LostLostLostLost

May = Best Month of Lost Ever. Four weeks and five hours of new Losty goodness. Ja bitte! In your face June through April!

Lost Episode Title: "The Greater Good"

Character Involved: Sayid (the loveable Iraqi Part II)

TV Guide Description: After burying one of their own, tempers flare as the castaways' suspicions of each other grow -- and an unlikely survivor vows revenge. Meanwhile, Claire and Charlie struggle to calm her newborn.

Brian's Deeper Meaning Guess: When I hear the phrase "The Greater Good", I think of one thing - sacrificing someone or something "for the greater good", meaning that their loss or death ends up being for the benefit of others to the point where it’s better off that the tragedy happened. In the case of Lost, we must be referring to one of two things:

1. Boone’s death as being for the greater good. But how? What good is going to come from the death of fair Boone with the freaky blue eyes? Well, if his death somehow opened the hatch / led Locke to a greater understanding of the island, it could be that his death leads to the remaining survivors getting off the island / being able to better survive on the island. Remember, it almost seemed like Boone’s death was a necessary part of opening the hatch, and Locke willingly made the trade. Is Locke so blinded by the "magic of the island" that he is willing to kill his friend? Or is Locke truly looking at everything logically, and seeing that a death was needed to open the hatch, realized that opening the hatch was more important than Boone’s life. But that would have to mean that whatever is inside that hatch is a BIG DEAL. What is in that hatch?!?!

2. Going after Locke for the greater good. The rationale from Jack / Sayid / the other survivors at this point is: "Locke is dangerous. We need to kill him to prevent him from hurting anyone else. We need to kill him for the greater good." The commercials show Shannon coaxing Sayid into killing Locke, and last episode ended with Jack saying "I’m going to find John Locke." Both Jack and Sayid have demonstrated how much they DO NOT LIKE killing people and do not want violence to be the answer. However, if they are both convinced that Locke murdered Boone, killing him would protect the rest of the people on the island. It would be for the greater good.

I should point out that this episode was originally titled "Sides". When I first read the episode title a few months back, I figured it had to be the characters choosing whose side they would be on - Jack or Locke seemingly being the two ring leaders. Although back then, I figured it would have something to do with either living in the caves vs. the beach, or choosing to take up arms against "The Others" vs. playing pacifist, it now looks like the "Sides" in question might be whether or not to kill Locke. This is a very polarizing event on the island. Will Locke be able to convince everyone that Boone’s death was an accident or that it was a necessary occurrence, or will Jack / Sayid convince people that Locke must pay for his crime? It should be very interesting…

TV Guide Description Breakdown: Well, the first sentence pretty well puts the nail in Boone’s coffin (literally). He really is dead. Granted, he will likely be back due to flashbacks of Shannon, etc - but that’s it. Tempers flaring due to suspicion are documented fairly well in the previews - showing a lot of shouting, pushing, fighting (and shooting?) between Jack, Sayid, and Locke. The unlikely survivor to go for revenge? I’d say Jack, simply because his character has been so anti-guns, anti-violence, save everyone all along (hey, he must be a democrat!). You could also argue that Sayid is the unlikely revenge-seeker, since he is pretty much doing it at Shannon’s request, even though this is the exact frame of mind that drove him to leave the rest of the survivors so many weeks ago.

His torture of Sawyer quickly brought him back to his Iraqi National Guard past, a past he doesn’t want to remember, a person he doesn’t want to be. If he goes after Locke, guns blazing, he must really want to impress Shannon. Hello, Sayid? Kate is way hotter! What are you thinking buddy?
The deep thinker in me hopes that the last sentence about Claire and Charlie trying to calm the newborn anti-Christ are related to the fact that the baby is pure, unadulterated evil - but I think this is going to be like the time that the TV Guide Preview said "a survivor has mysterious headaches" and then it just turned out that Sawyer needed glasses. Those tricky writers with their obvious and mundane storylines!

Last Month’s Episode Discussion Points: Remember this episode? Jack almost chopped off Boone’s leg, Locke was suspiciously absent, and Sayid tried to hook up with Shannon. Oh yeah, and Boone died. It was a decent episode. It was well made - but it really wasn’t shocking, didn’t really reveal anything else about the island, and we all saw it coming a mile away. Jack’s backstory was interesting, but not good enough to overcome a fairly weak episode. But there are a few points to ponder:

MARRIAGE. First and foremost - did Jack get married or what? The last flashback scene was setup for either he or his wife to walk away from the altar. But then they kissed. So, does that mean they’re married? This would explain why Jack has been resisting Kate thus far on the island, but doesn’t explain why Jack is ring free on all noticeable fingers. I guess my official stance is that Jack and hot blonde girl got married (she will from this point forth be known as HBG, in the same way that Rousseau is known as CFL) but then something happened to break them up. Divorce? Boring. Death? More likely.

WORDS. The biggest and most important thing Boone did in his dying moments was mention to Jack the Hatch, and the fact that Locke is hiding it from them. This should effectively focus the attention on that hatch for the remainder of the season… and the numbers ingrained on it. Also, how fitting that Boone’s last words were "Tell Shannon, tell Shannon…" Doesn’t that pretty much sum up their relationship? Feelings that he couldn’t put into words, or wouldn’t put into words due to the guilt that surrounded their relationship. Oh Boone, such a tortured soul. There’s a lesson here kids: Don’t get romantically involved with your sister in law or you will end up dead.

LOCKE. So Locke is back - is he different? Has he been inside the hatch? Has he had another epiphany on the island? Since Jack now knows about the Hatch, there’s no way Locke can hide it any longer. He has to let everyone in on the secret. The real question becomes "Why has Locke kept it hidden from everyone for so long?" There’s some believable rationale in not telling them about a giant monster, polar bear, or freaky French radio signal, because it would scare people and incite panic. This was a metal hatch in the ground. You have to think that, while Locke is smart, 44 (I believe that is our official number of survivors at this point) heads trying to figure out how to open it would be better than two. Also, it looks as though Locke has regained full use of his legs in the commercial. Were his legs failing him a direct result of his loss of faith in the island? Or was that just adding to the island "testing him" for his worth before revealing the Hatch’s mystery?

WE. Ah, the fun with audio! Remember in the original airing of "Deus Ex Machina", where the audio of the radio voice in the plane was up for debate? If you remember, closed captioning told us the radio said "There were no survivors of Oceanic Flight 815", but those of us who re-listened to the clip for hours on our computers that night (whatever, don’t judge me - what did you do that night that was so important?) heard "WE are the survivors of Oceanic Flight 815!" Adding fuel to the controversy was the new commercial that aired the following weeks, with a new voice-over for the radio, that CLEARLY said "WE ARE", not "There were no". This makes me think that someone realized that this HUGE revelation went unnoticed by the majority of the viewing audience, so they tried to trick us in the previews to think that we just weren’t paying close enough attention the first time. The funny thing is, in the clip show last week, they showed the scene with the original debatable audio again.

Why? Here’s what I think happened. Some crazy marketing people who have no appreciation for surprise and are just trying to make money were like "Wait, no one caught that!" after the original airing. So they messed with the audio in the commercials to BEAT YOU OVER THE HEAD with the message (effectively ruining the surprise and giving the audience no credit for having an imagination). The shows creators were like "Whoa whoa whoa - what’s in Cleveland?" and had them change it back. I’ve read more than one account of Lost producers expressing their disdain for the commercials that are shown for either being misleading or for giving away too much. Damon Lindlhoff’s official stance is "Do not believe anything that airs outside of the 42 minute episode. Commercials are the devil!"

CLIPS. Speaking of which, while many people would fail to look for deeper meaning in the clips episode, "Lost: the Journey", that aired last week - these people are not me. They likely have wives and / or kids, and can’t dedicate large chunks of their evenings to over analysis of TV. Losers! I was watching intently, thinking "What are they focusing on?" The point of the episode was to refresh people of what’s going on in the show and allow them to enjoy the remaining four episodes - therefore, you’d want to focus on the "main storylines" so far, and "set up" upcoming ones. What did they focus on? CLF and The Others.

CFL. Remember CFL? Remember Alex? Remember the Black Rock, the Others, the Voices, and the Sickness? Yeah, me neither. All these storylines have taken a backseat lately with the Hatch, Raft, and Baby taking the driver’s seat. Something tells me that CFL is coming back. Especially with the birth of Claire’s baby (speaking of which, when are we gonna get a name for it? I vote for Alex - wouldn’t that be interesting and feed into the whole "time loop" theory on the island?), CLF can come back either in the capacity to steal the baby and pretend it’s her own, or to "protect the baby" from the evils of the island. This should also lead to Claire showing a distrust for everyone else on the island to have any hand in raising her baby. Remember, raised by anyone other than Claire, this baby is going to be Mr. 666. Expect Claire to take this to the extreme, not letting anyone else hold her baby or help her with the child-rearing.

But I’m getting ahead of myself and stealing thoughts from an upcoming bullet point.

OTHERS. This was the storyline that I would have placed money on back in March. The Survivors vs. the Others in a big battle at the Black Rock. After the Hatch showed up, I went the other route, and you all know I’m now firmly in the "Tail of the Plane" camp. But… that clips show was awfully "Others" heavy. The voices that Sayid heard, the entire CFL speech about her compadres becoming "sick" once they came back from the Black Rock, etc. What if the Others in question are actually the survivors from the tail of the plane? What if the hatch somehow leads to the Others hideout? I’ve given up on this storyline much to easy! Are we lucky enough to get all these storylines tying together at season end? I was just banking on one or two of them being revealed… but now I think we might get all of them!

BABY. What is the over / under for this child surviving? Are we really going to have a newborn baby on this island? With the slow pace of the show (each episode taking up about two days on the island), they’ll have to recast this role every month! Or will we have a Hoby-like growing of the child (sorry about the obscure Baywatch reference - for you Star Wars nerds out there, what about how Anniken is all the sudden the same age as Natalie Portman in Episode II, when he’s like 15 years younger than her in Episode I - poor story telling Mr. Lucas!) where he’s all the sudden six or seven years old and is playing with Walt? This could easily setup the great Mr. 666 vs. Walt battle of good vs. evil, but is unlikely.

Best bets on the baby:
1. Getting kidnapped by the Others.
2. Getting kidnapped by CFL.
3. Getting sacrificed by the Others.
4. Dying by natural / cosmic causes.
5. Being eaten by a hungry Hurley.

Sorry for the crass - I just can’t imagine how that baby is going to survive on the island!

RAFT. Things are coming along nicely. My official picks for people who will sail away on the raft: Michael, Walt, Saywer, and Sayid. The hot theory on the internet is that the raft will set sail for the set of three smaller islands CFL had drawn on her map. I’m not sold on this… yet. I don’t think the raft will set sail before the finale, so that it can play into the "Exodus" title, so we can discuss this in future weeks.

DEATH. Remember my official stance on island deaths? That Boone would die, but so would someone else? I still stand by that. In fact, I’ll give you my top 3 most likely deaths before season end:
1. Michael
2. Jin
3. Sawyer

And the three least likely deaths:
1. Locke
2. Kate
3. Sayid

SHOT. Lastly, I’ll make another wager about the "shooting of Locke" seen in this week’s commercials. Refer back to my last point. There is NO WAY Locke is dying. No way. Even in my wildest, "What would really shock people and be crazy" dreams, Locke is staying alive on this island. He’s too integral to everything, and has been developed the most of any character, while still having tons of mystery about him. He’s a writer’s dream. So what do we see in the commercial? We see smoke and "hear" a gunshot. Like we "heard" the new voice over on the plane radio? I’m not buying. If Locke truly gets shot, he’s living through it and will somehow have been made invincible by the island. If not, someone is shooting a blank, or smoke is rising from something else and Locke is falling down for another reason.

MUSIC. Isn’t it ironic how the last two episodes of the season are famous song titles? Pretty cool if you ask me - also, they’re both about "fleeing" and "escaping".

May 11. 1.22 Kate-centric. "Born to Run"
May 18. 1.23 Everybody-centric. "Exodus, Part One"
May 25. 1.24 Everybody-centric. "Exodus, Part Two" and "Exodus, Part Three"

Yes, May is a very good month.


PS - Alias is really good again, you guys can start watching again if you’ve fallen off the wagon. It is once again an officially sanctioned TV show of the Lost Email. What are the other officially sanctioned shows of the Lost Email, you ask?
Monday - 24
Tuesday - Scrubs, the Office
Wednesday - Lost, Alias
Thursday - the OC
Sunday - Desperate Housewives, Family Guy


Delta House is where it’s at! Two turn tables and a microphone!: "The Greater Good"
Character Involved: Sayid (the loveable Iraqi Part II)
TV Guide Description: After burying one of their own, tempers flare as the castaways' suspicions of each other grow -- and an unlikely survivor vows revenge. Meanwhile, Claire and Charlie struggle to calm her newborn.
Brian's Deeper Meaning Guess: When I hear the phrase "The Greater Good", I think of one thing - sacrificing someone or something "for the greater good", meaning that their loss or death ends up being for the benefit of others to the point where it’s better off that the tragedy happened. In the case of Lost, we must be referring to one of two things:
1. Boone’s death as being for the greater good. But how? What good is going to come from the death of fair Boone with the freaky blue eyes? Well, if his death somehow opened the hatch / led Locke to a greater understanding of the island, it could be that his death leads to the remaining survivors getting off the island / being able to better survive on the island. Remember, it almost seemed like Boone’s death was a necessary part of opening the hatch, and Locke willingly made the trade. Is Locke so blinded by the "magic of the island" that he is willing to kill his friend? Or is Locke truly looking at everything logically, and seeing that a death was needed to open the hatch, realized that opening the hatch was more important than Boone’s life. But that would have to mean that whatever is inside that hatch is a BIG DEAL. What is in that hatch?!?!
2. Going after Locke for the greater good. The rationale from Jack / Sayid / the other survivors at this point is: "Locke is dangerous. We need to kill him to prevent him from hurting anyone else. We need to kill him for the greater good." The commercials show Shannon coaxing Sayid into killing Locke, and last episode ended with Jack saying "I’m going to find John Locke." Both Jack and Sayid have demonstrated how much they DO NOT LIKE killing people and do not want violence to be the answer. However, if they are both convinced that Locke murdered Boone, killing him would protect the rest of the people on the island. It would be for the greater good.
I should point out that this episode was originally titled "Sides". When I first read the episode title a few months back, I figured it had to be the characters choosing whose side they would be on - Jack or Locke seemingly being the two ring leaders. Although back then, I figured it would have something to do with either living in the caves vs. the beach, or choosing to take up arms against "The Others" vs. playing pacifist, it now looks like the "Sides" in question might be whether or not to kill Locke. This is a very polarizing event on the island. Will Locke be able to convince everyone that Boone’s death was an accident or that it was a necessary occurrence, or will Jack / Sayid convince people that Locke must pay for his crime? It should be very interesting…

TV Guide Description Breakdown: Well, the first sentence pretty well puts the nail in Boone’s coffin (literally). He really is dead. Granted, he will likely be back due to flashbacks of Shannon, etc - but that’s it. Tempers flaring due to suspicion are documented fairly well in the previews - showing a lot of shouting, pushing, fighting (and shooting?) between Jack, Sayid, and Locke. The unlikely survivor to go for revenge? I’d say Jack, simply because his character has been so anti-guns, anti-violence, save everyone all along (hey, he must be a democrat!). You could also argue that Sayid is the unlikely revenge-seeker, since he is pretty much doing it at Shannon’s request, even though this is the exact frame of mind that drove him to leave the rest of the survivors so many weeks ago. His torture of Sawyer quickly brought him back to his Iraqi National Guard past, a past he doesn’t want to remember, a person he doesn’t want to be. If he goes after Locke, guns blazing, he must really want to impress Shannon. Hello, Sayid? Kate is way hotter! What are you thinking buddy?
The deep thinker in me hopes that the last sentence about Claire and Charlie trying to calm the newborn anti-Christ are related to the fact that the baby is pure, unadulterated evil - but I think this is going to be like the time that the TV Guide Preview said "a survivor has mysterious headaches" and then it just turned out that Sawyer needed glasses. Those tricky writers with their obvious and mundane storylines!

Last Month’s Episode Discussion Points: Remember this episode? Jack almost chopped off Boone’s leg, Locke was suspiciously absent, and Sayid tried to hook up with Shannon. Oh yeah, and Boone died. It was a decent episode. It was well made - but it really wasn’t shocking, didn’t really reveal anything else about the island, and we all saw it coming a mile away. Jack’s backstory was interesting, but not good enough to overcome a fairly weak episode. But there are a few points to ponder:
MARRIAGE. First and foremost - did Jack get married or what? The last flashback scene was setup for either he or his wife to walk away from the altar. But then they kissed. So, does that mean they’re married? This would explain why Jack has been resisting Kate thus far on the island, but doesn’t explain why Jack is ring free on all noticeable fingers. I guess my official stance is that Jack and hot blonde girl got married (she will from this point forth be known as HBG, in the same way that Rousseau is known as CFL) but then something happened to break them up. Divorce? Boring. Death? More likely.
WORDS. The biggest and most important thing Boone did in his dying moments was mention to Jack the Hatch, and the fact that Locke is hiding it from them. This should effectively focus the attention on that hatch for the remainder of the season… and the numbers ingrained on it. Also, how fitting that Boone’s last words were "Tell Shannon, tell Shannon…" Doesn’t that pretty much sum up their relationship? Feelings that he couldn’t put into words, or wouldn’t put into words due to the guilt that surrounded their relationship. Oh Boone, such a tortured soul. There’s a lesson here kids: Don’t get romantically involved with your sister in law or you will end up dead.
LOCKE. So Locke is back - is he different? Has he been inside the hatch? Has he had another epiphany on the island? Since Jack now knows about the Hatch, there’s no way Locke can hide it any longer. He has to let everyone in on the secret. The real question becomes "Why has Locke kept it hidden from everyone for so long?" There’s some believable rationale in not telling them about a giant monster, polar bear, or freaky French radio signal, because it would scare people and incite panic. This was a metal hatch in the ground. You have to think that, while Locke is smart, 44 (I believe that is our official number of survivors at this point) heads trying to figure out how to open it would be better than two. Also, it looks as though Locke has regained full use of his legs in the commercial. Were his legs failing him a direct result of his loss of faith in the island? Or was that just adding to the island "testing him" for his worth before revealing the Hatch’s mystery?
WE. Ah, the fun with audio! Remember in the original airing of "Deus Ex Machina", where the audio of the radio voice in the plane was up for debate? If you remember, closed captioning told us the radio said "There were no survivors of Oceanic Flight 815", but those of us who re-listened to the clip for hours on our computers that night (whatever, don’t judge me - what did you do that night that was so important?) heard "WE are the survivors of Oceanic Flight 815!" Adding fuel to the controversy was the new commercial that aired the following weeks, with a new voice-over for the radio, that CLEARLY said "WE ARE", not "There were no". This makes me think that someone realized that this HUGE revelation went unnoticed by the majority of the viewing audience, so they tried to trick us in the previews to think that we just weren’t paying close enough attention the first time. The funny thing is, in the clip show last week, they showed the scene with the original debatable audio again.
Why? Here’s what I think happened. Some crazy marketing people who have no appreciation for surprise and are just trying to make money were like "Wait, no one caught that!" after the original airing. So they messed with the audio in the commercials to BEAT YOU OVER THE HEAD with the message (effectively ruining the surprise and giving the audience no credit for having an imagination). The shows creators were like "Whoa whoa whoa - what’s in Cleveland?" and had them change it back. I’ve read more than one account of Lost producers expressing their disdain for the commercials that are shown for either being misleading or for giving away too much. Damon Lindlhoff’s official stance is "Do not believe anything that airs outside of the 42 minute episode. Commercials are the devil!"
CLIPS. Speaking of which, while many people would fail to look for deeper meaning in the clips episode, "Lost: the Journey", that aired last week - these people are not me. They likely have wives and / or kids, and can’t dedicate large chunks of their evenings to over analysis of TV. Losers! I was watching intently, thinking "What are they focusing on?" The point of the episode was to refresh people of what’s going on in the show and allow them to enjoy the remaining four episodes - therefore, you’d want to focus on the "main storylines" so far, and "set up" upcoming ones. What did they focus on? CLF and The Others.
CFL. Remember CFL? Remember Alex? Remember the Black Rock, the Others, the Voices, and the Sickness? Yeah, me neither. All these storylines have taken a backseat lately with the Hatch, Raft, and Baby taking the driver’s seat. Something tells me that CFL is coming back. Especially with the birth of Claire’s baby (speaking of which, when are we gonna get a name for it? I vote for Alex - wouldn’t that be interesting and feed into the whole "time loop" theory on the island?), CLF can come back either in the capacity to steal the baby and pretend it’s her own, or to "protect the baby" from the evils of the island. This should also lead to Claire showing a distrust for everyone else on the island to have any hand in raising her baby. Remember, raised by anyone other than Claire, this baby is going to be Mr. 666. Expect Claire to take this to the extreme, not letting anyone else hold her baby or help her with the child-rearing.
But I’m getting ahead of myself and stealing thoughts from an upcoming bullet point.
OTHERS. This was the storyline that I would have placed money on back in March. The Survivors vs. the Others in a big battle at the Black Rock. After the Hatch showed up, I went the other route, and you all know I’m now firmly in the "Tail of the Plane" camp. But… that clips show was awfully "Others" heavy. The voices that Sayid heard, the entire CFL speech about her compadres becoming "sick" once they came back from the Black Rock, etc. What if the Others in question are actually the survivors from the tail of the plane? What if the hatch somehow leads to the Others hideout? I’ve given up on this storyline much to easy! Are we lucky enough to get all these storylines tying together at season end? I was just banking on one or two of them being revealed… but now I think we might get all of them!
BABY. What is the over / under for this child surviving? Are we really going to have a newborn baby on this island? With the slow pace of the show (each episode taking up about two days on the island), they’ll have to recast this role every month! Or will we have a Hoby-like growing of the child (sorry about the obscure Baywatch reference - for you Star Wars nerds out there, what about how Anniken is all the sudden the same age as Natalie Portman in Episode II, when he’s like 15 years younger than her in Episode I - poor story telling Mr. Lucas!) where he’s all the sudden six or seven years old and is playing with Walt? This could easily setup the great Mr. 666 vs. Walt battle of good vs. evil, but is unlikely.
Best bets on the baby:
1. Getting kidnapped by the Others.
2. Getting kidnapped by CFL.
3. Getting sacrificed by the Others.
4. Dying by natural / cosmic causes.
5. Being eaten by a hungry Hurley.
Sorry for the crass - I just can’t imagine how that baby is going to survive on the island!
RAFT. Things are coming along nicely. My official picks for people who will sail away on the raft: Michael, Walt, Saywer, and Sayid. The hot theory on the internet is that the raft will set sail for the set of three smaller islands CFL had drawn on her map. I’m not sold on this… yet. I don’t think the raft will set sail before the finale, so that it can play into the "Exodus" title, so we can discuss this in future weeks.
DEATH. Remember my official stance on island deaths? That Boone would die, but so would someone else? I still stand by that. In fact, I’ll give you my top 3 most likely deaths before season end:
1. Michael
2. Jin
3. Sawyer
And the three least likely deaths:
1. Locke
2. Kate
3. Sayid

SHOT. Lastly, I’ll make another wager about the "shooting of Locke" seen in this week’s commercials. Refer back to my last point. There is NO WAY Locke is dying. No way. Even in my wildest, "What would really shock people and be crazy" dreams, Locke is staying alive on this island. He’s too integral to everything, and has been developed the most of any character, while still having tons of mystery about him. He’s a writer’s dream. So what do we see in the commercial? We see smoke and "hear" a gunshot. Like we "heard" the new voice over on the plane radio? I’m not buying. If Locke truly gets shot, he’s living through it and will somehow have been made invincible by the island. If not, someone is shooting a blank, or smoke is rising from something else and Locke is falling down for another reason.

MUSIC. Isn’t it ironic how the last two episodes of the season are famous song titles? Pretty cool if you ask me - also, they’re both about "fleeing" and "escaping".
May 11. 1.22 Kate-centric. "Born to Run"
May 18. 1.23 Everybody-centric. "Exodus, Part One"
May 25. 1.24 Everybody-centric. "Exodus, Part Two" and "Exodus, Part Three"

Yes, May is a very good month.


PS - Alias is really good again, you guys can start watching again if you’ve fallen off the wagon. It is once again an officially sanctioned TV show of the Lost Email. What are the other officially sanctioned shows of the Lost Email, you ask?
Monday - 24
Tuesday - Scrubs, the Office
Wednesday - Lost, Alias
Thursday - the OC
Sunday - Desperate Housewives, Family Guy


Delta House is where it’s at! Two turn tables and a microphone!