Lostwatch: ...and That, My Friends, Is What You Call a Game-Changer

Last night was fantastic.

My only complaint was there was a little too much Jack. I have never found him so annoying as he was in the flashbacks.

Just a superb finale.

At first I would think the "he" that Kate has to get back to is Sawyer, but the urgency of having to get back to someone might indicate that there's either a strange psycho-sexual connection or the person is infirm... which could mean just about anyone, even Ben or Locke, I suppose.

But I think that Locke is still on the island, having walked off into the sunset when the helicopters came. It has taken Jack a long time to realize the error of his ways... very compelling that Jack, man of reason, might have to face the fact that Locke might be his redeemer (or at least a prophet).

Hurley with the microbus was cooler than Batman in the batmobile.

More later, but cool note - remember all of us asking why Hurley didn't drive the minibus down to the beach?

Now we know...

This was the best finale ever. I keep giving opportunities to the show week after week and at the end it ALWAYS pays off.
Please do not forget Ben: he might be the most intriguing, dark, and fascinating character in the island. And hopefuly out of it too, living with Kate and torturing Jack, again.

RAZZLE DAZZLE!!! Wow, what a season finale! Ben getting the ever loving crap beat out of him and Hurley in the bus were both worth the whole two hours. Now, some questions or comments.

Is Christian alive or was it just the booze and pills talking?

Why did Charlie lock himself inside? The hatch could have been closed from the outside too and both be saved. Was it to fulfill Desmond's vision and make sure that the plan worked?

Could the "he" that Kate has to get back to be a toddler? Hmmmmmm?

Can we safely assume that Juliet has switched sides?

The voice over the phone said they could get a fix on their location. I wouldn't be surprised if the voice says, "well that is strange, we can't get a fix" in the first couple of minutes of the new season.

When Penny asked Charlie how he knew the frequency, I wondered how Penny herself knew the frequency? It was obviously a Dharma frequency.

More as I think of it. My mind is still trying to absorb the whole episode.

@Keith:

1. Come to think of it, both Penny and the man on the ship said more or less the same thing--how did you get this frequency? Which must be significant tho I have no idea how.

2. We could assume that the hatch could only lock from the inside, so that Charlie had no real chance to save himself. Or we could assume that he physically could have got out, but chose to die, to fulfill Desmond's prophecy, ensure Desmond's escape or both. Given the religious themes of the show (not to get too pretentious) the latter is the more Christlike choice for Charlie (who died making the sign of the cross). He wishes that this cup could pass from him, but when he sees there is no chance, he sacrifices himself, although not without human regret.

I wish I could share your general excitement over the season finale. I loved many of the moments they prepared for us (several of which you mentioned already - taking out the Others, the return of Locke, the beat-down on Ben, etc.), but I can't help but feel reservations about the "flash-forward" sequences and what they may foretell about the continuation of the show. If they are just that, "flashes forward", so that most of the action remains on the Island and we see possible future events in flash sequences - that is an interesting twist. But for me, the Island is the biggest character on Lost and taking the show away from the bizarre, other-worldly locale of the Island and relocating it to the mundane, tedious real world would change the show from quirky and original drama, to soap opera.

I also couldn't help but fume at the death of Charlie. I realize that it was probably necessary for many reasons (though I wish it weren't true, I liked Charlie), but the manner of his death left me irked. Usually, the Lost writers are good at creating situations that seem fated and leave no other choices for the characters. I saw no reason for Charlie to close himself INSIDE the radio room to drown when he could have just as easily gone OUT of the room and escaped with Desmond through the moon pool. I don't think of Charlie as stupid, and the solution was so obvious - it didn't have to happen, he had an alternative. Heck, even the porthole looked big enough for the hobbit-sized Charlie to swim through. Did Charlie just choose to die? I know they were going for "noble", but what I got out of it was "unnecessary".

Finally, there is the 8 month hiatus. It just seems very long after a season that was only half satisfying. But then, I guess they have their full contract now, so they don't really need to worry about alienating their audience.

I believe that the Lost creators can keep us intrigued and entertained once the show comes back, I just hope everyone is as interested as Jack in "getting back to the Island".

I guess we'll have to wait and see.

Kudos to Rose in this episode. "If I help you make the S.O.S. sign, will that stop you?", "Say it again - I'm a dentist, not Rambo", "Jack, if you say 'live together, die alone' I'm going to punch you in the face". Loved it.

My single caveat, and it's a small one: How can Jin be a good enough shot to shoot two guys in the chest while being fired upon, in the dark, but can't hit an aimed shot at a pile of dynamite on the ground?

I may be the only one (am I?) that was sad to see Tom get shot. I really liked him, he was maybe my favorite Other. What's up with new cold-blooded Sawyer?

As soon as Mikhail had the harpoon in him I thought 'cut off his head, incinerate him, something' because I knew we'd see that blood trail sliding into the water.

Also, two hot chicks all locked up in an underwater station for who knows how long = HOT! What, just me?

In closing, I want to thank all of you for a wonderful season of commenting. I look forward to the episode each week, but as soon as it's over, I look forward to the discussion in the comments. It's all of this speculation and theorizing that really makes me love the show.

Well, that was certainly different. Although it was somewhat predicted, given how heavily the "Answers" recap show of last week/last night focused on "how have the experiences on the island changed them when/if they do get rescued".

1) This was planned out well in advance. The Lost Experience websites had events (Hanso taking control of the company back from Mittelwerk, the construction of the Quarantine ship) that happened on very specific dates (sometime in 2006, I think). At the time, that made no sense; even now, island time is still in 2004 (I think the finale took place on Christmas Eve?). If these events weren't going to happen for two years, the only conclusion you could get was that the show was going to air for twenty years - or, now, they were planning for a time jump.

2) The jump to "the future" really was necessary. Simply put, there isn't much of their backstories that we don't know. And even with new backstory characters (Ben, Juliet) the only way they dragged out the format for this long was with things like the tattoo episode. Note that anything in island past is still in future past, so they can still stage things pre-crash if needed (and I have a hard time seeing how they would relate the Richard info otherwise).

3) We don't know how many got off the island. Personally, I think it was more than just Jack and Kate. Jack does mention the "Golden Tickets we got" - why would Kate get one, when, you know, her 815 ticket was paid for by the Justice Department (apparently, Dharma made the murder charge go away (or kept as blackmail) as part of their agreement to let them off the island). I think we'll find out quite a few of the Losties got off, but they will intentionally not say whether the rest have died or were left on the island to keep us guessing.

4) And where does the show go from here? Does Fox finally start earning his drastically-higher-than-the-rest-of-the-cast salary and the show becomes The DaHarma Code, as Jack travels around the world, forming his A-Team (Hurley's money, Sayid's "negotiating" skills, etc.), going through the (already established in the Lost Experience, more future preparation) various branches of Dharma, meeting the Lost Experience cast members, trying to find the location of the island, while the flashbacks handle the even rougher time the Losties are about to have?

5) Everyone does realize they aren't getting rescued any time soon, right? That was the whole point of Ben's "the boy who cried wolf" hell he was going through last night - no one believes his truthful statement that Dharma is about to show up and try to kill everyone, and the Losties just killed his best fighters, meaning he'll take even more losses. Instead, we're introduced to another part of the ruins, The Temple, as more foreshadowing that they will be hiding out from Dharma. Clearly they aren't going there for modern religious reasons, as no one on any side has thought about Passover/Christmas/etc., even though it's something like Christmas eve - next time you get socks for a present, remember its better than what the Losties get, Dharma trying to kill them.

6) As far as how they get off? I have to think that Lost will always go back to the beginning - The Numbers, and how they relate to the Valenzetti Equation (which predicts when the human race will end). Somehow, Jack and Co. will hold an important piece of Dharma tech hostage, and Dharma will agree to let them go, if they say they've been stranded on an island and mention nothing of Dharma, i.e., Jack's Lie. Something tells me only Jack will have the medical knowledge to understand the plans for the superplague Dharma is working on, but won't share it with the rest of the Losties, hence his despair this episode - instead of manning up and trying to stop Dharma's plans back then, he's throwing away the days the majority of mankind has left until the plague hits.

7) Christian being alive is a giant question mark. Then again, did we actually see him die? Dharma faking his death to get Jack on 815 seems preposterous, but what other answer is there?
I guess was can officially declare Naomi's located 815 story bogus - how would Dharma let them off the island, to their old lives, if their "bodies" had already been found?

9) The funeral - I think showing the black thugs was intentional. I have to think that they are preparing in the case that Michael does not come back to the show, that he escaped from the island, assumed a new identity, and then never tried to get the rest rescued. If Perrineau does come back, then they just make the corpse some other Lostie that betrayed them to Dharma.

I'm swamped with work, but I do want to post something, and will get around to it soon.

But echoing Justin - I LOVE talking about this show with all of you (even if my "Charlie is evil" theory could not have been proven more wrong by the show, where "Charlie as self-sacrificing messiah" is maybe more realistic). And James, I hope you try to continue some type of Lost discussion over the next 8 or 9 months (geez, really? That long?)

A few questions (which we could use as weekly discussion topics, perhaps):
- The temple? What is it?
- Alex/Rousseau/Ben - is Ben still Alex's father? Or did he merely take her from Rousseau? If the former, that means he and Rousseau were intimate/together at one point (which is kinda creepy and gross)...I think we'll be seeing a heavy dose of Rousseau backstory soon (what research team was she a part of? How did they die? At the hands of the Others?)
- Locke - where did he go after refusing to shoot Jack? To the temple? And whither Jacob? Was Walt actually Jacob? Seems like the island has a way of making missing/dead people appear or creating startling visions, and normally to force people to deal with their past issues (Kate and the horse, Jack and his dad, Ben and his mom, Boone and dead Shannon, Shannon and wet Walt, Locke and dead Boone, Eko and Yemi) and subsequently frequently leads to death (RIP Shannon, Boone, and Eko, and Charlie if you count his weird dreams regarding Aaron/baptism)
- Flash forwards v. flashbacks: is the show permanently shifting to flash forwards? Is that really the future? Has Lost gone the way of "The Nine", where the flashforwards will show us life after the island while we learn what happened on the island? And is Jack's future fate set in stone, or one alternative future depending on the choices the Losties make?

(Come to think of it, that last one plays very well into the Lost philosophical debates: faith v. reason/science. Predestination (all is fated) vs. free will (our choices determine the future). Lost would seem to suggest a hybrid via the Desmond visions of Charlie's death storyline - all the paths possible for our future are mapped out, but we make the choices that determine which pre-mapped path occurs. This mean's Jack's despairing future is one path (one he seems to now be on) of many, and he can perhaps avoid that fate)

- Coffin: who is it? Was it me or was it small? Why was no one there?
- Future Kate: who is she with? How is she free (isn't she wanted for murder)?
- Penelope: why was she sitting there "waiting" for the transmission?
- Desmond: has he now lost his precognitive abilities? What does he do with the knowledge he received as Charlie dies?
- Charlie - speaking of the tragically lost one-hit wonder, what did his dream regarding baptizing Aaron mean? Did he (in a Christ-like way) die to absolve Aaron and the other Losties of the "sin" of the Island (i.e. offer salvation)? And wasn't this past episode the highlight of his arc? I loved him mouthing off to the two women - he knew that he would flood the hatch, and willing to tell them everything since he knew it would happen.

Wow...lots to talk about (and even more that what I already said, no doubt).....where to begin?

@Chaddogg: You want me to write a note to your boss? Really, you need a day off for this.

Like the idea of the off-season Lost seminar. That could work.

Please, no notes to my boss. My fault (I should plan vacation days for things like this).

Think - once a week, discuss a different unanswered Lost question, and only that question. We could rotate around selection of the question to discuss, or submit questions to James and he could select ones (offering his preliminary thoughts as a way to get discussion rolling).

Early season mysteries (i.e. Adam and Eve, the black and white rocks, "Guys...where are we?") should also be included.

I'm going back and re-watching a lot of the episodes from the first two seasons and there are so many small details that, while not really unresolved, are still without resolution. It's as if the writers have built up a pantry full of non-perishable story-macaroni that they can use to cook up new stories over the next three years for us to feast on.

I'd be all for a weekly (or every other week) discussion on these unresolved issues. If the 'Charlie is evil' discussion taught us anything we should think about how many awesome scenarios we could convince ourselves of before the reality is divulged!

More questions to consider:
- What will be the ultimate outcome of the continuing weariness The Others are showing toward Ben and his honesty/leadership?
- How do Sun's and Penny's father's companies factor into the island/Dharma?
- What's going to happen with the Juliet/Jack/Kate/Sawyer love parallelogram?
- was Naomi lying about the plane crash being found?
- if Naomi is not with Penny's company, why did she have the photo of Desmond?
- if I remember correctly, the producers said the woman from the ring store in Desmond's flashback would play prominently in upcoming seasons, how?

Also, let me add the awesomely sarcastic conversation between Juliet and Sawyer to my favorite Lost moments. "You nail Jack yet?", "No, have you?"

BTW, I seem, at my office anyway, to be alone in my remorse over Tom's death. My co-workers are calling it Stockholm Syndrome, but I don't buy it.

@Chaddog - YES, I thought the coffin was small too.

Chaddogg,

Rousseau came to the island preggers, so Ben couldn't be Alex's dad.

Is it inconceivable that Ben was in the coffin and that Jack was upset about it? Perhaps Ben is "good" after all, and, like Jack, wants only to do what's "right". If the anticipated rescue party turns out to have murderous intentions, Jack and Ben may fight together to save everyone.

Questions:

How is it that Jack has managed to maintain a cool stubble on the island for three months yet transforms into Wolfman Jack because of OxyContin?

Continuity: The continued operation of the Looking Glass hatch and its jamming communications off the island is apparently a recent event. Cyclops thought that the two women were in Canada, and he only recently lost contact with the outside world around the time the hatch blew up. But Rousseau's transmission has been jammed for 16 years. So how has Ben been simultaneously been able to contact the outside world and jam communication off the island?

Ben is afraid of Alex getting preganant because she will die. Or is it because he's pro-life?

Ah yes, Jack's beard. Was that the worst piece of makeup you've ever seen?

Mikhail thinking the two hotties were on assignment in Canada kind of answers someone's question in the last few weeks about whether Others besides Richard can leave the island. It would seem so.

I'm thinking there's no alternate universe storyline. And I don't think everybody got off the island. Her's my theory. After Jack placed the call, the barge likely sent the helicopter to the island to pick everyone up. My guess, the new bad guys (whoever they are) could only take 3 or 4 people to the barge at one time, which was likely Kate, Jack, Claire + baby & one other.

After being flown to the barge, they were told nobody else was being picked up (for whatever sinister reason), and were then sent back to the U.S. with orders that if they tell anybody about any of this, their friends would be killed. Jack, after 2-3 years back in the States, is still haunted by all this & wants to go back to the island to get them.

My guess is that season 4 alternates between a) what happened over the past 2-3 years on the island, and b) Jack & Kate trying to get back there - presend day - to save their stranded friends (likely with the help of Penelope). Then, towards the end of season 4, Jack & Kate make it back on to the island, and need to find a new way to get everyone off it.

Anyone’s thoughts on this? It does seem to be a really plausibly theory, and one that doesn’t have to involve parallel universes, etc. Plus, it keeps the dramatic tension alive. Jack is fuelled by saving people, not by the island's powers. Which means the only reason he’d want to go back there would be if there were people who still needed to be saved.

The more I think about this episode, the more I realize what THE three big questions are after that awesome finale:

1) Is that the "set in stone" future for Jack, to be haunted and broken by what happened on the island/getting off the island?

2) If so, what leads Jack to this desperate, hopeless state? And can he recover going forward(either by making peace with his actions, or returning to the island, etc.)?

3) If not (i.e. the future we saw is not the true, unchangeable "future"), how can Jack avoid that state?

These questions all wrap into the big question of next season - is the show as we have been experiencing it (i.e. life on the island) all a flashback regarding what "ruined" Jack? If so, it seems depressing: we're sticking around to see what ruined a (at one time) noble man. There has to be redemption, in my opinion - either retrospectively (i.e. the future we saw is not necessarily true, and can be avoided) or prospectively (future/present Jack can redeem himself by returning to the island and righting a wrong, or righting a wrong without returning to the island).

David, your theory makes the best sense out of any that I've heard so far. If it's the case, it means that the sense of urgency in the storyline would be maintained, and that there is still a mystery, not just a post-rescue psychological drama.

I still get chills when I see Sarah in a Jack flashback (or a Jack flashforward. I keep on thinking that she's up to something (maybe with the others?) and I'm shocked that they didn't reveal anything about her last night.

This is a good train of thought we've got going. Here's what I've been thinking:

How crazy will it be if, after spending two seasons fearing and hating The Others the 815ers are suddenly forced to team up with their once-nemeses and fight this new danger? That's a pretty classic storyline.

Concerning Future Jack and his crippling guilt, wouldn't it make sense that he blames himself for the repercussions of making that call? Theoretically, the next three seasons could reveal Jack answering that phone as the snowflake that starts rolling down the hill. While Jack, Kate and maybe a few others end up making it off the island, many of the other people may die. As a 'fixer' this would haunt Jack forever. Add to that the fact that Locke was right and Jack didn't listen to him—and probably many others—and you've got the makings for quite the guilt-laden drug addiction.

Just a thought, but Jack must have said about a thousand times last night, "I'm going to get _all of my people_ off this island!" or something to that effect. Which to me pretty much screams that he must not have gotten _all of his people_ off the island. So I'm with David as far as that goes.

Speaking of Sarah, and other flashback/forward characters who may or may not be up to something... I miss Libby.

James,

So that means you believe that what we saw really was the future (is the present)? Jack ends up despondent and suicidal?

I'm just not sure I'm prepared to go there yet. It seems like an extremely dark direction for the show - your hero (assuming Jack is one) has his character/self destroyed by the "rescuing" of "his people." Not quite fitting with the general redemption filled themes of Lost.

Then again, he is Jack Shepard/Shepherd/Moses, and as I recall, Moses did not enter the "Promised Land" with the people he led....so why should Jack find happiness/salvation by getting his people rescued?

(I'm still thinking that what we saw was a version of the future - a dark one at that. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if the flashforwards are revealed in the first moments of episode one of season 4 to be Desmond's vision, immediately after reading Charlie's note thru the glass. With Charlie now dead, Desmond has to help the Losties/Jack avoid this dark potential future, and find a future where their salvation is more heroic/happy; similar to how Desmond could not stop Charlie from dying, but could help him achieve dignity and meaning in death, so too is rescue inevitable, but Desmond must help guide the rescue down a path that has meaning and leads to happiness.)

So - was that future/present we saw last night real? Or not yet real (but potentially will be)? There's the question for discussion...

@chaddogg: Well, I think Lost can be hella dark when it wants to. The most beloved, jolly character on the show, Hurley, meets a nice girl and falls in love. And then she gets shot. And then she seems to get better. And then she dies! Why am I thinking so much about Libby today?

Also, it's a repeated pattern on Lost that a character--usually Jack or Locke--acts out of bravery and deep belief and in the perceived best interests of everyone around him, and then turns out to be totally wrong. So there's that.

But look, I have no idea exactly where the show structure goes from here. 24 hours ago, I didn't think we'd see any of the characters off the island until 2010, so what do I know? But until the season starts, I'm inclined to go with Occam's Razor and say that the simplest answer--that Jack actually screwed up and actually regrets it--is the simplest. Fits the flash-forward parallel story: Jack thinks he saved the crash victims; turns out he caused the crash.

That, and I just don't forsee every flash-forward turning into a Desmondian alternate-possible-reality. The Desmond flashback that introduced his premonitions was enough of a brain twister--would they make every episode like that? Lost doesn't mind being difficult, but that seems to be too much.

I guess it's possible that the flash-forward in "Through the Looking Glass" is a one-off; one alternate vision that will be revealed as such in season 4. But if so, then it's not really the promised game-changer--because Desmond's visions were already part of the "game"--and wouldn't that seem like kind of a cheat?

James: good points, all. Clearly if this is a "game changer" then the game must change - rather than having the mystery of Lost be about what will happen next (plot twists in the future) the show is now about what happened in the past (plot twists in the past that got us to the bleak-for-Jack future).

Unless, of course, we haven't flashed ALL the way into the future, which is what I take David's theory is. In other words, Jack is despondent because some of "his people" were left behind, Kate is bothered by it but has made peace with her guilt (or has been forced to by the man she must return home to), but that is not the end of the story - Jack and the others who "escaped" the island must return to make things whole or complete or right, and the next 3 seasons explore both what happened (i.e. Jack/Kate/anyone else getting off the island) and Jack's attempt at recovering or redeeming himself for that fallout (i.e. the return to the island, etc.)

@chaddogg: Oh, yeah--if the actual future is that Jack is despairing and desperate to get back to the island and fix things, then I assume the story goes forward in time from there. I didn't mean I thought that was the endpoint of the timeline and then we spend three years watching Jack get destroyed. Thought I'd probably watch that too. Maybe at some point there's a BSG-like jump into the future. Maybe each flash-forward flashes a little farther forward into the future. At this point, who knows?

In general I am guessing that the mystery is (where last night's flashback's point-in-time is X) both "How did they get to X?" and "Where do they go after X"? We have to find out how the rescue went "wrong." We have to figure out what happened in the interim. And we have to find out how it gets fixed. Lindelof said the finale would show us there are many more rooms in the house. That's quite an extension right there.

Regardless, right now I'm just assuming the simplest explanation, which is Lost is historically not the right one, so YMMandprobablywillV.