Lost with LOST: What's the Diagnosis Dr. Linus?

LOST's 6th iteration has overall left me a bit confused and wanting. It's not that I haven't spent years waiting for answers that never come and rather seem to bring more questions. And it's not like I expected all my questions to be answered so quickly in LOST's final season. But I was waiting for the writers to, in the words of another Doctor, Dr. Evil, "throw me a freakin' bone, here." Last night's episode started to do just that but left me equally as frustrated as when it began. That being said, I think it finally set the stages for the battle that we've all been waiting for and provided us with a much better episode than last week's "Sundown"--while answering some of LOST's questions.

Where Are We?

This one wasn't answered in the sense of how Charlie asked it in Season 1. But we're starting to get a sense, as we look around, that we are about where we're supposed to be. I refer you back to the pre-season 6 Last Supper photo. Click on it and make it large. Who is on the left side? Sawyer, Kate, Sayid and Claire. The right side? Jack, Ben, Hurley, Miles, Sun, and Lapides. Locke or FLocke is in the middle of it all. The only people seemingly on the "wrong" side right now are Ilana/Richard and Jin. And we saw glimpses this episode of why they could be switching sides.

But in another sense, we can answer the question above by saying that we're back at the beach*. This is where it all began, where they all returned to when things went wrong, and where all the bodies are buried. We saw the shelter they made, the graves they left, the diamonds they were buried with, the porno mags that Sawyer stole, and little glimpses of the life they made on The Island. We also saw, at the end, a familiar scene, with people returning to the beach and being greeted warmly by old friends. Reunions, though, are always short-lived on LOST as Charles Widmore and his submarine are lurking in the distance (more on this later).

*Side Note: And like in the movie Orange County, there are books left at the beach which we think give us answers. I haven't read one book in the LOST world and I'm not about to start now. But I know there are people who read every book referenced. So please let me know what the books found on the beach mean to the greater ideas of LOST.

But the last answer to the question has to address the Sideways World. And, in that sense, I have no clue where we are. We're in a world where Ben Linus is a school teacher, Alex is his student, Leslie Artz is his colleague, and Ben and his father have a good relationship. Moreso, we find out that The Island did exist, that they did go there, but that they left and regretted it. The regret they expressed sounded like the regret a frantic Jack expressed about long-ago nostalgia for this Island.

The problem is that this confused me even more about what the heck this Sideways World actually is. I thought it was a divergence from 1977 when the bomb went off: one was the Island sank, the other the Island transported everyone to the present and nothing happened. But if the Island sank in 1977, Ben and his father would have had to go down with them, right? They didn't evacuate per Marvin Candle's orders, right? I get the overall idea that the Sideways World is the look at these people's lives if they never ended up on The Island, but I don't get exactly what happened to The Island and when...

...but I think we got a hint. I saw the little wink to this in Lapides and Ben's conversation. Lapides said that he was supposed to be the pilot on Oceanic 815 and said he wondered how his life would change. Ben pointed out that he ended up on the Island anyways so really, how different could it be. But I think the Sideways World proves that it would have been different. In the Island World, everyone who is supposed to come to The Island eventually finds a way (Jacob told Hurley this much in "Lighthouse"), but it seems that something occurred in the Sideways World to turn off this magnetism in life. And the truth is, that for some people, it's OK. Roger Linus laments leaving The Island but Ben in Sideways World seems to make the right choice about Alex here and saves her from being "torched" as she was in the Island World storyline. Actually, if you look at all the characters right now, their lives were better having never set foot upon The Island. Let's see if that trend continues, though.

"The Black Rock Is Where I Like To Go"

The band O.A.R. has a song called "Black Rock". It's about a special place that people can go to feel at home when they need to get away. Here are the lyrics. Now think about the times that people have come to The Black Rock in LOST. The Losties when they were looking for dynamite to blow a hole into the hatch and find answers/safety, Locke and Sawyer to find solace in their world by killing the one man who caused them their lives pain, and now Richard Alpert who literally went back to where he came from and tried to find a way to get away.

We finally got the answer that most of us expected: Richard was brought to The Island on the Black Rock and Jacob gave him this eternal youthfulness and the inability to kill himself (and he was a slave on that ship--making FLocke's statement "nice to see you out of those chains" make a bit more sense). He's not the only one--Michael tried a few times and failed and even Jack climbed up on a bridge and tried to jump--but he's the first one to ask someone else to do it for him. I'm beginning to wonder if these deals were not always made with Jacob, but more of "deals with the devil". Remember, when Michael can finally die, Christian Shephard (and not Jacob) is the one to deliver him the message and I'm still under the impression that the Man In Black was pulling a Silence of the Lambs and walking around in Chirstian's body suit.

The other thing we found there is that Jack is fully invested in this whole Island thing. I guess that smashing of the mirrors got the anger out of his system. He's "special" and he knows it. It was a bit tense watching that dynamite continue to smolder and I wanted to run with Hurley out of the room. The fact it didn't blow up isn't surprising to me and the fact that this was done isn't surprising to me--it's just that it was done by Jack. Remember, this is the exact same thing that Locke tried to do with the Hatch at the end of Season 2. Unfortunately for Locke, the whole thing blew up. This time, not so much.

I'm getting the sense that Jack is going to have to commit an ultimate leap of faith to save his friends and The Island. I believe he's going to have to resurrect someone from the dead. I think he's going to have to totally suspend his "Man of Science" M.O. and bring the dead man to the Temple and dip him in that water (complete with the two floating corpses). But I'm not sure, yet, if it's going to be his dad, Jacob or John Locke...or maybe someone else.

You Shall Not Commit Adultery

Smack in the middle of reading Doc Jensen last week post-writing my column, I had a lightbulb go off in my head: we're reading the friggin' 10 Commandments. Don't believe me? Let's work backwards*. This was the seventh episode (if you count "LA X" as two separate ones which it is) and was about adultery, like the seventh commandment written above. Last week was about murder and the sixth commandment is, well, about murder. The week before was about Jack's relationship with his son and honoring his dead father in that relationship and the fifth commandment is "honor thy mother and father".  Episode four was about burying Locke and his funeral (his eternal rest) and the fourth commandment tells us to honor that day of rest. The third episode revealed that Sawyer was going to propose to Juliet (an oath) and the third commandment forbids false oaths. The second episode was all about FLocke and the second commandment prohibits false idols (yup). And the first episode was about this world away from The Island and about Jacob's power and the first commandment recognizes that the Lord brought us out of Egypt and that he is the #1 God.

*Side Note: The 8th commandment is "don't steal" (thank you, Hebrew School!). So I'm guessing it's a Sawyer episode. Interestingly enough, Wikipedia writes "According to the Talmud, this commandment refers to kidnapping and not to theft of material property, as theft of property is forbidden elsewhere, and it is not a capital offense. In this context it is to be taken as 'do not kidnap.'" Hmmm...

So where did adultery come in this episode? When Sideways World Dr. Linus tried to blackmail the principal for his infidelity. Which reminded us that Island World Ben Linus once got Charles Widmore kicked off The Island for breaking the rules by having a kid with a woman off The Island. Which was even more apparent when Widmore showed up at the end of the episode. Remember, when Ben visited Widmore to let him know he'd be avenging Alex's death, the two talked about how, unfortunately, they couldn't kill each other. Sounded a lot like MIB and Jacob. Hmmm....

Quick Hits

I'm really not all that enamored with the cutesiness of the Sideways World. Doc Artz wasn't a great character on The Island and he's still not a great character. He could have been left blown up. I'm worried that the need to get everyone back in Season 6 will not be because of necessity for Island survival but because they want to show that everyone would have intersected in their lives anyways. I get that, already. Less Doc Artz and more Doc Shephard!

I actually liked the Ben's Island storyline especially his breakdown with Ilana in the woods. But this was a man who was willing to be judged by The Island and die for Alex's sins last season, why are we reverting back to a different Ben who needs to make the same revelations now? And, really, no one else notices the Smokey noise but Ben when he visits or that Ben is talking to someone in the woods when he should be digging his own grave. And was FLocke telling the truth? And if he was, who is now his second choice? And little Napoleon studying Napoleon in his History class was pretty apropos.

I always love Lapides and this episode was no different. I loved Miles' part in this episode (and really the whole season). It's minor but it fits well and he's funny and fits into his character. I can't stand Sun, though. Shut up already. I hope Jin comes blazing out the forest and puts a few bullets into your thick head. Everyone is worried about your stupid husband, too, but they don't go bitching and moaning about it every damn episode. Talk about a static character. I do wonder, however, whether the "Kwon" candidate is neither Jin or Sun but their young daughter? Hmmm....

Conclusion

Remember the three ways that the men converged in the forest wanted to take to the Temple? So far in LOST we've taken Hurley's route to the Temple which is out of the way, hesitating and slow. We've also taken Richard's route which is seemingly shorter and correct but leads us to the wrong place. I'm all for patience and answers coming in the end, but I'm ready to take Jack's route--the direct route to the answers. Answering questions we sort of already know (or reaffirmation--the same thing Jack has seemed to have gone through) is not answering questions. Telling us a bit about the Sideways World is not telling us what it is (the beginning to Season 4 was equally frustrating in this way when we learned there were some who got off The Island but didn't know what happened to everyone else they were referring to). I've done my deep dive into LOST's long con and I'm ready for answers. Then again, I'm loving every minute of this ride (the more I wrote this blog post, the more I realized I liked last night's episode) so I'm not ready for it to end. Last night's episodes, while not one of the best ever, was one of the better ones of the season and think finally puts us back on that straight path to the Temple where we wanted to be all along. Let's hope, with more than a third done, we're finally there.

Questions? Comments? Theories? Love this episode? Hate it? Let us know in the comments below! And your homework for this week? Bob Dylan's album "Oh Mercy" which I really get the hint that it may be important and whose song titles are very LOST-y: "Political World", "Where Teardrops Fall", "Everything Is Broken", "Ring Them Bells", "Man in the Long Black Coat", "Most of the Time", "What Good Am I?", "Disease of Conceit", "What Was It You Wanted", and "Shooting Star" (maybe like "catch a falling star and put it in your pocket"????)


Picture from the New York Times