Lost - "The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham"

Apparently I’m a big liar and you can’t take me for my word. Less than 48 hours ago I told you there would be no episode preview this week, and maybe no more episode previews from this point forward. I put forth a logical argument to explain axing them, reasoning that no one would really miss them since based on the Comments Section, more people seemed to complain about them than enjoyed them.

 

But just like that one time in college when I said “I’m never drinking again”, yet was drinking again less than 12 hours later, here I am, writing an episode preview. Turns out that people really do enjoy them, have nothing but hatred for those that complain about them being “spoilers”, and without them the Lost experience for thousands of people would be much less enjoyable and their lives would lose all meaning. I can’t handle that on my conscience. Who am I to deny people such happiness and life fulfillment during a Global Recession?

 

However, my arguments against the episode previews were still pretty sound. It does seem like we’re getting less and less to go on each week as the season progresses, leaving me with less and less to analyze without just making stuff up. So I am going to make a concerted effort to make these things a little shorter and sweeter, as dictated by each episode’s title and description. As you’ll soon see, there was a reason I picked this week to attempt this experiment – it’s one of the most straight-forward and episode-description-less episodes of Lost of all time.

 

Episode Title: “The Life and Death of Jeremy Bentham”

 

Brian’s Deeper Meaning Guess: So we all know what’s going to happen this week… or so we think. We know the episode is going to start with Locke getting off the Island after turning the FDW, he’ll pay a visit to the Oceanic Six, and will end with Locke dying. But something tells me there’s going to be some pretty amazing scenes filling in the gaps between these overall episode tent poles. As for the episode title, there’s nothing deep about it – no reference to a book, movie, song, or historical event… except for the symbolism of Locke choosing to go by the alias of “Jeremy Bentham” in the first place. So who was Jerry Bentham?

 

According to the Internet (so it has to be true), Jeremy Bentham was an English philosopher and political radical. He was primarily known today for his moral philosophy, especially his principle of utilitarianism, which evaluates actions based upon their consequences. The relevant consequences, in particular, are the overall happiness created for everyone affected by the action. Influenced by many enlightenment thinkers, especially empiricists such as John Locke and David Hume, Bentham developed an ethical theory grounded in a largely empiricist account of human nature. He famously held a hedonistic account of both motivation and value according to which what is fundamentally valuable and what ultimately motivates us is pleasure and pain. Happiness, according to Bentham, is thus a matter of experiencing pleasure and lack of pain.

 

So what does that mean?

 

Aside from the blatant John Locke – Jeremy Bentham connection, Bentham’s utilitarian views are all about doing “the greater good”. Even though he also believed in pleasure over pain, (and I have to think that killing yourself would hurt at least a little), there’s nothing like suffering a little pain in order to create a lot of pleasure for lot of other people (that sounds dirty). You know, like sacrificing yourself to save a mysterious Island, helping the Oceanic Five find peace in life by returning to said mysterious Island, or helping to prevent the space-time continuum from ripping apart… any or all of which could be argued to be John Locke’s “mission” off the Island.

 

Hello utilitarianism!

 

 

Episode Description: Locke's fateful mission off the island as Jeremy Bentham is revealed.

 

Guest Stars: Malcolm David Kelley as Walt, John Terry as Christian Shephard, Alan Dale as Charles Widmore, Lance Reddick as Matthew Abaddon, William Blanchett as Aaron, Said Taghmaoui as Caesar, Zuleikha Robinson as Ilana, Ammar Daraiseh as Hajer, Grisel Toledo as Susie, Stephen Scibetta as foreman and John Jamal Bradley as kid.

 

Guest Star Breakdown: WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAALLLLLLLLLLLTTTTTTTTTTT! Our favorite special-powered man-child is back, and it’s about damn time. If this is going to be our token “Walt appearance for Season Five”, I hope it’s a worthwhile one, where Locke explains why he was so special, if he really needs to return to the Island or not, and hopefully squeeze in a quick game of backgammon for old time’s sake. Everyone has kinda assumed that Walt would return to the Island and factor into the endgame of Lost – but with each passing season without reference to him, I think that’s becoming less and less likely. Unless some foundation is laid for Walt’s reappearance in the future, we might have been wrong about Walt’s overall importance to the show all along.

 

On the other hand, back in Season One most of us would probably thought that Christian Shephard appearances would remain a rare occasion – mostly when Jack was hallucinating / drunk – or in his flashbacks. Yet Christian Shephard has become one of the most prominent and mysterious guest stars this season, so his appearance isn’t too surprising… until you remember that this episode will probably take place 100% off the Island, and 100% from the perspective of John Locke. I’m guessing this means that even though Locke turned the wheel and ended up off the Island, he still doesn’t know what he actually needs to do – and will need a little spiritual guidance from the Island in the form of Christian Shephard as he goes about his “mission”.

 

You’ll also note that Caesar and Ilana appear in this episode. I’m assuming that this episode is 100% “flashback”, meaning Locke probably interacted with them before Ajira Airways Flight 316… increasing the likelihood I posed last week that they were Outcast Others, who had been “helping” Locke on his mission off the Island over the past few years.

 

But for me, the most exciting guest star this week is Matthew “That Guy Now on Fringe” Abaddon. He’s the creepy tall black guy equivalent of Ms. Hawking, someone who seems to know a lot about everything, could potentially be a former Other, and might be a major player in orchestrating some of the major events that have occurred on the show thus far. Remember, he was the one who inspired Locke to go on the Walkabout which lead him to the Island in the first place and put together Naomi’s crew on the Freighter, which brought Charlotte, Miles, and Faraday to the Island.

 

Perhaps the most creepy and intriguing detail of all? Remember the last words that Abaddon said to Locke when they first met – that if Locke did go on the walkabout, when they met again, Locke “would owe him one.” With all of the dichotomy we’ve seen on Lost, it’s possible that Abaddon represents one side in “the battle for the Island” and Ms. Hawking represents the other… much like Ben vs. Widmore… and both sides might be fighting for control and influence over John Locke... I mean “Jeremy Bentham”. When Abaddon comes “collecting”, here’s hoping he’s got the best interests of our Survivors at heart… and isn’t trying to bring about the end of the world. Remember, in the Bible “Abaddon” means "A place of destruction", "The Destroyer", "Depths of Hell" and is the King of tormenting locusts and the angel of the bottomless pit.

 

Sounds happy!

 

Episode Breakdown: After over a full season of waiting, Locke's fateful mission off the island as Jeremy Bentham is finally revealed. 

We’ll find out what he said to each member of the Oceanic Six as he visited them (or if he visited all of them), as well as what led him to the decision to kill himself (if he really did kill himself). It’s probably the most anticipated episode of the season thus far, needing an extra 6 minutes to tell its tale (check your DVR now to make sure it’s going to 10:06 pm EST!) but ironically is the one episode we’ll have all season where we already know what’s going to happen in the beginning, the middle, and the end. We’ve all discussed countless theories about what happened during Locke’s time off the Island over the past year, but it’s finally time to find out the truth.

You all should probably be pretty excited about it.

 

…and there you have it, a half-assed, quickie episode preview for an episode that really didn’t need one. But I aim to please.

 

Happy Losting!

 

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