Not much to say about this week’s episode, which was decent but a bit filler-y for my tastes.  My favorite Sawyer episodes are the ones that con the audience (i.e., me), so I was a wee bit disappointed that Recon was so straightforward.  On the other hand — Miles and James are cops now!  Charlotte and James totally bone in the alter-verse!  I really dug Evangeline Lilly’s acting for once!  Un-Locke may or may not have a crazy mommy!  And Widmore’s doing… well, actually, I have no idea what he’s doing.  But, still: Widmore!  In other words, in a not-totally-spectacular episode, a lot of fun moments shone through.

Now onto the questions!

Question 1: Like the B-story in last week’s episode, Recon’s alt-plot seemed like a pilot to a spin-off series.  Which of the following Lost spin-offs would you most like to watch on a regular basis?  Hangin’ With Dr. Linus?  Straume & Twang (my name for USA’s new quirky cop show, starring Miles Straume & James Ford)?  The Good Shephard (a new Everwood-type show about a big-city doctor with daddy issues who learns about faith and family after moving to Provo, Utah)?  [Insert your own punny Kate- or Locke-based show here]?

Question 2: So, are we going to talk Un-Locke’s word for it on his mommy issues or what?  Is he talking about real-Locke’s crazy mom, or is he talking about someone else?  Tawaret, mayhaps?

Speaking of crazy mommies…

Question 3: What are we thinking about Claire now?  Is she crazy-evil or just crazy-crazy?  Did the “infection” make her go nutso, or did the supposed Aaron-napping do it?  And can she ever turn back to the light side?

Question 4: Who’s Sawyer?

See you next week.

Can we talk about irony for a second?

Yeah, I know: this is an Overthinking Lost post.  We should be talking about Egyptian mythology, or Jungian psychology, or, I dunno… Jesus?  But today I’d like to take off my former-English-major hat, if only for a moment, and replace it with my writer hat.  Because, damn, people.  That was a well-written episode.*

Ah, that’s more like it!  This episode made my day–and I’ll explain more about why on Monday.  For now, let’s mull over these questions, shall we?

Let’s call this season “Greatest Hits.”  So far, we’ve been to the hatch (although it was a little, erm, exploded), the Barracks, the caves, and, this episode, the beach camp, the Dharma sub, and the Black Rock.  Plus, Smokey went and told us that we’d be hanging out with him and his buddies at the Hydra Station soon.

Question 1: What classic Lost location would you like to return to before the season is out?  I’m quite positive we’ll be seeing the frozen donkey wheel again, but the place I’d really love to see, if only for a second, is the “pile of notebook-filled canisters where the pneumatic tubes end.”

Question 2: So, whose lips wobbled when Ben said, “Because he’s the only one who will have me”?  Come on.  Raise your hands.  Don’t be ashamed.  (For the record, my notes read: “Ben!  WAAAHH!”  Not that I could see what I was writing.  I had, um, something…sniff…in my eye.)  And for those of you who aren’t buying Linus’s transformation into epic woobie, why aren’t you buying it?

Question 3: So Miles FINALLY got something meaningful to do in this episode.  Welp, I guess he’s a goner now.  So, is Miles going to receive a karmic death for stealing Nikki and Paulo’s diamonds or what?

Question 4: Widmore!  Okay, that’s not really a question, but… Widmore!  He’s here!  He’s made his way to the Island!  What do you think’s going to happen?  Will he join up with Crazy Jack and His Island Boppers?  Why did Jacob want him to come to the Island, anyway?  And where are Penny and Desmond?!  For GOD’S SAKE — WHERE ARE PENNY AND DESMOND?!

Question 5: I can’t come up with a good question about Richard. Can YOU?

See you on Monday.

I’m not quite sure why I didn’t love this episode.  All the dramatic pieces were there, but for whatever reason they didn’t click together for me.  Anyway, due to that, and due to the fact that I didn’t see anything new, theme-wise, in this episode, this is probably going to be my only Lost-related post this week.

But look!  Questions!

Question 1: So, what’s the deal with Sayid’s accent?  Is he slipping into his Brit-tongue accidentally, or is there some story-related reason for it?  Or is he just angry about what the show is doing with his character?

Question 2: When Un-Locke asked Sayid, “What if I told you you could have anything you wanted?” was he talking about the Island, as in, “This Island is a mystery box that can give you whatever you want” –OR!!– was he referring to the alternate timeline, which he made or WILL MAKE later in the season?  After all, Sayid said he wanted Nadia, and in the alt-world, he got Nadia…

My favorite part of the episode was easily when Ben slooooowly backed away from Evil!Sayid.  Back away, Ben.  Back away.

Question 3: What do you think Ben’s role is going to be in all of this?  I’m personally still holding out for a redemptive death, but hopefully it won’t happen next week.  I need Ben with us until the very. last. episode.  For reals.

Question 4: Do you have any Lost-type questions you’d like me to overthink?  I’m stumped, people.

Last week’s episode of Lost was a Jack episode, so you know what that means: it’s Daddy issues time!  I don’t know about you, but I thought Lost had dropped this thread, never to pick it up again, sometime around when Locke and Sawyer strangled Locke’s dad with some rusty chains in the Black Rock.

“Lighthouse,” however, got me thinking that not only are the Daddy issues back at center stage now in season six, but that maybe they’ve been the main theme of the show all along.  The way I see it, Jack’s quest to resolve his relationship with his possibly-evil ghost dad—whether by reconciling with him or destroying him—will resolve his faith vs. science issues, his fate vs. free will issues, and his relationship with Jacob and the Man in Black.

[By popular demand, we're bringing you a Lost-oriented Open Thread this week.  And if it goes well, we'll bring you another one next Wednesday, too!  But don't worry—this isn't this week's only Lost post.  I'll still be subjecting "Lighthouse" to a level of scrutiny it probably doesn't deserve.  Come back Monday to see the full piece!]

So, here we are, four (or five, depending on who’s counting) episodes into Lost’s sixth season, and I’ve gotta tell you, I am loving it.  Although I disliked the flash sideways-es at the beginning, I think that had less to do with the narrative structure and more to do with the fact that Kate is just an uninteresting character. The events that occurred on the Island and in the flash Universe worked together to remind me of why I was so interested in the character of Jack back in seasons 1 and 2, before he started pining too much after Kate, before he got a tattoo in Thailand, before he stopped asking the important questions.  I’ll talk more about his flashsideways in my full post on Monday, but I was glad to see him get a full episode of character development before the season was up.

Question 1: The flash sideways-es: Awesome, or a waste of time?  Would you prefer a faster, more epic pace, or are you as cool as I am with these super-slow-burning character episodes?

"So, you and me are just gonna talk this whole episode? Uh, that's cool. I guess."

Speaking of Jack, it seems the the Daddy issues we thought the show forgot about are back and raring to go.

Question 2: Does this mean that Sayid, the only main living character who doesn’t have Daddy issues of his own, is doomed to die before the show’s climax?

And, speaking of Daddy issues, the unseen Christian Shephard haunted this episode.  (My bet is that we’re not going to see him again until the climax of the show — maybe the third-t0-last episode.)

Question 3: Takin’ all bets!  Christian Shephard: good or evil?  On the good side: Jack reminded us this week that he helped the Lostie’s out in the first season by leading them to the caves!  (Also his name is “Christian Shephard.”)  On the evil side: Back in the day, we saw him hanging out in the creepy cabin (which was probably being used by evil Smokey) with Infected/Evil Claire.

Speaking of Claire…

Question 4: Claire: What’s the deal?

The Othahs ate ha baybee!

And, finally, the big question:

Question 5: Now that the answers of Lost are coming out all fast and furious, do you WANT all the questions to be answered?  While I certainly want the big questions answered, I don’t want the show to lose its sense of mystery, either.  It’s like, if I were in a room with a poet, would I have him or her gloss every single word?  Then the poem would lose its spark.  Of course, I can easily understand the other point of view: “I invested so many hours in this thing.  I need to know that it all makes sense, that it holds together!”  (Also: is this debate just a meta-level recapitulation of the old “faith vs. science” debate we keep seeing in the show?  Am I like poor, deluded Locke, saying, “I looked into the eye of this network television series, and what I saw was beautiful”?  And if you, the rationalist answer-lovers, don’t get the answers you desire, will you take a telescope, Jack-style, and start smashing all the mirrors in Darlton’s houses?)

See you on Monday.

[Disclaimer: As you can see, I’ve titled this piece “Season 6 Episode 3” even though everyone else in the world is calling this “Episode 604.”  The reason for this is that I erroneously interpreted the season premiere as one episode when, apparently, it counts as two.  I hope you can enjoy this piece, regardless.]

Lost has always been a show about dichotomies, but maybe never more so than in this week’s episode, “The Substitute.”  In this episode alone we saw dramatized all of our favorite dualisms.  To wit:

• Light vs. dark: Symbolized by the rocks on the scales
• Things you can do vs. things you cannot: Embodied by Alterna-Locke and Un-Locke
• Being trapped vs. being free: Un-Locke again
• Acceptance vs. denial: Alterna-Locke and Alterna-Rose
• Realism (or nihilism, if you want to be dark) vs. faith in miracles

And, beyond that, of course, we have the whole “two timelines” thing going on, allowing us to see two versions of every character operate side-by-side.  So we see Evil Island-Ben looking into the grave of one of the many men he killed and Not-Evil-Evil-But-Still-Kind-of-a-Prick-European-History-Teacher Ben who wants to grab a cup of tea with Locke, his new buddy.  The Bad Luck Hurley of 2007 is now being contrasted with Good Luck Hurley, the easy-going multi-millionaire from 2004, and Rose, who once was the big lover of faith and hope, is now a grim realist.  In fact, we now have two versions of every character, except for Locke, who, being special, gets his very own trinity of selves: Dead Locke (who I like to think of as The Father), Alterna-Locke (who I like to think of as Dead Locke’s spiritual “son”), and Un-Locke (the Unholy Spirit).

Anyway, except in the case of the three Lockes, we’ve seen a lot dichotomies in the last few seasons of Lost, and now it’s coming out big time.

The main question that arises when we think about these dichotomies, of course, is, “Which side is going to win?”  Are the writers ultimately going to side with science or faith?  Fate or free will?  Jacob or the Man in Black?  The 2007 Universe or the 2004 Universe?  And so on.  These are all forms of the same kind of question.

But is that the right kind of question?  My theory for a while has been this: Lost’s writers have been tricking us all along.  They have been manipulating us–nearly forcing us–to look at the world they’ve created as a Manichean Universe, a big ol’ backgammon board with two sets of pieces and a decidedly “black and white” world view.  But this is all a ruse.  In the end, my bet is that Lost’s world isn’t Manichean at all.  It’s a gray, gray, gray, gray world.

Next month on Lost: Episode 6.3, or “What Kate Will Do”; Episode 6.4, or “What Kate Is Currently Doing”; and Episode 6.5, or “What Kate Would Have Done Had She Not Done What We Thought She Did.”  ‘Cause that’s what we need, Darlton.  More Kate episodes.

Sigh.  I don’t want to underthink this episode, but I need to get this out of my system before I do any true overthinking: This episode took away whatever little good will I had toward Kate’s character at the end of last season.  It wasn’t just the dumb crap she did that bothered me—although she did a lot of dumb crap.  For example, why is she going around L.A. telling random mechanics that she’s wanted for murder?  And then she goes into his bathroom, leaving him plenty of time to call the police?  And then she gets back into the same cab she carjacked—the one that clearly had its plates called in to the cops by the U.S. Marshal and the cab driver?  Dumb Kate.  Dumb.

Whatever.  It’s not Kate’s dumbness that bothers me.  That’s a character trait that the writers have developed in her for more than five seasons now.  At least she’s consistent.  Acting rash and stupid is What Kate Does.  (Get it?)

Recently, I was “flashing back,” if you will, to last summer, back when I first started watching Lost and writing this crazy column.  Back in June and July, I asked a lot of silly questions: Who are the Others? Can science and faith ever be reconciled? How is Lost’s season two like a game of Civilization IV?

I’m not going to answer any of those questions today.  No, today, the question I want to revisit is the question I asked at the tail end of Lost’s season one: What kind of show is this, anyway?

That question still hasn’t been sufficiently answered.  Back in June, I wondered if Lost was science-fiction, fantasy, or some other genre.  (The answer, it turns out, was “all of the above.”)  Now, in February, I’m wondering something else: Is Lost a “hero’s journey” or a Shakespearean tragedy?  Or is Lost’s narrative something else, entirely—something more interesting?  Something more…subversive?

The other night, I was watching the hilarious, soon-to-be-canceled sitcom “Better Off Ted” when ABC cut to commercial and told me something that made me raise my eyebrows and say “huh.”  Did you know that Lost was coming back to ABC on February 2nd, 2010 at 9 (8 central)?  Yes, it’s true.  I didn’t believe it, myself, at first.  Fortunately, ABC decided to repeat this information four more times before the “Ted” episode ended, just so I could be sure.

Okay, actually, I did know before Tuesday that Lost was coming back.  Shocking, I know.  True, I haven’t been foaming at the mouth over the premiere like some other people, but, you know what?  I’m excited.  Really excited.

Since I started watching Lost, people have been asking me, “Is it worth it?”  Well, let me put it this way: recently, I’ve started watching The Wire, and while it’s a very, very well-made show, it just doesn’t put a smile on my face the way Lost does.  When I think about Lost, I don’t think about the gaping plot holes and the silly plot twists or the still-stupid Jack-Kate-Sawyer love triangle.  I think about the warm, fuzzy feeling I get in my stomach when I think about Ben Linus doing something evil, or how I laughed with joy when Jacob said, “What about you?” in last season’s finale, or how I chuckle and shake my head every time Jack starts to cry and scream for no good reason.  I think about Hurley, a character who I claim would make every show better.  (Seriously, how much better would the new Battlestar Galactica have been Hurley were there to say, “Dudes, maybe we should, I dunno, like, chill out a little?”)  A few weeks ago I was sitting next to a Scottish guy in a restaurant, and it took all of my energy to stop smiling from giggly thoughts of Desmond Hume.

Anyway, to those who asked me long ago if Lost was worth watching: Yes.  Yes, it is,  if you can be nonchalant about the convoluted mythology, shrug off the never-ending fate vs. free-will arguments, overlook the increasingly annoying fact that none of the characters ever seem to communicate truthfully with each other.  Seriously, forget all of that.  This is simply the most fun, addictive show on television, and I will be very sorry when it ends.

The following post includes my predictions for Lost’s final season, made in part because frequent commenter dock asked me to, and in part because I’m a predictor by nature.  I’m not necessarily a good predictor, mind you, mostly because I tend to make predictions more based on what I think would make the most dramatically-pleasing story instead of what I actually think the writers will do.  For example, before the final Harry Potter book came out, I made various predictions primarily based on what I wanted to happen.  Some of these were right—Snape is good, the final battle will be at Hogwarts—and some, like my hope that the wizards and Muggles would finally ally to take down Voldemort, were, sadly, wrong.  I don’t have the actual statistics on me, but I believe my guesses were about 7-10% accurate.  (The ego-protection center of my brain assures me that this is because J.K. Rowling wasn’t as clever as my predictions were.)

So that’s how I came up with my predictions for the final season of Lost.  I sat down (yes, literally, I did this) and came up with various things that could happen in the show, and then I listed the pros and cons, from a dramatic perspective, of each plot occurrence.

Here are my predictions.