, “Your name’s John Locke? Like the philosopher?”)
The question is, is the name Henry Gale an in-joke by Lost’s writers (like John Locke and Rousseau), or is it a clever alias? I’m leaning toward the latter. Because my guess it that this dude is not Henry Gale. He may very well have flown in on a hot air balloon, but the character in the Wizard of Oz who had a balloon was not Uncle Henry at all. It was the Wizard. Does this mean that we have found the man behind the island’s curtain, so to speak?
I also like to think that this strengthens our theory that Lost’s island is a place where all your dreams come true. At some point Mr. Gale or whatever his name is will say, “Here, Jack, you can have your brains. And Kate, here is your heart! And Cowardly Sawyer, you can have your courage! But really, it was inside you all along! See, you went through all this strife so you could learn a lesson about yourselves!” And then everyone clicks their heels and returns home to their boring black-and-white homes to pet their little dogs, too. The end.
I’m only half-joking about this.
Question 3: Have we figured out yet if we’re watching Total Karma Island or Total Redemption Island? Has anyone slipped down the rungs of the redemption ladder?
Let’s go to the chart:
Click to embiggen.
Question 4: How are Locke and Rousseau like Locke and Rousseau?
Gab asked this question, and I’ll let Gab answer.
I do think there is something to be had in comparing the political philosophies of John Locke and Jean-Jacques Rousseau–if nothing else, their “origin stories,” i.e. State of Nature and Social Contract stuff. Locke believes man to be rational and capable at first and that the social contract is done out of a mutually beneficial understanding, while Rousseau basically thinks we’re idiots (but emotional, empathetic ones) and were especially stupid for allowing the first person to declare something as their own (thereby making the first social contract nothing more than a means for one person to achieve their end). It sort of fits the characters on the show in terms of how they treat others and what they do–Locke is open to others and tries to compromise or at least take other points of view into consideration, while Rousseau is paranoid and bossy, sort of, “My way or die,” at times–not as a threat, mind you, but in a sort of “it is what it is” way.
Sounds good to me. It also fits in with my earlier theory that Jack is the island’s version of Thomas Hobbes, who believed that the state of nature was “solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short” unless you socially contract yourself out to a benevolent dictator like Jack for protection. Ana Lucia’s the dark side of Thomas Hobbes’ theory. She’s what happens if the dictator you pick is batshit crazy. And there’s your political theory for the day.
Question 5: What do you think of Lost’s take on race?
Personally—and bear in mind this is coming from a very pale white girl—I’m pretty happy with how the show is dealing with race. I love the diversity, not only because I love diversity on TV in general, but because it’s fairly realistic. My perception may be skewed because I fly out of New York, but airplanes seem to be diverse as hell. Lost gets more points for having a cute interracial couple, having Hurley bring it up briefly as an aside, and then ignoring it. Nice work.
That said, when I first started watching, it did sometimes seem like the casting director was filling quotas. Here’s the Asian couple; here’s the black guy; here’s the Arab; here’s the black woman; here’s the fat one. So color me shocked when Mr. Eko shows up. WTF! TWO black men on a TV show? And they’re not related? Whoa. Of course, when that happened, Michael promptly ran off to The Others, making Mr. Eko the sole black man. I guess there cane be only one.
This question was posed by Saint, who also wondered if Lost perpetuated the idea of the “Mighty Whitey.” In other words, the inhabitants of the island are savage and need the awesome white man to bring in technology, religion, and civilization in general. I can’t really speak to that yet, because I’m not sure if The Others are more or less technologically-advanced than Team Jack. It wasn’t like the plane crashers came in, stuck in a flag, and started converting the natives. And, as I said above, it does seem like Lost is trying to set up a question along the lines of, “But who are the bad guys, really?” with Team Jack being the evil Western invaders and The Others being the mysterious but ultimately innocent natives. As I said above, I don’t think that works, because The Others are clearly not innocent. They go around kidnapping and killing people, and every time Jack or someone else tries to talk with them and get some diplomacy going, they act all mysterious and say, “Go away; this is our island.” Which is also crap, because the show is leading me to believe The Others somehow drew the plane to the island in the first place. So I don’t really believe Lost is a Mighty Whitey narrative. At least, not yet.
Saint, you also mentioned another interesting point:
More than once, we see the white characters get sophisticated, long-term, recurring narratives while the rest of the cast are used symbolically or for emotional effect, and then rarely (if ever) heard from again.
Again, I don’t know how true this is, because I haven’t seen the whole series yet. But, so far, I don’t think this is the case. Clearly, white characters like Jack, Kate, Sawyer, and Locke are getting much more screen time. Unfortunately, this is the way American television works. It sucks. But I have to give Lost some credit. I think Michael, Jin and Sun, and Sayid have been getting great storylines. I think they are all strong characters in their own right. Ana Lucia is also on her way to becoming a very strong character, too. Mr. Eko, I can’t tell yet, but, boy, do I find him interesting. We’ll have to see what he does.
Take all of this with a heaping tablespoon of salt. I’m a white white Jew. Hey, speaking of which, where are the Jewish characters? This plane was going to L.A., folks! Probably half the plane was Jewish! Mr. Abrams! J.J.! (Can I call you J.J.?) You’re part of the clan! Help a sister out. You had a baptism on the island. How ‘bout a Bar Mitzvah?
…Hello?
Question 6: Fate or free will?
Eric asked this question specifically about the hatch button. Let me start my answer with my old caveat that I’m an atheist rationalist materialist whateverist. Whenever these fate vs. free will questions come up , my default answer is always “free will.” I’m a fan of free will. Big fan.
That said, I’m going to reiterate an idea I brought up last week. Inasmuch as the members of Team Jack are being forced to push the hatch button, their destinies are fated. But, to me, Fate always takes on a religious undertone. God, or the gods, determine your fate. Otherwise, who or what is? (A physicist might argue “space-time!” but I don’t think that’s what Lost is going for here with all the religious imagery.)
The hatch button certainly is in some ways religious in nature. The counter counts down from 108, a mystical number in many eastern traditions. The hatch belongs to the Dharma Initiative; dharma is a religious concept. The remainder of their film strip is found in a Christian Bible.
But, as far as I can tell, the people who run the Dharma Initiative are people, not gods. They may be dressing up their experiments in religious clothing–maybe they’re pretending to BE gods–but they are people. And people, as we know from the Greek myths, can’t fool around with destiny.
Or maybe they can. Perhaps, like in one of my favorite anime, The Vision of Escaflowne, the Dharma Initiative has some sort of “destiny engine,” which alters people’s fate. That I’ll accept. But then it’s not a religious type of fate. It’s scientific fate-altering. It’s people screwing with the forces of nature.
Last week I made a similar point. Locke’s been saying everyone should have faith for a long time now. Only when he discovers the button does he start saying people should have faith in the Dharma Initiative. Not gods. People. So, are Jack and Kate and Hurley and the rest “fated” to push that button every few hours? If God isn’t making them do it, no. They’re being forced. Maybe they’re being forced by people pretending to be gods, but that’s different than the real gods determining one’s destiny. Here’s an analogy. If a guy dressed as Jesus Christ points a gun at you and says, “Walk in front of that car,” and you do it, that’s not Fate. That’s duress. You have the free will to make whatever decision you want in that awful situation. Jack and the rest, likewise, have the free will to stop pushing the button whenever they want. They’ll just have to deal with the consequences when they do.
Question 7: Who’s hotter, Sayid or Sawyer?
Sayid’s pretty and Sawyer’s damn fine. And Jin… Well, Jin looks like he’s cut out of stone. Does that answer your question?
Just so I’m not sexist or heteronormative or anything like that, let me also point out that the women on Lost are very attractive, too. But that goes without saying. Every woman on TV is attractive. That’s part of the job description.
*****
That’s it for this week’s Lost Q & A. If you have any more questions, comments, insights, feel free to write them below. I’ll probably answer them the next time I can’t think of a topic for OTI. Special thanks to everyone who submitted questions. I’d be…LOST…without you. Get it? See you next week, and remember (say it with me now), no spoilers!